MINORITY RULE? A disturbing and most un-American power grab

What does it mean to be an American, a loyal US citizen?  How about: Somebody that understands, respects and protects the values of the country’s Founding Fathers, as laid down in the US Constitution?  Few Americans would seem likely to have a problem with that definition.

Keeping that thought in mind, let’s ponder how a clear minority faction (conservative Republicans) now dominates the three branches of our federal government.  Majorities numbering in the tens of millions of adult Americans oppose the actions being taken by that minority faction on numerous key issues, but so far have little power to do anything about it. 

We can start to understand this situation by considering that approximately 9 million more American voters preferred a Democrat to Donald Trump in the 2016 Presidential Election.  How is that?  Well, the official tally shows that Hillary Clinton got 2,864,974 more votes than Trump.  In addition though, we know that about 20% of Bernie Sanders’ Democratic supporters, who hated Trump, didn’t vote for Clinton in protest of how the Democratic Party treated him.  They protested by not voting for Clinton, certain that even without their votes, Trump wasn’t going to win.  Or so we all thought.

Given that Sanders won 46% of the Democratic votes in the primaries, and that there were nearly 66 million Democratic votes in the November election, that means Hillary would have had something like an additional 6 million more votes if the Sanders people realized their votes were needed to counter Russian interference.  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bernie_Sanders 2016_presidential_campaign.  Adding those lost protest votes to Hillary’s margin of winning gives us the 9 million or so preference for a Democrat in 2016. 

Now, it is well understood how the number of Electoral votes, not popular votes, chooses the President, so we can’t say that Clinton or the Democrats won the 2016 election.  But this idea of Trump being the people’s choice, that he represents the majority of Americans, is a fantasy – “fake news,” if you like.  

తదుపరి పాయింట్

Actually, the real story is stronger than the 9 million number suggests, however.  We know that a clear majority of Americans do not support the issues that Trump is pushing and his followers support.  For example, the majority of Americans want legal abortions, want gay marriages, want tougher gun control, want a pathway to citizenship for the Mexican “Dreamers”, want strong environmental protections, want the government to stay out of religion, and all the other “liberal” things Trump opposes.  They also don’t want his wall along our border with Mexico.

We know this from more people voting against Trump than for him in 2016, and from the landslide victories of the Democrats in 2018.  We also know it from numerous respected opinion polls.  The latest Pew Research Center poll shows Americans favor abortion by 61% to 38%, and that 60% want stricter gun laws.  Since the US Census Bureau says there were 309 million Americans in 2016, and that 77.6% (or 240 million) of them were 18 or over, then we can reasonably think that about 55 million more American adults favored legal abortion than opposed it, while 48 million more adults favored stricter gun laws than oppose them.  Gallup says that 63% favor gay marriage, and that 65% of Americans value protecting the environment more than economic growth.  Using that same mathematical process, then 62 million more Americans favor gay marriage than oppose it, while 72 million more favor protecting the environment over promoting economic growth. An NPR polls shows that 66% favor citizenship for Dreamers (77 million more adult Americans than those who oppose it), and that a majority oppose Trump’s wall.  Finally, Statista.com says that Americans favor the absolute separation of church and state by 41% to 34%; that’s about 17 million more Americans not wanting more religion in government.  

In every case on these key issues, the views and actions of the Republican Party that won control of this country illegitimately are opposed by a huge majority of American adults - tens of millions of them in most cases.

Wait – what?  How did the Republicans win control illegitimately?  Well, there is now no doubt that the Russians interfered in 2016 in a big way to help Trump win the election.  Their help added to the Trump campaign’s own unprecedented use of blatant falsehoods (example: The Pope supports Trump!) to deceive American voters.  And we can’t ignore the final dagger in Clinton’s back, FBI Director James Comey’s announcement of “possible” wrong-doing by Clinton, just ten days before the 2016 election.  Comey’s action, which was a clear violation of FBI policy, reversed Clinton’s rising poll numbers.  The FBI ended up clearing Clinton, but it was too late, and well – you know how the story ended.  Those three actions, taken together, leave no real doubt that Trump did not win the election fairly; an objective observer could say that he basically stole the Presidency. 

తదుపరి పాయింట్

Why does Donald Trump have many millions of American supporters?  This question has been rolling around in my mind for several years now, because it so hard to understand why good people could support the man.  As documented in my earlier essay (Four Reasons), long before the Ukraine incident and even long before the Mueller investigation, there were four powerful reasons why Trump had no business being President.  Each of the four would have quickly disqualified the man in most Americans’ eyes just a short five or ten years ago.  And yet – he is President, committing vile, illogical, unethical, or illegal (and often – all of those together) acts every single day, while never losing any supporters.  How can this be?

It has become very clear that these people’s support is basically the result of two main factors.  One has to do with how many of his supporters, for a number of important reasons, just don’t have an accurate picture of who Trump is, the actions he’s taken, and the consequences of those actions.  But let’s leave that whole, complicated issue aside, and recognize that:

Trump’s supporters (his “base”) are politically conservative, do not like the direction the country has been going in recent decades, and they absolutely hated Hillary Clinton.  They saw Trump as the antidote to the liberalism that Clinton personified, and as a result, felt he was their only option despite all of his flaws.  They liked his efforts on immigration, abortion, protecting Christians’ rights, and so forth. 

Further, they liked that Trump was an outsider, rather than a politician.  Liked that he spoke his mind in plain words, liked that he wanted to bring down the establishment (the “Deep State”) that had kept the common people down, and liked that he wanted to get the government out of people’s lives.  So even when they do realize he’s a horrible person doing bad things, they’re willing to overlook that because he supports things that are important to them.  Evidence of this includes a 2018 article in TIME Magazine that stated that “Eighty percent of white evangelicals voted for and, by and large, continue to support President Trump,” even with his extra-marital affairs, constant lying, swearing, lack of humility and lack of just about every other Christian value.  https://time.com/5161349/president-trump-white-evangelical-support-slaveholders/

To summarize, they back the man because they like his policies.  And that takes us back to the original point made in my first paragraph.  This country is founded on the concept of majority rule.  That means we do what most Americans want, even while we respect the views and civil rights of those people who disagree.  Besides that, we are a nation of laws, not people.  That means everyone follows the law, no matter how rich or poor, no matter how powerful or powerless.  Right?

అవును

The history of this country is the history of change, of progress.  We used to have slavery, we used to have only property-owning white males allowed to vote, used to have people executed for minor crimes, used to dump sewage and toxic waste into our rivers – we used to do a lot of things that we don’t do now, because the country has gradually, steadily moved forward.  In fighting against political progressives, the pro-Trump forces are basically saying they want things to stay like they were, back in the 1950s and ‘60s.  And that’s great, as long as their's is the majority view. 

