The 'Cabaret' Conundrum: When Evil Is Also Weird
Yes, it all comes back to musical theatre.
Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz has revitalized Democratic messaging with one simple but devastating word: Weird. Democrats now openly label Donald Trump, his running mate for the moment J.D. Vance, and the entire MAGA movement as creepy and weird. This line of attack is so effective, it works retroactively: What else would you call Katie Britt’s State of the Union rebuttal but freaking weird? North Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem thought she’d make her pitch for vice president by admitting in print that she murdered her dog and a goat. That’s extremely weird.
Most importantly, the “weird” messaging is fun, a refreshing change from the more Sturm und Drang declarations about a “threat to democracy,” which arguably just empowered Trump. Bullies want you to fear them not laugh at them.
However, some very serious people object to the “weird” attacks. Thomas Friedman at the New York Times claims, “Democrats Could Regret Calling Trump and His Supporters ‘Weird.’” He writes:
I cannot think of a sillier, more playground, more foolish and more counterproductive political taunt for Democrats to seize on than calling Trump and his supporters “weird.”
“Weird” isn’t a schoolyard taunt. When you had a tantrum as a kid, your parents would correctly say you were acting silly. That’s not the same as giving you a wedgie during recess. Friedman argues that Democrats need a “message that is dignity-affirming for working-class Americans, not dignity-destroying.” He apparently hasn’t actually listened to Walz, who directly links MAGA’s weird obsessions with their lack of productive solutions.
“Who’s asking for this crazy stuff?” Walz asked MSNBC's Jen Psaki.“Who’s asking to raise the price of insulin? Who’s asking to ban birth control? … Where's the focus group of people sitting in a bar in Racine, Wisconsin, saying, ‘Yeah, we need to ban Animal Farm.’"
Walz has inspired Democrats to flip the usual GOP script that Democrats are overly concerned with “weird” issues (“pronouns,” “critical race theory”) and don’t care about what affects “normal” people. That was an issue in 2016. Yes, I know Hillary Clinton actually had plans for helping all Americans, but perception is reality in politics.
Sen. Bernie Sanders has said that “weird” isn’t his “cup of tea” because “60 percent of people are living paycheck to paycheck. We have to focus on issues facing where people are. Is Donald Trump weird? Is his behavior weird? Yeah. We've known that for the last many years.”
Yet, every time Walz calls Republicans “weird,” he also states that “they’re not offering us anything. They’re not gonna come with a plan. This is what I ask, ‘Where’s your health care plan?’”
Walz made this point even clearer last week: “Yes, they’re a threat, but we’re not gonna stay in their frame. We’re not gonna stay where they’re at. We’re not gonna play their game. We’ve called them out for the weird nonsense that they believe and we presented a different argument to the American public. One where everybody matters … One where we solve problems.” That is an overtly “dignity-affirming” message, as opposed to Vance’s creepy “childless cat lady” remarks. (Watch below.)
Anti-Trump conservative Joe Walsh posted on social media, “I’m just not a fan of the Harris campaign calling Trump ‘weird.’ Weird isn’t serious enough. Weird is inadequate to describe the danger Trump is. Donald Trump is a lawless, un-American psychopath. He’s an existential threat to democracy. Calling him ‘weird’ just doesn’t cut it.”
Polls and this year’s Republican primary results have shown that the “lawless, un-American psychopath” messaging doesn’t land with average voters, who aren’t regulars on Morning Joe. If our democracy depends on defeating Trump, then we should consider the tactics that tanked the campaigns of other “weird” Republican candidates, such as Todd Akin, who said that "legitimate rape" victims don’t get pregnant, or Christine O’Donnell, who literally released a campaign ad reassuring voters that she was “not a witch.” (Kristen Wiig’s Saturday Night Live parody was particularly brutal and hilarious.)
Yes, Trump is an existential threat to democracy. He’s a convicted felon and an adjudicated rapist, but he was still beating President Joe Biden. A few short weeks ago, Democrats had almost surrendered to despair, but now they exude joy and hope. They’re laughing at Vance and haven’t resigned themselves to his presence in the White House. It’s hard to see the downside. However, I do appreciate the concerns about “weird.” There is always the risk of what I call the Cabaret Conundrum.
