What A Wild Week

Eight years ago, Donald Trump became president amid a flurry of miscalculations and arrogant misreads by political and media professionals from both parties. The commentariat first insisted he couldn’t win the Republican nomination (we were told to await the “real candidate” as he rose in polls), then told us he couldn’t win the general without endorsements and corporate backing.

Then Trump did win and it became instant conventional wisdom that this impermissible political choice proved the rural malcontents who voted for him were moral troglodytes and white supremacists deserving of their fates.

A strategy of relentless vilfication on the one hand and self-congratulation on the other became standard. “I won the places that represent two-thirds of America’s gross domestic product,” chirped Hillary Clinton. “The places that are optimistic, diverse, dynamic, moving forward.” A list of pundits (Paul Krugman was a favorite) concurred: the Trump voter was a knuckle-dragging parasite living off the coastal wealth creators, whose votes mattered more. When Joe Biden won in 2020, media were quick to note Trump was only supported by 29% of GDP, practically the same thing as only being supported by 29% of people. White Rural Rage became the most predictable New York Times bestseller ever.

The cult of mass political psychosis was mind-blowing. Trump became a representation of evil more terrifying to laptop-class American adults than the Boogieman is to toddlers. Grown men and women rooted for the president to be proven a Russian agent. Studio audiences roared at the idea of vaccine-refusers dying. All explanations for Trump support other than racism and fears of “status loss” were dismissed, and his immigration policies were denounced as abhorrent and Hitlerian, until they were adopted by Harris in this cycle. Voters were told a billion times that Trump is a fascist dictator-in-waiting and a threat to democracy. They were chided a billion more times to remember he’s a convicted criminal. Virtually every federal enforcement agency made announcements proclaiming a vote for Trump to be tantamount to aid to foreign enemies.

At the end of all this messaging, Trump gained. He went from a two-time popular-vote loser to a president with a mandate of 5 million-plus votes. Despite constant reminders of his racism, he gained with black and Hispanic voters. There are species of tapeworms that could have grasped last night that voters got tired of being stereotyped as bigots by gasbags like Reid and Scarborough and told their race or gender or whatever compelled their political choices. An infant knows this, too, is a form of racism, and that too many “you ain’t black unless…” speeches will tend to push people after a while to reach for something sharp, or give Donald Trump a landslide win.

If 71 million people giving you the finger as eight years of statements and predictions go belly up on live TV won’t budge these idiots out of their “All people who are not me are racist” bubble, nothing will. Perfect, virginal ignorance is a rare sight. We should admire theirs for the shimmering collective pearl it is, though I worry the exhibition might keep running another ten years.