Decoding the MAGA Universe - "Now it looks like he's not their criminal. He’s just a criminal, same as the rest."

It seems like an innocent age, in retrospect. 

Back in 2016 we all laughed about Pizza-gate - that crazy story about how Comet pizza restaurant was the global headquarters of a Democratic party pedophile ring. And QAnon got involved in there somehow too. And the mugging of Seth Rich. And how Obama was secretly running the country. And something called Frazzledrip about a snuff film on Anthony Weiner's laptop -- notice how mysterious laptops seem to keep popping up in MAGA conspiracy theories? 

Now we are finding out that millions of Americans apparently believe all this tripe. And more. Crazy more. And they believe in it sincerely.

 
Steve M / No More Mr Nice Blog

CONSPIRACIES: REPUBLICANS LIKE 'EM BIG AND STUPID
If you want to understand Republican voters, you can read a half-dozen New York Times focus groups ... or you can watch this podcast clip featuring former 60 Minutes correspondent Lara Logan and stuntman turned conspiratorial religious-right documentarian Mike Smith:

I will never get over the fact that this woman was once a respected 60 mins correspondent!

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— Yashar Ali 🐘 (@yasharali.bsky.social) July 24, 2025 at 6:39 AM

Steve M also gives us another clip from this bananapants interview - "Did you open any fridges and see a baby's head?" 

Steve continues:

A generation ago, some of the conspiracies on the right were fairly primitive -- the Clintons killed Vincent Foster! Michael Dukakis's wife once burned an American flag! The conspiracies gradually became more and more baroque (the Clinton death list, for instance) until, eventually, Michelle Obama was a man, Barack Obama was controlling Joe Biden's presidency remotely, and, of course, every rich "globalist" in the world was an ally of America's Democratic Party and was part of a global conspiracy to sexually exploit children and extract a chemical called adrenochrome from their bodies.
When Fox News largely controlled the right-wing infosphere, there was a limit to how mainstream a truly batshit conspiracy theory could become. But in the era of social media and podcasts, conspiracy-mongers just keep upping the ante.
And now the audience expects every explanation of the world from trusted media figures to have two characteristics: (1) It must be elaborate, baroque, and massive, and (2) its villains must be exclusively people the right-wing base regards as enemies.
The Lara Logan-Mike Smith allegations fit the bill nicely. (To the right, everyone in Hollywood is evil, apart from a handful of brave conservatives.) .....if we ever see the Epstein documents, Republicans will declare them fake as soon as they don't confirm the right's global pedophilia narrative. If Trump is implicated, or prominent Democrats aren't, they'll say the documents are fakes created by Obama, or by whoever controlled Joe Biden's autopen. There seems to be a bipartisan movement now to get at the truth, but it won't be bipartisan for long. Republicans need their craziest theories to be affirmed, and if that doesn't happen, they'll turn against the whole process.
And, of course, that's why the Trump Justice Department is trying to coerce testimony from Ghislaine Maxwell. The Trumpers want her to endorse the right's narrative, and when and if she does, we'll be told she's telling the truth and the documents are the real liars. And everyone on the right will say that's true.

Next, here's a fascinating deep-dive into what MAGA is thinking about Trump now. And no, of course it doesn't actually make any sense. But it does explain why Trump is failing.

 
John Stoehr / The Editorial Board

The Epstein scandal’s effect on maga is confusing liberals
“They elected a rapist, now they’re upset that he’s a rapist?” Not exactly.
Liberals should bear in mind that recent revelations by the Wall Street Journal would not have the impact they are having if the president had not already triggered a crisis of faith in the cult of maga. ...
...as far as maga was concerned, for the last decade or so, Trump has been the exception to the rule of everything, such that he could shoot someone on Fifth Avenue and not lose support. He could lead an attempted paramilitary takeover of the US government and not lose support. He could be friends with a child-sex trafficker and not lose support. No matter what he did, maga never held him accountable.
Why? In large part, because maga is in thrall to conspiracy theories that claim to explain how things work. One of them holds that the world is dominated by shadowy elites who control the government, the corporations and the media. This (Jewish) cabal is so powerful it can commit any crime – including the most heinous, like child-sex trafficking and even cannibalism – and get away with it, all while conspiring with allies, foreign and domestic, to bring America down.
Belief in these stories was so strong that even when Trump was found guilty of committing crimes, as he was before the election when a jury convicted him on 34 counts of fraud, he couldn’t possibly be that guilty in the eyes of maga. After all, his conviction was seen as proof of the conspiracy against him and America. The maga faithful was never going to believe he was a felon, because they believed he was just like them – a victim of a conspiracy of galactic proportions that justified virtually any reaction. If Trump had to become a dictator to defeat it, so be it.
If this were still the context for the president, recent revelations by the Wall Street Journal would not have had the impact they are currently having, because Trump’s followers would have understood those reports as proof of the conspiracy against him and America. News about Trump being in the Epstein files would have been seen as affirmation of the faith. News about Trump covering up his involvement would have been seen as a necessary move in the battle against evil.
But Trump can no longer have confidence in a context that made him the exception to every rule, because the maga faithful are now beginning to doubt whether he really is like them, which is to say, whether he really is a victim of the conspiracy against America.
When the US Department of Justice closed the case on Jeffrey Epstein earlier this month, Trump’s followers were forced to choose between their leader and their belief in a pernicious plot to destroy their way of life, and because they were not going to stop believing in their imaginary enemies, they were suddenly open to the possibility that Trump isn’t the man they believed him to be. It was a crisis of faith.
This crisis of faith is why Trump’s normal diversionary tactics are not working as they used to. With assistance from Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard, he tried to draw attention away from the Epstein scandal by accusing Barack Obama of “cheating” in the 2016 election. That might have worked when maga believed Trump is a victim of the deep state (which, in magaworld, is controlled by those who control Obama) but now that Trump won’t release the Epstein files, it’s no longer clear to maga whether he’s against “the globalists.”
This crisis of faith is also being seen as an opportunity by Republicans who believe the president has outlived his usefulness. With the GOP’s reconciliation bill now signed into law, there are very few policy fights left that do not take more than they give. ...
...The maga faithful were willing to overlook any of Trump’s crimes – if they recognized them as such – with the understanding that his were nothing compared to the crimes committed by perceived enemies so powerful that bringing them to justice required a man of action ready to break all the rules to get the job done. To maga, Epstein represented those enemies. To maga, Trump was that man of action. But now it looks like he’s not their criminal. He’s just a criminal, same as the rest.

And last night, South Park targeted MAGA exactly:

South Park is getting canceled after this lmao.

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— Alejandra Caraballo (@esqueer.net) July 23, 2025 at 9:59 PM

South Park went after CBS and Paramount too.

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— Alejandra Caraballo (@esqueer.net) July 23, 2025 at 10:23 PM

I wrote about last night's episode of South Park and why its creators clearly think Trump is a little fascist bitch. Read here: charlotteclymer.substack.com/p/south-park...

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— Charlotte Clymer (@charlotteclymer.bsky.social) July 24, 2025 at 2:00 PM

The White House was forced to react to South Park as Trump completely loses it with rage, calling the show “not relevant” and "hanging on by a thread," despite the show recently securing a $1.5 billion deal. Trump is considering suing over ‘tiny penis’ allegations.

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— Anonymous (@youranoncentral.bsky.social) July 24, 2025 at 12:29 PM

I can't hardly wait to see the "discovery" for a "tiny penis" lawsuit!