“It’s more of the knee-jerk stereotyping that denies that Trump supporters have reasons for thinking as they do.”
This works both ways. “Working class” is usually thought of as white voters from middle America. But a black 35 year old single mom from an urban area can be working class as well.
8
In 2016 Trump's election was likely enormously helped by his opponent Hillary's characterization of people who live in trailer parks
as "trailer trash." Voters who live in trailer parks and in low income housing most probably do not care to be called "trailer trash" by a presidential candidate. Hillary's opponent, Trump,
most likely won much of the support of people living in trailer parks, etc. as a result of Hillary's insulting people who live in trailer parks.
2
But is Hardwick really representative of the thousands of Trump supporters who put on MAGA hats, attend rallies, and chant vile slogans? Don't think so.
32
"I fear for the Republic if he is re-elected."
I always respect Mr. Cohen but here I think his slow and steady prescription does not speak to the emergency we're in.
Americans are in their own little world. Half of them still think we're the greatest country in the world and that what happens outside America is not terribly important.
It's all very nice to be fair and respectful to the people who voted for the lying climate criminal Trump—and his party of lying enablers—but we have a VERY short window in which to salvage the world and the future.
We don't have time to wait for everyone to understand the obvious.
Mr. Cohen may fear for the Republic but I fear for the world...AND MY KID. My patriotism is no longer for America but the world. America has burned up the world's love. We must dump this dotard, get back in the Paris Accords, and work like hell to stand again for justice.
For 40 years, since the arrival of the Republican god Reagan, America has been in steep decline, with the exception of the invention of the portable computer.
It's all very sweet to be fair, but anyone who supports Trump really is a fool.
10
It's insane to vote for a corrupt billionaire in the hope that IT will do anything for the common people.
8
Anyone who would consider voting for the current occupant of the Whitehouse is not a "centrist" whatever that is. And I just dont see anyone on the right worrying about the feelings of "liberals" or "progressives" or "Coastal elites" or whatever else they choose to call those of us who love our country more than some morose political party. So let's just drop the "try to understand them" guilt trip. Trump is at heart a fascist and if you vote for him, whatever your reasons, then you are responsible for what he does to the country.
9
This is more liberal handwringing. It’s all our fault, isn’t it? If he is elected again, it will be our fault. Nonsense. When I find myself in a situation where I absolutely must address an aggressive Trump voter I find my only recourse is to respectfully, without emotion, say “I completely disagree with you.”
2
How dare anyone who supports and administration which has made traumatising families the centrepiece of its immigration policy ask for empathy.
Donald Trump is a one-trick pony: He sells casual cruelty as a panacea for all of the insecurities of white male Boomers: Worried about immigrants? Rip their families apart; Worried about Iran? Starve their people; Support Israel? Starve the Palestinians; News makes you uncomfortable? Conduct a systematic campaign of personal abuse towards journalists and undermining the truth; Worried about terrorism? Tar every single of the world's Muslim population as a potential terrorist; Economic issues? Bully our closest allies for nonsensical trade deals.
He offers nothing but wanton cruelty and everyone who voted for him knows that: He was just promising that if he was cruel to other people, they'd profit. Now that it's clear that he's not just cruel but astoundingly incompetent we go back to hand-wringing over the personal stories of the 'Silent Majority' who are, of course, a minority who just happen to control my public life.
7
Great - now we have to be nice to Republicans so their feelings aren't hurt. The Party of Personal Responsibility should stop blaming Democrats for making them feel bad, own up to their own snowflake tendencies, and get on with it without also empowering a narcissistic bigot. Anyone who thinks Democrats should coddle Republican feelings, lest the right make more terrible decisions, needs to reacquaint themselves with the concept of personal accountability.
4
It is easier, perhaps, to vilify people who are not your neighbors.
Maybe it is really that simple.
2
Okay, so what's the answer? Who supports Trump, and why?
2
Thanks for being one of the many who took the "deplorables" out of context to condemn Hillary, while giving Donald a pass for the many worse things he said during the campaign. Why would anybody vote for the person who said so many really disgusting things and disqualify the woman whose out of context comment was blown up? The secret might be in a close parsing of my question one sentence before this one.
2
I can suggest a possible reason why Trump's supporters seem so alien to people who cannot fathom how anybody could support a crude, amoral, greedy, ignorant and disloyal gangster. And how they might support an authoritarian and a dictator. It's because the Republicans long ago stopped believing in good public education for everyone, and never cared if civics and U.S. government were taught as subjects. You'll notice that Trump's supporters come from states where Republicans have been in charge for a long time, and wherever they go, they seem to think that not supporting public education was part of their conservative appeal. This lack of education is manifest now, and the diseased chickens have come home to roost.
2
When I think about people like Hardwick, I ignore that he was this or that in his life. Good for him. What I find horrible is that despite all the immoral things that Trump has done (and would do if re-elected) and the destruction he is doing to our democracy, and our water and air that Hardwick would still vote for hm anyway. Therefore by extension Hardwick has no morals, does not care about saving our environment and perhaps saving our democracy.
I always ask the same question: If Trump were your brother in law and he did the immoral actions against his wife (your sister) would you still like him? How about having him for Thanksgiving dinner and just spouting lies and just being a jerk?
4
You have provided more background about Mr. Hardwick. While I am not going to call him a deplorable, there is NO excuse for voting for a CRIMINAL over a Bernie or Sanders who by the way will be checked by Congress. (By the way - stop perpetuating the lie that Trump started that Hillary called Trump voters deplorable. She didn’t. In fact she said most of them are frustrated and left behind. She was referring to the Steve Bannon and KKK wing of his supporters.)
Stop acting like this is a normal election. The entire WH is a criminal enterprise and I want Trump OUT! We cannot survive another 4 years of his criminality. With the exception of Tulsi Gabbard everyone of the potential nominees would be better than the mob boss currently soiling the people’s house.
Why did he vote for Trump? Disdain for Hillary I can understand. She has been smeared, rightly or wrongly, for a long time....although she grew up a rock ribbed Republican.
I do not see any articles about the mob "lock her up chants" and how city after city of (almost all white) Trump supporters want opponents put in jail.
That said, and in an effort to be fair to your subject, I ask this: After all the empirical evidence of how Trump actually governed; his preference for Russia over US Intelligence, his tweets attacking people, his affirmation of Nazi's and White supremecist's, what does this hard working American success story see in Trump that moves the ball forward for all Americans?
Perhaps, instead of trying to prove a negative about people who dislike Trump, can he, in his own words, convince the rest of us why Trump is worthy of this countries top leadership post.
Also, please print the exact quote of Hillary about deplorable's next time for proper context. It was actually quite generous, but one would have to read about 6 to 8 paragraphs to understand it.
Hey Roger, next time you talk to this stand up guy ask him what he thinks about McConnell not giving Garland a chance to be a Supreme Court justice. Ask him what he thinks about GW Bush and the unnecessary, foolish war he started. I have a feeling he's a typical very right winger masquerading as a moderate.
Please, someone …. help me to understand how we get around "liberal contempt" & come up with a non-contemptible, persuasive analysis of the weakness of Donald Trump's positions. Please!
I really getting tired of pundits etc who insist that people on the left who can’t understand why people still support Trump and don’t want to engage with them will cause Trump to be re-elected. I don’t get that rational. How can you possibly understand how a person can still support such a moronic buffoon? We’ve seen 3 years of example after example of his incompetence. I’m in awe of anyone who can state they support such a clown. Somebody please reply to this and explain to me how he could possibly be re-elected based on my inability to engage with such ignorance. Will I be labeled a snobby liberal elite?
3
"If there’s one sure route to a second Trump term, it’s more of the liberal contempt that produced the “deplorables.”
Mr. Cohen is spending too much time on the NYTimes forums which are edited and civil. If he saw the stuff on other forums like Yahoo or even just watched Fox news or listed to talk radio he would see what real contempt is about. And it doesn't come from the left.
2
I have yet to hear why this man supported Trump.
3
Mr. Cohen? Mr. Cohen? Where do I start?
Let's start with your closing line which says; "It’s more of the knee-jerk stereotyping that denies that Trump supporters have reasons for thinking as they do. We know exactly how that movie ended in 2016."
Knee-jerk stereotyping. Let's go there Mr. Cohen.
The president said Mexicans are rapists. He said former president Barack Obama wasn't American. He told us who/what, in his eyes, Muslims are, and boy it wasn't a complement to Muslims.
Let's see. Calling Mexicans "rapists" and his ridiculous stereotyping of Muslims. Thank heavens those things don't rise to the level of what you, Mr. Cohen, considers "knee-jerk stereotyping."
With all due respect Mr. Cohen, you are an excellent example of why Hillary Clinton used the term "deplorable."
Argue behavior without making is seem like it's home to designated races/ethnicities, Mr. Cohen. If then candidate Trump had made that argument, he could have received my support.
But when it became a game of branding selective races/ethnicities with so much hate; when it became a game of ridiculous comments about individuals who may have some sort of disability, well, as the guys on ESPN would say to you, Mr. Cohen, my right honorable friend; "Come On Man!!!!!"
Or, as I would say to you; "Put on your thinking cap!!!"
1
Maybe it's a "Man in the High Castle" kind of thing where the good Hardwick beams in from some alternate relatiy.
There are loads of people who voted for Trump who are NOT Trump supporters. Many voted for him because, for whatever reason, they couldn’t/wouldn’t vote for Hilary Clinton.
Just as many say today they would vote for ANY Democratic nominee in 2020 because Trump is abominable, many voted for Trump, not because they liked him, but because they thought Hilary was abominable!
My point is that there are countless numbers who voted for Trump the first time that are itching to vote “for someone else” in 2020 if the Democrats put up someone who doesn’t scare the daylights out of them. For some Elizabeth Warren goes way too far. For others a Democrat who wants to basically open our borders or pay reparations goes way to far!
Give these people a candidate they can vote for and they’ll run to the polls on Election Day to vote Democratic. Don’t scare them away by vilifying EVERYONE who has become financially successful by hard honest work their whole lives. Stop giving the impression that anyone whose made a lot of money JUST MUST be a crook! Vilifying financial success will lead good people to “consider” voting for Trump again! Holding their noses and vomiting as they vote, but driven to it by being unfairly characterized as some low life because they made money!
That’s part of what this article is about!
4
I think what Mr Hardwick and other Trump supporters need to do is the old legal pad trick. Draw a line down the middle and list all the good points about Trump and all the bad. Especially after hearing Sondland yesterday the bad outweighs the good. Having a government a bit too far to the left for you would be a far better situation than this gang of grifters and cheats.
4
So... WHY would he vote for Trump? You didn't clarify.
I'm so tired of this misguided trope that liberals need to understand Trump voters. A lot of us liberals live in red states; we know conservatives and we know them well. They were disdainful and dismissive of liberals long before the Clintons came along. They have absolutely no interest in learning about the rest of us: not liberals, not women, not immigrants, not African-Americans, not gays, not Muslims. But, please, let's all drop what we're doing and make more of an effort to understand them. Been there, done that.
Most of them are honestly good people but their worldview is formed by the above lack of curiosity - and empathy. I think a lot of their frustration is that we DO see them and they know we do.
105
Heart warming story , no doubt, but says next to nothing about how the 2020 election will turn out. In the end, it will probably come down to Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Ohio (if it's a tight race) and pandering to Trump voters won't get the job done. If enough suburban Republicans (especially women, who have probably never been part of Trump's "base") and independents have had enough of Old Prez Blowhard, it's light out for Trump. My bet is that the race won't be that close. The Dems may win easily.
Why should I have to find common ground with people like Hardwick. If he cannot find a good reason to run as fast as possible away from Trump and the Republican coward party I have no desire to work towards some kind of commonality with others like him.
If I met Hardwick in a bar or restaurant after getting to know him I would quickly realize we had nothing much on common and I would be on my way. Np common ground. If someone cannot find Trump beyond disgusting and bigoted at best, racist at worst, why should I give them any respect?
7
Being one of the few who actually made plans to leave the country on November 10, 2016, and then who actually did, I don't have to pretend any of this is OK. This man is reprehensible as is anybody who can understand him. Good riddance. Hopefully I will die a Swiss citizen. The only chance the US is to collapse and break up. It failed.
2
Try for “Vascillating Trump” supporter, take three - and ask the tough questions of your interviewee, not us.
4
I'm going to side with Paul Krugman on this and state categorically that in my opinion it is impossible at this time to be both a Trump-supporter and a good person. I'd run out of space trying to list all the reasons, but here are a few:
Fascist wannabee;
Serial liar;
Cheats on his wives;
Cheats at golf;
Seems to be in Putin's pocket;
Can't negotiate and has been rolled every time he's tried;
Has betrayed our allies;
Has pardoned convicted war criminals;
Has seriously weakened our position in the world;
Has made the world a more dangerous place;
Is intellectually lazy and morally bankrupt;
Is utterly incompetent in all things;
Is a completely malignant narcissist;
Is a racist;
Has no compassion for or interest in anyone but himself.
That's a partial list, and it's all totally obvious. Spare me the sanctimony about being nice to those who support him. They are deeply flawed.
6
It's pretty ironic to hear Mr. Hardwick dismissed as an "old white guy" by so many NY Times readers. This line of attack manages to combine racism, sexism, and ageism in one concise argument. OK Wokester!
5
Many of us critical of those who supported, and/or continue to support Trump, would be more sympathetic to Cohen's argument if there was any evidence that these people have given any thought to what their actions have meant for tens of millions of their fellow citizens.
They ask for empathy and understanding while extending none at all. They demand respect when their words and actions have demeaned the office of President, and given power to a man whose only game is aggressive insult and swaggering corruption.
If they show some self-awareness and self-examination then we will be happy to extend an olive branch back. But they must take the first steps to meet half-way. Otherwise they will continue to earn nothing but contempt.
615
@Sphragis / I don't think self-awareness and self-examination is hot topics for Trumpvoters. They are just a different kind of human beings. Analytics isn't for them. Gutfeelings are and we all know where that took the nation.
40
@Sphragis - I want Trump out. But many of my friends who voted for Trump did so for two reasons: 1) They thought Hillary Clinton was corrupt and dishonest, and 2) they felt that Trump was standing up for them in the face of continued assaults by elites - in essence being called deplorable because they're working class (with working-class values). Every one of them is a good, caring person, who gives back to the community in some way. The fact that you disagree with them is one thing, yet saying there is no evidence that they have given thought to their views shows nothing, to me, but the usual contempt and disdain of the elites. Sorry if this offends you in any way.
14
@Milkate - let the Democratic canvassers knock on Hardwick's door and speak soothingly to him. It's not necessary for NYT commenters to mince their words. Nothing that anybody writes here is going to convince Hardwick to put away his MAGA hat.
Besides, anyone who lets random online comments negatively influence their vote frankly needs to grow up and stop making important decisions for spiteful, petty reasons.
Mind you. the right wing on the whole seems to be motivated primarily out of spite, "drinking liberal tears" and that whole business. I don't think people on the left want to see Trump's supporters suffer; they want to see them doing well, they want to bring them on board. But the right wing seem to take great delight in inflicting pain on their political opponents.
30
Those "deplorables" are our brothers and sisters. We, the liberal elites, got so intoxicated by globalization that we never looked back to see how they were doing.
They were hurting but we didn't care.
5
I have no intention of reaching out to anyone who offers only hate and bigotry in return. Why should I try to understand why anyone would support such a hateful liar who spews bigotry and tears families apart not to mention his unfitness for office and criminal tendencies! I can send them love but understand them I will not. The monster in the White House, complicit politicians and all the citizens being duped by ‘‘tis administration are destroying our country and asking me to understand them will not change that!
Not all the people who voted for the fascists were bad people. But they voted for fascists. The liberals' intellectual curiosity did not save the liberals from the devastation that followed.
2
I don’t grapple with understanding Trump supporters. I grew up surrounded by them and half of my family support the guy. They are racist, willfully ignorant, angry white people who think they deserve a handout but hate anybody else who they think is getting one. They love Trump because he is the embodiment of everything they are—greedy, narrow-minded, smug, arrogant, and self-entitled. You know, the “real Murica.”
5
Yup - it's always up to Democrats and liberals to work on better understanding the poor, sad, misunderstood conservatives. How does one come to terms with the brainwashed by hatred? How does one come to terms with racists?
Sorry, I don't buy it. Trump voters are now a brainwashed cult - and I am not going to waste one second of my time trying to understand them. The willfully ignorant don't deserve respect when they are supporting a person with such horrendous values.
Oh yes - Hillary had far more votes. Do YOU think that the election results are legit? I don't.
5
Nonsense. No quarter for *anyone* who thought this was a good idea. Trump was (and continues to be) a narcissistic, misogynistic, serial lying, policy-know-nothing, insecure, petty bully jerk who only found his way into the WH because of a critical mass of low-consciousness voters with horrific judgment made it so.
Like the invasion of Iraq.... I'll never "get over it" and I'll never let it go.
2
Trump is a racist (e.g., inter alia, Obama's birth certificate, "most Mexicans are racist," Stephen Miller in power in his administration).
Trump is a misogynist (e.g., inter alia, rating women on a scale of one to ten; calling women dogs).
Trump is an unindicted sex offender (e.g., inter alia, multiple accusers, Trump bragging on tape about habitual sexual assaults, bragging on radio that he barges in on undressed beauty contestants, including teens, saying he would be dating his own daughter with the great body).
Trump is a crook (e.g., inter alia, Trump U and racketeering fraud, using his office to promote his own hotels, forcing taxpayers to pay for Mara Lago and other Trump properties).
Trump is a compulsive liar (I have lost count of the tally--how many thousands of lies while in office?)
So those of us who have a serious problem with Trump voters lack curiosity? Mr. Cohen, I grew up in the deep south. I don't need to have curiosity and compassion for people who voted Republican because of the Southern Strategy, okay?
Whatever they want to say about change, whatever, the bottom line is, that basic human decency is unnecessary in the minds of Trump voters. They do not care enough about it to abstain from empowering a monster. There isn't a lot to be curious about. Sorry.
3
I understand the want and even need to connect with folks across the 'big divide'.
However, Mr. Cohen seems to find it easy to ignore some of what I consider truths, however inconvenient they might be:
If you support a bigot, you're a bigot.
If you support a racist, you're a racist.
If you support an anit-semite, you're a an anti-semite.
If you support a white nationalist, you're a white nationalist.
Let fly the indignant, "I voted for the economy!" or "I voted against Obamacare" or "He'll make the trains run on time!" or "I only read playboy for the articles!"
Baloney. And until and unless a Trump supporter understands, addresses and repudiates what he or she previously supported, I have no use for them. I understand all to well what they stand for.
3
You have to give it to the Times for giving equal time, with Roger trying to be diplomatic and at the same time this editorial is running.
Trump Is Doing Exactly What He Was Elected to Do
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/11/20/opinion/trump-impeachment.html
What sayeth you about this Roger?
Though Hardwick wad a motivated hard-worker and would have probably been successful his big break was a scholarship. So why doesn't he want everyone to get a scholarship like he got and is similar to what Warren is proposing.
Unrelated: "Trump has released Keynes's animal spirits ...?" Trump is about as anti-Keynesian as you can get. There is not much hopes of the economy continuing to thrive with the burgeoning national debt and increased trade deficit among other economic problems created by Trump.
What does Hardwick make of this Ukraine matter. Is his contempt for liberals allowing him to see the truth?
Dems might not think of Trump voters as deplorable, if Trumpers didn’t believe in outright falsehoods. Fox broadcasts the lies. They magnify and repeat the lies. I meet great solid good likable people who I think I ‘get’, until, perhaps, days later they start with the Fox-Trump-NRA bull. Then I’m shocked that I mis-read them. How did I miss their racism, cynicism, anger, their refusal to acknowledge their hero has flaws. They talk about him as if he were the second coming and believe he’s being picked upon unfairly. Those of us who live near Atlantic City have known for decades that he’s a crook. We know people who were cheated. Now you ask us the look at the good sides of Trump supporters. We have, we do, we want to like them. But they make it very hard. Don’t blame liberals for republican transgressions.
2
while I agree that we need to listen to Trump supporters. It is difficult, in part, because our president and many of his supporters, continues to call anyone who disagrees with him as "human scum" or worse,
It is difficult to remain civil in face of this.
This is sad for the United States.
4
What an absolute delight it was to watch and listen to the candidates for the Democratic party nomination debate - really, more like discuss - the critical issues of our day in an intelligent, articulate and civil manner. I see and listen to Trump on TV and his endless lies and self aggrandizement and I feel sick. I have no interest in learning why people voted for him in 2016 and why they would even consider voting for him again in 2020. There is no accounting for this level of ignorance no matter how wealthy or poor people may be. Trump is and always has been scum.
1
Received the book "A Warning" by Anomymous and the first 43 pages have scared the hell out of me. Totally agree with Mr. Cohen that the only way to succeed against Mr. Trump is to field a ticket which appeals to not only to democrats but also to independents and moderate republicans (yes, there are some, like me). Instead of blasting the Trumpsters, the democrats need to flood the airways with ads listing all of Trump's failed promises and corrupt acts.
36
As well articulated by other responses to this article, It's not about the non-Trump supporters inability to empathize with the Trump supporter, it's the Trump supporters inability to empathize with non-Trump supporters. Your view of action-reaction is reversed. And how much Is this malevolence by Trumpers fueled by conservative media, the chicken or the egg?
1
It's not that I have contempt for people I don't know. Quite the contrary. I was raised among these people; they were my neighbors, teachers, classmates, bosses. Some of them were extended family, other joined our family because of marriage (usually in-laws, thank god!). And they are not a monolithic group. Mostly, they were upper middle class, white people who valued taxes, and viewed poverty and misfortune as character flaws that could be overcome with working hard. And possibly prayer. Many were quietly racists; but some fairly loud and proud in their racism. Some that I've know (most of the extended family and in-law variety) have never met a science or history book they didn't let collect dust but believe every outlandish conspiracy theory tweeted by some out-there celebrity and hang on every word of Rush and Alex. Oh, yeah, and they travel on the racist spectrum as well. Then there are simply those that only care about being entertained, and Trump is entertainment for them so the rest really doesn't matter.
They aren't deplorable because of how they talk, look or where they live. We do know them. We do understand them. For many of us we chose to separate ourselves from them years ago because being around them could result in eventually becoming them. Some of my friends left their deplorables as a matter of survival.
2
I find this an admirable attempt to remind Democrats that they should not neglect the needs of the people who do not currently support them. But we should also remind those people who do not support them that more often than not, it is the Democrats who are fighting their fight--for better schools, better healthcare, a better environment, more progressive tax codes, and on and on. And they do all this for people for don't support them because it is the right thing to do. It would help if all those Dem-haters out there stopped spewing ridiculous lies and conspiracy theories and started being a little more thoughtful. Maybe the left would take them more seriously if Trump supporters knew more than the lies and propaganda they are fed on Fox News. A recent poll found that people who watch only Fox news actually know less than people who don't watch any news! I'm not being nasty here. It's not possible to have a conversation with most Trump supporters because they have their own set of "facts" that don't resemble reality. You can't have understanding without some common starting point. So, yes, while the situation presents a challenge for the left in the next election, the solution has to come from both sides or we are all doomed.
4
I am glad this gentleman made use of the good luck moments in his life, transcended the bad luck, and has had success and loads of cash. That is the American Dream. This is a very different life story than other Trump voters in 2016. So, Trump voters are a heterogenous group. Some are rich by birth, some by hard work, some are middle class, some are poor. This sounds like the heterogeneity one sees in all major US groups. Mr. Trump has a long history in the US media, not much of it flattering. Frankly, many of us were aware of his shady business deals, mistreatment of contractors and women, and generally low-ethics and morals approach to life. But, for decades now the Right has portrayed the Left, and particularly Hillary Clinton, as the source of all society's problems. Frankly, both sides have painted the other in broad brushstrokes that obscure as much as they reveal: the Left feels the Right are deplorables, the Right says the Left are baby killers, pedophiles, and snowflakes. But, the Right voted for a known con man over a woman they say is a criminal. The Left voted for Clinton, a seasoned political veteran on whom no charge of malfeasance has stuck despite decades of legal scrutiny, over a man with a long history of malfeasance of various types. Go figure.
2
It is so discouraging to read the excoriation of democrats towards republican voters without recognizing the damage that republicans have wrought. For me personally, the emotions run the gamut of anger, empathy, sadness and yes, contempt. What are we to feel? We are being asked daily it seems to “try and understand” the hows and whys of their beliefs yet never have I ever heard the same request for republicans towards democrats. My journey towards contempt for the deplorables began with Newt Gingrich, et al as they lectured democrats about our values, character, patriotism, etc. only to witness them play a hypocritical game. How are we to process their words and deeds across a spectrum and not end up at contempt. There is the saying that “we train people how to treat us”, republicans have been training the public for nigh to long to not end up at contempt. It’s the lying, cheating and stealing over the last 20+ years so that we are left with nothing but contempt for them trying to drag us down into their cesspool. If republicans can’t understand why people speak of them with contempt and disdain it’s a failure on their part to self evaluate their behavior. I have come to the conclusion that there are just some really petty, ugly, mean people and if they are called deplorable so be it, they brought it on themselves.
2
Sorry about the blindness. I am simply incurious, as you say, about someone who could vote for the guy who could shoot someone on 5th Avenue and not lose that voter. Mr. Hardwick knew exactly what kind of person Trump is, and voted for him anyway. I am unimpressed by his alleged open mind.
5
While I admire Mr Cohen's even-handedness, I reserve the right to consider some of President Trump's supporters "The Deplorables," for I consider anyone who continues to insist that President Obama was born in Kenya, that he is a Muslim, and that he plotted to bring Sharia law to America, does indeed merit the term deplorable. Last I checked, this seemed to account for about one third of all of President Trump's supporters, and I think it reflects a lack of critical thinking and a conscious and intentional disregard for facts.
That is deplorable.
If they will stop holding to that view, I will stop calling them deplorables.
But not until then.
5
There is no point in backing candidates who actively oppose political outcomes you prefer. The only way political change will come to this nation is after sustained effort. Change will likely take more than one election cycle, so there is no time to lose.
Progressives must take honest stock of what is arrayed against them. The factors include at least: corporate money; a stacked court; a hostile media, including even liberal media like the NYT; a terrified electorate; and time itself. The longer progressives wait, the more economically debilitated and politically helpless ordinary Americans become.
Warren and Sanders need to act as the natural allies they are. Their cause has been thrust upon them by circumstance. They can respond best by putting rivalry aside, and acting together.
Warren and Sanders should agree, or flip a coin, to determine which will continue as the progressive contestant for the Democratic nomination. The other should pledge to lead a third party progressive candidacy if Democrats do not choose a progressive. If the would-be Democratic candidate is bypassed for the nomination, then that one should become the third-party VP nominee.
Trump's presidency is a national emergency. A more urgent, continuing, and consequential emergency is the lack of any political party to represent the interests of ordinary Americans. Start fixing that now. Tell Democrats, and the nation, that their choice is to pick a progressive, or lose. Politics ain't bean bag.
2
The problem is that this man knowingly voted to vandalize this country in 2016, and is threatening to do so again in 2020 unless he gets it all his way. And he can make that threat because the day after the election no matter who wins he will still be rich, and he will still be a white male. He will not bear the burden of his choices. Fair enough, we all are free to make our choices. But rather than point out this obvious dodge you spend two columns kowtowing to his fantasy that because he is rich and successful his way should count more than the way of the people who have worked just as hard but for a variety of reasons have not become wealthy. That is the problem; you Mr. Cohen are using your column and your voice to comfort the comfortable and tell everyone else to shut up and go along with what they want or else.
4
Roger, I am a big fan. But I think your liberal vs. conservative construct is not accurate.
First, just a word on Mr. Hardwick. After your first column, I was curious enough to look him up with the thought that I might reach out to him (decided that might not be appropriate). But I did find that he has an interesting background and one part you left out, his adoption of a child and his support of the foundation from which he and his wife adopted the child, was touching.
I certainly bear him no ill will. but it baffles me how he can even consider to vote for Trump again--no matter who the Democrats put forward. Having a president who is a racist, pathological liar, who acts above the law, deliberately seeks to divide the country, demeans people on a daily basis, brags about assaulting women, separates children from their families, takes innumerable actions and makes statements that support our adversary and ruthless authoritarian Vladimir Putin, and denies climate change while rolling back environmental laws designed to protect health and the viability of life on the planet. Mr. Hardwick mentioned none of this in your last piece, only that he has concerns that Trump 'can't manage people.'
This is not a liberal vs. conservative divide. It is a cult of personality being abetted by America's enemies, that--if not recognized and extinguished for the danger it presents -will surely destroy us.
2
What, exactly, are the reasons for supporting our president. Oh, forgive me, there are so many. Let me see if I can give you some:
His humility is unbounded; his eloquence is memorable; his empathy for the poor is limitless; his treatment of immigrants is the most humane ever in the annals of our country; he tolerates those who disagree with him is endless; his regard for the constitution is unmatched; his rallies are the examples of measured and controlled behavior for Americans; he never lies; the people he has hired are the best, except for the ones in jail....etc., etc., etc.
There are just so many reason for voting for this depraved, indecent human being. Wasting time talking to people like Mr. Hardwick does nothing to advance any real feel for what a vacillating Trumpster might or might not feel. He, simply said, after three years of this depravity, should not be vacillating at all. The fact that he is and is not convinced of the inhumanity, which is at the heart of this man, is discouraging.
I think Mr. Hardwick is out of step with 70 to 80 percent of the rest of the country and I hope he lives to rue his 2016 vote, notwithstanding his rise to the real elite of the country. Perhaps he would like to share his tax returns with us, Trump certainly won't.
2
The devil has the country in its grip with a strangle hold.
The only way to break the strangle hold is to convince Trump supporters that he is a dangerous fraud.
This is the job of the democratic and republican candidates.
Yes, I said Republican candidates because they could do their country an enormous service by exposing Trump to the electorate.
Michael Bloomberg, a former Republican and successful business man is perfectly placed to reveal the truth about Trump.
Both the campaign and the impeachment hearings could very well save the country from another dangerous term by Trump.
1
Trump is president of course because he earned more electoral votes than Hillary in 2016, but Hillary proved to be a remarkably weak opponent to Trump with a history of some disturbing personal characteristics.
Hillary's husband, President Bill Clinton, had an undeniably serious problem with women and Hillary defended Bill's women problem in ways which must have seriously sabotaged her own chance of
being elected president. She infamously called the women accusing Bill, "trailer trash". One difficulty with calling people is that it in effect bad mouths a huge number of lower income voters. She also famously trashed Moniker Lewinsky.
Hillary went on to run against Trump on the principle platform of being the defender of women's rights, despite her history of bad mouthing low income women and women who were her husband's young female victims.
Hillary's extraordinary history of bad mouthing women should be mentioned when discussing Trump's victory over Hillary. Millions of men and women simply could not vote for Hillary, and Trump was the alternative to Hillary. But presumably Trump will not be running against the deeply flawed Hillary in 2020.
2
"this abandonment of curiosity, this rampant intolerance, this blindness, increases the likelihood of Trump’s re-election."
So you're describing NYT readers here, and not Fox watchers ?
Oh yeah, that's right, I forgot. Trump is in office because of liberal intolerance and the excesses of the PC language police.... It has nothing to do with the Fox bubble and the new GOP mantra, "Greed is Good, Corruption is Opportunity, and You Can Forget the Rest"
Just ask your Trumper friends to identify the most aggregious thing of which Trump is accused based on testimony or documented evidence, and ask them to deny or defend it.
The conversation will stop there, as you will find that they can't point to anything specific because they don't know, they don't pay attention to the testimony or mountains of evidence aginst Trump. They don't want to know.
I'll admit I have a hard time accepting the total refusal of the GOP & Trumpers to engage in any good faith debate, which is impossible with people who refuse to pay attention to the facts.
3
Thank you for your Part 2 column regarding Chuck Hardwick. What you say about the knee-jerk reaction by elements of the left deserves to be heard. Trump supporters have a genuine grievance with Washington. The powerless in our society are almost totally ignored and lied to by the government except during exceptional times (e.g. Roosevelt’s New Deal and Johnson’s Great Society.) Money rots both parties, Democrats as well as Republicans. Honorable and selfless people are rarely successful in defeating monied interests in any legislature, state, federal and local. We just get by for the most part. Good laws are watered down, made ineffective. Bad laws are given misleading and shameful names. We need to wise up, grow some courage. Show that we really do work towards justice for all. Only then would Trump supporters begin questioning the wisdom of what they are doing.
1
I think the problem is that Democrats are frustrated that we can’t “get through” to Trump supporters who get their news filtered by Fox News and other right wing outlets. Brian Stelter highlighted the chyrons used yesterday by MSNBC, Fox (their news division no less) and CNN. Different worlds. It’s not that we are elitists that look down on them. It’s that it is impossible to convince them to change their minds that Trump is bad for them and the country when their core beliefs about current events are being manipulated by news outlets and politicians (Nunes, Jordan) who have no regard for the facts. How do we break through?
1
Cohen's conflation of Trump's white, blue-collar Base with an old, rich, white guy is pretty lame, but I'll let that part go.
The Democrats are betting large, here. IF they can retake the White House AND continue to spew contempt on the Base, then the latter's humiliation and irrelevance will be complete. The tax cuts and judges are window-dressing for the main event, the culture war. Both sides want to win the culture, but the Right has demographics working against it, the old and white dominance is slipping away. The Left is gearing up for a Hail Mary move to finish it off "once and for all".
Too many of my older friends are just like this. Self made old timers who came from nothing and knocked the ball out of the park. They like Trump because he is every single thing every politician in their lifetime is not.
They laugh at his schtick and readily admit that he is full of beans, but they consider it harmless. They'd like to give his methods a try.
It is easy to be amazed at the gullibility of such folks, but when you think about it they're the ones who always get duped. Its an oddity how a person take their scant talent as far and as fast as they can only to lose all the lucre when they fall for some hairbrained scheme.
This is not a new dynamic its just that there are a whole lot more of these type of voters than there are sane ones. In the end, however, they are a dying breed.
If conservatives are counting on the votes of voters the age of Hardwick to carry the future they will have a short one...
As I've said, the craziest people on the Right, in general, are the dumbest, while the craziest people on the Left are the smartest. The Right, absent the white-nationalist violence this paper loves to cover, seems a slew of miffed graybeards. The Left, because of the above-mentioned fact, seems theoretically more dangerous.
Yes, I'm aware of the realities of this presidency and the Republican Party's shamelessness. Nonetheless, look at the increasing influence of the activist/intellectual Left -- if one were to try to effectuate their policies, the result would be calamitous.
Neo-socialism is driven by feelings of unfairness, fragmentation, a desire for solidarity and dignity, for the poor/sick to be cared for. People arrive at this view via their emotions. Most have no idea how prosperity arose, how modern societies-of-surplus came to be. Leftist intellectuals haven't the faintest clue, either; their explanation, without fail, is "exploitation."
That said, there is hope for such people, most of whom are self-aware and capable of critical thought. Many, maybe most, Trump supporters don't really know why they support him. And because they don't know why they support him, the reasons they give aren't the reasons. Thus, asking won't reveal the answers. Hardwick is not among them, and listening to him is, I guess, important. But many Trump supporters are oftener more like Julian Jaynes's "bicameral man," to slightly overstate it. Sleepwalking, they were led into Trump's arms.
I never see conservative articles on how to better understand liberals. Never.
I agree with engaging in dialogue. Members of my family who voted for Trump engage in ridiculous Fox-inspired conspiracy theories. They are unmoved by logic.
1
So now we liberals stand accused of contempt for the 1 percent, in the person of a somewhat obtuse rich guy who was either conned by Donald Trump or simply wanted to stuff his bank account some more. Either possibility, in the case of an educated person, is contemptible.
1
Anti-Trumpers cannot call some Trump supporters deplorables. Trump supporters call anti-Trumpers all sorts of deplorable names, both accurate and totally inaccurate, and this is encouraged.
If this name-calling should stop, it should stop on both sides. For one side to stop while the other side continues is a strategy that has been tried and has only limited success. It shows the name-calling side that the other side can be bullied and is therefore weak and worthy of being bullied.
The dislike of being called deplorable is largely a feigned excuse to justify name-calling.
Mr Cohen, this is ridiculous. It's fine that you like this man, but we don't have to cater to his wishes to choose our next President. There is FAR more contempt of liberals and progressives coming from the Republicans and Trump supporters than there is of Trump supporters. And the idea that we have to somehow dance around the feelings of people who are still interested in supporting Trump is both unfair and extremely limiting to our interests in choosing a good President.
