What's this got to do with Donald Trump?
Donald Trump has basically been in the news for months, pretty much every time he opens his mouth and comes up with a new policy pronouncement, from building a wall along the Mexican border, deporting all the illegal aliens, to barring all Muslims from entering the United States.
Much has been made of late in the media trying to explain Trump's appeal and his seeming inability to lose support despite the nature of his statements so greatly violating many American political shibboleths. My sense is that it's less the specific appeal of his so-called plans (border wall, excluding Muslims) than it is a desire to embrace anything other than the conventional policies of either party.
And this is where the uncanny valley comes into play. Donald Trump is kind of the Robby the Robot of politics and the policies of the establishment (on both sides of the aisle) are deep into the uncanny valley. Trump isn't anything like reasonable (or human, to follow the metaphor) but the policies of the establishment are so crafted, so delicate and so reliant on their own internal logic that the harder they try to make them "more human" the less real they become.
On the issues Trump has highlighted -- specifically immigration and terrorism -- the establishment has held positions that really defy common sense readings and which they have worked really hard to suppress dissent and questioning.
Take immigration, for example. The business right holds that immigration is good for the economy. It represents needed labor for jobs "Americans won't do" and they have legions of free-trade economists who step in and claim everyone benefits from the economic growth these new immigrants provide. The left mostly echoes these broad-brush economic benefits while also claiming a kind of humanitarian mission to accept "your tired, your hungry, &c.".
Both left and right have decried opposition to immigration, the left most vociferously criticizing opposition as representing a kind of racial bigotry against immigrants who are most usually non-white. The right is more prone to echoing more technical economic arguments that claim opponents are against free trade or advancing American business.
Neither side of the establishment coin brooks any dissension on these issues and neither seems to address any of the obvious criticisms. Basic, high-school economics suggests that flooding a market with a commodity -- in this case, labor -- tends to push down the price of that commodity. So ordinary Americans might reasonably ask "Doesn't this mean I'm likely to get replaced in my job or not get a raise because there is an immigrant who will work for less?" "What does a flood of people who don't speak English mean for my schools?" "Will these mostly poor people be needing government assistance and what does this mean for my taxes?"
By and large, Americans are being told the policies are real, legitimate, good for them, etc, but they can't quite accept them as real -- the more they are explained, justified, rationalized, the more these policies sink into the uncanny valley and the more suspicious Americans are of both the policy and the establishment that promotes them.
And this is where Trump -- as unreal as he is -- steps in, and despite his lack of polish and lack of resemblance to a normal politician, he is more relateable and familiar even if his specific policies seem extreme or bizarre. Trump is outside the uncanny valley.
