Posted on 01/25/2016 7:42:59 AM PST by Kaslin
Since his profanity-laced 2011 speech in Las Vegas, Donald Trump has made a campaign theme of calling the leadership in Washington "stupid" and "incompetent." In the most recent GOP debate, he again expressed his anger at the "incompetent people" running the government. Those are great applause lines with angry voters.
But Trump's frequent assessment of governmental incompetence as the cause of America's sad state should concern conservatives. The idea that competence is the hallmark of good government comes from the so-called progressive movement. Bring in better experts and smarter managers, the thinking goes, and we will have better government. The Obama administration and the GOP establishment share the attitude that an elite class of experts can manage us better than we can manage ourselves. And with the GOP establishment showing signs of warming to Trump as a way of stopping the more conservative Ted Cruz, conservatives have begun to seriously question Trump's conservatism. (Disclosure: I have endorsed Ted Cruz.)
Few in the conservative movement would share Trump's assessment that the nation's disastrous course stems from managerial incompetence. Conservatives largely view Obama, not as a bumbling incompetent, but as a dedicated leftist who uses Alinskyite tactics to subvert the Constitution that the left has long seen as a barrier to their socialist agenda. Obama does not misunderstand the Constitution; he disdains its limits on governmental power. If Hillary Clinton escapes indictment for her mishandling of top-secret information, it will not be because Attorney General Loretta Lynch is incompetent; it will be because the law does not serve the left's agenda.
To conservatives, our borders are not open because Obama and his allies are too incompetent to secure them. Our open borders serve the left's internationalist goals, and they serve the left's strategy of swamping our political system with millions of leftist voters from the third world. If illegals were likely to vote Republican, our borders would have been secured on January 21, 2009.
Porous borders, unchecked federal power, and declining respect for America abroad are not the blunders of incompetent managers; they're checkmarks on a leftist agenda that the Democrats have executed quite well for decades.
And to movement conservatives, the problem with the Republican leadership in Washington is not one of competence, but collusion. John Boehner, Mitch McConnell, and Paul Ryan have skillfully used the labyrinthine House and Senate rules to bring Obama's agenda to the floor and ensure its passage while casting show votes against it for the rubes back home. If they had wanted to gum the works for Obama's agenda as they have for the conservative agenda, they had the competence to do it.
Trump's accusations of incompetence and stupidity are red meat for angry voters who want to send Washington a message, but his diagnosis of America's ills is not that of a movement conservative.
That Trump's poll results are more about a message than a movement is illustrated in his stunning boast in Sioux City on Saturday that he could shoot somebody in the middle of Fifth Avenue and not lose any voters. He is probably right. To Obama's radical transformation of America and the soulless let's-make-a-deal attitude of the GOP, angry voters are answering with a resounding "screw both of you." Trump's lead so far is based on his bold personality, not on conservative principle.
But now, as the time approaches for real voting that has real consequences, conservative leaders - many of them featured in a recent special edition of National Review - have begun to highlight Trump's past support for liberal politicians and causes, and they are warning conservatives that Trump is not one of us.
Now that Ted Cruz has emerged as the conservative challenger to Trump, it is telling that the GOP establishment has warmed to Trump. Among other establishment figures, Bob Dole - who has endorsed Jeb Bush - recently told the New York Times that Trump would be a better choice than Cruz. He went on to praise Trump as likely to work with Congress and lauded his skills as a "deal-maker."
And the GOP establishment is all about making deals.
Of course, there is nothing inherently wrong with making deals. Dole told a Wichita audience in 2014 that President Reagan had once told him that, "if you can't get everything, at least get me 70 percent, and we'll get the rest next year." The problem for conservatives, however, is that the GOP establishment has the Reagan rule backwards. Boehner gave Obama 70 percent of his agenda, and now it looks like Ryan will give him the rest.
Boehner, Ryan, and McConnell are competent deal-makers, but they are not conservative deal-makers. Trump wrote the book on making deals, but he is not a movement conservative.
And that is what has conservatives worried about Donald Trump.
I don’t trust the GOPe as far as I could throw them...and neither should Trump (which he probably isn’t)...
They got their ass kicked, and dint wish to be shut-out.
I knew you would post this as soon as I rad it on Townhall. Trump hit pieces seem to be your specialty. I feel sorry for you. Trump is going to win despite your rancor.
I support Cruz first but also Trump.
I don’t see anything wrong with posting criticisms.
That’s the left’s approach - censor what they don’t want to hear.
Now that the Cold War with the USSR is long over, and the left doesn’t have to worry about being compared to communists so much, the left is all for new era of censorship with themselves as the censors.
The establishment RINOs figured out that Trump’s record is close to theirs.
I have no objection at all to posting founded criticisms. However, an incessant posting of hit pieces on Trump which are most times products of the same Web Site, Townhall, do get boring. One knows in advance this particular poster is posting another hit piece. Cruz has flip-flopped on so many things which even includes his own eligibility!
Conservatives do not want more “experts” and “consultants” to help run government. We just want common sense to prevail, and for politicians to live up to the promises they made to get elected. We also want to descale big government. If we scale back the role of government in our lives and require individual responsibility, then government would be able to function better and individuals would be better able to care for themselves!
Trump, the MSM and the GOPe all have one thing in common and that is their Hillary problem.
If, or hopefully when, Hillary’s legal problems come pouring out it’s going to be like a dam breaking.
It’s not going to stop at just a little trickle it’s going to be all hell breaking lose.
D Trump is going to be guilt by association with Hillary..
MSM are partners in Hillary’s crime.
GOPe new what Hillary was up to and didn’t stop her.
What is your evidence that Trump is going to win?
L8R
Trump knows the GOPe far better than most as he’s been buying them for years. LOL!
A lot of words to say: They don’t have a choice.
Honestly! Do these posters ever get outside and take a break? I cannot imagine seething with such white hot hate.
I’m skimming the hate Trump threads now, there isn’t any new or original thoughts in them, it’s the same story with a different voice.
I’m skimming the hate Trump threads now, there isn’t any new or original thoughts in them, it’s the same story with a different voice.
Indeed. You can tell what's being said by just reading the title of a thread.
Jesus Christ: You can't impeach Him and He ain't gonna resign.
“I cannot imagine seething with such white hot hate.”
It appears you can.
How silly. I’m not mad at all, actually I’m quite amused. I’ve never seen people so confused while trying to present feelings as facts.
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