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The Trump Presidency: Taking “Yes” For An Answer
I wanted Ron DeSantis, not Trump, to be our Republican candidate for president. It was simply because his record of achievement as governor of Florida was everything that conservatives had been begging for in a leader for decades. And presumably, it would transfer to a presidency as well. But it didn’t happen, and before DeSantis wisely dropped out early, Trump said things about him that made me so mad I couldn’t see straight.
So, when DeSantis bowed out, my reaction quite naturally was . . . what? To go away mad and become a never-Trumper? To rage against the conservatives I perceived as fools for not supporting the right guy? To move to DeSantis’ Florida to live free while I watched the rest of the country go to hell, possibly under Trump, but more likely under Biden or whoever replaced him?
No, my support instantaneously switched to Trump. Why? Because the only thing that mattered was stopping the evil that was engulfing us, and if Trump was going to be the one to stand in its way, then so be it. I’m on board.
And glory be, Land o’ Goshen and holy smokes! Trump’s decisive win is the sweetest political victory I’ve ever experienced. I know there will be difficult times ahead and, judging from the past, the guy is going to infuriate me on a regular basis. But right now and so far . . . Damn! Everything I’m seeing and hearing is cause for elation because it appears that one of the main objectives of the new Trump administration is to dismantle DEI at every level throughout the land, which is exactly what DeSantis would have done.
There’s also this thing called the “Trump effect,” and it’s real. Wonderful and unexpected things have been happening as a consequence of his decisive, cheat-proof election. For instance, Democrats have come out and publicly stated that the reason Trump won is because of their party’s loony left, and they’re now calling for it to be reined in. Huh! When have they ever so much as even tangentially broached the subject of backing off of even the fringiest parts of even their most outlandish elements before? If Kamala had won, do you think anybody would be saying such things? No, it would have been full steam ahead with the lunacy, depravity and civilizational destruction at every level.
Meanwhile, over in Qatar, an important Middle Eastern country that contains our largest military base in the region, but which has also allowed Hamas leaders to reside there in luxury while directing terrorist operations against Israel, an amazing thing happened. Qatar told Hamas to get out. Why? The “Trump effect.” Trump is feared and it’s known that he’s on the side of Israel.
Did you hear about the far-left Los Angeles Times editorial board? Even though the owner of the paper is to the left of Satan and refused to endorse Kamala because she wasn’t left-wing enough, he’s dumping his far-left editorial board and throwing around terms like “fair and balanced” (Gasp!) as he promises to hear all American voices equally. This is so fantastical it isn’t even explicable in conventional “Trump effect” terms, but rather seems to emanate from some part of the unseen realm.
And then there are Trump’s personnel choices, some of which are so good that I’ve wondered if I might have fallen through a portal into an alternate universe governed by sanity and common sense. My hands-down favorite is Tom Homan for border czar, replacing the outgoing border czar (you know who), the tenure of which was perhaps the biggest epic fail in history. Homan is the former acting ICE director, is a major hard-ass and is serious as a heart attack. The guy would scare the bejesus out of Tony Soprano and he’s already warned the Mexican cartels that Trump means to wipe them “off the face of the Earth.”
Somebody pinch me, this can’t be real. It’s simply too good! Trump and Homan going after the bad guys, like some kind of juiced-up Starsky and Hutch, kicking ass and taking names. Jan. 20 can’t get here fast enough.
How about RFK, Jr., as head of the Department of Health and Human Services? Let medical freedom reign! But he’s a dangerous, anti-vaxxer conspiracy theorist! Really? Given the 6900% increase in the occurrence of autism since the 1960s, would it be so unreasonable to take a tiny little peak behind the curtain at the vaccine industry, which for many decades has been riding an unassailable gravy train of profits without any particular scrutiny to speak of?
