Reflections on Trump's winning the nomination.

Watching Donald Trump win the nomination has sort of been like watching a train wreck in slow motion. I just could not believe it was happening. When it did, it was still a shock. I remember when

Trump first stated flirting with running, I thought it was a joke.  I thought it was a publicity stunt.   When he announced and started drawing large crowds I thought it was a fluke.  "Give it six weeks and it will be over," I said.  That shows you how much I know.

Now that Trump is going to be the nominee I would like to rally behind the Party and support him. I just can't do it.  My concern is that he is an unknown. Rather than believing he really does mean to build a wall along the southern border, I don't think I know anything else that I think he really believes. There is every reason to believe he is a liberal based on whom he has supported in the past and positions he has taken. He still thinks eminent domain is a great tool to be used to facilitate economic development, he has been pro-abortion, pro-Planned Parenthood, and pro-gun control. He as said contradictory things about Obamacare. He has not been an advocate for cutting the debt, balancing the budget or for cutting the size of government. He has praised Russian dictator Putin

In some ways Trump scares me more than Hillary. Sort like with Obamacare, it had to be passed before we knew what was in it; with Trump we would have to elect him to know what he really believes. I suspect that Hillary Clinton will not abandon free trade and start  trade wars. I fear Donald Trump may. We know Hillary and we know she is bad for America. With a Hillary presidency we can expect a continuing policy of more intrusive government at home, larger budget deficits and national debt, and a weakened America in the world. We can expect a more aggressive Russia and China and a nuclear Iran. As bad as that is, Trump could be worse.  I almost think sticking with the devil we know is better than the one we don't know. 

As of today, I cannot support Trump. If he chooses a running mate I like, if he begins talking more reasonable, if he convincingly takes position with which I agree, and if he wins the support of people I admire and whose opinion I respect, I might could support him.  If people like George Will and publications like National Review come out in favor of Trump, then I could be persuaded.  I doubt that will happen. As of now, I cannot vote for Trump.  It would however be very difficult to pull the lever for Hillary Clinton and don't want to stay home. 

Luckily I won't have the deciding vote in who will be the next president. Tennessee will go Trump, so I can safely not vote or vote for a third party without affecting the outcome. If Tennessee was in play I would have a much more difficult time deciding what to do. If the election was today, I would vote Libertarian, assuming the nominee is Gary Johnson. If the Libertarians nominate some clown, I will probably vote for the some other third party.  

My greatest concern is that if conservatives stay home, we will lose "down ticket." If we lose both houses of Congress, Hilary could have a free hand to enact single-payer health care and further balloon the national debt and expand government an appoint the most liberal person she could find to the Supreme Court.. If we can hold congress, then she will have to moderate her Supreme Court pick and most of her major proposals can be stalled. Most likely Hillary will only get one term.  It is very unusual for the party in power to get a third term and it almost never happens that the party in power gets a fourth term. I believe Hillary will be the next President, I just hope we can hold the Congress. 

Below are some other opinion gleamed from the Facebook and elsewhere worth sharing.

From Vincent Kreul as posted on Facebook:

Many of my friends vote by the Buckley rule (most conservative that can win). Some of you vote based on polls. Some of you vote because you personally know candidates. Some of you have voted or intend to vote for Donald Trump. I still love you. I expect you'll still be along side me in the fight for conservative principles long after this election has passed us. I'm very much struggling in my conscience to vote for a man who supports, or has recently supported so many things contrary to the steadfast conservatism that has guided me through decades of activism, education, and a career. Can someone who thinks I should vote for Trump, politely and factually, explain to me how doing so does not contradict my core principles of Pro-Life, Pro-Gun, Anti-Tax, Anti-Cronyism, Pro-religious-liberty, Pro-military (not pro-war), pro-civil-rights, and pro-equality for all races and both genders. Make the sales pitch, but know that I need evidence, facts, and logic. Hillary being bad isn't enough... Convince me that Trump isn't bad too.
“If we must have an enemy at the head of government,” Alexander Hamilton said in exasperation, “let it be one whom we can oppose, and for whom we are not responsible.”

Vincent Kreul is Tennessee Grassroots Director at Americans for Prosperity Foundation.

From Dan Turklay as posted on Facebook:

Some of the best advice my Dad, Dan Turklay, ever gave me was that if somebody warns you they're going to react a certain way if you do something, don't be surprised if they do exactly what they said they would.

Alas, Donald Trump voters...you had been given more than sufficient warning that the conservative GOP base would not turn out for Trump in November if you shoved a Democrat onto the ballot as the GOP POTUS nominee, and now you have no right to be mad when that base does not show up in November.

