Posted on 01/26/2016 7:10:54 AM PST by Theo
When the publisher of National Review Magazine, Jack Fowler, called and asked me to write 300 words on why I oppose Donald Trump for president of the United States, my first thought was about the derision that was sure to come from Trump supporters.
I was not disappointed, or rather I am disappointed that no one who reacted negatively rebutted any of the arguments I, or the other contributors, made about why we think a President Trump would not pursue conservative goals.
Sounding like Trump, I was called a "loser" and someone for whom one writer said he had "lost all respect." Sure, there were some who called me "brilliant" (I'm filing those away), but the name-callers resembled their political master. Trump also refused to address our arguments. Instead, he mislabeled the magazine a "dying newspaper" and said it had lost circulation and no one reads it. Many are reading this issue.
One friend said he is convinced that Trump is "teachable and we can move him in the right direction." On June 14, Trump will be 70 years old. By then, most people have long been settled in their worldview. Trump likes to cite Ronald Reagan, who was a Roosevelt Democrat before he famously said he didn't leave the Democratic Party, the party left him. But Reagan spent many years honing his conservative principles in speeches, articles, and radio commentaries. He did not have, as some nominees to high office experience, a "confirmation conversion."
Quoting myself would be redundant (read us all at National Review.com), so here is the key paragraph from the lead editorial:
"Trump's politics are those of an averagely well-informed businessman: Washington is full of problems; I am a problem-solver; let me at them. But if you have no familiarity with the relevant details and the levers of power, and no clear principles to guide you, you will, like most tenderfeet, get rolled. Trump has shown no interest in limiting government, in reforming entitlements, or in the Constitution. He floats the idea of massive new taxes on imported goods and threatens to retaliate against companies that do too much manufacturing overseas for his taste. His obsession is with 'winning,' regardless of the means -- a spirit that is anathema to the ordered liberty that conservatives hold dear and that depends for its preservation on limits on government power."
In the February 1 issue of The Weekly Standard, Stephen F. Hayes writes: "The Republican frontrunner is a longtime liberal whose worldview might best be described as an amalgam of pop-culture progressivism and vulgar nationalism. His campaign rallies are orgies of self-absorption, dominated by juvenile insults of those who criticize him and endless boasting about his poll numbers. He's a narcissist and a huckster, an opportunist who not only failed to join conservatives in the big fights about the size and scope of government over the past several decades but, to the extent he was even aware of such battles, was often funding the other side, with a long list of contributions to the liberals most responsible for the dire state of affairs in the country, including likely Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton."
What is the counter argument to these substantive opinions? Anger against the "Washington establishment" is not one. Those who worship Trump have an obligation to say why he is worthy of their faith. Given his liberal background and poor explanations of why he now believes differently, how do his supporters know he will govern conservatively should he win the White House? He once said his sister, who is pro-abortion, would be an excellent nominee to the Supreme Court. His story of how he supposedly became a pro-life convert lacks credibility.
Electing a president, especially in a dangerous world, is important work. Anger and emotion should not govern the choice. Considered judgment should. Trump appeals to the former, but not the latter.
They are afraid for their second-tier cloistered and pampered feathered beds where they can sit in their underwear and pontificate to us daily from their home computer and only have to go out once a week or once a day for a couple of hours and feather their beds with lying BS like they even know what drive by America faces.
They largely DC Denizens. The DC doesn’t mean District of Columbia - it means Doesn’t [effing] Care! They [always] get theirs, and we get ours, usually up the keester. And we’re “not conservative” when we holla.....eff them.
Until you can post a rational response instead of your usual emotionally hysteric ditribes, no one is going to take your posts seriously
The standard line of the GOPe. “He’s teachable”. They don’t say we should look at some of his ideas, maybe adopt some, learn from his connection to the base. No they say we have to teach him to be like us, ignore the little people in the base as they have no choice but to vote for us.
The RNC, the GOPe, and the bought and paid for “conservative” leaders can go to ...........
The expression -Trump’s Politics- is an oxymoron.
The reason Trump is dominating world media is because his platform is anti-political.
Or more accurately, anti-globalist political.
It has come down to this.
Pretty much all of the world’s politicians are Globalists.
No borders.
No nations.
No countries.
No national identities.
No cultural identities.
No historical identities.
No freedom to protect ones self and family.
No freedom of speech.
No freedom of thought.
No freedom to keep wages earned.
Trump says yes to all of the above.
