![]() ![]() The mainstream heart of conservatism has been the Paul Ryan school of budget austerity, especially when it comes to old-age entitlements. Trump’s populist borrowings from the left are the cause of the Republican establishment’s nervous breakdown. ![]() ![]() Now Hillary Clinton has, sadly, followed Bernie Sanders and Trump down the protectionist road. He still believed free trade was the right course, but the low prices at Walmart were an abstraction compared with the pain of job losses and dislocation. Years later, he told me he wasn’t sure he would be able to do that again, given the rising tide of plant closures and lagging wages. In 1992, during his campaign, Bill Clinton had the courage to try to sell NAFTA to a union hall of Detroit autoworkers. This is an issue that has been simmering in Democratic primaries, unsuccessfully, for 30 years. He is appealing to the inchoate gringo fear that America is becoming a mongrel place.īut Trump’s other signature issue–protectionism–comes from the populist left, especially labor unions. Trump doesn’t go in for anachronistic black-white racial fears he plays to more 21st century fears of Mexicans and Muslims, the latter reinforced by the Brussels terrorist attacks. His announcement speech was an anti-Mexican tirade, citing the “rapists” and “criminals” pouring across the border. He was at it years ago, with his ugly birther campaign against Barack Obama. Trump opened with an appeal to the nativism at the heart of conservative populism. Each of his dog whistles has been pitch-perfect and, I suspect, carefully selected. But for the rest, Trump has found a way to provide heterodox comfort food to assuage the fear and loathing of the white working class. There is one gigantic exception: the anti–Wall Street rhetoric usually at the heart of populism has been limited to the suggestion that fat cats are working the system. Indeed, he has constructed the purest populist agenda, drawing from the excesses of left and right, since Georgia’s Tom Watson led the Populist Party into the racial fever swamps over a century ago. Trump has seemed totally free form, solipsistic and despicable, but there is a method to his madness. But I would take any President from the last 80+ years over Trump, no question about it.Īnyway, that's all I'll say about that topic.And while Trump speaking with a teleprompter doesn’t quite approach the awe and wonder inspired by a collie walking on its hind legs, it does serve to illuminate an important point about his presidential campaign. I'm more inclined to go with Reagan because his presidency is where the Republican party pivoted toward what they are today, and he set us on a disaster course with trickle down economics, drug war, etc, etc. Aside from Trump, the worst President of your lifetime was either Reagan or GW Bush. The Democrats' refusal to impeach is shameful and just goes to show that you can do whatever you want without repercussions if you're the president.Īnd yes, I do not agree about Carter or Obama. That's a few of the hundreds, if not thousands, of major things he has done (or in some cases, not done). He's emboldened white nationalists, expanded ICE, is now targeting LEGAL immigrants, and is leading us into another recession. We used to THINK Presidents didn't have much power, but Trump has laid that idea to bed by doing things directly against the constitution, obstructing a federal investigation, and things everyone simply thought a president would never do, so there was nothing in place to stop it. ![]()
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