[KB] Trump question

[Clarke Rountree]

Dear Burkelers:

I never cease to be amazed at the power of tribalism in American politics.
Trump now stands at 45% approval rating--higher than Obama at the same
point.

Since tribalism is at its most basic a form of identification, I want to
ask a serious question: What could cause such a tribal leader to fall from
grace? For a strong identification to weaken? Trump said he could shoot
someone on 5th Avenue in broad daylight and not lose his base. I'm starting
to believe that.

I assume that since Trump is associated WITH and AGAINST a range of things
defining the lines of identification for his base, some kind of separation
between him and his base's beliefs would be a step in the direction of
alienation. However, since a WEB of identifications constitute the hold he
has on people, a simple disconnection here or there won't do. For example,
he was widely reported to have said after the tax cut to his rich friends,
"I just made you a lot of money." One would think that swampy, non-working
class sort of thing might get him in hot water. (I have trouble believing
that he has so brainwashed his base that they really think that all
mainstream media news is fake, even if they're wary.)

So, a revelation that he had funded several abortions for former lovers?
(Not that this is the case, I'm just hypothetically testing the waters.) A
videotape of his dressing down working class folks as he stiffs them for
the work they provided? Revelations of a gay sex affair? (This last
probably would never be believed because it flies in the face of the
hypermasculine image he pushes.) He has so many skeletons in his large
closet that there are any number of damning things that could come out.

I also wonder about weariness and its rhetorical implications. I'm
exhausted from the daily drama and I assume even his followers are. I would
think that they might miss the no-drama-Obama days when you could go
several weeks without hearing anything about the president or the White
House. We rhetoricians tend to focus on the notable more than the mundane
in rhetoric. The drip-drip-drip kind of rhetoric (from repeating: "MSM is
Fake News!" to a "Here we go again" kind of exhaustion) is harder to
account for. Also, we don't seem to have a good handle on what Perelman
once called "The Interaction of Arguments," such as when we have one
revelation about a Trump lie on top of another, so that the first is
forgotten as we grapple with the new one.

Burke shows us clearly how such demagogues establish themselves; does he
say as much about how they maintain themselves? (Probably his discussions
of the how systems like capitalism carry on are applicable.)

This listserv has some of the sharpest rhetorical minds I know--surely
there is some rhetorical daylight somewhere to offer encouragement!

Count me frustrated in the reddest of states!

Clarke

-- 
Dr. Clarke Rountree
Professor of Communication Arts
Associate Dean for Recruitment and Outreach for the College of Arts,
Humanities, and Social Sciences
212D CTC
University of Alabama in Huntsville
Huntsville, AL  35899
256-824-6646
clarke.rountree at uah.edu
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