I wanted to take an opportunity to reach out to a colleague at the college I work for. He is a foreign exchange instructor from Egypt who teaches economics courses here in the United States, and he has been closely watching our politics while following the politics in his home country at the same time. He and I have became good friends over the past few years, and we have had a ton of realistic conversations together in the office. I just thought I would ask him how he feels about Project 2025, and how I think releasing this to the public and making it known to everybody in advance is the most asinine thing a wannabe-dictator and his allies can do before an election. Here is a generous excerpt from the email I sent to him:
“...I just thought I would ask for your opinion on something. I'm sure by now you have heard of this so-called ‘master plan’ called Project 2025, devised by the conservative think-tank The Heritage Foundation and to supposedly be implemented by Donald Trump if he wins in November. It is my firm belief that these people are already making a HUGE mistake. If your aspirations are to be a dictator of a nation or to be part of their administration, you do not come out from the get-go and openly admit ‘Oh, yeah...we're dictators and authoritarians, and here's our perfect and beautiful plan’, and make it visible to God and everybody just months before an election. Because then, once people read about it or find out about its contents, people are going to abandon you and you are already setting yourself up for political suicide. Plus, it seems to be chock full of 'proposals' and 'plans' that sound even more sinister when compared to other true dictatorships like Egypt or Russia (e.g., the [privatization] of Medicare and other government-run healthcare programs, and to my knowledge, even Egypt and Russia have some form of universal healthcare [at the national level]). Making those known to everybody at the beginning is bad judgment on The Heritage Foundation's part.
In my opinion, a true dictator would campaign like a ‘normal politician’ the first time they run, promising reform and such, and winning the hearts and souls of their country's people while keeping their true plans hidden and top secret. And then, if you and your party do win, then you start carrying out your architectural plans and establishing your dream regime from the inside out. [I believe this is what] Adolf Hitler did. To my knowledge, this is also what Alexander Lukashenko and even Vladimir Putin did.
You don't come out and admit your plans in advance for people to find out about [them], only to have [your people] abandon you. No, no, NO. Stupid idea from the very start. To have a plan for a dictatorship made public to an entire country of citizens ahead of an election spells a recipe for disaster at the beginning. These people at The Heritage Foundation, as well as Trump himself, are not real authoritarians. They are criminals.
Just wanted to share my thoughts with you about this mess in the making. I would be eager to hear your thoughts as well.”
In his return message, my colleague seemed to express a considerable amount of agreement with my opinion, and added one additional yet simple point after reading, or at least skimming through, the 900-page manifesto:
“I read the master plan and it is impossible to implement it.”
He readily admitted that he sees there being zero chance of Project 2025 succeeding, and that it is going to be a failure right from the start. And this is coming from somebody whose home country is a true, full-fledged dictatorship.
While this is certainly encouraging and a glimmer of hope for our nation, we still have to do our Constitutional part as Americans and VOTE. We have to turn out anyone and everyone that we can on our side to ensure that the Orange Menace and his minions will not get back into government and have even the slightest chance to carry out this “plan.”