FROM “TRUMPING THE DONALD”:
The Donald worked for his father’s company and then was given control of it in 1971. From the perspective of the rich, he worked himself up from the top to the top.
His behavior at times might remind a psychiatrist of a bipolar person in the midst of a manic attack but when you’re that rich no one notices anything especially out of the ordinary–or dismisses it with the appropriate obfuscating term such as “eccentric, flamboyant, dashing, unpredictable, rambunctious” and the like.
He has a big boisterous personality–some might say arrogant. He can be narcissistic to an extreme but feels he is entitled to egomania because he is rich—with an ego as large as his fortune.
We’ve come a long way from the courage of a Washington or the humility of a Lincoln when considering what constitutes leadership, where the character and integrity of a man once counted for far more than his possessions and wealth.
Donald himself–besides the occasional collision with a bankruptcy or two–knew enough to keep the silver spoon in his mouth right side up. He knew how to go on making a handsome fortune even if he encountered a few questionable episodes along the way.
Currently, estimates of his total fortune range between 4 billion (Forbes) and 10 billion (Donald). Why anyone would be favoring a candidate for president who is involved in a statistical dispute over a missing $6 billion a year before the election is a complete mystery to me . . . . If that’s a token of things to come should he be elected, then the entire GDP of the U.S. is in jeopardy and could go missing.
Which brings me to my main point: allowing a billionaire like Trump in the White House likely will lead to one catastrophe after another. There is only one logical conclusion that can be reached: it’s time for the American people to start impeachment proceedings against Trump . . . .
All those in favor of the motion to impeach The Donald raise your hand and signify by saying “Aye”. Aye!
FROM “TRUMP AND JUDGE CURIEL”:
Let me say right away, I am probably wrong. I know there are readers out there who will say this as soon as they are done reading so it’s best to clear the air at the outset . . . .
Today’s “Wrong Way Thinking” concerns Donald Trump and U.S. District Judge (Southern District of California) Gonzalo Curiel. [Herewith is] a list of ten easy questions to ask Donald before we decide whether to praise or condemn his verbal broadside against a man’s honorable station in life:
- Have you ever met Judge Curiel? If so, where and when?
- Why does he hate you? Did he ever say this or are you just making it up
- Donald, are you familiar with Judge Curiel’s education and judicial record?
- Do you know of his personal and judicial courage in fighting drug traffickers?
- Did you oppose Republican Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger appointing Judge Curiel to the San Diego Superior Court?
- What specific statement or decision has he made that offends you, O Great Donald?
- Has he ever said or done anything to evince prejudice toward you? If so, what was it?
- Do you feel Americans born in this country should remain “foreign nationals” if their parents or grandparents came from another country? For example, do you consider yourself German or American?
- Is there any chance your unprovoked attack is an attempt to distract people from the [Trump University] lawsuits . . . alleging fraud in that you promised students far more than was actually delivered?
- Do you have any evidence at all that Judge Curiel ever acted in a biased or unprofessional manner toward you?
If so . . . oh forget it, everybody knows you don’t have a damn thing.
We do not know what will come next from the mouth of Donald but he sure has a way of surprising people. The question is not whether he survives this latest episode as he has weathered others, but whether he has any inkling of the total impropriety and gratuitous grossness of such reckless speech?
But what can he say to this last question? “Yes or no”, he stands condemned by his own raw immaturity, unstable personality, and imbecilic pronouncements . . . .
“Chumps for Trump” will meet next week to discuss the pending resolution: “Should Trump apologize for his insulting remarks aimed at Judge Gonzalo Curiel?”
See you there!
FROM “THE TRUMPSTER DUMPSTER”:
I had a newspaper deadline and a story due in two hours that I hadn’t even started! Why? All because for the last two nights I had the exact same dream and awoke with the exact same question dogging my mind: how will the candidates act after the election is over?
It’s easy enough to speculate. Winning candidates will display a generous and forgiving mood; they can afford to be generous amidst the high spirits of their winning campaign.
When candidates lose, though, that’s another story altogether; it certainly requires far more self-control to be graceful in conceding defeat right after being handed the bad news.
