Trump picks Ohio Sen. JD Vance for vice president

[Bigun]

Explain what?
It is self-evident.

Yeah! It really is! You falsely blame Trump for all your misfortunes and have outed yourself.

[Right_in_Virginia]

I want excellence.  I demand it.

Yet, you can't recognize it.

[massadvj]

Good and fair post. I agree with your, good, bad, and ugly list

But I disagree with the bolded. I think we are going to have to hit bottom before there is any change. And even that isn't guaranteed. I don't believe that not voting for Trump means Calvin Coolidge is coming  back in 2028. These working class folks that are MAGA today can easily go back to Democratic Socialism tomorrow

Hitting bottom will not guarantee we go conservative. We could very well go communist instead, especially if your assumption about working class MAGA is correct. Whatever and whoever these working class MAGA folks are, there would be no national plurality for the GOP without them.

[LMAO]

Not a chance in hell! At least not for a generation or two.

A generation, eh?

Here's what Hispanic voters, for example, did in four short years. And Hispanics are about 80% working class

https://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/07/us/politics/07latino.html

Latino voters shifted in huge numbers away from the Republicans to vote for Senator Barack Obama in the presidential election, exit polls show, providing the votes that gave him unexpectedly large margins of victory in three battleground states: Colorado, New Mexico and Nevada.

[LMAO]

Whatever and whoever these working class MAGA folks are, there would be no national plurality for the GOP without them.

True

I know my brand of conservatism is antiquated. And I can't predict what the future will bring

But I hope it's a Javier Milei and not a Joseph Stalin

@massadvj

[Right_in_Virginia]

Never had it. Don't want it, soo...

Of course not.  If you had power or influence you would have to put down you fiddle and accomplish something --- tough choice when fiddling and whining fuel you.

[roamer_1]

Yeah! It really is! You falsely blame Trump for all your misfortunes and have outed yourself.

Oh bullcrap! There's no 'falsely' involved. Biteme wasn't even in office yet.
Parts went *away*. Almost all parts. That 'misfortune' wasn't mine. Thousands and thousands of small businesses went under.

[roamer_1]

Of course not.  If you had power or influence you would have to put down you fiddle and accomplish something --- tough choice when fiddling and whining fuel you.

I have accomplished plenty. I just won't sacrifice principle to do it.

[Right_in_Virginia]

Whatever and whoever these working class MAGA folks are, there would be no national plurality for the GOP without them.

Then why do you go out of your way to insult them with the assertion "MAGA is a mass hallucination"?

[roamer_1]

Yet, you can't recognize it.

Oh I can see, just fine. Your emperor is buck nekkid.

[Lando Lincoln]

I don’t know how to add or detract to/from the comments here. I don’t want to try, truthfully. But I will say, this Wisconsin voter will be voting for President Trump. I gotta cancel out at least one nitwit relative.

[Right_in_Virginia]

I have accomplished plenty. I just won't sacrifice principle to do it.

From what I hear, fiddling takes a lot of practice.  Good job 

[roamer_1]

From what I hear, fiddling takes a lot of practice.  Good job 

Whatever. If you expect me to help you burn it down, then you've another think coming.

Because you are burning it down. y'all. just like Democrats.

[massadvj]

Then why do you go out of your way to insult them with the assertion "MAGA is a mass hallucination"?

Just because they get the GOP to a plurality, that does not mean I have to agree with them. I know quite a few MAGA guys, mostly in the senior golf leagues I play in. They are, to a man, completely upstanding guys who come from working class backgrounds: veterans, firefighters, plumbers, etc. I am close friends with many of them, and would much prefer to associate with them than with the nitwits on the left, who also suffer from mass hallucination of a different, and more dangerous, sort.

MAGA is a cult.

[libertybele]

Working class people used to be a Democrat Party constituency. These are union people who tend to believe in an active government in the economy

Many of them may vote GOP now because of Democrat wokeness. But that won't last forever

??? I know of and knew of plenty of working class people that were not DEM nor are they now.  They are conservative Republicans!

[DCPatriot]

Just because they get the GOP to a plurality, that does not mean I have to agree with them. I know quite a few MAGA guys, mostly in the senior golf leagues I play in. They are, to a man, completely upstanding guys who come from working class backgrounds: veterans, firefighters, plumbers, etc. I am close friends with many of them, and would much prefer to associate with them than with the nitwits on the left, who also suffer from mass hallucination of a different, and more dangerous, sort.

MAGA is a cult.

I agree with 100% of what you posted.  Said the same thing with a small fraction of the copy. The binary choice we find ourselves, not voting for TRUMP/VANCE is virtually treason.

I get it, Victor.  Last thing you want or need as a college professor? To be thought of as a MAGA "cult" member.

[roamer_1]

The binary choice we find ourselves, not voting for TRUMP/VANCE is virtually treason.

