Never-Trump Folks: Time to Reconsider | Eastern North Carolina Now

    Donald Trump is probably the most flawed candidate that the Republican party could have put up this year. Not only is his understanding of conservative principles and ability to defend them weak, he has no discipline and enjoys picking fights that he won't benefit from winning. His personal morality and temperament is often called into question, and rightfully so. All this considered, I still plan to vote for him on election day because of one simple fact: barring something crazy happening on November 8th, our next president is either going to be Donald Trump or Hillary Clinton. There really isn't a way around that at this point. We have a clear choice on our hands about which direction we want to head in as a country. If Hillary Clinton wins on Tuesday, we will have elected a woman who is under criminal investigation and we will be giving electoral legitimacy to the big government progressivism of the Obama administration. This is simply unacceptable.

    Many conservatives who I greatly respect and have learned very much from, including Ben Shapiro and Charles Krauthammer, have refused to endorse Trump. Several of my conservative friends remain committed to voting third party or not voting at all. While I do admire these stands on principle, I also find them to be flawed and void of practicality.

    American healthcare is falling to pieces because of the disastrous Affordable Care Act. The immense tax burden from Washington is killing economic growth, middle class families and driving businesses either out of the country or into the ground. Absurd and arbitrary regulation is chipping away at the rights of business owners, big and small. The labor force participation rate is also much too low for comfort. House Republicans, led by Speaker Ryan, have a thorough but largely ignored agenda that would go far in solving these issues with limited government solutions. The only way the "Better Way" agenda, as Ryan calls it, will pass, is with a Republican in the White House. Conservatives who find themselves more closely aligned with Ryan than Trump from an ideological standpoint would be smart to remember this.

    Conservatives would also all agree that the Obama-Clinton foreign policy has been one of utter failure. The infamous Iran Deal all but guarantees that the American-hating theocracy will possess a nuclear weapon within the next 10 to 15 years. The reckless pull-out of troops from Iraq has had obvious and destructive ramifications including the rise of ISIS and loss of territory that American troops died for. The administration's Syria policy has been an abject failure. Sadly, this list doesn't even come close to covering everything. What should be evident though is that we need serious change in both our approach to national defense and attitude on the global stage. Donald Trump and his administration would undoubtedly provide that.

    On a more basic level, Trump has also shown a strong commitment to rebuilding the military with twenty-first century technology, which is critical to our national security going forward. A President Trump would also be much better for our veterans in general, both in improving the performance of the VA and in building more public support for the men and women who serve and have served.

    The politicization of law enforcement by the mainstream media and leftist politicians has also been extremely harmful, with anti-police riots becoming a common occurrence in major American cities and the number of police officers getting shot considerably higher than last year. With a Hillary Clinton presidency, this trend would likely continue and may get even worse. Clinton has shown support for the violent Black Lives Matter movement and never hesitates to place the blanket accusation of "implicit bias" on law enforcement. This rhetoric has been anything but useful, and gives legitimacy to thugs attacking cops and destroying cities. While Donald Trump is certainly a polarizing figure in his own right, he will stand up for police and end the war on cops coming from Washington.

    Another argument for Trump that has been peddled repeatedly involves the Supreme Court and preserving the conservative majority. While making this case may seem recycled at this point, it is nonetheless an important one. Replacing the late Justice Scalia with anyone that is not absolutely dedicated to interpreting our Constitution the way the Framers intended would be harmful to the principles of individual liberty and federalism for years to come. While many fear that Trump's possible attempts to abuse executive power may be more harmful to Constitutional government than any court nomination, it is almost a guarantee that the Trump administration will be subject to unprecedented media scrutiny. This, along with generally tepid congressional support, will act as a solid restraint on Trump as an executive.

    Perhaps the most important thing that would come as a result of a Trump presidency, however, would be the casting of the Clintons out of American politics. They have managed to corrupt nearly every institution they have touched, and it is time that the cancer they have wrought on our government be cured. Donald Trump is not a perfect individual, in fact he is very far from it. He is, however, a change agent. In Washington, God knows that there are few things we need more.

poll#96

And now for your additional voting pleasure:
poll#95

poll#94

Should Americans be thankful for North Carolinians setting precedent in taking a stand for their state's right to manage the safety of their public facilities, where separation of the sexes remains, or should they follow Bruce Springsteen's lead and boycott the state as bigots since they will not allow grown Transgender men to use the same bathrooms /locker rooms as pre-pubescent girls?

  North Carolina is right to control the separation of the sexes as a matter of decorum and safety.

  North Carolina is a bigoted state to not require that children of opposite sexes share the same public facilities with adults of the opposite sex, although misidentified - the Transgender.

  I generally prefer the natural environs of the vacant, although rather public, large tree.

253 total vote(s)     What's your Opinion?