On January 30th, President Donald Trump gave his very first State of the Union address, and shall we say it was just…… ‘yuge’. From a Libertarian standpoint, it was a pretty good speech, and most Americans shared these sentiments. In fact, according to a CBS News poll, 75% of Americans thought the speech was good and unifying. Furthermore, even 43% of Democrats thought the speech was good. The poll also said that 91% of people favored what they heard on infrastructure, 81% felt that the President was unifying the country, 75% favored what they heard on national security, and 72% favored what they heard on immigration. What he achieved that night, by any standard, was a massive success. Moreover, his use of rhetoric made the speech well executed and delivered, particularly in how he consistently incorporated sympathetic victims of bad policy to tell a story. That story was very different than that of Obama’s.
Trump’s main point during his speech was that America is a great nation. He spoke about how anyone, from anywhere, can make something of themselves in this country.
“This, in fact, is our new American moment, there has never been a better time to start living the American dream, so to every citizen watching home tonight no matter where you’ve been or where you come from this is your time if you work hard if you believe in yourself if you believe in America and you can dream anything you can be anything and together we can achieve absolutely anything”.
Obama’s speeches were very much the opposite. He didn’t talk about how 99% of Americans live above the global poverty line, Obama did not talk about how in America people have access to computers, he did not talk about how people in this country can make money if they work hard, or that we are born with natural rights. Instead, he would always talk about the supposed institutionalized discrimination of minorities and women and go on to further support the hierarchy of intersectionality, in which everyone is a victim, and everyone is marginalized by society. Thus, it is laughable when the media suggests that Trump’s speech was dark, because the fact of the matter is, it was unifying, and it talked about the common values that we as Americans share, in that America is the greatest country in the world.
Aside from the rhetoric of the speech, there were some other aspects that were well received. Most notable was his excellent argument for the recent tax cuts, something the Republicans didn’t do very well, mainly because they spoke about it in very broad terms, rather than talking about what they would do for the average American family. What’s even more interesting is that most people thought they’d be losing money, but that’s not true, almost everyone got to keep a few thousand dollars that would have otherwise been paid in taxes. Trump extolled “The typical American family of four, with a household income with 75,000 dollars will see their tax bill reduced by $2,000, slashing it in half.”and “We eliminated, an especially cruel tax, that fell mostly on Americans making less than 50k a year, that would force them to pay tremendous penalties simply because they couldn’t afford government healthcare, the core of the disastrous Obamacare, the individual mandate is now gone.” It’s quotes like these that really helped aid what the point the President was trying to make about the tax cuts.
Americans needed to hear this, because the fact of the matter is, the media has been extremely dishonest in representing the policies enacted by President Trump. They lied about suggesting tax cuts would hurt the economy, and that the repeal of the individual mandate is going to kill many Americans. Both of these things, however, allow for the average American to keep more money in his/her wallet. In addition, he further emphasized that when the corporate tax rate is lowered, the worker will make more money. The reality is, when the corporate tax rate is lowered, jobs come back to the United States, and workers already here get a raise or a bonus. It’s sad that many of the Americans watching didn’t know this because they were lied to by the media. Don’t you all remember when the pundits were on TV, talking about how there was no “historical evidence” to suggest that when companies are given tax breaks, the money saved from the taxes would go to the worker? Don’t you remember that these pundits often said that these policies would, in fact, hurt the worker? Don’t you remember that they said the people who owned these companies would spend the money rather than invest it? Well, what happened? 164 companies gave AT MINIMUM $1,000 bonuses to millions- yes that’s right- millions of people, and what’s even better is that these changes alone are estimated to grow family income by over $4,000 dollars.
The Libertarian movement revolves around the idea that a small and less restrictive government is better for a nation because it allows for the individual to exercise his or her freedoms without being told what they can or cannot do. It is, in essence, a pro-choice government, in that you will have more options on how you choose to live your life without being penalized. Today, many Americans see that the government is becoming too large, and it is encroaching on our liberties and pursuit of happiness.What best demonstrates this is that we see a government that is spending money excessively on programs that waste money and also further increase the citizens’ dependence on government. Therefore, there are certain things Libertarians saw, that made them somewhat disappointed in Trump’s speech. That was, Trump did not talk about fiscal responsibility; Trump made no mention of deficits or debts, and made no mention about reducing the size of the government. Furthermore, he mentioned that he planned to blow out spending on infrastructure by about 2.5 trillion dollars. What’s wrong with that is, thus far there have been no spending cuts, and we are in fact going to be spending more, but due to the tax cuts, the amount of money being brought in will be less, therefore increasing the federal debt. So right now, our parents may not be paying for this, but when we get older, we will be the ones suffering the consequences, and in turn will be losing more money in taxes, making us serf’s to the government.
