I was one of those who thought that Kamala Harris would win because in all the previous elections since the overturning of Dobbs by the Supreme Court, the Democrats had a pretty impressive winning streak driven by women who were mad about losing their right to reproductive freedom and making their anger known at the ballot box. But in this election, neither abortion nor saving our democracy as offered by the Democrats were the primary issues. It turned out that inflation and the border as pushed by the Republicans were by far the most deciding factors.
Most observers felt that she ran an excellent campaign and crushed Trump in the debate when he was babbling on about Haitians eating the dogs and cats, a groundless claim based on a Facebook post which neither Trump nor his VP pick JD Vance ever retracted. But it didn't really make any difference to the media or voters any more than the quote from Trump's Madison Square Garden rally calling Puerto Rico an island of garbage. On the other hand, when Harris said in an interview that she couldn't think of anything she would do differently than Biden, this was viewed in itself by many as disqualifying. The double standard between the media coverage of the two candidates was appalling.
While Harris ran on an upbeat message, Trump ran a campaign of demagoguery that apparently was more effective in getting support.
Demagoguery is a manipulative approach — often associated with dictators and sleazy politicians — that appeals to the worst nature of people. Demagoguery isn't based on reason, issues, and doing the right thing; it's based on stirring up fear and hatred to control people. For example, a politician who stirs up a fear of immigrants to distract from other issues is using demagoguery. Demagoguery is one of the most negative aspects of politics, but it's also one that's all too common.
Trump is easily the most hated politician in America. But at the same time, he is the most beloved. With Trump as a cult of personality his supporters feel that he can say or do no wrong. Their devotion to him is unconditional. To his opponents, he is a pathological liar incapable of shame. But more importantly, tribalism instills loyalty that he is one of them and not the enemy Democrats as shown by some people wearing this t-shirt at Trump rallies (of course available from Amazon). So when running against him, you have a candidate with a vote floor of a solid 47% which leaves very little headroom for squeezing out a margin - especially if there are third party candidates who may each take a percent or two. His fiery and bombastic rallies are primarily aimed toward his base voters, seemingly not trying to expand to others. But this time, he did attract voters from just about every social category leading to an unexpected popular vote majority (the first for Republicans since 2004) along with the all-important decisive Electoral College victory sweeping all 7 swing states.
On the subject of popular vote totals, check these out:
Trump 2024 76.4 million Harris 2024 73.7 million
Trump 2020 74.2 million Biden 2020 81.2 million
So a big mystery is how Trump got about 2 million more votes in 2024 than in 2020 while Harris actually got 7.5 million fewer votes than Biden in 2020. People were apparently dissatisfied with Harris but couldn't vote for Trump. Why this happened is anybody's guess. Did her gender or race possibly figure into this?
All of this is formidable enough. But when you couple this with the propaganda from right wing media such as Fox News and Newsmax along with disinformation widely spread on Elon Musk's X (formerly Twitter) that he bought awhile back, instead of blaming Democrats for mistakes, it needs to be acknowledged that with all of his built-in advantages, Trump may still have won even with a perfect campaign waged against him. At least in America, there has been no other presidential candidate like him.
It is easy to understand how the Republicans seized the issue they thought would be most effective - inflation. After all, incumbent leaders throughout the world were booted out over the issue of inflation.
Discussion about economic issues generally requires some nuance because of their complexity. But when a consumer sees the price of gas or eggs go up, there is an understandable urge to vote their leader out. Having said that, in a free market economy, does the president really have control over prices like for eggs and gas? if the answer was yes, couldn't the president simply cut the price of these and other items? Of course he can't!
And then there was the complaint that interest rates have been too high. But interest rates were raised by the Federal Reserve Board to fight an inflationary economy - and it does not answer to the president. Inflation has now been brought under control to a low of 2.4% and the Fed as it's known is now lowering interest rates. Indeed, by most measures, the US economy is the best in the world.
Having said all of this, most Americans were still sour on our economy. There are two reasons for this I believe. One is that those on the right were relentlessly and falsely telling their audiences that the economy is a disaster. A prediction that can be easily made: Once the calendar turns to Inauguration Day on January 20th, our new president will pronounce this to be the best economy in the world. He did the same thing when inheriting President Obama's strong economy back in 2017.
But in fairness, there are Americans at the bottom of the economic ladder who are struggling, many living from paycheck to paycheck on fixed incomes. Any price increases are understandably sources of concern. It is safe to say that many of these people were tired of the status quo and wanted to try their lot with Trump.
So does this mean that Trump was unbeatable? No, Joe Biden beat him in 2020 but this was a result of Trump's major mismanagement of the pandemic resulting in countless unnecessary deaths. In this election, if Biden had withdrawn earlier leading to a primary, would that candidate have done better? Maybe, but it still would have been an uphill battle.
There are of course, major areas of concern when Trump takes over. If he does mass deportation of undocumented workers as promised, major disruptions of the economy will take place - especially agriculture, restaurants, and hospitality which will have unpredictable effects on employment and pricing in those industries. Perhaps even worse, Trump is advocating tariffs on imported goods which will certainly raise prices everywhere.
Even worse, the first couple of weeks have revealed Cabinet choices that go long on loyalty but appallingly short on relevant experience. Even many on the right are quite concerned. Will the Republican Senators have the backbone to reject any of his nominees? Stay tuned.
The midterm elections are only a couple of years away. If he really does most of the things he is threatening to do, he and his party will get a stern rebuke from the voters. It is one thing to be entertained by his rhetoric, but when many of his supporters finally suffer the consequences of his actions, I think the love affair will come to an end!
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