Is there a purpose in Trump's win?
Let's not make it about the man, but about America and the people
We made it to Friday without democracy collapsing, so that’s a good thing. Jonah Goldberg has a theory that the conventional wisdom is like lava, or steel from a furnace, which erupts hot and malleable and quickly hardens, so pundits must strike their hammers before it takes its final shape. I tend to agree, and the end of this week clearly is laying the blame for the Democrat debacle at Joe Biden’s feet. This is a shame, as I don’t think Joe deserves it. I mean, yes, he deserves some blame for a lot of things, but he didn’t set up Trump 2024 to win. In fact, he saved us from Trump 2020.
But that’s not what I am here to talk about this morning.
I will riff a bit about democracy, though. I was impressed with two speeches I heard this week. Vice President Kamala Harris’s speech was modest, uplifting, and at the same time, painting a resistance to the hate that’s spewed from this terrible—seemingly endless—campaign. Of course, she really had no choice but to concede, since the results could never have been challenged at such a scale. I suppose many had hoped the same results, but opposite, could have put Harris in the White House and force Donald Trump to concede. I think Trump would never have conceded, but what do I know? In any case, we will never know.
The second speech was from President Joe Biden. He was both gracious and cogent. He spoke clearly and with conviction, and committed his administration to work with the incoming Trump people without drama or delay. Isn’t that the goal of the transfer of power of any president to the next?
The first days of the new era, Trump 2.0, so far, has been absent the kind of drama that heralded 2016. There’s no Russia investigation. The Trump trials, such as they were, are done. Trump will enter the Oval Office convicted of 34 felonies in New York. He may be sentenced this month, but it’s more likely the sentencing will be delayed, possibly indefinitely. Or perhaps the case will be disposed with just a fine. Judge Juan Merchan is no friend of Trump or his family, but he also realizes his options are very limited. The less drama, the better, especially when the man in the dock is about to enter the White House with incredible power, and in many cases, complete immunity, to deal with those he dislikes.
Trump announced his campaign manager, Susie Wiles, will be his chief of staff. This is a good idea, for two reasons: Wiles knows Trump well, unlike the parade of ineffective or adversarial chiefs in his last administration; and, Wiles is not known for drama. She ran a tight ship in the campaign, and you never heard her name, unlike Paul Manafort, or Corey Lewandowski. Low-key is good.
There will be plenty of room for drama in the next four years. In fact, I’m sure of it. Trump thrives on drama. With that rather long intro, I want to get into my point at the end of the first week of what many feel is the beginning of numbness. But I don’t think we should be numb, especially Christians who believe that God is sovereign.
Many who oppose Trump on his character may feel that the nation—the voters—have let everyone down by putting him back in power. But I think there’s some big things they miss. The realignment we’ve seen since 2016 has its roots, I believe, further back. In October, 2012, in the midst of then-President Barack Obama’s re-election campaign, during a town hall style debate with then Governor Mitt Romney, a 20-year-old college student asked about jobs.
Romney answered: “With half of college kids graduating this year without a college — or excuse me, without a job and without a college-level job, that's just unacceptable. And likewise, you got more and more debt on your back. So more debt and less jobs.”
“The middle class has been crushed over the last four years, and jobs have been too scarce. I know what it takes to bring them back, and I'm going to do that…” Romney said.
Obama also answered, and sounded very much like Joe Biden. He spoke of manufacturing jobs, Detroit, and “let's take the money that we've been spending on war over the last decade to rebuild America — roads, bridges, schools.”
But economists, even then knew, those jobs aren’t coming back. It was after Romney’s loss in 2012 that Trump decided to run, and to run on what he knew would be the biggest betrayal Americans left outside the tech boom would certainly feel. By 2016, Obama’s tune had changed.
When asked by an audience member why blue-collar jobs continue to disappear, the 44th President admitted that good-paying jobs in America were moving overseas under his watch. Mr. Obama asserted that “some of those jobs of the past are just not going to come back.”
“There’s no answer to it,” Obama said. “. . . What magic wand do you have?”
Donald Trump promised a magic wand. He didn’t promise jobs, though he talked about it as if he could conjure them from nothing. Trump has been very consistent in his message: unlimited illegal immigration, abandonment of the middle class, and ignorance of the blue collar life that paints so many American towns and counties outside the bicoastal elite zones have created a class system in America, and Trump has promised to be the voice of the ones on the wrong side of the tracks.
Why did Kamala Harris lose, underperforming Joe Biden in 2020 by over 7,000,000 votes? David Brooks wrote one of the most incisive answers I’ve read.
As the left veered toward identitarian performance art, Donald Trump jumped into the class war with both feet. His Queens-born resentment of the Manhattan elites dovetailed magically with the class animosity being felt by rural people across the country. His message was simple: These people have betrayed you, and they are morons to boot.
Those on the left, and those in the center who believe character is important—even paramount—to leadership, need to absorb this message. There is no time to be numb. David French wrote “We Don’t Have Time to Waste in Despair.”
