Excerpt
SUMMARY: Syndicated columnist Mark Shields and New York Times columnist David Brooks join Judy Woodruff to discuss the week in politics, including what Brexit might suggest about the upcoming presidential election, how frustrations with low-paying jobs and expensive education are influencing voters this year, President Obama’s “depleted” legacy and the prospects for new gun legislation.
JUDY WOODRUFF (NewsHour): The presidential nominees also weighed in on the Brexit result today.
During a press conference at his Scottish resort and golf course this morning, Donald Trump praised Britain’s decision to leave the E.U.
DONALD TRUMP (R), Presumptive Presidential Nominee: I really do see a parallel between what’s happening in the United States and what’s happening here. People want to see borders. They don’t necessarily want people pouring into their country, that they don’t know who they are and where they come from. They have no idea.
JUDY WOODRUFF: Hillary Clinton also responded to Britain’s vote to leave. In a statement today, the former secretary of state said — quote — “We respect the choice the people of the United Kingdom have made.”
And now to the analysis of Shields and Brooks. That’s syndicated columnist Mark Shields, and New York Times columnist David Brooks.
Welcome to you both.
This whole program up until now practically has been about the vote in the U.K., David, to leave the European Union. What do you make of this?
DAVID BROOKS, The New York Times: Well, in country after country, we’re seeing a conflict between what you might call urban cosmopolitans, and less well-educated ethnic nationalism. And ethnic nationalism is on the rise.
And I agree with everything that Ivo, Richard and Margaret were saying, but it should be said — and I covered — I lived in Brussels for five years at the Maastricht Treaty, when all this was coming together — and the elites, as much as I hate the leave — the fact that the U.K. is going to leave the E.U., the elites in some large degree brought this on themselves.
There was built into the European unification project, an anti-democratic, a condescending, and a snobbish attitude about popular democracy. And, secondly — and this is also true here — and I’m as pro-immigration as the day is long, but we have asked a lot of people who are suffering in this company to accept extremely, radically high immigration levels.
And we have probably overflooded the system. And so while it’s easy — and I do condemn the vote to leave, get out — a little humility is in order on the part of the establishment, frankly, that we have flooded the system with more than it can handle. And, secondly, we have not provided a good nationalism, a good patriotism that is cosmopolitan, that is outward-spanning, and that is confident. And, therefore, a bad form of parochial, inward-looking Trumpian nationalism has had free rein.
JUDY WOODRUFF: Mark, the elites brought it on themselves?
MARK SHIELDS: I think the forces and the advocates of globalization have been primarily obsessed with the well-being of the investor class and the stockholders and the shareholders; and been indifferent, oftentimes callous, to the dislocation and the suffering that people in countries affected by this trade, the expanded trade, the larger economy, who have been victimized by it.
And it has been a accompanied, I think, by an elitist condescension, in many cases, and it’s been taken advantage of. I mean, the shorthand today is that we saw the words of the Republican nominee in waiting, who is a part-time presidential candidate and a full-time real estate developer, you know, he won, and Barack Obama lost. I mean, by any scorecard.
There is no spin you can put on this that in any way comforts Democrats today.
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