Donald Trump, When is Enough Enough?

[carlton]

This is the editorial that got me banned from Free Republic today. Good riddance.

A few days ago when asked about the couragous stand of Kim Davis, Trump essentially came out in support of gay marriage. "Its the law of the land," he said. “I hate to see her being put in jail." Well, isn't that swell Trumpy, but he added “I understand what they’re doing. It would be certainly nice if she didn’t do it." Lets get this straight, while bold leaders like Ted Cruz, Rand Paul and Mike Huckabee are coming out in support of Kim Davis and her religious stand of conscious, Trump is busy kowtowing to the gay mafia, turning an erroneous Supreme Court interpretation into the "law of the land". Of course this was brought to light immediately on FR. However, while there was some grumblings, most of those onboard the Trump train either glossed over the facts, became defensive and the usual (lack of) intelligent discussion took place.


When questioned about Obamacare at the first GOP debate August 6, Trump rambled and perplexingly came out in support of the single payer program they have in Canada and Scotland: "As far as single payer, it works in Canada. It works incredibly well in Scotland." Yes Donald, single payer is working so well in Canada that they basically bustling over the border just to get the treatment they need here. Sure, Trump went on to check all the anti-Obamacare boxes in his response, yet it is the muddled up way he did so that ought to cause consternation. One has to wonder if it wasn't Obama himself who put the healthcare changes that are destroying the country forward, if it wouldn't be Trump himself who would do it. You see Donald, when offering a conservative critique of Obamacare, you don't start by praising the healthcare systems of Canada and Scotland. If he sought to make a conservative statement on the issue, he sounded more 'severely conservative' than anything else.


Now the big issue that propelled Trump (so far) is illegal immigration. To be sure, illegal immigration has been a giant problem for decades and kudos ought to be given to the man for bringing the discussion to the forefront of this presidential election. That said, his recent history on this topic is just as muddled as the other issues I have mentioned. Now, when bringing up Trump's liberal past, many Trumpians are quick to say 'that was years ago! The man has changed.' OK, sure I'll bite. However only three years ago, Trump hammered Romney for being to harsh on illegal immigrants, referring to Romney's stance on self-deportation for the illegals:


“He had a crazy policy of self deportation which was maniacal,” Trump told the conservative website NewsMax. “It sounded as bad as it was, and he lost all of the Latino vote. He lost the Asian vote. He lost everybody who is inspired to come into this country.” Trump went on to say, "The Democrats didn’t have a policy for dealing with illegal immigrants, but what they did have going for them is they weren’t mean-spirited about it,” Trump added. “They didn’t know what the policy was, but what they were is they were kind.” Does this sound like the rhetoric of a conservative on illegal immigration? Mind you, no, this was not 10 years ago, this was as recent as the last election, when he had already had his Damascus moment and turned toward conservatism, supposedly.

Recently Trump has come on the populist side of things in regard to taxes, even Paul Krugman has come out in support of Trumps tax ideas... yes that Paul Krugman. In a Times op-ed, Krugman wrote that Trump is correct to embrace a tax hike on the rich and speak out in favor of universal healthcare. He added that conservatives — who are now slamming Trump’s proposals — were wrong to warn about the ill economic impacts of those policies ahead of the 2012 election. Keep in mind that Trump did once also propose the largest tax hike in U.S. history. Now Trump's tax hike idea isn't based on the wealthy carte blanche, but the small group of hedge fund managers who use a loophole to pay a lower tax rate on investment gains instead of income. However, his rhetoric is still jarring, "You've seen my statements. I do very well. I don't mind paying a little more in taxes. The middle class is getting clobbered in this country," he said. The statement boils down basically, tax the rich, they can afford it. Very liberal sounding. A better idea would be to lower the income tax tax to mirror the rate of investment gains. Or here's a novel idea, a flat tax!