But they are not the majority view in America today – we clearly saw that a few paragraphs ago.  And yet those views are running the show, because Trump essentially stole the 2016 election.  Just as bad is what’s happening to the federal courts.  The Republicans defied the intent of the Constitution by not allowing President Obama to choose the next Supreme Court Justice in 2016, and thus illegitimately-elected Trump got to place a conservative on the court the next year.  Incidentally, even a majority of Republican voters thought that blocking Obama’s constitutional right to name a Supreme Court Justice in 2016 was wrong.  https://www.usnews.  com/news/articles/2016-03-21/even-gop-voters-think-senate-shouldconfirm-scotus-nominee  

Just in case anyone missed the political hypocrisy involved, when Obama was President, (Republican) Senate leader Mitch McConnell claimed that it was improper to place someone on the Court in his last year of office.  Yet he now says that he would definitely let Trump name someone to the Court in his last year in office! https://www.cnbc.com/2019/05/29/mitch-mcconnell-says-he-would-seek-to-fill-supreme-court-vacancy-in-2020.html

But besides that, illegitimately-elected Trump got to name a second Supreme Court Justice in 2018.  His very conservative choice was Brett Kavanaugh, who strongly appealed to Trump (who was accused of multiple serious crimes) for his belief that a President could not be charged with crimes while in office.  In an unprecedented step, more than 2,400 law professors of all political persuasions sent a letter opposing Kavanaugh’s appointment to the Court.  Additionally, for the first time in the nation’s history, the (Republican) Senate confirmed a Justice that the majority of Americans opposed. https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/onpolitics/2018/10/12/brett-kavanaugh-poll-majority-americans-disapprove-new-justice/1616237002/

But nevertheless, Kavanaugh is now on the Court, along with Trump’s earlier appointee, giving the Supreme Court a clear conservative majority, rather than the liberal-centrist majority it would have had if the people’s will had been respected.  That’s the big headline story.  But there’s more going on behind the curtain.  While we don’t hear much about it, Trump has been appointing unprecedented numbers of other conservative Federal judges – 158 named and approved by the Senate as of last November.  As the White House website boasts: “President Trump has appointed more circuit judges by this point in his presidency than any president in recent history.  Approximately 1 out of every 4 active judges on United States Courts of Appeals has been appointed by President Trump.  This historic transformation is only accelerating, with President Trump on pace to have more judges confirmed this year than in 2017 and 2018 combined.”

This is wonderful news – if you’re a political conservative.  But remember, conservatives are in the minority now in the US.  It is only because Donald Trump won the presidency, unfairly and with the help of Russia, gullible voters, and James Comey, that those judges will interpret the laws for the next 20 or 30 years.  That is a reasonable span of service for judges since they are appointed for life. 

So what we have now is a Supreme Court that will likely vote to protect Trump from prosecution, from having to comply with subpoenas, and in other ways.  A Supreme Court that will likely hear a challenge to Wade v. Roe and quite possibly rule against legal abortions, despite Brett Kavanaugh implying at his confirmation hearings that wouldn’t happen.  Conservative Federal courts, Supreme and otherwise, ruling in all kinds of ways that go against the country’s more progressive majority – that’s what we should expect, possibly for decades.

Meanwhile, the President has taken countless actions to gut environmental protections put in place by every previous administration, both Democratic and Republican, while continuing to deny climate change.  This will benefit his own businesses, as well as those of wealthy conservatives who back him.  But it definitely doesn’t reflect the wishes of the people.  The latest Gallup poll shows that 62% of Americans want government to do more to protect the environment, the highest level since the question was first asked in 1992.  And that number was before many of Trump’s subsequent attacks on the environment, including his latest move to repeal important protections for the nation’s streams and wetlands on January 22, 2020 that his own EPA appointees argued against. https://www.npr.org/2020/01/23/798809951/trump-administration-is-rolling-back-obama-era-protections-for-smaller-waterways.   Not to mention Trump’s attacks on immigrants’ rights, on the separation of church and state, on efforts to reduce gun violence; attacks on our strongest allies while chumming it up with Vladimir Putin; betraying our Kurdish allies to score points with Turkey’s dictator Erdogan, and so many other actions that the majority of Americans do not want.

అవును, లేదు!

By the way, it’s common lately for Trump supporters to stop justifying his actions and instead claim that they just like him because of the strong economy.  That's a little easier to understand, given the need to put food on the table, a roof over our heads, etc.  But those folks don't really have it right.  (NOTE: The following comments on the economy were written BEFORE the coronavirus pandemic and economic shut-down.  Obviously, all of the latest figures are much worse than what is reported here.)

You see, most economists agree that Presidents have little impact on how the economy's doing; perhaps something like 15% of its health is due to whoever's in office.  In Trump's case, it's probably fair to say his impact has been greater than average.  In any case, let's take a look at some numbers, starting with GDP, which he said he'd make grow at "4, 5, maybe even 6%" a year.  In reality, the strongest quarter ever in his presidency had a 3.5% gain, with the latest figure a dismal 2.1% growth rate.  And as the pro-business magazine Forbes wrote last year, "Obama's last three years had better growth than Trump's three years."  Hmmm…..

How about the budget and national debt?  Trump boasted that he would balance the budget "fairly quickly," and “completely eliminate the national debt within 8 years.”  Sounds great, right?  But the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) just reported that the US federal deficit “will top $1 trillion annually over the next 10 years, ultimately reaching $1.7 trillion in 2030.”  Meanwhile, the US federal debt now stands at $23 trillion, up from $20 trillion when Trump took office.  Oops!

But at least there's the stock market, right?  Stocks rose a very impressive 52.2% during Trump’s first 3 years in office.  However, during Obama’s first 3 years, stocks gained 78.6%.    So as another conservative magazine, Fortune, claimed recently: "The stock market is doing far worse under Trump than it did under Obama," and then backed it up on an apples-to-apples comparison of the two presidencies.  

Well OK - surely in the area of jobs, Trump has been a winner, right?  Um... no.  Back to Forbes again, where its headline "Trump Has Created 1.5 Million Fewer Jobs Than Obama", makes us wonder.  And just to be clear that it's a fair comparison, they followed up with "Trump’s job growth falls short of Obama’s last three years."  Dang....

