Could this be goodbye? Credit: MANDEL NGAN/AFP via Getty Images
When you are in real trouble, deep trouble — job on the line, family restless, dog embarrassed to be seen with you in the park trouble — what do you do?
If you are President Trump (dogless but otherwise conforming to that description) it is simple. As Frank Bruni of the New York Times puts it, you “set yourself on fire”.
“His gratuitously touted instincts are nowhere to be found,” Bruni writes, instead they’ve been “supplanted by self-defeating provocations, kamikaze tantrums and an itchy Twitter finger”.
If it’s possible to have a kamikaze tantrum while digging yourself further into a hole then Donald Trump is doing it.
This all-systems meltdown indicates to Bruni and the Democrats that they’ve never had it so good. Not since Clinton Dole in 1996, has the electoral map looked so propitious. Yes, yes: events and all that, but this looks, four months out, like a slam dunk.
Biden by a landslide in November.
Democrats believe it. Many Republicans believe it. The doyen of the Republican smart set, the Wall St Journal columnist and former Reagan speech writer, Peggy Noonan, summed it up in two short, much retweeted sentences:
“He doesn’t understand his own base. I’ve never seen that in national politics.”
Her point was that plenty of Trump voters — perhaps half of them — now actively dislike him and his antics. They wanted the second act of his presidency to be more serious, in particular to be about securing the supreme court for conservative values.
Instead they get a never-ending maelstrom. And a court that has just over-turned Louisiana’s effective ban on abortions. Even after two much touted Trump Supreme Court appointments the big victories — the really serious conservative wins that secure the ascendency of the cultural traditions of (white) rural American for decades — are not happening.
The conclusion reached by all these disparate folk, from liberal Democrats, through ‘never Trump’ Republicans, into the base itself, is that Donald Trump is going to fight a dirty election, perhaps even contest the result, but eventually lose and lose big.
They should know — we all should know — that with Donald Trump there will be twists like you’ve never seen before! Made for TV events that boggle the mind! The promise of a totally new series! Folks, it is going to be way messier than just an election lost. But the wiser Democrats, along with some nervous Republicans, are preparing themselves for the messiest outcome of all.
Donald Trump resigns.
He throws in the towel. All of this flailing about has a direction: the direction water has when a sink-hole empties.
The really interesting thing is that the biggest fans of Trump quitting the scene are some of the more serious supporters of the Donald, or what they thought he stood for. The well-informed Trump-voting blogger Mickey Klaus — the man who first revealed that saintly Democratic presidential candidate John Edwards was a scoundrel cheating on his wife — has suggested a plan that may well have legs.
It goes like this. In a reference to a famous article written at the time of the last presidential election, Klaus poses the question ” “What happens if it’s a ‘Flight 93 Election’ and your side is corkscrewing down into the earth?
“…It is time to bail.”
With Donald Trump out of the race he paints a picture of a situation in which passengers rush at the cockpit, and (here the Flight 93 analogy rather fails, but stick with it) eject Trump, thus transforming the election entirely in favour of the Republican party. With Trump gone, the intensity level of the Dem campaign will instantly drop. Millions who might turn out to get rid of Trump will stay at home. The lightning rod having wandered off with all the electricity, everything will probably become very boring very quickly. The Democrats’ nominee is so weak that Republicans, depending on whom they picked, might still have a chance at retaining the White House.
There are of course plenty of Republicans who have wanted Trump to go during the course of his presidency. But I cannot stress enough that Kraus and those who agree with him are not ‘never Trumper’ Republicans opposed to the President and seeking now to bring the party back into the mainstream.
They are the opposite. They want to secure Trumpism, which they see as an aggressively pro-immigration restrictions, pro-American jobs, anti-China and anti-foreign entanglements agenda. Proper populism. And they fear (rightly probably) that a big defeat will lead to a situation where Mr Trump booby traps the White House and jets off into the sunset and the Republican party clears its throat and moves on, moves Left.
How do they stop this? They act NOW. Perhaps with Mike Pence, the vice president or perhaps with some other character sprung from a TV studio in time for the party Convention at the end of August. There is already a name in the frame: step forward Tucker Carlson, the host of “Tucker Carlson Tonight” on Fox News (of course).
