In his latest column at the New York Times David Brooks lurches uncontrollably to the conclusions I reached in November 2016:
We have persuaded no one. Trump’s approval rating is around 40 percent, which is basically unchanged from where it’s been all along.
We have not hindered him. Trump has more power than he did a year ago, not less. With more mainstream figures like H. R. McMaster, Rex Tillerson and Gary Cohn gone, the administration is growing more nationalist, not less.
We have not dislodged him. For all the hype, the Mueller investigation looks less and less likely to fundamentally alter the course of the administration.
We have not contained him. Trump’s takeover of the Republican Party is complete. Eighty-nine percent of Republicans now have a positive impression of the man. According to an NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll, 59 percent of Republicans consider themselves more a supporter of Trump than of the Republican Party.
as he acknowledges one of the viewpoint’s gravest flaws:
Part of the problem is that anti-Trumpism has a tendency to be insufferably condescending. For example, my colleague Thomas B. Edsall beautifully summarized the recent academic analyses of what personality traits supposedly determine Trump support.
Trump opponents, the academics say, are open-minded and value independence and novelty. Trump supporters, they continue, are closed-minded, change-averse and desperate for security.
This analysis strikes me as psychologically wrong (every human being requires both a secure base and an open field — we can’t be divided into opposing camps), journalistically wrong (Trump supporters voted for the man precisely because they wanted transformational change) and an epic attempt to offend 40 percent of our fellow citizens by reducing them to psychological inferiors.
What I think that Mr. Brooks is missing is the implication of our being reduced to tribalism. We have realized George Santayana’s definition of fanaticism. Let me offer another of Dr. Santayana’s famous remarks for reflection:
Progress, far from consisting in change, depends on retentiveness. When change is absolute there remains no being to improve and no direction is set for possible improvement: and when experience is not retained, as among savages, infancy is perpetual. Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.
Categorical rejection of 40% of the people is not a formula for republican government. You may get your way temporarily but any victory will be shortlived.
Imagining an unrealizable future is not one bit better than trying to recover an imaginary past. The same things are true in politics as in war. Amateurs talk about tactics. Professionals study logistics.
Brooks doesn’t realize that he, himself, is the problem, that the election was a specific rejection of him and his class.
Brooks and his class is The Swamp. Brooks and his class, with includes the Democrats, too, is personally responsible for the death and destruction we have imposed on the Middle East, Africa, Eastern Europe and Central Asia
While I don’t necessarily disagree with this, I have to wonder what one is to due when that 40%, or at least a sizable percentage of it demonstrates conclusively that it will not listen to opposing points of view, that anyone daring to criticize the President will come under immediate attack, and that there is essentially nothing this President can do that they will admit is wrong or improper.
At some point, you have to give up trying to persuade the unpersuadable and those people who clearly demonstrate that they wish to remain inside their own epistemic bubble where the only information and opinion they receive is from sources that reinforce what they already believe.
Yep. That’s the reason for federalism.
“At some point, you have to give up trying to persuade the unpersuadable ”
Sure, but what about policy? Is it ok to shove policy down the throats of the 40% (any 40%, not just Trump supporters)? That’s the real issue IMO.
Is it ok for the 40% to force policy on everyone else?
Steve
As our system was originally envisioned, yes. As embodied in the Constitution it was believed that major changes required not just a supermajority but substantial approval nationwide.
Our system is intentionally conservative (not as the term is used politically these days). Change requires consensus. 50%+1 is not enough.
BTW IMO that “40%” actually misrepresents things. I think that about 10% of each party is coming to control their parties’ agenda and they’re the most extreme and intransigent 10%. Not all Trump voters fit Doug’s pastiche.
“Is it ok for the 40% to force policy on everyone else?”
It depends on what you mean by that. First, I’m assuming a national policy that affects everyone.
– Is the 40% forcibly enacting some policy opposed by the 60%?
– Or does it mean the 40% prevents the 60% from enacting some policy?
If it’s the former, then it’s not OK. If it’s the latter, then it’s perfectly OK.
There’s also the question of process and legitimacy which is at least as important if not moreso.
In re forcing policy on others: The Trump administration has focused on reversing policies that have been imposed. There is a difference.
And I didn’t mean to suggest that they do, but a sizable number certainly seems to. In some cases, it appears to be just another example of the reflexive hyperpartisanship that has become all too common, causing people to rush to the defense of practically anyone with an “R” or “D” after their name. In others, though, there’s definitely a “cult of personality” air to the whole thing not unlike the fanaticism we saw around other politico-cultural personalities such as Sarah Palin and, yes in some cases, Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, and Bernie Sanders.
@Doug Mataconis
[…] I have to wonder what one is to due when that 40%, or at least a sizable percentage of it demonstrates conclusively that it will not listen to opposing points of view […]
I must say, “that is rich”. I am sure more than a few people here will find that amusing.
