David Brooks is not a closet liberal. He cares about the Republican Party and the conservative movement in American politics. I don't usually agree with his politics but he writes and thinks as a rational adult should. Here, he admits he did not understand the depth of anger felt by the Trump supporters but argues that there is a moral center which even a popular vote in a democracy does not override. It is the core debate of democratic government and one of the reasons our founding fathers created a republic and not a truly democratic government. You can fool all the people some of the time. You can fool some of the people all of the time. Elections can be won by fooling enough people for a short time. Political parties can be maintained indefinitely by fooling some of the people for a long time. Even though it is true that you cannot fool all of the people all of the time, that principal does not protect us from a horrible outcome in a single election if enough people are fooled for a long enough time to control an election. The hope is that we do not suffer irreparable harm from one election.
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