Sunspots (https://sunspots.cornellsun.com/tag/republican/)
With an open mind and two sides of the story, you’re bound to learn something new.
Welcome to the zoo! This is a blog where both the Republican and Democratic viewpoints are represented. The blog is not meant to sway you either way necessarily, just to present both sides of the story. You may not agree with the whole article, but hey, you’re likely to agree with half!
Evelyn Beatrice Hall, in her biography of Voltaire, famously coined the phrase, “I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it.” This should be a universally accepted principle at Cornell. But sadly, it is not. On November 30, Cornell Republicans hosted former U.S. Congressman and presidential candidate Rick Santorum. As a Republican known for his unabashed support of social conservatism and of Donald Trump, Santorum was met with fervent protest outside the event, which is allowed per University policy. At the beginning of the event, the president of Cornell Republicans kindly asked that audience members do not interrupt Santorum and defer all questions until the end of the speech.
With an open mind and two sides of the story, you’re bound to learn something new. Welcome to the zoo! This is a blog where both the Republican and Democratic viewpoints are represented. The blog is not meant to sway you either way necessarily, just to present both sides of the story. You may not agree with the whole article, but hey, you’re likely to agree with half!
I have an immense amount of respect for The Donald, and I could not be happier with how his campaign has unfolded. From his not-so-humble beginnings as just one hopeful drifting in a sea of infinitely more qualified candidates, Donald is the little, tiny-handed orange engine that could of American politics. Watching him rise to new levels of fame has truly been heartwarming, and has imparted some powerful lessons about what it truly means to be an American:
In America, you can be anything you want to be. No experience necessary! If you are white, wealthy and male, that is qualification enough.
If you are like many college students, you probably find that you have barely enough time to complete your class work, let alone follow the news everyday. In case you have managed to avoid a newspaper since you came to campus in August, I am here with some potentially bad news: Hillary Clinton has lost the solid lead in the polls that she maintained towards the end of the summer. Nate Silver, the famed statistician of FiveThirtyEight, currently has Clinton’s chance of winning the election at only 55.8%, while a month ago he predicted her chance of winning at 80.9%. Furthermore, Donald Trump seems to be gaining more momentum in key battleground states like Florida and Ohio — both of which Silver predicted would vote for Clinton in August and now predicts will go to Trump. However, Clinton still has time to come back from her bumpy September.
This election season has left people with some tough choices. In our two-party system, it kind of makes things difficult when a lot of people don’t support either candidate. Consider moderate Republicans: many of them don’t want to vote for Hillary Clinton for a bunch of reasons, most of which are ideological, but they also realize that Donald Trump is a terrible alternative for much more basic reasons. “What a shame,” they think, “that neither of the candidates agrees with my ideological views. If only there were someone I could find some common ground with!”
Enter Gary Johnson, the former Republican governor of New Mexico and Libertarian candidate for the presidency.
I’m baffled. I’m appalled. I hope the majority of Americans are as well. Last Friday evening, a rally that Donald Trump scheduled in Chicago was canceled and tensions between protesters and his supporters reached incredible new heights. As expected, the newscasters began asking, “Was Trump to blame for the violence we were seeing?”
Of course.
Everyone has something to say about Donald Trump. People tell me that Trump is winning because Americans are angry. Political pundits on both sides of the partisan aisle agree on this point. But why are people angry? Like Trump, some of them are racist, xenophobic, sexist, nativist and many other unpleasant things.