Meanwhile, one of the nation’s biggest problems – income inequality – has not been addressed by Trump's policies that have mostly helped wealthy Americans.  As reported just 3 months ago “U.S. Census Bureau data confirmed that income inequality has hit its highest level since the federal government started tracking it five decades ago. The richest one percent of Americans now rake in one-third of the country’s net worth, while the bottom half of the population scrapes by with only 1.2 percent.”  https://www.fastcompany.com/90427855/while-trump-boasts-of-economic-growth-inequality-deepens

Granted, the economy has done well under Trump, or truthfully:  It has merely continued the strong trends established in the Obama years.  Stocks are soaring, unemployment numbers are amazingly low, and Trump has done some good things in the area of trade agreements, IMO.  But the theme he’s been pushing, especially evident during the State of the Union address, of saving America from the disastrous economic times of his predecessor, is an outright falsehood.  Especially when you look behind the curtains to realize that the costs of further economic gains during his administration include the huge additional debt and environmental destruction his policies are creating.  Donald J. Trump: the economic Wizard of Flaws.

చివరకు

So returning to where this essay started, the bottom line is: People who support Trump, despite what a horrible person he is because he favors issues that are important to them are betraying our country.  They are NOT patriotic Americans, as they typically boast.  They are throwing away the concept of majority rule, of fair play, and of nobody being above the law just so they can get what they want.  They opposed his impeachment, just as they have opposed every other effort to reign him in and make him accountable for his horrid actions.  In other words, they put themselves first, and the nation second.  It’s shameful and brands them forever as being like Trump: Doing whatever it takes to get their way, regardless of the consequences.

Speaking of betraying the country, the very worst offenders are the members of Congress who keep protecting the President, denying that he does anything wrong, and continually pushing his agenda.  (Oh, and the current Attorney General, who's supposed to represent the American people, but who very clearly works as Trump's personal protector instead.)  While some in Congress support what he does, the majority of them know that he’s an illegitimate jerk, know that he constantly does things against the nation’s Constitution and better interests, but back him simply because they fear not getting re-elected if they cross him. 

The classic example of this is Trump’s current BFF, Sen. Lindsey Graham.  Back in 2015 when he still spoke truth, he said this about Trump: "He’s a jackass.  You know how you make America great again? Tell Donald Trump to go to hell… He's a race-baiting, xenophobic, religious bigot.  He doesn't represent my party.  He doesn't represent the values that the men and women who wear the uniform are fighting for…”  Many other powerful Congressmen/women have said similar things, and even more surely thought these things privately.  But today, they all (except Mitt Romney, lately) back Trump – no matter what he does.  It’s another case of putting their own interests in front of the nation’s interests which, by the way, they swore an oath not to do when they assumed office.  Former (Republican) House Speaker John Boehner knows what’s up, and now that he’s out of office he can tell it like it is.  Boehner knows that now "There is no Republican Party. There’s a Trump party.”

There are always consequences.  Among the consequences for those betraying the country in pursuit of their own interests are that, in violating our Constitution, they are setting the stage for people in the future to violate conservatives' rights when they are in power, so they can do whatever they want.  This is what our country is becoming.  In the short-run, the minority of selfish conservatives wins.  But in the long-run, we all lose, and the US is no longer America.

Reparations for All!

(I wrote this about 15 years ago, and my thoughts on paying reparations to black Americans have changed a bit since then.  Still, there are some good points here about the history of slavery and the concept of mentalite.)

Renewed calls for the U.S. to admit its guilt in the whole issue of enslaving Africans, and to pay some form of reparations to the descendants of American slaves, have come on the heels of a recent conference in Africa.   Surely these would be cleansing acts, as well as a way to improve African-Americans’ self-esteem.  Acknowledging culpability is a necessary step in the long process of mending the immense damage done to the collective black psyche in America.  And it is only fair that blacks in the U.S. should be compensated for the incalculable role their ancestors played in making this country the wealthy superpower it is today – we are told.

What is missing in all of this, however, is some understanding of historical reality and perspective.  Most informed folks know that black Africans themselves, in capturing and selling other Africans, played a role in the slavery issue that is perhaps as heinous as the roles played by the Europeans and Americans.  But even more importantly, we can’t just blame Africans (or whites) without realizing that this all occurred in a much different time.  The slave trade that brought Africans to the U.S. in the 17^th-19^th centuries came after millennia of worldwide, indiscriminant enslavement.  For as far back as we have written records, men have enslaved one another (and women and children too) – sometimes for money, but more often as a result of war.

Babylonians enslaved Israelites, Persians enslaved Babylonians, and Romans enslaved them both.  Spaniards took Englishmen as slaves when they could; Native Americans widely practiced slavery.  Mexican-Americans rue how vile U.S. Yankees stole the Southwest from innocent Mexico, yet the Spaniards of Mexico enslaved native Indians and imported African slaves in vast numbers.  And the Aztecs, which any good Mexican is proud to tell you were their glorious ancestors, were slavers of the worst kind.  Cortez and his few hundred men conquered the mighty Aztecs in no small part because they were aided by rival Indians that had been ravaged and enslaved by the Aztecs. 

The Slavic peoples (Slavs) got their name because they were so often taken into slavery over the centuries.  Whites took whites and blacks as slaves, and Asians too, when they had the chance.  Black Africans did the same thing; Asians were hardly above taking slaves.  At some point or another in history, just about everybody was enslaved by someone else.  This is simply the way it was in the past, when the world wasn’t quite as nice a place as it is these days. 

But gradually people began to see things differently.  Massachusetts abolished slavery in 1789; by 1830, slavery had ended in all Northern states.  Britain abolished slavery four years later, France in 1848, and freedom-loving Holland in 1863, only 2 years before slavery was abolished throughout the entire U. S.  Spain continued to allow slavery until 1883, Brazil until 1888, China until 1910, and Ethiopia until 1923!  So the United States was hardly out of line with the morality of the time a couple of hundred years ago, and in fact was one of the leaders of the world abolitionist movement.  It’s neither realistic nor fair to hold slave traders of 300 years ago responsible based on the (dramatically different) morals of today.  It makes even less sense to hold people responsible today for what their ancestors may or may not have done 300, or even 150, years ago.  Because if that’s the way we’re going to do things…..

I know that my Scottish ancestors, the original Britons, were brutally conquered over the centuries by Germanic invaders (the Angles, Jutes, Saxons, etc.).  Germanic atrocities on the Britons between the 6^th and 12^th centuries are fairly well documented, as were many cases of enslaving the surviving Britons.  These Germanic tribes, benefiting from the work of their slaves, went on to create one of history’s most powerful and richest empires: the British Empire.  Since I can clearly prove my Scottish ancestry, should I not, then, respectfully but firmly request reparations from Elizabeth II, the current and enormously wealthy British monarch?

Then there’s the Jewish side of my family.  Oy – don’t get me started on how they suffered at the hands of just about everybody for 3000 years!   Just consider perhaps the most famous enslavement in history: that of the Egyptians over the Jews.  This episode lasted, coincidentally, about as long as the U.S. South’s enslavement of Africans.  Surely it contributed greatly to Egypt’s ability to amass and display great wealth, so very long ago.  Egypt’s kind of a poor country these days, though, so I’d be willing to accept some priceless antiquities from them for the way their ancestors treated mine.   Or – hey, this could really work out well: you know how so many African-American historians now claim that the Egyptian pharaohs were really black?  So then, Oprah and Michael (Jackson or Jordan) are basically the descendants of the folks that kept mine as slaves.  Those guys – they have some serious money, and are in a position to help mend my shattered Jewish psyche with some monetary reparations.

