RUTHFULLY YOURS

Remember in October of 2008, when Barack Obama boasted, “We are five days away from fundamentally transforming the United States of America” into an even bigger and more intrusive big government nanny state? That prediction was on its way to being confirmed by Obama’s two terms and his policies both at home and abroad, from the expansion of illiberal identity politics, racial divisiveness, and tax-and-spend economics here; to an appeasing, self-loathing, serially cringing apologies overseas. His handpicked successor, Hillary Clinton, was poised to take over the project and lead it to its completion.

Then the unthinkable happened––Donald Trump. At first, he was a novelty act, too crass and déclassé for the bipartisan political guild to believe he could displace the five more conventional Republicans in the primaries. He lacked the credentials typical of postwar presidents––election to state or federal office, a degree from a tony law school, and experience as a lawyer.

In addition to being tainted by commerce, his business ventures were infra dig for the political establishment––beauty pageants, professional wrestling, real estate development, and a successful reality television show The Apprentice, with its insensitive catch-phrase “You’re fired!” For cognitive elites who fancy themselves culturally literate, his book, The Art of the Deal, reeked of hucksterism and profit-grubbing. Worst of all, his take-no-prisoners, blunt, often brutal, hyperbolic speaking style was more suited for a biker bar than the hallowed halls of government, and their decorous, elevated discourse redolent of a country club soirée.

But Donald Trump’s biggest sin was winning the presidency, which discombobulated the pundits, experts, consultants, and political guildsmen. His scorn for their haughty “norms” and fossilized received wisdom was unforgivable, and his patriotic populism was an ominous sign of incipient fascism, since every well-bred globalist technocrat knew that nationalism is the gateway drug to racism, xenophobia, and ultimately Hitlerian tyranny.

That his first term was successful on every level, with economic growth at home, and peace abroad, didn’t matter to the bipartisan Trumpophobes. He just wasn’t one of them, and made his disdain for their missish rules and gate-keeping “norms” crudely obvious. For the political establishment, he had to go “by any means necessary.”

The purging began before he took office with the Russia hoax abetted by the FBI and pimped by the regime media. What followed was more corruption of government agencies like the DOJ, and state prosecutors and judges who conducted transparently political fixed trials for invented “crimes” ––such show trials being one example of the “transformations” Obama promised.

The 2020 election, riddled with anomalies and hinky practices that cried out for an investigation, was quickly declared, by fiat, completely free of fraud, and any questioning of that conclusion was libeled as an attack on “our democracy,” as well as “election denial,” even though Hillary Clinton has been doing the same thing incessantly ever since 2016. That ginned up political “crime” was twinned with the January 6 demonstration, dubbed an “insurrection” that also tried to destroy “our democracy.” Hundreds of mostly middle-aged day-trippers were arrested, and many have been locked up going on four years, most for misdemeanors.

Next, Biden’s first term featured manifest failures on foreign and domestic policies. He has shamelessly appeased the mullahs in Iran, recklessly withdrew from Afghanistan at the cost of 13 servicemen’s lives, and compromised Israel’s very existence by hamstringing its attempt to stop decades of jihadist murder of their citizens. And on the domestic policy front, he has strangled the economy with intrusive regulations and drunken-sailor spending requiring an avalanche of fiat money, increasing the debt and turbocharging inflation. Equally destructive, he ended Trump’s policies that kept our border secure, and subsequently allowed entry to 10 million mostly unvetted illegal aliens, and distributed them all over the country.

Before the first debate with Trump, the latter had only a slim lead in the polls, despite Biden’s terrible policy record, constitutionally dubious show trials of his predecessor, and substantial evidence of pay-to-play corruption. The regime media covered it all up, rationalizing, or ignoring. And don’t forget the media’s shameless three-card-monte coverage of Biden’s obvious cognitive and physical impairments.

The debate blew up that fiction and the Dems’ plan to demonize Trump as a “convicted felon” who would become a dictator, shred the Constitution, bring back Jim Crow segregation, and execute the preposterous talking-heads of The View and the proudly un-American House Squad.

Biden’s disastrous performance during the debate featured all the symptoms of cognitive decline, now juxtaposed with a vigorous, fluent, and restrained Donald Trump. The optics were too awful for the Dems’ usual lies and spin, and polls were still declining, threatening the down-ballot candidates for the Senate and House.

Then, if all that weren’t frightening enough, an assassin armed with a rifle, and graciously allowed by incompetent security officers to make a rooftop sniper’s perch a mere 130 yards from Trump’s podium, got off five rounds. The kill shot missed when Trump slightly turned head, taking the round to his ear. A government sniper finally took the assassin out.

More damaging for the Dems, Trump once again did the unexpected. Surrounded by his brave secret-service detail, they were moving him to the van when Trump, blood streaming down his face, stood up, his upraised fist clenched, and defiantly chanted “fight!” while pumping his fist, with an American flag for a backdrop. As the Wall Street Journal put it, the iconic photo of that moment “transformed him from a nominee to a leader of almost mythical status.”

But for the Dems, once again the comparison with the brave, defiant Trump with the pale, addled, empty-eyed, gibberish-mumbling Joe Biden shrank him into insignificance. The intra-party coup against the incumbent started gathering momentum.

The third blow came with the wildly successful Republican convention, a joyous display of unity, confidence, and sheer entertainment. Trump’s rivals from the primary––Nikki Haley, Ron DeSantis, and Vivek Ramaswamy––spoke and enthusiastically endorsed Donald Trump; Ultimate Fighting Championship boss Dana White introduced Trump; wrestler Hulk Hogan performed; Lee Greenwood, Kid Rock, Jason Aldean, and Tenor Christopher Macchio––another Trump surprise–– sang; and Franklin Graham gave the benediction.

The line-up reflected and celebrated Trump’s working class and normal American supporters whom the Democrats, along with their media press agents and noisy leftwing caucus, for years have denigrated and slurred as fascists, religious nuts, homophobes, xenophobes, racists, sexists, flat-earthers, and anti-science dullards who refuse to “follow the science.”

But the RNC audience, the Dems’ “deplorables,” “bitter clingers to guns and religion,” and “smelly Wal-Mart shoppers” were jazzed with joy and enthusiasm, happy warriors obviously eager for the coming election battle. The whole extravaganza contrasted starkly with the panicky, sourpuss Democrats plotting feverishly to disenfranchise their own voters and elected delegates by booting Biden from the ticket. So much for their ostentatious display of fear for “our democracy.”

Trump is the architect of this transformation of the Republican Party into winners, who have good odds for taking back the presidency and Congress, rolling back Obama’s progressive “transformation,” and returning our country to its heritage of citizen rule, unalienable rights, and the freedom that made this country great.

Note: I had submitted this column prior to the news that Biden is ending his run for reelection and supporting Kamala Harris’ candidacy. Regardless, Trump’s accomplishment in reinvigorating the party and boosting its unity and enthusiasm remains a huge advantage for Republicans.