August 20, 2017
Our politics of late have become like Mark Twain’s adage about New England weather: “If you don’t like it, wait a minute.” One week after the horrific spectacle of violent racist and anti-Semitic animus on display in Charlottesville, we saw yesterday’s epic, peaceful rebuke of hatred in Boston. In response to what had been dubbed a “Free Speech Rally,” poised to prominently feature the speech of those who don’t believe in equality for people of color, 40,000 Americans came out to forcefully repudiate white supremacy and anti-Semitism. After an exhausting week in which the walking Klan id in The White House characterized Nazis and Klansmen as “very fine people,” it was a relief to see a massive demonstration rejecting that premise. It is an admittedly low bar.
Together with Friday’s announcement of the Steve Bannon’s departure from The White House, the last 48 hours have given us cause for measured optimism. There is a bright line in the sand and Nazi and Klan sympathizers are clearly on the other side of it. Yet, we shouldn’t pop the champagne just yet. Bannon has leapt straight from the West Wing back to his perch at Breitbart, his well-financed propaganda outlet. In recent interviews, Bannon sounds gleeful and defiant, itching to train his guns on his long list of enemies.
It is tempting to regard the prospect of internecine Republican warfare with amusement, but we would do well to remember the ideology for which Bannon is waging this war. His “nationalist” economic populism is a direct descendant of the “National Socialism,” of Hitler’s Germany. Bannon aspires to create a white, mono-cultural United States where the needs and desires of white Americans trump all others. Bannon’s (and I dare say Trump’s) cramped vision is of an inward facing, isolated America, with no presence on the world stage, for good or ill. It is clear that Breitbart will nurse white resentment and racial animus to achieve that end. We need to remember that Bannon’s patrons are the Mercers, the reclusive, retrograde white supremacist billionaires, who also own the data-mining firm, Cambridge Analytica. In 2016, Cambridge Analytica helped the Trump campaign manipulate social media to micro-target voters in key swing states. Although many articles about Cambridge Analytica say that it overstated its capacity to manipulate voters through social media, we should remember that technology does not stand still. A more technologically advanced Cambridge Analytica, combined with a Breitbart helmed by a man with intimate knowledge of the inner workings of The White House could wreak untold havoc.
Faced with a well financed, technologically advanced propaganda machine with the express goal of whipping white Americans up into a nativist, racist, anti-Semitic frenzy, the last thing we need are gauzy bildungsromans of young white supremacists or another in the seemingly endless profiles of Trump supporters which feign surprise that racists are happy when the President does something racist. We cannot congratulate erstwhile Trump supporters who only now are choosing to disavow Trump, solely because an inept, toxic Nazi sympathizer can’t get them their tax cut (h/t Damon Young, Very Smart Brothas).
We must eschew facile explanations. We cannot mistake feel good stories for the tough minded analysis it will require to properly detail the threat we face and to develop the strategy it will take to defeat it. Boston was a necessary first step, but we all know that rallies will not be enough to defeat the enduring forces of white supremacy. Just remember, Bannon was not fired. He was unleashed.