Most candidates manage it somehow or other but then I got to thinking about Donald Trump: if he loses, how will he handle it? I think there are three main choices here:
- Donald Trump will handle it gracefully, with tact and deference. He will congratulate the winner, Hillary Clinton . . . .
- He will be a bit on the quiet side: disappointed, pensive, perhaps biting his lip—but still, he will go through the rudimentary motions of saying what he has to say and keeping any other nasty thoughts or ugly utterances in abeyance . . . .
- A defeat will get under his skin like venom. He would not be happy about being asked to accept such results. He would risk an epic narcissistic meltdown the likes of which the world has never seen.
Rating these options in terms of likelihood:
- As regards the first choice, “graceful all the way”, nearly everyone in the country will agree that this is the most unlikely. The idea of Trump behaving in a dignified at the very moment of the final blow that lays him low is simply too difficult to imagine!
- As regards the second choice: perhaps he will make a mighty effort to contain his anger and disappointment—keeping his cool in a professional manner. There’s just one problem: every week of the campaign so far proves that such restraint is impossible for Trump. He has a hard time containing uncontrollable impulses when he wishes to hurl accusations at anyone he thinks is criticizing him.
- That leaves choice number three: he will lash out at his opponent, the press, the “rigged” election system and nearly everyone else he can think to attack for his defeat: perhaps even his own party and staff.
This is the Donald we have seen over and over again. This is his approach to life: strike back, blame others, make wild accusations, escape from the facts and substitute his own version of reality any which way he can. Sad to say, choice #3 is the most likely response.
Voters must make up their minds but the notion of how one candidate might act if he loses feels me with apprehension. While we don’t know for sure Donald would go into a nuclear melt down, it doesn’t take much imagination to at least see the possibility.
Would Donald in defeat remain quiet and gracious or would he start making excuses, hurling insults, and blaming others for his defeat?
The notion of voting for someone who often appears temperamentally unfit to hold the office of president of the United States is a frightening thought.
Have I embellished this scenario to such an extent that any reader can honestly say “I see no chance of The Donald acting arrogantly, belligerently, and impulsively should he lose”?
That is the question. Do we expect a leopard to change its spots? What will happen should The Donald lose?
As a very wise man I once knew was fond of reminding me: “The answer is in the question.”
FROM “THE WRONG MAN: THE TRUMP FILE”:
He’s just a wee bit conceited, don’t you think? I suppose every would-be king, tyrant, or dictator shares a marked degree of arrogance but the president of a democracy? The American people surely have a right to expect better of a leader elected by and presumably held responsive to the people.
Of course, we understand that some people have more “arrogance” than others. It is only when the trait becomes extreme that the focus shifts to studying the why and wherefore . . . .
There are various ways to describe arrogance but essentially it simply means a person who is too self-centered to allow easy, free, and equal inter-play with others. The potential harm such arrogance can cause is quite great since it both prevents and destroys amicable working relationships in larger social settings. It is, in sum, merely the old trait of greedy selfishness, however else it chooses to dress itself up in order to fool others.
Some personality traits can be kept in check or overcome in time, but the selfish man is unable to control his arrogance. That is why people often measure the character of their family members, friends, and colleagues with one eye on this most damaging of all traits since it tends to ruin all other positive qualities over time as well . . . .
Arrogance in an employer or political leader does not lead to team unity, healing, and the promotion of a healthy work or social environment. Indeed, such arrogance tends to undercut or destroy efforts to build cooperation, progress, and success by failing to treasure the contributions of all members of a team, business, or institution equally.
Whether this trait of egotism is found in a boss or employee, family member or friend, acquaintance or colleague, arrogance always remains a terribly ugly distortion of the healthy personality—distasteful to others and almost wickedly disfiguring in its effects upon the body and mind of the person so warped . . . .
If parents have wealth and abundant resources, they may spoil a child by over-indulging them and failing to set limits. This, too, can lead to a child developing an unpleasant personality and an unmanageable ego . . . The children of the very rich can develop an overly-acute sense of arrogant entitlement.
