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December 5, 2016 $4.99 SPECIAL POST-ELECTION ISSUE

JEREMY CARL # EDWARD CONARD # JOHN FONTE & JOHN O’SULLIVAN # VICTOR DAVIS HANSON JOHN HOOD # MIKE LEE # JON LERNER # YUVAL LEVIN # MICHAEL LIND ABBY M. MCCLOSKEY # RUSSELL MOORE # HENRY OLSEN # RAMESH PONNURU # # REIHAN SALAM BEN SHAPIRO MICHAEL SINGH $4.99 IAN TUTTLE # HEATHER WILHELM # KEVIN D. WILLIAMSON 49 THE EDITORS

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DECEMBER 5, 2016 | VOLUME LXVIII, NO. 22 | www.nationalreview.com

SPECIAL POST-ELECTION ISSUE

16 A CHANGED GOP by Yuval Levin 36 A PARTY OF INDUSTRY by Michael Lind Republican voters were not quite who the party The GOP needs to embrace manufacturing. thought they were. THE REDDENING STATES by John Hood RACE AND TRUMPISM by Ian Tuttle 37 18 Republicans are well established below the federal Prejudice is an inadequate explanation of the election. level, too. THE RETURN OF NATIONAL SOVEREIGNTY QUO VADIS , GOP? by Victor Davis Hanson 20 by John Fonte & John O’Sullivan 39 The establishment must cope. Voters are rejecting rule by transnational elite. DON’T MAINSTREAM THE ALT-RIGHT 22 TRUMP DEMOCRATS by Henry Olsen 41 by Ben Shapiro Retaining them would have big payoffs for the GOP. It opposes constitutional democracy and is bad 26 THE RED WALL by Jeremy Carl for America. Donald Trump retook the upper Midwest. 42 CONSERVATISM IN DISSENT 27 THE VIEW FROM PENNSYLVANIA by Jon Lerner by Kevin D. Williamson Trump and Toomey reached victory in different but NR and heterodox Republican administrations: compatible ways. a brief history. 30 TRUMPISM AND RYANISM by Ramesh Ponnuru 43 STRENGTH IN A TOUGHER WORLD by Michael Singh Toward a synthesis better than either. An outline for a new conservative foreign policy. 32 PRINCIPLED POPULISM by Mike Lee 45 FRAGMENTATION OF THE SOUL by Russell Moore Now is a good moment to resist the centralization of Religious conservatism can offer America a new power. engagement. 33 TRUMP THE TRIANGULATOR? by Reihan Salam 47 MOVING BEYOND THE GENDER GAP He might try to expand his support with a centrist by Abby M. McCloskey health-insurance proposal. The right needs an agenda for women. 35 A NEW TRADE CONSENSUS by Edward Conard 48 THE KIDS WILL BE FINE by Heather Wilhelm Reduce deficits and don’t forget about the workers. Talking to children about the election.

SECTIONS 2 Letters to the Editor 4 The Week 50 The Long View 51 Athwart 52 Happy Warrior

NATIONAL REVIEW (ISSN: 0028-0038) is published bi-weekly, except for the first issue in January, by N ATIONAL REVIEW, Inc., at 215 Lexington Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10016. Periodicals postage paid at New York, N.Y., and additional mailing offices. © National Review, Inc., 2016. Address all editorial mail, manuscripts, letters to the editor, etc., to Editorial Dept., N ATIONAL REVIEW, 215 Lexington Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10016. Address all subscription mail orders, changes of address, undeliverable copies, etc., to NATIONALREVIEW, Circulation Dept., P. O. Box 433015, Palm Coast, Fla. 32143-3015; phone, 386-246-0118, Monday–Friday, 8:00A.M . to 10:30 P.M. Eastern time. Adjustment requests should be accompanied by a current mailing label or facsimile. Direct classified advertising inquiries to: Classifieds Dept.,ATIONAL N REVIEW, 215 Lexington Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10016 or call 212-679- 7330. POSTMASTER: Send address changes to N ATIONAL REVIEW, Circulation Dept., P. O. Box 433015, Palm Coast, Fla. 32143-3015. Printed in the U.S.A. RATES: $59.00 a year (24 issues). Add $21.50 for Canada and other foreign subscriptions, per year. (All payments in U.S. currency.) The editors cannot be responsible for unsolicited manuscripts or artwork unless return postage or, better, a stamped, self-addressed envelope is enclosed. Opinions expressed in signed articles do not necessarily represent the views of the editors. letters--READY_QXP-1127940387.qxp 11/16/2016 3:38 PM Page 2 Letters

DECEMBER 5 ISSUE; PRINTED NOVEMBER 17

EDITORINCHIEF Richard Lowry Senior Editors Politics in the Context of Christianity Richard Brookhiser / Jonah Goldberg / Jay Nordlinger Ramesh Ponnuru / David Pryce-Jones Managing Editor Jason Lee Steorts Literary Editor Michael Potemra Ian Tuttle’s article “The Religious Right’s Demise” (November 7) argues that Vice President, Editorial Operations Christopher McEvoy what is needed is an authentic Christian voice independent of politics. I agree. Washington Editor Eliana Johnson Executive Editor Reihan Salam The Christian Church should boldly preach and speak publicly about spiritual and Roving Correspondent Kevin D. Williamson National Correspondent John J. Miller moral issues, but not get aligned with political parties or candidates. God Senior Political Correspondent Jim Geraghty Chief Political Correspondent Tim Alberta ordained both the church and the state, giving them different missions and Art Director Luba Kolomytseva means. American Christians are Deputy Managing Editors Nicholas Frankovich / Fred Schwarz members of both the church Production Editor Katie Hosmer Assistant to the Editor Rachel Ogden and the state. Indi vi duals can Research Associate Alessandra Trouwborst certainly join and support Contributing Editors Shannen Coffin / Ross Douthat / Daniel Foster political organizations and Roman Genn / Arthur L. Herman / Lawrence Kudlow Mark R. Levin / Yuval Levin / Rob Long conservative-Christian-based Mario Loyola / Jim Manzi / Andrew C. McCarthy non-church groups that take Kate O’Beirne / Andrew Stuttaford / Robert VerBruggen political actions. NATIONALREVIEWONLINE Editor Charles C. W. Cooke The reality is that all laws Managing Editors Katherine Connell / Edward John Craig National-Affairs Columnist John Fund are based on morality, which is Staff Writer David French Senior Political Reporter Alexis Levinson based on religious beliefs, be Reporter Katherine Timpf Associate Editors Molly Powell / Nick Tell they theistic or atheistic. The Digital Director Ericka Andersen beliefs/morals of elected offi- Assistant Editor Mark Antonio Wright Jerry Falwell Jr. and Donald Trump in June 2016 Technical Services Russell Jenkins cials have a big impact on our Web Editorial Assistant Grant DeArmitt Web Developer Wendy Weihs laws and should be known and discussed. The progressive movement away from Web Producer Scott McKim God’s instructions for our lives is bearing its bitter fruit. The major-party plat- EDITORS- AT- LARGE Linda Bridges / Kathryn Jean Lopez / John O’Sullivan forms have opposite positions on several moral issues and on court appointments NATIONALREVIEWINSTITUTE affecting these issues and the freedom of religion. A strong Christian voice is THOMASL. RHODESFELLOW Ian Tuttle needed now more than ever because of the attacks on our constitutional freedoms of religion and speech. BUCKLEYFELLOWSINPOLITICALJOURNALISM Alexandra DeSanctis / Austin Yack Contributors Robert C. Lemke Hadley Arkes / James Bowman / Eliot A. Cohen Dinesh D’Souza / Chester E. Finn Jr. / Neal B. Freeman Joliet, Ill. James Gardner / David Gelernter / George Gilder Jeffrey Hart / Kevin A. Hassett / Charles R. Kesler David Klinghoffer / Anthony Lejeune / Michael Novak Alan Reynolds / Tracy Lee Simmons Terry Teachout / Vin Weber IAN TUTTLE RESPONDS: The great literary critic Irving Babbitt wrote: “When stud- Chief Financial Officer James X. Kilbridge Accounting Manager Galina Veygman ied with any degree of thoroughness, the economic problem will be found to run Accountant Lyudmila Bolotinskaya Business Services Alex Batey into the political problem, the political problem into the philosophical problem, Circulation Manager Jason Ng and the philosophical problem itself to be almost indissolubly bound up at last Advertising Director Jim Fowler Advertising Manager Kevin Longstreet with the religious problem”—which is to say, the good professor would likely Assistant to the Publisher Brooke Rogers Director of Revenue Erik Netcher agree with Mr. Lemke that our political order is ultimately grounded in theologi- PUBLISHERCHAIRMAN cal assumptions, and I agree with Mr. Lemke that part of the duty of the Church Jack Fowler John Hillen is to expose the theological roots of political order—and, if necessary, replant that FOUNDER William F. Buckley Jr. order in more nourishing soil. Americans have always had a pragmatic streak,

PATRONSANDBENEFACTORS preferring to sideline messy metaphysical questions, and it’s not difficult to see Robert Agostinelli why. But a polity that becomes unmoored from the “permanent things” (to use Dale Brott Mr. and Mrs. Michael Conway Russell Kirk’s formulation) is likelier to turn citizens into subjects, to be exploit- Mark and Mary Davis COM Virginia James ed or destroyed. A vibrant Church, which is always attuned to higher realities, is . Christopher M. Lantrip Brian and Deborah Murdock the institution best situated to facilitate the opposite: a public life ruled first and

Mr. & Mrs. Richard Spencer KANSASCITY foremost by charity. . Mr. & Mrs. L. Stanton Towne

Peter J. Travers WWW

Letters may be sub mitted by e-mail to [email protected].

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! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! !! "e Reagan Ranch Center ! 217 State Street National Headquarters ! 11480 Commerce Park Drive, Santa Barbara, California 93101 ! 888-USA-1776 Sixth Floor ! Reston, Virginia 20191 ! 800-USA-1776 week-READY_QXP-1127940387.qxp 11/16/2016 4:15 PM Page 4 The Week

n We usually only worry about audits when Democratic pres- idents get elected. See page 10.

n “We are now all rooting for his success in uniting and lead- ing the country,” President Obama said of President-elect Trump the day after the election. “President Bush’s team could not have been more professional or more gracious in making sure we had a smooth transition so that we could hit the ground running. . . . I have instructed my team to follow [that] exam- ple.” For his part, former president George W. Bush, who did not endorse or vote for Trump, issued a statement saying that he and his wife, Laura, “pray for the success of our country and the success of our new president.” In her concession speech, Hillary Clinton said that America owed the president-elect “an open mind and the chance to lead,” adding that “our constitu- tional democracy enshrines the peaceful transfer of power, and we don’t just respect that, we cherish it.” Trump was gracious in return. To uphold the virtue of civility under such circum- stances is always an achievement. For their doing so, our thanks and congratulations to Mrs. Clinton and to the men she hoped to succeed and defeat in office.

n The presidential race got nearly all the attention, but Election Day went well for Republicans at all levels. Their losses in races for the House, the Senate, and state legislatures were much lower than expected, and they increased the num- ber of Republican governors. Republicans now have the gov- Klein asserted as indisputable truth that the 2016 campaign ernorship and the entire legislature in 25 state governments, had placed race at the forefront of voters’ minds, unlike elec- and in two more states, they have enough legislators to over- tions featuring the first black major-party nominee and presi- ride the vetoes of Democratic governors. Conservatives who dent. If you believe that, you’ll believe anything—or at least harbor doubts about President-elect Trump—including some anything you want to believe. of those who voted for him—can take comfort in the fact that most of these elected Republicans are not cut from the same n The truth is that Democrats made a series of deliberate cloth as he is and are not especially beholden to him. Most choices to alienate white working-class voters during the Senate candidates in competitive races outperformed Trump in Obama years. Stances on energy production, illegal immigra- their states, including winners Richard Burr, Ron Johnson, tion, and same-sex marriage that were within the mainstream John McCain, Rob Portman, Marco Rubio, and Pat Toomey. of the party even ten years ago had nearly disappeared from it We hope that the Republican Congress and president will by Obama’s last year in office. Democrats knew that white cooperate in advancing a conservative agenda, but the former working-class voters disliked their new progressivism, but should not hesitate to stand up to the latter when necessary— they thought that the “rising American electorate” of Hispanics to protect both us and him from missteps and to reassert the and young liberals would more than make up for any losses too-long-atrophied constitutional role of the legislature. from this declining group. Turns out the math was faulty. Democrats wrote off these voters and are now expressing n Amid mounting shock and horror on Election Night, liberals shock that the gesture was reciprocated. reached for a security blanket of an explanation: White voters had chosen Trump as part of a racial backlash against the rising n In North Carolina, a slight drop in African-American turnout non-white population of the country. While Trump is no inno- during this year’s early-voting period occasioned breathless cent in racial controversies, that’s a reach. Upon finding out reporting from mainstream outlets and lamentations of “Jim that a portion of Trump voters large enough to be decisive had Crow” from Democratic activists. By way of background: In previously voted for President Obama, even twice, the explain- August, the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals struck down a ers set about devising convoluted explanations of how this fact 2013 law that required voters to show a government-issued ROMAN GENN did not in any way bear on the validity of their theory. Ezra photo ID, ended same-day registration, and shortened the

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length of early voting. As a result, North Carolina’s 100 coun- toral college. Time to do away with that 18th-century relic? ties were required to file new election rules with the state’s Not so fast. The American president is an elected chief of gov- election board just three months before Election Day. But ernment in a continental federal republic. The electoral college contrary to claims by everyone from the New York Times to assures each state a role in the process, however unequal, and ThinkProgress, early-voting opportunities were not subse- requires candidates to campaign nationwide, however selec- quently “slashed.” In fact, early-voting hours were expanded tively. Eliminating it would drive the cost of elections up as and polling sites were increased statewide. It turns out that a candidates chased every vote and had to spend yet more in the record 3 million North Carolinians cast their ballots during the largest media markets. It would also raise the incentives for state’s early-voting period, and that in Wake, Guilford, and fraud, since any vote stolen anywhere would count toward a Mecklenburg counties, all home to large black populations, win. Losers always complain (the Bush campaign had pre- Clinton ultimately outperformed Barack Obama. If her vote pared appeals for electors to go rogue in 2000 if, as the polls lagged elsewhere, the ultimate suppressor was she. wrongly predicted, Bush had won the popular vote but lost the electoral college). Better that losers take their licks and learn n The two leading contenders for secretary of state were, as to campaign smarter than that we go all in for a national we went to press, John Bolton and Rudy Giuliani. Giuliani, a plebiscite. former New York City mayor, has done yeoman’s work for Trump but doesn’t have extensive foreign-policy experience, n When the dust settled, Libertarian Gary Johnson had won to put it mildly. Bolton, a former American representative to over 3 percent of the vote, and Green Jill Stein a hair under the U.N., has the advantage of being an experienced, straight- 1 percent; Evan McMullin’s pop-up campaign won 20 percent talking, yet nuanced foreign-policy hand who fits the Trump in his home state of Utah. This is small potatoes beside the sensibility on national security. A scourge of international showings of Ross Perot (1992, 1996), John Anderson (1980), institutions and treaties that threaten our interests or sovereign- or George Wallace (1968). Johnson and McMullin, who polled ty, he is a hard-headed realist whose focus is always the na- better earlier in the race, fell back as antsy Republicans who tional interest. Bolton has been around the block—he started had flirted with them returned to the fold. The third parties, his career as a protégé of James A. Baker III—but has never however, seem to be here to stay, and in a race this close they become an establishmentarian or lost his edge. He would had to be taken into the major parties’ calculations. Whether understand that he is the president’s emissary to Foggy they can influence them, as third parties have sometimes Bottom, not the other way around, and he is respected by done, is another question. The Greens have nothing to teach all factions of the party. With allies nervous and an adversary the Sanders wing of the Democrats, and the only place for sure to test the administration early on, he’d be a strong pick Libertarians at Mar-a-Lago is the doghouse. for a momentous job. n “If you lose your money,” goes the old blues ballad, “learn n Trump made two big ap - to lose.” Disappointed Democrats didn’t, as they tweeted or pointments. Reince Priebus, declared on their T-shirts, NOT MY PRESIDENT. In half a dozen the head of the Republican cities, disappointment took to the streets. Twenty-five thou- National Committee, got chief sand protesters swarmed Trump Tower in Manhattan; 8,000 of staff. While Priebus has no (many waving Mexican flags) turned out in Los Angeles. Two governmental experience, he cops were hit by rocks at an anti-Trump demonstration in was an effective if occasional- Indianapolis, and Portland, Ore., declared a riot as anti- ly heavy-handed head of the Trumpers smashed cars and store windows and lit fires. We tire RNC. And he also has good of saying this, but if Republicans did this the media would etc. relations with Republicans etc. What the media might do, instead of downplaying these on the Hill. Steve Bannon, stories, is report on who gets these demos up. Either the Left the Trump campaign’s CEO has organized a permanent march on demand (Occupy Wall and before that publisher of Street, Black Lives Matter, now this), or some not-negligible Breit bart, will be a counselor slice of Americans are natural anarchists. Depressing either to Trump. Bannon has been way. getting vilified as a white su - premacist and an anti-Semite. n If there is anything more New Jersey than having a cor- The evidence for either charge rupt political figure create artificial traffic troubles to tor- Reince Priebus is very thin, but he seems to ment a political rival for no obvious end other than sadistic welcome being allied with enjoyment, we do not know what it is. Governor Chris peo ple who meet those descriptions. Newt Gingrich and Christie, who has spent much of the past year acting as a Kellyanne Conway, among others in Trump’s circle, have campaign surrogate for Donald Trump, apparently has pronounced themselves offended by questions about Bannon’s offended Donald Trump’s sense of propriety and finds ties to the bigoted “alt-right.” The questions are legitimate, himself cast into the outer darkness as his role in the but the defensiveness is a good sign. “Bridgegate” scandal, which he has long denied, becomes undeniable. (There is another possible explanation for n For the second time in 16 years, the winner of the popular Christie’s alienation: Trump is close to his son-in-law, vote (Clinton now, Gore in 2000) came in second in the elec- whose father Christie put away on tax-evasion and witness- BLOOMBERG

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tampering charges. Small world.) Christie has long claimed their CEO. In a rambling rant sent to employees the day after that he was unaware of the planned bridge closures before the election, Maloney rehashed some familiar arguments they happened, a claim now contradicted by, among others, against Trump and then added this menacing remark: “If you defense lawyers for Christie underlings charged in the case. do not agree with this statement then please reply to this email A judge has ruled that there is sufficient evidence to advance with your resignation because you have no place here.” an official-misconduct claim against the governor. We could Elsewhere in the memo he wrote: “I want to affirm to anyone almost grudgingly admire the creativity of the scheme if on our team that is scared or personally exposed, that I and not for the reminder that politicians, including too many everyone else here at GrubHub will fight for your dignity and Republicans, too often regard the people they purport to your right to make a better life for yourself and your family.” serve as pawns in their own games or props in their own dra- Unless you voted for Trump, of course. mas. There is impeachment talk in Trenton, and depending on the facts uncovered it may be warranted. n As the election results poured in, futures on the Dow Jones Industrial Average plummeted 800 points; in London, the n Now that a Republican Congress and president have been Financial Times Stock Exchange 100 dropped 147 points at the elected together, Obamacare may finally be replaced with some- opening of trade. “Markets are plunging,” New York Times thing respectful of markets, individual freedom, and federalism. columnist Paul Krugman wrote in the heat of the moment. Trump has said that he wants the replacement to make sure that “When might we expect them to recover? . . . A first-pass everyone, especially those with preexisting conditions, is cov- answer is never.” By the end of the day, the Dow was up 256 ered. Existing Republican plans go far toward this goal— points; the FTSE 100 had rallied to gain 69 points, or 1 percent. although coverage for all cannot be assured without forcing Global markets in general bounced back nicely. So did Krug - people to buy it, which should not be done. Any replacement will man: After “listening to music, working out, reading a novel, face formidable legislative obstacles. Changes to Obamacare’s basically taking a vacation in my head,” he was back at it later regulations are subject to filibuster in the Senate, where Re- that day, referring darkly to “runaway climate change,” betray- publicans do not have a filibuster-proof majority. Under the ing no relief or gratitude that his doomsday economic forecast circumstances, conservatives should insist that Republicans on 17 hours earlier had turned out to be wrong. both ends of Pennsylvania Avenue act with resolve and dispatch while also understanding they need tactical flexibility. n Expiring at the same time as the Clinton campaign was n Promises, promises. If Trump won—Amy Schumer and American TV comedy. Having perfected (as they thought) Barbra Streisand vowed—they’d move to Canada. For Samuel the art of making liberal points by mockery, Jon Stewart’s L. Jackson, it’d be better to live in South Africa than in the U.S. heirs—John Oliver, Trevor Noah—simply repeated the under a President Trump. Ruth Bader Ginsburg said she’d head trick, over and over. Stephen Colbert apart from his Fox to New Zealand. Al Sharpton, Miley Cyrus, and Chelsea anchor persona: not funny. Samantha Bee: not funny. Handler all promised they’d leave, too (destinations unspeci- Even the venerable Saturday Night Live, which had two fied). Yes, the Canadian immigration website crashed on amusing candidate impersonators—Alec Baldwin and Election Night—owing to shoddy Canuck IT design or an Kate McKinnon—offered as its post-election cold open- overload of histrionic inquiries from jet-setting Yanks, we’re ing McKinnon/Clinton singing the lugubrious Leonard not quite sure which—but no one is actually going to move to Cohen anthem “Hallelujah.” Cohen had just died, making Queen Elizabeth’s Northern Dominion. Nor should he. No the event a double wake. Comedy matter what they do at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, life will go can tell bitter truths—who was on pretty much as it has in Berkeley and Haight-Ashbury and angrier, or funnier, than Samuel the West Village. Cher outdid everyone, picking Jupiter for her Johnson? But you must not next home. Where’s Elon Musk when you need him? serve a party, left or right, and you must know that you, too, n In the early days of the Republic, in some places, adherents being human, are part of the of the Federalist and Republican parties rarely mingled: A problems you anatomize. If you loyal Federalist lived in a Federalist rooming house, drank at a cannot hit that stern note, be Federalist tavern, and so on. As the nation grew, these customs Jimmy Fallon, and keep us fell by the wayside, but today the Internet and our mainstream laughing. At least someone media have created a situation where some people seldom will be listening. encounter a contrary opinion and are shocked if they ever do. Jimmy Fallon Hence a practice that sprang up after the election: Progressive Trump haters wearing safety pins as a sign to fellow progres- sive Trump haters that they are safe to talk to. They have made moral self-congratulation and political folly into a literal fash- n Lost in the noise and excitement over the presidential elec- ion statement. tion was the result of Colorado’s referendum on assisted sui- WIREIMAGE / cide. Voters approved it by two to one, about the same as the n Matt Maloney doesn’t like to be disagreed with. Neither do ratio by which proponents of the measure outspent opponents. most people, but in this case it’s a problem for employees of Doctors may now prescribe life-ending sleep medication for GARY GERSHOFF the online food-delivery service GrubHub, since Maloney is adults with terminal illnesses. Colorado joins five other states

