Damon Linker: “Easily the most influential pro-Trump essay of the 2016 election cycle was ‘The Flight 93 Election’ by the pseudonymous author Publius Decius Mus (later revealed to be author Michael Anton, who went on to serve on Donald Trump’s national security council).”
“The essay, a masterpiece of lurid metaphor and ideological hysteria, made, at its core, a very simple argument: Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton was the equivalent of a terrorist hijacker who, if given control of our plane/country, was certain to kill us all. Empowering Trump’s campaign to defeat her was very risky as well, but with Trump seizing the cockpit, the country — and above all, the country’s conservatives — had a shot at survival: ‘With Trump, at least you can … take your chances.'”
“This argument was always comically overwrought and wildly irresponsible, but now, just a few months shy of a full term in office for the Trump administration, it’s possible to assess the consequences of tens of millions of Republicans taking their chances on a man unfit in every way (morally, intellectually, temperamentally) to serve as president of the United States. Those consequences are clear: Trump has sent the country into a nosedive from which it is increasingly unlikely to recover.”