Shame worked in Alabama
By Tom Nichols December 18

Even as his overall approval ratings continue to erode, President Trump remains popular among a swath of Republican voters for whom he can do no wrong — including his endorsement of the now-vanquished Roy Moore, an accused child molester who nearly became a U.S. senator from Alabama.

This raises an important question: How should conservative critics of the administration approach those people who, a year in, remain unshakably attached to an administration plumbing such moral depths? Should we engage and try to understand these voters, or should we shame and scold in an effort to reawaken some moral sense in a party that once proclaimed itself the defender of patriotic and family values?

Personally, I am in the “shame and scold” camp. The “engage and understand” approach is based on the deeply flawed assumption that these voters don’t know what they are doing. It is a kind of “root causes” explanation, in which Trump’s supporters are good people who are merely expressing a yawp of anger at a globalized world that has left them behind.

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These voters are, indeed, angry. And their feelings are not entirely unreasonable: They fear — rightly — that much of the culture of political correctness is aimed at squelching their participation in public life. And, yes, they have legitimate concerns about globalization and changes that have both improved their standard of living and put many of them out of work.

But if these were really the issues at the bedrock of Trump’s support, more of these voters would care about values and policy than actually do. The same people who blasted the Clintons — again, rightly — for sex, lies and elitist corruption are rallying behind a cast of characters in Washington who make the “swamps” of previous administrations look like experiments in good government. In their world, Michael Flynn is a hero and Robert S. Mueller III the enemy. The FBI is worse than the KGB.

None of this is rational, and it cannot be remedied with reasonable argument. These are the politics of resentment. Although inevitably poisonous, resentment feels good. It gives meaning to a life in turmoil. It allows voters to dismiss facts at will. It’s a great rationale for staying put and staying mad. It gives focus to an otherwise inchoate rage. Why is your life less than you want it to be? It’s all Don Lemon’s fault.

The only response to such irrational and even hateful politics is to bypass pointless arguments and instead try to rouse a sense of basic decency. Are you arguing that black families were better off under slavery? Shame on you. Do you really believe America is no better than Russia? Shame on you.

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Shaming and scolding, obviously, are not the only answer to our dysfunctional politics. Conservatives who oppose the politics of people such as Moore and Bannon will have to make a better case than disgust. Nonetheless, if sensible conservatives want to reclaim the GOP, they need to stop responding to small-minded, un-American resentments that have nothing to do with politics or government and everything to do with crackpot notions of social revenge. They can begin by returning three important words to our national lexicon: Shame on you.

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