Explaining the Insurrection

Last night, I looked again at CNN coverage of the Insurrection and realized that there was more to say.

On November 4th, I explained the economic desperation of working class trump voters and called for compassion. On January 7th, I called for the arrest of Donald Trump for instigating the riot. He still can be arrested, although it might be hard to prove the case from his texts - although the body language is unmistakable. My point was that if he were arrested, he could be sent for examination at Walter Reed and removed from office under the 25th Amendment. Friday, I restated my argument on why the March for Life should be ended, because the focus on overturning Roe v. Wade is misguided because it is impossible to do under the Constitution. This morning, I will pull all of these threads together.

Poor people are unlikely revolutionaries. Radical movements usually arise from middle class grievance. The wealthy generally do not resort to revolution, as they can usually buy off both sides of any vote on taxes, although they will generally fund efforts to keep Republicans in power. They are smart enough, however, to stop way short of the kind of stupidity found found in the Insurrection and the QAnon movement. 

So what possessed the White working class to get so out of control. I have already answered the question - abortion. The working class can be mobilized around this issue - and deliberately have been.

Pro-life true believers, egged on by Catholic and Evangelical pastors and bishops, find abortion abhorrent. So abhorrent that they believe in violence to accomplish their ends, which is banning abortion through the appointment of pro-life judges. 

Trump and McConnell seemingly gave them what they wanted, so they ignore his personal flaws and see him as some sort of savior for the unborn. Any Democrat, even a Catholic, is tainted. Especially any Catholic. I am assured by my classmates from Catholic High School that this is, in fact the case. Some of them even cheered the Insurrection and now blame it on Antifa. 

If you listen closely to the rhetoric of those who would deny Joe Communion, their argument is that he waters down the pro-life message of the Church as a whole. Even if Joe promised to appoint pro-life judges, they go after him on his support for marriage equality and trans people. 

The sexism of conservative pastors is not the only driver of their movement. As demonstrated by their signage, the Evangelicals also bring racism and anti-Antisemitism to the party. Indeed, they only joined the pro-life movement because open racism was no longer socially acceptable, although Donald Trump did certainly let what was repressed into the open. Years of Rush Limbaugh laid the groundwork for Trumpism. 

The key to reversing this alliance is to speak truth about abortion, starting with the Catholic bishops. While many already know it, they toe the party line. They have the unenviable position of having to teach Catholic morals as others bring those morals into the service of the Republican coalition.

Joe Biden, as a Catholic, is uniquely qualified to spell out why abortion can never be legal. Mario Cuoumo used pluralism as his out. Where Mario brought personal reluctance to the party, his son is a strong advocate for abortion rights, with the President somewhere in the middle. 

Catholic doctrine has supported freedom of conscience since Vatican II, although conservative bishops do not seem to have gotten the memo. Specifically, it is no longer the view of the Church that Catholic countries must push doctrine, while Catholic politicians in non-Catholic nations must fight for the freedom of the Church (so it can convert the masses to go to Mass). Bishops still support abortion bans, but they do not understand how constitutional systems will never allow such things to happen.

The fall back for the Church is social democracy, to wit, families must be paid a living wage - enough to raise a family. Support for organized labor (but not strikes) was part of this picture. Pius XI even conceded that women can work if the father cannot make adequate income for a decent existence. When the economy cannot support decent incomes (and in the era of Reaganomic tax policy, especially after the 1986 tax reform, it certainly cannot), state-based income redistribution is called for. 

President Ford was the first to sign the Child Tax Credit, which has grown over time. In the Tax and Job Cuts Act, which Speaker Ryan and Chairman Brady pushed through, the credit was increased and replaced by a higher CTC. If the mortgage interest and SALT deductions were ended, rather than limited, the CTC could go as high as $6,000 a year - although the system does not know how to distribute so much money.

Joe Biden and Kamala Harris have proposed increasing the CTC by $1000 and would make it refundable, so that wages could be supplemented for any size family (rather than just families with more than 3 children. 

Joe has not sold this as a Catholic issue. He should. He must also give the rest of Catholic Democrats cover by explaining to the bishops and the voters why Roe can never be overturned or abortion banned (along the lines that I wrote on Friday). The current messaging goes right to the feminist argument, which Joe supports, but leaves out the intermediate argument on income redistribution.

The working class does not like to think that they need such support, even when they do, and they certainly do not want to subsidize other people's sexuality with such payments. Stressing this is how we can then explain that, yes, opposition to abortion is about controlling women's bodies.

If Joe shames the bishops into advocating his economic plans and educates them on the constitutional law aspects of Roe, enough of them will concede the argument, mobilize the pro-life movement to declare that such support is a pro-life issue and admit to the partisanship of some of their members. 

A more complicated argument has not been made publicly, both because it is easier to mobilize women than to attack the position of the bishops directly. The bishops, however, can handle complicated arguments. Many are actually in the dark about them. 

It is time for the President, as a Catholic, to shine a light on the issue in a way that President Obama could not. There is some risk of alienating Catholic voters by appearing disloyal, but those who think that way are not voting Democratic anyway. Now is the time for courage.

We will never convert those who would go so far as to support the Insurrection, but that is not most Catholics. Rahm Emanuel noted that a crisis should never be wasted. This is one of those times. The pro-life movement needs to be divided badly enough that Trumpism can never again exist in large numbers. Otherwise, next time will be worse.