A columnist for The New York Times is admitting that he was wrong for making the blanket statement that supporters of former President Donald Trump were “appalling.”
In an opinion piece published by the Times on Thursday, conservative columnist Bret Stephens wrote, “The worst line I ever wrote as a pundit…was the first line I ever wrote about the man who would become the 45th president: ‘If by now you don’t find Donald Trump appalling, you’re appalling.’”
“I regret almost nothing of what I said about the man and his close minions. But the broad swipe at his voters caricatured them and blinkered me,” he continued. “It also probably did more to help than hinder Trump’s candidacy. Telling voters they are moral ignoramuses is a bad way of getting them to change their minds.”
Stephens went on to note “the first” question he should have asked is what supporters of Trump saw in him that he did not.
According to the columnist, he viewed the former president as “a bigoted blowhard making one ignorant argument after another,” but his supporters saw “a candidate whose entire being was a proudly raised middle finger at a self-satisfied elite that had produced a failing status quo.”
“Anger can take dumb or dangerous turns, and with Trump they often took both,” writes Bret Stephens. “But that didn’t mean the anger was unfounded or illegitimate, or that it was aimed at the wrong target.” https://t.co/0C0UYKUbgg
— New York Times Opinion (@nytopinion) July 22, 2022
Stephens admitted that he was “blind” to that as he explained he “lived in a safe and pleasant neighborhood” and his kids “went to an excellent public school.” At the same time, he added, “I was well paid, fully insured, insulated against life’s harsh edges.”
By contrast, he wrote that Trump supporters’ experiences were the opposite.
Stephens went on to recount the financial woes they faced as well as the “great American cultural revolution of the 2010s” that saw “traditional beliefs” on a range of issues from same-sex marriage to “race-blind rules” to “reverence for patriotic symbols” become “more and more, not just passé, but taboo.”
“It’s one thing for social mores to evolve over time, aided by respect for differences of opinion. It’s another for them to be abruptly imposed by one side on another, with little democratic input but a great deal of moral bullying,” he added.
He also admitted that with his “dripping condescension,” he ignored the “nuance” of Trump supporters and also confirmed their thoughts about “people like me — people who talked a good game about the virtues of empathy but practice it only selectively.”
“For every in-your-face MAGA warrior there were plenty of ambivalent Trump supporters, doubtful of his ability and dismayed by his manner, who were willing to take their chances on him because he had the nerve to defy deeply flawed conventional pieties,” Stephens added.
As the saying goes: Better late than never.
Stephens did suggest that he would not be “morally” wrong to “lambaste” Trump’s current supporters but said he would “approach these voters in a much different spirit than I did the last time.”
“‘A drop of honey catches more flies than a gallon of gall,’ noted Abraham Lincoln early in his political career,” he wrote. “’If you would win a man to your cause, first convince him that you are his sincere friend.’ Words to live by, particularly for those of us in the business of persuasion.”
There is and has been a temptation among many in the media to ridiculously make this blanket statement that if people support Trump — even passively — then they must be on board with every insensitive utterance of him, every lie or misrepresentation of the truth, every alleged act of corruption, and they’re racist and white supremacists.
But you don’t have to be racist or support everything Trump has said or done to vote for him because you’re concerned about your future and your family’s future. And some Trump voters and supporters didn’t really love him, but they looked at the Democratic alternatives and their policies, and said, “Oh heck no.”
Those in the media who still view Trump supporters as “appalling” would do well to listen to Abraham Lincoln if they want to win anyone over. Just calling them names and attacking them won’t do it.
