This morning, the Washington Post ran an op-ed by Matt Bai entitled, "I Understand Trump Voters. Do I Also Have To Empathize With Them?" Normally, I pass over op-eds from notorious leftists, as they offer nothing of substance beyond, in Bai's own admission, the "sneering contempt" of the "educated American left." But something about the headline caught my gullible eye.
Was this a genuine attempt to "understand the other"? Leftists do it for Islamic terrorists as part of their breakfast routine. Maybe, just maybe, a normally cutthroat political polemicist was taking a step back, engaging in some self-reflection, and trying to honestly find some common ground with the neighbor next door across town with the MAGA flag in the yard.
Nope. Should have listened to my instinct. Bai proved convincingly that he neither understands Trump voters nor has any empathy for them. I'll save our readers time and aggravation and break down Bai's argument:
1) In 2016, desperate rubes in flyover country could be forgiven for "embracing easy answers" and voting for Trump.
2) In 2016, these same voters passed over Hillary because they didn't trust her.
3) In 2020, these voters may have genuinely "still believed" that Trump was protecting them against immigrants and China.
4) Trump supporters with advanced degrees don't care about abortion or the border. They prioritize tax cuts above all else.
5) But now, after eight years of Trump's "bigotry" and "reckless and malevolent" behavior, Trump supporters can't hide behind ignorance. Their support of Trump is a reflection of their own moral degeneracy. It's their "vengeful impulse" that drives them to "blow up the country" to teach "insufferable intellectuals a lesson."
In this same article, he makes the laugh-out-loud claim that Harris voters are the ones who "keep the faith in moral leadership and the Constitution." Oh, if I had the writing space.
But I digress. In a nutshell, Bai's assertion seems to be this: We on the Left have always argued that Trump supporters are idiotic, selfish racists. I disagree. They're not idiotic. They're just selfish racists. A brave and daring concession for a leftist, to be sure, as his Inbox is no doubt filled with emails from angry readers demanding to know why he's letting us ultra-MAGA semi-fascists off the hook so easily.
I tire of having to spell out our arguments—again and again and again—to leftists who won't even read this article, much less with an open mind. But on the off-chance any of them accidentally pressed "click" on this article when they meant to scroll past it, here goes nothing:
1) We didn't vote against Hillary because we didn't trust her. We voted against her because she's a power-hungry megalomaniac who despises us as "deplorables." We trusted all too well that she was going to do exactly what she promised. Oh, and we also happen to be conservative—meaning we vote for the Republican over the Democrat in elections, with little bearing on how much we "trust" the Democrat. If there are politicians we mistrust, it's cocktail party RINOs of the Ryan/Romney breed.
2) Yes, we "still believe" that Trump tried to protect us against illegal immigrants (you left out the "illegal" part again) and China. Every effort he made was thwarted by Democrats, by an activist judiciary, by the Deep State, and by their establishment Republican quislings.
3) Trump supporters with advanced degrees—I'm one of them—do, in fact, care about abortion and the border. I've talked to them more than you have. And recent polling shows that illegal immigration and increasing crime (the two issues are related) are among the top priorities of Republican voters. True, the wretched state of the economy remains our top priority. But this holds true for Democrats as well. If we conservatives support tax cuts, it's not because we're all encapsulated country-club Republicans looking to evade top-tier tax rates. It's because normal, everyday people—both Republicans and Democrats—can't afford their groceries, Matt.
4) What seems like us "embracing easy answers" is, in fact, support for obvious, commonsense solutions to problems created intentionally by the Left for political gain.
The Left wants open borders, not out of any faux compassion for the Third World poor, but because they want to create a permanent majority of loyal, dependent Democrats. And yes, the solution—secure the border and deport illegals—is easy.
The Left opposes voter ID, not out of any concern for the civil rights of legal American citizens, but because it wants to cheat in elections. And yes, the solution—mandatory ID cards for voting, just like we have for driving a car, traveling by plane, owning a gun, using a credit card, or entering a government building—is easy.
The Left demands abortion through all nine months for any reason, not out of defense for women's rights, but because the Left panders to its base with the message that our "rights" are permission to engage in whatever behaviors we wish with zero personal responsibility. And yes, the solution—reasonable abortion restrictions in line with almost every other progressive democracy—is easy.
The Left supports Antifa and BLM riots, not out of any solidarity with any of their imagined grievances, but because these rioters serve as their brownshirts and are useful in scaring middle America into compliance. That's why Kamala Harris raised money for their bail. And yes, the solution—criminal prosecution and sentencing for insurrectionist leftist stormtroopers by the same standards used against J6 defendants—is easy.
The Left supports revisionist history like the 1619 Project, anthem-kneelers, racially segregated colleges and graduation events, and attacks on American holidays and institutions, not because they think these tactics advanced the plight of any supposedly oppressed minority, but because they cause the division and infighting they need to attain and hold power. And yes, the solution—a refocusing of education to teach our children their common history and culture rather than indoctrinating them with political ideology—is easy.
The Left supports packing the Supreme Court, abolishing the Electoral College, expanding the Senate, censoring free speech, weaponizing the bureaucracy against the citizenry, jailing and assassinating political opponents, and engineering coups against their own leaders, not to save democracy but to end it. (Matt Bai's own Washington Post is wrong. Democracy isn't dying in darkness. It's dying in broad daylight with his acquiescence.) And yes, the solution—for leftists to grow up and accept the fact that, in a democracy, you're not going to get your spoiled way every second—is easy.
Well, maybe this last solution isn't so easy. But it should be attainable for a crowd that fancies itself as compassionate as it is enlightened.
After eight years, the "insufferable intellectuals" of Bai's description can no longer feign ignorance. My counterarguments are a brief and woefully inadequate snapshot of the counterarguments that Trump supporters have been making far more effectively than I have. But rather than a point-by-point refutation, leftists simply ignore our counterarguments and revert to the "deplorables" schtick. If they don't understand Trump supporters, it's because they refuse to do so. And that refusal is rooted not in ignorance but in unchecked narcissism.
I'm who Matt Bai attacks as a higher-education Trump supporter. I earned my master's degree and graduated with honors. And, believe me, I don't say that to brag. On the contrary, I think a college education is vastly overrated, and "earning" a degree with honors can be done in your sleep when the majority of your classmates are bleating, lockstep progressives. I didn't "earn" my degree so much as I was handed it for virtue of having a pulse. I only mention it because Bai puts so much more stock in it than I do.
But such is the tragedy of conservatives open for debate. More often than not, there is no willing partner on the other side. First Biden, and now Harris agreed to debate only after having their arms twisted. Usually, the Ben Shapiros, the Heather Mac Donalds, and the Charles Murrays take the stage alone, to be shouted down and chased offstage by frothing mobs of feral students looking to "keep the faith in moral leadership and our Constitution."
But why don't you, Matt Bai, debate an educated conservative onstage? They can present their arguments clearly with facts, statistics, and logic. And you can call them evil racists. What do you say, Matt? You can even keep the microphones on.
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