TheTrump Index Is Coming
Exactly What Does Trump Stand For?
Few conservatives will argue that Donald Trump has been the best president in a hundred years, one of the rare ones that ever actually delivered on his campaign promises. Renaming our annual voting index for the State House and Senate to the Trump Index will make the scores butt clear to everyone and have a much greater impact on the voters.
First before choosing the bills to be scored we have to determine what Trump stands for and what he stands against. To do that we researched his speeches and quotes and came up with the following list.
Abortion:
Trump is solidly pro life but a sensible person and in no way an abolitionist. He was once pro choice but is now working hard to deny Planned Parenthood funding, supports parental consent for abortion for minors, and puts originalistic judges on the bench.
The Economy and Taxes:
Trump supports ax cuts, de-regulation, rolling back occupational licensing requirements, isn't a fan of the Federal Reserve, supports the Gold Standard, has pushed fair trade instead of the RINO free trade that has devastated our manufacturing base, and has pushed tariffs on the worst countries that have huge tariffs on our goods while we let their goods in for little and zero tariffs. Trump prefers leveling the playing field rather than giving groups special tax breaks.
- Social issues: Some would call these civil rights but they are really social issues. Trump believes that the gays deserve no special treatment and need to be left alone. He is a huge supporter of women in his companies, understands that Muslims are a problem and need profiled to keep the rest of society safe, is color blind when hiring and promoting but again prefers leveling the playing field and making it fair rather than focusing on reparations or affirmative action, and Trump is a huge supporter of pushing back on political correctness. Trump is not a supporter of gay marriage but tolerates their lifestyle when he hired people.
- Corporate Welfare: Trump is tough on corporate welfare, moving jobs out of the U.S. to increase profits at the expense of the rest of society, has slashed the corporate tax rates but that benefits many small businesses as well as the huge corporations, is against crony capitalism, for lawsuit reforms to shield people from frivolous lawsuits, and wants corporations to repatriate their money by giving good tax rates for money earned overseas. Trump would be against the Oklahoma Chamber of Commerce's antics at the Capitol.
- Crime: Trump is a supporter of the death penalty, doesn't believe that non violent drug users deserve life in prison, focuses on helping inmates after they have paid their debt to society, supports law enforcement including stop and frisk where it is needed, doesn't believe that there are racial disparities in the criminal justice system beyond what a particular class of people creates for themselves, and in general is tough on criminals but ready to rehabilitate once they have paid their debt to society.
- Drugs: Trump is very anti gang and anti drug, called for the death penalty to drug dealers, prefers that states deal with legalizing pot or keeping it illegal, supports federal law over state law on other drug issues, anti liquor but tolerant of those that use booze, and personally doesn't use drugs, booze, or even coffee.
- Education: Trump is for more vocational training, skeptical of affirmative action in colleges, believes that cutting the federal Dept of Education and returning control to the states is best, anti Common Core, believes the educational system wastes huge amounts of tax money, and believes that we have to educate and not dumb down the curriculum so certain segments of society can pass. Trump believes in the right to school choice including school vouchers and is anti teacher union.
- Energy: Trump recognizes that climate change is a hoax, believes in developing our oil resources wherever they might be, supports coal and fracking, believes the EPA is damaging our economy and environment, and isn't a fan of solar or wind because it is too costly and unreliable.
- Environment: Trump believes in clean water and common sense stewardship of our lands, limited the definition of protected waterways, is a supporter of eminent domain, doesn't believe in animal rights, and supports hunting for those that wish to hunt.
- Foreign Policy: Trump rejects globalism and supports patriotism, supports foreign aid only for countries that are allied with us, holds the UN and NATO countries responsible and insists they pay their fair share of the costs, is anti illegal immigrant, is a big supporter of Israel, uses tough negotiators instead of academic types, understands that the Muslims are a threat to American values and the American public, and believes that tough deal making is better than starting another war. Trump doesn't believe that the U.S. Or the UN can afford to be the world's policeman and that foreign bases are paid for by the hosting countries.
