In the 1979 fable Being There, a simple-minded gardener named Chance—wandering the streets of Washington, D.C.—is misperceived as an insightful businessman, by the elite.
One of the points in Being There is that people only see what they want to see.
Also, once people have been fooled, it’s extremely difficult to convince them that they’ve been mistaken.
Chance becomes a popular media celebrity, a Presidential confidant, and finally heir to an aging tycoon.
By the tycoon’s funeral, political insiders are plotting that Chance become the next U.S. President.
Recently, Trump admitted that—despite graduating from an ivy league college in 1968—he didn’t realize what NATO was, before he was elected President.
He used tariffs very badly in 2018 through 2019, leading to agricultural export losses of nearly $27 billion.
Yet, Trump is still talking about adding more tariffs, if elected.
What many “victims” of “Trump-derangement syndrome” fail to understand, is how Trump was normalized by being made president eight years ago.
Lucky Loser: How Donald Trump Squandered His Father’s Fortune and Created the Illusion of Success, by Russ Buettner and Suzanne Craig, outlines how reality TV producers turned a failing, bankruptcy-prone businessman from a New York joke into a “star.”
Since watchers of Fox News never heard of Lucky Loser, Trump supporters still believe he’s an admirable, self-made billionaire.
People didn’t pick up the clues when Trump went through his Cabinet hires like tissue paper, and proudly revealed highly classified information (“great intel”) to a Russian delegation, just weeks into his presidency.
They didn’t mind when he betrayed the Kurds, or pitted state against state during the COVID crisis.
Never-Trumpers are worried 20 days from November 5: why do so many people still support an entertainer who’s determined to throw the world into chaos?
The court cases against Trump only made him more popular.
His supporters have known for years that he lies, is cavalier with government papers, and is “sexually incontinent.”
They don’t care!
Democrats may clutch their pearls while Trump fails to “uphold the honor and dignity of the office,” but his people don’t give a hoot.
The goal of “populist” Trump is to keep poor white people (as well as blacks and browns) stuck as second-class citizens, and to keep WASPs in charge.
That’s what he did when he signed the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017, and what he would do if he increased tariffs, and dismantled the Federal Government (as outlined in Project 2025).
According to the Brookings Institute, the trade deficit got worse every year of Trump’s presidency, and the number of manufacturing jobs went down.
Nevertheless, Trump supporters still defend him as their savior.
The upcoming election race may be so tight because the U.S. has always elected Presidents who fit the same old tired WASP pattern.
45 men have held the office.
U.S. Presidents have all been male, raised as Christians, and had Northern European—never Southern European!—ancestors.
With a few exceptions, Presidents have been taller, Protestant, military men, more vigorous than studious, and lawyers.
True. Obama was the first Black president.
He still fit several of the “other qualifications.”*
There’s a “presidential type” for the U.S. “avatar,” and Americans still tend to trust WASPs over other office holders.
If you check off the list of avatar attributes, the only attributes that Kamala has going for her is that she’s much more vigorous than Trump, plus she’s a lawyer!
Some voters think they’re facing a “Hobson’s choice.”
(“Hobson’s choice” refers to the choice of taking what’s available, or nothing at all.)
Neither Donald Trump, or Kamala Harris, fits the standard WASP profile.
Trump is not Anglo-Saxon, he’s unwillingly to learn from his mistakes, plus he’s obviously unstable.
Harris is a woman, plus she’s the child of two immigrants (not just one, like Trump).
Harris has an Irish ancestor (via Jamaica), while Trump is half Scot and half German.
Neither is Anglo-Saxon at all.
However, like Eisenhower and Van Buren, Trump is all Northern European.
In David Lean’s 1954 film of Hobson’s Choice, Henry Hobson (Charles Laughton) is a small businessman who’s forced to give up power—and stop treating his three daughters as chattel—by the manipulations of his eldest daughter Maggie (Brenda de Banzie).
In the end, Henry accepts his “Hobson’s choice,” and surrenders his shoe shop to his heirs.
The question is: who will people vote for, in November of 2024, when some believe that there’s no satisfactory choice (Trump because of his instability, and Harris because of her sex)?
Is the Vice-Presidential pick a factor?
Will a few more people vote for Harris, because they feel safer with Coach Walz than with Mr. Vance?
Will less, or more, citizens vote in 2024, than voted in 2020?
There are about 20 days left to learn what’s up.
* President Obama has extremely deep roots in this country, on his mother’s side. He’s the 11th great-grandson of an African man named John Punch. In 1640, Punch attempted to escape indentured servitude, and ended up the first Black slave in colonial Virginia. Who says God doesn’t have a great sense of irony?
