Althouse: "Clearly, elite journalists, political advisers, media anchors, and pollsters, for all their analyses, have no idea where, why, and how Trump garners support."

May 3, 2016

"Clearly, elite journalists, political advisers, media anchors, and pollsters, for all their analyses, have no idea where, why, and how Trump garners support."

That's Victor David Hanson in National Review with "Trump: Something New under the Political Sun."

I'm of 2 minds here.

1. He's addressing the topic I said I want addressed.

2. He said "garner."

63 comments:

Dan Hossley said...: Maybe we should stop paying attention to elite journalist, political advisers, media anchors and pollsters. Or maybe we already have.; 5/3/16, 3:47 PM
Tom said...: In some ways, I'm just as confused. We've really underestimated how effed up the last 16 years have been. In many ways, it doesn't feel anything close to the same country or even that it's a democracy. I can't imagine a president Trump and I loath the idea of a president Clinton. But, we've built the office of president in such a way as to "garner" exactly these two knuckleheads as candidates at this moment in time - no reasonable person would do it nor would they be elected. Even Obama might admit as much if he wasn't dropping the mic and lamely ducking tough questions.; 5/3/16, 3:51 PM
mockturtle said...: If they don't get it by now, they're not likely to.; 5/3/16, 3:51 PM
M Jordan said...: I'm 63 years old, a conservative, Christian ( though I prefer the term "Jesus follower"), Republican, teacher, amateur computer programmer, bla, bla, bla and I voted for Trump today in Indiana because he fights. What I like him to fight is the PC culture in all its incarnations. He doesn't have to match me ideologically on a lot, as long as he continues to fight the media, the SJWs, the academic assholes, the whole kit and kaboodle of the PC world. I want a country where I'm allowed to speak and believe things without risking social homocide.; 5/3/16, 3:55 PM
Freeman Hunt said...: I was in the mood for a red meat kind of book the other day. (This almost never happens.) But my kind of red meat. Hanson's "Who Killed Homer?" hit the spot.; 5/3/16, 3:57 PM
Char Char Binks, Esq. said...: Garner! I love it!; 5/3/16, 4:00 PM
Fabi said...: Maybe he was wearing a garner belt.; 5/3/16, 4:01 PM
Michael K said...: VDH is almost the only writer in National Review that gets it. I think it is because of his farm.

Even Peggy Noonan is getting it.

Maybe it's because she talks to people in shops and on the street.

In my continuing quest to define aspects of Mr. Trump’s rise, to my own satisfaction, I offer what was said this week in a talk with a small group of political activists, all of whom back him. One was about to begin approaching various powerful and influential Republicans who did not support him, and make the case. I told her I’d been thinking that maybe Mr. Trump’s appeal is simple: What Trump supporters believe, what they perceive as they watch him, is that he is on America’s side.

And that comes as a great relief to them, because they believe that for 16 years Presidents Bush and Obama were largely about ideologies.; 5/3/16, 4:01 PM
Clark said...: "Garner" is a totally cromulent word.; 5/3/16, 4:01 PM
Dude1394 said...: Victor Davis Hanson is the only writer at NRO that gets it. And I think it is because he does not hole up in NY, DC but lives with the consequences of the republican parties policies.; 5/3/16, 4:07 PM
Drago said...: "garner"

James Garner

James Garner was an Oakland Raiders super-fan

Raiders

Pirates

Apple employees were "Pirates" according to Steve Jobs.

Jobs.

Trump will deliver jobs!!

It's science....; 5/3/16, 4:09 PM
Big Mike said...: 1. I noticed that David Brooks, who continues to despise Trump, has at last owned up that he has "slipped into a bad pattern, spending large chunks of [his] life in the bourgeois strata — in professional circles with people with similar status and demographics to [his] own." He says that he intends to find out who who supports Trump and why, and to propose solutions that are ... what? More palatable to him and others in his bourgeois strata? At any rate, he doesn't seem to be in any hurry to get out of his circles filled with people who already think the way he does and go talk to real human beings who might challenge his belief systems. He says he will. Someday. Just maybe not yet.

1-a. It's simple, really. Hillary will be the Democrats' candidate because she carefully laid the groundwork to prevent ABH (anyone but Hillary) from running (she did overlook Sanders, who caucuses with Democrats in the Senate but claims not to be one himself). Trump will be the Republican candidate because the only candidate who figured out how to put him in his place was Carly Fiorina, and she never got enough support for the long run.

2. I think that Victor David Hansen is using "garner" correctly, and it is the best word to describe what has happened.; 5/3/16, 4:11 PM
buwaya said...: "VDH is almost the only writer in National Review that gets it. I think it is because of his farm."

