Steady Staters were cognizant of this. Before a major speech or event, some would try to moderate the tone as best they could by editing the president’s public remarks. The effect was limited by the reality that Trump constantly goes off script. Afterward advisors might suggest to the president that he steer clear of a phrase or idea that could be perceived as a dog whistle to hate groups, or that was particularly offensive to an ethnic or religious minority. That doesn’t happen a whole lot anymore, and the fiery rhetoric is getting more atrocious.
Nearly three-quarters of Americans surveyed agreed that “elected officials should avoid using heated language because it could encourage violence.” It can, it does, and it has. They should also consider whether it could result in what our Founders feared: democracy’s foundations being ripped apart by mob rule.
Speaking to a group of Civil War veterans in 1875, Ulysses S. Grant speculated that if ever the nation were torn apart again, it would not be split North versus South along the infamous Mason-Dixon Line, the geographic boundary that separated free states and slave states. He surmised that in the future the dividing line would be reason itself, with intelligence on one side and ignorance on the other. Grant was a student of history. He knew that in societies where truth comes under attack, the fertile soil is tilled for violent conflict. Austrian philosopher Karl Popper took it a step further, writing, “The more we try to return to the heroic age of tribalism, the more surely do we arrive at the Inquisition, at the Secret Police, and at a romanticized gangsterism,” a horrible degeneration that begins with the push of a domino—“the suppression of reason and truth.”
It comes as a surprise to no one that political tribalism is surging in America. Our self-selected groups are becoming more partisan and less inclusive than ever before. Today we have a digital Mason-Dixon Line. It is splitting our country right down the middle, all the way to the household level. Donald Trump is not its sole cause. The line was drawn by the disruptive effects of technology and the fundamentals of human psychology, but the president’s demagoguery has worsened the problem. His words are reshaping who we are.
An early colonist branded America a “shining city on a hill,” an image that has defined our country for centuries since. In his farewell address, Ronald Reagan added more color to the analogy, saying the United States was “a tall, proud city built on rocks stronger than oceans, windswept, God-blessed, and teeming with people of all kinds living in harmony and peace… and if there had to be city walls, the walls had doors and the doors were open to anyone with the will and the heart to get here.” Unfortunately, if we continue in our current direction, America will start to look more like the scene of “American carnage” the president said it was on his first day in office. He is debasing our national conversation to that level, and it’s up to us whether it’s acceptable.
If Trump’s actions have turned the US government into one of his failed businesses, his rhetoric is turning our national stage into one of his reality television shows. It is no longer a preeminent forum for the debate of high-minded issues. The stage is fast becoming a drama-soaked series following the misadventures of a business tycoon navigating Washington in search of power and popularity, stirring up new controversies to capture the short attention span of a glass-eyed, zombie-like mob of spectators. They are desperate to be entertained, willing to be fooled, and easily provoked toward infighting by his unseemly antics. If you feel sick watching this production, imagine what it’s like to be a part of the cast.
CHAPTER 7
Apologists
“The President hears a hundred voices telling him that he is the greatest man in the world. He must listen carefully indeed to hear the one voice that tells him he is not.”
Donald Trump was the unwanted candidate. Ask any official serving in the Trump administration today if he or she supported the real-estate magnate when he threw his hat into the ring. In an unguarded moment, chances are they will tell you no. Many will admit that, in the field of seventeen Republican primary candidates in the 2016 race, Donald Trump was their seventeenth pick, dead last. His candidacy was a stunt.
When people don’t have to take something seriously, they ridicule it. When they do have to take it seriously, they criticize it. As a candidate, Trump was ridiculed from the start. His comments were outlandish, so it was easy to joke about him. The mockery became feverish critique as soon as onlookers realized he might have a shot at the nomination. It was a clown car that became a slow-motion auto accident—funny at first, but soon horrific.
As we’ve discussed, conservative commentators tended to be candidate Trump’s most formidable critics. They didn’t believe he was one of their own. Elected officials in the Republican Party were even harsher.
New Jersey governor Chris Christie said the candidate lacked the credentials for the nation’s highest office. “We do not need reality TV in the Oval Office right now,” Christie lamented. “President of the United States is not a place for an entertainer.”
Senator Ted Cruz lambasted him as a “narcissist” and “utterly amoral.” Cruz argued that voters could not afford to elect someone so unfocused and social-media-obsessed. “I think in terms of a commander in chief, we ought to have someone who isn’t springing out of bed to tweet in a frantic response to the latest polls.”
Representative Jim Jordan, a leading conservative and one of the founders of the Freedom Caucus in the US House, wished Republicans in Congress had acted sooner to “avoid creating this environment” that allowed someone like candidate Trump to rise.
Texas governor Rick Perry labeled Trump “a cancer on conservatism” and a threat to the nation’s future. “The White House has been occupied by giants,” Rick noted. “But from time to time it is sought by the small-minded—divisive figures propelled by anger, and appealing to the worst instincts in the human condition.” Perry said the businessman was peddling a “carnival act that can be best described as Trumpism: a toxic mix of demagoguery, mean-spiritedness, and nonsense” and that he was running on “division and resentment.”
Senator Lindsey Graham told American voters: “This is not about who we nominate anymore as Republicans as much as it is who we are.” He bemoaned that the party had not taken the long-shot candidate more seriously. “Any time you leave a bad idea or a dangerous idea alone, any time you ignore what could become an evil force, you wind up regretting it.” The senator said he would not vote for the man, whom he called a “jackass” and a “kook.” Those who know Lindsey understand that he wasn’t using those words lightly. He meant them.
John Thune, one of the top-ranking Republicans in the Senate, expressed reservations throughout the race, but after the Access Hollywood scandal, he said the party no longer needed its candidate. “Donald Trump should withdraw and Mike Pence should be our nominee effective immediately,” he tweeted in the wake of the scandal, with only weeks until the vote.
Many other elected conservatives chimed in throughout the campaign, calling the Republican nominee a “bigot,” “misogynist,” “liar,” “unintelligent,” “inarticulate,” “dangerous,” “fraud,” “bully,” and “unfit” for the presidency.