An incident involving strange images on Twitter all but engulfed the Trump campaign this week.  I tried to go a little deeper than the usual interpretations in explaining it at New York.

It’s difficult to believe Donald Trump is anti-Semitic. For one thing, his adored daughter Ivanka is a convert to Judaism, out of solidarity with her Jewish husband. For another, as a New York–based business tycoon, Trump has interacted frequently and cordially with Jewish colleagues, employees, investors, politicians, and members of the news media throughout his career.

That’s all the more reason to puzzle over the weaselly reaction of Trump and his campaign to allegations one of his Twitter blasts at Hillary Clinton borrowed anti-Semitic imagery from one of Trump’s anti-Semitic supporters. Trump has gone to great lengths to claim that the image in question isn’t what it is, and has in general done everything other than the obvious: apologize for screwing up and forcefully disassociate himself with his alt-right fan club.

In a thorough examination of the incident, Matt Yglesias hit on an important insight about Trump that goes beyond anti-Semitism:

“Trump has not acted to distance himself in any way from the anti-Semitic behavior of his followers. There’s been nothing remotely in the vicinity of Barack Obama’s famous race speech from the 2008 campaign, and Trump has consistently appeared angrier about being criticized for ties to anti-Semites than about the anti-Semitism expressed by many of his fans.”

Some might associate this reluctance to admit error, apologize, and then move on to Trump’s narcissism — those who endlessly admire themselves in every mirror are not prone to see or admit flaws.

But there’s something else going on that makes Trump’s supporters share the same reluctance to say they are sorry. He’s developed a cult of “political incorrectness” in which any sensitivity to others’ feelings is considered weakness, and the impulse to apologize for offensive remarks or behavior is dismissed as a surrender to bullying by elites and their minority-group clientele.

In his long, sympathetic meditation on Trump’s supporters for the New Yorker, George Saunders noticed this same phenomenon:

“Above all, Trump supporters are ‘not politically correct,’ which, as far as I can tell, means that they have a particular aversion to that psychological moment when, having thought something, you decide that it is not a good thought, and might pointlessly hurt someone’s feelings, and therefore decline to say it.”

In other words, there’s a tendency in Trumpland to view what most of us consider common decency as “political correctness,” which is to be avoided at all costs, most especially when the opprobrium of liberal elitists is involved.  It’s no accident, then, that Trump sometimes seems to court the appearance of impropriety, and defend examples of rudeness, crudeness, and bigotry even when he’s not personally guilty of perpetrating them.

Trump did not invent this strange mindset, of course. Right-wing talk-radio types have made a living from baiting liberals and women and minorities and then inciting listeners to express umbrage at the resulting outrage. Trump’s former rival and current supporter Dr. Ben Carson could not go five minutes on the presidential campaign trail without attacking “political correctness” as the source of all evil and as a secular-socialist stratagem for silencing the Folks by shaming them….

To use a phrase beloved of Trump’s great predecessor in political sin George Wallace, the mogul does not “pussyfoot around” in offending his detractors and those people — the pushy feminists and entitled minorities whose very presence profanes America in the eyes of many Trump supporters. Trump tells it like it is, which means he is not inhibited by a civility that masks nasty but essential truths.

Inevitably, this nasty but essential explanation of Trump’s appeal will annoy supporters and enemies alike, who insist on ascribing purely economic motives to those who have lifted him so shockingly high in American political life. Sorry, but I don’t think uncontrollable rage at having to “press 1 for English” or say “Happy Holidays” can be explained by displaced anger over wage stagnation or the decline of the American manufacturing sector. As Saunders said in another of his insights into Trump supporters:

“[T]he Trump supporter might be best understood as a guy who wakes up one day in a lively, crowded house full of people, from a dream in which he was the only one living there, and then mistakes the dream for the past: a better time, manageable and orderly, during which privilege and respect came to him naturally, and he had the whole place to himself.”

