Donald Trump has been mysteriously quiet about his second-term agenda, preferring to speak about the past accomplishments of his administration when making the case that voters ought to re-elect him. Fox News host Sean Hannity gave the President two opportunities to layout a second-term objective during interviews in June and July. At his second at-bat, Trump said he wanted to beat the coronavirus, rebuild the economy, negotiate new trade deals, and appoint more federal judges.
The list still didn’t feel new or specific when compared to some of his 2016 promises: build a wall and make Mexico pay for it; renegotiate NAFTA; withdraw from TPP; repeal and replace Obamacare; renegotiate the Iran Deal, and cut taxes. In another Fox News interview, Trump struggled again when asked what he would do if re-elected, saying, “I want to take where we left — we had the greatest economy in the history of the world, we were better than any other country, we were better than we were ever, we never had anything like it in this country — what I want to do is take it from that point and then build it even better.”
The President is apparently getting hip to the fact that voters aren’t going to get excited about a vague and non-specific policy agenda. Especially while his opponent, Joe Biden, managed to release a coherent message on “Buy American” before Trump could even sign his administration’s own proposed “Buy American” executive order. So during a visit to a Whirlpool Corporation plant in Ohio, Trump made six promises to American workers:
- Defeat the China virus: “We are attacking the virus from every angle and through this aggressive strategy, we will win the war and it will happen sooner than people think.”
- Restore our country’s prosperity: “We will rise from the current adversity of this horrible invisible enemy and we will be more prosperous and resilient than ever before. We have done things that we never knew we could do. We are building factories now, we are building plants. you’ll see what’s going to be happening with the job numbers very soon.”
- Turn America into the premier medical manufacturing, pharmacy and drugstore of the world: “The United States must produce essential equipment and supplies and pharmaceuticals for ourselves. We cannot rely on China and other nations across the globe that could one day deny us products in a time of need.”
- Onshore manufacturing jobs: “We will onshore millions of new manufacturing jobs, across many other critical sectors that are vital to our national security and prosperity from electronics to machine tools to shipping, aerospace, autos, and of course to iron and to steel, and we’ll never forget your washers and your dryers.”
- Bring back factory jobs: “I love properly executed tariffs because they bring unfair competitors from foreign countries to do whatever you want them to do: equalizing duties, new trade deals based on the principle of fairness and reciprocity.”
- Put American workers first: “They will always be put first, and I don’t know if you’re union or non-union, doesn’t matter to me, but I did one hell of a good job for the unions. All the union heads are against me but all the workers are for me.”
Onshoring manufacturing jobs and bringing back factory jobs are similar points that could likely be combined into one, but the six promises are certainly a start for voters who were looking at Trump to run on something substantive. His messaging here has been backed with action.
He recently signed an order preventing government agencies like the Tennessee Valley Authority from replacing American workers with foreign labor. He’s also promised to make significant changes to the H-1B visa program, like getting rid of the lottery system and ending a loophole that allows companies to replace Americans with foreigners if they make over $60,000 a year, designed to protect American workers.
There’s still more Trump has to talk about ahead of the election. Promising to appoint new judges might now be a losing message due to the recent disappointing string of Supreme Court losses for conservatives. Rebuilding the economy is a foregone conclusion as the Trump administration’s gains have been decimated by the economic shutdown. His speech at the Whirlpool factory was a good start and a sign that he is starting to think more seriously about how to keep his base around come November.
What About Uncle Joe?
There’s the official Democrat Party nominee, Joe Biden. What’s he going to bring to the U.S. that is different?
Biden has given several broad and encompassing ideas he will support. But his plan’s details are nowhere to be seen: yet. Voters need (and are expecting) a list of specific objectives if the former Vice President is to win the election. He simply hasn’t been specific about details so far. Here’s some of what we’ve seen and heard:
There is much about America in 2020 that is head-spinning, and the latest is Joe Biden’s convention call for an “American moment. It’s a moment that calls for hope and light and love, hope for our future, light to see our way forward, and love for one another.”
Was that just a dig at Donald Trump, whom the Democrats seem to feel embodies all kinds of darkness? Perhaps.
The reference to an “American moment” and need to love one another could have referenced principles espoused by our founders in 1776: America’s exceptional experiment in individual liberty and self-governance comes from the idea that we are created equal, and that goodness naturally predominates in a culture based on the “Golden Rule” (love your neighbor as yourself).
But no. Sadly, the group of speeches at their convention make it clear that Democratic Party leaders do not see our nation as a beacon of light, and freedom. The common thread driving Biden and his party today stems from a belief that America, and Americans, are inescapably flawed, and that the introduction of slavery in 1619, not the principles espoused in 1776, or any progress since then, defines our national culture and character.