All these recent examples of Trump's murky brand of conservtism ought to put anyone who is truly on the right on edge. Delving further back into Trump's past raises even more questions: support for automatic gun ban, support for the bank bailouts, support for the auto industry bailouts, support for abortion (hell, even this year he came out supporting Planned Parenthood saying that abortion constitutes hardly a fraction of what they do), support for Hillary (calling her very capable in 2007, and donating hundreds of thousands to her controversy ridden charity), Barack Obama ("What he has done is amazing," "He's a champion") and the Democratic Party.


So the question for conservatives is when is enough enough? Will we sell out and cave in on our values just because we want to see a wall built? If that's the case, the true price of the wall cant be quantified in dollars and cents, but in the corruption of our conservative principles.


http://freerepublic.com/focus/f-bloggers/3334111/posts

Please keep in mind, some of my rantings (i.e. the gay mafia bit) was me playing to the audience.

 

[Foreigner]

I felt sad reading most of the comments. Why exactly did you get banned?

 

[carlton]

I felt sad reading most of the comments. Why exactly did you get banned?

Free Republic is a community of lockstep conservatives, failure to march in line usually results in ridicule and eventually banishment.

 

[Mike4Freedom]

Hopefully some of the people that read that article over there have second thoughts about trump.

 

[A. Havnes]

Trump is a brand, and a shallow brand at that. It doesn't have firm positions on anything, preferring instead to shout about everyone and everything he dislikes. He has no solutions (at the very least, they change depending on what he thinks people want to hear in the unlikely event that he's actually cornered into giving a real answer), but he has a list of complaints to rant about.

For everyone who says, "He just tells it like it is! And he hates political correctness!" I have a response:

Trump doesn't tell it like it is. He rants and raves without real solutions, which isn't truth telling. Moreover, what he says has nothing to do with political correctness. Political correctness is turning off all critical thinking facilities and admitting that Bruce Jenner and other individuals who get cosmetic surgery and embrace all the stereotypes of the sex they're trying to appropriate are real men and women. When Trump says, "I don't have time for political correctness," he really means, "I have no time to try and be a decent human being."

The man appeals to the lowest of the low.

 

[EBounding]

Free Republic is a community of lockstep conservatives, failure to march in line usually results in ridicule and eventually banishment.

And Trump is the conservative hope over there?

 

[hells_unicorn]

Kudos to you Carlton, it takes some real gusto to go into the belly of the beast and try to speak truth to madness. If those fools over at Free Republic don't scrub this article, you may end up planting some seeds that will hopefully grow into something better than the Kool-aid they've all been drinking.

 

[cindy25]

there is a new Trump bio book Never Enough, due on Sept 22, so I guess his answer would be never

 

[erowe1]

Free Republic is a community of lockstep conservatives, failure to march in line usually results in ridicule and eventually banishment.

But Donald Trump is very liberal. Why would lockstep conservatives ban you for criticizing him?

 

[anaconda]

It's getting to the point where we might as well have a TV reality show about everyone running for president, and just vote people off of the island or something until we have our Commander In Chief. It would be far more appropriate for the general mentality of the American electorate.

 

[Rad]

You made a solid argument. I think conservatives and progressive philosophies don't have soul. They are in the moment. What they stand for changes overtime. They are very pragmatic. Its more of an orientation towards policy and institutions than anything else. Conservatives protect institutions such as marriage or the border until they get used to the change. Progressives are technocrats who try things out and later regret it (remember eugenics?). Socialism has a soul. Classical liberalism has a soul.

 

[Patrick Henry]

And Trump is the conservative hope over there?

Yeah, as was Fred Thompson at one time lol.

 

[Cleaner44]

I think everyone here needs to realize that many voters don't choose with their brain based on logic. People make emotional decisions and Trump's lack of policies don't really matter.

 

[DamianTV]

I think everyone here needs to realize that many voters don't choose with their brain based on logic. People make emotional decisions and Trump's lack of policies don't really matter.

Truth!

