Politics Is About Feelings

For this week's issue @newyorker, I wrote about GOP support for Trump in places that defy the stereotype. His rise is often told as a hostile takeover. In truth, it is something closer to a joint venture with some of America's most prosperous citizens. https://t.co/XnCKRa4gD2

— Evan Osnos (@eosnos) May 3, 2020

Jim Campbell was the chairman of the Republican Town Committee. The Campbells, like the Bushes, had deep roots in town. Jim prepped at Exeter and graduated from Harvard and Harvard Law School, before working in Europe and returning home as a real-estate executive. On a fall evening, Campbell attended a reception for Jeb Bush at the Belle Haven Club, a private tennis-and-boating club overlooking Long Island Sound. Jeb was expansive and mild, which struck Campbell as precisely wrong for the political moment: “He gave a whole talk about a woman named Juanita in South Florida, and how ‘immigration is love,’ and I just looked at the people I came with and said, ‘Does he think he’s already the nominee? He’s running in a tough Republican primary, and just because we’re at the Belle Haven Club doesn’t mean we’re all voting for him.’ ”

At home one night, watching television, Campbell happened on a Trump rally in Iowa. “I’m not a hard-core conservative—I’m a Republican from Greenwich,” Campbell said. “But I listened, and he had that line that he would use: ‘Folks, we either have a country or we don’t.’ And I felt the chill—like Chris Matthews with the little Obama zing up the leg. I’m, like, ‘Oh, my God, this is a really good line.’ ” To Campbell, Trump was describing immigration in ways that resonated: “Could somebody finally say that we’re allowed to enforce the law at the border without being called a racist? I lived in Switzerland for ten years. Do you think I was allowed to go around without a passport?”

Campbell tapped out a text message to a friend: “Trump live - can’t turn the channel. Unbelievable. I don’t think any R can beat him.” Campbell watched the rally for forty-five minutes. “He was mesmerizing,” he said. Not long afterward, he saw a Republican debate in which Trump described the invasion of Iraq as a mistake. For Campbell, the acknowledgment came as a catharsis. “Of course it was a big, fat mistake,” he told himself. “He says everything I think.”

And about where you put the em-FA-sis.  Yes, Trump was right about Iraq.  No, that didn't qualify Trump for high office.  But who votes on qualifications, anyway?  If we did most of the Presidential elections since 1964 would have turned out very differently. I understand the appeal of Trump; but I don't feel it.  I don't think it, either, but then I find very few people think as I do.  That doesn't set me above, just apart; and apart and $4 will buy you a coffee at Starbucks.  Especially in politics.

As for Greenwich, Connecticut and the support Trump has there; I seem to recall Orange County was full of mossbacked arch-conservatives desperate to protect their own and turn the clock back on the century as well.  Lot of rich people there, too.  Just because you're rich doesn't mean you're smart; or that what you want is what the country needs.

And Trump's victory still came from  yahoos in the Midwest who voted when no one else bothered to.  Same ones shouting in each other's faces while carrying semi-automatics in the Michigan State House.  They probably represented Trump's margin of victory in 2016, too.

But feelings against Trump are running high, and with November just a few months away, those feelings matter.  Since his ratings fell a month after he took office, Trump's approval has never been higher than 45%, and now it's back down to 43%.    He couldn't win re-election if Joe Biden dropped dead in September.