Watch for cross-party recruitment
Jacob Heilbrunn, editor of the National Interest and author of They Knew They Were Right: The Rise of the Neocons
Forget the flapdoodle about a brokered Republican convention in Cleveland. Donald Trump will not only have defied the GOP establishment’s attempt to steal the nomination from him, but also housebroken it. The New York billionaire will focus on wooing white working-class voters in the Rust Belt to ensure the rise of a new phenomenon: the Trump Democrat.
At the same time, Hillary Clinton will try to create her own counterpart—the Clinton Republican. Already, former libertarian Congressman Ron Paul is calling Trump a “super authoritarian,” while former George W. Bush administration official Eliot Cohen is complaining in the American Interest about the broader “moral rot” in America that Trump epitomizes. (What does this sudden burst of cultural pessimism imply for the grand neocon project of exporting the American democratic model abroad?)
Clinton will invite both Pauls, Rand and Ron, to speak at the Democratic convention, while Trump retaliates by praising Bernie Sanders. Heck, maybe he’ll even flirt with him as a prospective running mate just to deliver a further poke into the eyes of the pooh-bahs that have run the GOP into the ground.
Join the conversation as a VIP Member