As you know, rather than clog this blog with the pronouncements of the many presidential candidates, I’m trying to help make sense of the political dynamics and trends behind those pronouncements.
And as everybody must have heard by now, Donald Trump on Monday called for “a total and complete shutdown of Muslims entering the United States until our country’s representatives can figure out what is going on.”
Other presidential candidates and politicians from both parties are condemning his comments.
Former Vice President Dick Cheney, speaking to the conservative radio host Hugh Hewitt, summarized the disconnect with American values: “I think this whole notion that somehow we need to say no more Muslims and just ban a whole religion goes against everything we stand for and believe in. I mean religious freedom’s been a very important part of our, our history.”
But at a rally at the USS Yorktown in South Carolina on Monday night, Trump drew “sustained cheers” from the audience as he outlined his idea for the ban, says The New York Times.
Trump’s success stems from the unmistakable stylistic contrast he strikes with President Obama, Politico says. While the president has projected cool calm in response to recent attacks, “Trump has mirrored the two-fisted anger and anxiety felt by many voters,” says Politico.
Bruce Haynes, president of bipartisan political communications firm Purple Strategies, says: “The power in politics lies in contrast, and when there’s a perception in politics that things are not going very well, people tend to want the opposite. The campaign and the persona of Trump is the polar opposite of Barack Obama.”
“What’s driving the ballot in the Republican primary is desire amongst Republican voters for a strong leader. The next president is almost always a reaction to the last president,” says Republican strategist Steve Schmidt, a former adviser to John McCain. “When Republican voters look at Obama they see weakness, fecklessness and indecisiveness, and Trump is, in their estimation, the antidote to that.”
The New York Times notes that Trump has a track record of “making surprising and even extreme comments whenever he is overtaken in opinion polls by other Republican candidates,” as happened on Monday just hours before he issued his statement about Muslims.
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