2020 Vision: A Modest Proposal

I recently visited Capitol Hill, where it is abundantly clear that the nation is extremely divided along political lines.  It seems like virtually every vote is split along party lines.  A lot of Democrats are trying to block the clearly-qualified Judge Neil Gorsuch from being seated on the Supreme Court.  They feel justified in this because the Republican-controlled Congress wouldn't even allow Barack Obama's eleventh-hour nominee Merrick Garland to go to a vote.  Meanwhile, Donald Trump is in the oval office, and his supporters think everything he does is right and everything he says is true.  The Democrats, on the other hand, think that everything Trump does is wrong and everything he says is a lie, and they're actively looking for ways to impeach him.  They fight him at every opportunity.  The media's stories about Trump are often lies mixed with truth or unsubstantiated allegations from anonymous sources.  Trump responds by rightly calling the media out on their biased bullshit, but then he heaps a load of his own lies and unsubstantiated allegations on top.  And this just repeats over and over, while Trump continues his Twitter rants and the far left continues to compare him to Adolf Hitler.  The far right thinks Trump is America's savior, and the far left thinks he's a racist, sexist, xenophobic Fascist who hates poor people.  The far right and the far left don't even take each other seriously anymore.  And they're both half right, because they've both become caricatures of themselves.  It's ridiculous.

Imagine, if you will, a nation united and largely proud of its very respectable President.  In my lifetime, this hasn't happened much.  I was born during Reagan's second term, and that man was a wonderful leader, but I was too young to have really appreciated him.  Under H.W., I remember that my Dad was days away from being called to go to war, before the war ended, but I don't remember much else.  Under Clinton, I remember that he reached across the aisle when Congress went Republican, and then I learned what a semen stain was.  Under W, the divide began to widen.  In the days that followed 9/11, I think it was the last time that we were all standing behind our President--a nation as one.  Bush's approval rating soared, even Democrats in Congress voted for a war (one that, in hindsight, probably was not the best decision), and a bearded Al Gore told the nation that, "George Bush is my commander-in-chief!"  But Bush made a lot of mistakes, and the nation eventually divided as the post-tragedy patriotism war away.  The divide continued under Obama, and increased significantly after Trump defeated Hillary Clinton in one of the most bitterly-fought Presidential campaigns in history.

Who could bring this nation together again?  John McCain and Lindsey Graham stand out as the favorite Republicans of Democrats, but McCain is an octogenarian who failed to win the Presidency in 2008 when he faced an economic collapse with his party in power, chose Sarah Palin as his running mate, and pretended to be conservative.  Graham tried for the 2016 Republican nomination and hovered around one percent polling until he finally dropped out and made some comments about his wing of the party being dead.  On the other side, Jim Webb is among the favorite Democrats of the Republicans, but his story basically mirrors that of Graham, and I don't see Joe Manchin making a run for the oval office either.  So where does that leave us?  It's a given that Donald Trump will run for re-election in 2020.  But who will be the Democratic option in the general election?  Could they nominate someone who would appeal to moderates or even to Republicans?  Leftists hate Ted Cruz nearly as they hate Trump, and despite Rand Paul being Libertarian and usually the smartest guy in the room, he envisions a government far too small for the modern Democratic party.  The Democrats could nominate someone nearly as polarizing as Hillary Clinton in Bernie Sanders or Elizabeth Warren, or they can see if Joe Biden is up to reviving the Obama legacy.  Or perhaps they can find someone who is a moderate--someone who has views that mainstream Democrats and mainstream Republicans may differ on, but someone who is at least widely respected by people on both sides.  Enter Ohio Governor John Kasich.

I know this sounds ridiculous, and it is, and it will never happen, but hear me out.  The Democrats should unite together around John Kasich becoming the party's nominee for President in 2020.  First of all, they would have to get him to switch parties, of course, and that's unlikely to happen as well, but just imagine if it did.  Kasich is perhaps the nation's best Governor (my state has the worst one--see my previous post).  He's done great things in Ohio, where he is well-liked, and he's been an outspoken critic of President Trump, as well as many of those on the far left.  He's a great leader and an even better human being.  During the primaries, he tried his best to stay out of the mudslinging and remain honorable, pushing a message of uniting rather than dividing, which is the message he is continuing to push today (see also the title of his book).