Such a guy may well be old enough to remember a time when he and people just like him could behave as though they had America to themselves. Nowadays that gets you hostile looks, a rebuke from HR, a shaming from moral authorities, and sometimes worse. But Donald Trump will fight for your right to offend in your own damn country. And some offenders will love him for it.

 

 

Yesterday J.P. Green noted an article in Campaigns & Elections underscoring the high regard Repubican party political operatives have for Facebook as a media outlet for their ads — despite the efforts of Sen. John Thune (R-SD) to discredit Facebook as tainted by liberal bias.
But Thune’s record suggests more than a little hypocrisy, as Steve Benen noted at Maddowblog:

…John Thune says he’s concerned about Facebook’s “culture” and the integrity of its mission statement, but again, how in the world is that any of his business? Isn’t the Republican model based on the idea that the free market should decide and if online consumers don’t like Facebook’s “culture,” we can take our clicks elsewhere?
But even more striking still is Thune’s uniquely weak position. When the South Dakota Republican became Congress’ leading opponent of net neutrality, Thune made the case that any political interference in how the Internet operates is inherently unacceptable.
Worse, in 2007, Thune railed against the “Fairness Doctrine,” arguing at the time, “I know the hair stands up on the back of my neck when I hear government officials offering to regulate the news media and talk radio to ensure fairness. I think most Americans have the same reaction.”

For the sake of argument, so what if Facebook had more “liiberal” content? Fox News, Breitbart and the Drudge Report display relentless conservative bias every day, and no Senators are trying to intimidate them to change their polices to reflect a more liberal point of view. Not all media has to be nonpartisan.
But Facebook has 1.6 billion “users,” and dwarfs all other websites in some key metrics that measure influence, which explain Thune’s meddling.
In reality, however, the political content of Facebook is mostly determined by the public, as its “users” choose which articles, videos and other content to share with their FB friends. It’s different for every user, from moment to moment. Liberals see mostly liberal content, and the same principle applies for both conservatives and moderates. Facebook does provide a powerful forum for peer-to-peer political education. But everyone can choose what to read and view and what to ignore, and that includes content spotlighted by Facebook’s administrators and staff.
But Brian Fung’s Washington Post article, “Facebook is making some big changes to Trending Topics, responding to conservatives” raises a disturbing possibility that facebook is caving to political pressure. As Fung reports,

Facebook said Monday it will stop relying as much on other news outlets to inform what goes into its Trending Topics section — a part of Facebook’s website that despite its small size has grown into a national political controversy amid accusations that the social network is stifling conservative voices on its platform.
Under the change, Facebook will discontinue the algorithmic analysis of media organizations’ websites and digital news feeds that partly determines which stories should be included in Trending Topics. Also being thrown out is a list of 1,000 journalism outlets that currently helps Facebook’s curators evaluate and describe the newsworthiness of potential topics, as well as a more exclusive list of 10 news sites that includes BuzzFeed News, the Guardian, the New York Times and The Washington Post.
…Facebook’s policy change Monday appears to be aimed at defusing the palpable tension between it and Republicans outraged over reports that Facebook’s Trending Topics could be biased against conservatives. Facebook’s announcement ending the scraping of news sites and RSS feeds for Trending Topics came in a response to Sen. John Thune (S.D.), the top Republican on the powerful Senate Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee. Thune demanded on May 10 that Facebook answer a series of questions in light of the mounting outcry over the perceived bias.

Facebook has reponded that “Suppressing political content or preventing people from seeing what matters most to them is directly contrary to our mission and our business objectives.” But the changes regarding the selection of ‘Trending Topics” content suggest otherwise.
Most Facebook users will probably not notice much change in political slant and tone. That will still be largely determined by user posts. But the possibility that Facebook’s content policy can be influenced by political intimidation, especially from the politician who leads the opposition to net neurtrality, is disturbing.

