To the Editor:
I am sitting here on the morning of Nov. 8 writing this, and by this reading on Nov. 10 we know that Hillary is elected president, as many of us predicted. Many of us who voted for Trump did not do so because of his many failings. Indeed, he is a flawed character, but we voted for him nevertheless.
We are in a country with unfair trade practices, insecure borders, poor schools, and a failed healthcare program with rising costs. It is not normal to have half a trillion dollars per year of deficit. Nor is it normal to have a debt that is as large as an annual GDP. We are experiencing ever-increasing entitlements, excessive regulations, a slow and weak economy; political correctness abounds, and so does government corruption. Wages don’t increase, defenses are failing, and terrorism is on the rise. We pay billions to Iran, which is a proxy for al-Qaeda, Hezbollah, and Hamas. The African-American community is not doing better — it is largely doing worse, and the middle class is stuck. Fewer people are looking for work, hence the low unemployment rate, and it isn’t all about demographics and aging population. Crime in large cities is on the rise, even after a 20-year slowdown, and the police are pariahs. The government is telling us that we are strong and all is well, but the average person doesn’t feel that at all. The elites don’t feel the pain. I don’t feel the pain, but the country at large is in malaise.
Trump wouldn’t have fixed all of this, but some of us wanted him to have a shot at it. Trump’s anger at the statism that exists resonates with many. Our support of him is about what he represents rather than what he will do. He is a disrupter. Fiscal ruin is on the way, ‘’checks and balances’’ are deteriorating, and government overreach is manifest. There are a lot of good reasons for not wanting Trump. He is shallow and uncouth and temperamental. Trump’s defeat and Hillary’s election will result in in the subversion of the FBI, State Department, EPA, and IRS, and will usher in a liberal Supreme Court for the next 25 years.
We could have had a more conservative candidate who would have beaten Clinton, but none of the initial 16 showed the outrage with the status quo that Trump did, and therefore they didn’t win the primaries. To be sure, the ascendancy of Boehner and McConnell did very little for conservatives, hence more outrage for us. We are also no longer a country of laws. Many readers think nothing of the private server; the deleted emails; the immunity granting; the circumvention of court orders; and the Clinton Foundation as a nonprofit wagon in ‘’pay for play,’’ yet if the shoe were one of Bush’s, they would level dishonor upon him.
So now we face open borders, more debt, free college tuition, more attacks on the dreaded carbon, more entitlements, more regulations, more taxes, including estate taxes, and dividing up a smaller pie. Russia and Iran control the Middle East, and we don’t interfere to save the thousands dead and dying. As someone said, ‘’the antiwar White House, upon finding a viper in the bed of their child, would first call the People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals.’’
If Republicans hold the Senate, and by this reading we will know, some blocking will occur, but she will launch the “pen and phone’’ actions of her predecessor. Many on Martha’s Vineyard, and indeed in the U.S. at large, have bought into the conceit that Hillary will fix all this. She will not. Stay tuned.
Andrew Engelman
Vineyard Haven