I’ve been asked to comment on the following 3 issues.
1)
Where do we go from here?
2)
Why did Trump win?
3)
What caused the change at the end of the campaign?
I’ve addressed #1 already.
In this post, I’ll address #2.
Please remember these are just one person’s thoughts.
Why Did Trump Win? (If you want to skip to what I think were the
reasons Trump won, go to the top of page 3.)
Like many elections, this election was so close that you
could argue that a large number of different issues “made the difference”. There is a tendency for people who lose an
election to grab on to a relatively minor reason that makes them feel justified
in thinking that their side was cheated or was defeated by people who lack
positive values.
Donald Trump set up such an excuse for himself by arguing
that the elections were rigged.
I think Hillary Clinton supporters are making similar
mistakes when they attribute her loss to people being anti-immigrant, racist,
against women, etc. or to FBI Chief Comey.
It seems undeniable that a high Caucasian turn-out helped
Trump succeed. A couple of things worth
noting in that regard:
1)
From a political perspective, most third-party votes
were more aligned with Republican views than Democratic views. Adding Jill Stein’s vote to Clinton’s vote
and Gary Johnson’s and Evan McMillin’s votes to Trump’s total, the Republicans
secured 51.4% of the vote.
2)
We had 4 million fewer voters in 2016 than in 2012. The
vote distribution shifted more rural, even though it is generally agreed that
Democrats are better organized to “get out the vote”, that Trump did a poor job
of creating a “get out the vote” support network and that it seems easier to do
so in urban areas than rural areas. It
seems that Trump voters were personally more determined than Clinton voters.
In those senses, Clinton’s defeat was a bit larger than many
people think.
Typically, people would argue that non-voters lean
Democrat. So if we had 100%
participation, Clinton may have won. We
could have raging debates, however, as to whether it is good to have elections
decided by unengaged voters who have not considered the issues carefully.
Immigration: Liberals have mis-framed the immigration
debate. Few people are anti-immigrant;
most are opposed to illegal
immigration. There is a big difference
here.
- I would agree that illegal immigration played a meaningful role in this election. Hopefully the liberals will understand that many people fear that amnesty without well-managed borders is a disastrous approach, encouraging more illegal immigration. If we can convince people that our borders are adequately protected, amnesty will be much easier to support.
- Legal immigration was a tremendously
smaller issue. Many people favor easier
immigration for people who have skills critical to our economy. Such people were more likely to vote for
Trump. In this sense, Trump’s voters
could be viewed as more pro-(legal)-immigrant than Clinton’s voters.
I have not perceived racism to be a problem for President
Obama during his 8 years in office.
Surely there are some people who were opposed to having an
African-American president but they were few.
Furthermore, they lacked influence.
While there were loud “birther” people, they were ignored or rejected by
almost everyone. (Note: birthers were not
necessarily motivated by racism; some may have been motivated by politics and
others by wanting disclosure.)
When people tell me they are not racist, I wonder whether
they are being dishonest or are trying to fool themselves. It is extremely difficult not to be racist to
some degree in our society. But a great
many Caucasians want to convince themselves that they are not racist. Voting for President Obama and speaking well
of him provided a great way for them to show that they are “not racist”. President Obama benefited from that during
his campaigns and his two terms as President.
It also extended to the press, who seemed very reluctant to criticize
President Obama.
Recent polls indicate that President Obama has a 56%
approval rating. Yet Trump won because
he represented change. The “change”
people wanted is from politicians in general, not President Obama solely. However, if the populace wanted change from
Republican politicians but not Democratic politicians, they would have voted
for Clinton. Therefore it appears to me
that the voters were repudiating President Obama’s politics to a significant
degree while they favor him personally. That
does not demonstrate racism in my opinion.
Supreme Court: I think the Supreme Court was a
factor. Hillary Clinton scared a lot of
people by having a long list of litmus tests (see my comments in my “Where do
we go from here?” post) that she would use to vet Supreme Court candidates to
assure that they would serve as advocates rather than judges when appointed to
the Supreme Court.
Rejection of President Obama: I think the biggest
reason Trump won was the rejection of President Obama’s policies. Clinton tied herself to President Obama and
Trump tied Clinton to President Obama.
