If Donald Trump is the Dark Side, then the growing push to free Republican delegates to dump him at the convention represents a brave movement back towards The Force… of sanity.
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Here’s a question for New Hampshire primary voters: if you had a chance to do it all again, would you still vote for Trump? How about those of you in Virginia? Or Nevada? Or any number of states voting before that fateful Trump win in Indiana, after which Ted Cruz and John Kasich were at last convinced to drop their campaigns, making Trump the sole Republican contender?
Sure, we knew Donald Trump had regrettable tendencies. He’d said some crappy things about women, and he’d showcased a range of mental voids where ideas and policy should have been housed. Unfilled chasms where thoughts on the nuclear triad or healthcare reform might be expected to rear their 8-pointed heads. Instead, there the hollows gaped: empty.
But there was so much we did not then know. We did not, for instance, know the extent of Trump’s propensity for racism and antisemitism. We did not know that he was on trial for fraud. We did not know that he had reneged on dozens of contracts with small businesses. We did not know he would refuse to release his tax returns. We did not know he would accuse US troops in Iraq of large-scale theft. We did not know that he would ban individual reporters and entire news divisions from his events.
We did not know that his first response to a mass shooting would be to tweet “Appreciate the congrats on being right.”
So if early state primary voters could get that magical redo, would many of them not make a different choice?
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Free the Delegates is the chosen name of a small group of motivated Republicans who want to dump Donald Trump at the Republican Convention, coming up on July 18.
At last night’s Free the Delegates conference call, guest conservative luminaries Bill Kristol and David French joined in. Kristol, the founder of The Weekly Standard, commended the true grassroots nature of this new effort, and said he was happy to support it.
David French, whose short-lived prospect as a third-party candidate ended about a month ago, spoke passionately about the “historic” nature of the 2016 GOP Convention. French said this was “a rebellion on behalf of a majority” of Republican voters, noting that Donald Trump did not pull over 50% of primary votes.
This is one of the best arguments for delegates who want to vote against Trump, but are afraid of ignoring the “voters’ choice.” Trump is NOT the voters’ choice.
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This is one of the best arguments for delegates who want to vote against Trump, but are afraid of ignoring the voters’ choice.
Trump isn’t really the voters’ choice. That’s point one.
Point two: Can the voters be wrong? Is it not self-evident that, provided Trump’s myriad faults and egregious actions revealed over the past six months, many early state voters who themselves cast a ballot for Trump might now admit they were indeed wrong?
And if they are, then what is the delegate’s individual role? What rights do they have?
Given the contested conventions of years past, it seems abundantly clear that delegates do have the right to “vote their conscience.” In fact, Republican Party rules guru Curly Haugland has been annoying anyone in earshot about this fact for years.
Delegates are free, all of them, and they should vote for whomever they think is the strongest candidate.
And yet, and yet. According to two speakers at last night’s conference call, delegates are afraid of speaking out against Trump. Some have even reported being contacted by the Trump campaign, enduring the usual Trump tactic: intimidation. Basic bullying, to ensure delegates get the message: Trump is the only option.
But he’s not. And if any delegate needs further convincing, look at the statement from FBI Director, James Comey, at yesterday’s press conference. Though Hillary Clinton sent or received over 100 emails with classified information, though she withheld thousands of work-related emails from investigators, and though her “extremely careless”’ handling of sensitive information may indeed have exposed top secret information to hackers, the FBI will not recommend charges be brought.
Comey’s own words: “There is evidence to support a conclusion that any reasonable person in Secretary Clinton’s position, or in the position of those government employees with whom she was corresponding about these matters, should have known that an unclassified system was no place for that conversation.”
If Republicans keep Donald Trump as their nominee, they will offer American voters no real choice. As David French said, “It’s a banana republic either way.”
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Still! No charges. Maybe the Clinton campaign is excited by this.
But voters are not amused. We live in the real world, where a mistake on tax filings will be punished.
What would happen to us, if we exposed national security information to foreign hackers? It doesn’t take too much imagination to figure out there would be no special Clintonian deference. Ask Edward Snowden.
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If Republicans keep Donald Trump as their nominee, they will offer the American voters no choice. If you vote Trump, you’re voting for an ignorant, racist, anti-Semitic conman who may very well be convicted of fraud. If you vote for Hillary Clinton, you’re voting for someone either too stupid or too lazy or too indifferent to value the security of American personnel and information.
As David French said last night, “It’s a banana republic either way.”
So yet again, I implore Republican delegates to keep your head up and vote your conscience. The convention is yours; and it’s your right to choose a candidate who is actually fit to govern.
The Trump Empire now reigns, but it’s time for a return of the Jedi. Channel your Obi-Wan Kenobi, your Luke Skywalker.
Remember what Yoda said: “Anger, fear, aggression: the dark side are they. Easily they flow, quick to join you in a fight. If once you start down the dark path, forever will it dominate your destiny, consume you it will…
The time has come. Dump Trump, you must.”
(Yoda did not, obviously, say that last part. But you know he would, if he could).
Now if only the DNC would follow suit, maybe we American peons – you know, us the voters – would get an actual choice this November.
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Source: 30dB.com – Free and the Delegates
“At 61% positive Free the Delegates is getting some support in social, however, the elephant in the network is #NeverTrump which indexes at only 36% positive in social media but the sentiment is a bit messy given the broad rants against Trump and against those rail that the #NeverTrump campaign is a shill for Hillary. Volume is the real story with #NeverTrump. Social is seeing hundreds of thousands of opinions on the topic which would probably rattle any candidate but this one.” — Howard K. 30db
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Photo: Getty Images
This, of course, begs the question: ‘Who is this fictitious Republican who will bring balance to the ticket?’ Ted Cruz? I think not. Trump, in all his -shall we generously call it- unpredictability is the closest thing to a moderate Republican or a liberal Republican presidential candidate since, maybe Ford, if there ever really was one in living memory. A (or any) not-Trump Republican candidate would, most likely, bring a different style & tone; but the fundamental problem of conceptions of ideas -from top to bottom- remains inherently constant (and, I would argue, flawed): A Trump candidacy is simply… Read more »