2
I don't understand how the title of this article is related to the content - where is there any "vacillation"? He is a Trump voter, content in his snug isolated world, and immunized against facts.
1
Republicans need a safe space? Talk about snowflakes! Anybody who voted for Trump can never complain about common decency in politics ever again. Nor can they ever demand it from their opponents. They have lost that argument.
2
Hardwick’s dad is just the kind of American Warren has in mind when devising her various plans.
I think I understand Trump supporters. They feel aggrieved, blame others for their supposed injuries, and see Trump as their champion. They are mistaken but continue, despite mounting evidence to the contrary, to prefer self affirming fiction over fact. Sadly, Trump IS contemptible. The whole situation—racism, xenophobia, scapegoating, bullying, etc. ascendant, ignorance, incompetence, and corruption in command—is deplorable. Trump and his misguided minions are responsible.
Please, Mr. Cohen, do not buy in to the notion, promoted by Trump and Co., that my ‘condescension’ in acknowledging the facts makes me responsible for them.
Your time and energy would be better spent encouraging those enthralled by Trump to shut up and listen to Elizabeth Warren.
"We know how it ended in 2016".
Do we?
Bipartisan Senate findings on Russia meddling in 2016 election:
""In 2016, Russian operatives associated with the St. Petersburg-based Internet Research Agency (IRA) used social media to conduct an information warfare campaign designed to spread disinformation and societal division in the United States...... [A]nd was part of a foreign government's covert support of Russia's favored candidate in the U.S. presidential election""
Sondland now testified to a disinformation campaign at the highest levels of the administration to blame Ukraine for the 2016 meddling in exchange for a presidential meeting.
Trump, Pence, Pompeo and Barr orchestrated this disinformation campaign.
Key players refuse to testify and key documents and phone conversations are being withheld in defiance of subpoenas by a co-equal branch.
Clearly Russia would benefit from such a defiance of the senate's findings.
That is treason and impeachment and removal by the Senate with all witnesses compelled to testify and key evidence brought before the Senate by Justice Roberts.
Otherwise a Senate trial is a sham and more like a Russian trial of political opponents.
Does Hardwick and other Trump supporters believe in the Constitution?
I have my doubts.
Prove it to me.
1
So you've found a Trump voter who doesn't share all of Trump's unacceptable qualities, among them: racism, xenophobia, egoism, extreme lack of empathy (also the lying, sexual assault...). Unlike Trump, Hardwick doesn't appear to have a cynical worldview in which people are inherently, generally bad. But how many Trump voters can you say the same for? Is it possible this is just anecdotal?
Since 2016 I've had many face to face conversations with my Trump-supporting parents and uncles and aunts. I've sincerely wanted to understand their worldview and how they came to have it. I've learned a lot about them as individuals. Unfortunately, I've found there's a lot they do share with Trump: cynicism, resentment, an individualism that results in a lack of concern for others and the community as a whole, mistrust and fear of those that are different or unfamiliar, fear of and resistance to change, a refusal to engage in critical thinking, willful ignorance about things that run counter to their current beliefs... More than anything, it's been disheartening and discouraging, this process of trying to better understand the Trump supporters in my life...
Also, what if, what you define as "the American dream" is not how the younger generations now define it? Does that matter? I have the sense that many people my age (30s) and younger, do not want "the American dream" that Hardwick wanted and achieved. We're wondering if it's led to a lot of the problems we're currently dealing with.
70
Mr. Cohen has brought in information about Mr Hardwick to give him more sympathy, but he misses the point. No one criticizes Mr Hardwick because he worked hard, walked fifteen miles to work, etc. They criticize him because he equivocates about Trump in an age when there is no equivocating. When Mr Cohen claims that Mr Hardwick is "fair and open-minded," I think that in this case Mr Cohen is not a good judge of character.
Mr Cohen apparently thinks liberals turn ordinary people into Trump supporters.
This is, to put it succinctly, nonsense. Trump supporters, by their refusal to recognize the facts of Mr Trump's behavior and their willingness to believe lies and distortion, at first baffled liberals.
Now, years later, this bafflement has become despair and contempt. Which came first, chicken or egg, is not a mystery here.
50
While I am sorry that you, "find the almost complete inability of opponents of Trump to grapple with who supports him and why to be deeply alarming," the fact is that we DO understand. What we can't fathom is why, given the egregious immorality and (I don't think I'm exaggerating here) evil demonstrated by Trump and his ilk, Mr. Hardwick and so called "principled" conservatives like him couldn't get over themselves and reject Trump. No matter how you look at it, it comes down to greed and self-interest. While I did not vote for them, I do not fault Mr. Hardwick to have voted for Reagan, the Bushes, McCain or Romney. But Trump is different. Mr. Hardwick's (and people who know better) inability to grapple with this is inexcusable.
77
I don't worry about the Hardwicks. I know guys just like him: hard working, college educated, managers in various businesses, and voted for Trump. He is perfectly capable of making a rational judgment about whom to vote for.
I worry about the guys who are uneducated and angry, who believe that the system is rigged against them, who admire Trump and will vote for him again because Trump sticks it to "the establishment." They love the way Trump ridicules the establishment "elite," the way he makes fun of the disabled, the way he tweets that the press is the enemy of the people. Unlike Hardwick, these guys are hopelessly incapable of rational political thinking. And are proud of it.
47
I think the negative reaction to your column is that it is difficult to understand Hardwick. Assuming that Hardwick is being honest with you, I fail to see why he is so hesitant to vote against Trump in 2020. This is not 2016 election when it was possible to fool oneself to vote for Trump. But now Trump has displayed in spades his cruelty, his incompetence, his contempt for the law and democracy, why does he even consider voting for Trump again. Any Democrat, including Warren, is better than Trump. This is not a policy issue, it is to save Democracy. So I just wonder how honest is Hardwick.
72
This man's blindness to the fact that Trump is working for Vladimir Putin, never in conflict with Putin, never critical of Putin, engineering the Russian takeover of Ukraine, helping Russia dismantle NATO, taking Russia's side against the U.S. military, destroying America's place in the world, letting Russia take over Venezuela and the Middle East and oil producing regions of East Africa thereby helping Putin corner the market on oil as he boosts Russia's gold reserves, means that he is quite simply incapable of seeing anything. It's useless to argue with a person who is color blind about what color the light is. I have met people like this. They see what they imagine and they like what they see. They're actually comparing the con artist Donald Trump, who never served this country in any capacity, to George Washington!
3
Roger, I'm sorry. I understand what you are saying; to defeat Trump we must better understand his supporters. But I'm tired of hearing this. We need to be more understanding, sympathetic. What are we talking about here? The man lies as easily as he breathes; he thinks his job is to watch TV, tweet, play golf and go to rallies; he offends so many so readily that we become inured to his childish behavior; he has turned the justice department into his personal lap dog, like a tin-pot dictator; we have a one trillion dollar deficit; there has been no progress on infrastructure; the department of education is a joke; the EPA and Department of the Interior are being run by lobbyists from industry; the State Department is completely demoralized; and now we learn that while Ukraine is finally getting it's act together, he was playing with them like a cat with a dead mouse. Do I need to go on?
Where do his supporters draw the line? When do they decide they've finally had enough? Just exactly what is it about them that I need to understand? How they could be so blind?
4
We can get to know each other till we’re blue in the face. In the end, the Hardwicks will always vote for LOWER TAXES.
5
No there are not "10s of millions" of Hardwick's out there. The guy is surely a multi-millionaire many times over given his background. Rather than write this tripe as a follow-up in which you pull the standard "liberals need to understand conservatives" why didnt you follow-up with him directly and ask WHY he would still vote for Trump? In fact ask him directly if it's really because of what all the tax cuts and deregulation can do for his bottom-line. Maybe then you'll be getting somewhere as to understanding what motivates this type of Trump voter.
3
Quote: "He does not rule out Medicare for all one day, and he thinks there’s a case for a wealth tax, but he’s convinced Elizabeth Warren’s program shifts the United States leftward too far, too fast,..."
No, this country does not need more moderates bought out by wealthy donors who refuse to 'shift the US leftward too far'. People in this country voted for Trump because he represented a change, chaos in government. It is unfortunate that this has turned into a cult that worships his evil deeds.
We need progressives who know how to get the country headed in the direction that will actually give relief to the middle class and the poor. Tax increases for the wealthy and corporations are long overdue. There are many problems that the US faces. We DO NOT need to procrastinate longer because, "it is going too fast to the left".
11
Cohen still doesn't get it, or maybe his own priorities are oriented toward plutocracy. People like Hardwick are not likely to support politicians or measures which benefit the great majority at the lower end of the economic scale. Trump is really their guy on most economic matters such as tax cuts and deregulation (trade war possibly excepted). Democrats need to appeal to those whose material well-being is harmed by the policies of Trump and Republicans. This is not Hardwick, whatever label is applied to him. Cohen seems to think that Democrats should keep appropriating Republicans' economic policies. This worked for Bill Clinton, thanks to the 2001 recession and subsequent stock-market boom, but not for Hillary. She did not lose by being too far to the left economically. Disparaging whites at the lower end of the income scale is certainly not the way to go, but that does not mean protecting plutocracy. In fact most Republican as well as Democratic voters are in favor of the measures that would reduce the wealth and income disparity.
9
Putting the political part aside: we have to quit stereotyping each other. This is why Fox viewers seem so crazy to us, they are fed a constant stream of negative stereotypes and they literally do not see the black, brown, immigrant, or liberal people working alongside them.
We have to avoid doing the same, even though sometimes it seems almost automatic.
I recently met an elderly white couple from one of the most conservative, whitest counties in America. I quickly judged them accordingly and avoided politics. But I was wrong about them completely; later they discussed their work trying to spread progressive values in their community. Turned out their hobby was going to demonstrations and public meetings.
Shame on me for that rush to judgment. Don’t write people off right away.
7
It is a trade-off.
Do the Democrats target the blue-collar Trump supporters with welfare (Warren, Sanders), or the white-collar Trump supporters with centrist policies (Biden).
For me, it may have to be a blended team.
My money is on Trump winning again, and crossing the peak of the US influence.
In any given election, there are a definite number of people who are single cause minded and going to vote for one part or another regardless. Abortion I sone of those issues. It would be interesting to poll Trump supporters, find those single issue folks and then talk to the rest of the folks whose reasons for supporting him are more general.
3
The day that Hillary Clinton called Trump supporters "Deplorables" was the day I knew she lost many working class and middle class voters and would lose the election. She stooped to the same level as Trump instead of heeding the warning from Michelle O'Bama about taking the higher road.
Cohen makes a good point (even though he may have used the wrong example to get there), elitist comments and attitudes about Trump supporters will not defeat Trump.
3
Plutocratically designed (ALEX) and funded propaganda (Fox) has convinced Trump supporters that their economic woes and life problems are due to liberal elites taking away their security and their happiness. They don't see that the real culprits are the Plutocrats themselves and the corporatist economic culture of the Republican party.
This has become entrenched in 40% of our population. Trump perfectly expresses their anger and so he is their leader.
Propaganda is effective. Advertising works. It has been a coherent campaign since before Reagan. Remember "It's morning in America"? What a great slogan. Brings joy without meaning. Trump supporters hold him in their hearts and feel better.
8
There are two primary reasons for the support of President Trump. One is that he supports a ban on abortion. The other is that he is a Republican which they correctly view as much more supportive of business and small business than any progressive Democrat. The Trump tax changes made this painfully obvious and have ensured his continuing support.
@sigmundk Trump doesn't give a fig about abortion. He very possibly bank-rolled a few of them in his lifetime. He tells you what you want to hear. He is not a Republican. He is an opportunist with no moral conviction either way. He couldn't care less for small business or small anything or anybody. Big money, yes! His money, yes, as the tax changes he got for himself and his peers show. The economy doing fine is not his doing. The economy enjoys the upward traction it has ever since Obama saved it from Bush and the Republicans. How can anybody be so blind to this amoral snake-oil salesman is beyond understanding.
Mr. Cohen: Your job is not have your readers understand Mr. Hardwick not to have Mr. Hardwick understand the falseness of his positions. Mr. Hardwick was able to prosper because he got a free college education. Whether his education was possible from the philanthropy of Wonderbread or governmental programs is immaterial. What conservative trump supporter has a proposal to allow all students the same opportunity? Mr.Hardwick worked for the pharmaceutical industry that reaps enormous profits based on knowledge developed from NIH, i.e. government, sponsored research. Yet did the pharmaceutical industry use the dollars garnered from the 2017 tax bill to lower drug costs or increase research spending? No. As a pharmaceutical industry worker does he understand the health threats from the current administration’s policies of gutting the Clean Air and Water acts and doing nothing on climate change? It is not us who need to understand Mr. Hardwick but Mr. Hardwick who needs to appreciate progressive ideas.
25
Cohen is wrong, at least in my case, that we don't want to know why individuals could support, or even be on the fence, about Trump. I desperately want to know. I keep asking when I can, but no one has yet to give me a good reason to think Trump is a better choice over ANYONE that ran in 2016 and I'd running currently.
Even Bernie or Warren. They at least have the nation first, and not their own self interests. My bottom line despair each and every day is wondering how anyone can even consider voting for him.
20
"There’s not much point denying that Trump, foul as he is, has released Keynes’s “animal spirits” in the United States." As near as I can tell the economy has continued on exactly the path that it followed under Obama. Presidents' influence on the economy is overrated.
5
Roger I think your taking one old white guy from Florida and pushing him as a "typical" Trump supporter is as much a generalization as any. 1 does not equal 63 million and it would be difficult frankly to generalize character traits in a Trump supporter.
The more troubling fact is, why they chose Trump in the first case. Here is a man who from most instances fails the general test which asks: would you let your kids to be adopted by him? In other words is he a role model to follow? In my mind it is a resounding NO! end of story. So my basic premise is how come these 63 million fail to see that character flaw which is so obvious to me.
That he won by 78,000 votes in 3 states does let me know that he won by a very narrow margin and the election could very well have gone the other way if a few factors had changed. The one glaring example was that 12% of Bernie supporters voted for Trump to spite their candidates loss to Hillary and the rigged Democratic primary system. That itself should give pause to anyone looking for an answer and a repeat of what happened in 2016 could very well happen in 2020. That is revenge voting.
As a liberal person I cannot fathom the Trump supporter but the last thing I would ever do is call them some derogatory name. However I do think that they have been snookered into believing that Trump works for their best interest. That is not the case and the long term consequences of Trump are just an economic slowdown waiting in the wings.
14
The difference between Trump supporters and everyone else lies in two basic areas: Rural influence and religious influence. One does not need to be presently rural and/or religious -- just influenced strongly by these. I know many highly educated suburbanites that statistic say should now be voting democrat, who are hard-core Trump supporters. Many hate Trump's style (a few love it), but they tend all to agree that American values (as they see them) are under assault by the Democratic party. There is probably too some unstated racism in this, though almost all would say they are not in any way racist -- which they genuinely believe is true. I personally am horrified by Trump and cannot vote for him in any circumstance, but I know so many people who are Trump supporters who do not fit the "Trump stereotype" that I know that the support he gets is genuine. Scary but true.
6
Hardwick’s “American Dream” is part of the problem.. the struggle against adversity is to have no safety net ... where freedom is the freedom of the sinking ship... every man for himself. The European model is today proving much more effective at producing social mobility based on social cohesion... and reducing inequality. For a country like the Netherlands to claim it has “the poorest rich and the richest poor” is something to be proud of. On almost every indicator of human well-being and quality of life it far out scores the US. What Hardwick and Trump represent is the consolidation of a broken system. When America learns to respect and admire the word “socialism” it will become a better place again.
10
"We are talking about tens of millions of such supporters. This failure, this abandonment of curiosity, this rampant intolerance, this blindness, increases the likelihood of Trump’s re-election."
I, a white male raised in NJ, spent a couple of my service years in the Jim Crow South. By and large I found white southerners to be fairly indistinguishable in most ways from the northerners I knew. But there was a significant exception that I think is similar to the knee jerk disapproval of Trump supporters.
That exception was the nearly universal white acceptance, and resistance to alteration, of the state enforced social and economic degradation of the black community. There was no apparent public or political turmoil over the issue. No candidate got elected by questioning or lamenting the Jim Crow status quo. It was as much embedded in the culture as the streams, rivers, and hills, are embedded in the land, not some regional DNA anomaly.
To me, bias against Trump supporters is their acceptance of his mendacity, cruelty, non-stop bragging, self serving hostility towards races and ethnic groups, bullying vindictiveness, and executive incompetence. It's hard to assume that one could embrace Trump, while not embracing , or admiring the nastiness of the man and his beliefs.
9
@sherm Amen. Where is the self-respect? Lie down with dogs......
There are several sloppy premises here.
Hardwick is a centrist. So what is a centrist, anyway. We all want to know because we're ready to vote for whomever that centrist will vote for. I was imagining some white guy in the midwest, working in an office. But they can also be Horatio Algers?
Trump won because Clinton made that "basket of deplorables" statement. Really? What about not having a message other than to promise another Obama term? What about her readiness to change her policies to suit the latest polls. What about "Clinton exceptionalism" which was a mild form, more subtle form of "above the law"
And Hardwick doesn't want Warren to change the system that rewarded him so richly. This tells me Hardwick isn't one of the basket of deplorables but one of the basket of ultra millionaires that are the natural enemies of an economic reformer.
So we should figure out the centrist Trump voter in order to win this guy over. So Cohen, did you figure out what it is in Trump that still captivates Hardwick. If you did, please clue us all in.
4
Mr. Cohen cited the wrong reader comments in this follow column. The compelling comments from readers were how could Hardwick for Trump for President when he would never consider hiring him to run a company. It just shows that there is a lot of work that behavioral scientists need to do to unlock the Why behind who we choose to vote for and then how we justify it.
And Hardwick's justification that Trump's election proves that he unleashed the animal spirits in the economy. Really? Then where is all the corporate investment?
Hardwick's case proves that it's our child self that chooses who to vote for and then it's our adult self that justifies it. A rational, pragmatic man wouldn't leave the keys of his company to Trump. But why then would he vote for Trump for President?
13
It's long past time we admit that "deplorables" is far too nice a word, a euphemism that is misleadingly and undeservedly kind, for the fraction of the electorate who so willingly, deliberately, and savagely act to degrade, demean, and erode the Great Experiment, the work-in-progress that is "our republic, if we can keep it."
7
Yes. Hardwick is an example of the American dream. Guess what? So is Elizabeth Warren. Her story is every bit as compelling. So my question is--why is Hardwick's story, and thus his political view, more compelling than hers? We can look at the Hardwicks of the world for the next year if we want but let's also remember that for every Hardwick, there's a person with Warren's type of experience and views not getting any press. Corporate power has a lot to lose if Warren or Sanders were to be elected and actually be able to enact some of their plans. Seems to me that's a good reason to be publishing stories about the Hardwicks of the world.
15
Sugarcoat it any way you like, but Hardwick is like most other people of means who support Trump: he’s in it for the money. Take away the giant tax cut he got this year, and what has Trump really done for him?
The economy was on a solid, steady upswing under Obama, thanks at least in part to the medical benefits of the ACA. There was a small bit of hope for people who were getting overrun by health costs—the very thing that has made Hardwick wealthy.
So, now he’s a little embarrassed by his choice of 2016 candidates? Maybe he can just take a pill for that. Even if the poor folks he used to hawk them to can’t.
13
OK, Boomer!
First, thanks for the opportunity to try a taunt designed to divide like-minded allies -- this time by generations and age or boomers v. millennials (an idea from the marketing folks to make it easier to sell stuff). Unless they sow divisions over concocted conflicts, folks might collectively see the same prize and demand a real representative democracy that treats all citizens as equal and ensures fairness, honesty, science, and security both economic and physical.
Second, it's absolute Boomer to focus on winning over folks who still need need to be won over, specially like Mr. Hardwick who needs to conform to the Smart Money Class now that he's arrived (via peddling million dollar a dose drugs from Big Pharma) he's a Trump man because when you ascend to the Smart Money Class, you check your conscience and soul at the door. Why cater instead of challenging him? The Mountain comes to Muhammad this time.
The smart move is the same that won Obama two terms: mobilization of blue voters, particularly those in states that actively work to disenfranchise Democratic voters. Trump got 77,000 more red voters to the polls in three states than the Democrats did blue voters. Dems let Trump -- plus a little help from Putin, Assange and a cowed media -- define and dump on Hillary, which meant a lot of blue voters didn't bother.
Turning out voters is a better bet than turning Maybe-Trump voters in the right direction.
Your fellow Boomer.
21
Why is it so many voters feel being too far to the left is a deal breaker but we keep electing extreme right wing candidates who are more extreme than their predecessors? I blame gerrymandering districts, stacking the courts with GOP judges, and deregulating media markets. This made it too financially risky to report the truth and alienating consumers by reporting the reality about the fossil fuel and health insurance industries, or why tax cuts, and politicians bribing voters by promising tax cuts, are bad.
11
I agree that there was a lot for Democrats to learn about who the 2016 Trump voters are and what they were experiencing to understand how and why Trump won the election. However, I don't believe those same reasons exist today. The 2016 Trump supporter, we have been told, felt invisible, forgotten, and left out of the discussions on how to truly make a better America. I don't know what the 2020 Trump supporter's psychology is, but it isn't about feeling forgotten, living in a "fly-over" State. It seems more like the need to stick with whoever and whatever, no matter what the reality of the situation is. And that is a much different and harder voter to reason with.
5
People voted for Trump because Hillary Clinton ran against Trump, instead of for herself. Most of her debate time was spent mocking "Donald," rather clearly articulating her goals or vision as President.
If Trump survives the impeachment, a good part of the electorate will vote for Trump again unless the Democrats put forward a candidate that can also appeal to the middle.
Please make it so.
1
I agree that the Democrats' view of the electorate is one of President Trump's strengths when it comes to his chances of being re-elected. However, I'm not sure that Mr. Cohen understands the centrist majority of the electorate with much more clarity. To centrists, Trump is the enemy who must be defeated in an election, period. The bad news is the candidate who will ultimately arise to this pursuit will apparently come from a list of Democrats who will need to be blessed by the Democratic Party, which has become ever more loathe to make peace with anyone who does not totally agree with them. Most of the country wants healing and they want to get back to the idea that compromise is quite a bit more than a four letter word. As for Mr. Hardwick's characterization by Mr. Cohen as a centrist I am confused. Perhaps relative to Daddy Warbucks this may be true, but today's centrists are the ones who elected Barack Obama for two terms, not the ones who would ever vote for Donald Trump.
6
The experience of Trump’s election has swung my political beliefs from a registered Democrat to a moderate/ independent. I’m ashamed of both parties uncivil behavior and lack of belief in the freedom of speech and hope in Democracy -which can only thrive in an open exchange in the freedom of ideas and varied beliefs - by all people regardless of race(white), age (old), and gender(male). Bias blinds.
1
It is reassuring to see that Cohen reads the comments and has rightly characterized them. The tribalism on view is very distressing. Liberals, please don't think you are changing any minds, which has to happen if Trump is to be removed either by impeachment or defeat in the next election, you are just causing thoughtful voters to give up and not show up.
4
This is a wonderful column. It reminds us all that when a society becomes diverse and divided, we all become labels not human individuals. With urbanization with its loss of neighborhoods and separation by class and income and race, the still lingering effects of the Depression when the most vulnerable lost a lot and the rich did just fine, with changing standards regarding sexuality, reproductive rights, protest, and other new cultural norms that are baffling and disturbing to many, there seems to be a natural and unfortunate need to retreat to the company of those you know and who coalesce around shared values that differ wildly from one group to another. Until there is a wider commitment to some national norms of citizenship, burnished by a all-encompassing excellent educational system for all, there is work for all of us to do to work out of our pigeon holes.
7
OK - so now we understand Mr. Hardwick and his background, which seems exemplary. However we have no clue as to WHY he voted for Trump. Can Mr. Cohen enlighten us?
11
@Mari He’s a lifelong Republican, who didn’t trust Hillary Clinton, and is certainly not an “Obama centrist”.
Trump voters call democratic voters all sorts of names all the time and accuse us of supporting Communism because they don't even understand "socialism" and how it works in our everyday lives in this country, from our police and fire departments, to our non-profit hospitals, to public schools, Social Security, unemployment compensation, job training programs. Even our public road system! The US Post office is supposed to be non-profit because the founding fathers felt that communication was important to keep a free democratic system functioning properly. In fact it is called the post office because it was meant for delivering newspapers ("the post") all over, especially to rural areas, to keep the public informed. That is also why we have public airways for radio and tv broadcasts. Many places have "public utilities" which are a form of socialism.
Just think, if all education required tuition payments, the education levels in this country would fall even farther than they have. Would you want to pay a fee every time you took your car out of your driveway because the roads were privately owned? If you had to pay for private security guards or if you forgot or couldn't afford to pay the fee to a fire department and they let your house burn down? There is a reason for e pluribus unum. Every man for himself doesn't work!
14
We should treat our fellow Americans with respect, for its own sake, not because we fear they will vote for a sociopath if we offed them. I find it incredible -- as in not believable -- that otherwise reasonable people will be nudged to vote for an abhorrent man because someone said something mean to them. In fact, this sort of thinking habors its own elitism, giving mythical power to coastal liberals to cast votes with mere insults and ignoring the agency of Americans who can think for themselves. Undecided voters are perhaps more clever than they are given credit. If there is a critical mass of undecided voters in a state, more political attention will be paid to the constituency. This is one way for struggling states to assert themselves at the national level. At the very least, undecided voters are heaped with media attention, including having their life stories published in the NYTimes.
6
The "animal spirits" Trump is liberating is the animal spirits of the scammer. A businessman should be able to tell the difference between getting ahead by honest good work and hard work at scamming. If the American Dream, the essence of the country that must be preserved is the opportunity to get ahead through hard scamming, the American dream becomes deeply problematical. The Sacklers worked hard and smart, and their work was richly rewarded. It may even be incorrect to call them scammers, but whatever they are is not to be admired -- at least not by lefties like Warren. But they did live the American Dream.
Hardwick was never a deplorable. He is more like a successful evangelical businessman who is convinced that the fervidness of his faith explains his success even though he knows others who are equally fervid but much less successful. He is not rich or powerful enough to be a plutocrat or oligarch. He is not enraged that his father apparently did not qualify for some sort of workman's compensation.
People who find ways to survive and even prosper within a given system often do not question that system even if it destroys many others. The system's bad treatment is like a fraternity initiation, something that one takes pride in surviving and ultimately regards as a good and necessary thing. Those who do not survive the initiation unharmed do not deserve to do so, and sympathy for them ruins the whole system.
17
@sdavidc9 "The system's bad treatment is like a fraternity initiation, something that one takes pride in surviving and ultimately regards as a good and necessary thing." Thank you for this thought. If I could run with it a bit, it also explains the reverence for "the old ways," "the right way"etc. It is the justification for brutal male management and parenting. "My dad beat some sense into me and I've come to appreciate it-now I raise my son the same way."And on we go
4
The real pity is that a voter in Kentucky has more power than a voter in California. I'm not suggesting he should have less! I would like equality, please. That is the main reason Trump won, not the snobbery or contempt exhibited by a few liberals. Mr Hardwick sounds like a good man and a heroically hard worker. And who could have known how bad Trump would be? Now that Mr Hardwick knows, I hope he contributes to a big enough majority to overcome the very unfair distribution of voting power in the Electoral College system.
17
Any label makes me both more than I am and less than I am. I believe that fully, and yet, it's hard for me to open my mind to "educated" people who manage to support Trump. It's a struggle to not label and demonize them. And, I ask myself if "they" would have the same generosity in listening to my point of view.
15
@knot nuts If you cannot apply the Golden rule to the misguided followers of Trump, there is no hope for a democratic solution. Only by finding our common humanity can we resolve this descent into emotionally charged reactions that guarantee a national collapse. Perhaps when the loss of confidence in each other manifests in the loss of confidence in the dollar, we will, like Venezuela, wake up to the realization that we are in this together.
It’s 2019.
Four years of endless articles about the Trump voters. Across three states he won by a combined 77,0000 votes.
That’s it. And Buttigieg is popular in the Midwest. If he’s on the ticket, Trump has no chance. Flipping around 26,000 votes for was each state would also happen if Bernie bots actually voted for the national interest instead of their own, and if non-voters get to the polls. Also, remove the barriers to voting, and cut out the voter restriction laws. The deplorables would vanish overnight.
14
@John Agree with what you have to say, John. Personally, I'm sick of all the genuflecting at the altar of White, Midwestern lunch-bucket Joes. The typical working class person is now Black and female. I'm way more concerned about reassembling the Obama coalition than convincing old White guys who are set in their ways and oblivious to their privilege of the error of their ways. As Bob Dylan once said, "How many times can a man turn his head and pretend that he just doesn't see?"
35
Vanish? How so?
"There’s not much point denying that Trump, foul as he is, has released Keynes’s “animal spirits” in the United States"
Cohen should get his economics right. Capex is actually down, R&D spending continues on a downward course, manufacturing employment is stagnant despite (or because?) of tariffs. Market concentration is up and productivity growth is low.
The only thing up is corporate stock buybacks after the corporate tax giveaways. Do you really want to call that "releasing Keynesian animal spirits"?
The same used to be about the Reagan period, but all the major innovations of those years (microelectronics, PC's, packet switching and the Internet) had been done during the 1970s.
The only thing Keynesian about the Trump era is massive deficit spending due to tax cuts for the rich and defense hikes. This it does share with the Reagan years.
21
Nice anecdote but that's all. Assuming he is not convicted we will see how much Trump suffers from impeachment after his trial in the Senate. The election is going to be very tight and Trump will have to replicate almost exactly what he did the last time. We know his base is reliable and will turn out. But the last time there were people who stayed home failing to vote for Hillary. If they vote, then the question is, will the base be enough? Moreover with nearly 20 Republican house members retiring how much will Trump help?
The story you should be writing is about a suburban white woman and black women in the south.
14
Trump has taken us far beyond the moment of the 2016 election. This is not about Hilary Clinton anymore. This about the playing field that allows different ideas to compete fairly to make sure ALL INDIVIDUALS get the same chances to improve their lives. Instead of that argument taking place we have one political party undermining the contest, cheating, to force the other side off the field and out of the picture.
If you vote for Trump and/or the Republican party you vote for that.
You can't vote for Trump again and say you believe in what this country stands for. Those concepts are in direct opposition to each other now, and will forever remain that way.
16
@Willow Amen and preach it...
1
And yet, Hardwick voted for Trump in 2016. An action I can not ever imagine taking, no matter how little I liked the alternatives.
30
@larry bennett Yes, some Republicans did not vote for Trump in 2016 out of principle, just as some Dems sat out rather than vote for Clinton...painful consequences.
1
@larry bennett
Please remember that many of us who voted for Donald Trump did so taking no pride in our decision and, in my case, did so only after seriously considering not voting for the first time since 1968. My only reason for choosing the Republican liar over the Democratic liar was my conviction that her election would have meant U.S. involvement in another Middle East war.
If the Democratic primaries produce a nominee who will not replace my health care plan with the inferior level of services provided by Medicare, who will not shut down entire industries in the name of clean energy, who is in full possession of the required mental and physical requirements of the office, and who will refrain from forcing private companies to adopt a new role as social service providers, I will vote for that Democrat. If not, I will stay home.
No society in history has survived the displacement of a dominant race/class being replaced by “others” without extreme violence. As disturbing as that thought is, that’s precisely where the United States is headed. White privilege is real, I can put on nice clothes and go to the most expensive restaurant in the country, order the very best appetizers, entree and a thousand dollar bottle of wine without the server or management asking me for proof that I can pay before serving my meal. In most mid size cities and towns a person of color could not. That’s a trivial example but it illustrates my point. Our dominance in this country will not be surrendered without real violence. It isn’t right and shouldn’t be but that makes it no less true.
16
@Tim to walk into such a place and be served certainly white skin would be an asset. However lacking the “right” clothes, hairdo accent, etc. Skin tone would not be adequate. There are many barriers.
3
@Tim Actually, no. Nonviolent social movements such as Ghandi's and Solidarnosc have at least double the chance of success as violent social movements. BTW, I already know many registered Republicans who assure me they will NOT be voting for Trump in 2020. Some even throw in kind words for the Affordable Care and Patient Protection Act (Obamacare) has made a difference for their friends or families. People can surprise you––and are often moving ahead of their "leaders."
Let's not be too quick to concede to our worst fears. If we want a peaceful society, we must work to increase justice and reduce economic inequality.
5
@Tim
Where does the "replaced by others" claim come from? It is the justification for the false righteousness of white supremacy or any class supremacy. It assumes that society is not based on the rule of law but privilege and it is not the description of any society that is so based.
In my mind, the equation is simple. After years of hurling derogatory terms at liberals, how can any conservative possibly interpret what is happening the same way a liberal does? They see it, they know what they see, but aligning their interpretation with that of liberals is more than they can bear. That would be tantamount to simply admitting, "you were right and I was wrong". In this climate, that is just not going to happen.
20
The Trump supporters want, no they need, change.
I think that is the problem. The Trumpers are those who feel that the distance between how things are and how they should be, just keep increasing. Corrupt, self-serving, or donor-serving, politicians are nothing new and they have never been interested in helping the middle- or lower class.
Trump told them he would change things and he certainly did. He also managed to tell them that he did it for them. He managed to make them believe him. That is quite impressive since reality is the absolute opposite. He is helping himself and people like him. The Trumpers are not among those.
But Americans have grown to have a massive fear of socialism. For generations, they have been told that socialism is the most terrible thing imaginable. Socialism would kill the American Dream with a snap of the fingers.
So the change that Warren and Bernie offers is not an option for them, they are Americans and real Americans fight socialism.
What Trump has given them though, is solidarity. They are a family now, the Trumpers. It feels so much easier to be angry together. Donald makes sure they are angry. He is good at that.
28
Ultimately the election hinges on the candidates, as it should. There is plenty of time for a Democrat to develop strong messaging and attempt to appeal to people like Mr. Hardwick.
In the mean time, I don't see the purpose in pointing the finger at people who are frustrated and impatient with Fox Nation. It's an easy gambit to produce column inches but it's not particularly constructive.
Cohen's portrait of the "real Hardwick" is rich in detail, but it doesn't explain much about why he thought Trump would be a good president. His father had a hard life? Then he got a scholarship and went to work at Pfizer? Where is the causality in any of this. What's the connection to a man who inherited millions from his dad who was already a real estate titan, yet moved into media and reality television in his later years? Cohen can't be bothered to ask Hardwick what he really believes, or what he likes about Trump. I suspect that more of Hardwick's own words would have many of us writing more intemperate things in frustration.
22
I find Mr. Cohen's plea for us to try harder to tolerate the intolerant among us to be unfortunate and potentially destructive. In 1945, the philosopher Karl Popper formulated the Paradox of Tolerance. I urge Mr. Cohen to read and grapple with it. Popper's ideas are vitally important and clearly relevant today. He wrote:
"Unlimited tolerance must lead to the disappearance of tolerance. If we extend unlimited tolerance even to those who are intolerant, if we are not prepared to defend a tolerant society against the onslaught of the intolerant, then the tolerant will be destroyed, and tolerance with them. — In this formulation, I do not imply, for instance, that we should always suppress the utterance of intolerant philosophies; as long as we can counter them by rational argument and keep them in check by public opinion, suppression would certainly be unwise. But we should claim the right to suppress them if necessary even by force; for it may easily turn out that they are not prepared to meet us on the level of rational argument, but begin by denouncing all argument; they may forbid their followers to listen to rational argument, because it is deceptive, and teach them to answer arguments by the use of their fists or pistols. We should therefore claim, in the name of tolerance, the right not to tolerate the intolerant."
28
I don't think the MAGA-hatted Trump supporters will have their minds changed by patronizing them, as this column does. I would characterize them as "gullibles" rather than "deplorables." I talk with relatives, who are Trump fans in Texas, often and I now avoid talking politics because they merely repeat talking points they've heard on FOX "News." Further, it has been three years since Trump was elected and I think the country is suffering from Trump fatigue. He thrives on chaos and I think Americans want to return to normalcy.
The media has a tendency to over-rate Trump's political
strength. It isn't what it was in 2016. Just look at Democratic victories in the mid-term elections, Louisiana, Kentucky and Virginia. Patronizing Trump supporters is not the answer.