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in legalizing assisted suicide, which has gained popular sup- Duke lacrosse team, fraternities and sports clubs were demo- port even as bioethicists have argued that its logic will eventu- nized as stand-ins for “patriarchy” and “male privilege” and ally lead to ending the lives of certain children and the the rest of it, while the impressions of society’s victims and mentally ill. European doctors in Belgium and elsewhere have “victims” are elevated to the condition of absolute truth even already begun to slide down that slippery slope. Right-to-die when they are absolutely false. One of the lessons that should advocates have succeeded in framing the issue as a choice be taken from this episode is that rape is a crime, that deans of between suffering and hastened death. Palliative care is more students and Rolling Stone writers are poor criminal investiga- expensive than euthanasia, and more difficult to administer, tors, and that these matters should be entrusted to police at the but also more dignified and humane. Its role in the care of earliest possible stage. individuals at the end of life has receded in the public debate over assisted suicide. Pro-life advocates should put it front n A California woman, and center. Mariza Ruelas, was recently summoned to court for an n Trump is coming for your birth control, some women unlikely crime: selling a warned one another breathlessly on social media in the wake plate of ceviche. Ruelas was of his surprise election. Mainstream media outlets and a member of a community Planned Parenthood stoked the hysteria, warning that “repro- Facebook group, “209 Food ductive rights” were threatened and advising women to pro- Spot,” which allows resi- cure long-acting intrauterine devices that would outlast the dents of Stockton, Calif., Trump administration. What is in jeopardy is a regulation pro- to organize potluck meals, mulgated in 2012 under Obamacare that required health- share recipes, and sell or insurance plans to provide birth control at zero out-of-pocket exchange food. As a hobby, cost to consumers. Should Republicans repeal or modify that the mother of six began to law, or simply withdraw that regulation, some insured women trade or give away meals via the group, and in July she was may have to pay more for birth control. Some Republicans, summoned to court on the charges of operating a food facility including Trump, have also called for oral contraception to be and engaging in business without a permit, after an undercover made available without prescription. No rights are being tram- investigator ordered ceviche from her as part of a sting. Ruelas pled here, and birth control will remain ubiquitous. refused a plea deal and now is headed to trial, facing up to one year in jail. n Charter schools have grown exponentially in recent years, with nationwide enrollment more than tripling between 2004 n Pope Francis recently flew to Sweden to commemorate and 2014. The publicly funded but privately run institutions Martin Luther’s contribution to the Reformation. That he so have a mixed record, but overall they have proven to be a honored a movement founded on hostile repudiation of the viable alternative to the current failing public-education sys- office he holds was, from a historical perspective, no less tem. Yet in Massachusetts, charter-school advocates lost a remarkable than the warm welcome Swedish Protestants gave major fight: A ballot initiative to create twelve new charter him: As recently as the mid 20th century, Catholics were schools failed as unions viciously fought to uphold traditional barred from various professions in Sweden, and the founding schools. The unions soundly defeated the charter-school advo- of Catholic monasteries was prohibited by law. In 1999, the cates on the Massachusetts ballot, but across the country char- Vatican and the Lutheran World Federation signed a joint dec- ter schools keep rising. The American Federation for Children, laration of agreement on the doctrine of justification, formally a school-choice advocacy group, helped elect 108 pro-school- settling a dispute near the heart of the split between the choice lawmakers in state legislatures. It seems that the Reformers and Rome in the 16th century. Comity between the charter-school debate has just begun. two churches has been the rule in recent decades. Meanwhile, in an interview published only days after he returned from a n Rolling Stone magazine has been ordered to pay a $3 million prayer service with Lutherans in Malmö Arena, Francis turned, judgment to Nicole Eramo, a former assistant dean at the as he often does, on members of his own flock who prefer the University of Virginia, for defaming her in its sensational— Latin Mass. He called them “rigid” and chastised them for and, as it turns out, entirely fictitious—account of a rape on the lacking “true love,” maintaining that enthusiasm for traditional college’s campus. Sabrina Rubin Erdely’s now-infamous story liturgy “always hides something, insecurity or even something was a classic of bad advocacy journalism: She combed through else.” We commend the Holy Father’s embrace of non- the nation’s college campuses collecting sexual-assault stories Catholic Christians but would remind him that charity begins until she found one that fit all her narrative needs (southern at home. school, fraternity assailants, callous administrators) and pub- lished it without really bothering to check out whether it n Young people who are, under the law, mature enough to checked out. The details of the story strained belief in a way drink alcohol, engage in sex, have an abortion, and call it all a reminiscent of the baroque elaboration of fantasies by toddlers busy weekend are not adult enough to bear the results of a pres- and mentally ill people: Among other things, the purported vic- idential election and the peaceful transfer of power in a dem - tim claimed to have been thrown through a glass table and ocratic republic. Across the country, there has been a wave of gang raped on the shards but to have miraculously walked dopey protests about Trump’s electoral victory, though that away with no sign of physical injury. As with the case of the victory was achieved in the ordinary way with no suggestion

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of unfairness or foul play—the students are simply unhappy n By his own admission, Leonard Cohen was not much of a with having lost. Classes and examinations have been canceled singer. Only in his home country, Canada, said Cohen, could because students are too “distraught” to attend them. The he have won “Vocalist of the Year.” Perhaps; that flat, beloved University of Michigan planned and then was shamed into baritone was an acquired taste, but his voice, in a broader canceling an event at which adult men and women would be sense, was something else, wry, detached, literate, sardonic, invited to console themselves with Play-Doh, coloring books, fiercely intelligent, sometimes terribly sad. Even the moments and puppies. The 26th Amendment isn’t looking like an obvi- of happiness came with a catch: “You know that she’s half ously good innovation just now. crazy but that’s why you want to be there.” A child of his time, he spent decades “limping along” after spiritual truth; a child n The day after the election, Teresa Sullivan, president of the of his ancestors (one of his grandfathers was a noted rabbinical University of Virginia, sent an e-mail to students that quoted scholar), he did so with seriousness, spending years in a Zen Thomas Jefferson, the university’s founder. University of monastery. (With characteristic precision, he noted that the lat- Virginia students, Jefferson wrote in 1825, “are exactly the per- ter involved no worship or god, “so theologically, there [was] sons who are to succeed to the government of our country, and no challenge to any Jewish belief.”) Robbed by his manager, to rule its future enmities, its friendships and fortunes.” Those he stepped up the tempo of his career in his final decade to words could have come today from UVA’s admissions office make the money back (and more), recording new songs and, (or any other college’s), yet within two days after Sullivan e- dapper in suit and fedora, returning to the road, staging a long, mailed them, 400-plus students and faculty members signed a long last waltz that was too much fun to be autumnal. Just letter of protest against quoting anything written by Jefferson weeks before his death on November 7, Cohen released his last because—you guessed it—he was a slaveowner. To be sure, album, read by some as his farewell. Not long after, he told an Jefferson was a man of his time and place, and his appetites interviewer that he intended “to stick around until 120.” If were stronger than his principles; it might indeed have been only. R.I.P. unwise if Sullivan had held him up uncritically “as a moral compass” (in the protesters’ words). But objecting so strongly THE ELECTION to such an innocuous sentiment because the writer owned slaves reveals an inability to assess people in the context President-Elect Trump of their times—something of which students, and especially faculty, at such a historic university should be particularly E did it. Donald Trump has won the biggest upset in mindful. American political history. In September, we suggested H that Republicans redeploy resources from the presiden- n You would expect that students at America’s oldest univer- tial race to the House and Senate races, in part because of polls sity would know that the Internet is forever, but the Harvard that indicated that to win Trump would have to make up more men’s soccer team still thought e-mail would be a good place ground more rapidly than any previous successful presidential to distribute a lurid “scouting report” on the sexual prospects candidate had done. He made up that ground, aided by Hillary of the college’s female players. The document leaked, of course, and resulted in an unsurprising overreaction by admin- istrators, who launched an investigation and canceled the team’s season. Harvard has no problem with the underlying behavior but does not want students talking about it frankly. You can see why the students might have been confused about the rules.

n The restoration of the right to keep and bear arms was the work of many people, but perhaps no one was as important to it as Donald B. Kates. A lawyer, academic, and activist, Kates spearheaded much of the successful Second Amendment liti- gation of the late 20th century; without Kates, it is possible that the groundwork that resulted in the seminal D.C. v. Heller decision would never have been laid. And yet it was his pecu- liar talent for coalition building and evangelism that marked him out from the rest. Ask an opponent of gun control how he first became interested in the question and he will more often than not say, “Kates.” Had one predicted in 1970 that all 50 states would enjoy some form of concealed carry, that a strict handgun ban would be considered politically suicidal in the GETTY

United States, and that the Supreme Court would unequivocal- / ly affirm an individual right to bear arms, one would in most circumstances have been laughed out of the room. But not by Kates. He was a man of vision and of action, and he will be MARK WILSON missed. R I P. Donald and Melania Trump celebrate a presidential-election win, November 9, 2016.

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Clinton’s recklessness with an e-mail server and her general trade barriers may no longer be in the offing, but Trump should inadequacy. Our congratulations to President-elect Trump, and consider whether ripping up existing trade agreements and provisional congratulations to the millions of Americans who levying new tariffs will really yield results that enhance either have invested their hopes in him. our economy or his popularity. During the campaign, Trump made many pledges: to nomi- His foreign policy has seemed like a work in progress. He nate conservative justices, to crack down on illegal immigra- has said he wants to pressure allies to contribute more to the tion, to reform the tax code, to protect religious liberty, and to common defense; but he also rightly criticized President replace Obamacare. His liberal history and his evident lack of Obama for making those allies less confident in our commit- interest in these issues created doubts among many conserva- ment to them. Achieving both of Trump’s goals seems likely to tives. We hope he now proves us doubters wrong. To do that he require delicate diplomacy. But if one of those goals has to be will have to show a self-control that was not uniformly present sacrificed, the alliances are worth their budgetary price. during his campaign but that characterized his most successful Needless to say, we also hope he adopts a more clear-eyed moments. view of Vladimir Putin’s Russia. Congressional Republicans, who retained a majority in both Finally, rounding out our list of Trump’s major departures chambers, should do what they can to reinforce Trump’s better from conservative policy orthodoxy, there is the matter of enti- instincts. They should take “Trumpism” seriously but also tlements. Trump has declared himself against cuts. So be it. temper it. To the extent that the election was a referendum on But if we are to avoid middle-class tax increases or rising debt, any issue, immigration was that issue. Trump originally gave we will have to restrain the growth of benefits. voice to a restrictionist impulse on the part of the public and Impressive as Trump’s victory was—and it was extremely eventually reached the right position: for an entry/exit tracking impressive—he was elected by a country that questions his system, stronger barriers at the border, and sanctions for busi- temperament and his honesty. It has been a long time since nesses that hire illegal immigrants—but without either mass Americans believed that a president would govern in the inter- deportations or, until these policies are in place, amnesty. On ests of the entire people, not just his favored slice of it, and that that issue he should stick to the position on which he cam- distrust has crested in this election. Here too he should try to paigned in the general election. prove his critics wrong. He hit grace notes in his speech on On trade, Trump has also carved out a distinctive position, Election Night and he should continue to endeavor to show but one that has less to recommend it. Further reductions 11:52 in AMhumility Page 1 in his moment of triumph. New from the Cato Institute “It’s refreshing to learn how other Western nations strangle opportunity with insane

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THE ELECTION had real worries about jobs and health care, she could offer End of an Era only herself and her sex. Bernie Sanders gave her an opportu- nity to come up with a message, but she neither contradicted LL the years of preparation, after the years of preparing nor outbid him, she only ground him down. for her first run; the millions and millions of dollars America’s long entanglement with the Clinton family is A raised, twice what her opponent spent; the legions of over. Goodbye. consultants and the blizzard of endorsements, from politicians and celebrities alike—none of it was enough. All the queen’s BARACK OBAMA horses and all the queen’s men could not pull Hillary Clinton An Impaired Legacy over the line. Clinton herself blames FBI director James Comey. His last- MONG the biggest losers of the election was President minute announcement in late October that the Bureau was A Obama, whose streak of not being able to transfer his reopening its investigation of her home-brew server thanks to personal popularity to other Democrats remains un - newly discovered e-mails “stopped our momentum,” she told broken. a post-election conference call of donors. It certainly revived He hoped Hillary Clinton would be his third term, playing the server as an issue, after Comey had seemingly put it to rest George H. W. Bush to his Reagan. He campaigned for her in July. Comey’s last-last-minute announcement in early robustly, and begged and even tried to shame his supporters November that there was nothing prosecutable in the new e- into turning out for her, all for naught. Obama’s enduring con- mails only picked at the scab. But Clinton herself set the server tribution to our politics was supposed to be the so-called coali- up, to conceal dodgy Clinton Foundation ties to official busi- tion of the ascendant, the bloc of minority, college-educated, ness. She violated protocol and the law, and when she was and Millennial voters assumed to have the country’s political caught she lied about it. If Comey flung the fatal stone, she had future in a headlock. These groups are indeed growing parts of put it out there in the first place. the electorate and a challenge for the GOP going forward. But But a campaign that can be killed by one thing was already they aren’t the only voters in the country. Democrats forgot ailing. The Democratic coalition that backed Barack Obama that this year. They acted as if they didn’t want even to bother twice was not enough. Minority turnout fell off in some key to appeal to working-class whites, who contributed more to states, notably Michigan. And while Clinton picked up white Obama’s victories than commonly thought. urban and suburban voters unhappy with Trump, they were The Democrats had already suffered historic losses at the matched by white small-town and rural voters excited by him. state level and in the U.S. House under Obama’s watch. With The Democrat who saw this problem, and urged the Clinton the latest Republican wave holding the GOP majority in the campaign to address it, was Bill Clinton himself, whose two U.S. Senate and delivering the White House, it is a total wipe- victories had rested on the support of just such voters. But out. Clinton’s advice was dismissed as oldthink by younger advis- The consequences for the president’s legacy are profound, ers mesmerized by demographic trends. and very welcome. Two of the biggest legislative accomplish- The great problem of Clinton’s campaign, however, was her ments of his first term in office, Obamacare and Dodd-Frank, lack of message. It showed in Clinton’s multiple debuts. It are susceptible to repeal. Republicans will likely undo most of showed in the internal e-mails revealed by WikiLeaks in which the health-care law early next year, which would represent the her advisers scratched their heads over how to frame her. It most consequential rollback of welfare-state legislation in the showed, most bizarrely, in the report that Team Clinton toyed nation’s history. with 85 different slogans before hitting on—what was it, After Republicans took Congress in 2010, President Obama again? Stronger weather? Longer together? If you have 85 slo- didn’t tack to the center like Bill Clinton after his midterm gans, you have none, and no hope of finding one. In a change rebuke in 1994, but drifted even farther left and resorted to uni- election she could offer only more of the same. To voters who lateral rule. Much of his work as the nation’s self-appointed lawgiver can now be reversed when President Trump picks up his own pen and phone. The immigration orders, the HHS mandate, the environmental rules, the impositions on college campuses—all of it can be unspooled by a determined execu- tive. The same goes for the Paris Accords on climate and the Iran deal, although these are obviously more complicated because they involve foreign actors. President Obama’s ideological fixity and high-handedness have come home to roost. He will always be remembered as the nation’s first African-American president. But his substan- tive legacy could soon get whittled down to a nub, and politi- cally, he could look like a parenthesis between Republican presidents, depending on the GOP’s fortunes over the next several years. YIN BOGU VIA GETTY / Obama was always supremely confident that history moved XINHUA in only one direction. It is another one of his presumptions that Hillary and Bill Clinton in New York after the election, November 9, 2016 have crumbled upon contact with reality.

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Remarkable remembrances of titans of politics, religion, literature, and pop culture

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ative. Trump showed that much of the base of the party was driven far more by resentment of elitist arrogance, by a rejection of globalism, and by economic and cultural insecurity than by a commit- ment to conservative economic or politi- cal principles. And he thereby also made the base of the party even more tradition- ally populist. This is surely part of the reason why most members of the House Freedom Caucus and many prominent conserva- tive talk-radio hosts didn’t stand athwart Trump’s candidacy in the primaries, even though he showed contempt for much of what they have always champi- oned. Trump demonstrated that the peo- ple they claimed to represent were not quite who they had imagined they were. He made this explicit soon after clinch - ing the nomination. “This is called the Republican party, it’s not called the A Changed GOP Conservative party,” Trump said in an Republican voters were not quite who the party thought they were interview in May. It was an extraordi- nary thing for a Republican presidential BY YUVAL LEVIN contender to say. And it was also true and important, and recognizing it would be EPUBLICANS have always un - uine self-understanding, many Repub- a very good thing for both Republicans derstood that their party’s tent lican activists and elected officials as - and conservatives. R is home to different factions. sumed that most people in these different For conservatives, in particular, ceas- But they have long tended to factions roughly fit that description, too. ing to imagine that we own the Re - perceive these factions—the grassroots This has never been quite true; it has publican coalition, and therefore ceasing base, the business Right, the conserva- grown less true over time, and it simply to expect it to simply follow our lead, tive movement, and the governing-party is no longer true in the wake of this would be a spur to sharpen, strengthen, establishment—as deeply united by a momentous election. and modernize our ideas so that they are way of thinking, and not just by transac- The most significant implication of more attractive and a better fit to con- tional relationships. the party’s self-misunderstanding was temporary problems. Understanding the For two decades and more after the a misimpression of the nature of its need to persuade our fellow Republicans end of the Reagan era, Republicans grassroots voters. Republican politicians (and not just business leaders but pop- implicitly thought of this coalition in thought of the base of the party as a ulist middle- and working-class voters) terms we might roughly describe as steadfastly conservative voting bloc that that our ideas would address their con- “The Four Modes of Phil Gramm.” would rebel against any departures from cerns and priorities would strengthen our Gramm, the former senator from Texas, the GOP’s longstanding agenda and ability to persuade others, too. And it was an ideal full-spectrum-conservative would be dissatisfied with party leaders would help Republicans reinforce gains Republican. He was a homespun pop- to the extent they were not sufficiently built up in a protest election that would ulist pouring his common sense like aggressive in its pursuit. The war be - be hard to sustain without substantive ice-cold water over liberal eggheads. He tween the Tea Party and the establish- policy accomplishments. was a libertarian economics professor ment in the Obama years was fought on But coalitions shape their members, who believed in markets because he could this premise. and so just as conservatives might hope do math. He was a wonk-intellectual But Donald Trump’s campaign, even to channel the energies of the populist deeply conversant in the vocabulary before he won the election, demonstrat- Right and restrain its excesses, sharing of modern conservatism. And he was ed that this understanding of the Right’s the party with a populist voter base a prudent politician who could cut a grassroots—the understanding on which might in turn reshape conservatism. In - deal. So Gramm could be fully at home the work of various tea-party activist deed, in some important ways it has among the grassroots activists, the busi- groups, the House Freedom Caucus, and already done that over the past decade nesspeople, the conservative thinkers, Senator Ted Cruz’s presidential cam- and more. And just as Republicans have and the politicians, but in every case he paign, as well as the responses to these failed to take note of the actual character was a purist conservative of a particular from establishment Republicans, were of their coalition, conservatives too have sort. based—was in error in some important not sufficiently acknowledged how our In their rhetoric, but also in their gen- ways, and in any case is no longer oper- movement has changed. ROMAN GENN

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American conservatism has always the problems of the late 1970s and the been a collection of varied groups and 1980s, but with time it has grown in - schools of thought united, in broad creasingly detached from American cir- terms, by a general view of the world. cumstances and priorities. One of the That view usually involves a low opin- things we see more clearly in light of this ion of man’s character and rationality, year is that the familiar conservative combined with a high opinion of his dig- coalition has for some time already been nity and rights; a resulting skepticism gradually transforming into a related but about power that tends to point toward different coalition. The precise shape of greater confidence in mediating institu- that emerging coalition remains unclear, tions and decentralized decision-making but it is a little easier after this momen- than in consolidated expertise and social tous election to speculate about its gen - engineering; and an overarching belief eral outlines. that the world is a dangerous place Rather than muscular international- and maintaining order takes real work. ism, social conservatism, and supply- These general views explain the attach- side economics, the three legs of the ment con servatives have to the American stool of the conservative coalition in the Constitution—which is rooted in some coming years seem more likely to be, similar premises—and to the Western broadly speaking, American national- tradition beyond. ism, religious communitarianism, and But as foundations for a coalition, market economics. That’s a closely re - these general views can add up in differ- lated coalition. The change has been ent ways under different circumstances. evolutionary, not revolutionary, and con- Since the 1970s, conservatives have servatism has not changed as much as tended to think of them as adding up to the broader Republican coalition has a coalition modeled on a three-legged under the forces of populism. stool. The legs have been muscular The internationalists who were more Principled (originally anti-Communist) internation- defense hawks than democracy promot- giving made alism, social conservatism, and supply- ers can find a lot to like in a constructive side economics. Different conservatives nationalism. The supply-siders are be - easy. emphasized these differently, with some lievers in free markets, they just tend to really belonging to just one faction and emphasize growth at the margins more only tolerating the others for practical than using markets as tools of problem- DonorsTrust is the only donor- ends. But the three routinely worked solving. The social conservatives share advised fund committed to the together. the worldview of religious communitari- principles of liberty. And as happens in coalitions, the three ans, if not always the same political Many organizations offer donor- elements all tended to shape one another instincts. There are many similarities, advised accounts to simplify your over time. The internationalists made but this also stands to be a different con- charitable giving. Only DonorsTrust social conservatives tougher and less servatism in some important ways. was founded to serve conservative naïve about the world, and made the It is, for one thing, an ideological supply-siders more committed to free- coalition that evinces a yearning for sol- and libertarian donors who want to dom along with wealth. The social con- idarity as much as a hunger for freedom. ensure that their commitment to servatives made the hawks more idealistic The ideological coalition that is progres- liberty is always honored through and made many of the supply-siders sivism will likely change in similar ways their charitable giving. To learn pro-life and otherwise traditionalist. The in the coming years, as an emphasis on how DonorsTrust can simplify and supply-siders made the internationalists conformity overtakes an ethic of lib - protect your giving, give us a call or smarter critics of Communism and made eration. This gradual evolution of the visit donorstrust.org/principles. the social conservatives friendlier to ideological Right and Left reveals an growth and wealth. underlying shift in American life that we The result, for a time, was a better- are only beginning to understand. rounded and more effective coalition— The interaction of the elements of this one with a particular kind of argument new coalition will also, unavoidably, be for freedom at its core. And that coalition different. As before, the three elements also helped shape the Republican party would need to restrain one another’s in recent decades in its battles with the excesses to make the whole more func- Democrats, who have been shaped by tional and appealing. Religious commu- BUILDING A LEGACY OF LIBERTY

their own different, if no less powerful, nitarians might help to make nationalists DT Philanthropic Services understanding of freedom. less livid and more tolerant, and to make -- • www.donorstrust.org That conservative coalition was well the “marketists” less libertarian and in - formed to offer attractive solutions to dividualistic. Nationalists could make

