Dakota Beacon

The election is finally over.  We will see what a President Trump will bring.  Conservatives who did not support him now must find a pathway forward.  As one such conservative myself, I can only say that I hope we were wrong about Trump. 

We did not support him because he promised various things we either did not want – like high tariffs – or things we didn’t believe he could deliver – like jobs or a wall (paid for by Mexico).  He has a mandate and he has a Congress.  What he will accomplish is entirely up to him now.

What I hope will happen is that he will grow into the job to the point where his goals are tempered by the many balancing acts that are ahead – with foreign policy, the economy and our immigration mess. 

If he can deal with immigration in such a way as to protect this country, great!  If his wall goes up and does what is needed (and no more) that’s great too. 

Perhaps race relations will not get worse.  Maybe not having an administration openly goading rioters will help. 

We might at some point wish we had not voted the Republican down ticket just to slow down the juggernaut.  There is an inherent danger in a President fueled by a compliant Congress – we saw that in Obama’s administration.  He was able to take us down a path that a vigorous party of opposition would never have allowed.  First he had Democrats to work with and then even more pliable RINOs.  It was a recipe for disaster.  We could wish for some braking mechanism with the Trump administration as well.  Trump is no conservative.  We can expect more massive growth in government.  It might have been  fortunate had we thought the polls were this wrong to have voted in some opposition to his particular programs, but – as he told us – he loves to make deals with Democrats and would have all day long anyway. 

We can expect the cost of goods to go up impressively.  There is no country on earth that imposes a tariff that anyone else pays.  The people of the United States will pay all of these extra tariff costs.  So there will be a great deal less spending money in our economy if this happens.  Your cost of living will increase substantially.  Apparently we are all – or most of us are - okay with this cost, because the people voted for it.  It will impact the poor first and hardest and probably will have little effect on the wealthy.  This is a corollary of high tariffs.

We will likely see little opposition to some of the things we oppose such as gun-grabbing.  Trump has never understood the reason and meaning of the 2^nd Amendment, but let us hope that he will be better than Hillary promised to be.  Hillary would have had a difficult time against the Republican majorities in Congress – more so than Obama, because she is disliked, while he was “cool”.  She would have been easier by far for Congress to stop than either Obama or Trump.  So there is that.  Even a weak RINO Congress could have found the courage to say no to Hillary. 

If all of this sounds discouraging, it shouldn’t – at least not more than if anyone else had won this week.  Our conservative loss was sustained long ago, last June, when Ted Cruz dropped out of the running and left the field to Trump.  Conservatives were not going to win this year regardless of who prevailed in November.  We should all rejoice that at least the misery of this year’s campaign is over and we can have our holidays in relative peace, or at least a hope for peace.  The next phase will come in January, and we can wait to see what unfolds.  We opposed Trump for good reasons.  Let’s hope we were wrong about him and that he will do some good.  Or at least less harm that we have anticipated.  Let’s hope Congress will find the stuffing to tell him “no” when he’s wrong.  We’ll need to be vigilant here and call our Congressmen and Senators frequently to let them know we’re paying attention.

Meanwhile, the conservative movement has taken a giant setback and it will be years before we get this close again to a return to constitutional, conservative government. 

As Mel Brooks says in The Twelve Chairs – “Hope for the best, expect the worst!”  We might be pleasantly surprised.  Who knows?  We could take the view that it could’ve been worse – Hillary was the other possible outcome.  In the meantime, many are looking for a third party solution to finally change a system that devolved into two choices almost no one wanted.  The future is very murky at this point.  Much depends upon whether Trump does what he said, in which case the third party prospects will heat up, or whether he tempers his approach with regard to conservative concerns and begins to pay attention to the Constitution.  

As Thanksgiving approaches we can give our thanks that this year’s election ordeal is over.