By Elliott Brack, editor and publisher | Is this the year of the Trump?
It looks more like it every day. The voting today in 11 states could open the way, it would appear, toward the Trump nomination as the GOP candidate. Efforts over the last few days to meld together old-line Republicans in solid opposition just didn’t work.
Should Trump take most of the marbles in the primaries today, it could open the floodgates toward his nomination as the GOP candidate.
What worries many Americans is what our government would be like with Trump as president. Certainly our State Department must be worried about his diplomatic manner. Can you see Trump making significant headway with world leaders, or our Congress, businessmen and people of good faith?
It would appear that it would be hard to trust the guy, fearing any agreement made with him might be turned around by none other than Trump the next day.
Trump’s moving toward the nomination reminds us of the way Ronald Reagan swept the nation back in 1980. After Mr. Reagan got the nomination, people across the nation asked, “Will we elect an actor as president?” We did, and we must admit, he was a reasonable president. Now do we face a reality show billionaire as president?
Up to now we have been thinking that Hillary Clinton somehow would not be the eventual nominee of the Democratic Party. Now she looks more likely as the nominee, and we wonder if Donald Trump may be the only Republican who could defeat her in what seems like a Democratic year. After all, Trump is pulling from those who feel disadvantaged in both parties. He could cause quite a few Democrats to switch their vote to him.
We could see another element: as president, Trump would not be a traditional Republican. He would tick off many Republicans in Congress. There might be bi-partisan support AGAINST him from the Congress, with both parties scratching their heads how to govern with him. So Trump, by himself, might make bi-partisanship strong again. It might even get both the major parties to talk to one another.
Who ever would have thought that Election Year 2016 would have turned like this.
Trump faces some difficult non-political challenges, surrounding his questionable business dealings. Perhaps the worst is a lawsuit, anticipated to come to trial this year though several years old, of people who felt taken by paying big sums to Trump University, and getting little out of it. So the charges will continue to fly. Will enough of them bring Trump down, in the eyes of the GOP? That seems about to be the major hope of party regulars who don’t want him to win the nomination.
The summer conventions are still months away. Marco Rubio and John Kasich seem waiting anxiously in the wings, candidates acceptable to many Republicans. If enough nasty laundry gets aired about Trump, is there enough to take him down? Or is it possible that he’ll crack under such strains, and get out of the race. We doubt that part. His ego would not accept that.
So far, Trump keeps dominating the headlines, and racking up victories, though his numbers in returns or polls seldom go over 35 percent. He and his backers anticipate victory. The rest of us wonder if The Year of the Trump can be stopped.
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