I recently verified something that most of us lefties more or less rightfully assume: Most Trump voters aren’t very smart people. But I also discovered something about Trumpers I didn’t really believe: Some of them actually listen—at least one I met recently did.
I was home in Ft. Worth last weekend from Florida to see the Dallas Cowboys play the Green Bay Packers at JerryWorld (better know as AT&T Stadium). While there, my rental car broke down and I had to summon a tow truck to take me and the car back to the rental car place at D/FW Airport, which meant a 40-minute drive in the truck with a total stranger making small talk.
The fact that I’m a U.S. Air Force veteran came up. And to his credit, the tow truck driver thanked me for my service. Then, out of the blue he asked me what I thought about Donald Trump. Now, talking about politics with strangers is something I avoid like the plague. But for whatever reason, I decided to engage.
I’m not even sure why he asked me. I’m black and most likely somebody who voted for Hillary and someone who can’t stand Trump. He was a white, working class guy who spoke and looked like a clone of Larry The Cable Guy—so I assumed he was probably a Trump supporter who was proud of his vote and wanted to tell me how Trump was going to make America great again.
I carefully thought about my response and took a deep breath before saying that I didn’t vote for Trump. I told him I can’t support Trump because he doesn’t have the maturity, emotional intelligence and patience to be an effective President. I told him as a former member of the U.S. Air Force that I’m particularly concerned about the way he dismisses the importance of NATO, while praising Putin for interfering with our election and extols Putin while ripping American intelligence agencies. I also mentioned that I wasn’t comfortable with someone as volatile and childlike as Trump being in charge of our military forces and nuclear arsenal. “Trump is a loose cannon. He acts before he thinks,” I said. “That’s a dangerous combination for a commander-in-chief.”
I don’t think he expected that. I think he was ready to challenge me over the need to build a wall to keep out Mexicans or a ban to keep out the Muslims...but when I brought up NATO, Russia, nukes, national security...he seemed genuinely perplexed, even stunned. I could see the wheels churning in his head. I think my military service bought me serious credibility with him, as well. So, I really believe I gave him some serious food for thought.
He sat there wide-eyed and could only repeatedly say, “Really?” as I explained to him how valuable NATO has been since the late 1940s and how it has kept Soviet and now Russian aggression in check for decades and was a force for peace in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Afghanistan and other global hotspots. I told him that if NATO is somehow scrapped, that it could destabilize peace across Europe and maybe the rest of the world. Adding that my biggest fear is that Putin will trick Trump into an alliance with Russia that will undermine NATO and create opportunties for Russian adventurism. And then I said, “The ultimate goal of such an alliance being to enrich Putin, Trump, Russian and American oligarchs while playing a game of nuclear ‘Truth or Dare’ with the Chinese.”
To which, all he could say was, “I didn’t think about all that. I really didn’t think about that.”
He was actually a very nice, soft-spoken guy who actually listened reverently to what I had to say. Eventually, we got to the rental car place. We shook hands and he let me out of his truck and wished me well.
He never once told me he voted for Trump. But I know he did. And now, based on what I told him he just might be regretting it. My guess is those wheels in his head are still churning and he’s doing some research on NATO and oligarchs. Timing and place are everything. If my car had never broken down odds are I’d never meet or talk to a guy like him. I just wish that somehow I’d met that guy before Election Day.