Republican debate; is Trump a Dem?

GOP debate

I watched the Aug. 6 Republican presidential candidates’ debate on Fox News, and I wasn’t surprised to see Donald Trump refuse to say he would support whoever gets the nomination from his party, if he doesn’t get it.

Perhaps I have misspoken! Trump’s party is probably the Democratic Party. He’s running as a Republican after talking to Bill Clinton, giving lots of money to the Clintons, their foundation and liberal causes. I wasn’t impressed with Trump’s debate performance nor was I shocked that he couldn’t say when he became a Republican or why.

If the election were held this year instead of next and Trump were the third-party candidate, he would take votes from the GOP candidate and help assure a victory for Hillary Clinton, as Ross Perot did for Bill Clinton against George H.W. Bush in 1992.

I wonder what the quid pro quo is for Trump with the Clintons for a Clinton victory!

One way to keep history from repeating itself is to expose Trump’s liberal leanings, so if he does run as a third-party candidate, he will take votes away from Clinton, not her Republican opponent.

— Hugh T. Lefler Jr., Fort Worth

Donald Trump explicitly declined to pledge support for the Republican Party nominee for president in 2016 if he fails to win the nomination, threatening a third-party run.

Any candidate for the GOP presidential nomination should pledge to support the eventual nominee. Failure to pledge erodes the legitimacy of the nomination process.

It allows someone with their billion-dollar marbles to promote their own candidacy within the party structure and then leave the field and play by their own selfish rules.

If the GOP presidential candidate system cannot be limited to party loyalists, then the debates could include Democrats Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders.

These two Democrats will not support the Republican nominee for president, but would also welcome the free TV exposure that Trump is reaping with the threat of a third-party candidacy.

Clinton and Sanders, at least, will not bait and switch.

— Michael Myers, Fort Worth

Megyn Kelly of Fox News obviously intended to embarrass and insult Donald Trump.

Then when Trump truthfully and appropriately responded, he was attacked for being out of order and being too harsh and disrespectful.

We are involved in a global conflict with barbaric forces that want to utterly destroy America and Israel. If Megyn can’t handle plain, hard truth, she needs another career.

— Bob Mowell, Fort Worth

The demeaning, sexist and cruel disregard for women displayed in the Republican debate made me wonder whether they even care about the women in their own lives!

Trump says it is fine to call women names like fat pigs, ugly slobs, disgusting animals, etc. And Scott Walker says the life of the fertilized egg must be protected even at the cost of the mother’s life!

I think these guys want to send women back to 1950, in the kitchen with their aprons or meeting their husbands at the door with a favorite drink dressed only in Saran wrap, barefoot, pregnant — ready to “give in” — and dependent on her husband for her identity as well as her allowance/spending money.

These reactionaries must be stopped!

Vote like a girl. And vote like your life depends on it.

— Kathleen J. Lowry, Paradise

This story was originally published August 12, 2015 at 5:48 PM with the headline "Republican debate; is Trump a Dem?."