Some recent comments from conservatives about Trump’s impending GOP nomination, the future of the Republican Party and, in some cases their intention to vote for some other candidate:

Rep. Scott Rigell [R-VA]: “My love for our country eclipses my loyalty to our party, and to live with a clear conscience I will not support a nominee so lacking in the judgment, temperament and character needed to be our nation’s commander-in-chief. Accordingly, if left with no alternative, I will not support Trump in the general election should he become our Republican nominee.”
Former Romney staffer Garrett Jackson: “Sorry Mr. Chairman, not happening. I have to put country over party. I cannot support a dangerous phony.”
Former top Romney strategist Stuart Stevens: “I think Donald Trump has proven to be unbalanced and uniquely unqualified to be president. I won’t support him… Everyone has to make their own choice. I think Trump is despicable and will prove to be a disaster for the party. I’d urge everyone to continue to oppose him.'”
Rep. Carlos Curbelo [R-FL]: “I have already said I will not support Mr. Trump, that is not a political decision that is a moral decision.'”
Sen. Ben Sasse [R-NE]: “Mr. Trump’s relentless focus is on dividing Americans, and on tearing down rather than building back up this glorious nation. … I can’t support Donald Trump.”
Weekly Standard’s Stephen Hayes: “This is what political division looks like. Trump’s claim to be a unifier is not just specious, it’s absurd. This casual dishonesty is a feature of his campaign. And it’s one of many reasons so many Republicans and conservatives oppose Trump and will never support his candidacy. I’m one of them.”
Former McCain adviser Mark Salter: “The GOP is going to nominate for President a guy who reads the National Enquirer and thinks it’s on the level. I’m with her.”
RedState editor Ben Howe: “#ImWithHer”
MA Gov. Charlie Baker: “I’m not going to vote for [Donald Trump] in November.”
Former RNC Chairman Mel Martinez: “I would not vote for Trump, clearly.”
Former VA Senate candidate, Ken Cuccinelli on Trump: “When you’ve got a guy favorably quoting Mussolini, I don’t care what party you’re in, I’m not voting for that guy.”
Former RNC Chairman Ken Mehlman: “Leaders don’t need to do research to reject Klan support. #NeverTrump”
Former Bush spokesman Tony Fratto: “For the thick-headed: #NeverTrump means never ever ever ever ever under any circumstances as long as I have breath never Trump. Get it?”
Former Eric Cantor communications director, Rory Cooper: “#NeverTrump means…never. The mission of distinguishing him from Republican positions and conservative values remains critical.”
Conservative blogger Erick Erickson: “Reporters writing about the “Stop Trump” effort get it wrong. It’s ‘Never Trump’ as in come hell or high water we will never vote for Trump”
Fox News’ Steve Deace: “Apparently @secupp has a #NeverTrump list to see who keeps their word to the end. You can sign my name in blood.”
Republican strategist Patrick Ruffini: “I will never vote for @realDonaldTrump. Join me and add your name athttp://NeverTrump.com . #NeverTrump”
America Rising co-founder and former Jeb Bush communications director Tim Miller: “Never ever ever Trump. Simple as that.”
Former Rep. J.C. Watts [R-OK] said he’d write-in someone before voting for Mr. Trump in November.
Former Director Of NV and MS GOP Cory Adair: “You’ll come around,” say supporters who just got done saying their candidate doesn’t need me. Nah. I won’t. #NeverTrump
Townhall editor Guy Benson: “Much to my deep chagrin (& astonishment ~8 months ago), for the 1st time in my life, I will not support the GOP nominee for president.”
DailyWire editor Ben Shapiro: “Really? #Nevertrump. Pretty easy.”
Wisconsin conservative radio host Charles Sykes: “I suppose I should clarify: #NeverTrump means I will nevereverunderanycircusmtances vote for @realDonaldTrump”
Editor at RedState, Dan McLaughlin: “For the first time since turning 18, I will not vote for the Republican candidate for President.”
Conservative columnist George Will: “If Trump is nominated, Republicans working to purge him and his manner from public life will reap the considerable satisfaction of preserving the identity of their 162-year-old party while working to see that they forgo only four years of the enjoyment of executive power.”
Redstate contributor Leon Wolf: “I will never vote for Donald Trump. I will not vote for him in the general election against Hillary, and I would not vote for him in a race for dogcatcher. Heck, I would not even vote for him on a reality television show.”
Former Romney adviser Kevin Madden: “I’m prepared to write somebody in so that I have a clear conscience.”
Pete Wehner, former speechwriter for George W. Bush: “I will not vote for Donald Trump if he wins the Republican nomination.”
Bill Kristol, editor of The Weekly Standard: “Donald Trump should not be president of the United States. The Wall Street Journal cannot bring itself to say that. We can say it, we do say it, and we are proud to act accordingly.”
Undersecretary of State under George W. Bush, Eliot Cohen: “I will oppose Trump as nominee. Won’t support & won’t work for him for more reasons than a Tweet can bear.”
Former Jeb Bush digital director Elliott Schwartz: “In case there is confusion about #NeverTrump.”
Doug Heye, Former RNC communications director: “I cannot support Donald Trump were he to win the Republican nomination.”
Former IL GOP Chairman Pat Brady said he’d back a third-party candidate or “just stay home” if Mr. Trump is the nominee.
Washington Examiner’s Phillip Klein: “I have officially de-registered as a Republican.”
Republican pollster Kristen Soltis Anderson: “I registered Republican when I was 18 because I thought free markets and liberty were important. Not sure what “Republican” means today.”

