Donald Trump's Pivot to the Center -- of Darkness
Where's the pivot?
That's what I was wondering throughout Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump's lengthy and surprisingly humorless acceptance speech Thursday at the Grand Old Party's national convention in Cleveland.
Ever since Trump won enough delegates to clinch the nomination in May, I've been waiting to see if and when Trump would make "the pivot."
That's today's fashionable term in political circles for a campaign strategy that President Richard Nixon used to describe as more of a pendulum: You swing toward your party's base to win their nomination, then swing back to the center to attract the independent voters that decide general elections.
Timing and managing your pivot as a candidate is tricky but crucial. But, with barely more than 100 days left to the November elections, Trump sounded like a guy who ain't about to pivot.
Quite the opposite, Trump sounded like he's doubling down on his efforts to rouse the conservative and largely blue-collar and middle-class base that has turned out in huge numbers, as he puts it, at his rallies.
That's quite the opposite of the outreach to minorities, women and millennials that was recommended by the Republican National Committee's post-2012 "autopsy" report.
There always has been a lower-profile but widespread grass-roots faction in the Grand Old Party that believes in doubling down instead of watering down their conservative agenda, especially in big, crucial rust-belt swing states like Ohio, Michigan, Pennsylvania and elsewhere that failed to show up for Mitt Romney in 2012.
"I have visited the laid-off factory workers, and the communities crushed by our horrible and unfair trade deals," Trump said in his convention speech. "These are the forgotten men and women of our country, and they are forgotten, but they will not be forgotten long. These are people who work hard but no longer have a voice. I am your voice."
He gave a lot of emphasis to those last four words. His me-against-the-world message seemed to reveal something important about the inner Trump. Leadership usually means sharing the struggle with those whom you wish to lead. Trump implies he can do it all himself.
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