18
I do try to understand the perspectives and motives other people who disagree with me. But I think it is fair to say that anyone who votes for Trump in 2020 is ignorant (to mean actually unaware of the truth, due to inattention or a reliance on Fox News) - or they want a radically different country than the America I believe in. I believe in accountability at the top. I believe in a president who does not lie, boldly and provably, to the American people every day. I believe in a president who puts the national interest above their own. And politically, I believe in a country that can do so much more for the average citizen than it does today.
For those reasons, I have little patience for making excuses for a Trump supporter. I can almost respect someone who votes for him from a misguided fright of "Socialism" that brings up images of gulags and food shortages. I can't respect the political opinion of someone who actually believes in Trump as a leader.
33
Point taken, Mr. Cohen, though I would disagree with your view that there has been an "abandonment of curiosity" by Democrats. In addition to the huge amount of energy required to document Mr. Trump's many abuses, Democrats have shown an untiring interest in trying to understand the minds of his supporters. Unfortunately, like the motivations of a mass shooter, the explanation does not spring from a well of reason or rational argumentation.
21
I think your byline "liberal contempt" is as much an abuse of terminology as is calling someone yelling out "lock her up" in 2019 a "conservative".
Somebody with reactionary behavior just needs a trigger and ... boom ... the hurtful words start flying. Multiply for groups. And that behavior is magnified by Trump, whose secret power has been to use strong opposiing reaction (c.f. reactionary) to grab publicity, propel himself forward, and bring others down to his level of reactionary behavior.
Your man Chuck Chadwick is an interesting, admirable, and accomplished person. He has enough life experience to understand the trend of reactionary behavior going on today, and choose whether to filter it out or take it personally.
14
Roger Cohen hit the nail on the head. The comments (unfortunately) bear him out one hundred percent.
In any group of human beings, eighty percent of the work will be done by twenty percent of the people. This cuts across social classes and income levels, and if you don’t believe me, try getting union members to attend meetings, or company board members to read their briefing packages before voting.
Democrats have a unique ability to antagonize people in the hardest-working twenty percent. Their ideology that all can be explained by privilege and skin color is at odds with the reality of most people’s lives.
It’s not that Mr. Hardwick is pro-Trump or even pro-Republican. It’s just that he gets tired of being vilified by freeloaders and social justice posers.
8
@Global Charm
Poor Mr. Hardwick. He needs to be coddled because he voted for an amoral snake oil salesman.
Has it ever occurred to Cohen that maybe we do understand Trump supporters and simply find them lacking? Could it be we heard their ideas and perspectives and found them wanting or groundless? Not every person on the left in this country lives in a vacuum like Cohen apparently does. Most of us have relatives and old friends/acquaintances that support Trump, and have talked to them. It just turns out they have no interesting thoughts or ideas.
36
Those of us appalled at both Trump's election, and the reality (even worse than expected) of his presidency are forced to confront the reality of that election, and how it happened, with two choices.
First - are we willing to risk four more years of him as the price we are willing to pay for the indulgent satisfaction of expressing our contempt for anyone who made the (yes, appalling) choice to pull the lever for him. They may be a minority, but they have a real, legal edge in the electoral college. Reality.
Second - is the satisfaction of expressing that anger and contempt so comforting that we are willing to ignore the real possibility of creating a bridge that might help us find some way to reconnect this country, and find a leader who can unite most of us.
As I read other Comments, and speak with friends, I am almost as disconcerted by "our team" and its willingness to take a huge chance on four more years of this by indulging the anger, as I am by those who enthusiastically support the dishonest, racist and criminally conduct of Trump.
We all get to choose. I hope we do so wisely.
10
Mr. Cohen, have you ever seen a Trump rally? I have long believed in compassion and understanding. But where exactly are these values when our current president is stirring up the base at his rallies? Leadership matters and I'll feel better about reaching out when we have someone else setting the national tone. And no, I don't agree that we need to try to understand these Trumpistas if we are going to win. Deliver the right message and figure out how to reign in the disinformation campaign by Fox News. That's how you get rid of Trump, assuming the Senate doesn't.
17
@Edge of Night
I think you may have missed Cohen's point a bit. The man he writes about in this piece doesn't sound like one of the "Trumpistas" you speak of (and yes, I know exactly the type). That particular group of voters will never change their minds.
Reading this article rather reminded me a lot of my mother, who also voted for Trump in 2016. A middle-class American Dream was a reality for her and my dad, who is now gone. Fiscal conservatism was something they took very seriously, though neither was beholden to a particular political party. My mother doesn't understand her privilege and probably never will, but she's not a greedy, hateful person. She's a conservative leaning moderate—an "old school" Republican. While I believe she's come to her senses about Trump, I know that there are many others like her who could go either way.
I'm a leftist, but I'm also pragmatic, and I believe it's dangerous how quickly both sides have taken to writing the other off.
4
I'm far from being a Trump supporter but many of these comments are proving Roger Cohen's point about animosity towards Trump supporters and the predictable backlash that will ensue.
8
@Louis, I've read many articles about understanding the trump voters and not having animosity towards them. Where are the articles in right leaning media about understanding those of us who lean left? We are vilified daily by republicans, trump and his supporters. They are relentless in their attacks and trump rallies show their complete disregard for his repulsive and disgusting rhetoric which includes encouraging violence against the press and people who protest him. Trump has destroyed any chance for civility among us as long as he continues his revolting attacks and lies and lawlessness.
I agree with the author that vitriolic, demeaning language about Trump's supporters will not help the cause of democrats in 2020, or increase the chance that the United States will survive this current test of our political system.
But I disagree with the premise that there are reasoned arguments that may yet reach "reasonable" Trump supporters. The President's contempt for democracy, for the rule of law, for truth and for any limits on his power has been obvious for 3 yrs. Those who are still supporting him are doing so out of a belief that if the republican party losses power now, they will be permanently rendered politically obsolete. The great majority of these voters are not persuadable -they are motivated by emotion; a belief that they are fighting for their political lives, and that any action in that setting is justifiable.
What this means is that we have to give up on them -for now. These voters will only begin acting rationally, moderating their party's platform and supporting democratic institutions again after they have lost, and lost completely. Until then, our only focus should be on rallying our own support and getting out the vote. Trump's 40% is immovable and uninterested in anything we would recognize as truth. Those of us still hoping to save democracy in this country need to stop wringing our hands and thinking that we could convince them if only we would improve our messaging.
12
"Still, I find the almost complete inability of opponents of Trump to grapple with who supports him and why to be deeply alarming. We are talking about tens of millions of such supporters. This failure, this abandonment of curiosity, this rampant intolerance, this blindness, increases the likelihood of Trump’s re-election."
Do you find the Republicans doing more to try to understand and appreciate the greater number of millions who voted for Hillary Clinton? Here in Colorado, at least, I experience Democrats making much more of an effort understand Republicans and not demonizing them.
Just listen to the impeachment hearings: Which side is doing more to describe the other side as deplorables?
24
@C Denver wrote: "Here in Colorado, at least, I experience Democrats making much more of an effort understand Republicans and not demonizing them."
This is probably one of the major reasons Colorado has shifted away from a Republican state and become a Purple to Lean Democratic state.
5
Cohen writes: "...this abandonment of curiosity, this rampant intolerance, this blindness, increases the likelihood of Trump’s re-election."
Curiosity hasn't been abandoned; it's been overwhelmed by an unjust, corrupt and cruel president who is nevertheless supported in spite of overwhelming evidence of malfeasance. What more do need to know about that?
Plenty of moral people are intolerant of the ignorant positions of Trump sympathizers because we are tired of being oppressed by a minority of Americans running roughshod over the better angels of our country. We want our country to stand for more economic equality, not less. That's not intolerance.
Mr. Hardwick's politics appear to be about what is good for himself, not about "good will" toward others. Mr. Cohen would push the country farther toward every-man-for-himself just to appease people like Hardwick. Saying no to that isn't intolerant or blind. Trump can be beaten without taking the country backward. He must be!
11
What exactly are you trying to prove, Mr. Edsall, by elevating this one particular man who voted for a corrupt, lying, racist. narcissist, wannabe-autocrat for President of the United States, and repeatedly insisting that the opposition party (which won a handy majority of the popular vote in 2016 despite the known fact Russia interfered extensively in the election) somehow placate him? Who is he anyway? He's not even all that typical of the Trump voter.
The people we are winning over seem to be suburban women. I'll take that, and I'll be happy to have a Democratic candidate who I think can communicate effectively with them. And I think that candidate is Elizabeth Warren, and if I change my mind it won't be because you have this thing about the Chuck Hardwicks of this world.
9
It's party first, country somewhere after for Trump supporters and tagalongs. They would never vote for a Democrat. It's a waste of time to court them. US has abysmal voter turnout.
A better strategy is to encourage the apathetic to register and vote!
9
Did I miss the part where it tells us why he supported trump?
11
@lisa
Hardwick explained that he was "mad at the media" for being mean to Trump as one of the reasons he voted for him. You apparently missed Part 1 of Cohen's love letter to the right, which showed photographs of Hardwick's MAGA hat and Ronald Reagan shrines.
Mr. Hardwick obviously is not stupid, and I presume not uninformed. He therefore knows that Trump acts precisely as though he were under the control of
Vladimir Putin. He knows that he has been credibly accused of serial sexual assault up to and including rape, that he lies continuously, that he is patently
mentally deranged, that he is a sociopath incapable of normal human relationships, including his own wives.
The fact that there are millions of otherwise competent Americans who are willingly blind to these facts is a tragedy which might yet end our “experiment
In democracy”.
11
I want a president who is not a narcissistic child. I can wrap my arms around our differences in policy. But Trump has destroyed all senses of decency in this country. His nastiness, name-calling, unwillingness to ever admit he is wrong, constant sense of “us vs. them” and completely self-interested behavior is what truly bothers me. He is the opposite of every value I want to teach my children.
So if a Trump supporter honestly admits that all of this is a problem but that Trump better represents their policy priorities, I will struggle to understand how they feel this way but I will respect their honesty. But Trump supporters who blindly ignore all of his atrocious personality characteristics are truly deplorable.
14
There’re many many people like that. They’re affluent, even somewhat rich, they did work all their life. They’re older and they’re white.
They vote “lower taxes”. That’s it. Because they know it’s “lower” first and foremost for the higher bracket and unearned income.
I don't think rational patriots can afford to waste their time trying to enlighten anyone who has yet to grasp the utter incompetence and corruption of Trump and his enablers. Such people cannot be a majority in the US. If they are, this country is in very big trouble.
12
Roger: We are supposed to sympathize with those who voted for Trump all the while knowing of his open racism, misogyny, and xenophobia? Tell me: do you sympathize with such folks?
12
If someone is going to hate all democrats because some look down on republicans, are they going to hate all women be ause some look down on men or all white people because some look down on people of color, and all Christians because some hate non Christians? Easy way out. Easy way to only vote for someone who likes like you, is your gender, religion and ethnic group. Voting is an immense responsibility and should not be done just because you don't like some of the supporters. If you are voting based on hatred of other Americans, again, I think you are wrong. The president is president of and should be working for all Americans. This isn't dancing with the Stars or a football match, this is about making our country the best it can be for all of us. Vote responsibly, for goodness sake!
5
Why isn't the author more alarmed at Trump supporters dismissing his critics as un-American, communists, or even worse, traitors?
Enough of the false equivalency. Trump supporters are a cult who deny reality, facts and truth.
14
I find it interesting that Hardwick, given his life experiences including support for civil rights, was able to turn a blind eye to the hate-mongering of Trump. Maybe the older, white, male Hardwick just doesn’t have any skin (or genitalia) to worry about... literally.
After decades of right-wing hate radio and other hate media... after decades of racist, misogynistic, and xenophobic politicians... I’m no longer willing to be nice, tolerant, and understanding of those on the right — be they Trump voters, Republicans in general, waffling Independents, or complicit Democrats.
11
I'm unsympathetic to the views of any person who has had lucky breaks and achieved a good life, but then seeks to deny the opportunities he has enjoyed to others.
How could a literate person, no matter how street-naive, fall for the barely disguised trickery of a New York con man? How could a person be so stupid as to vote for a vulgar man who governs for his own ego and greed?
How can any literate person forget the hollow promises of the 2016 election campaign? Where is the"health care we all will love"? Where is the domestic tranquility from "stopping the slaughter right now"? Where is that income tax code that boosts the middle class even if "it's gonna cost Trump a fortune"? Where's the magnificent infrastructure?
Whose gonna rescue our economy when the Obama recovery peters out? It's run its course over five successive continuing budget resolutions. The only way ahead promises an end to economic growth.
Those who vote for Trump do a great disservice to our nation. No traitor could inflict the damage and division that Trump has wrought in a mere three years!
14
Why do you presume there are so many Trump supporters that the rest of us have to turn onto pretzels to please them? You keep sounding the alarm, I suppose you have to, your newspaper insisted Hillary was going to win, I remember well that “meter” on her likelihood to win. But if we are not going to tackle healthcare and climate change, what is to become of us? I swear, if Trump gets re-elected I suspect many of us will need mental health care immediately, and I suspect marijuana and alcohol sales will soar, so I get what you’re worried about. But seriously, could you stop the chicken little yelling until after South Carolina? See where things shake out...give us some rest. I care desperately about our democracy. But you’re killing me — stop hitting me over the head!! I get your point.
6
I love how we all have to walk on egg shells around Trump supporters. Have you heard how they refer to anyone who doesn't have blind loyalty to this abomination of a man?
18
I wonder what Hardwick's younger self would have thought of this administration and his policies? Wealthy people like Hardwick have the luxury to not have to think too much about how 45's policies impact MOST people. These are just not problems he has: paying for that medical bill, or putting a kid through college, or helping an elderly relative. I don't blame Hardwick for his short-sightedness...I blame a skewed capitalist system that makes such thinking possible.
4
Mr. Hardwick can choose a racist, misogynist president because he's never experienced discrimination on his road to the American dream.
That he feels entitled to deny others that right invites those labels.
12
As with the previous piece there is nothing in this one that actually explains why Hardwick would vote for someone as obviously vile as Trump. It simply says “he’s not a bad guy when you meet him.”
So we should accept another four years of Trump and the end of democracy because some “not-all-that-deplorables” like him? Not me, brother.
The liberals didn’t start this war. The liberals didn’t normalize party-first propaganda, disregard for reality, or gaslighting.
The liberals didn’t employ scorched earth tactics and win-at-all-costs strategies.
The liberals are not currently defending blatant election-tampering by the president.
But here we are, literally fighting for democracy and the rule of law.
I know everything I will ever need to know about Trump supporters, vacillating or otherwise.
11
Thinking that democrats shouldn't articulate "more of the liberal contempt that produced the “deplorables.”" is exactly why Trump won. Don't tiptoe around and apologize for the sexists, the racists, the immigrant haters, the heartless who would let people die without insurance, the people who think its funny to "own the libs" no matter the cost. Take it to them. To their face. Often. If Hillary had doubled down on her comment and said "if you do these things, you ARE "deplorable" instead of backing away she would be President.
6
The man in the oval office is deplorable. He is the quintessence of deplorability. He's vicious, self-centered, racist, ill-mannered, lazy, cruel, and dishonest, yet he enjoys full, frenetic support from Republicans. I find that deplorable.
If people don't want to be considered deplorable, they shouldn't cheer on deplorable men.
7
Let's not forget the swing to Democrats in the mid-term elections, resulting in their majority in the House. These voters are not going away, and they outnumber the Trumpeters.
1
Roger ,
you did not address or answer why Hardwick would still support Trump. old fashioned American values and Trump have nothing in common. How can one support a crook? Is it all only about the money?
2
Mr. Cohen, I am calling you out: I think you deliberately planned this two part series knowing full well the profile of Mr Hardwick would unleash NYT readers like hyenas on a fresh carcass; now you are scolding us and trying to teach a lesson on tolerance. There is only one relevant label that applies to Mr. Hardwick: lifelong Republican. He grew up in Kentucky and Ohio, and currently resides in Florida, all solidly red, and unlikely to flip. He readily rattles off the good he feels Trump has done, and seems to believe the benefits of a Trump presidency outweigh the costs; let’s all just agree he will most likely stick to his roots. I really doubt there are many “undecideds” in Trump territory, and I don’t believe my unwillingness to forgive their role in placing a disgusting individual in the White House will matter; all Donald has to do is hang on to enough Electoral College votes and he’s in, and there is a good chance he will. Democrats should boldly nominate the candidate that most excites them and let the chips fall where they may.
In this game of “tolerance chicken” I ain’t blinking first.
8
Let’s try to get this straight - they vote for Trump because liberals look down on them. Do they think this will help?!
4
I’ll take a fabricated progressive“war” on business over a republican real war against science, facts and morals any day.
10
How it all turned out: Comey attacks HRC while giving Trump a pass. Russia unleashes a coordinated attack on HRC from purloined emails to a Facebook disinformation campaign. 24/7 Right wing attacks on HRC. And the NYTimes concentrating on every Clinton misstep while almost ignoring Trump's faults(Right, Maureen?)
HRC got 3+ million more votes.
Lets move on: Allies denounced while Putin, Turkey praised. North Korea fiasco. Federal agencies trumperized to weaken environment, workers, health care. Trillion dollar deficit for tax cut to corporations and rich.Throwing Kurds to Turks. Wealth disparity increasing. Daca disaster. Mexico will pay for wall. Children in cages. On and on...
Yes, he's a decent man supporting an immoral, unethical, poor role model,lousy administrator and liar. Worried about moving to far left when the country is faced with retreat from the world leadership to an isolated, tin pot dictatorship. Melodramatic? No.
12
Yes, I am interested in knowing why someone like Mr. Hardwick supports a lying, racist, corrupt, misogynist, ignorant, clownish President Trump. But I can only come to one conclusion why someone apparently so talented and successful is willing to overlook Trump's vile and undemocratic characteristics: blinding self-interest. And in Mr. Hardwick's case, that self-interest appears to be preserving or enhancing his economic position. It is not difficult to figure out.
9
Roger,
Whether committed Democratic voters have contempt for or empathy toward Trump voters is not dispositive of anything.
One can approach Trump voters with contempt or kindness.
Nothing changes their minds.
I've tried.
I've given up.
It is a fools errand.
10
How about this, Roger: We on the left will start listening to and speaking with those on the other side when they are willing to do the same. You know, quid pro quo, right?
4
"Wonder Bread supported a new program at Florida State University that granted degrees in baking science and management, and chose to jump-start it with scholarships to four children of employees" . Correct that to "four children of white employees" and your whole "American Dream" idea falls apart. It is a white American dream.
5
I found your last essay on Hardwick troubling not because I harbor some blind prejudice against him or his success, but because your argument seems unwilling to address the amorality behind his position. Who’s blind here? You, wittingly or unwittingly, are asking liberals to look past the rightness or wrongness of Hardwick’s views and nominate someone who will please him and his ilk in order to “save The Republic,” when you might instead write something that tries to open his eyes instead. The fact remains that Hardwick’s main criteria for voting for or against Trump are his financial concerns, his bottom line. Not moral ones, not civic ones. If that trumps everything then there is no Republic to save, period. “Kids in cages at the border? OK, bad optics (it’s all a question of style!) but immigration is a problem, and hey, look at the stock market, look at my 401K!” In some ways it’s not Hardwick’s fault: he is a logical result of 40 years of “mainstream” conservatism being turned into gospel in the Anglo-American world, e.g. Thatcher’s claim that society “doesn’t exist,” or the Reaganite fantasy that government shouldn’t. Your headline talked about getting the “brute” out of office, but so called extremists like Warren and Sanders are actually addressing the decades of real and extreme brutishness (see Hobbes!) that got your brute elected in the first place. Sure, Hardwick might vote for Biden, but give him a Trump with “style” in and he’ll be back with the GOP in 2024.
7
Does a NYT columnist really not know that those who comment in online forums do *not* comprise a representative sample of the population?
Citing negative posts in response to his article about a Republican voter as evidence for "the almost complete inability of opponents of Trump to grapple with who supports him" earned Cohen an official Liz Lemon Hall of Fame Eye Roll from me.
5
The sanctimony of many of the commenters is exactly why Trump will have a good shot in 2020 if he is not impeached.
2
Oh he’s going to be impeached, bank on it.
I doubt the Senate will convict, but impeachment is in the bag.
Exploring an individual voter's deep background experience to imagine why he voted for Trump in 2016 is not especially revealing about that 2016 vote, let alone as a reason to extrapolate to other voters for Trump. More meaningful would be to explain why the particular circumstances of 2016 led to Trump's election, and whether those same conditions persist in 2019-2020.
My hunch is that the conditions that led to Trump's election are continuing, and may well send him to another victory despite his personal offensiveness. That's in part because the Democratic leadership, many in the bureaucracy and most of the media are aloof, dismissive and arrogant, not unlike Adlai Stevenson.
Stevenson got thumped twice by Eisenhower, but Stevenson was still self-congratulatory about his principles -- and how most people are basically stupid. "Every thinking person will be voting for you," somebody said to Stevenson. "But I need a majority," Stevenson snooted.
HRC was not alone in sniffing disgustedly at the foul deplorables. That is still being trumpeted three years later in the media, by Schiff, and on the campaign trail. Did the Dems not get the message that this strategy is a loser?
Mr. Cohen's piece is condescending. It is basically an advertisement for Trump.
And I didn't vote for Trump in 2016.
1
Anyone who supports Donald Trump solely because of tax cuts and the state of the economy cannot simply disregard his moral unfitness to occupy the office of presidency of the United States. Trump's winking and nodding to white supremacists (and employing an immigration adviser, Stephen Miller, with proven links to white supremacist organizations), his indifference to the suffering of migrant children, his repeated and blatant lying, his vile attacks on reporters, State Department officials, the FBI, the CIA, the whistle-blower (the list is endless) his abuse of power by tying security assistance to Ukraine to a trumped up investigation of Joe Biden and on and on. Anyone who supports Trump must also support his morally corrupt conduct. It's not good enough after three years of seeing what Trump has done and what he is capable of doing to say that Trump supporters are misunderstood and feel misjudged by liberal elites. It won't wash anymore.
4
Here's where we're at: Pick a side, may the better tribe win.
1
So you mean the “animal spirits” of spending and exploding the deficit like no other time when the US wasn’t at war?
The protagonist’s story about his father paying debt with his future should ring a bell. A loud bell. An alarm bell!
2
Your patience with Mr. Hardwick is commendable, but you are wasting your time. He’s not vacillating, he’s a one dimensional guy who will never vote for a Democrat. He just looks for the “R” and pulls the lever. My malamute performs more due diligence.
6
Nice bio. I am a liberal, but to say I have a knee-jerk reaction to trump voters is wrong. Hate, scapegoating, me only not you, racism, hypocrisy, corruption, and on and on; these are not values anyone should vote for. A vote for trump is validation that you agree with his values. Better a Medicare for all President than a Trump and all he represents. I can live with a little socialism, I cannot tolerate a man and his supporters who hate as much as they embrace.
3
“Along the way Hardwick was involved in the civil rights movement in Florida in the 1960s.”
Just on the subject of racial justice, I find the cognitive dissonance of Mr. Hardwick having supported the civil rights movement in the 60s and yet now being undecided about voting a second time for a race-baiting president who stocks the highest echelons of his administration with white nationalists like Stephen Miller, to be mind-boggling.
4
The reader comments quoted by Cohen qualify as ad hominem arguments. The commenters attack a man whom they don't know for shortcomings they cannot document based on Cohen's description. Trump, not his supporters, should remain the focus of Democratic attacks.
Observations which explained how Trump's policies and behavior violated Hardwicke's principles, as outlined by Cohen, would surely prove far more effective in detaching this voter from his support for the president.
We have columnist after columnist arguing that voters should try to understand Trump supporters, and excuse their racism, their misogyny, their willingness to support a government that tears little brown children away from their parents and puts them in for-profit concentration camps without adequate medical care or even toothpaste.
And week after week we get told we shouldn't move "too far left." In other words, instead of re-instituting FDR policies with regard to a social safety net, we should put up with economic inequality that reminds me of the regime of Louis XVI.. Instead of adopting a health care system similar to those of other developed countries, we should tolerate a system that results in around 30,000 unnecessary deaths per year due to lack of coverage and skyrocketing prices on life-saving medications like insulin or Epipens.
IMO, the real deplorables are those who enjoy fat wallets and excellent health insurance from jobs where they are paid to lecture us to wait, not to move to fast, to endure the current situation. I am put in mind of one man's response to such advice...it was in a letter written from the Birmingham jail...
20
@Martha Shelley Right on! Democrats, Remember the Neediest -- Forget the Greediest.
There were no opportunities like this for women during the 1950s or 1960s. Most of the jobs available to women were boring and underpaid, and had no real career ladders.
And if you wonder why many women, expecially white working class women support Trump it's because it's still the case that most jobs available to most women, including the 2/3 who don't have college degrees and some who do, are still the same boring, dead-end pink-collar jobs. Women want Trump to bring back the 'family wage' so their husbands and partners can support them and they can quit work.
Real simple.
2
The "president" hurls invective all day long, and these millions who support the boor must be respected, while we on the other side must watch our language and struggle to understand. This reasoning is murky and frankly, it's getting old.
Do we observe soul-searching from the GOP? Not so much.
I guess that's exclusively our job.
9
Where is the evidence that "liberal contempt" produced Donald Trump and his deplorables? Opposing Trump is not a class war, but rather it is standing up for the all Americans who believe that climate change is an acute crisis, income inequality is destroying the American way of life for millions, and affordable health care is a right, not a privilege.
12
Chuck Hardwick, like many others want to have it both ways. Mr. Cohen describes him as a man of good will who nonetheless voted for Trump, whose racist message was clear and unambiguous: who had a long history of cheating the vulnerable - Trump University - ; who braged about using his status to molest women, and who ridiculed a handicapped reporter. Mr. Hardwick has not ruled out that he will vote for Trump again who since his election has attempted to eliminate the affordable care act and thereby deny health insurance to tens of thousands and who took infants and toddlers from their mothers to discourage immigration. Trump's stimulation of 'animal spirits' was fueled by tax cuts for the wealthy resulted in a massive increase in the deficit and perhaps by his determination to allow polluting business to use the land and water as a garbage dump and open sewer. i don't doubt that Mr. Hardwick is a nice guy and a good neighbor, but like thoughts and prayers - that does not make his voting Trump OK.
10
Mr. Cohen, you're right about a few things. Labels and caricatures are usually damaging to both those who apply then and to those to whom they are applied.
Ditto for disdain, close-mindedness, and failing to try to understand those we perceive as our foes.
But, no: In the quest to understand "tens of millions of Trump supporters," there's nothing to be gained from studying a man who "rose to the highest echelons" of a major multinational corporation. Harwick is typical of only a small fraction of Trump supporters and of a minuscule fraction of all Americans.
Your failure--and that of the NYT and other major media--to understand that is part of the problem. It's part of the reason our nation is mired in blaming each other, blaming race, gender, and ethnicity for our problems instead of seeing what is truly wrecking our economy and politics: the extreme concentration of wealth and power that Mr. Hardwick represents.
Hardwick's American dream is just that--an illusory dream--for the vast majority of 21st century Americans. After 40 years of trickle-down economics and government-that-you-can-drown-in-a-bathtub, his success is a rare anomaly--yes, even for an educated white male. His story is close to the antithesis of the typical American experience ... and it will be until America wakes up to that fact and faces it.
8
'Deplorables' were not created by'liberal contempt'. Anyone who could swallow a year of self- aggrandizing lies and still walk into a polling booth saying this is the guy I want as leader of my country AND, despite all we've seen since 2017, are thinking about doing that again are deplorable, care little about the future of this country.... what they are not, Mr. Cohen, is the product of some imagined liberal contempt.
11
Great Rog ... but the MAGA minority hasn't one iota of respect for the majority that did not vote orange. Additionally, direct me to anything you've read that mirrors your article here - admonishing the right to understand what motivates the left. It's all a one way street on how the left "failed" "those people". They've failed themselves. You can't force critical thinking.
I understand how we've come to this moment - Fox News and 30 years of Republican slide into Facism.
No sorry - no political respect for Hardwick or anyone who voted for Trump.
9
i've tried, mr cohen, truly. i've been trying for three years. mr hardwick sounds like a good guy. but how can he, or anyone, support a man who publicly ridicules a disabled person? how can he think such a man is fit to be president of the united states? if hardwick is a good guy, why does he not find trump's behavior unacceptable? i can't understand it.
i'm also disappointed that you perpetuate the "deplorables" thing. am i mistaken -- i thought the gist of her entire comment (after the first clause) was that a certain proportion of trump supporters were beyond persuasion because they were just bigots, or sexists, etc (can we agree that racism and sexism, etc are indeed deplorable?) but the rest of them, which in her first iteration was way more than half, could be won by reasonable argument. isn't that pretty close to what you're saying in this column?
4
We have not heard why he voted for Trump and will again. The fact he is 78 and retired is semi-interesting. What are Dems suppose to "win over"? If "winning over" means approving of locking kids in cages, climate denial, race baiting and approving a President extorting a foreign government to get dirt on his political opponent, I'm not sure that's worth the fight.
6
Left out of this analysis of the American Dream is “Why did it take moonshot-level luck for Mr Hardwick to go to college?”
He is clearly neither dim nor lazy, but rather both hardworking and intelligent. He should not have had to rely for his break on what was essentially the whim of management - nor should his father have lost everything because of a workplace accident.
4
Wait, it is the people who are dismayed by Trump that reflect an "abandonment of curiosity, ... rampant intolerance, [and] blindness"? Huh?
3
I have no interest or desire in converting any Trumper. If they can’t see what is right in front of their noses, that is not going to change.
We need to drive out our voters and get them to the polls.
2
It may be true that in order to win over the "deplorables," the rest of us have to show respect for their inexplicable decision to vote for a racist, misogynist, utterly corrupt, incompetent, Russia-aligned, dictator-loving ,know-nothing, lying con man in 2016; that we have to pretend that they had good reasons to decide that Trump would serve their interests better than Clinton would, or that he would be less dangerous or less corrupt.
I confess I find this hard. I do not respect their decision; I do not respect their reasoning; I do not respect the values that would put an obvious racist and misogynist and mentally ill person in the White House. It seems to me that one of the reasons that Trump has been so politically successful is that there has been a comprehensive attack, carried out on right-wing radio, television, and especially online and in social media, on truth and the very possibility of truth - and this attack, over many years, has been very successful. I am not inclined to contribute to the right-wing denial of reality by pretending that there are rational, decent reasons to support Donald Trump in the presidency.
5
I agree with almost everything here except where you say that the label, "oligarch" does not help. For sure this dude Hardwick is an American success story. He is not an "oligarch," a word that must have been used by someone who lacks basic knowledge of what an oligarch is (i.e. a powerful member of an oligarchy -- a form of government where few people run the government). Because the U.S. is not an oligarchy, Hardwick is not an oligarch. He is a person who has had a lot of success in life.
My question is, why does Mr Hardwick insist on postponing such an advance as healthcare for all under govt admin and management? He may not be around to see it. Sounds like he is too greedy to be able to stand it’s implementation. Is he envious of others getting for favorable prices what his parents never had?
2
Who can be impressed with a former Pfizer guy from a company that meddled in the political affairs of New Zealand, among others, opposed the inclusion of NZ in a trade agreement & all because the Prime Minister Helen Clark resisted profiteers inflating costs in their health care system.
The revolving door between these guys & govt is very big here in the USA. Take a look at the top lobbying firms.
But yeah, keep tilting at windmills like Hardwick & you'll get nowhere.
3
1. I am not sure that the cherry picked statements from a comment board about a man the commenters don't know tells us a lot.
2. Have you ever read the comment boards of conservative publications in response to liberals? Sure, that's a "whataboutist" response, but why are liberals the only ones excoriated by the pundit caste about disrespecting their opposition?
5
Sorry, no--they do not have "reasons for thinking as they do." What they have is reptile-brain reactions against black, brown, and female people. They are prejudiced and fearful. and that's why they voted as they did--whether or not they admit it, even to themselves.
It wasn't policy. Trump has no policy, beliefs, or ideas, and everyone knew that before November 2016. Trump has, and had, only hatred and fear to sell.
And it isn't a question of success, achievement, overcoming adversity, or even intelligence. Even when all that applies, as is apparently the case with your one data point, you can still succumb to your fears and prejudices. Happens all the time.
It is foolish and counterproductive to try to win the election by appealing to Trump voters. Can't you see that such persons are incapable of admitting error--mirroring the man himself? That strategy will fail, and drive away millions of us who don't give in to our prejudices.
Instead the task is to bring people to the polls who didn't come last time. Put another way, it means inspiring people. Who among the candidates is most likely to do that?
3
Wait, you want to blame me for a second Trump term because I state the obvious: that the man is unfit for office, and anyone who can’t see that is blind? So let’s change the scenario. I know the earth wasn’t created in 6000 years, but I am some how wrong if I point out it’s a demonstrable lie and anyone who believes it is scientifically illiterate and incompetent?
I think this is a case of giving respect to a man’s idiotic political opinions because he is a story of American success. Like many Americans who worship business success, Mr. Cohen is having trouble accepting a simple truth: that a man can be both a business success, a really admirable man in many ways, and still be completely incompetent at formulating a reasonable political opinion.
4
I read comments and commented myself. Few were about "evil Mr. Hardwick." Most were about the delusion of believing that Hardwick would vote for anyone but a faux Republican.
4
Just doesn't do it for me. I really don't care to appease those who applauded the caging of brown children at the border and most trumpsters did.
3
While I do not want to “vilify” supporters of the current occupant of the Oval Office, it is virtually impossible to engage with them on a fact basis.
Debating facts is hopeless; some of these citizens could only be helped through deprogramming.
2
I utterly reject your thesis.
Trump is a lawless criminal and his supporters are complicit in that lawlessness.
There is absolutely no way to square his behavior with his oath to uphold the Constitution of the United States.
Those who defend this criminal behavior are deplorable.
Devin Nunes is deplorable.
Jim "Gym" Jordan is deplorable.
Mitch McConnell is deplorable.
Our exploding deficit is deplorable.
The trade wars with China are deplorable.
The withdrawal from the Paris accords is deplorable.
The failure to adequately staff the Executive branch is deplorable.
Weakening our environmental protections is deplorable.
In short, the sooner this miscreant is sent packing the better off the country will be.
President Pence had best watch his back too. Sounds like he has a problem with the truth as well.
4
The Trump fans including the low education Fox News crowd, the religious fundamentalists, the outright racists that make up the bulk of Trump's adoration chorus, don't care what he does or how he does it, as long as he keeps spitting on the "liberal elite". No Trumpist will ever give up their Orange Dictator as long as he promotes fear, hatred, racism and ignorance. He has done far worse than shoot someone on 5th Ave- he has destroyed the reputation of the USA around the globe and they couldn't care less!.
The real question is: What do we do to motivate the millions of voters who sat out the 2016 election? What will make them stand up for themselves and their nation to get rid of Trump and his band of Republican servants.
It is not a question of Liberal vs Conservative, it is a question of the survival of our democracy, of the USA as we knew it before Trump was placed in the White House by a corrupted electoral process. Get out the vote in massive numbers and let the GOP know we will not stand for their contempt for the American people any longer. Our lives and those of our children and grandchildren depend on it.
5
I just don't get how anyone can consider a Trump supporter as anything but deplorable. I realize that that won't win an election but, to tell you the truth, if America wants Trump, it can have him. If we are no longer a country of virtue, so be it. Yes, the country and world will flounder. That is the nature of things. But how can you call someone who supports a religious bigot an racist anything but deplorable? You can't. The country will be what it will be but you can't change what is right and good as a result.
3
You write "If there’s one sure route to a second Trump term, it’s more of the liberal contempt that produced the “deplorables.”
Aren't we finding out, via the impeachment process, that all Republican members of Congress are indeed deplorables?? They don't care about laws or the Constitution. They just want power so they can have a means to get more money for themselves.
4
While I agree that perpetuating a sneering, condescending attitude (such as we see on FOX every day) is unhelpful in every respect, you are asking people to try and understand someone who voted for a candidate caught bragging about groping women, a candidate with no intelligible plans for anything who surrounded himself with, well, deplorable figures.
The voter voted for the first candidate I know of to be uniformly rejected by every major paper (except Adelson's), a candidate with a track record of failure in every business but reality TV, a man who sneered about rapists coming in from Mexico, and presided over a toxic and bewildering RNC convention.