The way things are going, don’t be surprised if this list doubles every couple of days. More on the great conservative Exodus, right here.

This is a good start, from the DSCC:

This week, the DSCC launched the “Party of Trump” campaign, a sustained campaign that will feature spending across platforms including television, radio, online, Twitter and Facebook, as well as up to the minute “Party of Trump” news alerts, highlighting Republicans’ continued support of Donald Trump as the nominee. With another big round of victories on Tuesday, Trump is even closer to becoming the Republicans’ nominee. Republican Senate incumbents and candidates are to blame for the rise of this toxic, divisive element that has overtaken their party, and they’ve all pledged to support Trump as the nominee. The DSCC’s “Party of Trump” campaign will remind voters that Republican Senate candidates are running in lockstep with Trump and his toxic rhetoric.

And here’s an opening ad to help the kick-off:

Not bad for openers. It appears that the DSCC is putting more brain-power and video muscle and into the effort to take back the Senate, which is long-overdue. There is enough material to make many such ads anchoring GOP senators and senate candidates to Trump and policies that are even worse than some of his positions.
With respect to Trump, there are gobs of clever amateur videos already up on Youtube, and the DSCC should be mining them on a daily basis. Now that Facebook has become the town square for ever-increasing numbers of Americans, the party that masters its potential will likely be well-rewarded in November.

A few months ago James Vega posted a strategy memo at TDS addressing the GOP’s “standarized strategy for manufacturing bogus Democratic ‘scandals'” most recently used to gin up outrage about former Secretary of State Clinton’s alleged email improprieties. The memo held the New York Times and other MSM outlets to account for allowing themselves to be manipulated by a “profound fear of reporting anything that contradicts the notion that both political parties are basically equivalent” and suggested strategies for Democrats to respond effectively. As Vega put it,

…Once the GOP grasped the fact that the mainstream media would not honestly report the fact that they were engaging in an asymmetric extremist warfare against the Democrats, Republicans realized that they could use the traditional journalistic standards for reporting information given “off the record” or “on deep background” to easily manipulate the press without fear of exposure or censure.

Vega cites proposals by Norm Ornstein, which gems can use to help prevent media from being so easily-manipulated in the future, including:

• Sources that provide information that turns out to be false and defamatory should lose any “off the record” protection whatsoever and have their identities exposed.
• Reporters should not be allowed to publish information provided by a source that refuses to allow the writer to honestly describe relevant information about the sources’ partisan ties and affiliations.
• Reporters or editors who fail at this fundamental public responsibility should face dismissal, suspension or other consequences from their publishers severe enough to dissuade them from continuing to abuse the public trust.

