In my last post, I wrote around a passage from Sebastian Haffner’s Geschichte eines Deutschen. The book is still on my mind, so I’m going to do the same tonight.
I’m in Europe. This means that tonight, election night in America, I will not be staying up to see the results as they come in. Instead, I will get up tomorrow, not long after midnight New York time, and find out what happened. I find myself thinking of Haffner’s description of the tense situation the night before World War One was declared, when he, as a child, was on vacation with his family in the country:
“Downstairs, in the hall, with its hunting trophies on the walls and a row of pewter jugs and bright earthenware plates ranged along a high shelf, I found my father and our host, the owner of the estate, seated in deep armchairs, solemnly and weightily discussing the situation. Of course I did not understand much of what they were saying and I can recall no details. But I have not forgotten how calm and consoling their voices sounded, my father’s higher tones against the deep bass of our host; how reassuring the sight of their leisurely manner was, the fragrant smoke of their cigars rising above them in slender columns; and how, the longer they talked, the clearer, the better and the more comforting everything became. Until, finally, it was irrefutably clear that war was quite impossible and, therefore, we would not let panic chase us back to town. Instead, as in all previous years, we would stay on to the end of the holidays….
When I was awakened next morning, packing was in full swing. At first, I did not understand what had happened. The word ‘mobilisation,’ which they had sought to explain a few days previously, conveyed nothing to me. Anyway there was little time to explain anything…”
I don’t think this is an election like any other. You could fill an encyclopedia with substantive objections to Trump, but for me, the worst are his statements concerning the use of nuclear weapons, which exhibit an ignorance of the (non-humanitarian) reasons they are never used, and point to a willingness to use them. For example, watch this.
So I don’t think the comparison to WWI is overblown. Since the Comey intervention I have been genuinely nervous. I have literally lost sleep. This is real, and it could happen. Thus I, too, seek comforting thoughts.
Friends remind me that Hillary has a far better ground game, and this is true. They remind me that it’s not entirely clear where Trump’s necessary voters will come from – he’ll win much of what Romney got in 2012, some people who don’t usually vote, and he’ll lose big-time among minorities. It now looks like Nevada and Florida should be blue, and that should surely do it.
And yet… This has felt wrong for a long time. Trump has been riding a wave (and anyway, read this or this).
So I go through everything again and again, until, finally, it is irrefutably clear that a Trump victory is quite impossible.
Hope I don’t wake to something quite different tomorrow.
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