We Must Go to the Root of This Political Crisis

Assuming Amendment XXII of the Constitution really means what it says that it and remains in force in the next few years, the nation will most likely be rid of Donald Trump and possibly Republican control of the Senate in 2028. And in 2026, we could very well be rid of the razor-thin Republican majority in the House of Representatives. But we can’t be rid of half of the American public.

49.7% of citizens who turned out to vote in 2024 – more than 77 million people – cast their ballots for a twice-impeached convicted felon who declared business bankruptcy four times. That bloc of voters will not just disappear or be magically persuaded to drop support for a lawless and deranged president and a cowering Republican regime that backs him up.

So we need to go to the root of this problem. There is of course more than one root, but the thickest and ugliest one is the right-wing media.

Half of the American public has been brainwashed by TV, radio, web, and print publications that are unabashedly in the business of stoking hatred and appealing to the basest, most ignorant instincts and prejudices for profit – often with lies, conspiracy theories and deliberate misinformation. These enterprises have some of the largest audiences in America and as a result, they receive a large chunk of advertising budgets. Those budgets are the fuel the propels this propaganda ecosystem. Take away the economic incentive to create this malevolent content – by which I mean advertising dollars – and no rational business manager will want to continue producing it.

We must therefore use every form of pressure available – on advertisers, ad agencies, audiences, and the media companies themselves to stop the flow of propaganda that drives xenophobia, racism, vindictiveness, and the flippant dismissal of rule of law and common decency. We must let marketers know that we do not approve of their ad dollars supporting this kind of content. The good news is, marketers can and will respond to that kind of pressure. As a life-long advertising professional, I can tell you with certainty that the marketing people at these companies really do pay attention to these kinds of complaints – and they are quite often responsive, and in some cases, even over-react to negative feedback from consumers.

Now, there are certainly other drivers of these mean-spirited attitudes besides right-wing media. Families of origin, religious organizations, local communities, and social networks all contribute to the formation of political beliefs. And sheer force of habit and the need for reinforcement of existing attitudes also comes into play. But right-wing media is the force that regularly exploits these attitudes and amplifies them as a business model, and it is in the power of consumers to restrain that force. Interestingly, the capitalist marketplace that these media claim to revere is the very thing that can cut them down to size.

Institutions, laws, and court decisions are core elements of our political world but they have little effect without the political will of the people. In the wake of the 1954 Brown v. Board decision, for example, little changed to remove segregation in America, and in fact the provisions of the decision were brazenly transgressed and vigorously fought by many, particularly in the South. It was not until the Civil Rights Movement gained traction a decade later, through civil disobedience and the placement of civil rights prominently on the national agenda, that Jim Crow laws and overtly racist policies began to be unraveled in actual practice. And still, despite laws and court decisions upholding principles of political and social equality, the promise of Brown v. Board remains unfulfilled. Even as these legal-institutional developments began to proceed, and recognizing the limits of judicial and legislative action, President Eisenhower stated “I do not believe we can cure all the evils in men’s hearts by law.”^[1] He was perhaps stating the obvious.

Nearly a century earlier, Lincoln famously declared, “Public sentiment is everything. With public sentiment, nothing can fail; without it nothing can succeed. Consequently he who moulds public sentiment, goes deeper than he who enacts statutes or pronounces decisions. He makes statutes and decisions possible or impossible to be executed.”^[2] We need to take that advice with the utmost seriousness.

Democracy and rule of law can win at the ballot box and in the courts and in public offices. But these things can’t really be preserved in an enduring manner without the public will. And the formation of the public will is where we have to start. We must vigorously, strategically, and systematically fight media that promote prejudice in the minds of millions of citizens – and that make lawlessness and autocracy somehow acceptable. Trump and his cult are at war with long-standing American values and core features of our system of government. But we can start to deny them of their most potent weapon.

--

Arthur Beckman is a political scientist and advertising copywriter. He has taught at George Washington University and colleges of The City University of New York and is working on a book called Data and Democracy: Political Marketing Research in the United States.

---

^[1] https://civics.supremecourthistory.org/article/brown-as-the-beginning/

^[2] Lincoln, Speech at Ottawa, Illinois on August 31, 1858. https://digital.lib.niu.edu/islandora/object/niu-lincoln%3A38360