Vega concludes that “If editors and reporters in the mainstream media aspire to be objective, they can start by refusing to allow themselves to be manipulated by the GOP.” In effect argues Vega, “Failing to do this is represents the endorsement and support of pro-Republican partisan dishonesty in their reporting that is different from the partisan propaganda of Fox News and talk radio commentators only in degree and not essential character.”
Since Vega’s memo and mounting criticism against biased reporting that elevates bogus “scandals,” it appears that some major media outlets are doing some constructive soul-searching. In her Public Editor’s Journal article, “Tightening the Screws on Anonymous Sources” in The New York Times, Margaret Sullivan explains that “Times editors are cracking down on the use of anonymous sources…Although the policy does not ban anonymity, it is intended to significantly reduce…an overreliance on unnamed sources.” Further, adds Sullivan,

It requires one of three top editors to review and sign off on articles that depend primarily on information from unnamed sources – particularly those that “hinge on a central fact” from such a source…
The policy also requires any other use of anonymous sources to be approved by a desk head – for example, the ranking culture, metro or international editor – or that person’s immediate deputy. It also “underscores what has been our policy”: that an editor must know the identity of an unnamed source.
The new policy also aims to significantly “ratchet down the use of anonymous quotation,” Mr. Purdy said. It would make such quotation relatively rare. Too often, he said, such direct quotations allow sources to express “their impression, their spin, their agenda” without accountability. And, he said, they don’t allow readers to evaluate motive because they don’t know where the information is coming from.

Sullivan warns that “the devil, of course, is in the enforcement.” She notes that recent experiments using the new policies have been encouraging. More rigorous standards for using anonymous sources is a welcome change in America’s most prominent newspaper, and it’s likely that the better newspapers, and perhaps some electronic media outlets, will follow suit.
But no one should be deluded that such well-intentioned policy changes will automatically prove to be permanent. It will require constant vigilance and monitoring both inside — and outside — major media outlets against equal constant pressure from partisan scandal-mongers.
For now, however, give the Times credit for addressing the issue in a credible way. May their example be contagious.

At The Fix, Philip Bump’s “How the Internet has democratized democracy, to Bernie Sanders’s benefit” sheds light on the power of social media as a force for political education and change. Commenting on the insights of NYU professor Clay Shirky, author of “Here Comes Everybody: The Power of Organizing Without Organizations,” Bump explains:

…The gist is this. The two-party system necessarily can’t encompass every viewpoint. So, to hold parties together, some things became unmentionable. As media options broadened and the press wasn’t acting as gatekeeper, candidates could talk to voters more directly. But they still largely needed the resources of the party in order to get elected, so they still hewed to the rules about what couldn’t be mentioned.
Until 2008, when Barack Obama mastered talking to, fundraising from and turning out a large population.
“Reaching & persuading even a fraction of the electorate used to be so daunting that only two national orgs could do it,” Shirky wrote. “Now dozens can. This set up the current catastrophe for the parties. They no longer control any essential resource, and can no longer censor wedge issues.” The result, he says, is the “quasi-parlimentarianism” of the moment: The Democratic Party, the Republican Party, the Trump Party and the Sanders Party, all vying for power and the presidency…Trump and Sanders can ignore the established parties by talking directly to the voters.

Thanks to the internet and social media, now candidates can define their political personas without as much help from their respective political parties. The “Internet has “democratiized democracy,” as Bump puts it.
The other factor referenced by Bump is cell phones. Bump quotes from Jill LePore’s New Yorker article describing a recent rally for Hillary Clinton:

The instant Clinton began speaking, dozens of arms reached high into the air, all across the room, wielding smartphones. It was like watching a flock of ostriches awaken, the arms their necks, the phones their heads, the red recording buttons their wide, blinking eyes.

