Here is a bold prediction: Donald Trump will be re-elected next year and be a burr on the saddle of his detractors for four more years.
I wish I was wrong, and actually hope I am. But sadly, I do not think so.
This has nothing to do with issues, or personalities, or poll numbers (how ridiculous is it to put any validity in polls more than a year before the election, and when you don’t know who will emerge out of those two soccer teams vying for the Democratic nomination).
This is one thing for which I have to give this President of the United States credit, and oddly enough, it comes from a political cartoon I saw last week in which a caricatured Sean Hannity says Trump has already “won the narrative” in the interpretation of the Mueller report.
Well, he’s winning it again. Loudly. And with extreme bellicosity.
This is how he won in 2016. Before he even announced his candidacy he’d already seized the narrative. He came out of the gate making outrageous statements (to some of us, anyway) that either had to be challenged right away or that left everybody stewing and steaming.
And pardon me for saying so, but much of what he said — especially early on when the Trump train was gathering steam — was unprecedented in the annals of presidential campaigning. The only one who might even come close in our lifetimes is Harry Truman, who said what he thought and damn the torpedoes.
But even Truman wasn’t as effective with the invective. I refuse to give Trump credit for much, but I’ll give him this: he set a template for all future campaigns. Take the proactive stance of creative a narrative — any narrative that resonates — and then watch everyone chase their tails responding.
Think about it. Can you think of one memorable thing any candidate other than Trump said in 2016? Bernie Sanders had the best TV ad (using Simon and Garfunkel’s “America” as background music), but as nostalgic as it made this stubborn old Baby Boomer, it’s not what made me vote for him in the primary. And it doesn’t translate to 2020 either.
Nobody said anything that rose to the level of “Make America Great Again,” and no one dominated the airwaves as much as Trump. And let’s not blame that on the networks. It’s their job to report news. He is, and was, news. The ultimate irony is that Trump used the media, knowing that every one of his pronouncements was going to be picked up by CNN and FOX. Then he kicked them and called them “fake” once he didn’t need them.
I dislike the man, but I’ll give a grudging nod to the skill by which he controlled the dialogue, and the relentless way he did it — like wolf eyeing a flock of sheep. Bobby Kennedy had nothing on him in the ruthless department. You got a good idea watching him that this was how he conducted business, and made deals. He wore everyone down to the point where they either gave in or risked having to listen to him any further.
One of Hillary Clinton’s biggest mistakes was saying that his supporters were “a basket of deplorables,” and she said it out of frustration over his tactics and, I’m sure, from being labeled “Crooked Hillary” by a guy who sounds like a carnival barker bent on swindling naive and gullible patrons at the circus. A bunco squad’s nightmare.
Clinton acted on emotion, and I’m sorry to say that right or wrong, that hurt her. And all it was, in the end, was one more example of Trump controlling the narrative.
This is what the Democrats have to overcome, and they have no one among those two soccer teams who can pull it off.
They don’t have to overcome the arcane concepts of public policy (sorry, Liz Warren. I like you, at lot, but I fear your intelligent, adult campaign style has flown out the window already).
Today’s candidates don’t have to overcome decisions they made 50 years ago when they were younger and more in tune with those times than these times. And if I dare say so, they don’t even have to overcome questions about their heritage and lineage. They’ll all come up, mind you, because right now, Trump’s the one with the microphone and he’ll just scream it out.
But the only way things will change is if someone takes the microphone away from him. Find your own narrative and make him and his people chase their tails. Lord knows there’s plenty there to use against him. Well, use it. Find your own voice and pump up the volume.
I’m telling you, that’s the only way the Democrats have a prayer. All that wonky stuff and “Liz has a plan” stuff will be drowned out by the noise of the Trump train.
These are things we should have seen then, and should see even more clearly now.
The Republicans have always understood that it’s never too early to steer the conversation to their advantage with invective and vitriol, and by attaching negative definitions to those they see as serious rivals.
And who’s better at that than Trump?
That’s what the Democrats have to overcome. And I wonder whether anyone has the skill, let alone the stomach, to do it.