I Can’t Do It

Donald Trump, Jr. appeared yesterday on the Opie radio show on SiriusXM, and presented both himself and his father in reasonable tones and with reasonable statements. As I listened to the interview/discussion, I found myself wondering if I shouldn’t soften my horror at and opposition to the prospect of a Trump presidency. After all, I find the prospect of a Hillary Clinton presidency abhorrent, as well, and I can’t think of a single expectation I have of her potential tenure that I’d look forward to.

I can’t do it.

I can’t bring myself to be complicit in any way in what I fear a Trump presidency would bring.

Economically, if he follows through on his trade war promises, his tenure will be disastrous for both the American and world economies. His long history of cronyism gives me no reason to think that he’d reverse the incestuous relationship between Big Business and Big Government. He’s also talking like a soak the rich kind of guy – not exactly the sort of person who one might expect to dial back the government.

The rank nativism that put him on the radar at the outset of the race is repugnant. Given that, if he does win, it will be one of the prime drivers, nativism will become a real and lasting part of the political landscape. Apart from the ugliness of it, there’s the long-term impact on electoral politics. The GOP was unfairly tarnished as “anti-black” by a concerted effort by the Democratic party that started in the 1960s, but if the GOP becomes solidly designated as “anti-Latino,” it’s Trump’s nativism that will be to blame. Pushing the fastest growing ethnic group in the country into the arms of the even-bigger-government party is both short-sighted and plain stupid. There’s plenty of effort among some in the GOP to distinguish among Latinos (i.e. the legal variety vs the illegal variety), but that’s just wishful thinking. In this regard, a Trump presidency would be a giant gift to the Left.

And that’s just regarding one group. His language regarding Muslims is just as unsettling. It is prudent to recognize that Islamic ideology is the prime driver of terrorism in the world today, and I’m not among those who seek to bend over backwards to deny that reality. But, the overreaction that’s at the root of such proclamations as “total and complete shutdown of Muslims entering the United States until our country’s representatives can figure out what is going on” should frighten any lover of liberty.

On health care, he’s all over the map, but I have little expectation that he’ll undo ObamaCare in any substantive fashion (i.e. diminish government’s role) and every expectation that he’d think he could get big government health care “right” where others have failed. There’s also the possibility that he’d pursue single-payer.

His foreign policy pronouncements suggest that he’ll be entangling the nation in even more foreign misadventures. We’ve had far too much of that already, and I dread someone of Trump’s apparent mien getting to send the American war machine all over the globe.

He’s all-in on government surveillance, and when that’s combined with the obvious conclusion that he’d employ as much power as he can accrete to the Executive branch, makes me believe that his tenure would be devastating to our privacy and freedom from government intrusion. He also seems quite cavalier about torture, and I haven’t heard much to give me hope regarding most of our other rights.

There are more problems, of course, but I won’t recap his entire platform here.

The few things that I think he’d get right? I don’t fear too much for gun rights under his watch, I don’t fear that economy-killing carbon taxes would be dropped on the economy, I don’t think that there’d be much attention paid to the social-conservative agenda (e.g. he’ll leave gay marriage and abortion rights alone). He’s also spoken good words regarding the localizing of control in education matters.

But, even there, I can’t hold solid hope. Trump has made statements that are all over the map. If I want to cherry-pick, I can find things that make him sound pretty good on certain issues. But, there are contrasting proclamations in most or all of those cases, leaving me having to guess as to what he’d actually do.

There’s an argument there that I’ve tried on. It’s opting for an unknown beverage instead of one I’m certain is poisoned. It’s the “lesser-of-two-evils” argument, and I’ve discarded it. The Hillary poison is a known quantity. It’ll make me sick, it’ll make the country sick, but there’s a visible path to recovery. President Clinton would offer the opportunity to dig into the demolished Republican party and try to build something legitimately small-government out of that wreckage. It’s a tall order, and a faint hope. It was tried in 2010, but it fizzled out as the establishment pushed back and the small-government movement was coopted by social conservatives. But, it did install a number of small-government Republicans into Congress, and the next wave, if it could be orchestrated, might reach critical mass.

If Trump were running as a Democrat (which I believe him to actually be), I’d welcome his presidency. Heck, I’d probably vote for him, especially if his opponent was running a social conservative agenda. It would make the GOP his opposition party from the Right, leading them down many smaller-government and pro-liberty paths. But, he’s not, which means that his tenure would invite the Dems to move even further Left than they currently are.

I can hope I’m wrong, and that a Trump presidency (which I fully expect to happen) would turn out not to be a libertarian’s nightmare. Slathering idealistic hopes on a shit sandwich doesn’t, however, make it palatable. I ain’t biting.