Posted on 11/20/2015 11:30:00 PM PST by Cincinatus' Wife
As has been made abundantly clear by his incessant mewling and pathetically thin skin, Donald J. Trump is not in fact an unwaveringly resolute tough guy of the type you would hope to find standing next to you in the trenches, but an insecure attention seeker who cannot help but pander to his audiences' prejudices. In the past few days, Trump has been asked variously whether, if elected, he would use his power to close mosques; whether he believes that Muslims should be registered in a special government database; and whether or not it would be a good idea to suspend the Fourth Amendment for anybody who prays to Allah. In all cases he has either demurred completely or eschewed the more traditional "yes" and "no" categories in favor of some choice hedging. "That may have to be done," Trump says. "There's no doubt." "We'll look at that." "We'll consider all the options." "We're going to have to look at a lot of things very closely."
So painful has this tendency become that I have begun to hope his interviewers will get a little surreal, just to see what he says:
"Will you replace your hair with spaghetti and your fingers with soup spoons?"
"Sure. We're going to look at everything."
"As president would you consider taking suspected burglars and parachuting them naked into lava?"
"That's something we'll consider. You can't have all this crime. Terrible."
"Do you think it's fair to say that you are the egg man, that you are the egg man, that you are the Walrus?"
"We're going to examine a range of possibilities."
"GooGooGooJoob?"
"I'll be looking into that."
Perhaps the only thing that is worse than Trump's silence is what he does say.
The most common defense of Trump's perpetual acquiescence has been that he did not explicitly say "yes" to the more controversial among the questions, and that he cannot therefore be accused of endorsement. In truth, this isn't quite right; speaking to NBC last night, he did seem to suggest affirmatively that Muslims would be required to sign into his hypothetical database or face consequences. Either way, I'm struggling to see how this defense can be acceptable to his admirers. Trump, recall, is supposed to be courageous. He's supposed to be steadfast. He's supposed to be a no-holds-barred badass who will make great deals and stare down enemies and Make America Great Again. How, one wonders, does a chronic inability to say "no" fit into that mien?
If there is one quality we need in a president, it is the ability decisively to say "no" - especially, I would venture, if that president hopes to advance conservative goals. When a sane person is asked whether he would institute a tracking database for Muslims or force one religious group to carry special ID cards, he says, "Of course I wouldn't." If Trump is unable to manage even this, how would he rein in spending or limit illegal immigration? More to the point, as Trump might ask sneeringly of others, how would he deal with Vladimir Putin?
Perhaps the only thing that is worse than Trump's silence is what he does say. Even if we are generous and assume that the man does not actually believe any of the specific proposals to which he has given his tacit consent, the attitude he is exhibiting is positively Wilsonian in character. In Trump's world, America will be restored to glory when his handpicked team of experts is permitted to experiment upon the public outside of the usual constitutional limits. Nowhere in his rhetoric will you find any reference to America's pre-existing cultural and legal traditions, or to the necessary bounds that free men insist be imposed upon the state. There is no talk of "freedom"; no reflexive grounding of ideas in the Declaration and the Federalist Papers; no conceptual explanation or underlying philosophy. There is nothing, except will to power. By his own admission, Trump's are the politics of doing enthusiastically what works in the moment; of Woodrow Wilson and Franklin Roosevelt; of the administrative state and of bureaucratic expertise; of the Prussians and the French and the Singaporeans. Whatever he might claim before his adoring crowds, Trump is not in fact an antidote to Barack Obama. He is his parallel.
Calvin Coolidge said "no" over and over and over again because he understood that the federal government existed for a handful of specific reasons, and that any action it took outside of its carefully delineated tramlines was inherently suspect. Donald Trump's only visible constitutional opinion is that someone strong ought to make sure the trams run on time. There's a word for men like that, and it sure as heck isn't "conservative."
May you both have a wonderful weekend and look forward to a blessed Thanksgiving holiday!
Explain the “he lacks intergrity” and “is too ill-informed to be president” bits.
Cruz is my first choice. I have a real problem discerning a second choice; though I do have a group at the bottom of my list (and, surprise, Trump is down there with them).
In the end, I’ll vote for whoever is running against Hillary, happily or reluctantly.
