When you care more about riches than the country that enriched you
Struggling to respect wealthy Trump voters
Jeffrey Denny
On a recent special trip, my beloved and I splurged to enjoy a certain exclusive New England seaside resort and restaurant.
The prix fixe dinner menu was sublime, more than my palate could appreciate. There were Naval Carrots Roasted and Marinated with Leeks, Arugula and a Duck Egg Sauce Gribiche, Columbia River Wild King Salmon Cured with Earl Grey, Ikura, Cucumber, a Fifth Bend Oyster Emulsion, and Hudson Valley Foie Gras Pan-seared with Sunchokes, Pink Lady Apples and a Fennel Pollen Waffle. Suggested pairing with a 1947 Lafite Rothschild.
Very demure. Very mindful. Very delicious. Very gucci.
The unexpected dinner entertainment was a nearby table of four. They looked, sounded and quizzed the sommelier like the place was their native habitat. One gent in bespoke dinner jacket who apparently couldn’t read the Massachusetts room or use his inside voice declared, “Trump was the best president since Reagan.”
I almost spit up my Gaspor Farms Porcelet Loin and Belly with Brussels Sprouts, Carrots and Ginger Wine Poached Pear. Paired with a bold 2022 Domaine du Seminaire Côtes-du-Rhone Grenache/Syrah.
As an open-minded liberal, I’m supposed to respect all people and points of view, especially when I disagree.
I even need to respect people who hate open-minded liberals who respect them. You know, as the former First Lady said, Be Best.
So, to the MAGA base, I send thoughts and prayers.
— They might not realize or care that wealthy elite Republicans are using them like geese for foie gras to elect Trump.
— Some defend MAGAs as misguided, ignorant or wallowing in anger, resentment and self-pity, bully-victim blaming elites — the liberal ones — for whatever their plight.
— Or they’re “the poorly educated” Trump said he loves, and no wonder.
— Or they’re addicted to and addled by the deliberate propaganda they’re voluntarily force-fed like foie gras goose by Fox wealthy elites. (E.g., Kamala Harris’s great inquisitor Bret Baier’s net worth ranges up to $70 million.)
— Or maybe MAGAs may not recall high school history that when autocrats take power, the powerless who backed them eventually become road kill.
— For instance, MAGAs may not realize they’ll be hurt first and worst — then wonder what WTF happened — when Trump raises corporate-protectionist tariffs that boost everyday low Walmart prices, fuels inflation again with tax breaks for the wealthy, slashes regulations that protect their health and wellbeing, and strips their Social Security, Medicare and other welfare safety net. (Yes, poor Red State whites take more welfare than the minorities and immigrants they hate.)
It’s harder to respect the wealthy that want more Trump.
— Do they care more about money than the country that enriched them?
— Is the record Biden stock market that made them even richer not enough?
— What about how Biden fixed the mess Trump left, tamed inflation without causing recession, and put the economy back on track? Surely they never really worried about grocery prices that Fox millionaires never faced but nonetheless hyped.
— Are they so blinded by wealth that — despite preening as national security patriots claiming they love the troops more than anyone — they sneer at America’s former top military official, Joint Chiefs of Staff chairman General Mark Milley, who Trump picked, when he warned from first-hand experience, “No one has ever been as dangerous to this country as Donald Trump.”
— Are they so deeply wool-dyed Republican, raised and indoctrinated for generations to hate Democrats, that they’ll vote for any Republican, no matter how awful? Would they go even lower for party over country?
— Are they so smitten with Trump’s impossible promises they don’t care about his depredations, destructions and threats to democracy they would never accept from any Democrat? And can’t see how he’s losing it, getting meaner and more unhinged by the day?
— Are they so gullible they believe Trump’s promises despite their elite educations at exclusive private academics and colleges?
— Are their minds so closed to other people and points of view, even those of reasonable Republicans who fear Trump? Or are they so brilliant in cognitive dissonance they can dismiss or deny the horrible things Trump says, does and promises and still love him, like he’s their troubled teen they sent away to boarding school?
— Was the old GOP “values” thing, as we all suspected, merely a slick political dirty trick all along? Is winning, even ugly, whatever it takes, more important than values? Are they like Groucho Marx, “If you don’t like my principles, I have others?”
— Will pious conservatives such as Christian megachurch millionaire preachers who sucker followers for money and back Trump admit they don’t really care about what Jesus taught?
— When they don’t care when Trump claims today’s immigrants are criminals poisoning our blood and attacking our communities, even while they depend on immigrants for cheap factory, landscaping and nanny labor, why are they so triggered when they’re called bigots? Does the truth cause agita?
— When they say, “Oh, Trump’s just saying that for votes,” do they swallow that? And why is that ok? Do they think a president’s words don’t matter anymore? Unless a Democrat says something that offends them?
— Do they forget their forbears were also tired poor huddled masses of immigrants who wanted to work hard for the American Dream? Or do they put them above today’s immigrants who aren’t European white?
— Since when did Americans who claim to love God and Jesus more than anyone hate poor endangered refugees seeking freedom, safety and a chance to work hard for the American Dream? As many of their forebears did?
— Are they so dopamine rage-addicted that their rational thinking is overwhelmed when their cognitively biased media choice hypes the woke progressive nonsense to feed their monkey?
— Do they really want government bureaucrats invading their deepest privacy, especially when they impregnate girlfriends, by dictating reproduction like communist China? Whatever happened to their hate for government intervention?
— Don’t they realize that our economy and their wealth depends on the global capital markets, which depends on our political stability? Which Trump loves to blow up?
Maybe I should stop worrying and love the Trump bomb.
Who knows? Maybe Trump will boost my 401(k) enough for me to next time order the Prime Beef Tenderloin Grilled over Charcoal with Pommes Paillison, Variations of Broccoli, Sauce Bordelaise and Brown Butter Béarnaise. Perhaps paired with a very demure, very mindful 1961 Chateau Margaux.
Jeffrey Denny is a Washington writer.
