…comes from the Tucker Carlson interview, not with Trump but with the Prime Minister of Hungry Viktor Orbán:
Because you know, you can criticize him for many reasons. I understand all the discussion. But the best foreign policy of the recent several decades belonged to him. He did not initiate any new war. He treated nicely the North Koreans and Russia, even the Chinese. You know, he delivered a policy which was the best one for Middle East, Abraham Accords. So he had very good foreign policy. He’s [Trump] criticized because he’s not educated enough to understand the world politics. This is not the case, Facts count and his foreign policy was the best form for the world in the last several decades I have seen. And if he would have been the president at the moment the Russian invasion started, no, it would not be possible to do that by the Russians. So Trump is the man who can save the western world and probably the human beings in the world as well. That’s my personal conviction.”
It’s worth remembering that Hungary is right next door to Ukraine and has a long and unplesant history with Russia to wit:
So if a Hungarian says that Trump is the best bet to avert a 3rd world war, a World War that would likely crush a Hungary that is a now a prosperous nation and turn it into a heap of rubble, I tend to believe him.
If you want to hear the whole thing, it’s here.
Ep. 20 Hungary shares a border with Ukraine. We traveled to Budapest to speak with the country’s prime minister, Viktor Orbán. pic.twitter.com/LOzpMrQNIz
Trump is still my 2nd choice behind DeSantis (and I suspect this week DeSantis will show why with his handling of the crisis in Florida). But if I was a Trump supporter I’d be playing this over and over again and pointing to the Trump foreign policy which was one of the most successful of this century.
Yesterday I watched the GOP debate till 3 am (my rundown here) and after getting my 1999 LeSabre inspected by a kid younger than the car and having lunch with DaWife got home with just enough time to watch the Tucker Carlson interview with Trump. Here are my thoughts:
The opening question concerning skipping the debate was a tad obvious but what was less obvious and less expected was his question about the decline of TV in general. This is a subject that has large cultural significance and it reminds one that Trump was very popular on TV for many years and is a expert on the subject. His commentary there had little to do with the election 2024 but was very fascinating concerning how the medium works.
It didn’t take long for me to conclude that Trump was exactly right strategically in skipping the debate and doing this interview instead. Not only for the sake of avoiding questions and attacks that he might not want to deal with but because of how comfortable he was in the format. I thought it was much better than a rally speech in the sense that he was in the position to expand on some subject and give some excellent insights on several subjects. It’s an appealing side of Trump that he would be wise to use more often.
I think the single biggest moment from the interview was Trump explaining to Tucker why the the indictments have not hurt and in fact have helped his poll ratings, noting that “The American people get it”. One does not have to have Trump as their first choice for the nomination to notice that the prosecutions of him are prosecution, particularly compared to how the Biden’s are treated.
A close second was his line about the Biden admin going after gas stoves etc etc. The “Let people buy everything.” should be adopted by every GOP candidate running for any national office there is. It’s a landslide maker that perfectly encapsulates the frustration folks have with the appliance Nazis out there
If I had to name the single biggest contrast between this interview and the debate it’s that Tucker gave Trump had a chance to hit Biden in detail while the Fox team seemed to do their best to shield him. Trump went in heavy on the corruption of the Biden while the GOP candidates strained to get in a few words on a subject ignored by the hosts.
His case against Biden and his noting of little things that give the game away were very significant and that’s why I suspect there is no way Joe Biden will debate him or any GOP candidate in a general election race.
All in all I think it was a good exercise for Trump but about 5 minutes after it was done something hit me square in the face. Tucker Carlson gave him time to answer and the conversation was good but there were two words that I didn’t recall hearing in those 45 minutes:
“COVID” and “FAUCI”
It would seem inconceivable to me that a subject that took up a full quarter of his term as president was ignored by Tucker Carlson and didn’t rate a question. I suspect this was not an accident and might have even been a condition of the him getting the interview.
I found the omission glaring because sooner or later he’s going to have to answer questions on that subject and I also suspect it’s one of the reasons why the administration would prefer to run against Trump because neither COVID nor Fauci are subjects that the left in general and Joe Biden in particular want to talk about and as long as Trump is the guy he’s running against he won’t have to .
Update: Played the interview again for DaWife and she says she heard Trump say the word COVID in reference to Biden having an excuse to stay in the basement so I stand corrected but again there was no conversation about the COVID response of the Trump administration
All in all I’d still say it was a good job by and for Trump and a smart move, but I think in the end he ends up in a GOP debate, perhaps not the next one or the one after that but when there are only two or three opponents left I don’t think the “duck and cover” will work in the long term for him, but we will see.
Yesterday I had expected to be home in time to watch the GOP debate live because thanks to BidenomicsTM there has not been enough work at work for full 8 hour days but as two people were on vacation and two more had left finding other jobs I ended up working a full shift and getting home at 1:00 am after dropping off my car at the garage for a pre-inspection checkup didn’t get to see the GOP debate till 1:05 which meant a long night and given the repairs and inspection this morning for my 1999 LeSabre (it passed) I’ve not had time to comment till now.
The first thing that jumped out at me was Nikki Haley who much to my surprise sounded like the credible presidential candidate and make several excellent points, particularly on the fact that there was absolutely no chance of passing a national abortion ban. She seemed ready to showcase herself as a credible alternative to Donald Trump and without a question accomplished that mission. The proof will be if Trump comes after her.
