Additional Conservative Thoughts on the 2024 United States Presidential Election

I posted yesterday about the many Republicans and conservatives opposing the United States presidential candidacy of Donald Trump, and how Trump’s poor character disqualifies him from office and how his narcissism, misogyny, cruelty, corruption, authoritarianism, and disloyalty affected his term in office and would again if he were reelected. These posts were only the latest of my posts about the dangers of Trump and Trumpism (a populist mix of protectionism, isolationism and nativism) and of Russian tyrant Vladimir Putin, the ex-Soviet intelligence officer who is continuing to interfere in the American election to support Trump, divide Americans and undermine confidence in the truth and in elections. But because there are many other thoughts worthy of consideration, this post will be a catchall for a few of the most relevant. One additional item I did not include in my lengthy post yesterday about Trump’s character is how his self-interest in his reelection, for reasons of ego, business interest and fear of prosecution for crimes, caused him to fail to address adequately the Coronavirus 2019 Pandemic and even to minimize it, which caused millions more Americans to become ill, hospitalized or die, with many more still suffering its long-term effects, than would have otherwise. His attitude encouraged skepticism of science-based public health policy and vaccine hesitancy, which has continued to cause harmful effects. Another thought about character is how this election pits a career prosecutor against a convicted felon, which is yet another example of what I have been posting about how Trumpist Republicans and “conservatives” have forfeited character, which is the most fundamental matter, as a political campaign issue. They keep trying to cast aspersion on Democrats and liberals while claiming Trump’s poor character is irrelevant to the highest trust in the land. Although both major party tickets include vice presidential nominees with military service, in contrast to Trump having dodged the draft through fraud, the Republican nominee denigrated his own service and that of his fellow servicemembers by falsely claiming his combat service was based on lies, which is an example of ignorant and foolish Trumpist isolationism. As I have noted, the Liberation of Iraq overthrew a brutal tyrant who was a serial aggressor and sponsor of terrorism who was violating the ceasefire and United Nations resolutions against Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction. As a result of the service of our troops and those of our allies, Iraq is no longer a conventional, WMD or terrorist threat, but an ally in the War on Terrorism, as thousands of chemical weapons were found and destroyed, as well as the banned chemicals to make more, and the terrorists were defeated in what became a critical battlefield of the War. In contrast, Trump legitimized the Islamist Taliban militia who had harbored al-Qaeda (the Islamist terrorist organization responsible for the September 11, 2001 Terrorist Attacks on America that killed a record 3,000 people), undermined our ally, the Afghan Government, and signed a deal with the terrorists that hamstrung his successor that led to a disastrous withdrawal from and abandonment of Afghanistan. The current Administration has otherwise continued the fight against various terrorists, while Trump has ignored foreign threats from dictators he admires and wants to make deals with to appease, which would only encourage their aggressiveness more. It is this last point that is most worth concluding this post about. Trump, whose business in America had been bolstered disproportionately by Russians and who had tried for decades to do open hotels in Russia, accepted Russian interference on his behalf and then denied it, against the conclusion of U.S. intelligence agencies, the Republican Special Counsel and the GOP-led Senate Intelligence Committee, even though some of the Russian interference was overt (the propaganda from Russian state-controlled media outlets in America) because he could not admit that his election was illegitimate and owed to a hostile foreign dictator. In addition to Trump being unable ever to criticize Putin because the tycoon admires Putin and wants to do business with him, he delayed sanctions on Russia, implemented them only at the deadline, and withheld military aid to Ukraine while Russian-backed separatists made gains. And after leaving office, his opposition to critically needed military aid to Ukraine caused its delay for months while the American ally was under full-scale Russian aggression. Moreover, Trump’s denial of Russian interference, which helps Russia’s goal of hiding its efforts, allows it to continue to interfere on behalf of Trump’s candidacy and thus to violate American independence. American voters should reject the interference of hostile foreign powers like Putin and exercise a free choice of leaders who are loyal to America and its ideals of equality, liberty and representative government.