Donald Trump and Our Weimar Problem

Tom Brown points me to a good piece by Jennifer Rubin on Trump:

"In the world before Trump the contest between a crass, egomaniacal know-nothing and a measured, detail-oriented opponent wouldn’t be a contest at all. So far, at any rate, the polls show the public appropriately wary of Trump. As Sullivan put it, ” The American people need a steady hand at the wheel in a time of uncertainty and not a reckless and erratic egomaniac who could easily drive us off a cliff. . . . Watching him, listening to his reaction to a major and consequential global event and then imagining this man as our President is a dangerous and frightening proposition.” It is, but are in a post-rational political world in which disgruntled voters are determined to lash out, no matter how self-destructive? We cannot ignore that possibility."

"The one silver lining in all this may be that Brexit and the economic instability it has already brought will help sober up the U.S. electorate. The example of economic self-destruction and avoidable hardship may help to intensify aversion to Trump. Do voters really want someone who invites and then revels in economic disaster so people will come play golf at his place? Do they really trust Trump — who along with Vladimir Putin — is cheering Europe’s turmoil? We used to be certain of the answer. Now, not so much."

https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/right-turn/wp/2016/06/26/brexit-can-we-come-to-our-senses/

Here is another good piece by another Never Trumper, George F. Will, who has now renounced the party that he loves, the GOP.

“There’s an old adage about a vat of wine standing next to a vat of sewage. Add a cup of wine to the sewage, and it is still sewage. But add a cup of sewage to the wine, and it is no longer wine but sewage. Is this what Donald Trump has done to our politics?”

— Martha Bayles, in the
Claremont Review of Books

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/republicans-save-your-party-dont-give-to-trump/2016/06/22/f56a8cda-37eb-11e6-a254-2b336e293a3c_story.html

This is George Will's thing. He always has done this-begin with an obscure literary quote.

But, it's a good one. As is this one:

“Every republic,” writes Charles Kesler, professor of government at Claremont McKenna College, “eventually faces what might be called the Weimar problem.” It arrives when a nation’s civic culture has become so debased that the nation no longer has “the virtues necessary to sustain republican government.” Do not dwell on what came after the Weimar Republic. But do consider the sufficiency of virtue that the Constitution’s framers presupposed."

I guess we are hitting up against that now. The EU certainly seems there. I still think thanks to our nonwhite voters we avoid Hitler in the US.

But Will makes a great point: the GOP donors have an important role to play in avoiding Hitler 2.0.

"In Trump, Republicans have someone whose reputation is continental only in being broadly known. He illustrates Daniel Boorstin’s definition of a celebrity as someone well-known for his well-knownness. It will be wonderful if Trump tries to translate notoriety into fulfillment of his vow— as carefully considered as anything else about his candidacy — to carry New York and California. He should be taunted into putting his meager campaign funds where his ample mouth is. Every dime or day he squanders on those states will contribute to a redemptive outcome, a defeat so humiliating — so continental — that even Republicans will be edified by it."

"Trump’s campaign has less cash ($1.3 million) than some congressional candidates have, so Republican donors have never been more important than they are at this moment. They can save their party by not aiding its nominee."

"Events already have called his bluff about funding himself and thereby being uniquely his own man. His wealth is insufficient. Only he knows what he is hiding by being the first presidential nominee in two generations not to release his tax returns. It is reasonable to assume that the returns would refute many of his assertions about his net worth, his charitableness and his supposed business wizardry. They might also reveal some awkwardly small tax payments."

We've already identified at least a few years he's taken no tax, and him taking a number of tax credits not meant for billionaires. Is he a thousandaire after all? We know the names he called a female journalist who called him that once.

Maybe that old African American saying has a lot of truth in it: only the truth hurts.

"If his fear of speculation about his secrecy becomes greater than his fear of embarrassment from what he is being secretive about, he will release the returns. He should attach to them a copy of his University of Pennsylvania transcript, to confirm his claim that he got the “highest grades possible.” There are skeptics."

Tom Brown and I have talked about convention scenarios. My hope is that he comes out the nominee though I agree with Tom, the more contentious, the better the process of him getting it.

Maybe the Jennifer Rubins, the George Wills, and the Mitt Romneys are able to force a requirement that before he's nominated he simply has to release his tax returns. 

But Will is exactly right: they key is to make speculation over his secrecy even more embarrassing than what he is being secretive about.

You like how the table is turned on him here. He slurred the President over his birth certificate and his college transcripts. Fitting that he should be the one forced to release his.