Trump stands for sanity. Any politician who stands against borders, as witnessed in Europe-istan, does not care if their citizens are robbed, raped, and murdered.
They don’t care.
In fact, they encourage it.
Trump is the last hope to maintain the flickering light of freedom.
He is far from perfect. Perfection always requires time, and time is what we don’t have.
We must deploy the Trump bomb.
There will be collateral damage, but it must be deployed now.
BTTT ......
A Chamber of Commerce and Business Council lobbyist
The cheap labor party?
Your argument that Jeb and Marco is more conservative than .Trump depends on one’s definition of conservatism. I do not consider open borders and amnesty conservative. I do not consider free trade, as opposed to fair trade, conservative.
I consider putting America’s best interests first, having secured borders, improving the economy through smart business planning, protecting the elderly, infirm, and vets conservative.
The conservative.
Make no mistake most of the 22 will have some half-hearted support statements for Trump if he is the nominee but most, including Fox News, will work to undermine Trump. It will be Karl Rove undermine conservative candidates in the Senate elections all over again. They would rather have a Democrat elected than someone they cannot control since they are part of the uniparty
*********************
Good grief.
Good post,
And I would add that CT saying that Trump is unprincipled is part of the problem, Trump has principles and he has stated them.
He will make his decisions based on what is right for the common middle class American. How is that?
Just because Trump did not come out and read the Scout Oath and Law does not mean he does not understand principles.
What has really surprised me is the almost religious fervor many of Trumps followers seem to display. I see very little reasoned arguments for or against from Trump supporters.
If you look at where he stands on things, Trump is not really a very conservative candidate in any kind of philosophical sense.
I like Cruz, because if one looks at things he’s written and said, you get a real feel for the foundation of his philosophy. He definitely harkens back to Locke in his thinking. I’m not really convinced that Trump has an actual core philosophy that guides his reasoning besides expediency. There is nothing inherently wrong with expediency in moderation, as sometimes even if you have strong core beliefs, you have to bend to move the goalposts further towards what you want, but it can’t be the basis of =everything= you do.
This is especially true in the national security arena. Yeah, there are things that would really make the jobs of police and intelligence agency’s jobs easier that we don’t do because they are =wrong= if you’re interested in following the Constitution.
Yeah, I’ll support Trump with my vote, though not a great deal of enthusiasm if he is the eventual nominee, but I really do think we have a much better choice from a conservative point of view in Cruz.
/Zeugma dons flame-resistant undergarments
Perhaps but many of us have legitimate concerns.
Donald Trump supported Kelo, single payer health care, Ethanol subsidies, Planned Parenthood, confiscatory taxes on the rich, opposition of Medicare/Social Security reform, enhanced gun control, Wall Street/bank bailouts as well as a history on multiple documented occasions of donating to Democrat campaigns/causes over the years
Also Trump’s praise first of Romney for his gentle approach to illegal immigrants, then later slammed him for being too tough and additionally badmouthing Republicans for being mean spirited in their approach to illegal immigration a scant 3 years ago .
Trump has exhibited numerous legitimate verifiable anti-conservative positions over the last 2 decades and that is worrisome.
Rehashing history? Maybe, but a man should be judged on the positions he has consistently taken over the last two decades not what he self servingly states at the moment.
It doesn't matter what you and the rest of the anti-Trump columnists write, Cal. Evidence, facts, logic, etc, are out the window. Why would we ignore all of your reasoned arguments against Trump? It's simple:
"We just don't trust you people anymore"
We may not know exactly what we're getting with Trump, but we know damn well what we'll get from the establishment.
Again:
"We just don't trust you people anymore"
Yes, the number one point being that the critics of the article only attack the speakers, not the meat of the article. Calling Cal Thomas nasty names does nothing to address the charges he is making against Trump. It is more like Trumps overall strategy “Don’t engage in debate, just ridicule and insult your opponents, if you never say anything you never have to take anything back”.
Snark is a mysterious, imaginary animal.
Trump is a liberal.
Vote for him if you like on the basis that he’s an outsider but don’t kid yourself into believing Trump is a conservative.
He will say what he has to say without conviction to win the nomination.
And his fans might end up being disappointed if as President, he would bear no allegiance to the causes conservatives hold dear.
Ted Cruz, the only conservative in the race is being sidelined, ironically enough, because many conservatives view Trump as more “electable.”
People are not ready to face the truth about Trump, that what they think he is, in reality he is not and a good deal of his popularity rests on what people want to see in him.
That and the fact he is a brilliant self-promoter.
Truth!
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