Speaking One's Mind

It's been interesting to see the coverage around Donald Trump's speech to the Value Voter's Summit. Near the end of his address he said: "Imagine what our country could accomplish if we started working together as one people under one God, saluting one flag." This has garnered a fair amount of coverage an analysis. Personally, if I were going to be concerned about a single sentence from his speech, it would be this bit from his closing: "Together, we will make America believe again, we will make America united again, and we will make America great again."

But when I read the whole speech, I started to understand the appeal that Mr. Trump has for people, beyond simple partisanship. He does what strikes me as a very good job of presenting the issues that people worry about as the result of intentionally bad decision-making by people who are out to injured them for their own goals. And while this is nothing new, Mr. Trump manages to not come off as if he were pandering to his audience, in the way that politicians normally do.

Will it work come this November? Maybe. But I suspect that as long as Mr. Trump isn't completely blown out, it's a tactic that we'll see more and more of moving forward.