Trump was exactly the right man for 2016. By Christopher Skeet.
Trump was exactly the right man for 2016. But Trump is currently devolving into more of a permanent liability than anything else, and he’s reached a point where his faults outweigh his virtues….
In 2024, he will turn 79 years old …
He tolerates zero criticism, even if legitimate. He fights every single battle on principle, rather than saving political capital for the ones that matter. He made every midterm campaign rally about him. On election night, he openly gloated when Republican candidates lost. And now he’s taking unprovoked swipes at DeSantis, a move that betrays fear and insecurity rather than leadership or confidence. Bluntly put, he doesn’t know how to keep his mouth shut. It’s petty, and it got old a long time ago. …
We will never know with 100% certainty what exactly happened in the wee hours in November 3, 2020, but in a sense that doesn’t matter. The election should have never been that close, and Biden should have been blown out of the water in a repeat of Mondale’s 1984 drubbing. Trump’s unpopularity can be attributed in significant part to both the nonstop media barrages as well as the fraudulent investigations. But to deny that Trump’s personality played no role whatsoever in deterring would-be voters is to deny reality. Do I personally think that his personality should play a decisive factor? No, I don’t. But millions of people do, and the evidence suggests that we’ve done little to convince them otherwise.
Now, don’t get your tights in a bunch because I’m pointing out Trump’s flaws. Unless your argument is that Trump is a perfect human being, then you too have criticisms of the man. For years, we’ve all kept quiet about them in the interests of presenting a unified front. But the misgivings I’ve highlighted are the ones that many of us know to be true. …
Trump was inexplicably naïve about the Deep State, often criticizing it but never fully grasping the power of the leviathan he was up against. …
DeSantis, on the other hand, possesses an indispensable quality that Trump lacked: discipline. … He controls the narrative, and he forces them to respond to him, not vice versa. He takes nothing personal and continually forces the media conversation back towards policy. He pulls his punches until he knows he will connect. And when he connects, they feel it for the next month.
DeSantis is not a NeverTrumper. He is heir to the movement, evolved and retooled to meet the needs of the moment. With DeSantis, we get Trumpian policy achievements without the Trumpian baggage train. …
His PR victory over Disney and his public exposé of the Martha Vineyard hypocrites shows he can mop the floor with the Left in the culture wars. …
Trump should be president right now. But he isn’t. We can make 2024 about 2020, as Trump insists on doing, or we can move on. If we play our cards right, we can make DeSantis a two-term president with congressional majorities whose accomplishments will have outshone even those of Ronald Reagan. Or we could try to “own” the libs again with a Trump candidacy that stands no chance of winning.
