“Say what you will about the tenets of national socialism dude, at least, it’s an ethos.”

That’s a line from my favorite movie, ‘The Big Lebowski.’ One that would never be quoted in any political context, unless there was a White Russian referendum on the ballot. The character Walter in the movie is trying to explain that nihilism, caring about nothing, is worse than the Nazi party in Germany from World War Two. I’m not sure that having a carefree attitude and getting blotto all the time like the nihilists in the film is as bad as the Nazis, but the Republican Party is so hungry for that fascism that I have to write.

An ‘ethos’ is a belief. The fundamental character or spirit of a culture as the dictionary defines it, and the ‘ethos’ of MAGA is to serve, vote, spin, and dilute everything that their cult leader, Donald Trump does. That is to say there is no ‘ethos’ of MAGA, it exists only to serve the figure at the top in the world’s largest self esteem project. The smallest man in the history of New York City needs his army of reality tv fans to bend at the knee to him.

Living in the era of Trump makes me ponder about the time of Bill Clinton’s scandal, I was just becoming aware of politics at that time, and it was inescapable. The same party that made a meal out of Clinton for indiscretions with a staffer has now made the spine of their party a man with a much worse resume of scandal than whatever happened with Monica. I am not exaggerating, embellishing or doing anything other than stating facts about Donald Trump by comparison with this next part.

He has been found civilly liable for rape. Say what you want about Monica, that was clearly consensual. He has cheated on all 3 of his wives, often very publicly, with tabloid stories that he quietly promoted behind the scenes. The Stormy Daniels affair occurred while his wife was home with their newborn child, and the now criminal cover up of that story has been litigated. A jury of 12 peers has convicted him unanimously of felony charges related to the falsification of business records to hide the affair and influence the election.

That was a disgusting paragraph to type, and when you consider that evangelicals are the most consistent part of his base, it really tells you a lot about religion in this country. They create the same messiah complex that paralyzes their ability to think rationally about the world with respect to god, and apply it to Trump. As a recovering Catholic, I know that this isn’t the morality the church teaches, and the recent comparisons to Christ as another ‘unfairly convicted’ person make me sick to my stomach. Not as a person of faith, but as a fan of socialist philosophers of which Jesus Christ is the most famous.

Make no mistake, the MAGA movement is a nihilist movement. There is no cause, there is no issue, there is no platform, there is only the fake tan savior. Savior from what exactly? The United States becoming less white? It has been since its inception in 1776. Savior from corruption? Are you fucking kidding me? If nepotism in politics is a problem, it is not the ‘Biden Crime Family’ of which no family members served in the White House. Savior? Save your breath.