By Mayank Chhaya-
As Vivek Ramaswamy, the 38-year-old Ohio native and the contender for the Republican Party’s presidential nomination, rises rapidly to second place, he is also beginning to attract some withering mainstream media scrutiny.
Ironically, while two of the meanings of his name Vivek in Hindi and Sanskrit are prudence and reasonable conduct, terms most used in the mainstream media to describe his conduct are the exact opposite such as “annoying”, “rude” and even “obnoxious”.
Quite like the man whom Ramaswamy unabashedly admires, former President Donald Trump, those insults only fuel his rise within the Republican universe where any denunciation by the mainstream media is celebrated as a badge of honor.
CNN’s S.E. Cupp, herself a “mainstream conservative”, in a column called him: “Obnoxious. Annoying. Disrespectful. Inexperienced. Conspiratorial.”
David Brooks, a conservative himself and a widely read columnist for The New York Times, said this about Ramaswamy, “If Trump emerged from the make-believe world of pro wrestling, Ramaswamy emerges from the make-believe world of social media and the third-rate sectors of the right-wing media sphere. His statements are brisk, in-your-face provocations intended to produce temporary populist dopamine highs. It’s all performative show. Ramaswamy seems as uninterested in actually governing as his idol.”
Ramaswamy’s tech-bro brio and pronouncements often come across as highly practiced even though they may not be. He is glib in a manner that seems to rise from having rehearsed it in his early 20s. “God is real”, he declaims as if he has just gathered some incontrovertible evidence behind his claim. His certitudes are disturbingly assertive.
For instance, his tweeted under “Truth” what could well his ten commandments: “God is real, There are two genders, Human flourishing requires fossil fuels, Reverse racism is racism, An open border is no border, Parents determine the education of their children, The nuclear family is the greatest form of governance known to mankind, Capitalism lifts people up from poverty, There are three branches of the U.S. government, not four, The U.S. Constitution is the strongest guarantor of freedoms in history.”
These are handed down from some exalted position that he would have the world believe he reached early in his life. They are clearly constructed to appeal to precisely the Republican base that Trump lords over. Of the ten the one that could be dicey for Ramaswamy is “God is real.” One might ask him which god? Is it the Hindu kind that he might believe in or the Judeo-Christian kind that the base believes in. He has kept it tantalizingly open.
To leave no ambiguity about his effusive admiration for the former president, he described Trump as the “best president of the 21st century” during the first primary debate. It was a manifestly dubious claim but had the virtue of Vivekian certitude. Notwithstanding that embarrassingly sanguine praise, media reports said ten percent of Republicans say they would vote for Ramaswamy instead of Trump.
Half the battle for Ramaswamy within the Republican universe seems to be won by his sheer lack of stage compunctions or inhibitions. He is remarkably at home on any stage. That gives him the kind of traction that no other candidates with the exception of Trump enjoys. Contrast that with Florida Governor Ron DeSantis who is so studiedly humdrum and even boring despite his aggressive far-right ideas.
Ramaswamy’s Indian American rival, former North Carolina Governor and U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley may have cut him to size during the debate over his near absent foreign policy comprehension but she still remains somewhat stagnant. “You have no foreign policy experience and it shows,” she told Ramaswamy pointedly and drew a lot of applause.
Ramaswamy’s debate performance, which many thought won the night, seemed to stem from his belief that he is the one to beat in the Republican presidential sweepstakes.
A biotech entrepreneur, who has made a fortune reputedly running into a billion dollars, has all the trimmings of self-assurance that comes with that kind of wealth. It is particularly celebrated within the Republican universe where one popular question has been “If you are successful, how come you are not rich?” Ramaswamy’s appears to have answered that with a billion dollars. That certainly earns him unbridled admiration in his world.
Forbes magazine’s John Hyatt wrote on August 21, “The whip-smart Republican made a pile of money in finance and biotech, enough to turn himself into one of the richest thirty-somethings in America. Unlike Donald Trump, he’s entirely self-made.”
Former New Jersey Governor and presidential candidate Chris Christie had a hilarious putdown when he said of Ramaswamy during the August 23 debate in Milwaukee, “I’ve had enough already tonight of a guy who sounds like ChatGPT standing up here.” That did not seem to dent his prospect at all.
One of Ramaswamy’s many criticisms has been that a lot of what he says on issues may sound “whip-smart” at first brush but is often actually just glib adlibbing. So far though none of those criticisms have curbed either his rise or enthusiasm. However, whether the spectacular run continues unabated all the way to the nomination is a big question mark.
