Donald Trump, by his past actions, has demonstrated that he is as thoroughly corrupt as any other politician; apparently having few core values that could serve this nation well. Trump brags about using significant amounts of money to purchase political support to bend rules and regulations in his favor. His previous support for positions were based on self-interest and he could care less about those individuals and entities that were disadvantaged. He has been a democrat and a republican, supported socialism as well as capitalism. With Trump, you get the man in a moment – and in the next minute, someone else.
I am different …
Of course, when confronted with his manipulation of the political system and individual politicians, his response is always something like: I am and was a world-class businessman and I owe it to myself, my family, my employees, and my company to do those things that make us prosper. With the implication that now he is a “politician” he would be a politician unlike any other politician before him; eschewing self-serving cronyism to serve “we the people” and to make our country great again. And, let us not forget, I am so rich that I can’t be bought and will serve all of the people.
A position echoed by former California Governor and self-professed Republican Arnold Schwarzenegger who turned out to be more corrupt than his predecessor, Gray Davis, who had been recalled. And a man who rarely interacted with the state republicans as he slavishly gave perks and privileges to the progressive socialist democrats while giving us one of the largest, if not the largest, tax increase in California’s history.
Donald Trump, a clear and present danger …
Precisely what makes Donald Trump so dangerous is that he cannot be trusted. His word is not his bond, and as we have seen with his numerous corporate bankruptcies, everything appears to be negotiable.
Which brings us to the specific reason I fear a Trump presidency. THE SUPREME COURT. The next president will appoint at least two and possibly three Supreme Court Justices for a total of nine unelected people who are exerting an unprecedented degree of control over our personal lives, our economy, and our nations policies, both foreign and domestic. Often issuing ideologically-based rulings by a margin of one vote in 5/4 or 4/5 decisions. The very people who have proven under Justice Robert’s watch that they put themselves above their constitutional duties and have allowed tortured and contorted interpretations of the constitution to be used to justify unconstitutional actions.
More importantly, what concerns me greatly is that these nine poohbahs have little or no regard for private property, the underpinnings of capitalism, and believe that the government has a fundamental right and responsibility to go beyond the constitution to enact programs that affect our lives. Without such a right being proven or demonstrated, only asserted by the Court.
Consider the Kelo decision. Under a wrong-headed and tortured explanation of eminent domain under the Fifth Amendment’s ”takings clause”, the Court has ruled that a government entity can take an individual’s property, not for a public use such as a road, firehouse, school, etc., but to covey to another private individual so that individual can make a profit that ultimately benefits the government in reducing urban blight or increasing tax revenues. A scenario that saw the acquisition of private property to be turned over to Trump for development and substantial profit. While the original property owners received a pittance based on the reduced value of the property at the time of its seizure.
One need only look at Trump’s activities in Bridgeport, Connecticut and Atlantic City to see how Trump’s activities played out. Both were failures, complete with dodgy politicians and special deals. Read my previous post THE DARK SIDE OF DONALD TRUMP for a better feel of Trump’s perfidy.
In 2005, however, Trump was delighted to find that the Supreme Court had okayed the brand of government-abetted theft that he’d twice attempted. “I happen to agree with it 100 percent,” he told Fox News’s Neil Cavuto of the Kelo decision. Can Republicans support someone with so little regard for the property of others? Let’s hope not. <Source>
Donald Trump’s view of eminent domain is not just immoral and un-American, it exposes a very troubling mindset that contradicts the populist appeal that has helped him get as far as he has in the Republican primary. People need to ask themselves if they want a second president in a row who’s so eager to use the fascist power of government to crush the individual in furtherance of corporate interests.
With its 2005 Kelo v. New London decision, the Supreme Court changed everything. The reasonable Takings Clause has been perverted into a “greater good” argument that allows the use of eminent domain to transfer property from one private owner to another.
In one 5-4 decision (Kennedy and the left-wing Justices, naturally), the Constitution’s explicit use of the words “public use” was upended to allow the well-connected to use the power of the government to force you to sell your property, your home or business, to well-connected developers.