Thank you, and same to you and yours, the Lord be with you!
There a lot of really really old paid trolls on this forum...age does not matter.
Amen
Good post. You've said it well.
I posted the basis on which my EXTREMELY well educated opinions are based. You, OTOH, offered NOTHING and I highly doubt that you have an "educated" opinion on much of anything.
Trump is in it to win it and by this coming Spring will be the nominee.
Trump prides himself as being inpredictable on negotiations. That’s how he wins. You can see him playing his cards very close to the vest when he skates in answering a question. Furthermore, he knows the other candidates are copying his position on some issues.
We have two candidates that need to make it through the GOPe Labarinth... Trump and Cruz....let’s focus on getting one of these guys through and the other will be part of the team.
I’m very glad there’s two people I can actually support that can spend the next 16 years undoing the immense amount of damage inflicted on this country by decades of the Communist Democrat/Socialist RINO Uniparty.
But for being a Cruz supporter, I find it highly unsettling you spend almost all of your posting time here attacking Trump. As another poster has in his tagline, Cruz doesn’t attack Trump. Cruz knows that he is on our side. I don’t attack allies in the fight for our country. We lose this race, we lose this country for good.
I define integrity pretty literally, integrated. One’s body, soul, person is integrated: in personal life and business life. One face, one standard, consistent values.
For Trump the “lack of integrity” part is being a major supporter of Charlie Rangel (one of the most corrupt politicians ever), supporting Hillary, supporting Reid, Pelosi, House and Senate Democrats.
To be conservative and do this one has to lack integrity (”all successful businessmen must be corrupt” is a liberal worldview).
The only alternative I can see is that he is really a liberal. :)
I’m no trump fan, but this piece is dishonest at its core and totally misrepresents trumps responses to these inane question. And need I add that no one can control what idiocy will spew from the mouth of a reporter. Or from the fingers of a journalistic hit man.
They sure are and more and more of them doing it this past week !
Thank you AntCeeCee.
Have a great weekend and Thanksgiving too.
Unlike some folks on this forum, I happen to think we have someone great to thank God for this year.
He may not have been what we asked for, but God generally knows best. He may have provided a way for us when there was no other.
BINGO
And yet as he’s ‘become more childish’ his poll numbers have risen. Imagine that.
He doesn't approve of it, won't engage in it as president, but you refuse to understand that.
I like Cruz, but nobody has investigated him.....yet. I'm NOT saying, nor implying that he has "skeletons"; just that we don't know of any..............yet.
You can't see the forest for the trees, IGNORE the points I've made, because you don't like them ( but I bet you know that they're true ), and are closed minded.
To begin with, you misread what I was trying to get across in my post. I am not talking about policy details or minutia. (although it’s true that Trump rarely gets into it at all)
What I am talking about is a explanation from him and from his mouth as to why he believes he can make can do what he says he can do. I want to hear why he thinks the country is on the wrong track and how it got that way, and I want it in complete sentences, not verbal quips or blunt statements. You have to make a candidate explain Conservatism, and in the process of answering that, he should be able to do the things I have asked for.
If they cannot explain it with some detail, then they are not conservative. Nor will they ever be. .
Secondly, as to Cruz and the polling. Are you saying that one should vote for the candidate that can win, according to polling?
That’s not what should happen here. That’s not what we should be doing in a republican primary because that is why we (Conservatives) have always lost in the past several GOP election cycles for president.
You are telling me to paint in pastels because the majority of voters seem to like this one guy so he’s the guy.
I made up my mind some years ago, to always vote for the most authentic Conservative candidate. I say authentic because appearing to be a Conservative is very easy to do. I am seeing it done every day by democrats and republicans but in some cases we don’t see the mistake until they get to DC.
I support Cruz and will continue to support him because he is the authentic conservative in the race. Not because polls say he can win. I support him because he should win.
If he does not, then so be it. I’ll not compromise any more. My pragmatic days are long past. Pragmatism is killing this country and this party. Works OK for business decisions but it fails to identify the best leaders for a nation.
Pragmatism did not lead to Reagans presidency, nor Churchill, or Thatcher. What led to their wins was a sense of urgency to really change direction to save a society from ruin or defeat. Polls said they were impossible as well.
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