We all realize these days how foolhardy it is to try changing anyone’s political opinion. The two-thirds of Butler County’s voters who helped turned Pennsylvania red for Donald Trump aren’t about to change their opinion of him, and we’re not about to try anyway.

So we’d just like to point out some fresh observations and let readers make their own conclusions.

On Oct. 10, when Trump visited Erie for one of his Make America Great Again rallies, the first topic he brought up was beach sand for Presque Isle State Park. The president said that was the one thing requested by incumbent Rep. Mike Kelly for the reconfigured 16th Congressional District. He explained that improvements to Presque Isle as a tourist attraction and improving boat traffic in the canal were Kelly’s main requests of him for the Erie area.

“That’s what he said he wants,” Trump said. “He wants sand.”

This week, the president delivered on Kelly’s request. “Presque Isle gets $1.5 million for sand: 2019 federal funding allocation comes months early,” says the headline on the front page of Wednesday’s Erie Times-News.

The report explains the early commitment enables the Army Corps of Engineers to get the sand replenishment done before the summer beach season begins. An Army Corps spokesman said that’s a huge plus for the tourist trade of Erie County and the 16th District.

That should placate Erie Mayor Joe Schember, who was quoted in the Oct. 12 Erie Times complaining that the Trump rally in downtown Erie cost the city about $21,000 in overtime pay, mostly for security.

Spend $21,000 and get $1.5 million back? That sounds like a deal worth taking.

Incidentally, no security problems were reported during the event despite an overflow crowd at Erie Insurance Arena.

Also incidentally, a Youngstown woman who attended the MAGA rally reminded the Butler Eagle that she and 1,200 other workers were laid off from the General Motors plant at Lordstown, Ohio, on Trump’s Inauguration Day in 2017. General Motors announced Monday that it planned to idle Lordstown and four other factories in North America, cutting roughly 14,000 jobs in a bid to trim costs.

Trump responded to the GM announcement, saying federal subsidies that have shored up GM since the Great Recession have encouraged the car maker to continue making products that the public doesn’t want to buy.

That’s hard to prove or disprove, the experts say. Automotive sales are mixed — and relatively flat. For November 2018, retail car and truck sales combined are expected to be about 1.1 million, down 3.8 percent from November 2017, according to a joint forecast from J.D. Power and LMC Automotive. In general, they say, pickup trucks and SUVs are selling well; sedans, compacts, hybrids and electric cars are not.

The bottom line: Presque Isle’s beaches are expected to be beautiful by Memorial Day. We’re likely to see fewer Chevy Cruzes in the parking lots when we get there.