Friends, there's a new sheriff in town in Trumpland, and it's not Trump himself -- it's his right-hand woman, Susan Wiles. Check out this Politico article, which is naturally not all that friendly to Trump or Wiles, but is still very informative and intriguing.
https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2024/04/26/susie-wiles-trump-desantis-profile-00149654
One of the biggest challenges that the Trump campaign faces is financial. The Dems and the Left are already bringing to bear massive financial resources in the effort to defeat Trump. Simply put, Biden has institutiuonal, establishment support up the wazoo. Trump does not. Trump will rely on small donations and the tender mercies of a handful of eccentric billionaires. That's why DeSantis and other Republicans need to help Trump close the money gap. And they are: Trump and DeSantis have finally met in person for the first time since their battle royal for the GOP presidential nomination. Let's hope this signals a ceasefire, and maybe even a fruitful alliance going forward. DeSantis would be my top choice for Trump's V.P., even if picking DeSantis would not necessarily help Trump win the White House. I just think DeSantis is the best man to fill DJT's shoes when he exits the scene.
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/trump-desantis-meeting-florida/
Perhaps you noticed that CNN published a poll over the weekend that has Trump 6 or 9 points ahead of Biden, depending on whether it's a two-man or a five-person race? Well, they did, and it's heartening, BUT most polls for the last month or so have been showing a very close race and have seemed to indicate that it's Biden who has wind, or at least a slight breeze, in his sails. For this reason, betting markets are saying the race is a tossup. My advice: don't get complacent, because this thing is going down to the wire.
https://www.realclearpolitics.com/elections/betting-odds/2024/president/
Finally, remember Giorgia Meloni, the nationalist/populist P.M. of Italy? Right-wingers have been somewhat disappointed by her performance thus far, but, as you'll see, she's working on some major constitutional changes that could solidify her dominance and remove the ability of centrist, establishment types to block positive, conservative reforms. Slow and steady may be a winning strategy, at least for her. Could we learn from her methods? Perhaps.
https://www.theamericanconservative.com/giorgia-melonis-soft-revolution/
RAY TO DR. WADDY
ReplyDeleteI have had a lot of mixed feelings about DeSantis over the past months. However, at the end of the day, he is the best choice to replace Trump.
I appreciate the concurrence, Ray! Why do you say that?
ReplyDeleteRAY TO DR. WADDY
DeleteI think it was because I had difficulty accepting DeSantis' "subdued" personality after being bombarded with Trump's bombastic MAGA personality, if that makes any sense.
Also, I now appreciate DeSantis' stepping up to bat and running against Trump before he dropped out. He (DeSantis) also outshined the other candidates, not to mention Pence.
DeSantis has also done a good job running Florida.
I wonder if Trump dropped out for some reason, how DeSantis would fare, and if he would be nominated as the presidential candidate?
Dr. Waddy from Jack: Wow! That is some article , thanx for posting it. She is a very well kept secret and her presence on the Trump team is good news. I remember when Guiliani won the Mayoralty, the NY Post quoted a devastated limousine liberal " how could he win!? Nobody I know voted for him." The Post commented "exactly". Similarly, I think some on the left are sincerely baffled why this formidable woman supports Trump and Trump nation. Many who drank the radical coolaid in the '60s have long since become so reflexively devoted to their views that they are incapable of fathoming any creditable person thinking otherwise. To do so is in their view not only obviously mistaken but also morally reprehensible and they understandably find it hard to think of such an impressive person in that way. The majority of them cannot creditably support their convictions; "feelings" are all to them and they usually cannot contain their contempt for any who dare to disagree. For Wiles they appear to muster patronizing regret but nothing better.