When life isn’t a Cabaret
Cabaret is one of my favorite musicals (and films). The story’s greatest triumph and our enduring tragedy is how it remains so timeless, but when I revisit Cabaret in 2024, I can’t help feeling the limits of satire against an emerging evil. The Kit Kat Klub's Emcee and Cabaret dancers openly mock Hitler and the Nazis like a Saturday Night Live sketch. All that goose-stepping seems obviously absurd and comical, but the Nazis were already beginning a march across Europe that would leave bloody footprints in their wake. I admit I’ve often wonder if ridiculing Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene’s Jewish space lasers and "gazpacho police" minimizes the very real threat she poses.
There’s a disturbing scene in the 1972 film when a crossdressing Emcee (Joel Grey) and the Cabaret girls act like Nazis — their bowler hats become helmets and their canes rifles as they march in goose-step to a military drumbeat. (Watch below)
Director Bob Fosse juxtaposes this moment with shots of young anti-Semitic thugs shouting “Juden!” outside the home of wealthy Jewish heiress Natalia Landauer (Marisa Berenson). When she opens the door, she finds her slaughtered puppy on her doorstep. (Kristi Noem apparently got the wrong idea from this movie.)
You could interpret this as an example of how everyone in Berlin had started to embrace Nazism, but it’s also possible that the Cabaret performers still consider Nazis a big joke — blithely unaware of their growing menace. Like today’s incels, Nazis were fundamentally absurd. Hitler was an inspired subject for ridicule in Charlie Chaplin’s The Great Dictator, released in 1940. Of course, there’s horror in hindsight. Chaplin later said he wouldn’t have made the film if he’d known the full extent of Hitler’s monstrosity. Goose-stepping is scary because we know where it leads. Even that rubbish mustache seems sinister now instead of comical.
In the Cabaret musical’s finale, Cliff describes the past events: “It was the end of the world, and I was dancing with Sally Bowles and we were both fast asleep...” No one who’s calling MAGA “weird” is asleep to the dangers of a second Trump administration. The Nazis weren’t stopped in time, so they became a jump scare instead of just a punchline. We now live in the moment where we can actively prevent that mistake. Laughter could yet prove the best weapon.
I hope you’ll consider becoming a paid subscriber for $80 a year or just $8 a month, if you’re not already. This helps sustain the newsletter and keeps all the content free for everyone.
Follow Stephen Robinson on Bluesky and Threads.
Subscribe to his YouTube channel for more fun content.
Nice framing with Cabaret!
And yes ridicule, if you also are following it up with policy and a good vision, is very effective. This was part of how Romney got taken down with the car elevator. It dispatched Palin too. But of course you have to execute on the fundamentals. For Democrats that also means you need to have a Johnny Unbeatable due to party messaging dynamics (which I think are changing.)
I really keep liking Tim Walz more and more. He actually reminds me of some of the cool teachers I had in high school. But he's got it right, doing the two-piece combo with the ridicule and the facts.
I am still livid from yesterday, so I just want to say I hope we use everything in the rhetorical toolbox against President Klan Robe, Shillbilly and his awful, racist toadies up and down the ballot. This unreconstructed party and its unreconstructed ticket must be repudiated with overwhelming force to the point that even they decide it's not worth it to do this. Not even Lee Atwater would've been this open with the racism.
Calling Trump a traitor, a felon, a danger to democracy etc feeds his base's fantasies of being rugged outlaw revolutionaries. Like the choad at the Heritage Foundation talking about how "their Second American Revolution will be bloodless 'if the left allows it'" It lets them project as strong rugged individualists bravely fighting the enemy leftists.
Calling them creepy and weird, and laughing at them just short-circuits that whole thing entirely. We force them onto their back feet as they cope with having to deny they fuck couches, or explain their creepy and weird obsession with 'childless cat ladies' .
So fuck all the tone police who 'warn us' about doing this like Freidman Unit. They have agendas that do not correspond to ours, so we should not seriously consider their 'advice'.