"America remains an indispensable nation" for the world, but each generation of Americans must be reminded of that, and President Trump is only dividing the country and making it look inward, our British friend David Rennie writes in his final "Lexington" column for The Economist, as he leaves Washington for a posting in China.
"A natural demagogue, he spotted how, after years of the war on terror, America was weary of trying to fix an ungrateful world," Rennie writes. "He grasped how, at home, millions could conceive of no benign explanation for economic and social changes that worried or disgusted them, and heard no argument from the two main parties that reassured them. He sensed that voters are more than adding machines, weighing the costs and benefits of this stale tax plan or that tired promise of help. He won in part by understanding how much people need to feel that they are useful, respected and heeded. A better man than Mr. Trump could have done great things with that insight."
Rennie uses some rural examples to illustrate voters' feelings: dislike of federal land-management policies in eastern Oregon, and a study of "why middle-aged men were buying fewer licences to hunt deer" in Wisconsin. "With women gaining economic and social power, the study found, men feel less able to head to the woods for a week’s deer camp, supremely confident in their authority as breadwinners. To be good fathers, they feel less able to skip children’s sports. 'The ladies all hollered at me,' one research subject recalled after a deer-related conflict, in tones of baffled hurt. . . . Partisans on the left sometimes scoff at conservatives ascribing voter anger to 'economic anxiety,' arguing that this is really prejudice at work. In real life, differing forms of anxiety cannot easily be separated."
Rennie concludes, "There are plausible scenarios in which Mr. Trump, a cynical and undisciplined bully, brings catastrophe to the country that Lexington was raised to love, and where both his children were born. For now consider a disaster that is already certain. Mr. Trump has a rare understanding of how change has left millions feeling disrespected, abused and alienated from mainstream politics. Alas, he has used that gift only to divide his country, for selfish ends. This is a tragic waste." (Read more)
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| David Rennie |
Rennie uses some rural examples to illustrate voters' feelings: dislike of federal land-management policies in eastern Oregon, and a study of "why middle-aged men were buying fewer licences to hunt deer" in Wisconsin. "With women gaining economic and social power, the study found, men feel less able to head to the woods for a week’s deer camp, supremely confident in their authority as breadwinners. To be good fathers, they feel less able to skip children’s sports. 'The ladies all hollered at me,' one research subject recalled after a deer-related conflict, in tones of baffled hurt. . . . Partisans on the left sometimes scoff at conservatives ascribing voter anger to 'economic anxiety,' arguing that this is really prejudice at work. In real life, differing forms of anxiety cannot easily be separated."
Rennie concludes, "There are plausible scenarios in which Mr. Trump, a cynical and undisciplined bully, brings catastrophe to the country that Lexington was raised to love, and where both his children were born. For now consider a disaster that is already certain. Mr. Trump has a rare understanding of how change has left millions feeling disrespected, abused and alienated from mainstream politics. Alas, he has used that gift only to divide his country, for selfish ends. This is a tragic waste." (Read more)
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