Disruptive Politics: Trump as a Third Party Candidate

Michael Barone / Townhall Columnist

 

"My sole focus is to run as a Republican," Donald Trump told my Washington Examiner colleague Byron York last week, "because of the fact that I believe that this is the best way we can defeat the Democrats." He went on, "Having a two-party race gives us a much better chance of beating Hillary and bringing our country back than having a third-party candidate."

But when York asked if he would definitively rule out running as a third-party candidate, Trump said, "It's not something I'm thinking about right now." And as John Fund pointed out in National Review, it is something Trump has thought about in the past.

He made a feint at getting Ross Perot's Reform Party nomination back in 1999. And while Trump recently called Clinton "the worst secretary of state in the history of our nation," somehow overlooking James Buchanan's feckless stint in the Polk administration, he also contributed to her Senate campaigns and has called her "a terrific woman."

The fact is that Trump, as a national celebrity and a non-politician often at odds with both parties, has the capacity to launch an independent candidacy scoring double digits in polls, just as Perot did in 1992 and Colin Powell could have done in 1995.

Walker: "I'd Rather Take the Fight" to Islamic Terrorists, Than Wait for Them to Come to Us

Cortney O'Brien / Townhall Tipsheet

 

Walking onstage and shaking hands as Rascal Flatt’s “Life is a Highway” played in the background, Gov. Scott Walker (R-WI) had a simple message for supporters: “I love America.”

The conservative governor announced he is running for president today in Waukesha, Wisconsin, spending the first moments of his speech sharing personal stories about why he is so sentimental about his country. He described being moved by a veteran in his neighborhood when he was younger, who had served in both World Wars, as well as other veterans he met through various jobs. These acquaintances, he said, taught him the important of public service to defend our basic freedoms.

The current GOP presidential field would make anyone claustrophic (17 candidates have now announced), but Walker has a list of credentials that could perhaps place him in frontrunner position.

For example, he took the opportunity to distance himself from his opponents today by reminding voters he doesn’t just talk the talk – he has a string of victories to back up his words. Remember that infamous recall election? In that win, he said, he successfully took power from special interests (labor unions) and gave it to the taxpayers.

Washington Post runs piece from Syrian jihad group that has allied with Al-Qaeda affiliate and fought alongside the Islamic State

By Robert Spencer / Jihad Watch

 

Can you imagine the Washington Post giving a platform to someone who writes honestly about how Islamic jihadists use the texts and teachings of Islam to justify violence and supremacism? Can you imagine the WaPo running a piece calling upon mosques in the U.S. to institute programs teaching against the understanding of Islam held by […]
 
Read in browser »

 

Egypt monitoring 3,187 mosques

 Pamela Geller / Atlas Shrugs 

The Egyptian government can acknowledge that violent and seditious activity can be and is plotted in mosques. The U.S. government refuses even to acknowledge that as a possibility.

Mosques that are bases of hate and treason must be monitored and shuttered if jihad-related activity or preaching is found to be taking place in these fortresses. That is what any responsible government would do. Egypt is doing it. The U.S. isn’t.

“Egypt sets curbs on mosque seclusion,” Zawya, July 10, 2015 (thanks to The Religion of Peace):

Cairo: Egyptian authorities have set strict rules for going into spiritual seclusion in mosques in the mostly Muslim country, the latest move in an inexorable government crackdown on militant Islamists....

Read the whole entry »

     

• Email to a friend • Article Search •