Breitbart News chief will now run Donald Trump's campaign
Donald Trump has shaken up his campaign again, naming the head of Breitbart News to run his campaign [1]:
Donald J. Trump today announced that Breitbart News Executive Chairman Stephen K. Bannon has been appointed CEO, temporarily stepping down from his role with Breitbart News to work full-time on Mr. Trump’s campaign in a new position designed to bolster the business-like approach of Mr. Trump’s campaign. In addition, nationally respected pollster and Republican campaign strategist Kellyanne Conway, Founder and President of The Polling Company, Inc./WomanTrend, a privately held, woman-owned corporation, has been promoted to Campaign Manager. Paul Manafort will remain as Campaign Chairman and Chief Strategist.
Obviously, Manafort - a shady GOP operative linked to Putin - should have never been hired in the first place and should have been long gone by now. Demoting him is at least a step in the right direction. However, because this is Trump we're talking about, he might have been demoted more because he wanted Trump to tone down his shtick rather than because of cash payments from shadowy figures.
What this means going forward is that Trump will be even more like Breitbart News: strongly us-vs-them, occasionally fact-free, oftentimes getting things wrong, and perfectly willing to just play to a relatively small echo chamber.
In order to halt Trump's slide in the polls, he needed, among many other things, to show voters he could be trusted with the nuclear launch codes. Would you trust anyone at Breitbart with the nuclear launch codes?
Trump needed to undercut Hillary to part of her base or to at least move those leaning towards supporting Hillary to support him instead. How often has Breitbart News ever done anything that undercut a Democratic Party leader to their base? Isn't it the case that Breitbart News only appeals to and is persuasive to those who already agree with them? To make matters worse, don't most Breitbart visitors - as shown by the comments - think of their opponents not as people who could be persuaded but as unpersons?
Trump needed to make smart arguments, like false compassion. How often has Breitbart News tried to make such arguments in a way that would undercut pro-mass immigration leaders to their base?
Trump needed to intellectually engage his opponents and show them wrong. How often has Breitbart News even tried to do that? As shown by the large numbers of deleted comments, how willing is Breitbart News to engage their opponents in debate? Don't they, like echo chambers on the left and the right, want to avoid debate as much as possible?
There are no doubt plenty of other people who Trump could have hired that would realize Trump needs to expand his base and that the audience at Trump's rallies doesn't reflect the electorate as a whole. Most of them won't have received secret cash payments from Putin cronies. They could "let Trump be Trump" to a certain extent, but get him to smarten things up and finally put USA first. Obviously, Trump doesn't want that.
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[1] donaldjtrump . com/press-releases/donald-j.-trump-announces-major-campaign-hires