It’s a serious question, and I’m not the first to ask it. Michael Moore wrote an intriguing article that suggested Trump was deliberately trying to sabotage his own campaign.
Trump is seemingly doing his best to alienate everyone but white males driven by testosterone. Today, he suggested that military veterans who suffer from PTSD do so because of their own failings, i.e. that they simply can’t handle what stronger veterans can handle. Add this (careless? ignorant?) statement to attacks on a Gold Star mother, the denigration of John McCain’s military service and time as a POW, and all the other attacks on Mexicans, Muslims, even an entire gender (his high school locker room mentality when he talks about women), and you have to wonder how such behavior could possibly be part of a winning strategy.
Why would Trump want to be president? To him, the salary is vanishingly low, and the workload incredibly high. Sure, being president would feed his ego, but Trump is mainly driven by capitalist greed and the celebration of his own magnificence. Being president is burdensome. It can be tedious, even boring. It requires discipline. Self-control. These are realities that don’t play to Trump’s strengths.
Trump is a showman. A braggart. A strutter. He’s thinks of himself as the biggest fish in the smallest pond. He seems to delight in thrashing around and upsetting all the little fish. But he’ll have precious little chance of doing this if he’s shackled to the Oval Office and all the responsibilities that office entails.
One thing is certain: Trump is rewriting all the rules of U.S. presidential politics. It’s hard to keep track of the constituencies he’s offended, the bridges he’s burned, the leaders he’s estranged. That he can still win it all is incredible: indeed, it may be incredible even to Trump.
Trump, I believe, would personally profit far more from losing the “rigged” election than winning it. If he loses, he becomes a martyr, at least in the minds of his followers. He can build a Trump Network/conglomerate that taps all the voters he’s rallied — and riled. He can milk them for all the money they’re worth, and bask in their adulation while being unencumbered by the real responsibilities of holding public office.
By losing, in other words, he’ll really be winning. Between now and the election, look for more outrageous statements by and from Trump. He already knows he can say or do almost anything without losing his core supporters. (As he himself boasted, he could shoot someone in cold blood in New York City and his loyal followers wouldn’t blink.)
Look for him to lose in November as well. And then look for him to clean up — big-time.
What kind of a presidential candidate tweets in the middle of the night about alleged sex tapes involving a former Miss Universe winner? Indeed, what kind of a man does this?
Donald Trump is a chump. I’d call him a chimp, except it would be an insult to chimpanzees everywhere. The man has no discipline, no sense of decorum, and no compassion for others (let’s not forget his signature line, “You’re fired”). Indeed, he seems to revel in humiliating others. This was mildly amusing when he was taking on equals on the stage during the Republican primaries, but it’s disturbing in the extreme to see him bullying the little guys and gals for whom he’s supposedly a champion.
So many sane people and major newspapers have gone on record as being against Trump that there’s little I can add. Sadly, Trump’s followers seem unperturbed and undisturbed no matter his insults and tyrannical behavior.
All I can say is this: Trump is not the kind of man my father taught me to be. My dad, who fought forest fires in Oregon in the CCC, a veteran of an armored division in World War II, a city firefighter for more than 30 years until his retirement, treated people fairly and squarely. He was humble about himself and considerate to others. I can’t recall him insulting others, certainly not in the intentional and hurtful way that Trump directs at others. Trump is especially fond of attacking women or minorities or anyone he sees as vulnerable, the very opposite of my dad’s code of behavior.
Don’t get me wrong: my dad wasn’t perfect. He had his faults. But his faults were not directed at others; he didn’t try to demean or diminish other people, as Trump so obviously enjoys doing. Unlike Trump, my dad wasn’t boastful; indeed, three favorite sayings of his were: “Still waters run deep,” “Don’t toot your own horn,” and “The empty barrel makes the most noise.”
You were right, Dad. The rushing nonsense from Trump exhibits his shallowness; the man is constantly tweeting his own horn; and, like the empty vessel that he is, he makes an awful amount of noise.
Trump: Not the kind of man my father would respect; not the kind of man our country needs. Dump chump Trump.
