by PAUL COLLITS – THE American election cycle is very nearly upon us again.
Actually, the formalities, like the presidential primary “debates” – unedifying slanging matches – have well and truly started, but the real action commences in the new year in places like Iowa and the other early caucuses and primaries.
- Trump’s problem with those for whom his COVID policies are a deal breaker is that he still thinks he was right.
- He was convinced in early 2020 that the virus was a bioweapon and so required drastic responses.
- This is, patently, fantasyland, and to re-elect someone who seems to believe this is simply impossible.
As things stand, there are three likely contenders, other things being equal. The three things that have to be “equal”, are, in turn, that the incumbent keeps enough of his enveloping docility at bay to stay upright and talking for another year, that Trump stays out of jail, and that Robert F Kennedy Jr gets on to the ballot paper in enough States to count.
No other Republicans seem to be any chance of making an impact on Trump’s massive poll lead, sadly.
SURGING
Nikki Haley is said to be “surging”, whatever that means. Perhaps rising from two per cent support to five per cent is a “surge”.
Chris Christie is just as irrelevant as he has been in the past. The unspellable Indian guy talks a great game.
And Ron DeSantis delivers a great game in office at sub-national level, but that doesn’t seem to be enough for those many, many Americans who believe in an imperial presidency – presidential exceptionalism – and who maintain that, as a consequence, the candidates for office have to be, well, “presidential”.
Again, whatever that means. Give me DeSantis’s boring right-wingedness any old day.
In any case, it looks like Trump. And it is here, for Republican voters of conscience, that the problems begin. They are attracted to RFK Jr because he alone, (apart from DeSantis, we must remember), gets the importance for society, and the sheer evil, of vaccine mandates and associated totalitarianism.
But many of them still like Trump. They believe he was dudded in 2020, and so deserves another crack to finish the job, and that he is the hope of the outsider-class for a better American future.
In both of these matters, they are probably right. The state of the place is such that only Trump is likely to be able to “make America great again”, just as he actually commenced to do in 2017.
PROBLEM
Trump’s problem with those for whom his COVID policies are a deal breaker is that he still thinks he was right – or, at least, he says he does – about his very own Operation Warp Speed. And so refuses to apologise for what he and the others did to us in 2020. He may actually believe that he has nothing for which to apologise.
An emerging line of thinking is that Trump was convinced in early 2020 – by, among others, Tucker Carlson, of all people – that the virus was a bioweapon and so required potentially drastic responses, responses that were completely justified, in Trump’s view, at the time.
Hence the military’s early and overarching involvement with the US response. If the problem was a “military” problem and not a health problem, then it required a (drastic) military solution and not a health solution. And it required the response to be driven by the military, and in particular by the National Security Council.
Carlson now regrets this, as well he might.
Trump still says that his actions “saved” a hundred million lives. This is, patently, fantasyland, and to re-elect someone who seems to believe this is simply impossible for many voters.
That this is rubbish is, for him, beside the point. But it isn’t beside the point for intending voters.
DEFENCE
As The Epoch Times notes: “President Trump’s defence of Operation Warp Speed, the program he rolled out in May 2020 to spur COVID-19 vaccine development and distribution amidst the pandemic, remains a sticking point for some of his supporters, who now say they will vote for Mr Kennedy in 2024.
“MaryJo Perry, a longtime advocate for vaccine choice and a Trump supporter, thinks votes will be at a premium come Election Day, particularly because the independent field is becoming more competitive.
“Ms Perry, president of Mississippi Parents for Vaccine Rights, believes advocates for medical freedom could determine who is ultimately president.
“Trump should admit he was wrong about Operation Warp Speed and that COVID vaccines have been dangerous. That would make a difference among people he has offended.”
“President Trump released a statement in March 2021 saying: ‘I hope everyone remembers when they’re getting the COVID-19 Vaccine, that if I wasn’t President, you wouldn’t be getting that beautiful shot for five years, at best, and probably wouldn’t be getting it at all. I hope everyone remembers that’.”
I am sure they’ll remember.
The Party split in relation to boosters is noteworthy, as is the overall current vaccine-hesitancy in the USA (and elsewhere).
All of this matters electorally.
Which brings us to the other side of the dilemma. Whatever one thinks of Trump’s pandemic performance, his opponent might still be Biden, and for voters of sound mind, this outcome must be simply impossible. What to do? Vote for Kennedy?
KENNEDY
RFK Jr isn’t only an anti-vaxxer. He has many other sterling qualities for the concerned Republican and outsider voter. He would, above all, address as president the outsized power of Big Pharma, executive overreach, the military industrial complex, corporatism and crony capitalism. These are huge, front-of-mind issues for non-RINO Republicans, as they should be for any sentient being.
But RKF Jr is unlikely to win, and will, in this case, simply take votes away from either Trump or Biden. Current polls suggest more from Trump. Where does this leave us all?
As I say, it is a dilemma for the ages. And this isn’t just a matter of punishment of Trump for the past. What if it all happens again? And it really is a bioweapon?
We know that the multilaterals and globalists are predicting something “even worse”, indeed, they are willing it and will seek to create it.
Would normally liberal actors like Trump and Boris simply do it all again? That is the real question. They didn’t last time! We simply know DeSantis wouldn’t. We know Kennedy wouldn’t. Even absent evildoers like Fauci and Birx in charge, and Peter Daszak in the background, who could trust your everyday politician to have learned the lessons? On this matter, I wouldn’t trust Trump.
Part of the problem with any administration is that it isn’t just about the president. Even a President DeSantis or a President Kennedy – doesn’t that have a ring to it? – would have to ensure a sense of the importance of medical freedom across the entire behemoth that is the White House.
Not to mention “the Blob” that comprises the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (the CDCs), the Food and Drug Administration, the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIHAD).
REPEAT
Trump is so mercurial that no one could guarantee avoiding a repeat of March 2020, where he flipped from libertarian to totalitarian in a single bound under the weight of bureaucratic pressure, then insisted that he was simply the best totalitarian going. The totalitarian of choice.
If you have to have a dictator, he was better than a Democrat. This was, and is, self-serving rubbish of the kind we saw among some conservative commentators in Australia who were endlessly cheering for Gladys and her weak-kneed successor in Sydney. And telling us they were “liberal”. Better than all the others.
All this is reasonably clear.
But what if the Kennedy run delivers us Biden 2.0 on a plate? We can assume that the Democrat machine would get rid of Biden within six months of the January 2021 inauguration and install the VP. Which makes the machine’s choice of VP the real issue for the next twelve months.
So, for Republican and Independent voters, what is it to be? A future of guaranteed medical and related (absent surveillance, digital ID, censorship, curtailed free speech) freedom, or an America that is more broadly great again. It seems that they can not have both.PC
Lets focus on the main problems like Biden, Obama… compared to them Trump is a fresh breeze