What is it that Republican voters want? I know they’d like to deny Joe Biden a second term as president. There’s nothing unusual about that. Political parties exist to win elections. But it seems to me that the Republican base wants Donald Trump as their champion irrespective of his chances of winning. And I really wonder about why that is.
Over the weekend, Robert Costa interviewed Kevin McCarthy. McCarthy predicted that Trump will win the Republican nomination and beat Biden. He also said he would support Trump and possibly serve in his cabinet. But the most interesting exchange had to do with Trump’s very transparent call for “retribution” on his political enemies.
Costa asked, “You praise Trump’s policies. You say he’s a good guy. But many Americans, they look at his language, they listen to his speeches, and they hear an authoritarian. Some say even a fascist on the horizon in this country. What do you say to those people who have those real concerns?”
McCarthy replied, “Look, I don’t see that, and this is what I tell President Trump, too. What President Trump needs to do in this campaign, it needs to be about rebuilding, restoring, renewing America. It can’t be about revenge.”
“He’s talking about retribution, day in, day out.”
“He needs to stop that,” McCarthy responded. “He needs to stop that.”
“You think he’s going to listen to you saying, ‘Stop that. Stop that’? He hasn’t listened to anybody before.”
“That’s not true,” said McCarthy. “He will adapt when he gets all the facts.”
“He’s not backing away from his calls for retribution,” said Costa.
“Yeah, but remember, you have a check and balance system. And I think, at the end of the day–”
Costa asked, “Where’s the check and balance on him in the Republican Party?”
“America doesn’t want to see the idea of retribution,” said McCarthy. “If it’s rebuild, restore and renew, then I think you’ll see that. And look – that’s him. But I’m not gonna change who I am. And I’m not gonna stop giving him the advice.
Maybe America doesn’t want to see “the idea of retribution,” but I suspect that Republican voters do. How else do we explain that five weeks before the first in the nation Iowa caucuses, Trump is the first choice of 51 percent of likely caucusgoers? He has a 32 point lead over his nearest competitor, Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida. And, while there are still a healthy number of undecided voters, most of those are people who aren’t choosing Trump right now. Among Trump supports, seven in ten say their mind cannot be changed. And if you want to be really disturbed, look at this:
Trump gets first-choice support from majorities of evangelical Christians (51% of them backed him), self-identified Republicans (59%), first-time caucusgoers (63%) and white men without college degrees (66%).
These aren’t all preexisting Republican voters. Trump is absolutely dominating with 63 percent support from first-time caucusgoers. He’s still bringing new people into the process.
I’ve mentioned before that the best way to dent Trump’s support is to change the perception of his electability, but that’s very hard to do when the polls don’t back it up, at all. On Monday, CNN released data showing Trump beating Biden in Georgia and thumping him in Michigan. The Wall Street Journal finds Biden at the weakest point in his presidency, trailing Trump nationally 47-43 percent in a two-way race and faring even worse in multi-candidate scenarios.
I’m not going to deny that the world is a mess right now, but it’s mystifying why Biden is so unpopular. The economy isn’t working for everybody, I know, but some of the metrics are really, really strong.
U.S. employers added a healthy 199,000 jobs [in November] and the unemployment rate fell, fresh signs that the economy could achieve an elusive “soft landing,” in which inflation would return to the Federal Reserve’s 2% target without causing a steep recession.
Friday’s report from the Labor Department showed that the unemployment rate dropped from 3.9% to 3.7%, not far above a five-decade low of 3.4% in April. The jobless rate has now remained below 4% for nearly two years, the longest such streak since the late 1960s.
Biden is solving inflation, defying expectations in avoiding a recession, and has done a fantastic job of creating jobs. Considering other factors, like housing costs and a monopolized economy, I don’t expect Biden to be riding a wave of popularity based on the economy, but he’s should be getting credit for his performance in office, and he most definitely is not.
Every time we see a new poll confirming that Biden is unpopular, it boosts Trump. It’s why a guy like Aaron Mann, 30, of Fort Madison, Iowa, says he’s caucusing for Trump: “I think a ham sandwich could probably win a general election against Joe Biden.” The NBC News/Des Moines Register/Mediacom poll shows 73 percent of likely Iowa Republican caucusgoers think Trump can beat Biden despite his overwhelming legal vulnerabilities.
There have been indications in numerous polls that Trump’s support would drop considerably if he were actually convicted of a felony, and I believe that is probably true. But that seems like voters dropping him more in sorrow than in anger. In other words, they want Trump but can be persuaded that he is not in fact electable. This seems especially true among Republicans who just seem to have a strong affinity for this guy who is such an obviously terrible person.
