A NEWSLETTER FROM DAVID CORN |
A NEWSLETTER FROM DAVID CORN |
|
|
Is This the Craziest GOP Candidate in the Nation? |
By David Corn September 24, 2022 |
Mark Finchem, Republican candidate for secretary of state in Arizona, at a debate on September 22, 2022, in Phoenix. Matt York/AP |
|
|
During the 2010 campaign, when the Tea Party was running strong by peddling a toxic brew of anti-government sentiment and right-wing paranoia (Death panels! Concentration camps! A secret Muslim, born-in-Kenya, socialist radical in the White House!), I surveyed the political landscape to identify what was the most alarming race of those midterm elections. There were plenty of kooks running for the House and Senate that year. But I settled on the Kentucky Senate contest, where the Republican Party’s nominee, Rand Paul, a libertarian far-right activist and ophthalmologist who had never held elected office, was running against the Jack Conway, the Democratic state attorney general.
Paul was a Tea Party champion who had appeared frequently on the talk show of Alex Jones, the noxious conspiracy theory conman, and who had spouted his own libertarian and conspiratorial nonsense. He flirted with 9/11 trutherism and claimed Democrats wanted to create an army of “armed EPA agents” who would burst into homes and apartments to determine if they were meeting energy-efficiency standards. He insisted there should be no federal regulation of any industry—that is, no health, safety, or environmental standards. “If he wins,” I wrote, “it will signal the power of know-nothing Tea Partyism.” I dubbed the Paul-Conway face-off the most important Senate race of the year. The election of Paul to the Senate would mean any right-wing, conspiracy-hawking buffoon could become a national leader. It would open the door to other kooks. This contest was a true bellwether.
Paul clobbered Conway 56 to 44 percent. This was a disconcerting sign. What might come next? Little did I realize…
Now, as I look at the current midterms, I see election denialists running for office as Republicans across the land. FiveThirtyEight reports that out of “522 total Republican nominees running for office, we found 201 who fully denied the legitimacy of the 2020 election.” Another 61 said they had questions and declined to accept the 2020 election as legitimate. About half of Republicans competing for these posts are not tethered to reality. Of course, their party cult is led by a champion liar and conspiracy theory pusher who recently embraced the nuttery of QAnon. Most of the GOP enterprise is cracked. But is there one race that might stand out—at least, symbolically—as the most important or disturbing contest?
With all the loons running, identifying that race is a tough task. There’s Doug Mastriano, the QAnonish election denier who was part of the January 6 mob; he is the GOP candidate for governor in Pennsylvania. There’s Don Bolduc, another election denier, who is the Republican Senate nominee in New Hampshire; he has called for repealing the 17th Amendment, which allows for the direct election of senators. His campaign slogan seems to be, Vote for me, and I’ll take away your vote. And there are many others. But my nominee for the most concerning candidate—in terms of sheer lunacy—is Mark Finchem, the Arizona Republican state representative running for secretary of state.
Naturally, Finchem is a spreader of Donald Trump’s Big Lie about the 2020 election, and he is an advocate of deranged QAnon conspiracy theories. The main idea of this paranoid and irrational cult is that the world is secretly controlled by a cabal of Satanic and cannibalistic sex-trafficking pedophiles—including prominent Democrats and other elites—and that Trump is waging an apocalyptic battle against these nefarious forces. Last year, Finchem was a “special guest” at a QAnon conference in Las Vegas. The roster of speakers was a veritable parade of QAnon promoters and other fringe theorists, including Ron and Jim Watkins, who are widely suspected of cooking up the QAnon scam. (They deny that.) Also on the bill: Stella Immanuel, the infamous sex-with-demons doctor, and ret. Lt. General Thomas McInerney, a far-out conspiracist who has claimed the Democrats and the Chinese government plotted to create Covid and then committed voter fraud to oust Trump.
Not surprisingly, Finchem was in Washington on January 6 and issued a tweet that seemed to justify the assault on the US Capitol, describing the riot as “what happens when the People feel they have been ignored, and Congress refuses to acknowledge rampant fraud.” According to the Arizona Republic, “There have been allegations that Finchem was part of the mob that stormed the Capitol but he has denied them—although he refuses to release his texts and other communications from that day.”
And here’s no shocker: Trump endorsed Finchem in Arizona’s GOP primary for secretary of state. He praised Finchem: “He is a patriot who has fought for our Country right from his earliest moments in government. Mark was willing to say what few others had the courage to say.”
