A cause for humility: Trump shows vulnerability as DeSantis sags
Timothy P. Carney
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Donald Trump, for a change, is polling consistently below 50% in Iowa. At the same time, Gov. Ron DeSantis (R-FL) is falling in the polls. This provides us with a good lesson.
Political operatives and commentators, being human, are prone to hubris. They tend to think they know the consequences of certain actions and that they can predict the way things will go. Again and again, history proves them wrong.
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In fact, much of conservatism is simple intellectual humility. We resist Grand Plans because Grand Plans are based on what we call the Fatal Conceit: The dangerous false belief that we know where things will go.
The conservative response to the Fatal Conceit is, “Actually, let’s let things play out a bit, because maybe they will take an unexpected turn.”
Back in the spring, there were Republicans and conservatives who believed that because Donald Trump is a curse on the GOP, and because Ron DeSantis was clearly the highest-polling challenger to Trump, other Republicans should stay out or get out of the race.
The general premise was that the best chance to defeat Trump in the 2024 primaries was in a one-on-one battle with a popular and effective politician. That’s very sound. The specific premise was that DeSantis was obviously that politician. That was a fine guess, but it took great hubris to believe that. Everyone in March 2023 should know that they don’t know who the best challenger to Trump would be in early 2024.
Since then, DeSantis has stumbled. His staffer put out weird Nazi imagery around DeSantis’s face. He inexplicably cozied up to RFK Jr. His social awkwardness has been on display.
Back in late March, I wrote this:
“It’s very tempting at this point to conclude that Ron DeSantis is the only man who can beat Donald Trump in a primary, and so therefore, every Republican and conservative needs to just get behind DeSantis and bite his tongue …
“But primaries are for airing debates. They are for training and prepping and testing the potential nominee. It’s certain that Ron DeSantis has unnoticed weaknesses that will be exposed and maybe patched up in a contested primary. It’s arrogant to believe that we already know for a fact that DeSantis is the best man to beat Trump and Biden. It’s also stupid to withhold criticism of bad ideas out of fear of helping Trump, because Trump will bash those bad ideas later — as will Biden.”
Then throughout April, Trump consistently polled well above 50% in Iowa, while DeSantis was between 20% and 40%. Now in July, Trump is down about 10 points, around 45% in Iowa. DeSantis, meanwhile, is closer to 15% than 20%.
So while DeSantis dropped, so did Trump. Trump grew more vulnerable, but not by losing support to the guy we suspected could take away his voters.
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Conservatives believe in competition and federalism because we believe that nobody really knows what’s best ahead of time. Likewise, retail politics and debates will show us who is the best conservative in the field.
Maybe right before or right after Iowa, all non-Trumps but one should drop out. But before then, let’s have some humility, and let politics work things out.