Donald Trump is not going to be president. All of the talk about Trump settling down and becoming more presidential was just the dream of a few GOPers and media types who want a real horse race. Even with the nomination locked up, Trump is continuing to insult his fellow Republicans and waging war with a media that helped create him. He’s going to run as the same person he’s always been: a narcissistic egomaniac with little regard for the truth and no self-restraint.
Establishment Republicans know that the White House is probably lost for another four years and they’re looking for an alternative that responsible Republicans can rally behind. Bill Kristol says that a strong independent candidate will announce this week. Rumor has it that it’s GOP lawyer David French. You remember Mr. French, right? The butler and nanny on the TV show Family Affair.
I don’t understand why Kristol is pushing an unknown lawyer and writer when the Libertarian Party seems to have just given conservatives a viable alternative. This weekend, they nominated former New Mexico governor Gary Johnson as their nominee and former Massachusetts governor Bill Weld as his running mate. That could be a formidable ticket.
Both Johnson and Weld have impressive resumes and offer a new generation of conservatives a place to go. While it won’t happen overnight, the Libertarian Party could become the new Republican Party. On domestic issues in particular, the party mirrors the thoughts of many young Republicans.
From reading conservative blogs and articles, most twenty- and thirty-something Republicans aren’t interested in fighting over bathrooms or Confederate flags. They don’t have a problem with people of color and they don’t care about sexuality. They want a government that leaves them alone so they can make money and build families. They don’t like taxes and regulations but they don’t want government in their personal lives, either.
The Libertarian platform offers compromise with Democrats on such controversial issues as immigration and drug reform. At the same time, Libertarians embrace free-trade policies that Republicans believe are necessary for a strong economy. In many ways, the party has as much to offer young conservatives as the current GOP does.
The biggest point of contention seems, to me, to be over national defense. Most Republicans embrace a neoconservative stance toward foreign policy while Libertarians are more isolationist. That split, though, currently exists in the Democratic Party. No party is going to be completely unified in every area.
Donald Trump has essentially killed the Republican Party. He’s a standard bearer with no principles. Rallying behind him in an attempt to save the party won’t work. Conservatives need to rebuild their coalition with an eye to the future. Adopting the the Libertarian Party as the vehicle for progress might offer them a way forward.
Johnson and Weld probably won’t win this year, but they’re not out of the running. With current finance laws, a couple of billionaires could underwrite their campaign. The support of young conservatives who were planning to vote Republican just a few months ago could reshape the political landscape. It’s a strange year and stranger things have already happened.
Thomas Mills is the founder and publisher of PoliticsNC.com. Before beginning PoliticsNC, Thomas spent twenty years as a political and public affairs consultant. Learn more >
I believe Hillary is the conservative, republican, alternative to Trump.
Thomas,
Your proclamations of who “is not going to be President” are counterproductive and rather immature, politically. You cannot predict the future and it’s pretentious to make such a definitive assertion. You said the same thing about Bernie Sanders not long ago, offending at least half the Democrats and many more independents in the room.
I don’t want Trump to become President any more than you do. But, I remember clearly how certain Democrats (including myself) were that Reagan could not POSSIBLY win against Carter when he received the Republican nomination. The horrible fact of the matter is that once someone gains the nomination of one of the two major parties, anything can happen.
In this election year this is especially true if the Wall Street branch of the Democratic Party is deaf, dumb blind and arrogant enough to nominate Hillary Clinton, with her extremely high unfavorable ratings, the public’s wariness of a Clinton dynasty, and an FBI investigation hanging over her head. Logic would dictate that Trump would be unacceptable to the American public- unless the other party offers someone equally as unacceptable.
Logic would also dictate that the Democratic Party will wake up in time to see the writing on the wall and nominate Bernie Sanders, the most popular politician in America today. If you really care about keeping Trump out of the White House, you too will start pushing for Bernie’s nomination.
“Johnson and Weld probably won’t win this year, but they’re not out of the running.” What a ruse! You can’t be serious unless you’re smoking something that is still illegal in this state. The Libertarians won’t come close to winning any state. All they can do is help the Democrats win a few closely contested states like they did in NC in ’08.
Of course, liberal Democrats would love to promote Johnson and Weld as a viable, competitive ticket. Taking up to 6 or 7 percent of the Presidential vote would ensure a Hillary victory in several battleground states. And it would also be helpful to the Dems in crucial down ballot races for Senator and Governor.
Liberals like Mr. Mills promoting the Libertarians is comparable to conservatives promoting the Green Party to reduce Democrat numbers. And while there are no doubt number of angry voters who think a vote for the Libertarians is an effective protest, politically astute conservatives will not buy into such a transparent ruse.