But what if Oprah or Michael or Michael aren’t descended from Egyptian slave-keepers?  Would it be fair to make them pay reparations?  That makes me think about my American ancestors.

You see, my people came to the U.S. in the 18^th and 19^th centuries, and they all lived in the North.  None of them owned slaves.  In fact, the Streblers themselves didn’t get here until 1888, long after slavery was history.  Great-grandpa Burns (on mom’s side) volunteered to fight for the Union during the Civil War, and then signed up for another tour when his time was up!  Great-great grandpa Kieffer also fought for the Union, as did great-great grandpa Moeder, who was seriously injured in battle.  I’d be willing to bet that they signed up out of patriotism, and maybe for the veterans’ benefits, but they probably were anti-slavery, and they did help end that “peculiar institution” in this country.  Yes, I realize that they, and I, all benefited indirectly from the labor of Southern slaves.  But if reparations to the ancestors of American slaves should ever come about, would I be responsible for the same amount as someone whose granddaddies owned slaves?  How come? 

So look – here’s how it goes:  African slaves in the U.S. got a raw deal.  So has everyone else, at some point in history.  Even after slavery ended, blacks had it really tough.  By all means, let’s apologize as a nation for what happened in the past.  But we’ve got better laws and a better sense of right and wrong now, and slowly – slowly but surely – black folks are getting where they should be.  Today they are top athletes, Oscar-winning actors, national teachers of the year, Secretaries of State.  These people didn’t need reparations to give them motivation and purpose, and neither does anyone else.

America gave a big chunk of change to Japanese-American internment camp survivors, and Germany did the same thing with Holocaust survivors.  But that’s where it ends: you pay the living survivors for the egregious suffering they personally experienced.  You don’t go back generations; you don’t go back centuries.  Because if you do, then we all just keep paying money to one another, and I want Oprah’s phone number! 

Jon Strebler

Back to the Future

 Let’s go back in time to January 1, 2015. 

The 2016 presidential election is just starting to be a thing, with Jeb Bush the only Republican candidate so far.  Bush would be followed later in the month by Chris Christie, then Lindsey  Graham and Mitt Romney, but nobody has any idea who might end up being the front runner at this point.

You don’t really care for Barack Obama.  But the economy is doing great, with the Dow Jones Industrials more than doubled from when he first took office, and unemployment at 5.7%, down from 8.1% six years earlier.  Still, you’re a political conservative and you hate Hillary Clinton.  So you plan on voting Republican this year.

But what if I told you that the candidate the Republicans chose:

·         Had zero (no) experience in government?

·         Was described by a former professor as the stupidest student he ever had in 35 years?

·         Lied to the American people almost every time he opened his mouth?

·         Faced charges of sexually molesting more than a dozen women, and would soon brag on tape about “grabbing women by the pussy”?

·         Was a convicted conman, having ripped off many contractors and run multiple scams?

·         Would be diagnosed as a malignant (as in evil) narcissist?

·         Was a really horrible person in just about every other way imaginable?

BUT WORSE THAN ALL THAT,

·         Was Russia’s guy, and their election interference is what would put him in office?

 

Just for now, assume that you were convinced that all of these claims were true, and be perfectly honest.  You’d never vote for this guy in a million years, would you?  And neither would anyone else you knew, Republican or otherwise – right?

That guy, who of course turned out to be Donald J. Trump, was on nobody’s radar as a serious candidate in early-2015.  Yet he won the US presidency, and then went on to add such deeds as these to his earlier résumé:

·         Reneged on his promises to release his tax returns

·         Asked Russia to release Clinton’s private emails, which they did the following day

·         Publicly announced that he believed Putin rather than his own intelligence experts

·         Met privately with Putin 5 times with no witnesses, and refused to release the transcripts

·         Was impeached for blackmailing Ukraine to interfere in the 2020 election

·         Has reversed, or is working on reversing, 94 key environmental protections

·         Refused to comply with numerous constitutional requests by Congress for testimony and  

       documentation

·         Made over 18,000 false or misleading claims since taking office

·         Refused to believe the corona virus was a real threat, causing 54,000 needless US deaths

Those are just a few of the countless ugly things Trump has done as President.  But the big question is: Are those claims really true?  Earlier I asked you to “assume that you were convinced” that these things are true, but actually you are probably NOT at all convinced.  So how about this:

Have a conversation with the you from 2015.  You really do love your country, and you do not want a horrible person like I described running it.  With just a modest amount of effort, you can see for yourself that these things are true.  Most of them can be proven to be 100% factual, without any doubt at all – reasonable or otherwise.  Much of this proof comes in the form of Trump’s own words shown and heard on tape, and his own tweets.  The rest comes from written records and other documentation that can be easily verified as legitimate.  

These things are not opinions or theories.  They are facts that you yourself can verify.  They’re also not a matter of politics – which political party thinks it’s OK to collaborate with our enemies, to defy Congress, to lie to us all the time, for example?   Take a fresh look at the facts, with an unbiased eye.  Truth can shatter the spell that Trump's never ending lies have cast over millions of decent people and TRULY make America great again.

Insults

We live in a time when people seem quicker than ever to throw out insults in response to criticism or differences of opinion.  Rather than use facts to dispute criticism, many people’s go-to response is to simply insult the other person.  Nowhere is this more evident than with our President, whose use of insults (often fallacious) about his critics and opponents is thoroughly documented.  For example, Never Trumpers are human scum; Omarosa Newman is a crazed lowlife, a dog; Megyn Kelly is a bimbo, with blood coming out of her… whatever.  And war hero John McCain was an incompetent dummy, about whom 5-time draft dodger Trump explained: I like people who weren’t captured.

Trump is both a sign of the times in this regard and also a model for others to copy, as insults beget insults and become ever more acceptable. 

But simply stating a FACT isn’t the same thing as an INSULT, especially one that is FALLACIOUS.  Here’s how two respected sources define those terms:

Fact                 (Cambridge Dictionary) something that is known to have happened or to exist, especially something for which proof exists

(Wikipedia) a thing that is known to be consistent with objective reality and can be proven to be true with evidence

Insult              (Cambridge Dictionary) to act in a way or say something that is offensive or rude to someone

(Wikipedia) an expression or statement (or sometimes behavior) which is disrespectful or scornful

Fallacious       (Cambridge Dictionary) not correct; false

(Wikipedia)  invalid, deceptive, or otherwise faulty

For example, we know that President Trump is very often untruthful.  It is easy to document, to prove beyond any doubt, that he lies on a regular basis.  This link will take you to a short essay that summarizes just a few of his falsehoods, though only those made before he took office.  https://jstrebler.blogspot.com/2017/01/  Countless more have been documented in the three years since.  Therefore, we might reasonable call him a liar.  That is not really an insult, certainly not a fallacious one; it is simply a provable FACT.

