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Save the Party; Abandon Trump
The reason the United States has not become just another European-style welfare state is that one of our two major parties is officially committed to limiting the growth of government while encouraging the growth of the private sector. Moreover, only the GOP has anything like a faithful approach to the Constitution, and it has appointed judges with a sound view of the Constitution. Republicans often betray these core principles – the list of GOP failures is long – but having core principles has moved the party in the right direction: tax reform, welfare reform, school choice, block grants, and even spending restraint (at least when compared to the Democrats).
Politics is a long game. Notwithstanding all the usual RNC hyperbole about this being the most important election ever – and the apocalyptic visions of a President Clinton – the survival of our republic is not at stake. The survival of the Republican Party, however, is.
If Trump wins, the Republican Party will own everything that Trump does. He will define the party. What does that mean for the GOP? Donald Trump is not a conservative. He is not pro-growth. Like European politicians, he sees the economy as a zero-sum game. He doesn’t talk about growing the size of the pie, he speaks for those who believe that somebody – an immigrant, a politician, a financier – has deprived them of their rightful slice of the pie.
To the extent he has articulated policies, they would be disastrous. He wants to rip up trade agreements and provoke a disastrous confrontation with Mexico – using cash remittances from the US as a bargaining chip to force Mexico to pay for “the wall.” He would attempt mass deportations of Mexicans and impose a religious test on new immigrants.
He has said almost nothing about shrinking the role of the federal government (except in education). Tellingly, he resists all calls to cut entitlements. What makes anyone think that a President Trump – a man addicted to power – would do anything to undercut his own power by shrinking the federal government? What makes anyone think that a President Trump would not eagerly follow in President Obama’s footsteps in ruling by executive order?
Abortion? He asserts that he recently became pro-life because of one acquaintance who decided not to abort her child and who, instead, gave birth to a child who became a “total superstar.” Classic Trump: Would it be ok to abort a child if somehow you knew the kid was going to be a “total loser” (e.g., if the kid had a disability like that reporter Trump made fun of)? His understanding of the issue is so shallow that he has suggested that mothers, rather than abortionists, should face prosecution for abortions.
Which brings me to the one issue that so many people consider decisive: the Supreme Court. Come on. The Constitution and social issues are simply not priorities for Trump. Does anyone really believe that a President Trump would expend political capital to nominate a conservative justice? Why bother? Far more likely, he’ll nominate someone who will breeze through confirmation so that he can make “deals” with the Senate about things that really matter to him. Even Ronald Reagan settled for Justice Kennedy. I have absolutely no confidence that Trump judges would be materially better than Clinton judges.
So, what to do? We save the party. Give all your support to down-ticket Republicans and none to Trump. Hope that Trump loses badly – so badly that he and his biggest supporters walk away from the GOP in disgrace. And hope that principled conservatives are there to rebuild the party for 2020.
Published in General
Thanks. There’s a doc named Ritchie Shoemaker who was the go to guy on mold related illness though he’s now not practicing (people he trained are) for a while now. His concept is that mold (among other things can initiate what he calls Chronic Inflammatory Response Syndrome) which is a common pathway in chronic inflammation and resultant autoimmune and similar conditions.
He’s looking not just at the genome, but at expression of critical proteins. The resulting response patterns are so complex that it takes serious number crunching to make sense of them. I suspect that that approach will be productive for a lot of patients. The proteogenomic testing currently costs about $1800.
What Cruz threat?
He was beaten. He gave up in May. He even told his delegates not to fight for his candidacy at the convention. Ken Cucchinelli was totally ready to throw Kendal Unruh et al under the bus to get rule concessions for 2020, and they didn’t even succeed in pulling that shakedown off. There was no threat. There was no obstacle to rallying to Trump left; anyone who was still a hold out is either #NeverTrump proper or would have gotten in line behind Trump anyway, just like they got in line for the last 2 uninspiring nominees.
Maybe you could say there was a 2020 threat, if you think Trump is thinking that far ahead. I doubt he is and even then, Cruz isn’t going to succeed in a primary challenge against a President Trump unless he turns out to be the worst sitting President in history. I don’t think that Trump, Manafort, Priebus etc expect that.
I believe the next four years will yield limited positives for “conservatives”. Here are five top accomplishments for a Trump administration ….
