Sorry, Trump Supporters, but Hillary Isn't Getting Locked Up (Anytime Soon), Free Trade Isn't Going Away (And Those Overseas Jobs Aren't Coming Back), and Mexico Isn't Paying for the Wall (Though It Still Will Be Built)

Donald J. Trump become our 45th President this morning and I congratulate him on a well-fought campaign.  Many of the things that I would prefer will likely come to pass but not because Trump was elected but rather because the Republican majority in the House and Senate will come together to implement an agenda that I would honestly prefer to see. I don't much like Obamacare, preferring either going to a single-payer system or going to a system in which more competition between insurance companies helps to bring down premiums. I don't like the fact that we don't enforce our immigration laws, preferring instead that we either have open borders or a immigration system that has some teeth.  In both of these cases, we will be getting the latter, rather than the former policy.

I would prefer less regulation, lower taxes, a downsized government, free trade, entitlement reform, a dismantled Federal Reserve System, and a military that is not trouncing around the world trying to enforce democracy or otherwise intimidate other countries into kowtowing to our interests.  It looks like I will be getting at least some of these things although I doubt a Trump presidency will provide meaningful reductions in the size of government, engage in entitlement reform, or dismantling of the Federal Reserve System, and that definitely concerns me because it signals that we will likely do very little with respect to the clear and present danger of the growing national debt.  Still, one cannot have all things and so while I supported Gary Johnson in his quixotic attempt at the Presidency, I cannot be entirely unhappy.

That doesn't mean that there aren't other things that concern me, especially with regard to the hateful and oftentimes egregious rhetoric that came from our newly elected President's mouth during the Presidential campaign.   Unless President Trump can figure out how to put the djinn of division back in the bottle and unite our country, the demographic reality suggests that Republican control of the country will be short-lived.

However, President Trump did something truly Presidential when he took the stage as a winner of this Presidential contest: he sought to bury the hatchet and not in the neck of his opponent.  When history looks back on President's Trump's legacy, it will be this moment in time that will uniquely define it.  I firmly believe that Trump's narcissism is, at this point in time, his greatest strength.  He wants to be loved by the American people and we should let him.  To that end, the rhetoric surrounding his opponents must end.  Calling for Hillary to be locked up or for Mexico to pay for the wall are simply untenable positions.  We do not have a national tradition of punishing our political opponents at the federal level nor can we act as a bully when it comes to other countries and not expect that such imperialist tendencies will be rejected and rebuked by the world community.  Similarly, I do not think that President Trump will fundamentally roll back free trade, preferring instead to ensure that our existing trade agreements, like our immigrations laws, are followed.  We respect of all things the rule of law above all else.  Unfortunately, for many, that will mean having to come to terms with the fact that many of those jobs that have gone overseas will not come back, which will cause many of his supporters in the Rust Belt to feel betrayed.  They should not feel this way.  Even if free trade could be dismantled, the resulting loss of national income that comes from a reduction in trade volume and freedom would effectively cancel, and indeed completely reverse, any minor gains we would get from autarkic policies.

Similarly, Trump will not be deporting 12 million people from America nor will Mexico pay for the wall, though I do believe it will be built and we will pay for it.  Instead, Trump will take a measured approach that insists that our laws are followed and that people who wish to legalize their presence in the United States will have to return to their home countries and go through the proper channels.  As the son of one legal immigrant and the husband of another, I would expect nothing less.  He will likely build a wall that will cost us $40 billion and will be much more symbolic than actually effective but the symbolism is important and it what he can effectively do.  Deportation on such a grand scale would cost far too much, not only in terms of monetary cost but also in loss of fundamental freedom as legal residents and citizens would otherwise be forced to prove their status in this country on an almost daily basis if he were to truly attempt to go through with such mass deportations.  On the other hand, the current system that gives employers an effective "slap on the wrist" and allows sanctuary systems to "turn a blind eye" to illegal activity will end.  Ironically, this simply means the continuation of the actual increase in deportations that has occurred under the Obama administration but remember that symbolism is important and that is what he is doing.

Likewise, there will be no "total and complete shutdown of Muslims entering the United States" and, in fact, Trump himself walked back that proposal some months ago but I do expect an enhanced and more rigorous vetting process that takes into consideration that in some parts of the world it is more difficult to verify information, which is an somewhat overdue policy change.

One of the reasons for these changes is that Republicans will not go along with his more extreme rhetoric.  The Republican Party needs to play the long game and that requires more nuance and less demagoguery.  In some ways, we would probably be thankful that Donald Trump is our next President.  If he had not succeeded, who knows who would have come next because extremist populist sentiment is difficult to eradicate.  Perhaps it will take a man like Donald Trump, beholden to no special interest other than himself, to purge us of this underlying current of divisiveness that threatens the very core of our glorious republic.

I am thus cautiously optimistic because Donald Trump, though he rode the wave of populist sentiment, is no ideologue and that means that is someone who can be brought to the table to negotiate.  Indeed, that aspect of him is precisely what he has signaled time and again that his rhetoric is merely a negotiating tactic to leverage a better deal for America.  So long as he remembers this, he could very well become one of our greatest Presidents.  If he forgets this and instead echoes the populist desires and prejudices that propelled him to the White House, may God help the United States of America for we will have lost the very essence of what makes America truly great, indeed, exceptional, as a nation.