Because of Trump’s countless insulting, bullying, and egotistical statements and tweets, we might think of him as an egotistical narcissist.  Rather than a fallacious insult, such a claim is supported by large amounts of objective proof.  According to John Gartner, Ph.D., a psychologist who taught at Johns Hopkins University Medical School for 28 years, the president has malignant narcissism.  Here’s what he says: “Trump suffers from malignant narcissism, a diagnosis [that is] far more toxic and dangerous than mere narcissistic personality disorder…  the closest thing psychiatry has to describing a true human monster.”⁷

Gartner goes on to describe Trump’s narcissism: “… (he knows “more about everything than anyone” and “has empathy for no one but himself”); paranoia (“his demonization of the press, minorities, immigrants, and anyone who disagrees with him, are all signs of paranoia”); sociopathy (“a diagnosis that describes people who constantly lie, violate norms and laws, exploits other people, and show no remorse”); and sadism (“He takes gleeful pleasure in harming and humiliating other people. He is undoubtedly the most prolific cyberbully in history.”) https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/5-types-people-who-can-ruin-your-life/201903/malignant-narcissism-does-the-president-really

Wow!  But the bottom line here is that we can say that Donald Trump is a paranoid narcissist, a sociopath, a sadist, and a prolific cyberbully.  While those claims are surely negative, they are NOT fallacious insults.  They are FACTS; facts that should be acknowledged and dealt with. 

Actually, we can go a bit further and just say that Donald Trump is a truly horrible person.  From his countless lies and insults, to his ridiculous claims of knowing more than (fill in the blank) about (fill in the blank), of being a “very stable genius”, and his famous “grab ‘em by the pussy,” few unbiased people would see Trump as being a good person.  Interested in more evidence of what kind of person Trump is?  Take a look here: https://jstrebler.blogspot.com /2018/11/  Calling him a truly horrible person is therefore just stating a FACT.

The man is also a proven con man, a swindler, and a tax-cheat.  Too harsh?  Fallacious insults or just opinions?  Nope.  Court records are full of examples where the Trump businesses refused to pay contractors for work done properly.  We also know that he has fudged legal records to reduce taxes paid over the decades, and that he conspired to cheat the government on hundreds of millions of dollars due on his father’s estate.  All of these things can be shown to be true beyond a reasonable doubt, as can the way he heartlessly ripped off students for his Trump “University” – which was later shown to be a total scam.  So I say that Donald Trump is a crooked conman; that may qualify as an insult, but it is not fallacious; it is merely a FACT. 

You’ve probably heard Trump being called a fascist, and done so in a way that seems like an insult.  Yet it’s also true that Trump almost perfectly fits the textbook definition of a fascist.  You can see how that is true here: https://jstrebler.blogspot.com/2018/12/fascism-back-in-fashion.html  Now that is not necessarily an insult; many people like fascism.  But simply stating the Donald Trump is a fascist, well – that is just a FACT. 

One of my biggest problems with Donald Trump is that he gained the Presidency by illegitimate means.  Much of his success was due to a campaign based on an unprecedented level of gross lies, aided by the Russians. Trump both welcomed Russian help and used Russian assistance to win the Presidency.  So said the extremely detailed Mueller Report, and so said the US’s top intelligence officer of the time.  You can read up on the FACT that Trump is an illegitimate President, put in power by the Russians here: https://jstrebler.blogspot.com/2019/04/. 

Similarly, it is not an insult to call Donald Trump grossly unqualified to be President, as much as it is simply a matter of fact.  We know that he had zero government experience before running for office; his behavior and statements once in office make it clear that he isn’t particularly bright and that he knew little about how the federal government actually worked.  Want more evidence that Trump has no business being President?  Check this one out: https://jstrebler.blogspot.com/2019/07/

There are other ugly and negative facets of Donald Trump that we could cover, but let’s skip to the present, and his responsibility for thousands of unnecessary American deaths, trillions of dollars of economic loss, and countless amounts of sorrow from the coronavirus.  How?  Well, it’s a simple matter to prove that Trump didn’t take the virus seriously back in January, February, and even into late-March, and ignored his own experts’ advice to take action.  And long before that (in 2018), he terminated the agency tasked with fighting a future pandemic!  

The results so far?  The US has more COVID-19 cases than any other nation, and the numbers are rising at an astonishing rate.  Hundreds of thousands of Americans will probably die, rather than the few thousand that would have perished, had Trump kept the pandemic agency intact and had followed the steps urged by his medical experts.  The economy is in free-fall, with signs that the country is likely due for years of Great Depression-style tragedy.  So I say it is a FACT that Donald Trump committed manslaughter on thousands of people he was elected to protect.

I’m going to end by saying that Donald Trump is a total fucking asshole.  I do mean that as an insult to the man, but yet it is also a FACT.  Here’s what it means to be an asshole:

(Cambridge Dictionary): an unpleasant or stupid person.

(Merriam-Webster Dictionary): a stupid, annoying, or detestable person

Now, a quick review of the FACTS that we established in this little essay make it clear that Trump is quite unpleasant and a detestable person.  His stupidity has also been established.  And I think it’s fair to say that having such a stupid, unpleasant, and detestable person running our country is annoying at the very least.  Since he therefore meets every descriptor of an asshole, then we are justified in saying that he is a TOTAL asshole.  The “fucking” part?  Just a bonus, a personal flair, if you will. 

But finally: WHY throw around insults, even if they are completely true and based on facts?  Here we may disagree, as many would say it is unnecessary and just makes the world a nastier place.  I agree with the second part, but disagree with the first, as I think these kinds of claims are important to put out there. 

It is important to recognize truth and facts.  Many people, including most Trump supporters, don’t know that their man is a liar, a swindler, a fascist, and all the rest.  So while very few people are likely to change their mind about the guy at this point, at least not in the near future, if we can help just one person see the facts, then it will have been worth it.  And in the long-run, I’ve gotta think that the more the truth gets put out there, the more likely people are (while seeing for themselves more and more of Trump’s assholiness) to finally see the light.

I am a firm believer in the people. If given the truth, they can be depended upon to meet any national crisis. The great point is to bring them the real facts. – Abraham Lincoln

FOUR REASONS

There are four powerful reasons why Donald Trump has no business being President of the United States.  Each one of them by itself would have been more than sufficient to keep him out of office throughout the 18^th, 19^th, 20^th, centuries, and first decade of the 21^st century.  And yet, with all four reasons together, he is the President, and there are many millions of Americans who feel he should continue in that role for years to come.  What the heck?

