I think the only thing that can be said with any certainty about the 2016 election, and which also all can agree upon, is that it is unexpected in its ferocity, its revolt against the establishment, and its divisiveness. And the center of this three ring circus is Donald Trump. I hear a lot of talking heads say that the Trump phenomenon is due to two things. First he has tapped into the anger of a large portion of the US population. Second is that he isn't using the standard political playbook. Whats more is the fact that he is doing so unexpectedly well has caused a great many people to panic and come to the conclusion that he would be a disaster as President, and that he certainly wouldn't bring the level of decorum expected of the office. People, Im here to tell you that its all been done before. Trump is playing by a political playbook; just one dated 1828. I've often noted that we, as a people tend to do one of two things when it comes to history and historical figures in particular. We either totally forget them or we mold them into what one historian termed as "the marble man".
What we have in this election is a perfect display of both faults in action. Lets take the election of 1828 for example. The candidates were none other than Andrew Jackson, John Quincy Adams and Henry Clay. There were a few others, but these were the most notable. What made this election interesting is the amount of mudslinging and personal attack that went into it. For example, there were personal attacks aimed at Jackson's wife, because her divorce wasn't finalized when she married Jackson which caused one newspaper to pose the question, "Should a convicted adulteress and her paramour husband be placed in the highest office?" Jackson was also attacked for being a slave trader, yet ironically, not for being a slave owner. Different era in terms of what was and was not acceptable professions I suppose. Trump is also lambasted in a similar manner for outbursts and even more so when his opponents fail to make a particular point stick. Ever wonder how the Democrats were tagged with the symbol of a donkey? Its because Jackson (a Democrat) was referred to by his detractors as a Jackass. Jackson fought back by adopting the symbol for his campaign for a short while. Years later, newspaper man Thomas Nast would resurrect Jackson's old symbol and apply it to the Democratic party....and it has stuck since.
As to the charge that Trump, Cruz, Hillary, Rubio, and Sanders are not Presidential in their attitude, actions, or past actions; lets review the past of some of our past Commander in Chiefs:
Adultery/extramarital affairs: Clinton, Kennedy, LBJ, Eisenhower, FDR, Harding, Jefferson.
Responsible for murder or execution: Cleveland and Jackson
Killed a man in combat: Washington, Monroe, Harrison, Taylor, T.R. Roosevelt, Truman, Kennedy, G.H.W. Bush.
Slave Owners: Washington, Jefferson, Madison, Monroe, Jackson, Van Buren, Harrison, Tyler, Polk, Taylor, Johnson and Grant...yes U.S. Grant via his wife.
Impeached (though not convicted): Andrew Johnson, Clinton.
But lets not stop there. What about the tone and comments of some of the candidates, particularly Trump? For this lesson, I've chose one President in particular, Mr. John Adams of Boston MA. Though spoken in the language of his time, here are some things he and to say about some of our most notable historical figures and publications:
Ben Franklin: “His whole life has been one continued insult to good manners and to decency.”
Alexander Hamilton: “That bastard brat of a Scottish peddler! His ambition, his restlessness and all his grandiose schemes come, I'm convinced, from a superabundance of secretions, which he couldn't find enough whores to absorb!”
Thomas Paine's "Common Sense": “What a poor, ignorant, malicious, crapulous mass.”
Thomas Jefferson: "His soul is poisoned with ambition."
GEORGE WASHINGTON: “That Washington is not a scholar is certain. That he is too illiterate, unlearned, unread for his station is equally beyond dispute.”
And just to give Trump's comments about "New York Values" some perspective, Adams had this to say about the city of Brotherly Love: “Phyladelphia [sic], with all its trade and wealth and regularity, is not Boston. The morals of our people are much better; their manners are more polite and agreeable... Our language is better, our taste is better, our persons are handsomer; our spirit is greater, our laws are wiser, our religion is better, our education is better. We exceed them in every thing, but in a market.”
This brings me to the second fault I mentioned. It is likely that you were not aware of any of what I mentioned above. Like I said, we tend to forget our history rather quickly. But whats more is that we idealize those whom we admire to the point that they shed all of their faults, they shed their humanity and in the process become these ideal, godlike figures that are lionized and whoa be it upon the person who speaks ill of them. In 1977, historian Thomas Connelly published "The Marble Man", a detailed look at the life of General Robert E. Lee and his subsequent image in American society. What he discovered was that although Lee was a very patriotic, pious, brave, and intelligent man, his image had been hijacked by many of the senior commanders who had served under him. More to the point, they realized that their cause (states rights based upon slavery) was not such a noble ideal. So in order to rescue that ideal from infamy, they made Robert E. Lee their symbol of "the lost cause". To be sure, Lee was and is a good example to follow in terms of honesty, integrity and character, but what the authors of the lost cause did was to hide the Confederate cause of slavery behind the good example that was Lee. They stripped away his faults, washed his history clean of any mistakes, be they on the battlefield or on social issues, and canonized him as what historian Douglas Freeman called "The Southern King Arthur".
But Lee was human. An examination of some of his recently discovered letters show that although he never showed any disappointment in his defeat, he was privately bitter about it. Though he agreed that slavery was an evil practice, he also did not think that African Americans were equal in station to white men. Rather than take decisive action to end slavery, he believed that God had placed this burden upon them for whatever reason and that time and the humble teachings of Christ would eventually destroy the practice. So he was human after all. But we don't like to think of our hero's like that. Can you imagine the uproar that would occur if a historian were to write a biography on Dr. Martin Luther King and dedicate a chapter to the FBI's files on his extramarital affairs? Yes, even Dr. King is in danger of becoming as marble a man as his statue on the Washington Mall. And when we do that to our past leaders, we lose perspective on their humanity and on our ability to judge the present with regards to the past.
Thus today we have an election that is unparalleled in its viciousness, uniqueness, and filled with unsavory characters who are driven by their fanatic moral beliefs, questionable pasts, and deranged vision of what America is and should be. Cruz and Rubio are driven by their religion, Trump is a bully and a potential stain on the office, not to mention the fabric of America, Hillary has blood on her hands, and Bernie..well he is just a Jackass. But the real story here my friends, is that there is nothing "new" to see here. No one candidate is more of a threat to American values than the other. We could replace Trump with John Adams, Hillary with Andrew Jackson, Cruz and Rubio with Kennedy, G.W. Bush, or Madison, and Bernie with Eugene V. Debs. To paraphrase the Bible, "there is nothing new under the Sun or in American Presidential elections".
Disclaimer: No this is not an endorsement of Trump or any one candidate. Just trying to bring some perspective from the steady stream of nonsense spewing forth from the TV and the Internet.
