Claiming that the nation “can’t afford two years of gridlock,” the Washington Post’s editors call on Joe Biden, Mitch McConnell, and Nancy Pelosi to work together. I call on McConnell to be exactly as willing to work with the Biden administration as Pelosi and Chuck Schumer were to work with the Trump administration.
McConnell will chart his own course. However, I’m betting it will be closer to the one I’m urging than to the Post’s.
As for those pesky Trump voters — close to half of the voting population — the Post says Biden should “reach out” to them with “rural broadband, for example.”
It turns out that Trump voters aren’t “deplorables” after all. They are just hicks with insufficient access to highspeed internet.
After five years, the Post is as clueless about the Trump phenomenon as it was when candidate Trump walked down that escalator in Manhattan. The grievances that gave rise to the Trump movement — grievances shared by people like me who never warmed to Trump — have nothing to do with internet access.
Trump voters reject the vision of America, and of Americans, shared by Democrats, media outlets like the Post, and the new business elites. They can’t be bought off with broadband.
Mitch McConnell and his caucus represent, albeit imperfectly, people who hold a very different vision of America. People who, for the most part, like the America they grew up in and don’t think it needs to be transformed. People who cherish their freedoms and resent governmental intrusions on them. People who don’t want yet more income redistribution by the government. People who don’t want to see religious freedom eroded.
People who reject the idea that America is plagued by systemic racism. People who favor merit-based decisionmaking, rather than a racial spoils system. People who want a strong military. People who are favorably disposed to the police. People who disfavor illegal immigration and expect the government to curb, rather than reward, it.
Gridlock in Washington reflects the national divide on these and other matters. For Republicans, gridlock is infinitely preferable to rule by the other side. The same is true for Democrats, as the past two years demonstrated once again.
Two cheers for gridlock.
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