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Current GOP is the RINO these days

DEAR EDITOR:

In the wake of Dick Cheney announcing his support of Kamala Harris, former President Donald Trump, in typical fashion, flung two pejoratives at Cheney. He called the former vice president a RINO and said Cheney was “irrelevant.”

RINO, of course, is no longer used to describe a traditional “Republican in Name Only,” but is a slur reserved for anyone who does not bow to Trump. It’s become a joke. As to Cheney’s alleged irrelevance, I at first thought it was a needlessly disrespectful description of a former congressman, defense secretary and vice president. But, of course, Trump thrives on being disrespectful to those who are his intellectual superiors or those whose life experiences exceed his.

I’ve since concluded that “irrelevant” is the exact word that describes Cheney in today’s Republican Party, because it is Republican in name only. The GOP has become the party of Trump. It is a cult that reflects only Trump’s positions (more accurately, his feelings) on any given day.

His followers eagerly attach themselves to his catch phrases. Consider “America First,” a phrase used by isolationists between the two World Wars.The belief that if Americans only minded their own business they would be better off is what allowed Hitler’s tanks to overrun Europe, his rockets to rain down on England and his gas chambers to murder six million Jewish people. It took Japan to pull us into the war with the attack on Pearl Harbor.

Just as Trump built his television career on the phrase “You’re Fired!” he has built his political career on “Make America Great Again.” I never understood how anyone who actually heard the words “you’re fired” could think they were funny. And yet …

Likewise, the appeal of MAGA eludes me. He’s been telling us for 10 years – including four during which he was president – that America is not great and that only he can make it great again. The America that I grew up in wasn’t perfect, but on the whole, “great” describes it better than most other adjectives.

So if we shouldn’t vote for Trump to make an already great country great again, why should we vote for him? There is no good reason, because Trump and his campaign are based on lies (like that the election was stolen), on exaggerated grievances and fears, and on slogans that are as meaningless as a promise to make the trains run on time.

There are some bad reasons to vote for him. If you really respect a wannabe strongman who is letting a think tank funded by billionaires draft his game plan, and if you’re impressed with a guy who admires Vladimir Putin, Kim Jong Un, Viktor Orban, Xi Jinping and the like, then, congratulations. Trump is your guy.

DENNIS B. MANGAN

Howland

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