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Posted on 03/10/2016 6:06:20 AM PST by TroutStalker
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Well, Trump may still be a carnival barker, but he’s looking more and more like a president! Along with most media pundits in the Northeast, I found it improbable if not impossible that Trump could survive his klutz-o-rama cascade of foot-in-mouth flubs, from carelessly categorizing Mexican immigrants as rapists to hallucinating about “thousands’ of Muslims cheering the fall of the twin towers from the mean streets of New Jersey. Surely he would soon implode and pouf into fairy dust!
But only a few weeks after that interview of mine in Salon, I suddenly realized that Trump’s candidacy had a broad support that few had expected or discerned. The agent of my revelation was a hilariously scathing, viral Web blog video posted by Diamond and Silk–Lynette Hardaway and Rochelle Richardson, two African-American sisters and former Democrats in Fayetteville, North Carolina. They were reacting with indignant outrage to the first GOP debate, broadcast by Fox News from Cleveland on August 6 and hosted by Megyn Kelly, whose loaded questions had impugned Trump as a sexist.
If Trump wins the White House, that no-holds-barred video will go down in history as “the shot heard round the world,” Ralph Waldo Emerson’s phrase for the first salvo of the American Revolution by rural insurgents at Concord. The video signaled a popular uprising and furious pushback against the major media and political elites, who had controlled the national agenda and messaging for far too long. Diamond and Silk threw zinger after zinger in defending Trump: “Here’s the damn deal, Megyn Kelly—or Kelly Megyn, whatever your name is!…. Go back and report news on Sesame Street!…You hit below the belt, Kelly!…He was the only one up there on that stage with any common sense!… He’s going to be the next president, whether you like it or not. Get used to it, girl! Get used to it!”
This fiery endorsement blew me away because it demonstrated how Trump was directly engaging with a diverse coalition in ways that the mainstream media had completely missed. I felt, and still do, that Trump is far too impetuous and thin-skinned in his amusingly rambling, improvisational style. The American president, who can spook markets or spark a war with a rash phrase, must be more coolly circumspect. And aspirants to the presidency shouldn’t care what small fry like bobble-head TV hosts say or do. A leader must have the long view and show an instinctive capacity to focus and prioritize.
Nevertheless, Trump’s fearless candor and brash energy feel like a great gust of fresh air, sweeping the tedious clichés and constant guilt-tripping of political correctness out to sea. Unlike Hillary Clinton, whose every word and policy statement on the campaign trail are spoon-fed to her by a giant paid staff and army of shadowy advisors, Trump is his own man, with a steely “damn the torpedoes” attitude. He has a swaggering retro machismo that will give hives to the Steinem cabal. He lives large, with the urban flash and bling of a Frank Sinatra. But Trump is a workaholic who doesn’t drink and who has an interesting penchant for sophisticated, strong-willed European women. As for a debasement of the presidency by Trump’s slanging matches about penis size, that sorry process was initiated by a Democrat, Bill Clinton, who chatted about his underwear on TV, let Hollywood pals jump up and down on the bed in the Lincoln Bedroom, and played lewd cigar games with an intern in the White House offices.
Primary voters nationwide are clearly responding to Trump’s brand of classic can-do American moxie. There has been a sense of weary paralysis in our increasingly Byzantine and monstrously wasteful government bureaucracies. Putting a bottom-line businessman with executive experience into the White House has probably been long overdue. If Mitt Romney had boldly talked business more (and chosen a woman VP), he would have won the last election. Although the rampant Hitler and Mussolini analogies to Trump are wildly exaggerated–he has no organized fascist brigades at his beck and call—there is reason for worry about his impatient authoritarian tendencies. We have had more than enough of Obama’s constitutionally questionable executive orders. It remains to be seen whether Trump’s mastery of a hyper-personalized art of the deal will work in the sluggish, murky, incestuously intertwined power realms of Washington.
From my perspective as a fervent supporter of the ruggedly honest and principled Bernie Sanders, Trump with his pragmatic real-life record is a far more palatable national figure than Ted Cruz, whose unctuous, vainglorious professions of Christian piety don’t pass the smell test. Trump is a blunt, no-crap mensch, while Cruz is a ham actor, doling out fake compassion like chopped liver. Cruz’s lugubrious, weirdly womanish face, with its prim, tight smile and mawkishly appealing puppy-dog eyebrows, is like a waxen mask, always on the verge of melting. This guy doesn’t know who the hell he is—and the White House is no place for him and us to find out.
Firstly, she has always been an Islam-lover, given her adoration of the phony Palestinian and pal of Obama, Edward Said. She’s never said much about Islamic terror, either, much to my disgust. And leave it to her to wake up only after 2 African-Americans steered her in the right direction. For all her vaunting of working-class men - who were fans of Trump way before Diamond and Silk - she imperiously ignored their interest and support until slapped in the face by a video. And I love the two women.
And to still support the moronic Bernie Sanders shows why even intelligent women must be denied the vote.
Bttt
Paglia makes a point that Trump is hardly the first president or presidential candidate to do or say anything vulgar. We all know about JFK’s womanizing, LBJ was as vulgar as they come, and Obama basically called Palin a pig and made a little rhyme that everyone knew was intended to suggest the “F” word. And, of course, Clinton/Lewinsky dragged the whole country through the mire for two years.
Cruz is “vainglorious” and Trump isn’t?
Have long admired many of Camille’s points of view over the years. Last paragraph in this one is epic.
Trump has actually accomplished a lot in the real world. So it's a matter of degree in relation to accomplishment, and Ted does seem overly pleased with his incomplete record of achievement. Education and position are great; but you have to be able to turn them into solid achievements.
She's a leftist, for sure, but she has a very unique perspective on politics and culture, which is not cookie-cutter liberal talking points.
From a technical aspect, and also for the unique style and ability to capture intent in the phrasing, she is an unbelievable essayist.
Although I disagree with her on many fronts, she is someone I'd like to have dinner with.
Cruz graduated from Princeton University in 1992, and from Harvard Law School in 1995.
Between 1999 and 2003, Cruz was the director of the Office of Policy Planning at the Federal Trade Commission, an associate deputy attorney general at the United States Department of Justice, and domestic policy advisor to President George W. Bush on the 2000 George W. Bush presidential campaign.
He served as Solicitor General of Texas from 2003 to 2008, appointed by Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott. He was the first Hispanic, and the longest-serving solicitor general, in Texas history.
From 2004 to 2009, Cruz was also an adjunct professor of law at the University of Texas School of Law in Austin, where he taught U.S. Supreme Court litigation.
We have two very good Presidential candidates. If Cruz remains a strong second to Trump, the establishment will be limited in it's ability to undermine the will of the voters at the convention.
When will we find out how much they are being paid?
Not alot of folks on the right like Paglia. But, I find her candor always refreshing. She doesn’t shy away from expressing her opinion - no matter which side it may support.
Morning Joe's liberals should read this then get off their damn fainting couches...
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