I do not believe that I have ever expressed my political leanings on this board. Suffice it to say that in my senior year at Iona (1972-1973) I was President of the Young Republicans and Co-Chairman of Young Voters for the President. In every federal election since my first vote in 1972 I voted for the Republican candidate. I have voted for Democrats in local elections. I can say that if I could change one of my votes it would be my vote for Richard Nixon in 1972. This is not because of Watergate, but for his actions in the cover-up of the break-in. He should have resigned or been convicted on his impeachment.
However, it was his actions prior to the 1968 election in interfering with the Viet Nam war peace attempts as they related to the bombings of North Viet Nam, which came to light in 2013, that truly make me regret my vote for him. Had his actions become public then, he could have (and should have) been convicted of treason. It would have likely resulted in a Constitutional crisis bigger than Watergate. God only knows how many Americans died due to his meddling, just so he could get elected POTUS.
Under no circumstances will I ever vote for Hillary Clinton. I am quite certain that if I had done 1/100th of what she did with classified information I would be standing before a Federal Judge. My clearance is nowhere near her level, but she got away with far greater breaches of her oath to protect such information than did a couple of ex-servicemen prosecuted by the Obama Justice Department (who are ex-servicemen now only because of their unintentional mishandling of classified information). Her past, including, but not limited to, Whitewater, the Rose law firm matters, her attacks on women who accused her husband of sexual harassment, Benghazi, and her mishandling of classified information, disqualify her from serving as our President in my opinion.
And what is my choice? Donald Trump. When all of the Republicans threw their hats in the ring this year, I felt that I could support any of them – except Trump and Cruz. Is Trump qualified? Constitutionally, yes – he’s a natural citizen and is over 35 years of age. But is someone who was fortunate enough to be born here and who has lived more than 35 years a good reason to elect someone POTUS? Not to my mind. As far as I am concerned Trump is as much a liar and opportunist as Clinton. Trump is on record years ago of being firmly pro-choice, now he’s firmly pro-life; he was once on record as saying that the 2nd amendment needed to be limited, now he’s Mr. NRA. He sways with the breeze. There are other examples of his changing core opinions, but none come close to his statement in 2008 that “Hillary Clinton would be a fine President or Vice-President of the United States”.
As far as I am concerned Trump is a bully – and I’m not talking “speak softly and carry a big stick” – I’m talking a name calling bully. Just because he can talk loud does not mean that he’s making any sense. How many times did he tell people on the debate stage that he was going to sue them or call them names? Is that what I want in a President? Hell no! He can never admit being wrong.
That BS move in claiming that the Federal Judge who has ruled against him on a couple of motions in the Trump University case was prejudiced because he had a Mexican background. Listen to this, Don, just because you lose a motion or two does not mean the judge is biased against you. Motions for Summary Judgment are seldom granted. I am certain that if his lawyers thought the judge needed to recuse himself they’d have filed a motion. They didn’t. I am sure they told Trump to keep his mouth shut about the judge (all lawyers tell their clients not to discuss their case in public). Trump couldn’t, he had to run his mouth. And before he accused the judge of being “Mexican”, he should have looked up the fact that the judge was born in the U.S. and that as a prosecutor prosecuting the Mexican drug cartel, the judge was forced to live on a secret military base for more than a year to protect him from being assassinated by the cartel. A real “Mexican”, indeed, Donny.
He even has excuses for the bankruptcies that he filed – hell, nothing is ever your fault Mr. Drumpf.
I just cannot believe that out of all the millions of people in this country, the major parties give us Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton. How far we have fallen! This Chicago song from 1975 seems appropriate now:
As I said, I regret my first vote. I will not live to regret my vote in 2016. I will vote for a Republican. I will write in the candidate I voted for in the Virginia primary – John Kasich.
It's time for term limits. I would propose: POTUS one 6 year term; Senator two 4 year terms; Representative three 2 year terms. The Founding Fathers must be rolling in their graves seeing how these idiots have made elections lifetime jobs. Actually, we are the idiots who keep re-electing them.
I apologize for the rant. So as to give this post some social redeeming value:
Go Gaels!!!
