This Sounds Basically Right

I didn't read this earlier because it was billed as "Donald Trump's speech addressing sexual assault allegations." I already know what I think about that -- I think his character is such that the accusations are completely believable -- so I ignored what he had to say about it.

That was a mistake. Once you get past his denials of wrongdoing, it turns out he has something very interesting to say.

This is not simply another four-year election. This is a crossroads in the history of our civilization that will determine whether or not we the people reclaim control over our government.

The political establishment that is trying to stop us is the same group responsible for our disastrous trade deals, massive illegal immigration and economic and foreign policies that have bled our country dry.

The political establishment has brought about the destruction of our factories, and our jobs, as they flee to Mexico, China and other countries all around the world. Our just-announced job numbers are anemic. Our gross domestic product, or GDP, is barely above 1 percent. And going down. Workers in the United States are making less than they were almost 20 years ago, and yet they are working harder.

It’s a global power structure that is responsible for the economic decisions that have robbed our working class, stripped our country of its wealth and put that money into the pockets of a handful of large corporations and political entities.

Just look at what this corrupt establishment has done to our cities like Detroit; Flint, Michigan; and rural towns in Pennsylvania, Ohio, North Carolina and all across our country. Take a look at what’s going on. They stripped away these town bare. And raided the wealth for themselves and taken our jobs away out of our country never to return unless I’m elected president.

The Clinton machine is at the center of this power structure. We’ve seen this first hand in the WikiLeaks documents, in which Hillary Clinton meets in secret with international banks to plot the destruction of U.S. sovereignty in order to enrich these global financial powers, her special interest friends and her donors.

Honestly, she should be locked up.

Let’s be clear on one thing, the corporate media in our country is no longer involved in journalism. They’re a political special interest no different than any lobbyist or other financial entity with a total political agenda, and the agenda is not for you, it’s for themselves.

And their agenda is to elect crooked Hillary Clinton at any cost, at any price, no matter how many lives they destroy.

H/t Cold Fury, via D29.

I don't know that I believe that Donald Trump can actually fix any of those problems, but allowing for a few rhetorical flourishes, he's right about what the problems are. Organizations like those set up by the TPP and T-TIP do intend to transfer much of America's sovereignty to international councils and courts that will respond to global corporations instead of the American people. Clinton's speeches to Goldman Sachs, and the large-scale foreign money passed quid-pro-quo through the Clinton Foundation, prove that she's on board with this transfer of power from the American people to this global elite.

Likewise, of course, her Supreme Court appointments will be pointed right at stripping away the limits on Federal power that the Constitution is intended to enshrine. It's already the case that they treat the 10th Amendment like a nullity; it's increasingly the case that the religious liberty guaranteed by the 1st Amendment is a nullity. We will see all such limitations traduced if she has her way on the Court, such that the American people will no longer be self-governing but will be bowed under the will of a tiny, "progressive" elite.

It's a dark future. I don't know if it can be avoided, and I don't know that I believe that Trump is the one who could avoid it in any case. But it's where we are.

UPDATE: Bret Stephens writes at the WSJ that he regards this talk as echoing anti-Semitic conspiracy theories from the last mid-century. As is well known, I have no use for anti-Semitism, and certainly would regard it as a disqualifying aspect of such a theory if it were true that it was merely a renewed telling of an old myth. But these charges about the threat to sovereignty aren't "conspiracy theories," they're an analysis of the language of the TPP -- and they aren't fever dreams of the right, either, as should be proven by this article on the subject by none other than Elizabeth Warren. Now, you may have noticed that there's very little overlap in support for Elizabeth Warren and Donald Trump.

UPDATE: David Foster, in the comments, proposes an analogy to the governor of an engine. The discussion it provoked in the comments section is highly interesting, which is a fact that speaks very well of his audience.