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My Rational Case for Conservatives to Vote for Trump
Donald Trump was near the bottom of my candidate choices during the primaries. I was among those who thought that his intemperate remarks would spell the end of his campaign, but they did not. That his campaign consisted of a few slogans rather than policies disturbed me. As someone who follows the Kremlin’s perfidy closely, Trump’s offhand praise of Putin was more than disturbing and elicited warnings from me. As a committed small-government conservative, I worry that Trump’s instincts do not mirror my own. In a word, I am an unlikely Trump voter, but come November I will pull the Trump lever without hesitation. I consider my reasons rational and want to share them with Ricochet.
First, there is no doubt that a Clinton regime will nominate Supreme Court justices who meet the demands of her extreme left-wing base. With a Supreme Court dominated by proponents of a living constitution, the protections of the Bill of Rights and the final check on an out-of-control executive will be lost — and lost for decades.
Second, although Trump is a high variance candidate, we know that Hillary Clinton is dishonest, a known liar and, through the email scandal and the Clinton Foundation’s wheeling and dealing, she places personal interests above national interests. If Putin has her emails, we could have a President subject to Kremlin blackmail. Trump may have blemishes in his background, but none compare to Hillary. Were she anyone other than a Clinton, she would be under criminal indictment.
Third, Trump’s foreign policy cannot be worse than Hillary’s failed years as Secretary of State. He has stated clearly that his foreign policy will be dictated by the national interest, not by the Obama-Clinton “citizen of the world” approach.
Fourth, Trump is correct in promising to solve the free-rider problem with America’s allies. If NATO countries are not willing to contribute their fair share to the common transatlantic alliance, they should suffer the consequences. Hopefully, Trump will allow for a designated transition period to give NATO members time to contribute their share.
Fifth, Trump has tapped into mainstream America’s disenchantment with Washington’s domination by special interests. The American people understand our national politics are broken and that both sides of the aisle are complicit. The people understand the problem is not a lack of cooperation but of corruption. A Clinton administration would mean even more of a broken Washington. Trump will have to battle the odds, including many in his own party, to make the basic changes in Washington that the working people of America want.
Sixth, economists of virtually all persuasions, including myself, favor free trade. Thus my initial reaction to Trump’s attack on trade (much of which had the wrong target such as exchange rates) was negative. However, one needs only to read the business-page headlines (such as China’s deplorable treatment of Apple and the banning of American chicken) to see that Trump’s call for fair trade is not without merit. We do perhaps need better negotiators to achieve fair trade, and Trump might actually improve free trade in the end.
Seventh, if a nation does not have control of its borders, it is no longer a nation. Nations must determine who they wish to enter the country for work and eventual citizenship. Most wealthy countries, like the US and those in Europe, need immigrants for their labor force and economic growth, but the choice of whom to admit should be determined by sensible rules, such as admitting very large numbers of highly skilled workers and entrepreneurs. Who gets into the United States should not be determined by unguarded borders, human traffickers, and family relations. America’s high school dropouts understand what Washington does not. Open borders drive down their earnings. We know that Hillary would not pursue a “rational” approach. Trump has promised he will.
Eighth, Trump has street-fighter instincts that the Republicans’ last two presidential candidates lacked. John McCain refused to go after Rev. Wright and Bill Ayers, and Mitt Romney insisted on playing the role of gentleman candidate. The Democrats can only be beaten by a candidate who is able to outpunch them. It is important that Trump’s attacks not be sui generis, but should focus on specific weaknesses, like Hillary’s sullied history and her failure as Secretary of State.
Ninth, Trump has launched an effective campaign against political correctness and has provided the Republican Party with a model for dealing with media bias. Instead of tip-toeing around political correctness and a biased media, Trump has shown how to attack dead on. His success in this area could neutralize the Democratic Party’s ability to control the language and semantics of political campaigns for years to come.
My reservations about Trump include:
First, he has not demonstrated an ability to run a viable general-election campaign. To do so, he must focus on the opposition and not on fellow Republicans.
Second, I do not know the depth of his anti-government, strict constitutionalist convictions.
Third, he must demonstrate that he is willing to do the study and work which is required to be a viable national candidate.
But my Trump reservations are minor relative to the alternative. Rational voters have no choice but to look at the alternative. On this, Trump wins hands down.
