Trump

The nominees of both political parties in American presidential elections have become clear. In terms of the U.S.’s future and the course of the world, the Republican Party’s campaign was the more interesting and sometimes the more frightening one. The conflict between conservative party leaders and the party supporters’ ideas caused the party elite’s nominees to drop out of the race early. After the last primary elections in Indiana, two nominees, colorless Kasich and antipathetic Ted Cruz, threw in the towel.

In this case, Donald Trump is guaranteed to be the nominee of the GOP. A short while ago, Trump was threatening to stir up trouble at the general assembly if he is not given the Republican Party candidacy even though he has gotten the most Republican votes. Trump’s words were not an empty threat, given that his supporters have often used brute force at his rallies and Trump and his team have passively observed these violent acts or supported them by laughing.

Eventually the Republican Party was left with no choice. A real estate mogul, whose fraudulency has been revealed many times, who is a narcissist, uses racist rhetoric and supports harmful and poisoned localism, who has not been involved in politics in a single day in his entire life before his candidacy, has become successful in building a strong connection with the GOP supporters. Winning the nomination by spending his own money reinforced the idea that he will not be a slave to any kind of lobbies. American voters who have had enough of lobbies took away from this a tale of independence and populism.

Trump is not an ordinary nominee. The highlighted elements of his campaign, the requests of the crowd of people he leads and him ignoring the established rules within the democratic system create anxiety among so many groups of people. In his statement, he almost proclaims that the rules and standards of the established system are illegitimate. Accepting or approving any rules that will block his path does not seem to be in question and it is absolutely natural to apply force to anyone who does not obey and accept his realities.

Trump gets his actual power from the mass of white Americans who have suffered the most from globalization. As conservative author, Andrew Sullivan, stated in his article “America Has Never Been So Ripe for Tyranny” in New York Magazine, “Global economic forces have pummeled blue-collar workers more relentlessly than almost any other segment of society, forcing them to compete against hundreds of millions of equally skilled workers throughout the planet.” Within the American system, no group, including the leftists, has ever defended this group’s rights, which were hit hard by the economic crisis.

This group, which consists mostly of white people, has started hating the elite’s liberalism in social and cultural arenas. While almost any ethnic groups’ rights have been defended and fought for in favor of their freedom, this one’s stance and culture has been considered racist and they were belittled and nobody was interested in their problems. This group saw itself “disinherited and injured by an unjust order of things.”

Trump has acted as a spokesman for these people’s anger, which consists of mostly over-45 uneducated white working males. They really welcomed a nominee who alienates and insults the groups (Mexicans, Muslims and even women) that they think are responsible for their unjust situation.

The most important element behind Trump’s success is the U.S. settled elites’ disregard of the lower classes. Their lack of concern for the increasing disparities in the population, involvements in unnecessary wars and their behavior of protecting the key responsible parties in financial crisis and ignoring the victims triggered a bitter reaction toward them.

In this case, as Sullivan expressed in his article, “The vital and valid lesson of the Trump phenomenon is that if the elites cannot govern by compromise, someone outside will eventually try to govern by popular passion and brute force.” For this reason, in terms of democracy, Donald Trump is a great threat against the U.S. and the entire world.