Your voter voted for sneering arrogance and a man who was at the forefront of the birther conspiracy. Does your voter deserve to be treated politely? Yes. Does he deserve to be coddled? No.
We can only wish the man had kept reading those newspapers he once delivered instead of allowing himself to be brainwashed by right wing media, but even that is no excuse for making such am immoral choice.
5
Given that background it's hard to see how he became qa lifelong Republican or understand why he would vote forv Trump who was not a Republican before he took over the party and remade it in his image.
1
I live amongst many Trump supporters. If one tries to engage them regarding their reasons, the conversations inevitably devolves into Hillary’s emails or her murder of Vince Foster or sex ring under the pizza parlor. I’m very tired of reading articles encouraging Democrats to understand Trump voters. I’m pretty sure there are no conservative pundits trying to promote understanding of progressives. I think I may have figured out something ...the average Trump supporter has never learned to think rationally, with their brain instead of emotion...to critically listen to Hannity and separate fact and fiction. They’re uneducated and have no desire to learn. They’re intellectually lazy. There have always been those types of folks in our midst. The Republicans know how to bait them into votes. Trump is the result. I’ve lived through the Kennedy and King assassinations, Vietnam, Nixon, 9/11. Trump and his supporters are the worst threat to our democracy in my lifetime. This next election may be the most important in the history of this country. Evil prevails when the good do nothing.
8
I agree with your column for the most part and can respect Mr. Hardwick's accomplishments. However, your column only discusses "liberal contempt" and completely ignores the "conservative contempt" from the other side. I don't know how often I've seen conservatives lumping every liberal thinking person into the "socialism" bucket, and I can't count how many times I've heard conservatives bragging about "owning the libs." There is contempt from the right for the left, and I would argue it is far more vehement, angry, and hateful that any so-called "liberal contempt" for Trump supporters. Look at the contempt Dopey Don Junior hurled at Lt. Col Vindman! Calling him a "low level bureaucrat and nothing more" Seriously? A decorated U.S. Veteran??? I thought conservatives were pro-Military... more like utter hypocrites!
3
The deplorables thing is actually a stunning example of the double standards and selective hearing of the right. The full comment from Clinton was an attempt to separate out regular people who were leaning Trump from the white supremacists, fascists, and other truly irredeemable nasties who were openly applauding him. "Deplorables" was the term she used to describe the second group. Everyone who self-identifies as a deplorable waves their willful ignorance and refusal to learn as a flag they're proud of.
As for so-called centrists who are still supporting Trump, I have yet to hear a coherent explanation as to why his behavior, from nepotism to ignorant incompetence to corruption to attacks on norms and institutions, is remotely acceptable.
3
'There’s not much point denying that Trump, foul as he is, has released Keynes’s “animal spirits” in the United States.'
Please, exactly how did you determine that nonsense? The Fed has pumped the economy full of liquidity for the last 11 years, we are merely riding that wave that started many years ago during the Obama administration. Sure, the bogus tax cuts provided an extra sugar high right on top of an economy that is already overheated. Trump has done zero to improve the economy although he claims credit every day.
I can admire Mr. Hardwick's life story, it's a life well lived and a classic American story. But I cannot forgive a man who would vote into the presidency a criminal who makes a mockery of every American value, who is ignorant, cruel, divisive, entirely self centered and a proven pathological liar on every issue large or small. Anyone who would cast that vote is an amoral creep.
4
Why is it that Democrats have to hand Mr. Hardwick HIS perfect candidate or he will vote for trump, who has proven himself incompetent, craven, self-serving, xenophobic,and misogynistic, and has lowered the USA's status in this world?
Please, Mr. Cohen, tell me why Mr. Hardwick believes that. I really want to know because I don't understand his reasons for thinking as he does.
3
I don't get it. These guys heard the Prseident call Mecixans criminals and rapists. They saw him mock disabled people, refugees, the powerless and all kinds of racial/ethnic, gender and religious minorities. Nobody who saw that could doubt what it meant. But they cheered his rallies, and then voted for him.
In a slightly different America, those guys might be the ones directing the mob to the neighbourhoods where we live. Then journalists will be writing sypathetic articles: let's understand these guys who burned crosses in that yard- we wouldn't want to lose an election..
4
So Mr. Hardwick may vote for Trump because liberals have contempt for people who vote for Trump.
That's a shallow and contemptible reason for voting for Trump, who is, as Mr. Cohen frankly admits himself, and indeed Mr. Hardwick seems open to considering, contemptible.
So what is Mr. Cohen saying here again?
5
I think Roger Cohen is exactly right about his "deplorable," but exactly wrong about the appropriate response, which is D-Day. It is El Alamein. It is the Battle of Berlin. This is a moment when Yeats' passionate intensity should be embraced not by the worst, but by the best! We face a moment of moral reckoning and we need to build an army of reason stronger than the forces of darkness. We should be as forceful, blunt, rude, angry, and determined in defense of the constitution as Trump supporters are in support of their idol. Roosevelt never asked Americans to empathize with Nazis. He organized an army! Churchill was even clearer: " We should fight them on the beaches! We will never surrender." We should fight them in Congress. We should march on Washington. We should flood the streets in front of Fox Studios. We should overwhelm them in their echo chambers on Facebook. My Bible is Raul Hilberg's history of the Holocaust, "The Destruction of the European Jews." In it, the great historian makes one fact abundantly clear: Hitler got away with it because the average man did nothing. Said nothing. Now is not a time for empathy, but for battle. Now is the time to complete the work of reconstruction abandoned in 1877, carried forward heroically in 1964, but never completed. Now is the time for the better angels in our nature to rise and take dominion.
5
Sad, but true. During a discussion with a close, and sadly former friend, in a heated moment she glared at me and said, “ Do you want to know what we conservatives really think of you liberals?” I nodded and she continued, “ We think you’re arrogant.” We haven’t spoken in over two years, but the frustration and anger she expressed are still so clear.
1
Anyone who is still supporting Trump after all we’ve witnessed regarding his greed, narcissism and lack of any kind of moral center is, in my opinion, not only deplorable but also severely lacking in both intellect and integrity. Just because they can’t see it doesn’t make it any less evident.
2
There is a cycle: Republicans wreck the economy, then Democrats come in and fix the economy.
Reagan/Bush ---> Clinton (surplus)
BushJr ------> Obama (10 years of steady growth)
If we really need to learn the lesson of what Trump (& Kansas) have done, give him four more years and watch the smoke rise from the ashes. Then, and maybe only then, will we realize that monopolies, unchecked capitalism and oligarchies are not good for the health of a nation.
1
Hardwicks original reason for voting for Trump ( as described in the FIRST paragraph of the original piece written by...Roger Cohen) was as follows....
"he disliked the "scheming" Clintons and was mad at the media for first mocking Trump..."
Not exactly a description of high-minded reasoning.
You wrote it, readers responded accordingly. To come back here and scold commentators as if we were petulant children seems a bit much.
4
This column omits how far up the corporate ziggurat the subject climbed. Did he make it to the exalted C-suite where stock and bonuses flow freely regardless of the company’s actual performance? Then yes regardless of origin he is now part of the plutocracy. Now as to Trump, spare me the hand wringing about how you don’t want to support him but ... “insert something about Elizabeth Warren”.
2
So this gentleman got the breaks, was given an education and opportunities. Now he wants to pull the ladder out from under whom? I know supporters of the con, they are either upper middle class and love their tax breaks, uninformed on a myriad of subjects or just racist to the core.
2
The article does nothing to explain its headline. Did this chump vote for Trump because he was concerned that Hillary Clinton was going to deny "some essence of the country that gave him and countless others an opportunity to get ahead through hard work"?
No, he's just a "conservative" Republican greedhead chump. Sorry.
1
No name calling here.
What is so objectionable to Hardwicke about equal rights across the board for everyone; boldly addressing climate change; providing universal healthcare; caring for the environment; maintaining the USA as the respected leader of the free world when it comes to human rights, nuclear containment and free trade; and perhaps most importantly improving education and infrastructure in the US.
HAS TRUMP DONE ANYTHING TO ACCOMPLISH THES OBJECTIVES? HAS HE EVEN TRIED?
The answer as everyone knows is NO.
HOW DIFFICULT IS FOR ANYONE TO REALIZE THIS?
6
The article never really says why this man supports Trump. It states why he doesn't think Elizabeth Warren is right for the country, but says nothing about why he thinks Donald Trump is right for the country.
13
@Doug
Elizabeth Warren has just as compelling a "rags to riches" American story. (Read her book "A Fighting Chance").
She seems to have been able to make more informed decisions along her political path.
3
From reading these comments it is clear Mr. Cohen that readers are not seeing this the way you do. Personally I do not tangle with republicans or Trump voters. I come out of a place of curiosity and ask their opinions on things without attacking back. I think that way I make a tiny difference: not all Democrats are critical and rude. I do think you selected a poor example this time.
7
I have a strong desire to understand those who voted for Trump and even stronger desire to understand those who could possibly STILL be undecided. When I read: "he’s convinced E W’s program shifts the United States leftward too far, too fast, denying some essence of the country that gave him and countless others an opportunity to get ahead through hard work..." I take issue.
Isn't that "essence" gone since the burden of tax obligations has been steadily shifting to the middle class, and investment in the country dwindling since the 70s? Did that "essence" ever exist for people of color, queer folks, new immigrants? It is simply a FACT and it would be amazing if it were reported as such, that since Gen X we have all had to contend with higher costs to get an education, which one needs to put in the "hard work" and "get ahead" (as if it has ever been true that simply working hard could get one to the place where this former exec ended up). We have also had to contend w fewer rights for workers, lack of pensions and other safety nets, increasing costs of health care and other necessities, as well as declining government investment in technology, research and infrastructure. Seems the 50s were good ol days for some and it might help all of us if they could look back, not with the self congratulatory individualistic idealism of someone who believes their hard work alone led to their success but with an understanding of systemic oppression and shifting realities.
9
Hardwick's America is gone!
America and much of the world is about the cheapening of their fiat currency. The economic success our nation has attained since the meltdown of 2008 is due to easy money policies.
The problem is that our success is stilted and regionalized. Many have not participated. We have a splintered society. The 2020 election will be determined by how divided we really are.
Trump has established a zeitgeist of, The Ugly Takes All, by whatever means possible. Empathy and fairness expired with Hardwick's America.
8
I get so tired of being thusly accused. I don't pursue conversations with Trump supporters for the simple reason that, overwhelmingly, they are people who are either too lazy or too disinterested to hold up their end of the "democracy requires an informed electorate" bargain. I grew up in central Illinois and know plenty about the type of people who support Trump, believe me. But I'm not the villain here. These are millions and millions of people who are willing to vote for an utter degenerate and then cheer him on as he trashes everything this country stands for and was built on. These people enthusiastically support a craven, borderline-treasonous party whose stated goal is to deprive their blinkered supporters of even the threadbare social safety net America now has, exclusively in favor of helping the rich get richer. And they're all taking me down with them. So, please, Mr. Cohen. Stop making people like me the villain. I'm a native Midwesterner and the product of schoolteachers. Before retiring in 1987, my dad made $19,000 teaching high school English. As he and my mother taught me to do, I've played by the rules and gotten myself an education and recognize the responsibility I have to the democracy, which is to participate in our electoral system in full command of the facts. I don't give a toss for people who won't do the same. Why are they deserving of either your or Mr. Hardwick's indulgence?
23
You are correct that we should put ourselves in the shoes of others but as a progressive liberal, the other side never ever tries to see things through my perspective. To them I am a liberal democrat which in parts of the country seem to be synonymous with pure evil.
I am so tired of the double standard that I just can't do it anymore.
17
@Earthling
Yes, when do you EVER hear pleas from the Republican/Conservative/McConnell, Nunes, Brietbart side to "understand the other side", "unite our divided country", "play fair", "don't tell lies" etc.
4
Hardwick sounds like a decent fellow, but it's clear that he's bought into the right-wing propaganda regime.
The problem with meeting anyone so 'influenced' half way is that it validates that propaganda--and the cult that thrives on it.
If we say, for example, that maybe Hillary should not have had her own server, they will leap to the next conclusion, that the server is in the Ukraine and that Ukraine used it to help Trump.
I'm not saying we should not reach out to people like this--we should. But in reaching out, we should never compromise our ideals (we can't be 'a little bit racist' to mollify them). We should never compromise on the truth.
14
“Knee jerk stereotyping” could be said to have occurred in 2016, though many of us already knew what Donald Trump was and what he would turn out to be. But after experiencing the first three years of him in the Oval Office, it has to be perfectly understandable for us to look askance at a voter still willing to vote for Trump in 2020. Maybe Mr. Cohen should be looking harder for the flaws in them instead of throwing more shade on us. Liberals maybe share some guilt for the election of 2016, but after all we’ve been forced to experience since, I think that guilt belongs somewhere else. Why is it wrong to call out the Trump voter now? Fear that they’ll pull that lever again isn’t a good enough reason or me and those like me to take it on again. I don’t hate or detest them; I just want them to justify their actions with more than a finger point and some false equivalencies. Is it too much to demand intellectual honesty that stands up to scrutiny? They aren’t shy about asking it of us.
13
I grapple with this constantly. I cannot fathom why anyone supports him. I listen to his supporters IRL and online. None of them make any sense to me. If anyone can explain it to me, I'm listening. Don't blame liberals for not trying to understand, I'm trying. His supporters are alarming, not people like me who can't understand their anger and hatred.
"Still, I find the almost complete inability of opponents of Trump to grapple with who supports him and why to be deeply alarming. We are talking about tens of millions of such supporters. This failure, this abandonment of curiosity, this rampant intolerance, this blindness, increases the likelihood of Trump’s re-election."
7
Mr. Hardwick's admirable biography notwithstanding, I think it's fair to point out that his vote for Trump in 2016 was in support of a candidate who had engaged in systematic slander of the previous president, making all sorts of nonsensical and easily-refuted claims about his birthplace. In other words, Trump was (and is) a bald-faced liar. I respect Mr. Hardwick, but I cannot respect his choice.
11
In the past three years the Op Ed pages of the Times have been fairly littered with editorials like this, telling us how our behavior, our voting choices, our words, our criticism and our general demeanor will somehow lead to four more years of Trump. We're told by a parade of patronizing authors to be quiet, be nice, be understanding, be patient, don't rock the boat, as though we're grammar school children who might be made to stay after class if we continue to act out.
With all due respect... fold it five ways, Mr. Cohen. Don't tell me to behave politely and compassionately in the presence of the monumental, epoch marking evil of this disgraceful administration, its vile cabinet, its corrupt and debased president and his dwindling, misguided, blind and incurious supporters. It's the responsibility of citizens to voice their anger vociferously and continuously when they see something this reprehensible and destructive.
Mr. Cohen, there is nothing more contemptuous than trying to frighten otherwise politically active people into silence in the name of the status quo.
15
I’m among the youngest of the boomers, and I’ve never voted for a GOP candidate. Why? Because during my entire politically-aware life - which started in the early seventies when Nixon was president - the GOP has repeatedly been the party of bad actors, bad faith politics, denial of demographics, racism, sexism, theocracy, and worse.
Mr. Hardwick disappoints me - as someone a bit more than twenty years my age, how did he miss the significant number of convictions obtained against GOP administration officials starting with Nixon? To me, that suggests either a deficient intellect - which seems unlikely - or a willingness to overlook criminal behavior in service to one’s own avarice. Since he’s clearly not stupid, it’s the latter, and that indicates that he puts his own interests above those of the nation at large. “Greed is Good” is hardly a motto to praise, yet it seems at the root of his political thinking.
If this is what we have to reach out to, we’re in a bad place. Democrats will not win over the greedy old white men who are in denial of their demographic decline, who are trying to set their dominance in stone through stolen judicial appointments and unjust laws (like the laws passed in WI and NC after Democratic governors won stripping them of essential powers to curtail GOP-approved excesses).
We need to beat them by getting more people to the polls and overriding the GOP attempts to disenfranchise legitimate voters to maintain their hold on power.
13
Republicans who are still even considering Trump are beyond hope and trying to persuade them is a waste of resources at this point. Instead the focus should be on independents and getting those who sat out or voted third party to vote Democrat in 2020
8
Mr. Hardwick’s library said it all. Illusion. A MAGA hat made in China and The Art of the Deal, a ghostwritten book made all the more hollow now that its author has turned against it’s subject. If all it takes is those objects to signify the hold such salve has on him, we truly have been bought and sold.
9
Dear Roger Cohen -
I am not a liberal. I am a centrist, registered Independent who for most of my 64 years has voted Republican more often than not. And I hold Trump supporters in contempt.
Your examination of Mr. Hardwick omitted what is possibly the most important factor in his support of Trump. Does he watch Fox News? Sadly, I know many people who possess plenty of native intelligence yet are nonetheless shockingly ignorant of actual facts. The common denominator is that they get their "news" from Murdoch's network of liars. They're not insane or immoderate, they're brainwashed. This is a national tragedy of immense proportion and I don't know what the solution might be.
I also must strenuously refute your statement that Trump "has released Keynes's animal spirits." The stock market has done well since he took office but not exceptionally so. After all, it tripled under Obama. The economy as a whole has been even less stellar, despite his constant baseless claims that it is "the best it's ever been." The big investments that businesses were supposed to make as a result of the ill advised tax cuts resulted in what most of us expected - a big increase in corporate stock buybacks, increased dividends and an uptick in corporate takeovers. That has accounted for the largest share of the gains in the equity price of public companies.
12
Thanks for the article.
I can't agree with it, the American people do not want to go through 4 more years of alternate facts, the trump presidency.
Hardwick may be a American story but it's not my story as well as the many that are out there.
We need people that are informed totally instead of the total garbage that radio and fox condone.
Visit a college and see how our younger people are reacting to this total malfunction of our society.
4
Boy, it's worse than I thought. Someone as thoughtful, empathetic and eloquent as Roger Cohen warns Democrats that their loud contempt for swing voters might persuade those voters to choose Trump in 2020.
The response of most of these commenters: It's more important to shame these swing voters than it is to win in 2020. This is tribal behavior. Utterly self-defeating. Shame on you. We were hoping you could act like grown-ups.
7
Are you kidding me. He supposedly supports Medicare for All and a Wealth Tax, but is otherwise fearful of a leftward shift in US politics? In what way? Any context? Any? Also, as Kip Leitner pointed out, this guy is a full blooded Republican, not a centrist at all: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chuck_Hardwick
5
Mr. Hardwick's personal history is inspirational and in many ways emblematic of a true American success story.
Yes he should be lauded for his efforts - he came from humble, difficult circumstance and worked his way honestly into a position of wealth and status.
I think the negative backlash from those of us who in "knee-jerk" fashion deride him stems from over twenty years of being on the receiving end of derision from the other side - Mr. Hardwick's side.
When Newt Gingrich, with his Contract ON America, threw away any sense of decency, honesty, respect and decorum with regard to the democratic party, he basically declared the Democratic party an enemy of America. He took the gloves off. Fox piled on with the most outrageous lies, slander and insults, followed by the likes of Limbaugh and others like him.
There has been nothing so egregious, outlandish, or a low that they would not happily stoop to, in order to denigrate, demoralize and malign democrats. They've turned the word liberal into an insult. They mock, bully and delight in playing dirty.
So if those of us who've been unjustly beaten up, beaten down, scorned and accused of every possible sin against the Constitution and our form of government for over two decades, are a little leery of playing nice with those same people, it's because we've learned the hard way.
Maybe Mr. Hardwick should look in the mirror and consider why he and his party might have earned the contempt.
10
"he’s convinced Elizabeth Warren’s program shifts the United States leftward too far, too fast, denying some essence of the country that gave him and countless others an opportunity to get ahead through hard work."
Firstly, President Warren's proposals would have to go though Congress like all legislation turns into sausage.
Secondly, has Hardwick not noticed that US governance has shifted radically to the right since 1980 when Ronald Reagan taught Americans to hate the government, thereby beginning the great Robber Baron Revolution in America that proceeded to gut education, infrastructure, worker wages and pensions so the rich could enjoy nightly baths in gold ?
America's Great American Healthcare Rip-Off is Exhibit #1 in radical right Republicanism; it's an international disgrace that denies tens of millions of workers freedom by chaining them to employer-based healthcare and it also saddles companies with a giant employee-healthcare bowling ball.
And then there's the fact that Republican Party doesn't even support democracy and works full-time to suppress it; what's more radical and unAmerican than GOP voter suppression laws, voter file purges and proud gerrymandering ?
Hardwick is entitled to his opinion, but America deserves a shift to the left with a smart progressive President after 39 years of Republican feudalism policy.
Hard work doesn't get most Americans too far these days, except for a sky-high medical bill, cable bill, cell phone bill.
Repent, Hardwick !
11
I can't decide which metaphor applies:
Is Mr. Cohen telling us to acquiesce to the terrorists who will burn everything don't if they don't get their centrist candidate;
Or are we abuse survivors being told that our abuser is a fine upstanding citizen that we need to have empathy for?
7
There's only one deplorable in this sad story, and that's Donald John Trump. I live in Ohio, and I have friends and neighbors who voted for Trump and support him now. They're farmers, auto mechanics, art designers and union members. They're not "deplorables." They felt ignored and trivialized by the crowd that ran the country well before they were called "deplorables."
The rich were getting richer. They were losing their jobs. They were the ones that didn't get the rewards for advances in productivity. I know some who were fired so that their publicly (and privately) held corporations could show higher quarterly profits - and bigger dividend checks and year-end bonuses. They were the "Left Behind."
Deplorable? The deplorable in this sad story is Donald John Trump, whose promises are as solid as a hot air balloon. I hope my liberal friends learn this. Come out to Ohio, Michigan and Wisconsin. See for yourself.
And hey! Shout out to The Akron Beacon Journal. Thanks for the props.
7
Some people vote the candidate and some vote the party. "Making nice" to current Trump supporters won't change this.
5
This is exactly the point. Put in a candidate that appeals to those center voters who don't vote by party!
Good piece here. What Cohen writes is important.
But but but the left says; the right are all so crazy, howling lunatics. All true. But the right says the same thing.
Look: its not the far left or far right that matters. Its the swing voters, the independents that matter. And, as an independent voter, the howling of either side doesn't sway me. I vote for policy and character. And I reckon most swingers and indies do, too.
So, Mr. Cohen - a hugely talented journalist - is onto something here. But, he goes a little far. The body politic isn't scaring anyone. Though when the Dems offer up only extreme candidates and swingers and indies don't have a choice they like, then that's a problem.
The right has is worse right now, because they are all enthralled w/trump.
As interesting as his character is in this story, as a former midwesterner, I"m unimpressed. That's half my friends.
And consdering turmp a viable candidate requires suspending of disbelief.
5
FDR didn't feel it was necessary to empathize with Nazis, nor did Churchill. This essay seems to evade completely the true danger facing America and our core vales.
Sure: we need to address income inequality as quickly as we can. But Lincoln's call for the better angels of our nature did not prevent the horrors after reconstruction. Only firmness, valor, determination, and commitment to the rule of law, can do that.
5
Besides Keynes's "animal spirits" why else does a person like Hardwick support a person like Trump? Hardwick may not be an oligarch, a plutocrat or any of the other names he's been called but for him it is still about the money. The money in his pocket. Trump, he thinks, will keep it there.
7
Sorry, but anyone who "is wavering" in his/her political support for someone, like Mr. Trump, is deplorable. That Mr. Hardwick has achieved a high material living, despite an extraordinarily difficult family environment, is to be applauded, needless to say, regardless of anything else, but it is irrelevant to political support for Mr. Trump.
The fact that Mr. Trump is a lifelong criminal/sexual predator/incessant-liar-about-everything has been recorded in umpteen places, well before the latest effort by Mr. Trump to be US presidential candidate, and now US president.
The gross inappropriateness of Mr. Trump for any public office, most of all the most powerful such office, the US presidency, is flagrantly and repeatedly shown by Mr. Trump's behavior as candidate and now for over 2 years in the office itself. At this point there is no excuse for willing blindness to this fact.
I make these statements with the full understanding that political viewpoint is akin to religious viewpoint. Both are reflections of the most deeply rooted beliefs that an individual has about his/her existence. Contesting either viewpoint, no matter what the underlying facts, equates therefore to questioning the validity of the relevant person's existence. However, the almost hourly evidence of malfeasance in every activity, provided not least in "real time" by Mr. Trump himself, transcends the need to tread delicately around someone else's political or religious viewpoint.
4
Cohen seems to be bending over backwards to defend the “typical” Trump voter. Consider what he calls the “complete inability of opponents of Trump to grapple with who supports him and why to be deeply alarming. We are talking about tens of millions of such supporters.” We opponents are hardly incapable of grappling with, or understanding the Trump base. We’ve been learning about them for three years, and have read countless essays on the aggrieved “Trump voter”, as they’ve been interviewed in diners and town halls all over middle America. We know a number of things about those tens of millions of voters. Some of these millions are racist, and resentful of the loss of white privilege. Some millions are xenophobes, fearful of immigrants. Some millions voted for Trump out of spite, to “own the libs” or to thumb their noses at the elites. Some millions voted for Trump in hopes of making abortion or gay marriage illegal again, or imposing a “Christian nation”. Some millions voted for Trump to protect their ownership of guns and assault weapons. Some smaller number (maybe still a million or two) voted for Trump to preserve their own wealth. Mr. Cohen you’re wrong if you think we liberals don’t understand the Trump base. Maybe you should be wondering how well they know, or understand us. Or how well they understand the damage Trump is doing to their country.
9
I really don't understand why so many Americans believe medicare for all is such a big step to the left and it will some how dumb down and demotivate the US population from being capitalist?
Australia and New Zealand have their own very successful versions of Medicare for all and neither country could be considered socialist, especially Australia which is a mini US in many ways. Proper medical for all citizens surely would make your country more productive than less. Neither Australia or NZ are going broke from having free Medicare for all, in Australia we pay a small Medicare levy each week from our wages and that keeps Medicare affordable.
Doctors here earn very good money as you would expect, so if introducing a similar scheme in the US would bankrupt the nation then surely there is something dramatically out of balance in how medical services and pharmacy is being charged.
The lack of free medical services for all of your citizens is something that most of the western world struggles to understand why such a successful nation can be so mean spirited in looking after its own people.
.... regards
9
There is a lot wrong with the US. Much of it resides in power and money gone unchecked. trump is a symptom of this sickness. You have much to fix. But it doesn't look like you're going to fix it.
You keep on prizing consumerism and indefinite, unlimited financial growth - clearly this is impossible.
You keep conning the average folk into trusting the rich patriarchs; "Trust them. See how successful they are? They'll make the US successful and you too." Meanwhile the average person doesn't notice that these so-called patriarchs are robbing the country blind and making people poorer and poorer.
Clearly leaving trump in power won't make things better. But electing Bidens or Bloombergs in his stead, won't change anything substantially either.
You really do need real, honesty, radical and substantive change - soon. Oh, and you don't need to embrace communism or radical socialism in order to do so. There are plenty of successful countries that have far fewer problems that successful democracies - akin to what the US was like in the 1950's.
5
There are many Trump supporters who are completely impervious to whatever outrages he provokes. They believe they are good Christians and patriotic Americans. Since they don't see themselves as racist or sexist, or dishonest, they take it as a matter of faith that their leader is not. People who recognize what is happening need to vote in overwhelming numbers to bury the GOP.
4
No, I think "contempt" rather than "incomprehension" is the right term to describe my opinion of Hardwick and his ilk.
Here is a wealthy man who at the end of his life desires nothing more in the way of social justice than the conservation of his wealth and his right to accumulate more.
In the backwash of the Trump presidency, seeing people floundering, families suffering and hatred flourishing, that this man should be seriously held up for our consideration is just about mind boggling.
6
You can have healthcare and still be a hard worker.
4
Those who voted for Trump may have had their reasons, but there is no reason to think of him now with anything but contempt, loathing, and regret.
3
Wait. There are tens of millions of wealthy retired pharma executives?! Let’s tax the heck out of them and fix our bridges.
5
I think there is a very good point to deny that Trump has unleashed any "animal spirits" in the economy that weren't already unleashed by Obama's eight years of economic growth. If anything, he has muzzled a significant part of that growth through his foolish and unnecessary foreign trade wars such that large parts of the economy are experiencing virtually no growth today. I'm sure that a sane and ideologically moderate businessman like Chuck Hardwick understands that, even if he dislikes wealth taxes, Medicare for All and random people on the Internet calling him an oligarch.
3
Please. We've "abandoned our curiosity" about Trump voters? All the media types would have us worry about since Trump's election is what these people think and why. I'm beginning to think what you're actually worried about is that we don't care anymore. I for one don't. This topic is just a shell game to keep the fact that these ignorant people still want this train wreck in office and you want to find a way to blame Democrats. It's a little rich coming from people who haven't spent a second trying to understand those that think differently than they do. Instead of trying to threaten us that Trump will be re-elected by people who still don't think 3 years of attention is enough, maybe you should start worrying about the blue tsunami coming next year in response to Democrats feeling that their majority votes were negated in the last election.
7
It's dismaying to see the Times and Roger Cohen mischaracterizing Hillary Clinton's excellent "Two Baskets" speech.
In that speech, Clinton acknowledged that not all Trump supporters are bad people, that many of them are in bad economic straits and we have to reach out to them.
The "basket of deplorables" she cites are qualities like racism, homophobia and misogyny.
If we can't condemn bigotry and misogyny as deplorable, where are we?
7
When you have Trump supporters at rallies proudly wearing T-shirts that say "I'd rather be Russian than be a Democrat", there is absolutely no hope in having any meaningful, rational conversation with them.
6
I can't claim to have ever gathered and talked to a representative sample of Trump voters. By January of 2017, I was pretty much done trying. Some Trump voters really are racist, and are motivated by hatred of Latinos, Muslims and African Americans. I'm white and older, so when it's just us white folk, people talk openly. Although some proudly display the Confederate flag.
Some Trump voters are motivated by opposition to girls running around, getting themselves pregnant, and having an abortion. Some Christians I know support Trump because he's ended the oppression they suffered under Obama. Some gun owners are glad Trump supports their desire to own high capacity semi-automatics, because they're fearful of Antifa, MS13, ISIS and inner city people of color. Some are just relieved that "socialist" Hillary won't be seizing their income to give to the undeserving. Others are glad that those pointy headed scientists with their global warming hoax have no say in policy. In other words, the Trump voters I have spoken to believe fervently in a long list of falsehoods, and nothing will sway them.
I don't know what the answer is, other than defeating the man. But I do know that I personally can't talk to Trump voters I've met. There simply is no shared reality.
9
If Trump wins a second term it will be because his supporters refuse to admit to the obvious reality, not because other people feel contempt over their willful ignorance. Please give this argument a rest.
5
The water hole is getting smaller, due to overpopulation, environmental degradation, climate change, on and on. What happens when you can't get enough water? Especially in a country where most of us don't know how much is 'enough'? Violence is what happens. Every one of us will fight to the end to get enough water, and the beginning of that battle is to identify the enemy. Trump is a violent man, in his words and his actions. He exposes and expresses the violence in this country. You need look no further than the millions of guns and the gigantic military. That's us, fighting for the water hole.
3
What’s conveniently elusive from this column is the fact that we’re living with the results of the Neoliberalism that was pushed in the US by Milton Friedman, and not so much for the interest of this country. Industries and their jobs were off-shored for profit. It destroyed US manufacturing and the American middle class. The only people who benefitted are the “brilliant”, so-called “meritocrats” who sold the country’s future for personal benefit.
That this column has the hubris to put American families vs. the corporate “center-right” and “center-left” political model that ensures Congress and presidents of both parties are primarily accountable to the corrupt ruling 1% who “pay to play.” Can you say Ambassador Sondland?
4
Willful ignorance is no excuse. When 40 percent of voters literally have their own reality, with their own set of facts, it simply isn't possible to reason with them.
4
I won't be voting for Trump because he is evil, but I think the radicalization of the Democrats and the left in general is worrisome. The patriarchy and white privilege blather will backfire. Medicare for all is a vote loser, as it was way back in the early 1990s with Hillary. Edsall today in this very newspaper went over M4A's lack of appeal to average voters.
Any centrist could beat Trump, but the Democrats are driving over a cliff and they simply will not stop. They're blinded by indignation and unrealistic hopes.
2
@vbering
Was Hilary not centrist enough?
I had a conversation with a couple of Trump supporters today.
Reached out to both of them for months, years.
What a total waste of time.
I use my children as a gauge...
Would I want any of my Trump supporter friends to watch over them?
I would rather my children left this country, the country I used to love and respect, and moved to the south pole than have any contact with the cult of Trump.
Am I liberal?
No.
I was a registered republican until Trump and the bizarro republican party came into power.
6
Hardwick is not a deplorable. He is just a guy who is willing to vote for one. Makes me feel so discouraged.
4
Sure the American medical system is a total disaster, but reforming it needs the art of the possible. Remember it was a year after many battles Americans came around to realizing independence was necessary and Ben Franklin slowly. very slowly, brought France around to support America. George Washington is America's greatest general and Franklin America's greatest diplomat. As Sherman said, the long way round is the short way home. Start with firming up Obamacare and giving Americans the time to become used to the public option.
3
No one ever worries if conservative contempt from Fox News pundits or Republican citizens and representatives is going to affect my centrist vote for Klobuchar or drive me towards Warren or what not. Well, they should reconsider their sneers, and so should the New York Times!
I'm angry because I'm a moderate voter being stereotyped as a woke elite Twitter troll. Just like Mr. Hardwick, thanks to my hurt feelings I will now ignore my desire to vote for a candidate that reflects my views and interests. Tom Steyer, here I come, whether you'll win or not!
5
Liberals doth protest Mr. Cohen's article too much.
The "... abandonment of curiosity, this rampant intolerance, this blindness..." which he identifies on the left is not a new phenomenon since the 2016 election.
Alas, a demagogue took the field by harnessing the rage which builds when half the population is relentlessly stereotyped and slandered as bigots and bumpkins, and shouted down with the full force of the popular culture.
Vox, of all sites, published a must-read essay for every liberal wishing to understand how "liberal" has become a synonym for "insufferable."
https://www.vox.com/2016/4/21/11451378/smug-american-liberalism
It describes exactly why I, having lived in cobalt blue LA for 35 years, worked at a major university for 25 years, and having voted like a pretty solid Democrat since '80 - who lives, feels, thinks and votes like a liberal - feel so alienated from the liberal tribe.
2
Interesting article, thanks.
I live in a small town in a rural area, and many people here support Trump. They are not insane nor are they evil or immoral. They are intelligent and reasonably well educated. They have an intense dislike of the sort of intolerance you describe here, and of what they perceived of as corruption in Washington - people in government becoming rich through whatever means. Given the Trump administration's massive corruption, I should think some of these people might change their minds and vote for a Democrat, unless of course that Democrat is far left they are told they are deplorable.
3
I cannot, for the life of me, understand how anyone who has lived a good life, a hard life, like Mr. Hardwick has lived can support the likes of Trump. If Mr. Hardwick is the best of us, Mr. Trump exemplifies the very worst of us.
Mr. Hardwick studied and worked hard for his fortune. Trump blew through a fortune of his father's money - we don't know his net worth now, because he refuses to show us his tax returns. Mr. Hardwick seems to be an honest man - need I say that Trump is, well, not. He is the antithesis of an honest man.
Who the Democrats nominate remains to be seen. I dearly hope that it will be someone moderate conservatives will find a welcome substitute for the narcissistic liar currently ensconced in the Oval Office.
3
I wonder if Mr. Hardwick thinks that four more years of President Trump, whose philosophy seems to be to take what you can, when you can, from whoever you can, would cultivate any success stories like his own among those children now growing up in challenging circumstances similar to his.
5
People will vote in 2020, and it will not be for Trump.
1
Attacks like those you quote will be the downfall of the left. Yet I gotta say, its hard... its hard to have a conversation with someone with the opposite point of view on the impeachment inquiry. I can't figure it out. Best I can say is it reminds me of the OJ case. There is just so much anger and resentment built up that people can't bring themselves to deal with any facts, or they are so distrusting of American institutions they are as quick to accept conspiracy theories as they are reported, accepted facts.
2
Anyone who voted for Trump is no "centrist".
1
we do not need this lifelong Republican to vote for a Democrat in 2020. We just need him to stay home, or to vote for another Republican. How about Mitt Romney?
