Wormwood

A Scary Tale: MAGA’S HALLOWEEN NIGHTMARE

The above image I call “Socio,” the Halloween ghost haunting MAGA politicians this year, rattling their sleep with nightmares of lost elections. “What to do? How do we survive?” Devoid of a productive platform or a shred of moral standing, the only strategy appears to be “Attack.”

MAGA politicians have decided to attack the way they always do when confronted by their godawful record. They find a word and invest it with a singularly horrible meaning and ascribe it to their enemy. And what word is scarier than the old right-wing bugaboo— socialism (or its sister “communism”). The very sound causes them to recoil in terror, as when Hamlet confronted his father ‘s ghost: “O horrible, horrible, most horrible.”

Having drained the deepest well of lies in earthly soil since January 6, 2021, MAGA is digging deeper and darker. Like the witches from Macbeth, MAGA is again scouring the underworld, as they did when they created their “voodoo economic theory,” to find a potion that will make the word “socialism” a weapon to destroy Democrats.

In magic, folklore, and fantasy fiction, words are rarely just symbols—they are literal weapons, tools of creation, and instruments of destruction. This concept relies on the ancient idea of Logos (the word as a cosmic force) and the belief that uttering a specific sound can physically alter reality.1

On the topic of ghosts, House Majority Leader, Mike Johnson, recently conjured the ghosts of Joe McCarthy, Richard Nixon, and Ronald Reagan, while railing against Democrats as “communists,” warning that “the barbarians are inside the gate. . . [dangerous because] this election is for all the marbles.” Trump, no stranger to violent incantation, calls Democratic Socialists “hardcore, godless communists” and ironically “the most serious threat to our country since its existence.”2

The Democratic Socialists of America are MAGA’s latest 3-D bogeyman. Unsurprisingly, they loom larger in the jaded MAGA imagination than in reality. “Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) represent a very small fraction—less than 1%—of candidates running in U.S. elections, functioning mostly as a minor wing within the Democratic Party.”3

Polling from the Pew Research Center indicates that “roughly one-third of Democrats and Democratic-leaning independents view democratic socialists favorably. And those who are Democratic Socialists, like AOC or Bernie Sanders share a vision, not of gulags, state control of major industries, or authoritarian rule. Their vision “is more aligned with Scandinavian nations such as Denmark and Sweden, where universal health care and a wide range of social benefits — and higher taxes — are the norm, but capitalism prevails.”4 Interestingly, this generation of voters is not as intimidated by the concept of socialism as earlier generations5 — especially since they have seen the ugly face of fascism in our current administration.

Despite this harsh reality, MAGA is investing their version of socialism with the sum of all evils, hoping to create an illusion so powerful that otherwise sane people will forget (1) that Trump’s favorite leaders are communists and authoritarian; (2) that Trump himself has befouled the altar of Holy Capitalism by taking a government stake in no less than thirty private companies, and (3) that Trump has taken the “free” out of the “free market,” by making insider trading a feature of his larger grift.

So, in order for MAGA’s boiling cauldron to produce an illusion powerful enough to alter reality when the word “socialism” is uttered, a potion similar to the one that bedeviled Macbeth is required, one that will include old and new poisonous ingredients:

Text within this block will maintain its original spacing when publishedFillet of fenny snake In the cauldron boil and bake.Jowls of Newt and toe of PamChin of Mitch, Eye of KashNose of Turk and Tartar's lipsNatalie's leg, Alito's cred,Clip of stuff atop Trump's head,Noem’s eyelash, JD’s couch.Double, double, toil and trouble;Fire burn, and cauldron bubble.

Black magic is the scoundrel’s refuge. But it is a tricky gambit. MAGA must hope their curse, taps into a deep dark mojo and hits its target but does not redound to their disadvantage. The risk is that most American voters, weary of their lies, will see the ploy for the shallow distraction it is. MAGA might even experience the unexpected reversal that dabbling with black magic had on Macbeth.

Text within this block will maintain its original spacing when publishedAnd be these juggling fiends no more believedThat palter with us in a double sense,That keep the word of promise to the earAnd break it with our hope.

Trick or treat?