Are Donald Trump’s supporters Deplorable? Perhaps the real question should be; is there a basket big enough to dump these haters into…
Hillary Clinton told an inconvenient and uncomfortable truth recently at a gathering of the LGBT community. In the context of trying to explain the popularity of Donald Trump and the nature of his appeal to the rabid group of core supporters that follow him unflinchingly and unconditionally, she made a statement that half of his supporters could be categorized and placed into what she described as a “Basket of Deplorables.” People who’s motivation for seeing Trump elected seems to stem from their unbridled hatred for groups of people that they see as “the enemy.”
The media uniformly decries that statement as a gaffe on Clinton’s part and they lament that this will hurt her with the general electorate who will see this statement as an affront to their motives and beliefs. I for one, would like to commend Secretary Clinton for her candor and her longanimity with regard to this and other matters related to this carnival sideshow that is masquerading as a political campaign.
The Conventional Wisdom says that you can criticize a candidate but not his supporters. But that CW presupposes that those supporters could perhaps be in contention as potential supporters of the opposing candidate if they can be converted to an alternate point of view either during the election or as constituents after the election has taken place.
The CW says: “you are the president of the country not of your supporters.”
Really?
Is Barack Obama the president of the 60% of republicans who believe that he was not born in the United States and is therefore not really our legitimate president? They say that he isn’t. Who are we to argue with them.
The simple fact is that the Trump campaign is only a viable campaign because it appeals to the racists, bigots, homophobes, xenophobes and the various and sundry others that would prefer a revisionist version of “the good ole days” in which white people could lynch a black man (or Muslim, or homosexual, or Hillary Clinton…) in peace without a bunch of bleeding heart, politically correct, Liberals ruining it for everyone.
Do these deplorable people constitute 50% of Trump’s supporters? I don’t know.
But here is the thing: Without that ferocious and vitriolic segment of his supporters in the mix, Trump would not control enough of the voting populous to sustain a viable Presidential run.
The simple fact is that the deplorable behavior that Clinton referred to is on display for everyone to see. I would direct you to this video as an example of the blatantly racist, bigoted, and yes, “deplorable” attitudes and behaviors that are common at every trump rally. These rallies are little more than well organized Lynch mobs.
The CW said that if Lincoln signed the emancipation proclamation into law it would destroy our country.
The CW said that LBJ should not have pushed the civil rights bill or declared a war on poverty.
The CW said that the country wasn’t “ready” to elect a black man as President of United States.
The truth is that Conventional Wisdom is nothing more than a means by which the status quo can remain the Status Quo.
The Conventional Wisdom conveniently forgets that the only times in our nation’s history that meaningful change has ever occurred is when brave citizens and their elected representatives chose not to listen to the CW and instead named hatred and bigotry and ignorance for what they are, when they are encountered and understand that for us as a nation to move forward, those circumstances must be condemned, loudly and publicly.