Thank you. Four years ago I did third party. It’s later now. A lot later. So much damage has been done, but so much more could be done. I don’t think third party is the right choice this time.
I am glad you're persuaded and appreciate your voting Trump. But the fact that it takes courage to publicly support one of the two presidential candidates is still wild to me. I emigrated from a communist country where you'd be "invited to tea" if you post something against the regime online. The day when Biden was installed I almost lost my faith in the U.S. I doubted if everything we believed about the U.S. had always been fictional. But Trump came back, stronger than ever, with more capable people on his team. Let's wish the best for the fate of America. There's still a long way to go even if Trump wins. The culture is clearly broken.
I had never listened to Trump much before the Joe Rogan interview. "What a goofball!" I though as they began their back-and-forth but the longer I listened the more convinced I became that he does know what needs to be done and is admirably focused on doing it. I may never warm up to his style and would prefer to be casting my vote for someone I liked better. DeSantis has been a heckuva governor. But the absolute panic of the Deep State swamp monsters over a POTUS that they can't control by bribery or blackmail is reason enough for me to give the man everything I can give by way of support.
DeSantis is smoother and a decent governor, but there is a reason his own legislators backed Trump. He would not return phone calls from legislators and they had trouble working with him. Trump communicates and listens better. I think he is a better governor than he would be president and the hurricane response was excellent. I also don't like some of the DeSantis donors.
I was upset with DeSantis when he ran for the GOP nomination barely a year into his second term. I didn't vote for him to have higher ambitions than governor while he was in office. Apparently others voiced similar opinions to him in private, he dropped out early. It should be no mystery why so many state governors have made POTUS. What better training could there be? I hope that Trump wins beyond the margin of fraud. I hope JD runs in 2028 when Trump can't with DeSantis as his running mate. But 20 years of normies in charge is probably to much to ask.
I'm a libertarian, which is to say strongly anti-authoritarian and opposed to war, except in the case of actual defense. Put otherwise, I want everyone left alone as much as possible. I'm tired of the big parties spending so much money we don't have on things we don't need. If it were up to me, I would work to find out just how many government departments we could abolish, somewhat as Javier Milei has. But we don't have a Milei or a Paul on the ballot. We do have a democrat on the ballot, and she seems to have been picked by people who read 1984 and thought it sounded pretty good. We also have a republican on the ballot, and he seems to piss off his own party because he is going to do what he thinks is right, the party be damned. The brilliant Victor Davis Hanson has compellingly compared him to Winston Churchill. So on the one side it is instant and draconian authoritarianism and on the other, there is a chance to break the corruption of the big parties. I may not necessarily want Trump in my house, but I want him in the White House. And I would love to put a chainsaw in his hands!
Wow. I became aware of you guys (well, really Brett) post-Evergreen and have been a fan of DarkHorse since episode 1 (not a prime number). Back then, you were sane but proud Sanders supporters. Like many of us, would you say you've changed, or you've stood still while the world went crazy around you.
I always felt that people of such high intelligence and intellectual flexibility belonged in my political sphere and I was thrilled when they moved over. I also agree with Brett that team red could go bad at any point and loyalty to a party is silly.
Excellent! A well written and logical essay delineating why Trump is the better choice....also presented without resorting to expounding the numerous negatives associated with Harris.
I view this as a single issue election, and you rightly pointed out their contrasting views on free speech. Unfettered dialogue is the only avenue we have to arrive at a consensus acceptable to all. Having the power to control that dialogue is the road to toletarianism.
Independent voices on Substack are rapidly replacing the irrelevant blather of a diminishing propaganda media.
Wow. Heather. Thank you. I "came out" as a DT voter in my book club and spent 4 ½ hours writing some of the reasons why (with links to sites including Dark Horse). First, I got some condolences but today, I got some push back. So, your articulate essay is so timely and helpful. FORWARD...
I am so glad that it is useful to you. The timing felt exactly right. I have known who I would vote for this election for many months, but it was time to say so, explicitly and clearly
I agree with everything you say. To me the main issue is the institutional risk of democrat policies. To borrow a scientific term, the policies of the democrat party are tinkering with the DNA of America. We were founded and for 250 years we have built a country based on liberty, the sovereign citizen, principles of merit and equality, freedom of speech and religion, and so on....These are core to the American success story. Left unchecked, the D party through its perverted prism of Identity Politics seeks to rewrite our history and eliminate most of these core features. In a generation, the leaders of this country will likely be the ignoramus' protesting Israel which is scary. They are being taught that America is evil and will seek to destroy its DNA.