The United States is in the midst of an epistemological crisis. The combination of partisan blindness and online algorithmic curation means that millions of Americans now live in their own bespoke realities. Millions of Americans are engaging in politics awash in conspiracy.
That’s a fancy way of saying that a lot of Americans feel betrayed, left behind, ignored, and denigrated. Those Americans need to be reached, not in a marketing, fake way (Tim Walz is folksy, but that didn’t cut it), but in a real way. Trump is nowhere near a rural, blue-collar person, but his message to be their voice is clear. And he does, indeed, speak for them, regardless of the constant stream of conspiracies and lies he spouts.
Brooks concluded with what I think may be a purpose to Trump’s win. I believe God can use anything to His purposes, and that when a nation, like America, goes astray from a moral path, and from the eternal truth, God will provide a shaking to break the bondage. Brooks didn’t reference God directly, though he did mention a Christian nationalist church he attended in Tennessee. But read this closing paragraph.
But we are entering a period of white water. Trump is a sower of chaos, not fascism. Over the next few years, a plague of disorder will descend upon America, and maybe the world, shaking everything loose. If you hate polarization, just wait until we experience global disorder. But in chaos there’s opportunity for a new society and a new response to the Trumpian political, economic and psychological assault. These are the times that try people’s souls, and we’ll see what we are made of. [Emphasis mine.]
Trump may say fascist stuff, because he believes his personal force of will is enough to conquer anything. (Who can argue that it hasn’t played out for him?) I think many of the people attracted to Trump may be actual crypto-fascists (Elon Musk, are you listening?), but Trump himself is a chaos engine, not a fascist. He throws chaos to the wind, but does it with a consistent message, to move himself to where his will decides to go, and to bring those who he speaks for with him.
I do not believe that Trump’s win is automatically the end of democracy. I don’t believe it’s automatically the harbinger of a time of darkness, or despair. I also don’t believe that people who are experiencing despair, and a crisis of faith of the rationality and even the goodness of fellow Americans, are faking it, or should be ignored. But now is not the time to be numb.
In the Bible, Hebrews chapter 12 contains a whole lot about God’s discipline, and a whole lot about strengthening one’s character so as not to fall when things get tough.
At that time his voice shook the earth, but now he has promised, “Once more I will shake not only the earth but also the heavens.” The words “once more” indicate the removing of what can be shaken—that is, created things—so that what cannot be shaken may remain. Hebrews 12:26-27
Perhaps, the People, the plurality, the majority of voters who elected Trump to a second term, did it because God has a plan to shake America, to shake those who are numb out of numbness, to shake those who despair into action, and to shake those living in deception into truth. Those things: faith, action, and truth, when they are bound to God’s kingdom, cannot be shaken. Everything else, in the storm of the next four years, will be shaken—that’s how the man we all just elected operates.
God can use the chaos to his ends. I believe that, and I still have faith in my fellow Americans to shake what needs to be discarded, and cling to what remains.
Therefore, since we are receiving a kingdom that cannot be shaken, let us be thankful, and so worship God acceptably with reverence and awe, for our “God is a consuming fire.” Hebrews 12:28-29.
Nothing we can do will change Trump’s character. But ours, that’s for us to fix. Humility, repentance, love, and respect for those in need could be the fruit that emerges from this time. Let’s get moving to plant those seeds today.
PRAY FOR JEWS IN AMSTERDAM. There’s a full-fledged pogrom going on in The Netherlands, as immigrants who hate Israel patrol the streets in search of Jews to beat. Israel has sent aircraft to help aid and evacuate those in danger. This is 2024, not 1936, but it sure seems like 1936.
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I hesitate to jump to eschatological explanations, but there are two schools of thought on America's role in the endtimes. One is that America has a central role as the "spiritual Israel," but this seems pretty unlikely since Israel's rebirth. The second is that America has no role and will be removed prior to the end.
I've wondered long before Tuesday if our decline may be setting the stage for endtime events that occur in a world without an American superpower. Maybe yes and maybe no, but internal conflicts, resurgent isolationism, and a church that has lost its first love make me think it's plausible.
Interesting take Steve, and just one of a couple i have read since trump was elected. My take is simple, as a country of voters, we just aren't very bright or tuned in. Clearly character has virtually no importance in who we elect. And please spare me, the nonsense voters love his "policies."
Nope, apparently we love the show, need to be entertained by an old man doing the "weave." We love the endless lies, hatred and rage that pours forth every time he stepped on a stage or appeared in front of a microphone.
Here's the good news (at least for me), i am an old man, relatively comfortable as i age. As i have written often, who wins or looses the election won't change my life in any meaningful way. After 48 years of sobriety, i understand perfectly my happiness and peace of mind is on me. No one else, no other person or thing can or will change that.
The chaos will be endless and rule the day, for that you are dead spot on. The one argument/rebuttal i have is simply this and i hope you are right: Somehow this is part of God's master plan and that we auto or self correct and find a better place for this country?
My best bet is a year from know way too many folks will look in the mirror and ask themselves: my God, what have we done?