Biden, Democrats mull running against the fascists by defining them as fascists. Yes, please
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President Joe Biden and congressional Democrats are mulling the idea of using the contrast between them and the Trump-loving, fascist, insurrectionist Republicans in 2022’s midterm elections and, well, yes.
IT’S ABOUT GODDAMNED TIME!
That might indicate that there’s just a smidgen of urgency among Democrats who hold the Congress and the White House that democracy is hanging by a pretty thin thread. Maybe we should be talking about that right now ahead of an election that could bring the fascists to power and end America as we know it.
“This ain’t your father’s Republican Party,” Biden said last week, testing out the new line of attack. “You know, but all kidding aside, this is the MAGA party now. It’s—you know, you got the senator from Texas and others. These guys are a different breed of cat. They’re not like what I served with for so many years.”
They need to work on sharpening that up a little, but it’s the right idea. “And the people who know better are afraid to act correctly, because they know they’ll be primaried,” he continued. “I’ve had—I won’t mention any of them; I promised I never would, and I won’t—but up to six come to me and say, ‘Joe, I want to be with you on such and such but I can’t. I’ll be primaried. I’ll lose my race. I’ll lose my race.’”
That’s not a bad tactic, either. Make them start doubting each other. Make Trump doubt them. Inject a little more vitriol and paranoia into the GOP. Republicans turning on each other might be the best hope for Democrats in 2022.
But also exposing them as fascists. That’s good, too. The Jan. 6 committee hearings, which Rep. Jamie Raskin promises will tell the “story of the worst presidential political crime against the union in American history,” should help.
All of this means getting Biden to abandon the Senate guy that he’s been for his entire adult life, for him to really absorb and reflect what he said about Republicans: they are not the same people he served with all those decades. They are not going to help him govern because they care far more about the party than the country.
What this will also mean is cutting Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema and their bipartisan gangs loose, and not worrying about angering them. It’s not like they’re really going to let Biden accomplish legislative goals before the midterms, anyway. Hell, Manchin is out there cutting primary ads for Republicans that crow about how he killed Biden’s ambitious agenda.
Biden’s team is also, reportedly, looking ahead to the return of Trump to an Elon Musk-owned Twitter, supposing Musk goes through with the purchase and Trump comes back. That’s a potential double-edged sword, Politico reports Biden aides are thinking. “While the former president would eat up an extraordinary amount of political oxygen, it’s also possible that he would push the Big Lie or feud with fellow Republicans and damage the GOP’s otherwise strong chances of regaining at least one house of Congress.” But on the whole, their thinking according to Politico, is that “more the election becomes about Trump, the better the Democrats’ chances become.”
That’s if they do a good job of cementing that contrast—that whole sedition and insurrection thing. The resounding victory of French President Emmanuel Macron over far-right Marie Le Pen last month has helped solidify the Biden team’s thinking on that. That too was previewed after the French election, by White House Chief of Staff Ron Klain.
Yes, running against a fascist party by defining it as fascist works in a democracy. Let’s do that!