Welcome to the Party of Trump

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Stephen Moore:

I stirred up some controversy last week when I told a conference of several dozen House Republicans that the GOP is now officially a Trump working-class party. For better or worse, I said at the gathering inside the Capitol dome, the baton has now officially been passed from the Reagan era to the new Trump era. The members didn’t quite faint over my apostasy, but the shock was palpable.

I emphasized that Republicans must prioritize delivering jobs and economic development to the regions of the country in the industrial Midwest — states such as Michigan, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Indiana, Wisconsin, Iowa, and Missouri. These are places that, for the most part, never felt the meager Obama recovery and where blue-collar Reagan Democrats took a leap of faith this election and came back to the Republican party for the first time since 1984. The GOP will be judged in 2018 and in 2020 on whether they deliver results for this part of the country and for the forgotten middle-class men and women (“the deplorables”) whom Democrats abandoned economically and culturally. This is all simply a political truism.

What roused the ire of some of my conservative friends was my statement that “just as Reagan converted the GOP into a conservative party, with his victory this year, Trump has converted the GOP into a populist, America First party.”‎

One friend lamented that I must have been drunk when I said this.

No. I meant exactly what I said, but I will clarify.

First, let me lay to rest the idea that this was a backhanded slam against Reagan’s legacy. Hardly. I worked for the Gipper. He rebuilt the American economy and caused a quarter-century-long boom in wealth creation and prosperity nearly unrivaled in American history. He won the Cold War and vanquished the Evil Empire of the Soviet Union. He belongs on Mount Rushmore.

But this is 2016 not 1986. The world is a different place. The concerns and priorities of the American people are different today from what they were 30 years ago. The voters spoke with a thunderclap. Trump squashed his 16 GOP rivals — a group that was touted as the most talented field of contenders in modern history — as if they were bugs crashing into his windshield. Republican voters opted for his new breed of economic populism. Republicans who were Never Trumpers and who insisted with absolute certainly that Trump could never win the primary, let alone the general election, can pretend that a political sonic boom didn’t happen.

Guess what? It did. ‎A realignment occurred while all the high-falutin’ intellectuals and political consultants were napping.

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It’s a new world out there. Reagan would’ve listened to the people if he were with us-that’s why he won. You can go over the heads of the lsm if people want to hear what you say and what you say reflects their thoughts and attitudes. Conservatives lost track of what is important to the PEOPLE and got hung up on purity of message. Trump heard the message and won, even if he had the dims, the lsm, the GOPe, and the #neverTrumpers against him. A lesson the GOP needed to learn. Fortunately, it looks as though the dimocrat party still hasn’t gotten the message…

Trump has skillfully exploited populace frustration anger, frustration, and fears. He methodically exploited everything that was available to exploit, working every angle with the single goal of winning an election.

I don’t believe there’s anything about Donald Trump that’s even remotely like Ronald Reagan. Reagan didn’t win simply by skillfully working angles. Reagan actually had a coherent message, and firmly held beliefs, values, and principles. He didn’t win by encouraging and harnessing negative energies.

The only thing these two tidal changes in American politics have in common is that they’re both tidal changes. The two men that populace energy has carried to the White House couldn’t be more different. The consequences may also be very different. It remains to be seen what Donald Trump may enable—or allow to slip the leash. There’s one thing that I know with absolute certainty, however: Donald Trump is no Ronald Reagan.

@Greg: Exploitation is only if he fails to produce. You continue to fail to understand what happened. Give it up Greg. This is well beyond your ability to understand let alone analyze.

@Randy:
I don’t think he can-his hatred is his security blanket. Understanding and analysis might ruin his absolute knowledge. He couldn’t handle that.

This is well beyond your ability to understand let alone analyze.

You have no effing clue what people who see through Donald Trump understand. I mean, seriously, look at this guy. I know what I see. What do you imagine you’re seeing?

I really can’t decide if it’s comical that Trump followers think everyone else is stupid, or utterly pathetic. Whatever else I’m feeling, there no shortage of anger that a blathering con man has stirred up enough witless rubes to lead the entire country down the garden path. Maybe the GOP will find their souls and/or their cojones, and rein this guy in before he does irreparable harm, but my confidence in that is not high. They’re afraid of the voters, and Trump has the voters baffled with his bullshit. They won’t snap out of it until the consequences begin to pile up on their own doorsteps. They’re expecting great things. I’m very much afraid they will get them.

Ya know, greg’s almost becoming entertaining. I hope his blood pressure meds are up to date…

Here in Michigan a federal judge has ordered a hand recount of five million votes. Yesterday I ran into an old friend who is a Democrat. She told me she has been selected to be a “counter” and that there is a plan to overturn the electoral votes of Michigan, Wisconsin, and Pennsylvania in federal court. Something about the “equal protection clause” being applied to voters who need to be protected against “Russian hackers”. We’ll see. I guess they want a re-do.

Trump, on Ben Carson, November 12, 2015.

The president elect is nominating Dr. Carson to be head of Housing and Urban Development.

So, is Donald Trump’s judgement utterly unreliable? Or is he willing to knowingly make totally dishonest statements to his supporters whenever he deems it advantageous?

It’s one or the other. I think the second option is likely correct, because I’ve watched this guy telling bald faced lies every other time he’s opened his mouth for months. No one who has ever assumed the presidency can hold a candle to Donald Trump as a prolific teller of lies. He lies so often the press has given up even commenting on the fact.