Yep. Exactly. That’s why Trump can tear apart our democracy and reduce the American experiment to rubble. Because we all go along with the charade that this is all NORMAL.
The framing of evaluating actions as couth/uncouth explains a lot. The massive fluffing of the Hunter pardon as "destructive" (without any attempt at explaining that judgement I can find) is far more than trolling for clicks. It's a moral judgement, though like Biden So Old, the damage is to the sensibilites of Other People who find it uncouth, corrupt, and unfair in some vague way. I get the impluse to "keep up appearances", like the concept of Money our democracy relies on people believing that it just works, and anything that attacks that assumption is dangerous. But how to explain the invisibility of Trump in all this? His history of pardons, his promise of mass pardons for everyone involved in Jan 6, his promist to continue to investigate and prosecute Hunter? None of this is relevant, only that Joe "broke his promise" (that he never made) to never pardon his son. I've been highly skeptical of the claims the media are in the tank for Trump, but this, not even the need to keep up appearances explains this deliberate and willfull blindness and obtusness. Trump simply does not exist in all this.
Murc's Law is reaching virtually total applicability. People cannot beat to treat Donald as another person with agency. The buck will never stop with him, so the ultimate blame goes to those who might just possibly have a conscience.
There's a thing going on that I don't understand. The existence of Trump, let alone his history and role in current events, is totally erased. All of the pearl-clutching about the Hunter pardon is completely 1-sided. The Republican party simply does not exist in this "analysis". It strikes me as a new level of propaganda from mainstream media we havent seen before.
It's like they are treated like inanimate objects, as if they are essentially landmines. Dangerous, yes, but not really capable of intention or agency, and therefore ultimately blameless.
All this talk of "uncouthness" seems to elide that these standards only exist for Democrats and their voters. Donald has tried his hardest to be as uncouth as possible.
I take the uncouth frame as a focus on the motivation of the media in how they judge politicians who violate their conventions. Trump is the black hole in the center of this framing, but he has been his entire political career. He simply is not considered to be a politician and is exempt from this judgement. I think it has to do with media's refusal to consider what Trump is and what his popularity says about this country and the assumptions it rests on. They pretend he is a politician in covering him but refuse to judge him the way they judge the Democratic party. This dichotomy is strained already, and will only get worse as his administration gets to work. Things are going to get very, very weird.
I don’t think it’s a matter of propriety. I think it has to do with a set of rules that hold society together in the way you describe. For elites—political, media, and financial—it’s a matter of keeping society within the goalposts of the rules that have benefited the elites.
The elites can't really see or understand a world not governed by the rules that made and preserve their success. For decades, the ball they have kept their eye on was how the ruling elite governs, because no matter which party is in power, maintaining The Rules (TM) is ultimately paramount.
Trump is not one of them, and they don't believe he can actually harm the system or affect the immutable rules that have governed their lives. He is an aberration to survive; once past, normalcy will reassert itself. Some barbarian is always at the gate, but the rules endure.
Trump’s transgressions aren't worth noting because he is one of the barbarians. Whatever his transgressions are, they won't become normative, because they are outside the bounds of The Rules.
Biden's small transgressions, however—those are incredibly important because they happen inside the bounds of the rules and will act as precedents. So never mind that Trump will round up a few million immigrants, *Biden pardoned his son.*
For the elite, there’s only palace intrigue. Barbarians at the gate are unthinkable.
Your analysis rings true. I can think of no other explanation for the NYT sanewashing every Trumpian idiocy or Republican perfidy. Early in the new Editor’s tenure, it was different…then the posture changed to normalizing the barbarians, bothsidesing, and the hyper focus on Biden’s age, then on Harris’ not immediately having a fully formed policy position on every single issue. At NYT, only Democrats are expected to maintain The Rules.
As usual, you have provided a brilliant and nuanced analysis of this situation.
It occurred to me that, to a degree, it is possible to become part of the political elite without being born to it or to wealth. But it also occurs to me that part of the price of that is agreeing that some things are uncouth, at least if one is a reasonably decent human being and not one of the right wing extremists screaming for (literal) blood. Which means it's virtually impossible for a decent person who makes it into the political elite to make any change whatsoever.
