Saturday, March 5, 2016

"How could everybody get it so wrong?"

Washington Times OPinion: Once upon a time a man or woman put in the early years on the Springfield Republican or the Log Cabin Democrat or the Bloomington Pantagraph, covering spats between aldermen or obscure state legislators, learning the trade along with something about the nature of humanity and acquiring a little familiarity with the body politic, and finally arriving in the city with knowledge, insight and a little learned humility. He was a hard man to fool.


But we’re all at the mercy now of progress, and columnists, commentators and pundits go straight from graduate school to a column, a microphone with a camera, certified like a CPA as a fully fledged doctor of humbuggery. This leaves them at the mercy of the flimflam artist, with no understanding of why and how an audience laps it up.
David Remnick, the editor of the precious and erudite New Yorker magazine, told his readers last summer that Mr. Trump was such an ignoramus, who knew nothing about politics, that his “whole con might end well before the first snows in Sioux City and Manchester.”
They’re still shoveling snow in New Hampshire — the last of it is expected to melt in time for the Fourth of July parade — and Mr. Remnick is still puzzled about why and how it happened.
Mr. Remnick has a lot of distinguished company, even if most of it has not learned a lot from the experience.
James Fallows, who has spent three decades as national correspondent of Atlantic magazine, was even more confident than Mr. Remnick when he wrote early in the campaign cycle that “Donald Trump will not be the 45th president of the United States. Nor the 46th, nor any other number you might name. The chance of his winning the nomination and election is exactly zero.”
Chris Cillizza of The Washington Post was certain as early as last July that “Donald Trump is not going to be the Republican presidential nominee in 2016.” Nate Silver, who successfully applied higher math to presidential politics four years ago and made a name for himself as the guru who got it right, told his colleagues in November to “stop freaking out” about the Donald’s poll numbers. He wasn’t going anywhere. (read the whole thing)

14 comments:

edutcher said...

Trump has been defying the "experts" all along. It's funny even if you aren't one of his "cult", as some put it.

It's going to be interesting to see what happens if he does well today.

Lem the artificially intelligent said...

These contests are open to republicans only, I believe.

Here is a chance to see if the Trump support among registered republicans is as tenuous as anti-Trump republicans believe/hope for.

AllenS said...

The cross-over vote is what's behind a lot of Trumps success.

Dust Bunny Queen said...

All those high and mighty pundits who are foolish enough to think they’re an opinion maker or opinion shaper, [Chris Wallace] should get out more. Instead of living in their safe little intellectual bubble, talking to themselves, they need to find out what the rest of the real world is doing and thinking.

I suggest they take 6 months and go work on a ranch, ride along with a long line trucker, work in a coffee house at a truck stop, do pick up work at a construction site and LISTEN to the people....Hell be a Walmart Greeter for a month. Try to live on those wages, pay the bills, buy gas, feed your family and LISTEN to what the people are saying and experience what they are thinking.

Instead of going from your precious college days directly to your insular jobs. Instead of flying over the people. Get out into the real world and talk to them.

Fat chance.

edutcher said...

Lem said...

These contests are open to republicans only, I believe.

Here is a chance to see if the Trump support among registered republicans is as tenuous as anti-Trump republicans believe/hope for.


Nicely put.

There's been a lot of rage in the party, so it's reasonable to think a good bit of his support comes from that, as much as cross-overs.

As for the "believe/hope for" part, I don't know that Cruz is really all that popular among Conservative Republicans as a whole as much as, say, Sessions or Walker or Jindal.

bagoh20 said...

Lots of people have have been angry about the status quo for along time, but until now there was no real "None of the above" choice. Trump's political brand is "None of the above".

bagoh20 said...

When was the period in American politics when people were happy with what they had, felt they made enough money, and believed they were respected and being treated fairly by the government and the elites?

edutcher said...

bagoh20 said...

When was the period in American politics when people were happy with what they had, felt they made enough money, and believed they were respected and being treated fairly by the government and the elites?

When did the American people ever think there was an elite in this country?

Chip Ahoy said...

I became exceedingly agitated reading this piece just beyond the introduction.

The introduction built up an insiders boner fighties xxxx bonafides.

The goes right into "protect from flimflam" *snap*

This is perfect. What is it about finally being able to communicate effectively that disrupts your world so thoroughly? He states this problem of his right off.

What is it about rejection of American political class that is not processing with you?

What is it about the destruction of guilds and destruction of guilds within guilds that is so troubling to you?

What is it about the rejection of political dynastic families that is not computing with you?

What is it about government by the people for the people that doesn't process for you? What is happening is perfectly and beautifully and essentially and fundamentally and crucially American in every way.

Just take you specialized elitism, for we see media for what it is, and we see politicians for who they are, and we see political parties for what they've become, and we see Washington draw power to itself and and the life out of its host. Everything you learned, all the in and out and arguments between politicians is shit and now it is known as shit. THAT is you problem, not a population slipping into Idiocracy, rather, a population suddenly aware your YOUR idiocracy and destroying it.

Sorry it's rough. But your gig is up. We've had it with the likes of you.

bagoh20 said...

American history is a parade of "the people" getting upset with the elites: Tammany Hall, The trusts, railroads, land barons, robber barons, "Fortunate Son". It's almost continuous with occasional flare ups that make changes but never give satisfaction, because dissatisfaction is the basic human condition, and corruption comes along with every movement against corruption when people get more invested in the people leading the movement than the principles.

Chip Ahoy said...

Hey! Do you know what is more interesting than this guy who thinks he is more qualified about political matters than anyone else due to soaking it?

Sunrise, that's what. Because it starts out looking unpromising. And that's bad because there's a decision involved about bothering with it or not. It's always borderline. And I go, eh, do it. And I observe as it goes, and I think, what a bummer. I knew it wouldn't be worth it. Just gray every time I look. Then when I take it down and put the images together, reduce them twice, and watch them run, it turns out to be long and fascinating and wondrous. And every one is different no matter what.

bagoh20 said...

It may finally be the real "year of the woman", or women.

edutcher said...

bagoh20 said...

American history is a parade of "the people" getting upset with the elites: Tammany Hall

Tammany wasn't the little people getting upset as much as one political side against another.

Tammany was the first to run under the Corruption That Works model; if you think the Daley machine or any other political machine is an elite, you have a different view of the term than I do.

Ironically, what brought down Tammany was a pier 6 brawl that ensued when Tweed's people refused a permit to parade to an Irish Protestant (ie Scotch-Irish) group who wanted to demonstrate against the Catholic Church (Tammany, of course, was Democrat) and the Micks and the Scotch-Irish went at it and the uproar focused attention on the Ring's nefarious doings (I'm sure Troop remembers it well) - that the Demos were associated with the late unlamented Confederacy was a bonus.

As for many of the others (The trusts, railroads, land barons, robber barons), you're talking about people who had clawed their way out of poverty to incredible wealth and justified it on the basis of Social Darwinism (true, they were screwing the people, but they also screwed the competition - it was often of whose ox was being gored), Leland Stanford, one of many self-made men of the era, looked down his nose at anybody whose money came from anything but his own effort

bagoh20 said...

The question was: "When did the American people ever think there was an elite in this country?". I wasn't saying who was elite. I was answering "when" with historical markers of the conflicts. The answer to the question is of course "always". The "elites" change, but the response of just wanting to do anything that might hurt them regardless of the consequences is timeless. Today the "elites" aren't even always rich. It's much easier to be an elite now. You just simply don't sign on to the populist "blow it up" movement and elite you be.