True, they may have far more money than the average guy to buy whatever they wish but it doesn’t mean they have developed a healthy and honest personality; they have not reached true maturity of character but instead a botched and caricatured version of it . . . among the worst of the scions of America’s richest families, they fail to achieve those principles of honor and virtue we Americans hold most dear . . . .
Their thinking typically remains warped in certain injudicious ways; they believe they can buy anything. This is a fundamental mistake, a failure to understand that the best qualities of human beings are not traits that can be purchased in a store . . .
Truth to tell, the finest virtues in life must be appreciated, nurtured, and practiced over many years until they become second nature . . . They have no price tag.
Honesty, integrity, the capacity to love, loyalty, compassion, and courage are counted as chief virtues among human beings everywhere in the world. To be reasonable, to be willing to compromise, to be able to listen respectfully to another speak–we all share an innate sense of why such qualities are indispensable to a healthy and intelligent society. These are lesson that seem to have been missed in the life of Donald Trump . . . .
Here we speak not merely of a degree of self-confidence or self-promotion that we’ve come to expect among certain types of ambitious men and women but of a truly colossal ego that borders on the abnormal and absurd.
From early in the campaign, the term “narcissistic” popped up repeatedly as pundits searched for a way to describe the vanity of Trump; they could just as easily have referred to his egotism or megalomania, both terms conveying an extreme arrogance that has burst outside the normal range in the psychological profile of a person.
In Trump’s case, his egotism totters on the threshold of becoming egomania all too often . . . .
What happened to historic examples of right conduct by past presidents? In today’s world, gone are references to George Washington’s personal courage and dedication to a cause larger than himself. Forgotten, too, is his stern repudiation of all suggestions that his new title as president should be like that of European kings when addressed; he kicked out plans to use “your eminence” or “your most serene high excellency” and suggested instead “Mr. President”.
The Washington Monument and the Lincoln Memorial are not tributes to these men’s vanity or conceit; they are the people’s memorials to men who were brave, steadfast, honest, honorable, and principled leaders in all matters great and small.
How have we gone from the courage of a man like Washington–who stayed with his cold, starving, ill-suffering troops through eight long years of the American Revolution–to a pompous and arrogant man like The Donald?
How have we gone from the humility of an Abraham Lincoln . . . to a presidential candidate who is boastful, brash, arrogant, self-centered, impulsive, condescending, insulting, and vulgar–and given to fits of childish temper tantrums and excessive displays of narcissism? Can anyone suggest another candidate who was ever as temperamentally unfit to be president?
And not only temperamentally unfit it seems; since the release of the audio-and-video Access Hollywood tapes, Trump is perhaps morally unfit as well.
His depraved indifference to the equality of women is absolutely shocking. He openly bragged about attitudes and actions that excuse sexual harassment and assault while speaking of women in the most degrading and vulgar manner—in language so obscene his words had to be bleeped from news reports as too offensive!
The tapes clearly record a man showing a pathological indifference to the basic social values and polite forms of civil discourse that have always served as bedrock for our greatness as a democratic nation.
Trump attempts to repulse all criticism with his own version of reality, even though it is clearly his own poor judgment that opens the door to all such criticism in the first place . . .
Everyone is wrong except him; everyone is out to get him; the system is rigged against him; fellow Republicans are ought to destroy him as they distance themselves from his latest public relations nightmare. His antics bring on the criticism, rebuke, and revulsion but it’s never his fault . . . completing the psychological profile of a troubled, mean-spirited, ill-tempered man . . . .
Now someone might rightly ask: in judging Donald Trump’s candidacy, should we not also address his beliefs concerning our social, political, and economic system? Normally the response is yes, absolutely we should.
There is nothing more important than understanding the basic differences in beliefs and policies of the two major parties and their nominated candidates.
It is a sad but unavoidable truism, however, that this sensationalized state of affairs has been brought about by Trump himself . . . . He cannot have it both ways. He can hardly expect voters to focus on differences of doctrine while ignoring his unbridled arrogance when he constantly insists on making such an ostentatious display of himself . . . .
He throws wild accusations around like confetti at a party; he strikes out blindly, lashing out at anyone who comes within range—anyone he suspects of criticizing him. This is paranoia alongside narcissism, along with other notable fault lines in his personality and behavior.
