I don't think I've ever felt such a whiplash between grimness and hope in the realm of politics as I have in the space of January 20 and January 21. Inauguration day lacked the gut-punching surprise of election night, but it carried a heavier burden, as Trump's ascension to power moved from potential to actual. After a transition that included Trump's full embrace of plutocrats and generals for leading roles in his administration, unceasingly aggressive tweets that demean the office of the presidency, and no attempts to reach out to those who voted against him, his inaugural address seemed confirmation that Trump will govern from a position of dark aggression and paranoid beliefs about our nation.
But the next day, America showed that Trump's narrative of a sweeping mandate and a benighted people owing him fealty and gratitude is a scam spun by a con man, as record-breaking crowds showed up in dozens of cities for women's marches. Rather than grim resistance, we saw a joyful, humorous, diverse explosion of grassroots democracy that reaffirmed a basic reality: many, many people thunderously oppose Trump and his policies. More than this: women are asserting a range of concerns that have been substantively and symbolically dismissed by Trump's election. These levels of contempt and ridicule for the chief executive seem unprecedented at the start of a presidency, and yet here we are.
I don't think it's too early to say that Trump's illiberal, authoritarian, and misogynistic campaign and election, after summoning forth a minority of voters to push him over the top of the electoral college count, have provoked a powerful backlash. If Trump's victory signaled a change in the laws of political physics (e.g., any of a number of missteps by Trump would have sunk any other candidate), then we may be beginning to discover that the change isn't confined to Trump alone, but extends to the broader political universe, and that we don't know what all these rules are yet. And now that I've mentioned alternative political, it does seem like underlying it all is at least one basic continuity between pre- and post-Trumpian physics: actions provoke reactions. The question of our time is, has Trump unleashed a movement that will end up blocking and even overwhelming his own?
Trump has put together a powerful coalition that draws on explicitly white resentment, economic suffering, and cultural dislocation. It is not a majority coalition, but it was close enough to one to win him the electoral college, with a little help from Vladimir Putin and James Comey. However much Trump's authoritarian style can be traced back to his own disturbed personality, there is a clear link between this approach and the fact that his political strategy continues to burn any bridge to the possibility of a majority coalition. In alienating a majority of women, minorities, gays, and believers in a scientific worldview, Donald Trump's strategy essentially requires an attack not only on democratic norms, but the idea of democracy itself. This is a project that was begun long ago by the Republican Party, which with Trump has completed its conversion into the party of white supremacy and white nationalism. But what we are beginning to discover is that while you can win for a while without a majority of the population, whether it's through gerrymandering or election assistance from the FBI, you cannot evade the most fundamental facts of life in a democracy - numbers matter.
Beyond this, we are discovering something else - that a majority of Americans actually do believe in a free society, a society of laws not men, a society where all people should be considered equal, whether man or woman, African-American or white, gay or straight. It is instructive that while the majority was finding its way back to empowerment this weekend, the Trump administration squandered its first days in power by clumsily attempted to propagate lies about how many people attended the inauguration. We are truly entered into a clash between democratic reality and authoritarian deception. I know which one I'm betting on.