There was no surprise last night when Trump won 98 of 99 counties in Iowa. That result was carved by the proverbial winds of populism for years already.
Trump’s popularity is the result of decades of rhetoric that has taken attention away from the real threats in American lives and turned it toward made up bogeymen in order for the rich and powerful to continue raiding our pockets.
That’s not hyperbole. It has been a well orchestrated indoctrination that is in its second generation. It is now so embedded that even the engineers of this fraud believe their own….bullshit.
This right wing movement has used a surge of hopeful immigrants as a threat of “invasion” and drummed the message that they are thieves and murderers taking our jobs and bleeding our welfare.
They aren’t.
This movement has convinced Americans that trans youth, gay marriage, and gender dysmorphia are causing moral decay, which in turn, lead to crime, even murder in our schools.
They aren’t.
This movement has convinced hard working people that unions are to blame for the high prices that reduce production and stagnate their wages.
They aren’t.
This movement has convinced people that freer avenues of wealth streaming to the top earners are the key to prosperity.
They aren’t. (Except for those at the top)
This movement has proffered that science and education are threats to Christian ideals and must be tailored to fit their faith.
This movement lost sight of what American democracy truly means and has instilled into tens of millions that a patriarchal, even fascist, society is a truer realization of their patriotism.
They have determined that representation for the Common Good is “socialism.”
All of the threats to American life; low wages, prosperity, safety, lack of ethics, were the result of supply-side economic worship, guided by plutocratic control that panders to the power of wealth. It has been a systemic brainwashing over decades to demonize that “common good” and the progressive principles of equity, fairness and equal justice that support it.
And an immoral, narcissistic, ego-centric, silver spoon, draft- dodging, faux-Christian, billionaire, becomes the archetypal hero of the right wing.
The result in Iowa should come as no surprise. Whether or not America can recover, that will be the surprise.