The four reasons are for the most part not about politics, and not a matter of opinion.  They are, instead, based primarily on facts, a.k.a. things that are true beyond a reasonable doubt, and that can be verified by anyone.  The FOUR REASONS are:

·         Donald Trump is grossly unqualified 

·         Donald Trump is a truly horrible person

·         Donald Trump’s is a pathological liar.

·         Donald Trump was not legitimately elected

To reiterate: at any time in our nation’s past, it is virtually inconceivable that a person would be elected President who lied all the time, or who was almost totally unqualified, or who was a horrible person, or who won the office by various dishonest means.  Especially when those "dishonest means" included interference by this country’s greatest adversary: Russia.  And yet – Trump sits in office in the White House, with all four of these conditions having been met.  This is not my opinion; rather, I will make the case for each of the four reasons using verifiable facts, logic, and related means that, at least until very recently, Americans understood and valued.  Let’s get to it.  

Donald Trump is GROSSLY UNQUALIFIED to be President.

A number of credible sources have suggested that he had no expectation of winning the position, but instead ran just as a way to further improve his image, his “brand,” gain support for issues he cared about, and to stroke his large ego.  Even if that is not the case, the fact is that he had absolutely no experience in government.  Furthermore, evidence supports the idea that Trump had little idea of how the federal government actually works.  Just one example of this was his claim in 2015 that judges (like his sister) are the ones that make laws.

Evidence of his overall lack of understanding about politics, history, government, economics, and world affairs abound.  A classic example was when he was asked, shortly before Britain’s vote on the matter, what he thought about Brexit.  “Huh?” Trump responded.  He hadn’t heard of Brexit, one of the most important world issues of the time, and he listened as the reporter explained it to him.  Anyone who is interested in doing so will have no problem finding dozens of other, easily verified examples of Trump’s ignorance of those matters in which a President should be well-versed. 

This lack of knowledge about even the basics of governing a giant like the United States of America is easy to understand, given Trump’s dislike of reading.   Asked what his favorite book was during the 2016 campaign, he said that he had only read one book after college – and that was his own biography.  Throughout the campaign, and during his time as President, anecdotal evidence is simply everywhere regarding his disinterest in reading reports, paying attention to anything other than short bullet points, and outright lack of curiosity about practically anything other than things that relate to him personally. 

Trump has several times repeated the claim to be a “very stable genius.”  The facts show that he is neither stable nor a genius.  From blowing up at reporters, his staff, and anyone else who he feels has crossed him, to making one decision one day, and totally reversing it the next day – on numerous occasions – “stable” is not a word that anyone other than Trump or his staff ever use to describe the man. 

As for being a genius, previous examples of his cluelessness bring that into question, along with claims by his own hand-picked people that the man is a “fucking moron,” and similar descriptions.  His own staff repeatedly reports, off the record, that they have to dumb down any information they give him, such as using pictures and video instead of written material, just so he can understand their reports.  Apparently, Trump wasn’t a very good student, having been described as a “C minus/D” student in college.  Trump denies this, claiming instead to have been a top student, but yet refuses to release his college transcripts or his SAT scores, threatening to sue anyone who divulges what they show.  Why would a “stable genius” not want to clear the air on just how good a student he was, or how smart his SAT score shows him to be?

Apart from those points, it has been obvious since Day One that the man is an idiot.  From his very first campaign speeches, Trump spoke like a 13-year old tough guy.  Small words, incorrect grammar, repeating the same simple phrases over and over, insulting, bragging, making false statements – those are the marks of Trump’s speaking.  Linguistic experts claim those things are signs of someone whose intellectual development remains in their teens.  Even his response to being called uneducated and his undeveloped vocabulary confirmed the charge against him: “I know words.  I use the best words!”  An eight year old couldn’t have said it any better. 

Let’s face it: A lot of people like the fact that Donald Trump is “just one of them.”  Not educated, not part of the political establishment, with no experience or great knowledge when it comes to running the government.  They feel that his fresh outsider status is a big plus, and not a disadvantage.

To some degree, they’re right.  It’s good to have a fresh face with an outsider’s perspective.  But Trump is so ignorant about the world and how things work, so disinterested in learning about government, economics, the military, other cultures, etc. These things matter.  The United States depends on having a President that understands what’s going on, how to run the government intelligently, and how to evaluate events and proposals from an experienced, educated, and rational perspective.  Donald Trump has repeatedly shown that he has none of those requisite characteristics, he is in way over his head, and has no business being in any public office. 

Donald Trump is a TRULY HORRIBLE PERSON. 

This is not a matter of name calling, of exaggeration, of just one man’s opinion.  By any reasonable definition, Trump is essentially the opposite of what most people would consider “a good man,” and there is an incredible amount of verifiable evidence to back up that claim.   

One way to consider this claim is by reading the essay A Good Person that I wrote in my Trump Tales book.  In it, I took the Boy Scout Law, which does a pretty good job of describing what it means to be a good man, with its A Scout is Loyal, Trustworthy, Helpful, etc.  One by one, I considered how Trump matched up with the 12 characteristics of a good man that the Law defines.  Using Trump’s own words and actions, it turns out that he is basically the opposite of a good man in 11 of the 12 categories (the exception being: Brave).  Now you may take exception to some of those interpretations, or you may suggest that the Boy Scout Law isn’t a good way to evaluate a person, but if you do, I think most  people who are being truthful would disagree with you.

But anyway, we can look at the “Trump is a horrible person” issue another way, by simply citing examples of behavior that show who he is.  Let’s start with his horrible treatment of women.  From it’s all about “having a nice piece of ass on your arm,” to “look at that face; who would vote for her?” to “grabbing them by the pussy,” to the 16 women who have made credible accusations that he groped, molested, or raped them – there is little doubt that Trump’s views and treatment of women ranges between unacceptable to felonious.

He’s a crook and a con man.  The many court cases against him for stiffing the people who’ve worked for him as a real estate developer make that pretty clear.  Though Trump claims he didn’t pay up for work because it wasn’t done properly, his own top financial officer is on record stated that not paying sub-contractors was an intentional strategy that Trump used to increase his profits.  In numerous cases, his failure to pay for work done resulted in bankruptcy for the small firms that he stiffed. 

Another aspect of his criminal behavior is that the court ordered him to terminate his "charitable" foundation, since the money was all going to him and his campaign instead of to charities.  Further, the court has prohibited Trump or any of his family from operating a charitable foundation in the future, due to "a shocking pattern of illegality."  And most recently, he had to pay a $2 million fine after "conceding that he used his charitable foundation at times as a personal piggy bank."

