By Sid Schwab / Herald Columnist
Around 30 percent of voters, the kind that attend Donald Trump’s rallies or wish they could, who cheer at everything he says no matter how dishonest, disconnected from reality, or undecipherable, will support him no matter what.
No amount of fact-checking or pointing out dangers will dissuade them. They love the idea of his promised military tribunals convicting and imprisoning the Obamas, Bidens, Clintons, members of Congress’ January 6 Committee, people he falsely accuses of election fraud, including election officials, voters and donors; even some of their neighbors. The similarity to the world’s worst dictatorships concerns them not; it’s their most fevered dream.
When Trump says rounding up undocumented migrants will be “a bloody story,” they must imagine it with delight. Unbatted eyes view his phantasm of school children heading off to school, only to return home sex-changed. Held down, castrated, given vagino- or phalloplasties, mastectomies or implants, presumably by the school nurse. Only people whose detectors have been wiped away like bugs on a windshield believe such obvious b.s.
They also buy his stunningly counterfactual claim (lie!) that tariffs are a tax on other countries and won’t cost American consumers a penny. It’s unsurprising that a “businessman” who managed to bankrupt casinos and several other projects could so thoroughly misunderstand economics; likewise his 30-percenters who lack the capacity to question it. But the ones bringing his support even with or ahead of Kamala Harris? Clueless voters, voting.
People educated beyond fourth grade ought not need explaining; but, for the record, tariffs are paid for by consumers, not the producing countries (Tax Policy Center: tinyurl.com/whopays4u). They raise prices. They’re inflationary. To conservatives, they once were anathema. Think: a country sells a widget to importers for $10. The U..S demands a 10 percent tariff, which it collects not from the sender but from the importer, who then sells it to consumers at an increased price to cover their increased costs. Trump’s “plan” would raise the cost to consumers of whatever imports he chooses by whatever rate he decides. He’s threatened as much as 100 percent on cars, and not just for China. Imports from everywhere. The money from tariffs comes from Americans. The U.S. has no power to tax other countries. Our timid media should call him on it (YouTube: tinyurl.com/notariff4u).
He’d have you believe tariffs solve everything: the trillions he says other countries pay (lie!) will balance the budget, eliminate the national debt and cover the cost of everything he’s promising, including tax cuts for the wealthy. Is he so stupid that he actually believes that, or is it just that he thinks his voters are? If, as tariffs are intended, consumers switch to buying only American-made products, there’d be a worldwide recession, and there’d be no revenue from tariffs. Until other countries’ retaliatory tariffs kick in, American businesses would do fine; and, absent competition from abroad, raise prices. Either way, consumers lose.
Trump’s tariff lie is but one of the countless others on which mainstream media fail to push back, while Foxophilic media amplify them, because they do think their listeners are stupid. In Tuesday’s “debate,” awakening voters to Trump’s lies, Kamala Harris did the best she could in the time allowed. With minimal pushback, debate “moderators” let Trump say whatever he wanted, rant about a horrible future that won’t happen, and ignore questions. Asked why he forced Republicans to vote down the border bill that would have solved many of the current problems, he avoided answering and the feck-deficient “moderators” moved on. They did, however, let him melt down time and again, repeating his golden oldie lies about crime, immigration, and, yes, tariffs. To her true statement that world leaders laugh at him, he proffered Hungary’s notorious dictator, Victor Orban, as a character reference. Comedy gold.
The 30 percent will think Trump “crushed” Vice President Harris. Notwithstanding being prevented from responding to all of his lies (or maybe she just chose to ignore them), Kamala Harris did extremely well. The pundits, though, will tell us what to really think.
Now, Trump voters must ask themselves: his own vice president, secretary of defense, chairman of the Joint Chiefs, chief of staff, secretary of state, national security adviser, and many of his Cabinet, people who’ve been with him in the Oval Office and the Situation Room, are warning of the dangers of another Trump term.
What do you think you know about him that they don’t? Why is your assessment, from afar, more accurate than those who worked with him, daily, up close? In the biggest of pictures, beyond yourself, for your country, how is it better to have as president a confabulating liar who will — despite his truthless denials — follow Project 2025’s path to autocracy, rather than a current vice president, former senator, attorney general, prosecutor, who’ll protect your freedom and democracy and respect our laws, even if you don’t agree with every one of her policies?
Email Sid Schwab at columnsid@gmail.com.
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