1
“There’s not much point denying that Trump, foul as he is, has released Keynes’s “animal spirits” in the United States.”
Not true.
Take a look at almost any 10 year graph of economic data from GDP to employment to black unemployment to food stamp usage, and you will see the Trump years are simply the trend maintaining continuation of the Obama economy ... except for dramatic increases in deficits and spending.
2
My conservative mother in Utah (who I can safely assume will not read this here) often refers to the "East Coast" with contempt. My wife, who is from NY is hurt and confused that she would make a blanket statement like that about fellow Americans. Just another data point. Good will is needed all around.
3
I just read the column on Hardwick that was referenced. I'm not convinced that Hardwick is thinking all that straight. He says he voted for Trump because he didn't like the "scheming" Clintons nor that the media seemed to gang up on Trump during and after the Republican primaries. What's up with this? What does he mean by scheming and how does Hardwick think the Clintons (he's lumping Bill and Hillary into one unit, not me) scheming (whatever that is) could be any worse than what Trump has done his entire adult life? Then... he votes for Trump because he thinks the media ganged up on him? Incredible! I suppose he also hates the Republican House and Senate for the way they dismissed Obama (remember Merritt Garland?), and for the way the Republican led House investigated Hillary Clinton over and over.
No. This guy Hardwick isn't a thinking American. He's a republican who can't stand voting for a democrat. I haven't the faintest idea how one could reason with him or anyone of his mindset.
7
I have struggled for more than three years to understand why Trump's supporters (including people I love dearly) fail to see what the rest of us see, or, if they do see it, how they can choose to overlook it. At this point I don't think I am intolerant, elitist, or lack curiosity if I choose to pretty much write these people off, at least as far as their political or ethical judgment is concerned--any more than I need to understand what makes pedophiles tick. Donald Trump is a threat to our country and those who continue to support him today, in the face of everything we now know (and what many of us have suspected for years), are complicit. Trump's supporters are responsible for allowing this situation to continue for so long.
5
Although voters such as Mr. Hardwick might be concerned with Democrats' policy moves to the left (and Warren is a rather extreme example), only self-interest can explain countenancing Trump's demonstrated mendacity, racism, misogyny, ignorance, and corruption.
3
Trump's politics is built on contempt of me, expressed crudely, dishonestly and repeatedly. You'll have to explain to me why I'm supposed to respect someone who voted for him.
3
Anyone who voted for Trump and still supports him is a poor judge of character. He has denigrated every American honorable tradition.
And he would mow down any supporter on a whim as we see everyday.
3
I began reading this opinion piece in hopes that, yes, it would understand Trump supporters beyond my core belief that they are not willfully ignorant but fundamentally dishonest. Mr Cohen, I enjoy your columns. But here you have given us Mr. Hardwick, who has led a thoroughly commendable life and dislikes Elizabeth Warren. And? What does Mr. Hardwick find appealing about Trump? What spell could be cast upon such an American Success story by a charlatan born with a silver spoon in his mouth? How does he excuse Trump's unquestioned racism? Mr. Cohen, you have shed no light here.
4
Why is it only a one way street? Why are "progressives" and "coastal elites" expected to keep on open mind and woo Republicans but not the reverse? Wake up! Most Trumpers enjoy baiting progressives. They like Trump because he is sexist and racist not despite those traits. At best, they don't care because they think he is "good for the bottom line" despite the ongoing trade wars. The election of Trump was like turning over a rock to expose the nation's underbelly. Trump voters are already in the numerical minority. Democrats just need to fix the system so that the true majority is represented. As a boomer, I look forward to the next generation of voters rejecting Trump and everything he represents.
3
So, why did Mr. Hardwick vote for Trump to begin with, and what does he now think of him and the impeachment evidence that is piling up?
2
I look forward to next week's installment of "How to change Mr. Hardwick's vote." Like everyone else he has only one. He is responsible for how he casts it. Not me
3
Oh we get why people support Trump. I can enumerate a few reasons:
1) They are racist.
2) They are sexist.
3) They believe the nonsensical propaganda that comes from outlets like Fox News.
4) They are Christian- and not in a good way.
5) They are very wealthy.
6) Beyond racism and sexism they feel they they are inherently superior to almost everyone else.
7) They feel inferior so they adopt strategies and views of people that fall into #6 so they can feel better about themselves.
I don't think trying to persuade Trump voters will get much traction. The only way to succeed is to energize the Democratic base.
4
I no longer find it worthwhile to try and reason with Trump supporters. We are talking about people who have an unshakeable, though wrongheaded, belief system. Nothing can deter these people from supporting Trump because they see him in almost religious terms as a "savior" trouncing liberals.
Any open minded person who has confronted one of these members of The Trump Base knows how unshakeable they are in their misguided fervor.
And it is that fervor that may well, indeed, re-elect this despicable creature and in doing so advance the decay and death of America's decency.
Hillary Clinton imprudently, but quite correctly, described these people as "deplorables". That they are and nothing will ever redeem them no matter how loathsome their "leader" behaves.
2
Mr. Hardwick is the generation born during WWII. He came of age in the 50's, probably got his job in the 60's early 70's. What I find interesting about this is that he truly reaped America's benefits in this time period. He had someone give him a scholarship to college or he wouldn't probably have gone. He would most likely have been a line worker with good pay, good benefits, retirement income. Instead he has a college degree and rose to the top of an industry which was coming into its own. For him it was a win-win. For those children, who through no fault of their own were born 10, or 20 yrs later, all this largesse had evaporated. And continues to evaporate to the point where college-educated millennials will be lucky to earn what their uneducated parents did. Their health is already suffering as the American dream is dead. Why Mr Hardwick continues to support the political party which decimated this generation to the extent of even denying them healthcare is beyond me. Why I need to understand this selfishness which elected a misogynistic, hate mongering, narcissistic illiterate is way beyond my ability to be polite. America will never be great again until it decides to give a leg up to those in need and stop thinking that they can do it by themselves. Just like Mr. H, those people all colors, will surprise you. America is suffering because its power brokers are greedy and selfish. People like Mr. Hardwick need to think generously, not selfishly.
3
Ok, we've all got our stories of how we got here. I'm in my 60s, from a working class family that valued education and hard work. My family were Irish Catholic Democrats, and I'm a Democrat. Yes I'm more moderate than many of the Dems who are running, but I will vote for whoever the party nominates. I trust Democrats more than I trust Republicans. I think they are better for the average working person, for the environment, and for preserving our civic values. I hope Chuck gets over feeling dissed and votes for the good of the country.
4
If New York Times Op-Ed columnists choose to waste their valuable space on starry hero-worship of Big Pharma millionaires, they should not expect readers to waste their valuable time on reading them.
8
@Richard Grayson You clearly missed the point of the story. People should not be reduced to simple easy labels. This particular Trump supporter probably has more in common with poor struggling workers than most liberal Democrats and likewise done more to advance civil rights.
2
@Richard Grayson I guess you really did not read Mr. Cohen. Not a word.
1
His life story of emerging from poverty means nothing to you?
In my worst moments, I can see myself in those tweets. I think we need to see the forest AND the trees. Contrary to much published "wisdom," Trump is NOT the Republican Party. Trump is Trump. the Repubs are the Repubs and the Dems are the Dems. The Squad is the Squad. We can decide how we think/feel about any institution, subset thereof, right down to each individual person. I "judge" Trump differently than I judge the Party, etc. Make sense?
Unfortunately I am not sure it does make sense Dave. There was a time when the Republican Party was independent of Donald Trump but that is clearly and certainly not the case today. Trump IS the Republican Party today.
In fact and I say this without hyperbole, the Republican Party is now approaching a cult status in terms of its relationship with Donald Trump.
The Dems have their own issues and are all over the lot with a wide range of solutions on healthcare and many other issues. But there is a public conversation going on and a lot of debate.
Not so in the Republican Party. No dissension is brooked and if complete and blind loyalty is not exhibited to the dear leader, threats are tweeted and primaries opponents are recruited. That is not how a party acts. That is how the totalitarian arm of a corrupt government acts.
Sorry Dave but putting the Republican Party on the same plain as the Democratic Party today, makes no sense.
4
"He does not rule out Medicare for all one day, and he thinks there’s a case for a wealth tax, but he’s convinced Elizabeth Warren’s program shifts the United States leftward too far, too fast, denying some essence of the country that gave him and countless others an opportunity to get ahead through hard work."
Wow. Coming from one of the plethora of countries with universal health care, and high tax rates for wealthy people, I chuckled at this. Believe it or not you can be successful outside the United States while still caring for other people. We manage it, why can't you, Mr Hardwick?
It's still all me me me for people like hm, and that's very American.
15
Democratic candidates need to inspire their base groups to come out in force on Election Day which is a serious challenge in and of itself. Young people, suburbanites, professional elites and African Americans all have different priorities. If there's a candidate that can do that, I think Mr. Hardwick will be happy to come along and join the party. But it's a waste of time to target voters like him, who in this hyperpartisan environment, are too few and far between.
5
But it is important to understand him. The big poison in this country is people taking things at face value and as Roger Cohen says the blatant absence of curiosity. Irritating in many but as a lifelong Democrat, it’s appalling in the well educated. It doesn’t matter how many degrees you have or from where, if you don’t learn how to learn, you’ve not been respecting your education. Someone wise said every complex problem has a solution that is simple, clear, and wrong
The labels are very irritating because that is EXACTLY playing into Trump and the Republicans hands. It is dismissive of intellectual rigor a we are so blind that we accept terms like pro-life, socialists, pro-choice, MFA vs oligarchs, tax and spend. We are being bullied and accept the names they call us and call each other.
Please hear what the author says. This is our election to lose and we’re doing a good job so far.
Mr. Cohen -
You seem to have confused the admirable trait of attempting to empathize with the motivations of those with whom we disagree with the much more immediate goal of replacing Donald Trump. I am willing to bet thousands that the man you profiled has very rarely (never??) voted for a Democratic presidential candidate. Do you seriously expect us to believe that a 40-year Pfizer executive often voted against candidates like Ronald Regan or either Bush? Do you think he voted for McGovern or Carter or either Clintons or Obama? Do you actually think he made his choices based on logic-based arguments respectfully presented by friendly Democrats? This is tribal. He's a Republican. He might be ashamed that his candidate is Trump, but he is more than willing to vote for him for one reason - because he is the designated Republican candidate. Trying to convert these people is a waste of time and resources. For the Democrat push to win the Presidency (as well as other political offices) to succeed, the most important things we all can do are to stop whining about policy differences, rally around the Democratic candidates, and get the vote out. Period. The least important thing we have to worry about is offending people who have no intention of supporting either our candidates, or, more importantly, our values.
13
OK, I'll trade background stories. Raised in Texas. Father died when I was 2, raised by a single mother and lived in many small apartments, worked 25 hours a week in high school and went to a state university (thanks also for help from Social Security until age 22). I never knew about "deplorables" except for the racism that was way too prevalent. I understand your main point that I should not "look down" upon people and I should respect their good intentions. But I have also watched enough Fox news to know that I am a "deplorable" in the minds of many people -- socialist, hate America, on and on. I watched the leader of the Senate show great disrespect for the President and our country by blocking a Supreme Court nominee and many, many other judicial nominees. I watched candidate Trump receive loud applause at rallies by mocking anyone he labels as an "enemy." So there is plenty of blame to go around. Maybe you can become a special compassion facilitator on Fox News to encourage everyone to become more understand and less filled with contempt. I'll start by re-watching Sarah Silverman's "I love America" to help raise my compassion quotient.
12
I've always found the real issue is so many Trump voters have no clue how demanding and difficult the job of president is.
It takes a well educated, hard working person with among other qualities empathy for people regardless of their qualities as well as a well rounded understand of the world.
The simple fact is being an isolationist is a bad place to start from, add to that a silver spoon spoiled brat who has never been held accountable to atrocity behavior.
We got exactly what was on the label, no more, no less.
4
Hillary Clinton was talking about the alt-right. She was talking about white nationalists. She was not talking about all Republican voters. This is blatant, in the context of the speech.
The rightwing media took that quote and fit it into their pre-existing narrative that conservatives are oppressed. Liberals are sympathetic to this narrative, because hand-wringing over their own side's flaws is second nature to them, and because they ideologically want to believe everyone's political views are, deep down, rational. Mr. Cohen may think he's criticizing something about the left. He isn't. He is perpetuating a Conservative Victimhood narrative that was bad faith from the start.
Because, how am I supposed to react when I see Steven Miller, recently exposed as an outright white nationalist, working in the oval office? Should I not offer my honest moral criticism? Should I not ask Trump-supporting friends how they justify voting to keep Miller in a position of power? How is that in any way an unfair or unwarranted question?
Which is more condescending: assuming someone can emotionally handle hearing someone thinks the alt-right is horrible, or refusing to say such things because they'll stamp their feet like little babies?
9
There is no excuse for declaring millions of fellow Americans “deplorable.” You can disagree with them, you can work to implement policies they disagree with, but calling them some disrespecting name is rude, and acting like a two-year old like Trump. Make your points with precision and clarity, and don’t make the mistake that cost Secretary Clinton the presidency.
2
You’ve got some nerve. She uttered one word to describe not millions but the radicals on the violent right. The millions’ collective ego is so fragile they perceive it as a deep and inexcusable insult. Why didn’t you stand up to your candidate and defend us, your fellow Americans, from his relentless hateful attacks, every day, month after month, during the campaign?
3
The 10s of millions of Trump supporters aren't Hardwicks, Pfizer hasn't had that many CEOs. Hardwick & the other 3 lucky ducks Wonder Bread supported are a tiny demographic. Why doesn't Cohen understand that? Convincing or not convincing the Hardwicks in the world just doesn't matter.
8
If Trump announced that he is the son of God most evangelicals would still support him. Trump supporters are in too deep to turn back.
6
Liberals always want to hear both sides and give their counterpart the benefit of the doubt. Trumpism has beaten that out of many. With Trump supporters, the question of why they could possibly have supported him (and the Republican Party) produces many unsatisfactory answers for anyone with 21st Century American sensibilities. After the question of why they supported him in the first place is shadowed only by the question of why they could possibly continue to support him, other than nihilism, belligerence, and willful denial. Unfortunately, there are a panoply of historical demons in America that Trump and the Republicans conjure into the present. Those attracted to these specters form the bitter core of Trump's cult-like following. The fact that there is in the White House one who endorsed racist websites to an alt-right propaganda arm is not irrelevant. Nor is the fact that before Trump became POTUS, he was King of the Birthers. Nor is it irrelevant that the racism the Republican Party cultivated by dog whistle for decades, bloomed into movement-Trump after two terms of a Black man in the White house.
4
How many of *them* made the effort to understand *me* when I voted for (my second Dem choice) Hillary?
3
During Trump's presidency, virtually every columnist has delved into psychology trying to understand the so called Trump voter. The typical Trump voter is overwhelmingly white in case you don't notice. In fact the typical rebublican voter is overwhelmingly white.Those columnists would have you believe that the trump voter is trampled upon, scorned, and so forth. I, as a black guy, find that so interesting and revealing. I am a liberal and my political leaning is informed by my life experiences. The Democratic Party is the party of diversity, of inclusion. Look at The US Congress; the Republican Party has only one black US Congressman out of almost 200 Republican Congressmen and he is leaving next year, mostly because he is embarrassed by President Trump's conduct in office. One party tries to be inclusive, the other one is trying to go back to pre- civil rights area (make America great again). Mr. Hardwick is an educated man and he made a conscious choice as to which America he wants to be a part of.
7
#snowball, Not only "the bigger the government but the bigger the bank and the corporation.
1
People on the left tend to be better educated and to be more capable of critical thinking than those on the right. Conservatives tend to see the world in ways that are black and white (pun intended) and their views simply do not stand up to intellectually rigorous examination, evidence, or nuance. For instance, this man thinks he achieved the American dream all by himself. Rubbish. The article is clear - he got his big break when Wonder Bread gave him a scholarship to attend university. They didn’t have to do that, he was just lucky. I did a paper round when I was a kid too. It’s pocket money, not enough to support a family. And statistically the whole idea that the American Dream will be yours if only you work hard enough, just doesn’t stack up. Most people who are wealthy are born wealthy (like Trump), those who are self-made are a small minority. And everyone’s going to stop working hard just because they have Medicare for all? Laughable. If anything it will unleash entrepreneurship and incentivise workers to get a little bit more. I understand that people have different experiences, so I don’t expect everyone to think the same way as I do. There are plenty of people on the left I disagree with. But, sloppy thinking, well that’s just deplorable.
7
Mr. Hardwick is hardly representative of the large numbers (though still a minority) of people who voted for Trump.
Most of them are indeed decent hard working folk (with a number of racist, misogynist xenophobes among them), and very few of them are wealthy.
The fact is that they have been shafted and deceived by a right wing orthodoxy that has convinced them over the past four decades that funding for schools, support for unions, access to affordable health care etc. is somehow not in their best interests. This was achieved by appealing to their fears of cultural change, stoking of their justifiable anger, and pointing it in the wrong direction.
I can only hope that recent push back as in teacher strikes in Kansas and West Virginia is just the beginning of a massive realignment.
2
two things were clear in 2016: (t)Rump was a monster and that HRC was a failed candidate that would probably not win. in 2020 the play is the same and only one of the characters has changed. (t)Rump is still a monster and both warren and sanders will probably not win. I voted for Obama and HRC but wont vote for warren. its likely that there is a preponderance of voters in swing states who think like me and will end up reelecting (t)Rump.
1
Nice to see you agreeing with President Trump "that there are some very fine people on both sides."
What is it exactly that you want us to understand, and have empathy for, the people who are even considering voting for Trump in 2020?
Are we to have empathy for their support of:
Racism?
Misogyny?
Increasing income inequality?
Locking immigrant children in cages?
Denying people health insurance?
Voter suppression?
Climate denial?
Contempt for the rule of law?
That is what Trump stands for. It is no secret. When you vote for Trump this is what you get.
What is it we need to further understand about these "very fine people"
Like many 'self-made men' Mr. Hardwick seems to forget that "the essence of this country":
failed to provide health care for his parents;
that he was one of only 4 children that a huge corporation with thousands of employees offered a chance to go to college;
that he received his education without crippling debts;
and he 'worked hard' at a time when there were only white males in the corporate suites.
It wasn't just his hard work.
I guess the moral of Mr. Hardwick's story is that in America you can make it big and then vote so no one else will have that chance.
4
The funny thing is that it's people like his father (i.e. poor working/middle class people), supported by wealthy sympathetic liberal elites, who fought all over the world bloody battles to gain access to universal heal care, decent pension, abolition of child labor, free education, etc. ! Bloody battles occured in the US as well with less success (May 1st?) WWI and WWII accelerated the process in Europe, by slaughtering millions and turning part of the society upside down. It never happened in the US, so far, and will hopefully never.
But because he did not benefit from this sense of social solidarity, he seems to consider his "way" was the "best", following a typical "american dream" narration. I find it hard to swallow. These profiles exist everywhere in the world, and are actually even less likely to occur in the USA today than in any other part of the developped world. Unless you allow greed and ambition to take over everybody else right to live a decent, peaceful and honest life. It s a winner take all inbred mentality that blur the ability to reason.
Seriously.
2
Trump is trying to become a dictator, it couldn't be more obvious. And he may well succeed.
How anyone who prizes freedom and democracy could possibly vote for him is simply unfathomable to me.
4
The question to ask is whether there is anything -- anything -- that Elizabeth Warren could propose that would make Hardwick support her.
3
Roger Cohen tells us that Trump could be reelected because there's too much "liberal contempt" for conservatives. Meanwhile, the pro-Trump online magazine American Greatness -- edited by a Times op-ed contributor, Christopher Buskirk -- features a column by Dennis Prager called "Does the Left Hate America?" (Spoiler alert: The answer is yes.) In another piece called "The Left’s Raising and Glorifying of Cain" we're told: "Aversion to God and infatuation with criminals. Those twin traits aren’t common to every 'progressive.' But in America, as in Canada, they are common enough to have made a comfortable home for themselves on the Left."
I could repeat this exercise every day, with every major right-wing opinion journal, op-ed columnist, and radio and TV host.
Many conservatives despise liberals and make no secret of it. I await the day when Roger Cohen warns them that their contempt threatens their electoral future -- or even notices the contempt at all.
5
The whole premise of this argument, and the many just like it, is that we either start saying nice things about Trump supporters, or they all are going to vote again for the most reprehensible person to ever hold the office. This isn’t a reasonable argument, it is extortion.
Are not Trump supporters also required to do what is best for our country?
10
@Patrick Michael Extortion seems to be the Republican Party platform these days.
2
So Hardwick got a great education for free at a public college. His mother underwent a lot of complex medical treatments and his father's business didn't thrive. They lived a tough life but the dad managed to take a job and reach the minimum number of years to get access to the same pension as people who had worked longer.
And Mr. Hardwick believes the country is moving too far to the left? Sounds like he had some of the opportunities (no medical bankruptcy, access to pension despite limited savings by the employee, well-funded public education) that the current crop of far-left candidates would want to see for the kids of today.
4
Democratic readers, you dismiss, challenge and ignore Roger Cohen’s sensible warnings at your own risk. I, for one, have been long convinced that left-wing arrogant condescension has Been one of the primary forces behind the emergence of a Donald Trump.
Like the 1976 movie “Network,” it was only a matter of time before the likes of a Howard Beale-like personality emerged to harness the frustrations of “fly-over” America. For too long left-wing intellectuals—I won’t call them “liberals,“ since liberals by definition should be open-minded—have been dismissive of the concerns of those who don’t share their self-christened “progressive” views. (Disclaimer: I hold a PhD degree, am a tenured academic, and generally fall left-of-center in my views.) On such divisive issues as abortion rights, for example, those not conforming to the official party have been literally excluded. Hillary’s remarks about the “deplorable” and Obama’s comments about fanatics “clinging to their bibles and guns” only serve to widen the abyss.
It seems to me the party is at an important fork in the road: they can either begin to really listen to the concerns of those whose priorities are different, or they can continue to condescend. Be warned, though, that choosing the latter path will only further enable a new generation of Trumps.
11
@WFP even if only some left wing people are negative about those who disagree with them, the entire party will be tarred with that brush. Somehow no one asks the right wing people to respect the left wing ones, not even the president. Why is it considered fine to hate left wing people publicly unless they make a big deal about how they respect you??? This assigning the actions of some to all left wing people and then requiring amends from all left wingers for it (and not doing the same on the right, how about even some respect from the president, our president?).... I sense a repeat of a high bar for left wingers and none for the right. This is a ridiculous double standard. Hold both candidates to the same standard, they want the same job. If you think trump is better, then I really have to wonder. His track record is worse than every other candidate.
I am a registered Democrat and will vote for whoever the party nominates. However, I know a fair amount of good, decent people who voted for Trump for various reasons. The Democratic Party, and, sadly, I have to include myself in that category on occasion, have to stop denigrating those who voted for Trump.
Witnessing Jordan, Nunes and others today make me firmly convinced that the Republican Party has to clean house and go back to its roots. The way not to do it is by casting aspersions on good people with a difference of opinion.
5
@JWMathews I do not believe that those who voted for Trump (I have relatives in that category and even some friends) are all misogynists, xenophobes, bigots and racists) but, what I do believe is this: all who fall into those categories are thrilled that one of their own sits in the White House...
1
I know a few Trump voters and I can assure you that none of them are billionaires. Why we should take anything this man believes as guidance for defeating Trump is beyond me. I suggest that Mr. Cohen try to mingle a little more with people below his lofty social station. And in my experience the Right is far more dismissive and condescending to "The Democrat Party" than the other way around.
18
Rather than worrying about which Democrat he can or cannot support, Mr. Hartwick needs to be concerned about his Republican Party. For the last 9 yrs. (6 -Obama / 3- Trump) little has been accomplished beyond approving the budget and, unfortunately, too many judgeships. If Republicans were willing to engage in negotiating with Democrats Mr. Hartwick has nothing to fear. Compromise would be the great leveler to many proposals. But, voting for Trump is voting for cruelty, environmental degradation, Putin-foreign policy, etc.
18
We all know this guy. We've been hearing about this guy all our lives. The trouble is that a lot of people nowadays are living likes more like the one his dad lived, not like the one he had a chance to live. Animal spirits or not, a lot of people are still miserable, and it has become clear that growth in the total GNP does NOT lift all boats. Also, at least some of the misery isn't likely to be fixed by money alone.
So we kind of want the guy who really made out to listen to US for a change. To ask what the young mother wants, or what the US citizen children of an undocumented immigrant think about policy. We can't all be trying to understand this guy all the time, if he's not trying to understand us.
24
I fully support Mr. Cohen's premise of trying to understand what motivates Trump supporters in a respectful way. I read his column with interest, looking forward to hearing his insights in the context of his discussions with Mr. Hardwick. And then he left me empty-handed and disappointed. Except for a couple surface-level positions on broad issues (Medicare for all, wealth tax) and a vague reference to "animal spirits," Mr. Cohen gave me absolutely no insight as to what attracts Mr. Hardwick or anyone else to Donald Trump. Just Mr. Cohen's own fears about "liberal contempt" bequeathing a second round with him.
17
@Mark Frisbie I’m happy to explain to you why I would vote for Trump. Perhaps because he hasn’t declared war on business, growth, rich people, my insurance plan, the amount I can bequeath my heirs, the marginal tax rate I may be subject to.... I could keep going if you’d like.
Democrats are intent on labels, demonizing success, who can use which bathroom, distributing wealth, banning cows... I could also go on.
If you think the moderates and/or business community, who drive this country, are going to vote for Bernie or Warren, well I would make a sizable bet with you.
It’s like Bill Maher said - “all you had to do was not be crazy.”
2
I think you mistake the "left's" contempt and demonizing of business for resentment and resistance. We on the left may seem anti-business but it is only because the business world continually pushes the edge in exploitation and alienation. Some of us don't want to live in a world where we destroy every living thing in search of comfort and mindless entertainment and where profits are more important than people. Those in the business world have proven over and over they pursue growth at the expense of humanity and are only held to any moral or ethical stand if forced to by law. It is my hope someday we can find a better balance between economic and humanitarian interests than we seem to currently have.
12
@Jason Trump has declared war on the current healthcare plans, which currently have a lot of things built in because of the ACA. If you have more than 11 million, then you can worry about the estate tax. Dems are not interested in banning cows as a party, any more than GOP members are all as racist as Rep. King. Business--are the tariffs and the destruction from climate change helping those? And for the people who work there, is tearing apart the safety regulations helping any of us? Are you benefiting from more mercury out there, more methane in the air, our parks being sold for fossil fuel extraction? Are you good with our foreign policy and constant lies by the president? Is a "lib" not a label? As in stick it to the 'libs'? Trump is out for only the rich, and somehow thinks the country will be fine as he pulls our structures apart plank by plank for his gain. He might tell you he has a great health plan, but he's not shown it to anyone yet. And if you aren't rich, then your taxes just jumped around, and your healthcare probably went up because of his attempts to gut provisions of the ACA (and your coverage went down). He's not looking out for Americans except those rich enough to buy his interest. But he sure likes to try to get us to hate each other.
1
Many people are alive today only because of Big Pharma. That makes some price-gouging forgivable.
1
Forgivable by who? The people without health insurance and too broke to pay outrageous prices for live saving medicine?
13
False logic. There is no justification for price gouging. Price gouging is unforgivable, especially where human rights are concerned.
1
What if I told you many people are dead today because of Big Pharma? Makes that price gouging a little less palatable, no?
2
I am an American story too, by the way...
Why are Dems always expected to take the high road? That is the very behavior that earns the label "elitist". We lose or we lose.
I hope Chuck decides to back democracy, the rule of law, and most importantly, his fellow citizens by voting a straight ticket of all Dems.
22
Thank you for this article which I know to be a difficult jab at my fellow liberals and lefties. The comments herein, which it sparked are for the most part, unhelpful, which is certainly linked to the core your article.
Personally, I am appalled that social media has degraded the discourse running wirelessly through America. Yes, it's a world-wide phenomena but in America today, slurs and four lettered-insults are commonplace. The President's contributions to this environment have only created more opportunities for this behaviour. I watch Fox intently because I want to know what moves the other side of the aisle. Cynicism aside, in the end, how can it be that they defend a man like Trump?
I think what I really appreciate about Adam Schiff and Nancy Pelosi is that they do not allow themselves to be dragged into the mud, left or right. Calmly, and with great patience, they are both able to behave like the adults in the room.
As a Democrat I would only wish that a calm, non-objective sanity could be at the heart of ALL our discourses both private and public. There is no need to make points by shredding the adversary with needless insults ad hominem. After all, what they think of of us is their business, not ours.
And, like what Vindman said the other day; "in the country I serve, right matters".
7
In your previous article "Democrats have to shift sane, moderate Republicans like him". The sad truth is that if a Trump supporter was truly moderate and sane he wouldn't support Trump. By sane I mean someone who accepts truth. This is where the rubber hits the road for people such as myself (and why the frustration). Because there is no debate if there is no agreement even on the facts. It's a plain fact that human beings are heating up the planet to near self-extinction levels come the turn of the next century. There could be a left-right argument about what to DO about it but we can't even get there if one half of the conversation doesn't even agree to the problem. Trump supporters self-deception have made themselves basically irrelevant. The world continues to turn with or without them. Sadly for all of us, it looks like it will be done without them.
18
@Paul hate to throw a wrench in your theory, but I’m an Ivy League educated physician with an MBA and I will vote for Trump any day or the week if the democrats are intent on running a leftist radical. And yes - that’s exactly how I would label half the democratic field.
Bloomberg has my vote, but outside of Klobuchar the rest of the field is catering to uber leftist fringe and twitter mob.
I think this is a case of giving respect to a man’s political opinions because he is a story of American success. It’s a fallacy. Like many Americans who worship business success, Mr. Cohen is having trouble accepting a simple truth: that a man can be both a business success and hold a demonstrably irrational political opinion.
28
"Still, I find the almost complete inability of opponents of Trump to grapple with who supports him and why to be deeply alarming."
I am an opponent of Trump, and I am generally unable to grapple with those who support Trump. But I am at peace with that state of affairs. In a democracy we need to be able to abide by a multiplicity of opinions and demographies. What really bothers me about Trump is that when he is not bamboozling me, he is insulting my intelligence. Today I can say that situation has been changed by the impeachment inquiry. Thanks to Speaker Pelosi, Representative Schiff, and a handful of Trump administration officials, I feel better. For those of us with eyes, Trump can no longer bamboozle us with impunity. What happens next is for the "demos" to exercise democracy.
12
The "movie" that Cohen mentions in the last sentence of this article would have ended differently if we didn't have the ongoing misfortune of the Electoral College. Always remember, please, that HRC won the 2016 presidential election by nearly 3,000,000 votes.
15
Mr. Cohen continues to rehash his arguments as if he did not listen to any of the counter-arguments.
Clinton got 69.8 m votes, Trump 65.8 m.
Over 90 m people did NOT vote.
The democrats have successfully convinced a portion of this population to vote in the mid-term elections last year, granting them... the Congress! Similarly this year, granting victories in many suburbs and exurbs.
So... forget the trump base. They are lost. They are part of a cult, and will NOT change.
17
@FDR
Read the following very carefully:
“If there’s one sure route to a second Trump term, it’s more of the liberal contempt that produced the ‘deplorables.’”
Your observation about the cultic nature of the Trump supporters is accurate. But there’s more. They are energized by our discomfiture and contempt. The more personal we become, the more of them will come out to vote. So, cool it!
We can only outnumber them, and we can do so only by silent respect and utter pragmatic solidarity. This time we will “hang separately if we do not hang together.,” especially if we provoke a hanging mob.
6
@Realist Even if only one Democrat says something insulting, it will be shouted from the rafters--so although I completely think we should be respectfully disagreeing with those with opposite views, I am very frustrated that fringe comments by any Democrat (not even those running) are used by the GOP to tell their voters that we are all out to get them. This is combined with another powerful lie: Trump keeps telling his supporters that by hating him we are hating them. And we are not, we are trying to stop him for our sake and their sake, as we are all Americans. But no one has challenged this lie, I think it needs to be addressed head on by the Dem candidates.
1
I don't think it makes sense to brand Mr. Hardwick an oligarch or plutocrat. That amounts to name calling.
What I don't understand, however, is why the Democratic side should even bother with the likes of him at all--65+ white Republican male. Sure, it would be nice to have his vote. But seriously, the Democratic coalition aligned for progressive causes and against Trump is shaping up as deep and wide without people like him. I wouldn't go out of my way for his vote.
Here's something to remember: in the 2020 election, the Gen Z population will be bigger than the silent generation. Their turnout won't be as high percentage-wise, but they are a far easier and more useful target group for Dems than well established Republicans in the Silent Generation. And winning them now can sew them up for 30 years.
In short, Democrats should not waste time or money on the likes of Mr. Hardwick.
26
Mister hardwick's generation is the generation that fought for civil rights, demanded the impeachment of a corrupt president, and knocked on doors to get Democrats elected. Do not dismiss an entire demographic. All of us are American and America works best when we all work together
Hardwick is a story of rising through adversity. But he's also a story of privilege. More under-represented minority children face the long odds Hardwick did, and most will have no access to the kinds of breaks, large and small, that enabled Hardwicks success
7
@Skut
How about preferential admission to almost every American university, full scholarships to their feeder boarding schools, "diversity" hiring at most major corporations? Don't they count?
A few weeks ago, I was in a park in Queens with about 25,000 other New Yorkers who were chanting "Tax the Rich!" and had come out to support Bernie Sanders. Now, how many billionaires are there again? I think people like Mr. Hardwick constitute a very small minority and their already out-sized voice needs no further amplification. Plus, he needs to pay more taxes.
13
Most Americans of both parties agree on a common set of values, it's only when an issue becomes partisan that people become set in their opinion. The change we need will take 80% of the body politic, it's time to work together.
3
Mr Cohen, I would have enjoyed your piece more if you had asked Mr. Hardwick, who had enormous success in corporate America, if he, were he member of the Board of Directors of a company similar to his, would vote to name Trump as the CEO.
Simple question. If his answer is other than "No" I think we should all be shocked.
13
@Tony Randazzo In Cohen's first column, Mr. Hardwick told us that were he a corporate director he would FIRE Trump due to Trump's manifest inability to manage and work with other human beings. However, he still might impose Trump on the rest of us as President, and hand Trump the keys to the world's largest nuclear arsenal.
I respect Mr. Hardwick's remarkable achievements in life. Furthermore, I agree with Mr. Cohen's point that liberals can be insufferably arrogant about Trump supporters and this is massively counterproductive to Job #1: getting Trump out of office and out of our lives.
But tell me how that's rational.
5
@Bill Camarda
Russia's arsenal is bigger. Lots of tactical nukes that they are more likely to use.
@Bill Camarda
My apologies for overlooking the first piece (which I read). So, Hardwick who more likely than not voted with his wallet (an acceptable reason, IMO - at least it's somewhat defensible), is OK inflicting Trump on the nation. But for a 2nd term? Is he being coy or just selfish, given that if Dems get a clean sweep (House, Senate, White House) his tax bills either go up or way up. Bottom line, IMO, his supporters are in the minority, and if we have '08 levels of voter turnout then he is toast. As a rhetorical question, am I arrogant if I am knowledgable? That is I use verifiably true and accurate information as my basis for decision making. Thanks for responding to my post, which regrettably was a reflection of my own ignorance.
Mr. Cohen may be correct that condemning erstwhile Trump voters will only push them to vote for Trump again. I don't disagree with that position as much as I disagree with the proposition that the Democrats, who are likely to beat Trump's popular vote, should be willing to accept the results of the Electoral College which is structurally advantageous to the GOP. The popular vote is likely to reflect Democrats and others who don't want Trump to be president, so why should a majority of this nation accept the presidential preferences of the 38 to 42% voters who would support Trump under all circumstances? Given that there is no means to change the Electoral College, the Democrats should announce well in advance of the 2020 vote that they will accept only the winner of the popular vote as the winner of the 2020 election. They should also announce that they will contest any and all attempts of Republicans to disenfranchise or intimidate cotes. If Democrats are willing accept a second Trump term despite beating him in the popular vote, then they will be complicit with the erosion of democracy and the rule of law that a second Trump term would bring. The GOP would be wise not to force a second Trump term on a majority of Americans who don't want it.
6
@Utahn -Great! I hope the leadership reads this and takes your thoughtful advice.
@Utahn
What does it mean not to accept the winner of the Electoral College? We are stuck with that, for good or bad.
