One reads that the self-described Republican candidate for the 43rd Assembly District will hold a meet and greet next week at a private establishment in town. Good for him – free speech is a core political right. (He’s also scheduled to appear at a local candidate’s forum this week. See The First & Last Questions.)
He’s a Republican, that simply expressed? No, that’s not quite candid enough. Gabriel Szerlong is either a Trumpist or he isn’t: that’s the political question of our time. His party is a Trumpist party. It lives and breathes Donald J. Trump.
As for seeing the country as merely a two-party universe, one can be assured that millions of independents (including libertarians) know the cosmos is wider and more diverse than that.
If, however, one hears that this is a Republican meet and greet, one should be clear about what that means.
Candidate Szerlong may euphemistically describe himself as a ‘Republican,’ but it’s Trumpism that rules that party, Trumpism that demands members’ allegiance, Trumpism that threatens this society and this small and beautiful town from which I write.
Trumpism fully implemented would destroy Whitewater’s society and economy.
When Community Development Chairman Larry Kachel met with James Sensenbrenner, he met with a Trumpist. When CDA Executive Director Dave Carlson told a radio audience that Sensenbrenner is ‘our guy,’ he was too familiar by far: Sensenbrenner is the city’s congressman, but he’s no more Whitewater’s guy (in a warm and supportive sense) than would be any other aged reactionary.
(Sensenbrenner votes in line with Trump’s positions 88.2% of the time; Sensenbrenner on 7.5.18, asking for support for Trump after an executive order reducing the effects of Trump’s own family separation policy: “I am waiting to hear any of my friends from the left stand up and say Trump did the right thing when he signed that executive order.” Sensenbrenner might as well ask for support for an arsonist who burns down house after house but then splashes a cup of water on the collapsing homes and expects praise for that meager effort.)
No bad empty economic deal (see About that Trump Tax Plan) will compensate for an even worse policy of authoritarianism and ethnic favoritism.