Trump Is Running to be Alienator-in-Chief

It is hard keeping up with the alienator-in-chief. He’s not the presumptive AIC. He won the actual title from the moment he declared his candidacy for president. Or maybe four years ago with his advocacy of the birther movement to delegitimize the presidency of Barack Obama.

Donald Trump believes in shooting the messenger while ignoring the message. His preferred tactic is to ridicule anyone opposed to him, as if diminishing their stature would somehow reduce or eliminate criticism of his actions or words. His latest salvo pins the label of “devil” onto Hillary Clinton. If that doesn’t stick, maybe he will mine literature and biblical history for some equally dismissive appellation, such as Lady Macbeth, Cruella de Vil, Jezebel or Salome. 

To small-minded America, to those who hate his opponents, to those whose bigotry he has given cover to, Trump’s in-your-face tactic exudes strength and refreshing leadership, qualities that politically correct politicians do not harbor, they believe. Should he win, and obviously I hope he does not, Trump would be the alienator-in-chief of an alienated nation.

At what point, however, will Trump say something so outrageous that even his most ardent supporters see him as the boob he is, unfit for the highest office in the land? Would it not be a delicious irony if Trump was taken down by a Muslim?

Sadly, I don’t think the Khan affair surrounding Trump’s defamation of the family of a Muslim American U.S. Army captain killed in Iraq will be his undoing. Trumpsters—I can’t claim authorship of this term for Trump supporters, though I swear I had not heard it before it popped into my head recently—anyway, Trumpsters are so entwined in his candidacy that rational arguments cannot and do not work on them. 

While public figures on both sides of the political spectrum sees Trump as a neo-dictator in style and substance, Trumpsters only see positive aspects of his authoritarian style. Like dumpster divers who believe hidden gems can be found among the detritus of society, Trumpsters view him as the fulfillment of their dream for a new American revolution that lowers taxes, removes the burden of government regulations, strengthens the already strongest military in the world while signaling Russia that NATO isn’t to be considered a deterrent to its Baltic and Black Seas expansionist desires, reduces entitlement programs but god forbid does not touch their Social Security or Medicare, builds a protective wall around our country to keep out criminal illegal aliens and cheap goods that will now be built in America but cost more, restores law and order by putting minorities back in their place behind white America, and appoints judges that will halt, maybe even reverse, the last 60 years of progress toward social equality in the country.

Trump is a factual chameleon, changing positions day to day, denying statements made in print and the airwaves. Yet Trumpsters don’t care about the truth. 

Apparently, neither do Republican Party leaders. They may cringe at what he says, but they are betting their future, and that of the country, on their ability to control him should he take the oath of office. They are as foolish as the voters and government leaders who thought they’d be able to contain Hitler, Mussolini, Hamas, and other dictatorial movements. Trump’s pronouncements, as offensive as many may be, such as limiting entry to America by select foreigners, oftentimes are within constitutional grounds. The CIA director has said he would not re-institute torture, but if Trump wants to, no doubt he would find some acolyte who would do his bidding.

In Monday’s New York Times Paul Krugman refuted reasons why Republicans cannot support Hillary Clinton (http://nyti.ms/2aVCiQN) . He cited three areas they find fault with her: economic policies, national security and the fear of executive overreach. In each case Krugman argued Trump would be worse. As cogent as his arguments were, he failed to mention the key impact this election may have on the coming decades. The next president will most likely nominate two to four Supreme Court justices. Presidents set policy for four to eight years. Justices influence lives for decades. 

Perhaps that is why GOP poobahs like Paul Ryan and Mitch McConnell and John McCain and Mike Pence have not abandoned their support of Trump. To their shame and lack of patriotic duty. 

Five and six years ago I wrote that Profiles in Courage should be required reading for public officials. It is John F. Kennedy’s 1955 Pulitzer Prize-winning account of eight U.S. senators who, at different times in the history of the Republic, acted on their conscience rather than succumb to political pressure to conform to party politics or the majority of their constituents. They did so at great risk to their careers, in the interest of serving country first.

Republicans want to go back to the “good old days.” Those days included times when public servants truly put the public good ahead of their own self-interests.

Here’s your election witticism of the day, courtesy of whowhatwhy.org:

A politician thinks of the next election; a statesman thinks of the next generation. —James Freeman Clarke

Reading List

Over a delicious dinner at friends’ house Friday night, politics and international relations dominated conversation that at times grew loud. One of the more contentious issues was the role of elected officials. Should they legislate according to the campaign promises they made to their constituents, or should they feel free to vote their conscience if they discover a more judicious and patriotic path?

For Gilda and me the choice was clear—we choose leaders to lead, not to stay stagnant when the world around them is evolving. Should Southern representatives have remained anti-civil rights even as the voters who sent them to Washington and their state capitols continued their bigoted beliefs, Gilda asked?