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religious conservatives less universalist ocratic and old industrial towns along and make marketists less cosmopolitan. Lake Erie. Counties that supported Mr. Marketists could help make nationalists Obama in 2012 voted for Mr. Trump by less isolationist and religious communi- Race and more than 20 points.” Similar pockets tarians less collectivist. can be found across the country. Maine’s In effect, all three will need to focus one Trumpism second congressional district, which allo- another on the middle layers of society: a Prejudice is an inadequate cates its own electoral vote, opted for constructive nationalism as a unifying explanation of the election Obama by eight points in 2012, but went force against both hyper-individualism for Trump by twelve. And, of course, BY IAN TUTTLE and globalism; a community-minded these sorts of counties were instrumental religious conservatism as a counterforce in helping Trump flip recently Dem - to the potential of markets to fall into N September, Zack Beauchamp ocratic states. Among the 2012 blue moral chaos and of nationalism to de- penned a long essay for Vox entitled states that ended in Trump’s column were volve into hateful insularity; market eco- I “White Riot: How Racism and Im - Wisconsin, which last voted for the nomics as a way of solving problems migration Gave Us Trump, Brexit, Republican nominee in 1984, and Iowa near at hand rather than of unleashing and a Whole New Kind of Politics.” (also 1984, but with an anomalous Bush faceless global forces or just liberating Fiddling with a heap of sociological data victory in 2004). As of this writing, individuals. purporting to show a strong correlation Michigan, which Obama won by almost This would still be a thoroughly con- between “racial resentment” and right- ten points in 2012, has not been called, servative coalition in a familiar sense. wing voting, Beauchamp announced that but Trump holds a small lead. It would be the natural home for pro- “racism, Islamophobia, and xenophobia” How did this happen? Exit polling, growth, small-government capitalism, are what unite “far-right politicians and taken together with turnout numbers, along with social traditionalism and their supporters on both sides of the suggests different causes in different unabashed American patriotism and Atlantic”—“far right,” in the case of the places. In Wisconsin, for example, constitutionalism. But it would tend to United States, being Donald J. Trump. Trump performed about as well as Mitt emphasize the links between these views Beauchamp’s was one of the more sub- Romney in 2012. However, Clinton vot- (which, after all, are also naturally in stantive contributions to what long ago ers did not materialize; compared with tension) by emphasizing their common roots in humility more than their com- mon aspirations to boundless liberation. Clinton outperformed Obama It would be more sober than cheerful, more careful than confident, more Tocque- in Pennsylvania. But she still failed ville than Kemp. And it would be a to carry the state. Why? conservatism heavily influenced by the increasingly populist flavor of the broad- became liberals’ preferred explanation President Obama in 2012, she received er Republican coalition in the age of for Trump’s inexplicable ascendancy: He approximately 200,000 fewer votes in Trump, even as it frequently needs to act is a racist and rose by exploiting wide- Wisconsin. Milwaukee alone dropped as a check on the party’s populism. spread, latent bigotry—and now he has 40,000 Democratic votes. Consider that This outline is speculative and heavy ridden that wave all the way to the White 80,000 Democratic votes also failed to on broad categories and vague “isms.” House. This narrative was refined to its show up in Detroit, and it’s clear that part But it might suggest some guidelines for purest form on Election Night, when Slate of the reason for Trump’s victory in these conservatives as we consider our role in columnist Jamelle Bouie, ever a hammer states was Clinton’s failure to hold on to the new Republican governing coalition. looking for a nail, suggested that Trump’s Obama’s voters among urban blacks. In a sense, Donald Trump has written a campaign and victory were a recapitula- Something similar seems to have played check to his voters that only conserva- tion of the assault that “angry, recalcitrant out in North Carolina, despite the fact tives can help him cash. That will require whites” waged on blacks in the wake of that Clinton outperformed Obama in conservatives within the party to de - Reconstruction. mostly black Guilford, Mecklenburg, termine how far toward populism we Election Day numbers, unsurprisingly, and Wake counties (where Democrats should be willing to go, what we should tell a very different story. claimed that Republicans were engaging ask in return, and how conservative prin- Start with the exit polls. Nate Cohn, in “voter suppression”). ciples can be applied to our contempo- data whiz for the New York Times’ “Up - The scene elsewhere looks different. rary challenges to address the desires and shot” blog, rightly observed that “Trump Clinton outperformed Obama in Penn - needs of middle- and working-class won the presidency by riding an enor- sylvania, running up large margins in Americans. mous wave of support among white the suburbs of Philadelphia; she won None of these will be quite new ques- working-class voters.” But it’s where Chester County, which Obama lost, by tions. Some on the right have been ask- those white voters are from that is strik- 25,000 votes. But she still failed to carry ing them for years. But the Republican ing. “Youngstown, Ohio, where Mr. the state. Why? Thousands of white coalition is only now beginning to under- Obama won by more than 20 points in working-class voters who live in those stand how important they will be to its 2012, was basically a draw. Mr. Trump industrial counties Cohn identified and future. swept the string of traditionally Dem - who voted Democratic in 2012 voted

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Republican in 2016. Trump also appears College government professor Philip to have mobilized white working-class Klinkner, whose examination of recent CRITICAL PRAISE FOR voters who did not vote last cycle but did American National Election Study data JAY NORDLINGER’S so this time in numbers sufficient to build showed that support for Trump was, as up large vote totals in the state’s most Klinkner wrote at Vox, most firmly “root- reliably Republican areas. ed in animosity and resentment toward All of this complicates the simple nar- various minority groups, especially rative of racial bigotry, and it becomes African Americans, immigrants, and especially improbable as the lens widens. Muslims”—not, among other popular Take the nation as a whole, and exit polls hypotheses, in economic anxiety. This suggest that Trump actually underper- lines up with a substantial volume of formed Mitt Romney among whites, 58 empirical data that finds that high racial- to 59 percent, while outperforming him resentment scores as measured by the among minorities—by two points among standard battery of tests are positively blacks and Latinos, and by three points correlated with conservative policy pref- among Asians. Meanwhile, the white erences. share of the national vote decreased, from But what “racial resentment” actual- 72 to 70 percent. ly indicates is disputable and disputed. As sociologist Jonathan Haidt has In their recent working paper “Con- observed, if we define the white working servatism, Just World Belief, and Ra - class by level of education rather than cism: An Experimental Investigation income, it is clear that this voting bloc of the Attitudes Measured by Modern The New, Acclaimed History of the has been steadily tilting away from Racism Scales,” Riley K. Carney and Nobel Peace Prize, ‘the Most Famous Democrats and toward Republicans since Ryan D. Enos, both of Harvard’s govern- and Controversial Prize in the World’ the 1970s. Al Gore lost whites without a ment department, compared rates of college degree by 17 points, and John “resentment” toward blacks with rates JOHN BOLTON in The Weekly Kerry lost them by 23 points. Barack toward non-blacks, using a simple test of Standard: With this “erudite and Obama, however, outperformed Kerry their own design. They found that conser- insightful history,” Jay Nordlinger “has by five percentage points—meaning that, vatives express similar rates of racial written not only the go-to reference book for the prize and its laureates if white working-class voters are closet resentment regardless of the racial group but also an important philosophical racists, many of them took a sudden hol- at issue. Conservatives are about equally reflection on the nature of ‘peace’ in iday from their bigotry in November likely to resent whites and blacks—or modern times.” 2008. Bhutanese or Nepalese or Lithuanians. What accounts for this long-term shift, According to Carney and Enos, what SCOTT JOHNSON at Power Line: and why do Bouie, Beauchamp, and oth- racial-resentment tests actually seem to “. . . a brilliant, thought-provoking, ers on the left think that the white work- show is the predilection of conservatives enraging, inspirational, fascinating, moving book.” ing class misperceives its own economic toward “just-world belief,” the “general interests? political orientation that perceives the MONA CHAREN in her syndicated Bouie, writing at Slate after the elec- world as consisting of people who work column: “Nordlinger is an engaging tion, theorized that Barack Obama’s suc- hard and those who do not.” Con - and wise tour guide.” cess among future Trump voters was servatives, the authors suggest, tend to simply a subtler form of racism. Part of “apply this same just-world belief regard- National Review, 215 Lexington Avenue, NY, NY 10016 the challenge of being black in America, less of whether they are asked about Send me ______copies of Peace, They Say. My cost is $27.99 each (shipping and handling are included!). I he suggested, is “navigating the reality of Blacks or non-Black groups.” Carney enclose total payment of $______. Send to: white Americans who show kindness and and Enos make allowance for the reality Name care in one breath and say nigger in the of racial animus and acknowledge that Address other” (italics in original). Such people just-world belief may cause conser - City State ZIP surely exist, but this is armchair psychol- vatives to ignore genuine historical e-mail: ogizing posing as explanation. and contemporary injustices to black phone: Beauchamp at least marshals some sta- Americans, but their findings clearly sub- PAYMENT METHOD: tistics to his armchair. In 1971, political vert simple-minded narratives such as Check enclosed (payable to National Review) scientists David O. Sears and Donald R. Beauchamp’s—to wit, that racial resent- Bill my MasterCard Visa Kinder proposed the idea of “racial ment means “fear [of] the demographic resentment,” a subtle form of racial prej- trends that would further erode the foun- Acct. No.

udice that blends hostile attitudes toward dations of white privilege.” Expir. Date black Americans with values character - Haidt and others offer a more nuanced istically associated with political con - and satisfying account. “When working- Signature servatism, such as an emphasis on class people vote conservative, as most self-reliance. Beauchamp cites work in do in the U.S., they are not voting against (NY State residents must add sales tax. For foreign orders, add $15, to cover additional shipping.) this vein by, among others, Hamilton their self-interest,” Haidt wrote in the

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Guardian in 2012; “they are voting for ment—professors, artists, designers, edi- their moral interest”—that is, they are tors, human-resources managers, law- more interested in voting for “a moral yers, librarians, social workers, teachers, vision that unifies a nation and calls it to and therapists—and a second, substan- The Return greatness” than in electing politicians tial constituency of lower-income voters who are disproportionately African who promise the protection or expansion Of National American and Hispanic. of specific programs, as has been the main pledge of Democrats in recent The Clinton campaign pinned its Sovereignty cycles. First Things editor R. R. Reno has hopes on the same coalition this year, Voters are rejecting rule by made a similar suggestion with a differ- underestimating (as did many number- transnational elite ent vocabulary in interpreting Trump’s crunchers on both sides) the extent to appeal: Our “politics of prosperity,” says which Obama’s victories relied on white BY JOHN FONTE & Reno, which prioritizes economic gain, is working-class support in the Midwest JOHN O’SULLIVAN giving way to a “politics of meaning,” a and Northeast. (One of the few people desire for cultural consensus and soli- who did seem to recognize the need to ONALD TRUMP’s election is darity. retain these voters was Bill Clinton, but above all else a rebellion of the Haidt elaborated this view in The the campaign largely ignored his intu- D voters against identity politics American Interest. Nationalists “feel a ition.) enforced by political correct- bond with their country, and they believe The Democrats’ failure should not be ness, and it opens the way to a new poli- that this bond imposes moral obligations overly surprising. It aligns with their ide- tics of moderate levels of immigration, both ways: Citizens have a duty to love ology. Increasingly under the influence patriotic assimilation, and, in foreign and serve their country, and governments of its most socially “progressive” ele- policy, the defense of U.S. sovereignty. are duty-bound to protect their own peo- ments, the Democratic party has adopted In the past few months, Trump put to - ple.” When this bond is widespread, it the mantra that—as signs at recent anti- gether a winning electoral coalition that facilitates “a shared sense of identity, Trump protests declared—“the future is stressed the unity and common interests norms, and history [that] generally pro- brown” and held it up ipso facto as a of all Americans across the full spectrum motes trust.” “Globalism,” by contrast, marker of moral progress. Actress Lena of policy, from immigration to diplo - with its eschewal of national loyalties in Dunham, a Clinton supporter, recently macy. favor of diversity, immigration, and cos- filmed a video celebrating the eventual Because of Trump’s electoral success, mopolitanism—literally, “world citizen- “extinction of white men.” The result is a this combination of policies rooted in ship”—fails to recognize the importance party largely convinced that appealing to the national interest and patriotism has of this shared sense of identity. And while the white working class is not only demo- suddenly begun to sound like common patriotism can verge into something ugly, graphically silly but morally regressive. sense. That was not so only yesterday, globalism’s dedication to embracing Democrats’ alarming racial opinions when political correctness made it hard “dif ference” often decays into the label- do not excuse Donald Trump’s. The even to examine such ideas as “multicul- ing of any skeptics as racists—on the president-elect’s campaign occasioned, turalism.” In February, David Gelernter whole, says Haidt, “a shallow term when and was entangled with, a virulent strain of stated that the “havoc” that political cor- used as an explanation.” Summarizing white racism and anti-Semitism; Trump’s rectness “has wreaked for 40 years [has the moment, Eric Kaufmann, a demogra- rhetoric about minorities ranged from been made] worse by the flat refusal of pher at the London School of Economics, careless (his approach to urban blacks) to most serious Republicans to confront it.” writes that rapid ethnic change has sepa- slanderous (Mexican “rapists”); and his Indeed, he noted, “only Trump has the rated “those who prefer cultural continu- treatment of Judge Gonzalo Curiel was common sense to mention the elephant ity and order from novelty-seekers open abominable. These are facts conservatives in the room. Naturally he is winning.” to diversity.” This thesis provides a much should not forget as they look for areas in Defeating political correctness—or, in more durable explanation for what hap- which to make common cause with positive terms, expanding real freedom pened this year than does racial animus. President Trump and to expand the elec- of speech—made it possible to raise There is also an explanation from a toral appeal of conservatism, especially other issues that worried the voters but hard-headed political perspective: Dem - among disaffected minorities. that a bland bipartisan consensus pushed ocrats are losing white working-class But Trump’s abundant flaws should to the sidelines. votes because they have given up entirely not be automatically ascribed to his vot- Once that happened, it became clear on trying to win them. ers. The same people who voted for that the room was simply packed with Writing in the New York Times in 2011, Trump also elected Tim Scott and Will elephants: multiculturalism, diversity, Thomas Edsall previewed the Obama Hurd and Mia Love. They gave Repub - bilingualism, identity politics, political campaign’s reelection strategy: licans the legislatures in Minnesota and correctness itself, and much more, Iowa. They gave a Republican the gov - All pretense of trying to win a majority Mr. Fonte is the author of Sovereignty or of the white working class has been ernorship of Vermont. Democrats who hope to recoup those losses should start Submission: Will Americans Rule effectively jettisoned in favor of cement- Themselves or Be Ruled by Others? ing a center-left coalition made up, on by trying to understand why they hap- Mr. O’Sullivan is an editor-at-large of the one hand, of voters who have gotten pened. The answer isn’t black and ahead on the basis of educational attain- white. NATIONAL REVIEW.

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extending to the wilder shores of gender American nationalism fits comfortably of life, or not? Do Americans have the politics. All of these were involved in alongside economic and traditional right to rule themselves, or will others the progressive project of “fundamental- conservatism, strengthening this ide - (e.g., foreign judges) make crucial deci- ly transforming” America. All of them ological coalition. The democratic sions for them? Conservatives need to acquired corporate and establishment nationalism within American conserva - think hard—carefully and strategical- support almost magically. But the major tism could even be seen as the glue that ly—about nationalist questions, to seize driver of this project was mass immigra- binds economic, social, and other con- the moral high ground and frame these tion without assimilation. Since the fight servatives together, just as in the old issues as vital to democratic self- over the Gang of Eight immigration bill days anti-Communism provided such a government. in 2013, patriotic and populist opposi- bond. Mainstream commentators will at- tion to amnesty and to increases in low- It will be needed in any event. In the tempt to marginalize nationalist con - skilled immigration has intensified. But coming Trump years, conflicts will cerns as backward, alarmist, and Republicans in general, and presidential accelerate on various questions involv- xeno phobic. We will be told that they candidates in particular, were late to the ing nationalism. Should immigrants be represent “unenlightened” policy posi- party. Except for Senator Jeff Sessions, “Americanized” via a process of “patri- tions and that they are of interest only to who led the fight in Congress, and otic integration,” or integrated into a “downscale” voters, not the middle class. Donald Trump, who did so in the pri- “multicultural/transnational society”? Both of these arguments are demon- maries, professional Republicans at all How should we be governed—by Amer - strably false. levels—donors, consultants, candidates, ican constitutionalism, or by interna- National conservatism, or “one and incumbents—were bullied away tional law? Should our government be America” conservatism, is idealistic from raising the issue, for fear of being rooted in American sovereignty, or in without being naïve or utopian. It thought unrespectable. Even some con- global governance? And should our reflects the good sense, decency, and servatives felt the same. policies on language and education be aspirations of the American people for And then Trump’s bold grasp of the inspired by ideas of national cohesion, self-government, national independence, immigration issue propelled him to the or by those of ethnic separatism and/or and the perpetuation of our way of life. GOP’s presidential nomination. Though transnational identity? At the core, these To believe, as most Americans do, that other issues are important here, no other are all serious “regime” questions of the U.S. Constitution is superior to inter- single one explains his rise as clearly or self-government. Do the American peo- national law, that immigrants—though as simply. So conservatives had (and ple have the right to perpetuate their way welcome—should become part of a have) to deal with it. In its relatively brief life, American conservatism has been built on three groups: economic conservatives (fiscal Meet the Beauty restraint, limited government); social 18" gold-finished conservatives (faith, family values); and in the Beast sterling silver chain national conservatives (immigration, Discover this spectacular 6½-carat green law and order, the social fabric—i.e., treasure from Mount St. Helens! national cohesion as well as national security). 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united national community rather than the GOP nominee since George H. W. join an ethnic enclave in a balkanized Bush in 1988 or Reagan in 1984; Re pub - America, and that our national identity is licans had not won Pepin and Kenosha more important than any ethnic or Trump since 1972. Trump swept Iowa by win- transnational loyalty is not to take the ning virtually every eastern county, places low road of nationalist selfishness but DemocratsRetaining them would have that had voted Democratic in every elec- the moral high ground of democratic tion since 1988. Pennsylvania’s Lu zerne self-government in a particular society. big payoffs for the GOP County last went Republican in 1988, In global politics, moreover, these prin- while Ohio’s Trumbull County had been ciples enshrine a universal ideal of BY HENRY OLSEN Democratic since 1972. democratic sovereignty within an inde- These voters do not fit neatly into any pendent liberal-democratic nation-state HE victory of Donald Trump of the GOP’s pre-Trump factions. If they that inspires people in—yes—less happy surprised virtually all political were motivated by social conservatism, lands. T observers. Many since have they would have backed George W. Bush. Conservatives should reach out to focused on Trump’s record-high If tax cuts were important to them, they new immigrant voters not from a posi- 39 percent margin among whites with - could have backed any of the GOP’s last tion of weakness with pandering “com- out a college degree. Few have focused four nominees. But Chamber of Com - prehensive immigration reform,” but on what this means: Trump—and the merce Re pub li cans can’t count on their from a position of strength, with this Republican party—owe the presidency to support either. These voters are workers, spirit of inclusive patriotism and the millions of whites who have largely voted not bosses, and they view corporate- promise of equality of opportunity. We Democratic for years. The implications of centric policies with a very jaundiced eye. should say to the newcomers: “We that for the future of the Republican party It’s common to view their concerns welcome you first and foremost as are immense. through a purely economic lens and call Americans. They—progressives, liber- Trump’s appeal to white non-college- them protectionist. That is largely true as als, Democrats—want to put you in a educated Democrats and independents is far as it goes: These people have been buf- box as part of a victim group. While we clear with even a cursory glance at the feted by globalization more than most welcome you as equal citizens, they election map. Take closely balanced Americans and see restrictions on trade patronize you as childlike clients.” This Mich i gan, which Trump leads as of this and immigration as ways to boost the emphasis on the unum, not the pluribus, should prove more attractive to an electorate than the designedly fractious Trump—and the Republican party— minority–majority coalition on the Dem- ocratic side. After all, most people in owe the presidency to millions America want to be Americans, not ambassadors from their family’s past. of whites who have largely Further, national conservatism is voted Democratic for years. embraced by Americans of all classes. According to a Harris survey of over writing by 12,000 votes. He carried the number of good-paying jobs open to 2,200 eligible voters, U.S. citizens pre- state by winning all but eight counties, American workers. But that’s far from all fer national self-government to “shared including historically Democratic places that they want, nor does a purely econom- sovereignty” or “global rules.” Nor are such as Saginaw, Bay, and Gogebic coun- ic lens capture the way they view their these views found only among brick- ties. A Re pub li can has not carried the votes. layers and short-order cooks. Harris first two since Ronald Reagan in 1984. They are best viewed through the lens finds that they are held especially firmly Gogebic, a 92 percent white county on of active citizenship. They take national by the college-educated. There is no evi- Michigan’s Upper Peninsula, hasn’t voted identity seriously and imbue American - dence that the forces of “global gover- for the GOP since 1972. ism with an implicit bargain that flies in nance” are any stronger (or represent a The pattern is identical in other mid - the face of liberal or libertarian cos- better-educated, more forward-looking, western states that Trump won narrowly. mopolitanism. They believe that being more “enlightened” social base) than the He carried Wisconsin largely because he American means more than voting and supporters of democratic sovereignty. If won ten white, historically Democratic paying taxes. To them it means that if you anything, the reverse. counties in the southwestern part of the work hard and play by the rules, the peo- Besides, this new patriotic fusionism state that even Gore and Kerry won in ple who run the country owe it to you that has now proved itself at the ballot box their races against George W. Bush. Most you will live with dignity and respect. as Trump outperformed Mitt Romney, of these counties had not been carried by It became painfully obvious to these John McCain, George W. Bush, Bob voters over the last eight years that nation- Dole, and George H. W. Bush in the Mr. Olsen is a senior fellow at the Ethics and Public al Democrats no longer treat them with working-class and rural precincts of Policy Center and a visiting fellow at the Matthew respect or believe they are capable of liv- Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Michigan, Ryan Center at Villanova University. He is the ing dignified lives. They have seen their Iowa, and Ohio. Why give up on a author of the forthcoming book Ronald Reagan: way of life under assault, whether in the winning game? New Deal Republican. form of attacks on gun ownership, the

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focus on climate change over growth, or challenging, however, to extend that treat- servative coalition can’t be done.” But in implicit claims that they are bigots. For ment to economic policies. fact it can be done, as Wisconsin governor people who voted twice for President These voters view questions of public Scott Walker showed. Walker cut taxes Obama, these last insinuations might have taxation and spending differently than do and reduced the rate of spending growth been the most offensive and damaging other factions in the party. Where move- while taking on public-employee labor of all. ment conservatives see many social pro- unions. He also expanded government- Just because progressive Democrats grams and the high taxes that fund them funded health-insurance coverage by tak- seemed determined to drive these voters as threats to liberty, these voters see them ing advantage of his state’s very generous away did not mean, however, that they as giving decent, hard-working people a Medicaid program to cover more poor found conventional Republicans any bet- hand up to live decent, dignified lives. people publicly and push working-class ter. These voters have shunned Repub - Where business conservatives see free people into Obama care’s exchanges. All licans because they disagree with the trade or immigration as helping people factions in his coalition got something party’s focus on low taxes, small govern- and increasing growth, these voters see they valued. ment, and pro-business policies. They those policies as favoring foreigners over Walker rode this balanced approach to benefit enormously from middle-class themselves and as just another way that two important political victories, winning entitlement programs; their children get their bosses try to pay them less without a recall battle and then reelection despite what they consider to be good educations justification. being targeted by national progressive from public schools and state universities. Social conservatives often think that groups. He won virtually all of the histor- They have no problem with redistribution their policies are the way to reach out to ically Democratic white counties that so long as it is focused on either people these voters and bring them into the GOP Trump won in his three elections, often who can’t work or people who do. coalition, but that’s a mistake. These vot- running only a couple of percentage This attitude comes out clearly when ers are not motivated by social issues; points behind Walker. Trump Democrats we look at entitlement reform. Polls show they are, as the conservative Canadian could also be called Walker Democrats. that these voters do not want to cut Social political analyst Patrick Mut tart says, Walker’s subsequent political missteps Security or Medicare at all. Pew Research “morally moderate.” They will go along also show how one can lose these voters’ surveys also show that voters like these with candidates of the Left or the Right support by becoming too conventional a believe the government should spend who hold their party’s consensus views on Republican. Walker veered to the right as more to help the poor even if it adds to the abortion, gender identity, or marriage so he prepared his presidential campaign, debt. These are not mainstream views long as they do not make those views their catering to tea-party and Christian- among most Republicans, to say the least. priority. Donald Trump’s lack of a firm conservative groups in nationally covered It will be easy for Republicans to treat grounding in traditional Republican so - speeches in Iowa. He also tried to reduce these voters with respect in non-economic cial policy was, for these voters, a plus, funding for the Uni ver si ty of Wisconsin policies. Most Republicans share these as it signaled to them that advancing system. His approval ratings dropped voters’ reverence for traditional American the Evangelical Christian social agenda sharply and remain mired around 42 per- values and reject the extreme coastal cos- would not be high on his agenda. cent. mopolitanism that increasingly defines I’m sure many people reading this are Accommodating these new voters’ the national Dem o crat ic party. It will be thinking, “Adding these voters to the con- concerns will be an ongoing challenge, but the political payoffs are immense. Bringing them into the Republican fold while veering like Walker toward more traditional GOP priorities will make the Midwest a new red firewall. Moreover, showing Americans more broadly that Republicans are willing to use govern- ment on occasion to break down barriers to people’s advancement will send a broader message to other voters, especial- ly Latinos. Latinos have historically liked strong government that rewards work and provides opportunity as they move up the economic ladder. Seeing that the GOP shares these values will inevitably broad- en the Republican co ali tion into some- thing that more closely resembles the demography of the new America. And that will allow conservatives to finally redeem the legacy Ron ald Reagan be - queathed to us, to make conservatism once more America’s true political ROMAN GENN religion.

