By Nancy Thorner & Bonnie O'Neil -
Americans, having acquired a distaste over the years for all things political, acted as a catalyst to help elect Trump as president in 2016. Too many of our political leaders were found lacking in the essentials needed for effective governing, having lost touch with the people they served.
Hillary ran for the Presidency believing she could/would win. And why wouldn’t she have been of that persuasion? Protecting her all the way, Hillary had then President Obama, the globalist elites, most of the media, and wealthy billionaire donors, among them Socialist/Communist George Soros.
How fortunate it was that enough American voters were paying attention to decide they preferred a presidential candidate who was not “steeped in political partisan favors, mistakes, secrets, and/or skullduggery,” which comprised quite a few of the want-a-be cast of career political politician candidates seeking the position. Trump was also the only Republican nominee on stage brave enough to call attention to Hilary's crimes deserving of jail time and the need to build a wall to protect our country from those flooding into our country illegally, to curb human trafficking, and stem the flow of dangerous and life-threatening drugs.
Three chief promises remain unrealized
Trump's chief promises were that he would build the wall, defund Planned Parenthood, and repeal Obamacare. Although Trump hasn’t yet been able to accomplish any of these promises, blame is placed on Trump and not the Congress. It’s not for want of trying that Trump hasn’t been able to carry through on his three stated promises. It’s up to Congress to defund Planned Parenthood, just as it is up to Congress to finance the building of the border wall. Trump would have at least been able to repeal Obamacare if John McCain hadn’t rose from his sick bed to fly to Washington in order to cast the deciding vote against the repeal.
Trump’s patience is wearing thin on funding the wall, and why shouldn't it? It was a campaign promise Trump made time and again to supporters during the campaign season and continuing throughout the first two years of his presidency. If Congress continues to refuse authorizing the funds for the wall, President Trump will need to find an alternate way to do so, perhaps through the Defense Department. On December 12, 2018, Trump advisor Stephen Miller indicated that Trump will absolutely shut the government over the border wall fight.
It’s not clear if the government will shut down if Congress doesn’t build Trump his wall, but, unlike the Democrats, most Republicans—outside of Congress, that is—don't think that would be a tragedy. Predictably Republican McCarthy said on the House floor that he thinks "going into a shutdown is stupid," but he offered no immediate plan before the Dec. 21 deadline. The House adjourned for six days soon after his remarks.”
For one thing, a shutdown only affects 20% of the bureaucrats who collect federal salaries. And as we hear every time one of these shutdowns take place, the 20% are those regarded as unessential. Might the only tragedy of a shutdown be that once things revert to normal, those people return to their jobs and are paid for their vacations.
President Trump does have some say in which services will be affected. When Obama was calling the shots, he shut down national parks and tourist attractions such as the Vietnam Wall in Washington, ensuring that families that had made long-range vacation plans would have their plans shattered. Then he blamed it on the Republicans. It backfired, though, because a mere 11 months later, the Republicans regained a record number of seats in the House.
Challenging Trump’s tweets
Often head by those who dislike Trump, and even by his supporters, is that they can’t stomach Trump’s self-aggrandizing, his boasting and his excessive tweeting. Although there is some truth in this wide spread criticism of Trump, Trump is using what is an acceptable social media method of reaching the public. Through tweeting Trump reaches the public to counter the mainstream media and left-wing cable programs who refuse to write or say anything positive about Trump and his accomplishments.
In The Cost of Presidential Candor (Nov. 25, 2018) by Victor Davis Hanson, Hanson indicated how Trump is attacked both by the establishment and the media as “crude,” “unpresidential,” and “gratuitous” for a recent series of blunt and graphic statements on a variety of current policies, Sometimes the implied charge is not that Trump makes up stuff, but that he says things that are factual but should not have been spoken. As stated by Hanson:
“Trump’s tweets and ex tempore editorials may have been indiscreet and politically unwise, but they were also mostly accurate assessments. That paradox revisits the perennial question that is the hallmark of the Trump presidency of what exactly is presidential crudity and what are the liabilities of presidential candor?”