My underlying anger is growing by the day as we watch the destruction of our country without doing anything to stop it. Not that I know how to stop it. I knew how to prevent it, but all those methods of prevention, which many smart people shared, would have been uncouth, and anything done to stop it now would of necessity be much more uncouth.
Anyway, I appreciate your work as always. Please keep doing it.
I agree with almost all of this, but I'm skeptical that Biden wouldn't have pardoned Hunter had Harris won. I think it would have been a narrower pardon, only covering his two convictions. Because the pardon is a two-parter:
1. Guns and taxes (already convicted, sentenced on the first and due to be on the second next week).
2. Lord knows what else, so long as it happened between Jan 1 2014 and now.
Part two is what Patel, or whatever other goblin Trump gets in there, wants to pursue. The FBI don't have to actually find anything to make someone's life miserable, and that's assuming there's nothing to be found.
Part one was scheduled to be done and dusted before Trump takes office. Nothing he could do there. So, if this was only about protecting Hunter from Trump's DoJ and FBI, what's it doing in there?
But, I agree with your bigger picture. Joe Biden is not the wise and noble statesman he purports to be. So he gets criticized by wise noble statesman standards. Trump is a demon from hell, what standards are we supposed to hold one of those to? So we just don't hold him to any standard. But that's scary to actually say out loud and it feels like resignation. Admitting resignation is also scary to say out loud. So it's gonna be no standards plus pretending there are standards. Whee.
I think the pardon wouldn't have happened because he'd still be surrounded by advisors talking about legacy and propriety, and those are values he certainly does hold.
But, as it is... Geez, he was talked out of running, then everyone spent months acting like he didn't exist anymore, then Trump was re-elected *anyway*, guaranteeing that the talk of his legacy will always be shaped by the Trump reelection and the resulting chaos. It seems like he sad "enough is enough" and acted to protect a son he loved.
I've been trying to understand why the Hunter Biden pardon just didn't matter to me. Your piece really nailed it. All the outrage, the tut, tut is so contrived and seeks to take up space in our minds that should be occupied by the January 20 wrecking ball swinging democracy's way. What distresses me even more than this phony Hunter Biden outrage is that too many of our political and civic leaders are behaving as if Trump II is no bigger a deal than Trump I and saying stupid things like "we will find common ground" or "we have been here before" or "we were built to deal with this." We have not been here before and the jury hasn't even been empaneled let alone reached a verdict on how well we will deal with Trump II.
How about it didn’t matter because it was a pardon for the right reasons? Hunter did nothing with the gun, paid his back taxes and penalties, admitted wrongdoing, has achieved and maintained sobriety, and represents no threat to society going forward. He would not have been prosecuted if it weren’t for his connection to the President. He was in fact subjected to a miscarriage of justice! Biden’s only mistake was stating he would not issue a pardon, instead of “we’ll have to see, after the case plays out” or some such deflection.
hunter pardon is only a story because big D Democrats/media types made it one(ie by repeatedly contrasting Biden's noble sacrifice in the pursuit of Law/Order/Justice w/the dubious ethics of Trump who is morally and rotten used his pardoning power TheWrongWay™️). Democrats entire schtick is to pretend they care about things and act couth! The lesson here should be: you can pardon your shitty son if he did something embarrassing and didnt kill anyone instead of witholding it to campaign on politeness.
Our wealthy media class may or may not realize it (probably some of each), but what they mean is that this pardon gives THEM license to handwave at the corrupt Trump pardons (and other actions) that are coming. They want to make excuses for Trump anyway, and now in their minds they can do it.
The author is working towards a good understanding but seems to be in need of help from sociology and historians. America has more than one elite but the media elite's true dynamics were parsed and explained beautifully by Tim Cruse (sp) in The Boys on the Bus decades ago.
Hot damn, this is the antidote to the rage I feel at the Never Trumpers pontificating about how the Hunter pardon gives license to Trump and his ilk.
Spot on sir!
Yep. Exactly. That’s why Trump can tear apart our democracy and reduce the American experiment to rubble. Because we all go along with the charade that this is all NORMAL.
