Trump
Dear Editor: Did you hear the latest? Pandering to Ohio voters, Donald Trump as president would change Mount Denali back to Mount McKinley.
Whatever you think of Donald Trump’s campaign for the Republican nomination, you have to admit he is good for the national political discussion. He is a breath of fresh air unencumbered by the ideologies of political donors. He can, and does, say anything he wants without fear of losing the monetary backing needed to run a presidential campaign. People like this. The media likes this and gives him all the free air time any candidate would want. He doesn’t need to spend millions on TV advertising. Trump is the poster child for taking money out of politics.
He is a hybrid Republican. He used to be a Democrat and championed single-payer health insurance during the Clinton years. He is pro-choice. Trump is the only one of the 17 Republican candidates who dares point out the obvious – the Bush-Cheney administration caused ISIS, not Barack Obama. He wants the rich, himself included and especially the hedge-fund greedheads, to pay their fair share of taxes.
On the other hand, he makes outlandish and simplistic promises about what he would do as president. No president can bring back the jobs lost to foreign countries – he hones in on China, Japan and Mexico. The corporations who sent them there in the first place would have to do this. According to Trump, climate change is a concept promoted by the Chinese to cripple U.S. manufacturing by encouraging over-regulation. He is a super-hawk – he promises the mightiest military on earth (which we already have) and has a plan to do away with ISIS which includes bombing their oil fields and then putting U.S. boots on the ground to secure them. He is against the Iran nuclear deal and plans a demonstration soon in Washington, D.C., along with crony Ted Cruz to protest it.
His most preposterous proposal is to round up and deport 11 million illegal immigrants along with their U.S.-born children and build ‘‘the most beautiful wall you’ve ever seen,’’ 1,900 miles long, between Mexico and the U.S. And make Mexico pay for it. (Will he use Mexican labor?) Say what you will about this, it causes some of his opponents to show their true colors trying to out-trump Trump. Chris Christie wants to ... what? attach a bar-code and a GPS unit to legal foreigners with visas and track them like FedEx until their visas run out and Scott Walker wants to build a northern wall against Canada. Why? To keep the cold air out?
You go, guy. You’ve got us talking and squawking. Maybe something will get done.
Ron Rau, Sitka