Partly. Thats the Cato the elder part of Hanson. The other is that he is a bona fide scholar of the classics, the Greek and Roman stuff, old school liberal arts.; 5/3/16, 4:11 PM
cubanbob said...: Maybe Trump will get the trains to run on time. And when the organized commies get their peeps rioting and looting maybe Trumpy will order the Army to shoot to kill the rioters and looters. If we are going to try fascism let's try to do it right.; 5/3/16, 4:14 PM
Char Char Binks, Esq. said...: Embiggen America Again!; 5/3/16, 4:14 PM
Freeman Hunt said...: That was a good piece. I think he's right.; 5/3/16, 4:14 PM
FullMoon said...: I will vote against Hillary.
Trump appeals to many people who do not take politics very seriously, people against Clinton, people sick of PC, LGTundecided, militant illegals, and holier than thou pundits. Also people that cannot find a job, lost their homes and all the associated turmoil involved with losing middle class status and having to go on welfare, etc.

Sad thing is, Trump is so hated by so many, that if elected, he will meet many obstacles. If Hillary is elected, people like me will say"Oh, well," and get on with our lives.
Trump haters will do everything they can to impede anything and everything and to keep the hate alive and growing.; 5/3/16, 4:20 PM
buwaya said...: Hanson used "garner" TWICE - "garners","garnered"
Evil demon word, then?
I will keep that in mind.
Maybe you should cut Hanson some slack though, it being derived from the Latin, and he cant help himself.; 5/3/16, 4:20 PM
Sebastian said...: I was opposed to PC when Drumpf was still a Dem. I was on America's side when he was in a reality TV show. I was opposed to much of the GOPe when he invited Hillary! to a wedding. I get the urge to protest. I don't get the desire to be the mark in a con game, or the notion that a clown will make America great again. Populism always comes to naught.; 5/3/16, 4:36 PM
Jaq said...: Trump has certainly revealed some ugly truth about America. It turns out that large numbers are expected to shut up and vote as directed by their betters. Sanders is told to go away quietly.

The billionaire boys know what's best and Trump's voters were supposed to take it and go away and stop disturbing us with the fact that they exist.; 5/3/16, 4:41 PM
buwaya said...: "Populism always comes to naught."

A remarkable number of populists have gotten elected.
Not really in the US, recently. It may be your turn though.; 5/3/16, 4:41 PM
rehajm said...: The predictions about Trump have been so wrong because none of the normal rules apply to him.

All the rules of politics apply to Trump. You've discovered you don't know what those rules are.; 5/3/16, 4:42 PM
Birkel said...: I am a political independent because of George W. Bush's big government policies. I know that I have no political home. The horse race bull shit infuriates me.

We have argues the whole of the country into a single political corner and a mountain of debt threatens the entire world's mirage of an economy.

It was a decent run.; 5/3/16, 4:42 PM
Birkel said...: Argued was auto-un-corrected.

WTELF?; 5/3/16, 4:44 PM
dreams said...: Yeah, VDH lives in less of a bubble than his fellow journalists/pundits. He sees what has happened to our country and to his own farming community in California on a daily basis, actually way more than most of us.; 5/3/16, 4:45 PM
Jaq said...: Get is a great word, why is 'garner' a better choice defenders?; 5/3/16, 4:46 PM
Brando said...: Ever since you made a thing out of the word "garner" I've been noticing it more and more in articles. Now I cannot unsee it!; 5/3/16, 4:48 PM
Jaq said...: If you think immigration is great because you get your gardening done cheaper, you might not understand Trump's appeal.

Scabs do the jobs others won't do too.; 5/3/16, 4:50 PM
Char Char Binks, Esq. said...: @tim in vermont

"Get" and "garner" are not exact synonyms. www.dictionary.com; 5/3/16, 4:51 PM
Michael said...: The long slide down began a while ago. As Freeman Hunt notes above, VH observed the collapse of the study of classics a while back. Excellent book for those interested in Classics and the lowering of standards in higher education.

GWB accelerated the PC bullshit hours after 9-11 by calling Islam a religion of peace, one of the more cloying and lying and hideous statements ever ill timed and yet uttered. It was as insulting as it was wrong.; 5/3/16, 4:51 PM
commoncents said...: Watch Fox News Live Streaming - Republican and Democrat Indiana Primary Results....

http://commoncts.blogspot.com/2016/05/live-stream-battle-for-indiana.html; 5/3/16, 4:58 PM
Jaq said...: This comment has been removed by the author.; 5/3/16, 4:58 PM
Jaq said...: Great piece BTW.; 5/3/16, 4:59 PM
Jaq said...: This comment has been removed by the author.; 5/3/16, 4:59 PM
Drago said...: buwaya: ""VDH is almost the only writer in National Review that gets it. I think it is because of his farm."

