Let me admit that I’d anticipated the current field of Republican presidential hopefuls to run along the lines of the last one – a new front-runner every week while the previous one fell from view. Not so this time. Not yet.
David Frum’s provocative and well-reasoned article, “The Great Republican Revolt,” in the Atlantic magazine argues, among other points, that Trump’s base, fueled by anger and a sense of despair, has no use for the brand of conservatism demanded by the ideological purists. Rather, they may have much in common with emerging right-wing movements in Europe that are not hostile to public services. As Frum explains, “These populists seek to defend what the French call ‘acquired rights’—health care, pensions, and other programs that benefit older people—against bankers and technocrats who endlessly demand austerity; against migrants who make new claims and challenge accustomed ways; against a globalized market that depresses wages and benefits. In the United States, they lean Republican because they fear the Democrats want to take from them and redistribute to Americans who are newer, poorer, and in their view less deserving—to ‘spread the wealth around,’ in candidate Barack Obama’s words to ‘Joe the Plumber’ back in 2008. Yet they have come to fear more and more strongly that their party does not have their best interests at heart.”
As part of Frum’s subtitle asks – “Can the party reconcile the demands of its donors with the demands of its rank and file?” – a fundamental conflict between the party’s big-money establishment and its voter base centers on immigration and other global economics, the forces that have been eroding America’s middle class. While the investors and corporate executives have been enriched by these policies, many native-born Americans have seen themselves sliding downward. Pointedly, few Trump supporters have more than a high school education, and few earn more than $100,000 a year. Cutting public support to education, health services, and the like are not in their interest – especially when the cuts benefit the super rich.
In that regard, the Trump message (who knows about his actual platform, if any?) has many parallels with Bernie Sanders’ so-called socialist stands. That, alone, should have the GOP establishment shaking.
Jnana's Red Barn 