Trump, Kamala, & The Authenticity Problem

Photo by Setvin on Deviant Art

Earlier last week, Trump sat down across from Joe Rogan in the podcaster's famous Austin studio for a sprawling three-hour long conversation that would go on to collect upwards of 45 million streams on YouTube alone in the coming days. This viral meetup arrived on the heels of a string of podcast sit-downs Trump managed to wiggle into his full calendar during the battleground weeks before Election Day. 

Eyebrow-raising view counts aside, the impulse to shirk the standard, sanitized pre-election appointments of mainstream media in favor of long-form conversational sit-downs says something striking about a shift in reaching the American electorate. Instead of button-downs, interviewers don sweatshirts and instead of groveling to a list of preplanned "safe" inquiries, they launch off-the-cuff questions sans the usual pomp and fanfare.

Kamala Harris has attempted to get into the podcasting action as well, but with decidedly less success. The numbers speak for themselves. And it's no surprise that the current VP has a noticeable distaste for impromptu inquiries, often resorting to death-glares to interviewers who dare to launch tricky questions meanwhile providing impossibly vague, head-scratching non-answers. These behavioral tendencies certainly do not help her case.

It's worth mentioning that after eight years of tackling Trump's shenanigans, the mainstream media seems not to have modified their tune much. Or dare we say, learned their lesson? Making an effort to render their platforms more hospitable to bipartisan discourse and softening their vitriol against Trump would have been a smart move in the interim. It might have enabled them to win back the wider public trust that they were successful in clawing away during that fateful 2016 campaign season. Instead, their language and bias remain the same, pathetically tired and frozen in time. This lack of change has only helped compel the rise of decentralized media outlets and further whet the appetites of the public for the unfiltered conversations that spring forth from this nontraditional medium.

Some members of establishment media gripe that these sweatshirt-clad podcasters are not "real journalists" and so, will fail to press the candidates on issues that matter and are of voting-interest. This is not a baseless concern, but it bears mentioning that the long-form podcast delivers on much that the bespectacled legacy interviewers with their clipboards and tart, interrogative mode of interaction simply cannot.

The long-form podcast isn't about robotic answers, but meandering conversation instead. And drilling out policy positions under the harsh glare of studio lights isn't exactly the "conversation" that untold millions of listeners are always after. Laid-back and drawn-out, the podcast can humanize candidates, giving them the rare license to talk as human beings, sans crowds to whip into excitement or critics to defend themselves against. The podcast certainly isn't a replacement for the traditional interview. But it is a refreshment from this stale norm and more importantly, a valuable medium for gaining new insight into a candidate.

And because it is unfiltered, it captures credibility. In an age of alarm over withering attention-spans and cognitive strain, it is ironic that the podcast continues to attract audiences in droves. But its popularity speaks to an itch for the truth. Bite-sized chunks of media are more palatable for our entertainment, but when it comes to more serious matters, a rising tide of individuals have chosen to supplement infectious soundbites and dodgy mainstream media reporting with the raw, uncensored podcast stream where instead of being plattered up an opinion, they are implicitly called upon to form their own.

The podcast is friendly and freewheeling and only tethered loosely around an agenda. It allows for complex answers to complex questions. It is a humanistic, holistic medium that allows a rare glance into the true personality of a politician in a relaxed habitat. It is also quite democratic in the way that it naturally encourages viewers to draw their own conclusions by providing raw content and stepping away. It is a necessary counteraction to a media landscape hellbent on slanted political reporting and constant foraging for misinformation done under a paternalist guise. At the same time, we could also say that the rise of the podcast represents a growing desire to access authenticity in a political candidate.

Authenticity as Political Currency

Gaining political favor from the American electorate has never been a clinical endeavor. This project has never been dependent purely on presidential competence or policy frills. It has crucially always required candidates to have an "authenticity quotient". Authenticity is a fluid attribute, one that changes with the times. What the population classified as "authentic" in a presidential wannabe in decades past bears a discernible difference from what we scout for in an "authentic" candidate today.