This is realistic and doable. And far, far better than snake eyes H. In any world or universe.
My, how the neo-populists are blind to the historical parallels! Don’t get me wrong — I think constitutional checks provide us here in the US with fairly strong protection against Mussolinis and Hitlers and Francos (oh, my!). What I’m concerned about is the rise of a populist candidate on unprincipled jingoism with no actual (as opposed to fantastic, in the sense of “fantasy”) policy grounding. “Good and hard, baby, good and hard,” keeps running through my thoughts.
This is a good and persuasive argument. But I kinda think Trump’s penchant, e.g., to kick the legs out from under NATO, and idea of placing a monomaniac’s finger on the nuclear trigger argue strongly on the other side.
I can’t tell you how much I appreciate this response @marktherustic. This is conservative dialogue with an attempt to listen and respond.
I likewise understand the ‘Trump finger on the nuclear trigger’ argument. Based on what’s he’s said he gives the impression that he could be this kind of maniacal tyrant over some perceived personal slight. I think it’s an act. Posturing.
My impression is this is the Trump playbook bluster. He says something outlandish with the belief that it is something he doesn’t really want but will help to set the stage to get what he actually does want as the negotiations move forward … the Art of the Deal. This is a realist. A businessman. This is not an ideological tyrant. Narcissistic? Yes. Self absorbed? Yes. But also a believer in mutually assured self destruction. He has too much to lose by pushing the trigger.
Secondly, either Trump is this maniacal tyrant or he is a Leftist in disguise. I see both of these suggestions from the NeverTrump position. He CANNOT be both. He is only one or the other … or NEITHER. I am in the neither camp.
Thanks for listening. Truly. I await your thoughtful reply.
Thanks! I appreciate the dialogue as well — this is a great space. I wish I had more time to reply but I don’t, so I’ll try to get right to the heart of it. Two points: 1) Even if Trump’s bluster is JUST bluster, it has consequences in the international arena. The fact that he lacks communicative discipline (on air, on Twitter, etc.) is deeply concerning with respect to foreign relations; 2) Maniacal tyrants ARE by and large leftists, and Trump’s political instincts seem to be largely leftist (his management style is definitely “maniacal tyrant”).
I live in a state that’ll give its electoral votes to Hillary no matter what I do, so I’m a little insulated from the consequences of my own vote. I have close family on both sides of this issue, so I do try to keep my ears (and brain) open.
It seems that whichever candidate occupies one’s frontal lobes the most negatively – Donald or Hillary – is the deciding factor. No one is more repugnant to me than Hillary, but for others it is the Donald whom they cannot get past. And I don’t think logic is the primary motive.
Good argument – which monomaniac are you concerned about?
Yup, revulsion reaches back to the lizard-brain – way more primitive than logic.
I don’t follow – couldn’t he be a leftist maniacal tyrant? Or has someone decreed that only right-wingers can be maniacal tyrants – but that’s a progressive trick – defining your opposition as extreme by definition and associating them with evil. Are you flying a false flag?
When I have heard the reasoning, at least as I’ve perceived it here, the maniacal tyrant characterization always seemed to be cast as a far right, neoconservative, warmongering, etc. rather than a lefty tyrant who seems to focus their tyranny domestically more than internationally.
And then in the same thread, someone would argue that he was no different than Hillary with regard to likely policy. Always seemed to be a contradiction to me.
This reminds me of a post from isegoria.net (http://www.isegoria.net/2015/06/precisely-the-wrong-stuff/). excerpt:
” A key principle of human factors is that it is the unspoken rules of who can say what and when that often lead to crucial things going unsaid. The most painful part of the transcript of Flight 173’s final hour is the flight engineer’s interjections. You can sense his concern about the fuel situation, and his hesitancy about expressing it.Fifteen minutes is gonna – really run us low on fuel here. Perhaps he’s assuming the captain and his officers know the urgency of their predicament. Perhaps he’s worried about being seen to speak out of turn. Whatever it is, he doesn’t say what he feels: This is an emergency. We need to get this plane on the ground – NOW. Similarly, the nurses who could see the urgency of Elaine Bromiley’s condition didn’t feel able to tell the doctors that they were on the verge of committing a grave error. So they made tentative suggestions that were easy to ignore.”