I know a lot of bad people in this country that are making a hell of a lot of money and not paying taxes. The tax law is totally screwed up. ... They're paying nothing and it's ridiculous. The hedge fund guys didn't build this country. These are guys that shift paper around and they get lucky. They’re energetic, they’re very smart. But a lot of them, it’s like they’re paper pushers. They make a fortune, they pay no tax... The hedge funds guys are getting away with murder.
[long time spent talking about terrible medical care in VA, it being a disgrace] ... I'm popular with the vets. They know I'll fix the VA. It's a disgrace. They are great people and treated very badly.
It's unfair to the middle class. We have to help the middle class. This country was based on the middle class. They're the ones that really had so much to do with what we all have now, and they are being treated horrible
All recent statements by Donald Trump. If you haven't been taking him seriously, it's time to start. He is presenting the American people with a uniquely populist, nationalist, conservative policy platform which is quite frankly looks more appealing to middle America than what the GOP usually has on offer.
I want to offer a scenario. I do not claim this is likely to happen in this race, with Trump, but that it should at least be seen as a warning, like Hurricane Ivan in 2004 to New Orleans - which way will the wind blow this time? The next time?
Trump's emerging policy platform could be seen as an attempt to revitalize, even revolutionize the GOPs eroding national coalition. He's been touching post-Reagan third rails on everything from "single payer was a good idea" to "tax the rich" to "our country has horrible infrastructure problems ... I want to rebuild our infrastructure" to brushing off naming his favorite Bible quote.
I've seen flirtations with Trump from an unexpected myriad of friends, old colleagues, my blogroll (the latest this, from prominent physicist/geneticist and VP of Research & Graduate Studies at Michigan State). The fact is, decontextualized from the fact that Donald Trump is the one saying it, a lot the statements will resonate across the political spectrum. A lot if it would get cheers from the left if it came out of HRC's mouth.
Again, Trump may well be too personally toxic, too likely to finally be caught up in lies or stick his foot too far into his mouth to ever pull off a GOP nomination much less general election win.
But his meteoric rise and sustained popularity should give progressives real pause. The question to ask is, if the GOP can pivot the culture wars away from gay rights and pot smoking, refocus on the ugly parts of abortion and scapegoating immigrants, and combine it with some authentic-feeling nationalism and at least a bit of populist economics ... what ground does a triangulated third way Dem have to stand on?
Could such a populist GOP President trigger a generational realignment of the two parties, stealing huge swaths of the middle class from the Democrats while pivoting the GOP from an unhappy, aging plutocrat/bumpkin coalition into a more openly nationalist, proto-fascist populists? Under the right circumstances, almost certainly.
Can Trump make the trains run on time? Do we want to find out, or is it long past time for the Democratic Party to rediscover its values before we lose the country to some truly scary people?