Trump and the Beltway Hays Code

For the last six months, the media has been at a total loss to explain the appeal of Donald Trump.  When you ask the average supporter, they will often say “He tells it like it is.”  And yet we know this is not entirely correct.  Trump is prone to exaggeration, if not outright distortions.  Others will say “He’s not politically correct.” This gets nearer to the point, but it isn’t quite right either.  Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) is perfectly politically incorrect and yet enjoys nothing like Trump’s numbers in the polls.   

So what then explains Trump’s appeal?  What exactly is he doing differently than the others?  

{mosads}Trump may not offer truth, but he does offer verisimilitude, which by definition feels like truth, and is almost as eagerly welcomed.  

Now why is verisimilitude a suitable substitute for truth?  Why is Trump’s pitch so refreshing to so many people?  It is by no means a perfect analogy, but Hollywood may provide an answer.  Throughout the 1940s and 1950s, Hollywood adhered to what is known as the Hays Code, a series of rather puritanical guidelines that prohibited depictions of violence, sex, and wrongdoing of all kinds.  This Code shaped the popular culture of the age, and explains why Lucy and Desi slept in different beds.  It made art feel a little stiff, a little contrived, somewhat artificial.  The productions were not lacking in truth but they were lacking in verisimilitude which makes them feel hypocritical and condescending.

Consequently, the difference between Mr. Smith Goes to Washington and House of Cards is not that one is true and one is untrue. In fact, House of Cards is perhaps less “true” or “real” than Mr. Smith Goes to Washington.  We may think Washington is broken and corrupt (which is the premise of Capra’s film), but who among us actually thinks the president is a serial killer?   Nonetheless, House of Cards feels more real.  And it feels more real because the story, like life, does not condescend.  Even when life feels like a Frank Capra movie, it doesn’t feel self-consciously like a Frank Capra movie.  Life never rises to the level of propaganda because it doesn’t have a censor.   

The 1960s rejected hypocrisy in art and politics. And although it succeeded in transforming popular culture, curiously, it utterly failed to transform the political culture.  If anything, our political culture became more hypocritically puritanical (consider our willingness to ignore JFK’s dalliances, but not Clinton’s). Today’s political advertisements demonstrate this perfectly: amber waves of grain with lots of platitudes about loving freedom and family values and the Constitution.  It’s not that these things aren’t real or aren’t true or good, but they do stand in contrast to the popular culture that primarily mocks such wholesome depictions of life.

Until this election cycle, satire has offered the only counterweight to the tone of the political culture.  Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert created an entire industry to mock the inanity of the Beltway establishment.  Now Trump has introduced this same method to the actual political culture.  He has abandoned the Beltway Hays Code and conducted himself entirely uncensored.

What Trump is saying isn’t necessarily more true (and is often less true) than what other candidates are saying, but it feels that way because he doesn’t condescend. His schtick doesn’t have this artificial moral scaffolding coddling our political development.  And in today’s two dimensional political circus, that feels like an enormous step forward.  It’s like watching House of Cards after spending a weekend watching nothing but Leave it to Beaver reruns.  

For too long the beltway establishment has told us that the only way to win elections is to praise freedom loudly and condemn corruption boldly.  In consequence, the only electable people are actually boring people or interesting people who pretend to be boring people.  Trump has recognized that we now want our political culture to feel more like our popular culture.  We don’t necessarily need it to be true, but it must feel more real.

You need not support Trump in order to recognize that he may be providing a valuable service to the political discourse in the country.  In dismantling the Beltway Hays Code, he is removing the censor from our political culture.  This will result in people saying nasty, hurtful things.  But it may also make politics less condescending and hypocritical.  Let’s give it a try.  Let us have some real people in this election, or at least some people who feel real.  Let us celebrate Trump’s grand performance.

Smith is a former Republican staffer and currently an attorney in New York.