You probably haven’t heard any of this kind of chatter, so you may be in for a little bit of a shock when we tell you. Prepare yourself. But it falls to us to let you know that on a few far-left blogs…and one or two cable news shows…and out in Hollywood…and in the pages of the New York Times, a few liberal Democrats have warned that Donald Trump is the next incarnation of Adolf Hitler.
We know, we know, this flew completely under your radar. But yeah, they think he’s a fascist dictator in the making, that our Constitution will soon be nothing more than a memory, and that Trump’s supporters will cheer in the streets when he dissolves the Senate and declares himself the Supreme Leader of These United States.
And in fact, they may be right about that last part. Because by the time Trump gets around to making good on that dictatorial destiny, his supporters may have grown so frustrated with our bloated, hostile-to-Americans government that an iron fist would sound like an improvement. Certainly, if those Chicken Little liberals think that Trump is already moving towards autocratic power, it’s one of the most anemic dictatorships in world history.
This is the dictator who couldn’t do anything.
Put a temporary travel ban in place so that the U.S. can improve its vetting system?
Nope!
Smoothly repeal and replace Obamacare?
Well, we’ll see, but it ain’t looking good.
Get his budget passed?
Republicans are calling it DOA.
It’s early days still, but so far, Trump has not even come close to exercising the brutal, unlimited power his detractors were afraid of. In fact, he has barely been allowed to exercise the basic authority that comes with the office of the presidency.
That’s not to say that Trump has done nothing since taking office; he has rolled back Obama’s prosecutorial discretion, thus allowing ICE officials to actually start doing their jobs again. All by itself, that’s a huge improvement. And he’s definitely making headway on the jobs front, working with major CEOs to broker deals on behalf of working Americans. And he’s signed a bunch of executive orders, some of which may be more symbolic than significant, but some of which will have a real impact on the country given enough time.
But these are hardly the first months of a dictatorship.
And guess what, that’s a good thing! No, we don’t want to see Trump run into one brick wall after another when it comes to his agenda, and we don’t believe there’s any merit to the rulings that blocked his travel ban, but we do believe that a president’s power should be checked by the other two branches of government.
Trump was not elected to run roughshod over Congress and the courts; he was elected to do what he does best: Make a deal. Get as much of his agenda through as possible. Negotiate.
But to do those things, you have to have a willing partner, and Trump does not yet have that in the Democratic Party. They want to destroy him, even if it means turning their backs on agenda items they might actually like. And it’s still unclear how much of the Republican Congress he actually has on his side.
Dictator? Seriously?
If Trump can even find a way to use the powers granted him by the Constitution, it will be an improvement. Right now, there are too many in Washington who want to deny him even those.
