President-elect Trump talked about the NeverTrump movement at a fundraiser at the National Portrait Gallery last night. He claimed that “they just didn’t understand” him.
Horseshiite.
We Principled Constitutionalists understood him. He has a record of statements, interviews, commentary, Op-Eds, Ads, TV appearances, Talk Shows and Reality TV to glean from.
He was and is a typical NYC Liberal Democrat and has been his whole life, despite what party he wanted to latch onto so he could 'win'.
Some NeverTrumps in the GOP Establishment may have misunderstood him and took him for a Cruz Conservative of sorts. I contend the majority of those simply opposed him because he was not groomed up through their ranks, and came in by his own forcible power.
A great deal of what manifested as NeverTrump was in my opinion the rejection of the sort of politics where people’s words have the shelf life of a Snapchat photo—the sort of politics where Governor Rick Perry can one day promise to eliminate the wasteful Department of Energy as President and on another say that Donald Trump is “a cancer on conservatism” and then ultimately sit before a Senate committee hoping to be approved as Donald Trump’s Secretary of Energy. This sort of thing happens routinely in Washington with virtually no one marveling at the mendacity. Many of us who were merely jaded have now simply decided to call a farce a farce.
Exactly. And Trump is no different one moment to the next.
Donald Trump’s candidacy only shined a carbon-arc spotlight on that reality and the reality that most people don’t care as long as they’re on the winning team.
We see that displayed in spades every single day from the Trump militant, whether one such acolyte here on this board or at TOS and elsewhere. This past election was just another sporting event; a fantasy football investment.
The NeverTrump movement that I know may be in limbo but we’re not on a respirator any more than the Democrat Party is on a respirator.
The Conservative movement as it is understood and accepted is already dead, being fundamentally transformed into a perverted form of Nationalist Populist Statism. Trump is branding Conservative to reference himself and the media is all-too-eager to take him up on that and run with it.
Many of us who opposed Trump remain skeptical of him. The outcome is not what we wanted, but apart from a loony few, we realize it’s not going to be undone. So we watch and intend to hold Trump to account. We will applaud any good that he does and we will be critical of him when he proposes big government, anti-liberty ideas. This rankles the tribalists who think we must give full throated support to the man in the White House because of he belongs to the right party. People who don’t cheer for the right team are, by default, the enemy even if they no longer cheer for any team.[/i]
Amen and fully illustrated by the Trump militants who have gone into overdrive to silence any criticism of their political messiah.