Big Pharma heads are exploding as we speak, and that’s a beautiful thing. These soulless bastards wanted to get a needle of a dangerous experimental shot into the arms of every man, woman, and child on the face of the Earth during the COVID reign of terror and didn’t give a damn who was injured or who lived or died. Nuremberg-like trials may be too much to hope for, but some kind of reckoning could now be in the offing. And maybe, if we’re lucky, the hitherto unchecked vaccine-industrial complex can be brought into some semblance of restraint and accountability.
Here’s something: Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy are going to lead the “Department of Government Efficiency.” Is this a joke? I mean, given that this title is the most extreme and hilarious oxymoron ever conceived, it had to be an intentional troll, right? Well, it’s good to have a sense of humor as you lay waste to immeasurable government waste. Remember when Elon fired about 80 percent of Twitter after he bought it? I’m practically drooling at the very thought of mass dismissals from not just useless, but actually destructive, federal bureaucracies whose unchecked authoritarian power seems to perpetuate itself no matter which political party controls the branches of government.
My arm’s starting to get tired from fist-pumping the air.
More potential good news: Pete Hegseth as Secretary of Defense. His major task will be to root wokeism out of our military, restore it to its real mission and make it feared again. But Hollywood actor, Wendell Pierce, who is black, said that Hegseth “is the epitome of white privilege.” Really? Hegseth repeatedly risked his white ass in combat for this ingrate’s ass of color. Shut up about white privilege already. None of the people who drone on about it are going to be leaving America to go to a non-white majority country. There is every indication that a significant part of Making America Great Again will be to delegitimize (or “cancel,” if you will) this kind of rampant public expression of woke white hate; and it can’t happen soon enough.
And then there’s the trans lunacy, which has been promoted by every institution in the country, including the fallen American medical establishment. In a public statement, Trump had something to say about it: “My Department of Education will inform states and school districts that if any teacher or school official suggests to a child that they could be trapped in the wrong body they will be faced with severe consequences . . .” And it goes on from there, gloriously. In addition to his decisive election, hearing those righteous words out of Trump’s mouth is helping to overwhelm my former skepticism about his life having been saved by divine intervention.
Anybody getting tired of winning yet? But let’s not get too giddy, because Trump isn’t even in office yet, and given the recent attempts on his life . . . Let’s just say I’d like to see him stay out of public sight for a while, and if he must go somewhere, that he travel in the equivalent of a popemobile.
Also, while we may be excited about some of his cabinet appointments simply because they seem appropriately disruptive, we have no idea how successful they’ll be, or even if some of these people are capable of running large organizations without prior experience.
But the alternative — Kamala! — is unthinkable, so for now, I’m not coming down from cloud nine until reality drags me kicking and screaming.
Published in General
What I’m really enjoying is all the names I am not hearing. All the “experts” on all subjects have evaporated. Maybe I will never hear those names again.
Greg,
This is why we have the Trump Dance. It uses a different set of muscles.
What we do is, we alternate between the two.
DING-DING-DING! That’s my politics in a nutshell: Whatever – and whoever – it takes to defeat the Democrats!
I like it. Here goes!
I can’t like this post enough. It’s exactly what I feel, and what I experienced, and what I want. Bravo.
What makes me smile the most is the difference between 2024 and 2016. Back then, McConnell was talking about how Trump didn’t understand how things got done and would have to back off on some of his priorities. This was before Trump was even officially in office. The rest of the GOPe offered no support for Trump. Now, when McConnell shot his mouth off, he was immediately slapped down by Rick Scott and a few others. What a change!
Greg, I wonder, do you still really think DeSantis would have been BETTER?
If so, based on what?
Do you think DeSantis would have picked Homan?
c’mon.
I have always wanted to get whatever inside scoop General Flynn had. Since whatever threat he represented was right at the beginning of Trump’s first term and Flynn was going to be in a key position relative to intelligence perhaps we already know now much of what would have been revealed with him in the White House.
Trump needs to figure out how to change the handling of the information security process so that it is not used to cover up nefarious actions and used as a hammer against whistleblowers.
