For My Republican Friends

Early presidential voting is kicking off.

It’s time for me to stop foaming at the mouth and start trying to influence things.

For my friends who have been Republicans for decades — who voted for Reagan and McCain and Romney over the years — please read on.

Here’s President Reagan on NATO: “If our fellow democracies are not secure, we cannot be secure. If you are threatened, we are threatened. And if you are not at peace, we cannot be at peace.”

Here’s Donald Trump on NATO: “Someone said, ‘Sir! Would you leave us if we don’t pay our bills?’ They hated my answer. I said, ‘Yeah, I would consider it.'”

Trump’s former National Security Advisor, John Bolton, made it even more explicit: If Trump wins in November, “the U.S. will be out of NATO.”

Here’s President Reagan on free trade:

America’s most recent experiment with protectionism was a disaster for the working men and women of this country. When Congress passed the Smoot-Hawley tariff in 1930, we were told that it would protect America from foreign competition and save jobs in this country — the same line we hear today. The actual result was the Great Depression, the worst economic catastrophe in our history; one out of four Americans were thrown out of work.

Here’s Donald Trump on the same subject:

We are going to have 10% to 20% tariffs on foreign countries that have been ripping us off for years, we are gonna charge them 10% to 20% to come in and take advantage of our country because that is what they have been doing.

President Reagan famously said that the Eleventh Commandment was: “Thou shalt not speak ill of any fellow Republican.”

Donald Trump called Dick Cheney, for whom you voted, “an irrelevant RINO.”

Donald Trump had this to say about John McCain, for whom you voted: “He’s not a war hero. He was a war hero because he was captured. I like people who weren’t captured.”

Donald Trump called Mitt Romney, for whom you voted, a “pompous ass” — and that was before Romney voted to impeach him.

Donald Trump called Paul Ryan, for whom you voted, “a loser who left Congress in disgrace.” I don’t remember whether that was before or after Trump called Ryan “weak” and “stupid.”

And Donald Trump, of course, stood silent for three hours while a mob attacked the Capitol Building on January 6, 2021.  Trump neither asked the mob to stop nor asked the National Guard to protect the legislative branch.

Can you imagine Reagan, or Cheney, or McCain, or Romney, or Ryan doing the same?

I know that you’re a Republican. I know that you think Democrats are the enemy.

But please think hard about Trump before you vote.

---

  Mark Herrmann spent 17 years as a partner at a leading international law firm and is now deputy general counsel at a large international company. He is the author of The Curmudgeon’s Guide to Practicing Law and Drug and Device Product Liability Litigation Strategy (affiliate links). You can reach him by email at [email protected].