By Lori Jaffe
We see the signs everywhere. Small signs like a knowing smile exchanged between strangers as they discuss a Trump wine to buy. Bigger signs like our local and state government leaders bracing themselves for impact. Huge signs like the announcements of presidential appointments. The signs are here and are being talked about openly in the media, which is busily analyzing election data. America is waking up - again.
This phenomenon of “revolution” or waking up and throwing off the government blanket is not new. CSPAN After Words featured KT McFarland and her book, Revolution: Trump, Washington, and “We the People.” “America has been through viciously divisive periods before, some far worse than the one we’re living through today. With the hindsight of history, we can see them as inflection points, the transitional periods between an old system that had broken down and a new one still largely in formation.” McFarland believes that we are “right in the middle” of an inflection point.
“… America goes through these divisive periods roughly every 40 years. Now why? It’s because we’re a very dynamic country. I mean demographically, geographically, socially, economically we are constantly reinventing ourselves not just as individuals but as a nation and government, by its very nature is sort of stuck. It’s a status quo institution….So America is set up to have these revolutions, political revolutions…”
The Baltimore Sun reports that the movement toward Trump was even felt in blue Maryland. “The largest shifts toward Trump happened in Cecil and Calvert counties, where Trump increased his margin from 2020 by 16 and 11 points, respectively. Both counties voted for Trump in 2020.
Smaller, but notable, shifts occurred in the solidly Democratic counties of Baltimore City (5 points), Baltimore County (6), Howard County (8), Montgomery County (10) and Prince George’s County (7). The last two border the deep-blue city of Washington, D.C.”
So, what made voters stop hitting the snooze button? Was it the economy? Was it our porous border and the stories of lives and innocence lost? Was it that parents were being deceived about what was happening to their children in schools? Was it the countless political and judicial attacks and even physical attempts on Donald Trump’s life? We think it was all of those things that made our nation decide that enough was enough.
The move to Trump is causing analysts to do some “soul searching” as to what went wrong. On Election Night, Scott Jennings said that Trump’s win was “something of an indictment of the political information complex.” “We have been sitting around for the last couple weeks and the story that was portrayed was not true,” Jennings said. “We were told Puerto Rico was going to change the election. Liz Cheney, Nikki Haley voters, women lying to their husbands. Before that it was Tim Walz and the camo hats. Night after night after night we were told all these things and gimmicks were going to somehow push Harris over the line. And we were just ignoring the fundamentals. Inflation; people feeling like they are barely able to tread water at best; those were the fundamentals of the election.”
Jennings added: “I think for all of us who cover elections and talk about elections and do this on a day-to-day basis, we have to figure out how to understand, talk to and listen to the half of the country that rose up tonight and said, ‘We have had enough.’” After all the damage that the media has done, we hope that they will rediscover their humanity and do what is right for our country.
So, while the political pundits and high brows scratch their heads, we join President-Elect Trump, and his supporters in a “Trump Dance.” Yes, a new day is dawning. Let us rejoice and be glad in it.
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Lori Jaffe is the Party Secretary for the Montgomery County Republican Central Committee, volunteer coordinator and Member of the Executive Board. She can be reached at [email protected]