I didn’t say I still think DeSantis would have been better. I thought so back early in the primary because, as I said, of his stellar performance in Florida, which is the best I’ve seen of a conservative leader in decades. The other part of my calculation, which I didn’t mention in this article, was the enormous downsides of Trump, which, briefly, are: his uniquely hated personality; his near universal support of useless RINO’s in Congress; his support of “criminal justice reform,” the premise of which was there are too many people of color in jail, so stop sending them there; his failure to do anything to stop the George Floyd riots, which went on for weeks in some places; handing the country over to Fauci and doing Operation Warp Speed, which injured and even killed who knows how many. And I could go on.
The whole point of this post, though, is that I’m happy and a big part of that is because Trump so far has cut the clown-show act so typical at his rallies and instead has sounded serious, even “DeSantean,” if I can make up a word.
Would DeSantis have picked Homan? I don’t know, but I can’t think of any particular reason why not.
I was with you most of the way, but you lost me with RFK Jr. This is a guy who is anti-Second Amendment, pro-abortion, a climate extremism activist who has stated that “climate deniers” should be jailed. His personal life is disgusting – this is not a man with a shred of integrity.
Those are fair points, but he may have helped Trump get elected so it’s not surprising that Trump would reward him with something. And I can’t think of a better job to give RFK since we all want the medical tyranny and corruption to be dealt with.
Really? I think Trump could have made up a commission or something for him to serve on, if he wanted to reward him (which I totally understand). The guy is a creep. And I don’t want someone who is pro-abortion in control of the department which will be in control of abortion data.
I don’t know if you’ve noticed or not, but Trump is not all that anti-abortion himself. He has opposed heartbeat bills so he thinks abortion should be legal up until some developmental point.
For the time being , at least, I’m comforted by the fact that the only thing he will control about abortion is data.
Yes, he’s dumped his pro-life base. I get that he doesn’t have any objection to RFK Jr. on that front. But I do, and presumably there are Senators who might feel the same.
My prediction is that Gaetz does not get confirmed, and RFK Jr. does. Unfortunately these two – and Tulsi Gabbard, to a lesser extent – end up muddying the waters and driving the news. Trump really has some excellent picks, but no one is paying a lot of attention to them because of his nominating these stinkers.
FWIW: https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2024/11/rino-lindsey-graham-shocks-gop-throws-full-support/
What a fun read , great post Greg !
They were on their own the moment SCOTUS ruled and rightly so. Trump got elected in part by speaking to and for a middle ground. If anti-abortionists can’t persuade their various legislators, that’s not on Trump.
One theory is that Trump owes RFK Jr, so can’t just pat him on the head and tell him to go back home to his tinfoil hat. So he’s giving RFK Jr a job that will stroke his ego and also put him well above his level of competence, where he will fail quickly and loudly. Then he can be put to one side where nobody needs to be bothered by him. And maybe he will do something useful before he fails, like call attention to some issues that need it.
The main problem with a plan like that is it’s hard to predict who and what RFK Jr will take down with him. Could be dangerous.
I suspect that RFK Jr. had enough leverage and smarts to negotiate a bigger seat at the table. I’m not one who thinks Trump can do no wrong, and this particular appointment worries me, but I can see why Trump might make concessions to secure the election. It’s a better worry to have than Harris being president.
Yes. Trump is Pro Abortion. Are we now all required to be lock step Pro Abortion to be good conservatives and republicans?
I’m not sure that’s true. I’m working just from memory here, but I recall his rather strident rhetoric in the 2016 race on the subject of abortion. He was very much against it. A person who feels that strongly doesn’t change his or her mind. He may view it differently as a political issue, but as a personal moral issue, he is against it.
Amen, Bro! Too many people take their ball and run home crying when they don’t get their way . . .
Well, I can’t argue with that.
I don’t see why that would be expected.
‘ … so much as even tangentially broached the subject of backing off of even the fringiest parts of even their most outlandish elements before? ‘
This has always amazed me about the lock step Dems and Media. They can defend a stranger starting a child on the sex change treadmill without the parent knowledge.