Look forward! The 2024 field is rich. You have Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, former UN ambassador Nikki Haley … the list goes on. All candidates who embrace conservative policies without the preoccupations of the Don.
New York Post Editorial Board, June 11th, 2022
The hardened MAGA right did all it could to deaden and dull American senses going into Thursday’s primetime televised hearing. The decision to bring the evidence to the people’s living room and treat the audience like adults, as people who want the truth, can discern the truth, and then can handle the truth, was so monumentally genius, so capable of changing the course of history, that the fear emanating from Bedminster, executive suites at Fox News, and Capitol Hill was palpable. They pushed back harder and harder, no commercials during Tucker… push, push…
According to the Nielsen ratings, an estimated 20 million people tuned in to a committee composed of adults speaking to adults. The audience heard Officer Caroline Edwards testify about slipping blood. They learned that representatives asked for preemptive pardons. They saw Ivanka say that her dad lost. And, most damningly, Trump’s presence or persona permeated everything so strongly that the viewer was forced to sense it.
There are at least four more publicly televised hearings, but a titanic paradigm shift has already occurred. The always-Trumpy, Murdoch-owned, New York Post Editorial Board, has seen enough and sent an earthquake through continental MAGA, just two days after the first hearing. The editors that had been so pro-Trump pronounced him unworthy of the office of president.
Trump has become a prisoner of his own ego. He can’t admit his tweeting and narcissism turned off millions. He won’t stop insisting that 2020 was “stolen” even though he’s offered no proof that it’s true.
Meanwhile, reports that Trump was pleased that the Jan. 6 crowd chanted for Vice President Mike Pence to be hanged — a truly reprehensible sentiment — makes him unworthy for the office. Trump can’t look past 2020. Let him remain there.
Do not get the Board wrong, don’t put them on the DNC mailing list. They are not suddenly supporting the Committee or even acknowledging its importance, the opposite, actually, calling the hearings “a Democratic campaign ad, a thinly veiled partisan exercise,” all – they say, “to bolster Joe Biden’s failed presidency.” The Board is still fully MAGA, they’ve only decided that Trump is not.
The Board’s justification is as predictable as one might expect. They’re not pointing at any new revelations or facts, nor do they have a new philosophical outlook. No, hidden among the self-important pronouncement is an acknowledgment of the power in the presentation they call a “partisan exercise.” If presenting grown-up truths to other grown-ups is suddenly partisan, so be it.
And therein lies the problem, anyone who looks to the evidence this committee presents and talks about Pelosi not securing the Capitol and… is being a child and a petulant child at that. The NY Post didn’t suddenly realize that they’d been wrong all along. They suddenly realized they have the wrong brand going forward, the landscape has changed.
As Americans learn what really happened, Trump looks more like Blockbuster Video.
Trump’s response? He insults Barr, and dismisses Ivanka as “checked out.” He clings to more fantastical theories, such as Dinesh D’Souza’s debunked “2,000 Mules,” even as recounts in Arizona, Georgia and Wisconsin confirm Trump lost.
Trump still wields enormous power in the Republican party and particularly the MAGA right. And under no circumstances should anyone think that a DeSantis presidency is preferable from a policy sense. But as to the ever-important “branding,” Trump’s outer sheen, his logo, his persona, the “it factor” that used to fill the coffers at the for-profit groups like CPACs and Turning Points, is is all stale, old, and increasingly dangerous. Bring out Kyle, Kayleigh, and DeSantis.
The Editorial Board has decided it’s time for a new ad campaign featuring a new leader in the cult of personalities and philosophies. The cult lives but the center moves. Their decision, of course, comes hours after getting the first glimpse, knowing more is to come. The Post is getting out now, and they cannot be the only ones. (Remember the Murdoch connection, watch out Fox News). The Select Committee’s message is powerful and it’s for grown-ups who need to face the truth. There is no damned way that the MAGA movement is or was going to meet the moment with Trump’s baby-face and disposition.
Jason Miciak believes a day without learning is a day not lived. He is a political writer, features writer, author, and attorney. He is a Canadian-born dual citizen who spent his teen and college years in the Pacific Northwest and has since lived in seven states. He now enjoys life as a single dad of a young girl, writing from the beaches of the Gulf Coast. He loves crafting his flower pots, cooking, while also studying scientific philosophy, religion, and non-math principles behind quantum mechanics and cosmology. Please feel free to contact for speaking engagements or any concerns.