Last night’s “commander-in-chief” security forum that featured Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump was, not surprisingly, disappointing. (You can read the transcript here.) Trump recently stated he was in favor of large increases in defense spending, but he wasn’t asked about this. He wasn’t asked about his support of torture, nor was he challenged on his remarkably dangerous statement back in March that military officers would obey his presidential decrees, even when they were unlawful. Hillary was challenged on her email fiasco at the State Department, and rightly so, but she pretty much got a free pass on her support of the calamitous Iraq war and the chaos following the Libyan intervention. And of course neither candidate was challenged on their blanket support of Israel.
What you got was two self-absorbed candidates, one wonkish, the other one clearly a wanker, both of them posing as warriors as long as someone else’s kids are doing the fighting. Here’s a question for Trump and Hillary: the next time you deploy troops to Iraq or Syria or Afghanistan or wherever, will you include Ivanka or Chelsea, respectively, and put them in harm’s way?
Most interesting to me was Trump’s old-fashioned imperialism, which explains much of his appeal to the rabid right. Here’s what Trump had to say about how the Iraq war should have turned out for the USA:
“We [the USA] go in [to Iraq in 2003], we spend $3 trillion, we lose thousands and thousands of lives, and then, Matt, what happens is, we get nothing. You know, it used to be to the victor belong the spoils. Now, there was no victor there, believe me. There was no victor. But I always said: Take the oil.”
You have to hand it to The Donald: at least he’s occasionally honest. The Iraq war was about oil, among other things, and Trump says the USA as the “victor” should have taken it. Why? Because might makes right. Because, as Thucydides said so many centuries ago, the strong do what they will and the weak suffer as they must.
Remember when George W. Bush said Iraq’s oil was the “patrimony” of the Iraqi people and that the USA wasn’t about to take it? That the Iraq war was about freedom and democracy in the Middle East, not a naked grab for resources? Trump is having none of that. Any wonder that he’s so popular among Americans who are tired, as they see it, of losing?
“Take the oil!” It’s a statement that could easily appear on the next iteration of Trump’s baseball cap.
I had begun an article on why Donald Trump can still win when I saw an article by Michael Moore on the same subject. I’m going to post Moore’s article below, and by way of introduction, here’s the gist of what I was going to say:
Trump has advertised himself as the “law and order” candidate, the new sheriff in town, the one who’s going to kick ass and save us all, from the very day he takes the oath of office. It sounds absurd. Laughable. But I’ve seen this script play out before, and the “absurd” won.
I lived in rural Pennsylvania for nine years in a conservative area that went gaga over Sarah Palin’s visit in 2008 (she drew roughly 20 times as many people as Joe Biden). The local election for mayor pitted a moderate Republican, cozy with the establishment (let’s call him “Hillary”) versus a candidate who had a billboard featuring his image and boasting to local criminals that “On Day One, You’re Done,” a candidate who was an outspoken outsider (let’s call him “Trump”).
Guess who won? “Trump” won. People got out and voted for “Trump” because they were tired of establishment politics and broken promises; they wanted the “law and order” guy. Incredibly, the new mayor actually wore a bullet-proof coat when he was sworn in, allegedly because people had made threats against him (his wife, who stood next to him during the mayoral ceremony, had no such protection).
The people voted for the tough-talking “Trump.” The guy who hung gun profiles with bullet holes in the window of his garage. The guy who talked about the past and restoration (not reformation, and certainly not revolution). And that’s what (enough) people wanted. A reactionary. A man in the saddle, a new sheriff, no matter how implausible it sounded. This is the dynamic the real Trump is tapping today.
I’ve lived outside the liberal bubble. I’ve spent 20 years in the military and nine years in rural PA, in flyover country, a place where limousine liberals would never come to, let alone get out of the car. And based upon my many years of bubble-free life, I tell you the real Trump can win.
Now, I’d like to call on Michael Moore to tell you the same thing.
Five Reasons Why Trump Will Win
Michael Moore
Friends:
I am sorry to be the bearer of bad news, but I gave it to you straight last summer when I told you that Donald Trump would be the Republican nominee for president. And now I have even more awful, depressing news for you: Donald J. Trump is going to win in November. This wretched, ignorant, dangerous part-time clown and full time sociopath is going to be our next president. President Trump. Go ahead and say the words, ‘cause you’ll be saying them for the next four years: “PRESIDENT TRUMP.”
Never in my life have I wanted to be proven wrong more than I do right now.
