Ugh. Here is a brief list of people I'd gladly vote for over Mr. Trump or Mrs. Clinton: Every other person who has run on either major party ticket for president in the last 75 years. This is the first time I've ever been glad that the Electoral College exists. Since I live in a state where the winner is pre-ordained, I can avoid the moral ickiness of voting for either of these two people by simply not participating in the process.
But even if the president were elected by popular vote, which he or she should be, and even if all known laws of probability were cast to the side and the entire election somehow came down to my personal vote, I would still not be able to vote for either of these people.
I miss Mitt. And we will all soon miss Barack.
The most dispiriting thing about this whole charade is that most of the body politic is proving incapable of being honest about both candidates. Trump supporters lie for Trump and they defend the indefensible. Hillary supporters do the same for their candidate. This is nothing new, of course, but this dynamic is amplified by the fact that these are the two worst candidates imaginable.
An unfortunate truth: The only person who Donald Trump could ever conceivably beat in a general election is someone as flawed as Hillary Clinton. The only person who Hillary Clinton could ever conceivable beat in a general election is someone as flawed as Donald Trump.
If Donald Trump were running against any other Democrat, he would have zero chance of winning. If Hillary Clinton were running against any other Republican, she would have zero chance of wining. These two need each other. They are locked in a symbiotic death spiral. They each are only as close as they are to the presidency because of the monumental flaws of their opponent.
First, for Trump. There are two stipulations about Mr. Trump that I think are very important, and they should not be taken as efforts to defend this indefensible man.
First, the mainstream media is grossly unfair to Donald Trump as compared to Hillary Clinton. According to the media, it is worse to hurt the feelings of some Muslims than it is to kill, dispossess, and forcibly displace millions of Muslims.
Second, Trump has raised some issues that need to be talked about. Illegal immigration is a problem, and any person predisposed to stick their fingers in their ears and yell "racist" over and over again is part of the problem. Hillary Clinton is pathologically corrupt and dishonest, and any person predisposed to stick their fingers in their ears and yell "sexist" over and over again is part of the problem.
So, the media is hopelessly biased against Trump and Trump has raised some valid points, points which the Democratic Party is invested in ignoring. The problem is that Trump is a despicable human being who, even when being treated unfairly, is deserving of no defense.
I actually think that many of Trump's policies are policies that would be supported by a clear majority of voters if they were being explained by someone with an ounce of modesty, empathy, and intellectual consistency. Trump has none of these.
The idea of my son behaving like Donald Trump when he is a grown man is revolting. Whenever my son, not yet three, goes even 10% Donald, he gets a timeout. The thought of any person I know and respect behaving the way this man behaves is unthinkable.
I don't think Trump is a racist. To be a racist, you need to have a worldview. Trump doesn't have a worldview. He has a mirror. He makes George W. Bush look like Plato and Einstein combined. Trump believes in nothing but Trump. He is a sociopath of the highest order.
While anyone who seeks the presidency must have at least some sociopathic tendencies, Trump sets the standard for a petulant narcissism that other politicians at least try to hide. Trump lacks the self-control needed to hide his narcissism. Self-deprecating humor, for example. Don't expect it from Donald. He is utterly incapable of it.
He is a self-absorbed, petty man-child who is temperamentally unfit to be a police officer or an insurance adjuster, never mind the job he's running for. The mainstream media is right about this aspect of Trump's temperament; after all, a broken clock is right twice a day.
Mrs. Clinton flaws are different, but just as troublesome. She may be more polite than Mr. Trump, but her actions and impulses are terrifying.
She seems never to have come across a proposed use of military force that she opposed. Her impulse towards secrecy and dishonesty is not of the run-of-the-mill security state variety. She actually set up her own security state via her private server scheme.
Not content to keep her actions secret from the American people, she insisted on keeping her actions secret from the national security state as well. She seems to have used her position as Secretary of State to merge the security state with the Clinton foundation, claiming to represent the American people while accepting mountains of cash on behalf of her family's enterprise.
How else would a "public servant" and her husband "earn" $250,000,000 in just over a decade? I know Bill gives a good speech, but come on.
What Clinton and Trump show more than anything else is a contempt for common decency. The moral standard that is being set here is truly dispiriting. A man who trades in wives the way we trade in cars and a woman who thinks we are too stupid to notice that she hasn't given a press conference in a year and that "despite extreme carelessness, we decline to indict" is a ringing endorsement of her moral rectitude.
How do we choose between bad and evil?
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