Strengthening His Base

I was all set to talk about how the race for the Republican nomination for President in 2020 is officially getting underway this week.  I was thinking that some member of Congress or Governor was going to take a strong stand against President Trump's actions in just his first week in office and establish themselves as a potential "party savior" that could ride the wave of discontent with Trump to the first intra-party victory over a sitting President in US electoral history.

But further consideration finds that Donald Trump likely hasn't alienated ANY of the people that voted for him in the last election.  Let's keep in mind that the President hasn't done a single thing that he hadn't promised to do in the first 100-days of his administration before they voted for him.  If anything, the "Trumpkins" are now completely enamored with their President--and their support for him has only become stronger.

But what about the "massive protests"?  The people marching in the streets?  The jamming of airports with those opposed to the travel ban?  Surely those masses of humanity show that the American people have turned against their President!  Well that's what I thought at first--but consider where these protests are taking place.  The airports in New York, Washington DC, Boston, Chicago, Los Angeles and San Francisco saw the huge crowds--but Donald Trump had little support in those areas to begin with.  The people jamming the terminals were those that packed Bernie Sanders rallies too--and looked what that got them.

Do you see the Michigan factory workers skipping a day on the job to go protest the inauguration?  Are the Evangelicals from Ohio getting on the buses to take part in the Women's March?  Are the Congressional offices of Paul Ryan and Jim Sensenbrenner being overwhelmed with calls from people in the deep-red suburban counties outside of Milwaukee demanding impeachment proceedings?

So far, Donald Trump is scoring touchdowns with those that carried him to a stunning Republican primary win--and an even bigger upset victory in the general election.  Today, he kicks an extra point with the party members that held their nose and voted for him in November by appointing a hard-core conservative to the Supreme Court--which was the only issue actual Conservatives could have hoped to get out of Trump.  And four years from now, that may be their only tie to Trump again--which would mean more nose-holding in the voting booth.

So the 35% of Americans that put Donald Trump in the White House shake their heads at the 35% that voted against him protesting--while the remaining 30% worry only about who got eliminated on The Bachelor last night.