Poor John Podhoretz, the NY Post's hapless hack. Even when he strains to get something right — "[Trump] is garnering support that may actually be real, and may actually change the course of the 2016 election — and, therefore, American history — through nothing more than blowhardism" — Podhoretz always manages to get something else dreadfully wrong, which emphasizes his and all the little Podhoretzes' general wrongness. To wit,
[W]hile happy talk (some of which I’ve indulged in myself) may dismiss Trump as this year’s flash-in-the-pan like the 2012 Republican also-rans, right now he’s more likely a version of Ross Perot in 1992 — the man who got Bill Clinton elected.
The "myth" of Perot's Clinton-assist has been debunked for years by competent election analysts. The myth has long since departed from the respectable status of speculation or debate; it is, and has been for some time, purely a myth. Anyone who follows politics, which Mr. Podhoretz claims to, appreciates the myth as myth only. In 2011, for instance, Clinton-era-obsessed Steve Kornacki observed in anticipation of yet more Podhoretzian wrongheadedness:
[The myth] is completely and thoroughly untrue — and it’s not an even remotely ambiguous matter….
A comprehensive national exit poll found that Perot voters were divided almost evenly on their second choice and that Clinton — in a two-way race — would still have beaten Bush by 5.8 million votes….
Repeat after me: Ross Perot did not "cost" George H.W. Bush the 1992 election. If you see or hear a commentator using this claim as supporting evidence, immediately discount whatever argument that commentator is advancing.
We have a first! One cannot, in this case, discount Podhoretz's larger argument — i.e., that Trump is a game-changer. Podhoretz is indisputably correct about that, but only because this is one immensely indisputable reality that even half-witted NY Post columnists can't deny.
Still, Podhoretz's "supporting" argument is thunderingly emblematic of what got the Podhoretzes where they are, which is to say, in the toilet with Trumpism. They ignore facts, don't listen to reason, and only toy with reality now and then. They detest history, they're dismissive of science, they're economically ineducable, and their foreign policies are straight out of fantasy literature. You can show them evidence upon evidence that Ross Perot didn't elect Bill Clinton or that the planet is warming or that Laffer curves are a joke or that American firepower often boomerangs and they'll simply fold their arms and sniff "Go away," which Mr. Podhoretz once dismissively sniffed at yours truly.
What's been the payoff of all their obstinance? Donald Trump and base-supported Trumpism, that's what. And now they're whining about both. Along with warning them that, for instance, blowing up the Middle East probably wouldn't pacify the Middle East, we warned the clowns that populist Trumpism would someday kill them. They sniffed, of course. And now we might very well die of laughter.