The election of Donald Trump as the 45th president of the United States has been called a shock wave, seismic tremor, social tsunami – and many other adjectives that describe radical surprise.
There has been an abundance of analysis and over-analysis about the election results since Tues., Nov. 8.
The presidential election was not a landslide. It was an even split, indicating there is a serious divide in our cities and towns. Some of that is fed by militant movements like LGBTQ activists, progressives, socialists and some far right extremists. Misguided radicals always exist across all spectrums.
The greater problem comes when “mainstream” leaders and journalists abandon reason in order to embrace radical ideologies – especially when those ideologies reject time-tested standards and moral absolutes.
One of the most consistent post-election themes I have heard is that the media has done an incredibly poor job of covering the political campaigns.
Analyzing Trump’s victory, Jim Rutenberg, a writer for The New York Times, wrote the day after the election, “It was a failure to capture the boiling anger of a large portion of the American electorate that feels left behind by a selective recovery, betrayed by trade deals that they see as threats to their jobs and disrespected by establishment Washington, Wall Street and the mainstream media.”
There you have it. Those who make up the media are completely out of touch with grassroots Americans.
They are taking a beating over their failure to deal with the facts and their severe lack of judgment. They earned this rebuke.
Blind to the basic values of most Americans and deceived by a doomed progressive agenda, media elites and career politicians simply don’t get it. They are not in touch with the average worker, average student, average family or average retiree.
To the media elite, it is unthinkable, laughable, even impossible that Donald Trump’s supporters, who Hillary Clinton called a “basket of deplorables,” would have a remote chance of influencing the election. But they did.
Though crass, Trump tapped into the anger and sense of betrayal most Americans believed Clinton and Washington insiders represent. The public resisted the arrogance and crassness of the elite – media, academia, entertainment and Washington insiders. This is the group that is known for their prejudice against the rural residents of our country, those without a college degree, those who embrace Judeo-Christian values, those who are Christians and those who are generally different from the elite.
Southern Baptist pastor Mike Huckabee served as the governor of Arkansas and is a two-time candidate for the presidency of the United States. In a post-election email he said, “Two years ago, I released a book, God, Guns, Grits, and Gravy, that detailed what I was observing in the great divide between the people in the ‘bubbles’ of New York, Washington and Hollywood and the people living in ‘flyover country,’ or as I coined it, the land of ‘God, Guns, Grits, and Gravy.’
“It was not geographical, nor racial, nor ethnic, nor gender based. It was the raw, seething anger felt by people whose lives were being devastated by policies and politics of the Ivy League-educated ruling class who looked with derision and bewilderment at the millions whose jobs had disappeared or were paying less, whose pensions had been obliterated, and whose future appeared bleak and hopeless.
“The press largely snickered at my message and thought it overly simplistic. It was intentionally simplistic because it didn’t have to be complicated to explain what was happening in the lives of the working class. If the shell-shocked elites are now wondering how they missed it, I still recommend their reading the book. It really will lay it out for them.”
Todd Starnes, conservative columnist and occasional guest on Fox News said, “Our long national nightmare is over, and the Republic has been saved.”
Whether you agree with Starnes or not, do you hear the sigh of relief in his statement? He speaks for a large segment of people who have deep concerns about the future of the United States of America. There is a strong sense that we would not survive another four years of leftist elected officials.
I want to be quick to acknowledge that there is also a sigh of despair among many who greatly fear Trump’s presidency. There are some very scary unknowns to deal with. I understand that, but my point is not the fears, reservations and concerns of voters across the scale. My emphasis is that mainstream media and other elitists have failed us.
The state of North Carolina produced a map that shows which counties voted for established liberal candidates.
For the most part, the map looks like a diagram of the state’s largest universities and urban centers. That underscores the view that much of academia has graduated into the artificial world of the elites, out of touch with most Americans.
I’m thankful that North Carolina Baptists have a growing presence in these collegiate communities.
Clearly this is a significant mission field. Kudos to all who serve in this field and those who live out a biblical vision to impact academia with the gospel.
I pray for every believer who is employed by our colleges and universities. May God use you in powerful ways!
I’m also grateful that Baptists have a vision to impact lostness in the urban centers of our state. People of every imaginable race and language are neighbors to believers in these large cities. Many of our established churches are intentional about sharing the gospel, and many new churches are being launched in these concentrated areas of our population. I pray God will tremendously bless all who live for Christ and proclaim His truth in the urban mission field.
But I’m also thankful for the effective ministry of the many churches in rural communities. Both small and large, these churches have a great influence. The recent election illustrates this point. Rural churches are important to America. I pray that every Christian in these communities will take heart and stand strong for the truth of scripture.
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