In the wake of the election — and I mean that in two senses, for Grounds really does feel like a wake — I thought I’d highlight the potential benefits of a Trump presidency. Take a pause from dwelling on the reality that the West Wing will soon be occupied by perhaps the most morally abhorrent and unqualified person ever elected president, and instead consider the opportunities a President Donald Trump provides. You’ll find that in addition to Republicans, Democrats and unaligned cynics also have reason to be optimistic.
Republicans don’t need to look too hard to see the bright side: Tax cuts, Supreme Court nominations, the enforcement of immigration laws, the repeal of the Affordable Care Act and the overall repudiation of the Obama years provide reason enough to celebrate.
But to be frank, until Trump assumes the office of president, policy isn’t the most rewarding aspect of Trump’s win. Rather, even anti-Trump Republicans like myself can’t help but delight in the fall of the Clinton dynasty and the collective freak out currently consuming the Democrats’ party press. How can you not laugh at the spectacular failure of the Clinton campaign, which somehow managed to lose to the most reviled nominee in U.S. history, a man they intentionally propped up during the GOP primary? And immature as it is, it’s hard not to revel in the horror of Samantha Bee, Lena Dunham and various other criminally unfunny comedians who spent the last year “destroying” Trump’s candidacy. Witnessing them react exactly how we knew they would — blaming white people and saying women who voted Trump hate themselves — is just icing on the cake.
But the potential good news isn’t just limited to Republicans.
For Democrats, the bitter pill of a Trump presidency might be tough to swallow, but there’s a decent chance they’ll like the results. Trump is already making overtures to Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-NY), possibly to signal to Republicans he won’t be constrained by his party label. Additionally, after meeting with President Obama, there are signs Trump is already wavering on his commitment to scrap Obamacare. Despite House Speaker Paul Ryan’s strangely ominous-sounding pronouncement of the dawn of a new Republican government, we essentially have an independent candidate in the White House. Trump himself has changed parties several times, and while the RNC certainly helped him win the presidency, Trump’s past indicates he has never had an issue stiffing his creditors.
Even better opportunities for Democrats lurk just down the road. Midterm elections generally punish the party in power, so while Democrats have an unfriendly Senate map in 2018, they can expect to make further gains in the House of Representatives and gubernatorial races. If the Trump presidency is especially disastrous, 2020 may bring a Democratic wave election with massive ramifications: Democrats could then assume greater control over the redistricting process. This would allow Democrats to gerrymander the states they control, reforge safe red seats in the House into safe blue ones and create a favorable House map for the next decade.
If I had to place a bet on who gets the most enjoyment out of a Trump presidency though, I wouldn’t wager on either Republicans or Democrats, but on the unaligned cynics. Type in “cynic definition” on Google and the first one to pop up reads: “a person who believes that people are motivated purely by self-interest rather than acting for honorable or unselfish reasons.” Could anyone deny the cynics have been vindicated this year? We’ve already seen the party of family values and free trade rally around a philandering protectionist; simultaneously, the party that mocked Mitt Romney for naming Russia a geopolitical foe spent the last few months calling Trump Putin’s puppet in a campaign effort that’d make McCarthy proud.
And this is just the beginning. The GOP and their allies at Fox News and other right-wing media outlets have spent the bulk of the Obama years raising hell over government spending and the federal debt, yet they’ll soon defend Trump’s massive tax cuts and a trillion dollar infrastructure package. The talk radio crowd excoriated the “establishment” for failing to live up to their campaign promises, yet Trump is already hinting at reneging on many of his. The response to these heresies from nominal conservatives will be telling, and I suspect the silence to be deafening.
Similarly, I eagerly await the Democrats becoming concerned with executive overreach again. Somehow I can’t imagine any of those who railed against the GOP’s “obstruction” during the Obama years expect or desire Democratic elected officials to allow all of Trump’s policies to pass without a fight. We might even see those “Dissent is the highest form of patriotism” bumper stickers that were so popular during the Bush years come back into vogue.
The case for optimism isn’t strong — the appointment of Breitbart chairman Steve Bannon as strategic advisor to the president is particularly concerning — but it’s there. At the very least, we can be grateful to Trump for being perhaps the one presidential candidate in modern times to offer a glimmer of hope to so many disparate factions. May you live in interesting times.
Matt Winesett is a Senior Associate Editor for The Cavalier Daily. He can be reached at m.winesett@cavalierdaily.com.
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