We're Only In It For The Money
In response to the Beatles’ Sgt. Peppers’ cover, Frank Zappa dressed his Mothers of Invention in Lonely Hearts Club Band costumes and released the album, “We’re Only In It For The Money.” It wasn’t aimed at the Beatles per se, but was biting social commentary about how money had corrupted artists and music.
Today, it seems as though politicians, “affinity” groups, and political parties have only money on their minds.
A lesson that was driven home to insurers at the dawn of the commercial television era is that fear of loss sells. Hope for gain does not. That’s why you never see an insurance company advertisement with happy go lucky families playing on the lawn. Instead it’s a fully engaged house fire, crackling over fire department radio transmissions. They usually add a whimpering child wrapped up in a firefighter’s blanket for pathos.
The simple truth they learned is that people will rip their underwear getting the money out of their pockets when you scare him badly enough.
I’m always interested in how these things operate, and I’m a glutton for punishment, so I subscribe to Rupert Murdoch’s Wall Street Journal (he also owns Fox News, which I watch until it jumps the shark (that usually takes about ten minutes). I’m also on a number of “conservative” email lists that aren’t really conservative at all. There’s never any mention of fiscal responsibility or small government. Just scare tactics intended to empty my wallet, like Trump’s OMB director, Russ Vought’s Center for Renewing America, CauseACTION/Clarion News, and Tucker Carlson’s Daily Caller, among others.
Each breathlessly tells me that the world is about to end, and the only way to stop it is to DONATE NOW!
Give your information by subscribing to one of these sites, and soon your inbox will be flooded with a dozen other similar fundraisers. I get no fewer than three emails a day from the Former Guy who wants me to know that in order to get him reinstated this month, I need to DONATE NOW!!
There is, interestingly, never a word about legislative priorities. Nothing about infrastructure, the debt, the budget, trade, international relationships, or domestic policy. The only thing they write about education is when they flog the Critical Race Theory boogeyman (usual stuff: Marxist indoctrination, socialist intent, etc.) to try to scare the money out of my bank account.
Of course in addition to accessing my piggy bank, they hope to undermine faith in our elections to the degree that we’ll willingly run into the arms of authoritarians who can’t win in a fair fight.
As the formerly robust Middle Class has seen its fortunes decline over the last forty years, and its members have watched the rich get richer, their resentment has fueled the culture wars “conservatives” have used to enrich themselves. The politics of resent is resonant, and the Trump-like groups whose grievances against LGBTQ, BLM, and democracy itself have fueled their rise.
The more outrageous, the better. Right behind Trump in this fundraising orgy, you’ll predictably find Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Pluto) (the Jewish space lasers are causing forest fires lady) and Ron Johnson (R-WI) (the FBI was behind the Capitol riots guy). Proof that the crazier your accusations, the more money you can raise.
There’s never any there, there. But they know that whipping certain alienated citizens into a frenzy of fear of replacement always rings the cash register, so DONATE NOW!
Here’s a typical day’s fundraising emails in my Junk Folder:
Trump: 8:07am “I’m inviting you to my rally…Donate Now”
National Republican Senate Committee: 11:46am “Are you still a Republican? Stop Democrats’ Radical Mandates…Donate NOW.”
Nancy Pelosi: 12:32 pm “Please…Donate Now.”
Trump: 12:16 pm “What happened? I thought I could count on you…Donate Now”
Conservative Intel: 12:46 pm “Stand with Republicans. Stop Vaccine Passports…Donate Now.”
Trump: 4:32pm “I hope you know how much your support means to me. Donate NOW”
National Republican Senate Committee: 2:40pm “You don’t want to miss this…Donate Now.”
Trump: 4:32pm “Official Presidential Announcement…I hope you know how much you mean to me…Donate Now.”
And by the way, there is a difference between the conniving profiteers and the man to whom they say they pledge all. Donald Trump is not cynical like them, he is deluded. While they have my ire, he has my sympathy. Unlike those who are profiting off of his Stop The Steal campaign, he actually believes the election was stolen.
For what it’s worth, I also subscribe to a bunch of Democratic lists. Just as in the above example, which was for Thursday August 5th, I usually get one fundraising email a day. I’m grateful they don’t pollute my inbox the way the others do, but I wonder how far behind they are in fundraising.
©2021 Jon Sinton for Progressive Agenda LLC