Donald Trump awakened this morning to a Wall Street Journal editorial, “The Third-Party Temptation,” warning against the search for an independent candidate who “would give conservatives an honorable alternative to Trump-Hillary.” The Journal in effect called on all concerned to (grudgingly) accept the choice of “the millions of Republicans who have voted for Mr. Trump.”
Trump wasted no time in showing that the Journal is wrong. He reminded us why serious people, including serious conservatives, cannot acquiesce in Donald Trump as their candidate.
Calling in to Fox and Friends, Donald Trump, as Politico summarized it, “alleged that Ted Cruz’s father was with John F. Kennedy’s assassin shortly before he murdered the president, parroting a National Enquirer story claiming that Rafael Cruz was pictured with Lee Harvey Oswald handing out pro-Fidel Castro pamphlets in New Orleans in 1963.”
Here’s Trump in his own crazed words:
“His father was with Lee Harvey Oswald prior to Oswald’s being — you know, shot. I mean, the whole thing is ridiculous. What is this, right prior to his being shot, and nobody even brings it up. They don’t even talk about that. That was reported, and nobody talks about it. I mean, what was he doing — what was he doing with Lee Harvey Oswald shortly before the death? Before the shooting? It’s horrible.”
What’s horrible is a leading presidential candidate trading in crackpot conspiracy theories. But of course this is the same man who, during this presidential campaign, accused George Bush of knowingly lying about Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction in order to justify the Iraq war. This is the same man who, in the previous presidential campaign cycle, trafficked in conspiracy theories about Barack Obama’s birth certificate. This is a man whose temperament and character render him unfit to be president of the United States–whether or not he succeeds in securing the nomination of one of our two major political parties.
But keeping quiet about this fact, and refusing to act on it, is, according to the Journal, a matter of political prudence. For if we succeed in providing a choice for Americans other than Trump and Hillary Clinton, we who are engaged in that effort could be blamed for Trump’s defeat. We could also allegedly make life more complicated for Republican candidates for the House of Representatives.
Tough. Donald Trump should not be president of the United States. The Wall Street Journal cannot bring itself to say that. We can say it, we do say it, and we are proud to act accordingly.
