If the recent events regarding Kavanaugh and Lord have shown us anything, it’s that we are dealing with a cult dynamic here –exactly, mind you, as Bob Corker (a republican (suggested. And in this case (as concerns the attacks on democrats), what we are looking at is the very Cassandra complex that tends to accompany the cult dynamic. What the repugs are basically spinning to their base (via confirmation bias( is the notion that the left of center attacks on Kavanaugh are purely political when the repug’s arguments, as far I can tell, are basically meant to make it look as if Kavanaugh was being unfairly persecuted when, in fact, they have completely failed to establish, for instance, that Lord was some kind of politically driven nut job out to sabotage Kavanaugh’s career. And that whole FBI investigation was little more than a sham that Trump channeled towards his ends to make it look as if the repugs were being fair and balanced.
It’s a little like being in love with a sociopathic player: they’ll go out and screw around on you (establish their power over you (then turn it around on you to make it seem like everything is your fault.
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To give you a real sense of the cult dynamic involved: have any of you noticed the way in which people around you are watching FOX News or listening to people like Glen Beck or Alex Jones? It’s like they’re programming their selves. Their world (which was once working great for white heterosexuals –especially male ones –think make America great again (is no longer working the way it should. And, of course, to bring into a political discourse the argument “what’s in it for me alone?” simply would not work in something meant to find a working compromise. So it stands to reason they would have to turn to the “in-crowd” of the cult. This was foreseen by Kierkegaard’s Continuation of Sin in which the individual, rather than face the guilt of their bad choices, leans into sin. Everyone knows, at some level, hate can only lead to ill and evil.
So why wouldn’t they turn to gurus like FOX News, Glen Beck, or Alex Jones to make their self indulgence seem a little less evil than it actually is? Make it feel a little less irrational and unreasonable?
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And the cult dynamic always begins and ends the same. It always starts with a lot of promise, arguments for how you have every right to self indulgence, that the only thing standing your way is such and such. But, by the end, all you’re hearing about is what you must do for the higher purpose of what the guru is offering you.
And make no mistake about it: Trump is a guru. At least that is the way he sees himself.
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Such is the misdirect that the emerging oligarchy under producer/consumer Capitalism must turn to in order to establish itself.
And the Republican platform is its primary form of expression.