John Locher / AP
He’s the low-rent con artist everybody’s speaking about, and for Republicans, he’s the one we deserve.
I refer, in fact, to George Santos, the Republican congressman-elect who just lately was pressured to confess to “embellishing” info on his resume, together with (however not restricted to) his ancestry (he claimed to be Jewish…then later, “Jew-ish”), his job historical past (he claimed that he “labored straight" for Goldman Sachs), and his schooling (he claimed to have graduated from Baruch Faculty and New York College).
Others have identified similarities to the 1999 film, The Gifted Mr. Ripley, during which Tom Ripley (performed by Matt Damon) assumes a false id overseas. The movie was set in 1958, lengthy earlier than Google made sussing out imposters dramatically simpler. It’s price considering why Santos received away along with his ruse for thus lengthy.
One idea is that we needed to consider in him. As a buddy of mine noticed, “A Republican pretending to be overtly homosexual and Jewish is, in a bizarre method, an indication of progress.”
In all equity, we don’t know if he pretended to be homosexual; we do know he was married to a lady till September 2019. Nonetheless, my good friend has a degree in regards to the new development of posing as a member of a marginalized or victimized group. In a world the place progressives have adopted identities reminiscent of Native American or Black to advance professionally, a Republican politician posing as a homosexual Jewish Latino is just a lagging indicator.
As traditional, Donald Trump explains a lot of this. Santos’ victory represents a Republican Celebration that's concurrently extra various and welcoming (by way of race and sexual id) and fewer devoutly spiritual and ethical—whereas additionally being extra accepting of corruption and mendacity.
To some extent, every of these items—the great, the unhealthy, and the ugly—are reflections of Trump. That is to be anticipated. Within the greater than seven years since Trump got here down the escalator, a technology of Republicans have come of age with him as the usual bearer.
The Republican candidates this period has produced—Herschel Walker (a fake cop), Kari Lake (a fake populist), and now Santos (a fake all the pieces)—are indicative of a celebration that solely pretends it desires to manipulate.
On this regard, Santos is the huckster that the GOP deserves.
Nonetheless, in different methods, Santos appears basically totally different from the MAGA right-wingers now we have grown accustomed to of late.
For one factor, he appears so cheery. Even now, after being uncovered as a fraud, a lot of the TV section b-roll and all of the pictures related to columns (like this one) have a tendency to indicate a smiling younger man.
He’s extra Sam Bankman-Fried than Blake Masters or Marjorie Taylor Greene. To paraphrase Mike Huckabee, he is perhaps a fabulist, however he’s not indignant about it.
Pulling off a con requires that you just look the half, to make sure. However in a world the place Republicans are sometimes seen as sneering and indignant, Santos' affability helped him cover in plain sight. He's (in his personal phrases) “not a felony”—but when he had been, he’d be extra of a gentlemanly cat burglar than the political bomb throwers who propagate the correct as of late.
And relating to prevaricating, he actually is gifted. Whoever got here up with the entire “I stated I used to be ‘Jew-ish,’ not Jewish” spin deserves an award for deviousness. As Tennessee Rep. Steve Cohen put it, “That’s some chutzpah!”
It hearkens again to a less complicated time—extra Clintonian than Trumpian.
Think about Santos’ remark to the New York Publish: “I campaigned speaking in regards to the folks’s considerations, not my resume… I intend to ship on the guarantees I made in the course of the marketing campaign.”
Right here, Santos appears like Invoice Clinton saying he wanted to maneuver on from the Lewinsky affair and get again to “doing the work of the American folks” or no matter.
Just like the not-so-Jew-ish Santos, Clinton bullshitted and parsed language (together with the which means of “is”) for causes of self-preservation and professional development. Clinton needed to cowl up his naughty affairs; conversely, Trump’s lies pose an existential risk to liberal democracy.
Compared, Santos’ scandal feels virtually quaint.
Clinton and Trump each come from the technology that embraced postmodernism and eschewed goal fact. Each had been ordinary, shameless liars, and each refused to step down or stop combating—even when the opposite aspect had the products on them. It was solely a matter of time earlier than this worldview went totally mainstream.
What stunned me, nevertheless, was that it was the Republican Celebration that turned the default desire for the bold weirdos, pathological liars, and sure, confidence males (and ladies) who're all the time drawn to politics and energy.
As The Atlantic’sDavid Frum tweeted, “The alarming factor is that even now George Santos nonetheless doesn’t make the lower as one of many high 10 most reprehensible members of the 2023-24 Home GOP caucus.”
Each events have sketchy actors, however as we speak’s MAGA occasion is the pure dwelling of reprobates, charlatans, and grifters. On this regard, Santos—who nonetheless appears prone to be sworn in subsequent month—will match proper in.