Fear this

Watching the coming Trump Train Wreck rumble down the tracks, I seek to detach and achieve a comic perspective. From Adams versus Jefferson in 1800 we have descended to Clinton versus Trump a couple centuries later. Darwin was wrong!

Far down on my long list of worries is the alleged fascism of Donald Trump. In today’s Wall Street Journal, James Freeman considers the competition (accessible here via Google):

The facts suggest that Mrs. Clinton is more likely to abuse liberties than Mr. Trump. Only one candidate in this election cycle has run for president while refusing to cooperate with a federal investigation into her conduct in a previous office. Only one candidate is on record opposing the First Amendment’s guarantee of free speech. Only one candidate condemns the Supreme Court for allowing a movie critical of her to be distributed and advertised.

Besides seeking to silence critics, another hallmark of authoritarians is that they abhor honest, fair elections. Mr. Trump, unlike the Democratic National Committee of the Bill Clinton era, has never had to return more than $1 million in donations because they were tied to foreign sources and likely illegal.

America managed to survive Mr. Clinton’s two terms, so it can stand the far less vulgar Mr. Trump. The question is how long it can survive if it elects presidents with a record of opposing constitutional rule of law.

Freeman also makes the point that we don’t have to conjure a dreaded future. It’s here:

Americans don’t have to imagine the abuses of the Obama administration. Mr. Obama falsely claimed the power to determine when Congress is in recess. He asserted the ability to waive immigration law for millions of people. Does using the IRS against philosophical opponents count as authoritarian?

No evidence has been uncovered tying Mr. Obama to the IRS targeting scandal. But since he proclaimed that it involved “not even a smidgen of corruption” long before his government had finished investigating, and has made no serious effort to reform the agency, he now bears some responsibility.

Barack Obama: He is the man our founders warned against.

In the rosy dawn of a Clinton presidency we will undoubtedly hear the variation on the old joke. They warned me that if I voted for Trump…

Only it won’t be funny, and not just because it’s getting old.

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