Why the establishment dumped Trump

As if horrified by the monster they created with unrestrained publicity, some of the corporate media have turned against the current Republican presidential candidate. Their fury borders on panic.

They had already done irreparable harm by repeating ad nauseam Donald Trump’s racist, misogynist and xenophobic rants. They allowed KKK and Nazis to mobilize under the wings of his candidacy.

The New York Times now leads the reversal, attacking him daily in articles, editorials and op-eds. The Times’ focus does nothing to reverse his racism. No, it is aimed at making sure Hillary Clinton is the next CEO of U.S. imperialism. Trump, they fear, will say or do something outrageous that harms U.S. ruling-class interests.

Joining Times editorialists are CIA honchos, Pentagon generals and Wall Street economists, even psychologists who analyze Trump’s “narcissistic personality disorder.”

Their collective message is “Vote for Clinton at all costs. Or else.”

What’s revealing are their reasons.

Even a stopped clock is right twice a day. Trump may fall short of that standard. But in his quest for issues that resonate with the public or the media, he sometimes strikes home. And brings down the establishment attacks on his head.

He said, for example, that NATO no longer had its Cold War mission and had outlived its usefulness, that Russia did not really invade Ukraine and that Vladimir Putin is a strong leader.

Given his history, there is no reason to believe Trump will actually stand strong for these statements longer than it takes to post his next tweet. He just hopes to hit paydirt with a hot issue. That’s what a demagogue does. And the people want peace.

What the corporate media reveals, though, and we cite the Times as an example, is that the ruling class prefers a tested warmonger in the White House. One like Clinton.

The Times and Clinton promote NATO, which U.S. strategy has turned from an anti-Soviet pact into an aggressive war machine. Since the 1990s NATO has made war on Yugoslavia, Afghanistan, Iraq and Libya and surrounded Russia from the West, all with Clinton’s approval.

The Times and Clinton also attack Russia for defending its naval base in the Crimea — whose people prefer Russia — from a pro-West coup regime in Kiev supported by fascists. Clinton is OK with coup regimes, as she showed in Honduras. She and her team of neo-cons and former Cold Warriors will assuredly boost NATO and attack Putin.

With people in general, both Clinton and Trump are unpopular at historic levels. They both earned the people’s disdain. Clinton is a pro-war, ruling-class machine politician, Trump a racist demagogue. There is no electoral road out of this hell.

Workers World Party is running a presidential campaign to put socialism on the front burners and to build solidarity with the Black Lives Matter and immigrant movements. We want to keep the struggle in the streets. Against Trump. And against Clinton. We want you to join that struggle, and not just for this election year.