Why I fear Trump will win

In our last presidential election, I predicted to friends on Facebook that Leni Robredo risked losing because her campaign was solely geared to the tastes and wants of the elite – more hospital beds (irrelevant if you can’t afford hospitals), pink ribbons (not a confidence-inspiring, “take-charge” kind of color), motorcades (to further emphasize which kinds of Filipinos support her).

I’m no longer on Facebook (I’m out of social media, just raises blood pressure and gets you into arguments and sniping – suggest you get out, too), but I still can’t help making predictions.

I think Trump will win, with 320 electoral votes, far more than the magic 270 that would constitute 50.2 percent. My gut factors (trying to dissociate from all my personal desires and prejudices) are:

1. Trump is a wandering and disjointed speaker, but Harris is squeaky, doesn’t sound commanding. The first woman US president will need a voice and an image like Sigourney Weaver in “Alien.”

2. The average young American cannot identify the US capital. (Watch Jay Leno Jaywalking on YouTube.) The average American cannot correctly calculate a two-digit percentage. This is due to the liberal wave of the past decades condemning discipline and hard work at home and in school (“it will destroy the child’s spirit”) and insisting on empty praise whether earned or not (“Good job! You’re a super-hero for throwing the candy wrapper in the trashbin!”) which has been a major contributor to rampant ignorance in America.

3. The Administration has been totally incompetent in dealing with the Middle East situation. Though this has been true since Truman, for this election the fault attaches to the Democrats. Blinken looks totally ineffectual, while Trump says he’ll “finish it.” However vague, this sounds strong, decisive. There are 2.5 million Muslim voters in the US. 95 percent of them intend to vote; only half of them will vote for Harris; the other half will vote for Jill Stein in protest. A few choice remarks and references to Kushner and Blinken (both Jewish), perhaps a promise of a Muslim-American or at least a non-Jew on the Peace Talks missions, could have possibly swayed 500,000 more persons to vote for Harris without alienating Jews, and convinced some that she did not entirely agree with Biden. But this segment of the electorate was largely ignored. Let me insert a plug for my “Two States But Far Apart Solution” – if you are at all concerned by this matter, for a daring out-of-the-box idea, entirely doable, see https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6gec5C-4dC4&t=12s.

4. Ukraine, Taiwan and the defense of the World Order are low on the list of priorities of less-educated Americans, many of whom have never left their home region or even state, and cannot conceive of going on holiday in Europe. NATO to them is just less money to spend on groceries.

5. The Democrats failed to capitalize on the Puerto Rico/floating garbage gaff. There should have been riots in the streets. Instead we got a few angry celebrities. Trump was even able to get some spin after Biden’s own “garbage” statement (which no one believes an apostrophe can correct).

6. The Democrats should have stuck to women’s abortion rights, instead of getting distracted by teenagers’ right to gender-affirming “care” and trans-gender athletics. I’m fairly liberal, have no problem hiring women (90 percent of my senior managers), gay persons (possibly 20 percent of my 450 employees, but we don’t ask and don’t care) and cross-dressers (one at work, others in private and I don’t care) and I don’t agree with it. That’s another example of the Center pandering to the Left; 20 years from now, a large proportion of those who got such “care” will regret their decision. Gender-affirming medication should be permitted on the whim of a teenager or a permissive parent? Ask how many Centrist non-elite moms and dads are OK with that. Ask how many Centrist moms and dads believe their neuro-non-divergent daughter should play a team sport against someone born male who now thinks he/she/it/they should be considered female because he/she/it/they took hormones. By over-embracing leftist ideas (as I insist the Centrists have been doing for decades), the Democrats burdened their winning issue with baggage that most non-elites won’t swallow.

7. Trump’s “I will protect women, whether they like it or not” did not win any hard-core Democrats’ hearts. But believe it or not, there are people who want the comfort of a parental figure who will do what is best for them, without forcing them to think or accept personal responsibility for their choices. Is this not the essence of a cult’s power?

8. Economic figures are aggregates. No Democrat commenting on “how great the economy is” seems to understand that. Some people are better off after four years of Biden. Much larger numbers are not. They comprise a miniscule part of the economic pie, but not the voting pie. The bottom 50 percent of Americans own only two percent of American wealth. Ask them how great the economy is. This is not to blame the Democrats for the inequality, but they failed to read the statistics correctly, and accordingly failed to formulate a convincing umbrella argument addressing the economy for the bottom 50 percent. Trump, meanwhile, talked directly to the bottom 50 percent.

There’s my $2,000 worth of opinion (inflation being what it has been).

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J. Manuel González is not an American but was educated in the US and lived there for almost 20 years.