Well put as always, Heather. I never voted for Trump before. I am this time. Thank you (and Bret) for helping me stay focused on what is true in this confusing time.
Actually Trump is owned by whoever will pay him. He brought RFK Jr. into his first Administration in 2016 to chair a committee on “vaccine safety and integrity.” But by January 2017 the Trump Team was running away from Bobby as fast as they could run. They dumped him. Bobby says Fauci got to Trump. Maybe or maybe BIgPharma money got to him as well.
Now, in an extraordinary display of naiveté or lack of judgement, Bobby has decided to believe Trump one more time and join his campaign with a promise of being in his new Administration.
Trump isn’t very good at much but one thing he is excellent at is conning people. He has an astounding instinct for another human being’s vulnerable spot; he knows exactly how to turn people, especially other men, into his marks. It has worked many times before. It’s at the root of his entire shoddy, failed business career and fuels his political appeal. His marks see a God. But it is a lie.
Trump is better for Women
Well, this can only be true if all women support a world as depicted in “The Handmaid’s Tale.” Women as individuated, free people- childless cat ladies - have no place in the Trump/Vance Male Centric Patriarchal Utopia. Vance has actually said that divorce should be illegal and that a woman who is being beaten severely by her husband should still stay with him – for social stability. Thanks, but no.
Trump is better for America
Only if you think we would be better off sans our Constitution!
This is not hyperbole. But if you truly believe that Trump will "uphold and defend the Constitution" then you are also entirely deluded and unfamiliar with the ideology of the "new right" which Vance and many of the other men around Trump espouse. They favor "extra-Constitutional" means to force their will upon this Nation. They will "rip out" anything and anyone who dares to stand against them. The Rule of Law, Bill of Rights and Separation of Powers will be shredded. They are not fans of voting and will seek to install a "king" for life. Go listen to what Vance was actually saying prior to being picked as Trump's VP candidate. Listen to him spell out his beliefs in the 2021 interview with podcast host Jack Murphy.
In that interview he destroys the separation of powers when he challenges the authority of the judicial branch of government asserting that if courts did try to block the president from firing federal employees, the president should simply ignore them and refuse to obey their ruling. Every president takes an oath to “preserve, protect and defend” the U.S. Constitution. Article II, Section 3 provides that the president “shall take Care that the Laws be faithfully executed”—all the laws, not only those with which he agrees. Respect for the Constitution and the Separation of Powers is fundamental to our unique country and our freedoms. After you review that interview, then sit down and read the works of Adrian Vermeule and the critics who unpack him. Like Vance, Vermuele is a recent convert to the Catholic Church which both see as the font of higher morality. Leaving all the pedophiles in the priesthood of this “higher morality” aside. If men who believe that we need a theocracy imposed by force are in power, how safe will our Constitution be?
Just listen to what Trump’s supporters said at Trump’s Madison Square Garden rally this week. Trump's supporters are trying to spin this but there is really no way you can. This is the kind of dehumanizing rhetoric Hitler used all the time. What the Nazis did to Germany is exactly the kind of country Trump wants to turn the US into. Stop apologizing for this man and wake up. Are you really this hateful? And stop kidding yourself. The kind of dictator Trump wants to be will not stop with the blacks and the browns...many many whites will find themselves under his boot as well should they be foolish enough to vote for him and his people. Not tall enough, not a "perfect specimen" of humanity as defined by Trump? Too old, too stupid, too poor? Too female? Too bad. You will not have a place in Trump's "new right" Utopia.
In that interview with Rogan, Trump actually used the phrase "perfect specimens" to describe the pilots who flew him into Iraq on Airforce One. They were "perfect specimens" right out of "central casting"... apparently, he thinks a lesser human specimen...whatever that means, or, God forbid, a female, would not be capable of flying a plane. This language is reminiscent of the Nazi concept of the Herrenmenschen, the Übermensch – the “perfect specimens” the only humans worth keeping alive.
