Clinton Takes the Gloves Off

            Donald Trump’s supporters like him because he hates political correctness.  Clearly speaking for a vast number of Trump supporters, one woman remarked, “I like the fact that he’s not afraid to say what we’re all thinking.” 

            Kind of begs the question, doesn’t it?

            What, pray tell, is it that Trump supporters have longed to say, but can’t because they believe they will suffer condemnation from people outside of their tribe?  Alas, they won’t tell you.  And for good reason.  They’re right.

            Political correctness, at least as practiced by people outside the right-wing tribe, is simple courtesy.  It’s a sensitivity to the feelings of others, a willingness to drop assumptions about other people and to treat others as they themselves wish to be treated.  The so-called “War on Christmas,” for example, is a mere recognition that not everyone in the United States celebrates the Christian December holiday and a willingness to accept and legitimize the practices of non-Christians.  Thus, the “politically correct” say “happy holidays” to others, not to denigrate the Christian observance of Christmas, but both to acknowledge that the person offered the greeting may celebrate some other holiday as the calendar year comes to a close and to express a degree of tolerance and even acceptance that others may have other faith traditions.

            Donald Trump doesn’t get it. “If I become president,” he’s said, clearly oblivious to the First Amendment, “we’re gonna be saying Merry Christmas at every store . . . You can leave happy holidays at the corner.”  But you knew that.

            Political correctness also means, among other things, that you can’t say or insinuate any of the things that were staples of humor when I was growing up, including that blacks are lazy, Jews are stingy, Poles and blondes are stupid, businessmen are heartless, or, more recently, that Muslims are terrorists.

            “Jeez,” Trump’s supporters ask, “why can’t we just say what everyone knows is mostly true?”

            Which leads me directly to Hillary Clinton’s comments last week on Donald Trump’s “basket of deplorables.”  Last week, at a tony Democratic fundraiser where Barbra Streisand performed, Clinton, speaking in a “grossly genealistic way,” called out the “racist, sexist, homophobic, xenophobic, Islamophobic” people who account for “half” of Trump’s supporters.  These people, she said, were “deplorable,” “irredeemable,” and ultimately “not America.” Clinton later walked the “half” back and nothing else.

            The anti-PC crowd, clearly not used to being the subject of politically incorrect commentary, was not amused.  The right-wing outrage machine joyfully cranked itself up to full power.  Donald Trump tweeted “Wow.  Hillary Clinton was SO INSULTING to my supporters, millions of amazing, hard working people.  I think it will cost her at the polls.” 

       Trump’s running mate, Mike Pence, in a speech he gave to the Values Voter Summit used even stronger language:

The truth of the matter is that the men and women who support Donald Trump’s campaign are hard-working Americans, farmers, coal miners, teachers, veterans, members of our law enforcement community, members of every class in this country, who know that we can make America great again . . .Let me just say, rom the bottom of my heart, Hillary, they are not a basket of anything.  They are Americans and they deserve your respect.

       Trump commented that it was “disgraceful that Hillary Clinton makes the worst mistake of the political season  . . .For the first time in a long while, her true feelings came out, showing bigotry and hatred for millions of Americans.”  Trump and his minions must have been positively gleeful about finally having acquired a cudgel they believed to be as potent as Mitt Romney’s 2012 comments about the 47% to use against the Democrats.

            Let’s put to the side the fact that Trump and Pence have expanded Clinton’s condemnation of a fraction of  Trump’s supporters to include all Americans.  In fact, Clinton also spoke of a second fraction of Trumps supporters deserving of understanding and empathy.  Regardless of that, let’s stipulate that Clinton was in fact denigrating millions of her fellow Americans.

            From the standpoint of people who reject political correctness, what’s the problem?  I thought the right-wing tribe appreciated blunt talk. Clinton was only saying out loud what most of us are already thinking and are simply too polite to say in public.  

            And I do mean “most of us.”  Among likely voters, according to a recent Quinnipiac University poll, almost 60% believe that “the way Donald Trump talks appeals to bigotry.” That includes 87% of likely Democratic and 59% of Independent voters.  62% of female likely voters and 57% of white female likely voters hold this opinion as do 58% of white likely voters with college degrees.  Small wonder that Trump is having difficulty with these groups.  That’s probably also why Congressional Republicans have refused to take turns with Trump and Pence in cranking the outrage machine.

            These poll numbers, together with the fact that Hillary Clinton is a much more disciplined candidate than many others suggest that she fully intended to breach “political correctness” protocols to get these ideas into the mainstream.  Trump has clearly been making an effort to gather up the Republicans and Independent voters who haven’t yet warmed to him.  His latest campaign team has probably made it clear to him that he can’t win unless he expands his coalition.

            But if Clinton’s statement was intended, it may well serve as a way of neutralizing Trump’s efforts.  American politics has become extremely tribal, and it matters to most people who’s company they are seen keeping.  Clinton’s suggesting to these undecided people that if they lie down with dogs, they’ll get up with fleas.  The McCain campaign tried something similar in 2008 when its “The One” and “Celebrity” spots suggested that Barack Obama was an empty suit who was bamboozling voters into joining his cult of personality.

            It’s generally a bad idea for a politician to lash out at voters.  Voters, after all, can fight back.  Yet, Clinton’s calculation is simple.  The “deplorables,” Hillary Haters, and staunch Republicans aren’t going to vote for her under any circumstances.  And the Democrats and Democratic leaners who have stuck with her through everything up until now aren’t going anywhere either.  Clinton may well be thinking that eschewing “political correctness and dragging the underlying racial dynamics of this race into the open gives her the best chance of keeping the basket of Republican and independent voters deserving of understanding and empathy out of Trumps clutches, and, perhaps, even winning their votes.