The Democratic debate last week was heavy on policy talk. The debate last week showed, both Clinton and Sanders see the public’s anger and frustration towards primarily economic issues, and they’re offering a myriad of proposals on college affordability, family leave, child care and breaking up concentrated economic power. The idea is that renewing broadly shared prosperity and helping the hard-pressed to solve particular problems in their lives will cure much of what ails us.
The mainstream Republicans have rather little to say about the specific challenges facing the middle and working classes. Instead, Republicans say — as they have for more than 30 years — that tax cuts tilted toward investors will get the economy to grow faster, which they believe will take care of everything else.
In fact, Republicans seem to want a government that would do less for everybody. Florida senator Marco Rubio, for example, dismissed the Democratic debate as a competition over “who was going to give away the most free stuff: Free college education. Free college education for people illegally in this country. Free health care. Free everything.”
The weak tea being served by the Republican mainstream explains Trump’s staying power. He is speaking clearly to a group that sociologist Donald Warren identified in 1976 as Middle American radicals. These voters, Warren said, feel that “the middle class has been seriously neglected,” and see “government as favoring both the rich and the poor simultaneously.” For their part, the established politicians in the Republican field still don’t have an effective response to Trump. Until they do, he will continue to haunt them.
Eryn Sanclemente
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/donald-trump-is-getting-a-boost-from-the-gops-weak-tea/2015/10/18/5d3dc8cc-743d-11e5-9cbb-790369643cf9_story.html
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