Like me, you are a medical freedom warrior. But Trump is not our hero. When Rogan pushes him on that subject he veers into supporting the great work done by the pharmaceutical companies et al.
Summary
Yes, we desperately need to reform our government. Curb the Left’s own tyrannical instincts. Oppose censorship, clean up the metastatic governmental bureaucracies, change plenty of incentives, revise flawed paradigms and insist upon transparency, medical freedom and informed consent! But Trump is not the one to do this. He is not our Savior. As General McMaster said of him, Trump is an “idiot” with the brain of a “kindergartner” who is incapable of paying attention to anything and is only capable of creating chaos. The former national security adviser isn’t the only member of Trump’s war cabinet who felt that way.
Don’t take their word for it either. Go listen to that Joe Rogan interview – you will hear the kindergartner all through Trump’s babbling “weave.”
Kamala Harris is not perfect, far from it. But she is not out to entirely destroy the country. The worst offenses of the Progressive Left are already dying of their own weight and the imposition of common sense by the people. We can continue to reform this country as long as we retain our Constitution, Bill of Rights and Rule of Law and Civility. Once those go, the secular republic will be lost to chaos and what follows revolutionary chaos? History says: Stalin and Mao and Starvation.
So your answer is to give up and try to keep our heads down? It doesn't occur to you that the Deep State fears him? Are you one of those people that think he faked an assassination attempt that was less than 3cm from killing him and did kill a spectator? Do you think the constant calling him Hitler and encouraging the weak minded to shoot him is just a psyop? Or are you just a troll trying to suppress the turnout for Trump by pissing on him like a dog to satisfy your masters?
There was no new argument in that poster's offering, was there? As if the female half of Dark Horse hasn't already been pelted with all those same accusations and predictions and talking points and thus needs to be told hither to now unknown horror tales RE Trump. Sigh.
That's what the Bolsheviks said. No matter how flawed the Progressive Left is – and boy is it flawed - we cannot afford to vote for the man who would seek to entirely destroy the very foundations of the Republic. Whose followers would resort to “extra-Constitutional” means to get their way. Who will accept the result of an election which declares Trump the winner but cry “Fraud” if he is not. Eli Lake over at The Free Press today posted an excellent essay: “Trump and the Art of the Bullshitter.” "Trump’s bullshit reached a zenith when he lost the 2020 election. On January 6, his belief in his own bullshit had alarming, violent consequences…Trump’s tantrums and inability to accept his defeat was sinister bullshit that millions of Americans cannot forget [or forgive].
Many people, including those around Trump—like then-Vice President Mike Pence—genuinely believed the whole system hung in the balance. Any claim that the election was rigged was untrue, but many of his supporters were willing to form a mob in a doomed effort to prevent the peaceful transfer of power. They failed. The system survived. But only because enough of Trump’s own allies, like Pence and Attorney General Bill Barr, called bullshit on their commander in chief.”
This time, the men behind Trump are far better prepared than they were in 2016. This time, they will destroy our democracy. They will install Trump as dictator. They have promised that they will. Vance has promised that they will. Believe them.
“The real victims of Trump’s deceptions the constituency most harmed by Trump are the segment of his supporters that are not in on the kayfabe. Put another way, Trump’s real victims are his marks, the voters that actually believe his bullshit.”
Liz Cheney, a clear eyed Republican adult willing to call out BS when she sees it told Trump on X: “Donald - This is the type of thing that demonstrates yet again that you are not a stable adult—and are not fit for office.” Liz Cheney is 100% correct. He is not fit for office. The choice before us is obvious and stark. And it isn’t Trump.
Very good, very succinct, completely accurate in the facts you've presented.
There's so much to say, isn't there? But it's really not necessary to drill down any further. You've done the job.
A comment though about the footnote (#1) below the photograph at end:
I also wish he would speak about the failures of OWS and the 'vaccines'. I do understand why he hasn't and yet he was conned all the way through the crisis - just read what the connivers and charlatans write now about how they hindered his initial wishes (Dr. Birx bragged about this in her book), and not just RE Covid19, but Gen Milley, and his CoS et al keeping people from his sphere so they could control him. Congress refusing to fun the border wall... oh my, too many to mention and I've digressed.
