Today's topics: The McDonald's wars. GOP endorsements for Dems. Abortion as Dems' #1 issue. And this election, to Trump or not to Trump?

By Gary Abernathy

Photo by Alia on Unsplash

The McDonald’s kerfuffle: In Trump-Harris contest, the media claims, without evidence, that it’s unbiased

Donald Trump’s appearance at a McDonald’s restaurant this week to work at the French fry station and serve up some burgers and fries to drive-thru customers was brilliant.

“It was staged!” some complained. Of course it was, just as is every campaign event by all candidates. But it was also authentic, with an actual employee showing Trump how fries are prepared and served, and Trump participating in the familiar ritual of bagging and serving meals to customers (pre-screened in this case, of course) as they drove past the window.

Trump’s long love affair with McDonald’s is well documented. What’s sad, as always, is how the far-left (formerly mainstream) media once again serves as the public relations arm of the Kamala Harris campaign.

Harris claims she worked at a McDonald’s in her youth, but there are no records to prove it and only one witness who claims she remembers Harris mentioning the stint years ago.

That’s all the media needs to verify the story when it comes to Harris. She says it, so it’s true. They write that Trump claims “without evidence” that Harris is lying.

What? Since when is supplying evidence the requirement of those questioning the truth of a claim? Why isn’t the burden of evidence on Harris? Apparently, Harris can make any claim she wants, and if it can’t be disproven it must be accepted as true. Amazing.

Everyone knows – and I’m talking to the most devoted Trump haters in the world – that if the situation was reversed, the media would be reporting, “Trump claimed without evidence that he once worked at McDonald’s.”

Here’s how it would go:

“Donald Trump said Monday without evidence that he once worked at McDonald’s for a few weeks one summer. But an investigation has found no record of his employment, and no former McDonald’s employees remember Trump ever working there.”

But with Harris, anyone – particularly Trump – questioning her claim is the one who’s doing so “without evidence.” Take this article Monday by the Washington Post’s politics writer Philip Bump.  

Bump writes, “By stating Harris had invented her service with the fast-food chain, Trump can play the same game he played with Barack Obama in 2011: Elevate a murky biographical detail in an effort to hopefully make people wary of a Black Democrat.” So it’s racist to question anything Harris claims without evidence?

Bump goes on to detail how he personally tried to verify Harris’ McDonald’s stint with no luck – and yet he still insists Trump is wrong to call it false.

Regarding Trump’s assertion that Harris is lying because no documents exist and no one really remembers it, Bump actually makes this comparison: “It’s like saying that, if America’s collective memory and documentation of its history suddenly evaporated, we could prove that Trump was never president, since no record of his having done so exists.”

Uh, well, yes. That’s exactly right. If America’s collective memory and documentation suddenly evaporated, we certainly could not prove that Trump – or anyone else – was ever president.

Think about that extraordinary leap of logic Bump is making – “if America’s collective memory and documentation of its history suddenly evaporated…” Wow. So if everyone in the United States lost their memory, and if all documentation of U.S. history suddenly evaporated, well, yes, it would be hard to prove anything ever happened.

Maybe Harris did work at McDonald’s. It’s entirely possible, although you would think she could come up with more people who remember it. McDonald’s officials acknowledge that records for part-timers back in the day are hard to come by, and they’re not calling her a liar. But it’s not unreasonable for people, including Trump, to conclude it’s a lie when there’s virtually nothing to back it up.

Again, if this was Trump, the media would demand evidence. Otherwise, they’d label it a lie. The double standard not only lives on, it is on full display each and every day.

Cheney, Taft and GOP endorsements for Democrats

Photo by Kelly Sikkema on Unsplash

Liz Cheney is on the campaign trail with Kamala Harris because Donald Trump has said critical things about her father. Let’s be honest, that’s what it’s all about, not her concern for democracy or the rule of law or any other high-minded reasons. She’s bitter that Trump has disparaged dear old dad.

I like Dick Cheney. I personally would not criticize him or the Bushes as Trump does. But Liz Cheney’s complete capitulation to the Democratic Party and her willingness to endorse someone who stands for everything Cheney has spent her life fighting against is astounding.

But we live in strange times. This week, Bob Taft, a former Ohio governor and member of one of the most prominent families in Republican history, endorsed Ohio Democrat Sherrod Brown for re-election to the U.S. Senate. Brown is in a neck-and-neck campaign with GOP challenger Bernie Moreno.

