A big question about Donald Trump is how did they get it soooo wrong? The pundits. The party elite. The consultants. The editorial writers. The other candidates. Howcum they were so totally wrong about the rise of Trump?

The answer is Joe the Plumber.

He’s the guy who dared to question Barrack Obama. During a campaign stop in 2008. He questioned his tax policies. He told the candidate he wanted to start a plumbing business. John McCain and Sarah Palin quickly made Joe the Plumber part of their campaign.

They did so because none of these guys knew a plumber. (Well, Sarah did.) And they don’t know any plumbers today. They don’t know electricians and bartenders and brickies. They don’t know barbers and cops. They don’t know Army privates and machine operators. They don’t know truckers and waitresses.

Candidates want votes from these folks. So in every campaign they assault us with fakery. The candidate bowls a strike with a bowling club. Or raises a mug of suds with miners. Or drives a tank or tractor. Or eats a hot dawg with county fair-goers.

But once the cameras quit, they don’t know these folks. These voters. They don’t sit in saloons with them. They don’t party with them at the Elks’ Club. They are not off to the church chicken supper tonight. This goes for the candidates as much as for the pundits, consultants, commentators, etc.

Because they don’t really know such folks, they did and do a lousy job predicting how they will vote. Because they don’t really listen to such folks, they don’t know how angry many of them are.

These are important voters. Because many are on the blue-collar side of the Democrat Party. They’re not crazy about the intellectual side of the party. The academics and social workers don’t do much for them. A lot of them jumped ship and voted for Ronald Reagan. They - the Reagan Democrats - helped elect him. A lot of them are voting for Trump.

Now Trump’s support is much broader than that. But if the pundit class had been slurpin’ suds with plumbers over the years they would have heard alarm bells. Bells so loud they would have known the noise would resonate well beyond the plumbers.

But they don’t hang out with the low brows. They don’t hear them. They sip Sancerre with their fellows. And hear only what their fellows think. Instead of what the Great Unwashed think. Most of them haven’t gripped a calloused hand in years. Unless they have a weight-lifting pal.

Novelist George Orwell wrote “Probably the battle of Waterloo was won on the playing fields of Eton…” He was referring to the qualities of elite officers educated at Eton.

If Trump wins this battle someone may declare it was won in the truck stops, greasy spoons, factory floors, saloons and county fairs of this country. The very places the media and political elite meet and greet during campaigns. The very places they avoid between elections.

Now I am not recommending these birds change their social habits. But in an election like this they should hang up their predicting boots. Because they’ve got no mud on those boots. And most of their predictions thus far have fizzled.

A few elections ago a network media gal in the Big Apple made a big announcement. She wailed that she could not understand how Reagan got elected. Because nobody she knew voted for him.

A few weeks ago I saw a similar comment from a female movie star. About The Donald. She does not know a single person who plans to vote for him.

Maybe she should attend one of her movies. And chat up the guy or gal who vacuums the popcorn between shows.

From Tom...as in Morgan.