It was GOP’s turn after DNC’s 4 days of their online convention last week. To be fair to them, I tried to watch as much as possible of the RNC event this week to be as objective as possible to hear the other side of the story.
Certain themes emerged over the 4 days as they targeted certain segments of the voters. Firstly, they aimed for their conservatives base with pro-life and religious freedom messages. Then there was a number of black speakers to appeal to the non-white population. Lastly, it was the promise of law and order against rioters.
Of course, Biden and Democrat bashing was also fair game. They had multiple over the top warnings that Biden was a socialist and wants to take away their guns and health care plan, bring chaos and rioting to the cities. They mentioned that DNC had a very negative doom and gloom image last week while they now predominantly project an image of fear if the other side takes over. They claimed that the work is not done yet and it requires 4 more years. Strangely, most of the speakers talk as if the pandemic was over and used the past tense.
Meanwhile, as the event unfolded, other major news was also happening around America. Bannon got arrested for fraud charges, 2 hurricanes barrelled towards the Gulf of Mexico, another unarmed black man was shot while a white 17-year-old militia vigilante shot and killed 2 unarmed protestors.
Then there was the Falwells and pool boy scandal that erupted on Sunday. The prominent evangelical icon confessed that his wife had an affair with a younger man and decided to resign from his post. Further sordid details emerged later in the week from the pool boy that it was an arrangement that Falwell like to watch his wife having sex with another man.
What was interesting was that his strong endorsement of Trump in 2016 helped to sway many religious conservative voters to support his presidency. Even more strange was the fact that Trump’s fixer and lawyer Michael Cohen, since jailed, had revealed that he helped Falwell use various means to cover up some incriminating photos in 2015 for them. So did this favour resulted in Falwell’s endorsement of Trump to help swing a majority of conservatives to his side?
For a while now, I was trying to understand why the conservatives and GOP were supporting a candidate that had no morals, lies repeatedly, have zero empathy for anyone other than himself, besides being racist and sexist. That goes against all basic religious beliefs. Does the end justify the means? If Trump achieves their aims, should they ignore all his human deficiencies? Also, GOP was traditionally against increasing deficits but Trump had managed to balloon it by giving a tax cut to the rich the moment he took on the presidency.
As a Gen X Asian with moderate views leaning towards the more conservative side, perhaps I can understand their concerns about the threats the RNC conservatives have seen over the Obama years. They might have felt that aggressive LGBT views had been forced down their throats together with issues like pro-abortion and limitations to their 1st amendment rights to carry arms. To make these items mainstream and acceptable to the general population is a red line they do not want to cross.
What I question is their means to an end reasoning. Is it right to ignore an amoral president who cheats and lie as long as you get what you want? Aren’t the basic framework of your religious beliefs compromised? If a thief manages to sell you an item stolen from elsewhere at a much lower price, is that acceptable? It is a dilemma which I have been questioning myself.
I have a friend that was very pro-Trump and much more in tune with the Man upstairs than me. He even bought a MAGA cap… But recently, he quantifies that he is a Trump observer and not a supporter anymore.
Honestly, I really don’t think any American news media, or any others in the world including BBC, can be trusted for an unbiased take on all subjects. This is especially true for the coverage of their own home-based news. All have a motive to capture as many eyeballs as possible and tend to present a side that achieves this aim. So if it is on American related news like the elections, they have a tendency to push their narratives. Fox for Trump/GOP, CNN/MSNBC for Biden.
So my same friend suggested, which I support, that one has to have a balanced diet of watching the same news from around the world to get a more unbiased view. For example, one should watch reporting of US elections from sources like Russian, Chinese and Middle East sources to get a flavour of the real scoop on the situation. Conversely, if I want S’pore news, I should check out the BBC and America for their reports on us. But sometimes this fails if the world is on the other side of the targeted country, for example, the current favourite past time of China-bashing nowadays.
Politics is and will always be dirty. One can play by perceived gentlemen rules or take a gloves-off no-holds-barred approach. The next remaining 65 days till the 03 Nov date will be an interesting time where the mother of all elections will be fought online, on TV and on all social media mediums. Compromise and constructive discussion is not an option anymore. It’s either you are for me or you are my enemy. SAD!
Leave a Reply