Asset Out of Containment
Trump simply can’t let go of a false narrative. Answer? Let go of him.
I understand the appeal of Donald Trump, as much as that understanding sometimes causes extreme revulsion. For years, it’s been understood that Trump was a symptom, not a disease. He was the product of a demographic that was disenfranchised during the Obama years and thought (perhaps erroneously) that he was the answer to years of feeling despised and unheard by political representatives. His brand of something-supposedly-resembling-conservatism was a weapon against being overlooked and unrepresented by D.C. politicians, right and left alike.
I won’t say that this characterization is entirely wrong. Nor would I say that the levied criticisms against establishment political parties are entirely in the wrong. But there is one thing that can be said now, with the benefit of 4 years of Trumpism behind us: embracing Trump the man is a terrible mistake for the American right going forward, now more than ever before.
During those 4 years of Trump, we were told not to pay attention to the things he said. Rhetoric, it was argued, was far less important than policy. Picking good justices, securing the southern border, protecting American interests, all these things were more important than “mean tweets.” And that was correct. But what’s happening now is not simply “mean tweets.” What we are witnessing right now is a former president of the United States refusing to admit defeat in a free and fair election and trying to draw support around that refusal. “If we don’t solve the Presidential Election Fraud of 2020 (which we have thoroughly and conclusively documented),” says Trump, “Republicans will not be voting in ’22 or ’24. It is the single most important thing for Republicans to do.”
I don’t care what you think of Trump. I really don’t. We can have disagreements there, I’m more than willing to accept that the choice to vote Trump has always been a contested choice. But let’s be clear here. Wherever you stand on the political spectrum, you should be able to denounce this. Tactically foolish, politically irresponsible, outright lying, pick your poison. This is not the way forward.
Trump’s brand of politics was served by the fact that he made it incredibly difficult to vote for his opponents. No one on the Trump train or anywhere in its vicinity was willing to pull the lever for Lyin’ Ted, Crazy Bernie, Crooked Hillary, or Sleepy Joe Biden. That worked for Trump, and his political outsider status made it comparatively easy to vote for him.
This latest statement is an indicator that the tide is shifting. Supporting Trump now, by the parameters he himself has set, means giving some form of assent to the election fraud narrative that the former president has pushed since November of last year. Giving that assent is proving difficult for the moderate and sensible on the right, and Trump should arguably be savvy enough to see that his narrative is not making it easier to vote for him. Yet, he’s not.
The tide is shifting, and it’s time to let Trump go. Large swaths of his support have disappeared, and his approval ratings at the end of his presidency hit lows among both Republicans and Independents polled. Even allowing for some resurgence in numbers given the general disaster of the current presidency, Trump’s open embrace of the election fraud narrative presents big electability problems for anyone wanting him back in the Oval Office. There was a time when Trump was the symptom, not the disease. Five years later, it’s abundantly clear that he’s become a disease unto himself — a disease no sane political party should want to catch.