Democrats need to stop their whining and accept that fact that Donald Trump is President for the next four years.  If they want to blame someone, they can look in the mirror, because Democrats nominated Hillary Clinton, who somehow lost to Donald Trump.  It was an election that pitted two of the worst and most disliked candidates in history against each other.  But what happens in 2020?  Donald Trump is up for re-election, and as long as he doesn't make any big mistakes between now and then and the economy doesn't tank, there's a chance that he will win his re-election bid.  If he does a lot of good things, more people start to like him, and the economy strengthens further, there's a good chance that he will win a second term.  Certainly, the Democrats can hope that he will not win again and nominate someone of their choice from the left.  Or they can take one for the team--the team being America--and rally behind John Kasich.  Kasich is moderate Republican, but his message is one of unity, and most people at least like him, respect him, or tolerate him.  Outside of the far right and far left, there are very few people who strongly dislike him, and given the choice between Kasich and Trump, the far left would choose Kasich.  Nominating Kasich would virtually guarantee a Kasich victory and a one-term Presidency for Trump.

If Kasich were nominated as a Democrat instead of a Republican, most Democrats would vote for him (a few might veer off to a third party), and enough Republicans would vote for him over Trump that Kasich would defeat Trump in a landslide of epic proportions.  And then the process of healing and erasing the political divides could begin.  If the first few months are any indication, a second-term of Trump would not do this.  And a victory from someone on the far left would not do this either.  We would be in the same place we are now, except with the opposite political party in charge of the executive branch.  A man like John Kasich could change all that.  The hate and vitriol normally directed at Republicans by Democrats isn't there for Kasich, and while he isn't even among the favorites of Republicans, especially those who are staunchly Conservatives, most in the GOP don't view him negatively either.  Kasich would win, and while no one in the nation would be ecstatic that their side won the election (well, I would, and I would certainly vote Democrat if he were the nominee), the majority would be content, and the hyper-partisan political climate on Capitol Hill would dissipate.

It won't happen though.  I've come up with ridiculous ideas like this before, like when I suggested that John McCain choose (Democrat/Independent) Joe Lieberman as his running mate in 2008.  Palin was about as far from Lieberman as you could get for a Republican VP nominee, both politically and geographically.  But Kasich is a great, principled leader.  In fact, he was just named number twelve on Fortune's list of the World's 50 greatest leaders, although I don't know how much stock I put in that list because Samantha Bee was somehow ranked 19th.  At least John McCain cracked the top ten at number nine (number one was Theo Epstein, which I also have to agree with).  Regardless, the left is too stubborn to pave the way for a Kasich nomination, and if the shoe was on the other foot, the right would be too stubborn to allow someone like Webb to take the GOP nomination.

Both major parties are in disarray.  Like it or not, the Democrats just lost an election to Donald Trump, and the party is further divided by the Bernie Sanders socialist faction and the slightly more moderate faction that was responsible for HRC's nomination.  The Republicans can't get their shit together either, despite controlling the Presidency, the Senate, and the House.  That party is divided into the camps of those who support Trump, those who oppose him, and people like Paul Ryan who are being ripped apart trying to walk a line somewhere in between.  After promising for the better part of a decade to repeal and replace Obamacare, they didn't even have enough votes in the Republican-dominated House to let their sorry excuse of a healthcare bill go to vote last week.  It's a disaster, and it's long past time for a moderate President who can reach across the aisle and unite.  Kasich is the right man for that job, and if he, a moderate Republican, were nominated as a moderate Democrat, it would strengthen that ability in him.  Or the divide will just get bigger if we continue politics-as-usual.

I'm not entirely delusional, so I know the odds of this scenario happening are virtually zero.  One can dream though.  Or seventy million people can write him in.  And for the record, I'm not writing this because I regret voting for Trump.  If the election were held today, I would still vote for him over HRC.  I'd really prefer someone who all Americans can get behind, but I'll vote for Trump again if I have to.  Don't make me do it.  I'm looking at you, Democrats.  Kasich 2020!

