With Friends Like These鈥�
When Donald Trump announced his candidacy for president in June, mainstream Republicans treated it with curiosity, then ambivalence, then anxiety — now dread. Panic is next.
Trump’s possible nomination is a joy to behold for Democrats.
For many Republicans, though, it could become a road map to certain disaster. If a certain disaster means President Hillary Clinton.
For Republicans, Trump’s careless rhetoric has made him the King of Chaos; the Maestro of Mayhem; the Duke of Division, that’s made many of them to lose sleep. On any day, on any cable news network, Democrats are bemused by Trump’s antics.
With each passing verbal controversy, the cries of foul from members of Trump’s own party get louder. Longtime conservative columnist George Will claims, “Conservatives’ highest priority now must be to prevent Trump from winning the Republican nomination ….”
The right-leaning New Hampshire Union-leader ran an editorial last week penned by its publisher Joseph McQuaid, that claims that Trump is “a crude blowhard with no clear political philosophy and no deeper understanding of the important and serious role of the President of the United States than one of the goons he lets rough up protesters in his crowds.”
Trump’s followers still pile into his rallies — sure he’ll dispense some deep political wisdom. They don’t care if he spouts bold-faced fictions, or that he’ll insult anybody who doesn’t support him.
He finds himself under increased scrutiny from party loyalists who’d like their presidential candidates to understand the complexities of the world that’ll greet them when they reach the Oval Office.
“Here’s the issue: I have concerns about giving this guy an Army,” says New York Rep. Chris Gibson. “As somebody who served (in the military) for 29 years, I have concerns given what I’ve heard today about his temperament and the judgement that he has,” Gibson added.
Down in Virginia, with its March 1 primary, the heads of the Republican Party have instituted a rule that voters must sign a “loyalty oath” to declare their allegiance to the Republican Party. Trump was incensed by that move.
“It begins, Republican Party of Virginia, controlled by the RNC, is working hard to disallow independent, unaffiliated and new voters. BAD!” Trump tweeted.
But Del. David Ramadan, a Virginia legislator, shot back, “Our party, our rules; your $$$ and your bullying do not work in the commonwealth. MORON!!”
Did he just say “MORON?”
After the last Democratic debate, when Trump made an issue of Hillary Clinton’s restroom break, then he claimed that she’d been beaten by Barack Obama in 2008, while using an off-color term to describe it, some conservatives had had enough.
“Because I’ve heard people defend him about making fun of a disability, making fun of John McCain, making fun of women, a woman’s face, I wanted to hear somebody defend this as well. I’m sick of hearing people defend this stuff,” said Fox News’ Greg Gutfeld, a rightwing co-host of “The Five.”
But this isn’t the only problem Republicans have with their potty-mouthed front-runner. There’s the anxiety they have about the prospects of a Trump candidacy, and what it might do to a political landscape that’s now dominated by Republicans in Congress, and beyond.
“A Donald Trump nomination would be very bad for some of the senators, folks running statewide in some of the purple and blue states. I’m not sure how much of the traditional Republican mainstream usual suspects who go to a convention you would see if that’s the case,” said Ana Navarro, a Republican strategist.
In other words, there is fear, real fear, among Republicans, that a Trump nomination may lead to widespread losses in Congress and in statehouses across the country.
If you’d like to know how far afield Trump has gone from the Republican mainstream, here are the words of white supremacist, and former Grand Wizard of the KKK, David Duke. “I don’t agree with everything he says. He speaks a little more, a lot more radically than I talk.”
I’d like to agree with David Duke, but I’m a Democrat — so I really don’t care.
Edward A. Owens is a three time Emmy Award winner and 20-year veteran of television news. Email him at freedoms@bellatlantic.net.