Well, no actually.

I'm a big enough student of history to see which way we're going with this. I'd like to think that the electorate is smart enough to see through the demagoguery and make the better selection for America's future, but I'm not convinced that will happen.

It's interesting to me, at least, to ponder what kind of a disaster awaits these United States under a Trump presidency. It's a parlor game at this point, but I wonder what a couple of key things might look like with Mr. Trump in the oval office?

Let's start on our southern border, with that pesky wall. There may be some half-hearted effort to build a version of the "Atlantic Wall" as a bulwark against a perceived invader. But the reality is, the border is 1,989 miles long. Some of it is on nice, buildable land, but much of it is across wilderness, scrubland, desert, and other unfriendly terrain. Look around your neighborhood - do you live near an active rail line? They don't want people crossing that, either. How well do those fences work?

Staying on immigration, think about this. Trump has spewed such negative rhetoric, who's going to want to come here anymore, anyway? People looking for a better life, for opportunity, for a safer place to live...will they come to a country where the leader is very clearly telling them to stay out? We're still the worldwide magnet and Great American Melting Pot, but that's probably no longer possible under President Trump.

Staying on the domestic front, let's think about the economy. I'm no economist, but under President Trump, I wonder what we'll be doing? Being a businessman himself, Mr. Trump is interested in only one thing - profit. Under a Trump Presidency, the probability is that he'd do anything and everything possible to increase the profits of the big businesses that supported his candidacy. Which probably means union-busting, more corporate tax cuts and shelters, and an eroding of onerous regulations designed to level the playing field and protect the workforce. We were there before, in the era of the "Robber-Baron". We're probably headed back that way.

It's Trump's foreign policy that's the most worrisome. And here is where TriSec admits that he can understand some of that siren song.

But think about this first. Pick a conflict going on anywhere in the world today. If the two sides want or need to talk, who is the only power in the world that can likely cajole them to the bargaining table to even start the process? I think that stops under President Trump. We used to deride President Bush for his "with us or against us" policy, but it seems to me that Trump is against everyone. Who's going to want to negotiate with that as a moderator?

I can wrap up with this thought - did you see the news this morning? Apparently, the lovely folks of ISIS have stirred up some more anger by executing 25 spies. They couldn't just line them up and shoot them - these poor folks were tied together and lowered into a vat of acid. I must admit that I am becoming increasingly convinced that the only way to defeat this is to let them "reap the whirlwind". I have actually said this before - when we got through with Japan 70 years ago, one of their cities looked like this:



They don't give us any trouble anymore, do they? And that's not even an atomic bomb - that's Tokyo after a 'conventional' firebomb raid.

This is what worries me. I think there might just be enough voters out there, whipped into a frenzy by rhetoric, that want to see this happen in places like Ramadi, Mosul, or Syria. It's very worrisome to me to ponder what January 21, 2017 is going to look like with Donald Trump in the oval office.