Trump's instincts about most things Covid19 were superb. As for the shots (called vaccines) he said from the beginning that he preferred therapeutics to the vaccine (I would bet the farm 'they' did ALL they could and swayed him to back OWS). Here is an article where he states that, and also a link to the interview where he can be seen stating that. He does at the beginning of the episode, and again he reiterates at 5:06 and >.
Treatments rather than just waiting for that mrna shot... how many might have been spared dying...
He wanted the sick to be saved, not to be sacrificed to pharma and the WHO and the CDC and Fauci and Birx and _____ (fill in the blank with whomever). It's his instinct to try to help that also pushed him to ok "right to try".
(I need to say this so forgive me for getting personal: I have never blamed DJT for our son's death. Never. I believe there are some who share some responsibility, but I don't believe he is one of them. I think he tried harder to save people than those who bullied their way into running the show.)
In fact, Trump’s whole clan now - JD, Tulsi, RFK Jr, Vivek, Musk, Nicole Shanahan - all used to be Ds. Viewed correctly, the R voters expelled the neocons in favor of a (growing) set of Americans intent on bringing us all back.
This is truly a tour de force, Heather. May it stiffen the spines of the legions of classical liberals who agree with you but tremble at losing their political purity by taking a firm stand based on reason instead of just whining that neither candidate is sufficiently virtuous.
One little point of contention concerning how Trump treats women: His two ex-wives, Ivanka Trump and Marla Maples both speak well of him and seem to maintain a good relationship. They are the only ones with a right to judge how he's treated them.
A plus for me has always been the fact that he has 5 children with 3 women and all the children seem very close and seem to love each other as true and bonded siblings. No jealousy or tribal contentions. That comes from 'somewhere'; it's not something that naturally happens if you just throw people together and see what develops.
This is a superbly reasoned and argued essay. I am sympathetic to people who dislike both major party candidates, and even have a few people in my inner circle who will likely vote Third Party. Ultimately however we are going to have either Harris or Trump as president. I believe it was the excellent investigative journalist Salena Zito who commented something to the effect that people who hate Trump take him literally, whereas his supporters interpret his words figuratively. I am definitely in the latter camp, and was originally back in 2016, although I, too, was unhappy with OWS and would like to hear him express regret about this--except what difference will that make, by itself? It would just be words. We need substantive change in so many things in this country--Trump will have just a few years to initiate change if he wins. I fear greatly what will ensue if he loses. I am cautiously hopeful because of the people he has making his case NOW--RFK JR, Elon Musk, JD Vance, Tulsi Gabbard (BTW--who doesn't think she will run for president now that she has joined the Republican Party??--I am very glad about that!!). All this Harris and Harris-supporter talk about future Nazi and Hitlerian actions by Trump is preposterous and ultimately insulting to our intelligence. We have a record to judge him by. I remember well discussing the Trump tax cuts with a member of my team--a medical assistant who with his wife supported a blended family that included 5 kids--I was glad he got to keep $4000 more of his income--I did not, having a substantially higher income--it was a true middle class tax cut. Meanwhile, Harris has the Clintons, Walz, Obamas and some Hollywood celebrities making her case ... and the Cheneys!!!! We are not going to get any change with a President Harris; presumably whoever is currently running the US government will continue to do so, since it isn't Biden and it isn't Harris. AND she has made no effort to explain how she will be govern differently than Biden, or do anything different.
We also paid more under the Trump tax plan as we could no longer deduct all of our investing expenses. Most people do not understand the tax code well enough to know that most higher income people paid more under Trump, you are 100% right.
This took some real courage to post, and I think you just help make the case for me to vote Trump rather than 3rd party.
Thank you. Four years ago I did third party. It’s later now. A lot later. So much damage has been done, but so much more could be done. I don’t think third party is the right choice this time.
I was a life long 3rd party voter until Trump came along.
I am glad you're persuaded and appreciate your voting Trump. But the fact that it takes courage to publicly support one of the two presidential candidates is still wild to me. I emigrated from a communist country where you'd be "invited to tea" if you post something against the regime online. The day when Biden was installed I almost lost my faith in the U.S. I doubted if everything we believed about the U.S. had always been fictional. But Trump came back, stronger than ever, with more capable people on his team. Let's wish the best for the fate of America. There's still a long way to go even if Trump wins. The culture is clearly broken.