Mr Carlson has veered in recent months into a fascinating area of political space: attacking Donald Trump from the populist Right. Specifically, he called out the White House for failing to clamp down more vigorously (with troops perhaps?) on the Black Lives Matter protests and the riots in some cities.
There’s even gossip — via the Politico website — that Carlson is pally with a man who has the ear of the President but a scratchy relationship with his advisors: “Carlson has established a friendship,” Politico says, “ with Donald Trump, Jr., according to a source familiar with their relationship.”
Whoever it is, the first item on their agenda is a no-brainer. They must find a way to pardon Trump senior or make it plain that they will. As Robert Kuttner of Brandeis University put it recently: “Mar-a-Lago isn’t Elba, much less Saint Helena, but it sure beats the Oval Office.” In other words this Napoleon needs an exile plan. He needs his lawyers to buy into these arrangements in order that he can be sure of living out his days in relative freedom.
That is not as easy to sort out as it might seem because the US federal system makes it nigh on impossible to stop individual states prosecuting crimes they believe were committed on their territory. Vice president Spiro Agnew is a case in point: when he was forced out of office in 1973 and did a deal in lieu of prison it was all sorted out with the federal authorities because his offences were federal not state crimes. Donald Trump has New York to contend with: property deals, loans, tax issues.
Worse: quite a few of the things he might need sorting date from before he was President, so his people cannot even be sure of a presidential get-out clause in an off-to-Elba scenario.
Hang on though, is this really a serious scenario? One Senior correspondent on Fox News, Charles Gasparino, claims to have talked to people who think it may be: “Over the weekend I spoke to a sample of major players; one described Trumps current psyche as “fragile”. Gasparino tweeted a few days ago. “I’ve heard the talk but I doubt it’s true,” another said. “My bet is, he drops if he believes there’s no way to win.”
There is still a way to win. There are new Trump voters to be found among the huge numbers of Americans who do not vote. It is possible, too, that ‘shy Trump support’ — un-noticed by the opinion pollsters — is a thing. And, of course, Joe Biden is no superman. But these are febrile times.
And in the modern world political movements gather pace fast. Mickey Klaus makes a telling point:
“I admit,” he says, “ I also called in Newsweek for Michael Dukakis to drop out in 1988, long after the convention, on the grounds that he was losing and his running mate, Lloyd Bentsen, would do better.
“Was I wrong?”
He was not wrong. Dukakis went down to historic defeat to George W Bush. Bentsen could have won. This is why the ‘will Trump resign’ question is more than a gossip line for bored political nerds: it is plainly possible, but with what impact? If he walks he throws the nation into a new and even more unpredicatable tumult.
He might like the sound of that.
Justin Webb presents the Americast podcast and Today on Radio Four. His Panorama documentary “Trump the Sequel”, is available now on Iplayer
JustinOnWeb 
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SubscribeAs a science PhD myself, this finding does not surprise me at all.
Getting a university degree these days is nothing more than an exercise in compliance. You do the work, you wag your tail when you’re offered a bone, you virtue signal about diversity, inclusion, equity and climate change when required, and Bob’s your uncle. Independent thinking is not required. Indeed, it is a hindrance. A master’s degree is no different from a bachelor’s degree, it often doesn’t even require writing a thesis, it’s just another year of taking courses. A degree is positively correlated with being compliant and it is negatively correlated with creativity, independent thinking and ability to get things done.
A PhD, on the other hand, requires you to get something done. You need to produce a piece of work which is original and new. It requires independent thought.
Now that’s mainly true of STEM PhDs. Humanities PhDs are a lot less like that and a lot more like a Master’s Degree. So I predict that if the PhDs were split into cohorts by subject, you would find a lot more vaccine “hesitancy” among the STEM PhDs, while most humanities PhDs would be compliant.
Also, that’s all true of PhDs of years past. The quality of PhD programmes has fallen just as all university standards have fallen with the drive for more “diversity, equity and inclusion”. So I further predict that the older PhDs will be more vaccine “hesitant” than the younger ones.
Similar considerations hold of those who – either by design or by necessity – have to build up their own businesses or their own clientele as self-employed tradesmen. Like the self-employed who never go to university. They have to create something of their own.
