Letter: Former Trump supporter is still a "useful fool" for Trump
07/07/2024 09:00 AM
Before the 2016 POTUS election, the opposition to Hillary Clinton tended to viciously characterize her as corrupt, probably criminally so. Donald Trump championed that perspective, promising to "lock her up" if he were president. Influential columnists like Charles Krauthammer pledged not to vote for Trump, but due to concerns about Hillary, said he would defiantly, proudly select some other person to receive his vote.
Realizing too close to the election what he had effectively been doing — that is, helping to secure Donald Trump's election by making untenable the only alternative — he reversed course and pronounced Hillary the only candidate qualified for the office.
The ultimate outcome? Donald Trump became POTUS and Hillary Clinton was not convicted, nor even credibly accused, of any crime. Unlike Trump, her crimes were so brilliantly accomplished that no trace of them remained sufficient to prosecute.
This time around, it appears that Sam Jardine, in a recent op-ed to The Tribune, seeks to fulfill, at least in part, Krauthammer's role. "I will not," he proudly declares, "be supporting … Biden's bid for re-election." Presumably, that is the position he believes Republican voters against Trump should take.
In the event that President Biden and convicted felon Donald Trump become, as appears likely, the two parties' candidates, one of the two will absolutely become president of the United States. Successfully helping to defeat one amounts to supporting the other by default.
Jardine's dissatisfaction with President Biden is greater than his concerns about electing a serial liar, convicted rapist (a term the case's judge viewed appropriate, despite its failing to meet the state's strict definition), convicted felon, and credibly accused architect of an effort to overthrow a presidential election by subterfuge, force, or any means necessary?
Jardine's dogma is exactly the kind of "principled" Donald Trump support its exponents naively deny.
Thomas Walker, Salt Lake City