I can see what you’re doing right now. You’re shaking your head wildly – “No, Mike, this won’t happen!” Unfortunately, you are living in a bubble that comes with an adjoining echo chamber where you and your friends are convinced the American people are not going to elect an idiot for president. You alternate between being appalled at him and laughing at him because of his latest crazy comment or his embarrassingly narcissistic stance on everything because everything is about him. And then you listen to Hillary and you behold our very first female president, someone the world respects, someone who is whip-smart and cares about kids, who will continue the Obama legacy because that is what the American people clearly want! Yes! Four more years of this!
You need to exit that bubble right now. You need to stop living in denial and face the truth which you know deep down is very, very real. Trying to soothe yourself with the facts – “77% of the electorate are women, people of color, young adults under 35 and Trump can’t win a majority of any of them!” – or logic – “people aren’t going to vote for a buffoon or against their own best interests!” – is your brain’s way of trying to protect you from trauma. Like when you hear a loud noise on the street and you think, “oh, a tire just blew out,” or, “wow, who’s playing with firecrackers?” because you don’t want to think you just heard someone being shot with a gun. It’s the same reason why all the initial news and eyewitness reports on 9/11 said “a small plane accidentally flew into the World Trade Center.” We want to – we need to – hope for the best because, frankly, life is already a shit show and it’s hard enough struggling to get by from paycheck to paycheck. We can’t handle much more bad news. So our mental state goes to default when something scary is actually, truly happening. The first people plowed down by the truck in Nice spent their final moments on earth waving at the driver whom they thought had simply lost control of his truck, trying to tell him that he jumped the curb: “Watch out!,” they shouted. “There are people on the sidewalk!”
Well, folks, this isn’t an accident. It is happening. And if you believe Hillary Clinton is going to beat Trump with facts and smarts and logic, then you obviously missed the past year of 56 primaries and caucuses where 16 Republican candidates tried that and every kitchen sink they could throw at Trump and nothing could stop his juggernaut. As of today, as things stand now, I believe this is going to happen – and in order to deal with it, I need you first to acknowledge it, and then maybe, just maybe, we can find a way out of the mess we’re in.
Don’t get me wrong. I have great hope for the country I live in. Things are better. The left has won the cultural wars. Gays and lesbians can get married. A majority of Americans now take the liberal position on just about every polling question posed to them: Equal pay for women – check. Abortion should be legal – check. Stronger environmental laws – check. More gun control – check. Legalize marijuana – check. A huge shift has taken place – just ask the socialist who won 22 states this year. And there is no doubt in my mind that if people could vote from their couch at home on their X-box or PlayStation, Hillary would win in a landslide.
But that is not how it works in America. People have to leave the house and get in line to vote. And if they live in poor, Black or Hispanic neighborhoods, they not only have a longer line to wait in, everything is being done to literally stop them from casting a ballot. So in most elections it’s hard to get even 50% to turn out to vote. And therein lies the problem for November – who is going to have the most motivated, most inspired voters show up to vote? You know the answer to this question. Who’s the candidate with the most rabid supporters? Whose crazed fans are going to be up at 5 AM on Election Day, kicking ass all day long, all the way until the last polling place has closed, making sure every Tom, Dick and Harry (and Bob and Joe and Billy Bob and Billy Joe and Billy Bob Joe) has cast his ballot? That’s right. That’s the high level of danger we’re in. And don’t fool yourself — no amount of compelling Hillary TV ads, or out-facting him in the debates or Libertarians siphoning votes away from Trump is going to stop his mojo.
Here are the 5 reasons Trump is going to win:
Midwest Math, or Welcome to Our Rust Belt Brexit.
I believe Trump is going to focus much of his attention on the four blue states in the rustbelt of the upper Great Lakes – Michigan, Ohio, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin. Four traditionally Democratic states – but each of them have elected a Republican governor since 2010 (only Pennsylvania has now finally elected a Democrat). In the Michigan primary in March, more Michiganders came out to vote for the Republicans (1.32 million) that the Democrats (1.19 million). Trump is ahead of Hillary in the latest polls in Pennsylvania and tied with her in Ohio. Tied? How can the race be this close after everything Trump has said and done? Well maybe it’s because he’s said (correctly) that the Clintons’ support of NAFTA helped to destroy the industrial states of the Upper Midwest. Trump is going to hammer Clinton on this and her support of TPP and other trade policies that have royally screwed the people of these four states. When Trump stood in the shadow of a Ford Motor factory during the Michigan primary, he threatened the corporation that if they did indeed go ahead with their planned closure of that factory and move it to Mexico, he would slap a 35% tariff on any Mexican-built cars shipped back to the United States. It was sweet, sweet music to the ears of the working class of Michigan, and when he tossed in his threat to Apple that he would force them to stop making their iPhones in China and build them here in America, well, hearts swooned and Trump walked away with a big victory that should have gone to the governor next-door, John Kasich.