In his letter to the editor to the Dayton Daily News announcing his decision, Taft cites three main reasons for his endorsement: Brown’s support of Wright-Patterson Air Force Base; Brown’s annual acceptance of Taft’s invitation to speak at the University of Dayton (where Taft has been a faculty member for several years); and Brown’s longevity in the Senate.

Well, Moreno will surely also fight for Wright-Patt, as every Ohio senator and congressman does, regardless of party, since it’s one of Ohio’s major employers and crucial to a significant portion of southwest Ohio’s economy. And there’s no doubt Moreno would come and speak at UD if Taft would invite him. And longevity cuts both ways – Brown has become part of the entrenched Washington bureaucracy.

As is the case with Cheney and Harris, Taft’s endorsement of Brown signals just how meaningless his so-called commitment to conservative causes really is. You can’t truly believe in free enterprise, lower taxes, the right to bear arms and the right to life and endorse either Kamala Harris or Sherrod Brown.  

No, the reason for Taft’s endorsement likely comes back to Trump. The Taft wing of the party strikes me as similar to the Bush-Cheney wing – blueblood Republicans who don’t line up well with the Trump wing. Taft has not, to my knowledge, endorsed Harris. But I’m also not aware of him vocalizing any support for Trump.

Moreno won the GOP primary and became the party’s nominee because Trump endorsed him, and a Trump/MAGA-style candidate is simply not a Taft kind of Republican. No doubt Brown was smart enough to know all this, and the sitting senator has obviously ingratiated himself with Taft over the years and called on him to make this choice.

One thing Trump has done along his bizarre journey is to expose the hypocrisy that has existed among some in the GOP who insisted they held firm beliefs on various conservative issues, only to see them abandon those beliefs — or at least any strong dedication to fighting for them — because of a personal dislike of Trump or Trump-style candidates.

Is abortion the winner Democrats think it is?

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Democrats have largely made “abortion rights” the centerpiece of their messaging during this election cycle, emboldened by various state-level victories intended to codify abortion in the wake of the Supreme Court’s overturning of Roe v. Wade.

Clearly — and sadly — when presented as a stand-alone ballot issue, the right to an abortion is supported now by a majority of Americans. But I think Democrats are too optimistic in their belief that it registers as a top issue among most Americans. The economy and the dangers presented by the Biden-Harris open border policy will likely carry the day in the presidential race.

Polls consistently show that while a majority of Americans will now support a right to abortion, most Americans also believe in restrictions and that protections should be in place as the pregnancy advances. In other words, as a pregnancy moves along, support for allowing abortion dissipates. What’s important for pro-life candidates is to rightly point out that so much abortion legislation written in recent years includes no restrictions, which is also the position of many abortion-rights candidates, as is made clear when they’re asked to directly answer that question.

The pro-life side has been losing the abortion battle in part because we are using the language of the left. Pro-lifers must get back to describing abortion for what it really is — and what it really does to unborn children — and not fall into the trap of using the Orwellian language invented by abortion advocates. That doesn’t mean being crude or overly graphic. But it means being honest and factual.

I’ve long argued that the best chance and the smartest tactic to reverse the abortion trend is to appeal to hearts and minds rather than focusing on changing laws. But hopefully, this election demonstrates that being an abortion-rights advocate is not an automatic ticket to electoral success.

To Trump or not to Trump, that is the question

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After Donald Trump refused to accept the results of the 2020 election and decided not to attend Joe Biden’s inauguration, I felt that Trump had let the country down and disqualified himself from future consideration. I believed that while Trumpism would remain the dominant strain of Republicanism, most Republicans, even of the MAGA variety, would settle on another standard-bearer, most likely Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis. But the majority of Republican voters were not ready to move on.

Back in 2015 and ’16, I was excited about Trump’s emergence and was quickly in support of his nomination. I saw him as a break with the stale and, frankly, losing direction the GOP had been on for quite a while. I thought that once elected, he might be a transformational president cutting through the traditional mindset and talking points to forge a new coalition not wedded to past orthodoxies or grievances.

I was wrong. Trump was not big enough to overcome his own ego and rise above the petty attacks against him. He quickly sank to the level of his enemies.

While Trump lost the popular vote in 2016, he still cobbled together a coalition of voters that neither John McCain in 2008 nor Mitt Romney in 2012 had managed to amass – primarily blue collar workers and other disaffected Americans who were not normally politically active. It was enough to win the electoral college, which no traditional Reagan-Bush Republican would have accomplished – and still would not today.