Clinton’s ties to President Obama were the single issue that both
campaigns agreed upon. Each candidate
encouraged voters to decide based on this issue and the voters complied.
People wanted change primarily because President Obama
divided our country (even though some may not have blamed him for it) and
weakened us internationally. They
disliked “Obamacare” to a lesser degree and only some of the Obamacare dislike
led to Trump (those who had wanted a government single-payer system were less
likely to be Trump voters). The
deception involved in passing Obamacare helped Trump somewhat.
When President Obama got elected, the country was mostly elated. People were excited to have an
African-American president and hoped to see him succeed. Unfortunately, Mitch McConnell made a stupid comment
(“The single most important thing we
want to achieve is for President Obama to be a one-term president”).
President Obama is a great speaker and motivator. Had President Obama acknowledged the
contributions and sufferings of various groups and asked them all to make
sacrifices, I believe he could have had an extremely successful Presidency and
a great legacy.
Unfortunately, Democrats such as Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid,
Henry Waxman, and Barney Franks pressured President Obama to ram legislation
through without any consideration of Republican ideas. (Pelosi has publicly taken credit for
this.) They used McConnell’s statement
and outright lies to trick their supporters into thinking that President Obama
had reached out to Republicans but been rejected.
Over the past six years, many friends have argued
strenuously to me that President Obama reached out to Republicans. But when I ask for evidence, they cite that President
Obama said he reached out or they cite McConnell’s comment (which of course
does not even address whether President Obama reached out). I’ve been able to cite one example of
“reaching out”, but Democratic internal correspondence has shown that effort was
insincere, intended to entrap Republicans rather than reach out. (Please note that I have never taken the
position that the Republicans would have responded positively had President
Obama reached out to them. I don’t know
and harbor significant doubts. But I believe
that he did not do so.)
Because he spurned working with Republicans and/or because
Republicans did not like his proposed health care program, he was dependent on
every Democrat vote. Unfortunately, the
“blue-dog” Democrats did not like PPACA because they believed it would drive up
the debt. So President Obama tried strong
inducements (some were rolled back because they were determined to be illegal)
and other pressure to get those Democrats to vote for his health plan. The result was that the blue-dog Democrats
were voted out of Congress because they abandoned the principles cherished by
their constituents. They were replaced
by Tea Party Republicans.
Before I heard anyone else complain about President Obama
inciting class warfare, I registered complaints about that to my wife and
perhaps friends. (Note: I had voted for
President Obama in 2008, so this complaint was coming from a supporter at that
time). Instead of recognizing that
business people pay a large percentage of our taxes and create a large number
of jobs, yet appealing to them for sacrifices, President Obama chose to try to
mobilize the country against business people.
Instead of strongly encouraging students to apply themselves to get a
good education, he fostered the idea that they were being abused by the system
and encouraged them to occupy Wall Street.
I’ve cited this legacy of President Obama for 6 years now,
but it has not been obvious to people.
Most people have perceived that his health care program would be his
legacy.
The other legacy is his preference for a weak United
States. He took the position that we had
wielded strength inappropriately and should withdraw from international
influence. While I disagreed with the
foreign policy of George W. Bush, the world had a relatively peaceful second
half of the 20th-century, much of which was attributable to USA
strength and leadership.
President Obama wanted to use more diplomacy than President
George W. Bush. More diplomacy would
have been a good idea, if President Obama had been a strong negotiator
internationally. Unfortunately, he
abandoned negotiation points unilaterally before negotiations started and made
it clear that reaching agreement was more important to him than to the people
on the “other side of the table”. He
seemed to have a “Pollyanna” belief that other countries would respond
favorably to his sincere weak posture, rather than taking advantage of it.
He backed away repeatedly from our staunchest mid-eastern
ally (Israel), confusing the Palestinians into thinking he would support their
entry into the UN, then upsetting them when he did not do so. He went “all in” on the Arab Spring, for
example insisting that Egypt’s President Mubarak step down immediately rather
than manage a peaceful transition. He
drew a red line in Syria then backed down. These actions exposed a lack of understanding
of his adversaries.
I think President Obama’s two main legacies will be that he
divided our country and weakened us internationally, opening the door to Trump’s
success. In other words, Trump is
President Obama’s legacy.
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