Trump brilliantly trolls the Hillary campaign about her emails

Trump is simultaneously a dream and a nightmare candidate. Stylistically, I adore his fearlessness, his utter disdain for political correctness, and his unfettered willingness to take the fight to the Left. Simultaneously, I dislike his carelessness with facts, his checkered (to say the least) ideological history, his scary stream-of-consciousness riffs, and (most of all) his frequently uninformed pronouncements — although I’m beginning to understand that he often uses these as trial balloons.

Substantively, I appreciate his support for the Second Amendment and for Israel, his willingness to admit that we’re at war with radical Islam, his recognition that illegal immigrants are an attack on America’s sovereignty, the fact that he hasn’t (yet) backed off from his promise to nominate conservative Supreme Court justices, his apparent willingness to address bureaucratic bloat, and his obvious love for America. I also really dislike his belief that he can remake government managed health care in his own imagine, his apparent respect for Putin (who is no friend to America), his support for isolationist policies, his trade protectionism, and his other random ill-thought-out or Progressive policy ideas.

When it comes to describing my relationship with Trump-the-candidate, it’s complicated.

Trump showed his best side yesterday when he completely played the media and the Democrats (but I repeat myself) regarding Putin and Hillary’s emails. I first became aware of the kerfuffle when all my Progressive friends on Facebook suddenly became wildly up in arms about the fact that Trump was proposing a violation of America’s national security laws and playing into Putin’s hands. The horror! What upset them was Trump’s having said this:

“Russia, if you’re listening, I hope you’re able to find the 30,000 emails that are missing,” Mr. Trump said during a news conference here in an apparent reference to Mrs. Clinton’s deleted emails. “I think you will probably be rewarded mightily by our press.”

What struck me right away, of course, is that Trump wasn’t telling anyone to hack Hillary’s current emails about yoga. Instead, he was referring to emails that were already hacked years ago and that are almost certainly in the hands of countries and people hostile to America’s interests. That is, he was phrasing in the present tense a past act, rather than inviting anyone to commit a future crime.

Moreover, when one checks the context in which Trump made that manifestly facetious suggestion, it becomes clear that this was reasonable pushback against pro-Hillary reporters (i.e., the entire MSM) trying to shill for their favored candidate:

Why do I have to get involved with [Vladimir] Putin? I have nothing to do with Putin. I’ve never spoken to him. I don’t know anything about him other than he will respect me. He doesn’t respect our president. And if it is Russia [behind the WikiLeaks release of stolen Democratic National Committee emails]—which it’s probably not, nobody knows who it is—but if it is Russia, it’s really bad for a different reason, because it shows how little respect they have for our country, when they would hack into a major party and get everything. But it would be interesting to see—I will tell you this—Russia, if you’re listening, I hope you’re able to find the 30,000 emails that are missing. I think you will probably be rewarded mightily by our press.

In other words, what the MSM hid from its credulous minions was that Trump was castigating the DNC for failing to secure its emails, which is precisely what Hillary did with her official Secretary of State emails. Trump didn’t say anything wrong at all. But oh boy, did he bait Hillary’s protectors into saying incredibly stupid things.

Hillary’s own senior policy adviser, Jake Sullivan, was out of the gate fast with this gem:

This has to be the first time that a major presidential candidate has actively encouraged a foreign power to conduct espionage against his political opponent. That’s not hyperbole, those are just the facts. This has gone from being a matter of curiosity, and a matter of politics, to being a national security issue.

Do I understand Sullivan correctly to be saying that it’s a serious national security concern if someone enables a foreign power to conduct espionage against the United States? Yes, I think that’s exactly what he said.

If I remember correctly, Sullivan’s boss, Hillary Clinton, during her four years as Secretary of State, conducted all of her official business on an unsecured server set up in her bathroom. When caught, she deleted 30,000 emails (a federal offense, no intent required). Of those remaining, several emails that allowed to be shared with everyone who had mastered hacking 101 had top secret security clearance. We know all about the fact that Hillary selfishly, carelessly, and intentionally exposed America’s national security information because the damn things were hacked years ago.

