Trump Trees, Trump Forest

            In trying to understand the Donald Trump phenomenon that has flummoxed most political pundits, it is helpful to think about forests instead of trees.  My take on what is driving Trump to the top of the polls has less to do with anything most of us would think of as an issue and more to do with what most of us would think of as a culture.

            According to 2 NBC News polls of over 12,000 respondents conducted during July and August, Trump supporters “match non-Trump Republicans in terms of age, income, racial identity and political ideology,” but they are somewhat less educated and less religious.

            What’s striking, though, are their positions on a syndrome of cultural, racial and related economic issues.  Table 1, copied from the linked poll results summarizes these positions and shows how they differ from the views of other Republicans.

Table 1

	Non-Trump Republicans	Trump Republicans
Immigrants are a burden on our country because they take our jobs, housing and health care	61%	83%
Confederate flag is a symbol of Southern pride	79%	88%
Gun Owner	44%	52%
Government should promote traditional values in our society	62%	70%
Blacks who can’t get ahead in this country are mostly responsible for their own condition	86%	93%
Increases in Earth’s temperature are due more to natural changes in the environment	59%	65%
Government regulation of business usually does more harm than good	79%	83%
Display the American flag	76%	80%
In today’s economy, everyone has a fair chance to get ahead in the long run	60%	55%
More likely to vote for a candidate who wants stricter limits on abortion	60%	45%

            The analysts who conducted the poll conclude that Trump supporters “are more conservative than other Republicans on almost every issue.”  While I don’t want to quibble about the meaning of the word “conservative,” there’s something much more important going on, if you look at the results as a whole.

            What I see going on in these poll results is an extreme rearguard attempt to recover a largely white, Norman Rockwell kind of America that no longer exists (if it ever actually existed at all).  We mustn’t miss the fact that for the most part, large majorities of Republicans, regardless of whether they are Trump supporters, are in general agreement with each other.  But in most cases, Trump supporters hold these beliefs much more fervently than other Republicans.

            Responses to the three racial questions are telling, when considered together.  Though, by now we know that Trump’s signature hostility to undocumented workers resonates with his supporters, they are also more likely to say that if African-Americans have failed to get ahead, that failure is the fault of African-Americans.  Trump supporters are less likely to think that everyone has a fair chance in today’s economy, and so for them, “everyone” must not include African Americans.  That’s why it’s not surprising that Trump supporters are more likely to see the Confederate flag as a symbol of southern heritage than as the racist symbol most of the country has come to believe it is.

            Trump supporters are more likely to be gun owners, and though I have no evidence on the point, it wouldn’t surprise me if the reason for this is that they own guns more for personal protection than for sport.  That would be consistent with Trump’s rhetoric about the kinds of people coming across the southern border from Mexico.

            The American flag is a somewhat more potent symbol for Trump supporters than it is for other Republicans. That’s consistent with the idea that Trump’s candidacy is about recovering a by-gone America, as is his supporters’ greater desire for the government to promote “traditional values.”  Whatever those values are, they apparently do not include banning abortion, the mother of all traditional values for other “conservative” Republicans.

            One of the reasons that Trump is doing so well in the polls right now could be that there are so many other Republican candidates vying for the nomination among the same core group of voters.  That’s one reason professional pundits aren’t counting out a Republican establishment candidate just yet.  Even if Trump maintains a plurality lead of about a third of the Republican electorate, that still means that two thirds of the GOP’s voters prefer somebody else.  That leaves plenty of room for one of the establishment Republican politicians to build a coalition composed of supporters of the “also- rans.”

            But it’s also important to note that Trump supporters are merely giving more lurid color to a chimerical image of America most Republicans still hold.   Regardless of who wins the Republican nomination, Trump’s wistful crusade to “make America great again” is likely to be the subtext of the coming general election Republican campaign.