Probably the biggest reason for President Trump losing support? Iran.
A big part of Trump’s coalition were people who didn’t want any prolonged wars, wars which served the interests of the “military industrial establishment” (politicians and their cronies), but not the cause of American liberty and sovereignty.
They equated Trump with, “No war.” But clearly that’s not what Trump was about. Trump was about pro-America. True: It didn’t serve America’s interests, back in 2003, to invade Iraq and then deal with the years long mess created by that war.
But Iran is different. Iran is openly and proudly the # 1 sponsor of world terrorism. Thanks in large measure to the money and moral support afforded by the Obama and Biden regimes, Iran has moved closer and closer to having nuclear weapons capability. In fact, based on information now released by Trump’s administration, Iran may have already been to that point.
You can’t say “no war” as an out-of-context absolute. When someone is already at war with you, literally coming to kill you (or, perhaps just as bad, engage in nuclear blackmail with you), then you have to strike them before it gets to the fatal point. It’s not about Israel. It’s about American safety. America benefits from Israeli sovereignty because, compared to the alternatives, Israel is a bastion of freedom and individual rights in that part of the world. And we need that part of the world for oil, which keeps the lights on in Western civilization. If we didn’t have a Communist-inspired environmentalist fascist movement impairing oil and energy production in America, it might be a different story; we might be able to ignore the middle East much more. But Iran would still be a threat, because Iran exports terrorism to America.
You can’t assume, “Trump stands against endless wars” and then consider Trump to have betrayed you when he strikes out against Iran. You might debate the timing, strategy and manner of that strike — but you cannot oppose the strike itself, not in principle. If “America First” means anything, it means saving us from nuclear blackmailers and bloodthirsty totalitarians like the Iranian regime. Oil and Israel are important factors; but America First is really what this was all about. It makes me terribly sad to think that radical leftist totalitarians (some of whom call for “capitalist blood” in the streets) will take over Congress because some people don’t believe in war, even when it’s clearly self-defense and survival.