MAGA is an exercise in futility, because it fails to confront the primary source of its problems - the investor class

Above: "Back of the Yards," oil on canvas, by Mitchell Siporin, WPA, 1938. Image courtesy of the Smithsonian American Art Museum.

Misplaced Ire

Ever since Donald Trump took office we have learned that diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) is the cause of all problems - from high prices to wildfires, and everything in between. And from the very beginning of its movement, MAGA (essentially, the Tea Party movement 2.0) has focused most of its anger on immigrants, Black Lives Matter, "libtards," and similar villains. But what it never seems to confront is the investor class - those Americans who make most of their money in the stock markets.

Many in the MAGA movement are lower income (see here, for example), and presumably upset about high prices, the loss of manufacturing jobs, the high cost of healthcare, stagnant wages, and so forth. But instead of recognizing how the investor class has done this to them--through stock buybacks, political donations (i.e., bribery to ensure policy preferences), offshoring jobs to take advantage of cheap labor (or importing cheap labor), wealth hoarding, etc.--MAGA directs most of its anger at other working-class folks, and also at low-income migrant workers (but rarely at the rich who lure migrant workers here, like Donald Trump and his billionaire donors, the Uihlein's).

Indeed, MAGA will soon reward the wealth-hoarding investor class with yet another round of tax cuts, provided courtesy of their president, billionaire Donald Trump, and the rest of the billionaire-owned Republican Party. We will be told the same lie that has been told for the past many decades - that if the wealthy receive tax cuts, they'll invest and create tons of wonderful jobs for everyone. The fact that we've been down this road several times before--via Reagan, Bush Jr., and Trump 1.0--and the fact that people are still economically downtrodden and angry (in fact, even worse so) doesn't seem to faze MAGA voters at all. What's that saying?... about doing the same thing over and over again, expecting different results, and insanity?

As long MAGA voters give the investor class a free pass (and indeed, reward them with more and more tax cuts), and focus their attention on DEI, Black Lives Matter, low-income migrant workers, "libtards," and the "Biden Crime Family," their movement will be an exercise in futility. The investor class will continue to prey upon them financially, wrecking them with usury, long-term healthcare costs, high prescription drug prices, high prices for goods and groceries, a constant push to raise the Social Security retirement age, pathetic 401k's instead of fixed pension plans, job outsourcing, and a whole array of regressive taxes, tolls, fees, fines, and utility rates at the state and local level--see, e.g., "Who Pays? 7th Edition" (Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy)--to pay for tax cuts for themselves at all levels of government.

MAGA voters are being duped by the investor class--just as the Tea Party movement was--and we're all going to pay a terrible price for it. And it doesn't help, of course, that the Democratic Party is also bought and paid for by the rich, forcing it to speak out of both sides of its mouth on matters that affect the working class.

"[MAGA] concerns have been exploited and manipulated by Republicans who have traumatized them into believing that liberalism, rather than capitalism, is the source of their ills; that because of the evil policies of liberals, they keep working harder and harder but never seem to break even, much less get ahead."

--Rich Logis, "MAGA's true believers don't understand capitalism — Trump will teach them a hard lesson," Salon, January 26, 2025.