The framing of evaluating actions as couth/uncouth explains a lot. The massive fluffing of the Hunter pardon as "destructive" (without any attempt at explaining that judgement I can find) is far more than trolling for clicks. It's a moral judgement, though like Biden So Old, the damage is to the sensibilites of Other People who find it uncouth, corrupt, and unfair in some vague way. I get the impluse to "keep up appearances", like the concept of Money our democracy relies on people believing that it just works, and anything that attacks that assumption is dangerous. But how to explain the invisibility of Trump in all this? His history of pardons, his promise of mass pardons for everyone involved in Jan 6, his promist to continue to investigate and prosecute Hunter? None of this is relevant, only that Joe "broke his promise" (that he never made) to never pardon his son. I've been highly skeptical of the claims the media are in the tank for Trump, but this, not even the need to keep up appearances explains this deliberate and willfull blindness and obtusness. Trump simply does not exist in all this.
Murc's Law is reaching virtually total applicability. People cannot beat to treat Donald as another person with agency. The buck will never stop with him, so the ultimate blame goes to those who might just possibly have a conscience.
There's a thing going on that I don't understand. The existence of Trump, let alone his history and role in current events, is totally erased. All of the pearl-clutching about the Hunter pardon is completely 1-sided. The Republican party simply does not exist in this "analysis". It strikes me as a new level of propaganda from mainstream media we havent seen before.
It's like they are treated like inanimate objects, as if they are essentially landmines. Dangerous, yes, but not really capable of intention or agency, and therefore ultimately blameless.
All this talk of "uncouthness" seems to elide that these standards only exist for Democrats and their voters. Donald has tried his hardest to be as uncouth as possible.
I take the uncouth frame as a focus on the motivation of the media in how they judge politicians who violate their conventions. Trump is the black hole in the center of this framing, but he has been his entire political career. He simply is not considered to be a politician and is exempt from this judgement. I think it has to do with media's refusal to consider what Trump is and what his popularity says about this country and the assumptions it rests on. They pretend he is a politician in covering him but refuse to judge him the way they judge the Democratic party. This dichotomy is strained already, and will only get worse as his administration gets to work. Things are going to get very, very weird.
I don’t think it’s a matter of propriety. I think it has to do with a set of rules that hold society together in the way you describe. For elites—political, media, and financial—it’s a matter of keeping society within the goalposts of the rules that have benefited the elites.
The elites can't really see or understand a world not governed by the rules that made and preserve their success. For decades, the ball they have kept their eye on was how the ruling elite governs, because no matter which party is in power, maintaining The Rules (TM) is ultimately paramount.
Trump is not one of them, and they don't believe he can actually harm the system or affect the immutable rules that have governed their lives. He is an aberration to survive; once past, normalcy will reassert itself. Some barbarian is always at the gate, but the rules endure.
Trump’s transgressions aren't worth noting because he is one of the barbarians. Whatever his transgressions are, they won't become normative, because they are outside the bounds of The Rules.
Biden's small transgressions, however—those are incredibly important because they happen inside the bounds of the rules and will act as precedents. So never mind that Trump will round up a few million immigrants, *Biden pardoned his son.*
For the elite, there’s only palace intrigue. Barbarians at the gate are unthinkable.
Your analysis rings true. I can think of no other explanation for the NYT sanewashing every Trumpian idiocy or Republican perfidy. Early in the new Editor’s tenure, it was different…then the posture changed to normalizing the barbarians, bothsidesing, and the hyper focus on Biden’s age, then on Harris’ not immediately having a fully formed policy position on every single issue. At NYT, only Democrats are expected to maintain The Rules.
As usual, you have provided a brilliant and nuanced analysis of this situation.
It occurred to me that, to a degree, it is possible to become part of the political elite without being born to it or to wealth. But it also occurs to me that part of the price of that is agreeing that some things are uncouth, at least if one is a reasonably decent human being and not one of the right wing extremists screaming for (literal) blood. Which means it's virtually impossible for a decent person who makes it into the political elite to make any change whatsoever.
My underlying anger is growing by the day as we watch the destruction of our country without doing anything to stop it. Not that I know how to stop it. I knew how to prevent it, but all those methods of prevention, which many smart people shared, would have been uncouth, and anything done to stop it now would of necessity be much more uncouth.
Anyway, I appreciate your work as always. Please keep doing it.