I'm still sort of voting third-party this year, because I'm voting for RFK via Trump ;)
I had never listened to Trump much before the Joe Rogan interview. "What a goofball!" I though as they began their back-and-forth but the longer I listened the more convinced I became that he does know what needs to be done and is admirably focused on doing it. I may never warm up to his style and would prefer to be casting my vote for someone I liked better. DeSantis has been a heckuva governor. But the absolute panic of the Deep State swamp monsters over a POTUS that they can't control by bribery or blackmail is reason enough for me to give the man everything I can give by way of support.
DeSantis is smoother and a decent governor, but there is a reason his own legislators backed Trump. He would not return phone calls from legislators and they had trouble working with him. Trump communicates and listens better. I think he is a better governor than he would be president and the hurricane response was excellent. I also don't like some of the DeSantis donors.
I was upset with DeSantis when he ran for the GOP nomination barely a year into his second term. I didn't vote for him to have higher ambitions than governor while he was in office. Apparently others voiced similar opinions to him in private, he dropped out early. It should be no mystery why so many state governors have made POTUS. What better training could there be? I hope that Trump wins beyond the margin of fraud. I hope JD runs in 2028 when Trump can't with DeSantis as his running mate. But 20 years of normies in charge is probably to much to ask.
I'm a libertarian, which is to say strongly anti-authoritarian and opposed to war, except in the case of actual defense. Put otherwise, I want everyone left alone as much as possible. I'm tired of the big parties spending so much money we don't have on things we don't need. If it were up to me, I would work to find out just how many government departments we could abolish, somewhat as Javier Milei has. But we don't have a Milei or a Paul on the ballot. We do have a democrat on the ballot, and she seems to have been picked by people who read 1984 and thought it sounded pretty good. We also have a republican on the ballot, and he seems to piss off his own party because he is going to do what he thinks is right, the party be damned. The brilliant Victor Davis Hanson has compellingly compared him to Winston Churchill. So on the one side it is instant and draconian authoritarianism and on the other, there is a chance to break the corruption of the big parties. I may not necessarily want Trump in my house, but I want him in the White House. And I would love to put a chainsaw in his hands!
Many of us would be willing to donate fuel for that chainsaw.
Wow. I became aware of you guys (well, really Brett) post-Evergreen and have been a fan of DarkHorse since episode 1 (not a prime number). Back then, you were sane but proud Sanders supporters. Like many of us, would you say you've changed, or you've stood still while the world went crazy around you.
I suspect the latter.
What a brave thing you've written. Thank you!
I always felt that people of such high intelligence and intellectual flexibility belonged in my political sphere and I was thrilled when they moved over. I also agree with Brett that team red could go bad at any point and loyalty to a party is silly.
'loyalty to a party is silly'
Ditto. People treat political parties like a religion or hometown baseball team or something.
Excellent! A well written and logical essay delineating why Trump is the better choice....also presented without resorting to expounding the numerous negatives associated with Harris.
I view this as a single issue election, and you rightly pointed out their contrasting views on free speech. Unfettered dialogue is the only avenue we have to arrive at a consensus acceptable to all. Having the power to control that dialogue is the road to toletarianism.
Independent voices on Substack are rapidly replacing the irrelevant blather of a diminishing propaganda media.
Dick Minnis removingthecataract.substack.com
Wow. Heather. Thank you. I "came out" as a DT voter in my book club and spent 4 ½ hours writing some of the reasons why (with links to sites including Dark Horse). First, I got some condolences but today, I got some push back. So, your articulate essay is so timely and helpful. FORWARD...
I am so glad that it is useful to you. The timing felt exactly right. I have known who I would vote for this election for many months, but it was time to say so, explicitly and clearly
I agree with everything you say. To me the main issue is the institutional risk of democrat policies. To borrow a scientific term, the policies of the democrat party are tinkering with the DNA of America. We were founded and for 250 years we have built a country based on liberty, the sovereign citizen, principles of merit and equality, freedom of speech and religion, and so on....These are core to the American success story. Left unchecked, the D party through its perverted prism of Identity Politics seeks to rewrite our history and eliminate most of these core features. In a generation, the leaders of this country will likely be the ignoramus' protesting Israel which is scary. They are being taught that America is evil and will seek to destroy its DNA.