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for a second we shouldn’t pursue minor- really didn’t take a rocket scientist to ity voters or pay attention to their inter- figure it out—just someone who hadn’t The Red Wall ests. We can do far better with minority already decided upon the answer (“Win Donald Trump retook voters by going into communities, solv- Hispanics with am nes ty,” as pushed by ing problems, having a positive econom- the GOP’s 2012 autopsy) before doing the upper Midwest ic agenda, a focus on families, and a the analysis. hopeful message. But the numbers don’t In 2016 the path to victory for the GOP BY JEREMY CARL lie—if we engage in any amount of eth- nic pandering, and in doing so alienate or ran through the Midwest, and this may discourage even a small number of our remain true for some time. In combina- VER Labor Day weekend in base white voters, we will lose the elec- tion with its solid southern base, a GOP 2015, four months before tion, period. that targets much of its energy toward O the first primary votes were The voters who stayed home and mid west ern concerns could be a jugger- cast in Iowa, a somewhat didn’t vote for Romney, particularly in naut. ob scure policy analyst and strategist the upper Midwest, are just the sort we While Trump surprised the pundits wrote a confidential memo to a presi- need to reach. The Reagan/Bush sce- with his overperformance among minor - dential campaign he was informally nario outlined above flips Ohio, Penn - ities (he did better among African Amer - syl va nia, Wisconsin, and Iowa, along advising. He outlined what he believed icans, Hispanics, and Asians than Mitt with Virginia and New Hampshire, to was the path to victory for the GOP in give us a victory. Romney did), there obviously remains the 2016 presi dential election, based on plenty of room for the party to grow there. election simulations he had run using Nothing came of the memo, which was And though Trump had the best perfor- a couple of publicly available models. received politely but not acted on. That mance among white voters of any GOP He attacked the GOP’s official Election candidate did not become the GOP nom- candidate in recent history (his 21-point 2012 post-mortem as being politically inee, or even come close to doing so. But margin narrowly eclipsed Romney’s 20 motivated and divorced from actual vot- while Donald Trump may or may not percent in 2012), he also left a lot of the ing data. A portion of the memo, edited lightly for style and length, is repro- duced below.

The most important voters to win in the entire country are white voters in the Midwest and upper Midwest. According to the modeling done here, if [Candidate X] could win white voters at Reagan 1984 percentages (66 percent) and at Bush 2004 turnout levels (67 per- cent) and we assume African-American turnout was to return to historical levels and percentages for the Democrats, we could win the presidency without win- ning a single Hispanic, Asian, Native American, or Arab vote. Think about Tallying electoral wins at Hillary Clinton’s Election Night event in New York City that, because that is a staggering state- ment, and it’s a true one. have gotten a similar memo, his cam- white vote on the table in the Midwest and The converse is equally staggering: paign certainly acted according to the elsewhere, falling far short of Reagan’s We could win 53 percent of the non- black minority vote (Hispanics, Asians, principles expressed in this one. He 1984 total of 66 percent. Native Americans, etc.), and if white and took all the states listed above except While compared with Romney he black turnout and voting percentages New Hampshire, where he lost by a racked up enormous margins among stayed the same as they were in 2012, the hairbreadth, and Virginia, and added white voters without a college degree, Democrats would win the presidency. Michigan, where he won by a similar winning that demographic by 39 percent- These stats indicate the foolishness of margin, taking advantage of the same age points (an improvement of 14 per- the approach of pandering to chase after demographic forces. Had the author centage points over 2012), he gave most minority votes if that means ignoring the assigned even a trivially small (10 per- of it back by losing 10 percentage points interests of the GOP’s white voter base. cent) Hispanic vote share for the GOP, among white college graduates. To some Of course the Democrats and the media which he refrained from doing only degree, such a split is understandable— are always concern trolls about this sub- ject—they want us to lose. What is dis- to support his broader point about the Trump’s over-the-top rhe tor ic that is so maying is how many in the party have importance of white turnout, it would appealing to rural truck drivers is less absorbed the media/Dem concern- have forecast Trump’s Florida win as appealing to suburban soccer moms— GETTY trolling. Of course, that doesn’t mean well. but there are certainly many ways that / Now for a confession: That somewhat a candidate without Trump’s histrionic Mr. Carl is a research fellow at the Hoover obscure strategist was this author. And style but with a laser-like focus on issues Institution, Stanford University. while what is written looks prescient, it that are relevant to middle-class GOP DREW ANGERER

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voters could hold most of his non-college each end and Kentucky in between.” It’s a white vote while adding white college pithy summary, but it’s much too simplis- graduates who have traditionally been in tic and does not reflect the state’s political the GOP fold. A net improvement of 3 The View diversity. Three counties in particular percentage points among white midwest- epitomize the Trump–Toomey diver- erners, combined with even modestly From gence and point to the future of the GOP improved performance among minori- nationally. ties, would make the GOP’s position in Pennsylvania York County is in the Republican heart- the Midwest dominant rather than tenta- Trump and Toomey reached victory in land of the state. While Penn sylvania has tive in future presidential elections. different but compatible ways the nation’s seventh-highest unemploy- But the geography of Trump’s win ment rate, York County’s rate is more than wasn’t confined to the Midwest. And nei- BY JON LERNER a full point lower than the state’s. With ther are its implications, which extend about 440,000 residents, York’s popula- beyond the presidency to the Senate. WO of the most consequential tion grew by 14 percent between 2000 Despite Trump’s losing the popular vote elections of 2016 took place and 2010, and has continued to grow to Clinton, things weren’t that close on a T among the same voters in the since; it is one of the fastest-growing state-by-state level. Trump won 30 states same state. Pennsylvania effec- metropolitan areas in the North east. The and Hillary Clinton just 20 plus D.C. tively put Donald Trump over the top of county is home to recognizable food Clinton broke 60 percent in just four the 270 electoral-college votes needed to brands such as Utz potato chips and states plus D.C.; Trump did it in ten win the presidency, and Pat Toomey’s Snyder’s of Hanover pretzels. This is not states, including seven in which he per- reelection helped secure a Republican a place of heavy industry, nor is it a capital formed better than Clinton did in her best majority in the U.S. Senate for at least of the upscale service sector. York County state, California. In two additional states, another two years. works well in the modern economy. heavily Mormon Idaho and Utah, Trump Both of these results were remarkable. Registered Republicans outnumber would have easily cleared 60 percent but Trump succeeded in a state where Bob registered Democrats by 15 points in the for the presence of conservative protest Dole, George W. Bush (twice), John county, and York votes as one of the most candidate Evan McMullin. McCain, and Mitt Romney all failed. reliably Republican parts of the state. It is, Overall, Trump was dominant (19 or Toomey won a second term, despite hav- if you will, the Kansas or Nebraska of more points ahead) in 18 states represent- ing more money spent against him than Pennsylvania. Donald Trump carried the ing 119 electoral votes and 36 Senate any Senate candidate in U.S. history. county by 29 points. Pat Toomey won it seats—the potential basis for a new “red Trump won the state by 1.2 percentage by 28 points. No meaningful difference. wall.” Compare this with the twelve points, or about 68,000 votes; Toomey As reflected by York County, the main- states, representing just 69 electoral votes won by 1.7 percentage points, or about stream of Republican voters came to and 24 Senate seats, in which Romney 100,000 votes. Given the closeness of accept, more or less equally, the conflict- won by equally large margins. these outcomes, it’s tempting to conclude ing styles and substances of Trump and Meanwhile, Clinton won by 19 or that there was little difference between the Toomey. York is especially notable for more points in just six states, represent- two races and that just enough voters went how different it was from two other ing twelve Senate seats and 115 electoral generically Republican for both candi- counties that represent the divergent paths votes. At a senatorial level, this is a dates to prevail. That conclusion would be facing the GOP. tremendous structural advantage for the wrong. Trump and Toomey took distinct- Chester County holds a portion of the GOP. It will be seen in the 2018 Senate ly different paths to victory and never famous “Philadelphia suburbs” that many races. The Democrats will have ten sena- appeared together in the state. The differ- analysts claimed were the key to this tors up for reelection in states carried by ences between their paths present signifi- year’s national elections. With about half Donald Trump, several overwhelmingly, cant implications for the future of the a million people, encompassing parts of whereas the Republicans have only one Republican party in an increasingly polar- the elite “Main Line,” Chester has the seat up in a state the Democrats carried, ized nation. highest average income of any county in Dean Heller in Ne va da—and they carried Toomey and Trump are two of the most the state and the 24th-highest income of it only narrowly. A Trump-like political dissimilar individuals you could find in all counties in America. Its population and policy strategy in 2018 would find the same political party. Toomey is a free- grew by 15 percent from 2000 to 2010 the GOP almost certain to expand its market, fiscal-conservative true believer. and has grown another 3.4 percent Senate majority, probably substantially. In temperament, he is thoughtful, wonk- since—it is a healthy, wealthy, and Looking ahead to future presidential ish, polite, and civil. Trump is, well, bustling place. elections, the Trump strategy points to a Trump. Their differences in policy views Politically, Chester has become swing red wall that could be bigger and more and personality led to their different paths territory. It is ancestrally Republican, and beautiful than the Democrats’ blue one, to success. Republicans still hold a five-point regis- which kept the previous two GOP candi- Pennsylvania is sometimes mischarac- tration advantage, but like the rest of the dates out of the White House. In the wake terized as “Philadelphia and Pittsburgh on Philadelphia suburbs, Chester has trended of the 2016 election, it should be obvious Democratic in recent years and has that the GOP needs to keep building that Mr. Lerner served as lead strategist for the Pat Toomey recoiled sharply from some Republicans. big, beautiful red wall. U.S. Senate campaign. In the 2006 Senate race, Democrat Bob

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Casey beat Republican Rick Santorum by managed to carry the county by one point Colorado or Virginia. Toomey won ten points in this county, and in 2008, in 2008, but that wall had clearly broken Pennsylvania by carrying Chester, while Barack Obama beat John McCain by down by 2012, when Romney won it by underperforming Trump in Cambria. nine points. 18 points. These counties fit a pattern. Toomey out- This year in Chester, Toomey per- This year, the GOP advance continued, polled Trump by seven to ten points in the formed twelve points better than Trump, but not evenly. Toomey won Cambria by other three suburban counties outside winning the county by three points as 24 points, beating Romney’s margin by Philadelphia and by 29,000 votes in the Trump lost it by nine. That gap fairly well six points and besting his own 2010 mar- city of Philadelphia, while Trump sig - represents the total statewide vote margin gin by two points. But Trump’s perfor- nificantly outpolled Toomey in a dozen between Toomey and Trump. Ticket- mance was something else; he won the smaller, rural counties. splitting was a widespread phenomenon county by an incredible 38 points, 67 per- Which is the better path to political suc- in Pennsylvania this year. cent to Clinton’s 29. At the presidential cess? Population trends favor Chester, About 200 miles west of Chester level, and in just eight years, Cambria and it’s questionable whether any Re - County lies Cambria County. It might as County went from Obama +1 to Romney publican other than Trump could have well be on a different planet. Nestled +18 to Trump +38. And on Election Day, achieved his stratospheric heights in within rural, west-central Pennsylvania, Trump’s margin exceeded Toomey’s by Cambria. But perhaps this is a false Cambria County’s population center is 14 points—just about the same as choice. After all, Trump and Toomey are Republicans who won Pennsylvania by nearly the same margin, even though their paths were distinct. Thinking about it dif- ferently, what would happen if, rather than choosing between the two paths, you merged them? If you gave Toomey’s sub- urban margins to Trump, and Trump’s rural margins to Toomey, neither race would have been particularly close. This implies things about both policy and style. Toomey’s serious temperament contributed to his win in Chester. For example, he aired a TV ad that quoted the state’s former Democratic governor Ed Rendell calling him “a man of uncommon decency.” Not many people would say the same of Trump. Toomey also emphasized his support for expanded background checks for gun purchases. These ads aired in Chester County, but not in Cambria County. Conversely, Trump’s vigorous Donald Trump addresses supporters in Hershey, Pa., November 4, 2016. attacks on long-established free-trade agreements, and his wish to leave entitle- the small city of Johnstown. The total Toomey’s twelve-point margin over ments untouched, played well in Cambria county population is about 140,000 and Trump in Chester County, on the other but less so in Chester. shrinking fast. It lost 6 percent of its peo- side of the political moon. These differences are worth noting. At ple from 2000 to 2010, and in the last five What does all of this mean? the same time, Toomey is no gun-grabber, years it has led Pennsylvania in popula- If York County is predictably Re - and Trump is unlikely to be a tax hiker tion loss. Johnstown is a suffering former publican, like Kansas, neither Chester nor or an Obamacare defender. Relatively steel-manufacturing city doing its best to Cambria can be so easily typecast. They modest flexibility regarding Second diversify its economy while getting ham- are both swing territories, but of vastly Amendment and free-market orthodoxies mered by EPA regulations. different natures. Upscale Chester is sim- can make a major difference in the swing Politically and economically, Cambria ilar to the politically decisive regions of parts of America that determine who is the inverse of Chester. It is ancestrally Colorado and Virginia, two heavily con- becomes president and which party con- Democratic and has a 15-point Dem - tested states that ended up in the Clinton trols Congress. ocratic registration advantage. Old Bull column, while downscale Cambria is sim- This election showed that it’s possible Democrat John Murtha, who was known ilar to the politically decisive regions of for Republicans to narrowly win tough for his mastery of the pork barrel, repre- Ohio and Michigan, states that proved states like Pennsylvania with either the

GETTY sented the area in Congress for 36 years, critical to Trump’s success.

/ Toomey approach or the Trump approach. until his death in 2010. Despite the Trump and Toomey showed that either If the party can determine how to com- Democrats’ large registration advantage, path can be successful, at least in 2016. bine the two methods, then Pennsylvania Cambria has moved steadily in the Re - Trump won Pennsylvania without Chest - and several other states could become CHIP SOMODEVILLA publican direction in recent years. Obama er, just as he won nationally without reliably red.

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racist and, in his speech at the Republican destroyed more jobs at American compa- convention, dwelt on the Declaration of nies that use steel than the steel industry Independence and its affirmation of the itself provides. Trumpism equal worth of all human beings. Ryanism resembles Bushism in pro - Ryan sees the promotion of democracy posing that a mix of tax cuts, deregula- And Ryanism and human rights abroad as important tion, freer trade, entitlement reform, and Toward a synthesis better than either objectives for U.S. policy. Trump does high immigration will raise economic not appear to agree. Ryan says NATO is growth and lift all boats. That promise, BY RAMESH PONNURU an “indispensable ally”; Trump has said though, is increasingly hard to believe. the alliance should dissolve if other coun- The Bush administration advanced a sim- ONALD TRUMP’s first appoint- tries refuse to pull more weight. Paul ilar agenda (the steel tariffs were imposed ments as president-elect were Ryan calls Vladimir Putin “an aggressor to make bigger trade-liberalizing deals D a mixed bag for Speaker of that does not share our interests.” Trump politically possible). It achieved much of the House Paul Ryan. Reince takes a different view. that agenda, but the economic results, Priebus, a longtime Ryan ally from Conservative journalists, policy wonks, particularly for people in the middle of Wisconsin who headed the Republican and legislative aides in Washington, the income spectrum and below, were National Committee, will be Trump’s D.C., will mostly, maybe even over- unimpressive. White House chief of staff. Steve whelmingly, be rooting for Ryan over Even if the promise is true, however, Bannon, a financial executive and pub- Trump on these policy issues. So will a the agenda has a fatal political weakness: lisher who has vowed to destroy Ryan, lot of Republican voters across the coun- It gives a lot of working-class voters will be a top White House counselor try. The polls—which, by the way and something to fear without giving them to Trump. contrary to a widespread myth, were fair- any concrete and immediate benefits. Trump and Ryan will be, respectively, ly accurate about both the primaries (they And it lends itself to a rhetoric of hope the most powerful and second-most showed Trump winning the most votes) that is a poor fit for this moment and, powerful elected officials in the United and the November election (they showed maybe, this era. The idea of democracy States, and their relationship will do a lot Clinton with a narrow vote lead)—indi- promotion abroad has similar draw- to determine the future of the Trump cate that a lot of them think that illegal backs. administration, the Republican party, and immigrants should have a chance at citi- Optimism about immigration seems the country. zenship. Polling of Republicans on trade to be going over particularly poorly. For As is well known, the two of them do this year has been more volatile, but even one thing, it is especially hard to make not see eye to eye on several issues. Ryan the survey with the least pro-trade results the case that a substantial increase in made his name advocating reforms of found that a third of Republicans think low-skilled immigration—something for Social Security and Medicare that would well of most trade agreements. which, lest we forget, a large bipartisan rein in their growth. Trump says he wants The struggle between Ryanism and majority in the Senate voted in 2013— to protect those programs from any cuts. Trumpism, to the extent the latter exists, will boost the fortunes of people in hard Ryan is a free trader. Trump says he has the potential to polarize Republicans. economic conditions. Immigration boos- favors free trade, but favors tearing up But neither presents a truly adequate and terism on the left and right also tends existing free-trade agreements and im - compelling vision for the Republican either to ignore or to disdain the cultural posing tariffs to keep companies from party or the country, and a fruitful synthe- concerns immigration raises: the sense moving jobs abroad: which is to say that sis ought to be possible. that too much immigration can threaten a he does not actually support free trade. Trumpism is weakest when it turns way of life. Ryan favors higher levels of legal immi- to specific policy recommendations, Trumpism both corrects and exploits gration and wants to give illegal immi- which it rarely does. Trump’s temporary some of Ryanism’s blind spots. Trump grants “a chance to get right with the Muslim ban, for example, was originally won big among white voters without col- law.” Trump has sometimes talked about supposed to be conducted on the honor lege degrees. In part that must be because reducing immigration, says he wants to system. It was less a considered anti- Trump’s agenda offered these voters step up the pace of deportations, and terrorist measure, that is, than a way of more, and threatened them less, than never explicitly said during the presiden- communicating his willingness to do Ryan’s. Rather than supplementing enti- tial campaign that any illegal immigrants whatever it takes to protect Americans. tlement reform with free-market policies should be eligible for legal status. And if Trump really means to reject that would be more attractive to these Trump called for a temporary ban on Ryan-style entitlement reform, he cannot, voters, Trump ditched entitlement reform Muslims’ entering the country, which as a matter of math, make good on his and offered them protectionism. And may or may not have been superseded by promises to control the federal debt and having made that trade, Trump built up later calls for a temporary ban on entries cut middle-class taxes. enough political support that he may now by people from nations where anti- Or take trade. It is certainly true that be able to deliver on some of the policies American terrorism has originated. Ryan competition from imports has hurt some on which Ryan and he agree, such as criticized a ban based on religion. Trump workers, companies, and communities. large tax cuts for the highest earners in said that a Mexican-American judge was But raising tariffs would inflict damage the land. biased against him because of his immi- all its own. According to one estimate, The distance between Ryan’s and gration views. Ryan called this comment President George W. Bush’s steel tariffs Trump’s views could well shrink. Both

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have been capable of changing their philosophy, populists can tend toward minds. Trump has famously switched his inconsistent or unserious pro posals. position on many issues. He began the The rough terms of a successful part- campaign suggesting that he would Principled nership seem obvious. Populism identi- deport all illegal immigrants. In August, fies the problems; conservatism develops he gave a speech saying that he would Populism the solutions; and President Trump over- increase enforcement of the immigration Now is a good moment to resist sees the process with a veto pen that laws and suggesting (without explicitly the centralization of power keeps everyone honest. Call it “princi- saying) that he might give legal status to pled populism”: an authentic conser- many remaining illegal immigrants after BY MIKE LEE vatism focused on solving the problems that work had been accomplished—a that face working Americans in a fractur- more realistic position. T is much more important to kill ing society and globalizing economy. Ryan earlier this year said that he is bad bills than to pass good ones,” Consider how this approach might “not a neocon” on foreign policy, having ‘I Calvin Coolidge once said. With help Republicans tackle Trump’s two sig- reached a “limited view” of the potential a unified federal government nature issues, immigration and trade. of American intervention overseas after soon to be in Republican hands, however, Since his first speech as a candidate, seeing the results of the wars in Iraq and maybe we can do a bit of both. Trump has attacked our broken immigra- Afghanistan. Over the last few years, he But how? While congressional Re - tion system and the ways in which it ben- has had a heightened appreciation of the publicans tend to identify as conserva- efits elites at the expense of less affluent extent to which voters considered the tives, President-elect Donald Trump is Americans. Traditionally, Washington Republican program to be of exclusive a populist. Many observers, including Republicans have favored “comprehen- benefit to the affluent. His House agenda, some Republicans, see this as an un- sive immigration reform” that trades “A Better Way,” is an attempt to put for- squareable circle. border enforcement for amnesty. It’s ward conservative policy ideas that might I disagree. For all the challenges a exactly this kind of corrupt elitism— have wider appeal. And he has tried to President Trump may present conserva- treating the rule of law as a bargaining co-opt Trump on trade, arguing that a tax tives during his term, his populism need chip—that Trump entered the presiden- reform that changes the treatment of im- not be one of them. Far from contradicto- tial race to combat. Nonetheless, some of ports would accomplish some of Trump’s ry, conservatism and populism comple- Trump’s ideas about a solution can fairly goals without tariffs. ment each other in ways that can change be said to suffer from populism’s tradi- Trump and Ryan have incentives to get history—as did the most successful pop- tional faults. along. Ryan wants Trump to sign his leg- ulist in recent decades, Ronald Reagan. Imagining principled-populist immi- islation and does not want Trump stirring The chief political weakness of con - gration reforms that would help lower- up opposition to him. Trump would not servatism is its difficulty identifying income Americans isn’t too hard. Border benefit from the chaos in the House that problems that are appropriate for political security—including a wall, fence, or would follow Ryan’s ouster. But Trump correction. Conservatism’s view of hu - some other barrier—is an obvious first has the whip hand in the Trump–Ryan man nature and history teaches us that step. Finally creating a strict entry-exit relationship. Trump won roughly 60 mil- problems are inevitable in this world and system and a workplace-enforcement lion votes nationwide; his media mega- that attempts to use government to solve regime would discourage illegal entry phone is bigger; his command of the top them often only make things worse. and penalize visa overstayers. In short levels of the executive branch will be This insight actually makes us good at order, fewer foreigners would illegally firmer than Ryan’s of House Repub li- finding solutions. At our best, conserva- enter the United States, and more who cans; and the Congress has grown in - tives craft policy reforms that empower already have done so would leave—all sti tutionally weaker over time as the bottom-up, trial-and-error problem- without the violation of anyone’s rights. pres i dency has grown stronger. solving and the institutions that facilitate Then there is the matter of trade poli- On a lot of the issues where the two it, such as markets and civil society. At cies. Trump says America is losing in the disagree, Trump doesn’t need legislative our worst, though, we can seem indif - global economy and blames international cooperation. The president has the consti- ferent to suffering and injustice because trade agreements for failing to deliver, tutional authority to ban Muslim entrants we overlook problems that require our especially to the working class, on their to this country. He can withdraw from action or resign ourselves to their insolv- promised benefits. This contradicts con- the Trans-Pacific Partnership, a pending ability. servatives’ traditional support for free trade agreement among eleven countries, Populists, on the other hand, have an trade. But Trump does have a point. without a vote of Congress. He can uncanny knack for identifying social prob- Whatever its aggregate benefits to the devalue our NATO commitments just lems. It’s when pressed for solutions that economy, free trade has imposed costs by talking. He already has. populists tend to reveal their characteristic on millions of Americans. On the other What conservatives should hope for, weakness. Unable to draw on a coherent hand, Trump’s promise to “bring back the though, is not the total victory of one of jobs” now done in factories abroad is these worldviews over the other. If we Mr. Lee, the author of Our Lost Constitution: dubious. Automation has so changed lived in the best of all possible worlds, The Willful Subversion of America’s American manufacturing that most of they would be synthesized into some- Founding Documents, represents Utah as a the jobs we’ve lost to outsourcing may thing better than either. Republican in the United States Senate. not even exist anymore. Indeed, total

