Mountain Views News          Saturday, February 20, 2016

15

OPINION

 Mountain Views News Saturday, February 20, 2016 

Mountain 
Views

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Susan Henderson

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Howard Hays

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Kim Clymer-Kelley

Christopher Nyerges

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Dr. Tina Paul

Rich Johnson

Merri Jill Finstrom

Lori Koop

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Tina Paul

Mary Carney

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Despina Arouzman

Greg Welborn

Renee Quenell

Ben Show

Sean Kayden

Marc Garlett

Pat Birdsall (retired)


TINA Dupuy


HATE-WATCHING 

THE ELECTION

“I love Bernie! I’ve donated to his campaign! He’s great!” my super 
conservative Beltway establishment Republican friend says. “Feel 
the Bern!!” He texts me with a snicker during all of the Democratic 
debates. The night of the Iowa Caucus I retaliated, texting, “Cruz! I’m 
so happy!!” I knew that’d make him cringe.

 So while Republicans are swooning over Bernie, I’m obsessed with the GOP field for the 
same reason I spent a year getting into Real Housewives of Whatever Awful Place: I loathe 
all the cast members. They’re disgusting, short-sighted narcissists and I just can’t look away. 

 In the immortal words of Twitter beat poet Donald Trump: They’re all horrible. Total 
losers.

 It boggles the mind to think of all the incompetent, unimaginative, unaccomplished 
and unintelligent Republicans who decided to sit this one out. One has to praise Michigan 
Governor Rick Snyder for staying home and merely poisoning his own state instead of the 
entire country.

 Wisconsin is way at the bottom (if not “dead last”) in job growth, and yet college dropout 
and wet cardboard impersonator Scott Walker still put his hat into the ring. This year Politico 
ranked Louisiana last in basically everything. Still their twangy “stop being the stupid party” 
exorcist-in-chief Bobby Jindal thought that’d be a great launching pad for him to be POTUS. 

 GOP-gadfly and former Hewlett-Packard CEO Carly Fiorina ruined a major American 
company, lost to Barbra Boxer by 10 points, was fired by the McCain/Palin campaign for 
(wait for it) gaffes, yet she somehow got this idea that what the country really wanted in the 
White House was a Bizarro Hillary. I mean, Texas Governor Rick Perry, Mr. Oops himself, 
saw this pathetic clump of corporate-ese spewing militia-kissers and mused, “Even I could 
win this thing this time!”

 But what’s really fun about this election is witnessing the coal-burning “with us, or against 
us” Nixon-Reagan-Bush Republican machine break down. Like everyone else in 2000 who 
saw the Brooks Brothers riot take over the country, I thought this “perception is reality” 
brand of the Bush-Cheney-Rove holy trinity would come back in full force for Jeb. I just 
assumed. I mean, “Fool me once, shame on — shame on you. Fool me — you can’t get fooled 
again.” Right? But no! Jeb has affluenza, a word someone came up with describing those who 
are wealthy and yet still pitiful.

 Jeb Bush, everyone. Please clap.

 Ted Cruz reminds me of the creepy film that develops on the top of mushroom soup. 
Marco Rubio’s credibility is on par with his personal credit score. Sorry, I’m not buying your 
plans to defeat ISIS when no one would let you finance a Honda.

 So out of this compost pile has grown a monosyllabic, monomaniacal outer-borough sue-
happy mutant man-child named Donald Trump. Every day he comes up with a new human 
right he’d like to violate: Bombing the hell out of civilians being held by ISIS; shuttering 
Muslim places of worship; killing the families (women and children) of alleged terrorists; 
or closing the Internet. In the last debate he got an applause break for the war crimes he 
promised to commit. The Party of Lincoln has devolved into the party cheering for torturing 
the right people.

 Trump won 35 percent in New Hampshire, which means 65 percent of GOP primary 
voters don’t want him to be their nominee. But he’s still winning! The Republican machine 
that cut taxes while putting a couple of wars on credit cards, that buckled the economy, that 
waterboarded innocent people, that sat idle while thousands of Americans died in Hurricane 
Katrina, that had 9/11 happen on their watch, now can’t save themselves and stop Trump?!

 This is fantastic!

 Then there’s the delicious irony that because there are so many candidates still running—
Trump will continue winning. So because the entire field is flawed and terrible and incapable 
of honest self-reflection they’re staying in and allowing Trump to sweep. The only way out 
of this mess is for the field to become selfless, think of the party over their own personal 
ambitions and drop out, allowing the least horrible candidate who’s not named Trump to 
win.

 Trump is a goiter on the neck of the GOP. He’s sticking out because the party is sick. And 
they have no one to blame but themselves. (You know, personal responsibility and all.)

 Go hate-watch 2016! Go Trump!

 Tina Dupuy is a nationally syndicated columnist and host of the podcast, Cultish. Tina can 
be reached at tinadupuy@yahoo.com.


