On the Meaning of NeverTrump

It Always Was Meant For One Man and One Man Only

Pardon the offense (if you took any) in not having this in your mailbox yesterday. It was of course, a national holiday.

Anyone who has followed me on the interwebs for any amount of time since 2016 knows that I am unalterably opposed to the former President having any role whatsoever in the governance of this country. My stance came early, and it has not diminished one iota. I believed then—and continue to believe today (with considerably more hard evidence than I did in 2016) that the former President is a serious and ongoing threat to U.S. national security. I will not repeat why here, and if you require evidence, I’d recommend you stop reading and head over to American Greatness or Newsmax.

Trump’s eventual election was a great blow to me and many who thought like I did. To be legitimately NeverTrump, one must have had more than just a passing relationship with the GOP. People who wouldn’t normally vote Republican voicing opposition to the Republican front-runner were uninteresting. People who voted Republican their entire lives vowing not to vote for the Republican nominee—now, that was interesting. Some of us voted for Clinton. Some of us voted for a third party candidate (me). Some of us didn’t vote at all. When one sees a unique threat to national security, all of these choices were acceptable.

We are now gearing up for another presidential election, and the GOP front-runner is once again Donald Trump. I will not vote for him in the primary (I am unaffiliated), and I will not vote for him in the general election. I will also not vote for Joe Biden. I did in 2020 from the perspective of someone who had the least nuanced, most specific reason for doing so. I wanted the other guy to lose. I wanted nothing out of the Biden government from a policy perspective, as I was aware that they would not give me anything I desired. I simply wanted the other guy gone. Well, that’s not entirely true. I wanted a law-abiding and law-executing President, one who respected the Constitution and its brilliance. That has been more elusive. No, Biden and his people have not attempted to overturn the Constitutional process of electing a President. But there have been enough instances of Article II overreach for me to mistrust his basic understanding of the Constitutional order (can you say “student-loan c forgiveness”?)

What I find irritating lately though is the degree to which some of the folks who joined me in NeverTrumpLand seven years ago in order to avert a unique threat to American national security have so easily slipped into a mindset in which EVERY GOP candidate/politician is as bad a Trump. Many of these people SEEMED to share similar ideological impulses, but now are all too happy to adopt the battle cries of the Left. Why? Because it is fashionable, and because it demonstrates their bona fides as having shaken the dirt of the crummy GOP off their shoes. Returning the abortion issue to the States through overturning the profoundly-flawed Roe v. Wade was an article of faith on the Right for fifty years. Now I see former Conservatives railing against the Supreme Court for the decision. Controlling federal spending used to be an article of faith on the Right. Now I see former Conservatives criticizing the House GOP for—egad—politics—as they use the leverage they have—the leverage they were GIVEN by voters—for restraining spending. Yes. Getting something for raising the debt ceiling is not a great look, and I’d be happy taking the debt ceiling off the table for ever. That said, IT IS ON THE TABLE, the GOP passed a bill raising it, and all along the President said he’d not negotiate (to the cheers of the Soft Right and the suggestion that the GOP is all Trump).

Andrew Sullivan has a nice treatment of the Soft Right here. It is hard to even call them “Right”. I’ve ceased to honor the Christo-populist blather of the NatPop crowd with any suggestion that they are Conservative, and I’m forced to do the same with a large portion of the NeverTrump crowd who now confess at the church of the center-left. The single most effective way to attack Trump and Trumpism is the tried and true path of the rule of law, limited and divided government, individual liberty, and national strength. While these quaint notions are out of fashion with both the AOC Left and the NatPop Right, a governing majority exists in this lane for the skillful (and visionary) conservative movement.

The first step though, is to recognize that Ron DeSantis, Nikki Haley, Tim Scott….any of the current or potential challengers to Donald Trump—are NOT DONALD TRUMP. You may not care for them. You may not wish to vote for them. You may believe that they pander to the mouth-breathing Trumpenproletariat. But what they are doing is called POLITICS. They are trying to meet voters where they are as they gain support and recognition. My early warning alarms were BLARING in the fall of 2015 as I watched Trump do his thing, LONG before he was the favorite. I have no such reaction to any of the current challengers. Sometimes they act boorishly, but that only impacts my preference/non-preference for them. Boorish behavior is NOT a threat to the Constitutional order. Donald Trump is a unique and dangerous threat to our political order, and he should not be confused with anyone else.

Debt Ceiling Agreement

News this weekend from both the President and the Speaker of the House is that they have reached an agreement “in principle” on a measure to raise the debt limit that includes some restraints on spending. To call them spending “cuts” would be hyperbole, as they are in the main, reductions in increases. But, even reductions in increases can be good things, and so now we move on to the process of passing the bill in the Congress.

This will not be easy, as the wingnuts on both sides are unsatisfied. This alone should comfort thinking Americans, as anything equally odious to the current versions of our political extremes is likely to be worthwhile.

Not all is great though, as the agreement appears to lock in the (woefully insufficient) Biden 2024 defense budget number (insufficient due to inflation driven lost buying power) and a 1% increase in 2025 which is even worse. In a perfect world, our Congress would take that 2024 number and reapportion it strategically in an effort to address near term readiness and weapons stocks needs in the USN and USAF. I will not hold my breath.

On Dreams

I read this Sunday and was immediately a little jealous:

No, I don’t necessarily wish that I were part of this dream. My envy is his RECALL of it. You see, I RARELY remember my dreams, just short flashes MAYBE once or twice a year. I don’t remember good dreams, I don’t remember bad dreams. Early in the Navy, I went to see a psychiatrist because I was having what were eventually called “Night Terrors”, dreams where I’d wake up full-out bloody murder screaming. If there were someone present to wake me, I’d have some relatively incoherent story about what was going on, and then almost immediately go back to sleep, with little recall of anything but the waking up part—no content—in the morning. The trigger was almost always being overtired/physically exhausted, and it peaked during my three year Operations officer tour in a cruiser. My girlfriend at the time can attest to this carnival act.

When I talked to the Psych Doc years ago, I said “I’d love to know what it is that would make me SCREAM like that.” His answer was “No, you don’t.”

Scott Simon’s dream on the other hand sounded very pleasant. Good conversation, good food (well, he didn’t mention the food, so it could have been pedestrian). I cannot recall EVER having had such a pleasant dream. I did a sleep study while I was on active duty and the interpretation was that I was a bit of a wreck as a sleeper (although I am a champion napper), with little of my sleep occurring in REM or other deep sleep stages. I use a CPAP now, and while my sleep is great—out right away and sleep straight through until my bladder is stepped on by a cat—I still don’t dream.

The thing is, I’d like to believe that I do dream, that I have an active dream life, that whatever tiny bit of creativity lives in me gets to fly its freak flag when I sleep. Maybe I have deep conversations with famous historical figures. Maybe I have a romantic dinner with Jennifer Connelly. Maybe I birdie #12 at Augusta.