There is No Shared Interest between Marxists & MAGA
You can't "unite" with those who disagree upon your core belief.
This weekend, Jackson Hinkle, a self-professed “Patriotic Socialist,” brewed a particularly unserious Twitter discourse when he suggested a unified movement of “Marxists & MAGA.”
Like many Professional Posters who come before him, Hinkle has followed the money, gradually moving from Leftist politics to Right Wing politics. Just recently, he undertook the ceremonial graduation of this journey, appearing on Tucker Carlson.
I’m not outright opposed to Leftists going on Fox News (Chris Smalls did a great job), but Jackson’s appearance wasn’t for the purpose of moving disaffected viewers towards working-class politics. Instead, Hinkle whined about Joe Biden’s recent speech being “dictator-inspired,” hoping to win favor with the Fox News viewership for his own celebrity.
This is known as “Pulling a Glenn Greenwald.” (Dave Rubin recently completed this transition, which I covered in my Read & Roast of his book.)
While one could write an encyclopedia about the factors that drive a once dedicated leftist like Hinkle to play sock puppet for the far right, our time is much better spent debunking the notion that the working class should align with the MAGA base.
While many think “MAGA” is synonymous with “working class,” it is not. While Trump’s most vocal supporters may be burly men who like beer, guns, and trucks, the masculine aesthetic does not make these people “workers.” That is decided by their relationship to the means of production.
Data on voting by income brackets is self-reported, so it should be taken with a grain of salt. But what data we do have shows that the median Trump voter is wealthier than the median American. According to exit polls during the 2016 primary, the median Trump-voting household earned $72,000 a year, about 28% higher than the median American household ($56,000).
Income alone does not dictate someone’s class, but it does indicate a preference for business owners over workers, as owners by definition earn more. This is supported by polling from the 2020 election, which shows a majority of small business owners (53%) supported Trump over Biden.
This is where Hinkle’s idea for a [MAGA + Workers] coalition crumbles. Based on what we can measure, MAGA draws support from wealthier, bourgeois Americans. This puts them at direct odds with a working-class, Marxist movement.
While we have many objectives, the core of Leftist politics is to emancipate workers from the exploitation of wage labor. Not everyone in the labor movement is a Socialist, but all sympathize with our principal that without labor, capital is obsolete, driving our belief labor (workers) should receive more of the value they create.
As the MAGA base derives support from business owners, reactionaries, and wealthier-than-average Americans, it is in direct opposition to the interest of the workers.
Hinkle claims we must “work with those we disagree with” to achieve our goals. But it is precisely those goals upon which we disagree. Such a coalition would ask the Left to sacrifice the principals we hold most dear, rendering us nothing more than an audience of angry YouTube viewers and Twitter users. Clicks and re-Tweets would make Jackson Hinkle’s life better, but they do nothing for the American worker.
With all due respect to Mr. Hinkle (none), I politely decline his offer.
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Should have waited a day to embed this tweet! https://twitter.com/jacksonhinklle/status/1569738720831746049?s=20&t=ZUX6oT4MLErkx54K6vylAg. Kissing the top boot of the GOP.
I've known Hinkle for years, he's a fraud who will say anything for likes.