You Broke It, You Bought It

First the election, then the consequences

The decision by a majority of the American electorate to return a 78-year-old convicted felon who attempted a coup to the White House is an act of civic vandalism that has no parallel in U.S. history.

If you were to turn on cable news today (which I do not recommend), you would find it awash in hot takes from Democrats and pundits who are all sure they know the one thing that Vice President Harris should have done differently. They are all almost certainly wrong. If you want to point to a single factor, I would note that in countries across the Western world the voters are kicking out the government which was in power when inflation first started to spike. Be that as it may, Americans wanted Donald Trump and Trumpism. The former president increased his share of the vote from almost every demographic group in the country.

Let us give credit where credit is due. Trump could have pretended to be a changed man, chastened by the experience of his multiple arrests and his shameful role in an insurrection. Instead he ran for president as a wolf in wolf’s clothing. He promised a more radical and authoritarian second term, an American kakistocracy staffed by the claque of opportunists, kooks, and fanatics who often accompanied him to his rallies. Trump was forthright about his plans. Mass deportations. Steep tariffs on U.S. trading partners. Pardons for the January 6th criminals. Retribution for his enemies. Abolishing the Department of Education. Banning vaccine mandates for schools. The abandonment of Ukraine. Trump ran as an unrepentant criminal and directed what the journalist Susan Glasser described as “one of the most racist, sexist, and xenophobic campaigns in modern history.”

Interestingly, Trump- thrice-married, a proud sexual predator who probably breaks a couple of the Commandments before breakfast each morning- won a majority or supermajority of the votes from every Christian denomination.

And what are we to make of the fact that America’s young men turned out in droves to vote for the former reality show host ? Is Trump- vulgar, vain, always the victim- their idea of a masculine role model ? The available evidence suggests the answer is yes.

Political journalists and pundits are busy sifting through mountains of poll results and voting data in hopes of validating their pet theory of why the election turned out the way it did. Meanwhile a study conducted by the public survey company Ipsos might offer the best explanation for how we got here. Ipsos asked their subjects to answer a set of factual questions. The people who got most of the questions right overwhelmingly voted for Harris, while those respondents whose answers were mostly incorrect overwhelmingly voted for Trump. Republican and right-leaning voters are supporting and voting for politicians who are offering solutions to problems (Murderous migrant hordes ! $8.00 a gallon for gas !) which are often fictional. The two halves of the U.S. electorate now exist in two different epistemic universes. When we have different values, we can sometimes come to agreement on an issue. However when we have different facts, basic discourse becomes impossible. If I’m concerned that climate change is increasing the frequency and severity of hurricanes, and you believe that hurricanes are created by the government’s weather machine, then there is no common ground.

Truth be told, I never cared much for the “this is not who we are” refrain we heard so much from Trump’s opponents over the last nine years. First, it always sounded weak and whiny, and secondly, it’s not historically accurate. Americans are after all just human beings, and human beings often do terrible things. And now, after we (the collective we, maybe not you and I) have elected Trump twice, it is manifestly untrue. This is who we are.

Perhaps Trump’s opponents spent so much time focusing on the man’s myriad character flaws that they failed to appreciate his strengths. Trump is an excellent practitioner of fascist politics. This style of politics has been successful in many countries (for a time) less because of a specific country’s history or culture but because of the way our brains are wired. The appeal of “us versus them” is strong. Human nature is unchanged.

Many voters probably took another chance on Trump because they don’t remember his first term as being all that bad. What they fail to realize is that that was not a real Trump administration. It was a presidency in which, as one writer put it, baby bumpers and pool noodles were placed around all of the government’s sharp edges. This time the voters will get to experience Trumpism unbound. His party has a commanding majority in the Senate and he has been immunized from accountability by a friendly Supreme Court. So be it. This time the voters will not be insulated from the consequences of their decisions at the ballot box, nor should they be. Indeed, the consequences are already starting to accrue. Small companies are pulling back on Christmas bonuses and raises; instead they’re buying a year’s worth of inventory in advance in anticipation of Trump’s tariffs. Prominent CEOs are already making it clear they will pass on any added costs from the tariffs to the consumer. As the satirist H.L. Mencken once famously wrote, “Democracy is the theory that the common people know what they want and deserve to get it good and hard.” One can only hope that the experience which awaits us will deter Americans from making another such disastrous choice in the future.