So if I get this correctly, Sullivan just accused his boss, and the Democrat party’s presidential candidate, of violating national security laws. Fascinating.

The reflexive stupidity didn’t stop with Sullivan, of course. Reliable Leftist Eugene Robinson chimed in, making exactly the same point (which is that Hillary violated America’s national security laws left, right, and center):

You read that right. The man one of our two major parties has nominated for president just encouraged cyberespionage by an adversarial foreign power against a former U.S. secretary of state. Jesus.

By this time, rather than thinking “Uh oh, Trump screwed up,” I’m thinking, “You go, guy! That was the most brilliant trolling I’ve ever seen.”

Sen. Harry Reid (DEM – Mafia) only made things better, when he urged the CIA and other intelligence agencies to engage in fraud against a major political party’s presidential nomination:

“How would the CIA and the other intelligence agencies brief this guy? How could they do that? I would suggest to the intelligence agencies, if you’re forced to brief this guy, don’t tell him anything, just fake it, because this man is dangerous,” Reid said in an interview with The Huffington Post [sic] Wednesday afternoon. “Fake it, pretend you’re doing a briefing, but you can’t give the guy any information.”

I was so moved by the wonders of that quotation that I queried my real-me Facebook friends to determine whether there wasn’t some irony at work here having Reid propose this when his party’s nominee is the one who’s already released the U.S.’s secrets. If someone’s “dangerous,” it’s Hillary, not Donald (at least in this context). As far as I know, the Donald has never released America’s most closely held national security information to foreign governments . . . but Hillary has. So far, my Progressive friends have not responded to my question.

Trump may be bombastic, crude, mercurial, and scarily egotistical, but my God does he know how to set traps for the Left — and after eight years of Obama, it’s worth remembering that the Left, not Trump, is currently the worst threat to America’s constitutional governance. Another four years of Obama’s policies (and don’t expect Hillary, the ultimate “me too” candidate to deviate from the hard Left path Obama set), and it’s questionable whether America can ever walk her way back to the Bill of Rights.

Keep in mind that Hillary’s very first act as president will be to nominate a hard Left Supreme Court justice. Once that happens, you can kiss good-bye America’s most important bulwark against tyranny — an armed citizenry (and Trump, the alleged “proto-tyrant,” supports gun rights). One after another, all of our rights will start falling. Remember, the party in power will be the party that believes that “militant open-mindedness” and “severely punish[ing] any deviations from accepted [i.e., Leftist] schools of thought” are the same thing!

And for those legitimately worried about Trump’s obvious authoritarian streak, don’t worry too much. Congress critters, both Republican and Democrat, will suddenly discover the separation of powers when they’re dealing with President Trump. That too will be a good thing for our Republic.

As I say often, I don’t like Trump, but I’m coming to appreciate his virtues and I continue to believe that, with all his faults, he’s still infinitely better than Hillary. In his own crazed way, he’s a much better candidate than she is too. After all, this is a woman whose husband felt compelled to spend more than an hour trying to convince people she’s human. Hillary has been in the public eye since 1992. If she were really human, wouldn’t we know by now without his persuasive skills? (And yes, that was sarcasm. I know that Hillary is biologically human, but have to admit that she gives a fantastic impression of some scary Nurse Ratchet robot.)

And here’s a video to help explain why even Trump’s worst excesses are probably more calculated than most realize and are very effective:

Two more quick points while I think about it: First, does anyone else find it as ludicrous as I do that Obama is touting Hillary’s experience as a virtue when he came into the White House on the strength of a little teaching, a little lawyering, community activism, two years as a state legislator, and two years as a federal senator? Trump, on the other hand, has been a successful businessman for his entire adult life. It’s a resume of experience, management, and success.

Second, most of my seriously rabid Bernie friends are going to vote for Trump or Jill Stein. That’s how much they hate Hillary.