The origins of the GOP’s populist madness can be traced to the last few months of the 2008 campaign, when the Republican faithful were baying for Palin and essentially ignoring McCain. Trump and Palin clearly appeal to a lot of the same voters. How are they similar, and how are they different?
- Clearly, both of them are right-wing populists with a grudge against the GOP establishment.
- Both of them, in their respective unique ways, are effective communicators, at least with the far right.
- Palin’s stock-in-trade is her pseudo-Jeffersonian belief that rural America is the “real America.” She is openly contemptuous of urban voters and cosmopolitan culture. Trump, on the other hand, is a creature of New York, and directs his ire at foreigners and elite politicians, intellectuals, and businessmen who fail, in his eyes, to stand up to them.
- Both of them have an unsophisticated critique of the American political system.
- Palin’s appeal is rooted in the Christian right. Trump is a rakish Social Darwinian.
- Palin is a career politician. She ran for VP on her record, not as an authoritarian.
- Palin has a history of taking on oil companies. Trump’s populism occasionally meanders into attacks on big business, but his tax cut and deregulation program is in the mainstream of the GOP establishment.
On the whole, the differences are as compelling as the similarities.