About the Trump candidacy, Jim Gerraghty observes in his newsletter this morning, "There will always be an appetite for someone who comes along and insists the solutions are easy." Fair enough, but it's also true that this argument works particularly well when the powers that be have accomplished astonishingly little in recent years, always with the explanation that it's all very difficult, and we wouldn't understand the complexities. Leaders like the unlamented soon-to-be-departed Boehner radiate the impression that they don't accomplish much, not because it's difficult or complicated, but because they can't see the point. Trump looks like a hero by seeming to get down to brass tacks: the brass businessman, focused on effectiveness and the bottom line.
I'd feel so much better about it if I thought he really agreed with me on the bottom line. In that way, he may be much like Boehner, but slightly more likely to achieve whatever his goals turn out to be.
I think what I'm really afraid of with Trump is that he hasn't told us any of his real goals and that he would be very, very effective in achieving them.
ReplyDeleteI suspect that is possible, although it may be that the real danger is that he doesn't have any real commitments. He strikes me as someone who would be easily persuaded by the Good Idea Fairy.
ReplyDeleteAs long as it was his idea, sure.
ReplyDeleteThat's Tom's concern. My concern: "...or any he could be convinced to think of as having been his own ideas."
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