I'm conservative, but I want to win. A major shift in my thinking has been Social Security. On the face of it that's one of the worst, most fraudulent programs. An outright Ponzi scheme. However... the demographics of the GOP base skew older. To run against Social Security is to cut the legs off a good percentage of the GOP base. So I don't argue about Social Security anymore. Trump gets this instinctively.
That's practical politics. Is it less conservative than the guy who says "Stand on principle, lose every election!" That was Ron Paul's approach to running for president. How did it work out?
Long ago, when it was absolutely taboo here, I hinted that invading Iraq was a major political mistake. Trump gets that too. There was never any benefit to the GOP base. Just vague theories about democracy and turning Iraqis into modern capitalists. Why is the GOP on a losing streak? Because the core of the party leadership is still dedicated to globalist schemes like the Iraq invasion, free trade and open borders. All of those "conservative principles" are right out of The New Republic. So this is far worse than Ron Paul, who at least is being economically conservative when he attacks Social Security. This is leftism calling itself conservatism.
Trump has shot to the top by very cleverly throwing out the leftist globalism, downplaying issues that hurt the base, and putting forward anti-globalist patriotism to appeal to a wider public.
Is it conservative? In some ways it's far more conservative than anything we've had to choose from since Reagan. It doesn't check off every box on a right wing think tank's wish list, and it's not libertarianism, but it's a winning combination.
I agree, Iraq was an absolute disaster. Iraq (yes, along with other failures) led directly to Obama. America has been suffering through almost 3 decades of disastrous leadership, that encompasses both parties. How many nations could survive intact with three decades of the destructive leadership in government that America has withstood? The plethora of terrible decision followed by terrible decision, with the cost heaped upon the people, mostly the middle class, of the nation - the people that truly keep the whole thing afloat?
After three decades of destructive leadership, we need to be practical now - we need to make not only the right decision, but the decisions which a terribly, terminally, over-burdened and demoralized population of productive people can handle.