Driven by this dark vision of us and our nation, the Biden Democrats are consumed by passion for remaking America. The Biden ethic is this: despise your neighbor unless they are woke; change them — or make them pay for their sins. Our cities and our culture are in the grip of those who believe that love is measured by the intensity of one’s hatred for our nation as it is. They believe that destruction and violence are the paths to peace and justice.
But hate is never a measure of love.
So, we watch as the Democrats’ activist base, comprised of disappointed Bernie Bros, Justice Democrats, The Squad, Antifa, Black Lives Matter, and random hard-left politicians — give free rein to self-righteous hatred. They destroy our communities while claiming moral superiority and think no one can see what is actually going on. Unfortunately, Biden’s Democratic Party is now a wholly-owned subsidiary of that left – despite the fact that he was nominated because he was supposedly a moderate.
The BLM organization has had enormous success this summer, specifically because Americans are, almost universally, NOT racist. Most of us believe that we are all equal, and skin color is no basis for differential law enforcement. This is reflected in our laws and it’s universally espoused from boardrooms to classrooms, from pulpits to sporting events. There is no institutional or cultural support for racism left in America. Decades of struggle have actually changed hearts and minds, which should be applauded.
Yet Democrats today assert that America is systemically racist. They argue that racism controls every aspect of American life — our economy, institutions, people, stores, arts organizations. They claim that no white person is not a racist.
And so we have seen every major cultural and economic institution confess their sinfulness and publicly pledge to be better in order to prove their desire for goodness. But that is not enough for BLM.
For example, the recent looting and destruction of stores in Chicago (or New York, or Minneapolis). It was followed by a BLM rally in support of looting as a right, and a first step toward “reparations.” You would think that a political party that wants to win the presidency would denounce this lawlessness and looting at its national convention. But the Democrats had nothing to say last week about the collapse of civil society in our cities, and the destruction of property and businesses often owned by Black proprietors.
Joe Biden spent three paragraphs of his acceptance speech discussing white supremacists and Nazis as if they are something more than a tiny fringe in our society. He falsely suggested that President Trump supports white supremacists and Nazis and tied the ugliness in Charlottesville three years ago to events this summer.
Vice presidential candidate Kamala Harris spent much of her speech ranting about “systemic” racism, even to the point of saying it explains the death toll of COVID-19. So, it would have been too much to expect Biden to contradict her. Actually, her own personal experience contradicts what she has said: She is a woman of color who rose to the U.S. Senate, and now a national ticket – unlikely in a nation that was actually racist. Naturally, the media missed the contradiction.
Just as the Democratic mayors and governors have allowed the looting to continue, and leashed law enforcement that could have stopped it, so the national Democratic ticket failed to condemn violence in the streets, riots, and looting. We are left to wonder if they share the BLM view that the riots, and attacks on people and property, are justified.
The traditional, universal, and non-political view is that riots and looting are illegal and unacceptable violence, regardless of who the rioters are and what they use to justify their actions. It is tragic when a major American political party embraces mob violence for its own political ends. Sadly, that is exactly what Biden-Harris has done with their silence.
In November, Americans will decide whether we wish to be governed by those who believe America is systemically evil, or by those who believe America is fundamentally good. Should we elect those who believe their mission is to destroy our culture and change us radically? Or those who believe that the job of a president is to keep us safe, and enforce the law?
Why would we trust politicians with such a dark vision of us, who see us as fundamentally evil, to safeguard our people and our nation?
Summary
As Republicans conduct their convention, many questions are still on the minds of Americans about the candidates. Joe Biden has a 50-year record, much of which is bare of dramatic or significant actions in the U.S. Senate and as Vice President. Obviously, with satellite communication and such, easy access to videos and audios of speeches from the past, it’s impossible for either presidential or vice-presidential candidates to go unchallenged for things from their political pasts. Trump lived a dramatic life covered in dramatic style by the media.
Biden too has a career in front of cameras. Long before this formal campaign, the news world began to reveal things from past political speeches and rallies for Americans to use as fuel for their determination of who should represent the U.S. as President and Vice President.
It is no longer easy to cover negative statements or speeches from the past. Changing policies on specific topics are all codified in public records. I doubt either presidential or vice-presidential candidate will be successful in offering “new” ideas on particular issues when their historic political perspectives are easily obtained via the internet.
Americans are on the most part tech-savvy: that is Americans have the ability to (and most do) seek for and find facts. I’m certain this election will be decided based on the truth of what each candidate stands for as confirmed by the voters. This election more than any other will measure the desire of Americans to aggressively march toward a bigger and more controlling government or away from our current far-reaching D.C. bosses to a truly free government that acts as constitutionally structured by our forefathers. In that scenario, “We, the People” control our future. Presidents and Vice Presidents are merely the managers of OUR country.
