Neal Milner: Trump, Caldwell And Ige Took Different Paths To Unpopularity
The president, the mayor and the governor have divergent stories, but they’ve ended up in the same political place: the dumps.
The old wives’ tale is true.听Bad things do happen in threes, at least to the threesome of Donald Trump, Kirk Caldwell, and David Ige.听
All three of these politicians now have similarly awful approval ratings in the 30s.听
Trump鈥檚 is at 39 percent nationally.听In Hawaii, according to The Civil Beat Poll, it鈥檚 32 percent, the same as Caldwell鈥檚.听滨驳别鈥檚 35 percent is hardly better.
Down there in the dumps with Trump, who knew? How did such very different politicians end up in the same unpopular place?
Each took a different path. Trump鈥檚 story is about foreshadowing, Caldwell鈥檚 is about unanticipated disaster. And 滨驳别鈥檚? Well, his tale is as mild and murky as he is.
A Predictable Low
Trump鈥檚 story is not how low his presidential approval ratings are now.听It鈥檚 about how very low they鈥檝e been all along and how little they have declined.
At 45 percent, Trump鈥檚 approval rating when he first took office was well below the 53 percent average for presidents at that stage.
During the 2016 race there was plenty of evidence that come July 2017, Trump鈥檚 approval rating would be that low.听
Polls during the campaign consistently showed that he, and for that matter Hillary Clinton, had historically low negative ratings.听There were a lot of reluctant Trump voters.
Add the fact that he lost the popular vote and you come up with this:听Trump had no firm cushion of approval to begin with.
But as weird and whacky as his first six months have been, his approval numbers have dropped just 6听points, mainly because of the political polarization, which is a continuation of a pattern that was deeply entrenched in American politics well before 2016.
Republican and Democratic voters are polarized on almost every significant political issue. Today a person is much more likely than before to distrust a president from the opposing party.
So it should not surprise that his 39 percent national approval rating conceals huge differences.听Close to 80 percent of Republicans approve of him, compared to only 9 percent of Democrats.
As unprecedented as Trump is, his approval rating is part of the same old story: his pre-election unpopularity and voters鈥 continuing polarization.
Disaster Arrives On The Rail
Kirk Caldwell鈥檚 story is sure not about the same-old, same-old.听It鈥檚 about disaster hitting the mayor just when he thought he had become the master of disaster.
Before and throughout the 2016 mayoral race, Caldwell鈥檚 approval rating was up in the 60s, but in a recent poll taken just nine months after the mayor鈥檚 re-election it dropped by half.
In a blink of a political eye the mayor鈥檚 status went from 鈥淵ou win!鈥 to 鈥淵ou suck!鈥
Rail was supposed to be Caldwell鈥檚 downfall in the 2016 race against Charles Djou, who hammered at the incumbent鈥檚 lack of ethics and especially his bad rail management skills.
But Caldwell won again, easily. The voters鈥 attitude seemed to be: yeah well, Djou is, after all, a Republican, and he does not have a rail plan any better than Kirk鈥檚.听So, I guess, what the heck鈥
Caldwell鈥檚 relationship with the voters was like the one Huey Lewis describes in his song, :
Yes, it’s true, I’m so happy to be stuck with you
‘Cause I can see that you’re happy to be stuck with me.
This kind of OK听attitude toward Caldwell changed because rail came back to bite the mayor in the okole even harder than it had before. And just when he hoped that his victory gave him some breathing space.
Rail costs went up again.听And again.听During their recent session, legislators called Caldwell a liar and a concealer as they frustratingly and unsuccessfully tried to shovel out of a mess that they blamed on the mayor.听
And the federal transit money people gave rail鈥檚 progress report at best an incomplete.听Even the staunch rail supporter Star Advertiser did not have much good to say about him.
More than ever, certainly more than he was in the either of his mayoral elections, Caldwell has become the poster child of rail failure.
“Happy to be stuck with you” has turned into “I鈥檓 going home to Mother.”
An Uncompelling Mystery
David 滨驳别鈥檚 story is as hard to unpack as the governor himself.听His approval ratings have never been high, generally in the 40s.听Then they began to decline for no obvious reason, clear foreshadowing or crippling disaster.
The best way to explain this decline is to look at how much of an anomaly his win over the incumbent, Neil Abercrombie, was in the first place.
That victory was not just big.听It was historically unprecedented. But what was most impressive about it was the voters鈥 willingness to vote for Ige despite knowing so little about him.听He defied the conventional wisdom that you need a high degree of name recognition to be a successful candidate.
Ige was an unformed candidate running against Abercrombie who was, it seems, way too formed.听That turned into 滨驳别鈥檚 advantage.
But it has now turned out also to be a disadvantage.
Blandness can sometime work for politicians by keeping them out of trouble.听Not so in 滨驳别鈥檚 case.听Voters still don鈥檛 know enough about him to feel comfortable being stuck with him.
He鈥檚 a mystery, but not a compelling mystery.
To the public, Gov. Ige is like a rebound from an obnoxious ex-boyfriend: a calming relief at first, but enough with the calmness. Maybe it鈥檚 time to reboot the听eHarmony profile.
The last governor鈥檚 race proved that it鈥檚 possible for an incumbent to be boisterously unpopular enough to lose to anybody.
The next governor鈥檚 race may show that it is possible for an incumbent to be blandly unpopular enough to do the same.
Of course, each of these stories is still a work in progress.听Who can say what will happen to any of them?
But going back to bad things happening in threes:
Three coins in the fountain.
Which one will the fountain bless?
Quite possibly, none.
