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You seem reasonable, so please help me understand the other side. I’m a big fan of conservative thinkers like Milton Friedman and George Will. I’m against the

You seem reasonable, so please help me understand the other side. I’m a big fan of conservative thinkers like Milton Friedman and George Will. I’m against the left’s attack on free speech and find their obsession with identity, at best, perplexing. I prefer isolationist foreign policy and less military involvement from the US. I’m originally from a conservative area and have many conservative relatives I know to be good people. And yet I cannot conceive of how anyone could support Trump or the boot licking republicans who enable him. He is incapable of telling the truth. He does not seem to believe in reality, science, or expertise of any kind. He does not believe in rule of law. He is an authoritarian and egomaniac. Even before the election he challenged the idea of a peaceful transition of power. How is this supportable? Edit: And to be clear I get that we live in a two-party country and that a vote for a candidate is not a wholesale endorsement. You look at the options you have and choose the "lesser of the evils," as it were. Hell, I would vote for Trump if the other candidate was Stalin. Edit Edit: I know it’s bad form to make political rants like this on HN. I had a moment of weakness :/

umvi 6y ago
A lot of my conservative relatives are too old to even know what Twitter is, so they completely ignore Trump on that front. They like that Trump doesn't kowtow to the media and they like his judge picks, his foreign policy, and executive orders. The media would zing Romney with little zingers and he would get all hang dog and apologize, but Trump punched back instead and his voter base loved that they finally had a candidate that would stand up to the media. Trump also tried very hard to make good on his campaign promises. Can you imagine opening an embassy in Jerusalem under Hillary? I can't, and my conservative relatives love that he did that and that he stands up to China and acknowledged Taiwan's president. They also love that he fights back against identity politics (removing requirement for forced diversity trainings, etc). In short, from their perspective he goes to bat on a lot of their grievances. So yeah, his Twitter is a dumpster fire, but half his voter base doesn't even see it because they don't use twitter.
vxNsr 6y ago
Look I’ve had conversations like this a lot, it comes down to exactly what you said. Two parties ends up being the lesser of two evils, and trump to most conservatives absolutely was the lesser of two evils. As other commentators said, he fulfilled many of his campaign promises. He pushed foreign policy in a direction the whole world needed but didn’t want. He’s been drawing down foreign troops since his first day in office, so much so that apparently his generals were lying to him about how many ppl they had out there. It’s perplexing to me that if what you say you believe is what you believe why a politician being a liar is a problem for you. All politicians lie, none as brazenly as Trump sure; but every single one of them has been caught lying in the last 9 months, many have been pretty brazen in their hypocrisy. My many conservative friends will point to 1000s of small white lies and 100s of big ones that Biden told, as proof that the other side is just as complicit.
- jaredklewis 6y ago
  I get there is policy to like, particularly regarding the Middle East. I mostly disagree with Trump on policy, but even if he ticked every policy box for me, I can't imagine wanting to end rule of law and just have an imperial president. Our political institutions like elections, the courts, the Department of Justice, and the Federal Reserve are built mostly on norms that took decades and sometime centuries to build up. He seems ready to throw them all out.

umvi 6y ago

A lot of my conservative relatives are too old to even know what Twitter is, so they completely ignore Trump on that front. They like that Trump doesn't kowtow to the media and they like his judge picks, his foreign policy, and executive orders. The media would zing Romney with little zingers and he would get all hang dog and apologize, but Trump punched back instead and his voter base loved that they finally had a candidate that would stand up to the media. Trump also tried very hard to make good on his campaign promises. Can you imagine opening an embassy in Jerusalem under Hillary? I can't, and my conservative relatives love that he did that and that he stands up to China and acknowledged Taiwan's president. They also love that he fights back against identity politics (removing requirement for forced diversity trainings, etc). In short, from their perspective he goes to bat on a lot of their grievances. So yeah, his Twitter is a dumpster fire, but half his voter base doesn't even see it because they don't use twitter.

vxNsr 6y ago

Look I’ve had conversations like this a lot, it comes down to exactly what you said. Two parties ends up being the lesser of two evils, and trump to most conservatives absolutely was the lesser of two evils. As other commentators said, he fulfilled many of his campaign promises. He pushed foreign policy in a direction the whole world needed but didn’t want. He’s been drawing down foreign troops since his first day in office, so much so that apparently his generals were lying to him about how many ppl they had out there. It’s perplexing to me that if what you say you believe is what you believe why a politician being a liar is a problem for you. All politicians lie, none as brazenly as Trump sure; but every single one of them has been caught lying in the last 9 months, many have been pretty brazen in their hypocrisy. My many conservative friends will point to 1000s of small white lies and 100s of big ones that Biden told, as proof that the other side is just as complicit.

jaredklewis 6y ago
I get there is policy to like, particularly regarding the Middle East. I mostly disagree with Trump on policy, but even if he ticked every policy box for me, I can't imagine wanting to end rule of law and just have an imperial president. Our political institutions like elections, the courts, the Department of Justice, and the Federal Reserve are built mostly on norms that took decades and sometime centuries to build up. He seems ready to throw them all out.