The
Weekly Standard is a reliably conservative magazine owned by Rupert Murdoch.
Stephen
Hayes, one of its regular contributors, wrote after the GOP
convention that “Donald Trump is crazy, and so is the GOP for
embracing him.”
He
focuses on Trump’s remarks the day after the convention ended, when he
addressed the volunteers who worked the convention.
Trump
rambled on about his hatred for Ted Cruz, that he didn’t want his support, that
he would reject his support, that he might start a PAC (after he is elected
president) to defeat Cruz.
Trump
restated his claim that Cruz’s father was an associate of Lee Harvey Oswald and
was somehow involved in JFK’s assassination. This is not what you call “moving
on.”
His amplification of the Cruz-Oswald conspiracies is part of a long pattern of embracing crazy. He hinted that Antonin Scalia was murdered. He’s suggested autism is linked to vaccinations. He claimed “thousands” of Muslims celebrated in the streets of New Jersey after 9/11. He said many people consider Vince Foster’s death a “murder” and called it “very fishy.” And before he ran for president, his deepest foray into politics was a campaign to prove that Barack Obama wasn’t born in the United States. (It failed.)
Trump has praised Alex Jones, whose radio program is to conspiracy theories what ESPN is to sports. Jones, a prominent 9/11 truther, claimed there was a “98 percent chance” that the 9/11 attacks were controlled bombings perpetrated by the U.S. government. In an appearance on Jones’s radio show last year, Trump offered the host deferential praise. “Your reputation is amazing,” Trump said. “I will not let you down.”
He
urges his fellow Republicans to speak out against Trump. He is not a normal
candidate.
Trump
is a man who has been repeatedly sued
for discriminating against blacks in his rental properties.
The Washington Post
says Trump is a threat to the nation and the world.
And
yet Trump is tied in the polls with Hillary Clinton.
Many
Americans like his fear-mongering and conspiracy theories.
They
want him to protect them.
They
believe it when he says he will bring back all the lost jobs.
They
believe it when he says that he alone can “fix” the problems.
This
man could be elected president. Think about that.
