Andrew C. McCarthy:
About an eon ago, David Brooks coined the memorable phrase “status-income disequilibrium.” It diagnosed modern elites, politicians in particular, whose jobs endowed them with power that dwarfed the attendant financial compensation. It would seem quaint to fret over SID today, grubby pols having turned the monetizing of “public service” into an art form for which the Bill, Hillary, and Chelsea Clinton Foundation is the national museum.
Ah, but there’s a new SID in town. Those closely following the GOP presidential sweepstakes have doubtless noticed the haggard Beltway Republicans in its throes: Status-Influence Disequilibrium.
The condition was in evidence Tuesday night, as Donald Trump rolled up another series of primary victories. Bewildered GOP strategists groped for a silver lining, in chorus with commentators who wear establishment sympathies on their sleeves — and never more openly than when denying that there is any Republican establishment.
Solace was sought in the triumph of Ohio governor John Kasich, who managed to win his home state primary with less than 50 percent of the vote, denying Trump a sweep of the night’s five contests. The glow was not exactly like “feeling the Bern.” With this victory, Kasich ran his record to one win and 28 losses (in the Kasich spirit of Christian charity, I’m just counting states and ignoring losses piled up in D.C., Guam, the Northern Mariana Islands, and so on). As competitors go, Kasich is the ’62 Mets. Yet, Ohio became a ray of establishment hope: an aberrational win by a candidate already mathematically eliminated from contention somehow means the home team still has a shot.
Not a shot in the person of Governor Kasich, of course. Leading GOP lights are disappointed but they are not delusional. John Kerry, they know, has a better chance of winning the Republican nomination than John Kasich. The latter, instead, is a placeholder for a whimsical conspiracy: If, before the July convention in Kasich’s Cleveland backyard, no candidate has gathered up the 1,237 delegates needed to prevail, the party establishment (which conveniently controls the convention rules) could conceivably rig the proceedings, anointing some preferred deus ex machina — Paul Ryan? Mitt Romney? John McCain?
To pull this off, it would be necessary — though by no means sufficient — for vanquished also-rans like Kasich to grab and hold the few delegates they can, keeping Trump under the magic number. Success would mean party leaders keep control of what they see as theirs. They know rigging the convention is a far-fetched idea — though not so far-fetched in this cataclysm of an election cycle that they will dismiss it out of hand.
Indeed, it may not even be the most outlandish flyer out there. A #NeverTrump contingent — Republicans resolved never to vote for the Donald, no matter how objectionable the opponent — met this week to bat around the possibility of launching a third-party run. The group is well-intentioned, led by very solid conservatives with strong establishment ties. But like the “rig the convention” fantasists, they might as well cut out the middle-man and name Hillary Clinton as their alternative candidate.
If Trump wins the GOP nomination, he will already have beaten very strong conservatives in an electorate more conservative-friendly than the one that will vote in November’s general election. While a rigged convention would cause the GOP to be abandoned by Trump supporters, a third-party gambit would induce many conservatives to flee the party. Either way, the Democrats would win. Were that to happen, the righteously indignant #NeverTrump crowd would pat themselves on the back for sticking to their principles . . . but would they still feel that way when Elizabeth Warren was sworn in to fill Justice Scalia’s Supreme Court seat — while the second President Clinton (assuming she hasn’t been indicted) vets her next two or three Supreme Court nominees during downtime from the Muslim Brotherhood Reset?
The Republican establishment knows all this. So for now, party leaders pooh-pooh these unlikely schemes. Their goal is more modest: to preserve their viability by framing the narrative in which the ongoing 2016 nomination chase is understood. Thus, Tuesday night’s oft-repeated storyline: The Non-Trump.
Trump’s dominance, the story goes, is an illusion. Yes, he has a lopsided lead, but he has won only about 37 percent of the votes cast. Because of sundry state delegate-allocation rules, this has computed to about 48 percent of the delegate haul, roughly 673. But that still means he’d be losing nearly two-to-one among voters, and by a significant number of delegates, if he were running one-on-one against The Non-Trump.
