I’ve already frequently bemoaned the fact that so many U.S. conservatives are deciding that Donald Trump is, you know, our Wacky Uncle Donald, who doesn’t mean half the stuff he says (that is to say, half of what he says is a lie), and he does get cranky at times, but his bark is worse than his bite, most of the time, unless you’re one of the ones who actually gets bitten, so don’t get so down on the guy, you know! Hey, he isn’t Hillary Clinton!
Well, over at the National Review, no one has accused Big Don of being Hillary Clinton with a cheap weave, but otherwise they’ve been pretty harsh. David French, who I harangued in the past for pretending to believe that Trump’s ghastly executive order on refugees was “moderate”1, has slipped out of his Trump apologist mode, casting a cold eye on the Trump Administration’s extended Russian imbroglio, which continues to be a riddle, wrapped in a mystery, inside an enigma. Says Dave,
“The Trump team has now lost three key aides (Michael Flynn, Paul Manafort, and Carter Page) because of alleged ties to Russia; the intelligence community believes Russia tried to help Trump win the election; the Trump team can’t seem to tell the truth about its communications with Russia; and Trump himself is oddly persistent in his admiration for Vladimir Putin—even going so far as to slander the U.S. in an effort to defend America’s foremost geopolitical rival.”
Also at the Review, Eliot Cohen says, more succinctly, “I wouldn’t be surprised if there were some pretty unsavory Russian monetary relationships with the Trump Organization.” Cohen also proclaims himself to be an “agnostic” when it comes to the “golden shower” dossier compiled by “a former British intelligence officer”, saying that it will be “interesting to see if reporters can confirm parts of it,” which is probably true.
Cohen is rightfully disgusted by Trump’s compulsive bullying of anyone who won’t kiss his ass in public2, “but in some ways the biggest concern thus far has been the serial lying.” So I guess it could get worse.
Afterwords
I earlier identified Cohen as #notmyfavoriteneocon and that tag still goes. In the course of the interview posted at NR, he pumps for continued maintenance of the U.S. land-based ICBM force: “It makes sense to have it. It offers a force that is really instantaneous3 and really reliable.” Because when you set out to kill a hundred million people, God forbid you should have time to change your mind.
- “dominated mainly by moderate refugee restrictions”, according to Dave, curious language indeed. If it was mainly dominated by moderate refugee restrictions, what else was it dominated by? Immoderate refugee restrictions? And what about the “non-dominated” part? Isn’t this like a mostly non-poisonous apple? ↩︎
- LBJ’s definition of “loyalty”: “I want him to kiss my ass at high noon in Macy’s show window and say it smells like roses.” ↩︎
- “Instantaneous” has all five vowels (as well as two “tan”s). James Thurber claimed he once asked a nurse if she could think of a word with all five and she said it was “unconceivable”. A little hard to believe (doesn’t “everyone” say “inconceivable”?), but maybe. ↩︎
