David Brooks wrote yesterday in a New York Times column headlined, "The Cure for What Ails Our Democracy." I'm featuring a short excerpt here that differentiates between Trump the person and Trumpian populism, saying the latter is in a legitimate struggle with liberalism "over how to balance legitimate concerns." Another issue he highlights: the need to protect working-class wages from the pressures of globalization.
Sure, there are some occasions when the struggle really is good versus evil: World War II, the civil rights movement, the Civil War. As Lincoln argued, if slavery is not wrong then nothing is wrong. But these occasions are rarer than we might think.
I think I detest Donald Trump as much as the next guy, but Trumpian populism does represent some very legitimate values: the fear of imperial overreach; the need to preserve social cohesion amid mass migration; the need to protect working-class wages from the pressures of globalization.
The struggle against Trump the man is a good-versus-bad struggle between democracy and narcissistic authoritarianism, but the struggle between liberalism and Trumpian populism is a wrestling match over how to balance legitimate concerns.