theres certainly some truth and valid concern in that..
like you, I voted for him (all three times).. but I readily admit I didn't like it... I felt like I was choosing the lessor of evils.. I longed for a better candidate.. one with similar ideals as Trump (put the US first, dispose of all of the DEI, political correctness, focus on transgenderism mess, critical race theory, boys peeing in girls bathrooms, and other nonsense the far left has been fielding lately), but a much better ability to actually accomplish something in the long term.. and someone that would better unify our country rather than keeping us on this wide swinging pendulum that only knows extremes..
Hell.. while I am socially something of a centrist, and fiscally an extreme right winger.. and very hard right when it comes to size of government and government involvement in our personal lives.. you might have even gotten me to vote for a Democrat if they could have put someone reasonable on the ticket..
One of my fears is 4 years of Trump leaves the country as MAGA weary as it did the last time... and we end up with another radical swing left via another extreme leftist candidate (or someone so detached like Biden was that the extreme leftists have far more power and influence than they should have)..
I don't know that a DeSantis or Rubio would have been more or less effective than Trump.. but I do believe they would have been far less divisive.. and there would have been a better chance at our country coming back together a bit... Right now I don't see the gap narrowing.. I see it getting wider and wider..
That said.. I have faith in James Carvilles "Its the economy, stupid...".... IF by some chance Trump can put the US economy on more stable ground than its been for the last 4 years, and we can see it grow demonstrably.. I think there's a pretty good chance of another 4-8 years with a republican in office, no matter how many Europeans, Canadians, and others he pisses off along the way.. and then perhaps that next republican can spend some time mending some fences and fixing our international relationships via foreign policy..
If we're still sitting where we are today 3 years from now (not in a bad place.. but also not in a good one.. with fragility and fear dominating the markets, etc).. I will be bracing for AOC's inauguration and the hell that we and the rest of the planet will have to endure as a result of it..
To jump into an ongoing discussion, I think where you and I differ mdwest, is that I am much more confident that Trump's... personality IS a major issue to policy, and IS highly likely to push the D's into power.
Now on the one hand, you're right. My personal opinion that he's an uncouth asshole of the highest order is, for the most part, irrelevant. Emotion does not matter, it is not a driver of policy, nor does it effect anything. Results do.
Reading your description of hard right on financial issues, hard right on small government, fairly centrist on social stuff, we're really, really closely aligned on what we want those results to be.
But where we differ, is our opinions on if Trump's methods will get us there. I don't think they will, because rightly or wrongly, optics DO matter in politics, and because for Trump to truly achieve anything, he not only has to 'do stuff' in this term, he needs to make sure that it sticks.
Bringing back US manufacturing for instance. Maybe tariffs are a useful tool to achieve that, maybe they aren't. But 4 years is not going to magically rebuild the US manufacturing base of the 1970s no matter what actions Trump takes. It took 50+ years for that to go away. There's no chance whatsoever that the US going to change that trend in one term. None. A couple decades maybe, but 4 years? Not a chance.
As such, for anything that Trump does towards that goal to be effective, it needs to be implemented,
and then sustained. Not just by his 2028 replacement, but in 2032 and beyond.
Yet, because Trump is an asshole, that 'sustained' part of the formula is now far, far less likely. Not only does it hurt his chances of being able to do anything at all in the last 2 years of his term, it also means that the next president is markedly less likely to be an R, and is markedly less likely to just 'leave Trump's policies in place' no matter if they're an R OR a D.
We saw that in 2020. It wasn't a competition of policy, or a really compelling opposing candidate with really good ideas. It was a competition of Trump vs 'anyone but Trump'. We all know how that turned out, and I think that'll happen again. I was half expecting it to happen in 2024, but it seems the electorate have short memories, and that Biden was just that bad.
Effectively, Trump, through his own actions, has given the D's a ready made, highly compelling platform that will resonate with many, many voters. A platform that has already propelled a worthless candidate to the Oval Office once. That platform is simple; 'screw this guy'.
He's effectively ensuring that reversing everything and anything he's done is not just something to be considered for the D's, it's the #1 priority, and the ONLY thing they need to do in order to get elected.
Not only that, but because of the way he's implemented change, he's made it very, very easy for that new incumbent to totally decimate anything and everything he's trying to achieve. He doesn't pursue wide ranging support, he doesn't use the House, or the Senate. Executive Orders are the go to. You know what's funny about executive orders? They're real easy to implement, but just as easy to cancel.
You talk about the political pendulum. I fully agree with your opinion on that, and in fact I'd go further. My position is Trump has done more than any other individual to increase the amplitude of those swings. He's not really moving the mid point, or achieving any directional drift, just pissing everyone off to provoke a reaction, whilst running on a policy of spiting the opposition as much as any other factor.
That's why I have such a low opinion of Trump. Not because I dislike the guy and find him childish and uncouth (although I do), but because with his choice to act like that, he's putting his own ego ahead of everything he claims to represent, and crucially, ahead of everything the people electing him care about.
DOGE won't last the next term. Tariffs won't last the next term. His foreign policy won't last the next term. His immigration efforts probably won't. His anti-DEI stuff might, I'll give him that. Seems Biden did all the legwork to turn the electorate against that one long before Trump. But what will he really have achieved? If almost everything just gets abolished the second he leaves office, then the honest answer will be very little. Same as his first term.
These policies won't be killed because they're bad ideas necessarily (although some are imo), but because they've been implemented terribly. That poor implementation is almost exclusively due to Trump's personal desire to be 'seen to be doing something' to gain the adoration of his base over actually doing something that might gain enough widespread support to be enduring and effective.
That disgusts me, almost as much as Biden did. More so really, at least a D candidate is honest in their desire to work against my interests.
I can't help but think that De Santis or Rubio could have pursued the same goals to much, much greater effect, with a clear path to sustaining a trend over and above the 4 years. Trump, I'm pretty confident he can't. He didn't last time, after all.
The only possible silver lining is that Trump can't run for re-election. Let's hope he can restrain his ego enough in the latter part of his term to lay the groundwork for a successor. I doubt it though.