The American people must not lose their way or let the moorings of the ship of state be tossed aside by trusting such a ruthless and arrogant candidate.
Our democracy began with a historic revolution based on courage and commitment to constitutional principles, not loyalty to the cult of personality.
Such a man who always talks first and foremost about himself–who sees everything through the one-and-only Donald prism–cannot be entrusted to keep our ship of state on a safe and steady course. He lacks the very understanding of America’s democratic philosophy needed to provide intelligent leadership for the American people.
He cannot appreciate, let alone embody, the time-honored political principles of our nation that rise high above the petty idiosyncrasies of any one man or woman.
The first and greatest task of any president is to preserve and defend the Constitution, including its fundamental rights for all Americans as embodied in the Bill of Rights. This includes the First Amendment’s liberty to speak our minds freely.
A candidate who slurs and insults, mocks and denigrates any person who criticizes him in the slightest degree, lacks the most basic understanding of what the Constitution stands for and who we are as a nation.
Besides his narcissism, this is his fundamental weakness: he lacks knowledge, understanding, and compassion—the very qualities we seek in our leaders. Or does he think it presidential to:
Act contemptuously toward other candidates on stage with him?
Mock a reporter for his disability?
Suggest undocumented workers are rapists and criminals?
Engage in ethnic slurs against a federal judge, born in America, because the judge’s parents came from another country?
Refuse to honor a Gold Star mother and father whose son made the supreme sacrifice?
Refuse to release his tax information and brag about how he pays as little in taxes as possible?
Gratuitously insult Senator John McCain, a man who survived years of mistreatment-in-captivity and who passed up an opportunity to be released in order to remain with his comrades?
Engage in a vicious twitter attack upon a former Miss Universe winner?
Speak of women as objects-of-conquest for his sexual gratification?
The list goes on; one can hardly keep up, each new misstatement or scandalous episode pushing the previous one out of the headlines but they are there, all of them, with more to come.
As of this writing, the latest news is of ten or more women coming forward to accuse Trump of sexual advances, inappropriately touching and groping them. At this point, we should hardly be surprised, should we? He could be facing rape charges in New York.
That is why this election is about something other than political affiliation, other than policy, other than platform: we cannot let 240 years of national effort to improve our country through reasonable elections be sunk by a colossal ego that has no sense of perspective, proportion, or appreciation for the greatness of ordinary Americans everywhere.
It is they who perform the labor; who defend and protect our democratic philosophy. It is they American people who breathe life into words like justice, equality, and freedom. They are the ones who make the biggest sacrifices on the battlefields and who pay their taxes because it is right to do so; it is they who build the houses, roads, bridges, and cities.
America is great because we the people are America!
We should never elect a candidate with such an ego and unpredictable pattern of behavior; there are many more good reasons to honor our history and to keep this record of sound and sober judgment intact and inviolate.
If we wish to put the health and welfare of our nation first, then we must reaffirm in the strongest terms possible that the American presidency is not for sale to the highest bidder, even a rich man.
One must earn the presidency by earning the respect and trust of the American people, by demonstrating a lifelong commitment to those core American principles that animate out nation at its very heart. A candidate must be willing to demonstrate that personal desires and interests can be held subordinate to the needs and wishes of the nation.
Trump lacks the temperament to be a moral and virtuous leader. To the contrary, he exhibits far too many impulsive and reckless traits that could seriously endanger the nation.
A man like Donald Trump appears wholly incapable of understanding these larger issues and principles, let alone act in a way to show that he can be as brave as a George Washington or as unselfish as an Abraham Lincoln.
We as Americans must not endanger our country by allowing this man through the gates to the seat of power. We have fought too many battles, struggled for justice too long, to allow our eyesight to become myopic or blind at this late date in our nation’s history.
As a matter of conscience, as a matter of principle, as a matter of love for our American democracy, I earnestly beseech each of you not to be fooled, bought, or tricked by this man.
Do not sell our country to the likes of him but trust that calmer heads will one day again prevail.
He is making a joke and a travesty of the entire political process–and to him we cannot entrust our nation’s future.
There is only one power that can stop him: the power of the American people!
