On Sun, Jun 21, 2020 at 8:07 PM PGage <[email protected]> wrote: > In none of these scenarios can I see myself being interested in spending > more than zero seconds listening to a Joe Rogan. > > I’m surprised they think the Dem Clean Sweep is most likely. And I think > it is extremely unlikely the Dems take the Senate and lose the WH. > > I expect any outcome that includes Biden winning to result in a real > struggle within the GOP, perhaps with C-R Republicans becoming a force > again, or perhaps with the emergence of a new C-R party. > > I don’t expect the hard core 33% or so of the country explicitly dedicated > to the racism, sexism, homophobia and xenophobia of Trump to become kinder > and gentler, so there will continue to be a market for the likes of Rogan. > But a Trump loss would make the more pragmatic, less explicitly racisty > part of the party look for a way to re-brand themselves. > > I’m not exactly optimistic, because I think even now Trump’s channels of > winning are not much worse than they were at this point 4 years ago, and > things are likely to get better for him as We get closer to November. > <https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/tvornottv/CAKGtkYK2VD7UqRUD4uh0M_XdJKsANvN7BAyNY5rc2FXmn93UZg%40mail.gmail.com?utm_medium=email&utm_source=footer> >
The point with Rogan isn't whether you listen to him. If his audience gets large enough he enters the mainstream and his voice and ideas echo into mass media conversation. As the mass audience dissolves through fragmentation it takes a much smaller audience to build critical mass. Rogan isn't a self identified right winger and his show isn't specifically right wing like Rush or the syndicated AM radio talk shows. Rogan identifies as a libertarian and he's open to all viewpoints from his guests. He prefers guests from out of the mainstream and he's had guests from the left as well as from the right. I have had a problem with libertarians going back 40+ years because their ideal society makes sense only from a place of privilege - if you're doing well in life you can do better without the constraints of government. But for people not doing well, even if the reasons are unfair or out of their control, there's no government or public sector to offer any help. And Rogan provides no filter or moral pushback to his guests when they go off the rails or talk in a way that is directly hurtful or even harmful to people. Throughout the twentieth century the political parties were more geographically divided and ideologically mixed. There were large numbers of liberal Republicans and conservative Democrats and they could run the country by hammering out compromises. Going into this century the Republicans became a more coherent top-down party while the Democrats remained a coalition of different movements. The Republicans started to enforce ideological purity by calling moderates RINOs and with the Tea Party movement, bringing zealots into the leadership. Then they turned compromise into a taboo for their party. A post-election analysis of the party showed that they could only grow by attracting immigrants and people of color into the party and the leadership responded by turning against both. They openly say their future is through restricting the franchise by voter suppression. If Trump loses none of these trends reverses in the short term. There is going to have to be grass roots and donor pressure to oust the current leadership and bring in a new generation. Trump's chances of winning are different from 4 years ago because he has a record and has to campaign in an environment where he has stayed at around 40% popularity. When we get closer to the election the polling gap will narrow because it always does in October. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "TVorNotTV" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/tvornottv/CAJE-FiGTzWJ4NqPP6mE1UDrxvesxccVSgfuUqizzdYdF%2BfL%2B0g%40mail.gmail.com.
