Rejecting The Future, Demagogue Style

Political spectators had a rare treat over the last eight years to view the types presidential candidates fall into. Since 2008 we’ve seen three personalities emerge: The Leader, the Demagogue, and the Pragmatist.

The Leader offers us hope and a vision. The Leader will stand in front of us and tell us the truth. But that truth is offered alongside a vision. Bad news cannot stop us and good news means we’re soaring to new heights.

“We will succeed,” the Leader says, “because that is who we are.”

The Demagogue offers a type of hope, I guess. There’s certainly a vision. A fearful vision. A distorted vision of the present and a horrifying view of the future.

“We are failing,” the Demagogue tells us, “because that is what they want for us. We won’t succeed unless we upend society. They’ve stacked the deck against you and I’m the one to flip the table over. For you.”

                                                       

Of course, the Demagogue can’t do that. The Demagogue loses if the table flips because the Demagogue helped stack the deck. The Demagogue may change things but it won’t help the Demagogue’s followers.

Make no mistake, though. The Demagogue has created an “other” to face blame and those poor people will surely suffer. Getting rid of the scapegoats won’t solve the problems, of course. Maybe reality will set in among the Demagogue’s followers. More likely, the Demagogue will just change to some other unfortunate people and the cycle will begin again.

This is how the Demagogue stays in power.

Finally, we have the Pragmatist. The Pragmatist is honest and truthful. The Pragmatist will stand before us and tell us what is happening. While the Pragmatist lacks a soaring rhetoric, there is a vision. That vision and the Pragmatist’s passion are tempered, though, by a realistic plan.

In lieu of hope, the Pragmatist offers diligence. A Pragmatist will dream of things that never were and, instead of asking “Why not?” will ask “How can that come to be?” The Pragmatist wants to create that roadmap.

In 2016 we saw a Demagogue narrowly beat a Pragmatist. Despite my excitement for the first Madam President, I’m willing to admit Hillary Clinton rarely spoke to my heart. Hillary Clinton told us the truth. Despite popular opinion, she talked to us about jobs. She told us how she wanted to build jobs. She set out a roadmap for that future.

Unfortunately, some of us didn’t want that future. Instead, they bought a miracle cure from a Demagogue. Donald Trump offered us a miracle elixir to preserve the status quo.

“This oil doesn’t just cure the status quo,” he said. “No, this elixir will reverse history.”

Donald Trump went to coal country and sold a snake oil cure for change. He went to the rust belt and offered a magic pill that would claw jobs back from overseas and undo automation. He would undo history.

He sold us this cure for the future based on outrageous lies. He lied about the economy, he lied about crime, and he lied about Hillary Clinton. Most of all, he blamed every demographic group—except white people—for our faults and the coming catastrophes.

Demagogues can’t undo the past and there’s no remedy for the future. Only a Leader and a Pragmatist will plan for the future instead of pretending it won’t happen.

Change marches to the beat of profit margins. When history keeps unfolding and his followers are left behind, what will they do? They were spared the wrath of the Demagogue before. But a Demagogue leads through fear.

Eventually, his eye will have to turn somewhere.

Let's Talk Electors

Alright, Ezra Klein posted a link to this Vox post by Andrew Prokop the other day and this immediately caught my eye. 

As I wrote recently, this effort was “almost certainly doomed” and “essentially a call for destroying American democracy.” I also argued that despite the high-minded rhetoric about what the Founding Fathers would have wanted, it was also “essentially an attempt to steal an election that Trump fairly won.”

No way is this a fair assessment. 

First, it is a fact that Hamilton defended the Electoral College as a firewall between a candidate that won based on showmanship, empty rhetoric, or cheating. Or, 

Talents for low intrigue, and the little arts of popularity, may alone suffice to elevate a man to the first honors in a single State; but it will require other talents, and a different kind of merit, to establish him in the esteem and confidence of the whole Union[.] (The Federalist Papers No. 68)

Based on what we've learned of Trump's cabinet, we know that his rhetoric was empty. We know he has no intention of fulfilling the promises he made to his voters. 

We also have a high degree of confidence that Trump was aided by a foreign government through espionage and a psy-ops campaign against his opponent.

We know that Trump has a ludicrous number of conflicting interests. He will almost certainly be violating the constitution on his first moment of office. We also know that his conflicts of interest include interests in the country that likely compromised our election. 

To say that Trump won fairly despite getting almost 3 million fewer votes than his opponent is to admit he gamed the electoral college. If you admit the electoral college is picking the winner despite the votes, you have to look at the reason for the electoral college. 

It might sound pedantic but it's hardly "high-minded." American democracy is a combination of a popular vote and a group of undemocratically chosen electors. Calling on the electors to consider and deliberate on their choice is part of American democracy.