While thinking about the return of Trump – he’s already conducting campaign rallies – I ran into Peter Robinson’s essay of vignettes on the political, social, and economic morass that is California. Robinson was a speechwriter for Ronald Reagan and is currently the Murdoch Distinguished Fellow at the Hoover Institution. No RHINO this guy.
His story of the predicament of Mike Garcia (R) in California’s 25th Congressional District is illuminating.
Garcia is the son of Mexican immigrants, an Annapolis grad, flew two dozen missions in the Iraq War, and is overflowing in charisma and oratory skills. The 25th is tailored for Republicans to be legitimately competitive (D 38%, R 32%, NPP 25%). It like much of the state has been trending increasingly Democrat but is an easier get than most of the other districts on the coastal plain. The district centers on Simi Valley, the home of the Reagan Library for good reason. Yet, a Democrat, Katie Hill, took the seat in 2018 but had to resign in scandal in 2019. In a special election, Garcia took the seat back for Republicans, and barely won reelection in 2020 by 333 votes out of 339,000 cast. Why so tough, after all, in a competitive district with a great candidate?
As I’ve said repeatedly, I voted for Trump twice and would do it a third time if he is the 2024 nominee. The Democrats are too wretched. But campaigns like economics are decided in the margin, that space where voters or consumers could go either way, or simply leave a line on the ballot unmarked. Looking at the 2020 result, I can only conclude that Garcia was running with the Trump anchor chained to his ankle in a Republican-competitive district that Biden won by 10%. Trump is wildly popular among the rabid 24% of the electorate, but he’s highly toxic to a good chunk of the rest, especially in California. For any candidate like Hillary, Biden, or Trump, how many of the getables are willing to engage in hold-the-nose? For Garcia, thank the Almighty that enough were willing to ticket-split.
Holding the nose is an epidemic when the choices were Hillary, Biden, or Trump. Just looking at Trump, his ribald, brutal verbal ticks appeal to crowds not offended in bars and locker rooms. His approach is as Gutfeld would say, “direct”. But depth of understanding is shallow to such as extent that he ran the executive branch in a naively “direct” manner in, for instance, personal overtures to the world’s pariahs like Kim Jong-un. If you agree with Trump that foreigners are screwing us, Trump scraps the Trans-Pacific Partnership whose purpose was to create the commercial foundation for an alignment of Asian and Pacific countries against a resurgent and hegemonic Red China. Don’t like the “forever wars”? He’ll negotiate a pull out. Direct and understandable, yes. Effective in the long run . . . ?
He began his most recent rally in Alabama with Patton’s speech at the beginning of the movie “Patton”. How ironic. Scott’s Patton regales the crowd with Americans “staying out of the war as a bunch of horse dung”; “Americans love the sting of battle”; and “. . . making the other poor bastard die for his country”. It was lost on the rally-goers that Patton’s call to arms and martial virtue doesn’t comport with Trump’s pull-out fixation – essentially a negotiated runaway – and his drumbeat against “forever wars”.
Bar-room bouncers having to deal with roadhouse fights aren’t likely to deal with nuance, and the bouncer Trump wouldn’t practice it anyway. As president and politician on the stomp, he plays checkers as the CCP is immersed in chess.
Playing checkers gave us the Doha Agreement. Biden doesn’t play checkers since he doesn’t understand the colors of the pieces. Translating, Trump was getting to the king line on the checkerboard with his Doha pact; Biden is in the sand box; and the CCP is in the chess room with the rest of the geeks.
Trump got his withdrawal agreement which would have produced the loss of an operating base on China’s western flank and key on-the-ground assets in a strategic location to counter Islamofascism, protect our allies (read Israel and the Gulf Arabs), and kill those who have killed so many of us. To borrow from Patton, long distance, over-the-horizon diligence is “horse dung”. Once you’re out, you’re out, and you’re not going back in . . . unless we lose another 3,000 in the American heartland.
Biden achieved Trump’s endgame with a whole lot of chaos while destroying US credibility for a generation or more. Trump would have done a better withdrawal but still manufacture a vacuum in Afghanistan. All the rhetoric about “forever wars”, lack of fighting willingness of the Afghan forces, and Afghan government corruption is beside the point if the Islamo-crazies flock to the feudal Hindu-Kush, as they did before under the watchful eyes of the Taliban, to have the tranquility to coordinate mass-casualty events among the Kaffir (an insulting term used by some Muslims for non-Muslims).
That’s what is so amazing about Trump’s use of the Patton speech. Patton was calling men to arms. Trump was calling the nation to get out. Biden couldn’t get either right and gave us a cluster-f@#*. Get prepared for a perpetually heightened terror threat level to go with the non-stop COVID hysteria. Can a civilization withstand such a water-boarding? I guess that we’ll see.
RogerG