There was a lot of speculation that everyone would be targeting Ron DeSantis but that wasn’t the case. DeSantis made his points very well and seemed to spend his time focusing on the failures of the Biden administration (something that it seemed to me the moderators were doing all they could to avoid dealing with that subject). While Haley was the star there is no question DeSantis did what he wanted to do which was make the case that he had produced and would continue to do so. Ed Morrissey put it best:
We're at the end of the debate; just final summations now. I'm very stunned that no one really went after DeSantis; he did a good job tonight being above the fray of the other fights as a result.
This reality is likely why the Trump campaign has apparently invested plenty of time claiming this was all bad news for the Florida governor. The facts alas don’t match with that rethoric.
In terms of entertainment Chris Christie was the primary source of it spending all his time throwing punches at Ramaswamy as there was no Trump to attack while occasionally touting his record as a conservative governing a deep blue state (a record that wasn’t as bad as people remember it to be) Ramaswamy handled it well and make me smile by forthrightly calling climate change BS and speaking truths concerning Ukraine and other subjects that were being dodged. I thought he acquitted himself well.
Most of the rest of the field was invisible, Tim Scott particularly, although he did better than Hutchinson & Bergum who showed they didn’t belong on that stage. As for Mike Pence he kept talking about the achievements of the Trump/Pence admin which is a legit move and was rather adamant that despite the Biden admin making a point to pass a law preventing a VP to reject electors after the fact (a point he never mentioned btw) he in his opinion had no authority to reject the electors in 2020. I think he’s dead wrong but I also think he actually believes he believes that
Finally several quick thoughts:
I think the debate moderation demonstrated little difference between Fox & the rest of the MSM
It’s apparently still possible to have an actual debate about substance, at least without Trump
The whole Trump “counter programing” plan really doesn’t work when in a streaming era
It seemed to me Youtube did all it could to steer people to the spin rather than the debate
When the first round of debate cuts come half of those candidates should be gone
I’ve yet to watch the Trump interview I’ll do so tonight when I get home from work
I suspect Trump will reverse his no debate position once the field is down to 3 or 4 but we’ll see
Imagine if instead of serving as the governor of Illinois, Democrat J.B. Pritzker is an Uber driver. And Pritzker’s car is loaded with problems. The check engine, oil pressure, ABS, and TPMS warning lights are on.
What would be Pritzker’s fix?
Uber J.B. would simply ignore the problems by having his car professionally detailed, so his vehicle looks good, then he’d place electrical tape over the locations on the dashboard where each warning light is flashing.
Pritzker governs America’s sixth most populous state the same way–by ignoring the metaphorical warning lights facing the Land of Lincoln. Here at Da Tech Guy for years I’ve been railing Illinois’ big three problems–which are intertwined–and they are a massively underfunded public pension system, widespread government corruption, and declining population.
Now there is a fourth one, rampant theft and violent crime. Illinois’ largest city, Chicago, is still suffering from the highest murder rates since the 1990s. Carjackings are skyrocketing–in 2013 there were 344 reporting carjackings, last year the total was 1,674. Because so many shoplifting incidents aren’t reported, I don’t trust any theft figures. But the anecdotal evidence is alarming–shoplifting is soaring.
For years, liberals have, often blaming “corporate greed,” decried the many food deserts in big cities–and rural areas too. A food desert, if you are unfamiliar with the term, is an area without a nearby supermarket selling inexpensive groceries. Chicago, after some pushback from left-wing alderman because it is non-union, didn’t see its first Walmart open until 2006. Eventually there were eight Walmarts in Chicago, but shortly after the election of a far-left Democrat, Brandon Johnson, as mayor, Walmart announced it was closing four of those big box stores. In the press release explaining the reason for the shuttering of those Chicago stores, Walmart revealed “that collectively our Chicago stores have not been profitable since we opened the first one nearly 17 years ago – these stores lose tens of millions of dollars a year, and their annual losses nearly doubled in just the last five years.”
Also last week, multiple media outlets reported that Home Depot, Target, and yes, Walmart, have decried the drastic rise of “shrink,” that is, shoplifting, at its stores. Walmart’s CEO, John Furner, pointed his finger in the right direction about “shrink.”
“It’ll take communities stepping up and enforcing the law to be able to – to bring this issue under control,” Furner said.
While local law enforcement is not the responsibility of Illinois’ governor, Pritzker has never condemned Kim Foxx, the Soros-funded so-called prosecutor in Cook County. Her social worker approach to law enforcement–which Brandon Johnson also favors–is partly responsible for Chicago’s crime wave.
As for Pritzker, thru his ridiculously misnamed SAFE-T Act, the abolishment of cash bail–little or no bail is the current de facto practice of Foxx–will take effect statewide in less than a month.
Here’s my fix for the food desert problem: Hire more cops, have them arrest shoplifters and the criminals who fence their swag, prosecute them in a fair trial, and imprison them if found guilty for a few years. Such a surefire strategy will not only to protect the public and retailers, but it will serve as a deterrent to people considering a life of crime.
Simple and easy.
Illinois’ mainstream media needs to get on board and accurately report on food deserts. In a New York Times-length study by the Chicago Sun-Times and Chicago’s NPR affiliate from earlier this month, only one sentence mentioned the real problem, albeit gently. “Grocery operators have pointed to crime and homelessness as reasons they’ve needed to invest more in security, driving up costs,” they reported, “according to Amanda Lai, a Chicago director of food industry practice for the consulting firm McMillan Doolittle.”
Yep, one sentence.
Meanwhile, with the warning lights flashing, J.B. Pritzker continues to drive Illinois into the ground, while pissing away $20 million to fight food deserts. In the short term there is no hope for a repeal of the SAFE-T Act, but that’s part of the cure that Illinois needs.
As Ronald Reagan said, “Government does not solve problems; it subsidizes them.”
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