Finally, let’s not forget the Trump University scam, where students were promised a world-class education from top, hand-picked instructors that would make them rich in the real estate business.  All for only $35,000!  Of course, it turned out that there was little substance to the “curriculum,” that Trump had nothing to do with hiring instructors (as promised), and that the high-pressure sales tactics resulted in a total waste of money for those who signed up.  Trump finally settled the lawsuits from students by paying $25 million, claiming he did so just to clear the air before his election.  But a quick review of the evidence leaves little doubt that this was a total scam and that he would almost certainly have lost had the cases gone to trial.

Donald Trump is a nasty bully.  In every case where somebody criticizes him or points out that he’s wrong, his response is to attack the person, rather than intelligently respond to the criticism.  So Meghan Kelly has “blood coming out of her whatever,” John McCain isn’t a hero because “he was captured,” Congresswoman Maxine Waters is “a very low-IQ person.”  More recently, it was using the occasion of the 75^th anniversary of D-Day to blast House Speaker Nancy Pelosi as he sat in a graveyard of lost American soldiers.  Nancy Pelosi is an “very evil, nasty person; a real loser,” said our most un-presidential of Presidents.  And on and on.  Who the hell talks like that?

Aside from that, one of his favorite responses is the lawsuit.  If someone has negative information about him, Trump has his lawyers sue the person to prevent the information from becoming public.  Claim that he molested you?  Trump will sue you.  Claim that it’s actually Trump that is the “very low-IQ individual” by requesting to see his university records?  He’ll sue the university for releasing those.  Insult people and threaten to sue them: That’s Trump’s modus operandi.

Donald Trump only cares about what is good for Donald Trump.  More than a few psychologists and psychiatrists have studied his actions and concluded that, apart from being a pathological liar, he is a “prototypical narcissist.”  So when presented with conclusive evidence that Russia interfered in the 2016 election, instead of acting to prevent that in the future, Trump’s only concern was about how that impacted his legitimacy.  His inauguration in early-2017?  The greatest attendance ever, by far, even when the evidence showed something quite different.  He even ordered the White House to Photo-Shop pictures to show a bigger crowd than was actually there.  Then there are all his ridiculous claims of having “the world’s greatest memory,” that he is “dazzled by his own creations,” and that “only he can fix” the US’s problems.  Who the hell talks like that?  The man is in love with himself and disconnected from reality.

But besides that, his focus on him and him alone places the nation in great danger.  By refusing to address Russian meddling,  by charging taxpayers tens of millions on his golf trips, by exchanging “beautiful love letters” with a vicious N. Korean dictator, by insisting on a pointless investigation to prove the existence of “3-5 million fake ballots” against him in the 2016 election – Trump harms the nation, all in pursuit of further stroking his gigantic ego.

And he is a fascist.  Too much?  An exaggeration?  Nope.  The essay Fascism in Fashion in my Trump Tales book considers the characteristics of fascism, written before Trump came along by an expert on the topic .  It turns out that Donald Trump basically meets every requirement, from backing nationalist, racist policies, to bashing the free press, and so forth.  Who would have ever thought that Americans would elect a fascist – and then continue to support him as it becomes ever clearer that he is one?

Granted that details and citations of evidence are sparse here, but anyone who doubts the President’s nastiness, narcissism, crookedness, and the rest will have no problem finding countless examples and evidence of those traits by simply looking.

Donald Trump’s entire persona is based on lies; HE IS A PATHOLOGICAL LIAR.  Shouldn’t this claim be part of the prior point of him being a horrible person?  Well, it could be.  But apart from all his other horrible traits, the scale of his lies is so huge that it deserves special focus.  Of course a person who lies all the time is a horrible person.  Who would claim otherwise? 

It is easy to show how Trump’s lies enabled him to capture the attention and support of tens of millions of Americans, starting with “Barack Obama isn’t a US citizen” way back in 2010.  Long after that claim was disproved, Trump continued to promote it, becoming the darling of those who opposed a liberal (and black?) President.  Trump built on that base with non-stop lies about Mexicans (criminals and rapists), Clinton giving weapons-grade uranium to the Russians, to knowing “more about Iraq than all the generals,” building a wall that “Mexico will pay for,” “climate change is a Chinese hoax,” “wind turbines cause cancer,” and on and on. 

There’s no point in further detailing all the man’s lies; it is no exaggeration to say that he can barely open his mouth without twisting, spinning, or outright lying about practically every and any thing.  “Yeah, but all politicians lie,” his supporters counter.  Well sure, but Trump’s degree of telling falsehoods probably exceeds even the least honest other politician by a factor of 10 or more.  In other words, if we take the next biggest liar in US political history, then for every lie he or she told, Trump probably has told ten or more lies.

Think that is an exaggeration?  According to Vanity Fair, Trump told an average of “23 false or misleading statements a day” over the past 7 months.  The President loves to criticize the New York Times and the Washington Post as FAKE NEWS and the “enemy of the people” (a classic line for dictators), but it’s a simple matter to prove almost everything those sources print, and at the same time disprove most of what Trump says. The mainstream media is not the source of FAKE news; Donald Trump is.  

Speaking of the Washington Post, it claims that Donald Trump exceeded 10,000 “false or misleading statements” earlier this year.  Maybe you’d disagree with some of their judgements; maybe you think a more accurate number is more like 5,000, or 15,000.  But the point simply is that the man is dishonest at an astounding level, far more than anyone else we've ever known. 

This matters because it got an incredibly flawed person elected as our President.  It matters because it allows him to continue to mislead the tens of millions of gullible Americans who take his words as truth.  And importantly, it matters because intelligent Americans can never trust what he says.  What will happen in the case of a genuine disaster or emergency?  How can we believe what he says about it?  Well of course, we can’t.  The leader of our nation, the leader of the free world – is a liar on an unprecedented scale, and that is a huge problem.

Donald Trump DID NOT LEGITMATELY WIN THE PRESIDENCY.  When you think about it given the facts, it is somewhat remarkable that nearly 3 million more Americans voted for Hillary Clinton than voted for Trump.  As explained in more detail in my Have They Pulled It Off? essay from Trump Tales, there are three main reasons to challenge the legitimacy of Trump’s election.  We can argue about whether each of the three were illegal or merely unethical, but in any case, each of the three were unprecedented in American politics and disturbing enough to question whether Trump should have been allowed to assume the office.  Taken together, the three leave little doubt (at least, to unbiased and truly patriotic Americans) that the man should not be in the White House.