It’s commonplace today for not just Democrats but Republicans as well to co-opt the legacy of John F. Kennedy. But in doing so they must embrace one of his sentinel works. Profiles in Courage is JFK’s 1955 Pulitzer Prize-winning account of eight U.S. senators who acted on their conscience rather than succumb to political pressure to conform to party politics or the majority of their constituents. They did so at great risk to their careers, in the interest of serving country first.

We find ourselves today in need of such statesmen. Instead of country first, it’s party first for too many of our chosen representatives. Instead of compromise, they are determined to humble their opposition, sowing conflict and animus not seen for generations, perhaps not since the great debates over slavery in the early decades of the 19th century. But even those debates yielded compromises. Today, compromise seems not to be part of the political lexicon.

Perhaps Profiles of Courage should be made mandatory reading for everyone in Washington and our 50 state capitols. Perhaps some who read it and take its lessons to heart will not win re-election because they have put country before their re-election effort. They will earn eternal gratitude. It’s a pipedream, I know, but it’s a worthy pipedream.


Here’s another must read for all—Since Yesterday by Frederick Lewis Allen. You might not have time to read this 1940 book about life during the Great Depression and how our government tried to help its citizens survive it, but surely you have a few minutes to read Joe Nocera’s column on it from Saturday’s NY Times: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/15/opinion/nocera-the-1930s-sure-sound-familiar.html?_r=1&hp

If Nocera is right about the lessons to be gleaned from Since Yesterday, we are in for rougher times given the mood in Washington to cut, cut, cut and not invest in our future.

Campaign 2012

It’s all over but the shouting. Actually, the shouting hasn’t really stopped, as the GOP and its Conservative/Tea Party cousins have already embarked on Campaign 2012 to make Barack Obama a one-term president. In the two-year run-up, they are determined to block any meaningful attempts at bi-partisanship and will try to roll back achievements of his first two years in office.

The first job of any politician is to get elected. The second job is to get re-elected. The third job is a source of contention. It is within that conflict we may distinguish leaders from parasites of the public trust. The countervailing forces confronting a politician are: a) faithfully representing his or her constituency (even if it is backward and bigoted), or, b) advancing the welfare of the country even if it runs against the grain of the voters who elected him or her to office and might mean defeat at the next election.

Whether written by JFK or Ted Sorensen, Profiles in Courage is a book that should be required reading for all who serve in government. Published in 1955, the book, in the words of Wikipedia, profiles eight U.S. senators “who crossed party lines and/or defied the public opinion of their constituents to do what they felt was right and suffered severe criticism and losses in popularity because of their actions.”

Obviously I disagree with the majority, if not all, of the “thinking” of the Republican/ Conservative/Tea Party. They have a right to their beliefs. What I object to is their disdain for the process of government, of compromise, their willingness to obstruct responsible stewardship of our land and people. Is there no one of principle in the Republican/ Conservative/Tea Party, no one with sufficient patriotism to put country ahead of conceit?

Equally fervent is my disappointment with the Democratic Party and its willingness to cave in. Instead of fighting brass knuckle tactics with equal measure, Democrats shrink from their responsibility. The failure of the Obama administration and the Democratic majority in Congress has been its inability to inform the American public. They allowed the opposition to frame the debate on health care, financial bailouts, Bush tax cut extension and other hot button issues. Instead they supplied a “could’ve been worse if we didn’t do anything” message.

Obama et al have no time to waste. They must start now lauding provisions of Obamacare, provisions that guarantee coverage for children post-college, that restrict insurance companies from denying coverage for pre-existing conditions. The Midwest is full of companies dependent on the auto industry. Without the bailout of GM and Chrysler, millions would have lost jobs. Democrats permitted the Republican/ Conservative/Tea Party to tarnish the benefits of the bailout program. Yes, it’s hard to defend an economy that tanked under your predecessor and has not responded to the financial stimulus package. But there have been success stories. Aside from the rebounds at GM and Chrysler, the bank bailouts will not cost anywhere near the billions originally forecast.

The American voter is fickle, shifting allegiance seemingly at whim, not sufficiently patient to “stay the course” beyond any one congressional election cycle. The next two years will be hell for those who care about responsible government. Republican/ Conservative/Tea Party spokesmen have vowed to downsize government. Democrats will fight to salvage consumer, social, workplace and environmental protections, but will be hard pressed to succeed. At the state level, given the new dominance of the Right, there will be massive changes. It is hard to imagine our country maintaining its infrastructure, educational system, and quality of life.

Perhaps that’s for the long term best, for without first hand exposure to what life in a Boehner-McConnell-Palin world would be, Americans might be deluded in 2012 into voting for a continuation of a government of “NO.”