Does Trump Deserve Respect?
No, but the Presidency itself does.
After I posted my column about why journalists are mostly failing to cover Donald Trump adequately, I heard from faithful reader Dan O’Leary, who said, “I’m waiting for the day when Trump insults a reporter and they say, “I don’t care who the hell you are, you don’t talk to me like that.”
He added, “There isn’t any reason in hell that this loathsome creature deserves any consideration.” Well, sorry, Dan, but there is. Not as Donald Trump per se.
.
But he is the President of the United States. Yes, the worst one that we’ve ever had in many ways. But he was elected by the people, as appalling as that is, and he is not only the head of government, but the head of state, and (pardon me while I vomit) the living symbol of the United States of America.
For several years I worked with a brilliant organic chemist who had over 50 patents to his name, Dr. Douglas Neckers (1938-2022.) When he was growing up, his family were strong Republicans and (unfairly) blamed President Franklin D. Roosevelt for closing the failure of a bank they owned during the Great Depression.
But one afternoon, seven-year-old Doug came home to find his mother crying. President Roosevelt had died that afternoon. Puzzled, he asked why she was upset. “We hated Roosevelt,” he said.
She answered, “but he was the president of our country.”
We who loathe the current president have to take care that we don’t further damage the office he has so disgraced. O’Leary was totally correct when he said “where are all the other reporters’ outrage and defense of the abused?” presumably, when Trump does things like call a female reporter “Piggy.”
They should have informed the President that this language was unacceptable, and walked out. That would have taken him aback. Nothing wrong with insisting on a little professional respect. But to behave the way he does, even towards him, cheapens everyone involved, including the press. Which is precisely what he wants.
We need not take his bait. The day will come when he is nothing, and then we can say whatever we want to about this sad, pathetic imitation of a man.
That is, if there is any reason to waste another few minutes of life on thinking about a vile creature who really has become our very own Enemy of the People.
"He added, “There isn’t any reason in hell that this loathsome creature deserves any consideration.” Well, sorry, Dan, but there is. Not as Donald Trump per se."
I don't see where we disagree on this particular fine point.
But, I can't imagine any non-MAGA who sheds a tear when he's gone just because he was the president. There will be none, except in grief over the damage done and lives lost. Indeed there will be rejoicing in the streets around the world.
In the matter of Trump, it is not just a political difference of opinion. We are in uncharted waters. I won't tick off the characteristics of this creature that makes him unworthy of the tears that were shed by those who opposed Roosevelt's policies.
But they are unique and peculiar in a way that requires a different approach. (This is the reason why all resistance and opposition tactics have failed.)
To me the comparison to Roosevelt, or anyone else, is a false equivalency.
And since you used the fancy Latin term per se, I'll see you one, and raise.
Sui generis.
(I was going to preface these remarks with "Jack, you ignorant slut", and close with "And keep my name outta your mouth" but humor is a tricky thing.)
But I will say that I have reached a milestone in my life: I have been called out by Jack Lessenberry.
Cheers and keep up the good work. You are loved and appreciated.
"Mis-attributions are a bugger of a thing. Some folks claim Mark Twain said 'I’ve never wished a man dead, but I have read some obituaries with great pleasure.' Others say it was Clarence Darrow. I'm not sure, but it's pretty darn witty."
Abraham Lincoln
Donald Trump will be gone some day, sooner than we all are, with any good fortune. It is the surrounding distasteful tenor of the country that worries me most. It is as though all standards of decency have been scuttled, and the worst of the worst behavior has been normalized and validated by Trump and his cadre of ill-mannered malcontents. America has become the drunken motorcycle gang crashing the democratic world's family reunion.
The GOP could not have selected a more desired offering to Vladimir Putin.