Free Republic

It should be clear by this time that popularity has nothing to do with electability. Trump filled rally after rally in state after state with countless, full-house, full-stadium crowds, and such numbers do not lie. There really was a red wave in the midterms, but it was macro-engineered to a trickle, as should have been expected. The scam of “malfunctioning” voting machines, the shortage of paper ballots, the tsunami of mail-in and late ballots, the temporary closing and slow-downs of polling stations, and so on would have been sufficient to determine an electoral result. 2020 was an early run for...

Skip 1. He was not “presidential.” He was considered crude in speech, rough-hewn in manner, and given over to bluster and hyperbole unbefitting the highest office in the land. ... 2. He was an outsider, ... He was never a member of the Beltway club, whether Republicrats or Democrats. ... 3. He was competent and proudly patriotic. He put America first, cutting taxes, renegotiating bad trade deals to the nation’s advantage, ... For the “question of Trump” factors down to the three elements for which he was held accountable—personality, independence, and ability—and, of course, to the unbridgeable rift between the...

I would re-name the malaise from which we suffer CHINA-19. The acronym might stand for something like China’s Highly Infectious National Arsenal -- readers can supply their own candidates -- though the 19 is only a very specific temporal designator. The problem of China dates from the time of Nixon’s reopening of diplomatic relations in 1972 to the present moment. One recalls the Bushes’ preoccupation with Iraq when the menace was always Jimmy Carter’s Iran. Similarly, the media and Democratic obsession with Russia Russia Russia! was not only wrong and meretricious but completely beside the point; the political and economic...