Trump has made no secret of the fact that he is politically well-connected. In his business dealings, he has also used eminent domain to enrich himself, and in an interview this week he called this “wonderful.”
In an exclusive interview with Breitbart News Wednesday, Trump made his “greater good” arguments:
“But if you’re going to build a factory that’s going to have 5,000 jobs, that’s entirely different,” Trump says. …
“These people, they’re not just being thrown out. Everyone said ‘you’re taking their property,’ but they’re getting paid at least fair market value,” Trump says.
“What people don’t know is, usually you go through a condemnation, and [the property owner] will get 2, 3, 4 times the value of their house. People don’t know that,” Trump tells Breitbart News.
Trump acknowledged that the condemnation process is difficult.
“It’s always unpleasant,” he says. “They always say you pay them fair market value, but politically, they will pay you much more.”
And all he has to do is crony up to the right elected officials and use the magic word “jobs.”
We’re not talking about a road here — a road that cannot go someplace else. We’re talking about another hotel or another ugly box store; we’re talking about a business that can go someplace else but won’t because the billionaire in question has his eye on my property. He wants something that belongs to me, something he can get richer off of, and in order to get it, he’s willing to use the power of government force to take away what is legally and morally mine.
Would my wife and I give up our home to expand a road? If we were convinced our local government had no other viable option, I would not only agree to sell, in good conscience, I would not gouge the taxpayers.
Would we give up our home to Trump so he could get a little richer than he already is with some hotel? Believe it or not, that decision is no longer up to me. Even though I live in America, I’d have no choice in the matter. And Trump thinks that’s “wonderful.”
One of the things that is so appealing about Trump is that he speaks “American” like no other candidate. I don’t mean English, I mean American. He’s fluent in it. But Kelo is neither American nor wonderful.
What is “wonderful” is a government that understands that the smallest and most vulnerable minority in the country is the individual, and that the government’s primary responsibility is to protect the rights of that individual, most especially the rights of the obstinate, unreasonable “hold outs.”
The Individual has already suffered through eight years of a president completely enamored with the idea of using government to crush his human rights. We do not need another. <Source>
It appears, at least to me, that Trump has a complete disregard for any individual who opposes him or speaks out. They are, by Trump’s definition, losers, scum, and should not be considered in any conversation.
Bottom line …
Socialists and communists are hostile to private property, believing that the rights of the collective – and the government – should supersede any individual rights, whether God-given or acquired through legislation. Even if the progressive socialist democrats cannot erase private property, they can dilute, tax, encumber, restrict, or render it unfit for a given purpose. Anyone who has seen the damage wrought by the environmentalists – in collaboration with the government – can see how the lack of a tough-minded conservative with core values could further the decline of the United States that was built upon conservative principles.
Donald Trump has proven to be a self-serving weathervane, blowing with the political winds and embracing some elements of conservatism while he continues to talk like a progressive socialist democrat when it comes to healthcare (single-payer, the long-term goal of the democrats), private property (he favors Kelo and taking private property from one individual to give to a large corporation to develop), and other democrat memes.
The single thing that scares me more than Donald Trump’s crony capitalism and his willingness to claim greatness for himself while throwing others under the bus for failures on his watch, is his apparent attitude that all things can be negotiated; that you can actually make a deal with the devil. As others have said, Trump is not a self-made man like Marco Rubio (his father was a multimillionaire with an extensive property portfolio), but a self-invented man.
Given his flamboyant personality, obvious narcissism, lack of self-control when challenged, and his concentration on style over substance, I wonder if he will emulate President Obama in using the taxpayer’s money to purchase photo ops and meaningless accords when times get tough. <Source: One Citizen Speaking>
In the final analysis, I would much rather have a stable conservative politician like Ted Cruz in the Presidency than a wild card like Donald Trump. That the two political parties could serve up corrupt individuals like Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump is a sign that we are so screwed.
-- steve