By Thomas Sowell
Friday, January 29, 2016
Of all the many things said about Donald Trump, what was
said by Roger Ailes, head of the Fox News Channel, said it all in just two
words: “Grow up!”
It is amazing how many people have been oblivious to this
middle-aged man’s spoiled-brat behavior, his childish boastfulness about things
he says he is going to do, and his petulant response to every criticism with ad
hominem replies.
He has boasted that his followers would stick by him even
if he committed murder. But is that something to boast about? Is it not an
insult to his followers, if it is true? Moreover, his cockiness is misplaced,
because he still does not have a majority among Republican voters, while you
need a majority of all the voters to win any state in the general election.
Trump has a showman’s talent for telling people what they
want to hear. But you can listen in vain for a coherent argument from him,
based on facts and logic, much less an understanding of the inherent
limitations of the office of president.
More than two centuries ago, Edmund Burke said:
“Constitute government how you please, infinitely the greater part of it must
depend upon the exercise of the powers which are left at large to the prudence
and uprightness of ministers of state.”
In other words, the personal character of the people to
whom you entrust the powers of government matters even more than what kinds of
government institutions there are. There have been some good kings and some bad
presidents, as well as vice versa.
In a world where the future of this country is threatened
from within by increasingly angry polarization, and where external threats can
become nuclear, are we really going to entrust the safety or this country to a
man who still needs to grow up?
Is the fact that he loudly expressed our own disgust with
the political establishment a sufficient reason to gamble the whole future of
the country by putting him in the White House?
The White House is not a place for on-the-job training.
You are supposed to be ready, or at the very least grown up, before you walk in
the door. Aging happens automatically, but maturity is optional — and it is an
option that Donald Trump has not yet chosen to exercise.
The issue that Trump raised about Ted Cruz’s having been
born in Canada is not the first time he has tried to challenge where someone
was born. “The Donald” was among those who tried to say that Barack Obama was
not born an American citizen, and who disgraced themselves, while undermining
other critics of Obama who had serious objections to his policies.
On the other hand, messianic demagogues have often spoken
at least part of the truth. But they have also often led their followers to
their doom, whether at Jonestown, Stalingrad, or innumerable other places. That
is a very high price to pay for an exhilaration of the moment.
Donald Trump is not the only one who needs to act like an
adult. With this country starting to unravel from within, while ruthless
enemies overseas are developing both nuclear weapons and intercontinental
missiles to deliver them, we face problems that cannot be solved by candidates
with glib words or by voters who vote for whoever meets their emotional needs.
If you don’t understand the issues, but want to do your
patriotic duty, then stay home on election night, whether in the primaries or
in the national election in November. Uninformed voters turn elections into a
game of playing Russian roulette with the future of America.
Conservative candidates will also have an opportunity to
show their maturity and their patriotism. This is not the first primary season
in which the conservative vote has been split among so many Republican
candidates that it virtually guarantees that someone who is not a conservative
will win the Republican nomination.
At some point during the primary season, it becomes clear
that some candidates have no real chance of winning the nomination, much less
the general election. At that point they can either continue hanging on,
keeping the conservative vote split, or they can withdraw and throw their
support to some other conservative candidate who has a chance.
A lot of people need to grow up, and to do something for
this country that has done so much for them.
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