From Green Bay to Pittsburgh, this, my friends, is the middle of England – broken, depressed, struggling, the smokestacks strewn across the countryside with the carcass of what we use to call the Middle Class. Angry, embittered working (and nonworking) people who were lied to by the trickle-down of Reagan and abandoned by Democrats who still try to talk a good line but are really just looking forward to rub one out with a lobbyist from Goldman Sachs who’ll write them nice big check before leaving the room. What happened in the UK with Brexit is going to happen here. Elmer Gantry shows up looking like Boris Johnson and just says whatever shit he can make up to convince the masses that this is their chance! To stick to ALL of them, all who wrecked their American Dream! And now The Outsider, Donald Trump, has arrived to clean house! You don’t have to agree with him! You don’t even have to like him! He is your personal Molotov cocktail to throw right into the center of the bastards who did this to you! SEND A MESSAGE! TRUMP IS YOUR MESSENGER!
And this is where the math comes in. In 2012, Mitt Romney lost by 64 electoral votes. Add up the electoral votes cast by Michigan, Ohio, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin. It’s 64. All Trump needs to do to win is to carry, as he’s expected to do, the swath of traditional red states from Idaho to Georgia (states that’ll never vote for Hillary Clinton), and then he just needs these four rust belt states. He doesn’t need Florida. He doesn’t need Colorado or Virginia. Just Michigan, Ohio, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin. And that will put him over the top. This is how it will happen in November.
The Last Stand of the Angry White Man.
Our male-dominated, 240-year run of the USA is coming to an end. A woman is about to take over! How did this happen?! On our watch! There were warning signs, but we ignored them. Nixon, the gender traitor, imposing Title IX on us, the rule that said girls in school should get an equal chance at playing sports. Then they let them fly commercial jets. Before we knew it, Beyoncé stormed on the field at this year’s Super Bowl (our game!) with an army of Black Women, fists raised, declaring that our domination was hereby terminated! Oh, the humanity!
That’s a small peek into the mind of the Endangered White Male. There is a sense that the power has slipped out of their hands, that their way of doing things is no longer how things are done. This monster, the “Feminazi,”the thing that as Trump says, “bleeds through her eyes or wherever she bleeds,” has conquered us — and now, after having had to endure eight years of a black man telling us what to do, we’re supposed to just sit back and take eight years of a woman bossing us around? After that it’ll be eight years of the gays in the White House! Then the transgenders! You can see where this is going. By then animals will have been granted human rights and a fuckin’ hamster is going to be running the country. This has to stop!
The Hillary Problem.
Can we speak honestly, just among ourselves? And before we do, let me state, I actually like Hillary – a lot – and I think she has been given a bad rap she doesn’t deserve. But her vote for the Iraq War made me promise her that I would never vote for her again. To date, I haven’t broken that promise. For the sake of preventing a proto-fascist from becoming our commander-in-chief, I’m breaking that promise. I sadly believe Clinton will find a way to get us in some kind of military action. She’s a hawk, to the right of Obama. But Trump’s psycho finger will be on The Button, and that is that. Done and done.
Let’s face it: Our biggest problem here isn’t Trump – it’s Hillary. She is hugely unpopular — nearly 70% of all voters think she is untrustworthy and dishonest. She represents the old way of politics, not really believing in anything other than what can get you elected. That’s why she fights against gays getting married one moment, and the next she’s officiating a gay marriage. Young women are among her biggest detractors, which has to hurt considering it’s the sacrifices and the battles that Hillary and other women of her generation endured so that this younger generation would never have to be told by the Barbara Bushes of the world that they should just shut up and go bake some cookies. But the kids don’t like her, and not a day goes by that a millennial doesn’t tell me they aren’t voting for her. No Democrat, and certainly no independent, is waking up on November 8th excited to run out and vote for Hillary the way they did the day Obama became president or when Bernie was on the primary ballot. The enthusiasm just isn’t there. And because this election is going to come down to just one thing — who drags the most people out of the house and gets them to the polls — Trump right now is in the catbird seat.
