Chris Jepson: America's political pornography

I abruptly awoke one recent night with the word “pornographic” seared in my mind. It quickly combined with “politics” and I returned to sleep with an idea on how to describe the 2016 Republican presidential primary.

Merriam-Webster offers its third definition of pornography as “the depiction of acts in a sensational manner so as to arouse a quick intense emotional reaction (the pornography of violence).”

Without a doubt, that is what the United States is now witnessing, political pornography.

The current Republican presidential primary race may be the most degrading national political contest since 1800 when Vice President Thomas Jefferson ran against John Adams, then president of the United States. Here’s an example of one Federalist Party insult hurled at Jefferson, “Are you prepared to see your dwellings in flames... female chastity violated... children writhing on the pike? Great God of compassion and justice, shield my country from destruction.”

President Adams was described as a “hideous hermaphroditical character which has neither the force and firmness of a man, nor the gentleness and sensibility of a woman.”

“Firmness of a man” reminds me of Donald Trump and that little is new in politics. What are we to make of a political exchange between the Republican presidential candidates questioning the size of Mr. Trump’s, uh, hmmm, manhood? It’s comical, it is—rather, it would be—if it were not part of our political process.

The unremarkable South Florida fluff, Marco Rubio, intimates that because Donald Trump has small hands (I hadn’t really noticed) that something else—undoubtedly—must be small. That’s undeniably funny stuff, if uttered by a Vegas strip comedian. Alas, sigh, Unremarkable Marco desperately wants to lead America and considers such quips as appropriately presidential. Recommendation to Unremarkable Marco: fire that speechwriter.

Unquestionably, Unremarkable Marco was relentlessly taunted, described by Donald Trump as being little Marco. Too funny. Mr. Trump ultimately responded that he’s just fine below the belt, no doubt, HUGE. And that is what passes as intelligent political discourse between America’s Republican presidential candidates.

Let’s, however, delve into the real political pornography of the Republican presidential race.

Republican candidate Ted Cruz offered last December while campaigning in Iowa that, “we will utterly destroy ISIS. We will carpet bomb them into oblivion. I don't know if sand can glow in the dark, but we're going to find out.” Such inflammatory rhetoric is political pornography, spoken to the uninformed to sound “tough,” offering a simplistic solution to a complex problem. Not to mention that “carpet bombing” today is a war crime.

The ultimate Republican example of pornographic politics is their relentless use of the dog whistle of racism. Since Nixon’s Southern Strategy to Ronald Reagan kicking-off his 1980 presidential campaign in Philadelphia, Miss. and declaring, “I believe in states’ rights,”— this is sweet music to the ears of disaffected whites as was Donald Trump’s reluctance to “immediately” separate himself from David Duke, former grand wizard of the Ku Klux Klan.

Robert Mann, chair of journalism at LSU’s Manship School of Mass Communication observed, “After watching him romp through the early weeks of the Republican Party’s primary season – spewing hate, stoking xenophobia and attacking the Washington establishment – this thought keeps coming to mind: Is Donald Trump just David Duke in a better suit?”

It is helpful to understand the hypocrisy of Republicans when they deplore the coarsening of America when they themselves are the main political pornographers of our times.