One can only look at the headlines lately and ask, “What responsibility do we, as Americans, bear in this?” No, I’m not talking about Islamic terror. I’m talking about Donald Trump. If anyone seriously thinks that a large number of Americans suddenly woke up one day and decided to back one of the most reprehensible people they could find, they need to think again. We made Trump what he is. How?
Quite simply, modern politics has left many people with nowhere else to go.
Let’s look at the tactics of the Left over the past eight years or so. Their primary approaches are either to assign the worst of motives to anyone who disagrees with them, or to ignore there is even a problem to begin with. Or both. Disagree with President Obama’s policies? You’re a racist, even if other Democrats also disagree with him. Letting millions of illegal immigrants and refugees into the country and making them citizens? There couldn’t possibly be any negative drawbacks to that. You’re obviously a harsh, uncaring person. There is little doubt the Left has gone out of their way to make sure a large portion of America are not welcome in their “Big Tent”.
It likely wouldn’t hurt anyone’s case to admit that yes, there could be some problems from doing X, we’ve thought of them, and we’ve taken steps to minimize them, but the standard Left-ward line is to deny that any unintended or negative consequences could occur at all, and that to think otherwise makes you a terrible person. So people who might otherwise lean leftward can only assume the Left is naïve, mean-spirited, and severely lacking either curiosity (do you see a problem with this?) or imagination (what could go wrong?).
The result is a lot of people who, perhaps rightfully, get the idea that the Left not only doesn’t care about them or their concerns, but actually considers them a bigger enemy than the avowed, violent enemies of America around the world. Hearing liberals claim that law-abiding citizens who see themselves as simply defending their rights are indistinguishable from an army of genocidal killers is insulting, and suggests they’ll get no sympathy or understanding or help from the party in power. It also shows them that the Left is pretty much hopelessly delusional. And, frankly, it probably makes them wonder if radical Islam doesn’t have the right idea. Perhaps if they started chopping off heads the Left would be less critical and more interested in listening to their concerns and being more respectful of their religion.
Can you really blame them when any time there’s a violent incident in this country the Left rushes to blame the usual suspects–the NRA, Christian fundamentalists, the Tea Party–even before there is any actual information on who is behind it? Can you blame them when, should the perpetrator be linked in any way, however loosely, with one of those groups the Left acts as though it’s the fault of that entire group, and that that group somehow advocated the violence? Can you blame them when, should the perpetrator prove to be from some other group, the Left falls all over itself insisting that we shouldn’t judge an entire group by one person and that we shouldn’t rush to judgment?
On the other hand, the Right’s approach over the past eight years hasn’t been much better. They either roll over and play dead whenever the Left trots out the epithets, or to simply stonewall without seeming to propose any alternative. They couch their arguments in terms a large percentage of Americans don’t accept as a basis for law. And, at the risk of opening another can of worms, they seem incapable or unable to get their side of any issue out to the public, whether because their leadership are inarticulate dolts, there’s a left media conspiracy, or they just have no marketing skills. What the people who find they simply can’t trust the Left see, however, is a group with no apparent principles of their own to stand on, other than “we oppose the other team”, and no real will to stand up to anyone.
Both Left and Right seem to ignore at best, and denigrate at worst, anyone in the middle. In short, they feel they’re not being listened to, and there’s no one willing to fight for them. Except perhaps Donald Trump.
You may remember that Trump ran for president before, and no one took him seriously. Now? Total reversal. What happened?
There are a lot of things people see in Donald Trump that they don’t see anywhere else:
- He fights. He’s the “honeybadger” of politics. Call him names because of his views? Donald Trump don’t care! He just thumbs his nose. The Left is used to scaring people into submission with their name-calling. Those who have been scared by it have to admire Trump’s thick skin.
- He’s not afraid to call a problem a problem. Yes, he may exaggerate the problem, but that may be preferable to someone who refuses to even see a problem at all.
- When he over-reacts he seems to over-react in a direction they can accept. When faced with a choice between people who seem to claim that Islam poses no threat whatsoever, regardless of evidence to the contrary, or someone who claims we need to do whatever is necessary to keep ourselves safe, is it really so bizarre that people go with the people who err on the side of safety?
- He’s not a fancy talker. He doesn’t dance around the issue, afraid the say anything that might turn anyone off. He says what he means and he seldom backs down. If you misunderstood him or were offended by him, that’s your problem.
- He’s so colorful the media can’t resist covering him. Even those looking to trip him up in his own words end up doing him a service, as he gets his message out. Every word he says gets reported. And the media is baffled that people respond to that message. They keep screaming that the emperor has no clothes only to find that’s what people like about him. (Okay, perhaps not the best image to put in your head. My apologies.)
- He’s not Hillary or Bernie–or Jeb or Ted or Marco or anyone else we’ve been hearing about for years and are frankly sick of and wouldn’t trust on a dare just because they’re established politicos. Consider the low ratings of Congress, the President, and the Supreme Court of late and you should be able to pick up on a general distrust and dislike of “the usual suspects” conducting “business as usual.”
- He’s not a pretty face. He’s got the money to be if he wanted. Whatever else he may be, he probably looks more like “one of us” than just about anyone else out there.
- We’re a country addicted to reality TV drama. Trump is not only a reality TV star, he exudes it even when “off camera”. We love a train wreck, and that’s our Donald.
- He is the “un-Obama”. Obama is cool, suave, and seems to see himself as president of only the parts of America he likes. He musters more anger for Republicans than for terrorists who slaughter thousands. Trump is passionate, perhaps to a fault, but at least he gets angry at the right people. It’s easy to see him doing more to combat the injustice in the world than just starting a hashtag campaign.
- The Donald comes from the real world. You can practically see it on his suit. America is getting a little tired of intellectuals who actually knew what arugula was before Obama made it cool, but seem to have no idea how real people live, work, or get along with people they don’t like. Trump knows.
- He’s unashamedly un-PC at a time when PC is running rampant, with blatant examples of over-reach and hypersensitivity on national display.
Let’s get one thing straight. I don’t like Trump. I don’t want to vote for him. I think much of his extremism is an act, but I’m not willing to bet our future on it. But I can see why he appeals to people. I can see why he’s so popular. You can’t ignore, overlook, demean, talk down to, and even villain-ize a large segment of the population for this long without them grabbing onto someone they believe will at least give them some respect. I hope along with many of the rest of you that his campaign will self-implode before too much longer, but I wouldn’t hold my breath. But if he took a more moderate stand on many issues I would find it much harder to dislike him. He may not be a breath of fresh air, but at this point people may be thinking anything different is good.
I remember after 9/11 people asking of Muslims, “Why do they hate us so?” If anyone is serious about beating Trump they really should be looking at his core supporters and asking that very same question. But no one wants to do that because it’s easier to dismiss those people as stupid, ignorant fools with the wool pulled over their eyes, bigots, racists, or whatever. I don’t think most of them are anything of the sort. I think they a real people with real, legitimate concerns that no one is addressing. They’ve had it, they want some respect, and if it means putting someone like Trump in the White House to get it, that’s what they’re prepared to do. They hate all the other candidates because they sense the other candidates hated them first.
America, we created this monster. If we’re not careful we’re going to find out what a real uniter he can be–turning both Left and Right against the guy who won the White House while we fiddled and flamed.