Results from the New York Times/Siena College poll suggest that as we wait for additional indictments of Donald Trump, the former president holds a commanding lead over his rivals in the 2024 Republican primary. Impeachments, indictments, increasingly authoritarian pronouncements, contempt for the rule of law, an agenda drenched in revenge, and the unending torrent of lies, including the big lie that he didn't lose in 2020, hardly deter his strongest supporters.
“He might say mean things and make all the men cry because all the men are wearing your wife’s underpants and you can’t be a man anymore,” David Green, 69, a retail manager in Somersworth, N.H., said of Mr. Trump. “You got to be a little sissy and cry about everything. But at the end of the day, you want results. Donald Trump’s my guy. He’s proved it on a national level.”
That's a metaphor, right? An allusion to dominance, strength, swagger – manliness, as regarded by men who would be altogether more comfortable if only women (among others) knew their place. While imprecise and ill-defined, if I interpret the metaphor correctly, "all the men" refers to the folks who populate the 21st century Republican Party, with a message directed at those who are not all-in with Donald Trump.
The MAGA base – defined by Nate Cohn as those polled who "strongly support" Trump and who have a "very favorable" view of him – comprises 37% of the party. They don't need much convincing. They're not fussing over what Trump says or does, no matter what that is. He's their man.
An equal percentage – 37% – are designated as persuadable. They'd prefer another candidate without Trump's baggage (in mainstream parlance), but they won't rule out voting for Trump if it comes to that. They need to stop being a little sissy, while crying about everything, and just get in line behind Trump.
And, if they're listening, the quarter of the party that is not open to Trump needs to reconsider and get in line too (if they haven't become too comfortable in wives' underpants to get the message).
Nate Cohn advises us that within the MAGA base, there are no second thoughts about Trump:
The MAGA base doesn’t support Mr. Trump in spite of his flaws. It supports him because it doesn’t seem to believe he has flaws.
Zero percent — not a single one of the 319 respondents in this MAGA category — said he had committed serious federal crimes. A mere 2 percent said he “did something wrong” in his handling of classified documents. More than 90 percent said Republicans needed to stand behind him in the face of the investigations.
It is hard to fathom that "not a single one" among the MAGA base thought Trump had committed serious federal crimes. And then there are Republicans not quite so boxed off from truth and facts and evidence, but still on board:
“I think he’s committed crimes,” said Joseph Derito, 81, of Elmira, N.Y. “I think he’s done terrible things. But he’s also done a lot of good.”
As an avid observer of American politics over more than half a century, I am tempted to think: Republicans will be ready to ditch Trump by the time voting starts in 2024, won't they? But we're not following the rules of the 1960s or '70s or '80s, when my understanding of politics evolved, are we?
Not at all. By 2012, the Republican Party had become "an insurgent outlier." It had taken a decade or two to get to that point and the party is much further off the rails today than ever before.
Today's GOP is Trump's party.