Editorial Article by Jim Lantern
Night of Thursday 29 September 2016
I agree with USA Today Editorial Board advice and reasons why to not vote for Trump.
Excerpts worth noting, covered by CBS News…
- National newspaper USA Today broke its decades-long streak of staying out of presidential endorsements with a scathing editorial Thursday night, saying Republican nominee Donald Trump is “unfit for the presidency.”
- “This year, the choice isn’t between two capable major party nominees who happen to have significant ideological differences,” the paper’s editorial board wrote, saying that in 34 years it had never felt the need to alter its “no-endorsement policy” until now. “This year, one of the candidates — Republican nominee Donald Trump — is, by unanimous consensus of the Editorial Board, unfit for the presidency.”
- The editorial lists eight reasons for its strong rebuke of Trump, including both reasons of temperament and character and some of policy. Among those reasons are the fact that Trump is “erratic,” “traffics in prejudice” and is a “serial liar.” They note that his business record isn’t as sterling as Trump himself suggests, and that the racial tensions he’s stirred—they wrote that he has “coarsened the national dialogue”—will be lasting.
- “Trump has demonstrated repeatedly that he lacks the temperament, knowledge, steadiness and honesty that America needs from its presidents,” the editorial board wrote.
- The paper made it clear its editorial should not be taken as “unqualified support” for Clinton, urging voters to either back her, choose a third-party candidate, write in another name or focus their votes solely on down-ballot candidates.
…I especially agree with those last words above…
- “or focus their votes solely on down-ballot candidates.”
…Meaning, don’t vote for any of the presidential candidates on the ballot, but vote for other candidates at lower levels, and of course any issues/questions on state ballots. That is my plan, I decided earlier today. Even though Gary Johnson did a good job as governor of a state, and was a Republican twice elected in a blue Democrat state, he is (in my opinion) no longer competent to be President now. I will not vote for Clinton because of her bad record. I will not vote for Trump because he clearly intends to declare Martial Law and become Dictator of the U.S. by federalizing and militarizing the police, possibly to be ordered to shoot to kill any dissidents. It’s happened before in history in other countries. It can happen here. So many blind followers could make it possible if he gets enough votes to win.
- “Whatever you do, however, resist the siren song of a dangerous demagogue,” they write. “By all means vote, just not for Donald Trump.”
I was born in 1956 in Kansas. This Election 2016 is the worst I’ve ever seen. I was born into a Republican family. Most of my friends, coworkers, and employers over the years have been Democrats. I briefly joined Kansas Democrats, then departed when I found them to be in a useless state of anarchy. I then became registered as an Independent voter, unaffiliated. I average out to be Centrist, in such a way as to be similar to Libertarians. I now live in Oklahoma.
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Lantern Timeglass Journal 