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I’ve selected some interesting political reading to recommend to you

I’ve selected some interesting political reading to recommend to you

Last updated on: October 7, 2016 at 10:12 am by Dan Peterson

I’ve selected some interesting political reading to recommend to you 2016-10-07T10:12:24-06:00 Dan Peterson

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It’s not the Party of Lincoln any more.
(The official White House portrait of Abraham Lincoln; Wikimedia Commons public domain)

Election Day is almost exactly a month away, and I can hardly wait for this seemingly interminable horror to be behind us. Maybe then some of us can focus on trying to resurrect the American conservative movement or, barring that, can surrender politics and concentrate on things of more lasting value while, sorrowfully, we watch our country fall apart.

In the meanwhile, though, I continue to read about the current crisis and, from among my readings, I choose a few items to recommend to you.

Here’s a selection

“If Candidate Trump Can’t Be Managed, What Makes You Think President Trump Could Be?”

“You Can’t Pretend Trump’s Flaws Away”

“Oblivious Trump Can’t Avoid Self-Sabotage”

For those of you who aren’t aware of Mr. Trump’s self-revealing contretemps with Alicia Machado, here’s a summary from a week ago:

“Donald Trump quintuples down”

And here’s a piece illustrating one aspect of the damage that he’s done to the conservative movement:

“Trump causes a split between Fox hosts Megyn Kelly and Sean Hannity”

(Sean Hannity was never a favorite of mine; I’ve always found him too shrill, too nakedly partisan, and not entirely fair. But I swore him altogether off when, roughly a year ago, he appointed himself Minister of Propaganda for the Trump campaign. I regard him now as fatally compromised. I don’t expect that he’ll ever have any credibility with me again.)

This is a piece that hits Mr. Trump right at the heart:

“‘Trump is a failed businessman’ video has more than 6 million views”

In my judgment, he’s not a good businessman. He just plays one on TV.

But I would never submit to heart surgery at the hands of an actor simply because he portrays a surgeon in a television series.

Unsurprisingly, given all of the many reasons for objecting to Mr. Trump, a large number of people who would typically support the Republican presidential nominee are jumping ship. I myself resigned from the Republican Party on the night Mr. Trump accepted its nomination at the national convention:

“30 former GOP lawmakers sign anti-Trump letter”

“Major Ohio paper endorses Clinton after years of backing GOP”

(I also think this piece, published nearly a year ago as an editorial in the Deseret News, is worth remembering: “In our opinion: Trump unmatched as a candidate in blatant contempt for basic 1st Amendment freedoms.”)

Here, in case you can gain access to the Weekly Standard, is an article on how Trump (and the Republican Party) have lost the Mormon vote, at least to a considerable extent:

“He’s No Mitt: Where did the Trump stakes go?”

In a very interesting essay — I’m a big fan of Plato’s Republic, which I’ve studied for most of my life — a writer for the Washington Post considers the Republican nominee from the perspective of the father of political philosophy:

“Here’s what Plato had to say about someone like Donald Trump”

On a rather lower level, here’s a piece that will inflame quite a few Trumpists:

“Are Trump Supporters Too Dumb to Know They’re Dumb? Science Says ‘Probably'”

Christianity Today, the flagship (and very good) evangelical Protestant magazine, has run a series of perspectives on the current presidential race. Here’s one of them:

“Not the Lesser of Two Evils, Choose Candidate Evan McMullin Instead”

(Here is the official McMullin website.)

Finally, let’s return to the matter of Mr. Trump and women.

A former reporter for the Philadelphia Inquirer recounts a tale of vicious (and obscene) verbal abuse from Mr. Trump back in the 1980s:

“Female reporter: Trump called me the c-word”

Here’s a fairly sober legal comment on one of the many lawsuits in which Mr. Trump has been involved:

“Would the ‘Hooters defense’ have worked for Trump?”

(In this context, “Trump Used Charity Money to Cover Legal Costs, Report Says” might be an appropriate read.)

And then there’s this little gem, which, to be fully appreciated, should be read in conjunction with one of my earlier posts here:

“Trump took Polaroids, interviewed models in 1994 Playboy video”

There. For the moment, at least, I’ve pretty much cleared out my political files.

Good luck to you as you face decision in this horrible presidential-election year.

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