TPM EDITORS BLOG The Only Honor Is Corruption
By JOSH MARSHALL Published DECEMBER 12, 2017 9:13 AM
I wanted to add a point about Donald Trumps pretty transparent sexualized attack on Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY). The attack speaks for itself. But theres a less disgraceful but also revealing subtext, one which President Trump returns to again and again.
Trump routinely levels attacks like this. Democratic Politician A always came asking for political contributions. Now that Im a Republican and a conservative President, theyre against me. In other words, theyre clearly shown to be a fraud, hypocrite, disloyal person.
This seems like a fairly major misunderstanding about how our politics are at least supposed to work. If Politician A solicits political contributions from Apolitical Businessperson B or one who gives equally to both parties and then sees Apolitical Businessperson B stake out a public politics that clashes dramatically with the Politician As beliefs wed expect Politician A to opposes formerly Apolitical Businessperson B. If they didnt, if they continued to support the now Presidents extremist politics, which were starkly different from their own, because of past political contributions, wed rightly consider the politician to be corrupt. This is clearly not how Donald Trump sees it.
To the President, soliciting political contributions creates a bond of subservience against which any subsequent caviling about mammoth political differences is either sleazy, hypocritical or disloyal.
What it all amounts is that personal loyalty, a kind of mafia-like allegiance, is the only legitimate mode of interaction. Which is to say, in Trumpthink, only corruption has legitimacy.
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http://talkingpointsmemo.com/edblog/the-only-honor-is-corruption