The Two Establishments are in Cahoots

The Bush family dynasty has again shown that its members are much more comfortable with Hillary Clinton — the predictable and tainted career politician — than with the Republican Party’s unpredictable and unpolished nominee, a man who isn’t deeply entrenched in Establishment ties.

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It’s no secret that the Bush family likely holds a grudge against Donald Trump for his brutal beat down of Jeb during the Republican primary season, including the belittling rhetoric Trump used against “low-energy Jeb.” But when it comes down to party loyalty against the liberal alternative this election season, the Bushes have indicated the GOP Establishment has other bones to pick with Trump.

“They continually vote for political reform, sending people to Washington hoping they will do something, and are then betrayed as the newly elected representatives become a saccharine travesty of the reform they clamored for.”

While at a private fundraiser in Cincinnati Tuesday for Ohio Sen. Rob Portman, former President George W. Bush criticized Trump for his policies advocating for “isolationism, nativism, and protectionism,” The Wall Street Journal reported. Bush also expressed some concerns with Trump’s break from the traditional GOP party platform.

Trump, who runs his campaign on the slogans “Make America Great Again,” “Make America Safe Again,” and “America First,” has taken a stance against free trade and for the renegotiation of current trade deals, banning all Muslim immigration into the U.S. until further notice, and reconsidering current and longstanding military alliances. Trump has also repeatedly criticized Bush for the Iraq War.

And all of that didn’t sit too well with Bush.

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“It was an interesting exercise of statecraft,” Ken Blackwell, a former Ohio secretary of state, told WSJ. “No one could say he directly spoke in attack mode against Donald Trump. Neither could anybody miss the fact that he thought there were some cutting-edge issues that Trump is advancing that need to be scrutinized and debated.”

This is not the first time that George W. Bush, Jeb Bush, and former President George H.W. Bush have expressed their disapproval for Trump. No Bush attended the Republican National Convention in July, and none of them have endorsed Trump’s presidential bid.

The Bushes are far from alone among the reluctant, dismissive, or hostile GOP elite in their rejection of Trump. Ohio Gov. John Kasich — a former rival of Trump’s — declined to attend the convention housed in his own state. Arizona Sen. John McCain, the 2008 Republican nominee, as well as former Massachusetts Gov. and 2012 Republican nominee Mitt Romney, were also no-shows. Although McCain has endorsed Trump, he did so reluctantly, as did House Speaker Paul Ryan, who did attend and speak at the RNC.

“No political leader since Ronald Reagan has created the excitement and buzz that Donald Trump has. He is the first politician since that late, great president to … speak directly to the American people.”

But why have these members of the GOP Establishment expressed such distaste — and even fear — for Trump and his platform? Why are they choosing to essentially sabotage Trump’s campaign and causing a deep party rift that will only serve to aid Clinton? After all — Clinton is such an easy target, with a slew of scandals accrued over a lifetime of corruption and lies. Why won’t the GOP focus on attacking her, instead of demeaning Trump? Are the elite afraid of more than just Trump himself? Perhaps there is more to Bush’s critiques of “isolationism, nativism, and protectionism” than meets the eye.

“Trump is an exciting political presence, responsible for drawing new people into the political process,” Lou Murray, an RNC delegate, wrote in a July 18 op-ed in The Boston Globe. “The American people today are frustrated. They feel our whole political process is unresponsive. They continually vote for political reform, sending people to Washington hoping they will do something, and are then betrayed as the newly elected representatives become a saccharine travesty of the reform they clamored for.”

Trump has ridden a vast wave of populism to the forefront of the American political spectrum, championing the democratic voice of the people in having a say in their country’s future.

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“No political leader since Ronald Reagan has created the excitement and buzz that Donald Trump has. He is the first politician since that late, great president to go over the heads of the media and elite ruling class and speak directly to the American people,” Murray wrote, adding Trump is such a danger to the GOP elite because he is “beholden to no one.”

“He is concerned that our country is no longer a country, and that America has sold out its sovereignty to a nondemocratic internationalist order, at the expense of the American worker and of American jobs,” Murray wrote. “Trump speaks for the average American worker. He wants prosperity at home and peace abroad. His conservatism is not a dogma. Trump seeks to conserve our best values at home, and not go abroad promoting monolithic internationalism — a monster of many tentacles, as John Quincy Adams warned.”

So for the members of the GOP establishment to ignore the will and voices of the people by actively opposing or passively rejecting Trump reeks of a strict adherence to the political norm — whether it be Republican or Democratic.