ReplyDeleteDr. Waddy from Jack: If Italian PM Meloni holds to the populist views which apparently empowered her, if she is now following a patient and gradual approach to the reforms expected of her it could bespeak a patient and well conceived prolonged effort to effect lasting change. Then again, she could be what we have had to endure before DJT broke the mold: prevaricators who talk conservative but govern apologetically. Is the nation of Italy a perhaps unworkable concept? The Romans may have been their last sound national government. Should DJT take the oath in January I would expect him to take some summary measures, such as closing the southern border. Perhaps also the criminal tasking of George Soros and cadre for Seditious Conspiracy, in view of the spreading anarchy they may now be financing , would be in order; Jan. 6 and all that you know. Longer term effort like public defunding of the American academy can also be set in initial motion. After this cataclysmic year, Maga will expect decisive response to the antiamerican antisemitic left's outrages.
ReplyDeleteRAY TO JACK
DeleteDon't take offense, but Trump needs to SECURE the Southern border. The only places he can CLOSE are the official ports of entry, but even if he does, everywhere else on the border is OPEN. The only way the border can be secured is to be MILITARIZED. Use you own imagination to envision what militarized means. Can it be done? Sure, but it probably won't be. Why? Too many people getting payed off to keep it open to a multi-Trillion dollar industry. So, until the border is militarized, and I mean ALL of it, it will be an OPEN border.
RAY TO JACK
DeleteAll Trump did when he was in office (and it was something at least) was build a type of wall which could be climbed over, dug under, and blown through in military terms. It was not a real military barrier. Now a double fence, nicely spaced, with a mine field in between is a military barrier. Sound harsh? So is illegal immigration and all the problems it causes. Until there is such a barrier, any talk about a secure border is delusional.
Dr. Waddy from Jack: I have long since lost sympathy for Ivy League institutions, though I would not wish upon their decent students and faculty the injustice done them by the young totalitarians. But I wish the antiamerican antisemitic left well of their obvious ignorance and bigotry so clearly demonstrated by their worker ants at these shamed campuses. It cannot but cost the dems the votes of many Jewish people who have heretofore hesitated to face the terrible truth about them: that these presumptuous sociopaths are the political spawn of a tragically and immeasurably degraded once loyal American party. I hope DJT's campaign makes haste and devotes unrelenting effort to reminding America of the direct connection to the present administration and its obsequious figurehead.
ReplyDeleteDr. Waddy from Jack: So I see the neoNazis have come clean about it. Reportedly at either Wisconsin or Fordham a sign urging the "Final Solution " was brandished by ardent barbarians. I think a subhuman similarity between Nazis and the Commies who are surely at the very heart of this current well organized explosion of ABYSSmal antipathy has always obtained but this is the first time I have seen antiamerican leftists actually and with appalling frankness display it. That IS a new one; I don't remember it having happened even during the sometimes traitorous demonstrations which occured during the Vietnam era. Usually it is far leftists casually and reflexively branding any American insolent enough to oppose them "Nazis". Takes one totalitarian low life to know one . Once again we are given telling notice of the promised nature of the savages who may, if we fail to turn them out of office in Nov. , be resolved to make their final all out "fundamentally transformative"onslaught on American civilization.
ReplyDeleteDr. Waddy from Jack: This AM Buffalo news covered a small demonstration at state supported SUNY Buffalo. I didn't see any neonazi trash being expressed; it APPEARED to protest Israel's fight in Gaza. I think Israel has pursued a grimly necessary self defense in Gaza and that the blame for the terrible suffering of innocent Gazans lies solely with the Hamas savages who have forced their way onto Gaza. But it is possible to argue plausibly against Israel's effort; yes. even that may well be motivated by antisemitism but not necessarily. Meanwhile the government of LA and probably that of Gov. Hirsute has grudgingly employed the despised police to bring order at UCLA by meeting totalitarian force with icky force. Of course LA officers know their jobs and their freedom are at great risk should they do anything offending the criminal apologist DA who daily negates their dutiful tasking of freewheeling thugs. The moral courage to face this enervating prospect along with the physical courage to face anarchic rioters graces these dutiful public servants. Meanwhile, UCLA has bravely announced no more than timid sanctions against neonazi"students" and faculty who would of course be summarily and permanently expelled had their protests contained any hint of any of the automatically condemning "isms" in the reflexive antiamerican. leftist arsenal. Jews are the unprotected "class "upon which the season is always open and no license is required; it is assumed and welcomed.