So what makes a presidential prospect "authentic" these days? And what makes this so important? First off, it's worth mentioning that authenticity is ultimately a personal interpretation, and because of this, partly a fabrication of our own minds—a hopeful pasting together of attributes from which we sit back and triumphantly declare the man or woman in question knowable, relatable, trustworthy, real.

In an earlier essay of mine titled "Charisma, Personality, & Spectacle in American Politics" I wrote,

"The American politician is called to maintain a complicated balance between humility and self-confidence and between relatability and inviolability. He is vulnerable but not too vulnerable. He is both a bridge to the people and their chosen hero-deliverer. Crucially, he must contain a seed of ordinariness, elude (at least vaguely) to an origin story of noble struggle, and demonstrate a shameless going-to-battle grit. [. . .] America's appetite is not sated by a mere intellectual at the presidential podium, no matter how well-spoken or given to parental reassurances he is. He must exude a palpable life-force and demonstrate that he is at once rooted to the earth, as much as he is eyes-lifted-to-the-sky and maybe, just maybe able to transcend the muck."

Hollow Words

The authentic politician needs to dabble in the dialectic mentioned above, but he also needs to speak in straightforward language to the public. Trump is often criticized for his kindergarten-esque vocabulary, but he may have an edge over Kamala who, while may sling bigger words, is notorious for her puzzling, insubstantial public statements. Political speeches on either side of the aisle brim with platitudes, but what's mixed in (or at least should be) is substance. Actual opinions, decisive plans—that type of thing.

In recent elections, a popular distaste for vague, genteel political rhetoric has emerged. Of course, one of the things that Donald Trump's supporters will repeatedly report they appreciate about him is his ability to "tell it like it is". People find his brash, straight-shooting talk "authentic" precisely because in today's day and age we have correlated inauthenticity with bowing to political correctness.

Some make the mistake of assuming the backlash against politically-correct notions is an indication of increased hostility. Instead, the backlash against politically-correct notions is really an indication of those notions breaking down. As a result, people value the bravery of someone willing to stand up to them and point out their inconsistencies and falsehoods. There's an increased tenor of corruption and stagnation sloshing around in establishment politics which absolutely makes for an environment ripe for an elevation-of-authenticity and a desire for a man like Trump to come thundering into Washington.

Some find Trump's propensity to engage in this rough-and-tumble play evidence of his crude, uncivilized nature. But they fail to see how his brash straight-talking is a corrective for the suave, empty moral grandstanding that his opponents favor.

Furthermore, it's no secret that the Democrat and Republican parties have weathered some striking demographic shifts over the last handful of election cycles. Statistics have shown that Republicans have scooped up increasing numbers of the disaffected working class, whereas Democrats have become a stronghold for the coastal elites and the urban laptop class. This shift has dangerously narrowed Democratic opportunity, showing that Republican appeal is on the move. In certain swing states, Democrats are losing ground to a surge of Republican registrants.

In The End

Few can dispute the observation that Kamala's campaign strategy derives most of its energy from negation [of Trump] and markedly less from the strength of her own personality or fleshed-out plans for the American future. People rally behind Trump because they find him authentic. We can all agree that few are those that would cite the same reason for Kamala, a woman prone to word-salads, skin-crawling cackling, and ideological shape-shifting.

It is hard to toy with the public's intuition that correctly detects a chameleon-esque expedience and false sincerity about her. No matter how much she preaches about maturity or unity, for many her words ring hollow. Because in this day and age, as a direct result of the corruption and stagnation inundating the Capitol, many want a politician willing to brave the muck. To dispense with pretension. To call it like it is.

After all, this is precisely why Trump has found his way onto the national ticket in 2024. Historical realities have intensified the American appetite for political authenticity. This particular quality will likely pack a punch at the polls—but only time will tell just how much.

Happy Election Day everyone! :)