At this date, it seems futile, if not quaint, to speak of character. A lot of us were writing about it in 2016. And we laid heavy emphasis on it in the Clinton years, of course — by “we,” I mean Republicans and conservatives. But “that ship has sailed.”
(This is one of my least favorite expressions. It is tied, I think, with “It is what it is.”)
As I have noted in the past, Peggy Noonan wrote a book called “When Character Was King.” The book came out in 2001. It’s about Reagan. In 1999, Bill Buckley gave a speech at the Reagan Library titled “When Character Counted: The Importance of Ronald Reagan.”
Here is an excerpt:
I remember telling the Philadelphia Society that the most powerful man in the Free World is not powerful enough to do everything that needs to be done. Retrospectively, I have speculated on what I continue to believe was the conclusive factor in the matter of American security against any threat of Soviet aggression. It was the character of the occupant of the White House; the character of Ronald Reagan.
Have you seen the latest from Donald Trump? I mean, not the latest, because there is something new every minute, but a message from last Wednesday?
Let me concentrate on just a few words: “Rupert and Lachlan, get that dog off your Board – You don’t need him. ALL YOU NEED IS TRUMP.”
The conservatives I knew would have gagged on that — been appalled by that. Leaving “style” aside (“dog”), how about “substance”? “ALL YOU NEED IS TRUMP”? Conservatives would have thought that bizarre and insulting. To Caesarism, we were allergic.
And who has the more legitimate claim to represent American conservatism? Paul Ryan, the “dog,” or Donald Trump?
In recent years, there has been a debate: Is Trumpism a continuation — even a culmination or consummation — of the conservative movement launched by Buckley and others, or is it a break from it? I believe it is a break, and a sharp one.
The demagoguery. The anti-intellectualism. The hostility to free trade. The attempt to overturn a democratic election. The use of mob violence. The call for “the termination of all rules, regulations, and articles, even those found in the Constitution.” The softness on anti-American dictators, such as Putin. The hostility to the Ukrainians as they fight to save their country from obliteration.
Trump calls his Republican opponents (few as they are) “dogs,” “human scum,” etc. Have you ever heard him breathe a word of criticism of the tyrannical, warmaking Putin?
For years, I’ve been told by Trump defenders and perfumers something like this: “Yeah, he’s a little rough around the edges. ‘Mean tweets’! He is an ‘imperfect vessel.’ He may lack the geniality of Reagan or the polish of Buckley — but he is an heir to them, a partner of them, in his own way.”
No sale. He has more in common with George Wallace — and Henry Wallace, for that matter — than with those other guys.
And he will be nominated by the Republican Party three times in a row. No Republican, from the 1850s onward, has ever been nominated for president three times in a row. Something important to ponder.
(When I lived in Washington in the 1990s, I used to startle and vex Democrats by referring to Marion Barry as “the four-time mayoral nominee of your party.”)
Trump’s outburst against Paul Ryan last Wednesday was provoked by a statement Ryan made on Fox News: “I voted for him in 2016, hoping that there was going to be a different kind of person in office, and I do think character is a really important issue. If you put yourself above the Constitution, as he has done, that means you’re unfit for office.”
In his response, Trump called Ryan many things, including a “weak and ineffective RINO,” a “total lightweight,” a “failed and pathetic Speaker of the House,” a “very disloyal person,” and a “dog.” (Dogs are famous for their loyalty.) About the “RINO” part, Trump may be right. “RINO” means “Republican in Name Only.” Trump has remade that party, and the general world around it.
Here is a Republican congressman, Troy Nehls of Texas, in his own response to Ryan: “Paul Ryan, you’re a piece of garbage. You’re a piece of garbage, and we should kick you out of the party.”
A bit more from Mr. Nehls: “Don’t go spouting your mouth off and saying that you’re a conservative. You’re spitting in the face of the leader of our party.”
This is the new normal — a normal that has been in place for so long, it is no longer really new.