Vivek Ramaswamy left the presidential race the best way he successfully entered it: as a supporter of Donald Trump. The 38-year-old businessman endorsed the previous president as he suspended his marketing campaign final evening, calling Trump “the best president of the 21st century.” That won’t sound like excessive reward—there have been solely 4 presidents this century, except you rely not fairly three weeks of a lame-duck Invoice Clinton—however provided that Ramaswamy was simply 15 when the century began, I am positive it was a honest praise.
Ramaswamy is an ex-libertarian—he voted for Michael Badnarik in 2004, in order that’s at the very least one skeleton in each of our closets—and he thus had a greater sense than most politicians of learn how to successfully handle libertarian audiences. Perhaps due to that, I generally heard from anti-statist kinds that they favored him better of the GOP choices. And to offer credit score the place it is due, there had been occasions when Ramaswamy appeared like the one individual within the discipline keen to talk some impolitic reality. It is simply that he blended these truths with a few of the most godawful positions you could possibly think about. He had extra anti-war impulses than the opposite Republican candidates, however he additionally was keen to send the military to Mexico. One second he would possibly defend the free speech of pro-Palestinian protesters; the following he may be able to ban a whole internet platform. If a debate moderator requested the candidates what shade the sky is, Ramaswamy may be the one individual on the stage keen to declare it blue, however then he’d in all probability add that the solar has inexperienced and lavender stripes.
I by no means felt the pull of the Ramaswamy motion myself—moreover the authoritarian and simply plain kooky parts of his platform (did I point out that he needs a border wall with Canada?), his onstage method was annoying, like somebody had by some means crossed Tracy Flick with Wayne Allyn Root. For those who favored him higher than the out there options, that certainly says extra about how dispiriting these decisions are than one thing good about Vivek Ramaswamy. Anyway, he typically felt extra like an unofficial Trump surrogate than an actual candidate.
Properly, now he will be an official surrogate if he needs. And if Trump returns to the White Home, he will be the Secretary of Podcasts or one thing. The person clearly has a future, within the sense that all of us do.