Well put as always, Heather. I never voted for Trump before. I am this time. Thank you (and Bret) for helping me stay focused on what is true in this confusing time.
Ok Heather - let’s unpack this:
Trump is not owned.
Actually Trump is owned by whoever will pay him. He brought RFK Jr. into his first Administration in 2016 to chair a committee on “vaccine safety and integrity.” But by January 2017 the Trump Team was running away from Bobby as fast as they could run. They dumped him. Bobby says Fauci got to Trump. Maybe or maybe BIgPharma money got to him as well.
Now, in an extraordinary display of naiveté or lack of judgement, Bobby has decided to believe Trump one more time and join his campaign with a promise of being in his new Administration.
Trump isn’t very good at much but one thing he is excellent at is conning people. He has an astounding instinct for another human being’s vulnerable spot; he knows exactly how to turn people, especially other men, into his marks. It has worked many times before. It’s at the root of his entire shoddy, failed business career and fuels his political appeal. His marks see a God. But it is a lie.
Trump is better for Women
Well, this can only be true if all women support a world as depicted in “The Handmaid’s Tale.” Women as individuated, free people- childless cat ladies - have no place in the Trump/Vance Male Centric Patriarchal Utopia. Vance has actually said that divorce should be illegal and that a woman who is being beaten severely by her husband should still stay with him – for social stability. Thanks, but no.
Trump is better for America
Only if you think we would be better off sans our Constitution!
This is not hyperbole. But if you truly believe that Trump will "uphold and defend the Constitution" then you are also entirely deluded and unfamiliar with the ideology of the "new right" which Vance and many of the other men around Trump espouse. They favor "extra-Constitutional" means to force their will upon this Nation. They will "rip out" anything and anyone who dares to stand against them. The Rule of Law, Bill of Rights and Separation of Powers will be shredded. They are not fans of voting and will seek to install a "king" for life. Go listen to what Vance was actually saying prior to being picked as Trump's VP candidate. Listen to him spell out his beliefs in the 2021 interview with podcast host Jack Murphy.
In that interview he destroys the separation of powers when he challenges the authority of the judicial branch of government asserting that if courts did try to block the president from firing federal employees, the president should simply ignore them and refuse to obey their ruling. Every president takes an oath to “preserve, protect and defend” the U.S. Constitution. Article II, Section 3 provides that the president “shall take Care that the Laws be faithfully executed”—all the laws, not only those with which he agrees. Respect for the Constitution and the Separation of Powers is fundamental to our unique country and our freedoms. After you review that interview, then sit down and read the works of Adrian Vermeule and the critics who unpack him. Like Vance, Vermuele is a recent convert to the Catholic Church which both see as the font of higher morality. Leaving all the pedophiles in the priesthood of this “higher morality” aside. If men who believe that we need a theocracy imposed by force are in power, how safe will our Constitution be?
Just listen to what Trump’s supporters said at Trump’s Madison Square Garden rally this week. Trump's supporters are trying to spin this but there is really no way you can. This is the kind of dehumanizing rhetoric Hitler used all the time. What the Nazis did to Germany is exactly the kind of country Trump wants to turn the US into. Stop apologizing for this man and wake up. Are you really this hateful? And stop kidding yourself. The kind of dictator Trump wants to be will not stop with the blacks and the browns...many many whites will find themselves under his boot as well should they be foolish enough to vote for him and his people. Not tall enough, not a "perfect specimen" of humanity as defined by Trump? Too old, too stupid, too poor? Too female? Too bad. You will not have a place in Trump's "new right" Utopia.
In that interview with Rogan, Trump actually used the phrase "perfect specimens" to describe the pilots who flew him into Iraq on Airforce One. They were "perfect specimens" right out of "central casting"... apparently, he thinks a lesser human specimen...whatever that means, or, God forbid, a female, would not be capable of flying a plane. This language is reminiscent of the Nazi concept of the Herrenmenschen, the Übermensch – the “perfect specimens” the only humans worth keeping alive.
Like me, you are a medical freedom warrior. But Trump is not our hero. When Rogan pushes him on that subject he veers into supporting the great work done by the pharmaceutical companies et al.
