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Ulysses S … Trump?
General George McClellan was beloved by his troops. McClellan returned the affection, earning a reputation as a well organized and meticulous commander. Giving credit where due, McClellan turned the Army of the Potomac into a cohesive unit and kept it together, even in the face of defeat. He is also credited with fortifying Washington, DC and securing the Union frontier, all through his skills in logistics. But after some early victories, defeats became all too common. It is a common theme of biographies of McClellan that, when it came to actual battle, the general was overly cautious, unable (or unwilling) to gamble, and failed to take advantage of Confederate mistakes that might have turned stalemates into victories, or victories into routs. According to some, McClellan consistently overestimated his opponents’ strength and, thus, refused to advance or attack for fear of losing. Lincoln came to distrust the general and, when sufficiently frustrated with McClellan’s hesitations and caution, fired him.
The Army of the Potomac then went through a series of generals (Burnside, Meade, Hooker), all of whom were blamed for similar failures of leadership, chiefly the inability or unwillingness to advance against the Confederacy. Then came Ulysses Grant. In the western states, Grant had fought hard against the Confederacy. Unlike the other generals, he was willing to risk casualties to achieve strategic advantages and would try unproven tactics if he thought some advantage could be gained. With the full aid of superior Union industry and a far larger Union population — advantages his predecessors shared but failed to exploit — he was relentless in his advances, racking up casualty numbers that earned him criticism as a butcher of his own troops. But he won battles.
The years since 2008 have reminded me greatly of our Civil War. The Obama administration has effectively declared a cultural war on middle America through an expanded regulatory state, lawsuits in retribution of political appointments, collaboration with far-left activist groups, the stirring-up of racial animosities, attacks on religious institutions, the opening of borders, assaults on the Second Amendment and the attempts to gut the First Amendment, and scores of petty and vindictive skirmishes against small businesses, churches, and private citizens. Our president has pitted half of America against the rest, claiming — like some restless dictator — that his advances and occupations are really defensive in nature, while wielding powers no prior president would have dared try.
We scored a few victories in return, regaining first the House and, later, the Senate as well. We won many lower court victories, but the battles that counted at the Supreme Court have frequently been lost. As for our generals in the cultural war, John Boehner and Senator Mitch McConnell deserve more credit than they are generally given. They returned the House and Senate to our side and Regular Order. They stopped the relentless legislative push to enshrine and secure the regulatory victories claimed by Obama. They built a defensive works that, while not impenetrable, have held true against many of the worst excesses of Obama’s agenda.
Yet — like McClellan before them — they’ve held party unity and discipline remarkably solid, but have secured few offensive victories and rarely exploited the enemies’ vulnerabilities. “We need more troops! We need more Congressmen and Senators!” they’ve pled, without ever breaking camp.
Mitt Romney, too, failed to make a solid case for himself or to sufficiently attack Obama; such, it seemed, would have involved getting his hands too dirty. He waved the flag and paraded the troops, but led a tepid campaign that seemed more hopeful of victory through Obama’s mistakes than his own aggression.
So now we come to the campaign season again, and we have a general (for those who would follow him) who could well cause enormous casualties for our side. “And yet he fights,” as Lincoln said of Grant. His principles are uncertain, and his tactics are unconventional, hearkening back to an America well-nigh forgotten. And yet he fights. He won the Republican primaries, out-maneuvering the party princelings and upstarts, turning them against each other. Those within his party who were most dismissive of his abilities when this began are now those most opposed to his victories and, unsurprisingly, most convinced of his inevitable failure. Many — like McClellan running for president after his termination — are now threatening to oppose the one who succeeded where they all failed.
The worst damage Obama has done to this republic has been to our national unity and, though it, support for the rule of law. No president since Lincoln has been so utterly divisive, and no president has ever so actively pursued division. No previous president has so openly sought to curtail the First Amendment without even attempting to disguise the attacks as “temporary” or “expedient.” Obama has launched and led a cultural war on America, the likes of which has only been seen writ in larger scale in major revolutions in France, Russia, or China. Hillary shows every indication that she will continue this war. Love him or hate him, only Trump is openly fighting them.
Yes, the man is morally distasteful. Yes, the man is corrupt. Yes, he may well butcher the down-ticket races in this election. And yet he fights, and for the sake of wrenching the presidency from the cultural Marxists, we should not fear a bloody battle. With the head of this cultural war firmly entrenched in Washington, with an uncertain and timid Congress unable or unwilling to attack the executive overreach, and with the courts having deferred the very law of the land to the whims of the cultural warlords, we must remove the Democrats from their power base. We must remove their hands from the levers of control. We must break their stranglehold on the media and the dissemination of information. After four or eight more years, the damage may be insurmountable, and the losses unrecoverable.
