Full disclosure. Quite a while ago, I was presenting at a conference, and in response to a question about a patient's body habitus, I correctly, if opaquely, described her as "Rubenesque". This elicited a grin and a chuckle from the moderator, a mentor of mine, who responded, "You Northwestern guys (I'm an alumnus), your shit just doesn't stink!".
Well friends, if you didn't know already, with precious few exceptions, in politics, it all stinks.
The alien invasion I've been waiting for hasn't stopped Trump or Clinton from essentially securing their party's nominations, so most of the media circus has now pivoted to the general election. But before we go there, today's blog takes a look back as how the heck we got to this dismal state.
We start with the GOP. I don't know who's cousin got the job as the Republican's pollster, but I think the belief that there are a lot of "true conservatives" out there hasn't seen Ted Cruz's list of Facebook friends (few, none?). Unpleasant, uncompromising, narcissistic, smarmy. Those aren't typical qualities of a Presidential candidate, and they won't be this time. But that raises the more interesting question, "why Trump, and not Kasich/Bush/Rubio/etc..."? I think for many, there's a surprisingly large rift between what they want, and what they're willing to do to get it, a divide that gets larger the more fear and anxiety play into the mix. Socioeconomic anxiety, security fears, there really is no difference if these are real or imagined, once the anxiety switch is turned on the imagination will take it the rest of the way. Using Bush as the prototypical example, sensible and moderate approaches to policy positions, despite being backed by super PACs of rich folks unaffected by economic strife, were no match for a pervasive anxiety amongst "regular" Republican voters that they were in some way being left behind by an already-slowing economy. Neatly filling this void, and need, was the Donald, who has cleverly chosen to run as the "blame aliens, I'll fix it, America first" candidate. In this current climate, that's proven to be a winning solution so far. Trump's challenge heading into the general is if he can bring this same offer of salvation to a broad enough swath of America to beat Hillary. Smart money says, "no way", but I think it might be closer than those people, who wrote Trump off from the start, realize.
The same "logic" (that's a stretch) applies to the Democrats. Yes, of course we want to save the whales. Of course we want LGBT rights. Of course we want clean energy. Wait, no fracking? What about my job? Black lives matter? In my neighborhood? The rampant idealism of Bernie Sanders, with enormous appeal to those under 50 (Used to be 20. Then 30. Then 40. Now 50) was IMO a "better angels" campaign. Sorry, but being a better angel has historically proven a tough slog (eg. martyrs). But I think the reality, and a slim majority of Democratic voters, have said "no thank you, the status quo will do just fine, see you next election". Why on this side? "Better the devil you know than the devil you don't". I think there was an undercurrent of fear that a Sanders presidency would have proven to have been TOO democratic for some, if it meant sharing some of the wealth. Hillary may be our untrustworthy, e-mail serving, Wall Street lecturing, military hawk, but she's OUR untrustworthy, e-mail serving, ... you get the idea. Supporters, Democrats or otherwise, will be willing to support her, especially if they fear a Trump presidency. Translated, that means most non-white minority voting groups will be firmly in the Clinton camp, along with many of the other groups that Trump has slighted during the primary campaign. An intriguing question on this side is, "how energized will Democrats be in the general election". My prediction is, no where near 2008, but this season that might not be necessary. While Trump is the gift that keeps on giving, I still believe he's a much stronger general election candidate than Cruz would have ever been. And Joe Biden continues to kick himself.
So in summary, this will be an election about fear (the polite term, akin to "Rubenesque", is "anxiety", but let's call it what it is, pure, distilled, fear). Fear first for economic security, made manifest by jobs and job opportunities. Next is social fear, "can I keep up with the Jones, or at least ahead of the Smiths?". Much further down the list are fears of ISIS, or fears of trans-people using a public restroom (really?). Not making the list, for voters at least, are future Supreme Court nominees and the relationship with Russia. Sorry, I'm a junkie (hence the blog) and even I don't care. Voters don't. Care.
We'll wrap it up with prediction time, because I like putting picks in writing. VP picks. A month ago I would have said Julian Castro for Hillary's VP, but upon further reflection this was a pick from my own Crazy Town. With a likely Hispanic vote tally north of 80%, Castro would be a wasted VP pick from Clinton. Maybe if the GOP candidate was Rubio, but it's not. So my Monopoly money today is on either Tim Kaine or Jim Webb, the current and former Senators from Virginia. While they're both white guys, Webb has a military background, and that would help Hillary in the general amongst men and veterans. For Trump, many say he needs to pick a woman to help him against Hillary, but I have a hard time seeing him getting along with a woman. Period. Jeff Sessions is another old white guy, and he's a Republican establishment Senator (but no name recognition, however). Paul Ryan is a no-way, Kasich burned that bridge, and Jeb would only play Brutus to Trump's Caesar. Today I'm going out on a limb and saying Chris Christie. Mostly because I would find it endlessly amusing (can you imagine the debates!), and it would open up Attorney General to Rudy Giuliani.
Well, next week it's on to a Trump romp (yugge!) in Indiana, and some inconsequential primaries on the Democrats side. Then the real fun begins... Thanks for reading!
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