Trump is going to get plastered by Hillary and I will take absolutely no joy in that. I do hope that Trump voters find the dismal results in November educational as to what happens when you sacrifice principle for bumper sticker slogans. But understand, the blood will be on your hands. It will not be on the hands of the conservatives who did everything we could to stop this from happening in the first place.

As for myself, I don't know exactly where I will land. I'd be lying if I said I knew for sure I won't end uo voting for him, but I can say for sure that if I had to choose right now the answer would be a resounding "Absolutely Not!"

I will figure that out for myself some time between now and the second Tuesday in November. Even though I have the luxury of living in a state that will undoubtedly go red, I will still take my decision very seriously as to who or if I vote for POTUS this year.

It's such a shame it had to come to this, Trump voters. Your justifiable anger was used to push an unjustifiable solution. Just know that when the votes are tallied, it will not be that the conservatives you were counting on abandoned you.....you were merely warned in the most unambiguous of ways and chose to ignore it.

Best of luck with that. ‪#‎NeverTrump‬ ‪#‎NeverHillary‬ ‪#‎AlwaysPrinciples‬

Daniel Truklay is an attorney,  having recently passed the bar, is a member of The Federalist Society and a friend of mine from Liberty on the Rocks.. 

From Richard Upchurch as posted on Facebook:

Here is the difficult and painful truth, FB friends. No longer the "Shining City on the Hill". Out of 300 million, one of these two reprehensible specimens is going to be our next president? Incredible. The profound shame, insofar as can tell, is not in who and what these two are, but that the voters seem to be choosing them.

Richard Upchurch is my uncle and a smart wise old man. 

From Gene Wisdom as posted on Facebook:

They're both liars, they're both liberal Democrats, they both hunger for power. Pick your poison. Personally, I'm not ready to drink the hemlock.

Gene Wisdom is a local political activist and close friend. 

From National Review: A Dark Time in America

As of tonight, we might know whether Donald Trump will be the Republican presidential candidate. And barring unforeseeable events, it is certain that Hillary Clinton will be the Democratic nominee. Those are two reasons (of many, unfortunately) why — other than the first years of the Civil War, when the survival of the United States as one country was in jeopardy — there was never a darker time in American history. 

The various major wars — the Revolutionary War, the Civil War, World Wars I and II, the Korean and Vietnam Wars — were worse in terms of American lives lost. The Great Depression was worse in economic terms. There were more riots during the Vietnam War era. But at no other time was there as much pessimism — valid pessimism, moreover — about America’s future as there is today. 

Among the reasons are: Every distinctive value on which America was founded is in jeopardy. (link)

From National Review: No, Trump Isn’t Actually Better than Hillary

Those of us who’ve pledged that we will never, ever vote for Donald Trump always get the same response: “You’d put Hillary Clinton in the Oval Office instead?”

Clinton’s name is spoken like an epithet, as if it’s unthinkable that any conservative would take any single action that could facilitate her election. I will not, under any circumstances, vote for Clinton, but I also do not believe that Trump would make a better president. Not because Clinton isn’t as bad as you think, but because Trump is worse than you imagine.

There’s no real difference in character between the two. They lie as easily as they breathe: habitually, transparently, shamelessly. Hillary lies like a lawyer, always parsing her words to provide a legal escape route. Trump lies like a thug, contradicting himself with each successive breath and daring anyone to call him on it. They both seek to destroy their political opponents, and they’d probably both wield the levers of power to do so and to reward their friends. In other words, they’re both fundamentally corrupt.

We know what we’ll get from Clinton when it comes to foreign policy. She’s an internationalist interventionist with more muscular instincts than Barack Obama and less resolve than George W. Bush. (link)

From George Will in the Washington Post: If Trump is nominated, the GOP must keep him out of the White House

Donald Trump’s damage to the Republican Party, although already extensive, has barely begun. Republican quislings will multiply, slinking into support of the most anti-conservative presidential aspirant in their party’s history. These collaborationists will render themselves ineligible to participate in the party’s reconstruction.

Were he to be nominated, conservatives would have two tasks. One would be to help him lose 50 states — condign punishment for his comprehensive disdain for conservative essentials, including the manners and grace that should lubricate the nation’s civic life. Second, conservatives can try to save from the anti-Trump undertow as many senators, representatives, governors and state legislators as possible.

If Trump is nominated, Republicans working to purge him and his manner from public life will reap the considerable satisfaction of preserving the identity of their 162-year-old party while working to see that they forgo only four years of the enjoyment of executive power. (link)

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