It is sooooooo typical — of the Swamp and its denizens.
The other day, former Trump Attorney General Bill Barr was the guest at a City Club of Cleveland luncheon. Up rose Fox News’ Geraldo Rivera to ask if former President Donald Trump is, according to this USA Today account, “fit to be president.”
Barr’s decidedly expected response was this:
If you believe in his policies, what he’s advertising is his policies, he’s the last person who could actually execute them and achieve them. He does not have the discipline, he does not have the ability for strategic thinking and linear thinking or setting priorities or how to get things done in the system. It is a horror show when he is left to his own devices….
You may want his policies, but Trump will not deliver Trump policies. He will deliver chaos and, if anything, lead to a backlash that will set his policies much further back than they otherwise would be.
And right there is a perfect example of the problem — the problem represented exactly in the person of Bill Barr.
With an apology for the self-promotion, back there in the wilderness years of 2019, I wrote a book titled Swamp Wars: Donald Trump and the New American Populism vs. the Old Order. I opened by saying this, with italics in the original:
It’s war.
A Swamp War.
Swamp Wars are bitter and increasingly savage conflicts waged by an elitist Old Order for the cultural control—not simply the political control—of America. They have been appearing on occasion since the 1980s. But the pace at which Swamp Wars now regularly explode into public view has rapidly accelerated—and their size, scope, and intensity have increased.
The major Swamp War of today is the titanic clash over President Donald Trump….
The reason for the escalation from the occasional skirmish of years gone by to today’s constant explosions of full-blown Swamp Wars, not to mention the headlining Swamp War targeting the Trump presidency, is the iron-fisted, decidedly authoritarian Old Order’s obsession with demanding complete obedience of and submission to Old Order orthodoxy. An obedience and a submission that not coincidentally preserves Old Order power and privilege as this group exerts its cultural and political control over the entire country. Anyone—anyone—who is seen as standing in the way of Old Order power and privilege, not to mention violating any Old Order sacrament or doctrine, must, in one fashion or another, have his or her reputation damaged, if not having an entire career or a business—or a presidency—destroyed.
Go back to the former attorney general’s words and see this assessment of the former president, bold print supplied on the key line:
He does not have the discipline, he does not have the ability for strategic thinking and linear thinking or setting priorities or how to get things done in the system.
Got that? Trump does not know “how to get things done in the system.”
Which is Barr’s inadvertent admission of my point in Swamp Wars, when I wrote that the Swamp is all about:
the iron-fisted, decidedly authoritarian Old Order’s obsession with demanding complete obedience of and submission to Old Order orthodoxy. An obedience and a submission that not coincidentally preserves Old Order power and privilege as this group exerts its cultural and political control over the entire country.
In short, what Bill Barr is really complaining about in that talk is that Trump is refusing and consistently has refused to obey the rules of Barr’s world of the Swamp, “the system.” The system in which “obedience … and submission to Old Order orthodoxy” are basic requirements.
If this were some minor difference of opinion, no one would care. But the Swamp War against the American people is no small matter. It is, in fact, a seriously major political issue, with the former president the very symbol of opposition to the Swamp. Which in turn accounts for his popularity, not to mention all those cheers at his rallies.
Here, for example, is a headline from the Daily Caller back in March:
Trump Soars Over Competition, Expands Lead In New Fox News Poll
The story reports:
In a new poll released by Fox News, former President Donald Trump is pulling away from his competition.
The new poll shows Trump with 54% of the Republican primary electorate backing him. His nearest opponent, Republican Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, sits at a distant second with 24%. Mike Pence and Nikki Haley sit at 6% and 3%, respectively.
These new results released by Fox are the latest in a series of polls that show the former president building his lead in the primary. Since February, Trump has widened the gap between himself and DeSantis by 30 points, according to the poll. Trump has gained 11 points in the poll since February whereas DeSantis has lost 4 points.
Then there was this poll just this week from the Washington Post:
Biden faces broad negative ratings at start of campaign, Post-ABC poll finds
The president’s approval ratings slip to a new low, more Americans than not doubt his mental acuity, and his support against leading GOP challengers is far shakier than at this point four years ago
The Post story says this, bold print for emphasis supplied:
Biden inherited from Trump an economy badly damaged by the coronavirus pandemic, but the public sees the former president as a better economic steward than the incumbent. In the poll, by 54 percent to 36 percent, Americans say Trump did a better job handling the economy when he was president than Biden has done during his presidency so far….
When asked who they would support in 2024, 44 percent of voting-age adults say they would “definitely” or “probably” vote for Trump while 38 percent would definitely or probably vote for Biden. The remaining 18 percent are either undecided or gave another answer.
There is a reason for polling results like these. And that reason is not just that the former president is seen as an advocate for tax cuts or the Reagan-style “peace through strength” foreign policy that keeps adversaries at bay, or that he carries through on the appointing of conservative judges to the federal bench.
Trump’s real strength is that millions of Americans have had it with the Swamp. Whether the Swamp is in Washington, D.C., or oozes out in the form of a trans advertising campaign for Bud Light, the Fox “parting of the ways” with Tucker Carlson, or the battle between Republican state treasurers and corporations investing in the latest ESG (environmental, social, and governance) craze, all of it and more is part of the same woke political beast unleashed on the American people. And all of it is designed for, as said:
the iron-fisted, decidedly authoritarian Old Order’s obsession with demanding complete obedience of and submission to Old Order orthodoxy. An obedience and a submission that not coincidentally preserves Old Order power and privilege as this group exerts its cultural and political control over the entire country.
All of which is to say, Bill Barr has made himself the personification — the very symbol — of the Swamp’s Old Order. With utterly no ability — much less willingness — to fight it.
And Trump supporters — not to mention the former president himself — get it.
READ MORE:
God Save the King, Not Fox News
Joke’s Over: We Should All Be Using ‘Woke Alerts’
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