Summary
Yes, we desperately need to reform our government. Curb the Left’s own tyrannical instincts. Oppose censorship, clean up the metastatic governmental bureaucracies, change plenty of incentives, revise flawed paradigms and insist upon transparency, medical freedom and informed consent! But Trump is not the one to do this. He is not our Savior. As General McMaster said of him, Trump is an “idiot” with the brain of a “kindergartner” who is incapable of paying attention to anything and is only capable of creating chaos. The former national security adviser isn’t the only member of Trump’s war cabinet who felt that way.
Don’t take their word for it either. Go listen to that Joe Rogan interview – you will hear the kindergartner all through Trump’s babbling “weave.”
Kamala Harris is not perfect, far from it. But she is not out to entirely destroy the country. The worst offenses of the Progressive Left are already dying of their own weight and the imposition of common sense by the people. We can continue to reform this country as long as we retain our Constitution, Bill of Rights and Rule of Law and Civility. Once those go, the secular republic will be lost to chaos and what follows revolutionary chaos? History says: Stalin and Mao and Starvation.
So your answer is to give up and try to keep our heads down? It doesn't occur to you that the Deep State fears him? Are you one of those people that think he faked an assassination attempt that was less than 3cm from killing him and did kill a spectator? Do you think the constant calling him Hitler and encouraging the weak minded to shoot him is just a psyop? Or are you just a troll trying to suppress the turnout for Trump by pissing on him like a dog to satisfy your masters?
There was no new argument in that poster's offering, was there? As if the female half of Dark Horse hasn't already been pelted with all those same accusations and predictions and talking points and thus needs to be told hither to now unknown horror tales RE Trump. Sigh.
And thanks for tackling that one. :)
100% the latter.
I'm not a fan of Trump, but compared to what the arc of Democratic Party policy has been, I'll opt for even just a chance of breaking the pattern.
That's what the Bolsheviks said. No matter how flawed the Progressive Left is – and boy is it flawed - we cannot afford to vote for the man who would seek to entirely destroy the very foundations of the Republic. Whose followers would resort to “extra-Constitutional” means to get their way. Who will accept the result of an election which declares Trump the winner but cry “Fraud” if he is not. Eli Lake over at The Free Press today posted an excellent essay: “Trump and the Art of the Bullshitter.” "Trump’s bullshit reached a zenith when he lost the 2020 election. On January 6, his belief in his own bullshit had alarming, violent consequences…Trump’s tantrums and inability to accept his defeat was sinister bullshit that millions of Americans cannot forget [or forgive].
Many people, including those around Trump—like then-Vice President Mike Pence—genuinely believed the whole system hung in the balance. Any claim that the election was rigged was untrue, but many of his supporters were willing to form a mob in a doomed effort to prevent the peaceful transfer of power. They failed. The system survived. But only because enough of Trump’s own allies, like Pence and Attorney General Bill Barr, called bullshit on their commander in chief.”
This time, the men behind Trump are far better prepared than they were in 2016. This time, they will destroy our democracy. They will install Trump as dictator. They have promised that they will. Vance has promised that they will. Believe them.
“The real victims of Trump’s deceptions the constituency most harmed by Trump are the segment of his supporters that are not in on the kayfabe. Put another way, Trump’s real victims are his marks, the voters that actually believe his bullshit.”
Liz Cheney, a clear eyed Republican adult willing to call out BS when she sees it told Trump on X: “Donald - This is the type of thing that demonstrates yet again that you are not a stable adult—and are not fit for office.” Liz Cheney is 100% correct. He is not fit for office. The choice before us is obvious and stark. And it isn’t Trump.
Yeah, no. Judging actions and not words, the Democrats are a much bigger threat to our civil liberties.
The fact that you admiringly cite Liz Cheney is the icing on the cake.
Very good, very succinct, completely accurate in the facts you've presented.
There's so much to say, isn't there? But it's really not necessary to drill down any further. You've done the job.
A comment though about the footnote (#1) below the photograph at end:
I also wish he would speak about the failures of OWS and the 'vaccines'. I do understand why he hasn't and yet he was conned all the way through the crisis - just read what the connivers and charlatans write now about how they hindered his initial wishes (Dr. Birx bragged about this in her book), and not just RE Covid19, but Gen Milley, and his CoS et al keeping people from his sphere so they could control him. Congress refusing to fun the border wall... oh my, too many to mention and I've digressed.
