Wartime presidents are different than peacetime presidents. Sometimes being president during a war has a political advantage – Franklin Roosevelt and both Bushes initially. Sometimes being president during a war has political disadvantages – Lyndon Johnson and George Bush. The reaction tends to be due to the success or failure of the war effort rather than the validity of the war itself. If Bush had presided over the immediate capture of bin Laden and surrender of the Taliban as he almost did, he would have been viewed quite differently.

What all these wars have in common is that they involved external enemies. The situation is quite different when the foe is internal. George Washington successfully led troops into western Pennsylvania in 1794 during the Whiskey Rebellion. More prominently, Abraham Lincoln preserved the Union in the War of Northern Aggression against the breakaway Confederacy. Both Washington and Lincoln sought the unity of the United States. Now we have a president who thrives on division.

As I previously wrote, America’s third civil war will be fought differently than the first two. Right now the nominal leader of We the People is traveling throughout the country doing his best to divide it into two warring groups. Perhaps it would be more appropriate to say he is seeking to exploit the existing differences much like his Russian allies. He did not originate them.

When Sarah Palin during the 2008 campaign called for her side to take back the country the conflict was already underway. At that time, John McCain refused to demonize Barak Obama, an action for which Republicans today will never forgive him. By contrast today, the current head of the nominal Republican Party leads a full-throated denunciation against the forces of chaos that are threatening the land.

Before turning to how he is actively dividing America today it is important to reflect on how the Democrats contributed to the current civil war. Palin might not have been well versed on Russia beyond being able to see it from her front yard, but she was correct that America was involved in a civil war and that her side was losing. Her assessment of the situation was spot on.

For years, the Democrats have been touting the coming of a demographic deluge. This flood of brown-skinned non-Christian(?) people were going to overwhelm the real Americans with their alien ways. Republicans responded as Samuel Morse did to the arrival of Irish Catholics in the 1830s with thunderous denunciation of the havoc these foreigners would unleash especially in the Mississippi Valley heartland. Even to this very day, America abounds in Irish and German Catholics who pledge no allegiance to the United States. Morse’s fears have been fulfilled. The non-Celtic white, the non-Germanic white, and the non-Hispanic white leave few real white people left to defend the country. So it is no wonder that Palin and the Republicans feared another round of foreigners who would undermine American way of life as the Irish, Germans, and Italians had done before them.

And the Democrats did everything they could to stoke the fears of the native-born white Americans. They relentlessly championed the flood of hyphens who would never become part of We the People and had no desire to do so. Just as the Irish, Germans, and Italians retained their hyphen and never become assimilated so the Caucasians from South America, Mexico, and Asia would forever remain beyond the pale and never identify as Americans.

Why should anyone want to be an American anyway? Democrats and their Woke politically-correct allies ceaselessly disparaged all acts in history by heterosexual white males. The celebration of those people and the events they participated in would be banished from the new country being created, first in the schools, then in the media, and finally in the halls of political power. Even non-college educated whites got the message – they were the targets of the new political order the Democrats and their brown-skinned people championed.

After physical survival, the Maslow hierarchy posits safety needs as the next most important. Safety includes not just protection from the natural elements – where is the president during the storms that ravaged New Orleans, Puerto Rico, and Florida – but human ones. The stress engendered by fear wreaks havoc. It does so to the people in an abusive relationship; it does so to the people in a crime-dominated neighborhood; and it does so to the people facing a demographic deluge. People who see no future for themselves, their family, their community, and their country are vulnerable to having their insecurity exploited be it by internet trolls, political leaders, or both.

Enter Donald Trump, lifelong con artist who excels in the exploitation of the vulnerable. He does not have the mental necessities to understand the Maslow hierarchy but he does has the people instincts to exploit it. He lives in a time when social media permits him in cahoots with American and Russian trolls to inflame Americans as no leader as before him. Of all the American Presidents he is the champion at dividing the country. Now during these final weeks of the 2018 elections, he is in his prime. Until such time as the fears of Republicans are overcome, his personal shortcomings, his illegal activities, and his dishonesty are irrelevant.  Consider the words of Margaret Power, professor of history at Illinois Tech, in an article about Westmoreland County, PA:

One issue that has confounded many is why so many women voted for Trump, despite his obvious misogyny and the accusations and evidence that he abused women. Penny Young Nance, president of Concerned Women for America, succinctly sums up their sentiments about Trump. “We weren’t looking for a husband. We were looking for a bodyguard. 

The Maslow hierarchy rules! BUILD A WALL!

Once again, Democrats and their erstwhile allies are ready to assist him in his effort to divide America. Their motto is “When Republicans go low, kick them.” The video of General Maxine Waters commanding her troops to get in the face of Republicans is a godsend to the native-born white Americans desperate to defend their country. The accosting of Republican elected officials no matter how despicable they are is a godsend to the native-born white Americans desperate to defend their country. It is almost as if the Democrats are trying as best they can to live down to the level of the Republican caricatures of them.

And then there is the refugee caravan. If you tried with all your might, all your heart, and with all your soul to concoct an image better suited to play into the fears of native-born white Americans about a demographic deluge preparing to invade and undermine the country, it would be difficult to do better than the image of the brown-skin caravan marching north to America. The only thing missing is having the Moslem terrorists accompany them. Oh wait. That charge has been made too.

Obviously, in the national political arena today there is no Lincoln to try to keep American together. Amazingly the Democrats who have the opportunity to rise to the occasion to provide leadership to We the People have failed to do so and do not even try.

Sorry Cory, you did not have a Spartacus moment.

Sorry Hillary, “crooked Hillary” will live on even without you avenging 2016.

Sorry Elizabeth Warren, what were you thinking? If Little Donny Wany taunts you with a $1,000,000 bet that he never would pay under any circumstances, do not sink his level by accepting his challenge. Taunt him back in a way that exposes his shortcomings as Stormy Daniels does. She is much more skilled at this than you are. You should have said:

I will give $1,000,000 to his favorite charity (meaning himself), if he releases his tax reports.

I will give $1,000,000 to his favorite charity (meaning himself), if he testifies to the grand jury.

I will give $1,000,000 to his favorite charity (meaning himself), if he identifies the California cities that rioted against sanctuary cities.

I will give $1,000,000 to his favorite charity (meaning himself), if he fulfills his campaign promise to sue all the women he claims falsely accused him of sexual abuse.

I will give $1,000,000 to his favorite charity (meaning himself), if goes one full week without telling a lie.

I will give $1,000,000 to his favorite charity (meaning himself), if he can explain his healthcare program in an actual speech of at least 30 minutes.

I will give $1,000,000 to his favorite charity (meaning himself), if he reads a book…more than 200 pages long and reviews it as in a book report.

Game on, Tiny.

The seventh-grade smart-aleck dumb-aleck is superb at fanning the flames of a war within America that is become explosively violent. By contrast, the Democrats are superb at digging a hole ever deeper without providing any leadership to We the People.