The Non-Trump is a composite character: sort of like President Obama’s girlfriend in Dreams from My Father, except non-fictional. Collectively, The Non-Trump’s delegate haul is 738 — Cruz (411), Kasich (143), and the candidates who’ve suspended their campaigns: Rubio (169), Carson (8), Bush (4), and one each for Fiorina, Huckabee, and Paul. (Chris Christie, Trump’s new man Friday, hatched a goose-egg, which may seem like nothing but is better than he could do in New Jersey right now.)
The Washington wisdom is that we should see the race in terms of Trump versus The Non-Trump. This means seeing The Non-Trump as the combined fortress of Republicandom, led by the establishment.
Now, about the establishment: Notwithstanding its occasional pretensions to non-existence, it is real and identifiable. To be sure, there is validity in the complaint that the term “establishment” is too readily contorted into nonsense, and even slander. Yet it seems silly to suggest that there isn’t an establishment. The Republican party, one of only two major political parties in a country of over 300 million people, started before the Civil War. Any large, hierarchical, diverse, bumptious, and enduring organization could not endure long without leaders, financial backers, and loyalists. The urge to reject a categorical term because it can be demagogued into an epithet is understandable — just ask any neoconservative. But you’d still need to call the establishment something, and any substitute term — “elites,” “mainstream,” what have you — would soon be subject to the same complaint.
Which gets us to why “establishment” has become so pejorative. “Trump versus The Non-Trump” is the wrong way to analyze the contest. It is actually insurgents versus the establishment, or perhaps anti-Washington versus Washington.
Trump is such a larger than life figure — a gauche and buffoonish icon of a society that worships celebrity — that it is easy to conflate him with the phenomenon he has tapped into: a seething rage against Washington. Note: I saidagainst Washington, not necessarily against government — Trump supporters include many blue-collar Democrats and the disaffected white working class (including its non-working underclass). Those people do not oppose government in principle. They oppose the self-dealing Beltway racket: the chummy bipartisan congeries of politicos, strategists, big-monied donors, union bosses, special-interest agitators, lobbyists, and stars of the 24/7 political media that is increasingly remote from their strife, that always manages to take care of itself while they struggle. That is the wave Trump is riding, but we shouldn’t confuse the rider with the wave.
the two most powerful men in the Republican Party are Trump and Rush
Moderates in that party are despised
The most extreme are exalted
The Gop is always asking why don’t moderate muslims speak out against extremists. Well why did moderates in the GOP allow their party to be hijacked by extremists?
The GOP became the no-compromise party, now they are reaping what they sowed.
And yes Elizabeth Warren IS a real possibility for the SCOTUS, but the GOP will continue to not even consider a relative moderate like Garland who they formerly were able to confirm
John, syntax is a wonderful tool in written communication. Moreover, after reading this National Review article, “…Rush and Trump are the leaders of the Republican Party…” this becomes your first analysis is moronic, to say the least.
“relative moderate” is a laughable description, just as calling the grass roots conservatives “extremist”. It is the moderates who control the GOP that have set up the current middle finger gesture from voters, by their consistent betrayal of conservatives despite huge victories in 2010 and 2014, gaining control of both houses of congress.
To.a leftist, anyone who disagrees with the march towards progressive totalitarianism is an “extremist”.
How is securing our national border – like every other country – extremist?
How is expressing the desire to enact fiscal responsibility via reigning in wasteful federal spending “extremist”?
How is wanting to protect the citizens of the nation from muslim terrorism extremist?
How is wanting the federal government to abide by the first and second amendments, along with the rest of the Constitution extremist?
How is opposition to a marxist twit and an outrageously corrupt harridan extremist?
How is opposition to failed Keynesian economic insanity extremist?
How is opposition to having more than 50%of your income taken in the form of taxes extremist?
How is opposition to the death tax – on income that has already been taxed – extremist?