I don't think Hunter was ever in prison
I agree with almost all of this, but I'm skeptical that Biden wouldn't have pardoned Hunter had Harris won. I think it would have been a narrower pardon, only covering his two convictions. Because the pardon is a two-parter:
1. Guns and taxes (already convicted, sentenced on the first and due to be on the second next week).
2. Lord knows what else, so long as it happened between Jan 1 2014 and now.
Part two is what Patel, or whatever other goblin Trump gets in there, wants to pursue. The FBI don't have to actually find anything to make someone's life miserable, and that's assuming there's nothing to be found.
Part one was scheduled to be done and dusted before Trump takes office. Nothing he could do there. So, if this was only about protecting Hunter from Trump's DoJ and FBI, what's it doing in there?
But, I agree with your bigger picture. Joe Biden is not the wise and noble statesman he purports to be. So he gets criticized by wise noble statesman standards. Trump is a demon from hell, what standards are we supposed to hold one of those to? So we just don't hold him to any standard. But that's scary to actually say out loud and it feels like resignation. Admitting resignation is also scary to say out loud. So it's gonna be no standards plus pretending there are standards. Whee.
Fair point, we can't run history twice.
I think the pardon wouldn't have happened because he'd still be surrounded by advisors talking about legacy and propriety, and those are values he certainly does hold.
But, as it is... Geez, he was talked out of running, then everyone spent months acting like he didn't exist anymore, then Trump was re-elected *anyway*, guaranteeing that the talk of his legacy will always be shaped by the Trump reelection and the resulting chaos. It seems like he sad "enough is enough" and acted to protect a son he loved.
South Korean citizens told the military to f--- off and helped members of Parliament get into the chamber. US citizens should take note.
Yes!
Like a breath of fresh when surrounded by the acrid odor of bullshit that was the last 48 hours.
I've been trying to understand why the Hunter Biden pardon just didn't matter to me. Your piece really nailed it. All the outrage, the tut, tut is so contrived and seeks to take up space in our minds that should be occupied by the January 20 wrecking ball swinging democracy's way. What distresses me even more than this phony Hunter Biden outrage is that too many of our political and civic leaders are behaving as if Trump II is no bigger a deal than Trump I and saying stupid things like "we will find common ground" or "we have been here before" or "we were built to deal with this." We have not been here before and the jury hasn't even been empaneled let alone reached a verdict on how well we will deal with Trump II.
How about it didn’t matter because it was a pardon for the right reasons? Hunter did nothing with the gun, paid his back taxes and penalties, admitted wrongdoing, has achieved and maintained sobriety, and represents no threat to society going forward. He would not have been prosecuted if it weren’t for his connection to the President. He was in fact subjected to a miscarriage of justice! Biden’s only mistake was stating he would not issue a pardon, instead of “we’ll have to see, after the case plays out” or some such deflection.
hunter pardon is only a story because big D Democrats/media types made it one(ie by repeatedly contrasting Biden's noble sacrifice in the pursuit of Law/Order/Justice w/the dubious ethics of Trump who is morally and rotten used his pardoning power TheWrongWay™️). Democrats entire schtick is to pretend they care about things and act couth! The lesson here should be: you can pardon your shitty son if he did something embarrassing and didnt kill anyone instead of witholding it to campaign on politeness.
Our wealthy media class may or may not realize it (probably some of each), but what they mean is that this pardon gives THEM license to handwave at the corrupt Trump pardons (and other actions) that are coming. They want to make excuses for Trump anyway, and now in their minds they can do it.
We chose not to face this when Ford pardoned Nixon and now it’s bitten us from behind yet again. American exceptionalism at its finest.
The Atlantic Article in the link does not appear to mention QAnon in relation to K Patel at all?
Oh thanks, good catch. I linked to the wrong browser tab.
This NPR story covers the QAnon ties. (The Atlantic one is also great, even if it doesn't hit that point.)
https://www.npr.org/2024/12/09/nx-s1-5213692/kash-patel-conspiracy-theories-fbi
The author is working towards a good understanding but seems to be in need of help from sociology and historians. America has more than one elite but the media elite's true dynamics were parsed and explained beautifully by Tim Cruse (sp) in The Boys on the Bus decades ago.