So much about this presidential campaign is a puzzle and I’m having trouble finding the pieces to complete it.
I’ll start and finish with Donald J. Trump, the presumptive Republican nominee.
He has tossed every single bit of conventional wisdom into the Dumpster. Trump has no public service experience; he has demonstrated zero understanding of how government works; he has blustered, bullied and bloviated his way to this point in the campaign; his insults and innuendo should have doomed his candidacy months ago; his personal history is, well, checkered.
To my way of thinking, the most confusing element of this campaign is the absence of any philosophical grounding for this individual.
In normal election years, Democrats nominate a candidate who stands for a set of principles; Republicans do the same.
Hillary Clinton is about to become the Democratic nominee. She, too, has switched positions on occasion as she battles Sen. Bernie Sanders for her party’s nomination.
But one gets a general idea of Clinton’s world view: It seems to tilt left, with a more hawkish view of the use of military power than her more progressive political brethren.
Trump? Where does this guy stand? On anything?
He changes his positions almost hourly. Women should face punishment if they obtain an abortion; on second thought, he didn’t mean that. He would ban Muslims from entering the United States; oh, wait, that’s just a “suggestion.” He once was pro-choice on abortion; now he’s pro-life. He once called Hillary Clinton “great”; now he calls her “Crooked Hillary.” He said Mexico is sending drug dealers, rapists and killers into this country: but he says “I love Hispanics.” He has boasted about his philandering; now he seeks to woo the evangelical voters who comprise much of the GOP “base.”
How is Clinton going to campaign against any of that? How is she going to pit her ideas against his ideas, when he doesn’t seem to stand on a single principle — other than furthering his own ambition?
The late Gertrude Stein once said of Oakland, Calif., that “there is no ‘there’ there.”
I’m sensing that Trump lacks a “there.”