- Government Reform: Trump understands that the main stream media is in the pocket of the donor class is as a big of an enemy as the corporate welfare loving Chamber of Commerce. He believes that for every new regulation two old regulations should be found and eliminated, he believes that former government employees and politicians shouldn't be allowed to lobby for foreign countries or businesses. Trump believes that government waste and corruption is a huge problem, that the government should follow the enumerated powers in the Constitution by focusing on infrastructure and public safety and leave all else to the states and local government or to the people. Trump doesn't support the Super PACS, believes in voter ID being required, believes in stopping soft money or dark money but also believes in unlimited personal contributions. Trump understands too well that money corrupts both businesses and politicians.
- Second Amendment: Trump believes solidly in the Second Amendment, believes that arming and training school employees and teachers will help on school shootings, believes we should end gun free zones including schools and military bases, supports Second Amendment supporting judges, believes that buying lots of guns, ammo, or body armor are not red flags but a right and a responsible thing to do, believes that school shootings are mental health problems, that concealed carry is a right and a good thing for safety, and believes that mental health control is better than gun control.
- Heath Issues: Trump is not a supporter of Obama Care and has helped dismantle it. He is against expanding Medicare, is against Americans paying higher drug prices than in other countries, believes in allowing terminally ill patients try anything reasonable and in limiting the FDA, believes in educating people on vaccines instead of forcing vaccination, believes in removing cross state barriers to health insurance carriers and demanding competition.
- Homeland Security: Trump has banned transsexual troops from serving, has fired over 1500 VA workers for not taking care of veterans, supports increasing military strength and spending, avoid foreign wars and entanglements, wants a stronger nuclear defense, is not against water boarding terrorists, believes that America comes first above all else in security, believes in closely monitoring mosques, keeping Gitmo open and keeping it full of bad guys,
- Welfare: Trump believes that welfare and food stamps ought to be a temporary support, that work makes people better, force all public assistance clients to transition to work, and believes forcing able people back to work is good for them and for society.
In all of that I can think of a handful of things I personally disagree with, the two of any importance being Eminent Domain and the reluctance to strike back at military provocations like the $200 million dollar drone shoot down. Yet that last one, I am sure is more of a game within a game Trump is playing.
Of all of these values the one we have the most problem with here in Oklahoma is crime, we have a huge problem with legislators wanting to divert the cost of crime from the state and local government to the victims. Trump is anything but soft on crime so let's go through the crime issue again in more detail.
First Trump hired Jeff Sessions for the AG initially, a known tough on crime politician and former federal prosecutor. Yet Trump compartmentalizes between punishment and rehabilitation of ex convicts, an intelligent policy. In early February 2017 Trump issued three executive orders, a task force on crime reduction, ideas and recommendations on LEO safety, and enforcing federal laws against transnational criminal organizations.
Trump also warned Chicago to crack down on the homicides or risk the feds coming in. Trump also advocated for the death penalty for high level drug dealers and cop killers and really focused on illegal alien criminals.
Trump advocated the bi-partisan First Step Act which he signed in December of 2018. The law applied the 2010 Fair Sentencing Act, signed by Obama but not applied to sentences applied before 2010. There was a problem, crack cocaine had been thought to been 100 times more dangerous than powder cocaine so the penalties were 100 times harsher. The First Step Act allowed this injustice to be corrected and freed around 1500 inmates or reduced their sentences to match the powder cocaine sentences. That wasn't soft on crime, it restored credibility to the justice system. The law also expanded compassionate release for terminally ill convicts. This is good policy, get the medical care costs off the prison system and a terminally ill patient isn't likely to re offend.
The FSA also required federal prisons to place prisoners closer to family and increased markets for Federal Prison Industries which provides work for federal inmates. The FSA also slightly increased the amount of good time credits from 47 days per year to 54 days per year. Again this is good reform, if an inmate is behaving they ought to be rewarded and having 54 days a year shaved off a sentence is a good reward for a model inmate. Furthermore, to earn these credits the inmate has to participate in education and rehabilitation programs that will likely help them avoid returning to prison.
Trump is also focused on making it possible for ex convicts to re enter the work force, something that is the furthest thing from being soft on crime.
The reality is that Trump is fairly tough on crime. Fifteen hundred sentences shortened in the federal prisons are a drop in the bucket when you consider that 87% of all prisoners in the U.S. are in state and local prisons or jails. Trump separates prison time and after release and it is a better way of approaching criminal justice than continuing to punish ex convicts after they are released and making it impossible to live.