Bump adds, “That ceaseless documentation of the moment made individuals in the crowd often indistinguishable from reporters…The media has a role, as do the political parties. The role of each was once to serve as gatekeeper. Now, the role is often to serve as bullhorn.”
Trump’s TV presence surely fueled his success as a GOP presidential candidate. He began his white house run with name recognition few political leaders could hope to match. Plus, he understood how to leverage media to get free publicity worth millions of dollars.
A few weeks ago, I noted that, with respect to advertising,

Online ad share is growing fast. But broadcast television still rules, when it comes to ad budgets and is projected to account for about $8.5 billion of the $11.4 total ad spending for 2016, compared to about $1 billion for digital media, according to Issie Lapowsky, writing in Wired. But Larry Grisolano, who supervised political ads for the 2008 and 2012 Obama campaigns, predicts that in 2016 presidential campaigns will allocate “nearly a quarter of their spending to digital media.”

Yet, it’s not as much about the ads, as peer contact and sharing in social media, particularly facebook, which is so easy to use and where anyone can share print, video and photos. You can’t do that in newspapers and TV.
A well-circulated YouTube clip likely meets more persuadable eyeballs than the most carefully-crafted letter to the New York Times. Peer to peer contact is critical for enhancing voter turnout. But it’s also important for forming and changing political attitudes.
The success of the Sanders campaign owes much to social media. Sanders does not have a flashy TV persona, as does Trump, and to a lesser extent, Clinton. His sincerity comes across well on television. But his more effective tool is social media, which helps to explain his soaring popularity with younger voters.
A candidate can get a lot of bang for the buck recycling YouTube clips on facebook and other social media to reach younger voters. Democrats seem to have more leverage with these tools at the moment. I’m seeing a vigorous debate between Clinton and Sanders followers on facebook and twitter.
Hillary Clinton can be an extremely effective communicator, frequently comes across as the most knowledgeable candidate in televised debates, and generally does well in TV, radio and print interviews. But the Clinton campaign has some catch-up to do to reach the youth demographic on social media.
One of the best things about social media is that it can’t be smothered by the Koch brothers or any other wealthy conservative financiers. A staged political ad is always going to have less cred with swing voters than a heartfelt share on fb. This may come in handy in the final weeks of the general election.