After bagging the GOP nomination, Fincher did not back off the bonkers stuff. He recently held a fundraiser in California that, according to the Daily Beast, was co-hosted by a QAnon adherent who “has spent years propagating baseless lies like the Sandy Hook shooting being a staged ‘false flag’ and Sept. 11 being an ‘inside job.’” Also present: Steve Bannon and Michael Flynn. This month, prominent Jewish groups accused Finchem of deploying antisemitic rhetoric in his campaign—a charge he denied.
Finchem also recently told Time reporter Charlotte Alter that he was sure the 2020 election was stolen from Trump because he couldn’t “find anyone who will admit that they voted for Joe Biden.” How scientific. If elected, Finchem would be in charge of certifying statewide election results. And when Alter asked if he would certify a Biden victory in 2024, should the president run for reelection and triumph in Arizona, Finchem remarked that he could not envision the possibility of Biden placing first in Arizona, noting, “I think you’re proposing something that, quite frankly, is a fantasy.” This is a man who has demonstrated that he cannot and will not accept reality—and that, if elected, he could trigger a national crisis by refusing to acknowledge a Democratic win in Arizona.
Finchem embodies how batcrap crazy the Trumped-up Republican Party has become. And he seems to have a good shot of winning. A recent poll had him leading Adrian Fontes, his Democratic opponent, 40 to 35 percent, with about a quarter undecided. Independents favored Finchem 31 to 28 percent, with 41 percent undecided. Though he is merely one of scores of crackpot Republicans on the ballot nationwide—Arizona GOP gubernatorial candidate Kari Lake is another—Finchem has managed to stand out in his craziness. Yet what’s most troubling is that even should he be defeated, many of his comrades in derangement are likely to end up with government jobs.
Got anything to say about this item—or anything else? Email me at ourland@motherjones.com |
American Psychosis, a New York Times Bestseller |
On Wednesday evening, my agent called. “Congratulations!” she exclaimed before I could say hello. “For what?” I asked. I had forgotten that the New York Times releases its weekly list of bestselling books on Wednesday night. “You’re on the list,” she said. It was a rewarding moment. Being on the list is the benchmark of success for an author. This was not my first time. My four previous works had reached these heights, with Russian Roulette: The Inside Story of Putin’s War on America and the Election of Donald Trump (co-authored with Michael Isikoff) hitting number one. But I was anxious this time around. Many books have been published in the past few weeks. Plus, the death of Queen Elizabeth led to the cancellation of some media appearances. I had feared my streak might end. When I viewed the list, I saw that eight of the top ten books were new releases, including mine. That is unusual and shows how competitive the environment is now.
What many people don’t realize is that the list is extremely relative. Michelle Obama will hit the top spot with first-week sales in the hundreds of thousands. Other weeks, a book selling a fraction of that—maybe several thousands—might weigh in at No. 1, if no other book is doing better. Timing is everything. And because publication dates are decided months in advance, it is tough to know what the competition will be. American Psychosis was not up against a mega-seller. But there are plenty of popular works out this month, and I am grateful the book has fared well.
Much of the credit goes to OurLanders who purchased copies, especially those who preordered. You helped the book get off to a strong start, and that juices up the algorithms. (Yes, that’s how we must think these days.) My heartfelt thanks. You might notice in the graphic below that I edged out Jared Kushner on the list. But did you spot that little dagger at the end of the entry for his book? That means that a number of his books were bought in bulk purchases. Perhaps he put that Saudi money to good use.
Meanwhile, the promotion express for American Psychosis keeps on chugging along. (Please bear with me a little bit longer.) I had an intriguing conversation about the book for the Politics + Media 101 podcast that focused on the Tea Party’s role in the dark history of the GOP’s relationship with far-right extremism. And I discussed the book and its timely message with David Rothkopf for his Deep State Radio podcast.
|
|
|
Dumbass Comment of the Week |
After taking last week off in regard to DCotW, I was met by a barrage of crazy this week. Michael Flynn, a perennial favorite of the bookmakers who set odds for this contest, had a doozy. He claimed that with the Covid vaccines, globalists “are trying to change the very essence of our DNA” and forcibly putting “components of robotics into us.” |
His derangement grows by leaps and bounds each week. Earlier this month, Flynn appeared to support the bonkers conspiracy theory that Covid vaccines contain pathogens that can be unleashed by a 5G signal and cause widespread epidemics of horrendous diseases and turn humans into zombies. (You read that right.) Now he says it’s DNA-mutating robotics. This is so confusing, General Flynn. Are our precious bodily fluids being polluted by pathogens or nanobots? Or is it both?!
