The brilliance of Hillary Clinton's "deplorables"

Could there be a clunkier phrase than “basket of deplorables”? Hillary Clinton’s assertion that half — or maybe something less than half — of Donald Trump’s supporters are “racist, sexist, homophobic, xenophobic, Islamophobic, you name it” struck a lot of observers as not just an odd turn of phrase but politically unwise. You attack your opponent, the idea was, but you don’t attack the voters.

But now, a few days later, the brilliance of Clinton’s remark is becoming clearer. Yes, she got a few liberal commentators to take her side and defend the substance of it. But the far bigger benefit is that in the wake of her comment, some media figures decided to devise a “deplorables” quiz for Trump supporters. Is Person X deplorable? How about Person Y? The effect was to pressure Trump supporters not only to agree with Clinton’s larger point but with her precise terminology.

That’s what Wolf Blitzer did with Trump running mate Mike Pence Monday. “There are some supporters of Donald Trump and Mike Pence who — David Duke, for example, some other white nationalists, who would fit into that category of deplorables, right?” Blitzer asked Pence.