[…] there is essentially nothing this President can do that they will admit is wrong or improper.
You, Mr. Brooks, the anti-Trumpers, the #NeverTrumpers, and assorted Trump haters are doing the job for everybody. I realize that people who do not agree are inconvenient, but you all are the problem.
Let me help out you and those like you. The 40% was not always 40%. Trump Democrats were Obama voters. More importantly, more and more people are ending their sentences with, “… but he has a point.” What once was settled is now unsettled, and this can be a little unsettling.
President Trump may go “down in flames”, and everything will return to the old normal. But, he may succeed, and nothing will ever be the same.
The ‘deplorables’ are at the gates, and the best you and the others can do is hope the gates will hold. Unless you can crush the deplorables, you all are finished, but if you win, the deplorables lose nothing. They are still outside the gates, and you all will never allow the opposition to enter.
(For those confused, I am more deplorable than a deplorable. I want to see the existing system burned to the ground. I have hot dogs that need roasting and marshmallows that need toasting.)
@Doug Mataconis
[…] such as Sarah Palin and, yes in some cases, Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, and Bernie Sanders.
Is this what passes for intellectual honesty among the ‘smartest people in the whole wide world’? The sad pathetic answer is “yes”.
“One of these things is not like the other.”
I guess we should all be grateful that you were kind enough to throw in the possibility that Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, and Bernie Sanders might be idiots, but of course, this cannot be true. They are among the ‘smartest people in the whole wide world’.
They won’t roast themselves, you know.
“– Is the 40% forcibly enacting some policy opposed by the 60%?”
More this, although we can quibble over forcibly. In my state, we were routinely ending up with 70% of our congress people as Republicans, even when they won less than 50% of the vote. That was done through creative gerrymandering. Forcibly? I don’t know but at least without regard to equal representation. So we are having policies passed now that truly do not represent the majority of our people, without any real effort to engage or help them. Look at the tax cuts. They were designed to specifically hurt people in blue states.
But even on this “– Or does it mean the 40% prevents the 60% from enacting some policy?”, I think that if it goes on too long, it becomes harmful.
Steve
WHAT? Has President Trump done since the swearing in that has frightened you? Tax cuts? Barely increased border security? Tough talk?, Military spending? To me, he looks like a very middle of the road, American President. Very distinct from President Omama, who famously said, “I believe we need a civilian force every bit as large and as well funded as the U.S. military”. What he meant was an ever expanding federal government whose well compensated staff now fear going back into the private sector. These people are known as “The Swamp” collectively. They are now using every bit of their illicit power to protect their tenure, their security. How the hell DID Mueller get a warrant to search Trump’s private lawyers’ office, home, and automobile?
“How the hell DID Mueller get a warrant to search Trump’s private lawyers’ office, home, and automobile?”
He didn’t. It was the attorneys in the SDNY.
OK , then, still. HOW?
Because the attorneys convinced a judge that there is sufficient grounds to believe a crime has been committed, and thus a warrant to search for evidence of the crime is justified. You do understand that this matter is distinct from the so-called Russian collusion investigation, right?
This discussion doesn’t really belong here. It’s better suited for “Please Wait…”
I think the preceding remarks understate the potential significance of these events somewhat. Keep in mind that my next remarks reflect my understanding which may well be flawed, inaccurate, or incomplete.
“Grounds to believe a crime has been committed” is not enough to get a warrant to search an attorney’s office. There must be grounds to believe that the lawyer was in an illegal conspiracy to break the law with his client, a significant difference.
As I see it there are two alternative likely scenarios. Either evidence has been presented that Trump and Cohen were in such a conspiracy, the warrant was appropriate, and the search has produced additional evidence which could prove very damaging or no such evidence has been presented, the warrants were granted improperly, and what you’ve got here are a bunch of people who don’t like Trump on a fishing expedition. Either way it’s pretty much of a bombshell.
Be more specific. It was the US attorney that Trump appointed for the SDNY. That US attorney has to know that unless the evidence was so strong that it could not be ignored, he is out of a job.
Steve
There are a lot of Republicans all up and down the chain of this. That doesn’t mean they’re not anti-Trump. We’ll just need to see what emerges from all of this.
The idea that because a Republican attorney is ‘anti-Trump’ they’re just going to approve a flawed warrant on the attorney of the President is absurd. The problem is that pro-Trump people believe the FBI is treating Trump like he’s Martin Luther King. There’s no evidence for this belief, despite the weekly attempts to prove this. But evidence is a liberal scam, like fact-checking, so the conspiracy is just incredible.
You really think Trump appointed an anti-inflammatory Trumper as a US attorney? I know you try to be fair, but really?
Steve