• "Voters to Elites: Do you see me now?" David Brooks

    From a425couple@21:1/5 to All on Mon Nov 11 15:44:57 2024
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    One should look for David Brooks editorial
    in the 10 Nov. 2024 NYT
    "Voters to Elites: Do you see me now?"
    A very good one!

    an excerpt from https://currentpub.com/2024/11/07/david-brooks-as-the-left-veered-toward-identitarian-performance-art-donald-trump-jumped-into-the-class-war-with-both-feet/

    David Brooks: “As the left veered toward identitarian performance art,
    Donald Trump jumped into the class war with both feet.”
    John Fea | November 7, 2024 4 Comments

    Check out David Brooks’s New York Times piece, “Voters to Elites: Do You See Me Now?” A taste:

    The Democratic Party has one job: to combat inequality. Here was a great
    chasm of inequality right before their noses and somehow many Democrats didn’t see it. Many on the left focused on racial inequality, gender inequality and L.G.B.T.Q. inequality. I guess it’s hard to focus on
    class inequality when you went to a college with a multibillion-dollar endowment and do environmental greenwashing and diversity seminars for a
    major corporation. Donald Trump is a monstrous narcissist, but there’s something off about an educated class that looks in the mirror of
    society and sees only itself.

    As the left veered toward identitarian performance art, Donald Trump
    jumped into the class war with both feet. His Queens-born resentment of
    the Manhattan elites dovetailed magically with the class animosity being
    felt by rural people across the country. His message was simple: These
    people have betrayed you, and they are morons to boot.

    In 2024, he built the very thing the Democratic Party once tried to
    build — a multiracial, working-class majority. His support surged among
    Black and Hispanic workers. He recorded astonishing gains in places like
    New Jersey, the Bronx, Chicago, Dallas and Houston. According to the NBC
    exit polls he won a third of voters of color. He’s the first Republican
    to win a majority of the votes in 20 years.

    The Democrats obviously have to do some major rethinking. The Biden administration tried to woo the working class with subsidies and
    stimulus, but there is no economic solution to what is primarily a
    crisis of respect.

    There will be some on the left who will say Trump won because of the
    inherent racism, sexism and authoritarianism of the American people. Apparently, those people love losing and want to do it again and again
    and again.

    The rest of us need to look at this result with humility. The American
    voters are not always wise but they are generally sensible, and they
    have something to teach us. My initial thought is that I have to
    re-examine my own priors. I’m a moderate. I like it when Democratic candidates run to the center. But I have to confess that Harris did that
    pretty effectively and it didn’t work. Maybe the Democrats have to
    embrace a Bernie Sanders-style disruption — something that will make
    people like me feel uncomfortable.

    Read the entire piece here.

    RECOMMENDED READING

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