Suppose I have to be counted among
those who got Trump wrong - not wrong about his flaws, which are still
operative and liable to becoming issues - but wrong as concerns his chances of
winning. I mean, I suggested the GOP had no choice but to dump him after the
Access Hollywood debacle - and had the Democrats not put up such a flawed
candidate themselves whose corruptions ineluctably terminated in the actions of
Comey, the ‘pussy grab’ may have indeed sunk Trump’s chances. But the dems did
manage to nominate someone worse than Trump and so here we are.
Still, you have to give the man
credit - it was his decision to explicitly target frustrated white middle class
voters in the Rust Belt, and to do so by deliberately using ‘politically incorrect’ language that strongly
appealed to them, that made victory possible. No doubt no other GOP hopeful
thought that a strategy that could work - especially since a high proportion of
these pivotal white voters ended up being people who twice supported Obama. Which
raises an interesting question: were these people swayed by Trump or driven to
him by how awful Clinton was and Obama had been? Or did the two forces feed off
each other?
It raises another interesting
question - with the pro-Trumpers gloating as if their man was the only viable
choice for the GOP, are there any numbers out there that might tell what could
have happened had Rubio been the choice? Fair to say he wouldn’t have had the same appeal for
these new ‘Reagan
democrats’ as Trump did -
although who really knows - but would his appeal to other demographics have
easily compensated for that? In terms of popular vote, probably yes I’d say - in terms of electoral
college, that’s tricky.
But if the key hinge around which all views of this election must pivot is the
awfulness of Obama/Clinton, then I have to believe it’s legitimate to wonder if someone with less flaws than Trump
might have done better than he - even though, strictly in electoral college
terms, he did pretty damn good.
Still, it’s an important question to ask since going forward -
assuming the Trump presidency isn’t
a compete disaster - going forward the GOP has to figure out how to keep these
new Reagan democrats while still reaching out to the key constituencies of the
erstwhile leftist dream of a permanent hold on the White house - minorities,
millennials and women. The GOP doesn’t
need to make huge gains here, just enough to hobble the Democrats electoral
strategy for a permanent governing majority - something that is definitely doable
if you can keep these white voters Trump has turned - and therein lies you’re trouble. What if only Trump
can keep these voters? And what happens when the Democrats run a candidate who isn’t a corrupt mess with no
personality - how quickly will these voters Trump has turned turn back?
As for what to expect from President
elect Trump, it’s pretty
much just a case of wait and see. Since the man said so many confusing and
contradictory things on the campaign trail, made so many promises that are
gonna be very difficult to keep and is clearly no ideologue it’s impossible to know how he’ll govern. So far he’s shown a willingness to work
with Ryan, which is a very good thing - but will it last? Will he simply reward
loyalists with this appointments, or will it be more of a grab bag of good, bad
and iffy choices? So far kind of looks like both - Priebus is an ok choice,
Bannon highly problematic, Sessions good but with question marks, and Flynn - I
dunno, agree with how he speaks about islam but there’s some red flags fluttering around this guy. Let’s see what happens with Defense
and State and Commerce etc etc and take it from there - not problematic yet that
all his appointments are white guys, but getting close.
