That Parochial, Old-Fashioned Donald Trump

Recently social medial and the conservative sphere of the internet erupted with outrage when Rick Wilson, an Establishment Republican campaign consultant, suggested that the Establishment needed to “put a bullet in Donald Trump.” While Mr. Wilson’s choice of words was obviously inappropriate, I think all the outrage on the right unfortunately caused an important point to be missed.

First of all, I’m not at all a fan of feigned outrage. I decry it when the left uses this tactic against conservatives, usually for some alleged transgression of PC rightthink or deviation from the conventional wisdom. It is a cheap form of gotcha argumentation that serious thinkers on the right should be above. Leave the feigned outrage to the professional snarks masquerading as journalists at outlets like Huffington Post and Salon. While Mr. Wilson chose his words poorly, he is most likely not a complete blithering idiot (although below I will demonstrate that he ain’t too bright either) so I think it is entirely reasonable to assume that he was not suggesting that the Establishment literally put out a hit on Donald Trump. He was likely suggesting that they get serious about taking down Trump’s surprisingly successful campaign.

All the noise about the bullet remark drowned out a more important point that Mr. Wilson inadvertently made. Read the Breitbart article about the scandal linked above. In it Mr. Wilson calls Trump supporters “low-information,” which seems to be the new go to insult, and likens them to conspiracy theorists. Better yet, he is quoted as saying that Trump has a “very strange, sort of parochial, old-fashioned view of the world and the international economy."

Rick Wilson is the embodiment of everything I have been ranting about in recent articles. He is an Establishment Republican consultant who advises Republican candidates on how to win the votes of average Americans while openly despising them and without even trying to understand their concerns.

Mr. Wilson’s undisciplined mouth also illustrates a point I have attempted to make several times before. People who claim that Trump is just another member of the Establishment because he is rich don't understand the pitched battle of different economic visions that is going on here, but Wilson gets it as does the donor class for which he is doing the bidding. To folks like Wilson, Trump's economic nationalism that puts the interests of America and Americans first is "parochial" and "old-fashioned" and Heaven forbid, "nativist." What Wilson and the donor class he flacks for support, and what they think all good obedient little Republicans should support is the oh so modern agenda of the World Economic Forum which is not burdened down by those pesky efficiency reducing things called national borders or antiquated emotions like patriotism.

One wonders if Mr. Wilson even realizes that he is addressing conservatives? Does he have any idea how conservatives think? One also wonders how someone so seemingly clueless and out of touch with the voter base he is trying to woo could become an apparently successful campaign consultant.

Ummm… Mr. Wilson, if you haven’t noticed, us conservatives kinda like parochial things, like say parochial schools. And we really like old-fashioned things. That because conservatives like to conserve things. Go figure. A conservative friend of mine who is less inclined to be enthusiastic about the Trump campaign than I am said, “Parochial and old-fashioned are the best things I've ever heard said about Trump.” I suspect he is not the only one who considers these a high compliment.

I hesitate to give any advice to Mr. Wilson, but perhaps he shouldn’t be so quick to call Donald Trump supporters “low-information” as he clearly does not understand the base he is busily attempting to simultaneously woo and disparage. And then he wonders why the hoi polloi won’t do as we are told.

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Comments

trade, immigration

When he sticks to the issues he wins, but watch out, while the Donald rips apart illegal immigration he is all for H-1B Visas and more foreign guest workers. These are being used to displace U.S. workers, including PhD level engineers, age discriminate, sex discriminate U.S. workers and replace them with foreign ones.

There are so many wolves in sheep's clothing where workers are dead last in their plans here, both parties.

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Actually, if you read his

Actually, if you read his immigration position paper on his website, which many assume was written by Sen. Sessions or his staff, he is solid on legal immigration and H-1B Visas. He waffled a little in the 3rd debate but corrected himself soon after. My theory is that he is hearing it from the GOP bigwigs to tone it down on immigration, and since he is not a natural ideologue he doesn't know exactly how to do that, but he has good advisors who apparently watch social media chatter and keep him on track.

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Dan E. Phillips, MD