@Utahn
That sounds impossible.
We are stuck with the EC.
Interesting that you feel that push back against Mr. Hardwick's consideration of a second vote for trump if the Democratic candidate is Warren is translated into "contempt" rather than incomprehension on the part of Democrats.
10
Trump supporters are in several groups:
1. Religious Christian Protestant evangelicals that feel threatened by the rise of secularism and the immigration of those who are Roman Catholic, Muslim, Hindu and Buddhist. They fear that American will no longer be a predominantly Christian nation.
2. Those who strongly oppose abortion and family planning and fear that the sanctity of life will be totally eroded.
3. Gun owners who fear government confiscation with compensation for their guns, and fear having their guns taken from them because of things they write and say, and having to use guns with small magazines.
4. Very wealthy people who wanted a tax cute that would produce an economic boom and feared increased taxes under Democrats.
5. Those fear losing their jobs to offshore outsourcing and automation.
6. Those who are white nationalists and fear replacement.
7. Those whom benefit from fossil fuel usage and fear that addressing climate change with hurt their profits and incomes.
I can discuss with each distinct group their fears. I can listen to them. When I try to examine the cause of the fears, it quickly become clear that they are operating out a lack of knowledge and factual information. Their minds are filled with propaganda.
47
@Brad -Outstanding list Brad.
5
@Brad
Remember what Cohen said about contempt?
Start with #6: The left wing of the Democratic party is proudly boasting Anglo-Americans will be replaced.
Nice column. Probably close to dead on target. If so, Bloomberg is best positioned to beat Trump. Warren and Bernie could be true electoral disasters. Pete and the other so- called moderates are lightweights without the gravitas to beat Trump. In particular, Pete is no Obama. Unfortunately, Biden is simply anemic as a 2020 Presidential candidate. Joe is not a bad guy but his candidacy is weak- not to mention tainted by his son’s Ukraine fiasco. His son clearly gained because his father was VP. It doesn’t sound illegal but it’s an election turnoff nonetheless. The honorable and best thing for the country would be for Joe to bow out and endorse Bloomberg. With Tammy Duckworth or maybe Stacy Abrams as VP - or perhaps a thoughtful retired general as second in command.
Citizens United and it’s consequences are reality for 2020. Nothing will change that fact and Trump’s huge funding advantage. Bloomberg is singularly positioned to defeat the Trump team’s full-force of Citizen’s United with his many billions. Bloomberg has also been a major player supporting climate change concerns, gun violence and many other issues of great importance to the country and the world at large. Plus, no-one can call Bloomberg a socialist, radical,or commie.
Independent centrists like me will decide who becomes President in 2020. Democrats should consider this premise long and hard. God help us on this one!
7
@Doug M I like Bloomberg too. However, unfortunately, he's already been made to grovel over stop and frisk, and what will he be made to apologize for next? I don't think Democrats will let him into their pantheon of perfection. How can he win? As an Independent? He would slice the vote into three parts, and Trump would win again. Help figure this out, we and Bloomberg need help!
@yvonnes
The presumption that an indie bid by Bloomberg gives Trump the win might not be correct. I do hope Bloomberg monitors this issue if he jumps in - but ultimately gets pushed aside by the Democrats because he is too moderate.
@Doug M have you noticed that Trump is completely incompetent? He puts children in cages and separates them from their mothers. He's destroying the environment. He doesn't staff any government agencies. It's amazing to me that you can look at the garbage of this administration and want 4 more years of that.
Both pieces are spot on. Well written and insightful. Thank you.
3
All of us develop our own internal sense of morality individually. Whatever experiences that lead one of us to see the world as we do are our own- if we disagree, well, then we disagree and this should not come as a surprise. The challenge is to keep our minds and hearts open to those who see the world differently than us. And to remember that none of us are the sole proprietors of The Truth.
2
I fear for our country when I read the comments to this article. I am not a very observant Christian, but there is a quote from the Bible that seems very appropriate. “Love thy neighbor as thyself.” Not, “Love thy neighbor if you agree with them”. Not even, “Love thy neighbor if you understand them.” Just love thy neighbor. Assume they care about the fate of this country as much as you and think about it as much as you.
Full disclosure - I make my paycheck from big pharma. I understand as well as anyone that they have saved countless lives, and that they have harmed many people in the process. I don’t defend their bad actors, but truly think I hat drugs have improved the life of everyOne on earth. Could they do better? Yes, absolutely. Could we all? Yes, absolutely.
4
There is another quote - you reap what you sow. That had many applications- on one hand it fits with many in their 70s and older whom were able to take advantage of an expanding economy as they entered the workforce- one that shared productivity improvements. That is no longer the case. At first, I believe this happened because Reagan and many in the GOP believed that the social safety net created by FDR and LBJ made people soft and soft people were lazy and to be despised. Later, I believe it became a form of social judgement- particularly against women and minorities. Which brings me back to the second interpretation. We as a society will reap what we sow by creating an economic and political system that consolidated power. It’s been tried before. It either leads to nations like the Soviet Union or China or it leads to revolution and democracy. Our forefathers warned what happens when there is taxation without representation. Today, most don’t have the latter, only the former.
7
Funny, it's always the left that has to extend the olive branch, to show empathy, to try and understand. Well I recently did that at a family reunion. It didn't work out so well. And let's be clear, the majority DID NOT vote for Trump. He won because of the electoral college. So I'll tell you what, I am lucky to live a comfortable life. The tariffs don't effect me at all, I could care less about appeasing Trump supporters any more. They vote against their own best interest and are too blind to see that. Good riddence to them. I hope they get what they voted for.
32
The majority of states voted for Trump.
@confounded
"Good riddance to them". Remember what Cohen said about contempt?
I’m a white straight man living in Birmingham, AL. I’m economically progressive and socially moderate. I think progressives are digging themselves deeper in a hole with their judgmental attitude towards people who don’t automatically agree with the position they hold that day. Having said that, I have zero interest in trying to convince a registered Republican who already voted for Trump to now switch sides. Give me a break. There are plenty of other more promising voters out there. Winning this guy over is not a relevant goal.
32
I recompile Hardwick's biography and studied it. He's still an unremarkable center right Republican who will never vote Democrat.
Hardwick is a nice-guy fiscal conservative with a Reagan smile and friendly countenance who believes, without evidence, that reducing corporate tax rates is good for the economy. He doesn't like the scheming Clintons and he is against Medicare for All and supports no alternative. He got his start in the 'American Dream' when his father won a random lottery which enabled Hardwick's start in higher education. He eventually got his MBA and landed at Pfizer where his 39 years of service in government relations are not detailed (though Pfizer is one of the most heavily fined Pharmaceutical firms in history). During his 14 years in New Jersey politics his major issues were gambling addiction, strip searches and adoption. He was supported in his New Jersey Governor's campaign by the NRA and Pro-Life constituencies.
He was also on the executive board of ALEC, the nefarious far right Republican political machine which ingeniously perfected the technique by which money secretly flooded into close state level elections prior to the 2010 Census allowed Republican takeover of State delegations, who then promptly gerrymandered their congressional districts using fancy software technology in order to enable un-democratic congressional representation of the dwindling Republican constituency. They opposed Obama.
Did I mention he has a great smile?
69
@Kip Leitner -Great research! This is what should have been included in Cohen's column.
6
@Kip Leitner wow, this was way more informative than Cohen's article. Thanks!
5
@Kip Leitner Excellent background research. The ALEC connection alone leads me to believe that this fellow, coy as he may be, will never vote for a democrat. I think Cohen owes a response to your comment.
8
Either explicitly or implicitly, people consider the downside risks over upside - for presidential candidates, for domestic economic issues, domestic social issues, and then foreign policy (in that order, most of the time).
That said, when one considers the risks from flawed candidates, which are abundant on both sides, the familiarity of policy will trump the unknowns (pun intended, of course).
It shouldn't come as a surprise that jobs and a strong economy, with a promise for modest health care expansion, will likely prevail over an expansive, progressive agenda with many untested unknowns, even among flawed candidates.
In economics/finance, addressing downside risk is a common lens through which to view issues. This doesn't seem to be common in political discourse, though.
4
Mr. Hardwick certainly is an example of the American dream at its best. Regrettably, neither he nor Mr. Cohen seems to understand how his good luck happened. His father as a Wonder Bread employee made it possible for him to attend Florida State and from there he succeeded in a career. However, his success is also a perfect illustration of white privilege. How many blacks were employed by Wonder Bread Florida at that time? Did they hold jobs where their children might have been eligible for scholarships? Thus if a black was not where a door had been opened, he could not have competed for a scholarship. And the fact that doors were closed for thousands of minorities meant that their talents were wasted. The GI Bill of Rights, one of the greatest social experiments of this nation, educated thousands of veterans. Although one million blacks served in WWII only a fraction of them could take advantage of the program. The legislation, at the insistence of southern white congressmen, was administered at the local level, where black veterans were denied the benefits, which thwarted their aspirations and preventing them from joining the middle class the law created. Note that it wasn't the market that created that middle class, it was the federal government. In short, Mr. Hardwick was in the right place at the right time where a door was opened. Not all Americans are so lucky.
40
When are we going to get the article about Trump voters who genuinely understand progressive policies but respectfully disagree with them? Or don't those people exist?
42
I read this article, and the previous one, in an attempt to do what its author implores: understand why those who support Trump do so. Sadly, other than tax cuts and opposing China, I found nothing. Everyone knows tax cuts benefit only the rich. And big business sacrificed our own middle class in exchange for cheap Chinese labor decades ago. At least the “evangelicals” have blind abhorrence of abortion to hang their hats on. I still don’t get this guy.
19
@DJA Regardless of Hardwicke's work 'with civil rights', I doubt very highly that racism is not deep in the core of his allegiance to Trump, as it is with most. Yeah, there might be a smattering of non-racist Trump followers, but there might also be needles in haystacks.
Too many people "speak to" the other side rather than "speaking with" them. Kudos to Mr. Cohen for listening! Left and right don't agree on what the issues are. For many people on the right, it would be impossible to vote for anybody who advocates open borders and abortion right up to the hour of birth, while vilifying business and not seeming concerned about where the jobs will come from. I've heard a number of people on the right say that Trump may be a troll (my term), but at least he's addressing their concerns.
3
Ah. This is the problem. No one is advocating for open borders. Liberals want effective borders, not a giant wall someone can cut into or climb over within minutes (both recently proven). Nobody wants abortions up to an hour before birth. That’s just crazy talk. Where do you get your information? Facebook? Fox? Please choose something more reliable, for everyone’s sake.
I met West Point senior recently. A brainiac he's applying for all sorts of fancy graduate fellowships. He studies physics. he's from the Pittsburgh area. I asked him why he liked Trump. He gave m three policy reasons. I said we could argue about policy for hours, but you go to West Point tele what you like about his leadership style. The student said, "He's honorable." How could I possibly take him seriously.
40
@Phoebe West I agree, it is hard to find the words to respond to "he's honorable". When I have tried to put myself in others shoes with asking "help me understand or give me an example of Trumps honorable nature, any positive things he has done for the country or even yourself and your family..." with Trump supporters, all I get back is, " You Democrats are just trying to get him. "
So sad, so exhausting, I just "can't understand", how someone with intelligence, compassion , love of country and our fellow man can ignore his behavior, his insults, his unintelligible rants, his disregard for human values, the constitution, and especially the environment and be so filled with hatred for anyone who doesn't agree with him.
When his behavior is called out, he calls it a "which hunt", when it is ignored, it is labeled acceptable. His daily "executive decisions" given then turned around , then tweeted again differently, has made feel so helpless.
Have we become so numb that we can no longer be kind, caring and empathy for those less fortunate. I think that is what bothers me the most about Donald Trump and his supporters.
Evangelist: show me the "love thy neighbor as thyself" in his behavior.
Republicans in the congress and Senate: Show me how his behavior is helpful to upholding the constitution and our democracy.
Middle Americans: show me how your life has actually improved, I know mine hasn't.
9
@Phoebe West that is like my gop neighbor who believes trump's bankruptcies are proof of his expertise because he played the system and came out on top.
6
@Phoebe West
You can't take him seriously. You have to make his chances of taking over unlikely. This is a war of values. We have to win it.
4
The only problem with this is that trying to understand why someone supports and believes in Donald Trump is very much like trying to understand why someone supports and believes in figures like Charles Manson, David Koresh, or Jim Jones. You cannot reason or empathize with or understand the motivations of someone who is a member of a cult. They may appear quite sane and normal in other respects, but their veneration of and devotion to their "leader" simply does not square with or have basis in what we understand as reality.
33
This is correct,and both parties call people deplorables, or the 47 %, looking down on some of our people. Whether the remarks are elitist or racist or misogynist, they all reflect an attitude of disrespect to my neighbor. Our problem is how do we help each other? Certainly not by holding some of us in contempt. Having put myself through medical school, since the family money was to go to my younger brothers, and my father's expectation was for me to get a job and help pay for their education. As a physician I practiced 40 years starting in 1960. I am familiar with inequality in both the family and the market place. I consider myself conservative in many ways. I cannot stomach the president's attitude to women, blacks, Hispanics, all of whom are my neighbors. I could not have lived my life successfully without my neighbors who helped me and my desire to help others.
17
I am curious why Mr. Hardwick voted for Trump but his statement that Warren’s plan would deny “some essence of the country that gave him and countless others an opportunity to get ahead through hard work” leads me to believe he might not be curious about some people, like a family member of mine, who have worked hard for DECADES with no employer provided health insurance or ANY benefits. Hard work that many people would not be able to do but that this family member has done with intelligence, grit, and loyalty. Please, Mr. Hardwick, and others, think of those who do construction type jobs for small firms and don’t get enough for the value of that work. There are others, too, doing very difficult work and NOT getting ahead. The time period he thinks of, that of his own experience back in the day, is gone.
28
I'm afraid we have become so polarized that when each side visualizes the "other" we imagine the worst possible example and we generalize those negative characteristics to include everyone that disagrees with us. The truth is that the vast majority of people on both sides are good, well-intentioned people doing the best we can. Both sides need to cut some slack, and we need to start working on this some way.
6
The American Dream and getting ahead through hard work?
Did you miss the part in your own article where this man was handed a scholarship to college because he was the son of an employee? His father was lucky the company kept him for 15 years--no ageism then? And he was lucky to get a chance to go to college on someone else's dime.
I am so tired of the old rich oligarchs thinking they are better and stronger and smarter and more hardworking than everyone else when they are just plain luckier.
73
@Irmalinda Belle Beat me to it :-). The other 999 kids like this guy didn't get college scholarships, and ended up with nothing, or not much. I'm willing to bet the benefits his dad got were because of a union. Which he no doubt fights against.
7
This is essentially the same article Nicholas Kristof wrote recently about his sister, a Trump supporter. The problem is that neither Roger Cohen nor Mr. Kristof give us a recipe for talking to Trump voters effectively. During the last election when I met people who said they were going to vote for Trump, I listened to their grievances about status quo society, and then said, "I understand and sympathize with your issues, but cannot understand how you think T will do anything to remedy them." At that point they invariably started to wave their two hands at me, and that would be the end of the discussion. I understood the hand-waving to mean: 1) "I can't put my reasons into words" and 2) "Nothing you can say will dissuade me." I would like to talk about how T is destroying the environment to T voters through 1) Ignoring the manifest impending global warming catastrophe and 2) Deregulating all poisons and toxins. If I speak with consummate humbleness and respect, do you think they will hear or listen??? Clinton made a huge mistake using that word "deplorables," I agree. Condescension won't work, I agree. But what WILL?? I don't think reason will, and that's all we got besides great alarm. I respect you both, but I doubt that you have answers, I really do. I'm waiting to hear them.
58
@deedee
Yes, Hillary made one reckless verbal swat, and she was history, out, gone, done with.
Trump made reckless verbal swats left and right and continues to make them. For him, endless devotion.
I agree with the commenter that it is about cult follower mentality. Trying to find "reasons" or "common ground," is okay to try, but not likely to be fruitful.
16
Hillary spoke the truth.
As near as I can determine, overall economic statistics suggest that the U.S. economy is roughly on the same trajectory it was when Barack Obama left office. Growing steadily but not spectacularly. Modest accelerations in some measures, modest decelerations in some others. Deficits massively higher, leaving less fiscal flexibility whenever the next recession arrives. Stock market +34% in almost 3 years compared with Obama's +182% in 8 years.
So it's not self-evident to me that Trump has unleashed "animal spirits," unless you are talking about jackals and hyenas.
42
How about interview Trump supporters whose economic circumstances aren't as rosy as this gentleman's, who haven't seen a substantial raise in years—certainly not enough to keep up with increasing costs of living—who have worked just as hard as this guy but haven't seen their overall standard of existence rise, who aren't 78 years old and, to be honest, guaranteed to be gone from the scene within 15 years or less. In other words, folks under age 40, married or single, childless or raising a family, who presumably have a long road ahead of them and somehow still think that Trump will make that road smoother. Who perhaps find a way to hold him up as an example to their kids, or look to him to bolster their own ideas of leadership. Those are the folks I can't figure out.
26
@Vic there are stories in the Times this week with Farmers who are getting hurt by the tariffs, and they STILL support Trump. So forget them. There's no winning them over. These people are LOST.
4
Hardwick's break came from a scholarship that sent him to university and paved the way for an MBA. Such opportunities are even more necessary today in our globalized, hypercompetitive world. Instead younger Americans are drowning in a mountain of debt and loan algorithms that are designed to extract every penny they can't pay.
One doesn't have to support 'free college for all' in order to see how important this is, and Trump (or Betsy Devos) certainly will not address the problem.
Hardwick undboubtedly made the most from his education but he didn't earn the chance to get it. Until the US creates opportunity for people like him today, its competitiveness and vitality will continue to circle the drain.
27
For Trump's base, a high school diploma is the highest educational rung on the ladder. There are a million good reasons why millions of Americans don't go further in their education. But, engaging this cohort in a fact-based, reality-based debate or discussion isn't as possible as it needs to be. I m not impugning the niceness of some of these folks. Some are hard-working, honest people. But, like their president, many don't read books. They get all their news and beliefs from Fox. The "deplorables" tag was an unfair shot: those today in Trump's base need to be invited into the conversation about what government does and why that's important. The response is likely to be disheartening, but at least they would have been invited.
17
@jim jennings
Please don’t use formal education as a measure of an individual’s thoughtfulness or knowledge. Plenty of people without degrees read.
I wrote an earlier comment about a NY family member’s hard work not being enough to “get ahead.” This family member is disgusted thoroughly and disheartened by Trump & cohorts. He does not have a college degree but is one of the most intelligent and knowledgeable people I know. He carefully reads the newspaper and periodicals, watches documentaries and a variety of news and business oriented shows. He is thoughtful & curious.
In contrast, 2 other relatives, who attended a Trump rally here in Ohio, are college educated, occasionally read bestsellers, and are, as you say, nice. I believe they watch mostly HGTV. So, it isn’t really as simple as whether you have a college degree.
2
@jim jennings
"For Trump's base, a high school diploma is the highest educational rung on the ladder. "
Strange I have my MBA and CPA. Maybe I just guessed REALLY lucky on all those tests and essays...
Moreover, I don't watch TV News (or really much TV). I prefer my news to be long form so I can get more of the story. I read a diverse set of sources from the NYT to The Economist, to the WSJ, not to mention other sources such as The Atlantic, National Review, and the occasional long form book. Anything from "Beyond Growth", to "Dirt to Soil". Pretty much whatever strikes my fancy.
I also do think climate change is a problem, and so think there are some instances when a government solution is needed (if designed correctly)
I didn't vote for Trump in 2016 because I didn't like his rhetoric, but I will be voting for him in 2020 because his actual policies have generally been great, and of course because the Dems have gone so far left I wouldn't vote for them if you put a gun to my head.
I will never vote for a socialist candidate. I will never vote for a candidate trying to restrict my right to bear arms. I will never vote for a candidate that that drinks the SJW cool aid that the root of all evil is white men (particularly Christians of course).
Shoot the Dems have gone so far left, that Obama of 2008 would be a racist homophobe. That's how far left they've gone, and that's too far for me...
@Mathew
Please explain which policies of Trump’s have “been great”.
So you’re saying you aren’t listening to any of the Democratic candidates and regardless of anything Trump does in the next year, he has your vote?
Don’t you think this is a problem for our democracy?
When Mr. Cohen states firmly that he finds "the almost complete inability of opponents of Trump to grapple with who supports him and why to be deeply alarming", he is condescending to the many Democrats who are fully aware of the statistics regarding Trump voters. Mr. Cohen seems to forget that they lost the election to Hillary Clinton by 3 million votes, give or take.
Cohen goes on to say "We are talking about tens of millions of such supporters. This failure, this abandonment of curiosity, this rampant intolerance, this blindness, increases the likelihood of Trump’s re-election." Clearly the author refuses to acknowledge that the calculated and cynical gerrymandering by Republicans that resulted in the disconnect between the Electoral College and the majority of American voters is the most serious issue facing us in the next election.
References to "liberal contempt" are tedious, wrong and damaging to any Democratic candidate's run for office in 2020.
40
@Elizabeth Bennett
I don't think gerrymandering has anything to do with the Electoral College. I do think that the population distribution is so skewed towards high-density in the Democratic-leaning coasts that the Electoral College isn't flexible enough to represent actual votes. My recommendation - for what it's worth - is to allow one Electoral College vote for the lowest population state, then give proportional Electoral College votes to each state regardless of how many Electoral College votes that would take.
Or negate the Electoral College by signing on to the popular vote initiative.
7
@Peggy Bussell Unfortunately, gerrymandering has a great deal to do with Electoral College votes--it's how Electoral College voters are picked. According to the Brennan Center for Justice, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania and Virginia introduced legislation to make the distribution of electoral votes for president dependent on the votes in each congressional district instead of statewide results.
Most critics of this plan identify it as a scheme by the GOP to rig the election to improve its chances to elect a president. The last several Republicans who have won the presidency lost the popular vote, but won the Electoral College vote.
1
To be totally honest when Hillary declared "half of trump supporters are deplorable", I knew it was 100%. "Dont you want to know why they feel the way they do?". I am 77 and have worked and lived in 10 states in different sections of America except Pacific Northwest. I know how they feel and am more concerned about the 46% of Americans who did not vote. I dont believe these MAGA can be changed but the 46% non voters can be. I want to know how I can can convince them to vote against trump and any GOP candidate for any office.
73
@Ernest Lamonica
pt 2
"But the other basket, the other basket, and I know because I see friends from all over America here. I see friends from Florida and Georgia and South Carolina and Texas, as well as you know New York and California. But that other basket of people who are people who feel that government has let them down, nobody cares about them, nobody worries about what happens to their lives and their futures, and they are just desperate for change. It doesn't really even matter where it comes from. They don't buy everything he says but he seems to hold out some hope that their lives will be different. They won't wake up and see their jobs disappear, lose a kid to heroine, feel like they're in a dead-end. Those are people we have to understand and empathize with as well."
8
@Almighty Dollar
I agree we should try to understand these people/voters, but much of what these disgruntled individuals are suffering from are policies/actions promulgated at the levels of their state and local governments.
A person needs to be politically attentive to their state and local leaders and the bills and initiatives that are put forward and voted on at these levels. States can undermine what happens at the presidential level, and it has happened, and recently, increasingly, as our nation becomes more divided. Politics is local. Politics is local, and each individual needs to not only vote, but to pay attention and learn, and then vote. It starts local and if we all do that starting early, we might do a good job of understanding the issues when the presidential election comes along.
@Almighty Dollar Just explain to me how trump is addressing or helping improve ANY of the issues you mention above that are troubling those who think the government has let them down. He has done nothing for the struggling Americans who thoughtlessly believe he is on their side. The damage he has caused our nation may be irreversible and those who continue to support him truly are deplorable. There is no other explanation. One cannot condone his criminal, greedy, bullying behavior and then claim to be an honorable person.
2
I like many of Roger Cohen's columns. The ones about his dad were very moving.
But his recurring meme that Elizabeth Warren's policy ideas are an attempt to make America become like Europe, and that our vitality and creativity would somehow be lost is misguided. We are not creative and economically dynamic because we tolerate the abuse of the the weak by the powerful but despite it. We allow conditions to persist that are not merely immoral and cruel but that result in an immense waste of human potential, measured in lives lost or financially ruined from random medical occurrences, and victimization of the poor by predatory financial practices.
36
I can understand that Trump is good for people like Hardwick.
With Trump they pay less tax, and they don't care about the way the country is going, how the US is now viewed internationally, the state of the infrastructure, or health care. They got theirs. They are not women or members of any minority either.
I just hope he is not representative of the Centrists.
38
Thank you for this portrait of grit during economic struggle. My mother grew up during the Great Depression. Her generation grew up with hardship and learned to be resourceful and frugal as a means of survival. Her generation's story is very different from mine, who came of age in the era of Reagan. Money, abundant or scarce, shapes our values and beliefs.
8
@Mary M My parents grew up during the Depression and they would never vote for a Republican. Republicans help the rich and try to take programs away from the poor. Trump is an example of this.
2
Mr. Cohen,
I have not abandoned my "curiosity" as to why millions of people continue to support Trump. I've tried to keep an open mind but the only response I get is a vague reference to "American values" without any explanation.
Like you I too fear for the Republic if Trump is elected to a second term. Which brings up an obvious question. Since you also fear this, did you ask Hardwick if he fears for the Republic with a second Trump term. If you haven't asked then why not? If you have asked what did he say? To the rest of us the danger is very real and the path this country is going down is frightening.
How can Trump supporters separate "American values" with the values of the Republic? Have they given up on free speech, free press and representative democracy?
56
See, if you had just told me that Mr Hardwick thought Medicare for All might be a good idea eventually, but not yet, and that there might be a case for a wealth tax (albeit probably not too high), I would have pegged him as a moderate Democrat, someone that probably likes Joe Biden or Pete Buttigieg.
Maybe I missed it in the first column, but I don't see anything here that actually addresses why Mr Hardwick supports Trump. Without knowing more all I can do is assume that he is someone who voted for Trump because Trump was running as a Republican, and he thought he knew what being a Republican stood for, and didn't dig any deeper. The problem is that the Republican party has drifted massively to the right over Mr Hardwick's 78 years. Moreover the America that "gave him and countless others an opportunity to get ahead through hard work" barely exists anymore, crushed by policies embraced at times by both parties, but championed most aggressively by Republicans. Whether you agree with the whole of her program or not, that is actually the America Elizabeth Warren wants to bring back.
As far as denying that Trump has "released Keynes' animal spirits?" Yes I will deny it, the growth trend is unchanged from Obama's presidency, all Trump has done is blown up the deficit with his tax cuts. Moreover there is increasing concern that his trade wars are creating untimely headwinds for the economy.
66
From what I have observed the increases in jobs have all been in the service sector which means there are a lot of people making very little money and working very hard. We keep hearing that the economy is surging but that definitely is not the case for millions of American workers.
38
It’s refreshing to see sobering articles like this in the NYT. I’m a moderate republican who deplores Trump. But the current democratic candidates have declared war on business, health insurance, rich people, aviation, tax cuts (which really do help small businesses like mine) and who knows what else. They are full of labels, purity contests, and impractical and unelectable policies.
I’m trying to give Democrats the roadmap to win the moderate vote. And instead I’m ridiculed on NYT message boards for being a moderate in the first place. That is the whole premise of this article.
15
@Jason
Sorry Jason but Mr. Pete hasn't risen to your allegation of "declaring war on business, health insurance, rich people etc.
I will accept that many other have. But not Mayor Pete
12
@Jason Are you suggesting there is no carbon problem from Jet flights?
I actually worry for those younger than me and the world they inherit, and by inherit, I am not talking about the vineyard that I escaped paying taxes on thanks to BDO's advice.
3
@Jason "Labels, purity contests" are what always happen during primary season. This is true for Republicans as much as Democrats. Warren is an avowed capitalist and is only trying to reverse the Gilded Age income distribution that we have going now. The only war being raged on health care is being done by Republicans as they push their case against Obamacare to the Supreme Court. It sounds to me like you have swallowed Fox News talking points.
3
The original article presented a picture of a shrine in Hardwick's home to Trump, with a MAGA hat, Trump's ghost-written "Art of the Deal" book, and a picture of Hardwick and Trump.
Anyone who would have this in his house is not on the fence about Trump and open to alternative views.
Please.
Instead of constantly trying to justify Trumpism by seeking out and giving voice to his supporters, how about interviewing the rest of us?
106
It's sad how wide the chasm between the right and left has become. The mutual intolerance. It's a vicious cycle, mutually enforcing, and driven by ideologues on both sides. I'm Portuguese, a firm believer in the goals of the European Union. Here, like in the States, I think most people want similar things. But we have all unlearned to listen to each other and find common cause. Here, like in the States, society is polarising at the time we most need to come together, at a time of very serious global challenges. Though I am left-leaning (by American standards), I am distraught that political discussion is increasingly driven by ideological extremism, rather than common need.
16
It's sad how wide the chasm between the right and left has become. The mutual intolerance. It's a vicious cycle, mutually enforcing, and driven by ideologues on both sides. I'm Portuguese, a firm believer in the goals of the European Union. Here, like in the States, I think most people want similar things. But we have all unlearned to listen to each other and find common cause. Here, like in the States, society is polarising at the time we most need to come together, at a time of very serious global challenges. Though I am left-leaning (by American standards), I am distraught that political discussion is increasingly driven by ideological extremism, rather than common need.
3
Let's get one thing clear. The economy is not surging as Mr. Trump claims. You can't claim the economy is doing well while maintaining a nearly $1Tr/year deficit. The next President will have to do something to fix this, as well as all the other things Mr. Trump has broken.
33
@Rick You’re unfortunately not entitled to your own facts. GDP is quantifiable and measurable and we know exactly how well (or poorly) the economy is doing.
1
I could not agree more, Roger. You're right that "you don't know much about anybody until you look them in the eye." That requires lifting your eyes from the little screen you're holding in your hand. I remember Joe Biden's comment after the last election about Hillary's write-off of certain voters as "deplorable." "They're good people, man." Of course, he wasn't talking about those who are white nationalists. Rather, about people like Mr. Hardwick. Find time for those look-them-in-the-eye conversations. Trump rules the little screens. His whole strategy is designed to distract attention from what's really important. And yes, after what we learned today, his abuse of power for personal gain at the expense of our national interests should be a good conversation starter. I bet it makes Mr. Hardwick uncomfortable too. But if not, I'll still listen to what he has to say. Thanks again for the column..
5
Everything Cohen suggests as mitigating qualities for Hardwick's dubious, pinched and self-serving politics are hollow and wishful. There's no basis for optimism when someone who struggles and rises to the top of Big Pharma can -- fully informed and with clear conscience -- opt for Trump and conflate what's best for America with protecting what's his.
If anti-semitism was what Hardwick is ambivalent about I don't think Cohen would be quite so generous in his estimation of Hardwick's oddly conflicted political sensibility.
For whatever reason Cohen sees Hardwick's position as nuanced and complex when in fact it's lukewarm denial and jerry-rigged defensiveness.
Cohen would have us cajole and comfort Hardwick as if he were a difficult child in need of a pacifier instead of being called out as a smug mug who got his and promptly stuck his leftover slice of integrity in his Sub-Zero freezer.
Cohen's kid glove approach to Hardwick hints at a macho brotherhood a lot of guys feel for other guys who think of themselves as smart and self-made and actually admire Trump's audacity as a no-nonsense tough guy.
If Cohen is seconding Obama's wise counsel to keep our eyes on the prize of beating Trump instead of pie-in-the-sky or angels on a pinhead, extolling Hardwick as the priority makes no sense.
Forever-Trumpers already cut their noses off to spite the nation. Political Seppuku is their remaining option.
Hardwick is the problem, not the solution.
50
@Yuri Asian -- This one dangerous sentence gets to the heart of why men like Trump: "a macho brotherhood a lot of guys feel for other guys who think of themselves as smart and self-made and actually admire Trump's audacity as a no-nonsense tough guy."
This is the alpha-male fantasy of the poor, struggling white man slipping ever downward in salary and social status. They are angry and need someone to blame. Rather than do the tortuous analysis required to locate economic injustice and the social inequality this slowly engenders over several decades, with their philosophy of hyper-individualism, they are much more amenable to boogeyman speculations. "It's the Hispanics taking our jobs!" "No, it's the Mexicans invading." "It's the snowflakes and their liberal policies."
It's simply too banal and incomprehensible for many folk to understand that shifts in the global economy and American retreat from fairness are all that is necessary to produce poverty and despair. The wealth is pouring upward and even out of country, taxes have been cut, funds aren't available -- enter suffering.
1
@Yuri Asian
You just cut off all possibility of decreasing the Trump vote. And your psychoanalysis of Cohen is based on nothing but stereotyping.
1
Look, when they start caring about me, I'll resume caring about them. I'd hate to count the hours I've spent, the books I've read, and the conversations I've had trying to understand conservative motivations, viewpoints and fears - because I have empathy for my fellow man. But they have expressed nothing but contempt for me and my views. I fail to understand how we can have a conversation in this context.
58
@jim
Not all conservatives are the same, and not all Trump voters are the same. Not all Sanders voters are the same and not all Buttigieg supporters are the same. Etc.
1
Yea, but how many books are out there discussing how conservatives can reach out and understand liberals and their worldview? There are literally troves of books and articles offering a “peak” into the worldview of the mysterious Trump voter.
4
Years ago there was an expression used by the destitute : "Readin', Writin', and the Road to Akron."
Hardwick is proof positive of that adage. Why was a good job at Wonder Bread so easy to obtain? Because of the masses of industrial workers at the big tire & rubber companies. Akron was the Rubber Capital of the World.
Then, as an MBA, Hardwick oversaw an economy based on finance and marketing, and not making heavy industrial products which required a lot of union labor.
We went from an industrial economy to a transactional economy which used much less labor. Hardwick saw this first-hand. All the while, conservatives and business were saying that Big Government was the problem.
Somehow conservatives, social media, and the Russians got common people to nod in agreement with them.
I would not call them "deplorables" in most cases. I would call them misguided, and lacking knowledge of the history of the economy.
As I posted after Mr. Cohen's previous column, perhaps people are not ready for Elizabeth Warren's policies. But eventually we will come around to them in shepherding people to a postindustrial economy in an era of climate change.
29
The "deplorables" must be understood, according to Cohen:
"If there’s one sure route to a second Trump term, it’s more of the liberal contempt that produced the 'deplorables.'"
Why? Because it is humane to try to understand another? Because there are more of them than us? Because that side really gets out and votes? Because by understanding them we are that much closer to having them see the truth?
What are we not seeing, getting or comprehending about who they actually are? Could you please explain, Mr. Cohen? There are so many questions and so few answers:
Does the "sin" of us judging them cause them to be motivated to stick it to us and vote?
Is it because Trump promises so little and delivers less, and this allows them to feel more certain that government is useless?
It is all theory, belief. It is the theory that these voters can be reached if some miraculous insight about them is attained.
The sneaking suspicion is that these folks are traditional Republicans who like someone who berates the press, cuts taxes, speaks against politically correct types, and promises and delivers next to nothing because they feel vindicated in the belief that government is the problem, not the solution.
34
@Srose
Those voters are not all the same. Think about that.
Mr. Cohen, I respect you greatly, but I think the voter class you represented with Mr. Hardwick is irrelevant, for two reasons.
First, if young people don't step up and vote to steer this country in the direction that is favorable to them, then it really doesn't matter who wins. If the Democrats put up a candidate who doesn't stir young voters and draw them out, it doesn't matter if Trump is re-elected vs. some lukewarm right of center Democrat. I think Warren in particular is counting on getting young voters, in the same way that Trump counted on riling up older white voters. The statistics I saw: old white people, 70% voting rate; millennials, 49%, gen-x, 29%. So it is in the power of young people to make a change.
Second, there isn't time to return to Barack Obama half measures 12 years after he was first elected. The crisis of climate change is a ticking time bomb. Estimates of how long we have before effects are irreversible are truly scary. On top of that, and in second place, something has to be done to address wealth inequality before the plutocrats have completely taken over, if they haven't already.
So as I see it, a candidate who can effectively address both of these might induce a turnout surprise, and if not, the young get the government they didn't bother to vote for.