Trump morphed the GOP from Reagan conservatism to Trump populism with a conservative leaning. I love Ronald Reagan as much as anyone. He was one of our greatest presidents. But it has been a long time since 1980 or 1984.

The worst thing Trump did after the election of 2020 was not related to the January 6 riot at the Capitol. Trump neither organized nor directed that. It happened of its own momentum, and Trump was along for the ride.

No, the worst thing Trump did was fail to show up on Jan. 20, 2021, when Biden was sworn into office. Every outgoing president or the loser of the presidential race (sometimes one and the same) has a responsibility to demonstrate to the world that in the U.S., we all acknowledge and honor the peaceful transfer of power. Even Hillary Clinton did that for Trump, as did many others who were certainly not happy to be there (the Obamas, the Bushes, etc.). Trump was a small man not to do the same for Biden.

All that aside, here we are in 2024 and the choice is Donald Trump or Kamala Harris. Despite my disappointment in how Trump handled his loss four years ago, I have no hesitation in casting my vote for him this November. I won’t write in someone’s name as a protest, or vote for one of the minor candidates. That’s a wasted vote.

Either Trump or Harris will be our next president, and we should all be weighing in on which one it will be.  The issues I believe in – free enterprise, a society with only the minimal government necessary for our collective well-being, the right to use the energy sources of our choosing, securing our borders and vetting who crosses them, the right to bear arms, the protection of life even in the womb, and opposing a Big Brother mentality that thinks government holds the answer to our well-being and even our happiness – makes the choice a no-brainer.

Let’s be clear: Donald Trump is no more a threat to democracy than Kamala Harris. Trump is a blowhard at worst.

And, frankly, sometimes he’s a blowhard at best. He’s not a revolutionary. He’s not a savior. He’s not destined to be regarded as a great president, although the coalition that supports him has become a great power. Someday, the MAGA movement might get the leader it deserves.

But in his own unique way, there are admirable traits about Trump. He truly is a man of the people, a billionaire with a common touch. He really is comfortable manning the French fry station at a McDonald’s or working a rope line. He enjoys being around the “common folk.”

I believe he loves our country, even if in a rather self-serving way. He loves the free enterprise system. He loves capitalism. He loves freedom.

I also appreciate that Trump is extremely disinclined to engage the U.S. in war. He is not a warmonger. The U.S. must defend itself from aggression, and freedom and democracy are worth fighting and dying for. But such action should come only after many other avenues are exhausted, and I am confident Trump is that kind of president – as he demonstrated in his first term.

And he has the courage of his convictions. By pure accident I happened to be watching television on July 13 when they switched live to his rally. I heard the shots and saw Trump reach for the right side of his head and duck for cover. My first thought was hoping he was not dead, not only for his sake but for what that would do to the country.

My second thought was watching for how he reacted if he was alive and unharmed. Even if he was ok, would he rush out, scrunched between his protection detail, or demonstrate a level of fear or panic? One could hardly blame him if he did, but I knew his haters would try to make hay with it – Trump the coward. Look how he reacts to danger. Look how the tough-talking guy really responds when the going gets rough.

When Trump stood up, blood on his face, and insisted on sticking around long enough to pump his fist and exhort his audience to “Fight! Fight! Fight!” it showed me – and probably millions of others, even some haters – a lot about him and his character. As far as he knew, more bullets could have been flying. Even if he heard his detail say that the attacker was down, no one knew yet if there was more than one assailant.

Say what you will, think what you want, but Trump’s bluster is equaled by his fortitude. While his ego, hubris and need for constant attention rob him, and us, of the possibility of greatness, the fact is, his persona is a match for our times, as I once spelled out in a Washington Post column. Why aren’t people more shocked by some of Trump’s comments or actions? Have you looked around at our society – especially things that have resulted from the politics of the left? What remains to shock us?

I fear far more a country that would take shape under a Harris presidency than a Trump administration. And so my choice this year is easy.

‘MAGA Republicans Are Already Normal,’ in Print & eBook

My new book, “MAGA Republicans Are Already Normal — And Other Shocking Notions,” is available on Amazon. Buy it here.

The book (actually much thicker than the illustrations above indicate — the hardcover and paperback are each 453 pages) is a compilation of many of the columns I wrote for The Washington Post from 2017 to 2023, and covers a variety of topics.

Here’s a link to our website dedicated to the book. Thank you!

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