Justified were scathing attack tweets President Trump released on the media over the weekend of December 15 and 16, 2018, blasting “one sided coverage” and “Democrat spin machines” that “should be tested in courts.”
On Sunday morning, December 16, 2018, Trump tweeted:
“A REAL scandal is the one sided coverage, hour by hour, of networks like NBC & Democrat spin machines like Saturday Night Live. It is all nothing less than unfair news coverage and Dem commercials. Should be tested in courts, can’t be legal? Only defame & belittle! Collusion.”
On Saturday, Dec. 15, President Trump gave similar comments, noting:
“Never in the history of our Country has the ‘press’ been more dishonest than it is today. Stories that should be good, are bad. Stories that should be bad, are horrible. Many stories, like with the REAL story on Russia, Clinton & the DNC, seldom get reported. Too bad!”
President Trump also took a swipe at the Weekly Standard, the right-leaning publication that was often critical of him before going out of business this week:
“The pathetic and dishonest Weekly Standard, run by failed prognosticator Bill Kristol (who, like many others, never had a clue), is flat broke and out of business. Too bad. May it rest in peace!”
As Bill Kristol found out, the “resistance” media strategy to attack President Trump is not only corrosive to the country; it also seems to be a loser business model. Bill Kristol devoted almost three years of work to attacking the President and his supporters. Telling is that the week The Weekly Standard’s troubles broke, Vanity Fair dropped a bombshell report about the struggles faced hip, millennial-targeted left-wing rags with the cool names and rabidly anti-Trump headlines strewn across your social media feed such as Vice, Vox, Mic, Buzzfeed, and Mashable.
Considering the promises kept by Trump
What about the promises that Trump was able to keep, in some cases because he didn’t require Congress’s cooperation? They include the cutting of business-killing EPA regulations; cutting federal taxes; moving the U.S. embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem; revising trade treaties; greenlighting oil pipelines; upgrading the military; pulling us out of the Paris Climate Accords and the Iran nuclear deal; defending religious rights; doing his best to improve the V.A.; seating two conservatives on the Supreme Court; and trying to seriously slow the flow of incoming Muslims for whom vetting is impossible.
In regard to the Paris Climate Accords, in a film clip from Steve Hilton's Next Revolution aired on Sunday, Dec. 16, 2018, Hilton indicated that Trump's record is head and shoulders above the rest of European leaders. He then goes on to explain what happened when the U.S. Representative took the stage at the recent COP24 in Katowice, Poland, to explain U.S. opposition to the Paris Climate Accord. Trump haters claim, as in this nation, that pulling out of the Paris climate deal by Trump is definitive proof that he’s destroying the world. Instead of being met by cheering, the Trump official was rudely cheered.
Unresolved conclusion
The saddest spectacle facing Trump is seeing the Department of Justice continue to be a totally corrupt institution. It's safe to say at this point that the entire Justice Department hierarchy has been thoroughly corrupted by the Washington establishment to the point where cleaning the house is necessary and urgent. May the new AG attorney, William Barr, be up to the task of doing what must be done and not the totally swamp creature some believe he is.
For those for whom Trump may not be conservative enough, Trump will probably be remembered as the most Republican "conservative" president this nation will ever again have am opportunity to elect. Why? 1) Because of changing demographics due, in part, to millions of illegal immigrants streaming into this country and 2) the embrace of Socialism by many younger Americans who have been brainwashed to glorify Socialism.
Trump loves his country and wants to do what is best for its people, in contrast to the globalist elites who are attempting to eviscerate Trump and this nation. It is so easy to complain and be critical of what we think Trump should be doing if we are on the outside looking in. May President Trump feel free to use his veto pen often in the tumultuous two years that lie ahead.
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Part 1: Monday, December 16, 2018. Thorner/O'Neil: Is a Well Informed Electorate a Thing of the Past or has it ever Existed https://www.illinoisreview.com/illinoisreview/2018/12/thorneroneil-is-a-well-informed-electorate-a-thing-of-the-past-or-has-it-ever-existed.html