27
Chuck Hardwick got where he is with a bit of luck, brain power and lots of hard work. We're not told that government programs assisted him. Such programs are a staple of Democratic policies and Warren/Sanders, in particular, are promoting huge ones. Supporting family with paper route proceeds? Sounds like from another planet. Is the age of the self-made man/woman over in America? I know there are exceptions but either one has very wealthy, connected parents or gets a lot of government assistance to achieve the American dream. So it's different than it was for Hardwick. His story may therefore not be so relevant. His position as a persuadable Trump voter is however relevant to next year's election. My guess is that Hardwick will be more influenced by who is the Democrats' candidate, what is the platform and what economic risks it may entail for him than by the contempt expressed by some Democrats for Trump voters. Besides, my take is that those who do express contempt are as beyond redemption as the Trump voters who do the same.
2
Let's be fair here - this is one category of supporter, one which has much more to do with trump's election than most realize. As was written, educated, successful, and with a broad perspective on the world, longtime or lifelong Republican, but I wonder what the rest of the conversation was like. If it was anything like what I've experienced over here, it's hard enough trying to understand how someone can see the foreign policy, tax cuts and trade wars as being a positive, but listening to what leads someone to adopt, defend, and normalize what trump has done and what America has become is as demoralising as much as it defies logic.
But it is also a bit deceptive to mention the "deplorables" in connection with him. The fact is, 60 million people voted for trump, the vast majority of them white. The proportion of Non-Hispanic white people is about 200 million. Calling half of them "deplorables", as Clinton mentioned - seeing what too many white Americans are showing themselves to be now, it isn't difficult for me to feel that 1 out of 6 is just that, and that you never know who it is going to be.
6
I think the right does a pretty good job of looking down on everyone who is not them and then creating policy proposals that look to hammer the very people they are looking down on.
51
I think Cohen's even-handedness is necessary and similarly deplore the lack of curiosity about people who are "other" that many liberals exhibit. The comments that Hardwick is an oligarch are an example of obtuse liberals in the extreme.
Just when I'm feeling sympathetic to the messenger and the message, I trip over the framing that is central to Cohen's idea that political centrism is the only viable path forward: "The American dream? ... he's convinced that ... Warren's program ... denying some essence of the country that gave him and countless others an opportunity to get ahead through hard work."
I have no reason to doubt that Hardwick worked hard. So do I. He enjoyed a career of remarkable privilege; I cannot get a full time job commensurate with my education and skills and was recently
4
finishing the thought...
The difference is good luck. Hardwick had it, and I don't. He was born in the right era, and I appear not to have been.
Can we please stop accepting the right's conceit that "hard work" is even usually rewarded and that people who don't succeed in securing good permanent jobs with pensions either have not have worked hard enough or are deficient of character? Makes a great story and slogan, but I think it describes the exceptional case, not the usual one. The right has been hard at work for 30 years undermining the very structures that enabled Hardwick to profit and live comfortably from his combination of presumably hard work and good luck, all the while pretending that harder work is all it takes to achieve success. I know some migrant workers with green cards (attention: not illegal!) that pick strawberries in California, then cherries in Oregon, then salal and evergreen boughs in Washington, and I bet they work as hard as Hardwick ever did. Doubt they'll realize his American dream, even if we do manage to prevent centrists from continuing the neoliberal project of undermining unions, eliminating workplace regulations, ensuring access to affordable health care, and all the rest. We need to maximize corporate profits to ensure we can cover the cost of Hardwick's pension payments...
14
Mr Hardwick is an obvious American success story because he took advantage of opportunities, worked hard, improved himself, and applied his abilities to build success in business.
He and I are the same age and I remember what it was like to grow and learn as an individual during that time 50-60 years ago: opportunities were available, college was cheap, and believing in a great personal future was easy.
For today's young people there are jobs but they are low wage and dead end, college is crazy expensive, and the future seems shaky at best.
The country's financial structure needs to be rebuilt: large corporations pay no taxes, millionaires can't get enough boats and airplanes, and the majority have trouble making ends meet, even before confronting the next financial problem that awaits them up ahead.
Trump backers saw the problems and voted for him, they are still holding on and hoping.
But Trump is definitely not the person to make the changes this country needs.
35
Can't help but note the poor health of his mother, better health care might have saved her? Dad crushed in an elevator accident - how about better regulated buildings? Soundd Dad had a decent pension deal going on, union protections anyone? Heavy borrowing on the truck stop restaurant, long time to pay off - what kind of loan was that, high interest, better regulated banks/lending anyone. Moving from one state to the next - good federal infrastructure, regulated interstate commerce, rule of law. Public university scholarships... the list goes on and on.
There is a clear difference between current Republican platform and Democratic. And this guy is stuck on an insult he might have heard somewhere of being "canceled"... he's insecure.
Being old and personable does not a wise person make.
Why are we even listening to him.
37
Many people seem to think that the best way to convince people of the rightness of a position is to yell at them loudly while insulting them.
I've yet to see any evidence that this is actually effective.
The truth is that if the Democrats want to win in 2020 they will have to convince at least some of the people that voted for Trump in 2016 to shift their votes. There is no realistic path to victory without that. Yelling at them for their prior vote isn't going to do the job.
10
@Chris R No. They will have to convince people who didn't vote then to vote now.
3
@Joe B Does this mean that you think we should simply yell at everyone that voted for Trump and dismiss them entirely? If that is the case then I'm not sure I see how that is more important than winning in 2020.
If you try to reach out to understand Trump supporters, you simply must watch Fox News, which echoes the sentiments of Trump's base.
I have, and I've given up. Fox News doesn't convey facts, or even reality. It is a propaganda operation, purely and simply, and if appears to reflect the attitudes of a certain segment of the electorate, for which I have no respect whatsoever. They are by and large low information voters seeking revenge for real and imagined slights. They are overwhelmingly predisposed to accept conspiracy theories that fit their limited viewpoint of current events, history and culture.
IF any of these fine folks begin to respect moderates and liberals, then I will reach out with an olive branch. Respect is not a one-way street, and I'm tired of the constant drumbeat that those of us who are progressives must come to grips with angry, revenge-filled, ill-informed, under-educated voters.
106
I am a lifelong Democrat, sometimes a strident one. Got it from my grandparents, refugees from the Depression-era Delta who despite the lack of education always credited their ascent into the middle class, shop foreman division, to the New Deal.
Sen Warren's policy set, while admirable, cannot be imposed by fiat here any more than they were in Europe, where they emerged from a century's worth of change in social relations and the church, often revolutions, and warfare.
Still I would give them a chance. But I have never heard her say a nice word about making a buck. Based on her record. it's fair to say she sees the American workman primarily as somebody who needs to be shielded from that, not as one who would like to take part in it himself.
Surely a citizen can be a worker and a creator at the same time. Workman will pick up from Sen Warren her impression that this cannot be done, and see it as another case of the patriarchy even if it's a woman in charge.
1
I admire Mr. Hardwick's perseverance through very harsh family circumstances, for which I offer sincere congratulations. I do note that his scholarship is said to have been the result of a lucky break.
Millions lead lives just as harsh but never get such a break, and the awful ways in which MAGA is playing out -- other than in sales of red caps -- will preclude millions of other opportunities. Mr. Hardwick should vote Democratic.
23
Chuck Hardwick’s personal history is inspiring but provides little real insight into his political and economic thinking today. Tell us instead about today. Who is he? Who are his friends? What does he read? How many homes does have? What are his hobbies? Who are his heroes? If he were president, how would he address the health care problem? At this point, I know more about who he was than who he is.
Regarding Liz Warren: The society that Elizabeth Warren envisions is more likely to offer young Americans the kind of opportunity Hardwick had than anything the political right is offering. Even if he believes Warren is advocating too radical a change too quickly, is the best response choosing the insanity and incompetence of the Trump administration? Doesn’t it make more sense to embrace her goals and work with her to slow down the process?
38
@Richard Frank
"At this point, I know more about who he was than who he is. "
I agree with your comments Richard, although I would point out that Mr Hardwick's 'shrine' to trump tells us as much as we need to know about who he is. The fact that he can't rule out voting for trump again also speaks volumes about his values and beliefs.
2
I didn't comment on the last article, but I will this time. I don't care about Mr. Hardwick's childhood, his story, his problems. I don't care about his American Dream successes and achievements. We all have good times and not so good times in our lives. We all have successes and failures, although it seems the American Dream opportunities don't abound as much these days as they did when Mr. Hardwick and I were young.
What I do care about is that Mr. Hardwick would vote for Trump again.
Trump makes a mockery of everything this country stands for. It's obvious to everyone by now. I can't imagine it isn't obvious to Mr. Hardwick.
If Mr. Hardwick had simply said, "I will not vote for Trump again under any circumstances. If I don't care for the Democratic candidate, I will just stay home," you would not have read the comments you read.
It's that simple--some of us have principles. Mr. Hardwick's are questionable.
159
I think that the article is incisive. However you seem to have an asymmetrical view. The theme seems to be that Trump supporters are the aggrieved and the Trump opponents are the agitators. You are stereotyping both groups and you fail to capture the heterogeneity in both groups. A big part of the problem is the social construction of the current polarization. It makes good press and good politics to have clear sides.
15
Warren too far too fast? At least she has come forward with some proposals. These issues didn’t grow over night. Where was the Regan plan the Clinton,Bush or Obama plan? We had the affordable health care plan but that left big pharmaceutical and insurance companies still in charge-more profits for them. All the current issues have grown in severity and have been thrown in to today’s voters laps. So we have choices. The Trump plan which is no plan, some form of Warren plan or a more centrist plan which has also not been very well explained. Do we fix the old car or buy new? It is time for a new car.
9
@Viincent President Clinton had a health care plan. I remember the Republican response.
2
For the Democrats to win the White House, time spent trying to convince Trump supporters is not time well spent. Democrats win when we vote. Too many Democrats did not vote in 2016. Our time will be spent convincing those people to vote.
41
@Nick Clinton won the popular vote. Trump won the Electoral College vote. I want to do away with the EC. I think we have to after this disaster of a presidency.
There has developed a tendency on the left, and it is to some extent understandable given the mephitic behavior of the trump administration, to attack anyone who even remotely defends trump. This extends beyond trump's personal venality and probably criminal actions to any policy of the administration . Given the good economy, the low unemployment rate and the disquieting lack of present foreign policy crises it will be difficult at best to defeat trump and, if it is to happen, it will have to be done, but carefully, in the area of his divisiveness and damage done to the nation.
All Democrats, and especially the candidates for office, need to walk a fine line between making clear what the stakes are without finger pointing and blame directed toward those who have voted for him and even those who still support some of his policies- that only increase their stake in his success. The trump phenomena of name calling and ad hominem attack has infected the nation at large, including some Democrats, and giving in to that isn't helpful in ridding the country of his malevolence.
4
This would be useful in an era when people cared about what others thought. Most are now simply fascinated with their own views. And we wonder why we have no institutions left that anyone trusts.
6
I responded to the first article, never questioned Mr. Hardwick's background and authenticity. What irks me is, somehow Mr. Cohen, and others, think I should be running around trying to convince people who voted for a despot to try another way. And I should move more to the center if necessary to accommodate them. No I won't.
Where the fertile ground for Democrats is, those 60 million plus individuals that didn't vote in the last Presidential election. Get some of them to vote and we win.
81
@cherrylog754 The people voted for Clinton. The Electoral College put Trump in office.
1
@Sharon Conway : But the non-voters made the difference in the EC.
1
It never ceases to amaze me how supporters of Mr Sanders and Ms Warren choose to ignore these moderate Republicans when they consistently say they will not vote for these candidates. If the Democrats can win over these traditional Republican voters, or even get them to stay at home on polling day, they will take the White House. But, it seems that for many Democrat supporters, moral purity is more important than winning office. And, down that path, lies a second Trump term.
4
@Melbourne Town
I'm not so sure this analysis is correct. Many here have pointed out with good reason that getting a significant number of the latent Democratic Party voters to vote in 2020 is a direct path to victory.
Compromising policy to appeal to the so called 'moderate' republicans is not the best use of time and resources. Anyone considering a vote for trump is a lost cause and not worth appealing to. A much better strategy, I think, is to inspire and rouse the Democratic base.
Many of the comments to this article simply try to out-yell the author or the view that he's trying to communicate rather than engaging in any sort of thoughtful conversation. For these commenters, the author and those he writes about are "obviously" wrong and need to be overwhelmed at the ballot box.
And the beat goes on... Perhaps if we all took a breath from these last 3 years to reflect on common values and the way forward together, we might actually accomplish something other than yelling at each other like 6 year olds.
4
Not sure about Mr. Hardwick, but many Trump supporters do indeed, vote because of an emotional backlash. Trump's appeal is all about emotion. That's how conmen work.
36
"Still, I find the almost complete inability of opponents of Trump to grapple with who supports him and why to be deeply alarming. We are talking about tens of millions of such supporters. This failure, this abandonment of curiosity, this rampant intolerance, this blindness, increases the likelihood of Trump’s re-election."
Perhaps we are -- all of us to which you refer -- afraid.
Afraid of how our friends, neighbors and relatives will react when the Trump Organization begins its tweet campaign against us.
7
Stereotypes, labels, identity politics, etc. aside, I would hope and like to believe that Hardwick's life story can be summed by knowing the difference between what's right and what's wrong when it really counts. Like now. We may never know whom he or countless others will vote for yet perhaps we'll know why.
8
Trump's diehard supporters don't want to pay taxes, they rail against immigrants, oppose any sort of gun control, believe climate change is a hoax, and hate welfare recipients. They're also the first to complain if their Social Security payment didn't arrive on time.
No one is going to change their attitudes. They just need to be overwhelmed at the ballot box next year.
162
@Mark McIntyre
They also want to live in a different country, not the USA.
14
@Mark McIntyre Hardwicke is not a "die-hard supporter" according to this article which is sort of the point. It says right at the top that he is unsure who he will vote for in 2020. We should not just write off his vote. Whether we get it or not, writing it off beforehand is just dumb (and sort of what Democrats did in state and local elections in red and purple states at our peril)
This column give Trump far too much credit for the economy. No real "animal spirits" have been released:
* Increased business investment from huge business tax cuts? Nope, didn't happen. The money has all gone into short-term measures like stock repurchase programs. We got a trillion dollar deficit to go along with 2% growth.
* The great manufacturing revival? Not really. There was a modest increase of about 450K in the 2 years ended last February, but employment has been stagnant as the tariffs have hit supply chains.
* A big, beautiful infrastructure program? Nope. At this rate, we won't get that until the sun cools to a blackened cinder.
28
Mr. Hardwick is 78 years old. Roger Cohen quotes him saying, "he thinks there’s a case for a wealth tax, but he’s convinced Elizabeth Warren’s program shifts the United States leftward too far, too fast, denying some essence of the country that gave him and countless others an opportunity to get ahead through hard work."
The opportunities for young people who are born without connections or money these days are pretty much non-existent. Hardwick is living in the past and that past is long gone.
Policies advocated by Senator Sanders or Senator Warren are trying to merely level the playing field a bit so that those opportunities which were available to Hardwick will be available again for a new generation.
The wealth inequality in our country is worse than it has been for 50 years. Why doesn't Roger Cohen or Mr. Hardwick address this fact?
73
“If there’s one sure route to a second Trump term, it’s more of the liberal contempt that produced the “deplorables.”
I really don’t understand how such a gifted writer can offer this rationale, unless I was too dazzled by your elegant use of language and missed the point all along.
I don’t hear many liberals calling Trump voters deplorable, but have seen some of those voters wearing it on tee shirts
I am a liberal whose contempt lands squarely on the shoulders of Mr. Trump and his Republican backers in government who continue to wreck the country. Mr. Hardwick hardly matters to me. He’s not in a place where his survival is at risk so while it’s great that he thinks we can have Medicare for all someday, that doesn’t help all those who need it today. If he cannot support Warren over Trump, then it’s a waste of time to try to win him over.
I want to see the Democrats stop worrying about the drift to the so called left and talk more about the lurch to the abyss this administration has taken us too. I really think articles like this are distractions from the seriousness of these times.
91
@MG Someone show me a path to victory in the Electoral College that does not include some voters with views like that of Mr. Hardwicke. We write off those people at our peril. (And Warren is not the only candidate available to Democrats.)
8
@MG Someone show me a path to victory in the Electoral College that does not include some voters with views like that of Mr. Hardwicke. We write off those people at our peril. (And Warren is not the only candidate available to Democrats.) And I know many liberals who call Trump voters deplorable (which it is true some/many are) and write them off and say their concerns are not ours.
@Liza : About 50% of American adults don’t vote, largely because their lives have remained miserable through both Republican and Democratic administrations. Give the 50% something to vote FOR, and Trump supporters will be overwhelmed.
P.S. Tepid centrism won’t do the trick
5
I would like to know Mr. Hardwick's thoughts on all the children of Winder Bread employees that didn't get scholarships. Was Mr. Hardwick just lucky or did he earn the scholarship on his educational merits? Reflecting on the positive impact education had on his life, does he think that it would be beneficial for the government to make higher education affordable for all or are corporate charities the answer?
23
Roger, you are absolutely correct about the dangers of "liberal contempt and the risk of abandoning the American dream. But, you are dead wrong about Mr. Hardwick and people with attitudes like his.
Like Trump, Hardwick managed to avoid military service during the Vietnam and Cold War eras. There's no evidence that he's invested his time in community efforts.
He doesn't appear to be the kind of guy you might run into while at a union hall or an American Legion or VFW post, while fishing, or working on your hobbies. I wouldn't expect to see him at a state or county fair.
You want to see a real American: look at the Vindman brothers, Mike Bloomberg, truck drivers, Caterpillar or Ford techs. defense OEM employees, military members, cops, firefighters, engineers, laborers, or just about any of the hundreds of people you see every week.
Hardwick may not be a plutocrat, but, his views suggest that he'll do until a better example comes along.
9
@Mack
Hardwick came from nothing. He's not a trust fund beneficiary. That, to me, is admirable.
Even after Mr. Trump leaves the Presidency, the attitudes and feelings of the many tens of millions who supported him will remain. It would do those on the other side well to listen more.
4
Hearing these stories is important. Dems should practice empathy for Political opponents just like we try so hard to do for society’s disadvantaged and discriminated against. It does mean we don’t still pursue a liberal agenda. It does mean we reflect on how it affects others even while we’re trying to rebalance power.
I’d like to hear more from the Democratic candidates about how they would unite the country. Booker and Buttigieg talk about it. The others seem to imply that their policies will do the uniting. If that works, great, but how do they get those policies adopted without uniting first?
5
Sorry for typo, should be "Doesn't mean we don't still pursue a liberal agenda. It does mean we reflect on how it affects others . . . "
Serves me right for excess of double negatives.
Roger, you ask us not to stereotype, but let's face it, you picked a stereotype: a retired CEO multi-millionaire. Kudos to Mr. Hardwick and his family for rebuilding their life. It's a great accomplishment. I am genuinely happy for them. However, the arc of the story of his family is much harder for families to replicate today. That's at the heart of the issue. Opportunities, like the Wonder Bread job for his incredibly hardworking father, are far less than 70 years ago. Although Trump talked a lot about helping hourly workers, he knows nothing about the experience of their lives. In fact, he has repeatedly stiffed small family businesses in pursuit of his own bottomless, but empty egotistical endeavors. Many two income families cannot now make enough to rent a 2BR apartment in many cities, or small towns. If Mr. Hardwick truly wishes for others to follow his uplifting family's path, he must know it's not possible with T's unsustainable economic pyrotechnics. $1T a year budget deficits now are a recipe for disaster. The Dems do offer middle of the road alternatives: Biden, Buttigieg, Klobuchar, & Bloomberg. They don't generate the sensationalist press of the those on the far left, but polls show the first two can beat Trump. The country needs less bombast, and less talk of very complex $20+T government programs. We need action on how to sustainably increase working wages for millions of Americans, with affordable healthcare. Hardwick could help with that.
21
We're all the American story, Mr. Hardwick no more or less. How someone, anyone, could look at and condone the actions of Trump without immediately knowing that, at the least, they are plain wrong, and at most, plainly illegal, and against everything that we've stood for and fought for is astounding. And frightening for our future as a country.
31
I try not to handicap myself with binary thinking. Still, I cannot fathom how anyone could rationalize a vote for candidate Trump in 2016 given the mental deficiencies and depravities in plain sight. These should require no narrative specificity at this point.
Yet, I have relatives and acquaintances who I value that continue to support president Trump despite the glaring evidence staring them in the face. I have no words. I'm not exactly sure what a "rabbit hole" is. But I think we are down one.
As for Mr. Hardwick: Congratulations on your success. Don't pull the ladder up behind you.
38
Some responses from the left and center-left to people on the other side are over the top. But I think it is fair to question people who will support Trump unless the Democrats nominate a center-right candidate - basically George W. Not voting because you don't like either candidate, I can understand, but voting for Trump is not the fault of Democrats, it's a choice those voters have to own.
Also, no matter who Democrats nominate, the candidate is likely to be considered as "cheating" or "scheming" or "patronizing" or "corrupt" or worse by most Trump supporters by the election, given the drumbeat of lies and innuendo (and Russian interference) we will see, so even if we pick someone conservatives say they will like, by November 2020 they are likely to say they had no choice but to vote for Trump.
17
Listening to the other side is all well and good, when the other side is thoughtful and rational and has facts to back up their positions. The problem is, they aren't, and they don't. How exactly are we supposed to have a conversation with them?
50
"There’s not much point denying that Trump, foul as he is, has released Keynes’s “animal spirits” in the United States"
There's actually lots of point in denying this, see e.g. any of the work of your colleague Mr. Krugman, but it's a nuanced argument, the type that a Trump supporter is..not going to buy.
So, all we're left with is another "show empathy for those who purposefully deny it to others or else they'll be upset!" argument from Cohen.
This assumption is neither admirable nor likely to be well supported based on the available evidence. It's just as easy to construct a syllogism that Cohen is dead wrong and not activating voters who are motivated against trump is a critical mistake. It's definiitely easier to make a moral case for that.
16
When Mr. Hardwick was growing up, the government and society were run on the principles and policies of liberalism, with government not being demonized in the culture at large, and business recognizing that they had a responsibility to society as well as the bottom line. Power and wealth weren't as concentrated in the hands of a few as they are now. Society, for whites at least, economically was more egalitarian. I bet union membership back then was much higher than it is now.
Thanks to decades of Republican party politics and leaders, that America is no more. Trump is just the latest, most extreme case of the party turning its activity towards plutocrats and anti-democracy.
So why is Mr. Hardwick voting for him again?
29
Great column, Mr. Cohen. I want Trump out, but so many of my progressive friends, all highly educated, look on working-class people, as well as people in business, with nothing but disdain and contempt. I fear that outlook will guarantee that those tarred as "deplorable" will again stand up for themselves and their values by electing Trump.
2
Easy to cherry-pick the offensive comments. Many of us have resided in both populations and really do respect some of the people who voted for Trump (the ones who truly believed that T offered hope). Having observed both sides, there is at least as much mud slinging coming from the MAGAs. And it appears that this is the activity they most enjoy. I have tried to have calm conversations about specific issues. Usually no interest, just snarky remarks and joyous trolling.
19
When I read Mr. Hardwick’s remarkable story of very successfully overcoming many huge obstacles and tragedies I have great respect for what he has accomplished. What I can not understand how a person with this work ethic, strength of character, and demonstrated compassion could ever get past trump’s grotesque hate speech, greed, dishonesty, and lifelong bigotry and racism to justify voting for him. And as you point out tens of millions of people did just that.
73
Roger, do Trump supporters spend a moment of their time wondering how they can reach out to liberals? I agree with you when you say that having a superior, judgmental attitude is a real turn-off. Haven't the majority of Trump supporters already made up their minds about the impeachment hearings? Isn't the collective refrain from Trump's base "So what!"?
Adam Schiff has conducted these hearings with dignity and restraint. That's more than the liberals are getting from David Nunes, Jim Jordan and Donald Trump's shakedown tweets. Their behavior is pushing the envelope. Does the burden of civility lie solely with liberals. Give us a break....... please.
53
You're so right. Until I read your comment, it had not registered on me. I have read many comments regarding obnoxious liberals who needed to reach out and respect the other side. But I have never seen anything about far right supporters of trump respecting the liberals.
1
Mr. Cohen, I greatly appreciate your columns, and respect your world-wise viewpoints. However, my father-in-law has a similar background as Mr. Hardwick, a hardscrabble beginning that ended in success born of hard work. Problem is, he is a devoted Fox watcher, gets 100% of his information from that source. As such, try as his daughter and I have, there is simply no way to have a fact-based, open-minded discussion with him. To the point where, like many Americans, we had to agree not to discuss politics in the interest of familial harmony. Perhaps Mr. Hardwick is more amenable to a discussion than is my father-in-law. I hope so. But my wife and I live in a deeply red state, surrounded by die-hard Republicans. We've tried and failed to converse with friends on the issues of the day. But when a retired senior executive of Mobil Oil says categorically that climate change is due strictly to sun cycles, well, that's a show stopper. We've ceased trying, but we definitely intend to vote. And we imply cannot relate to anyone, no matter their career accomplishments, who could remotely consider voting for Trump again, not with all that has come to light.
75
People are partial because the scope of their thinking is limited in the extreme. People are wise when they acknowledge their limitations.
1
Two quick thoughts:
1. Why would providing healthcare for all cancel the “essence” of America that spurns innovation and motivates people to be all they can be, as Mr. Harwick appears to have accomplished. A baseline safety net for proper health coverage will not remove a desire to thrive, but it will give more members of society a strong basis to start from.
2. Why do articles continue to give the current administration blanket credit for a strong economy. It is a complete sham. Tax breaks now for short term gains and a massive deficit hangover that will punish the country in the long term. The more columnist promote Trumps handling of the economy as an unfettered success based solely on the current stock market, they will encourage more willful blindness regarding our true economic health.
37
It's easier for me to sympathize with Mr. Hardiwck here, having read some of his life's story, but I'm still somewhat confused by his motivation in considering Trump. Mr. Cohen explains that he won't support Elizabeth Warren because her programs deny "some essence of the country that gave him and countless others an opportunity to get ahead through hard work."
It occurs to me that the opportunities that Mr. Hardwick had came to him between the New Deal and the Great Society. What might appear to some people as Warren's radical pull to the left is, to others, just a return to that "essence" from the radical pull to the right that we've been experiencing since Reagan's days.
Why is it hard for him to see that, now that the ultra-rich pay about the same percentage of their income in taxes as the very poor, now that student loans dominate so many lives, and the protections that unions used to provide are slowly being eaten away, that, aside from Trump's horrible behavior, his policies are preventing us from having a healthy, prosperous society as well?
22
When it comes right down to it, he’s putting himself before everyone else.
Greed is a powerful corrupter to even the best people.
Thank you Mr. Cohen. I'm glad there are still some people trying to make this point. I hope the Democratic candidates read this. I may disagree with conservatives, but I do not feel the need to demonize them. I would never vote for Trump, but I will not hate the people who do. My husband and I have spent a lot of time in small rural towns since the 2016 election. They are some of the most hopeless places I have ever seen. I get why people who live in those places want to break the system. It isn't working for them. For the people in the comments who say that there is no point trying to understand, or that they are tired of hearing about why people supported Trump, do you care about your fellow man? Do you care about democracy? Do you think empathy matters? Or are these things only for people who share your views? This is what democracy looks like when it gets hard. It is worth fighting for.
3
I don’t understand this thinking. Why does pulling those self same hopeless people out of the clutches of medical poverty which is the one of the largest causes of crippling debt become unAmerican? I’m in Europe currently and almost all working people here tout the benefit of health coverage. It could have helped the father when he couldn’t work for a year like it will help lots of other Americans. We need to move away from this rhetoric. It’s only undermining our place as as a society that cares for all not just wealthy people.
11
American Dream? He worked hard, sure, but one lucky break was what sent him to college. That's not a dream that's universally open; not then and certainly not now.
12
I like Roger Cohen a lot, but I am continually amazed at how little really smart columnists and pundits actually know about how our political system works. As a political scientist and someone who is progressive I am just amazed at these all too numerous NY Times articles and columns substituting personal bias for any sort of serious data analysis.
First, It is another of the "as a NY Times columnist/reporter I am amazed that people voted for Trump, but let's try to understand them and get them to vote for the Democratic candidate." What does the data show? Party ID forms early in life. Not surprisingly life long Republicans will either stick with Trump or would vote for a conservative Democratic candidate who is actually parroting Republican positions.. If you have never voted for a Democrat. Party ID, and party loyalty run deep.
Second, a lot of data shows that turning out the base is the key to the election. As someone who lives in Georgia, this was the entire premise of Stacy Abrams gubernatorial campaign. Rather than try to be a moderate Democrat, she campaigned on much more progressive issues and came much closer than any previous candidate and indeed would have won had there not been a series of voting irregularities promulgated by Brian Kemp who was the referee of an election in which he was a contestant.
18
I encounter this argument very frequently (usually from a conservative, but sometimes from someone in the center or center left). There is more than a grain of truth to it - contempt, regardless of what inspires it, is not persuasive to almost anyone. Quite the opposite - no matter how wrong someone is, if you treat them with contempt, they will usually dig in their heels and refuse to concede much of anything.
That said, I have some big problems with this argument too. Foremost among them is this - conservatives have, with their political choices, treated the rest of us with utter contempt. They support Trump, who is tearing apart our social and political norms. He's attempting to transform every government bureaucracy from at least relatively nonpartisan filled with qualified professionals into little more than extensions of his and his party's will. With his rhetoric, he has subjected more than half the country to a degree of contempt that is a far worse than the (unfortunate) deplorables episode - but he is the President, and he has behaved this way for his entire presidency. Conservatives are also doing everything in their power to change the rules of the game, so to speak, by suppressing voting, gutting federal voting rights protections (via the Supreme Court), and taking gerrymandering to absurd new heights.
If conservatives think that its worth tearing democracy apart to keep power, so be it. But if so, they have more than earned my contempt.
36
I think the reality is that people like Mr. Hardwick would have been just as satisfied if Mrs. Clinton has become president. Jobs would have been created and the economy would be humming along. The Republicans in Congress would have stymied any particularly egregious tax increases and life would be little changed in November 2019. Issues like immigration and climate change would have not created any particular ruckus. No wall building would have wasted the time of the media nor would lots of other inane and petty decisions that will be reversed in the future anyways. The budget deficit would have been less, too. As it is, Trump and his administration will simply become a very black mark for the USA and a warning for future generations. Voters for Trump will not have been inconvenienced one bit.
9
Clearly there are some thoughtful conservatives, and some compassionate ones. But even ignoring the administration's ghastly corruption, to support Trumpist policies one has to be unthinking and mean. So much of his agenda is irrational - "trade wars are easy," "climate change doesn't exist," "regulations are killing the economy," "the Kurds will be fine if we leave Syria," etc. Completely, utterly, factually irrational. And those examples are the tip of the iceberg. The border wars are the clearest example of the meanness (and also irrational) - violating int'l law by denying asylum seekers to even make their claims; violating domestic laws by locking up other asylum seekers for years pending adjudication; referring to caravans, shamelessly separating kids from families, deporting people who have lived here for years without ever doing anything wrong. But similar meanness is the only thing that justifies the tax breaks, the education policies, the inaction on opiate addiction, and the general hostility to anything that has any connection to social justice or equity. It is the only reason to support his grotesque nominations to the bench, many of whom are not remotely qualified. It is the only reason to tolerate Stephen Miller at the president's side, for Mr. Miller has nothing going for him except hatred of brown and black people. So for all those reasons, I have a hard time giving Trump supporters any benefit of the doubt.
24
Thanks for giving us a more complete story. At the same time, we all need to be waiting for the full story, and trying to understand each other, and to imagine others' lives.
4
To quote Mr. Cohen:
"Still, I find the almost complete inability of opponents of Trump to grapple with who supports him and why to be deeply alarming."
I agree, alarming and hazardous.
No doubt the outrage and disgust understandably evoked by Trump's words, actions and behaviors blinds some to the fact that understanding why he's supported is key to overcoming that support.
Yes, there are many who support Trump for unmovebale reasons; misinformed/uniformed, or fearful/hateful, or simply no good, reasons. However there are many — I know a few — that do not fit the stereotype, have legitimate concerns, and are potentially reachable.
For me it's simple. I find Trump not only a disgrace and a disaster, but a truly awful human being. Even if I agreed with his policies (absolutely do not), I would never support or vote for him.
So, I get it and indeed find it very difficult to understand how anyone still supports Trump. Nonetheless I hold hope that persuasion, information and addressing of fears can change the minds of some.
9
I'm starting to see these essays less as a warning ("you better take these voters seriously and understand them!") and more as a desperate plea ("don't forget us!!").
The truth is, voters like Hardwick are becoming fewer, and less -- not more -- powerful. The country -- not just the Democratic party -- is turning leftward. The demography is changing. The surest sign of this is the desperation we're seeing in the GOP's attempts to change electoral maps, their willingness to outright gaslight and lie to the American people to further their outdated views, and yes, even columns like this.
The Trump era used to scare me. I'm starting to think it's just the last gasp of old conservatism. The GOP has tied itself so thoroughly up with Trump that it's hard to imagine much support persisting for it as the Boomer generation ages and is replaced. I would not at all be surprised if in 20 years the two parties we have are the Democratic party splintered in two.
14
@GH I am a boomer Republican who despises Trump. Didn’t vote for him or Clinton in 2016 and will sit this one out again if the Democratic Party keeps up its hard turn to the left. If you think the Republican Party principles in so-called Red States are a phenomena that will go away with demographic changes, you need to get out more. I don’t see anything like the different wings of the Democratic Party you postulate here. Everything you say runs against U.S. political history and realities on the ground. The Democrats may get into power sooner rather than later, but no political party can avoid overreach and the inevitable backlash it will generate.
1
"...but he’s convinced Elizabeth Warren’s program shifts the United States leftward too far, too fast, denying some essence of the country that gave him and countless others an opportunity to get ahead through hard work." This is the key assertion by Mr. Hardwick, in Mr. Cohen's telling. Granted, condescension, name-calling and other forms of disrespect on the part of liberals, without attempting to understand the motivations of Trump supporters and leaners like Mr. Hardwick is not only unproductive from an electoral sense, but contributes to the long-term alienation and division that is dismantling our democracy. But it would have been beneficial if Mr. Cohen had investigated and explained more thoroughly why that fear of Ms. Warren's proposals exerts a greater influence on Mr. Hardwick than the outright corruption and policy incoherence exhibited by Mr. Trump's Administration. The logic behind Mr. Hardwick's conclusion is difficult to understand.
21
I'm sorry Mr Cohen. I'll be sure to kowtow to all conservatives while their contempt for me will be obvious. That's every conservatives answer for democrats, give them everything they want and ask for nothing in return.
17
Thank you for pointing out this trap of bad faith. Persuasion is based on respect. Note MLK's phenomenal powers of persuasion accrued from his rhetoric of rapprochement and compassion. He never used the ad hominem "racist" in respect to individuals. Rather, he addressed the evils of "racism" as a plague on all Americans. But this ethical response of "love your enemy" has been lost to our own time, with devastating results. The bad news is that Republican contempt for Democrats works, because the driving force of the Republican party is toward oligarchy. For those who want to constrain the will of the people, demonizing other voters implicitly reinforces the legitimacy of dominating powers. Conversely, Democrats cannot afford to demonize other voters, if they hope to build a civil order of the people, by the people, and for the people.
13
Lots of mostly white men were promised since they were young that they were going to have the same advantages belonging to their post WWII fathers, their tribe. It had to be hard to change their world view, to acknowledge new competition from people of color, women and then people half way around the world. The world changed and changed fast, and you don't get to redo some decisions in life.
Who cannot understand the fear and anger this change might cause? Absolutely no excuse to try to bring it all crumbling down.
12
Why the effort to change course for this described gentleman? He has not absorbed the fact that self reliance is a myth. The success story described is not one of bootstrap tugging, but being helped by many sojourners who cared enough to provide opportunity for someone down on their luck.
Without such interventions whether by chance hiring, providing education, or just plain encouragement, the ladder to success will have no rungs.
This is not about centrism, conservatism, or even progressivism. It is about decent survival, and the tools to accomplish it.
Presently too many, some estimate half the population, is either outright poor of near poor. This is a blight on our democracy.
In a campaign speech, Senator Sanders asked attendees to look around them, and ask themselves if their concern for this country extended to those they did not know. This is the healing balm that should push our agenda to make a country that ensures all have a solid stake in their nation.