To briefly summarize, the first reason is that Donald Trump and his campaign used fake news and phony social media stories to spread wildly false information.  Sure, politicians have always spun the news, tweaked the facts, and thrown out a whopper or three in their campaigns.  “All’s fair love and politics,” as one version of the old saying goes.  But as my previous point explained, the degree of spinning and lying by the Trump campaign wildly exceeded anything we’ve seen before.  Combined with an astute use of social media, Trump was able to capitalize on Americans’ lack of knowledge about history, economics, world events, and government, along with their inability to distinguish between facts, opinions, lies, and propaganda.  The result was that millions of Americans bought into what should easily have been seen as FAKE NEWS, converting them into Trump supporters.

The second factor was the proven Russian interference in the 2016 election.  Every US intelligence agency long ago stated that there was no doubt the Russians sought to impact the presidential election in order to help their candidate, Donald Trump, win the post.  Trump himself has consistently denied this, as it obviously implies that perhaps he wouldn’t have won without Russian help.  But even he has acknowledged their interference in recent months, ostensibly since it is now far too late to reverse those results.  Despite disagreement about what the Mueller investigation found, there is no question that it shows the surprising extent of Russian interference, with goals of 1) sowing domestic discord and 2) electing Donald Trump.

The question is, of course, just how much that Russian involvement changed the results.  The answer largely depends on one’s politics and ability to be objective, but I believe it could easily have pushed Trump over the top.  Various analyses of his victory show that it was accomplished with just a few thousand votes in specific districts, areas where (not surprisingly) the Russians had directed much of their effort.  

Again considering the Mueller report, it documented how operatives of the Trump campaign shared important voter information with the Russians.  That, along with other proven facts such as Don Jr. welcoming Russian dirt, leave no real doubt that there was collusion, which is defined as secret or illegal cooperation or conspiracy, especially in order to cheat or deceive others.  Luckily for Trump, collusion is not a legal term, not criminally defined, so he and his supporters can lie in boasting of "NO COLLUSION!" found by the Mueller investigation.  

Former Air Force general James Clapper, as the Director of National Intelligence from 2010 to 2017, is in a unique position to know more than just about anybody about what the Russians did in 2016.  He is quoted as saying: "Surprising even themselves, [Russia] swung the election to a Trump win. To conclude otherwise stretches logic, common sense and credulity to the breaking point. Less than eighty thousand votes in three key states swung the election. I have no doubt that more votes than that were influenced by this massive effort by the Russians.”  None of Clapper’s fellow intelligence chiefs have disagreed with that assessment.    

Former President and US Naval Academy graduate Jimmy Carter recently joined Clapper in this opinion, calling Trump an “illegitimate President,” and claiming: "There's no doubt that the Russians did interfere in the election. And I think the interference, although not yet quantified, if fully investigated would show that Trump didn't actually win the election in 2016. He lost the election and he was put into office because the Russians interfered on his behalf." 

Sidebar!  Let’s take a little detour to consider the fact that other notable former military officers have a big problem with Donald Trump being President, even those whom he chose to serve in his administration.  Marine General and Secretary of Defense Jim Mattias, for example, finally gave up trying to work with someone he said was like “a 5th or 6th grader.”  Four-star General and Trump’s Chief of Staff John Kelly called Trump “an idiot.”  Trump’s own National Security Advisor, Gen. HR McMaster is on record as calling Trump “a dope, with the intelligence of a kindergartner.”   

There’s also retired Admiral William McRaven, former head of the military’s Special Operations, who’s taken on Trump several times.  McRaven scolded Trump for calling the press “the enemy of the people.”  He said Trump “embarrassed us in the eyes of our children, humiliated us on the world stage and, worst of all, divided us as a nation.”  Finally, consider four-star General Barry McCaffrey, the most highly decorated General in our nation’s history.  I doubt that anyone would consider him, or any of those other officers just mentioned (all Republicans, except Carter), to be “snowflakes” or “libtards”.  Yet McCaffrey has repeatedly criticized President Trump, calling him (among other things) “under the sway of Vladimir Putin,” and a “serious threat to national security,” and most recently blasting his use of the military to make the 4th of July a “vile political fight.”  

(Update: A January, 2020 report revealed that in a meeting with the nation's top military leaders in July, 2017, Trump said: "I wouldn't go to war with you people.  You're a bunch of dopes and babies."  To America's top generals and admirals!  Who talks like this?) 

So my question is: Why in the world do so many military veterans, and current members of the military, back Donald Trump?  Seriously.  
I mean, besides all of these guys’ thoughts on Trump, he’s a 5-time draft dodger, as his former physician recently admitted he provided false evidence of Trump’s “debilitating bone spurs.”  He claims, as mentioned earlier, to know more about military affairs than the generals.  He trusts Russia’s leader more than his own military and intelligence advisors.  And he lies all the time.  So I really want to know: Why is this despicable person the overwhelming choice of our military and veterans?

OK – back on topic now with the third factor that unfairly brought the presidency to Donald Trump, and that was FBI Director James Comey’s decision to publicly announce, some ten days before the 2016 election, that there “might” be some negative information on Hillary Clinton in some newly discovered emails.  Donald Trump later put Comey on his hate list for refusing to proclaim his loyalty to the President and so forth, but the fact is that this decision of Comey’s, in hindsight, sort of sealed the coffin on Clinton’s run for President.

You see, in the weeks before Comey’s decision, Clinton had been well ahead of Trump in all the polls, up by some 3-4%, and still gaining.  But immediately after Comey’s announcement, Clinton’s numbers started to drop.  About a week later, Comey proclaimed the results of reviewing those new emails: There was NO negative information about Clinton.  But it was too late; there were just a couple of days until the election, and not enough time for Clinton to recover from her loss of momentum to Trump.  As we all know, Trump just barely squeaked by, winning the Electoral College vote, even while losing the popular vote.

Also as we all know, Comey directly violated a clear FBI policy against taking action or making announcements that might affect an upcoming election.  I have read Comey’s book, wherein he explains why he made that tough decision contrary to FBI policy, and I understand his rationale.  But nevertheless, the fact is that his actions almost certainly took the Presidency out of Clinton’s hands and put it in Trump’s – a decision he likely will regret for the rest of his life.

James Clapper and Jimmy Carter are right: Russia’s interference almost certainly gave the Presidency to Donald Trump.  But add in the Trump campaign’s unprecedented level of lying and manipulating social media (Pope Francis supports Donald Trump for President), and James Comey’s unfortunate reveal of “potentially” negative emails on Hillary Clinton and, well – there doesn’t seem to be any reasonable doubt that Trump unfairly, illegitimately took the Presidency from Hillary Clinton.

So that’s my case.  Donald Trump is a horrible, unqualified person who stole the Presidency from Hillary Clinton.  Besides my question about why in the world American military types support this idiot, this leaves us with the sad fact that tens of millions of Americans don’t care.  Trump is their guy, they love him no matter what he does, and no matter what the facts are.  May God save America!