Photo Credit: Image: Ari Levinson via Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 3.0 (cropped).
Ari Levinson
And MAGA, on the other hand, makes people happy.I’m not much of a spontaneous laugher, but the explosion of videos with people doing the “Trump Dance” just cracks me up. When President Trump started showing off a few of his signature moves during the 2020 campaign, I thought the whimsical addition to his rallies provided a bit of levity to an otherwise stressful time, during which COVID dominated the headlines. Then I noticed that college-aged social media users had adapted Trump’s routine into a game similar to Dance Dance Revolution. Trending videos on YouTube and TikTok highlighted young people trying to replicate his movements with a split screen showing Trump dancing on one side and competitive mimics on the other. The “Trump Dance” became a cultural phenomenon.
The late, great Andrew Breitbart was keen on reminding conservatives that politics is downstream from culture. It is only right, then, that his eponymous publication featured a story a few days ago that captured how popular the “Trump Dance” has become. The Breitbart article includes videos of Argentinian president Javier Milei breaking out to the “Trump Dance” with supporters, San Francisco 49ers star Nick Bosa celebrating with his teammates on the field, and numerous young men and women enjoying the Donald Trump dance craze. If you look at any social media platform, you can find videos of people all over the world doing the “Trump Dance” at parties, in bars, at sporting events, and near historical landmarks. The funny little dance is a global sensation.
Now, this might seem silly to a lot of people. We have so many serious problems today, and Americans struggling to make ends meet don’t have time for an extra helping of nonsense. Allow me to suggest, however, that the widespread enthusiasm for the “Trump Dance” is a healthy sign for a society that has been deprived of authentic joy for far too long.
It is no coincidence that Kamala Harris’s presidential campaign avoided real policy issues and concentrated on selling “joy” to the American people. Polling consistently shows that Americans have never been so unhappy, and during Biden’s presidency, a record share of the electorate has agreed that the country is on the wrong track. Democrats tried to spackle over these ugly numbers with fake displays of happiness. They relied on celebrity musicians, actors, and influencers to smile for the cameras and tell voters how excited they were to vote for Kamala Harris. This media blitz of artificial joy failed.
Why is that? Because Democrats abandoned authentic joy long ago. They turned their backs on American history and took a knee during patriotic tributes. They rejected the concerns of blue-collar workers and began openly mocking people with dirt under their fingernails. They moved away from the inspirational rhetoric of past Democrats such as President Kennedy and embraced a dark worldview in which Americans are divided into discrete identity groups and forced to fight one another. When you think of Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Ilhan Omar, Rashida Tlaib, or other members of the Democrat “Squad,” you don’t picture smiling faces. You imagine angry frowns.
This is the Democrat party that President Barack Obama and Attorney General Eric Holder built. Americans across the political spectrum had hoped that Obama’s 2008 victory would be the beginning of a national renewal in which petty racial divisions could be forever relegated to the past. Instead of seizing the moment as a singular opportunity to heal old wounds and rejuvenate the country, however, Obama and Holder chose to pit Americans against one another. In the half-century preceding Obama’s historic election, race relations steadily improved. After Obama’s election, race relations steadily degraded. Democrats and the propaganda press have done their best to falsely blame renewed divisions on white conservatives’ “unconscious racism.” In reality, conservatives of all skin colors had hoped that Obama’s presidency would usher in a new era of American unity.
Instead, Obama and Holder proved that their Marxist inclinations severely outweigh any nobler impulses. As proponents of Saul Alinsky’s Rules for Radicals and ideologues who worked constantly to politicize the most personal aspects of Americans’ lives, Obama and Holder specialized in rubbing salt in old wounds. They told us that America is not exceptional, that America’s history is nothing to celebrate, and that America’s heroes are all irredeemably bad. They told us that America is “systemically racist,” that the Constitution is a relic of “white supremacy,” and that the country must be “fundamentally transformed.” Michelle Obama told us that she had never been “proud” of her country until her husband’s meteoric political rise. Obama and Holder’s anti-American negativity so infected the temperament of their party that President Biden and other prominent Democrats have repeatedly argued that America was never that great. For nearly two decades, the Democrat party has soaked in this acid bath of dour pessimism and grim hatred for the country that it seeks to lead.
It is hard to believe that young Americans who have just become old enough to vote have never lived during a time when oppressive “political correctness” and social media censorship were not the norm. They have no memories of a time before public finger-wagging and online mobs hell-bent on “canceling” groupthink offenders. They cannot relate to a time when Democrats and Republicans could disagree about important issues and still enjoy one another’s company. This era bereft of great comedy, satire, and intellectual debate is all they know. This joyless wasteland has been the Obama-Holder legacy.
It is all the more ironic, then, that Democrats have spent the last decade trying to tarnish Donald Trump as a “dark” and “divisive” figure intent on spreading “hateful” misery. As assiduously as they have worked to push that lie, Americans can see the truth. Obama’s Democrat party is a struggle session of stern lectures and disappointed frowns. President Trump’s MAGA movement is a boisterous celebration filled with happy people sporting wide smiles. You can’t fake “joy.” Kamala Harris learned that lesson the hard way. President Trump, on the other hand, is filled with so much authentic joy that he creates pop culture attractions with something as simple as a little dance. His joyful determination in the face of hardship is why he gained substantial support from young people in 2024.
President Trump’s political movement is changing the world for the better. After the attempt on his life at the Butler Farm Show Grounds in Pennsylvania on July 13, online images circulated of a guardian angel tapping the president on the shoulder, moving his head slightly to the right, and saving his life from an assassin’s bullet. In Japan, this guardian angel took the form of Shinzo Abe — the Japanese prime minister who was good friends with President Trump and who was assassinated in 2022. So strong is Trump’s connection with the Japanese people that they felt invested in his survival. This kind of bond with an American leader is not normal, but it has become an undeniable feature of the Trump Era.
At Mar-a-Lago last week, Sylvester Stallone introduced President Trump at a black-tie affair with some touching words. Comparing Trump to his creation, Rocky Balboa, Stallone described the president as a “mythical character” who has gone through a “metamorphosis” and “change[d] lives” for the better. “This individual does not exist on this planet,” Stallone remarked. “Nobody in the world could have pulled off what he pulled off, so I’m in awe.”
It is clear that Stallone is hardly alone in seeing President Trump as not only a legendary American but also a consequential world figure. Across the globe, friends and foes have expressed admiration for the man. He has taken on the mantle of peacemaker, change agent, and future-builder. He inspires hope. He nurtures joy. It is no surprise, then, that so many follow his lead…and dance.
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Image: Ari Levinson via Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 3.0 (cropped).
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Image: Ari Levinson via Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 3.0 (cropped).
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