New York Times headline, March 5: “Do Americans Have a ‘Collective Amnesia’ About Donald Trump?”
This is the third Times article within less than a month to suggest that surveys and polls are showing a highly competitive presidential election largely because voters are suffering some form of political Alzheimers. After everything the media have done to render Donald Trump an untouchable, toxic sludge — no less, a racist sludge that threatens democracy — Democrats can fix on no other reason so many people could openly declare their support for him outside of inexplicable memory loss.
From the Times: “More than three years of distance from the daily onslaught has faded, changed — and in some cases, warped — Americans’ memories of events that at the time felt searing. Polling suggests voters’ views on Mr. Trump’s policies and his presidency have improved in the rearview mirror. In interviews, voters often have a hazy recall of one of the most tumultuous periods in modern politics. Social scientists say that’s unsurprising. In an era of hyper-partisanship, there’s little agreed-upon collective memory, even about events that played out in public.”
Don’t you remember the daily onslaught?! Don’t you recall one of the most tumultuous periods in modern politics?! God bless the poor voters. Those memories have faded. Those recollections have warped. The past has gone hazy.
People surely forget details, misremember facts, and even sometimes unintentionally fabricate things that didn’t happen (false memory). But the Times suggests there’s something much different at play here, that Trump’s
