POTUS Trump: For the party’s sake, walk softly and carry a big stick

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Of late, I have been having an internal debate in my mind about my level of support for POTUS Trump. I definitely support his Presidency because I am a financial and foreign policy conservative, and he has delivered on both points. Quite frankly, he is more in line with my “liberal” social values because he has distanced himself from the religious right on abortion and LGBT issues.

My enthusiastic support for “candidate Trump” was the attraction of an outsider who would disrupt the political norms of Washington, D.C. and ….yes…. drain the swamp. Problem is, the swamp is a muddy pit today and we need a bridge to get to the other side. I am uncomfortable with his “shoot from the hip” and “instinctive” style of communicating. It’s one thing to be a candidate, and it’s another when you are President. We all know that Trump’s Presidential demeanor is well below the norm, especially compared to the telegenic and media beloved Barak Obama, but I am uncomfortable with his constant off the cuff remarks on twitter to criticize and humiliate allies and trade partners.  He could make the same comments using private diplomatic channels and not force the other side into a defensive position where they don’t have and ‘out”.

For the record, I used to be a Democrat, having voted for Bill Clinton twice. With that said, the Democratic party is not even an option for me now because it has shifted so far away from where the party was 10-15 years ago - so it is not even an option today. In my top 5 policy positions is support for Israel and concern about radical Islam. In my opinion, Jews who vote Democratic these days don’t prioritize support for Israel because if they did they would not be able to live with the body evidence showing the hostility of the Democratic party towards Israel.

More often than not, politics has been a process where you hold your nose and pull the lever for the least bad choice. Trump and Clinton was a good example of this in action. IT’S OK TO BE A CONSERVITIVE AND NOT LIKE TRUMP, but it is important to support him because we are in a binary political system and political power is about party politics. The Republican Party had control of both houses for 2 years and there was a lot they did right - like the low hanging fruit of deregulation and the tax cuts, but the Republicans did nothing to fix Obamacare or the immigration issue. I blame this “failure” on the Republicans like Jeff Flake, John McCain and Bob Corker to name a few. They either were uncommitted Republicans, like Flake who was really an independent, or traditional “Swamp Republicans” like McCain and Corker. These “Resist Trump” Republicans stonewalled the slim Republican majority by using their leverage to scuttle significant progress on the Republican policy agenda.

Now we face a Democratic House and a Republican Senate. How each party handles themselves over the next two years will influence who wins in the 2020 election. The wild card? POTUS Trump. He is the undisputed leader of the Republican Party and for the most part, the Swamp Republicans are gone. If Trump reaches across the aisle with reasonable policies and the Democrats refuse to negotiate a deal, it will make them look bad in 2020. POTUS Trump is not dumb by any means. He knows how to shape public opinion even with the media 95% against him.  I just hope he matures in the office and starts to listen to his advisors and is a lot more deliberate in his comments and actions. “Walk softly and carry a big stick” should be Trumps motto for the next 2 years.

Russia is still playing the USA like a Violin, thanks to the Democrats

“Democrats are unknowingly aiding and abetting the goals of the KGB by not stepping back and smelling the coffee”

This analysis starts with the premise that the U.S. and Russian governments have been manipulating each other’s elections for decades with the express intent of fomenting chaos and political paralysis. Both sides use covert means, as well as through NGOs (non-governmental organizations) in each other’s home countries that can advance their goals. In the 2016 election, we learned from the FBI that Russia had a goal of inciting chaos in the 2016 election by exacerbating the existing political divide between Democrats and Republicans using social media. They did a damn good job.

I was in New York City at a hotel next door to Trump Tower the morning after the election was announced. By that evening there were thousands of people marching and chanting against the outcome of the election. The FBI has already determined that the Facebook Group(s) that promoted these marches were of Russian origin. Once the “Russian seeds” of the anti-Trump march went online, it spread across the country like a virus. We had to cancel our dinner in the village because Manhattan was cut in half by thousands of “anti-Trump marchers” who unknowingly were called into action by “Russian intelligence”.

The Russians lit the match to start the forest fire of political discontent in 2016 election, but it is the Democrats who are fanning the flames and throwing fuel into the fire. Democrats are unknowingly aiding and abetting the goals of the KGB by not stepping back and smelling the coffee. It is an established fact that Obama knew about Russia meddling in our election before it even started. Obama had our intelligence agencies “stand down” and not cyber counter-attack.

Trump is Putin’s poodle? Trump ordered 200 Russian mercenaries killed in one afternoon in Syria. Trump levied significant trade restrictions and sanctions against Russia. Trump has re-energized NATO by forcing them to fund and extra $40 Billion a year in military spending. Trump is pushing Germany to cancel their oil pipeline agreement with Russia. Trump is arming the former countries of the Soviet Union with sophisticated arms to prevent another invasion like what happened in Ukraine. After 8 years of having it easy with Barak Obama, Putin is up against someone he can’t “read” like a book.

The Democrats want to tie POTUS Trumps hands when it comes to his foreign relations with Russia. Any meeting with Russian officials is called traitorous and un-American, but it was OK when Obama and Clinton wanted to “reset” our relations with Russia. This is why the Supreme Court decided years ago that a U.S. President cannot be charged with a crime in office. His job is too important to be sidelined by malicious prosecutions meant to create political paralysis.

I have to give Trump credit. He has stayed positive and focused on promoting his vision and advancing his policies. That is what a President is supposed to do. It’s a tough job, made tougher by a Democratic party that refuses to accept the election results, is blinded by political tunnel vision, and refuses to see that they are a pawns in the machinations of Russian intelligence.