A good many MSM journalists and headline-writers are uncorking predictable military and sports lingo in exaggerating the tone of the Democratic debate last night (transcript here). Compared to recent GOP presidential debates, however, the Democratic candidates provided sober, civil and, gasp, informative discussion of actual issues Americans care about. As for who “won,” Isaac Chotiner of Slate says Clinton, while other pundits say Sanders. It was that close.
Both Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders tore into Michigan Governor Rick Snyder at the end of the debate, with Sanders calling on him to resign because of his appalling negligence contributing to the lead poisoning of Flint’s drinking water. As Paul Egan describes it in the Detroit Free Press: “…As Snyder prepares to deliver his sixth State of the State address on Tuesday, his political capital has plummeted, the state is grappling with what could be a billion-dollar mistake with incalculable consequences for human lives, and his river analogy is particularly unfortunate in light of a state-appointed emergency manager’s 2014 decision to save money by temporarily drawing Flint’s drinking water from the polluted and corrosive Flint River. That move, followed by other state errors, has led to a public health crisis, allegations of a state government cover-up, and Saturday’s declaration of a federal emergency in Flint by President Barack Obama…Amid calls for his resignation, stunning vitriol directed at him through social media and protests planned outside his Ann Arbor home today and in front of the Capitol on Tuesday, Snyder will deliver one of the most closely watched State of the State addresses in Michigan history.”
In Jack Lessenberry’s “Is there a Democratic strategy for Michigan in 2016?” at Michiganradio.org, he notes that the new state Democratic Party chairman Brandon Dillon has further reason for optimism about Democratic prospects in 2016. “Dillon’s focus is on the state house of representatives, where all 110 seats are up for election…Democrats need to gain nine seats to win control, but this year, Dillon thinks his party has a real chance. Twenty-seven Republicans have to leave office because of term limits, as opposed to only eleven Democrats. Many of the open Republican seats may be vulnerable, since the departing incumbents were all first elected in the GOP landslide year of 2010…If a Democratic presidential nominee wins a landslide in Michigan this fall, Dillon hopes this will carry in a legislative majority. That’s what happened eight years ago, when President Obama badly beat John McCain.”
In “Republicans’ White, Working Class Trap: A Growing Reliance,” NPR’s Asma Khalid notes, “while white, working-class voters are now only about a third of the overall electorate, they’re about half of the Republican electorate.”
From Politico’s “The One Weird Trait That Predicts Whether You’re a Trump Supporter” by Matthew MacWilliams: “…49 percent of likely Republican primary voters I surveyed score in the top quarter of the authoritarian scale–more than twice as many as Democratic voters…In a statistical analysis of the polling results, I found that Trump has already captured 43 percent of Republican primary voters who are strong authoritarians, and 37 percent of Republican authoritarians overall. A majority of Republican authoritarians in my poll also strongly supported Trump’s proposals to deport 11 million illegal immigrants, prohibit Muslims from entering the United States, shutter mosques and establish a nationwide database that track Muslims.”
Trump will be the MLK Day speaker at Liberty University. It will be interesting to see how he navigates his big pitch to the conservative evangelical community, while paying respects to Dr. King, whose economic policies have more in common with the views Sen. Sanders than any other presidential candidate.
Dale Ho, Director, Voting Rights Project, ACLU has an update on the legal challenges to voter suppression laws.
At Smithsonian.com Heather Hansman asks “Could Pop-up Social Spaces at Polls Increase Voter Turnout?” The idea is to make polling places more of a fun spot, where people can “hang out.” What could go wrong?
George Washington University professsor Henry Farrell’s “Bill O’Reilly will flee to Ireland if Sanders is elected. He’s in for a shock” at the Washington Post provides the chuckle for the day, especially for all who have ventured to Ireland and actually paid attention. As Farrell writes, “from the perspective of American conservatism, Ireland looks like a hellhole of socialism” with “a tax system which is not all that different from the U.S. tax system for top earners, and arguably a little less favorable. The effective top Irish income tax rate is a little over half of income….Police only carry arms under special circumstances. Most Irish police officers don’t even have firearms training…Gun ownership is highly restricted in Ireland. People have to apply for a license to own a gun, and are likely to be refused under many circumstances. Furthermore, there are heavy restrictions on kinds of guns that they are allowed to own…Handguns of the kind that O’Reilly could use for “self-defense” are not [allowed], let alone automatic weapons. Gun rights are not a topic of political debate in Ireland — Ireland’s most conservative party, which is now the majority party in the government, has just introduced new restrictions, without any significant public opposition.” Further, adds Farrell, Ireland has “socialized medicine on a scale which would be politically unthinkable in America. Ireland also has welfare benefits for the unemployed which are not notably generous by European standards, but are wildly permissive in comparison to their U.S. equivalents.”

James Hohman’s Daily 202 column at WaPo, “The Daily 202: Trumpism rejected by Obama in State of the Union and Nikki Haley in GOP response,” spotlights a host of interesting reactions to President Obama’s State of the Union speech. Here we’ll just share some responses to the GOP rebuttal by Governor Nikki Haley:

— In the latest sign that the GOP establishment fears an electoral debacle if Trump is the nominee, the official Republican response from Nikki Haley also made the case – albeit a little more gently – against going down the path Trump offers. “During anxious times, it can be tempting to follow the siren call of the angriest voices,” the South Carolina governor said. “We must resist that temptation.”
— Haley’s speech has become a Rorschach test on the right…The far right hated it.
Breitbart headlined its story: “Republican Party Uses State Of The Union Response To Attack Trump.”
“Trump should deport Nikki Haley,” Ann Coulter wrote in one of six-anti Haley tweets.
Radio host Laura Ingraham chimed in: “The country is lit up w/ a populist fever & the GOP responds by digging in, criticizing the GOP candidates dominating polls?! NOT SMART.”
Former Ted Cruz aide Amanda Carpenter wrote: “Haley’s speech would’ve been good except for the GOP self-loathing.”
More mainstream elites in the right-leaning media loved Haley’s speech:
Charles Krauthammer, on a Fox News panel, called it the best State of the Union response he can ever recall hearing.
The Washington Examiner’s David Drucker said Haley’s response “will likely elevate her to the top of the list of potential vice presidential contenders.”
National Review editor Rich Lowry said it’s “always a tough assignment”: “Haley was a little shaky at beginning, but moving treatment of Charleston shooting and nice riff on GOP agenda.”

