News isn’t supposed to make us angry or purposefully divide us.
It’s supposed to inform us of verifiable truth, make us think, and help us decide what is best for the largest number of our people and governing body. This, like so many things today, is no longer the case and what is right and wrong with, in, and about our country and for her people, is nothing more now than survival of not the wisest, but cleverest.
Three weeks ago, we talked about doing our own homework and researching the source of our opinions. We discussed how watching the words come out of anyone’s mouth is the most indisputable evidence. It makes us face what we know for certain whether we like it or not, no matter whom it benefits or hurts.
The truth must be spoken and referred to, yet, many of us, unfortunately, only exert a memory of convenience instead. This is what causes most of the anger among Americans and the chasm in what we believe, but the truth is staring us in the face whether we like it or not, and whether we helped create it or not.
Desperate times in America now force us to look at things that make us uncomfortable, unhappy, regretful, or even fearful. It’s time to bite the bullet … to bare what is obvious and bear what is true. Many of us marvel at what is being denied even by high ranking officials; it’s killing our country and it must be addressed.
Donald Trump is the president. He is manipulating the power that was given him, working it like a business deal. The truth is, he’s a businessman. As a leader of a nation, he is unseasoned, a man of little restraint and little couth. He deals with world leaders as he dealt with hopefuls on his television show: with a confidence in his complete and unchallenged power, disregarding the fallout. He bases his decisions on his emotional response to the stimuli before him.
He responds to even critical international issues with a knee-jerk response; yet, even many of his cabinet members dare not challenge him. He presents his decisions as right even if they are only right for his image or his business assets, and doesn’t seem to care whom else they are right, or wrong, for.
It’s fine to doubt what we don’t personally know as certain and what others try to tell us. If we do, we must do our own research. We can watch or listen to the words come out of his mouth; his words are well documented, and are irrefutable evidence.
He said, “I have the most loyal people, where I could stand in the middle of Fifth Avenue and shoot somebody and I wouldn’t lose any voters.” Many of his supporters say that he says what’s on his mind, even if that’s all it is, is that what a wise president should do?
None of us has lived through a completed impeachment (Nixon technically resigned), and few are sure impeaching Trump would be a good thing, but neither our leadership nor any Americans should tolerate this – the most erratic administration most of us have ever known. Yet, many powerful people who need to face that and change that remain silent and are, thereby, complicit.
His violations of the emoluments clause, to which all his predecessors have been held, and his numerous flirtations with the 1967 law passed by Congress regarding family appointees, are being ignored. His misogyny and vocalization of great sexual degradation against women are being ignored. Why? More than 3,500 lawsuits involving him or his businesses, and his public humiliation of Serge Kovaleski, a physically impaired journalist, are being ignored. His abandonment of American victims of hurricanes and, even though he evaded serving in Vietnam, his mocking of John McCain, who was captured and tortured, are being ignored. We’ve listened to him call world leaders insulting names, and curse in public speeches, and it’s been excused. When he kept the Queen of England waiting in public, his supporters touted it as an act of superiority. Why?
We, as a nation, wouldn’t have tolerated this from any other president and, though many of us wish this wasn’t happening, none of us, especially our representation, should tolerate it now. We’re better than this; at least, we used to be. Regardless of our political bend, we need to face facts, talk truth and demand decorum … now.