Now that we’ve gone over the good, and the bad, let’s get to the ugly. Luckily for Trump, the ugly had nothing to do with him, but that of the behavior of the Democrats. It was clear that the Democrats have chosen not to be the Progressive Party, but simply the anti-Trump party. It was clear that whatever Trump said, they were not going to applaud no matter how great, or unifying it may have been. For example, when he acknowledged a young boy named Preston, who helped place approximately 40,000 flags on the graves of fallen soldiers by saying this: “Young patriots like Preston teach all of us about our civic duty as Americans. […] Preston’s reverence for those who have served our nation reminds us of why we salute our flag, why we put our hands on our hearts, and why we proudly stand for the national anthem”. After saying this, there was a standing ovation, and cheers throughout the audience, but while this was happening we saw the Democrats sitting down and looking very annoyed. In fact, you could see Nancy Pelosi almost gritting her teeth.
To the majority of Americans, when they see Democrats sitting as President Trump talks about being patriotic, it makes them feel that they don’t care about this country because they feel it’s bad to be patriotic and that people are justified in being disrespectful during the anthem. It’s because they’ve begun to lynch onto this idea about intersectional politics, in which if you are a member of a minority group you are justified in kneeling during the anthem simply because America is a terrible society which has wronged you. This just goes to show that the Democrats are out of touch with reality. The fact of the matter is most Americans think America is a great place, and that it is ludicrous to suggest that America is not. You know why? Because it’s the truth! Because of America, we now have access to things we don’t even think about: a cell phone, the internet, and even the ability to become successful through working hard. Another example of the Democrat’s unwillingness to accept that Trump can be unifying is when Trump talked about his new Immigration plan, in which he now is offering FULL AMNESTY TO 1.8 MILLION ILLEGAL IMMIGRANTS. Just to put that into perspective, DACA covered only about 700,000 illegal immigrants, and it only gave them green cards, while Trump’s new plan gives them citizenship 10 years into staying. What Trump just proposed is much more generous than anything Obama did during his presidency. Be that as it may, the Democrats still found a way to criticize Trump rather than praising his seemingly liberal policy. Immediately after the State of the Union, Democrats were quick to call Trump racist, simply because he said “Americans are dreamers too”, and in addition, wished that in exchange for granting amnesty to the 1.8 million illegals, he wanted to see an end to chain migration, the lottery visa system, and to putt 25 billion dollars toward funding the wall. This clearly sends a message to the American people, that first, Trump is not racist, because he’s letting 1.8 million illegal immigrants, most of whom are not white, stay in the country. Secondly, it shows that despite Trump giving the Democrats MORE than what they wanted, they will still call him racist, refuse to allow for border security, and also allow for the Dreamers under DACA to suffer, all simply because Trump is the one proposing this policy. The fact of the matter is, America is increasingly seeing the Democrats as anti-American, and it is made evident in every special election. Thus far, Republican candidates have won all of them, except in Mississippi, despite how the media often projected a Democratic win, most notably in Georgia’s sixth congressional district, where CNN predicted a Democratic win by two points but ended up losing by five. The only reason as to why the Democrats won in Mississippi was simply because Roy Moore was a pedophile, that’s it. Democrats need to realize that although Trump has a history of decisiveness, he can be unifying, and by Democrats demonstrating their discontent with Trump to the point where they won’t even applaud the things that every American should agree on or even their own policy, they will surely lose more seats in November of 2018.
It may appear that there is an anti-democratic/leftist bias present, and that Libertarians are just reactionary Trump supporters, however, it’s just being intellectually honest and consistent. Often times, Libertarians disagree with Trump on a multitude of issues, however, many think of Libertarians as supporters of Trump’s policies, because they frequently defend them, but the fact of the matter is, it’s just honesty. The media, and much of the American left, has been first, extremely dishonest about how Trump’s policies impact the country, and secondly have often been inconsistent in their attacks. Libertarians believe that small government is the key to a successful nation, and that being intellectually honest, and not lying about particular policies will lead us there.