If one of Obama’s goals was to out the Republicans’ internal divisions, the President succeeded admirably.

Harold Meyerson’s Washington Post column, “The right’s war against the spirit of Christmas” calls out the toxic stew of xenophobia, bigotry, resentment, fear and greed that the GOP is serving up for the holiday season. Meyerson raises interesting questions:

Who’s really waging a war against Christmas in 2015? Secular multiculturalists who, stealthily and nefariously, have somehow rendered Starbucks’s coffee cups a tad less festive? Or the self-proclaimed culture warriors on behalf of traditional values, who demand we leave refugees — even small children, as New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie (R) has made pitilessly clear — at the mercy of the latter-day Herods? Who condemn entire religions? Who fear and loathe strangers?

Put another way, can you even imagine any of the Republican presidential candidates actually quoting Christ’s teachings about love, forgiveness, charity and peace? Meyerson continues,

It’s been a banner year for fear and loathing, xenophobia and racism. What has made the year genuinely ominous is the emergence of fictions presented (often, but hardly exclusively, by Donald Trump) as facts that legitimize a sense of both grievance and hatred: New Jersey Muslims celebrating 9/11; the quarter-million Syrians that the Obama administration is planning to bring in; a wave of black-on-white homicide. Concoctions all, but credible enough to the sizable share of Republicans who also believe the president is a Kenyan Muslim. Fed by talk radio, Fox News and paranoid websites, millions of our compatriots dwell in a parallel universe of alternative realities. My colleague Dana Milbank has noted that the fashion among conservatives is to dismiss hard facts that clash with their alternative realities as “politically correct.” That’s Republicanese for “empirically correct” — verifiable by research, but at odds with the stories they’ve created to justify their rage.
Such right-wing fictions have always hovered on the fringes of the body politic, but what has enabled them to go more mainstream is the sense of displacement — from their previous position as a majority race, a thriving class, a dominant religion — that is now widespread among the white working class Trumpites and the evangelical Christians flocking to Ted Cruz’s banner. The mission of right-wing media and pols has been to exaggerate some of that displacement (the threat to white America), play down other parts of it (the evisceration of blue-collar living standards by corporate America) and lay the blame for it all on minorities, foreigners, liberals, feminists, gays — you know the list.

There’s nothing new about politicians pandering to the worst instincts and most irrational fears of voters. But in 2015 Republicans hit a new low, as Meyerson explains, “…Enmities, and most certainly not love, have become the core of the right’s appeal and message this year…They may well sweep Trump or Cruz to the Republican nomination; they have already infused the entire party with bigoted perspectives that will be hard to disclaim.”
It’s a sad turn for a political party that once tempered its conservatism with appeals to “bind up the nation’s wounds,” instead of inflaming them with expressions of contempt and exclusion. As Meyerson concludes, “They are most surely at odds with the spirit of Christmas. Walls on the border, religious tests for admission, despising the poor — good thing Joseph and Mary didn’t have to encounter our modern-day defenders of the right as they scrambled from one country to another, desperate to save their son’s life.”
It would be good if Democratic candidates and office-holders everywhere craft their holiday and New Years messages in stark contrast to the Republicans sour spirit by presenting a more healing and hopeful vision of shared prosperity, peace, brotherhood and sisterhood. These are the values that can lift up and unify all Americans of good will, and this is the brand that can inspire the best in voters and move America forward.