Fear and Lathering on the Campaign Trail

(By American Zen's Mike Flannigan, on loan from Ari Goldstein)

"#JebBush has to like the Mexican illegals because of his wife." - Donald Trump in a now-deleted tweet
“I don’t think he represents the Republican Party, and his views are way out of the mainstream of what most Republicans think.” - Jeb! Bush

     Unfortunately, Jeb! is wrong. And he knows it.
     Immediately after overrated birthday party clown Donald Trump came out swinging against Mexican immigrants and Mexican Americans, calling them "rapists", his poll numbers began skyrocketing. It seems the more companies that give Trump his own medicine and fire his umber bum, the more popular he gets. That goes to show you the current state of the Republican Party and, frankly, I am amazed there are any Latinos who still identify and vote as Republicans.
     And, as Rachel Maddow pointed out last year, hypocrisy is the one crime in politics for which there is no comeuppance and Trunp is living personification of that Golden Rule. So it doesn't matter to Republican voters that after inveighing against the Chinese and the Mexicans taking our jobs that it was quickly revealed his clothing line is made in those very same countries.
     He plainly loathes anyone who isn't white or orange or rich in his orange creamsicle world and, by God, that's good enough for them.
     Therefore, since he'd placed himself in a tie for second with professional token Ben Carson in the Iowa straw poll, CNN feels it incumbent to take Hair Force One seriously and to give him 24/7 coverage on their endless cycle as he bobs and double weaves his way down the campaign trail sourly calling for boycotts of Macy's and whoever else has fired him. It also doesn't matter to the not-so-smart set who continue defending the confederate rag that Trump has in short order been shit canned by virtually every company he doesn't own.
     So why do we have to take this Bozo seriously?

The Only Man Who Can Give Bill O'Reilly Gravitas

     In his interview with Bill O'Reilly last month, Trump came off sounding like the drunk in a bar at last call challenging anyone to a fight. To give you a taste of the Pirandelloesque Theater of the Absurd feel of the interview, here's a choice snippet from Trump about ISIS:

“I say that you can defeat ISIS by taking their wealth. Take back the oil. Once you go over and take back that oil they have nothing. You bomb the hell out of them and then you encircle it, and then you go in. And you let Mobil go in, and you let our great oil companies go in. Once you take that oil they have nothing left.”

     One has to give O'Reilly props for not bursting out loud in laughter during the interview and asking the Donald whose birthday party he'd be doing next.
     The reason why the Republican establishment is alternately supporting Trump and giving him one free pass after another is because they know to go after him is to dismantle one of their load-bearing planks: Immigration. They know he represents their positions and, like politicians the world over, get the dry heaves at the thought of running afoul of a sizable voting block like the NASCAR BBQ Ford truck set.
     So, yes, people. We have to take this clown seriously, just as Chicago police had to finally take Pogo seriously. And we have to take him seriously because others take him seriously. CNN takes him seriously. Every network and virtually every newspaper has to take him seriously because he represents one of the Republican Party's hood ornament issues: Immigration.
     And the only reason why a precious few Republicans are publicly criticizing him is because Trump's not doubling weaving his positions like he does his hair. He's not cloaking his racism with blather about "state's rights."
     He's bringing the rest of the Dylann Roof wing of the GOP kicking and screaming into the disinfecting sunlight and forcing the rest of the country to confront what they truly stand for.
     And against.