Trump may be the most reprehensible and amoral candidate the GOP has ever fielded, yet he is the general we have. And at least he is fighting.
Published in Politics
Yes there are. Rachel Lu’s is only the latest.
Our previous internal polls have shown that Trump supporters are in the minority on Ricochet. They are, however, a very vocal minority, writing plenty of OPs and comments. And since Trump looks like the nominee now, it’s not surprising that there are more posts up about supporting him. Also keep in mind not everything written to try to understand Trump’s support in a non-hostile light need be written by Trump supporters.
Take it a bit easier, Mr. Ledoux. It’s not what you make it sound like. In one very important sense, Skip’s comparison is dead serious: He’s not asking about your commitment or virtues or achievements, here, but about your status. It’s not who the most respectable or effective soldier was–but about a fighting general.
I agree that Mr. Trump does not seem interested to be the general of the troops–I believe Skip is wrong to think of it this way. But his new success is all about his having managed to achieve authority comparable to that of a general–he’s the presumptive nominee of one of the two national parties.
Yes, comparing the men is silly. But I think the phenomenon, the seemingly common reaction of those following each had/have to his fighting nature, is an interesting comparison.
Now I want to see the Hillary-McClellan comparison.
The problem is that he fights, but mostly for leftism.
I agree with this criticism. It’s not that he’s not one of us, when it comes to how we think about America or politics. It’s that he doesn’t want what we want & he doesn’t seem to care.
One difference between running an army & a political coalition is, there are no court martials or summary executions in the latter case. A politician needs to make persuasive gestures to the parts of his coalition to whom he is most alien to the effect that living together is possible. Mr. Trump seems to have persuaded a lot of angry people that these are days of rage. But those Americans who are not persuaded will not hear anything that might show them how they, too, can get along with this campaign & presidency. It seems like a tactical mistake to me, to say the least-
This is the most uncharitable reading of Trump possible, Merina.
On healthcare, he’s said something about buying insurance policies for everyone who can’t afford them. I wish with all my heart that’s what had happened instead of Obamacare. It would have saved this country and all of us already with insurance a ton of money and grief. The health industry is rapidly becoming a government utility. There are no good solutions, only worse ones.
He’s right about the bathrooms. It shouldn’t be a federal issue.
Maybe he “doesn’t care about the social issues,” but Hillary does. Passionately. And all in opposition to where you and I stand, without any compunction about violating our rights of conscience.
There are worse choices than Donald Trump.
I just want to thank you, Skip, for expending your social capital in this way. I think you’ve established yourself as a fair-minded, stand-up guy of intelligence and integrity, and you didn’t have to do this.
“Courage is the first virtue that makes all other virtues possible.” — Aristotle
I salute you.
Q: Do you know the difference between #NeverTrump and #ReluctantlyHillary?
A: Me neither
That part about the local police and veterans cheering Trump saddens me more than a bit. It shows that people have been wanting this kind of leadership and fighting spirit for a long time. There is a pent-up anger and finally someone is taking up the mantle. What saddens me is that good men and women have neglected or shrunk from this task. Now it has been taken up by a man who shows no depth of conviction or evidence of courage. It has been taken up by a man who seems to wield it heedlessly, crassly and probably even cynically. What happens when he lets them down. What happens when this righteous anger gets led astray by a pied piper on a children’s crusade? This anger will be spent for the moment…perhaps to be replaced with despair and retreat.
The moment will be lost because it was squandered on a con man.
In my case, you’re sort of breaking my heart, Skip, but the lady’s right that it takes guts, & that’s why I’m coming along for the ride-
Couldn’t agree more.
Couldn’t agree less. Who were those 16 vanquished by Trump but “non-shrinkers” who were disbelieved and discarded?
Actually it was charitable to say he doesn’t care about social issues. I think he supports the other side but won’t admit it right now. He is just a leftist without having thought any of it through. I think Amy Schley has the right take–Trump says to the left that conservatives are what they’ve said we are all along. If he wins, there is no hope that we will ever regain conservatism except with a new party. If the GOP can still ever be a conservative party, Trump cannot head it. Maybe it is time for the party to die, but I think it can be revived if Trump is not elected. Hillary is bad, no question, but she is better in some areas than Trump and she doesn’t risk killing conservatism but would instead strengthen it because she is certain to be a horrible, unpopular president. I will give him this– he has forced the party to have a conversation, and that is good, except that without him we would very likely have have had an actual conservative at the helm. And the sniping at each other is bad.
Fighting for what? To what ends? Victory over whom?
