I find that the Bulwark’s JV Last has a dark view of current events that often fits my mood even if I’m actually quite a bit more optimistic in general. (See my earlier posts today exhorting everyone to chill a bit about Biden’s chances.) But there are days that I ponder our situation and feel the blackness descending and I appreciate Last’s analytical prowess as he tries to assess just what the hell is happening here. He doesn’t come to any firm conclusions and neither do it but it’s important to at least try to figure it out.
Anyway, here’s today’s dark missive:
1. Decadence
We’re going to keep doing this and I’m sorry. Here are some tidbits from yesterday’s Wall Street Journal poll:
By an 11-point margin, more voters see Trump rather than Biden as having a record of accomplishments as president—some 40% said Biden has such a record, while 51% said so of Trump. By an eight-point margin, more voters said Trump has a vision for the future. And by 10 points, more described Trump as mentally up to the presidency. Some 46% said that is true of Trump, compared with 36% who said so of Biden.
What?
Trump has more of a record of “accomplishment” in office than Biden?
I would pay a lot of money to sit down with that 51 percent of respondents and ask them to tell me five things Trump accomplished in office. I’d even spot them the first four: A tax cut; the appointment of three SCOTUS judges; the killing of Qasem Soleimani; Operation Warp Speed.
Meanwhile, whatever you think about voting for Biden for another term, just on the basis of balls and strikes, this has been one of the more successful first terms most of us have lived through:
-Beating COVID
-American Rescue Plan
-Bipartisan gun reform
-Bipartisan infrastructure
-Inflation Reduction Act
-CHIPs
-Killing of Ayman al-Zawahiri
-Managing the allied support of the war in Ukraine
I would add the withdrawal from Afghanistan which was always going to be a mess but Biden had the guts to do it and we are out. It’s pathetic that people who love Trump and Obama (for different reasons, obviously) are so critical of Biden for doing it. He was forced to follow Trump’s withdrawal plan but understood that if he was going to do it, he would have to do it early and he did it. And Obama never followed through.
As for being mentally up for the presidency, again, I understand people who have doubts about Joe Biden. Fair enough.
But they think Trump is up to the job, mentally?
This guy?
This guy?
This guy?
I do not understand how anyone who has been awake for the last seven years could see Trump as “mentally up for the presidency” if Joe Biden is not.
But wait. It gets worse.
Here’s one more piece of data from that WSJ poll:
[N]early three in four say inflation is headed in the wrong direction.
So 74 percent of those polled say that inflation is “headed in the wrong direction.”
Here is the reality:
Inflation has been headed in the right direction, by a lot, for more than a year. That’s just the objective truth.
This is the part I think is interesting to ponder. When did we become such a nation of whiners?
The People seem hell-bent on being unhappy these days. They complain about the price of gas. When gas prices are down, they complain about the cost of eggs. When egg prices are down, they complain about the cost of real estate. When real estate prices stabilize, they complain about the rise in mortgage rates.
On the one hand, these complaints are annoyingly stupid. On the other hand, they’re a real problem.
That’s because a populace determined to be dissatisfied isn’t capable of self-government in the long run. It will continually seek change. Over time, it will become open to ever more extreme changes. It will lose the ability to make rational, outcome-based choices. And it will become susceptible to strongmen and demagogues because these figures create scapegoats and targets for dissatisfaction.
Historically speaking, strongmen and demagogues have arisen in times of stress, calamity, and desperation. It is an example of American exceptionalism that our own confrontation with authoritarianism has emerged during a time of peace and almost unimaginable prosperity.
I’m not sure what that says about us, but I suspect it says something important. And not good.
2. Decadence
Why would this be? 2020s America is not Weimar Germany. We are not reeling from a Great Depression. Our recent wars have been—by all historical measures—small scale.
We are in the opposite position: 2020s America is a place of almost inconceivable prosperity. Not everywhere and not for everyone. We do not live in utopia. There are real problems: income inequality and stagnant middle-class wages. Poverty exists. Upward economic mobility is not as easy as it should be, and downward economic mobility is real and scary.
But by historical measures? This is about as fat and happy as a society gets.
So why now? Let’s posit a few options and then you can discuss in the comments.
(1) People are stupider. I’m predisposed to this argument. Obviously.
But are they really? Probably not. Even if “education” was better at the top level at some other time in American history—which I doubt—more Americans are better educated today than at any time in history.
And while lots of people believe stupid things today (Qanon, Flat Earthers, etc.), is that any different than during the ’70s? Or the 1930s? Or the 1850s? Is information in the media less reliable? Again: I doubt it.
(2) Decadence. Maybe people are less “serious” today. By which I mean that people are so comfortable that they can make choices based on self-actualization rather than managing their daily reality. For example:
Only someone safe in the understanding that no serious harm can come to them is liberated to live at odds from reality. That’s a good-enough definition of decadence.
(3) Failure of liberalism. Maybe we’ve reached the end of history and discovered that Donald Trump is actually the Last Man.
By which I mean: Perhaps liberalism is not an end-state, but a transitory period that contains the seeds of its own destruction. The appearance of illiberalism across much of the developed world over the last decade would support this thesis.
(4) Racism. Or maybe the problem is a uniquely American one tied to race. We’ve undergone a rapid demographic transition since 1980.
Even though this transition has coincided with enormous gains in prosperity, racial majorities do not (historically) welcome such changes with arms wide open.
(5) Reaction. If you asked conservatives this question, they might explain that the current friendliness to demagogues is a natural reactionary movement in response to overreach from progressive ideological successes. This is “The Cathedral” argument from the nat-con right, and it shouldn’t be dismissed just because many of the people making it are cranks.
Obviously this is a partial list. You can probably come up with other theories. And the real explanation will be some combination of many factors.
Why did the tensions, conflicts, and economic dislocations of the 1940s lead to FDR, and the problems of the 1970s to Reagan—but the peace and prosperity of the 2000s led to Trump and the elevation of demagoguery?¹
The comments to the column feature a lively discussion if you are a Bulwark subscriber.
I can think of some reasons that have to do with the rapid adaption of technology that’s created epic changes faster than we can deal with. And I think our media environment creates a sense of chaos and dissonance. But honestly, you’ve got me. Let’s just say that I’ve certainly noticed this phenomenon and can see it in myself.