Anyone heard anything lately about a new media venture called Truth Social? That’s the name of the social media network that Donald Trump was going to launch after he finished raising a billion dollars from private investors to get this show on the road.
Only what happened is nothing happened. And because nothing happened, the fake news media forgot about the whole thing and so did everyone else.
But the truth is that Trump never needed to launch his own media network because he has unlimited, free access to right-wing and alt-right media whenever he wants to shoot his mouth off about anything. And since he would be chasing the same audience on his own media channel which right now tunes into Newsmax, Breitbart and the other alt-right shows, what’s the point?
When Trump burst on the political scene in 2015, he started getting media coverage on a daily basis from the entire media, and the more he blasted CNN, MS-NBC and the Big Three (NBC, CBS, ABC) for being ‘enemies of the people,’ the more these enemies featured him on prime-time news.
That being said, Trump as the primary target (or subject) of fake news political reporting seems to have finally begun to fade away. The only reason he received any fake news media coverage of his Texas rally over the weekend was because he promised to pardon the ‘patriots’ who stormed the Capitol on January 6th. This crazy statement was immediately attacked by some of his Trump’s Congressional allies, comments which also got mentioned by the fake news.
In other words, as we move into the second year of Joe’s Administration and Trump begins to find himself in the same company as Obama, Bush, Clinton, and Carter, he’ll break out from the doldrums of being a ‘former’ President only when and if he says something which is either phenomenally stupid, or ridiculously extreme, or both.
As long as Trump continues to dangle a possible return to the electoral wars in 2024, he’s got a chance of staying at the top of the leaderboard of past Presidents who usually only make a headline when they either check into a hospital or die. But in eight months, the GOP will have to start getting serious about who will lead their Presidential ticket the next time around, and in states like Florida, where the primary vote really counts, storm clouds are beginning to gather around Trump.
Today, a new Suffolk poll shows that Trump has a lead but a not very large lead against DeSantis if a GOP Presidential primary was held today. And this is the kind of poll result which will make other Republican Presidential wannabees begin thinking about jumping into the 2024 race.
What shocked and surprised everyone in 2016 was how quickly and easily Trump plowed through the GOP primary field. But if anything, what made Trump attractive in 2016 was the one thing he doesn’t have going for him this time around. Because the thing he had back then was that he was the new guy in town.
What’s so new today about calling his golfing partner Lindsay Graham a RINO or saying that Mike Pence was chicken-shit because he wanted to do what the Constitution said he had to do? Nothing, okay? Not one, goddamn thing.
For all the talk about how Trump is planning a 2024 campaign, I don’t think this really explains what Trump is doing or thinking right now. His big problem today is that he won’t be on the ballot in 2022, and if the GOP scores a big one on November 8th, he won’t be the only guy out there promoting himself for 2024. The last guy who ran for President after having been President was Teddy Roosevelt, who was President until 1908 but then stepped down in favor his good buddy, William Howard Taft.
Know what happened when the head of the Rough Riders ran for President again in 1912? He created his own national party, called the Progressive Party, and received a whole, big, whopping 88 electoral votes.
I would give anything to see Trump form a third party for 2024. And don’t put it past him because if nothing else, he could use such a situation to keep himself in the news.
Let’s remember that Trump ran not only against the Democrats in 2016 and 2020. He also ran against people who consider themselves to be situated inside he GOP tent. When you have that many scores to settle, you’ll do it any way you can.