Donald Trump and Jesse Ventura

What’s going on with older white guys in America?

Four things you might not know:

1. Whites will be in the minority in the US by 2042
2. The percent of Whites in the US peaked at 89% in the 1930-40s
3. In the US, over 35 million Whites are descendant from at at least one immigrant who passed through Ellis Island – our past was, our present is, and our future will be, dependent on immigrants.
4. Historians estimate there were 10 million indigenous peoples living in what is now U.S. territory in the 15th century. And then Christopher Columbus showed up and by 1900 the Natives had been reduced to less than 300,000.

Synopsis

The United States of America is no longer the same united bunch of people that it has been for almost two and a half centuries – a white cohort led by a bunch of mostly old, white guys. By the middle of the 21st century the non-whites will be in the majority and most of the 75 million “Boomers” will be dead.

The long slide of white, male supremacy into marginalized insecurity has generated a typical human reaction – worry, fear, anger. But that should not manifest into a desperate clinging to the myopic past. The Founding Fathers not only established a national foundation and rule of law, they framed an enduring status quo: White guys rule, women follow, women don’t vote, blacks aren’t counted. These same guys wrote the US Constitution. No wonder things are in a mess.

(4 minute read)

There seems to be a long, well-worn cultural thread unraveling in the social-economic fabric of America?

Polls for the US presidential election do vary but there is a general consensus that Donald Trump has a 2-to-1 margin over Hillary Clinton with white males, particularly older ones with no college education. In pictures above, these guys do have college degrees but they are still firmly ensconced in the older, white guy category.

Many experts have said that it’s not that Donald Trump is doing a whole lot right (that’s an understatement) rather it’s that he happens to be in the right place at the right time. That place being a disquieted America. Dissatisfied. Disappointed. Disillusioned. Disengaged. Damn angry. And in many ways with good reason. The same experts suggest that Brexit was a result of similar populous sentiments. People feeling much like the character Howard Beale in the 1976 movie, Network, “… mad as hell and not going to take it anymore.”

So many have been ignored for so long, passed over and screwed by political and corporate leadership that they have grown to believe that anything is better than the status quo. This is not an overnight shift, a new-found surge to get behind Don Quixote Trump as he rides on his high-horse “Narcissistic,” tilting at windmills. For more than a 100 million Americans, the reality of being-on-the-short-end-of-the-stick has been a way of life for decades (actually centuries) and the status quo has always been life imitating a swamp full of alligators. And the status quo didn’t originate with Clinton or Obama or Carter or Roosevelt. It started long before.

In 1776, Washington was 42, Adams 41, Jefferson 33 and needless to say, all white. And that’s the way it was. Martha Washington, Abigail Adams, Martha Jefferson and all women new their place – and it wasn’t in leadership. And the blacks, they were slaves. Thomas Jefferson, who penned that clarion phrase, “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal,” was lying. He owned 130 slaves. And he personally struggled with – and then rationalized – this fundamental human contradiction between intellect and emotions, between right and wrong. The Founding Fathers, as they are fondly acclaimed, not only established a national foundation and rule of law, they established an enduring status quo. White guys rule, women follow, women don’t vote, blacks are not counted, and everything  written in the Constitution lasts in perpetuity (as adopted by “strict constructionists”).

These legendary, white father figures and much of their 18th century thinking are embedded in the American culture and have created a historical arc that has been sustained to this day. But the United States of America is no longer the same united bunch of people that it has been for almost two and a half centuries – a white cohort led by a bunch of mostly old, white guys. By mid-21st century the non-whites will be in the majority and most of the 75 million “Boomers” will be dead. As Bob Dylan said, “The Times They Are a-Changin.”

• In 1790, the US population was almost 4 million with just over 3 million whites (81%) and 3/4 million blacks – slaves (19%).
• The percent of whites peaked in the 1930-40s at 89%.
• Today, whites make up a little over 70%  and blacks 12%. 
• Projections are that the non-Hispanic White population will be less than 50% by 2042.

Summers and Bernanke

What’s ailing them?

Is it this looming demographic reality that has so many older white guys insecure? Do they feel the evolutionary threat to centuries of their dominance? Are they clinging to their inherited beliefs? Do they think that the Mayflower and Ellis Island were symbols of a rights of passage that gave them dominion over all? Do they actually believe they are best suited to lead. To maintain their status quo?

More than ten million white people can trace part of their ancestry back to the Pilgrims who arrived on the Mayflower in 1620 and over 35 million whites have at least one ancestor who passed through the Ellis Island immigration station, which processed arriving immigrants from 1892 until 1954.

Are the descendants of the immigrant white men who tamed the Wild, Wild West – slaughtering millions of indigenous people – now afraid of losing control to the new immigrants? Are they so frightened that they would elect any cowboy as sheriff or mythical Moses to try and make the promise land great again? Is it possible that just about anyone could come down from the mountain (or his Fifth Avenue gold tower) and say, “Only I can do it … Believe me.” And, presto, the spiritual flame of white entitlement would once again burn across the land.

We want someone who can help us rebel against our problems and lead us into the Promised Land. – Clotaire Rapaille

Ancestry, inheritance, royal lineage and racism create in human beings a narcissistic, self-deluded sense of entitlement and a fierce defense of the status quo. It has spawned genocide and wars since time began. So after 500 years of unprecedented growth in America, do the descendants of the original white immigrants see this fractional period of time in history as a last stand? (We know what happened to Custer).

Donald Trump has poked the bear and hit older white guys over the head with a blunt force object – fear. And fear raises one of two innate human responses: Fight or flight. And since there’s no place to run to, millions of older, white guys are fighting, not for Donald Trump, but against the unknown, untried, unimaginable – an America that is not predominantly white, Christian, heterosexual and led by good ol’white boys.

Fear trumps whatever comes second
The long slide of white, male supremacy into marginalized insecurity has generated a typical human reaction – worry, fear, anger. But that should not translate into myopia, desperation and stupidity. How, when Trump’s flaws, failings and, yes, stupidity, are so obvious, so glaring, so frightening, can smart white guys support him? How can a decision to vote “anybody but Clinton” be intelligently rationalized?

If they simply ask the right question perhaps they’ll have a better chance of coming up with a better answer. Ask this:

As good, staunch, smart – wise – people, why would it not be better to “let” Clinton win and focus on running the right Republican candidate in 2020, one who can create a big tent and tap into a populous movement that includes older white guys, a leader who is much smarter, more stable and a quintessential leader for the majority of Americans? Someone who is the opposite of the divisive, deluded, dysfunctional, dangerous Donald Trump?

Or perhaps they have a better question?