Today’s episode of the Telos Press Podcast features a panel discussion of Timothy W. Luke’s new book, The Travails of Trumpification, published earlier this month by Telos Press. The discussion, in which Tim is joined by David Pan, Fred Siegel, and Mark S. Weiner, covers a range of topics and questions, including the meaning and origins of “Trumpification”; Trump’s contempt for democratic liberal norms; the emergence of a progressive habitus in the early twentieth century; the critique of liberal managerialism; the rhetoric of the “forgotten little guy” (à la Rodney Dangerfield); the purposeful use of ignorance to send up the degreed classes; the extent to which Trump emerged out of “Nixonland”; Trump’s undermining of the claims of scientific truth; the relationship of science to political interest, and how each should inform the other; the populist attack on the New Class; Trump’s elevation of individual winning over larger collective interests and the public good; the weakening of a rationalist epistemology on which democracy depends in favor of an ethos of pure power; how the Afghanistan withdrawal and the coronavirus pandemic exacerbated the public’s disdain for expertise; and how power might be shifted from the administrative state to the local level as a way of integrating all members of the public in political decision-making and thereby revitalizing citizenship. Timothy W. Luke’s The Travails of Trumpification is now available in our online store, where you can save 20% off the list price by using the coupon code BOOKS20.
About Timothy W. Luke’s The Travails of Trumpification
In this series of critical essays written over the course of Donald J. Trump’s presidency, from its chaotic early days to its calamitous end, Timothy W. Luke explores how the recent twists and turns in the civic life of the United States have precipitated a dangerous transformation of American political culture. Since 2016, Trump’s will to attain, and then retain, his office by whatever means necessary crossed red lines never before violated by any previous presidential administration. Even before his loss in the 2020 election, Trump sought to discredit America’s electoral process by challenging legal voting practices in key swing states on social media, in the courts, through executive agencies, and finally with violent riots, culminating in the disastrous attack on the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021. Yet while Trump himself no longer remains president, the “Trumpification” of the American political system persists today, with the majority of Republican politicians as well as Trump’s millions of devoted followers still firmly in the grip of his influence. The goal of the critical probes collected in this volume is to evaluate the “travails,” or excessive tribulation, pain, hardship, anguish, and agony, that his dangerous demagoguery has inflicted—and continues to inflict—on the nation’s democratic institutions and processes.
Praise for Timothy W. Luke’s The Travails of Trumpification
“Democracy is in crisis in the United States, and under the Trump regime the crisis turned into an impending catastrophe. Timothy W. Luke’s The Travails of Trumpification provides a brilliant and much needed analysis of the forces that produced Trump and their dire consequences. It also provides an insightful and crucial rendering of the danger that Trumpism continues to pose to the nation. Luke provides both a language of critique and an urgent call to act quickly to prevent both the idea and the reality of democracy from coming to an end. This is a book that should be read by everyone concerned about the fate of the United States and the future itself.”
—Henry A. Giroux, McMaster University Professor for Scholarship in the Public Interest and Paulo Freire Distinguished Scholar in Critical Pedagogy
“Timothy W. Luke’s The Travails of Trumpification critically engages the rise, dangers, and continual threats to U.S. democracy generated by the Trump presidency. Luke documents that Trump was a malevolent figure even before his forays into politics, and took his arrogance, narcissistic self-interest, contempt for democracy and the public, and destructive tendencies into his presidency. This volume provides a comprehensive overview of the ‘Trumpification’ of America and how Trump, his prejudices, his policies, and his base continue to threaten U.S. democracy, the environment, and our health and well-being. Well documented and argued, this is a book every U.S. citizen should read who is concerned with the United States’ survival and the values and traditions that constitute the best aspects of U.S. democracy.”
—Douglas Kellner, author of The American Horror Show: Election 2016 and the Ascent of Donald J. Trump (2017) and American Nightmare: Donald Trump, Media Spectacle, and Authoritarian Populism (2016)
The issue of the absolutely necessary transformation of the administrative state (beyond Trumpification) must be examined in much greater detail.
The suggestion by David Pan “that we just give them the money,” without any prior dramatic modifications in the present structures of administrative power (both domestically and internationally) risks an eventual Telos endorsement of contemporary efforts presently underway by the Federal Reserve, (to create a single Central Bank Digital Currency– leading to one Big Bank running our economy and distributing money directly to all of us) operating in co-ordination with the hybrid intelligence community/ big tech monopolies (solidifying an ever more powerful surveillance capitalism built around obscure but jointly managed NSA/big Tech data bases) and justified by liberal authoritarian/ and increasingly condescending Leninist elites spread across most disciplines within the academic community) in a joint attempt to save the political/economic status quo (what I would call sophisticated system stabilization under the guise of supposedly helping the average U.S. citizen economically)–and by such steps minimizing the possibility of ever going local or ever moving toward a vision of everyone becoming an insider.
I would also suggest that the popularity of Trump cannot be understood without delving into his capacity (whether intentional or not) to radiate an emotional resentment which profoundly resonates with a greater and greater proportion of the American populace–especially after living through the first year of the Biden regime.