The Donald Trump Party

Like the old song says: Did you ever see a Dream Walking? Well I did. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p6pfR7lsZWw

The Trump Democrat dream was long in coming.

http://lastmenandovermen.blogspot.com/2016/05/this-is-why-im-trump-democrat-reason-759.html

Now the dream walks:

"Outside the building, Representative Darrell Issa, a combative conservative ideologue from California, found his path blocked by several dozen activists from United We Dream, which advocates on behalf of undocumented young people. Some held makeshift signs calling Trump a racist or associating him with the Ku Klux Klan or the Confederacy, but many held up professionally produced placards reading, “The G.O.P.: Party of Trump.” Issa hopped a fence and raced up the street as if he were fleeing a crime scene. When a reporter ran after him, he ducked into a building."

"The leader of the pro-Trump wing in the House, Chris Collins, of New York, was conducting an impromptu press conference on the sidewalk. Collins was the first of his colleagues to endorse Trump, switching his support from Jeb Bush, back in February. Now he criticized George H. W. Bush and George W. Bush, both of whom have said they would not vote for Trump or for Clinton in the general election. “How an elected official can message to America, ‘Don’t vote’—I find that embarrassing for them,” Collins said. “These people are becoming irrelevant.” Like other Trump backers, he argued, “One on one, Mr. Trump is a listener. He’s not a talker. When he’s got a group of people, he wants to know what’s going on in other people’s districts.” If Ryan didn’t endorse the nominee, Collins said, he would lose the Speakership. “I have spoken to very few members who have said that they’re not on the Trump train.”

http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2016/06/20/inside-the-gop-trump-dilemma

Remember the old saying Better Red Than Dead?

Maybe these few members not on the Trump train would rather be irrelevant than dead.

In any case. I have to give George W. Bush credit where it's due.

"And yet it was hard to swing a boom mike without hitting a skeptical Republican. Charlie Dent, of Pennsylvania, who is a leader of the faction of moderate House Republicans called the Tuesday Group, said, “Donald Trump has to convince many Americans, including myself, that he’s ready to lead this great nation. He’s got to do that. At this point, I haven’t been persuaded.”

Hm. Yet to be persuaded. I doubt yesterday put the Congressman over the hump. 

http://lastmenandovermen.blogspot.com/2016/06/trump-and-teleprompter-wars.html

http://lastmenandovermen.blogspot.com/2016/06/trumps-call-for-airstrikes-garners.html

http://lastmenandovermen.blogspot.com/2016/06/offer-condolences-then-stay-silent.html

"For Ryan and Cole, Trump posed a different challenge. Insofar as Trump has fixed political positions, he disagrees with a majority of House Republicans, including Ryan and Cole, on foreign policy, taxes, entitlements, trade policy, immigration, and the minimum wage. He repeatedly talks about a tax policy that would be less generous to the wealthiest Americans, allow the government to pay down the debt, and keep Social Security and Medicare solvent, although the plan he has presented would do none of those things. Cole said, “It’s not as if the majority was created by Donald Trump. This majority was created much more by the views and vision that Paul Ryan laid out.” Cole said that he respects what Trump has accomplished as a candidate: “It’s an amazing achievement. I suspect, and I would hope, he respects what we did to win the majority."

Trump actually has called for huge budget busting tax cuts for the rich and he has talked about eliminating the federal minimum wage. He also said in a really revealing moment last year that wages are too high.

As for SS and Medicare, he now have advisers who do want to cut both.

https://lastmenandovermen.blogspot.com/2016/05/but-at-least-donald-trump-wont-cut.html?

Did he not realize this when he hired them? If you think so, try asking him sometime.

Ok, now for just pure schadenfreude:

"After the meeting, Trump and Ryan issued a perfunctory statement declaring it “a very positive step toward unification,” but Ryan declined to issue a formal endorsement. Trump had put countless Republican lawmakers in excruciating political predicaments. Senator John McCain, who told me last summer that Trump had “fired up the crazies,” now needs Trump’s voters to support his own reëlection in Arizona—a state that Trump won by twenty-two percentage points in the primaries—and has said that he will support him. Marco Rubio, whose last days as a Presidential candidate were spent mocking the size of Trump’s hands and the orange hue of his face, recently apologized for the personal attacks, and said that he would speak on Trump’s behalf at the Convention. Governor Chris Christie, of New Jersey, another of Trump’s opponents early in the campaign, has transformed himself into a sort of manservant, who is constantly with Trump at events. (One Republican told me that a friend of his on the Trump campaign used Snapchat to send him a video of Christie fetching Trump’s McDonald’s order.)

Hm. Taking the Vichy Regime analogy even further, maybe this is what Richard Nixon's 'peace with honor' looks like. 

Chris Christie gets the McDonalds. I'd love to know who paid for it. Supersize it.

Did he have any trouble on the bridge as he drove there?

Meanwhile, McCain is trailing in Arizona while supporting the man who mocked his heroic service in Vietnam. 

http://lastmenandovermen.blogspot.com/2016/06/the-trump-effect-and-john-mccain.html

Meanwhile. Sarah Palin-McCain's greatest mistake, about whom, McCain has never said a bad word about in eight years is now a major Trump booster. 

"Ryan, who went on to endorse Trump on June 2nd, was the last major holdout. Tim Miller, a former spokesman for Jeb Bush, who has said that he can’t support the nominee, told me, “It’s noteworthy how few rank-and-file members have spoken up against Trump. I think that’s a mistake that people are going to regret.”

In the longterm, yes. After all, this something that will mark every Republican who supports him for the duration of their career.

Then again, looking at McCain, Kelly Ayotte, and Pat Toomey, maybe even in the short term.