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American industrial output continues to As principled populists, Republicans grow, even as industrial employment would not only apply conservative in - stagnates. sights to solve discrete problems but also Republicans should be able to recog- anchor conservatism to the Constitution Trump the nize that while globalization and free and radically decentralize Washington’s trade have created enormous opportunity policymaking power. The new Congress Triangulator? and wealth for the country, those benefits should seize back its Article I legislative He might try to expand his have flowed disproportionately to the authority, ideally with President Trump’s support with a centrist wealthy. So principled populism would, help. Only by putting Congress back in health-insurance proposal rather than withdraw from the global charge of federal lawmaking can Trump economy, seek to channel its benefits make good on his promise to put the BY REIHAN SALAM to workers—to harness the irresistible American people back in charge of forces of globalization to the interests Washington. ONALD TRUMP finds himself of Trump’s “forgotten Americans.” And as quickly as Congress recovers in an enviable position. More Dramatically cutting—even eliminat- its policy portfolio, we should transfer as D than any other president-elect ing—the corporate-income tax while much of it as possible to the states. The in recent memory, he is his raising investment-tax rates to recoup the election map once again showed how own man who owes almost nothing to lost revenue would help accomplish this divided our nation is. To those who large donors and other partisan power goal. First, it would boost wages, since would centralize power, this diversity is brokers. And this has given him room to employers currently pass on some of the an obstacle. But constitutional populists maneuver. Over the coming months, tax burden to their employees. And sec- can make diversity a real strength by lib- President-elect Trump will have to ad- ond, it would flood our economy with erating blue and red states alike from the dress a number of pressing policy ques- new foreign investment and help create arbitrary rule of an imperial president. tions, of which the ongoing Obamacare American jobs. Let states, cities, and towns govern them- crisis is by far the most important. How But a successful populism cannot just selves, according to their own values. Let he resolves that crisis will tell us much give Americans more money; it should every community engage in the global about how he intends to govern. also give them more political power. Lots economy on its own terms, prioritizing I have a working hypothesis, which is of it. Happily, the Founding Fathers long growth, economic security, environmen- that as president, Trump will successfully ago mastered the art of this particular tal protection, social solidarity, or what- divide Democrats and expand his narrow deal. The United States Constitution is ever else inspires its civic spirit. In this political coalition. Yet he will do so by not purely democratic, but it is profound- way, the people will be empowered to alienating more ideologically minded ly populist. Indeed, it’s the most success- protect their own interests from hubristic Republicans, not least on Obamacare. ful populist platform ever written, as last elites even after this Trumpian era ends. Conservatives hoping that the Trump Election Day proved once again. None of this is to predict that President White House will work hand-in-glove All human history teaches us that peo- Trump will govern as an ideologue. with congressional Republicans to pass ple cannot be trusted with unaccountable Trump ran and won as a populist and various items on the conservative wish power; therefore, freedom and security should govern as one. But what this idea list, from trimming the future growth of are best protected by dispersing power. of a principled populism can do is pro- Social Security and Medicare benefits Federalism and the separation of powers vide all Republicans a unifying theory of and block-granting Medicaid funds to may sound like legalistic abstractions, reform to guide both conservatism and the states to slashing the top marginal but in truth they are as important, con- Trumpism, and help the new president tax rate and taxes on capital gains, are crete, and guaranteed under our Con - fulfill his mandate. bound to be disappointed. Throughout stitution as the right to vote or of due In the past, when populist rebellions his campaign, President-elect Trump process. have failed, it has usually been when their conspicuously avoided sounding familiar Elites hate the transparency, account- leaders, lacking a governing philosophy, conservative themes, such as a commit- ability, and inclusiveness that the have descended into authoritarianism. ment to freedom and liberty. Instead, he Constitution requires of federal policy- Reagan succeeded because he elevated championed “the silent majority” and “the making. That’s why they have spent his populism by channeling it through forgotten American,” drawing on lan- decades circumventing its guardrails. It is conservative and constitutional princi- guage used decades ago by Richard Nixon not a coincidence that our era of inequal- ples, just as President-elect Trump now and Franklin Roosevelt to describe patri- ity and distrust has been marked by fren- has the opportunity to do. otic working- and middle-class Ameri - zied centralization of political power. History warns us that, for ordinary cans. Centrist populism has taken the Power has been pulled up and away from people, there is no such thing as “our” president-elect very far, and it’s not clear the people and states and toward the fed- strongman. A republic of constitutionally why he’d stop now. (See Luke Thompson, eral government. Within Washington, it empowered citizens—free, respected, “Trump as Centrist,” October 10.) has been transferred from the people’s and sovereign—would never want one in The contrast with Trump’s immediate elected representatives in Congress to the the first place. Leaving our children just predecessor couldn’t be more pro- two other branches, especially the un - such a republic is how principled pop- nounced. A self-styled outsider who accountable and ever-growing adminis- ulism can help our new president truly came into office with high hopes and trative state. make America great again. Democratic majorities in both houses of

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Congress, Barack Obama was as ideo- late. It has become painfully obvious that regulations and its premium subsidies logically disciplined as Trump is ideo - the Obamacare exchanges are a sham- would apply only to plans sold on the logically improvisational. Rather than bles, in large part because Obamacare exchanges. If you chose to buy private extend olive branches to his partisan insurance policies have proven so unat- insurance on an exchange, your plan rivals, President Obama translated his tractive to healthy people, despite heavy would be regulated by your state govern- party’s congressional victories into the subsidies. Repealing Obamacare outright ment, and you wouldn’t be eligible for most ambitious and most partisan legisla- will be difficult if not impossible as long any financial assistance. Premiums for tive agenda in modern memory. From the as the Senate retains the filibuster. But off-exchange plans would tend to be much stimulus to Obamacare to Dodd-Frank, vulnerable Senate Democrats up for lower than for Obamacare-compliant the first years of the Obama administra- reelection in 2018 are keenly aware that plans, and they’d be better suited to the tion saw a frenzy of activity, despite the rising premiums pose a threat to their needs of the healthy middle-class people objections of Democrats representing prospects, and many will be open to a who are finding the exchanges too ex - swing districts, many of whom were face-saving deal. pensive. swept away by Republicans in the con- Enter Trump the negotiator. In an inter- Such an Obamacare compromise gressional elections of 2010, 2012, and view with Monica Langley and Gerard would be far from perfect, and it would 2014. Without President Obama’s ideo- Baker of the Wall Street Journal, the no doubt leave many on the right and the logical overreach, a Trump presidency president-elect explained that despite left dissatisfied. Nevertheless, it would could never have come to pass. having campaigned on repealing Obama- give healthy people seeking affordable Unlike Bill Clinton, a political sur- care outright, he wanted to retain the insurance an exit option while preserving vivor who was more than happy to jetti- a safety net for the poor and the sick. son his partisan allies and broker deals How shocking would it be if Donald with congressional Republicans when Trump, one of the most divisive political doing so suited his purposes, a strategy figures in modern American history, bro- insiders dubbed “triangulation,” Pres- kered a bipartisan Obamacare deal? ident Obama took a different course. With the hated mandates out of the way He was a devoted progressive partisan and low-cost individual insurance plans who wanted to extend the frontiers of the once again allowed to exist, Republicans welfare state, even if it meant risking could declare victory. Centrist Senate political defeat. One suspects that Democrats could share in the credit, President-elect Trump will have no such having saved the exchanges as a bare- scruples. His first priority will be to bones safety net. secure big, visible legislative accom- If Trump were to take such a centrist plishments that will serve the interests course as president, he’d meet with resis- of his Main Street constituents, even if tance from some on the Republican right, that means forcing more-ideological who’d resent his refusal to dismantle Republicans to give ground. One also Obamacare root-and-branch. But if there suspects that the president-elect will, like The president-elect and the president meet in is one thing we’ve learned about the Clinton, be more than willing to triangu- the Oval Office, November 10, 2016. president-elect, it’s that he does not fear late when necessary. confrontation. Taking a page from Rich - If this strikes you as unlikely, consider health law’s prohibition of denying ard Nixon, Trump might even go so far as that in the days following his victory, insurance coverage on the basis of preex- to reward cooperative Democrats by stay- President-elect Trump offered warm isting conditions. On other occasions, ing neutral in their reelection races while words for his erstwhile opponent Hillary Trump has spoken favorably of high-risk railing against recalcitrant Republicans Clinton, a woman he had on more than pools as a way forward for health reform. and cheering on their primary challengers. one occasion threatened to prosecute, and These two ideas together point toward a Suffice it to say, if Trump can success- for President Obama, a man he had workable compromise. fully triangulate on Obamacare, he will famously accused of falsifying his own Rather than fight the fact that the have paved the way for legislative victo- birth certificate. More important, the Obamacare exchanges have become a ries in other domains, including infra- president-elect made overtures to con- refuge for the poor and the sick, a Trump structure investment, tax reform, and gressional Democrats, including House administration could embrace it. Right perhaps even immigration enforcement, minority leader Nancy Pelosi and New now, all individual health-insurance the most contentious and most important York senator Charles Schumer, the lead- plans must comply with Obamacare’s issue he will face in his first term. ing candidate to succeed retiring Senate regulations. President-elect Trump could None of this is to suggest that a suc- minority leader Harry Reid. Are these repeal the unpopular individual and cessful Trump presidency is assured— overtures little more than empty gestures? employer mandates and deregulate in - not by a long shot. To have any chance of Or are they a sign that the president-elect dividual insurance plans that are not sold success at all, the president-elect’s out- GETTY

/ has learned from his predecessor’s over- on the exchanges. Those who want to sized ambition will have to discipline reach? purchase an Obamacare-compliant pol - his vanity and his eagerness to settle old NAMEE C The Obamacare meltdown gives icy would be able to do so on an ex - scores. Which Trump emerges in the com - WIN M Trump the perfect opportunity to triangu- change. But Obamacare’s insurance ing months is anybody’s guess.

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determines productivity and that produc- remain competitive by manufacturing tivity determines wages. From this per- something for $20 that it can buy for $2. It spective, an abundance of low-skilled must trade with low-wage economies. A New Trade workers doesn’t slow wage growth when Like innovation, trade increases prosper- savings don’t constrain GDP growth. ity by lowering the cost of goods. If dis- Consensus But in today’s knowledge-based econo- placed workers couldn’t find work at Reduce deficits and don’t forget my, capital no longer drives productivity. higher wages than the now-lower cost of about the workers Companies such as Google can scale to imported goods, the goods wouldn’t be economy-wide success without much cap- cheaper to manufacture offshore. Trade BY EDWARD CONARD ital. Properly trained talent and the econo- necessarily lowers the cost of goods more my’s capacity and willingness to bear risk than wages, which makes the economy RESIDENT-ELECT DONALD TRUMP now constrain growth, while savings sit richer as a whole. has shown Republicans how to unused despite near-zero interest rates. An But low-skilled workers bear 100 per- P forge a new electoral college increase in low-skilled workers spreads cent of the cost of lower wages, while majority by energizing blue- constrained resources—talented supervi- high-wage workers, retirees, and the non- collar voters. His victory, with its de- sion, for example—over a greater number working poor capture a large portion of mands to restrict trade and immigration, of workers. This slows productivity and the value of cheaper goods. Given this also marks the end of free-market advo- wage growth, because low-skilled workers imbalance, it’s unclear whether trade cates’ control over the Republican party. don’t add to constrained resources in pro- benefits low-skilled workers. Anyone But there is a way that these advocates portion to the demands they place on them. claiming to know is either naïve or disin - might find common ground with blue- When manufacturers move plants to genuous. But given the value of trade, it collar Republicans to accelerate wage Mexico, most economists are confident would be wise for blue-collar Repub - growth, better fund looming pension that opportunistic risk-takers will reem- licans to accept compensatory income benefits without tax increases, and defeat ploy displaced workers and that compe - redistribution through progressive taxa- the next iteration of liberalism. tition between employers will increase tion rather than demanding heavy protec- Republicans have always been a coali- investment, productivity, and wages. But tionist restrictions. tion of voting minorities, and their share properly trained talent has moved to Nevertheless, workers needn’t endure of the vote has been slowly shrinking as Silicon Valley and outsourced blue-collar perennial trade deficits, which reduce the the country’s demographics have shifted. employment to Asia, while the engineers demand for low-wage work, for the coun- Trump’s blue-collar voters offer the GOP who remain design products and factories try to enjoy the benefits of trade. Trade a way to enlarge its base. It won’t be easy, that increase the productivity and wages deficits occur when countries such as however, to find common ground be - of Mexican workers. This brain drain Germany lend the U.S. economy the pro- tween Trump supporters and traditional slows low-skilled American productivity ceeds from the sale of goods to Americans, free-market Republicans. and wage growth; it is no surprise that the rather than using them to buy goods made As growth has slowed and government wages of displaced manufacturing com- by American workers. To prevent trade spending has reached historic highs, it’s munities have been stagnant for decades. deficits from reducing the wages and no surprise that the beneficiaries of Meanwhile, 40 million foreign-born employment of lower-skilled workers— government policies—workers, retirees, adults and their 20 million native-born the economy can always achieve full new ly arriving immigrants, and the adult children, including 35 million pre- employment at lower wages—Americans poor—have started competing with one dominantly low-skilled Hispanic adults, must borrow and spend these savings. But another for benefits. Tea-party Repub- depend on the same limited pool of talent- today, savings sit unused despite near-zero licans want spending cuts to ensure the ed supervisors and job creators to raise interest rates, putting downward pressure solvency of their pensions. Blue-collar their wages. With these constraints on on wages as they accumulate. Trump voters want restrictions on trade growth, an increase in low-skilled em - We could eliminate trade deficits by and immigration to raise their wages. ployment puts downward pressure on issuing a dollar of import licenses for Both factions fear that government spend- wages. every dollar of exports and allowing ing slows growth. Struggling workers want America to licenses to be traded freely. Such a sim- It would be easier to find common deploy its constrained resources in their plification would minimize the discretion ground if free-market advocates recog- behalf and not in behalf of newly arriving of policymakers by eliminating the need nized that an abundance of low-skilled low-skilled immigrants and offshore for tariffs and quotas, which are impossi- workers can slow wage growth in an workers. They want high-paying jobs, not ble to manage effectively. economy with constrained resources. handouts. And retiring Baby Boomers, It’s worrisome to give policymakers Most economists assume that the amount who are expected to increase government limited control over trade, but trade of capital invested per worker largely spending by 9 percent of GDP over the deficits may be worse. Economics teaches next 30 years, want reassurance that their us that the first dollars of imports are Mr. Conard is a visiting scholar at the American pensions will be paid. To dismiss these much lower-cost than American-made Enterprise Institute, a former partner at Bain concerns as racist underestimates their goods; the last dollars, however—imports Capital, and the author of The Upside of legitimacy. in excesses of exports—are virtually the Inequality: How Good Intentions Despite Trump’s good intentions, same cost as American-made goods. Were Undermine the Middle Class. Amer ica can’t maximize prosperity and that not the case, we would continue to

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buy cheaper offshore goods. For little from other sectors of the economy— additional benefit to consumers, we allow compared with 66 cents for retail and 61 the rest of the world to dump its unused cents for professional and business ser- savings onto America at great cost to low- A Party of vices. skilled employment and wages, growth, Libertarians often suggest that the U.S. the stability of banks, and the efficacy of Industry can import whatever manufactured goods monetary policy. In turn, slow growth The GOP needs to embrace it needs. But imports must be paid for by inflames demands to increase govern- manufacturing exports, if they are not to be paid for by ment spending, restrict free trade, and unsustainable borrowing or the sale repudiate an unsympathetic and uncom- BY MICHAEL LIND of domestic assets to foreigners. In 2015, promising establishment—so much so the U.S. exported $2.23 trillion worth of that these sentiments have overtaken the ONALD TRUMP won the presi- goods and services combined. Man u - Republican party. Balanced trade would dency in an upset victory large- factured goods accounted for 50 percent help mitigate these grievances. D ly because of his appeal to of all U.S. exports, far more than services In addition to eliminating trade deficits, the white working class in a (33 percent). Within the service-export we could lower corporate taxes to make number of industrial states that have been category, the largest share was travel America a more competitive place to cre- reliably Democratic for years. His denun- and tourism. Absent an unrealistically ate jobs, increasing demand for employ- ciations of Chinese mercantilism and U.S. large expansion of service exports from ment and putting upward pressure on transnational corporations that offshore Silicon Valley and Wall Street, a deindus- wages. We could also increase the ratio jobs to low-wage countries resonated trialized U.S. would have to radically cut of high-skilled to low-skilled workers. strongly in the parts of the South and the back on its imports of manufactured Talented innovators, entrepreneurs, and Midwest where most U.S. manufacturing goods. supervisors create employment and in - is concentrated—while shocking defend- The most compelling argument for a crease productivity, which also puts up- ers of the bipartisan orthodoxy in favor strong and dynamic manufacturing sector ward pressure on wages. of unrestricted globalization and mass is national security. No country can be a Restricting low-skilled immigration immigration. Trump’s astonishing suc- great power, much less a superpower, would achieve this effect, but it would cess shows the potential in American without an innovative and advanced man- also reduce production and slow growth. politics for a party of industry. ufacturing base that is independent of A more effective policy would recognize Since the 1990s, the Republican and potentially hostile suppliers. Neglect of that the cost of retiring Baby Boomers, China’s eventual military threat, and fed- eral debt at 75 percent of GDP necessitate The most compelling argument faster growth than America can achieve for a strong and dynamic organically. Doubling the number of full- time, 95th-percentile, ultra-high-skilled manufacturing sector workers from 5.5 million to 11 million might double America’s growth rate and is national security. tax revenues. Unlike most other taxpay- Democratic establishments alike have this wisdom allowed the U.S. military, for ers, these workers pay significantly more shared the view that the U.S. should shed a time, to become dependent on essential in taxes than they consume in government “old” industries such as manufacturing to rare-earth minerals from China and rock- services. With America already issuing other countries, in order to specialize in ets made in Russia. Allowing your mili- over 1 million green cards per year, a dou- “knowledge industries” such as software tary to become economically dependent bling is achievable. By refusing to replace and social media that employ a college- on your major geopolitical rivals is never low-skilled immigration with ultra-high- educated “creative class.” The declining a good idea, as Alexander Hamilton rec- skilled immigration, Democrats have share of employment in the goods- ognized in 1791 when, in his “Report on squandered America’s most significant producing economy, as a result of auto - the Subject of Manufactures,” the first opportunity for growth. Republicans must mation and offshoring, makes this view Treasury secretary emphasized the need capitalize on this forgone opportunity. superficially plausible. for federal promotion of manufacturing to Every faction of the Republican coali- But the tradable sector—including man - make the United States “independent on tion must recognize that, in the next elec- ufacturing, industrial agriculture, energy, foreign Nations, for Military and other tion, Democrats will compete fiercely for and minerals, and dominated by large essential Supplies.” the blue-collar voters they have neglect- firms and complex supply chains—is far What if there were a party or movement ed. To build an enduring alliance with more essential to American prosperity in the United States that championed these new Republican voters, free-market than its share of employment might sug- modern, large-scale, corporate-industrial advocates must find common ground gest. A dollar’s worth of manufactured- capitalism rather than simply assuming its with them and use it to both accelerate goods sales generates $1.33 in output health or denouncing it as evil? A move- wage growth and increase tax revenues ment that championed American indus - without tax increases. A thoughtful plan Mr. Lind is a fellow at New America and the author trial capitalism would differ in significant needn’t alarm voters who want their pres- of Land of Promise: An Economic History ways from the anti-corporate Left and the ident to unite a divided country. of the United States. libertarian Right.

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Because of increasing returns to scale manufacturers should therefore prefer and high costs of entry, such industries as prosperous to poor service-sector work- consumer electronics, aerospace, and ers—e.g., home health aides, hotel work- automobiles tend to be dominated by a ers, and waiters—in the United States. It The few huge, dynamic firms at a global as makes no strategic sense for science- well as a national level. Both nation-states based, capital-intensive industries to ally Reddening and their provincial sub-units compete to themselves in politics with cheap-labor be the sites of high-value-added suppliers employers in low-productivity, labor- States in regional and global supply chains co- intensive sectors. Republicans are well established ordinated by these oligopolistic global Social insurance. Industrial corpora- below the federal level, too firms. tions and their investors and employees From this fact, two things follow. The have a natural interest in social-safety-net BY JOHN HOOD first is that the neoliberal idea of writing policies that minimize the collapse in con- neutral rules for world trade, enforced by sumer spending during periodic reces- TATE politics can be volatile. states that are strictly indifferent to sions. For this reason alone, they should Consider the case of Indiana. A whether particular industries are located prefer pay-as-you-go, tax-based systems S year ago, embattled governor within their borders, is not so much wrong of social insurance such as Social Security Mike Pence faced the prospect as anachronistic, when a growing share of and unemployment insurance to the pre- of a challenging rematch against the for- what is called international trade actually funded savings accounts favored by mer speaker of the Indiana house, John consists of transfers of components across the libertarian Right. Social insurance is Gregg, whom Pence had defeated by just borders for assembly by a single trans- countercyclical, acting as an “automatic 75,000 votes in 2012 to succeed popu lar national corporation. stabilizer” to keep the income of the Republican governor Mitch Daniels. Also The second implication is that the dis- unem ployed and elderly flowing during a year ago, Daniels’s former campaign tinction between trade and domestic eco- recessions. But prefunded retirement sav- manager and deputy chief of staff, Eric nomic policy collapses, replaced by a ings accounts and unemployment ac - Holcomb, was planning a long-shot cam- single concept familiar to state and local counts, of the kind favored by liber tarians, paign to win the U.S. Senate seat being governments: “economic development.” are disastrously “procyclical”—when the vacated by Republican Dan Coats, for In a global economy in which the compar- stock market tanks, accounts decline with whom Holcomb was then serving as chief ative advantage of nations is replaced by it, worsening the economic contraction. of staff. what might be called their “competitive Immigration. An industrial-capitalist As the 2016 election cycle unfolded, attractiveness,” the American federal party in the United States, if one existed, Indiana politics went in an entirely differ- government must start thinking like a would support an immigration policy that ent direction. Pence’s 2012 running mate, U.S. state government. favored workers with skills useful to the Lieutenant Governor Sue Ellspermann, But this is only the beginning. An tradable sector, though not in numbers resigned to take a college presidency. American party of industrial capitalism that would reduce incentives for com - Pence picked Holcomb as Indiana’s new would evaluate domestic policies accord- panies to hire and train Americans. But lieutenant governor. A few months later, ing to whether, in addition to achieving technology-intensive firms do not benefit Donald Trump picked Pence as his run- their stated goals, they helped or hurt the from great numbers of uneducated work- ning mate. On July 26, state Republicans science-based, capital-intensive tradable- ers. And unskilled immigration, both legal selected Holcomb to replace Pence as goods sector: and illegal, might retard productivity their gubernatorial nominee. He began the Taxes. Corporate income taxes fall growth by incentivizing firms to rely on fall campaign as an underdog against most heavily on U.S.-based manufactur- low-wage immigrant labor rather than John Gregg, just as the Trump-Pence tick- ing firms and suppliers. They should be invest in labor-saving technologies and et faced long odds for the White House reduced or abolished and replaced by techniques. and as the GOP nominee for the U.S. Sen - taxes on individuals. Of America’s two major parties, the ate, Representative Todd Young, faced an Wages. Now as in the past, manufac- Republican party would be the easier to uphill battle against the former Indiana turing companies benefit from a broad remake as a party of dynamic industrial senator and governor Evan Bayh. middle class that buys mass-produced capitalism in the national interest. Its But the Democrats all faded at the end. goods and the services that go with them, voter base is the disproportionately white Mike Pence is now the vice president– rather than small, rich clienteles that pre- private-sector working class, its elite base elect of the United States. Eric Holcomb is fer artisanal luxuries. Foreign markets includes much of the leadership of nonfi- the governor-elect of Indiana. Todd Young are only partial substitutes for home- nancial business, and its regional base is now the senator-elect. And In diana’s country consumers. A disproportionate includes the states most likely to depend status as one of the nation’s leading incu- number of successful transnational on manufacturing, agriculture, or oil, gas, bators of state-level conservative reforms corporations are based in the three most and coal, as opposed to the post-industrial is secure. This isn’t just a fas cinating populous industrial-capitalist nation- “knowledge economy” and subsidized, states—the U.S., Japan, and Germany— uneconomical green-energy ventures fa - Mr. Hood is the president of the John William Pope whose large domestic markets, thanks to vored by the Democrats. Donald Trump Foundation, a North Carolina–based grant-giving increasing returns to scale, act as spring- has proven there is a constituency. What organization, and the chairman of the John Locke boards to global success. Enlightened is lacking is a program. Foundation, a state-policy think tank.