As Thomas Paine remarked in "Common Sense": "In this state of natural liberty, society will be their first thought. A thousand motives will excite them thereto; the strength of one man is so unequal to his wants, and his mind so unfitted for perpetual solitude, that he is soon obliged to seek assistance and relief of another, who in his turn requires the same."
11
I am disappointed in Roger Cohen. He has argued that the case of one Trump supporter shows that Trump supporters as a group should not be considered deplorables. It is easy to find Trump supporters who are deploralbes. Statistic show that they are generally not well educated (with some exceptions of course.) In my online discussions with them, they are taken in by Trump's lies, and believe what he says, rather than the truth, because they distrust the mass media. They often buy into the characterization of career government employees as the "deep state" which must be eradicated. My experience shows thatthe ones I have engaged with will not be persuaded with logic and facts, because they refuse to acknowledge what the facts are and to use logic. Most follow what Trump says blindly.
17
I believe that mr. Hardwick is too smart to vote for trump again .
At his age and with all his accomplishments he, most certainly, wants to leave a legacy for future american generations, who have been left out from achieving the American dream .
The cost of healthcare and getting an education are becoming prohibitive in America ( the only industrialized country without healthcare for every citizen and affordable education ) .
The protection of the environment ( being destroyed by this administration) is fundamental for everybody’s health .
Mr. Hardwick is way too smart for not acknowledging that another vote for trump would mean a catastrophe for his beloved country.
7
The reason why anyone (not just liberals) may have contempt for those who vote for Trump is because of "this abandonment of curiosity, this rampant intolerance, this blindness" that they show.
Is it so curious that, having evinced these qualities in voting for and supporting Trump, that they should see such attitudes about themselves be expressed by others? We are encouraged to "do unto others as we would have them do unto ourselves"; Trump supporters have shown exactly those qualities listed above (quoted from this article, by the way), and for them to be surprised when their own concerns are treated in the same way that they treat others is laughable.
They sound like the usual fragile conservative "snowflakes"; they want to demonize others, but don't want to be demonized themselves. They want to ignore the concerns of others, but don't want their own concerns to be ignored. They want to treat others unfairly, but are offended when they perceive themselves to be treated unfairly.
I would contend that there is no other way to treat these people who still even consider Trump than in such a way. After all, it's the behavior that they exhibit; isn't that an indication that they feel that it's an appropriate way to behave?
TL;DR: "Ok boomer".
16
The sure route to Trump's second term is whether those of us who wish to deny it to Trump will get our act together and vote as a bloc for the Democratic Party nominee, singular. The last election went to “Did not vote” in the Electoral College by a large margin.
The Trump supporters are the least of our problems. They are not a majority and won’t be. Nearly all won't change and never will. But they will be a plurality and win should the rest of us collectively decide that moving the country forward with our own agenda--climate change, medical care, immigration, something else--in a big hurry is an yes or no vote for the nominee, forgetting that in order to move forward, one first has to stop moving backward.
Defeating Trump puts on the brakes. It is going to take some time to shift into forward. Then and only then will we move forward. Stated another way: getting rid of Trump is the priority; the rest of it needs to happen, but we need to be in power first before it can.
17
I guess I simply reject the premise of your argument: that these voters are ‘knowable’.
I could lay out my childhood, though I’m a generation younger, and you’d find homelessness due to the Great Recession of the early 90’s; squatting in homes with raw sewage running through them while I was in my junior and senior years of high school; taking in student debt to obtain two undergraduate degrees and one graduate degree; etc., etc.
My point is, I’m not a Trump supporter even though my personal narrative hews closely to the ‘American Dream’ and Hardwick’s.
So why is his personal narrative indicative of his support and, perhaps more importantly, extrapolated to apply to other Trump supporters I should work harder to understand?
40
I give those who voted for tRump exactly the same consideration they give to those who voted for his opponent.
21
Some people voted for President Trump because he was concerned with mid America a demographic that was ignored by the previous administration. He said he would create jobs and improve the economy. He not only made promises he actually delivered. He has also assigned judges and Supreme Court justices that are more conservative than the previous administration. Those who voted for President Trump are staying with him because he has improved our country to which many have seen the benefits. They want President Trump to continue on this positive path.
6
@KMW
Welcome to this new wonderful America whichb Trump has created with your help. It's where people will work 3 jobs, not just 2 to try to avoid homelessness or bankruptcy due to medical bills. It's where dissent will land you in court or in jail. It's where you'll soon be studying either Russian or Chinese. It's where your children will be doing lock down drills daily and their teachers won't have time to teach because they need to perfect their own shooting skills. It's where Mark Zuckerberg will soon orchestrate 2 minutes of cheers for Big Don. etc etc. The US --welcome to it if Trump is not convicted
3
I find this to be so true. I am a complete bleeding heart liberal, have been my whole life. And yet, I do not understand the need to vilify people who are more conservative than I am. This is a big problem in our society, the seeming need to marginalize folks who are different than us. I do not know how it began or how to stop it, but I truly pray that people can find a way to be more open to our fellow human beings, no matter their beliefs. Maybe it's old fashioned, but I am a firm believer in the notion that human beings must surely have more in common than that which divides us. I mean, don't we? Aren't the biggest fights over things as base and simple as, how do we spend shared resources such as tax dollars? How do we prioritize action and legislation for the benefit of the largest number? Disagreeing over stuff like this, shouldn't become personal. People of good will can disagree over these things, even vehemently. This should be ok and not cause an entire culture war that I don't even believe is really there. We are being manipulated into fighting each other. Don't take the bait! Debate and speak your truth, but then, LISTEN! And then speak your truth, rinse and repeat. We are going to sink or swim together.
14
"Denying some essence of the country that gave him and countless others an opportunity to get ahead through hard work."
If that essence is not longer valid then people are going to deny it. The world that Mr. Hardwick grew up and prospered in does not exist anymore for tens of millions of people. This is the appeal of Warren and Sanders they are speaking to the people who get it. Unlike Mr. Hardwick.
13
Frankly, I'm getting tired of hearing what Trumpists think. Since the election, all we've been seeing are articles about how they're not deplorables, essays based in diners and farms and small town clubs and churches. At this point in the Trump regime, anyone left who'd vote for him may not be deplorable, but sure is hopeless. Judging by the polls average at 538.com, the numbers have barely moved since late fall 2017 --- 42% percent approval; 52% disapproval. Trump voters who changed their minds did so long ago; the others simply dug in. The way Democrats won the House, the way things went earlier this month: this happened because Democrats and Independents actually went to the polls and outvoted Trumpists. How about going to coffee shops and real restaurants in urban areas and talk with Sanders and Warren voters, and convince your readers that these people who are "too far left" are actually New Deal Democrats? Would be nice for a change.
154
Interviewing someone in a diner in an urban area? That’d be a bigger news item than man bites dog.
I always wonder why the farmer in a small town at the diner should be more important than the single mom taking her kid to school in the city.
7
Roger,
You missed the points raised by the comments lambasting you for offering Hardwick as an example of the "other" who supports Trump. Sure, Hardwick and his parents had lots of "hard knocks," and he struggled through hardworking, and managed quite an achievement as a senior executive at a pharmaceutical firm. '
However, at age 78 what Hardwick, who, I believe, worked in New Jersey and is now retired to Florida, encapsulates is a retired corporate executive who is more concerned about his stock funds than the common man, or families with two spouses working two or three jobs to barely make $60,000 a year, or a single mother or wife working two jobs (first a full or part-time job at work at $15/hour, and then their second and real job returning home to raise their kids). As a corporate executive, Hardwick lived in a different universe and a different neighborhood than these common folk.
And, if you can't see this, then you, too, live in a different universe. Try working two jobs at $15/hour and see which side you support or views you espouse, whether it be health care, raising the minimum wage, or time off policies while pregnant, or leave of absence policies involving child rearing duties. And, wholly apart from these economic issues, Hardwick was a poor choice because he evinces no sympathy (call it empathy) or moral center regarding the heart of Trumps. i.e., nasty, belittling comments towards the press or opponents, or feathering his own financial bed.
57
@Martina I appreciate your points of parents working two jobs to provide for their families, and would add that here in rural southern Appalachia, a $15/hour job would be a dream. Most service jobs for unskilled workers are miminum wage: $7.25/hour.
7
I would be drummed out of my left-tilting business if I let it be known that I am quite conservative. Not a Trumper, but a conservative. Not an alt-righter, but a conservative who believes that the bigger the government, the smaller, the individual, that America does not need fundamental change, that the American trinity of Liberty, e Pluribus Unum, and In God We Trust have helped to shape our nation into the greatest and most successful multicultural experiment in human history. Do we have flaws and faults in our history? Of course we do. Are those flaws and faults unique among the great nations of the world? Hardly. So I have to hide what I think in public, but I still don't have to tell anyone whom I'm voting for. I wish it were anyone but Trump on the GOP side, but compared to the Democratic left, it's going to be a tough choice. I am not going to vote for the side that has a significant percentage who would want to cancel me.
51
@Snowball Please consider voting for conservative principles: for objective truth, for decency, honor and integrity, and against moral relativism; for strength and integrity of democratic institutions; for a community of democratic allies; against authoritarian regimes and “illiberal democracy, ” abroad and at home; for prudence, steadiness and consistency in policy. Perhaps not all liberal politicians are conservative in this sense, but only liberal politicians are conservative in this sense. Mr. Trump represents the opposite of these values.
258
@Snowball ….And what do you think about the importance of public education? Do you favor rebuilding our infrastructure? Do Americans spend too much on healthcare? How are you on "that all men are created equal"? I understand why someone might choose not to vote for a Democrat, but I have no sympathy for anyone who would vote FOR Trump. If Trump is the best that the GOP has to offer in 2020 the party has well gone down the drain.
200
@W.A. Spitzer
1. Public education: more money is not the answer, as achievement around the country most correlates with who reads for fun, and having two parents in the home. Encourage people not to have children until they are married, and to wait to marry until after 21, and educational outcomes improve.
2. Medical costs: figure out better end of life care options, tort reform, and not treating illegal immigrants for more than stablizing care, and open dozens of new physician assistant programs, and costs drop.
3. All people created equal. Of course. But equality of outcome is not the same as inequality of opportunity.
4. Immigation: Robust international legal immigration, hard stop to illegal immigration, tax remittances by non-citizens/non-permanent residences at 100%, and trade Dreamers stay for parents-of-Dreamers depart. Start there.
16
So I am a retired Petroleum Geologist who lives alone on a boat and I am a Republican. So I guess that makes me a right wing plutocrat. I think Elizabeth Warren would be a disaster for the Nation.
Yet I did not vote for Trump, refused to vote for Clinton. The impeachment hearings have only solidified my opinion of the Democrats, Warren, Trump and the Republicans. Bad for me, bad for the country.
Really is it any surprise Trump calls Zelensky the day after he is “exonerated” by Müller ? Without any bipartisan support, the impeachment hearings will only increase polarization. Starving centrist Democratic candidates the oxygen they need. If the Democrats nominate Warren or Sanders then Trump wins.
Give me someone I can vote for. You want real change look to the center.
5
if only media types gave as much consideration to decent folks with values and consciences who see Trump as beyond detestible as they seem compelled to give those genuinely complicit voters who gave us the most corrupt man ever to hold power in America. "deploreable" was a weak word for them. if that represents "contempt for such as those folks then ok, it is
13
Trump's supporters are not deplorable as much as they are naive . Unfortunately, it's just as hard to get someone to admit that he/she is naive as it is to get them to admit that they are deplorable. If you try to calmly explain why they are naive they will simply switch the channel and listen to those who assure them that they are no such thing. The truth is that Trump may get re-elected notwithstanding the "fact" of his incompetency, vulgarity, corruptness etc.
11
What's so frustrating about this column is tht we hear nothing about why this man voted for Turmp, or would consider voting for him again. That's the outward stoires of Trump supprters are not by and large about secret Nazis is not news. But there's not an englightening moment in this essay that addresses the quesiton why. I have no clear idea how Tump appleased to this man more than Donald Duck may have. Is "animal spirits" supposed to be an explanation?
22
Roger - we all have and know the Hardwicks. They are
fixed in their beliefs and generally happy about the status quo. It works well for them. You will not change his or her mind.
We need to focus on the people who are tired of the reality that our nation works for the few and not the many.
That`s how we will get rid of this woman-hating, racist, misogynistic, lying sociopath.
31
Oh no: not ANOTHER 'you liberals need to understand Trump supporters or you will never win' missive. Sigh. These just keep coming. Obviously, Trump supporters understand us liberals/progressives/lefties well enough to determine that we are "libtards" and traitors and liars, so they've must have spent a lot of time considering our thoughts and feelings, and for that, you think we need to reciprocate? Have you, Mr. Cohen, ever stopped to consider that we might understand them all too well? You've obviously concluded that we don't, so instead of chiding us again, simply enlighten us as to what it is you think we don't understand about Trumpers?
130
@gf
He is warning of hubris that’s all. Globalization has clearly failed after all and led to Trump.
2
Mr Cohen
Mr Hardwick sounds like he worked hard to get where he is. For some reason the Democrats have turned him off.
I agree with your opinion that we can resist an impulse to judge, and objectively consider alternative points of view.... where there is some ambiguity which leaves room for interpretation.
Unless we don’t know something and are just not aware, any ambiguity regarding Mr Trumps actions has been drained away. Our president, indeed Mr Hardwick’s President, violated so many aspects of the job he decided to take, I couldn’t fit them all here.
I can still respect your decision to profile a Trump 2016 voter, but loyalty to a president who violates the Constitution strikes me as delusional.
Cheers
37
Now write an article about how Trump disciples write off tens of millions of people who oppose Trump as 'libtards', and explain why that won't hand the election to democats.
31
@C ... I for one am tired of being called every name in the book. Living as I do in a crimson red part of Texas, I consider my well off ranch to be a bastion of Blue. I have spent years being called Libtard, idiot, fringe, Nutjob, Cuck, SJW, Snowflake, Triggered, and every other name that Rush Limbaugh can think up, but call a Republican a "deplorable," and OH MY GOD the world is ending.
Let's hear why Republicans seem to be able to do this year after year. I have become numb to all the names I have been called and lord help me when they see a bumper sticker on my pickup that's not pro trump or pro gun. Right now I have a "Pete 2020" on the bumper and every 6 foot rancher in boots that sees it somehow gets the vapors and nearly faints.
Why is it MY job to get along with republicans and not their job to get along with me?
2
I have a story that is every bit as heart rending as Mr. Hardwick's. I've had a successful life, hard earned, military background and GI Bill, started my own company, and one of the very, very few who own a small consulting company in Virginia and China started with my own savings, that turned out to be a nice family business, against many odds. But I view life in America as a gift to be treasured by the measure of commonwealth, what we can share to make the best of opportunities for all Americans, and by extension people everywhere. And that's the way I vote.
67
Look. It's not as if we haven't tried. After the shock of the last election I made it a goal to seek out and engage with Trump voters and also watch more Fox News. Neither goal has panned out well. I just cannot sit through the justifications for hating Clinton and the evils of her email system. Nor can I sit through justifications of why separating babies from mothers with no plan to reunite them is perfectly acceptable when it comes to brown-skinned Latinos. Or why providing healthcare to everyone is the first step to Stalinism. And as for watching Hannity on Fox, God knows I really tried......
577
@Sipa111
Not all Trump voters are the same. Some are unreachable and some are reachable.
Try talking about specifics as they affect people. Avoid hot-button issues. There is plenty else in politics.
4
@Sipa111
I tried the same thing, with the exception of watching fox. What I couldn't stand (and still can't) is the shear and utter hypocrisy of them.
27
@Sipa111 I agree. Liberals did not create "deplorables," ie. racists, haters, basically unhappy people. They've been there since the dawn of time. 2008 just created more in America, the World really, and the Republicans gave them a megaphone.
9
You lost me here: “This failure, this abandonment of curiosity, this rampant intolerance, this blindness, increases the likelihood of Trump’s re-election.”
On the contrary, we have gone out of our way to understand Trump supporters. Why aren’t they asked to understand us? Why is the onus on us — the majority? If it weren’t for Citizen’s United, gerrymandering, billionaire funds, and the electoral college, Trump supporters would not be in a place to demand that we understand their dark ages worldview. We have tried for decades to understand these people. We have reached across the aisle for decades....
Forget it. We’re not playing that play-nice-with-the-bullies game anymore. That does NOT mean we are incurious. It means we refuse to ignore THEIR incuriosity, blindness, intolerance and rigidity any longer. You don’t let the arsonists continue to play with matches and burn down the house after you’ve rebuilt it repeatedly. At some point, you take the matches away until the arsonists are reformed or gone. Either way, THEY are the ones who need to learn empathy and attain enlightenment. They are the ones who need to work to understand the rest of us who are a majority of Americans.
I usually agree with you. But you are wrong on this one.
206
@Misplaced Modifier
They do understand us. We would rather pretend they don’t exist. I’m talking about disaffected Democrats as well.
@Misplaced Modifier Great answer. We are the ones who preach AND practice tolerance. Very few of us even consider mentioning "second amendment" measures, etc, etc, etc.
5
@Misplaced Modifier Great answer. We are the ones who preach AND practice tolerance. Very few of us even consider mentioning "second amendment" measures, etc, etc, etc.
Hardwick sounds a lot like Ivanka preaching that Americans want to "work" for their money (just like she does?) Health insurance tied to employment is an artifact of wage controls enacted during WW II. There is no reason to continue with it; it has simply become entrenched. Medicare for all allows for worker mobility and associated increased opportunities for all (e.g., starting your own business without fear of losing health insurance or not being able to pay for it).
A candidate like Warren needs to figure out how to harness the Black and Latino vote as well as significantly upping the youth vote (historically low-turnout voters); these cohorts will be key given that Trump voters and those still "on the fence" probably cannot be swayed in significant numbers before the election next year (although I do not consider them "deplorables"; more like "intractables").
I don't think Warren can win next year on her own. Luckily, nothing happens in a vacuum. Impeachment really needs to wound the president. That is a real possibility, although progressives cried out against Gorsuch and Kavanaugh and yet they both now sit on the Supreme Court.
At this point, getting Democrats to turn out to vote is probably a better strategy than trying to turn Trump supporters around.
23
Good points and he seems like a decent man. Still, all these stories about people that made it despite incredible challenges has the narrative that it could happen to anybody- but the fact is, in this nation, 99% of people that faced that kind of hardship that this man did would have died as poor as they lived and their children would most likely have been poor their whole lives, also.
Why not talk about that? Why not talk about how robust social programs make it more possible for people to get ahead in nations that have those? Why not talk about how we can better invest in ourselves and our children and reap the rewards of those investments like other good nations do?
These bootstraps stories never do much for me, because they are largely fantasy for most people. Not everyone is a cowboy, not everyone is Superman, and in the cruel nation that the United States is, poverty is almost always permanent and usually hereditary.
24
As I read the column, Roger Cohen says that Mr. Hardwick is undecided about whom to vote for in 2020. Yet the comments that I have read (the first 10 or so) assume that Mr. Hardwick will vote for Trump again. To me they illustrate Mr. Cohen's point -- no one is taking a breath and looking at whom they are talking to or about. I say this as a lifelong Democrat who started marching on Washington with Dr. Martin Luther King, so where I stand is without doubt that Trump has proved dangerous to the country. But to restate what Mr. Cohen said, to assume all those who supported Trump are bad people is dangerous to the country too, as the results of the 2016 election proved.
8
Anger and defiance serve to generate more of the same. We can choose to win in anger and defiance, and we will win, eventually, but in turn we will lose, again in anger and defiance.
"But the other side is worse" is an excuse for inaction, not a solution.
What do we do the day after Trump leaves office? Begin the complaints about an obstructionist Senate?
The issues that divide America will not have changed. Handouts and higher taxes will not serve to bring us together.
3
I am tired of trying to get into the heads of people that continue to support a racist criminal who has contempt for the rule of law and traditionally American ideals. I'm sure there are reasons, rationales, and justifications -- but I cannot find anything other than spite, stubbornness, greed, or fear at the heart of any of the motivations I've heard or experienced.
Stop telling me I need to be sensitive to these hidebound enablers.
27
Mr. Hardwick had a career fueled by "hard work". Sure; though it was jump-started by an incredibly fortunate gift from others, in the form of the scholarship he received. Absent that, who knows what would have become of him?
I had to laugh when he was described as admiring T's "energy" (as evidenced by ...what?) and of course he loved the tax cuts! And still, though he feels T will cause "damage" to the Republic in a second term, he won't rule out voting for him. Serious cognitive dissonance.
46
We are still grappling with why people who bore children and loved them deeply would give them poison, but they did because they believe in Jim Jones......go figure
17
Indeed. Until we stop passing the buck by blaming an opposing political party for greater graft or framing our friends as racists and radicals (or stupid) we will never wake up to see how we, we, have managed to change American culture for the worse. Touting the marketing message of two lame political parties hardly makes for meaningful discussion.
1
Cohen sure likes him some people overseas who riot in the streets but for his adopted country he preaches tolerance and curiosity. Honest Abe might have had something to say about the necessity of calling out evil when it makes itself at home. I can envision the country split in pieces but not the fantasy of convincing the MAGA hats to join the 21st century.
13
Call it knee-jerk stereotyping or whatever you want to call it, but in my view there simply is no reason anyone can give that justifies voting for Trump. He is evil, and there is no alternative that presents a greater danger to this country. Medicare for all won't destroy this country. Trump will.
21
There is the famous quote attributed to Pauline Kael when Nixon won his second term in a landslide that was essentially: I can't figure how he won, I don't know anyone who voted for him.
This is as true for the Dems now as it was back then. I consider myself liberal. But we have to accept that the labels liberal and conservative - before the emergence of cable news - were relative terms. We all watched the same TV and came to different conclusions.
I knew people who voted for Nixon : my parents. Pauline Kael obviously ran in different circles.
I find myself in a different world. I could not imagine voting for Trump, nor could any in my immediate family.
Yet, I know plenty of people who did vote for him. Russian interference not withstanding, I know enough people who voted for Trump to completely eradicate any surprise I could have had when he won.
And the people I know who voted for Trump are people I care about
That's my world, and I know that in the cities, liberal people may not have that experience - as Kael voiced. And in middle-America people may not have that experience from a conservative stance.
For the good of the nation we have to figure out how to disagree and not ex-communicate each other from each other's lives the way our parents did 50 years ago.
6
As another retired Big Pharma/Biopharma, I hear/see something else in the two columns on Mr. Hardwick.
Hardwick may state he is vacillating, but he will continue to vote as the lifelong Republican he always has been, irrespective of who the Democratic nominee is. That’s because he spent his entire career at Pfizer. Hardwick probably held a variety of positions there, but never left Pfizer. He’s not the “changing horses” type.
Some of us in that industry took risks by leaving the unbelievable security at Pfizer and Merck to jump into biotech start-ups. We’re the “changing horses” types—not Hardwick. Even for Michael Bloomberg.
15
I expect that the Democrats will continue with their strategy of smugly awaiting an inevitable demographic sea change, one that will sweep them into power with the Congressional majorities needed to create an egalitarian utopia. While they're waiting, they'll vent their frustration at its delay by tearing down all the old white people (especially the men) who will be gone soon anyway.
I also expect this strategy to continue to work as well as it has for the last 9 years. There are still plenty of white people left for the Democrats to alienate, and I wouldn't have thought that I'd turn out to be one of them, until I was. I'll vote against Trump (of course, because he's a horror), but in my swing state, I'll also have plenty of opportunity to balance that vote by supporting Republicans for the House and Senate. I'm no longer party-line voting for a party that delights in bashing people of my race and gender; why would anyone?
The Democrats are shooting themselves in the foot by goig
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@Patrick Yes. You can see how discrimination against white men has resulted in their lack of representation in Congress and in state legislative bodies. Also their earnings relative to women and POC. Also their ability to get a taxi, and the frequency with which they are subjected to murder by police. Sad.
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Whoops - accidental send.
... going overboard with spiteful attacks on people like Mr. Hardwick. Maybe he's a self-interested, disagreeable, myopic person with limited empathy. Don't we recognize that type of person on the left as well? I certainly deal with people like him every day in my business.
As if the contempt issued by the left towards Trump supporters is somehow greater than the the constant fire hose of contempt spewed by Republican politicians, right wing media, and would be Trumpers for the last 30years. Republicans need a war. They’re always at war. It’s a built in assumption that it’s the left that has to settle down, act with decency, and refrain from calling deplorable behavior deplorable in order to save the country.
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@Stephen V But the left is decent. Compare Obama to Trump. We have sunk so low. We were admired in the world. Not so much anymore.
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Good points. That Trump remains a huge liability, no question about it; hence, the need to defeat this malevolent ignoramus. This, to restore our trust in democratic institutions, the rule of law, and the rightful place of the truth in our daily lives. For that to occur, we need all folks willing to think for themselves and see rhe chaos we are living with now, to vote for an alternative. Accordingly, they must be treated with respect and tolerance, and made welcome to a new era where justice gets a chance.
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I am a coastal progressive but I learned a lot when I went on business trips to places like Olive Hill, Kentucky. If you write off those who live there, you are making a big mistake. Instead try to understand why they think the way they do and address those issues.
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If Hardwick is content voting for a compulsive liar who is sacrificing future generations on the altar of "economic growth," then so be it. Deplorable may not be the right adjective for him, but it certainly fits many others who support the president.
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I wholeheartedly agree with the thrust of this article. We must begin to see others as humans just like us, but with different life experiences and different values. When we run into an Archie Bunker type, just move on and do not assume that everyone who voted for Trump is just like this hopeless jerk. On that same line we must let go of this cluck clucking political correctness. Its excesses are turning everyone off, including most of my progressive friends. Let's lead by example not by lecturing.
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You still haven’t explained why he might vote for Trump again. This was just a narrative of the guy’s life.
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This is an interesting account of one man's rise through adversity. America has countless similar stories. What the column does not explain is how Mr. Hardwick can continue to support the man in the White House. Vote for him once, okay. Vote for him again after all the lies, all the attacks, all the rampant racism and sexism, all the blatant bludgeoning of the Constitution and our Allies? This to me is just inexplicable. The Presidency is far larger and more important than a rising Dow and a purring economy, which the man in the White House may or may not be responsible for. If Hardwick is still even contemplating voting for this corrupt individual, I have to think he only cares about one thing—himself. He could not possibly care about America as a place to live, as a place to raise our children, as a place to dream.
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@Bill Simpson The article opens by saying Hardwick is unsure how to vote in 2020. Let's take the opportunity to convince him to not vote for Trump. Calling him names and questioning his intelligence, good faith, or morals is NOT a good way to convince him. Recognizing his common humanity and engaging with him will produce better results, for the Democrats and for the country.
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@Bill Simpson Reading about Hardwick's beginnings in life reminded me of the early years of Elizabeth Warren. There's no reason to think that Warren wouldn't be able to relate to the Hardwicks of the world, if only they'd take their fingers out of their ears and learn to listen instead of just talk.
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@Bill Simpson
The man is thinking. Give him a chance to think better. Don't push him out the door with "If Hardwick is still even contemplating voting for this corrupt individual, I have to think he only cares about one thing—himself." -- you can't read his mind and you don't know this is true.
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Everything that Mr Hardwick and his family experienced in their "American dream" success story was enabled by policies that were killed by Ronald Reagan. For example I expect his FSU education was only affordable due to the the federal support for education, and the taxes needed for that, that were in force at the time. His father had an accident and didn't work for a year? Nowadays his family would likely be struck down by medical bankruptcy.
I'm sure Hardwick is a nice guy. But he clearly has forgotten -- if he ever really knew -- what it was that enabled his dreams to come true.
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I know lots of Trump voters - they usually justify their vote by saying that Hillary Clinton and the Dems would have "destroyed" America - by shifting money and resources to the "undeserving" and opening the borders to a horde of immigrants who would similarly have "destroyed America"/ Sadly, the destruction of America has been carried out by Trump and his gang, and the shifting has taken place - to the rich. These people, whom I have met in social situations, also feel that they owe nothing to the country where they have made their success. Now they strive to remove their own wealth from taxation in any way they can, including trying to move to rural America, but not really living there - it's clear that these people despise anyone not "like them" - and consider most of their fellow Americans "deplorable" in every sense of the word. So I don't call them deplorable - they are using that for everyone else. I call them opportunists.
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As is the case very often, Mr. Cohen's piece is exactly right.
Just for reference, however, as I recall, Hillary C's offhand remark about "deplorables" was in reference to people who really were deplorable, e.g., people waving swastikas and the like at Trump rallies. The right wing media took off with the effete sounding term and made Hillary pay for her candor, but she was absolutely correct in her assessment about those particular Trump voters. See, for further information, Charlottesville, VA.
Separately, "Big Pharma" has much to answer for, but Mr. Cohen is right to point out that perspective is required in passing judgment on that industry, not to mention its employees. If you think otherwise, may you never become ill or require hospitalization or hospice care.
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Seems Mr. Hardwick's "American dream" life story is one we would be good to replicate through programs that benefit the poor, like the opportunity for debt-free college that changed Mr. Hardwick's life. I hope that he (and those he represents in the larger electorate) are supportive of such things.
We liberals cannot separate Trump the man from his policies and find both deeply odious. It seems to me that many who support him care little about the integrity of the office or our reputation in the world; they are motivated to defend him and vote for him based on their policy interests (some of which include inhumane immigration policies, regressive tax changes, and reduction of aid--both foreign and domestic--to the vulnerable) even if they find him personally abhorrent. I didn't like Bill Clinton but found his policies to be better than those of Mr. Bush or Mr. Dole.
I continue to be confused about how people like Mr. Hardwick--people who owe their success to both their hard work and philanthropy, charity, kindness, and unearned opportunities--can support not only a hateful, mean person but also policies that lack compassion and benefit the well-off rather than the vulnerable.
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Mr. Cohen,
I appreciate the effort to engage your critical readers. I am one of them, and I enjoy your work.
I have several points for you to consider.
1. I do not "deplore" my fellow citizens such as Mr. Hardwick, though I fear he is terribly misguided. It is, however, easier to support policies and politicians who will comfort the comfortable when you are one of them.
2. I appreciate that Mr, Hardwick came from modest means and had to overcome a number of family struggles to get where he is now. You (and he) should note that he and his family was able to do that in the 1950's and 60's. It is vastly more difficult to make something of ones self today. Largely this is due to skyrocketing medical and higher ed costs and economic changes concentrating wealth - and therefore ability to cushion against life's challenges - at the top. All this was driven by Republican policies.
3. I am not sure how someone who worked for civil rights could countenance the Republican party of today and its organized coordinated race-based voter suppression, let alone the Racist-in Chief.
I try very hard to criticize the policy, not the person. I hope my fellow Democrats do the same. I confess, I don't see much real contempt for rank and file Republicans amongst my family and friends on the left. We just can't understand how people of thoughtfulness and good will can end up supporting the current administration. I still don't.
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@Victor We need to recognize that the good parts of the 50's and 60s mobility wise were an aberration. Read Piketty
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@Victor Your point #3 All day long.
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Point taken, and good to remember as I daily struggle with how anyone could vote for Trump. But that was Obama's problem, too, wasn't it? An inability to understand people who didn't agree with him, especially when it was an issue based on simple facts, and he was on the side of facts. But, because there is a Fox News and a Rush Limbaugh, facts don't matter anymore to the people who willingly allow themselves to be poisoned by the Rightwing Media Cartel. I don't know where Hardwick gets his information, but there is no way a citizen could be reasonably informed and still be on the fence about whom to vote for next November.
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A fine article, "fair and balanced" in the best sense of that abused term.
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While I appreciate what Roger writes about the guy in this collumn, I think it is also more than a bit frustrating in reading the guy's story. I love to hear stories like this guys, of someone struggling to making it, of through hard work making it in the world coming from humble origins; but I also wish people with these stories would look back and realize that they didn't do it alone. His father went to work for Wonder Bread baking bread, and with that job could get a pension, starting at age 50, which was great, probably a union job.
Try doing that today; what jobs like this exist are likely non union and the days of pensions is long gone, and age discrimination would likely keep him from getting this kind of job (back then, well paying jobs in factories and the like were so plentiful age didn't matter, they needed workers). That job he got delivering the papers doesn't exist any more, and try finding a job today as a kid in school that could let you help support the family, it doesn't exist. The scholarship he got from Wonder Bread? Long gone, the 'activist investors' and hedge funds killed those off a long time ago (a lot of companies used to offer tuition reimbursement for college degrees, gone with the wind, too).
My answer to Mr. Hardwick would be to ask if he thought the outcome would be the same today, if he would be where he is today without what his world provided.
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I agree. Mr. Cohen is right in his methodology in meeting this man to try to understand but I believe he has mistaken manners, a good life story, and modest affect as decency and the type of person we must engage. I suggest Mr Cohen read or re-read “They Thought They Were Free” by Milton Mayer about “normal” German citizens before and during WW II.
Also Cohen’s description of Mr. Hardwick reminds me of the story in Matthew, Chapter 19 of the rich man who went to Jesus and asked what he could do to enter the Kingdom of Heaven. The man affirmed to Jesus that he obeyed the law and lived a good life but when Jesus said “then sell all your possessions and follow me,” the man could not and was very sad.
Based upon what Mr Cohen has related Mr. Hardwick seems to recognize the need for social justice but I suspect deep down Mr Hardwick has assumed since he made it anyone can and if they haven’t it is because of poor life choices or character deficiencies. For him, the choice of voting for Trump/Republicans as opposed to voting for a progressive interested is like facing the dilemma of the rich man in Matthew.
Ok Boomer” seems entirely appropriate for referring to Mr. Hardwick.
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Roger, this is fascinating information about this Man and his life. Obviously, he’s the “ Great American Success Story “. Sure, maybe one in a hundred, or a thousand, can do the same thru sheer perseverance and hard work. But what about those that cannot ? Are they to be discarded and left behind like Human refuse ? Is it their fault they did not choose better Parents, location or a higher I.Q. ? Where does random luck, but good and bad, fit into this equation for success ? What about Disabilities?
No, we will never all be equal or even all average in this Society. Their will always be outliers, Geniuses and Criminals. The best we can hope for, and the best we can DO, is to ensure that everyone is provided opportunities to learn and succeed. And if all else fails, no one will starve, be without Shelter, or suffer without basic Healthcare. THAT is common decency and the very first goal of humane Societies. Otherwise, we might just as well return to living in Caves.
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Last week you described Hardwick last week where for him to come along with a Democrat, that Democrat needed to strike from the agenda many necessary policy changes, including progressive taxation and other things.
My GOP friends are the same way. Trickle down and tax cuts or bust. Read Bret Stephens' stuff. Douthat just wrote that he thinks welfare should be handled wholly by religious organizations. The core Conservative principles are the elements driving us toward oligarchy. They are the things that have lead us to the situation where Trump got elected and to where the GOP will stop at nothing to defend him.
Back when Hardwick went from rags to riches, we had strong unions and progressive taxation. He thinks others should do what he did without those supports.
You say think about Hardwick... My problem is the requested comprise will not put us back on track.
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It’s refreshing to read an article that’s not focused on Trump bashing especially since all of the news coverage of witness testimony is doing a great job of that.
More articles focused on the positive aspects of the Democratic candidates will help avoid the following lesson that hopefully has been learned.
“ If there’s one sure route to a second Trump term, it’s more of the liberal contempt that produced the “deplorables.” We know exactly how that movie ended in 2016.”
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@Bronx Jon -- That was not the reason why Clinton lost the electoral college--you may remember that she won the popular vote, convincingly. But, thanks for playing.
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@Bronx Jon Contempt and disrespect spews from the mouth of Trump every single day. And from those of his staunch Republicans who defend him in Congress. Many many people have stories just like this man's--my father quit high school to help support his family and then to go fight in the Battle of the Bulge in WWII. He worked in a factory as a welder and supported our family of five kids and his parents and uncle on that paycheck. He built the indoor bathroom in our farmhouse when I was about 6 years old--we were not at all wealthy. But he would NEVER have approved of Trump's actions and would never have voted for him. He would see right through the fake facade and would have despised the lies and smears that the president doles out every day. I really can not understand how anyone can stand this man, and I've tried. But hearing that your retirement accounts and investments are doing great is not an argument that I can agree with--not when so much wealth is concentrated in such a small group of people when citizens of the richest nation on Earth go hungry, have no medical care to speak of, and poor education opportunities. It's not liberal contempt--it's truly not understanding how people can stand by and watch the destruction of America.
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