The Register's editorial

The outcome of the 2016 presidential election won’t tell us anything we don’t already know about the two major-party candidates — but it will say a lot about who we are.

Are we a nation that believes in freedom of religion, a right our founders held so dear they enshrined it in the First Amendment, or are we a nation that denies entry and citizenship to people of one specific faith?

Are we a nation that believes in the rule of law and the limited powers of the presidency, or are we a nation that wants its president to prosecute and jail his political opponents?

Endorsement follows series of editorials opposing Trump

Are we a nation that believes in shared sacrifice and the notion that taxes are the dues we all pay for living in a free society, or are we a nation that exempts people of means from that obligation at the expense of the less privileged?

Are we a nation that measures its greatness by its generosity and its global commitment to helping people in need, or are we a nation defined by conspicuous consumption and the accumulation of personal wealth?

Are we a nation that celebrates the cultural, ethnic and racial diversity that 200 years ago made America the “great melting pot” and which even today makes us stronger and more secure, or are we a nation that categorizes Mexican immigrants as rapists and drug dealers, and provides no sanctuary to refugees fleeing war-torn countries?

Are we a nation that that forcefully condemns murderous foreign leaders who support terrorist activities that threaten our way of life, or are we a nation that expresses admiration for the so-called “strong leadership” of tyrants and despots?

For those who believe America should be a beacon of a hope in a world ravaged by terrorism, that it should be a force for good and that its leaders should embody all that is best about this nation, there is only one choice for president: Hillary Clinton.

The Democratic nominee is intelligent, experienced and respected by our allies around the world. Her detractors say she’s too secretive and too distrustful of the press and the public — and they’re right. But these are characteristics that would have prompted almost anyone else with her background to retire from public life and seek employment in the far more lucrative private sector.

Clinton has instead taken the path of greatest resistance, choosing to remain in the public arena where, for almost 40 years, she has fended off an unrelenting barrage of politically motivated attacks while fighting for social justice.

Her public-service work began in the early 1970s when she graduated from Yale and, rather than join a private law firm, signed on with the Children’s Defense Fund where she advocated for disadvantaged youth and children incarcerated in adult prisons.

Thanks in part to her groundbreaking work as first lady, eight million children in low-income families obtained access to medical care through the State Children’s Health Insurance Program.

As a senator, she worked tirelessly with Republicans on providing health care for 9/11 first-responders and for members of the National Guard. She pushed for revisions of the Family Medical Leave Act so the families of wounded veterans could care for their loved ones without losing their jobs, and she successfully championed efforts to create more jobs, provide women with pay equity and establish universal access to health care.

As secretary of state, she was instrumental in securing international sanctions against Iran, brokered a lasting cease-fire agreement between Israel and Hamas, and made poverty, the environment and women’s rights elements of America’s foreign-policy mission.

The case for a Clinton presidency could easily be made even if the GOP nominee wasn’t Donald Trump, a man who has never held public office, never worked in the public sector, has no experience in foreign relations, and has relatively few political allies even within his own party.

Trump could try to compensate for those deficiencies by surrounding himself with experts and assembling a cabinet modeled after Lincoln’s “team of rivals” — highly qualified individuals who disagree on matters of policy. But Trump’s defining characteristic is his distaste for dissent. It’s inconceivable that a Trump cabinet would be anything more than a coterie of like-minded hand puppets. Faced with protesters at rallies, he encourages his supporters to respond with violence, and he professes to know more about defeating ISIS than our top generals — an audacious claim for a real estate developer who might soon control our nuclear arsenal and have the power to send our sons and daughters into war.

Part of Trump’s appeal is that he asks nothing of his supporters, including intellectual engagement. Instead, he metaphorically points at Clinton, as he did recently in Philadelphia, and says, to thunderous applause, “She is the devil.” He describes America as being on the brink of an apocalyptic collapse marked by poverty, terrorism and violence, and then has the temerity to say, as he did at the Republican National Convention, “I alone can fix it.”

This sort of one-dimensional thinking appears to be utterly without precedent in presidential politics. Historically, every other major-party nominee has possessed the intelligence and humility to understand and acknowledge that the presidency demands more than any one individual is capable of giving.

In his first speech to Congress as president, Harry Truman told his political opponents, “Only with your help can I hope to complete one of the greatest tasks ever assigned to a public servant.” Richard Nixon, in accepting his party’s nomination in 1968, was even more direct: “Without God’s help and your help, we will surely fail.”

Contrast that with Donald Trump, who shows no appreciation for the daunting tasks that await our next president. He is oblivious to the fact that he’ll need the full support of Congress, the American people and the international community to accomplish one-tenth of what he has promised. His tax plan has almost no chance of being enacted — which is fortunate, as it would benefit the wealthy at the expense of the middle-class, while causing the federal debt to increase by $7.2 trillion, according to the nonpartisan Tax Policy Center.

The very qualities that have endeared Trump to his supporters — the lack of polish, the vilification of his opponents, the refusal to articulate policy details, the reluctance to seek advice from others, the inability to recognize his own shortcomings, the complete absence of humility, the disdain for compromise, the hostility toward the Fourth Estate, the alarming paucity of intellectual curiosity — would be crippling liabilities for any president the instant he or she took the oath of office.

Trump mocks the disabled, denigrates prisoners of war, objectifies women, brags about his anatomy on national television and, if his own boastful comments are to be believed, indulges in criminal, predatory behavior. Then he looks at America and asserts, as he did in Nevada just two weeks ago, “I am a reflection of you.” It’s up to each of us, as voters, to disprove that statement and proclaim to the world, “We are better than that.”

With Trump on the Nov. 8 ballot, there is more at stake than important policy decisions on immigration, energy, the economy, education, climate change and foreign intervention. Democracy itself is threatened when its care is entrusted to individuals who are neither statesman nor thinkers and who would abuse the powers of their office to silence opposition and retaliate against their political opponents.

In 1938, Franklin Roosevelt warned that the only “real safeguard” of democracy is education. An uninformed — or a badly misinformed — electorate, he said, could spell an end to this great experiment of ours. “Democracy cannot succeed unless those who express their choice are prepared to choose wisely,” Roosevelt said.

On Election Day, all of us share the privilege and responsibility of protecting the principles on which this country was founded and for which so many others have died: justice, liberty, equality and opportunity for all. In this particular election, only one of the two major-party candidates stands prepared to honor America and uphold its highest ideals.

The Des Moines Register endorses Hillary Clinton for president.

This endorsement is the opinion of The Des Moines Register’s editorial board:

David Chivers, president and publisher

Lynn Hicks, opinion editor

Clark Kauffman, editorial writer

Andie Dominick, editorial writer

Brian Smith, engagement editor