Dannel's Logic is Shot

It's well-documented that Dannel Malloy (D, Connecticut) is the worst Governor in the nation.  For a state that leans pretty far to the left, you would think that a man who was once a dream Governor for leftists would be a little more well-liked, but he has the second-worst approval rating (26% per morningconsult.com) out of all of the nation's Governors.  The only Governor in the nation with a worse approval rating is Sam Brownback (R, Kansas), probably because people in Kansas like his last name less than people like Malloy's first name.  That dude is the only person I know of named Dannel.  I wonder if his parents named him Daniel but legally changed his name when he just kept spelling his name wrong on all his papers when he was a kid.  But mostly I'm just here today to talk about why his proposed gun permit fee increases are dumber than his name.

In large part because of Malloy's fiscally irresponsible policies during a time in which the economy has supposedly been improving, Connecticut is estimated to end up with a nearly two billion dollar budget deficit in the next fiscal year.  Naturally, as a leftist, one of the solutions he's come up with to help chip away at the deficit is to make people with guns (or those who want to obtain them legally) pay more money to have permits for these guns.  He wants renewal fees for pistol permits (which are good for five years) to more than quadruple, from $70 to $300, he wants first time permits to be issued for $370 instead of $140, and he wants background checks to obtain a permit for the first time to go up to $75 from $50 (per New Haven Register article).  The knee-jerk reaction for many leftists?  Cheers.  Yeah, stick it to those damn gun owners exercising their first amendment in a way in which it was never intended, right!?  Well, let's follow what this policy would actually do if implemented...

People who would not be impacted by this policy?  Criminals who obtain guns illegally anyway.  People who would be impacted by this policy?  Citizens who legally obtain guns and gun permits as required by the state of Connecticut, in order to exercise their rights.  And further breaking that down, is the fee hike really going to impact rich people?  No.  Not at all.  Middle and upper-middle class?  Not really.  I mean, it's a slight annoyance.  I consider myself part of that group, and I'm not happy that I may have to pay a few hundred dollars extra every five years for a permit renewal of my God-given right, but it's a minor inconvenience for me.  Not a big deal.  That leaves the poor and the lower-middle class, who disproportionately live in more dangerous areas and are disproportionately minorities.  Malloy is either out to get these people, hasn't thought this through, or doesn't care about the consequences as long as it gets money to the state and looks like he's being "tough on guns."  My guess is the third option here, maybe the second.

The main problem is that the poorest people in the state who want to own guns, probably in large part for home defense, would have three options if Malloy's proposal were to pass: pay for the permit even though you can't really afford it and may have to forfeit other important things, don't pay for the permit and don't get a gun, or don't pay for the permit and possess a gun anyway (possible future felony conviction).  I don't really see another option there with the proposal as-is.  But hey, leftists are all about giving away things for free, right?  If healthcare should be free for those who want it but can't afford it and college education should be free for those who want it but can't afford it, shouldn't guns and gun permits be free for those who want them and can't afford them?  I mean, healthcare and college education aren't even mentioned in the bill of rights, but the right to bear arms is the second amendment.  Access to buying guns and gun permits doesn't mean you're guaranteed to have guns and gun permits, right?  And no, I don't think that's the actual solution, but see my point?

The same amount of money can be raised by the state via a much, much, much smaller increase in the cost of driver's license renewals every six years (except that driving is a privilege, not a right).  Or, you know, maybe we wouldn't have such a mountainous deficit if Malloy and company didn't scare away businesses and do such a shitty job running the state in the first place.  Connecticut is already one of the worst states in the nation for taxes and fees.  The solution isn't to make that worse.  The solution is to fix the problems that cause the state to hemorrhage money.  And yes, it's a damn shame that we have some of the most insanely wealthy and incredibly poor areas in the whole nation within our tiny state.  If you don't believe me, try comparing Bridgeport public schools with public schools in Westport or Greenwich, just a short drive away.  Stark contrast.  Sad!  (Shout out to Trump tweets.)

Whatever we're doing here isn't working and is rotten to the core.  Maybe it's time for the right, the left, and everyone in between to get together and come up with some real solutions to enact positive changes in the state.  Finding more and more ways to charge Connecticut residents money that the state squanders isn't fixing the problems we have.  We'll just keep piling up deficits.  It's like a doctor prescribing pain pills to treat a torn ACL instead of performing surgery to fix the torn ACL.  And also the doctor is making it harder for you to exercise rights you have that he isn't particularly fond of.  Especially if you're poor.