I & I Editorial BoardIt seems everyone but the Democrats have had a bit of fun with President Joe Biden’s insulting characterization of former President Donald Trump’s supporters as “garbage” (and, yes, he did mean Trump’s supporters, not Trump himself). Not so funny is what it shows about the Democrats, who seem to loathe any American who doesn’t support them.
It started with a bad joke told by a comedian, one of 30 warmup speakers at Trump’s Madison Square Garden rally, who referred to Puerto Rico as a “floating island of garbage.” Trump didn’t make the remark, nor did he approve of it.
“This joke does not reflect the views of President Trump or the campaign,” Trump campaign senior adviser Danielle Alvarez said.
But in a phone call with an Hispanic voter group, Biden unleashed a tirade: “The only garbage I see floating out there is his (Trump’s) supporters,” he said. “His demonization of Latinos is unconscionable and it is un-American.”
In fact, Trump demonized no one. But Biden did, namely the 74 million-plus people who voted for Trump in the last election, and the millions more who will vote for him this time around.
But given lemons, Trump once again made lemonade, proudly wearing a garbage worker’s fluorescent vest to his next rally as he rode shotgun in a gleaming garbage truck. It underscores what many still are finding out: No one works harder to attract working-class American voters than Trump.
With mere days to go in the campaign pitting Democrat and current Vice President Kamala Harris against febrile campaigner Trump, the former president’s decision to don a worker’s vest might turn out to be a masterstroke. In one move, he showed his ability to have fun with a stupid remark, a sharp contrast to the grim, angry campaign of make-believe “joy” that is Harris’ campaign.
If Trump wins the presidency again, it will largely be thanks to the “garbage” people in this country. You know, the ones who fix our cars, repair our homes, stop our leaky plumbing, build our transportation and communications infrastructure, and work in the nation’s factories to build the things we want and need to improve our lives. And, yes, also those who take out our trash.
These are the people Biden called “garbage.” It’s a lesson in how the left views America. The essence of progressivism is that highly educated elites know what’s best for the country. Average Americans are merely sheep, ready to be herded by their elite betters.
This is where Trump’s support comes from.
It’s working-class, non-urban, non-college-age voters and disgruntled minorities who are fueling Trump’s rise, as data from our I&I/TIPP Poll has shown. The Democrats’ base is weakening, leading to panic in the party’s leadership.
Based on the 2020 election outcome, Trump’s support among women (contrary to media spin) has increased roughly 2 percentage points. Among blacks it’s up by 4 percentage points, and among Hispanics, by 10 percentage points.
Trump currently also holds 50%-plus of those with a high school education and those with some college, while having just 40% of college-educated voters and those with advanced degrees.
The numbers show a widening divergence between voters in the elite managerial and professional class, and average workaday Americans who show up, do their job well, and go home to a family.
As demographic evidence of this split, Trump is running behind in big cities, where voters remain solidly Democratic, but he’s neck-and-neck with Harris in the suburbs, and maintains a whopping 2-1 advantage in rural America.
Meanwhile, his support among union members shows Trump is currently about three percentage points above the 40% of the union vote he received in 2020.
The point here is that Trump has become a champion of the working class. Those who haven’t gotten the big bucks, the stock options, and the lavish perks of modern corporate work culture, but rather get paid hourly to do dirty, hard labor.
You know, “garbage.”
The Democratic Party couldn’t be clearer in its disdain for those who have decided to vote for Trump, rather than Harris. Rather than acknowledging and criticizing Biden’s denigrating remarks, they first defended him and then, with the aid of the media, lied about what he said.
After vowing to “unify” America after his election in 2020, Biden has instead opted to demonize non-Democratic voters, the “deplorables” as Hillary Clinton calls them.
As the news site Just the News noted, “the Democrats’ penchant for smearing MAGA supporters and other dissident groups has become a central part of their messaging as Trump appears poised to make a return to the White House.”
With two assassination attempts made on his life and his fervent MAGA followers vilified daily by the so-called mainstream media, Trump’s response to Biden’s word-belch perhaps put it best: “You can’t lead America if you don’t love Americans,” he told supporters at a North Carolina rally Wednesday. “And you can’t be president if you hate the American people.”
Next Tuesday, Democrats might find out just how true those words are.
— Written by the I&I Editorial Board
Is it possible that Biden said what he said, knowing it would help Trump, as a revenge for the way he was treated by the Democratic Party . Wasn’t he treated like garbage?
Trump didn’t approve the joke? Utter bovine scat. They knew the comedians record and they knew what kind of jokes he would say because it’s not the first time he’s done so. If they’re that incompetent not to check his spiel out before hand then they’re not competent to handle the reins of government.
You have a problem with a joking reference to Puerto Rico’s landfill overflow problem? The one for which the Biden administration literally SUED the government of the island?
You have a problem with a joking reference to Puerto Rico’s landfill overflow problem? The one for which the Biden administration literally SUED the Island’s government?
Calling anyone “garbage” is almost as bad as calling him/her a Kamala supporter.
Although I commented before, I have to comment again.
An I&I/TIPP survey reveals: Trump has “just 40% of college-educated voters and those with advanced degrees.”
This lends credence and is proof positive as to the horrid state of our titular educational institutions, our American Universities.
It also shows that the supposed pyramid that registers Americans is topsy-turvy. The bottom is actually the top-while the top, undoubtedly, floats on the bottom.
Proud Garbage people have to tolerate dimwitted and often very stupid propaganda from our newspapers.
The Philadelphia Inquirer spews slanted, one sided, blindly idiotic and pandering articles, commentaries and editorials; the masthead of which is in lockstep with autocratic Nancy Pelosi, who tossed Biden into the real garbage heap of history to hand pick her girl, Kamala, for the Democratic Party, all “to save democracy,” as Pelosi loves to warble on and gesticulate incoherently about.
Opinions and debate in newspapers are what the papers are meant for, but to completely deny the validity and fair debate that there are opposing opinions is sophomoric and not at all what the donor, Gerry Lenfest had in mind when he set up his Lenfest Foundation to fully subsidize the Inquirer, when it was going bankrupt.
Washington Post’s owner, Bezos, finally made his paper heel to the good editorial behavioral principles of fairness in public debate.
Will the Philadelphia Inquirer CEO, editors and Foundation directors rise to that basic standard of being responsible, balanced, wise and even, somewhat intelligent?
By my wealth and education level, I would be considered an elite. But I am much more comfortable with the garbage folks. These are really democratic hard brain wired leftist people who have been blue pilled by their democratic masters for control of USA society and culture. Smart elites don’t like illegal immigration. Are concerned about cost of USA life. Have issues with crime and crazy cancel culture and woke agendas. I am a garbage elite, and I am with Trump to restore America’s former glory.