Being the World's Boy Scouts

 

I like having been the world’s boy scouts. I like having a country that did so much good in the world. I like having a country that saved the world from fascist tyranny in World War II. I like having a country that rebuilt western Europe and Japan after that war and led former tyrannies to become stable, fairly liberal democracies. I like having a country that fought and won a decades long cold war with Soviet communism that led to the liberation of the countries of central and eastern Europe. I like our country being that last, best hope of which Lincoln spoke.

Donald Trump does not. He has no use for liberal principles, liberal societies, or the cause of liberty in the world. His ideas on foreign policy and international relations are closer to those of Putin or Mussolini than those of FDR, John Kennedy, or Ronald Reagan. (It is an interesting experience to listen to speeches by any of those three and then read one of Trump’s screeds on Truth Social.) In a very deep way his behavior is both anti-American and a repudiation of Americanism. In regard to Greenland it is also nuts. He is a disgrace, and he is doing his best to disgrace this country. Regardless of the various and conflicting things we are for politically, decent Americans need to stand up together and make it clear that this is something we are against.