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LEFT TURN/RIGHT TURN 

MAKING SENSE

MICHAEL Reagan

HOWARD Hays As I See It


“Seriously, this is insane. 
The GOP is destroying 
itself tonight, and they 
have no one to blame 
but themselves.”

- Republican pollster 
Frank Luntz, on last 
Saturday’s Republican 
presidential debate

If pollster Luntz was 
more honest, he might 
have tweeted instead, “we have no one to 
blame but ourselves.” He was joined by other 
conservatives who last year saw clear tracks 
ahead to the White House, but now see a train 
wreck.

 Charles Krauthammer on Fox News 
described the confrontation as “thermonuclear” 
and a “cage fight”. CNN commentator Amanda 
Carpenter spoke of “an average voter tuning 
in to this debate and seeing people scream liar, 
brawling openly”. Columnist Kathleen Parker 
on “Meet The Press” envisioned voters thinking, 
“OK kids, can you just stop fighting?”

 But the big news this past week was 
Republicans, lauding the late Justice Antonin 
Scalia’s devotion to our Constitution while 
accusing President Obama of ignoring it, now 
insisting the president forgo his constitutional 
duty (Article II, Section 2) to appoint “Judges of 
the supreme Court” – lest that replacement be 
something other than another Scalia. But it’s one 
of those jobs the president was elected to do – by 
a 5 million vote margin, last time around. 

 The singular recollection I have of Justice 
Scalia goes back to a 2008 “60 Minutes” interview 
he did with Lesley Stahl. The question was about 
torture, and the Eighth Amendment ban on 
“cruel and unusual punishments”. Scalia pointed 
out that if somebody’s being tortured to get 
information, it’s not really a “punishment” – so 
where’s the problem? The question was about 
a practice abhorrent to our national values; a 
practice then swelling the ranks of our enemies. 
But for Scalia, it was an opportunity to best Ms. 
Stahl with a constitutional “gotcha”. 

 Scalia’s opinions were predictable though 
not necessarily consistent. In 1997, he argued 
requiring local officials to enforce federal gun 
laws was an infringement on states’ rights. 
Eight years later, he argued states had no rights 
with their medical marijuana laws to supersede 
federal drug policy. He argued that the words 
of our Constitution meant nothing more nor 
less than what the Founders intended, but also 
that rights accorded We the People applied to 
multinational corporations, as well. Article II 
Section 1 states the president is selected by “a 
Number of Electors” appointed by “Each State 
. . . in such manner as the Legislature thereof 
may direct”, but in Bush v. Gore Scalia thought 
the state of Florida was taking too long in 
getting those electors appointed, so decided the 
Court should choose our president, instead.

 Scalia was “pro-life”, arguing lack of an 
exception for the health of the mother was 
insufficient grounds to invalidate a “partial-
birth” abortion ban. He was also pro-death, 
supporting capital punishment for those as 
young as 15 when crimes were committed and 
also for the mentally retarded (in the latter case, 
noting there’d been no problem executing those 
similarly afflicted back in 1791).

 In opposing measures to address past gender 
and racial discrimination, Scalia argued such 
measures were just a continuation of that gender 
and racial discrimination they were meant to 
address. He was adamant in dissents as the Court 
struck down “anti-sodomy” laws. He argued 
protecting gays and lesbians from discrimination 
was instead a granting of “favored status”.

 In his 2003 dissent to a ruling affirming 
right to privacy protection for conduct between 
consenting adults, he warned disallowing 
“anti-sodomy” laws could open the door to 
disallowing laws forbidding “bigamy . . . adult 
incest, prostitution . . . bestiality, and obscenity”. 
He dissented from a 1996 ruling affirming 
a community’s right to prohibit anti-gay 
discrimination by arguing “moral disapproval 
of homosexual behavior” was in line with 
considering “certain conduct reprehensible – 
murder, for example, or polygamy, or cruelty to 
animals”.

 In hearing an affirmative action case last year, 
Justice Scalia suggested there are some schools 
blacks simply aren’t cut out for, that some say “it 
does not benefit African-
Americans to get them 
into the University of Texas where they do not 
do well, as opposed to having them go to a lessadvanced 
school, a less -- 
a slower-track 
school 
where they do well”.

 Among those most insistent that President 
Obama ignore his constitutional responsibility 
to nominate a successor, hoping to get another 
Scalia by holding out long enough, is Sen. Ted 
Cruz (R-TX). He’s had his own experience 
before the Supreme Court as Texas’ solicitor 
general; losing his first case nine-zip arguing 
Texas be allowed to renege on its agreement to 
improve healthcare for poor kids. He fared not 
much better trying to uphold a 16-year prison 
sentence for a guy who stole a calculator from 
Wal-Mart. His other big cases involved trying 
to get people executed and defending Texas’ 
GOP-gerrymandered congressional districts.