Trump's instincts about most things Covid19 were superb. As for the shots (called vaccines) he said from the beginning that he preferred therapeutics to the vaccine (I would bet the farm 'they' did ALL they could and swayed him to back OWS). Here is an article where he states that, and also a link to the interview where he can be seen stating that. He does at the beginning of the episode, and again he reiterates at 5:06 and >.
Treatments rather than just waiting for that mrna shot... how many might have been spared dying...
He wanted the sick to be saved, not to be sacrificed to pharma and the WHO and the CDC and Fauci and Birx and _____ (fill in the blank with whomever). It's his instinct to try to help that also pushed him to ok "right to try".
https://www.newsweek.com/president-trump-says-give-me-therapeutics-over-covid-19-vaccine-1519852
https://youtu.be/JZGPpFr_2Nc?feature=shared&t=306
Thank you for this piece.
(I need to say this so forgive me for getting personal: I have never blamed DJT for our son's death. Never. I believe there are some who share some responsibility, but I don't believe he is one of them. I think he tried harder to save people than those who bullied their way into running the show.)
Correct me if I'm wrong, but didn't Trump used to be a Democrat?
Yes,as did I.,but the party left me.
In fact, Trump’s whole clan now - JD, Tulsi, RFK Jr, Vivek, Musk, Nicole Shanahan - all used to be Ds. Viewed correctly, the R voters expelled the neocons in favor of a (growing) set of Americans intent on bringing us all back.
I don't think the neocons were expelled—it's more like rats following a garbage truck.
No offense to rats.
This is truly a tour de force, Heather. May it stiffen the spines of the legions of classical liberals who agree with you but tremble at losing their political purity by taking a firm stand based on reason instead of just whining that neither candidate is sufficiently virtuous.
One little point of contention concerning how Trump treats women: His two ex-wives, Ivanka Trump and Marla Maples both speak well of him and seem to maintain a good relationship. They are the only ones with a right to judge how he's treated them.
A plus for me has always been the fact that he has 5 children with 3 women and all the children seem very close and seem to love each other as true and bonded siblings. No jealousy or tribal contentions. That comes from 'somewhere'; it's not something that naturally happens if you just throw people together and see what develops.
Not to mention former employees of Trump’s businesses.
You mean Ivana, Ivanka is the daughter. They both endorsed him and said he would be a great president as well.
This is a superbly reasoned and argued essay. I am sympathetic to people who dislike both major party candidates, and even have a few people in my inner circle who will likely vote Third Party. Ultimately however we are going to have either Harris or Trump as president. I believe it was the excellent investigative journalist Salena Zito who commented something to the effect that people who hate Trump take him literally, whereas his supporters interpret his words figuratively. I am definitely in the latter camp, and was originally back in 2016, although I, too, was unhappy with OWS and would like to hear him express regret about this--except what difference will that make, by itself? It would just be words. We need substantive change in so many things in this country--Trump will have just a few years to initiate change if he wins. I fear greatly what will ensue if he loses. I am cautiously hopeful because of the people he has making his case NOW--RFK JR, Elon Musk, JD Vance, Tulsi Gabbard (BTW--who doesn't think she will run for president now that she has joined the Republican Party??--I am very glad about that!!). All this Harris and Harris-supporter talk about future Nazi and Hitlerian actions by Trump is preposterous and ultimately insulting to our intelligence. We have a record to judge him by. I remember well discussing the Trump tax cuts with a member of my team--a medical assistant who with his wife supported a blended family that included 5 kids--I was glad he got to keep $4000 more of his income--I did not, having a substantially higher income--it was a true middle class tax cut. Meanwhile, Harris has the Clintons, Walz, Obamas and some Hollywood celebrities making her case ... and the Cheneys!!!! We are not going to get any change with a President Harris; presumably whoever is currently running the US government will continue to do so, since it isn't Biden and it isn't Harris. AND she has made no effort to explain how she will be govern differently than Biden, or do anything different.
We also paid more under the Trump tax plan as we could no longer deduct all of our investing expenses. Most people do not understand the tax code well enough to know that most higher income people paid more under Trump, you are 100% right.
Thank you! I'm sharing widely!
Thank you Dr.Heying, I will share this with friends and relatives.