The Democracy We Deserve
Many I speak to can’t believe the Trump/Vance victory is real. Two weeks later and they are still in shock. Some I know are thrilled. I’m neither shocked nor thrilled. I think Trump represents the state of America today, for better or worse. Perhaps for better and worse.
Four years ago, Biden beat Trump as the majority wanted something approaching normalcy. They were unhappy with what they saw as a sorry state of the country. Four years of Biden was a return to normalcy. But the normal was not and is not particularly good—so did not hold. The people want something else. Presumably, they want something better.
I’ve met dedicated Trump voters—those who really love the man and his bluster. I’ve met Trump voters who find the man appalling but want what they think he will deliver—including laying waste to what they see as wokism. And I’ve met people who voted for Trump, hating the man, what he stands for, and what he may try to accomplish; they also, though, believe he will either tear down the existing system or pave the way for its self-implosion. They may not like or agree with him, but they are willing to accept him to end what they see as evil capitalism, colonialism, patriarchy, etc.
Before the election, the last group I just mentioned scared me the most because of their unpredictability. I think that fear turned out to be well justified. These were people who simply thought the American system was so corrupt that there was nothing to do but tear it down and start over (relatedly, see this very interesting and scary paper on the “need for chaos”). They seemed comfortable admitting they couldn’t say how bad the transition—the actual tearing it down—would be. (Now that I think about it, many of these were older or from marginalized groups—in retrospect, unsurprising since they had the least to lose.) Regardless of their desires, I don’t these people will be happy with the results.
Whereas many of us are discussing a political realignment where the Republican party comes to represent the working class—a major change, even if it’s in word only—and the Democrat party struggles to come up with a coherent new self definition, I worry that what we are looking at is much more. Not a mere realignment of parties, but a refashioning of America. With Christian Nationalists and Common Good Constitutionalists in charge, we might be entering a new order dominated by religious nationalism (one hopes not as bad as Margaret Atwood’s Gilead) that will leave women, gays, lesbians, transpeople, and others suffering and also make everyday life for everyone far more expensive and static—as imports are curtailed, immigration slow or reversed, and innovation stymied. A conservative nation in the worst sense of the term.
I’ll note that I don’t expect the current Republican Party to hold power. If I had to guess, I’d guess they lose the House in 2 years, and lose the presidency 2 years later. But the changes will outlast them. The changes in budgets, laws, and courts, if enacted, are likely to have a decades long effect. Some are likely to be good for us; others are clearly not.
First, you significantly presume the characteristics of Trump as being the characteristics of the people who voted for Trump. That's a very distorting presumption. It never even occurred to me to see my neighbors as being like Kamala Harris, for the mere fact that they voted for her. How is that a real way to understand real people? (That's old style stereotyping. It's wrong in principle in this case, and it's wrong in fact.)
Here are the top three reasons, among many others, that voters swung toward Trump in this election cycle:
1) Inflation makes wage earners, people who typically live paycheck to paycheck, poorer, week by week. (An overwhelming majority of people fit this description.) The pinch gets tighter every time they go to a cash register, every time they go to a gas pump. The Democrats’ answer to inflation was the “Inflation Reduction Act,” a one trillion dollar government spending program. (seriously)
2) The wage/labor market is extremely competitive. Increased availability of low wage labor puts downward pressure on wages in the markets in which those laborers compete. The Democrats’ answer to the huge influx of people at the border, of low wage labor and competing needs, was to not answer; to look aside, to pretend to be helpless as they helped immigrants into the country. (seriously)
3) Donald Trump is a person. He presents as a person, albeit a very flawed one. Kamala Harris acted as a professional presenter….a construction of the Democratic Party…a messenger of the moment’s DNC positions on everything. This election wasn’t a referendum on Trump against Harris; it was a referendum on him, a person, against them, a giant partisan political machine.
I’d distill the Democrats’ problem down to this: they couldn’t hear the cries of the people they were trying to help because they were filled with belief in the great plans they hold for those people. They, the college educated financially stable Democratic political class, were somehow able to stay focused on a better tomorrow while the people they were trying to help moved backward, in the present.
Generally speaking, people want their lives to improve. They want that improvement today, this month, this year. How much of today can you put aside in pursuit of a better tomorrow? Answer: as long as you feel financially secure today, you can focus on [an abstract vision of] tomorrow. But if you don't feel financially secure, how much of today can you put aside? Almost none. When you have little, there is little to give up. And tomorrow...what about tomorrow? That's why the impatient focus is on improvement today, now, on what matters most. ("The rent is due next Tuesday. The refrigerator and cupboard are almost empty.") Improvement today, in what matters most, is a normal person's road to tomorrow.
What matters most. To the voter. Today. [No excuses.] Understand, big guy?