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political tale. It exemplifies a broader ed in just a few blue strongholds. In fact, The story is a little more complicated trend, encompassing both partisan politics in half the states, the GOP has a governor when it comes to social issues. Grass roots and policy success, in which conservatism and full legislative control of both state Republicans have made real pro gress, is becoming the govern ing philosophy of governing bodies. Democrats have such a both in policy and in public opinion, on most states across the country. trifecta in only six states the issue of abortion, but controversies Holcomb had never served in elective Republicans have certainly surfed fa- about gay and lesbian rights damaged office, although he’d spent much of his vorable national waves in the states in Pence during his gubernatorial term and life working for candidates and office- such years as 1994, 2010, 2014, and now explain much of the difficulty North holders in Indiana and Washington, D.C. 2016. But that’s far from the whole story. Caro lina governor Pat McCrory experi- During his brief sprint to victory in the Democrats have had their own wave years, enced in his 2016 reelection bid. governor’s race, most Hoosiers had little most recently in 2006 and 2008. Across Still, Republican politics and conserva- opportunity to get to know him. What these political oscillations, Re publicans tive governance have enjoyed tremen- they did know was that Holcomb was have simply recruited stronger candidates, dous successes over the past decade. With likely to continue the fiscal and economic built better party structures, raised more the election of a new Republican presi- policies of his predecessors. That proved money, and outmaneuvered their Dem - dent alongside a Republican-controlled to be a popular idea. ocratic counterparts. The result is clear. Congress, a new wave of accomplish- From the inauguration of Mitch Dan - ments might be on the horizon. Some of iels in early 2005 to the last months of the the thorniest issues facing state leaders Pence administration, Indiana’s economy during the Obama years—such as the fal- grew by an inflation-adjusted average of tering health-insurance exchanges and 1.1 percent a year, outpacing all of its costly Medicaid expansions associated neighbors. During his eight years as gov- with the Affordable Care Act—are about ernor, Daniels and the Indiana legislature to get easier, assuming that Donald Trump slashed state payrolls, placed new limits follows through on his promise to decen- on state expenditures, cut taxes, enacted tralize power and that he works with right-to-work laws, and created a school- Speaker Paul Ryan and other congres- voucher program. During his four years, sional leaders on health care, transporta- Pence followed up on these achievements tion, and welfare reform. by working with lawmakers to cut person- As newly elected Missouri governor al and corporate income taxes, eliminate Eric Greitens leads his state to join others death taxes, block local governments from in adopting right-to-work laws, he and foisting living-wage laws on em ployers, like-minded state leaders won’t be sty - and expand the state’s charter schools and mied by a national administration seek - voucher program. Indiana now ranks sec- Mike Pence in New Hampshire on Election Eve ing to subvert the trend toward worker ond in the nation in educational freedom, freedom, particularly with regard to the according to the Cato Institute. At the same time, conservatives across public-employee unions that have blocked Indiana is only one of a number of the states have done a better job than lib- conservative fiscal, regulatory, and edu- states—including Arizona, Wisconsin, erals at putting together grassroots organi- cation reforms for decades. And as Michigan, North Carolina, and Florida— zations, effective think tanks, alternative conservatively governed states move to where dramatic gains in conservative media and messaging outfits, and a set loosen regulatory restrictions on job policy and highly competitive politics go of ideas that are both transformational creators, their work will be welcomed hand in hand. Republicans have more and practical. In conservatively governed rather than obstructed by the federal power in states today than they’ve had at states, taxes are lower and structured in alphabet-soup agencies. any time since the 1920s. At this writing, ways that are less injurious to investment Trump is not consistently conservative, the GOP has 33 governors, 31 lieutenant and entrepreneurship. Reg ulatory codes and his populist followers are now en - governors, 29 state attorneys general, 31 are less rigid and counterproductive. Citi - sconced within the Republican coalition. secretaries of state, and functional control zens have more choices in education and No matter how the tensions between the of 67 legislative chambers, with 30 con- health care. Entitle ments such as cash GOP’s presidential party and congres- trolled by Democrats and the other two assistance and unemployment insurance sional party play out in D.C., what state tied or still pending. cost less and are less likely to ensnare conservative leaders need from the Trump If you compare these results with those people in long-term dependency. administration in most cases (Obama care of the presidential and Senate races, you These policy gains initially followed being the obvious counterexample) is quickly see that Republicans aren’t just conservatives’ political successes. Now just to stay out of the way. These leaders winning down-ballot races in consistently the effects of these policy gains are fuel- need a restoration of federalism, a proper red states. They’ve captured statewide ing more political successes in a virtuous balance of federal and state powers and offices or control of legislative chambers circle, as voters respond to new jobs, responsibilities. Does Trump have a in places such as Minnesota, Illinois, income growth, and other tangible bene- strong and consistent view about federal- GETTY / New Mexico, Colorado, Maryland, and fits by rewarding the politicians who ism? I have my doubts. But I know Mike Massachusetts. It’s the Democrats whose authored the policies that brought those Pence does. And that may very well be SCOTT EISEN strength is disproportionately concentrat- benefits. all that is required.

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greater effect on this electoral gift of mil- idea that their supposed denseness was as lions of the turned-off working class and DNA-generated as their skin color. thus made the need for the volatile Donald Earlier, the gifted conservative intellec- Quo vadis, Trump superfluous? tual Charles Murray had perhaps inadver- Unfortunately, Republican leadership tently prefigured Brooks’s emphasis on a GOP? had also lost connection with the middle naturally talented conservative elite that The establishment must cope and lower classes. Such disdain manifest- knows better than to align itself sinfully ed itself in various ways. Trump was a with hoi polloi and their demagogic BY VICTOR DAVIS HANSON wealthy man of a different stripe from Trump: “But I cannot end without urging either McCain or Romney, in that his you to resist that sin to which people with HERE does the Republican voice, tastes, and appetites seemed more high IQs (which most of you have) are party go after the election of of the lower middle class than of the rich unusually prone: Using your intellectual W Donald Trump? and were recognized as such from powers to convince yourself of something Trump ambushed Repub - Wisconsin to Pennsylvania. More impor- despite the evidence plainly before you. lican establishmentarians and grabbed the tant, conservative elites had bought into Just watch and listen to the man. Don’t party’s nomination by winning over the the value system of the Left, one of Ivy concoct elaborate rationalizations. Just white working and middle classes—and League credentials, high finance, Wash - watch and listen.” Murray may have Democrats and independents who were ington politics, big media, and coastal- thought he was warning high IQs not to sympathetic to their plight. The opening corridor tony residence as synonymous overthink, but again his comments came was given to him, first, by the Democratic with sober and judicious leadership. And across as equating “high IQs” with know- party that long ago ignored blue-collar thus they became a bookend on the right ing better than to fall for Trump. workers in favor of identity politics, cul- of left-wing smugness and likewise were Collate as well what some former tural wackiness, boutique environmen - left blind to the uprisings in their midst. neocons, who became Hillary-supporting talism, the new progressive rich, and From the WikiLeaks trove, the values of neoliberals, said about Trump supporters. redistributionism—as it became a politi- Colin Powell appeared hardly different Their dark picture emerges of ignorant, cal pyramid of a plutocratic capstone atop from those of Hillary Clinton—cashing nativist, low-IQ, xenophobic rubes, who, a broad subsidized base—with not much in, easy writing off of the Trump support- in the wake of Trump’s inevitable defeat, in between. ers as racists and nativists, and serial should have to beg and barter to rejoin the Obama’s successive election victories name-dropping. Republican party—properly ruled over had seemed to signal not only that there Recently, PBS’s resident conservative by the wizened 10 percent who knew bet- was little need to appeal to middle-class David Brooks grew distraught about ter than to vote for Trump. whites, but that they were also a smelly Donald Trump’s candidacy. He attributed Still, if Republican policymakers and Palinesque cultural albatross better cut the know-nothingness to a new tribalism intellectuals did not particularly like the loose. Hillary Clinton happily promised dividing the nation—without acknowl- base, why did they so openly alienate the (without fear of repercussions) to put coal edging that the 94 percent of the African- very roots that nourished their party or fail miners out of work. The Obama admin - American vote that went for Barack to reach out to minorities on economic istration, perhaps in a weird sort of in- Obama might have been explained by issues? Take almost any issue, and a your-face middle finger, constructed the something other than a disinterested eval- predictable theme emerges: Republican obnoxious metrosexual Pajama Boy as uation of the issues. Brooks intoned, elites’ abstract positions were not predi- the poster adolescent for the Affordable “Basically . . . it doesn’t matter what the cated on having experienced any of the Care Act. Bill Clinton occasionally went guy does. And college-educated [are] ramifications of their own ideologies. off topic on the stump in stream-of- going to Clinton.” Did Brooks mean that Conservative thinkers long ago saw consciousness self-confessionals about college-educated voters’ support for Hil - illegal immigration as a reflection of how his party had abandoned the blue- lary Clinton—of illegal-private-server, robust free markets. Transnational labor collar class. Clinton Foundation pay-for-play, and was a fluid, inanimate expression of sup- The common thread in Barack Obama’s serial-prevarication fame—was in con- ply and demand, a good thing as long as clingers, Hillary Clinton’s deplorables trast empirically based and predicated one did not meet the living, breathing peo- and irredeemables, and the Podesta ar - only on her principled positions on the ple affected. To the degree that those of chival contempt for “everyday Ameri - issues? the coastal corridor ever experienced ille- cans” is disgust for what the Left sees as Brooks—a Republican Clinton support- gal immigration, it was manifested as an yahoos. When Joe Biden talked about er who once gushed that President-elect “act of love” in the form of a happy maid “they” wanting to put blacks “back in Obama lorded over a “Valedic to cracy” of or industrious lawn keeper, who smiled, chains,” or Hillary poorly affected a black “Achievatrons”—then scoffed of these worked cheaply, and was grateful for patois, the subtext was that only a few mindless automatons: “You get the sense hand-me-down gifts of old clothes and anointed white people such as they, in that the campaign barely matters. . . . furniture—not such a reality of illegal exchange for political fealty, could protect People are just going with their gene immigration as a tattooed gang member people of color from a familiar inbred pool.” Brooks might have intended that who assaulted his child at the local park or Neanderthal tribe. his “gene pool” putdown apply to all bloc a thrice-deported drunk driver who aban- But why then had not the pre-Trump voters, but it certainly came across as doned his vehicle after totaling the fami- Republican party earlier capitalized to most focused on Trump supporters, or the ly’s SUV. Such realities explain why Jeb

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Bush might have been more an open- remake strange lands into American Crowley hijacked the second debate and borders advocate than were many Mexi- democracy. became a political operative for Obama. can Americans who are on the front line Trump found resonance on the Iraq Whatever Trump was, he was certainly of massive illegal immigration. issue despite his fibbing about his initial not a good loser, and that appealed to “Free trade” and globalism meant that support for the war because lots in the those who felt, whether admirably or not, losers obtuse enough not to be retrained or base never believed that we needed to lose that they were no longer going to be, move to winning locales should have in Iraq, or to follow arcane rules of either. Good losers have the money and known what to expect—as if an op-ed engagement, or to implant Jeffersonian power to shrug off setbacks; those on the writer ever worries about waking up to democracy in the wake of Saddam edge more often see failure in existential find someone in Vietnam writing his col- Hussein’s demise. If the war was a bad terms. umn, or a tenured professor finds his job idea, a worse notion was to lose it. When For now, the “divider” Trump has unit- sliced into four part-time slots without conservative elites during the Clinton ed the Republican party in celebration benefits, or a Wall Street grandee is sub- administration signed up for the Project of controlling most of the statehouses, ject to the same affirmative-action guide- for the New American Century’s idea of the Congress, the presidency, the future lines as the Postal Service. remaking the Middle East, one would Supreme Court, and 3,000 federal ap - Elites saw affirmative action as little have expected them at least to stick Iraq pointees. In contrast, the “uniter” Obama more than a bothersome counterbalance to through to its bitter end. But instead, as leaves a shredded Democratic party wealthy white people’s old-boy influence- things went from bad to worse in Anbar reduced to municipal governance, able peddling and privilege-mongering. Province, many voiced their “my wonder- neither to run effectively on his left-wing But does a white, male, straight-A high- ful war, your terrible occupation” lamen- legacy nor to emulate the turnout and bloc school student in Tulare have recourse tations to liberal voices such as (of all voting of Obama’s minority constituen- to a dad who can make a few calls to places) Vanity Fair. Unfortunately, the cies. Stanford pals to pull strings, much less a Marines in Anbar had no such avenues for Whatever the exact relation because hyphenated name that exudes victimiza- second thoughts. cause and effect, it remains true that most tion and thus reparation consideration? Trump also capitalized on the disgust Republican senators and senatorial can - The appeal of Trump’s neo-isolationism not just with political correctness, but also didates in competitive races who voted was written off as misplaced nativism at with the idea that respectable Republicans Trump won; and most of those who did best and racist triumphalism at worst. can still find virtue in losing nobly—in not, lost. Trump’s appeal to minority vot- But the conservative base did not neces- John McCain’s case, by refusing to go ers on economic issues and jobs won over sarily object, in Jacksonian fashion, to after the anti-Semite and racist mentor more than a quarter of them, and may well removing threatening anti-American of Barack Obama, Reverend Jeremiah have encouraged others to stay home and dictators as much as to doing so as a part Wright, or in Romney’s, being rendered not vote for Clinton—critical in winning of a larger, losing, and costly project to largely speechless as moderator Candy key states such as Pennsylvania and Michigan, and raising the possibility of a future populism that could make race and tribe secondary to economic dynamism. Establishment groupthink that Trump would ruin the party or turn off the elec- torate might have better applied to the efforts of the last two moderate, establish- ment—and losing—Republican presi- dential candidates, who fared more poorly with minorities and white women. The much-prognosticated Republican civil war is for a time somnolent. But when President Trump once again pro- vokes the establishment—and he will— and when his popularity dips as it also will, we shall see current post-election Maybe Trumpers return to their pre- election Never Trump proclivities. The odd thing is that there are very few issues on Trump’s agenda that divide Republi - cans; instead, the rub seems to be Trump himself. And that paradox ultimately is GETTY / more than just a matter of Trump’s crudi- ty, but remains an issue of class, style, and establishmentarian reputation that will SPENCER PLATT never quite go away for a self-described At Donald Trump’s Election Night event in New York City, November 8, 2016 talented tenth of the party.

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individual and group identity and that The alt-right would have to do three any attempt to create a society in which things to achieve this. race can be made not to matter will fail.” First, it would have to give the Don’t The alt-right rejects any non- impression of having outsized influ- European ethnicity, including Jews— ence. To this end, its supporters coordi- Mainstream particularly Jews—as a weakening nate online in a particularly effective of the stock of Western Christendom. way. From August 2015 to July 2016, The Alt-Right Its adherents call a conservative who the alt-right sent millions of anti- It opposes constitutional democracy doesn’t acknowledge the superiority Semitic tweets, according to the Anti- and is bad for America of ethno-cultural Europeans a “cuck” Defamation League. Those tweets came (short for “cuckold”)—an epithet de - from approximately 1,600 accounts BY BEN SHAPIRO rived from pornography and meaning a whose bios most frequently include the man who lets his wife have sex with a words “Trump,” “nationalist,” “conser- ONALD TRUMP’S election could member of a minority group in order to vative,” and “white.” I was the personal be a magnificent opportunity generate non-white stock. The alt-right recipient of well over 7,000 anti-Semitic D for the country. Despite his thinks it needs a great leader to protect it tweets from this charming group. Trump character defects and less than from the ravages of the onrushing ethnic and his surrogates improvisatorially col- stellar adherence to anything remotely invasion. laborated with the alt-right on Twitter approaching a conservative philoso- The alt-right is besotted with Trump. throughout the campaign, strengthening phy, Trump will have a Republican- Alt-right sites are replete with odes and the alt-right’s impact. Alt-righters and controlled Congress as his co-equal—and tributes to him and can be recognized by fellow travelers—particularly Trump will need their cooperation to undo a Internet memes starring the cartoon cheerleaders such as Breitbart News’s bevy of nasty Obama policies. Trump’s character Pepe the Frog. Alt-righters Milo Yiannopoulos, and former Breit - victory could usher in an era of a conser- feel kinship with a candidate who bart News head and Trump-campaign vative renewal. speaks of cultural superiority but not CEO Steve Bannon—made close con- It could also mainstream a despicable constitutional freedoms, who speaks nections with Trump and his surro - fringe of Trump supporters known as the crudely of and sometimes denigrates gates. alt-right. Trump’s most ardent fan base races and classes and ethnicities, and Second, the alt-right would have to in the primaries and the general election who pits “globalism” against national- make inroads into more-traditional sprang from the alt-right. Its adherents ism (a contrast the alt-right reads as movements by broadening its definition don’t believe in constitutional conser- code for the battle against a multiethnic, of itself. To that end, the alt-right claims vatism, since, according to them, that multicultural new world order). Trump, as allies paleoconservatives such as Pat philosophy fails to account for racial in their view, represents a sort of tribal Buchanan and anti-immigration polemi- and ethnic differences in intelligence revenge against the race-baiting tribal- cists including Ann Coulter. They show- and aggression, among other purported- ism of the Democratic Left. Trump is er praise on such personalities, hoping ly biological features. They disdain the the great leader who will protect them for a de facto alliance. Along with his ideology of the Founders. As Richard from the barbarian hordes. As alt- co-author Allum Bokhari, Milo Yian - Spencer, who publishes the website righter Vox Day writes: “Donald Trump nopoulos (who relies on his identity as AlternativeRight, states: “Our dream is not only wants to make America great a gay man with black lovers to deflect a new society, an ethno-state that would again, he wants America to be Amer- charges of racism but who tweeted a be a gathering point for all Europeans. ican. That is what distinguishes him picture of a black baby to me on the day It would be a new society based on very from Ted Cruz, Hillary Clinton, and of my child’s birth because I am a different ideals than, say, the Decla ra- Bernie Sanders.” “cuck”) in a lengthy piece links the alt- tion of Independence.” So, who cares what the alt-right thinks? right to “Oswald Spengler, H. L. Menck - Constitutional conservatism assumes People in Trump’s inner circle do. They en, Julius Evola, Sam Francis, and the equality of rights and the innate capacity are a small but influential constituency. paleoconservative movement that ral- of each individual to make decent deci- They’ve made their presence felt at Trump lied around the presidential campaigns sions, given the chance; the alt-right, in headquarters partly be cause Trump pos- of Pat Buchanan.” According to Yian - contrast, thinks that Western civiliza- sesses the vain defect of catering to any- nopoulos, virtually anyone can be alt- tion’s achievements are inseparable from one who applauds and loves him. Whether right so long as he isn’t “establishment,” the race and ethnicity of the people who it’s Vladimir Putin or miscegenation- anyone from neo-Nazis to “natural con- make up a majority in the West. Spencer opposing @WhiteGenocideTM, if they servatives” (white people unapologeti- describes alt-right philosophy thus: “an flatter Trump, he treats them warmly in cally embracing a new tribal identity ideology around identity, Eu ro pean iden- return. The alt-right is seizing this mo - politics) who have been “abandoned” tity.” American Renaissance editor and ment to try to go mainstream, transform- by the anti-tribal elites at NATIONAL alt-right leader Jared Taylor said, “The ing itself from a fringe base of white REVIEW and elsewhere. Yiannopoulos alt-right accepts that race is a biological supremacists into a movement of people disdains constitutional republican - fact and that it’s a significant aspect of who simply oppose political correctness ism and professes love for “Daddy” or want to fight back against perceived Trump. Not surprisingly, a huge num- Mr. Shapiro is the editor in chief of the Daily Wire. leftist racism toward white Americans. ber of young conservatives who like

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Yiannopoulos’s provocateur shtick conservative activism and hence in the think that they’re alt-right, too, and pages of NATIONAL REVIEW. In a tirade throw around alt-right terms with that will sound entirely familiar to any alacrity, not necessarily understanding Conservatism talk-radio listener or Fox News viewer in their full import. 2016, Buckley was denounced by Kevin The final thing the alt-right would In Dissent Phillips, who coined the term “new have to do to succeed would be to con- NR and heterodox Republican Right,” as a sellout, “abandoning Middle vince mainstream conservatives that it is administrations: a brief history America to load up his yacht with vintage too large to ignore. But it is not. So it wines” by failing to support the right- uses the tactic of trying to redefine itself BY KEVIN D. WILLIAMSON wing populist of the moment—George in such a way as to attract the tacit sup- Wallace—while Eric Voegelin mocked port of respected conservatives. This is N odd criticism was leveled at the anti-Wallace conservatives as being how my friend Hugh Hewitt mistaken- NATIONAL REVIEW during the out of touch with “Kansas City and ly labeled me alt-right (he apologized) A 2016 presidential election: Scranton.” and how anybody who opposed Paul How could the magazine in (Why is it always Scranton?) Ryan in his House primary also got good conscience refuse to support the Needless to say, that was a strange slapped with the alt-right brand. The duly elected nominee of the Republican period, but certain figures on the right alt-right won its greatest victory on this party? One wonders what magazine they have a real weakness for certain strains of front when Hillary Clinton, in a speech thought they were reading. the most vulgar kind of populism. Not to donors, said: “Just to be grossly NATIONAL REVIEW was founded in long after conservative activists on the generalistic, you could put half of 1955 for the purpose of giving hell to a Kevin Phillips model (he is now a differ- Trump’s supporters into what I call the Republican president, Dwight Eisen - ent kind of thinker, one who is very much basket of deplorables. Right? The hower. As William F. Buckley Jr. put it at bothered about the purported “American racist, sexist, homophobic, xenopho- the time: “Our principles are round, and theocracy” lurking on the horizon) were bic, Islamophobic—you name it.” Eisenhower is square.” From the point of pushing George Wallace as the political Mainstream conservatives immediately view of anno Domini 2016, Eisenhower messiah, fringe libertarians, Murray leapt to the conclusion that they, too, were looks quite conservative indeed, but his Roth bard notable among them, were being called “deplorables.” De plorables conservatism was temperamental rather pushing a far-left/far-right alliance in the are real, but Hillary foolishly or mali- than ideological. He gave serious thought daft hope that the anti-war Left could ciously overestimated their number. to running as a Democrat and until about become somehow linked to David Duke Will the alt-right be able to do these ten minutes before he announced his can- and similar lunatics in a grand coalition three things now that Donald Trump is didacy was not quite sure which party he of the edges against the center. NATIONAL president-elect? If he’d lost, they would preferred. He had no intention of rolling REVIEW took a dim view of this, and have been deprived of their Great back the New Deal and believed that Buckley later wrote in an acid obituary Lead er, a man who panders to them and social insurance was not only necessary of Rothbard: “Yes, Murray Rothbard lends them his bullhorn on Twitter, a can- but obviously necessary. He declared that believed in freedom, and yes, David didate who hired the alt-right-pandering the Republican party would be progres- Koresh believed in God.” Bannon (he described Breitbart News as sive or it would disappear and insisted While NATIONAL REVIEW was critical “the platform for the alt-right”) to head that no one save a “few Texas oil million- of Eisenhower, many of its editors had his campaign. With Trump victorious, aires” took seriously the prospect of high hopes for his vice president, Richard and Bannon now a top White House eliminating Social Security or farm sub- Nixon—until Nixon actually found his adviser, they’re feeling their oats. They sidies. “Their numbers are negligible, way into the White House and was such a want revenge on all those who stand for and they are stupid,” he wrote in a letter disappointment to conservatives that NR constitutional conservatism; they want to to his brother. backed Representative John Ashbrook burn the conservative move ment down One of history’s little ironies is that the in his quixotic 1972 primary challenge. and replace it with alt-right ethno-cultural eventual standard-bearer for the oppos- Buckley convened a meeting of conserv- solidarity. As self-proclaimed alt-righter ing view was a self-identified New Deal ative leaders who became known as the and full-time troll Chuck Johnson told Democrat and former union official, “Manhattan Twelve,” who announced Politico at Trump’s victory party: “We Ronald Reagan, whose objection to the that conservatives were suspending their memed the president into the Oval Democratic consensus of his time con- support of the Nixon administration in Office. . . . We hunt down the cucks.” cerned not its New Deal progressivism response to its weakness in the face of Mike Cernovich, an alt-right fellow but its 1960s radicalism and subsequent Communist threats from the Soviet traveler, has declared, “Trump’s people abandonment of the anti-Communist Union and the People’s Republic of know @benshapiro is a traitor. He will project. “I didn’t leave the Democratic China. have NO influence with the administra- party,” Reagan famously declared. “The Nixon’s people, perhaps thinking that tion and new right. He’s purged!” Democratic party left me.” Buckley could be bought off by putting For the sake of the country, we should The interplay between the realities of him “in the room where it happens,” to all pray that Trump disassociates from party politics and the interaction of intel- borrow from Hamilton via David French, the alt-right and lets their perverse phi- lectual conservatism with right-wing brought him along on that famous trip to losophy wither on the vine. populism has been a constant presence in China, a decision that they must have