The Depressed Sanders Vote.
Stop fretting about Bernie’s supporters not voting for Clinton – we’re voting for Clinton! The polls already show that more Sanders voters will vote for Hillary this year than the number of Hillary primary voters in ’08 who then voted for Obama. This is not the problem. The fire alarm that should be going off is that while the average Bernie backer will drag him/herself to the polls that day to somewhat reluctantly vote for Hillary, it will be what’s called a “depressed vote” – meaning the voter doesn’t bring five people to vote with her. He doesn’t volunteer 10 hours in the month leading up to the election. She never talks in an excited voice when asked why she’s voting for Hillary. A depressed voter. Because, when you’re young, you have zero tolerance for phonies and BS. Returning to the Clinton/Bush era for them is like suddenly having to pay for music, or using MySpace or carrying around one of those big-ass portable phones. They’re not going to vote for Trump; some will vote third party, but many will just stay home. Hillary Clinton is going to have to do something to give them a reason to support her — and picking a moderate, bland-o, middle of the road old white guy as her running mate is not the kind of edgy move that tells millenials that their vote is important to Hillary. Having two women on the ticket – that was an exciting idea. But then Hillary got scared and has decided to play it safe. This is just one example of how she is killing the youth vote.
The Jesse Ventura Effect.
Finally, do not discount the electorate’s ability to be mischievous or underestimate how any millions fancy themselves as closet anarchists once they draw the curtain and are all alone in the voting booth. It’s one of the few places left in society where there are no security cameras, no listening devices, no spouses, no kids, no boss, no cops, there’s not even a friggin’ time limit. You can take as long as you need in there and no one can make you do anything. You can push the button and vote a straight party line, or you can write in Mickey Mouse and Donald Duck. There are no rules. And because of that, and the anger that so many have toward a broken political system, millions are going to vote for Trump not because they agree with him, not because they like his bigotry or ego, but just because they can. Just because it will upset the apple cart and make mommy and daddy mad. And in the same way like when you’re standing on the edge of Niagara Falls and your mind wonders for a moment what would that feel like to go over that thing, a lot of people are going to love being in the position of puppetmaster and plunking down for Trump just to see what that might look like. Remember back in the ‘90s when the people of Minnesota elected a professional wrestler as their governor? They didn’t do this because they’re stupid or thought that Jesse Ventura was some sort of statesman or political intellectual. They did so just because they could. Minnesota is one of the smartest states in the country. It is also filled with people who have a dark sense of humor — and voting for Ventura was their version of a good practical joke on a sick political system. This is going to happen again with Trump.
Coming back to the hotel after appearing on Bill Maher’s Republican Convention special this week on HBO, a man stopped me. “Mike,” he said, “we have to vote for Trump. We HAVE to shake things up.” That was it. That was enough for him. To “shake things up.” President Trump would indeed do just that, and a good chunk of the electorate would like to sit in the bleachers and watch that reality show.
(Next week I will post my thoughts on Trump’s Achilles Heel and how I think he can be beat.)
It’s Trump coronation week. My wife and I were out with friends last night, sitting in a bar, watching a muted screen that featured Melania Trump giving her (plagiarized?) speech at the convention. A muted screen was perfect to focus on what really matters at this convention – the optics. The screen behind Melania was a fetching color of patriotic red. Shots of the audience showed a mostly clean-cut crowd of predominantly White people, politely applauding, sprinkled with occasional shouts (which happily I couldn’t hear).
As I watched the spectacle, I turned to my friend, another historian. We both waxed nostalgic for political conventions that featured real news rather than manufactured drama. For example, I vividly recall the Republican Convention of 1980, when it seemed for a fleeting moment former President Gerald R. Ford was joining Ronald Reagan on a “unity” ticket. (It was not to be, which is sad. Such a ticket may have saved us from the rise of the Bushes.) Nowadays, barring a major gaffe (plagiarism again?) or perhaps a violent protest, nothing much of consequence happens at these conventions.
