Frank's Musings

Somebody has given  Donald Trump the keys that open allegiance by most voters in the U.S. to his retributive policies.  I’m afraid it is all of us who disdain the people who are more concerned with their family's day-to-day personal welfare than abstractly with the good of the entire community.

The  remedy for this careless mistake is to change all the locks; but shrinking Trump’s base by awakening enough people to the political shortsightedness of their priorities is a task that will be costly and will take a lot of time.  While awaiting the task’s completion, how can we avoid  permanent destruction of our liberal democracy?

Congress has shown themselves beholden to Trump’s MAGA crowd and, like indulgent parents of a three-year-old, refuse to discipline the President’s disregard for the Constitution in fear of losing the privileges of their position.  With the failure of one coequal branch of government to exercise its checking power, the courts are left to assert the rule of law. Unfortunately, their usual means of enforcement depends on the executive branch.  This puzzle is what led David Brooks to call for a “civic uprising” to supplement the Constitution’s own enforcement measures (see https://www.nytimes.com/2025/04/17/opinion/trump-harvard-law-firms.html).

Such a movement needs a leader.  Let us support whoever grabs those reins.

Let’s admit it—The main reason for Trump’s tariff proposals is to offset the reduction in federal revenue that will be caused by his lowering of income tax rates for high-income individuals. Pretty surely, increased tariffs will be inflationary and only shift more of the federal budget burden onto middle class taxpayers.

Clearly, the administration wants to find a way to assuage the class of its biggest political donors. Perhaps a better way to palliate both those taxpayer groups would be to institute a luxury tax on the purchase of conspicuous consumption items. These goods include expensive homes and cars, large yachts, private aircraft, and other luxury items, the prices of which exceed the median level by, say, 50% or more.

Not only would this policy shift responsibility for reducing social divergences more equitably to those who have been blessed with a greater share of life’s rewards; it would give high-income earners a means of control over the size of their contribution to making possible attainment of the American dream by deciding to limit  their showpiece acquisitions.

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The only constitutional method for removing an errant president from office before a federal election is impeachment; but that is currently impossible , given how obsequious the Congress is to President Donald Trump.

Hilary Clinton hasn’t changed her clumsy rhetoric since it cost us her election loss in 2016. She continues to protest Donald Trump’s proposals and supporters as ‘a basket of deplorables,” although in the 28 March 2025 NYT she just calls them “dumb.”

The only way that tariffs can be said to be paid by a foreign supplier is to assume that the import market is so crucial that it forces those exporters  to reduce their prices sufficiently to beat their domestic competitors. This reasoning was rejected after the Smoot Hawley Act that contributed to the Great Depression.   Nevertheless, President Donald Trump relies on it to galvanize support among the majority of Americans whose perspective is narrowly focused on their personal well-being and who lack an appreciation of critical thinking.

It has become apparent that Trump’s genius is that he recognized that he could attain the most prestigious political position on the planet by running for the U.S. presidency because most American voters, regardless of race, share his solipsism. He and they have no higher goal in life than maximizing their personal or their biological family’s comfort.

It’s not that they don’t understand; they just don’t care. Moreover, they resent being looked down on by elite critical thinkers who mysteriously are wealthy and act like they are in control. They think elites are presumptuous and deserve to be put in their rightful place by a populist demagogue like Trump.

If those elites wish to serve the general welfare, they must learn how effectively to communicate in a modern democracy. (One illustration of this is  “servant leadership,” advocated by Rep. Jason Crow (D. CO).  cf. https://www.nytimes.com/2025/03/19/opinion/jason-crow-democrats.html)

In a liberal democracy, the common people usually outnumber the highly educated  elite.  Nevertheless, by reason of equity, ultimate control of society is awarded to the numerical majority of participants in the decision-making process—general elections.

Public opinion in our modern society is influenced by those who are adept at utilizing its diverse means of communication. These channels include electronic and digital media (broadcast and targeted); in-person contact at rallies, at town-halls,  and door-to-door; hidden messages associated  with various work, recreational, and cultural contexts; not to mention direct mail and print.

As long as public opinion still matters in our system of government, those who wish to redirect its policies towards equitable, non-discriminatory distribution of benefits must learn to communicate effectively to the people who ultimately control it.   The modern irony of liberal democracy is that advances in communications technology have weakened the relative persuasiveness  of critical thought versus entertainment.  Now more than ever, the medium is as important as the message.  Restoring democracy’s liberal values requires packaging them in a consumer-friendly style, not in language that only speaks to the minority elite.

Why couldn’t the February 2025 request from DOGE for federal employee self-critique memos have come from the president and directed that all answers be submitted to the cabinet-level official in charge of the employee’s agency? Such a procedure would have obviated suspicions of violating confidentiality and reinforced the structure of the executive branch.

President Trump was correct that this exercise can be a useful audit of government efficiency. However, it is another illustration of the Trump administration’s chaotic approach to doing the people’s business.

By the way, a “presidential advisor," like Musk, has no power to order civil servants to do anything or to fire any of them for non-compliance.

MAGA Voters won’t listen to reasonable arguments in the abstract. They feel that Trump shows them how to succeed by disobeying the establishment’s rules.  Ramaswamy and Haley missed this point in the primaries.  They proudly restated Trump’s tirades in rational terms; but their arguments fell on angry ears that are deaf to what is  viewed as pusillanimity.  Unfortunately, Harris didn’t take up the banner in the general election, either.

The MAGA movement is not based primarily on policy differences. It is a paroxysm of resentment at being left behind.  Its members can be weaned away from a demagogue only by believable promises of improvement in their economic well-being and in their living ease.

This is where the Democrats must focus to weaken the reliability of the MAGA base for Republicans. Defeating that electoral juggernaut means instilling a sense of being valued by the program of the “establishment” to create safety-net incentives and encourage risk-taking and determined effort by ordinary citizens in their career, budgeting, and investment decisions. That should have been  the centerpiece of the 2024 Democratic platform.  Instead, the Harris/Walz campaign only targeted the minority slice of the public that are critical thinkers, who are equally concerned about  the general welfare as well as  individuals’ well-being.  That portion of the population is often accused of ignoring the concerns that really matter to most people.