With Donald Trump my childhood bias against New Yorkers makes it difficult for me to even listen to him, let alone take him seriously as a Presidential candidate. Growing up in rural northeast PA, an area invaded by discontented city dwellers seeking the quiet bucolic life, yet who upon arrival loudly demanded amenities (city sidewalks and streetlights for example) and vocally attempted to school the PA Dutch rural folks on how things should be done influenced my perception of New Yorkers dramatically.. Being one of those backward PA Dutch hicks, a healthy disdain for loud, brash New Yorkers blossomed. Of course, there are a few other things, beyond the bad comb-over, that make me wary of The Donald, like his womanizing ways, which speaks to a character issue that my straitlaced upbringing taught me to view with a jaundiced eye. Then there’s the over-the-top braggadocio and brash mannerisms, which clash with my view that humility is a virtue to be revered.
Of course, to take on the Washington establishment and our venal mainstream media, it’s unlikely the milquetoast, humble types stand a chance of even getting noticed, let alone feared by the permanent political class or the press and that’s why with The Donald they’re pulling out all the stops to demonize, discredit and derail his presidential campaign.
While I can’t see myself voting for Donald Trump, mostly because I want a CINC with a calmer temperament and less bombast, but that Washington outsider/not-a-politician attitude appeals to me a great deal. So far, Carly Fiorina, another successful business person, has captured my interest. With each interview, she shines brighter and there’s a careful, well-studied manner to the way she artfully handles questions, which speaks to time spent researching the gamut of subjects she’s been quizzed on. She can artfully turn gotcha questions right back on the interviewer, she doesn’t wilt under pressure and she doesn’t back down. Plus, she lacks the theatrical circus atmosphere of the Donald Trump campaign, awash in reality show drama.
One of my favorite analysts, G. Murphy Donovan, a native New Yorker to boot, boldly penned a piece, “Trump’s Trump”, at the The American Thinker today, which pinpointed many of the truths nudging at my consciousness about the relentless charge to annihilate Donald Trump’s presidential campaign quickly:
“In any case, the merits of entrepreneurs like Trump might best be defined by the character or motives of his critics. Trump detractors are for the most part “B” list politicians, ambulance chasers, and a left-leaning Press corps that lionizes the likes of Nina Totenberg, Dan Rather, Chris Matthews, Andrea Mitchell, and Brian Williams.
If the truth were told, most of Trump’s critics are jealous, envious of his wealth -e- and they loath his candor. Donald might also be hated for what he is not. Trump is not a lawyer, nor is he a career politician who lives on the taxpayer dime. Trump is paying for his own campaign. Bernie, Barack, McCain, and Kerry could take enterprise lessons from a chap like Trump.”
Read more: http://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2015/07/trumps_trump.html#ixzz3hBnnwmAC
Follow us: @AmericanThinker on Twitter | AmericanThinker on Facebook
Likewise, the GOP establishment roils with anger and dismay that a political outsider is successfully gaining traction without the aid of their political backing, advice, or money. Therein enters John McCain, the Republican the media rolls out at every turn as the voice of the GOP. As a frequent critic and definitely not a member of the John McCain fan club, I’ve penned many harsh critiques questioning his foreign policy expertise and his motives. Here’s my rather prescient view from June 2, 2013, “The GOP policy maverick rides again (unfortunately)”:
“Andrew McCarthy penned a brutally honest assessment of the John McCain Arab democracy projects in a National Review piece, “Syria: John McCain’s Next Libya” (article here). It’s way past time for the GOP to take away the megaphones from John McCain and Lindsey Graham. They spend more time being simultaneously for and against issues than John Kerry and that sure takes policy acrobatics to a whole new level. These two relish all the media attention and they hog the media spotlight to such an extent that President Obama gets a pass on these policy debacles, because Graham and McCain so generously stamp the GOP seal of approval all over these foreign policy disasters. It seems like only a few upstarts like Ted Cruz and Rand Paul have the guts to stand up to these bloviating relics. The GOP needs an internal rebellion or maybe it’s time for a new party, because the GOP doesn’t seem to welcome new ideas and their “maverick” should be put out to pasture with his woefully misguided foreign policy adventure notions.”
The GOP’s internal rebellion has come to pass, let us see which maverick rides the winning horse into the sunset.
libertybelle diaries 
Dead on, LB… (We come from similar small town backgrounds, although my home town was further south, just north of Reading. My paternal grandfather spoke fluent Deutch, and my last name is German.) I feel the same way about Trump. I don’t think he has a chance at the presidential nomination, but I reluctantly admire the way he has of speaking plain truth to the power brokers of the GOP, much to their chagrin. The RNC and the Party Elites, the long-serving—self-serving—Congressional lever-pullers. They have been beating the “broaden the base” drum for at least the last 4 presidential elections, and the results are obvious. Many of us who used to be Republicans have quit the Party in disgust as the “suits” in Washington moved ever further to the left and into the RINO camp. Every poll shows that most of the remaining people in the Republican Base are either “conservative” or “leaning conservative”, but the power brokers like Carl Rove think they can ignore them, because they have nowhere else to go. They are delusional. We conservative Republicans and former GOP Independents and Libertarians lost finally patience and said “hell no” to yet another “big government”, establishment RINO, Mitt Romney. We showed we had another choice: we could stay home. Four and a half million people that held their noses and voted for John McCain–or at least against Barak Obama—-refused to come out to the polls and vote for Romney, and it cost him the election. Like me, they are sick, tired and disgusted with being taken for granted. The GOP fat cats should be wooing us and our votes, not the Hispanics—who are all going to vote Democratic anyway. Trump has the gonads to speak truth to power. He is addressing our concerns: illegal aliens out, the Border sealed, making the U.S. economically-competitive again, taking on China and Russia and the Jihadis internationally, funding a strong military and taking care of our Servicemenbers. And the GOP leadereship hates it. I don’t like the guy, but at this point I admire him. He’s a fighter and a plain-talker. The Republican leadership, instead of bitching and moaning and complaining about what a mean man he is, should start paying attention to the clear fact that what he is saying is resonating with their Base, and perhaps seriously addressing those issues themselves.
Something Kinnison mentions among other stuff got my attention. Mr. Donovan referencing it too.
The former, ” … taking care of our Servicemenbers …” and the latter, ” … He is also a Johnny-come-lately to Veterans Administration rot, which has metastasized as long as McCain has been in office. …”
Had me reaching for my flashdrives as I’d recalled something I’d saved a link to from back in 2002 – Pre-Iraq! Phoenix Arizona we should remember was Ground-Zero for the media when the VA fiasco (finally) got on its [the media’s] radar.
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/04/06/us/va-health-care-strained-by-big-wave-of-enrollees.html
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Just my opinion but I think John McCain ought to be reactivated … and probably just as well Lindsey Graham too.
So they can stand at Courts Martial.
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It’s not as if they didn’t have time to see this coming.
Thanks, Belle, prescient as usual. My origins are an accident of history. And my singular ambition as a youngster was to see the Bronx in the rear-view mirror – goal achieved at seventeen, Nevertheless, as the nuns used to say, “you might take the boy out of the Bronx but never the Bronx out of the boy.” I can picture Trump swaggering down Fordham Road to school praying that none of the Bronx kids would discover that he was from Queens.
GMD, I love your articles, but I love the bits of your fascinating bio, both childhood and beyond even more. Your latest contained a very interesting tidbit, lol. It would be quite elucidating to listen to you tell old war stories, I believe.
Mavericks? Maybe a term from the high tech and economics world–“disrupters”.
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