It is the midwits, the accountants of this world, those who are very ambitious and desperately want a bachelor’s or a master’s degree so that they can climb a corporate ladder, or achieve other positions of “leadership” (for which yet more compliance, tail wagging and virtue signalling is required), but whose ambition is not matched with ability, and thus they are unable to build their own business, to get a doctorate or otherwise to do something new and creative, that are universally the dumbest and the most likely to be compliant with the prevailing orthodoxy. It’s not just about vaccines, it’s true in every walk of life.
I totally agree with your POV and I would like to add this:
The 2nd and 3rd most vax-hesitant groups are considered the “uneducated”.
Why are they vax-hesitant?
Because most of them were forced to live a “tough” life, not only have highly developed COMMON SENSE but also STREET SMARTS, and these two both come with the talent for identifying bull-shit and fraudulent messages.
While not being brainwashed by the “educational system” into being obedient, and not having so much time to be plugged in front of the TV to consume TV programming (due to the need to make ends meet, their money making activities being more stressful and time consuming that those of an educated individual).
So the “uneducated” are more sensible and more sensitive to fraud: they see a politician/business man talk the talk and not walking the walk, so they disregard anything else he may recommend, like “medical advice”. They won’t allow someone to fool them twice. They also tend to see the famous people, sport stars, actors, entertainers for what they are: mere actors paid to deliver something or fake it for the camera. They also won’t take medical advice from these empty shells.
And as DrT said it, this aspect regarding the uneducated “It’s not just about vaccines, it’s true in every walk of life.”
Whilst there are ignorant people on both sides of the fence, the most articulate and eloquent motivations for decisions come from the vaccine hesitant.
I’ll be honest – I noticed a similar thing about Brexit in my experience. Be interesting to see what studies have been done into this.
People who self professed to know very little about the EU and international affairs etc, often seemed to be pro-Brexit.
People who knew a bit or had a more international (if somewhat) superficial) mindset seemed to overwhelmingly support remain.
Whereas a lot of those who knew a lot about the EU and had real life experience outside the UK and EU were likely to be pro-Brexit.
True in my experience too re Leave. As for vaccines: the sample may be statiistically weak and full of outliers. More generally, PhDs in the UK often keep quiet about their qualifications, due to resentment. Some are acutely aware of what we do NOT know. So, perhaps they are more risk averse?
Yeah agreed! Good points.
I suppose I would clarify my initial comment as just a general one about knowledge as opposed to education level.
People with PhDs are significantly from academia – whose inhabitants generally favour Remain
Decades ago I used to argue with my London friend about the viability of the EU based mainly on the prospect of a common currency. What I battled to articulate then in smoky bars after gallons of wine, became crystal clear over the years. The EU was always going to fail if it had a monetary union of budgetary sovereign states.
I listened to a very intelegent discussion on vaccine hesetency, the the guys said that across the refusers you find the people can discuss somethings intelligently about covid vaccines, in that they thought about it, and took in many facts and bits of info in their consideration.
The vaccine takers rarely could sayanything about covid but mindless ‘Fallow the Science’ and ‘not killing Granny’.
George Orwell’s comment springs to mind” Some ideas are so stupid that only intellectuals believe them”
I too would be intrigued to see the numbers and the subjects of the PhD s.
‘Women and gender Studies’ PhD’s vs ‘Bio-Chemestry’ PhD’s….
This is something we need to know, what side do they fall on, how are our intellectual elite positioned on this vital issue.
The piece is, obviously, specifically about vaccine hesitancy among people with PhDs.
But it would be interesting to consider more broadly the typical characteristics (if indeed there are any typical characteristics) of people with PhDs in relation to other issues.
For example: are PhDs more independent in their attitudes generally, or more sceptical (in the sense of requiring more evidence for a proposition before accepting it), or do they become more fixed in their views once formed, or do they regard themselves as somehow ‘above’ the concerns of the general population?
And if any of the above might be true, would it be the result of obtaining a PhD, or would it be that people with those characteristics to start with have a greater tendency to be come PhDs?
Answers on a postcard, please.
I’m currently following a doctorate program. As you climb higher up the academic food chain you realize that experts are no different than most other people – susceptible to hyperbole, self-aggrandizement, opportunism, flattery and fame. I’m vaccine-hesitant and will do all I can to avoid taking it unless I’m absolutely forced to. I’m young and healthy, and would much rather take my chances catching a virus I’m very likely to survive than to be injected with a vaccine that has the potential to wreak irreversible damage to my bodily functions.
