Trump Could Be Another Reagan in the Making

 

By: Joe Mauricio

 

Remember the 80’s election? Remember Reaganphobia, when we heard that Ronald Reagan was a member of John Birch Society, whose credo was “Better Dead Than Red”? He rejected “Mutual Assured Destruction,” the bedrock stretegy of the liberal consensus to guarantee coexistence by nuclear deterrence, the belief in “counterforce,” that was in a disarming first strike to win nuclear war. Proven to be a really good president, the voters clamored for his reelection thus, serving the country from 1981 until 1989.

Donald Trump irritates many with his vulgarity, but Reagan was insistently depicted as a threat to the human survival. Most of the media were reluctantly for Jimmy Carter’s reelection, despite failures of his hopelessly irresolute administration.

So many eminent people asserted that Reagan wanted to start a nuclear war that the KGB went on maximum alert for two years, watching all U.S. strategic bases to detect the telltale simultaneous launching of nuclear first strike. As for nuclear weapons, Reagan horrified his advisers at 1986 Reykyavik Summit with Mikhail Gorbachev with his eagerness for nuclear disarmament, disclosing he didn’t believe in strike-back, let alone attacking first. He wanted missile defenses, not ballistic missiles. The rest is history. The Berlin Wall collapsed, and Germany unified.

Mr. Trump’s lack of good manners may be disconcerting to many voters, but as president, his foreign policies will be unlikely to deviate from standard conservative norms. As for trade, yes, Mr. Trump has called for tariffs against China and Mexico. Most economists now agree that wage stagnation in the U.S. and other first-world countries is caused by imports from China. Tariff is unlikely, but one should expect antidumping measures instead of allowing entire industries to be submerged.

What about racism? Born and raised in New York City. True, Mr. Trump launched his campaign by denouncing the supposed crimes of illegal immigrants from Mexico, but given his personal history, one may seriously doubt the sincerity of his anti-Mexican sentiments. He must certainly find ways of undoing the damage–starting with apology–but nobody should view him as a racist because of those remarks.

The hysteria from certain circles notwithstanding, the Trump presidency would offer only the prosaic changes of any conservative administration. Less activism across the board, with view of saving some money, less environmentalist extremism, fewer migraines, instead of more of them.

So, to those who are planning to emigrate if Mr. Trump is elected president of this country (one heard lots of emigration vows when Reagan was winning) might want to wait a week or two after his inauguration before fleeing the country.

They might discover that President Donald Trump is as good as an administrator of the public weal as he was in his presidential campaign—the cheapest by far and successful, too.