It’s depressing that Republicans like Trump so much, but I think they like him precisely because he’s terrible, and promises to do terrible things. That doesn’t explain why non-Republicans are still open to him despite the January 6 insurrection, and despite his handling of the pandemic, and despite all that has been revealed and all his legal problems.
In other words, I know that Republicans want to see “the idea of retribution,” but I’m beginning to suspect that that is also true for the majority of Americans. The mood is just sour beyond imagination.
I agree that it’s crazy that people want what Trump is selling. But…it’s crazy to us because we don’t live in a world where Fox News (and even worse stuff) is playing 24/7. That’s 30 years of people’s brains marinating in a non-stop stew of “Democrats are Evil and you should be VERY angry about it.” I get to see that every Christmas with the in-laws, and every year it gets a little more shocking how far the Rs are from anything I recognize as reality. Combine that with the normal thermostatic political reaction, lingering unhappiness from the pandemic, and a general feeling that things could be better… Well, it’s like the old Yeats quote: “The best lack all conviction, while the worst are full of passionate intensity.”
Great comment, thanks. Kevin Drum’s come to the conclusion (based, naturally on lots of charts and graphs) that Fox News and its larger universe is the single biggest factor in the growing crazification of the Republican party.
One thing that adds to the frustration for the rest of us is the lack of accountability, and accountability points, for Trump. If Judge Chutkan can keep her trial on schedule, that could be an important event. Trump as the presumptive GOP nominee (having won a majority of convention delegates by May) *and* a convicted felon is, I think, a different proposition than Trump flying all over the country and spouting off daily on social (and other) media.
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We few options as individuals except to talk about this with our friends, family and neighbors to do the right thing and vote for Biden. We also need to be defiantly hopeful – lights in this darkness. Cynicism and pessimism are not helpful.
I’ve dropped all pretenses of copium after 2016. I can absolutely see Trump winning 2024 and doling out exactly what he has promised. Remember his Fifth Avenue quote, and remember that there are a lot of Fifth Avenues in this country.
If you’re still 100% against safely owning and knowing how to operate a firearm, it’s probably an own-goal, but hey, you gotta do you and whatnot.
Adding: some of the sourness is the sheer length of Trump’s presence on the presidential political stage. He’s been president or campaigning for president nonstop since 2015…and there’s nearly another year (at least) to go.
And it’s not as simple as, say, Grover Cleveland, who won, then lost, then won elections. Trump lost the popular vote by an unprecedented margin for a winning candidate. Then he lost the popular vote by a much larger margin *and* lost the electoral vote but attempted to overthrow the government *and* has so far escaped accountability for his actions.
There’s a very good chance that the Trump “story” will have a conclusion by a year from now. Bad case: he wins the November election, becomes president again in January 2025, and does what he’s promised to do. Good case: he loses the November election decisively and is a convicted felon serving (or about to start serving) a lengthy sentence. Better case: Trump’s defeat and conviction (and the better-than-expected Democratic showing in state and other federal elections) signals the beginning of the end for the reactionary and authoritarian movement he leads.
A news poll out says 31 percent of Republicans will not vote for Trump if he is convicted.
Maybe it’s not really so mysterious. Maybe it’s very easily understood when one looks at it from the premise, “Yes, this really is who we are as a country and as a people”. Maybe in 2023 retribution is just fine with most white Americans? Maybe they really are ready to violently purge their fellow citizens who disagree with them, and roll back everything that has even been attempted in the last 75 years to move the country toward it’s professed creed of equality for all? Maybe they really are at a point where they are ready to revert the country to a pre-1865 form of government? Maybe we are at the point where The Great American Experiment finally dies at the ballot box?
If it does, it will be largely due to the fact that the vast majority of voters for at least the last couple of generations have not given two fucks about even bothering to participate in the electoral affairs of our constitutional republic, and are perfectly willing to go along with the radical minority who want to burn it all down now, simply because they don’t believe they will be target of their new authoritarian rulers. On the whole, we have become a pathetically spoiled and lazy country. The willful ignorance and disinterest of so much of its citizenry is going to bring a heavy price down on all our heads if at least some of those people don’t wake up and recognize the dire threat that we are now facing. The past is rife with well established forms of government that have died. Ours enjoys no special grace in the eyes of history. There is no reason to believe it cannot also simply fall into the dustbin of history with all the other failed efforts that have come before ours.
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