{"id":1348,"date":"2015-07-31T12:37:15","date_gmt":"2015-07-31T16:37:15","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/attheintersectionoffaithandculture\/?p=1348"},"modified":"2015-07-31T12:37:15","modified_gmt":"2015-07-31T16:37:15","slug":"trump-rhetoric-vs-record","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/attheintersectionoffaithandculture\/2015\/07\/trump-rhetoric-vs-record.html","title":{"rendered":"Trump: Rhetoric vs. Record"},"content":{"rendered":"

As much as GOP politicians and their apologists in the media despise it, Donald Trump is, deservedly<\/em>, the GOP presidential frontrunner at the moment. To Trump\u2019s eternal credit, he has made it acceptable (or at least somewhat less unacceptable) to openly discuss the scourge that is American immigration policy.<\/p>\n

Still, intellectual honesty demands that we contend with Trump\u2019s record, as opposed to his rhetoric.<\/p>\n

If \u201cRomneycare\u201d divested Mitt Romney of the moral capital that a GOP presidential candidate needed in 2012 to defeat Barack Obama and Obamacare, then how much worse does Trump promise to fare if he has to go head-to-head with Hillary Clinton\u2014who he\u2019s supported over the years<\/em>?<\/p>\n

That\u2019s right: Hillary Clinton is among the many Democratic politicians who Trump has supported over a period of decades.<\/p>\n

However, as Jonathan S. Tobin, a writer for Commentary, <\/em>notes, Trump wasn\u2019t just \u201ca major donor to\u201d Clinton\u2019s \u201ccampaigns for the Senate.\u201d He as well \u201cgave $100,000 to the thinly-disguised political slush fund that is the Clinton Family Foundation [.]\u201d<\/p>\n

Harry Reid, Ted Kennedy, and John Kerry are some other notable Democrats to whose coffers Trump contributed.<\/p>\n

In 1990, Trump told Playboy <\/em>that if he ever ran for office, he \u201cwould do better as a Democrat than as a Republican.\u201d Admittedly, Trump immediately qualified this judgment by stressing that he was a \u201cconservative,\u201d and that it was only because \u201cthe working guy would elect me\u201d that he would be more successful running as a Democrat.<\/p>\n

But this<\/em> idea\u2014the idea that \u201cthe working guy\u201d votes for Democrats\u2014is itself a Democrat\u2019s prejudice.<\/p>\n

Years later, in 2004, he gave Wolf Blitzer a different<\/em> reason for why he is more sympathetic toward Democrats: \u201cIn many cases, I probably identify more as a Democrat.\u201d Trump explained: \u201cIt just seems that the economy does better under the Democrats than the Republicans.\u201d<\/p>\n

Throughout the last 26 years, when we adjust for inflation, Trump has contributed $1.4 million to politicians. Overall, about one-third<\/em> of this money has gone to Democrats. But it has only been within the last five years<\/em> that the lion\u2019s share of his donations has gone to Republicans.<\/p>\n

In 1999, Trump described Republicans as \u201ctoo crazy right.\u201d<\/p>\n

Trump is now <\/em>claiming that his support of Democrats like Hillary Clinton was purely \u201ctransactional,\u201d that as a \u201cbusinessman,\u201d he needed to have leverage when dealing with such big wig politicians. \u201cAs a businessman and a very substantial donor to very important people, when you give, they do whatever the hell you want them to do.\u201d Trump says that he \u201cneed[s] that.\u201d<\/p>\n

This may very well be the only reason that Trump lent enormous sums of money to the task of insuring that the Clintons and Kennedys would maintain and increase their power. However, there are two reasons why this explanation fails to clear him.<\/p>\n

In fact, the explanation<\/em> for having contributed to Democrats and their causes reflects far worse on Trump than the fact that he made these contributions in the first place.<\/p>\n

First, if Trump is telling the truth and he gave roughly $500,000 to Democrats over a span of decades, and until fairly recently, for the sole purpose<\/em> of advancing his own material interests, then doesn\u2019t he reveal himself to be a narcissist extraordinaire? Presumably, he recognized that the Democratic Party was destructive of the well-being of the country\u2014this, after all, is why his relations with Democrats was purely \u201ctransactional.\u201d Yet he put his own purposes above those of his compatriots who he supposedly knew <\/em>were suffering under Democrat Party policies.<\/p>\n

So, even if Trump persuades us that he is sincere in what he says on this score, he wins by losing, for few people (if they think about this) will want a person like this in the White House.<\/p>\n

On the other hand, Trump may not be sincere at all. Why not think that he is just faking it now in order to get something else, like greater power, fame, etc. that he thinks will serve his<\/em> own interests?<\/p>\n

Either way, by his own words, he stands convicted.<\/p>\n

Trump has also supported an assault rifle ban and a single-payer health system. He has never been pro-life. Actually, in supporting Democrats, he has strengthened the cause of abortion.<\/p>\n

And perhaps most telling of all, given the popularity that he\u2019s enjoyed as of late over his comments on immigration, Trump has very recently suggested that he favors essentially the same kind of \u201ccomprehensive immigration reform\u201d\u2014i.e. amnesty\u2014<\/em>favored by every other Republican and Democratic candidate.<\/p>\n

Trump said that he supported an immigration system that would rid the country of the \u201cbad\u201d illegal immigrants while arranging for the \u201cgood\u201d illegal immigrants to remain.<\/p>\n

As a result, Americans for Legal Immigration Pac (ALIPAC) added Trump to their \u201cCantor List\u201d\u2014a list, named after Eric Cantor, comprised of \u201camnesty supporters.\u201d<\/p>\n

Numbers USA now gives Trump an overall grade of \u201cC\u201d on immigration. For their \u201cAmnesty Rating,\u201d Trump receives a \u201cHarmful.\u201d As far as \u201cReducing Legal<\/em> Immigration\u201d is concerned, Trump received an \u201cUnhelpful.\u201d<\/p>\n

It\u2019s a blast watching Trump shake things up, for sure. And it\u2019s far from obvious that he is any worse than any other Republican candidate (of whom more will be said at a later time).<\/p>\n

But anyone who thinks that Trump is either a conservative or a libertarian is willfully blind to his record.<\/p>\n

The record goes so far as to suggest that he isn\u2019t even a GOP loyalist.<\/p>\n

He is, rather, a crass political mercenary.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

As much as GOP politicians and their apologists in the media despise it, Donald Trump is, deservedly, the GOP presidential frontrunner at the moment. To Trump\u2019s eternal credit, he has made it acceptable (or at least somewhat less unacceptable) to openly discuss the scourge that is American immigration policy. 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I teach philosophy at several colleges in the New Jersey and Pennsylvania areas.","sameAs":["http:\/\/www.jackkerwick.com"],"url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/attheintersectionoffaithandculture\/author\/jkerwick"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/attheintersectionoffaithandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1348","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/attheintersectionoffaithandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/attheintersectionoffaithandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/attheintersectionoffaithandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/399"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/attheintersectionoffaithandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1348"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/attheintersectionoffaithandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1348\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1349,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/attheintersectionoffaithandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1348\/revisions\/1349"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/attheintersectionoffaithandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1348"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/attheintersectionoffaithandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1348"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/attheintersectionoffaithandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1348"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}