ReplyDeleteQuite so, Jack! The continued existence of tens of millions of Americans who support Trump and the GOP is a mystery to Democrats and progressives -- a mystery that they seem incapable of solving except by resort to demonology, which unfortunately doesn't necessarily suggest an effective counter-strategy, except possibly mass exorcisms...
ReplyDeleteYes, Ray -- DeSantis is a totally different man than Trump, personality-wise, and he will never have Trump's charisma or his passionate following. Of course, few presidents or aspiring presidents have ever had Trump's unique "gifts"...and flaws. Someday, we may have another president who is personally forgettable, but politically consequential. Hmm. Come to think of it, we already do! That proves that such a thing is possible.
Undoubtedly the MAGA crowd would have very high expectations of a second Trump term. On the other hand, the MAGA crowd might also be overjoyed by whatever crumbs DJT chooses to throw at them. It could go either way...or both.
Ray is right that a militarized border would be secure in a way that we've never experienced before, frankly, and that would be a good thing...but in my view almost as effective would simply be sending everyone who crossed the border home. If border-hopping works 0% of the time, no one will do it.
Jack, I sorely wish that American Jews would abandon the Democrats, but I haven't seen any objective polling evidence that they have or are likely to do so. Have you?
it is heartening indeed to see big city police forces taking action against riotous thugs -- although naturally this does not signify real disdain for thuggery, so much as reflexive disapproval of anything and everything that hurts Democrats politically. The thugs will once again have free rein once their depredations are judged useful.
Dr. Waddy from Jack: I agree that often those who order the police into action do so to protect their political flanks. That feckless and mercurial Mayor of NY is one of them, despite his police background. But in my experience the police themselves loathe willful criminality. And that offense is glaringly obvious in the "university " brats, presumptuous rookie intellectuals pusillanimously manipulated by aging dead serious New Left faculty together with professional dissemblers and spineless administrators. The police are well aware that some criminals have been raised in conditions so violently dysfunctional that they have no comprehension of what positive living is. But they also know that these vicious, ungrateful juveniles defiling themselves and their country by embracing detestable doctrines like Naziism have come mostly from fortunate settings. They are big nasty babies and I would guess the police derive some professional satisfaction from ministering even what limited correction , under threat of ruin should they "misbehave", is "allowed" them by public executives who can barely disguise their sympathy for anarchic far left delinquents.
ReplyDeleteDr. Waddy from Jack: No, I have not seen polling indicating that some American Jews are abandoning the dem party. On the face of it one would think they would feel constrained to do so because of that party's countenance of antisemitism. But many of them may be so conditioned by prolonged assumption of the justice of the left and by dislike for its conservative antithesis that they cannot yet be convinced of the of the staggering truth of the dems' submission to totalitarians, including those who purpose a"final solution" of the Israel "anomaly" and of world Jewry's continued tenure on earth. These foolish "university" neonazis but give reckless voice to already settled radical doctrine. The antiamerican left presumes that it has firmly secured the loyalty of some groups and in a clear prediction of how it would rule, assumes them to be in its thrall. Events since Oct.7 signify a new and ominous antiamerican leftist willingness to press their long held totalitarian dream with arrogance borne of perception that they are winning. And with the quasi medieval oppression of Jews in our very time by one of the most advanced civilizations on earth and now this, American Jews must consider the unthinkable: that such subhuman thought informs a powerful faction of our polity. One must hope they will decide to join with those of us
ReplyDeletealready convinced of the antiamerican left's prospective unalloyed evil.
Jack, I'm sure you're right -- "busting heads" can be very gratifying, depending on the heads... These days, though, the police are so circumscribed in their actions that that species of gratification must seldom be manifested -- and, when they are permitted to arrest scumbags, as you well know, nine times out of ten the scumbags are back on the street the next day, or the next hour.
ReplyDeleteWill a significant number of Jews abandon the Dems in 2024? I dunno. Here's a poll from early April, but I think it's fair to say that the landscape has changed a lot in the last month...
https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2024/04/02/how-us-jews-are-experiencing-the-israel-hamas-war/