Grading past candidates by how “America First” they were
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  Grading past candidates by how “America First” they were
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BG-NY
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« on: November 14, 2021, 03:34:57 PM »

This is a project I had been considering for a while, but NCY’s packaging of the concept really resonated with me:

[T]he "core four" elements that most would agree embody the America First movement



1. Immigration Restriction
2. Trade and related matters
3. Avoiding Foreign Wars
4. Draining the Swamp

I just wanted to put this thread up to post my notes as I work on them. I’ll probably update the OP with grades as I go along.

Some guidelines I’ll be following:

(1) I’m going to start with the 2020 general election and go backwards. I would like to make it at least 1968. I can go back further eventually, but 1968 seems the oldest election in the current era (post-New Deal).
(2) To start it’ll be major party nominees. For competitive primaries I will try and grade as well (uncertain whether I’ll grade relative to party or on an absolute scale).
(3) I will also include my vote (without hindsight) for each election. I will try and force myself to pick D or R, with an anti-incumbent party nod when it’s close on those issues.

That’s all. Hopefully I actually can finish this and it’ll be interesting.
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SInNYC
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« Reply #1 on: November 15, 2021, 01:43:42 PM »

I think many America First types are fine with imperialistic foreign wars, just not wars with the stated goal of bringing democracy (or something else good) to another country.

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Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee
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« Reply #2 on: November 16, 2021, 08:23:18 AM »

I have been toying with the concept of a "core four" elements for a couple weeks and that was my first attempt and articulating it in such fashion.

I was tempted to do for five with cancel culture/anti-wokism but frankly, I don't even think that is exclusive to the America First/Trump crowd and is historically very much in line with Republican approaches to such matters going back decades.

Likewise with a number of other items from pro-police, supporting the military/vets, tax cuts and deregulation, judges and a number of other things are standard Republican fair in some cases back to the 1960s.

The point is to find the most novel or core elements that drove support to Trump and got him the nomination besides just being tougher than all the rest and other intangible considerations like "he's a fighter" etc.

1. The anger at the repeated attempts by Bush era establishment to push immigration and amnesty
2. The anger at the devastation wrought by the incoherence of Reaganite fusionism's economic policies undercutting the social and cultural message, most notably in the form of trade, opposition to infrastructure investment, decline in defense spending and knock on effects in places like upstate New York, So Cal, and of course the Great Recession.
3. The anger at the never ending foreign interventions
4. The anger at establishment corruption that was exposed during 2005-2006.

The fact that all of these occurred against a backdrop of the GOP shifting considerably more non-college white thanks to the influence of the religious right alienating the secular wing of the college educated whites (still retaining the more religious CEWs at that point), which only served to undercut the GOP establishment even more.

The Tea Party combined all of these into one, but its leaders misread these core four and kept pushing generally the same line as before just more extreme (more hyper religious/hyper business) as you saw with the tea party coming to be defined by Todd Akin in 2012 and Ted Cruz in 2013 and afterwards. This is what created the opening for Trump in 2015 and 2016.
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Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee
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« Reply #3 on: November 16, 2021, 08:34:00 AM »

Mitt Romney answered 1, 2 in part and 4 in part.

Romney ran hard line on immigration understanding what few others in the party did at the time regarding the immigration issue and he pushed the issue hard and got second in 2008 and the nomination in 2012. So we can give him one rather clearly.

He also ran against currency manipulation by China to in part answer two, which is what got him the nomination. However he failed to understand the underlying dynamic as well because he selected Paul Ryan and embraced his program, which was a mistake fueled by the misreading/hijacking of the tea party movement. 2008 Romney was much better on this front. Though it could be said Huckabee was more attuned to Point 2 than Romney.

Only Ron Paul understood point 3 and to that point it had not yet reached the critical mass that it had by 2015 and 2016 for Trump anyway. Most of the GOP was very much still pro-War in 2008 and even in 2011/2012.

As for point four, Romney was a Northeastern Business guy just like Trump. He had served as Governor but had not served in any other elective office. He therefore lacked any connection to Washington at a time when Washington was deeply reviled. That said he still ran as the establishment candidate in 2012 and allowed himself to be controlled by the donors, here again 2008 Romney was better than 2012 Romney. Its also worth noting that 2008 Romney self funded to a large extent. If Romney had been a billionaire, he would have had more flexibility.
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BG-NY
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« Reply #4 on: November 30, 2021, 12:09:31 AM »
« Edited: November 30, 2021, 12:21:18 AM by BG-NY »

I put together a basic template, a lot of work to be done still. For now I'm just using +1 for positive, -1 for negative, 0 for neutral, and summing without weights. I think I'll go with A-F after I've refined it a bit.

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1kKoqkEGA5J6H0tJFF1Hhok4kKbLZA8_UUGWGkqdoTPE/

Notes:

(1) Going back to 1968 to start, with Democratic/Republican general election nominees.
(2) This is without hindsight. It's only knowledge up until and including Election Day.
(3) Since it's without hindsight, one person can have different grades in different years.
(4) For "Intervention", this includes invasions and other multilateralism (UN, NATO, etc.).

My knowledge of US history is limited, so any feedback is welcome.
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darklordoftech
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« Reply #5 on: November 30, 2021, 04:31:57 PM »

https://youtube.com/watch?v=F9SOVzMV2bc

http://www.dolekemp96.org/agenda/issues/foreign.htm

“Neither the United Nations, nor any other international organization or foreign country, will set America's foreign policy agenda. Paring down the U.N. bureaucracy and genuine U.N. reform will be a high priority.”

“Foreign aid will be offered only as a precise targeted instrument of American foreign policy, designed to advance specific U.S. foreign policy goals. It will not be an international welfare program.”
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