The political process has been high-jacked by media and political elites, political profiteers and extremists on the left and some on the right. Hard working Americans of every race, color and creed are paying the price for this greed, political correctness and folly. This sentiment fueled a major political realignment that sent Donald Trump to Washington.
As I watched the President’s press conference last week, I did not see a media savvy politician dodging the tough issues raised by the violence and murder in Charlottesville. Rather, I saw a leader drawing the clear lines necessary to maintain the moral center while protecting a core principle of freedom – the First Amendment.
President Trump condemned white nationalists, Nazis and racists stating, “We condemn in the strongest possible terms this egregious display of hatred, bigotry, and violence. It has no place in America.” He also rightfully criticized the use of violence by both sides. However repugnant racism, bigotry and the ignorance of Nazism, we must never sanction violence as an acceptable response in the public debate. By design, the First Amendment applies equally to fools and the wise. Fools so they can display their ignorance for all to see. The wise so that we may all be lifted up by the power their ideas. I fought a war to defend our freedom and share with all my brothers in arms a unique understanding of the steep price of liberty.
For decades, everyday Americans have paid an ever-higher price for the relentless growth in the size, power and cost of government. As the media, the elites and politicians feathered their beds, hardworking Americans have seen the American dream slowly slip away. The evidence of neglect is all around us. Nowhere is this more on display than with the scourge of opioid addiction ravaging every corner of our society from the inner city to the suburbs to our industrial cities and country towns. Hopelessness gives way to despair, which gives way to resignation. This is the way our freedom will be stolen from us if we do not fight back.
Wherever President Trump can constitutionally act he has done so. He has restored a conservative balance to the Supreme Court. He has placed a moratorium on new regulations and has already saved our citizens almost $90 billion by eradicating unnecessary job-killing regulations forced on us by the Obama administration. President Trump has ordered a government-wide, comprehensive regulatory review requiring a true cost/benefit analysis and that rulemaking be based on science and not any political agenda. The President has taken steps to unleash American energy production, guaranteeing energy independence and energy security and declared America’s opioid crisis a national emergency. He has begun to wrench America out of international treaties and trade agreements that sacrifice the best interests of the American people at the altar of internationalism. Still, our Republican-led Congress, inexplicably, has failed to answer the call of duty.
The agenda is clear. Healthcare and tax reform, transportation and infrastructure investment, and banking reform to ease the cost and access to credit for average Americans and small businesses that are, and always have been, the true engines of our economic growth. GOP leaders could deliver on the promise of healthcare and tax reform with simple majorities. That means conservative and moderate Republicans must check their ideological puritanism and compromise for the greater good. But, our GOP leaders in Congress have thus far failed our citizens and our country. Democrats facing election in 2018 in states where voters sent Donald Trump to Washington could demonstrate political courage (and wisdom) by crossing party lines. Our duly-elected President Donald Trump is doing his part to create a better country for all Americans.
In 2016, I co-chaired the Trump Leadership Council, a group of business leaders committed to putting America first by advocating for reform. Now I have joined other patriots to help form the American Leadership Council (ALC). The ALC is mobilizing business leaders from all corners of the American economy to demand elected officials deliver on critical economic reforms. I hope you will join me in this fight to restore power to the American people and in the process, restore the greatest common denominator among Americans – the simple dream that working together we can guarantee our children have a better life than ours.
John T. McNabb is vice chairman, American Leadership Council. co-founder, Trump Leadership Council and Former Chairman and CEO, Willbros Group.
