If you needed any additional evidence that MAGA is more of a kleptocratic demimonde or criminal racket than a political movement, look at how Steve Bannon gravitated to Jeffrey Epstein just as the stench of disgrace became unbearable for most others. Or look at Trump’s otherwise inexplicable commutation of the sentence of fraudster George Santos. Marx wrote that the mob was drawn partially from “discharged jailbirds”—in Santos’s case, it’s literally true. The message there is clearly: “Support me, and I’ll take care of you.”
Actually, incompetent and compromised people are better from Trump’s perspective. They’re not capable enough to challenge his authority, and they owe him completely, without him they’re sunk.
And you have to be really incompetent in order not to be able to muster a challenge for Trump. The man literally shuffles around shitting his pants and doesn’t know the basic facts of almost anything. That’s why the whole thing is such a motley assortment of weirdos and failures.