This essay reflects the views of the author and is not reflective of the views of the Hoover Institution or the University of Houston.
Published in General
Even now that the race is down to Clinton and Trump?
National security is the sine qua non of issues. If we don’t get that right, nothing else is really going to matter.
Make up your mind who you think will be better [however you define better] for our national security: Clinton or Trump. Then vote that way.
Imagine yourself waking up to this in the news every day for 8 years:
[There have been plenty of hideous pix of Trump on the Main Feed this year, thought it was about time for a little reminder of the alternative]
Yes, I did yesterday and as usual the flag is ignored. James of England, a moderator, has identified the comment and he has a direct line to editors.
I refuse to believe that the comment has remained on the Main Feed where guests can see it and the editors are completely unaware of it.
I don’t think it is conspiracy theory based on the performance.
The OP doesn’t denigrate Trump for being alive thus the comments become a free fire zone to insult the author for not toeing the Ricochet line.
If this was a post about Paul Ryan or Marco Rubio and a member put up the same comment BThompson did it would be instantly redacted and the member threatened with at minimum a suspension if it wasn’t implemented immediately.
Hasn’t the past month disproven this?
He should be running circles around Hillary right now over Orlando, the broken policies of the current administration that lead to it, the weaker jobs report, and the outright declaration of the State Department that basically said that she broke the law. Anyone with competent street-fighter instincts should have beaten Hillary to a pulp given all of that.
Instead, Trump has been talking about “Mexican” judges, trying to get the NRA to surrender on the very thing that they endorsed him for, and generally distracting from the Democrats’ blunders with his internal campaign drama. Now the Democrats are in total control of the narrative, and instead of trying to get it back, Trump is now talking about Corey Lewandowski. Who, for some reason, needed to be fired on Monday at noon so it could bury the Orwellian nonsense of the Orlando 911 transcripts.
For a street-fighter, he’s not exactly putting much effort into fighting.
I wouldn’t consider that a hideous pic. You may be letting your knowledge of the individual taint what you see. She looks rather presidential there. Or is that what you wanted?
No, I think someone needs audio at least, and perhaps video, to get a true flavor of this candidate.
Great post.
i can’t believe it’s so hard to convince people.
Look what our Divine Ruler has done:
Lo, he abolisheth gender: male and female UNcreated he them.
And yea, verily, he proclaimeth that Allah and Yahweh are one and the same; Christian and Jew, we’ve been worshipping the Muslim deity all along!
Though Clinton walk through the valley of the shadow of indictment, she need fear no evil, for HE is “with her”.
Is that who we on Ricochet are?
Not all, but yes, a good many.
You’re right. Let’s see some pics of her looking wild-eyed, grimacing, red faced! Like every single still we’ve seen of Trump.
No, sadly, in this pic she just looks: old.
For a woman, that is unforgivable.
This is very unconvincing. On many levels and I afraid the author of the OP needs more hesitation in his life.
First the strongest argument. First, there is no doubt that a Clinton regime will nominate Supreme Court justices who meet the demands of her extreme left-wing base. With a Supreme Court dominated by proponents of a living constitution, the protections of the Bill of Rights and the final check on an out-of-control executive will be lost — and lost for decades.
Yes Clinton will be some what worse then Trump and Trump will almost certainly give a first good pick but he has all but said that he will trade future Supreme Court picks down the line for what he wants. He does not recognize the Supreme Court as being important to him. If Trump loses we must focus on our efforts not on keeping the Supreme Court all powerful but returning the court to its proper role. We lose that chance once Trump starts nominating the future Warrens and Blackmuns.
Next: If Putin has her emails, we could have a President subject to Kremlin blackmail. Trump may have blemishes in his background, but none compare to Hillary. Were she anyone other than a Clinton, she would be under criminal indictment.
Well this is backhanded praise for Clinton. At least Putin would have to black mail her. There would be no need to do that for Trump. Trump and Putin I am afraid would agree on too much and Putin is saavy enough to make Trump look good, tough and strong while giving Putin everything he wants.
Next: Third, Trump’s foreign policy cannot be worse than Hillary’s failed years as Secretary of State.
