However, they did vote. Their votes allowed Nixon to defeat Hubert Humphrey in the 1968 Presidential election. That year saw a lot of protests and anger about a number of issues-civil rights and the Vietnam War chief among them-but Nixon prevailed against the much more vocal activists on the left.
It seems to me that a similar dynamic is going on right now in America. The last several years have seen a lot of noise from fringe groups that are given outsized attention by the Mainstream Media. Black Lives Matter. Occupy Wall Street. Antifa. Hollywood celebrities. NFL players who don't stand for the National Anthem.
However, every day and in every way, the work of America goes on. Farmers tend their fields. Truckers drive their routes. Grocers stack their shelves. Nurses care for their patients. The people who keep America going do not generally have time to protest, pontificate or be prickly about political issues. They generally are too busy trying to support their families, pay their taxes and be good citizens of their community.
The Silent Majority may not be visible and vocal but it is a mistake to think that they don't care or are not willing to stand up when they see that their country is heading in the wrong direction.
It became very clear to me that The Silent Majority was still in place in this country back in 2012 when leftists tried to boycott Chick-fil-A because its CEO expressed support for traditional marriage. What did The Silent Majority do? They responded by supporting a Buy-cott of Chick-fil-A on August 1, 2012.
The boycott failed miserably as throngs of The Silent Majority flooded Chick-fil-A on that day. Many waited hours in line to get a chicken sandwich. I was one of them
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| The Silent Majority lined up to eat at Chick-fil-A Appreciation Day, August 1, 2012 Port Charlotte, FL Credit-Wikipedia.com |
That day gave me renewed confidence that all was not lost during the Obama years. The vote in November, 2012 tested my beliefs but the election of Donald Trump in 2016 reaffirmed to me that there still existed a Silent Majority who wanted to "Make America Great Again". They were not ready to turn the country over to socialists and leftists who found faults in everything in America and wanted to remake it in their idealized image.
2016 showed that The Silent Majority was still interested in defending the Constitution, the rule of law, the American economy, our border and the men and women who serve in uniform.
You would think that defending each of these would be easy for any American. However, the Democrats seemed to have lost their way on each of these core issues. What have they become when they are openly rooting for a recession? What have they become when they seem to care more about the "rights" of illegal immigrants than the rights of American citizens? What have they become when they want peace talks with North Korea to fail? What have they become when they are encouraging people to "harass" officials in the President's administration?
Political scientist Thomas Schaller recently opined that he thinks we are at "the beginning of a soft civil war" in the United States. To see the recent actions of the Left it is easy to make that case.
Of course, the Left argues that Trump started it all. However, they seem to forget that 62 million votes from The Silent Majority and 306 electoral votes from 31 states put Trump in office. When they attack Trump they are effectively attacking those 62 million members of The Silent Majority.
Trump has famously stated that he could do almost anything and he would retain his support of that Silent Majority. My advice to Trump is that he should not get carried away with himself. Nixon showed that the support of The Silent Majority can be short-lived if there is misconduct and you continue on a path that the majority determines is ill-advised (Vietnam War). However, if Trump continues to do what he says he was going to do when he ran for election (and stays out of new -found troubles) I think he will continue to retain that support.
If you doubt the strength of that support take a look at this graphic that shows the job approval of all Presidents since Truman at the 500 day mark from their own party. Only Bush 43 (in the aftermath of 9/11) had stronger support than Trump. This is also despite incessant 24/7 negative Mainstream Media coverage. When have you seen this information in any coverage?
If you doubt the strength of that support take a look at this graphic that shows the job approval of all Presidents since Truman at the 500 day mark from their own party. Only Bush 43 (in the aftermath of 9/11) had stronger support than Trump. This is also despite incessant 24/7 negative Mainstream Media coverage. When have you seen this information in any coverage?
The New York Times and other members of the Mainstream Media apparently cannot understand why Trump's core support remains so strong. It is because Trump is merely doing what he said he would do. Why is that so hard for liberals to understand? I believe it is because that is not the way they understand the political game is supposed to be played. That is especially true for liberal Democrats.
Look no further than Barack Obama as candidate compared to President Barack Obama. I wrote a blog about all of this called "President Opposite". Candidate Obama was against gay marriage (wink-wink). He was going to bring everyone together (wink-wink). He was going to set a new bipartisan tone in Washington (wink-wink). He was going to lift millions of people out of poverty (wink-wink). He was going to reduce everyone's healthcare costs by $2,500 per year (wink-wink).
Cynics would say that this is the only way that liberal Democrats (are there any other kind of Democrat right now?) can get elected today. If they truly ran on what they believed they would never be able to garner the votes required to be elected in anything other than liberal enclaves.
I have often referred to the book "The Fourth Turning" in my blog posts over the years. In May, 2016 I even asked the question of whether The Fourth Turning had brought us Donald Trump? If you have not read this blog post read it and see what you think. If you read it previously, read it again now that you have some additional perspective on the subject. After all, despite the continuing disbelief of the Left and the Mainstream Media, Trump did WIN.
William Strauss and Neil Howe make the point in that book that the last 60 years have been an era where things generally never got settled. There were not true winners or losers. There was no winner in the Korean War or the Vietnam War. Issues like abortion and gay marriage have never been settled the way the Founders designed them to be settled---with a Constitutional Amendment. The result has been a lot of division and diversity of opinion. All of that has left us divided when we need to be united.
William Strauss and Neil Howe make the point in that book that the last 60 years have been an era where things generally never got settled. There were not true winners or losers. There was no winner in the Korean War or the Vietnam War. Issues like abortion and gay marriage have never been settled the way the Founders designed them to be settled---with a Constitutional Amendment. The result has been a lot of division and diversity of opinion. All of that has left us divided when we need to be united.
When Strauss and Howe wrote The Fourth Turning over 20 years ago they predicted that we would enter an era beginning in 2005 that they referred to as the fourth turning where the populace and culture would begin to insist on finality. Consensus would form on many of the big issues we faced. It is the only way that society can move forward. There are times that society will surely fail if it remains divided. Fourth Turnings (that occur about every 80 years) require a unity of thought and purpose for a society to survive. Think of the Revolutionary War period. The Civil War. The Depression and World War II. These were all separated by roughly 80 years.
In 1860 it became clear that the issue of slavery in the United States had to be decided once and for all. It was not enough to merely prevent its further spread. It had to be torn up by its roots. There could be no compromise. One side would win. One would lose. That is the only way a true war ends. There is finality. The fight is completely taken out of the losing side forever.
I don't know how this "civil war" will end. However, I know that it will only end when one side is thoroughly defeated and demoralized. That is the lesson we learn from history.
I also know that The Silent Majority will determine who wins. Fringe players may make a lot of noise but it is the will (and votes) of The Silent Majority that will determine the outcome in this "civil war".
That is why I see the 2018 mid-term elections as so important to determining where we are headed.
Will the Democrats see the resurgence which is normal in a mid-term election of the opposing party to the President?
What does it portend for the Democrats if a blue wave does not materialize and the GOP builds on its gains of the last eight years?
Don't pay attention to the noise.
Pay attention to what The Silent Majority thinks and does.
That is where the power of America has always been. And that is where it remains.
Will the Democrats see the resurgence which is normal in a mid-term election of the opposing party to the President?
What does it portend for the Democrats if a blue wave does not materialize and the GOP builds on its gains of the last eight years?
Don't pay attention to the noise.
Pay attention to what The Silent Majority thinks and does.
That is where the power of America has always been. And that is where it remains.
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