Appearing on Newsmax, Donald Trump’s out-of-her-depth attorney Alina Habba slammed the FBI’s search of Mar-a-Lago as a “crazy raid,” and she added, “This is what we like to call an ‘October Surprise.’” The raid occurred in August. |
Though the judges tend to ignore Trump—he could win every week—this time around they concluded they had no choice but to consider him. During an interview with Fox’s Sean Hannity, TFG (or FPOTUS, as the Justice Department calls him) popped off a series of dumb and bizarre remarks about that raid. He claimed a president can declassify documents by just “thinking about it” and referred to the National Archives and Records Administration as a “radical left group.” Then he went even more bonkers with this comment: “There's also a lot of speculation because of what they did, the severity of the FBI coming and raiding Mar-a-Lago. Were they looking for the Hillary Clinton emails that were deleted, but they are around someplace?” So the FBI was searching for Clinton’s emails within Trump’s papers? Was Trump suggesting he might have possessed these 30,000-plus records—which he has long sought and even urged Russian hackers to find—without knowing he had them? This was a clumsy attempt to deflect attention toward his favorite bogeywoman. But did Trump expect any of his followers to believe this pure bunk? Probably yes. For surpassing his usual high level of disinformation BS, Trump—on a bad week for him (a $250 million lawsuit filed against him and a loss in the appeals court regarding the sensitive government documents he pinched)—takes home this prize.
|
There was much commentary about my report on Trump merging MAGA extremism with a full embrace of QAnon to forge what I’m now calling QMaga. Karen Martin wrote:
Thank you for your fact-based and dire warning. I am not yet ready to give up hope that the Democrats pull a rabbit out of their hat and at least maintain control of Congress. If not, the destruction of our democracy is too close for comfort. By the way, I received your book yesterday. Can't wait to read it! Putting a QMaga-supporting party in charge of one house of Congress (if not both) would certainly pose a threat to democracy. This is a point that could use more emphasis in the remaining weeks before the midterms.
Barry Shmookler emailed:
I always look forward to your insightful and often accurately prophetic articles. This is totally applicable to today’s article on the progressing merger of MAGAism, QAnon and religious fundamentalism. I totally concur that it is “reminiscent of a religious revival meeting.” However, it is also ominously and chillingly reminiscent of the Nuremberg Nazi rallies with a paranoid Hitler inciting the supplicants to cheer and raise their right arms in the Nazi salute = QAnon salute with raised right arms extending one finger. History repeats itself.
I understand the fear generated by the GOP’s embrace of irrationality, hatred, and extremism. I know that to many the Nazi Germany comparison is salient. I find myself a bit reticent to use it, perhaps as a matter of taste. But I do believe we need to discuss fully Trumpian authoritarianism and its fascist elements. Bailey Share had a sharp take:
QAnon, if you can see beyond the wildness of the plots it describes, has always been about Trump. That’s what makes it different from other conspiracy theories (which have historically seen conventional American politics as a distraction or part of the conspiracy). But QAnon was always a Trump fan club. And if there is one thing we have learned about Trump, it’s that he goes where the fans are. He riffs onstage and builds policy platforms around what gets the most applause. He surrounds himself with yes-people and says whatever will make the crowd go wild. It’s no wonder he’s speaking the language of his fan club now. To them, he’ll always be perfect.
This is a perceptive point. QAnon is a conspiracy theory that follows the general formula—evil elites doing evil things to control the world and destroy the United States—but it also places Trump-as-savior in a central role. Most conspiracy theories focus on the purported wrongdoing without identifying a hero. QAnon posits that Trump is secretly and heroically battling this cabal to save the world. No wonder he’s a fan. Nancy Krempa wrote:
I so wish there was a way to abort this ungodly mash-up of MAGA and QAnon. The two being welded together will cause even more strife than either has managed alone, and that has been substantial, actually. In my own area, in the community where I work six days a week, we had the following tragedy unfold. [This is the story of a Michigan man who killed his wife and shot his 25-year-old daughter and then died in a shootout with police officers. His other daughter said he had been radicalized by QAnon.] How many more have died, or died trying to kill others, in the service of either of those insane ideologies? What can be done to staunch the wound That Man has inflicted on our country and our most vulnerable citizens (those of the most gullible nature)? Will the next volume of the DSM contain Trumpism or QMaga as a disorder?
There was also much response to my article about the necessity of a reckoning for Republicans regarding the party’s decades-long exploitation and encouragement of right-wing extremism. Roger Smith chimed in:
Your essay on the roots of the current Republican descent into madness is a temperate, fact-based evisceration of the maddening "both sides-ism" and "what about-ism" that is the enduring refuge of those who seek to either ignore or excuse the roots of the GOP's current folie-a-74 million. I received my degree in modern German history from Harvard more than 50 years ago. There are imperfect but useful parallels with the process by which a clear majority of the German people became comfortable with—if not outright supporters of—Nazism. "Coastal elites" and generic "liberals" have taken the place for today's Trump supporters of "Jews" and "international bankers"—well not entirely. Old habits die hard.