A lot of people vote for names they hear. Doesnt matter their stance on the issues or not. There was a video during the 2008 elections that misrepresented both Obama and McCain where they said McCain was the "black guy" and Obama was the white nut job. And not trying to pick on african americans, but when many were told that McCain was the "black guy", many (not all) said they agreed with McCain on the issues (likely because he was represented as black) although they didnt have a clue what the issues were.

Dont get me wrong, both Obama and McCain are dirty as sin. IMHO Obama was a better speaker, McCain always struck me as having some very creepy pedophile like body language.

Then we have Donald Trump and the MSM.

#1 - MSM will talk about anyone that provokes a strong emtional response in viewers because it directly corresponds to Ratings and Ratings means MONEY. This is why Howard Stern is popular. Its not that everyone agreed with him, but his statements were considered highly contraversial and provokative, thus he drew a lot of attention. The type of attention does not matter. For example Charlie Sheen's "Winning". MSM thrives on sensationalism.

Introduce Donald Trump and he is basically what would happen if Howard Stern seriously ran for president. MSM continues to spout his name and ride the wave of contraversy because it generates Ratings, but as a result, the more that people hear DTs name, the more likely they are to vote for him.

As a result, I think that if Adolf Hitler were alive today, people would be dumb enough to vote for him because "they have heard his name" if he was contraversial enough and the MSM plastered his name every time they opened their brain-anuses they call Mouths.

 

[erowe1]

Yeah, as was Fred Thompson at one time lol.

But Fred at least took traditional conservative positions on most things.

Trump makes no sense at all. It used to be that being pro-choice automatically disqualified anyone from getting a Republican nomination. Romney had to spend years and years building up his pro-life credentials in order to convince people he genuinely changed his position. Trump says he changes his just in time to run for president after years of being zealously pro-abortion and he gets a pass? Plus he openly had an affair and has been married how many times? He supports the gay agenda. He supports socialist health care. He supports disarming us. He supports raising taxes on people. People are gaga over his immigration rhetoric, but who even knows what he would really do in that area? It's all surreal.

 

[Cleaner44]

But Fred at least took traditional conservative positions on most things.

Trump makes no sense at all. It used to be that being pro-choice automatically disqualified anyone from getting a Republican nomination. Romney had to spend years and years building up his pro-life credentials in order to convince people he genuinely changed his position. Trump says he changes his just in time to run for president after years of being zealously pro-abortion and he gets a pass? Plus he openly had an affair and has been married how many times? He supports the gay agenda. He supports socialist health care. He supports disarming us. He supports raising taxes on people. People are gaga over his immigration rhetoric, but who even knows what he would really do in that area? It's all surreal.

It does make sense, just not the way you are looking at it. Trump rising is a representation of the rejection of politicians.

People hate politicians like Clinton and Trump.

People don't vote for politicians nearly as much as they vote against the politicians they hate (the greater evil).

Ron Paul attracted many voters because we was seen as not being a typical lying politician.

Trump is gaining a following of voters that want to stick it to the man (Bush and other establishment politicians).

People love getting on a winning band wagon. People don't want to be connected to losers.

The more Trump rises, the more others feel comfortable getting on board. This is for real and he is getting stronger, unfortunately for Rand.

Rand had better turn his numbers around soon or voters will dismiss him as a viable candidate.

 

[erowe1]

It does make sense, just not the way you are looking at it. Trump rising is a representation of the rejection of politicians.

People hate politicians like Clinton and Trump.

People don't vote for politicians nearly as much as they vote against the politicians they hate (the greater evil).

Ron Paul attracted many voters because we was seen as not being a typical lying politician.

Trump is gaining a following of voters that want to stick it to the man (Bush and other establishment politicians).

People love getting on a winning band wagon. People don't want to be connected to losers.

The more Trump rises, the more others feel comfortable getting on board. This is for real and he is getting stronger, unfortunately for Rand.

Rand had better turn his numbers around soon or voters will dismiss him as a viable candidate.

That is true for most of Trump's support. But I was under the impression that Free Republic had at least some semblance of an ideological agenda. Admittedly, I have hardly ever visited the site and the last time was years ago.