I cannot believe I am going to say this: Ebrun is right!
In 2016, a vote for the libertarian candidates for President and Vice President helps the presidential Democratic ticket, but not for the reason Ebrun (I still want to know who he is.) believes. My experience with political consulting and teaching over 50 years tells me that many Republicans are :”closet Libertarians.” And, they just can’t bring themselves to admit it. But, voting Libertarian is really the only way to protest the conditions within each of the two major parties–especially the candidates of today’s Republican party.
Totally wrong.
Kristol has a well-thought-out strategy for maintaining neo-con control of the White House this cycle, and he is actively implementing it in a rational, winning manner.
Kristol wants Hillary to beat Trump, because she is a reliable war-mongering neo-con that has already promised her allegiance to Eternal War, and Trump is not. Trump is already drawing the Libertarian vote because he is actually more in tune with the Libertarian agenda than the more conservative GOP establishment has ever been. The “Libertarian Alternative” has NEVER been LESS attractive to those disillusioned by the GOP primary winner.
The task for neo-con Godfather Kristol is NOT to admit defeat and help GOP’ers find a new home in order to build for the distant future. The neo-con movement is far, FAR more powerful and robust than having to rely on only one way forward. The neo-cons usually own ALL the horses in the race, even if they do have a preferred “team” – and they force those candidates to compete for who is the most violently aggressive in support of their agenda.
But this cycle is different. This cycle one of the major parties broke free from their grip and is actually offering an alternative. Kristol’s task is to not only prevent the American People from uniting behind the “wrong” choice, but also to re-establish control of the herd by eliminating any future possibility of “alternatives” (TINA). He must reinforce the false right-left paradigm in which debate has been kept trapped for decades, and prevent rational, or “out-of-the-box” thinking. Smearing, name-calling, and other ad hominem assaults are good. Thinking about why you are supporting who you support must be prevented at all costs – even street violence if necessary.
Kristol must get you to hate “the other” and not question “your team”. Remember, if the American People stop hating, and start thinking about what is being done to them and by who, the neo-cons are doomed – maybe to the gallows.
Thus, Sanders vs. Trump would have been the Great Nightmare – an election where they controlled NEITHER horse, and they could not force their unpopular agenda down the throats of the American People by bribing the duopoly. An election where EVERYTHING is questioned. This is the only set of circumstances under which the neo-cons do not get their way – the only way for the American People out of the trap of Eternal War for Eternal Peace.
But that is not where we are. The neo-cons still have control of one of the candidates, just not from their preferred team. They need “their guy” to win, but without damaging either of the Party “brands” that help keep things grid-locked and unchanging in the future. So Kristol really just needs to keep the Republican brand alive somewhere for future use, and then provide covering fire for Hillary so she can deny her quid pro quo deals and pretend that she is “doing all she can do in a bad situation”.
Enter Mr. French.
Enter Mr. French.
Trump’s demise has been preached for over two years and he is still there and the presumptive candidate of the Republican Party for 2016. A lot of this stuff sounds like wishful thinking with lots of glib assumptions about the alleged voters — many of whom are happy to see the two major parties, partners in a coercive duopoly in a total pickle – including of course the so called Democrats. So I call Bull Shit on all your pronouncements and finely trimmed rationale. Quite frankly, I expect a nontrivial bunch of working class Democrats, men, to flee to Trump. But there are a hell of a lot of people who just want to see the pooh bahs at RNC and DNC smacked stupid and worse, willing to live with whatever the fallout is. For example, I would pay a lot of good money to Wasserman-Shultz defenestrated and worse. The aspect of Clinton dragging her moron husband along into a perverted dynastic arrangement is enough to gag a maggot. And worse, none of these distinguished commentators has mentioned the fact that no matter the outcome of this unfortunate contest for president between a thug and Medusa, many state offices are owned by the Republicans, witness the morons in the NCGA, as are far too many county offices. Supposed Democrat leadership never saw 2010 or 2012 coming. It will take generations to rectify their lack of foresight, judgment and leadership, if ever. A proud old, if racist party, brought low by 40 years of bad leadership. Time to change the bathwater.
The bad news for Trump is only beginning, and he’s making the classic error of picking fights with people who buy ink by the barrel and paper by the train load. His long string of fraudulent and shady dealings are fair game when voters examine his fitness to represent the United States.
I expected a public meltdown during the primary season which would end his campaign, but it didn’t happen. Trump has succeeded beyond his own expectations. He had not planned to be in this contest this late in the game so he is in uncharted territory. He never expected to be in a position to explain his shady dealings or to be asked to lay out policy options in the national interest. He has been the Don Rickles candidate, but that schtick will wear thin as Americans begin to ask what he plans to do with the country.