It absolutely can be worse. This simply a failure of imagination on Mr. Gregory’s part. We don’t have a lot of reason to think it would be any better but it could definitely be worse.
And if not?
If not, it’s like yesterday, when in response to disapproval of their public, the Omega admin decided to UN-redact Omar Ka-Blam’s 911 tape.
It’s your credibility Tom, not mine.
That’s basically where I’m at with this. I’ve been an independent for a long time now and it’s simply not my fault that the Republican primary voters decided to go with this strange hybrid of Don Rickles mixed with Marine Le Pen.
I’ve voted for your mediocre Presidential candidates all of my life. You guys finally rallied as a team and found a candidate that even I can’t rationalize voting for this time.
The fact that we spend so much energy here on Ricochet still debating the GOP primary election might be one of those early clues if this next election cycle turns out to be a Democratic romp.
The recent FEC filings might be another clue. He’s getting creamed by the Democrats on the money end of things. I thought one of the whole premises of his campaign was that he was going to hire the classiest and luxurious advisors to work on this stuff.
Fine job, Tom.
To continue from #38:
Next: He has stated clearly that his foreign policy will be dictated by the national interest, not by the Obama-Clinton “citizen of the world” approach.
I would like someone to tell me why these two words “national interest” seem so special to them. Obama acts in the “national interest” all the time, as he defines it. Trump sees the national interest through a prism of what he thinks benefits himself. He does not see the national interest the way that you do. Him saying he will act in the national interest is just saying that he will do whatever he thinks is best at all times. Which would mean that you trust Trump’s moral and political judgements in the foreign policy area. Why would anyone trust Trump in all that? He doesn’t even know very much about foreign policy or even the stakes at play in his decisions. His judgement is uninformed. He may be a great negotiator but if he does not understand the end goal nor the importance of what he is negotiating away he can’t come to a good deal. It is not possible. The best negotiator in the world without the right goal and without knowledge of the the real stakes will never, ever strike a good deal.
Next: Trump is correct in promising to solve the free-rider problem with America’s allies. If NATO countries are not willing to contribute their fair share to the common transatlantic alliance, they should suffer the consequences. Hopefully, Trump will allow for a designated transition period to give NATO members time to contribute their share.
The time will be close to zero as almost every NATO member is increasing defense spending and the number of nations meeting their targets for defense spending has increased from 2 to 5 members. This problem is already being resolved and resolved naturally. This is like the foreign aid problem that cutting foreign aid will reduce the deficit when foreign aid is a very small part of our budget.
Next: . A Clinton administration would mean even more of a broken Washington. Trump will have to battle the odds, including many in his own party, to make the basic changes in Washington that the working people of America want.
What are these changes to how Washington works and when has Trump committed to making any of these “changes”? How firm has his commits been? People think that this corrupt, crony capitalist will get to Washington and suddenly make people honest? How in what shape or form? Trump will do no such thing. At best he will seek to triangulate his way to success like Bill Clinton before him and since he cares nothing about Conservative principles his triangulation will only win us the most modest of gains and then only as an after thought.
Indeed it is.
One of the candidates is manifestly unstable and prone to uncontrolled fits of rage
http://www.breitbart.com/2016-presidential-race/2016/06/20/exclusive-secret-service-agent-book-raging-hillary-clinton-threw-bible-at-agents-colleague/
What’s that the whole argument that we got from Trump and his supporters early in the primary process? We didn’t need to be worried that Trump literally didn’t know what he was talking about when discussing topics such as the nuclear triad because he would hire the classiest and most luxurious advisors and that would make everything awesome.
To continue from #44: However, one needs only to read the business-page headlines (such as China’s deplorable treatment of Apple and the banning of American chicken) to see that Trump’s call for fair trade is not without merit. We do perhaps need better negotiators to achieve fair trade, and Trump might actually improve free trade in the end.
Since Trump does not value free trade but only cares about he appears this is a very, very pollyanna approach to what Trump will achieve. Trump would have to value free trade to improve it. What evidence do we have that he values it?
Next: Who gets into the United States should not be determined by unguarded borders, human traffickers, and family relations. America’s high school dropouts understand what Washington does not. Open borders drive down their earnings. We know that Hillary would not pursue a “rational” approach. Trump has promised he will.