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come to regret. Buckley was merciless in Treaty, which it lambasted as “Reagan’s his assessment. As Nixon wined and suicide pact.” Buckley sent Reagan a dined with Chairman Mao, Buckley copy of the issue with a personal hector- wrote that it was as if the prosecutor at ing letter attached. Strength in a Nuremberg had “descended to embrace George H. W. Bush was bound to dis- Goering and Goebbels and Doenitz and appoint conservatives with his implicit Tougher Hess, begging them to join him in the rebuke of Reaganism in calling for a making of a better world.” As Rick “kinder, gentler” approach. There is some World Brookhiser has noted, Buckley wrote that fair criticism that the conservative move- An outline for a new Nixon “lurched” into a toast of the Com - ment and its principal journalistic organ conservative foreign policy munist dictator, a verb suggesting that the grew too closely affiliated with the American president might have been in Republican party and the White House BY MICHAEL SINGH his cups at that moment. during the George W. Bush administra- Nixon kept trying and made Buckley a tion, but NATIONAL REVIEW also kept its ITH Donald Trump’s victory, delegate to the United Nations, where he eyes open. Ramesh Ponnuru made the Republicans are set to reas- spent his time reading aloud selections case against Bush in his usual spare way W sume the reins of U.S. for- from Solzhenitsyn and reports from the (“Swallowed by Leviathan,” September eign policy after an absence Chinese gulags. Lee Edwards, who gives 29, 2003): of eight years. Precisely what a new a detailed account of this period in GOP foreign policy will look like will William F. Buckley Jr.: The Maker of a Bush has increased the federal role in depend foremost on the preferences of the Movement, reports that Nixon and Henry education, imposed tariffs on steel and president-elect, but obviously it should lumber, increased farm subsidies, Kissinger eventually shut this arrange- take account of the concerns of voters and okayed federal regulations on campaign ment down as incompatible with détente. finance and corporate accounting, and the realities abroad. U.S. global leader- Republicans are never more partisan expanded the national-service program ship remains indispensable, both for than when one of their own is under President Clinton began. Since Sep - Amer ican interests and for the world, but attack from the other side, and this can tember 11, he has also raised defense must be tailored to a geopolitical land- lead to poor decision-making (many spending, given new powers to law scape that has shifted since Republicans examples of that were evident in the eight enforcement, federalized airport securi- were last in power. years following January 20, 2001). Lib - ty, and created a new cabinet department What fueled voters’ support for Trump eration from narrow partisanship is help- for homeland security. No federal pro- was in part their worry that the world is ful in avoiding such errors: In the Nixon grams have been eliminated, nor has changing in alarming ways. Polls showed Bush sought any such thing. More peo- years, NATIONAL REVIEW and conserva- that for Republican voters, the most im - ple are working for the federal govern- tives were presented with the case of portant issues besides the economy were ment than at any point since the end of Spiro Agnew, brought up on tax-evasion the Cold War. terrorism and foreign policy—issues per- charges (Buckley was not much tempted taining to America’s relationship with the to defend Agnew, because he knew him Buckley pronounced the Iraq War a world. Americans are right to be con- to be guilty), and then the hunting of the failure and Republican attempts to justify cerned. The world is becoming more president himself during the Watergate it an embarrassment. He argued that if competitive and less susceptible to our affair. Senator Buckley, WFB’s brother, Bush had been a European prime minis- influence. Compared with the uniquely called for Nixon’s resignation before the ter, he would have been expected to favorable post–Cold War “unipolar mo - so-called smoking-gun tape, on WFB’s resign or face a no-confidence vote. ment” of the 1990s and 2000s, this new advice. Buckley also wrote to Ronald Eisenhower executed the master- era is likely to be more dangerous, disor- Reagan advising him not to expend too stroke that secured the Allied victory in derly, and contentious. much political capital on the defense of Europe. Nixon, for all his personal and It is tempting for Republicans to blame Richard Nixon. Reagan did not heed that political defects, carried the center-right President Obama for these developments. advice as he should have. standard during a time of nearly revolu- Crises have multiplied on his watch and Even Reagan got the back of NATIONAL tionary radicalism on the left; Reagan alliances have grown strained, and he has REVIEW’s hand from time to time. Buck - spent years studying the best of conser- often seemed blasé about it. Polls show ley and Reagan had their famous debate vative thought, turned around a nation that more than half of Americans dis - about the Panama Canal, which was con- mired in Carterian “malaise,” and won approve of President Obama’s foreign ducted with warmth and mutual respect the Cold War; George H. W. Bush hus- policy. Indeed, many Democratic foreign- but also represented a real and deep dis- banded the fruits of that victory during policy experts have criticized him. agreement—and it was not the only one. the transition to the post–Cold War President Obama’s policies have likely After Reagan’s meeting in Reykjavik world; George W. Bush, a successful accelerated negative trends in the coun- with Gorbachev, NATIONAL REVIEW Texas governor who had thought he’d try’s international standing. But a decline pounded the administration with pieces spend his presidency being a school in Americans’ perceptions of U.S. power from the likes of Richard Nixon and reformer, did his best to take the fight to Henry Kissinger. NR published an en - our enemies after 9/11. Mr. Singh is the Lane-Swig Senior Fellow and the tire special issue in opposition to the If Donald Trump is expecting defer- managing director of the Washington Institute for Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces ence, he is going to be disappointed. Near East Policy.

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and influence started not in 2009 but years for example Washington’s failure to rally In short, U.S. foreign policy must be - earlier. This suggests that the need for opposition to Beijing’s Asian Infra - come more focused, pragmatic, and com- self-reflection is bipartisan; it also indi- structure Investment Bank, with even petent. Ends and means must match, cates that something deeper is afoot than the U.K. rebuffing U.S. overtures. which in Iraq in 2003 they did not, nor did the failure of any single policy. The U.S. can maintain its preeminent they more recently in Syria and the South What is transpiring in the world is not position in the world. But doing so will China Sea. We must expand our military the decline of the United States, but the require us to confront these challenges and diplomatic capabilities, backing our rise of other countries. Economic might, and craft a foreign policy capable of over- diplomacy with force and vice versa, once concentrated in the United States, coming them rather than hoping to turn using our manifold policy tools in concert Western Europe, and Japan, is diffusing. back the clock. American power and rather than in sequence. We must also China’s gross domestic product likely influence remain enormous. Yet we will seek to prevent crises and conflicts, and already rivals that of the United States, not once again enjoy the relative advan- therefore to reemphasize deterrence and and India’s economy will be the world’s tages we had following World War II or strategic planning, rather than wait to deal third largest by the middle of the century. after the collapse of the Soviet Union. Nor The National Intelligence Council reck- can we expect that a strategy of general ons that the U.S. share of global power as retrenchment will do anything but delay measured by economic wealth, military our reckoning with threats and crises and strength, and the like will narrow from a place them on terms less favorable to us. quarter in the early part of the century to a What should define U.S. foreign policy sixth by mid century. That of Japan and going forward is an appreciation of the traditional U.S. allies in Europe, more- importance of preserving and expanding over, is likely to shrink even more. American power and employing it strate- Increasingly, other states are transform- gically and efficiently in a more con- ing their growing economic power into strained and competitive geopolitical military power. While other militaries, environment. This means going beyond such as China’s, have long been larger the debates of past decades between neo- than the United States’ in sheer manpow- conservatives and realists, which centered er, it is their accelerating modernization on whether, how, and to what purposes to that is most worrisome today. Cutting- deploy a surplus of American power. edge military capabilities such as armed These are no longer pressing questions drones, precision-guided munitions, and when power is increasingly at a premium. anti-access/area-denial systems have pro- U.S. power should be deployed not to liferated. China is building a military that solve the world’s problems for their own can challenge the United States in the sake but to clearly advance U.S. interests. western Pacific, and Russia one that can Brokering a solution to a conflict or other do so—albeit in more limited ways—in problem overseas is sometimes sound Eastern Europe. strategy, but only if the benefits for us out- Furthermore, the established interna- weigh the costs. Sometimes solutions are tional order faces increasing challenges. out of reach and all we can do is safeguard Democracy—whose gradual spread had our interests. Chinese People’s Liberation Army soldiers previously seemed inexorable—has been But understanding and focusing on our on parade in 2015 receding since 2006 as measured by the interests should not mean casting aside number of electoral democracies in the the pillars of our post–World War II with problems when they erupt. And we world and by levels of freedom and civil engagement with the world—global lead- must secure rather than assume the sus- liberties globally. The tide of free-market ership, strong alliances, and liberal insti- tainment and extension of our preferred capitalism has slowed since the financial tutions—or failing to understand and take international norms, which will become crisis, and trade agreements have stalled. account of the interests of others. The meaningless if not enforced. Other countries, meanwhile, have in - U.S.-led order has served us well and has A recent survey by the Chicago Coun - creasingly sought to challenge the West been one of the most important channels cil on Global Affairs revealed that Amer - for the right to shape the international for projecting American influence. The icans of all parties still believe in U.S. order. China and Russia have become rise of powers antithetical to it means that global leadership. As they return to the more assertive in advancing their own it must be updated and strengthened, not White House, Republicans should make approaches to issues ranging from territo- abandoned, since what replaced it might the case for a foreign policy that will rial control in the South China Sea and be far less congenial to us. Alliances will deliver leadership in an increasingly com- Crimea to the rules of the global com- be more, not less, important in an era petitive world, and do so successfully and GETTY / mons to the terms of trade. Not only when U.S. power will not be as predomi- sustainably. This is vital not only for Amer - AFP / “fence-sitter” countries but close U.S. nant. We need allies and partners not just ican citizens but also for the multitudes allies are becoming more cautious about to share burdens but to help balance and abroad who still regard the United States signing on to American initiatives or re - resist the challenging powers—and they as the world’s best hope because they so ISAAC LAWRENCE sisting those of American rivals. Witness need us. directly know the alternatives.

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and many of their secular-progressive understandably good enough for most antagonists alike. In some ways, this is religious conservatives, since their para- Fragmentation true. a President Hillary Clinton would, mount objective this year was to stop the no doubt, have appointed a Supreme hostile use of the levers of government Court nominee hostile to unborn human against them. White e vangelicals, thus, ReligiousOf theconservatism Soul can offer life and to religious freedoms, while voted at around 80 percent—similar to President-elect Trump has promised to previous years—for the republican ticket. America a new engagement appoint pro-life conservatives to the The new situation has advantages. BY RUSSELL MOORE Court. evangelicals are often tempted to view Moreover, the Clinton campaign prom - political leaders—living or dead—as spir- ised not only to continue the Obama itual leaders. The thoroughly secular earS ago, I was preaching from administration’s most socially dangerous worldview of Donald Trump as leader of the Old Testament book of Josh - policies—a contraceptive mandate that the republicans could remove that temp- Y ua in an evangelical church in targeted nuns and other religious insti - tation. religious conservatives, especially Indiana. My sermon tied God’s tutions, for instance—but to amp up the evangelicals, could then seek to cultivate promises to his people to bring them into coercion by attempting to repeal the Hyde leaders who can articulate a theological the land of Israel through his anointed amendment, which prohibits the federal vision that goes beyond the relatively leader, to God’s ultimate fulfillment of government from directly funding abor- ephemeral back-and-forth of the headlines those promises through Jesus Christ. af- tion. That republicans thwarted this effort and political talking points of the moment. ter the service, an older man approached presents at least the possibility of a model Perhaps an american Christianity that and said he had really been hoping to hear of social engagement from Washington doesn’t feel as much under siege can a sermon on judges. other than endless progressive culture return to the more basic foundations of assuming, of course, that he was refer- wars against traditionally religious people explaining what the Christian vision of ring to the next book in the Biblical and institutions. We should all hope so. humanity and the universe actually is. canon—the Book of Judges—I immedi- at the same time, we have endured We also have some reasons for pes- ately started enthusing about the rich what must be the most secular presiden- simism, but most of the pastors I know Gospel themes in that book as well. The tial campaign in modern american histo- who supported Trump did so while refus- man stopped me, seemingly not knowing ry. The Democrats once respected faith, ing to claim him as a Christian or a moral what I was talking about, to say, “No, I not only in the long-ago-dismantled Jim - role model. Sometimes this went awry— mean I wanted to hear a sermon on why my Carter coalition of southern white and when, for instance, some religious con - these Democrats are wrong to be blocking black evangelicals but also in the ever servatives abandoned their “character President Bush’s judge nominations.” Oh. smaller but persistent cadre of socially matters” mantra to argue that personal after a few minutes, I realized that poli- conservative but economically progres- character is irrelevant in a leader who tics seemed more real to him, more rele- sive Catholics—think Bobby rather than is not a “pastor in chief.” Many were vant, than Christological themes in the Ted Kennedy. Most of all, there was with- nonetheless eager to comment on the Hebrew Bible. in the Democratic party a strong black character of Hillary Clinton. Still, at the In 2016, many evangelicals apparently church tradition that was respected as a grassroots level, it seems, churchgoing have both judges and Judges on their necessary part of the coalition. This year, evangelicals who voted for Trump do not, minds. For the roughly 80 percent of Hillary Clinton’s campaign made almost and do not want to, see him as a spiritual white evangelicals who voted for Donald no effort to speak to more traditionally leader. That can be good both for Presi - Trump, the Supreme Court—especially religious voters. Whereas Barack Obama dent Trump and for religious conserva- in light of the death of Justice antonin had appeared at rick Warren’s civil for - tives. Scalia—was an overriding factor. at the um in 2008 and hired an evangelical- religious conservatives should re - same time, many evangelicals—whether outreach director in 2012, the Clinton late to friendly political leaders the way pro-Trump, reluctantly Trump, or Never campaign seemed resolved to win with a the early american Baptists related to Trump—seemed to agree that the frag- more secular band of voters who neither Thomas Jefferson and James Madison. menting american culture echoed the need nor want a religious undertone. These founding-era Baptists saw them- refrain of the Book of Judges: “In those On the republican side, the coalition selves as a theological constituency for days there was no king in Israel: every included and embraced religious leaders, whom political engagement was a practi- man did that which was right in his own but even there the appeal (often even from cal necessity to secure the freedoms to do eyes.” Desperate times, for many, seemed the leaders themselves) was more secular what was really important—to preach the to call for desperate measures. than what we had previously seen. The Gospel and build the Church. They sup- Trump’s victory seems to be a shared campaign talked little about religious ported Jefferson and Madison and urged triumph for religious conservatives in the liberty, except in terms of repealing the them to achieve the enactment of a bill of minds of many religious conservatives Johnson amendment, which prohibits rights protecting religious liberty while churches or other tax-exempt organiza- also making it very clear that these leaders Mr. Moore is the president of the Ethics and Religious tions from endorsing political candi - would never be welcomed into member- Liberty Commission of the Southern Baptist dates and so was portrayed as hampering ship in their churches without repenting Convention and the author of Onward: Engaging evan gelicals from being an effective and professing faith. Because these the Culture without Losing the Gospel. mobilized political constituency. This was Baptist communities self-consciously

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defined themselves in terms of their theol- Jones, CEO of the Public Religion Re - That’s just as well, since often such a ogy, their political engagement was not search Institute, has demonstrated in “Christianity” was more about vague felt as an extension of their identity. They his book The End of White Christian moralism than about the content of the had no permanent allies and no perma- America, the demographics of white con- Christian Gospel as handed down for nent enemies, only issue-by-issue collab- servative Evangelicals are not pointing 2,000 years. Younger Evangelicals aren’t orative pluralities. They could “Amen” upward, but will plummet in numbers, satisfied with a nominal religious identity Jefferson’s views on the First Amendment given the projected makeup of American that sees “faith” and “values” as identity while scorning his views on the French society in the immediate future. Evan - politics. Instead, they define themselves Revolution—and felt no fear of doing gelicals in the Republican coalition theologically, and often view politics either, publicly and vigorously. should learn the lesson of manufacturing skeptically, since they believe, with their The danger now is that religious con- unions in the Democratic coalition. The ancient ancestors, that the solution to servatives will end up contributing to the AFL-CIO and other such unions assumed moral decay must be inner transformation Right only their votes and not their minds that their membership numbers alone by the Spirit. This requires evangelism, and consciences. Without a faction com- would make them permanent kingmakers discipleship, and the planting of churches mitted to transcendent religious truths, in Democratic politics. As the economy more than it requires electing politicians. any coalition is in danger of being re - has transitioned, though, from manufac- Politics can seem for them, at best, a duced to an expression of the will to turing to the tech sector and as the size of diversion from that spiritual mission, power. As Ross Douthat warned progres- government has grown, the sort of influ- and at worst as the devil’s third temptation sives: “If you dislike the religious right, ence once wielded by a Walter Reuther of Jesus: subordinating transformation wait till you meet the post-religious or a Jimmy Hoffa is now exercised by through the Gospel to the covetous right.” He was referring, of course, to the public-employee unions with very differ- pursuit of political influence (Matthew resurgent blood-and-soil nationalism in ent concerns—not so much for reinvigo- 4:8–9). Europe and beyond. Our opponents may rating American manufacturing as for To build for the long term, religious wish to define morality differently, but protecting a litany of progressive policies conservatives must cultivate leaders who no one should want a political coalition— on social issues. Meanwhile, union work- recognize that the problems we face are of the Right or the Left—where no one is ers in Ohio and Michigan and Pennsyl - not fundamentally political. This has to be pointing out duties that go beyond poli- vania voted Republican this year, done with a theology articulate and coher- tics. We have seen what happens in world frus trated by a Democratic party that ent enough to inform our commitment to history when concepts of good and evil believed it didn’t need their votes. human dignity, personal responsibility, are replaced by the will to power. Those A religious conservatism with some- family stability, and religious liberty, who caricature religious conservatives as thing to offer in the years ahead must be especially when the challenges ahead wanting to impose the worldview of The genuinely—and not just culturally— may be hard to imagine, given the veloci- Scarlet Letter should beware of having religious. Secularization is not the He - ty of social and technological change. such a worldview replaced with that of gelian necessity that many assert, but it is The goal should be to see churches that Lord of the Flies. true that American culture increasingly engage their neighborhoods not merely Political exigency is an unstable raison doesn’t assume a broadly Christian iden - with politics but also with the sort of tran- d’être for the religious Right. As Robert P. tity to be in the mainstream of society. scendent truth and cohesive community needed to bring about cultural renewal. The Bible Belt is buckling under the weight of unemployment among men, opioid addiction, out-of-wedlock births and child-rearing, and social fragmenta- tion. Building a wall will not keep any of this out, because Mexico and China did not export this problem to us. We manu- factured our fragmentation at home, in our own souls. Precinct captains can’t undo it; only churches can. Religious conservatives should want to work for a better social order because we know what happens when there is “no king in Israel.” But we can achieve right- eous success only if we prioritize the Gospel, the Church, and the mission, and

GETTY therefore have something distinctive to / say. We can do this only in turn if those who are Christians know that “there is another king, Jesus” (Acts 17:7). We need MARK WALLHEISER good judges, but we need the Book of Donald Trump campaigns in Mobile, Ala., in 2015. Judges more.

