Peggy Noonan: The Protected Class and the Rise of Donald Trump

[NightHawkeye]

Trump and the Rise of the Unprotected
Why political professionals are struggling to make sense of the world they created. | Peggy Noonan

If you are an unprotected American—one with limited resources and negligible access to power—you have absorbed some lessons from the past 20 years’ experience of illegal immigration. You know the Democrats won’t protect you and the Republicans won’t help you. Both parties refused to control the border. The Republicans were afraid of being called illiberal, racist, of losing a demographic for a generation. The Democrats wanted to keep the issue alive to use it as a wedge against the Republicans and to establish themselves as owners of the Hispanic vote.

Many Americans suffered from illegal immigration—its impact on labor markets, financial costs, crime, the sense that the rule of law was collapsing. But the protected did fine—more workers at lower wages. No effect of illegal immigration was likely to hurt them personally.

It was good for the protected. But the unprotected watched and saw. They realized the protected were not looking out for them, and they inferred that they were not looking out for the country, either.

The unprotected came to think they owed the establishment—another word for the protected—nothing, no particular loyalty, no old allegiance.

Mr. Trump came from that.
...
This is a terrible feature of our age—that we are governed by protected people who don’t seem to care that much about their unprotected fellow citizens.
...
I don’t know if the protected see how serious this moment is, or their role in it.​

 

[NightHawkeye]

Instapundit had this to say ...
Peggy Noonan: Donald Trump and the Rise of the Unprotected | Instapundit

As I keep saying, we have the worst political class in American history. And people have noticed. There’s no particular reason why the outcome must be good. Bismarck said that God looks after fools, drunkards, and the United States of America, but as Jerry Pournelle noted: “Of course we were a much more devout nation” when Bismarck made that observation.​

 

[Eryk]

The Republicans were afraid of being called illiberal, racist, of losing a demographic for a generation.

Republican business owners want cheap, vulnerable foreign workers.

 

[HannahT]

Republican business owners want cheap, vulnerable foreign workers.

That doesn't make any sense if you look at the many stereotypes of what 'Republicans' are. I mean they are the ones that want to throw these individuals out of the country according to many. That would mean their cheap, vulnerable foreign workers would be gone.

 

[NightHawkeye]

That doesn't make any sense if you look at the many stereotypes of what 'Republicans' are. I mean they are the ones that want to throw these individuals out of the country according to many. That would mean their cheap, vulnerable foreign workers would be gone.

Unfortunately, the wealthy elite control the agenda of the Republican party ... not the grass-roots base supporters.

 

[Arcangl86]

Unfortunately, the wealthy elite control the agenda of the Republican party ... not the grass-roots base supporters.

The thing that I don't understand though is that Trump is a member of that wealthy elite, as he takes great pains to remind us, yet he is getting the grassroot support.

 

[grasping the after wind]

Republican business owners want cheap, vulnerable foreign workers.

Which does not make the statement you quoted less true. Both are the case. BTW there are plenty of Democrat business owners that want cheap vulnerable foreign workers too.

 

[Eryk]

Which does not make the statement you quoted less true. Both are the case. BTW there are plenty of Democrat business owners that want cheap vulnerable foreign workers too.

Point taken. Thank you.

 

[grasping the after wind]

The thing that I don't understand though is that Trump is a member of that wealthy elite, as he takes great pains to remind us, yet he is getting the grassroot support.

The protected class the author is talking about is not the private sector elites it is the political elites. Those voting for Trump don't hold anything against him because it was never his job as a private sector businessman to care about them.Rather than waste their anger on someone that never had before pretended to be on their side, they are much more angry at those who were elected and appointed to be public servants that decided they were not interested in serving the public but instead were more interested in serving themselves at the expense of the public. Though IMO choosing Trump as the vessel for expressing that anger is irrational, the anger about public officials betraying the public good is itself quite rational.

 

[AHH who-stole-my-name]

Both party's need to held up as champions of their constituents desires and many of those desires have been placed in the public's ear by the mouthpieces of the perspective parties.

Both need to have an issue to espouce and the unprotected are that issue. It is hear and now and as the econmy shrinks it becomes more toxic. If this issue would be solved then either party would have to look for something of a more immediate importance that may just force them to make some really hard choices that may just place their jobs in jeopardy.

Why should either of these parties put their neck out on a limb when both can use these people as a political football and set Americans against Americas, instead of revealing just how inept they are at their job.