The Glory and the Burden includes a startling statistic: Just 14% of eligible adults voted for either Donald Trump or Hillary Clinton in the 2016 primaries. It’s one of many interesting points raised by Notre Dame American studies professor Robert Schmuhl in his latest book. Maybe less surprising but more alarming is the mere 18% who trust the federal government, down from 77% in 1964. Those and other factors have combined to permit candidates unthinkable in an earlier age to rise to the highest office in the land. Extremism, “alternative facts” and divisive media have destabilized and decentered the process of electing presidents with the White House’s current occupant as an outcome. Schmuhl shows that, in recent decades, voters tend to veer from one personality-image to its opposite, giving hope that 2020 will bring a well-spoken, civic-minded leader to the fore.