 The reality’s sinking in that with the inevitable 
4-4 ties from an eight-person bench, the most 
the Supreme Court could do would be to kick 
decisions back to lower courts while remaining 
unable to establish precedent. It’s also sinking in 
that Democratic operatives are already cueing 
up YouTube videos of President Ronald Reagan 
urging Senators to do their duty in taking up his 
nominee Anthony Kennedy to succeed retiring 
Justice Lewis Powell during the last year of his 
own presidency.

 Most of all, they’re realizing that while 
President Obama fulfills his responsibility in 
forwarding a nominee “indisputably qualified . . 
. who would serve with honor and integrity on 
the Court”, their refusing to even consider such a 
nominee would be seen as yet more confirmation 
that “the GOP is destroying itself”.

 Already, some Republican Senators are 
backing off commitments made hours after the 
announcement of Scalia’s death to leave his seat 
vacant until after the election. But, so far, the 
Republican presidential candidates are holding 
firm. As the election nears, more voters will be 
agreeing with pollster Luntz that “Seriously, 
this is insane”. As for the candidates (and their 
boosters), “they have no one to blame but 
themselves.” 


PARTY OF REAGAN OR 
PARTY OF TRUMP?

The Republican food fight last weekend 
was a horrible embarrassment for the 
Republican Party. With their childish 
attacks on each other, and with Donald 
Trump’s nasty bullying, they made the 
Party of Lincoln and the Party of Reagan 
look like the Party of Brats.

Only Ben Carson and John Kasich acted 
like adults. Kasich was absolutely 
right when he asked why the Republican 
Party’s 2016 candidates for president 
were squabbling about arcane 
pieces of legislation that didn’t pass the 
Senate. 

Trump showed his true liberal colors 
repeatedly Saturday night. He even 
recycled old Democrat talking points 
when he said George Bush was lying 
about Iraq and lying about weapons of 
mass destruction.

Yet diehard Trump fans keep telling 
me he reminds them of my father.

That’s not just a total insult. It’s incredibly 
stupid.

Do you remember Ronald Reagan insulting 
his way to the presidency, as Jeb 
Bush would say? Do you remember 
Ronald Reagan demeaning, disparaging 
or bullying the other candidates in 
a debate or in his campaign speeches?

Do you remember him saying nasty 
things about immigrants groups in 
America? If that’s what you think Ronald 
Reagan was all about, you’re living 
on a different planet. Planet Trump, I 
guess.

And no, Ronald Reagan would not vote 
for Trump in the California primary 
and he’d hope and pray Trump didn’t 
get the nomination in the Republican 
Party. Anyone who thinks differently 
is just wrong. 

Trump is not a conservative. He is not 
a Republican.

He’s not going to blow himself up and 
the media can’t hurt him. And nothing 
he says or does in the primaries 
can hurt him, no matter how crude or 
stupid.

If the GOP doesn’t want to go the way 
of the Whig Party, it’s time to stand up 
and stop Trump now. It’s time for the 
chairman of the Republican National 
Committee, Reinhold Richard “Reince” 
Priebus, to get off his laissez-faire 
butt and make a stand.

Preibus – and any other real Republican 
he can recruit to back him up -- has 
to come out and condemn Trump for 
the Republican 
imposter he is.

Trump doesn’t 
represent our 
party or its 
values.

Our party 
doesn’t stand for 
deporting 11.5 
million people from the USA.

Our party doesn’t stand for stopping 
an entire religious group from coming 
to America.

Our party doesn’t trash its past president, 
George W. Bush, by implying he 
lied about weapons of mass destruction 
in Iraq and saying 9/11 was his fault.

Our Republican Party is smarter and 
better than Trump.

Our party can solve the illegal immigration 
problem without resorting to 
deportation.

Our party can prevent terrorists from 
sneaking into the USA without shutting 
our borders to all Muslims.

Our party knows G.W. Bush is not a 
liar. We know he was a great president 
who kept us safe.

The Republican Party used to allow 
talk radio to define what the party is. 
Now the RNC is allowing the party to 
be defined by Trump. The GOP has 
to find its spine and define itself. Party 
bigwigs started thinking about winning 
the general election. They have to 
rally around the party’s basic conservative 
values and heroes, point to Trump 
and tell the rest of the country that his 
crude character, horrible values and 
dumb Democrat ideas don’t represent 
Republicans.

If it can’t stop Trump, it may cost Republicans 
the Senate as well as the 
White House – which means forgetting 
any chance of a conservative filling 
Antonin Scalia’s spot on the Supreme 
Court. If Trump represents where the 
GOP has gone to, or if party leaders are 
willing to accept a fraud like him, then 
the GOP is no longer the Party of Ronald 
Reagan. To paraphrase what my 
father said once about why he left the 
Democratic Party, if Trump gets the 
nomination, we conservatives will be 
saying we didn’t leave the Republican 
Party, the party left us.

 Michael Reagan is the son of President 
Ronald Reagan, a political consultant, 
and the author of “The New Reagan 
Revolution” (St. Martin’s Press). 

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