Those who followed my blog will be aware that I vehemently opposed Trump’s nomination and did not vote for him in 2016. Watching his behavior at the inauguration, I became persuaded I’d been wrong, that he really was sincere, and I sat down and mentally compared Trump’s deficiencies to those of other presidents during my own lifetime (Truman, Eisenhower, JFK, LBJ, Nixon, Carter, &c.) and concluded that, really, compared to others, he was not worse. Not every president was Ronald Reagan.

As his administration progressed, I found myself very happy with his appointments and his policies, by and large. I was always an opponent of Protectionism, but one must admit that it has a long political tradition in this country, and de-industrializing America and enormously enriching and empowering China is undoubtedly a very dangerous thing to do.

A lot of Trump’s appointments did not work out. He seems to be bad at working with people with strong opinions and large egos. Trump obviously is a spoiled, narcissistic millionaire. But, oddly, I thought the appointees I liked the very best, Jim Mattis and John Bolton, turned out to behave, IMO, even worse than Trump. Mattis revealed himself to be a great talker and self promoter, but an empty uniform principally concerned with being well aligned with establishment opinion. Mattis did nothing to oppose fashionable PC in the military.

John Bolton obviously proved to be an egomaniac fully competitive with Trump, and a greedy and disloyal subordinate, bent upon revenge and so eager to cash-in with a tell-all book that he felt not need to wait until the administration he would be savaging was out of office. A lot of people would not be quite so willing to give aid and comfort to the democrats.

Trump’s policy decisions, on the other hand, were generally great. Trump dismissed catastrophist superstition out of hand. He cleared away regulatory obstacles to oil production, creating millions of jobs, helping the economy, dramatically lowering energy prices, and making America energy independent again. He gave America back working dishwashers and useful showerheads. He blocked communist Woke propaganda where he could. He sold oil leases on the North Slope. And he restarted the Space Program.

Trump suffers obviously from Trumpiness, but he has one great and supreme virtue: he fights. We live in an emasculated age of trimmers, grovelers, conformists, and opportunists, all sticking a wet index finger up to find out which way the wind is blowing. When the Establishment turns its unlimited powers of credentialing and decredentialing, of ridicule, spin, and narrative framing, strong men surrender and run and hide. Not Good Old Trump. He stood up to them and fought back.

I could today be saying: I told you so. I said, back then, that Trump was limited and could very well screw up and hand the presidency and big fat mandate over to the democrats after one term, but I won’t be doing that.

Yes, Trump as out of his depth dealing with the stolen election mess. Yes, he did not seem able to locate and employ effective professional legal representation. But, when you come right down to it, most of the GOP leadership and the conservative commentariat funked out. It was Trump and a handful of real conservatives, Cruz and Hawley, who actually tried to fight. There was obviously little time, the holidays come between the election and the vote certification. Our judges tend to be democrat tools or just too timid to venture into the stormy waters of a contested presidential election. The Republican Party was not united and did not have Trump’s back. Shit happens. Ephialtes showed the Persians the way around the pass at Thermopylae. General Ewell should have taken the high ground on July 1st.

Things look black today. They have the presidency, the House, and the Senate. And they are vindictive. They will try to impeach Trump a second time. As Instapundit put it: “Big Tech today settles all family business.” But it is not the end. 74 million Americans voted for Trump. There will be resistance.