Trickle down, like heaven, requires delayed gratification
Well the Republican candidates are at it again. Pushing that trickle down economic theory. The idea is manifest in all Republican policy issues. Venerate the oligarchy and they will eventually reward you. It’s kind of like the heaven argument. You can’t see it, there is no data to provide proof, you’re just gonna’ have to make that leap of faith.
Herein seems to lie the confluence of the right wing with faith based communities. The conjoining is especially strong where Calvinistic notions reside. Only some shalt be saved. Get in the club or be damned.
Seeking security, and with time explanation, ancient peoples sorted out the travesty of the natural world events like hurricanes, lightning and earthquakes. Shuddering around a cave entrance some ancient in primitive language ascribed the events to a supernatural influence. Originally a pantheon of gods it eventually in the west boiled down to monotheism. Sort of a “one ring to rule them all” concept. Demigods took the form of archangels and eventually a community leader by the name of Lucifer become the devil incarnate, a fallen demigod.
Some of us left the cave. Some remain behind. They repeat the ancient legends of explaining relation of life to afterlife. Suffer now, get the reward later. The original focus group language. Use the kind of language that leads the gullible. Convince them of your version of the truth.
Belief in the delayed is a common thread between the right wing political message and western religious fundamentalism.
Consider it this way. You have an agenda, perhaps a hidden one. You need support in the electorate to move the votes. You know the critical thinkers are not easily suckered. So your attention turns to those you consider susceptible.
Now how to package your message? Well the most malleable to accept a preposterous postulate would be the same folks known to accept some other unproven argument. What can you say that parallels the same message your target audience accepts.
Well, you might just choose the notion of heaven. The delayed gratification message. Suffer now because eternity awaits.
The Jesuits were particularly good at merging beliefs. They had little or no qualms about the convergence of primal religious belief with their monotheism. Find the buy in point and build on that. South America would be the example given. There you’ll find pagan figureheads in the aisles adjacent to the nave.
This is what is transpiring today. Republicans are making a sell. They are using the language which is so effective elsewhere. In the Judeo-Christian arena there was Eden. Some place in the past from which humankind has been damned. The last place where family values, zero regulations, no taxes and the right wing’s panacea of non-government interference existed.
Surrender to the argument. Make that leap of faith. At some point the rich will share. Only some shalt be saved.
In the model of trickle down, suffer now, the reward comes later. Never mentioned is the fact you may not live to see it… kind of like heaven.
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