Partly. Thats the Cato the elder part of Hanson. The other is that he is a bona fide scholar of the classics, the Greek and Roman stuff, old school liberal arts"

I have become a big fan of buwaya on this blog.

And Laslo.

Yes, it's strange.; 5/3/16, 5:00 PM
exhelodrvr1 said...: VDH and Richard Fernandez.; 5/3/16, 5:08 PM
Big Mike said...: Interesting quote from Hansen's article: "Tomorrow Trump could declare there to be 57 states, or address vets as Corpse-men or tell his legions to bring a gun to a knife fight — and none of his supporters would find him clueless, half-educated, or incendiary."

To be fair to Trump, no one in the entire Democrat party seems to have been bothered by these gaffes when made by Obama.

Hansen goes on to write "To get a clearer idea of the feelings of Trump supporters, read the comments section following any mainstream news story that deals with race, class, and gender in politically correct fashion."

See, David Brooks, you can continue to stay in New York and meet face-to-face only with politically correct people. Just read the comments and there's a chance you'll get it.

"They cannot stand lectures from those who make more money in an hour than they do in a year about their own bad habits or slothfulness."

Hansen has that right!

"They do not hate political correctness so much as one-sided political correctness, which gives a pass to some to say things that would get others fired or ruined."

Yup.; 5/3/16, 5:11 PM
Jaq said...: Why is 'garner' the better choice in this case? I think that it was chosen because there is a rule against using 'get' that when applied absolutely makes for stilted writing.; 5/3/16, 5:12 PM
traditionalguy said...: To garner something is to grab it up and hide it in a protected place where it will stay until The Count of Monte Cristo comes along.

It has something to do with a Jewish teachers aphorism that where a man's money is, there will be his heart.; 5/3/16, 5:25 PM
jg said...: won't someone please glean how he garners it?; 5/3/16, 5:36 PM
Wince said...: What Trump's "powerful " enemies don't understand about the key to Trump's success -- it is his powerful enemies.; 5/3/16, 5:45 PM
Chuck said...: "Garner" is a perfectly good word in this case, and in most cases where it is used.

The only knock on "garner" is that it is a word that is not often used conversationally. So people who are afraid of words might have something against it.

But "garner" expresses something different from "get." You "get" a cold. You "get" caught speeding. You "get" scolded, and you "get" a bonus. All things that you might, or might not, seek.

"Garner" is something that you seek and pursue, mostly, but the nice part of the word is that there is an element of chance or doubt in amongst the seeking.

You could "corral" the votes of a certain group. You could "earn" the votes of your core demographic. You could "obtain" the votes of Chicagoans. You could do a lot of things. But one of the most natural of all verbs associated with voting would be "garner," it seems to me.

Gather, collect, accumulate, amass, assemble, reap; all synonyms of "garner," and they all seem clumsier than "garner."; 5/3/16, 5:46 PM
Char Char Binks, Esq. said...: @trad

"Cruz" is Spanish for "cross". "Monte Cristo" is Italian for "Christ Mountain". Jesus Christ died on a cross on Mount Calvary. To win the nomination, a candidate needs to win, gain, gather, collect, amass, store, and mound up votes, to "garner" them, if you will. To trump is to win even with a lower number card (the first shall be last, just like Jesus, the alpha and the omega), so Cruz could beat Trump despite garnering a smaller number of caucus and primary votes, ironically enough. It's in the Bible.; 5/3/16, 5:52 PM
buwaya said...: "so Cruz could beat Trump despite garnering a smaller number of caucus and primary votes, ironically enough. It's in the Bible."

You have to admit though, it would take a miracle.; 5/3/16, 5:54 PM
Big Mike said...: Oh dear! It's Hanson with an 'o'. My bad.; 5/3/16, 5:55 PM
Char Char Binks, Esq. said...: Blogger buwaya said...

"You have to admit though, it would take a miracle."

That's where Jesus comes in.; 5/3/16, 5:56 PM
Big Mike said...: Anyway, it looks like Indiana has closed out Cruz (Kay-sick was closed out long ago). Barring something unlikely, like Obama's hyper-politicized DOJ indicting Hillary Clinton, it will be Trump versus Hillary Clinton for the right to sit behind the Resolute desk.; 5/3/16, 6:04 PM
Jaq said...: Yeah Chuck, I'm afraid of words. Your rule about 'get' is contrived and unconvincing. 'Get' means a lot of things.; 5/3/16, 6:06 PM
Michael K said...: "The billionaire boys know what's best "

There is a great scene in Fred Siegel's great book "Revolt Against the Masses" where a very successful woman executive is hired by a billionaire's fund in California and learns how it is to deal with such people. At a meeting she cracks,"What is the difference between a billionaire and a terrorist? You can negotiate with a terrorist." She was fired the next week.; 5/3/16, 7:09 PM
Moneyrunner said...: People who do not understand Trump's appeal are not really deep thinkers. They are superficial, seeing only the Trump surface. They are repelled by that without understanding that they are watching a play.

