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Trump’s Angry and True Victory Speech

At what point is it fair to say that a political faction presents a threat to the country?

This question loomed over impeachment week, which saw the country struggling to digest a disorienting series of dramatic contrasts. First we had the Democrats’ demoralizing meltdown in Iowa, followed by Trump’s  optimistic but sometimes staid State of the Union Tuesday night and his subsequent victory over impeachment. All of that was followed by the president’s formless, angry victory speech against his enemies on Thursday.

In a way, Trump’s State of the Union was “fake.” Most of those addresses are forgettable by design, but this time convention was taken to the limit. Trump’s address was solemn, uplifting, and occasionally boring. The theme, a “Great American Comeback,” powerfully evoked a yearning for national renewal, as Trump predicted, “the best is yet to come.”

But the elephant in the room, of necessity, was left out of the speech: the gravest threat to the State of our Union is internal. This received some passing acknowledgment when Trump attacked the “radical Left” for encouraging illegal immigration. But for the most part, Trump was required to be “presidential,” which is to say, not himself.

Trump’s tirade on Thursday, by contrast, was gloomy and unhinged, but it also contained more of the blunt truth. It was more indicative of the broken state of our Union, and it was also more suited to Trump’s style.

Trump is outrageously funny, and he’s at his best when he’s needling the “fake news” media or working a crowd. In an hour of stream-of-consciousness, Trump raged against the Russia hoax, FISA abuse, the Ukraine sham, “horrible” and “vicious” House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) and Representative Adam Schiff (D-Calif.), “low lifes” Peter Strzok and Lisa Page, “that sleazebag” James Comey, and much more.

As he fumed over the coup plotters that have dogged him from day one, Trump cracked plenty of jokes, but he wasn’t in a joking mood. He was angry, hurt. Listening to him torch the “Mueller . . . top scum” and “evil, corrupt” people who sought his destruction, you would think that our country was in terrible danger—not from Iran or Russian internet trolls, but from a faction within our very borders.

“We’ve been going through this now over three years. it was evil. It was corrupt,” Trump said. “It was dirty cops. It was leakers and liars. And this should never ever happen to another president.”

Of the Russia hoax: “It was all bullshit.”

Trump was not there for a speech or a news conference, he said, but to celebrate. But what he had to say was terribly sad. President Trump has spent the majority of his first term fighting a war of succession. To the ruling class, Trump’s election was a catastrophe like no other in American history because it placed a man who they had not vetted in the halls of power. They responded by taking the country on a deranged, three-year detour through Eastern Europe.

First it was a maundering Russian fever dream that held its target audience, the corporate leftist media, in rapt attention for the better part of two years, then a Ukrainian soap opera that was somehow even more esoteric and insane. It was a joke from start to finish, but also it wasn’t. It did profound harm to the nation. Nothing like it has ever happened in American history.

Impeachment week was full of reminders of just how much contempt the liberal elite have not only for Donald Trump but for the United States, its citizens, and our democratic republic.

Americans didn’t vote for the State of the Union Trump. They voted for the flamethrower in the White House on Thursday afternoon.

Trump is the enemy of a political establishment that, with each passing day, demonstrates it has precious little in common with the people of this country. They’re not only negligent of American decline but active participants in it.

Trump is not perfect, but he’s the only guy in town willing to say that illegal immigration and endless wars need to stop. He’s the only guy who can say those things and hope to “move the needle.”

At one point, Trump asked a very sensible question about military aid to Ukraine: Why is the United States “always the sucker?” Why was America giving millions in aid to Ukraine in the first place, and why was a temporary hold on that aid made out to be an act of treason? This is the kind of nonsense that consumes the political establishment.

Democrats advocate terrible policies such as open borders, but they’re “vicious” and they “stick together like glue,” Trump said. He’s right: they’re a party of managers. They’re looking out for the ruling class, not the country they’re governing. Democracy, to them, is an inconvenience.

It’s not that complicated. People don’t want leaders who openly despise them and want to replace them with cheap labor from abroad.

The Democrats might have been spared the Trump nightmare if they were just willing to meet the American people halfway. But they just can’t help themselves. Hillary Clinton’s “basket of deplorables” comment wasn’t an accident, but a confession. The hatred that the ruling class harbors for America is so profound that it can no longer be hidden, and in large part they no longer bother to try. This is why Trump is rising in the polls, and it’s why the Democrats still don’t have a compelling candidate to take him on.

Impeachment week was full of reminders of just how much contempt the liberal elite have not only for Donald Trump but for the United States, its citizens, and our democratic republic.

In Iowa, a meltdown at the caucuses brought a swift backlash against Iowans for being too white and using an “antiquated” system. A “conversation” came out of nowhere about abolishing the caucuses, or at least their first-in-the-nation status, entirely. Meanwhile, many suspect that the party establishment did everything possible to shaft Bernie Sanders, the only viable anti-establishment candidate, and elevate Pete Buttigieg.

The kind of people who think Iowa is too white find Buttigieg deeply impressive, in spite of his whiteness. To adoring imbeciles in the media, Buttigieg is “Neoliberal Man,” the uncreated ideal of “meritocracy.” He deserves to be president because he sounds smart. But a president doesn’t need fancy credentials or “smarts.” What he needs is heart.

Trump showed tremendous heart in his State of the Union, wherein he spoke of having “shattered the mentality of decline” of people like Buttigieg, the management class that can’t seem to organize a country any better than a caucus in the Midwest.

Trump spoke about America the way that all presidents customarily spoke about it before America was taken over by people who obviously despise it.

In a normal country where the people’s priorities are paramount, his remarks would have been received with unanimous enthusiasm. But Democrats crabbed. Pelosi glowered the whole time, then petulantly ripped Trump’s speech in two at the finish. The media denounced Trump’s “partisan” tone, but what they clearly found most bothersome were his patriotic themes. The president gave a full-throated defense of America with zero apologies. Democrats proved how much they love America by hissing.

What they call dictatorship is a democratically elected president appearing, at least momentarily, to get the upper hand over a managerial elite. To them, it’s as if endless night has settled over the land. In this deep darkness, the only Republican they find palatable is Mitt Romney, because he does exactly what they tell him to do. This was never about the Constitution or Ukraine or military aid or Russia or what Trump said on a phone call or even Trump.

It was about power.

Democrats will do anything to hold on to it. They’ll lie, smear, destroy as many lives as needed, take the country hostage with meaningless distractions for months and years at a time. Trump’s victory speech, in all its righteous fury, hit the nail on the head. The greatest threat to America’s future comes from within.

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About Matthew Boose

Matthew Boose is a Mt. Vernon fellow of the Center for American Greatness and a staff writer and weekly columnist at the Conservative Institute. His writing has also appeared in the Daily Caller. Follow him on Twitter @matt_boose. ‏

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