Who is Donald Trump, Really?

Texas GOP Vote ^ | December 1, 2015 at 8:14 AM | Tom Donelson

[TBP]

Byron York had an interesting piece on Donald Trump that is worth reading. At least anyone who might be interested in the real Donald Trump. Trump appeared in front of the “non-partisan” No Labels group who desperately wants candidates that will “compromise” even though it is never clear what compromises will result in.

Donald Trump told this group, "Let me just tell you, the word compromise is not a bad word to me. I like the word compromise. We need compromise, there is nothing wrong with compromise, but it's always good to compromise and win. Meaning, let's compromise and win." Can you imagine the reaction of Trump’s supporters if a Marco Rubio actually met with this group and said this? The cries of RINO would arise and say that Rubio is nothing but a tool of the Establishment.

York's thesis is that Trump is prone to saying outrageous things or beginning with outrageous positions so he can get what he wants. This is Trump the deal maker who understands you won’t get all that you want so you start with many positions that you know you can throw away to get what you want in negotiations.

As American Enterprise Institute Marc Thiessen noted, a portion of Trump’s plan on immigration is actually an idea that came from Texas Moderate Senator Kay Baily Hutchison, who proposed Trump's “touchback” in which you deport millions of immigrants to let them back in. You can decide whether this is a practical plan, but make no mistake, under Trump’s reform, the vast majority of illegal today will still be here after his reforms. This means that the results will be no different than a President Rubio or a President Bush. If you don’t believe me, listen to Trump’s own words when he told CNN's Dana Bash, “I would get people out and then have an expedited way of getting them back into the country so they can be legal…. A lot of these people are helping us … and sometimes it’s jobs a citizen of the United States doesn’t want to do. I want to move ’em out, and we’re going to move ’em back in and let them be legal.”

I have already made the case that Trump’s plan is laying the basis for Republican compromise on immigration, and I am not the only one as National Review's Ramesh Ponnuru has made the same observations. Nor is that the only area that Trump will compromise on. As I have mentioned in past posts, moderate and liberal Democrats and conservatives have all agreed that any tax reforms will include lower marginal rates and fewer deductions since 2009. Even the President's own commission under moderate Republican Alan Simpson and liberal Democrat Erskine Bowles agreed with this consensus and Trump's own tax plans follow along those same lines. Trump's tax plans also have been sold as a boon for the Middle Class, using language similar to what Marco Rubio has said about his plan. (There are differences in details but Trump’s tax plans are part of what the real consensus truly is.)

Trump has set the stage for his own version of the big compromise on both taxes and spending if elected, and his foreign policy is closer to the left than the right as he has supported the leftist position that much of the Middle East's problems are Bush’s fault and not Obama's handling of foreign policies, even though he has criticized Obama's deal making skills. In attacking Obama’s deal making skills, he has not really attacked the basis of Obama’s foreign policies. In the case of the Iranian deal, he has made it clear that he would not ditch the deal but simply “renegotiate” the deal. And his protectionist trade views are in line not just with the populist right but also the hard left.

The reality for Republican voters is that Trump is the most centrist candidate we have running, if you chose to read what he actually says as opposed to the image he projects. My own view of Trump is that of a business man who loves to make money; he has an instinct for conservative ideas but he is not the conservative that Ted Cruz or Marco Rubio is. Trump doesn’t keep a copy of F.A. Hayek in his back pocket, and over the past decade, he has taken positions that are to the left of the GOP and other times, he sounds like the hard core right wing. If you look at Trump’s supporters, they are more politically moderate than Rubio’s or Cruz's supports, and they are more blue-collar. They are not traditionally conservative but he is building a broader center-right coalition, leaving the question of will that be enough? And a Trump Presidency will be a centrist administration with something for everyone, but will it be a conservative administration? That is a question that one can’t fully answer.

[Las Vegas Ron]

BTW, you still haven’t substantiate your first claim (lie) waiting......as I had to search for an even REMOTE example.

LIAR

[Chauncey Uppercrust]

Yes multiple “Trump or nothing posters” posted all over this forum that somehow Cruz was disrespecting 911 and everything surrounding it. Even the poster you linked me to (though he/she may have been a Trump supporter) agreed with me, and was telling people to lay off the 911 accusations

So go blow your nose ok fella

You are bearing false witness and I am don with you so blow off

[TBP]

They are beginning to give him some degree of tacit support. Cruz is the one they MUST stop at all costs.

The essence of Donald Trump is “deal maker.” You can cut a deal with Trump. Some of them are great deals, some are bad deals. But he lives to cut deals.

Cruz doesn’t. He is in politics to restore as much of our constitutional government as he can.

So the Establishment is trying to do a pincers on Cruz by simultaneously boosting Trump and Rubio — one of whom they control and the other of whom they can do business with — so as to cut off Cruz before he gets going.