The Trump Insurgency
If you Google the words “Trump” and “insurgency” you will get over 650,000 links to articles and commentary. I recently said to a friend that Donald Trump has gone from being a candidate for the Republican Party nomination for President to the leader of a movement.
Can this movement now be called an insurgency?
The definition of an insurgency is a “rebellion against an existing government by a group not recognized as a belligerent.”
Is it Trump who created an insurgency or is Trump following the lead of a growing insurgency that was already taking place? I have written that Trump leads his followers by following their lead. The movement began during the Presidency of Bill Clinton and continues today. It is a struggle between the individualist and the collectivist.
Ayn Rand wrote a short nineteen page paper asking: What is the basic issue facing the world today? Rand, in her paper makes the case that, “The basic issue in the world today is between two principles: Individualism and Collectivism.” Rand defines these two principles as follows:
- Individualism – Each man exists by his own right and for his own sake, not for the sake of the group.
- Collectivism – Each man exists only by the permission of the group and for the sake of the group.
Trump supporters. Photo: Facebook.
Donald Trump has tapped into the “Individualism Movement.” Trump’s life is the embodiment of the individualist. Trump has been rich, then poor and then rich again. He has done this not with government handouts, but rather despite the government.
Members of the Individualism Movement go by many names: Silent Majority, TEA Party Patriots, Constitutionalists, Blue Dog Democrats, Anti-Establishment Republicans and the working class. They embody the insurgency.
Joseph P. William in his U.S. News & World Report column “New Insurgents, Old Problems“, wrote:
[Ronald Reagan in] His famous televised 1964 “A Time for Choosing” speech for GOP presidential nominee Barry Goldwater, tapped into deep-seated anxiety about communism and runaway government spending. Decades before the Reagan Revolution, The Gipper laid out a then-radical vision for vastly smaller government, shaking up the party’s blue-blood ruling class and setting his course toward political immortality.
[ … ]
“We’ve certainly seen this before,” says Norm Ornstein, a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute think tank and a veteran political scholar. In uncertain economic times, he says, “we get populism.” In Sanders’ case, that means disdain for bankers and Wall Street; the brand Trump’s selling sweeps in nativism, trade protectionism and mistrust of the GOP establishment.
Is Trump the new populist or the old individualist?
Here are just some of the reasons Trump’s campaign is different than any other of the candidates, Democrat or Republican, running for President:
- Not a career politician.
- Not politically correct.
- Isn’t influenced by money or big donors.
- When he sees something he says something.
- Turns his negatives into positives.
- Attacks against him consistently backfire.
- Fearless and is therefore feared.
- Has broad appeal due to his forthright comments.
Each of these are indicators of individualism on steroids.
Donald Trump is saying what people have wanted to say but have been afraid to do so. When Trump speaks he is not speaking to the media or the elite, he is speaking to John and Jane six-pack. He is speaking to each an every American.
Trump has shown that there is nothing to fear but fear itself. He is the new Individualist and the people love him for it.
It truly is a time for choosing.
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As a life long republican I am fed up with our party and all politicians in general. I feel like Donald trump is our last great hope in restoring sanity and fiscal sense to our gov’t. like everyone I know our country has lost its way and only a business person like trump with no political ownership controlling him can save the day. President trump 2016.
Except for the John & Jane Six-pack remark (which I thought was demeaning) I totally agreed with you. I think Trump is saying exactly what we the people have been saying for years. But we didn’t have a voice to get it said loudly enough to be heard. Facebook and perhaps Twitter have changed all that. Now we are a voice to be reckoned with. We are too many and too loud to be ignored. Enter Trump who says what we say. Who feels what we feel. Who is alarmed at what we are alarmed at. And who has the power to be heard. The clay feet of the other candidates, and the smell in the closet of our elected officials can no longer be hidden in smoke-filled rooms. We see it and we broadcast it. And we are ANGRY! We want our country back. And we believe Trump is the only person who can help us get that done.
I was referring to everyday working Americans and patriots.
Trumps is the man!
I love Trump because I identify with him. I profoundly dislike my party. The last 12 or so years, the party has become corrupted, greedy, do not value us and is the same as Demorats. Arriba the Patriots and those who loves the truth. The American Gladiator has come forward to fight for his people. The people loves him,and he loves his people.