Nothing binary about it... Your big government or their big government... It's all the same, big government. What is treason is the debt y'all are willing to bestow uop our children, grandchildren, and great grand children... And the devaluation of the yankee buck with the very same ramifications.

Y'all are selling us off. For big government.

[roamer_1]

Increasing our debt by almost a full third in four years... What a piker... Lets see if he can increase the debt by half in four years! Will you vote for that?

Yes, you will...

[Right_in_Virginia]

MAGA is a cult.

To those who disagree, you are right and @massadvj is wrong .... and apparently a little pissed because the torch is being ripped from his bloody fingertips. 

He could choose to stand down graciously and admit his GOP has effed up for long enough or he can continue to throw around  pseudo-intellectual rhetoric.  Whichever road he travels,  I hope you join me in wishing him safe passage through this inevitable and necessary political transition.

[libertybele]

Just because they get the GOP to a plurality, that does not mean I have to agree with them. I know quite a few MAGA guys, mostly in the senior golf leagues I play in. They are, to a man, completely upstanding guys who come from working class backgrounds: veterans, firefighters, plumbers, etc. I am close friends with many of them, and would much prefer to associate with them than with the nitwits on the left, who also suffer from mass hallucination of a different, and more dangerous, sort.

MAGA is a cult.

So, wanting to keep our country in tact, restore our Republic, maintain our sovereignty, support our Constitution, obey our laws and respect our flag is a cult???

I beg to differ.

[Hoodat]

Except power and influence.

The Democrat Party mindset.

[Hoodat]

Yet, you can't recognize it.

Your idea of 'excellence' is giving $2 billion in taxpayer money to Planned Parenthood because they do good things.

[massadvj]

True

I know my brand of conservatism is antiquated. And I can't predict what the future will bring

But I hope it's a Javier Milei and not a Joseph Stalin

@massadvj

On this we agree. Or Nayib Bukele.

[roamer_1]

So, wanting to keep our country in tact, restore our Republic, maintain our sovereignty, support our Constitution, obey our laws and respect our flag is a cult???

I beg to differ.

None of that is going to happen without fiscal Conservatism... FOREMOST.

[Hoodat]

Folks, The GOP/MAGA party that has emerged is NOT a conservative party. I grant you that. But it is a party with some conservative leanings that has emerged from the democratic process, and, unlike unbridled conservativism, it has the potential to gain a voting plurality unlike anything we have seen since Reagan. So let's look at the good, bad and ugly of the current GOP/MAGA movement (from my point of view):

THE GOOD
1. Peace through strength, avoidance of foreign wars
2. Deregulation, especially in the energy sector
3. Secure borders
4. Conservative appointments to the courts
5. Resistance to the woke agenda

THE BAD
1. Lack of fiscal responsibility
2. Tariffs and isolationism
3. Failure to dismantle the bloated federal bureaucracy (Trump did not even go after Public Broadcasting or Education the first time around)
4. No genuine appetite for constitutionally-limited government, or individual freedom
5. Bias toward devalued dollar

THE UGLY
1. The personality cult That fails to question the cult leader
2. The personality of the cult leader himself, whose narcissism is a weakness that can be exploited and then betrayed  by the worst sorts of sycophants

I won't bother to try to make the case that the good outweighs the bad and the ugly. I will simply say that under a future Biden or Harris (or someone else?) administration, there is no good. Only bad and ugly, and getting worse and uglier by the day. So I will vote for Trump, and I will expect only three things from him: energy deregulation, border security and good judicial appointments. If he delivers on those three things, I feel my vote will have been justified.

Finally, let me say this. We may think that voting no on Trump now might usher in some future conservative utopia, free from the mass hallucination that is MAGA. I have come to realize that politics does not really work that way. If it did, there would have been a conservative utopia after George HW Bush or Bob Dole. There wasn't. There never will be, for the simple reason that thoughtful, constitutionally-principled conservatism is a minority view in this nation, and has been for three generations.

We are a parasitic nation, and parasites are not going to vote for anything that keeps them from being able to suck sustenance from the host.

Excellent post, @massadvj .  You and @Bigun are the only two so far that have acknowledged Trump's shortcomings, have pointed out the tradeoffs that exist, and have made a decision with full consideration of those tradeoffs.  I also have openly acknowledged the pros and cons of a Trump Presidency.  Trump gets high marks in foreign policy and other head-of-state duties.  But for me personally, I have areas of importance that differ from yours.  I fully respect your decision because of the honesty and integrity you have put forth in reaching it.

Having said that, I have zero tolerance for those few on this forum that champion Democrat policies and ridicule Conservatives ones simply because they lack the integrity to do what you have done.  It sickens my soul to see people on this forum defend $2 trillion deficits, government shutdowns, and Fauci's fascism because to do otherwise would go against their lord and saviour Donald J. Trump.  To hell with that.  Truth matters.  It matters more than anything else.