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Moving Beyond the

GenderThe right needs an Gap agenda for women

BY ABBY M. M C CLOSKEY

OST women didn’t want Donald Trump to win. Ac - M cording to CNN exit polls released the day after the election, Trump lost the women’s vote by twelve points to Hillary Clinton. This gap jumped to 90 points among black women and 42 points among Latina women. Given that the Republican nominee had been recorded bragging about grop- ing women, it’s surprising that the gen- der gap wasn’t bigger. Trump’s standing among women voters was more or less in line with the GOP’s lackluster per - formance over the last 40 years. Mitt nominee to put forward child-care and sional success. But there also have been Rom ney lost the women’s vote by twelve paid-leave policies, likely blunting his challenges, such as the unaffordability points to President Barack Obama, ac- fallout with women voters. These are of child care, lack of paid leave, family cording to Gallup. That was only a slight policies that have been ignored by the breakdown, low-paying jobs, and per- improvement from 2008, when Senator Right for far too long and, if properly sistent poverty, which have presented John McCain lost the women’s vote structured, could significantly improve new public-policy puzzles. by 14 points. Women have backed a the lives of women across America. They The Right largely has ignored these Democratic presidential candidate over are part of a broader portfolio of policies shifts, ceding so-called women’s issues a Republican one by an average of eight that Republicans could embrace to help entirely to the Left, with the gender gap points since 1980, according to Pew women succeed in today’s economy. widening accordingly. They have their Research. The role of women, and the nature of reasons. Some argue that the gender gap It may be tempting for Republicans to family life and work in American society, is inevitable because of the Republican believe that the gender gap is not a lia- has fundamentally changed since the hey- party’s opposition to abortion. Others bility, given that they have won a nation- day of Republican politics in the Reagan contend that whatever solutions conser- al election in spite of a large one. But era. Forty years ago, it was common for vatives propose would look measly in Trump’s victory is the exception, not the married women not to work, and only comparison with progressive proposals, rule. Since the 19th Amendment was a small share of families were led by sin- or that such proposals should be avoided passed, this is the only time on record gle parents. Today, the opposite is true. altogether because they could result in when Republicans have won the White Women are the primary breadwinners more government spending. House with a double-digit gender gap in 40 percent of American households, These arguments may satisfy political among women. according to Pew Research. Single par- strategists. But they fail a bigger, much This performance is not something ents as a share of the population have more important test: Can Republicans that conservatives should seek to repli- tripled since the 1960s; 25 percent of offer a compelling conservative vision cate, with one notable exception: Trump families with children are now headed to improve women’s lives and address was the first Republican presidential by single mothers. And women’s labor- 21st-century challenges? This is a fun- force-participation rate rose from approx- damental responsibility of any good Abby M. McCloskey is an economist and the founder imately 50 percent in 1980 to a high of 60 political party and one that Republicans of McCloskey Policy LLC. She previously served as percent in 2000, although it has dropped largely have abdicated. the policy director for Rick Perry’s presidential slightly since. Until Trump. Likely in an attempt to campaign, an adviser to Jeb Bush’s presidential This has led to opportunities and break- close what was shaping up to be a gen- campaign, and the program director of economics at throughs, such as women’s achieving der gap of epic proportions and under the American Enterprise Institute. record levels of educational and profes- the strong influence of his daughter TETRA IMAGES

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Ivanka and her #WomenWhoWork care costs are often a barrier to work. This initiative, Trump put forward policies to is every bit as pro-work a policy as other directly support working women. (Full Republican proposals, such as an expan- disclosure: I reviewed these policies, sion of the earned-income tax credit. The Kids though I did not support him as a can - Another significant issue facing work- didate and worked for several of his ing women is taxes. Women are more Will Be Fine opponents.) His proposals were far (and likely to drop out of the work force than Talking to children about the election sometimes very far) from perfect, but men when faced with high marginal tax BY HEATHER WILHELM they were a critical break in the inertia rates and benefit reductions that kick in of the Republican party on these issues. as income increases. These effects were Republicans would be wise to build heightened under changes the Obama N November 9, the morning upon Trump’s proposals instead of ig - administration made to the tax code and after America chose Donald noring or merely criticizing them. benefit programs. Married women are O Trump to be its next pres - Paid leave is a significant issue facing more likely to be a household’s sec- ident—yes, friends, this is today’s working women. Trump’s plan ondary earner; thus the first dollar of happening, and it’s happening big would expand unemployment insurance their earnings is effectively taxed at a league—social media went completely to include six weeks of paid leave for higher rate than their single counter- bananas. new mothers upon the birth of a child, part’s, and they bump up against the top To be fair, social media have always though I believe it should be extended marginal rates sooner. Low-income wo - boasted an enthusiastic banana popula- to all parents. The benefit would be men can face up to a 100 percent effec- tion, whether it’s election season or not. equivalent in size to the average unem- tive marginal tax rate because of the way In fact, one of America’s first viral flash ployment benefit (ap proximately $300 government benefits are phased out as videos, 2002’s “Peanut Butter Jelly a week), which is nearly a 100 per- income increases, an effect made worse Time,” featured a crazy-eyed, manic cent wage replacement for low-income by the Affordable Care Act. High effec- banana dancing to a hip-hop beat, occa- work ers, although significantly less tive tax rates, especially combined with sionally shouting the following catch- than that for higher-income workers. high child-care costs and low wages, phrase: “PEANUT BUTTER JELLY WITH A Evidence from state paid-leave pro- make work unattractive for many wo - BASEBALL BAT!” It was baffling. It made grams suggests that paid leave increases men. Conservatives should seek to re - no sense. People loved it. Internet users the work-force attachment of new duce high marginal tax rates in our tax shared that hyperactive dancing banana mothers, reduces reliance on other gov- and benefit programs and should even all over the globe, and countless goofy ernment benefits, and im proves chil- consider more-sweeping reforms, such as memes were born. There you have it, dren’s outcomes. moving from a family- to an individual- folks: The modern world may be slight- Notably, this would involve no new based tax and benefits system. ly insane, but at least it’s frequently taxes or government spending. Trump Over the last three years, I have writ- lovable. has promised that it could be paid for by ten about these and other reforms that In any case, on Day One of the official reducing fraud in unemployment insur- might constitute a conservative wo- countdown to Trump’s presidency-to-be, ance, which is unlikely. But it could eas- men’s agenda, outlining a set of policies one particularly earnest Twitter hashtag ily be fully paid for by structural reforms in National Affairs in 2015 and then in took off: #WhatDoWeTellTheChildren? to the existing safety net (including enti- these pages and elsewhere. In a turn of Based on two post-election stories—one tlements). Given the positive economic events no one could have predicted, in the Los Angeles Times and another in and social effects of paid leave, it could Trump is now the Republican best situ- the Huffington Post—the question was easily fit into a broader pro-work, pro- ated to act on these policies and increase posed by angst-filled parents deliberat- opportunity reform package such as the women’s economic opportunity. ing how to break the news of President one outlined by House speaker Paul The bigger question is whether the Trump to their kids. Ryan and House Republicans in “A Republican party is ready. When Trump The question of properly discussing Better Way.” released his family policy, Republican politics with children is frequently a Child care is another important issue. responses ranged from tepid support good one, particularly in our hy per- Trump’s child-care proposal was expen- to outright rejection. Conservative politicized, NC-17 culture. After 2016’s sive and poorly targeted. But there are commentator Charles Krauthammer wrenching, absurdist presidential fiscally responsible child-care proposals said, “What he is proposing is to out- contest, this dilemma rings especially that Republicans can get behind. For Democrat the Democrats,” a response true. But predictably, most of the example, child-care assistance now indicative of a party that is tone-deaf post-election “What do we tell the chil- mostly goes to parents on welfare and to the economic challenges faced by dren?” anxiety rattled on a single anti- those with a significant income-tax lia- women voters and short on positive, Trumpian rail, conveniently forgetting bility, leaving out low- and middle- thoughtful solutions. This is a dynamic the other contributor to this year’s de - income families who arguably need help that a Trump administration must push cidedly un-fun roller-coaster ride: the the most. Our existing maze of child- back against—to preserve the future spectacularly awful Hillary Clinton. care credits and subsidies could be viability of the party he now leads and restructured to direct help to low- to improve women’s lives across the Heather Wilhelm is a NATIONAL REVIEW colum- income women, for whom high child- country. nist and a senior contributor to the Federalist.

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In her piece for the Los Angeles good guy.” (Here, as always, we can cue inevitably be passed to your opponent Times—“Donald Trump Is the Next the sound of a sad, anemic antique klax- in the future. President. What Do We Tell the Chil- on, which has been the official sound But for all the traumatized parents out dren?”—Michelle Maltais talked to of 2016.) there, there’s a final, more comforting several despondent Clinton-supporting There are multiple problems, of truth: Unless you try to indoctrinate friends. “My kid went to bed believing course, with this philosophy. First, it them, most kids don’t give a rip about in the best of America,” one said, still likely isn’t true. Second, it’s a recipe presidential candidates, at least not stunned, like many pockets of America, for turning otherwise hopeful kids into beyond their entertainment value. Nor the morning after the results rolled in. future sociology or gender-studies should they. They’re kids! “I can’t bear to wake him up.” majors at second-tier liberal-arts During parent–teacher conferences Excuse me? Hillary Clinton, a cor- schools that cost more than the GDP this year, I learned that my son had told rupt D.C. fixture with an unfortunate of several small Eastern European one of his kindergarten classmates that I lying habit—an individual, it should be countries. was voting for Hillary Clinton. (Earlier, added, who often seems to have trouble But finally, and most important, for he had told another friend I was voting imitating basic human emotions—sud- many Americans, this election repre- for Donald Trump. Fact check: both denly represents the “best of Amer- sented no clear “good” or “bad” choice. false.) On learning this scandalous news, ica”? Are we talking about the same That was why 2016 was such a torturous my son’s best friend promptly told him, person? year. To paint Hillary Clinton as the in very hushed tones, that Hillary Clin - Look, I understand if you’re not a “good” candidate is downright comical, ton was “a robber.” At the thought of a Trump fan, but if you voted for Clinton, given that her most animated moments lady robber in the White House, both you can’t pretend that you voted for a on the trail seemed to involve calls for boys broke into cackles. Then they went virtuous and flawless imaginary oppo- rah-rah, no-limits, all-systems-go abor- on with their day. nent imported from Paradise Island, tion. On the Republican side, as we all As the hallowed vote counters of any Wonder Woman’s verdant, all-female, know, Donald Trump was certainly no fourth-grade mock election can tell you, Unless you try to indoctrinate them, most kids don’t give a rip about presidential candidates, at least not beyond their entertainment value. Nor should they. They’re kids!

conflict-free birthplace. You voted for a peach. He was a walking minefield— the entire exercise is essentially a stealth woman who apparently thinks it’s a and not just on policy, but for reasons tally of the parents’ votes, not the prefer- good idea to campaign with people like that you can’t discuss in front of chil- ences of the kids. During my first mock Lena Dunham, who recently posted on dren. election, in 1984, my small Christian Twitter a video celebrating the prover- Many in America recognized this di - school served as a microcosm of deep- bial “extinction of white men.” lemma, processed it, and made the best red Reagan country. Most of us voted Let’s move on with the Los Angeles decision they could. Some Americans, accordingly. Not my friend Sara, though. Times story, because I fear it gets worse. including former first couple George W. As the results came back, she sat there, “Many said they cried with their kids, and Laura Bush, declined to vote for a stunned. “My parents,” she whispered, who had stayed up to watch the returns.” presidential candidate at all, supporting cagily scanning the room, “are voting Well. That sounds like a recipe for calm, down-ballot Republicans instead. Some, for Mr. Mondale.” well-adjusted children. One parent like me, wrote in a third-party presiden- For sheltered fourth-grade me, it upped the ante, Maltais reports, by say- tial candidate and then voted down- served as a good, early lesson: People ing he planned on “flipping the im - ballot GOP. have different opinions, and that’s migrant story” and encouraging his kids When it comes to politics and life, okay. to leave the country: “Your mom and navigating this complexity—and the The great choice of 2016 is finally your grandparents are immigrants. Some - uncomfortable uncertainty that comes over. The consequences are yet to be times you have to leave your home for with it—might be one of the most seen. But after all the agonizing over a better life.” important things a kid can learn to do. what to tell the children, and as we watch Sleep tight, kids! Good thing we In fact, when we put its many tragi- college social-justice warriors gearing bought you that bigger Star Wars back- comic elements aside, 2016 can offer up for another season of censorship, trig- pack for your next escape-the-country multiple non-apocalyptic lessons for ger warnings, safe spaces, and canceled run! Other parents, distraught at Trump’s kids: Politicians are flawed. Group- classes—a hysteria that was fashionable presidential win, declared that they think runs rampant in politics and in way before Donald Trump—perhaps the would dispense the following downbeat life. Limited government is the best answer is simple. “Please, kids,” we wisdom to their children: “In real life the government. In politics, whatever might say. “Whatever you do, don’t bad guy wins way more often than the power you give to your own team will grow up to do that.”

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The Long View BY ROB LONG

POTUS-ELECT: It’s an expression. POTUS-ELECT: No idea. I got this What I’m trying to say is that, hey, Word-A-Day desk calendar dealy, I’m president now. Things are dif - because I need to step it up, wordwise. ferent. Maybe when you call, I don’t People always say, Mr. Trump you NSA know, when you call it’s a little more always think you’re perfect, but the like you’re calling an equal here. May - truth is I like to work on myself. I like DOCUMENT be it’s an I-call-you-back situation, to get better. Okay then. So now that EXTRACT when-time-permits type thing. Instead we’re speaking, I’m telling you that of— some stuff has shifted on our punch 111016: 00:45GMT UNIDENTIFIED MALE VOICE: Mouth list. SURVEILLANCE closing! For this is not agreement UNIDENTIFIED MALE VOICE: Punch TRANSCRIPT part! This is not agreement part! I do list is what, this punch list? what I promised. E-mails, those things POTUS-ELECT: Not gonna be able to Begin Extract: and others were done with as dis- move on some of those items previ- cussed and now president you are and ously discussed and bullet-pointed, Static. Buzzing. now is time for the back pay! just because, and this is obviously POTUS-ELECT: Back pay? Not follow- awkward in a business-situational POTUS-ELECT: Yello? ing you. UNIDENTIFIED MALE VOICE: UNIDENTIFIED MALE VOICE: sense, but just because it’s a lot more Donald! I The agree - different on the ground now, as I’m am already trying to call you since ment particle! I do the thing and now learning. And this is a learning pro - three days! To say for that I am happy you do the thing. I want to do the Syria cess, Vladimir. I like to think for both about election and then it goes to and do the Ukraine and do the sanc- of us. voicemail and voicemail and voice- tions lifty. UNIDENTIFIED MALE VOICE: Slow mail and I am wondering presently POTUS-ELECT: Sanctions lifty? You speak now. You are forgetting deal. how comes this, because for I see you gotta hear yourself. Too funny. POTUS-ELECT: Not forgetting. No, not tweeting. You are tweeting but not UNIDENTIFIED MALE VOICE: Joke is forgetting. Just saying, now that this is picking up when I call which confuses not making here! really happening it’s not so easy as we me. The device is the same! POTUS-ELECT: I know, I know. Sim - thought to do the thing with the thing, POTUS-ELECT: Hey, look, it’s been mer down. Jeez. It’s just funny, and let the Ukraine and the Syria, and Syria is crazy. I’ve been crazy busy. Stuff to me say to you that I believe that it’s such a bad situation, it’s so terrible, read, people to hire, it’s endless. important to remember to laugh and hard to imagine how we can, you know, There’s stuff, let me tell you, stuff I smile during the day. Connect with the do what was discussed. didn’t—no one told me about, not that joy. Keep your sense of humor. UNIDENTIFIED MALE VOICE: I’m surprised, of course, because I UNIDENTIFIED MALE VOICE: You You are know what’s happening and what me telling that you were liar? More? POTUS-ELECT: needs to be done. But you’re still sur- POTUS-ELECT: Humor. Okay, now you’re be - prised, you know? You know a thing is UNIDENTIFIED MALE VOICE: You ing rude. UNIDENTIFIED MALE VOICE: happening but it’s still crazy that it’s More? Agree - happening. And then, you know, I’m POTUS-ELECT: Yes. ment was made. Things agreed, in line still working on my screenplay, so UNIDENTIFIED MALE VOICE: What? with numbers next to items. We say, there’s that. Anyway. Nice to connect. POTUS-ELECT: Yeah. That’s what I okay, number one and then do number UNIDENTIFIED MALE VOICE: Not you said. one, and on and on. Now you say no to understanding. Do not me weasel talk. UNIDENTIFIED MALE VOICE: What? those things? Very angry I am making POTUS-ELECT: This isn’t that. Really. POTUS-ELECT: And also, let’s be hon- angry face. POTUS-ELECT: Look, I gotta be honest here, and I do est, okay? It was some of the e-mails What can I say? Kinda not mean this to sound in any way but it was also some of, you know, me, need to wiggle out of some of it. UNIDENTIFIED MALE VOICE: argumentative or rude or anything my thing, my speeches and what not Swindler. because I really do believe I have a and the way I do the things that I You are. To me, you lied many times. fine temperament. But see, here’s the was doing, with the connecting to the POTUS-ELECT: You sound surprised. thing, Vlad— voters and things of that ilk. Did you read my book? UNIDENTIFIED MALE VOICE: What UNIDENTIFIED MALE VOICE: Who is thing? The thing for what is this? this Ilk? End Extract 111016 00:55GMT

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Athwart BY JAMES LILEKS Standing athwart Hillary

LL my right-leaning friends in Minnesota—both Skepticons: “I still think he is, when you get down to it . . . of them—went for Trump, and they haven’t held What’s the word? Trump. That’s what he is. He’s going to my disinclination to take a berth in the Trump tweet ‘Sad!’ at someone at 3 A.M. and we’ll lose a military A Train against me. (By the way, can we call those base on a Philippine island. I hope I’m wrong, but I wouldn’t who got on the Trump Train early enough to get a sleeping mind being absolutely right.” compartment “berthers”?) We’ve turned the Etch-A-Sketch Lockerupicons: “I would rather see a tarantula in my upside down, given it a good shake, and decided to bond baby’s crib than Hillary in the White House. If that tarantula anew over the final repudiation of Hillary Clinton. bit my baby and then ran for the presidency, I would vote Whether you were a supporter or a doubter, your dark evil for that spider. And I hope that when it won the election be - heart has enjoyed the sight of some liberals taking the elec- cause people were sick of elites and insiders and wanted to tion like an Ikea bookcase hit by a semi. The brutal repres- send not only a message but a disgusting hairy insect, that sion of the Reagan years with the know-nothingness of tarantula would bite Hillary when they met in the Oval Chimpy Bush combined into one thick smirking bolus of Office, because then she’d know what our family has been malignity! America is doomed? Our feeling about their through.” panic is both cruel and refined, so naturally there’s a Ger - Rubicons: “I think America needs a Caesar.” man word for it. But however much schadenfreude you Trusticons: “I was for Trump from the start because he felt toward the weeping Hillary hopefuls as they watched was saying things no one else was. Marco Rubio is short. I Donald Trump paint over the glass ceiling like the windows mean c’mon. Political correctness, we’re just sick of it. of Grand Central Terminal during World War II, the rever- Trump believes in us and we believe in him, and while I sion of some college students to thumbsuckery of the literal don’t believe everything he says, I believe he knows that sort was even more delightful. we don’t believe everything he says he believes. What You heard reports of events like this: matters is that he’s on our side, and that’s why we trust him.” SELF-CARE DROP-IN HEALING PLACE This last category is the most interesting, because they’re For those who have been psyche-wounded by the election of going to have some disappointments. The press has been the Ochre Horror, the Susan B. Anthony Room in the Shirley reporting walkbacks in the Trump platform—they might Chisholm Wing of the Betty Friedan Building will be open for keep some parts of Obamacare, the wall might be a holo- medication and reinforcement. There will be stuffed animals, Play-Doh, pacifiers, small beds with bars on the sides and gram, the swamp might not be drained, but the crocodiles mobiles suspended overhead, blankeys, and a bucket of stage are outfitted with doorman’s uniforms, so you can walk blood should you wish to smear yourself and scream at the across the swamp by jumping from croc to croc. Also, moon. (A small, gender-neutral picture of the moon will be Obama is a good man. provided.) The press would love nothing more than leaks about walkbacks, so make of that what you wish. Keeping price Or, reports like this: controls on hospital aspirin but eliminating coercive man- dates and nun-punishing abortion funding—no Trump sup- PROTESTERS, PROTESTING IMMINENT VIOLENCE, ARE porter will complain about that. If there’s no wall but there PROACTIVELY VIOLENT AGAINST VIOLENCE is tougher criminal deportation, strict border enforcement, Several dozen masked people, protesting the imposition of and an end to sanctuary cities, few Trumpers will pick the fascism on America, joined up with the Committee to Destroy nits. Israel and smashed dozens of windows downtown. At first, police thought the riot was caused by Never Trumpers and They might be trotted out as brainwashed minions who’ll dubbed it Billkristolnacht, but the presence of many hammer- buy anything if the Donald stamps his name on it, but con- and-sickle T-shirts led them to believe otherwise. sider this: They realized that a politician, even one who came to the role late in life, says things during the election They have a name: bitterclingers. But what do we call and compromises afterward to accomplish what’s possible. them right now? “Never Trump” doesn’t work at this point, Which would make the most faithful voters quite canny because it’s like jumping out a plane without a parachute and about the reality of politics. shouting “Never gravity!” Here are some suggested terms: What was Trump’s song in the rallies? The Rolling Optimisticons: “Hey, I wasn’t for Trump initially; I was Stones’ “You Can’t Always Get What You Want.” Don’t say for Scott Walker. In fact I actually am Scott Walker. Now he didn’t warn you, sure—but don’t say they didn’t know we have to make the most of this, and maybe he will sign going in. And that was fine. Because it was like that great good bills. If he does join us for entitlement reform, a scene in the second Star Wars movie—Han Solo is about to Mt. Rushmore addition would seem a fair trade.” meet his fate, and Princess Leia says, “I love you.” Han says: “I know.” Mr. Lileks blogs at www.lileks.com. Of such emotion, great bonds are formed.

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Happy Warrior BY ANDREW STILES The Tiny Violin

E deserve Donald Trump. By “we” I mean Acela-corridor millionaires worried about income inequali- the entire class of political and cultural elites ty and North Carolina bathroom laws. What more could in this country who scoffed at Trump and Rust Belt voters ask for? W wrote him off from the moment he de - Democrats can’t explain why their incessant cries of scended that gilded escalator back in June 2015. Trump’s “Racism!” and “Sexism!” were not persuasive. Maybe it’s stunning, poll-defying upset over Hillary Clinton was a because they’re screeching to the converted and everyone short-fingered smack in the face to many people, including else has tuned out. They spent years attacking John Boehner many on the right, who had it coming, big league. as an unhinged “extremist.” Mitt Romney was accused of Maybe Trump will be a disaster as president and all his killing a woman with cancer and mocked for using binders to critics will be proven right. Of course, their track record on keep track of women job applicants in the hope of hiring one. Trump predictions is rather poor, so maybe he’ll continue to Liberal journalists wrote thousands of words this cycle argu- prove them wrong. In the meantime, it’s worth taking a ing that Marco Rubio and Ted Cruz were actually more “dan- moment to appreciate the magnitude of the comeuppance he gerous” than Trump. Now, they insist, Trump is the single has inflicted. greatest threat to civilization. It’s confusing, to say the least. Let’s start with Hillary Clinton. She was supposed to be Perhaps the most satisfying consequence of Trump’s inevitable, to go down in history as the first female presi- victory is the broadside it delivered to the liberal bubble. dent. Her campaign team was so confident that “everyday Members of the media establishment and their armchair- Americans” would rally behind her that they reportedly activist counterparts in the entertainment industry—a dis- popped champagne on their chartered jet en route to a tinction without a difference, perhaps—cannot fathom a “victory” party—at a convention hall with a massive glass President Trump. He used to be one of them, but they don’t ceiling. know anyone who voted for the guy. They’ve seen Hamilton After the race was called for Trump, venue staffers were and they thought Hillary’s references were on point. seen emptying out confetti cannons stuffed with imitation The media, who chased ratings by slavishly covering glass shards—a fitting homage to a shattered legacy. Hillary Trump’s every move throughout the Republican primaries didn’t even bother to address supporters after calling Trump and (to a lesser extent) the general election, now admonish to concede at roughly 3 A.M. one another about the dangers of “normalizing” a Trump Hillary’s downfall is so ignominious as to almost invite presidency. They’re debating whether they could have done sympathy, but not quite. Days after the election, Alan Cole, more to “convey the stakes” of this election—i.e., convince an economist at the Tax Foundation, reported via Twitter voters Trump is bad—but they’re unlikely to consider the that he had overheard a Washington, D.C., suit lament how possibility that maybe they’re not as influential as they think the “Clinton-connected people” his firm had just hired were they are, that they are the ones who are out of touch. now rendered “worthless.” If you listen closely, you can The Saturday Night Live reaction to Trump’s improbable hear the world’s smallest violin accompanying a mournful win was an exquisite testament to this bubble. Days after the requiem. The Clinton dynasty, and its barnacled hull of election, the show opened with a somber Kate McKinnon rotten grifters, will not be missed. portraying Hillary Clinton singing “Hallelujah” by the late Don’t worry. Hillary will do just fine in the private sector, Leonard Cohen. It was a decent performance, but it was sitting on corporate boards, selling reverse mortgages on accompanied by that same small violin—on a “comedy” cable, and overseeing the Clinton Foundation’s transition. show best known for roasting politicians. McKinnon, it’s She won’t go down in history the way she planned, but worth noting, recently starred in the marketed-as-“feminist” she’ll always have her accomplishments as secretary of reboot of the Ghostbusters franchise, a film whose poor state, whatever they are. reviews and box-office returns were blamed on misogyny. The Democratic party suffered a delicious shellacking as The Republican party deserves no quarter, either, and well. Party elders had cleared the field for a boring grand- should be prepared to receive none. Trump won by throwing mother under FBI investigation for negligent mishandling out every recommendation put forward in the GOP’s 2012 of national-security secrets who hadn’t driven a car in post-election “autopsy.” The donor class thought victory decades and focus-groups her fast-food orders, and tried to could be achieved this time by nominating a third member present her as a candidate of the people. Party elites lauded of a political dynasty and offering a healthy dose of Paul Hillary’s platform of 21-point policy papers and contemptu- Ryan explaining why “Subchapter S corporations” are crit- ous attacks on her opponent. They tweeted “#YasQueen” ical to tax reform. at all her celebrity endorsements, dance-offs on Ellen, self- You don’t have to like Donald Trump to celebrate, and ies with Lena Dunham, and rehearsed references to cat hopefully learn from, the system shock his victory repre- memes and Hamilton, a Broadway musical beloved by sents. You may yet get your chance to say, “I told you so.” But for now, this is Donald Trump’s world, and you’re just Mr. Stiles is the politics editor of Heat Street. living in it.

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