However, anyone can watch video of Trump campaigning in 2016 and it is quite evident that he is a shadow of his former self. His messages are less coherent, he rambles, and he misspeaks with great regularity. Those are links to articles, but just search YouTube for old footage of him from 2015 until 2020.
Through 2020, America became increasingly unimpressed with Trump and his daily COVID TV show. Many analysts say that the 2020 election was a referendum on Trump's handling of the pandemic -- and he lost. Biden won by 7 million votes nationally.
In any case, despite the lack of a second debate to highlight the contrasts between the candidates, there is still time for the Harris campaign to emphasize the stark differences in their views of America. I intend to make another post highlighting why Harris is the far superior candidate -- not only in temperament, but also because of her pro-choice stance, climate change policy, the importance of Supreme Court nominations, her plans to restore higher and fairer tax rates on the richest Americans, the survival of the Affordable Care Act, etc. Trump is far worse on all those points.
In this post I'm going to pick some choice Trump remarks that highlight some horrific stances the former President has taken regarding his plans for those opposed to his ideas and policies.
Before I begin, however, I would note that this clip from the 2016 campaign would have been disqualifying for someone seeking to be a junior high school assistant principal let alone President of the United States. I'm not sure new young voters are familiar with it:
Indeed, I've seen credible claims that the youngest voters don't really know anything about Trump's notorious Access Hollywood video footage. This also seemed disqualifying at the time -- and many Republicans said so:
Those words, which Trump and his followers dismissed as "locker room talk," were seemingly very accurate as reflected in Trump's civil defamation trial where a jury found that the former playboy committed "sexual abuse" and even "rape" against a female journalist -- and then denied it.
I have not even mentioned the 34 felony convictions for business fraud that were again returned after a jury trial. Average Americans, not partisan competitors, heard the evidence presented by prosecutors in NY and decided he filed fraudulent documents concerning his under-the-table payments to porn star Stormy Daniels. Basically, instead of using personal funds to buy her silence, which might have been legal, Trump used business funds and recorded that the payments were for legal services. All of this was in an attempt to hide the facts of his tryst from a voting public in 2016. In other circumstances we'd call that "hush money."
As I've blogged previously, some of my greatest concerns about Donald Trump center on the fact that the former President regularly makes the kinds of claims and threats that people associate with dictators and tyrants -- he fantasizes about not relinquishing power (and sought to remain in power after losing an election), describes his political opponents as "vermin" or enemies of the people, and threatens to turn the powerful US military against those enemies.
Just this week, Trump discussed having Republican Liz Cheney, who co-chaired the January 6 investigation in Congress, face a firing squad for her political opinions.
This is on top of Trump expressing open admiration for non-democratic rule in March 2018 -- and the press reported that the Republican donors in attendance applauded!
Chinese President Xi Jinping recently consolidated power. Trump told the gathering: “He’s now president for life. President for life. And he’s great.” Trump added, “I think it’s great. Maybe we’ll give that a shot someday.”
I know that the Trump campaign has been trying to play up Joe Biden's recent slip of the tongue inadvertently calling Trump supporters "garbage," but Biden is not the candidate, he clarified his remark to make clear he was talking about specific speakers at the Trump rally in Madison Square Garden, AND Trump himself makes similar comments all the time. For example, on Veterans Day in November 2023, Trump called his political opponents "vermin" and an "enemy within" that his administration would persecute:
“We pledge to you that we will root out the communists, Marxists, fascists and the radical left thugs that live like vermin within the confines of our country that lie and steal and cheat on elections,” Trump said toward the end of his speech, repeating his false claims that the 2020 election was stolen. “They’ll do anything, whether legally or illegally, to destroy America and to destroy the American Dream.”
It is clear from the speech context that Trump was not talking about some small slice of people who actually identify as communists or Marxists (though a new round of McCarthyism would be horrible). He imagined that this collective group is more dangerous than China or Russia. It's a lot of people.
Trump went on further to state: “the threat from outside forces is far less sinister, dangerous and grave than the threat from within. Our threat is from within. Because if you have a capable, competent, smart, tough leader, Russia, China, North Korea, they’re not going to want to play with us.”
Trump has called Kamala Harris supporters garbage and scum. Just about a week ago, he called the US the "garbage can for the world."
While words matter and these words are especially concerning, all voters should be frightened about how a new Trump presidency would address the so-called vermin/scum/garbage enemy within. Trump himself claims his response would involve setting the National Guard and military on these foes. Consider his words from an interview on Fox in mid-October 2024:
"I think the bigger problem is the enemy from within,” Trump said. He added: “We have some very bad people. We have some sick people, radical left lunatics. And I think they’re the big — and it should be very easily handled by, if necessary, by National Guard, or if really necessary, by the military, because they can’t let that happen.”
Now circle back to that quote about Cheney above -- and the many documented times Trump has encouraged political violence. Former top national security and political aids who worked for Trump have warned that he is a dangerous wannabe fascist who should not be anywhere near the presidency again. I believe them.
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