By Scott Johnson
Donald Trump has proved himself to be a man with substantial insight into the mind of the average Republican voter, a category in which I place myself (in case that's not obvious from my comments here over the past many years). Having made illegal immigration and American greatness the primary themes of his campaign, he floated to the top of a competitive field and has if anything continued to increase his lead over the rest of the field, at least as measured by the national polls so far. I think Trump's candidacy represents a reaction to the Age of Obama among Republican voters.
Obama's promotion of illegal immigration represents a larger component of the Obama syndrome. It stands for Obama's promotion of lawlessness for political purposes.
Bret Stephens assesses Obama's approach to foreign policy in his book America In Retreat: The New Isolationism and the Coming Global Disorder (now available in paperback). David Bernstein takes the measure of Obama's lawlessness in Lawless: The Obama Administration's Unprecedented Assault on the Constitution and the Rule of Law. These books are essential guides to the Age of Obama.
Except insofar as they take up the issue of immigration, Republican candidates haven't made a theme of Obama's lawlessness or the restoration of the rule of law. (Ted Cruz, incidentally, contributed the foreword to Bernstein's book.) I think the theme badly needs a spokesman in the campaign. Bernstein himself shows what a useful tool it was in Obama's hands in the 2008 campaign.
Obama's promotion of illegal immigration, Obama's rule by executive decree, Obama's disparagement of law enforcement in the service of the racial hustle, Obama's assault on the rule of law — there seems to be a method to this madness. They all take us closer to the status of a Third World country.
In the 1968 presidential campaign, Richard Nixon promised the restoration of law and order in response to the riot culture that has seen its return over the closing years of the Age of Obama. Nixon smartly called out LBJ Attorney General Ramsey Clark as a conscientious objector in the war against crime.
Obama is something worse than a conscientious objector; he is more of an agitator-in-chief. If updated with the necessary changes and elaborated properly, it is a theme that would make an important contribution to the campaign.
