Introduction
Originally, this was just a list of things Trump had done that were questionable, but that eventually got turned into another article. So here are a few general thoughts I've come up with that are higher level. First, I'm a Republican, a Capitalist, and a Christian. So I've broken down the biggest issues into those categories.
From a Christian Viewpoint
There's really more on this in the Micah article, but although there are good things Trump has done, the bad outweighs the good. Ask "What would Jesus Do?" about almost anything going on in the country today. He would be against any crime that was based on similar layouts on crime God implemented. Murder, stealing, and all the like would still be bad. I'm pretty sure of that. But would he have compassion on people? You know He would. All I see is compassion on the lawless and no compassion for those who have been here, working, and not causing any trouble.
Maybe I'm just in a part of the country where you don't see many immigrant problems. That could color my judgment. The one thing I do know is that we aren't having enough babies to support our population. Without immigrants, we're going to be in the same situation most other first world countries are in shortly. In many places in the world, there are too many old folks to support for the young people to handle, and there aren't enough young people coming up.
Thankfully we haven't had a world war, or most of the first world would be in even more dire straits of population imbalance. Population dynamics are pretty stable outside of pandemics and war. It's tough to get people to change their plans for children, especially in times when affordability is a real issue. Cutting off immigration (legal or otherwise) isn't the solution. Forcing people to any country who might take them, rather than at least sending them home is bad. Doing it with a racial bias is worse.
My heart goes out to the people in conflict in the world. It goes out to the people of the Ukraine, and the soldiers on both sides of the conflict as the average Russian soldier doesn't want to be there either. But not helping the people who were attacked (including those in the already occupied Crimea) is just wrong.
It also doesn't seem Christian to use your muscle in the world too much. Perhaps we haven't used it enough in the past. But blockades and tariffs were some of the things that led to the Revolutionary war. Kings that didn't listen, troops being called in to fight against and quarter with the people. There were many reasons. But what is going on isn't good.
We are to pray for our leaders that they will be saved and do the right things. There is value in peace. We need to pray that all our leaders at all levels of government will be saved. Otherwise, we are going to see peace disintegrate.
Finally, God declared that vengeance was His and He would repay. The DOJ should really think about this. There is crime to prosecute, but it shouldn't be all directed against Trump's enemies. The personal level with prosecutions like that of Kelly and on a state level where he withholds funds from states that are "blue" isn't what Trump was elected to do. Neither is hiding the Epstein mess and protecting the party and possibly himself.
What would Jesus do? I'm pretty sure He'd try to stay out of politics. He'd be about God's business instead. But asking yourself that question as you draft every bill and before crafting every E.O. would make the country a better place to live for everyone.
From a Capitalist Viewpoint
Business needs consistency in order to maintain a maximum profit. The tax and tariff issues that been thrown out month after month and sometimes week after week is no way to run a country.
Just this week, Trump, in seeing that the midterms were looking iffy and wanting to do something to make it "better" arrested a foreign leader (after freeing another) both involved in the illegal narcotics trade, but one having huge oil reserves. Then he throws out a cap CC rates at 10% for a year - just get us through midterms... If that goes through, people will be frozen out of credit markets (or if not, they'll run up even more debt at cheaper interest rates and then go under when the rates reset). Those disciplined enough to pay down their debt during this grace period probably don't need a short relief window anyway. Seriously, pay down your credit card debt as fast as you can regardless of the rates.
And then, to cap the week off he said he'd throw 25% tariffs on any country doing business with Iran. Whether that is 25% more or a flat 25%, who can keep track anymore? But the inconsistency is killing business and they won't keep eating the tariffs. They can't. Inflation which was heading down at the end of Biden's term went back up and down and up and down. Right now, there isn't much change from when Biden left, last I looked.
You can't plan your business in the environment we have. Yes, some stocks are up. Primarily they are AI stocks, which are up for unrelated to politics reasons. A huge number of other companies are down or will be down due to his crazy policies and those of his cabinet like RFK Jr.
Good relationships with foreign countries is paramount to good business. The random tariffs are blowing those relationships up. The friendliness to Putin and shirking Ukraine isn't good for business. We might not do much business with Russia, but we do with Europe. Blowing up NATO alliances over Greenland is dumb. Grabbing Venezuela's leader to get access to their oil is dumb. Consistency and gradual changes are good.
From a Republican Viewpoint
Many Republicans are happy that the government is getting shaken up. They think it has been a long time coming. Cheers for our side.
I can't join in the celebration, however. This is a country whose people, in a normal recent year, have been almost evenly divided between the major political parties. Control of the White House and Congress in such elections has been narrow, skewed only by the winner take all nature of the Electoral College. I do like the Electoral College, but think every vote should be fractional based on the votes of the people state by state.
As a divided nation, you can't have a government where one person, in this case Trump, is ruling without the consent of Congress. It just doesn't work. If any change that has been made by his Executive Orders was worthwhile, that change needed to come by legislation out of that divided House of Representatives in Congress, be supported by the Senate, and then signed by Trump to have any hope of not making politics worse than it was before.
As it is, there's likely to be a drastic change at mid terms depending on voter turnout. If Trump tries to mess with elections, it'll just be worse. We'll be looking at the very real possibility of another Civil war. Even the Republicans would be hard pressed to point to much good that has come out of the first year in office. The One Big Beautiful Bill certainly doesn't qualify, and the fact it was named that, in itself, shows just how pathetic Congress has become.
Is there much that needs changed in our government. I'm sure both sides would agree that there is. But you can't do it by throwing dynamite into everything you see that you don't like and then running a bulldozer after what's left. The people won't support it. You certainly can't try to fix everything at once.