This lament by writer Bartle Bull in the Wall Street Journal is, if nothing else, a cautionary tale:
I’ve been an outspoken Democrat since 1948, when I was the only student in my fifth-grade class to “vote” for Harry Truman. It’s been astonishingly difficult to disclose that next month I will vote for Donald Trump.
Like many, I will be doing so in the European way, voting for a party and its issues, rather than in the American way of supporting someone I like. When I have expressed my views—on economics, security and cultural matters—long-time liberal friends have said, “You sound like Trump, or some uneducated hillbilly.” Ignoring my schooling at Harvard, Oxford and the Sorbonne, these friends sound like well-meaning dilettantes, otherwise described as self-righteous, useful idiots or bien-pensant.
and
For a long time, like an old locomotive, I have been building steam inside when liberal friends, with the certitude and arrogance of the righteous, decry me as a “right-winger.” In a Harvard class-reunion speech many years ago, I said that “Harvard should stand up to the tyrannies of the left today the way it stood up to the tyrannies of the right in the days of Joe McCarthy.” But the progressive agenda doesn’t seem to include what Truman and John F. Kennedy considered liberal values, such as true political tolerance.
Now, as a lifelong Democrat, I am voting Republican for policy reasons, not because I like Mr. Trump. I believe my old party, as it abuses the powers of office and threatens to pack the Supreme Court and end the filibuster, now supports a government that is far too strong at home and far too weak abroad.
I wonder how many lifelong Democrats the party can afford to alienate in promoting the agenda they’re hellbent on pursuing?
“Now, as a lifelong Democrat, I am voting Republican for policy reasons, not because I like Mr. Trump. I believe my old party, as it abuses the powers of office and threatens to pack the Supreme Court and end the filibuster, now supports a government that is far too strong at home and far too weak abroad.”
Among other transgressions.
You tell me; you are the lifelong Dem. Tribalism is powerful. I officially now consider myself independent. (corrosive, long term disillusion with Republican statement vs action) But I think the hated “MAGA Republicans” are far closer to traditional Dem (or at least middle of the road) values than the, my words, wild eyed crazy progressives who control the Dem Party, media, social media etc today. They, simply, are batshit crazy. And dangerous. You want to talk fascism?
Notable that he doesnt actually articulate the GOP policies he supposedly supports. There has been talk about packing the court for a long time and I think it is all talk. Also, seems odd that someone who opposes a government that is too strong is OK putting an authoritarian in office.
Fascism? Fascism is hard to define so it’s mostly used as a pejorative. However, fascism as practiced had a couple of universal characteristics. One, that only a strongman could fix everything. Two, that the country had a glorious past and that the strongman would recapture those great days. Shoe fits.
Steve
I figured it out! Since Harris is going to outlaw all of the cows in the country he must be a serious steak guy. One of the neighbors has a small dairy herd. Guess I should warn him.
Steve
We now have an EPA directive out of the “Biden?” Administration that40% of long haul trucks shall be fully electric within eight years. Talk about batshit crazy.
Replace 40% of the national fleet with trucks three times more expensive in eight years. Trucks that the electric grid cannot supply.
Mandate the impossible. Reach for the stars. Fall flat on your face.
Maybe they’re trying to lure Musk back into the fold with more subsidies they have to borrow to fund.
I can’t find that directive. If you can locate it, please tell me here.
The expense of such a transition is a major concern as are the grid issues you mention. I would also be concerned about the charging time. It could add substantial lags to delivery by truck.