An inconvenient Trump: Republicans are living an enormous lie

The Republican primary debate charade, hosted by a hapless Bret Baier and Martha MacCallum, revealed two things: Vivek Ramaswamy is a rising star, and Donald Trump dominated as the elephant not in the room.

(Article by Melissa Mackenzie republished from Spectator.org)

The Democrats and the media run a constant clown show, but the Republicans play along as useless puppets, willfully participating in a system designed to destroy them. The Republican party is allowing itself to be rigged by playing by the rules of an old system that no longer exists. The Democrats, bureaucracy, and media are vicious apparatchiks. They are a dirty and obvious enemy who clearly need to be fought. The Republicans are worse because they don’t see their own participation in the Big Lie. They would rather step over Trump’s dead political body than save the republic. In so doing, they will never have power again, even if they regain it. They will be vassals of the state apparatus, nothing more … or else.

Donald Trump is not the Republican front runner. He’s the presumptive nominee. Further, he’s the most popular politician in America. Trump created a coalition that made the Rust Belt winnable. He turned Ohio, Florida, and Iowa reliably red. He made Pennsylvania, Michigan, North Carolina, and Wisconsin gettable. In Florida, he out-won Ron DeSantis by 1 million votes.

Why the all-out assault on Donald Trump? Because in a fair system, he wins — and he wins bigly.

The assault on Trump and anyone who supported him is an attack on the only one standing in the way of generations of Democrat power, and the Republicans are pretending that America and the Republican Party can return to a Bush-era neocon Republicanism that simply doesn’t exist anymore outside the beltway.

How, pray tell, would any of the Republicans on the debate stage win in the general election? Where do they win, and how do they expand Trump’s coalition? Is their big strategy to win back Georgia and Arizona?

Only one candidate on the debate stage tangentially dealt with this reality: Vivek Ramaswamy. That every other Republican doesn’t understand the heart of the lie was revealed by Vivek. He knows that the biggest issue facing the republic is the disintegration of the rule of law surrounding the persecution and baseless prosecution of Donald Trump and anyone who supports him. Vivek says he wants to win, but not like this. Here’s his exchange with Chris Christie, Democrat operative:

The question is: Why are the rest of this Republican field okay with winning this way?

How can any Republican govern if voters can’t canvass, can’t protest, can’t speak on social media, if no attorneys can advise Republican candidates, if strategy callers can’t brainstorm ideas for winning, if legitimate lawsuits are dismissed out of hand, if free speech is not allowed? How can Republicans win against sophisticated vote-running machines? How do they win against faked, duped, and dumped ballots? How do they win against millions of dollars laundered through accounts where people didn’t actually donate to the Democrat Party? How do they win against the new Zuck Bucks? Is something magical going to happen in 2024 that sweeps these issues away?

Now that the Democrats, the State, and the media have created a playing field where they alone win, what will the uncharismatic, unserious Republicans on the debate stage do to win?

The debate questions were inane. Why did these Fox talking heads blab about whether Mike Pence did the right thing? Chris Christie, in an act of sexual servicing too shameless for even the seediest blue district, extolled Pence as a defender of the Constitution, God, and country. It was so risible that the audience laughed. Who do these folks think they’re kidding?

Speaking of Pence, he came off as a constipated church lady. A raging hypocritical one, at that. Of all people, he knows the injustice being served cold to Trump, and he cannot let charitable words pass his mouth.

Where were the questions about Biden’s corruption? What about the bribes? Why was the question about a man who is not holding office when the man holding office is compromised by America’s enemies? Just today, the Daily Mail reports that the Bidens are alleged to have taken foreign bribes.

Further, why didn’t the Republicans on the stage address Maui and the massacre there? How about plans for an economy wrecked by Joe Biden and the plight of the poor and working class? Gas prices are increasing again. Groceries are so expensive that it cost this writer $72 for the main ingredients of a spaghetti dinner. How about the failed states attempting to impose masks and restrictions when the data is clear that they do more harm than good? Are shutdowns coming? These issues affect voters every day. Meanwhile, the Republicans wax eloquent on Ukraine.

Truth has left the Republican Party, and it’s diminishing them, if that’s even possible. They can talk of the border. They can pontificate about the world-changing necessity of making Ukraine secure. They can tell everyone what they already know: Vladimir Putin is a bad guy. Noted. Now, how about something more pressing and closer to home? How about addressing the criminalization of free speech? How about addressing the conditions of Jan. 6 defendants? How about addressing using the justice system to bankrupt and persecute political enemies? How about addressing the raw, unchecked power being thrown around by the Biden administration?

Examine this list of Democrats criminalizing political enemies:

• Arizona considers prosecutions of Trump electors.
• Michigan prosecutes 16 GOP activists, including an opponent of the Michigan attorney general.
• Michigan then charges attorneys, like Stefanie Lambert.
• Wisconsin governor calls for prosecutions (meanwhile, Republicans stayed home, and the Wisconsin Supreme Court now is in Democrat hands).
• The Georgia 19 are being charged for discussing election strategies.
• USMC veteran Harrison Floyd is still jailed. This is an outrage. Again, the Fulton County jail is a place for enemies of the state. Floyd is being hounded by the feds.

Meanwhile, Joe Biden brags in a tweet as Trump gets prosecuted for his tweets:

Apropos of nothing, I think today’s a great day to give to my campaign. https://t.co/Tj5cURqgQT

— Joe Biden (@JoeBiden) August 24, 2023

Republicans don’t mention the Jan. 6 prisoners. There’s no recompense for those brought before the Jan. 6 Committee, the one that destroyed evidence. The Jan. 6 footage is still not released.

Donald Trump is facing more than 90 charges and 700 years in prison. The Republican response to this travesty of justice? Meekly raising hands saying they’d pardon him, maybe, if they became president — which will not happen in 2024 and probably not ever.

The enemy isn’t out there somewhere. Well, it is. But guess what? The average American citizen has much less to fear without than within.

The Federal Bureau of Investigation placed agents in Catholic churches to look for dissidents. The DOJ is prosecuting people and dropping charges at the last minute, just to make people suffer. The persecution is the point. Across the fruited plains, American citizens doing perfectly legal things are being arrested because they deign to disagree.

Republicans respond by whistling past the graveyard in a meaningless debate debating meaningless things.

Donald Trump is an inconvenient truth exposing the corruption of a corrupted elite. His persecution, and those of his followers, is putting the whole system on trial, and America is being found wanting. The Democrats, run by communists who would happily burn the system down in service to ideology, are being aided and abetted by Republicans who put personal ambition and hatred of Trump over love of country.

Step outside the debate and see it for what it really is: a sideshow to mollify the wicked and stupid. Not one of these candidates can win the nomination, and should the powers that be succeed in jailing or killing Donald Trump, not one can win the presidency. And if, by some random “chance,” a Republican does win the presidency, he or she will be a pleasing suit presiding over nothing and serving at the pleasure of masters greater than any one of them.

Read more at: Spectator.org