Of course, readers of this blog know that I reject Trump, and all his works, and all his empty promises. But that doesn’t mean I won’t give the devil his due. Trump is a deceiver, a con man par excellence, and many Americans are desperate to believe the con.
An example from my local paper. A reader wrote: “Without Trump’s help, we’re all going down,” following that with “We are on the Titanic, and it is going down. Hillary is snug in a lifeboat. The rest of us are in steerage. I don’t care what his hair looks like; we need to be rescued.”
What can one say to that? As I recall, once it struck the iceberg, the Titanic was a doomed ship. Putting Trump at the helm would only help it to slip under the waves faster, perhaps a mercy for those fated to die, but certainly no salvation for ship, crew, and passengers. But if it sped up the Titanic movie and Leonardo DiCaprio’s death scene, that at least would have been a cinematic mercy.
In all seriousness, this reader’s letter moved me. Not for its logic, but for its desperation. Yes, for many people these are desperate times in America. They know the ship of state is sinking. They know they’re stuck in steerage. And they know they’re fated to suffer the consequences, even as Hillary Clinton and crew have ready escapes.
But, and it’s a big “but,” America: Putting a con man at the helm of a foundering ship is not exactly the wisest course of action.
There are alternatives to Captain Trump and Lifeboat Hillary. Seek them out. Get involved. Leonardo DiCaprio’s character found his way out of steerage. Yes, a bit of Hollywood fantasy, but remember the Unsinkable Molly Brown? She was real.
Give me the generosity of Molly Brown over the narcissism of Trump any day — or any year.
(Dedicated to Paul and Mo, my friends at the bar.)
The language of war fascinates me. I was reading President Obama’s response to Donald Trump on whether Obama “gets it” when it comes to the threat of terrorism and came across this passage:
“Someone [Donald Trump] seriously thinks that we don’t know who we are fighting? If there is anyone out there who thinks we are confused about who our enemies are — that would come as a surprise to the thousands of terrorists who we have taken off the battlefield.”
That’s such a curious phrase: “terrorists who we have taken off the battlefield.” As if the United States has simply evacuated them or relocated them instead of killing them.
I think the distancing effect of air power has something to do with this euphemistic language. The U.S. military “takes people off the battlefield” rather than killing them, blowing them up, and so on. Obama’s personality may also play a role: a rational person, he’s been compared to the Vulcan Mr. Spock from “Star Trek” in his coolly logical approach to war.
Perhaps that coolly rational side, and not his preference to avoid terms like “radical Islamic terrorism,” is what gets Obama into trouble. Many Americans would prefer more directness, more passion, even though such directness and passion is often the approach of posturing chickenhawks. Consider the language of Bush/Cheney and all their blustering about “wanted, dead or alive” and “the axis of evil“ and “you’re either for us or against us.” Bush/Cheney talked as if they had just walked off a Western movie set after a gunfight, but both avoided the Vietnam War when they were young men, with Cheney famously saying he had other, more important things to do with his life. (Bush flew in the Texas Air National Guard, apparently gaining a slot after his father pulled some political strings.)
So, what should Obama have said in place of “we’ve taken them off the battlefield”?
Why not be honest and say something like this? “I’m well into the eighth and final year of my administration, during which I’ve approved drone strikes and air raids that have killed thousands of suspected and confirmed terrorists. Sure, we’ve often missed some targets, killing innocent people instead, but hey — war is hell. I’ve approved Pentagon budgets that each year approach $750 billion, I’ve overseen the U.S. dominance of the international trade in weapons, I continue to oversee an empire of roughly 700 overseas U.S. bases. Some have even called me the assassin in chief, and they’re right about that, because under my command deadly drone strikes have increased dramatically. Meanwhile, we’ve already made some 12,000 air strikes against ISIS/ISIL. So don’t tell me, Mr. Trump, that I don’t know who the enemy is. Don’t tell me I’m not willing to murder terrorists whenever and wherever we find them, even when they’re U.S. citizens and teenagers. Don’t tell me I don’t get it.”
Those words would be honest – though they’d really just scratch the surface of the Obama-led efforts to secure the “Homeland.” But instead Obama speaks of “taking” terrorists “off the battlefield,” cloaking his administration’s violent actions in a euphemistic phrase that would be consistent with angels from on high coming down to lift terrorists off the battlefield to some idyllic oasis.
