Rand Paul, to my mind, is the most principled person running. But I can’t see how he can get the nomination when the Republican party doesn’t want him, and he isn’t rich. If he can, fantastic. I hope he does. But failing that, plan B.
I read Ben Carson is surging in the polls. Here is the thing: whenever a clear frontrunner emerges, however briefly, all the attack engines of the vicious Left will go into high gear. In the last election cycle some of us hoped for Rick Perry. They destroyed him. We hoped for Herman Cain. They destroyed him.
The ONLY way you can fight this insidious operation, designed to prevent honest debate, and to control the dialogue through sheer and shameless aggression, is to HIT BACK. Carson won’t do that. Jeb Bush won’t do that. I don’t even think Cruz or Paul will, to the extent needed.
Trump is the only one willing to take strong stands on controversial subjects. He is the only one who is saying he will roll back all the law breaking of the past 10 or whatever years.
And I will remind folks he is the only one who protested Obama’s birth certificate. The situation could not have been more clear. That patent forgery would have been thrown out of every court in the nation, likely with a contempt charge. But everybody was afraid of the media, afraid of negative attention, afraid to make a stir.
There are really two issues in play here. One is Donald Trumps actual politics. I think those are evolving, but can be counted on to always work to resonate with a base of some sort. This puts limits on his flexibility. We know there are more conservative candidates running, but I don’t see any others surviving the meat grinder, at least without back pedaling on nearly everything they say the believe.
The other issue, though, and this is the important one, is that of style. Trump is demonstrating how you deal with left wing propaganda, how you deal with Alinskyan attacks. You cannot ever concede anything, and you have to attack back relentlessly.
Our media is shameless. They are nakedly partisan and unprofessional. And we all know this and have known it, but we have seen candidate after candidate cravenly apologize for non-crimes. We have seen them apologize for speaking the obvious truth.
And if NOBODY in the public domain is willing to speak the truth, we are well and truly fucked.
Trump gives people hope because he exists outside a system which fills most of us with helpless rage. At least, we hope he does. He may disappoint us, too, but at least there is a CHANCE he won’t, which is more than I can say for any of the Establishment candidates.