Why the chattering classes don’t get Trump

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America’s political and journalistic establishments still can’t figure out the Trump phenomenon.

Movement conservatives — they’re the ones who take conservative ideology seriously — are at a loss to explain why Trump, who has supported as many left-wing political causes as right-wing ones over the years and who they suspect raises the banner of conservatism the same way a privateer raises a flag of convenience, has managed to appeal to huge numbers of self-identified political conservatives.

Doctrinaire progressives — they’re the ones who take Bernie Sanders seriously — can’t explain why Trump, who tramples all over the rules of political correctness and identity politics with gleeful and reckless abandon, keeps rising in the polls (and not just among Republicans) after each supposedly lethal politically incorrect affront.

Political moderates — they’re the ones who take candidates like Jeb Bush, John Kasich, Hillary Clinton and Joe Biden seriously — can’t explain why Trump, who embodies a lot of the qualities that are supposed to turn off voters (like a big ego, a mastery of the art of the insult, a brazenly self-promoting style and a bad comb-over) can send their candidates plunging in the polls with a flick of his tongue.

Political consultants and journalists –— they’re the ones who take themselves seriously (and who think they’re the smartest guys in the room) — can’t explain how an un-house-broken candidate like Trump can piss all over their most deeply held beliefs — and all over them — and thrive by doing so.

Give the political and chattering classes credit for this much: They have figured out that Americans’ rising revulsion with political correctness has something to do with Trump’s rise in the polls. What they haven’t figured out is exactly what that “something” is.

That’s because they’ve never thought through what the term “political correctness” means. Political correctness is a euphemism for the belief on the part of self-appointed, self-righteous elites, usually but not exclusively found on the left, that they are entitled to tell Americans what they can and cannot say and think about race, ethnicity, gender, religion and cultural issues generally — and that they are entitled to use political and economic coercion to enforce their views on others.

Political correctness would probably be harmless if America’s mainstream media hadn’t turned itself into its principal enabler. But it has, and as a result there are probably millions of Americans who are afraid of losing their jobs or damaging their businesses if they speak their minds and a lot of others who have had to apologize under duress for doing so. I think neither the American left nor the chattering classes have remotely realized just how angry the American people are over political correctness. For that matter, I don’t think the American people themselves knew either — until Trump pulled their chain.

But revulsion with political correctness alone doesn’t explain Trump.

I think it’s possible to over-think the Trump phenomenon. A political psychoanalysis of Trump won’t explain it, nor will an examination of the spoken and unspoken rules that have defined presidential electoral politics for the last two or three generations, and neither will banker’s boxes of opposition research.

The real explanation, I submit, is this: America is a can-do country which currently is being governed by a can’t do/ won’t do/don’t do political class.

Balance the federal budget? No can do. Repair the country’s roads, rail-roads and critical infrastructure? No can do. Repeal Obamacare (which half the country despises) and replace it with a system the country approves of? No can do. Stop the Iran deal (which two-thirds of the country opposes)? No can do. Become energy independent? No can do, and what’s more, don’t do if it involves fracking or nuclear power. Secure the southern border? No can do, and anyway it would be immoral even to try.

And so on. 

Then along comes Trump, who is nothing if not a can-do sort of guy.

Build a wall and secure the southern border? Can do.

Repeal and replace ObamaCare? Can do.

Tell the press to take its political correctness and put it where the sun don’t shine? Can do. Been there and done that.

Make America great again? Can do. Hey, how hard could it be?

Supporters tend to overlook his gaffes, flaws, braggadocio and hyperbola because they believe he will find reasons to succeed instead of reasons to fail — and because they have real misgivings about the ability of most of the other candidates to do so.

But can a candidate actually get elected by telling people he’s the guy who can get things done without really telling them how he’ll get things done, by telling them he’s the guy who will deliver so many American victories that Americans will get bored with victories? Can a candidate substitute great motivational slogans for real substance and still get people to pull his lever when the moment of truth arrives on Election Day?

Of course he can, and if America’s political and journalistic establishments don’t see it they really are as stupid as Trump says they are.

Don’t think so? Well does the phrase “hope and change” mean anything to you?

This opinion column does not necessarily reflect the views of Boulder Weekly.