Odd, isn’t it, that so few Americans criticize Obama for his murderous actions in overseas wars, but so many will criticize him for not bragging and boasting about it.
Well, if America is looking for a braggart, someone willing to boast about himself, they have their man in Donald Trump. If they’re looking for a new assassin in chief, they have their woman in Hillary Clinton. And if they’re looking for fresh ideas, a new strategy, a way to end our seemingly endless wars, they’re simply out of luck this election season, unless you go to a third-party candidate like Jill Stein.
In these over-heated times, the chances of a third-party challenge with substance are somewhere between nada and nil. In the United States in 2016, war and weapons sales and imperial expansion will continue to find a way, even as our leaders cloak their violent actions using the most anodyne phrases.
Donald Trump’s faults are legion. But which ones are truly awful?
A crass womanizer who brags about his penis. But wait a minute. Lyndon B. Johnson was vulgar and crude and crass and a womanizer – and LBJ was easily eclipsed as a womanizer by John F. Kennedy.
A bigot who attacks Mexican immigrants and Muslims among other “undesirables.” But wait a minute. Richard Nixon railed against the Blacks and the Jews, among other “enemies” of Nixon’s righteous “silent majority” of Americans.
An ignoramus who knows little of foreign policy. But wait a minute. Many presidential candidates have lacked foreign policy experience (Jimmy Carter and Barack Obama, to cite two recent examples).
A posturing tough-guy who supports torture for America’s enemies and the murder of terrorists’ families. But wait a minute. The Bush/Cheney administration freely used torture (they just called it “enhanced interrogation techniques”), and the Obama administration freely uses drones to “take out” terrorists and whoever may be with them (including innocent family members).
A serial liar who can’t be taken at his word. But wait a minute. Name any president, other than Jimmy Carter, who prioritized truth-telling.
A bully who bludgeons his opponents into submission. But wait a minute. Just think of LBJ, Nixon, and Dick Cheney (yes, he was a Vice President, but still). These men were all bullies.
A shameless showman who exploits the media while professing to hate it. But wait a minute. Nixon despised the media; the media colluded with Kennedy to hide his negative qualities; and Obama has cozied up to the corporate media even as he’s actively prosecuted whistleblowers.
Focusing on Trump’s many “awfuls” is not the best way to defeat him, since America’s presidents have hardly been choir boys. Put simply, Trump’s prejudicial attitudes toward women, minorities, and other groups or peoples he doesn’t like don’t mark him as exceptional, nor does his record of flip-flops on issues, as the American people have come to expect that politicians are basically liars.
Where Trump is vulnerable, I believe, is his tyrannical qualities. Trump’s past behavior suggests he sees himself as above the law. Put differently, he sees himself as a law unto himself. And if he wins the presidency I simply don’t believe he’ll honor his oath of office to the U.S. Constitution.
Remember during the Frost Interviews when Nixon said, If the president does it, that means it’s legal? That’s Trump in a nutshell. Recall during the Republican presidential debates when Trump said the U.S. military would obey his orders regardless of their legality under the U.S. Constitution. Yes, he later recanted that dictatorial position, but his initial answer revealed his essential nature: I’m in charge, I’ll do what I want, everyone else has to obey me.
Here “Star Trek” fans may recall an episode from the original series called “Space Seed,” featuring Ricardo Montalban as Khan. A tyrant from Earth’s past, Khan speaks of unifying humanity under a strong leader. Spock’s reply is telling: “Unify, sir? Like a team of animals under one whip?”
Khan then waxes about the wonders of one-man rule, eventually blurting out, “We offered the world order!” The Donald, today’s version of Khan, offers to make America great again.
Trump has the makings of a tyrant. His approach to the presidency is fundamentally undemocratic. His statements and behavior suggest if he becomes president he’ll do what he wants and expect others to fall into line, even the U.S. military, which swears its oath to the U.S. Constitution and not to any one leader. At a time when Congress has abdicated its responsibility to declare war or to check executive warmaking prerogatives, a tyrant like Trump is an especially dangerous prospect as president.
Because of this, Trump is truly an awful choice for president.
Bracing Views 