Please. Please stand
up. I get it that you did not want
Hillary Clinton to be President. I get
it that Donald Trump is the President of the USA. I get it that the office of the President
merits respect. I get it that any new
President should be allowed a honeymoon period, a time to cement his or her appointees,
prepare to implement his or her vision for the country via legislation, prepare
to establish new connections with our foreign allies and hostiles. I get all of that. And I will argue that Donald Trump via lies
and misstatements and tweets and bigotry and poor judgment has abrogated the opportunity
to not only have a honeymoon, but the opportunity to complete his term. No other human other than Donald Trump has
ever been afforded an opportunity to assume a leadership position and shoot
himself in the foot with an automatic weapon as has Trump.
Let’s be clear. His
lies are almost beyond listing. Perhaps “lies”
is too strong a word. His perceptions of
reality that are not confirmed by reality are now almost too numerous to
list. 3 million fraudulent voters. He made that up. It is not true. His inaugural turnout was the biggest
ever. Not true. 96 million Americans unemployed. Not
true. Highest murder rate ever. Not true.
Smooth transition. Not true. Implementing initial immigrant ban going very
smoothly. Not true. Obama wiretapped him during the election. Not true.
No dealings with the Russians prior to election. Not true.
On and on and on and on. The
embarrassment level alone must surely put you in a position of shunning an invitation
to a White House dinner.
Equally appalling to me, and I suspect to many of you, is
his habit of tweeting whatever comes to his mind. That is not healthy, smart, wise or
leader-like for anyone to do.
Equally appalling to me is that every time there is a
reality problem (that is his reality does not fit reality) he conjures some
sort of conspiracy theory to explain why his reality must be right. We have gone from alternative facts, to voter
fraud, to Russians hacking him, to the press is the enemy, to Obama wiretapped
him. All pure conspiracy theories.
Equally appalling to me is the use of his office for product
endorsement and petty misogynistic judgments.
Fox news is good. CNN is bad. Female candidates have ugly faces. He will be good for women. Women who are sexually harassed at work
should just quit.
Equally appalling to me is that he is in fact a blatant
bigot and a blatant misogynist. He has
and is willing to practice discrimination by gender, ethnicity and
religion. That may not bother some of
you so much, especially if you share similar beliefs. But for me, that is appalling.
Equally appalling to me is the shift from the role
of government as a protector of citizens and consumers to the role of government
as the protector and promoter of corporate interests. No longer is the consumer always right. No longer must we protect the environment from corporate goals. Now we protect corporate goals at the expense of the environment. Now, it is the corporation and their
ambitions that are always right. Sadly,
pursuit of wealth is rarely bound by moral limits. Every agency that protects us is being
dismantled.
We have been thinking about Trump in all the wrong
ways. I suggest we think about his
practices and proclivities in other contexts.
Suppose your local school system hired a principal who after one month
on the job had been caught in multiple lies, had disparaged some kids and some
teachers, had proposed unfounded conspiracy theories, had suggested that the local
paper was his enemy, and had proposed to do away with the code of ethics as
well as the student handbook. Would you
tolerate the continued employment of such a principal? As a superintendent of schools I would
terminate a person for such behavior. If
your newly elected mayor did similar things, would you tolerate it? If your chief of police did similar things
would you tolerate it? Then why, oh why
are you tolerating this from the President of the United States? Trump has engaged in behaviors that would guarantee
his termination in any other office of public trust in this country. What does it say of you if you defend a man
who lies? What does it say of you if you
defend bigoted behavior?
I share very few values and beliefs with Vice President
Pence. I believe most of what he
believes is un-American. But I believe
he is a man who is sane and thoughtful, just misguided. Please start standing up and saying, “Trump
is unacceptable. Pence is
palatable. Remove Trump.”
Please. If you want
America to be great again then do not tolerate such behaviors from your leaders
and continue to make us the laughing stock of the world while scaring and
disgusting more than half of our citizens.
Republicans now rule Washington.
If you take no action in this direction it implies support for such
behaviors. That cannot be good for our
country and it cannot speak well of you.
Please.