Scott Adams understands what's really going on.

They are the same people who thought that Bill Clinton was a good leader rather than a great politician because they could not see behind the facade. They were deceived by Barack Obama when he convinced them that he was capable of bringing the races together, again because they could not see below the surface. Anne made that mistake, once.

It takes experience to see below the surface; the experience of making the mistake of of believing that the surface is the reality. Only by making that mistake time and time again are we able to see things as they are, not as they appear to be.; 5/3/16, 8:28 PM
Phil 314 said...: "Maybe we should stop paying attention to elite journalist, "

You obviously don't know VDH.

Because of his Central Valley roots he routinely writes from a regular guy, working class perspective.

VDH also despises a fraud.; 5/3/16, 9:24 PM
Sal said...: That is a very good article. I could 'share' it on Facebook or something, but would immediately be socially outcast by everyone I know in Madison.; 5/3/16, 9:41 PM
ga6 said...: John Nance , another thieving Texas politician...; 5/3/16, 10:13 PM
JackWayne said...: The irony of a constitutional law prof not understanding the fundamentals of the current political situation is delicious. But I'll play. The Social contract we live with is broken if you believe that the point of ANY constitution is to limit government and promote individual freedom and responsibility. An unlimited government leads inexorably to this point: where a President believes "L'etat c'est moi". IMO, both Trump and Hillary will RULE with a "pen and a phone". In an unlimited government, the People realize that they're not going to get a fair government so they might as well vote for a government that does what they (the majority) wants. What you are experiencing is the realization that the Tyranny of the Majority is all we have left of our War of Independence. After all, if you teach AND BELIEVE in the "compelling interest of the government" then you are advocating for the dissolution of the Social Contract.; 5/3/16, 11:46 PM
jaed said...: "Garner", Althouse, comes from the Latin word granarium - a storehouse for grain. To garner is not just to get things - it's to gather them in and store them, as one would gather a crop.

Are Trump's votes a crop which he is gathering? You could make an argument.; 5/4/16, 2:25 AM
Tarrou said...: Anecdote time! Yesterday I transported a regular client, middle aged black man, and he started talking about Trump. The man knows little about politics, but ranted about how everyone is corrupt for a while, then said this:

"People saying Trump says offensive stuff, but I only heard two things he said. Gonna build a wall and he's so rich no one can buy him. That's why I'm with Trump. I mean, I don't vote, but I'm with Trump."

People like me, who follow politics the way Texans follow football, tend to forget that most people don't.; 5/4/16, 5:30 AM
Sydney said...: A rebellion against "Smug, Inc." That pretty much sums it up.; 5/4/16, 5:53 AM
Jaq said...: The first rule of good writing is that it not call attention to itself. Using 'garner' in place of 'get' calls attention to the writing. Nobody says it, it's like who and whom, sometimes if you use it 'correctly' it sounds funny and you are just calling attention to your writing rather than your ideas. It's not like 'garner' is some precious word whose loss would make the language poorer. The only use for it now is to make the writer or speaker sound affected, if for example, you were writing fiction.; 5/4/16, 6:19 AM
Jaq said...: He's so rich no one can buy him is his best argument. Air Force One is not something he drools over, he has been traveling in similar style for a long time. He doesn't need to get richer. I take him at his word on that. That he bought shares in Hillary Inc as a business decision, and that the whole system sucks. Hillary is going to have a hard time living down appearing at his wedding after he gave her money.

Trump can reform, people don't own him, Hillary couldn't reform if she tried, she is owned by the whole elite. Bernie doesn't even play the game, which I sort of admire.; 5/4/16, 6:38 AM
MadisonMan said...: I chuckle at the word garner, the fancy get, and your reaction to it. It's very similar to my reaction towards the word utilize which is really a fancified use.; 5/4/16, 6:43 AM
MadisonMan said...: Oh dear! It's Hanson with an 'o'. My bad.

I guess we know your favorite music group now based on misspellings. :)

That Hanson -- he's so hot right now.; 5/4/16, 6:45 AM
Johnathan Birks said...: amass, pick up, assemble, reap, glean, gather, harvest, stockpile...; 5/4/16, 7:08 AM
Phunctor said...: Has it become offensive to demonstrate mastery of the language? It might actually be a more useful heuristic for imputing credibility than, say, Megyn Kelly's legs.

That a louring pleb might be made to feel uneducated by the use of unfamiliar terms is a feature, not a fault. Let him recognize his betters, it will be good for him.

So garner that harvest of delegates Donald. You have my blessing.; 5/4/16, 10:02 PM