The mainstream media has done little to ease my concerns of the vaccines. In fact, by telling me what to do and what to think, it has done the exact opposite. I’m also very independent (according to a personality test given to me by my employers). The moment I feel coerced into something, even if it’s for my own good, I start to dig my heels in.
Very much agree with you, Julian. I was always a bit of an independent thinker (my primary school teachers used to complain about it in my early school reports!), and my PhD (science and stats-based) taught me to require evidence rather than propaganda. I’m not swayed by badly-presented graphs or flawed statistical analyses, which have sadly been the recourse of both pro and anti-vaccine groups. During my somewhat varied career, I’ve encountered plenty of academics who are blinded by dogma or their own biases. I’ve also worked for big pharma and seen how the motivation for profit can lead to ‘bad’ results being buried, if only by researchers who are eager to ‘clean up’ data to ensure their contract is renewed. When you see how much research is influenced by funding, or the requirement to publish, publish, publish, you become cynical about the reliability of results. Then, of course, you have those with vested interests who promote particular results, viewpoints or policies for their own benefit.
When it comes to the vaccines, I’d advise anyone who is vulnerable to covid to be vaccinated, because the risk of covid outweighs the potential risks of the vaccines, but I’m very much pro-choice and the relentless propaganda/coercion/vilification of sceptics makes me extremely uneasy. I’ll make up my own mind, thanks, when I’m good and ready, and I’ve seen more long-term data. We were told that Pandemrix was safe, but the people who suffered from long-term side-effects were initially treated with derision – I saw that personally, with a family member, which has, I admit, influenced my views.
Nice one.
Perhaps, but you should show a curve that gives absolute numbers too. Then you would see that PhDs are very few indeed. I wonder how statistically significant that data can be, unless they were specifically targeted.
Also it would be interesting to see the difference between PhDs in intellectually bankrupt subjects like social sciences vs. physical sciences.
Nice idea!
It would be fun to be surprised. But, my own prejudice would be that my fellow social science PhD’s would rank among the less skeptical.
That would be equivalent to a home economics GCSE?
mmm…who do you think wrote this paper?
Quite – this comment deserves more recognition.
5 million surveyed is really decent and large sample, but those with PhDs must be a small % of the total.
No
Do you think 2% is a large percentage? Not being facetious, genuine question
(Ignore – seen comment below – thanks!)
2% have doctorates, so sample size > 100000, populuation iro 328m….= a very high accuracy/confidence level.
Thank you for that. I didn’t know the stats but given with that sample size and the overblown size of some parts of academia, I am surprised we haven’t got PhDs coming out of our ears.
Being as universities are nowadays educationally worthless, I wonder how significant this is. Whatever, it’s classic “everybody’s stupid except me”.
The study design was a facebook survey LOL :
Design, participants and setting A COVID-19 survey was offered to US adult Facebook users in several languages yielding 5,088,772 qualifying responses from January 6 to May 31, 2021. Data was aggregated by month. Survey weights matched the sample to the age, gender, and state profile of the US population.
What this tells me is that ‘clever’ people are useless at anything remotely useful.
Demonstrating once again how the real problem is the ‘mid-wits’.
This story is basically false. The effect described in the study turned out to be demonstrably caused purely by trolls, who could be identified by the fact that they provided nonsensical self-described genders like “attack helicopter”. Once the study authors eliminated answers from people who gave self-described genders (28.1% of whom claimed to have PhDs), it was no longer the case that PhDs were most vaccine-hesitant.
See a good writeup at https://coronavirus.quora.com/Is-it-true-that-PhDs-are-the-most-vaccine-resistant-group-https-www-nationalreview-com-corner-the-most-vaccine-hesita-1
This story is basically false. The effect described in the study turned out to be demonstrably caused purely by trolls, who could be identified by the fact that they provided nonsensical self-described genders like “attack helicopter”. Once the study authors eliminated answers from people who gave self-described genders (28.1% of whom claimed to have PhDs), it was no longer the case that PhDs were most vaccine-hesitant.
See a good writeup at https://coronavirus.quora.com/Is-it-true-that-PhDs-are-the-most-vaccine-resistant-group-https-www-nationalreview-com-corner-the-most-vaccine-hesita-1