Tom Johnson had a question:
In your most recent column, you appear to date the history of GOP extremism from the Eisenhower era. Does your book address how—or whether or not—this extremism evolved from the earliest days of the Republican Party? Thank you for your forthright and insightful journalism.
The main narrative of the book does begin in the late 1940s and early 1950s. But I trace the full history of the GOP from the 1850s and note that Abraham Lincoln, when he ran for president in 1860, did not denounce a key part of the Republican coalition: the Know-Nothings and other anti-immigrant bigots. The Republicans wanted and needed their votes. Throughout the rest of the 1800s and early 1900s, both the Democrats and Republicans capitalized on extremism at different points. But I chose to focus on the modern era when the pattern is clearly dominated by one of the two parties: the GOP.
Alan Godwin wrote:
Heard you on The Bulwark podcast and am reading your book now. I was a lifelong Republican but started to see what you’re writing about a few years back. Stuart Stevens, who wrote It Was All a Lie, is a childhood friend of mine and was influential in helping me see now what’s been there all along. I’ll be recommending your book often. Thanks again.
Thanks, Alan. I’ve been quite interested to see how what I call “recovering Republicans” are responding to the book. I do think the recent developments ought to compel them to reconsider their support of the party in years past.
Kat Drennan observed:
I agree 100 percent with all that you presented. Both my children have been sucked into this idiocy. The problem I see is the Democrats do not yet offer an alternative that appeals to what the non-MAGA Republicans “perceive” as “conservative.” My 48-year-old daughter with two young daughters is absolutely disgusted with the gutting of Roe v. Wade and voted for Biden in the last election under extreme duress. She sees it as the lesser of two evils and is angry at both. Clearly the GOP has had a chance to reassess and not done it. I think it’s a dead horse. But the Dems haven’t created a sturdy bridge for disenchanted 40-somethings.
Paul Raetsch shared an important conversation he had: Me: “I think I’ll buy the audio version of David’s book.”
Sarafina: “If Moxie gets the book, I’d better get the book. It looks much tastier than Kibbles. Besides, I’ve heard reading is a novel idea!” |
Thanks for the support, Sarafina. Moxie says she thinks you’d enjoy the book. Speaking of which… |
“Moxie, looks like you’ve had fun playing with Marley this morning.” “Yeah, but….” “But?” “He’s a puppy.” “And?” “Is he always going to be here?” “No, he’ll go home soon.”
“Good. I think I need some alone time now.” |
Read Recent Issues of Our Land |
September 21, 2022: Donald Trump and the birth of QMaga; American Psychosis in the news; House of the Dragon versus The Rings of Power; and more. September 17, 2022: American Psychosis and the reckoning of history; the Mailbag; MoxieCam™; and more.
September 13: What Barack Obama said to me about the 47 percent video; the release of American Psychosis; and more.
September 10, 2022: A death in Washington and a very Trumpian conspiracy theory; American Psychosis update; Dumbass Comment of the Week (Donald Trump Jr.); the Mailbag; MoxieCam™; and more.
September 7, 2022: Donald Trump and gaslight fascism; the conservative crazy gets crazier; American Psychosis: the first review; a brilliant after-the-Vietnam War novel and Dark Winds; and more. September 2, 2022: Snowflake fascists and the GOP politics of rubber and glue; American Psychosis tease of the week; Dumbass Comment of the Week (Blake Masters); Michael Ondaatje’s The Cat’s Table and Sara Watkins’ “You and Me”; the Mailbag; MoxieCam™; and more.
August 26, 2022: In praise of preaching to the choir; American Psychosis tease of the week; J.D. Vance and the podcaster who said “feminists need rape”; Dumbass Comment of the Week (Mitch McConnell); comparing The Old Man, Westworld, and For All Mankind; the Mailbag; MoxieCam™; and more
August 19, 2022: Has Biden learned from Obama’s big #fail?; American Psychosis tease of the week; conflicted feelings about Liz Cheney; Dumbass Comment of the Week (Ted Cruz); Better Call Saul’s magnificent finale; MoxieCam™; and more. August 5, 2022: The January 6 Rudy Giuliani mystery; American Psychosis tease of the week; Dumbass Comment of the Week (Alex Jones); the Mailbag; MoxieCam™; and more. July 29, 2002: We need to worry about Christian nationalism; American Psychosis tease of the week; Stranger Things jumps a ghoulish shark; Steve Earle honors his forebears; Joni Mitchell’s glorious return; MoxieCam™; and more. |
|
|
Got suggestions, comments, complaints, tips related to any of the above, or anything else? Email me at ourland@motherjones.com. |
|
|
|