Now–now–they were mostly really bad candidates! Some of them would not do by any stretch of the imagination…
I actually agree with Derek’s point. I think we finally had some really good choices. That’s another part of what saddens me about Trump…I thought the moment for a true conservative had come. I was more referring to the general cautiousness and lack of courage that preceded this as described by the OP.
This makes me even more worried. I don’t think Trump is a friend of the Constitution, and if he is able depend on the loyalty of law enforcement and the military that only makes it more likely that he will be able to govern extra-Constitutionally.
Easy-
It would be ironic if the “black helicopter” Alex Jones types that are supporting Trump help deliver their own nightmare.
Well, I’m sure we’re going to keep complaining about the people who ran for office in 2016 a long time. I don’t mind doing it again & again as yet. It seems Mr. Trump alone had national appeal. The others could neither stop him together nor learn from his appeal to confront & defeat him. I tend to think voters get the kind of candidate they prefer & this was an especially varied offering…
Oh, but I forgot. Trump is not a “globalist”.
What a slander. America’s history shows the military and civil police to be infinitely more reliable in following the Constitution than the political class have shown themselves.
Folks, thanks to all of you for chiming in and keeping it relatively civil – feelings over Trump tend to run either hot or cold, leaving little room in the middle. I cannot respond to all of the comments thus far as I am actually having to work today, so I’m just chiming in while finishing my lunch.
I’d like to address some of the points raised thus far, though:
Note:
Misquoting fixed.Usually, I’m Ricochet’s most reliable slanderer. I stay up nights to meet my quota. But that one is not mine. I’m not blaming you–you were kind & did your best. But I’m too honest about my slandering work-ethic to take credit for other people’s work.
But not too honest to try to dim their brilliance. I don’t think the guy’s suggesting in any way that you’re wrong. He’s only worried about what might change in the future, if these people are faced constantly with abuse.
I agree that the man has it wrong, the men in law-enforcement are first & foremost Americans, not the extras in a liberal weirdo’s political thriller. But he did not mean to slander men as to their record or their present conduct.
The one possible Trump promise that is really at the forefront is that he will greatly disturb the status quo; Regardless, the outcome of our elections for the last several decades has been the consolidation of power has been in the hands of a leftward leaning elite, whether Republican or Democrat.
Trump does not appear to be an “in” guy, and promises to disrupt that status quo. A four or eight year interruption in what amounts to a class-based-cabal.
Neither GOP victory nor Hillary defeat can deliver on that promise. It is the gift that only a Grant can bring to a Lincoln.
This guy for President, he fights!!
3. There is no one else left. The Republican field is wiped out. It is gone. Your own favorite general may have departed the field (mine certainly did long ago). If you believe, as I stated in the OP, that Hillary would be worse than Trump, even if all else were equal (and all else is far from equal with the servitude of the press and the abandonment of firm principle by the courts), and that you believe 4 or 8 years of Hillary would only consolidate the incredible damage done thus far, while providing a firm base from which to launch yet more degradations on our society, then you are left only with Trump or a Hail-Mary 3rd party run. If you think Hillary would be survivable, or at least less awful than Trump, vote Hillary and be done with it.
4. “But he is unprincipled and would destroy the Constitution!” – Too late for that, I am afraid. The Democratic Party has already declared the Constitution effectively null and void, else they would not seek to subvert it, ban it, or avoid it at every turn. And quite frankly none of us really know what Trump would do, while we do know exactly what Hillary would do – she is campaigning on 4 more years of the same rule, an extension of the unconstitutional rule of Obama. Obama would not be where he is today if Americans had not wanted him there – they no longer want the Constitution.
Really? REALLY? Mostly really bad. Let’s assume, arguendo, that you’re asserting the system that gave us “The Primary 16” is worth blowing up? And doesn’t that still bring us back to Trump?
Skip, I was with you until 4. If it turns out my faith in the American Constitution is fanaticism, I’m ok with that, too…
Even if they were good people (and, with a few exceptions *Kasich, cough cough, Christie*Ahem* they were), they did not campaign well enough. They failed to take Trump seriously, and they paid for that blindness.
Secondly, where has Titus suggested blowing up the primary system?
No, I think there was nothing necessary about Mr. Trump’s rise. This is not an historical moment; it’s just a combination of bad luck, bad politics, & intrinsic constitutional weaknesses. It could have happened before; it might happen again later with somewhat similar circumstances. Or the people might prevent it.
I think the GOP puts forth pretty bad candidates-that as a party, it’s not really good at winning presidential elections & it’s not changing, either people with the know-how or the people with the principles or feistiness. The GOP was similar in the 1930s & its weaknesses after the New Deal lasted nearly two generations. Not unheard of–but it does not really require blowing up the system. The changes should come from the people who want them–if they do want them, as I do, realizing that all these prize roosters did not manage between them to fight off Mr. Trump-