Freud called it the id.
The id wants what it wants, and it wants it now. It has no patience for restraint, no interest in lectures, and precious little use for the word “no.” Politics has an id too, and the parties understand it well, even when they pretend otherwise.
Democrats have made that appetite into a political vocabulary. Their coalition holds socialists, progressives, activists, and anyone else who sees government as an instrument for remaking American life. The ideological differences can wait. First, collect the votes.
Then comes the pitch.
Free health care. Free child care. Free college. Debt forgiveness. Housing assistance. Food assistance. The list changes with the election; the appeal doesn’t. There is something you want, and we will find a way to make somebody else pay for it.
None of it is free, of course. Somebody always receives the bill, whether it lands on the taxpayer, the consumer, or the next generation. But that isn’t what the voter hears when a politician says “free.” The voter hears exactly what the word says: Free.
So when Donald Trump floats a $5,000 payment to Americans if Republicans hold Congress, we’re suddenly meant to discover something morally suspect about offering voters what they want.