Donald Trump's Character is his Destiny
His entire life has been a dress rehearsal for inciting populist riots — from keeping a book of Hitler speeches on the bedside table to his incendiary rally speeches to January 6th.
Character, Heraclitus wrote somewhere around 500BC, is Destiny. Meaning: One's future is shaped and determined by one's own decisions. Over two millennia later, Soren Kierkegaard, another Philosopher of Becoming, flipped the saying, revealing hidden layers of meaning. "Life can only be understood backwards," the Danish existentialist wrote, "but it must be lived forwards.” Both quotes suggest the problem of the inability of man, in the flux of time, at divining the meaning of his own particular life.
Enter: Trump, the most non-introspective man in American politics. Trump did something in the last few weeks that he has done before and cannot, it seems now evident, stop himself from doing. It is one of Trump’s (many) perverse compulsions. Namely — exposing the political opposition to the possibility of a confrontation with his shameless, thuggish hordes. For some primitive, libidinal reason, Trump truly gets a twist out of threats and the possibility of random acts of violence committed in his name. And in so doing, he, Mafia don-like, distant from the hurly-burly of it all, has plausible denial. He didn’t do anything — wink, wink— he just put it out there, into the ethers. A little birdie told them to do it.
He employed this tactic in 2015, against Lindsay Graham. Back then he gave out the South Carolina Senator’s phone number. Trump, in a move reminiscent of early Mussolini, encouraged his supporters to “try it.” He didn’t do anything, of course, he just floated the idea. It’s not his fault if a hothead paisan took things to the next level. He did this again, last week. In that instance, “a little birdie” exposed former President Obama, his immediate predecessor, to the possibility actual physical danger. Michael Tomasky in TNR explains:
The most recent example, perhaps small, but I think nevertheless telling, consists of his recent “truths” on Truth Social. He posted Barack Obama’s current address. Think about that. That’s an invitation to someone to go try to shoot him. And sure enough, someone did. Shortly after Trump’s post, Tyler Taranto showed up with a machete, two guns, and 400 rounds of ammunition. He appears to have reposted Trump’s post. He was arrested, and Obama’s block in D.C. is of course heavily protected, but none of that changes the fact that a former president of the United States pretty obviously was egging his supporters to commit violence against another former president.
Of course, Trump would never admit to any culpability, even if something had happened to former President Obama. He — he would argue — didn’t show up with a machete, two guns, and 400 rounds of ammunition. Nor did he — he has argued in the past — storm the capital on January 6th. He just encouraged them to do it, not aware of the consequences of what might happen. Nothing more. Case dismissed. Did he learn this from Roy Cohn? Trump has a fascination with violence, with strongmen, fixers and with the mafia.
These putrid, unresolved compulsions are what will probably keep him from achieving the Presidency a second time around. The first time was novel, unpredictable to ClintonWorld, but this time he is a politically known commodity, and American manifestation of the global far-right movement. Trump appeals, always and in everything, to the radical base. He is temperamentally at one with his own immoderate base; he is incapable of moderating his language or his tone. In 2016, he conjured up a new sour, aggrieved electorate — many of which were not regular voters. His army; his “irregulars.”
Character, at Heraclitus said, is Destiny.
That having been said, Trump is tailor-built for the primary. Especially one that, like in 2016, is highly contested. Jérôme Viala-Gaudefroy in The Conversation speaks to the dividedness of Republicans and the advantage of the former President:
The problem is that, apart from this homogeneous radicalized pro-Trump base unified around the former president, the Republicans are divided. Those who might be prepared to opt for a candidate other than the former president are motivated to varying degrees and for various reasons. And almost a third of them (i.e. 20% of Republican voters) have not found an alternative candidate and therefore say they are ready to rally behind Trump.
The challenge for any of Trump’s competitors is not only to rally a sufficiently large percentage of Republican voters under the same banner but also to position themselves as both heir and rival to Donald Trump. Meanwhile, the former president will not pull his punches against anyone he might perceive as a threat, as he has been doing with Desantis.
What’s more, he benefits from the proliferation of primary candidates.
So while Trump is tailor-built to win the primaries as they are presently constuted, he is incapable of veering to the political Center, a strategy immemorially applied to Presidential campaigns. A candidate says and does what he — or she — must to win their respective party nominations. And then, like clockwork, they pivot to the Center in the hopes of winning the majority in the general. Trump, as I’ve said, is incapable of that. His entire life has been a dress rehearsal for inciting populist riots — from keeping a book of Hitler speeches on the bedside table to his incendiary rally speeches to January 6th. Trump lost the 2020 election by nearly 7 million votes, and 74 votes in the Electoral College. He will probably lose by more this time around, considering his string of legal losses, more of which to come. And, not to be too morbid here, Trump has also lost some of his support — forever — in Trump counties, due to COVID (and the stubborn Trump electorates view on masking and vaccines).
There will be no hugging the shore in this Trump v. Biden second sailing. Biden, as incumbent, will have the advantage, despite fussiness over his age. Of course, the Biden campaign must skillfully navigate the Scylla of the No Labels political party and the Charybdys of Cornel West, two not insignificant factors. “Black voter turnout in the 2022 midterms was down nearly 10 percent, according to the Census Bureau’s turnout survey, and now Cornell West wants to run a third party campaign against Biden,” I have written regarding West’s quixotic campaign. And of No Labels, I wrote in this very newsletter: “For the price of a mere $70 million, No Labels would have enough money for their nationwide ballot access efforts, allowing their Presidential candidate to run in all 50 states.” Those two third parties — influenced, strangely enough, by billionaires and Jill Stein — might tilt the battlefield towards Trump, but the advantage, unless something radically changes, still belongs to Biden.
Finally, it should be noted that the reason Trump gave out Lindsay Graham’s phone number in the first place as previously mentioned is because the Senator accused the New York real estate marketer of “becoming a jackass.” And, why? Because Trump had been stumping for the Presidency in 2015 saying the late John McCain was not a real war hero because he had been captured in Korea. Lindsay Graham, at the time, was a fellow traveler of John McCain’s. Ironically, ten years previous, McCain published a book under the title “Character is Destiny.”
The irony, of course, would be lost on Trump entirely. Lindsay Graham, as well, who eventually metamorphosed from McCain fellow traveler into “Trump Whisperer.”
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