Tifton Merritt’s Pub Notes (“A Trump Supporter Explains Things,” Nov. 23) is typical of post-election fare from liberals—agonizing over the election of Donald Trump and, as a result, wringing hands about how the U.S. is headed for disaster. While it may indeed be the case that the worst is yet to come, Trump certainly cannot be blamed for the current state of affairs.
For example, the Affordable Care Act (Obamacare) is the creation of the Democrats. And all of the health-insurance companies are extremely grateful for its implementation. A government that is truly “for the people” would surely have single-payer insurance (Medicare for all) that completely cuts out the middle-man insurance companies. We should have universal health care, not health insurance. It’s completely disingenuous to pretend that Trump is somehow going to be responsible for health-care disasters in the future, when it’s already been a disaster for decades.
Merritt then criticizes Trump for going back on his campaign trail promise to “drain the swamp.” But he never acknowledges that Hillary Clinton never even made such a promise and, had she won the election, would certainly have filled her cabinet with “insiders and lobbyists,” too. At least we now have the possible advantage that the loose cannon of Trump on Twitter will let everyone know what he’s thinking, unlike the uncertainty we would have had trying to guess Clinton’s public vs. private positions.
Next up on Merritt’s list of criticisms is Trump’s “hatred of people who are different.” While Trump has indeed said many vile things directed toward various groups of people, he has yet to put any words into actions. Merritt fails to mention, much less criticize, our government’s horrific actions—not simply hateful words—against people who are different (i.e., not Americans). For example, Merritt ignores Sen. Clinton’s 2002 vote in favor of the catastrophic invasion of Iraq, Secretary Clinton’s approval of the military overthrow of the democratically elected president of Honduras, Secretary Clinton’s sadistic “We came, we saw, he died” laughing commentary on the brutal murder of Muammar Gaddafi, etc.
Merritt then attempts to pre-blame Trump for possible future bombings and wars, all the while ignoring the drone strikes, bombings and wars (carried out against people who are different, of course) that have been initiated or continued by the Obama Administration, of which Clinton, as secretary of state, was an integral member.
The article finishes by insinuating that the attempt to privatize Social Security is surely a possibility under a Trump administration, but it fails to mention that that was likely to be a cause that Hillary Clinton would champion, too.
A Trump administration is likely going to be a bad one, but not, unlike what Merritt implies, orders of magnitude worse than what’s been happening for the last few decades, or what would have happened under a Clinton presidency.
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