Why I'm Removing My Republican Tattoo After 21 Years In The GOP
It’s a long story involving online college Jeopardy, the University of Colorado at Boulder and too much cheap vodka, but suffice it to say that late one night in the fall of 1999, when I was newly 18, I got the Republican elephant tattooed on my body.
For a while, I was quite pleased with that decision, willingly going to battle against my liberal friends and roommates, always leaning on my conservative values of fiscal responsibility, limited government, personal accountability and private sector efficiencies.
Fast forward 21 years to an all-time high deficit, beyond questionable extensions and abuses of federal power, astounding private sector corruption, and a president who insults everyone who calls him out on his lies as fake, weak, nasty dummies, and my previous Republican defences are out the window. That little red-and-blue pachyderm represents something different today than it did at the end of the Clinton years.
This isn’t the first time I’ve thought about removing my one and only tattoo. I sent emails inquiring about laser removal when Donald Trump won the GOP nomination in 2016, having been against his selfish slash-and-burn business practices for years and certainly opposed to his total lack of moral character. But I didn’t really think he’d get elected. My party, you see, likes morals and hard work and fairness. There’s no possible way, I thought, that my fellow Republicans could vote for this guy.
You know how this story ends, but yet, it’s not over. I was confused four years ago, and I’m even more confused now.
To me, Trump is about as un-Republican as someone can get. So why are we rallying around this guy? Here, a quick roundup of the proof that his values don’t align with those of traditional conservatives: He allowed unmarked federal agents to detain protesters in Portland, Oregon (someone should brief Trump on federalism). He convinced his fans that credible media outlets are the public’s greatest enemy, when our founding...
