On Tuesday, former president Donald Trump appeared on The Ben Shapiro Show to highlight various issues surrounding the election. In typical fashion, little time was dedicated to substantive policy discussions. Instead, Trump’s never-ending list of political grievances (some quite legitimate) grew even longer.
“The whole system is just a terrible system, actually,” Trump said while griping about the inconsistency of polling. Yes, polls can be wrong — famously so, in 2016. But the sheer range of topics he has rebuked on the grounds of their systemic ills has proven to be a hallmark of Trump’s rhetoric since the day he descended that escalator in 2015.
Trump undoubtedly struck a winning political chord with his incessant criticism of how the country’s institutions had been corrupted. Folks were not wrong to look around — at academia, Hollywood, the entertainment industry, Fortune 500 companies, federal bureaucracies, mainstream media, the legacy press, etc. — and see themselves as cultural lepers within their own society.
But complaining only gets you so far. Conservatives played some part in failing to prevent this situation, and will have to act to do something about it. But those on the right who have embraced the Trumpian framework often display political attributes common on the left: helplessness, victimization, and hints of institutional conspiracy aimed at particular groups. Listen to Tucker Carlson today and tell me if he sounds more like Ronald Reagan or Noam Chomsky.
Or listen to Trump tell Ben Shapiro, “It just doesn’t feel like it’s that close of an election,” and ask yourself: Doesn’t he more resemble the anecdotal mode used by the Left on topics such as institutional racism, whereby isolated examples of racist behavior become a pervasive element across American society?
It doesn’t have to be this way. J. D. Vance’s impressive debate performance showed that conservatives have options besides just complaining about how bad and unfair everything is. Yes, the moderators favored the Democratic nominees. Yes, the press remains obviously partisan. And yes, the culture has markedly shifted to the left. But Republicans can still have agency — even if we need to work a little harder to achieve our ends. We should expect our leaders to recognize this and act accordingly.