Visible at last
How did the Trump phenomenon happen? Until recently the ruling elites in the Democratic Party and the national media seemed remarkably uncurious.
They viewed Donald Trump’s victory in 2016 as a freak of nature, an aberration best forgotten.
But Mr. Trump almost pulled it off again — with close margins in the swing states he lost (like Georgia and Arizona)and comfortable margins in the swing states he won (Texas and Ohio) and by gleaning an even bigger vote in rural America than last time. (The suburbs tipped it for Joe Biden.)
The Democrats watched their blue wave recede and vanish. They lost seats in the House. They almost lost to Mr. Trump again.
Maybe it’s finally OK to ask why.
It’s pretty simple, really. Both parties forgot the flyover people — the people in the rural parts of every state. Those people watched their jobs get exported and never were asked their opinion of “free trade” or internationalism. They were invisible and expected to quietly remain so.
As a result of bipartisan myopia and indifference, a large part of America (allegedly bitter and clinging to Bibles and guns) got effectively canceled, at worst. They got benign neglect at best.
As a result of decades of bad trade, tax and fiscal policy, there is not a prosperous small town in all of Ohio, and not more than a handful in Pennsylvania (college towns). West Virginia is overwhelmingly poor. And it is not much different in the small towns and county seats anywhere in the country, save the coasts.
So how did a billionaire real estate developer and socialite who’d spent his entire life in New York City become the tribune of Appalachia? That’s pretty simple, too.
He saw them.
The invisible, flyover people were visible to Mr. Trump.
Many of the West and East Coast Democrats may never see them. But there is evidence that others have awakened to the wake-up call at last. And that evidence rests most prominently in the president-elect — Joe Biden.
Mr. Biden comes from Delaware, a hardscrabble state, in both country and city. He grew up in Scranton, which is a part of the America that has been pillaged and forgotten.
In an interview with Thomas Friedman, of The New York Times, Mr. Biden put it simply: “There is no way Democrats can go another four years and lose almost every rural county in America. For their sake and the country’s, Democrats have to figure out what is going on there.”
He said of rural America that he would be its president too.
He said of the people who live in flyover land, “I respect them.”
He added: “We have got to end the rural health care crisis right now by building on Obamacare … with a public option [and] automatically enroll people eligible for Medicaid. There’s strong support for that — and particularly [from] people in rural states, like Texas and North Carolina, that reject expansion. We can boost funding. I visited 15 rural hospitals. And the biggest problem is there’s not enough reimbursement for them to be able to keep open.
“We should be spending $20 billion to put broadband across the board … We have got to rebuild the middle class … especially in rural America.”
So the Trump phenomena changed the debate and could change policy, and then reality, in smalltown America.
“I respect them” is a whole lot better than calling the flyover people “deplorables.”
Mr. Biden has seen the other America. His party should join him. The Republicans should join Mr. Biden in his rebuilding plan, which Mr. Trump could have pursued had he more interest in the details.
If we really want to heal the country, we have to see the country — the whole country.
If the two parties go back to myopia and indifference, there will be, understandably, hell to pay.