A Cold Spell in Oregon
Many of us spent the majority of October living in the Republican news bubble of Fox News, the Wall Street Journal and Real Clear Politics. For diversity, we might buy the New York Times and then roll our eyes at their political profiles of Democratic candidates they thought were running intelligent races in red states, such as Ohio. In our GOP bubble, poll after Real Clear Politics poll showed a Republican tsunami coming in the midterm election. In October, the bubble was a nice place to be.
The only exception to the good news was one series of polls that measured the generic ballot test. In other words, would you choose a generic Republican or a generic Democrat candidate for Congress?
At the time of the election, Real Clear Politics gave Republicans only a two-point edge in the generic ballot test. Last spring, the Republican edge in the test had been closer to five or six points – which is what you need for a tsunami in a midterm election. Things changed when the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade. After the ruling, Democrats did a masterful job of scaring voters that Republicans would completely ban abortion in red states.
We ignored how close the Generic Ballot test was – or that in this election independents would eventually break on the margin for Democrats. Instead, we luxuriated in the good news that despite Donald Trump's unpopularity, he wasn't on the ballot after all.
These midterm elections, we told ourselves, would be a rout for the Republicans because the country was such a mess and the 80-year-old president that Democrats had forced on the country in 2020 was so obviously mentally disabled. Anybody could see that. We were sure voters would punish the Democrats for this awful Biden presidency. The Republican bubble told us so. We were wrong.
Much to our surprise, Donald Trump was on the ballot.
In the last 100 years, five prominent demagogues stand out as major disrupters of American politics. They are: Huey Long, Joe McCarthy, George Wallace, Ross Perot and Donald Trump. All of them had presidential ambitions, one of them obtained it.
Despite his obvious talents, is it fair to call Donald Trump a demagogue? Here's Webster's definition: "A political leader who seeks support by appealing to the desires and prejudices of ordinary people rather than by using rational argument." And an example they used: "a gifted demagogue with particular skill in manipulating the press."
He fits that more than not.
If Trump is a demagogue, you can't blame ordinary working Americans for wanting him as their leader. The elitist selfish baby boomers "had it coming!" in the words of Velma Kelley in the musical "Chicago."
In the summer of 2015, the editors of this newsletter warned our region in an Oregonian op-ed, "Baby Boomers Have Left the Millennials the Bill for a Bloated Public Sector," what was about to transpire in the candidacy of Donald Trump and why.
"It's ironic that the baby-boom generation, whose political baptism began with Vietnam and Watergate – and that gave birth to Silicon Valley – would later be defined by a fondness for big government and a passion for bloated, unsustainable and generational cruel public sector union benefits.
"So how do you know when generational politics are about to change? You know by the appearance every 25 years or so of a generational ‘town crier.’ Each generation has its Paul Revere. In 1992, Ross ‘a giant sucking sound’ Perot played the part, warning WWII types that their time was up. This year Donald ‘you're a loser’ Trump delivered an eerily similar message to aging boomers."
Now, three elections and seven years after the emergence of Donald Trump as a gigantic national political force, the American public has tired of his politics by division. It was inevitable.
During his 30-year reign of late night television, viewers and critics often wondered why Johnny Carson lasted so long while the dozens of late night competitors that other networks threw at him never lasted. Eventually, the common lore about Carson came to be that he lasted so long, wore so well in the nation's living rooms, because he played it cool, not "hot," on TV. Those who played it "hot" on TV eventually wore out their welcome with the American people.
Playing it "hot" is exactly what the five demagogues of American politics did to make an impact. Being a demagogue and making a mark is a "hot" game.
Huey Long, Joe McCarthy, George Wallace and Ross Perot all had dramatic "hot" populist runs in American politics. And all lasted approximately four years in the nation's political conscience. Huey Long's reign ended when he was assassinated in 1935 at the Louisiana state capitol. Joe McCarthy, and McCarthyism, ended when the U.S. Senate voted in 1954 to censure him 67-22. George Wallace's populist reign ended when a potential assassin shot him at a mall in Maryland during the 1972 Democratic presidential primaries. Ross Perot's political moment came to an end in the presidential election of 1996, after his second failed attempt for the presidency as an independent candidate.
These four demagogues had approximately four years when they either dominated American politics or possessed a larger-than-life public presence. Give Donald Trump his due. His dominance of our nation's politics has lasted not four years, but closer to seven.
That's a long time to play it "hot," and if it wasn't for January 6th and the three elections where his candidacy or candidates failed to produce a majority of the popular vote, we might not yet be writing his political obituary.
But ... the Republican Party has lost the popular vote in seven of the last eight presidential elections – which shows the limits of politics by division. Trump has been a genius at this kind of politics.
Still, Trump changed our politics. And there is no turning back. America will only recover its national well-being if the populists take power from the failed, elitist baby boomers. While Trump was uncanny in his assessment of who needs to be fixing our mess, his contribution to that future effort will be more Barry Goldwater than Ronald Reagan. Historically, Trump, like Goldwater, was a harbinger of "change," but not the "change" itself.
That may be a little hard for Trump to stomach – leaving the limelight to others. Egotists like Trump usually take the advice of the Welsh poet Dylan Thomas and "do not go gently into that good night." But the good news from this election cycle is that he will have no choice. History says so.
As for the good news for Oregon from the midterm election, well ... not much hope there. In the next election or two, the nation is being propelled into a populist correction, with or (most likely) without Trump. He's running just a little too hot. Meanwhile, Oregon is probably not so lucky. We may be in for a long cold spell.