I've read a couple of recent thought-provoking posts which caught my attention: Josh Kraushaar's piece on how the pollsters got messed up on the election and Nick Gillespie's upbeat post on the election. I recommend readers read the posts for themselves. Josh had expected that the Dems would have a 2008 like expansion on the 2006 midterms that captured Congress but suggests that the election at House level, involving a net gain for still minority Republicans, probably reflects a backlash against political correctness and cancel culture. Nick Gillespie points out California voted on propositions favoring the gig economy, rejecting an affirmative action industrial complex initiative, nor to mention economically illiterate rent control, Biden could barely beat a hugely unpopular Trump and the GOP mostly held off an expected blue wave seizing Congress, and various liberalization propositions of marijuana and other drugs passed across states.
I have to admit my first impression was how different the 2020 election compared to 2008. Some vulnerable GOP senators (ME, SC, GA, NC, MT) who had trailed in the polls or were in tight races either won or got into a runoff (GA). As I write, the GOP has 49, including projected wins, with Alaska (+30) uncalled. So at worst, the Senate is split. Of course, VP-Elect Kamala Harris would be a tiebreaker. So the Dems' only chance to win control of the Senate would be sweep both runoffs in Georgia, and I think a GOP sweep is more likely. Sen. Loeffler faced a challenge from Congressman Collins, and lead Democrat Warnock got less than a third of the vote, while Sen. Perdue just barely missed winning the necessary majority vote against Ossoff. According to the Gray Lady, the Georgia Dems have only won 1 of 7 statewide runoffs since 1990.
The only rationale for Trump, hardly a principled conservative or pro-liberty, would have been to control against an opposition Congress run amuck with the power of the veto. But Trump has hardly been principled; he dealt away hard-won sequesters against Obama to get huge defense department increases. On the other hand, an opposition Senate to a President Biden could block his big-spending agenda, at least through mid-terms.
The issues with Trump start with his toxic, self-serving personality. His diplomacy is unorthodox and confrontative, often by the seat of the pants, personality-driven, often based on cursory, superficial understanding of the international context.
This is part of his simplistic, uninformed approach to things, e.g., the recent election: he lives in black-and-white world. For example, he fear-mongers in energy-producing states the alleged Biden threat to such industries under his green agenda; keep in mind many energy-producing states have more diversified economies (e.g., Texas) and there are scalability issues with alternate energy technologies, millions of gasoline-powered vehicles which won't be replaced overnight, etc. He brags in farm states how he got "China" to pay for retaliatory tariff actions against agricultural exports to provide farmer relief, not pointing out that tariffs are actually paid by other Americans and the Chinese actions were blowback to Trump's unprovoked trade war.
This is important because foreign relations are one of the legitimate enumerated responsibilities of the Presidency. He badgered and bullied NATO allies into increasing defense expenditures while cozying up to communist and other authoritarian leaders. He also pressured Canada and Mexico into a facelift to NAFTA, USMCA, which had more to do with managed/protectionist trade (e.g., Trump wanted more US-based auto assembly) than trade liberalization. In addition, his policies were intrinsically inconsistent; for instance, he wanted to provide leadership in the SE Asian region competing with China, but his trade protectionist policies led him to abandon TPP, a trans-pacific trade zone exclusive of China.
Make no mistake: Biden is a labor protectionist and as much a meddler in international affairs and military interventions, but to contrast the two, I don't think that Biden would have unilaterally recognized Jerusalem as Israel's capital or pushed a deal with Saudi Arabia in the context of the horrific Yemen intervention.
What do I think of Biden? Well, I've been very clear I oppose Biden on virtually every policy. He is also a career politician, part of the problem, not the solution. But I am exhausted after 4 years of Trump: his infinite supply of insane tweets, the constant need for attention, for absurd hype and narcissism, his corruption (whether we are talking about his illegal handling of Ukraine leading to his impeachment), his illegal diversion of defense funds to build his southern wall, his petty terminations, e.g., of inspector generals, defense secretaries, Comey and others, his massive deficits. If I can survive 8 years of Obama, I can survive 4 years of Biden.
As I write, Biden has won nearly 77 M votes, for about 50.8% of the vote, which is I believe is the largest against an incumbent Presidency since FDR denied Hoover's reelection--over 5 M more votes than Trump. Trump has lacked the class to concede, having argued election fraud for months without evidence and now mounting frivolous challenges trying to stop states from certifying his loss. Trump, with the incumbency advantage, improved by only up to 1.5% over his 46% share in 2016. The fact is nearly every poll had Biden at 50 or above. Trump has over 50% unfavorable ratings, his job approvals are I believe at a record low for any first-term President. His leadership during the pandemic has been poorly received, the economy, almost certain to contract this year, is struggling with still near term high unemployment, and his first debate performance was a disaster. In my view, Trump overachieved in the election, and it's more puzzling why Biden didn't flip more states than he did
But let me finish this essay by once again showing how particularly Mises caucus libertarians are in the crackpot conspiracy/Biden Derangement Syndrome club. I have embedded many Tom DiLorenzo clips in my miscellany posts and generally agree with him, but he went off the rails in his latest essay on Rockwell's website:
There is a lot of talk of another Civil War in America these days. The reason for such talk is all of the violence that has been organized by what is effectively the military wing of the Democrat National Committee – Antifa and Black Lives Matter. They have rioted, looted, committed serial acts of arson, and even murdered. No one expects conservatives to behave in such a manner should demented Joe Biden prevail. If President Trump succeeds with his lawsuits against the blatantly obvious, massive vote fraud that has taken place, the Democrats will no longer be dancing in the streets guzzling champagne. They will escalate the kind of violence that they have orchestrated for the past six months or so, and it will likely be orders of magnitude worse. They will have become the new Party of Lincoln
Dude, have you taken your meds? I have zero respect for libertarians who defend an authoritarian wannabe who has crafted dubiously constitutional executive orders, tried to use funding as leverage to get Ukraine to open an investigation on his political rival Biden, redirected defense budget dollars for his southern border wall, has escalated bombing and drone missions overseas, etc. True libertarians hold that elections are intrinsically fraudulent, not pay lip service to Trump's unsupported allegations. To see a free market economist turn his head away from "Tariff Man" 's trade wars, his mammoth deficits, massive defense budgets, etc., is just sad.