A touch back amnesty is rational? How? Why go through all the effort of deporting everyone just to allow most of them back in? Trump is right in the broad sense on immigration and is superior to Hillary here of course but to say his proposals are rational is not warranted. I think we will essentially get the Gang of 8 bill out of Trump and find it much, much harder to fight it this time because Trump rhetoric has been so extreme. But from his own business practices we can already see that Trumps heart is basically the Gang of 8 bill.
Next: Eighth, Trump has street-fighter instincts that the Republicans’ last two presidential candidates lacked. John McCain refused to go after Rev. Wright and Bill Ayers, and Mitt Romney insisted on playing the role of gentleman candidate. The Democrats can only be beaten by a candidate who is able to outpunch them. It is important that Trump’s attacks not be sui generis, but should focus on specific weaknesses, like Hillary’s sullied history and her failure as Secretary of State.
A street fighter would have punched Hillary hard while she had to fight Bernie Sanders where has Trump been? Punching fine Republican governors and threatening the Republican party and attempting to intimidate Mr. French’s family. What street fighting? What joy have seen from Trump in battle with Clinton since he secured the nomination we have seen no evidence of this. He is always all potential he never gets going on these things.
Or maybe the editors have a backlog of people behaving badly? Having been a publisher, editor, and site moderator, I feel for them. Even in a relatively civilized bastion within the Internet like Ricochet, they have far too much to do.
To continue from #49:
Mr. Gregory writes: First, he has not demonstrated an ability to run a viable general-election campaign. To do so, he must focus on the opposition and not on fellow Republicans.
I am afraid what is happening now is about as good as Trump will get.
Mr. Gregory: Second, I do not know the depth of his anti-government, strict constitutionalist convictions.
The depth is about the size of puddle a small child leaves when drying off after shower. That is about it. I am fairly certain that Trump does not not even know what a “strict constitutionalist conviction” would consist of, except that he knows that the only good conviction is one that benefits Mr. Trump.
Mr. Gregory: Third, he must demonstrate that he is willing to do the study and work which is required to be a viable national candidate.
He will demonstrate no such willingness.
Mr Gregory one last time: But my Trump reservations are minor relative to the alternative. Rational voters have no choice but to look at the alternative. On this, Trump wins hands down.
Trump is a candidate of hope in that we don’t know exactly how bad he will be and Hillary has given us a better preview of her awfulness. But none of your points in Trump’s favor really hold up at all. Trump will be for who is always for Mr. Trump. His over handling of foreign affairs and domestic policy will be a disaster because the only business Trump has ever run is the one about his brand. What is good for Trump’s brand and what is good for America will very rarely reconcile. Trump’s instincts will always be to benefit himself at the expense of the nation. You should do more than hesitate in your desire to vote for him Mr. Gregory.
Well they could kick those people out but apparently there’s this illegal alias problem recently. I expect that is quite annoying.
Painter Jean, respectfully and humbly submitted, this is not a claim that requires conjecture- she was the Secretary of State. There is no “think” or “might” involved when it comes to assessing her foreign policy, er, acumen. She was an unmitigated disaster. Eight years ago your speculation on her performance would have been relevant, 2016 we know the answer, objectively and categorically. Just take a look at the world and observe the measure of her foreign (literally) policy. I think the technical term for the result is: Yikes!
I finally flagged it and it seems to have been quickly redacted. To be fair, it’s entirely possible the editors just didn’t see it overnight.
<smirk> Yea, I think that was it. I actually suspect that if he wins, some good, knowledgeable people will come forward to serve. He might even nominate some of them. What I don’t believe for an instant is that Trump will listen to any of them if they disagree with him.
Really? Because the editors have time to put up OP’s overnight from the European time zone and James of England also highlighted it last night.
Are you saying they like you better than others who may have flagged it?
Bingo. Some of us have long memories of this candidate that make deep roots of aversion. As Epstein said recently (paraphrasing), Trump’s idea that he can scrap all tradition and remain ignorant of the rule of law and the constitution combined with disregard for the informal duties of the office make him ungovernable. I buy that.
I think that’s spot on. Our leviathan federal government has nearly countless numbers of political appointments to fill and I suspect there will be many fine people who will step forward to fill those positions. Fat lot of good that it will do anyone. :)