A conservative third party candidate will split the right and give Hillary an assist, much like Ross Perot helped her husband defeat the elder Bush in 1992.
The problem for Republicans is that they don’t like anybody very much. They started with a field of 17 hard-to-like candidates. Trump is somehow the least unliked candidate in the entire Republican Party, and they really dislike him.
The Don Rickles schtick that got him this far will continue to carry him among his supporters, because that’s what they love about the guy. And they frankly don’t give a fig about the Short Fingered Vulgarian having no clue and no plan, he’s “their guy” and that’s all that matters. They will not be swayed by pointing out that the Tribble-Headed Angry Man has no grasp of foreign policy (or domestic policy or any other kind of policy). Logic and reason have no place in the world view of Trump or those that follow him. They will vote for him because he “says what everybody else is thinking” — not considering that “everybody else” is limited to those who are already encamped with them.
Which thankfully (for the sake of the nation, if not the world) is only about half of just under half of the voters who will come out for this study in cognitive dissonance. The Trumplings are resolute, bright and shiny and sure of something. The rest of the GOP voters are really quite verklempt at this turn of events, but lack sufficient numbers to derail the Trump Train. The usual big money donors are in the unfamiliar position of not having a presidential candidate that they can throw YUGE wads of money behind and trust that he’ll do their bidding if elected. And the RNC is now worried because it looks like they’re going to get stuck with the bill for this loose cannon, when _they’re_ not in the best financial shape themselves.
The real question is what effect this has on down ballot races. One thought is that the idea of a Trump candidacy depresses Republican turnout making those races easier for the Democratic opposition. While that is certainly possible, I think it’s more likely that the effect is on Democratic and D-leaning Independents bringing them out in greater numbers (which usually happens in presidential years anyway) making the road tougher on Republican candidates. In the Congressional and legislative races, the R’s have a buffer in that they drew the districts with a majority in mind, and in many or most of those, the firewall should hold. But any district that was even modestly competitive before will be highly competitive in this environment.
“The ideal is that we use [the 2016 election] as a springboard to mass defections and the destruction of at least one of the old parties. It’s time for the Republican Party to fall apart and go away. Or the Democratic party. I don’t really care which.” -Libertarian National Committee Chair Nicholas Sarwark
For Kristol and his fellow neocons, maintaining perpetual war is a litmus test issue. That, and the fact that they do not want to strengthen the Libertarian Party long term for short term gain.
btw, we prefer to call ourselves ‘noninterventionist,’ not ‘isolationist.’ We love being part of the global community. We just think dropping bombs on it is a bad way to make friends.
How many presidential runs does this make for Johnson now? I’ve lost count.
“Donald Trump has essentially killed the Republican Party. He’s a standard bearer with no principles. Rallying behind him in an attempt to save the party won’t work.”
I think a majority of ignorant North Carolina Republican voters would beg to differ.
This is what worries me… the ignorance of the NC voters and the rage of the NC voters are not isolated to NC – and could easily propel Trump past the polarizing HRC.
This is a very perceptive and realistic column, Thomas. No matter what state GOP “leaders” –like McCrory, Burr, Forest and others in NC–say and promote, the majority of American voters are not dumb enough to buy into what Trump is selling. Ignore the present polls, the conditions just are not there for a Trump victory in the Electoral College.
After a half century of polling and consulting, I put my faith in American voters–sometimes it takes them too much time–but they always make the right decisions. If that were not true, we would have had Presidents: Goldwater, McGovern, Mondale, Perot, McCain and Romney. The 2016 election cycle, although quite strange, will not change that.
The Libertarian party is the place to go for many Republicans who just cannot bring themselves–unlike their “leaders”–to support and vote for Trump. How many Republican officeholders in North Carolina say what they really believe about what The Donald is doing to their Republican party? Art Pope–bless his heart–is the ONLY one thus far with the guts to say or do anything about this takeover of the national and North Carolina Republican party. The consequences of this will be with the GOP far longer than this one election,. Will those who are left after the November 8 disaster, turn to those who caved and did nothing to stop Trump, to put the pieces back together? I doubt it.
But enough of that. Republicans can turn to the Libertarian party at least as a mark of defiance and resistance to what is happening with Trump as the leader of their national party. I don’t know about you, but many Republicans I know and have taught, strike me as “closet Libertarians.” So, your argument makes a lot of sense. Peace.
The American voters don’t always “make the right decision” for the country, unfortunately. That’s why he had presidents named Nixon and Reagan, unfortunately, as well as Harding, Coolidge, and Hoover.
Well, that would all be real nice if we could teach voters to count past two.