An anecdotal observation related towards this behavior pushing away the educated. I’m an engineer and historically engineering has been the most conservative professional class field (software/computer science notwithstanding). However, nearly every engineer that I know under 40 leans Democrat to some degree even in fields that lean conservative (military and sometimes even petroleum!)
It's interesting you mention McCarthy because there's a direct connection to Trump through Roy Cohn. Trump is in many ways his reincarnation.
On the positive side, rabble-rousers like McCarthy make it easier for moderate men to embrace their causes without as much pushback. For example, Nixon's career was launched through his hearings against Alger Hiss.
Ultimately, character and competence matter most. Even on the issue where I agreed with Trump the most -- opposition to U.S. involvement in Middle East wars -- Trump betrayed his promise and ignored the counsel of the experts on Iran, who correctly predicted the outcome.
Re: Not only were Buchanan and Perot defeated, but their ideas were categorically rejected by America’s ruling elite.
One of Perot's big ideas was to balance the budget. Whether by accident or design, the GOP and the Democrats did cut some deals on that-- and we ended the 20th century with a balanced budget.
On NAFTA Perot (for whom I voted in 1992 but not 1996) was simply wrong. There was no "Giant sucking sound". In fact the later 90s hosted a huge employment boom with work force participation at its all time high. In Michigan my sister and her blue collar friends were complaining not about layoffs but about too much overtime. What spiked all that was not NAFTA but the GATT agreement that opened up China to free trade, and flung wide the gates of offshoring.
Re: But as with McCarthy, Trump’s flaws risk discrediting many of his ideas
The article leaves out one huge betrayal of his base: the Iran war.
Hard to believe it's been four years since Wood's article in First Things.
An anecdotal observation related towards this behavior pushing away the educated. I’m an engineer and historically engineering has been the most conservative professional class field (software/computer science notwithstanding). However, nearly every engineer that I know under 40 leans Democrat to some degree even in fields that lean conservative (military and sometimes even petroleum!)
It's interesting you mention McCarthy because there's a direct connection to Trump through Roy Cohn. Trump is in many ways his reincarnation.
On the positive side, rabble-rousers like McCarthy make it easier for moderate men to embrace their causes without as much pushback. For example, Nixon's career was launched through his hearings against Alger Hiss.
Ultimately, character and competence matter most. Even on the issue where I agreed with Trump the most -- opposition to U.S. involvement in Middle East wars -- Trump betrayed his promise and ignored the counsel of the experts on Iran, who correctly predicted the outcome.
Re: Not only were Buchanan and Perot defeated, but their ideas were categorically rejected by America’s ruling elite.
One of Perot's big ideas was to balance the budget. Whether by accident or design, the GOP and the Democrats did cut some deals on that-- and we ended the 20th century with a balanced budget.
On NAFTA Perot (for whom I voted in 1992 but not 1996) was simply wrong. There was no "Giant sucking sound". In fact the later 90s hosted a huge employment boom with work force participation at its all time high. In Michigan my sister and her blue collar friends were complaining not about layoffs but about too much overtime. What spiked all that was not NAFTA but the GATT agreement that opened up China to free trade, and flung wide the gates of offshoring.
Re: But as with McCarthy, Trump’s flaws risk discrediting many of his ideas
The article leaves out one huge betrayal of his base: the Iran war.