Donald Trump Is a Sycophant

What a travesty when the elected leader of our country shows no leadership.  Instead, his every action is determined by whether or how it will impact the support he receives from his core constituency.

Now to be fair, every president keeps his base very much in mind when considering actions to take.  It would be unreasonable to expect otherwise; the president is a politician.  

But I can think of no previous president who made all decisions in a way designed to throw red meat to his base and appease them.  Every president has had some issues he believed strongly in that were not supported by his base, or events happened that required taking action that his base disapproved.  That is the mark of a leader.  Once elected you act in the best interests of the country, you are the leader of all Americans, not just your core base of support.

Recently, it appeared that perhaps Trump was distancing himself somewhat from his base when he met with Chuck Schumer and Nancy Pelosi and made a few deals.  Or when he supported a bi-partisan approach to shoring up Obamacare.  

But this was not a change of heart.  He did this not because it was in the best interests of the country, but because he desperately needed some legislative wins.  And so, except for the debt ceiling deal, he has reneged on the others as it became clear he was endangering the support from his Tea Party/alt-right base.

This administration can therefore be described as the tyranny of the minority.  The Tea Party and alt-right are a minority whether one looks at those voting, all eligible voters, or the entire population.  As a result, perhaps 20-25% of the country is at this point directing its destiny.  Our democracy has never been without its problems, but never has it been so failed.

The Amorality of Donald Trump - Part 2: Charlottesville

I previously wrote in a post that Donald Trump will do and say anything he feels he needs to in order to get what he wants.  He has no morality or ethics.  It’s all transactional.  The end definitely justifies the means for him.

The New York Times pointed out several days ago that the one group that Trump cannot afford to lose the support of, the one group he cannot offend or criticize, is the alt-right, be they religious conservatives or white supremacists.  Because it is the only group that he can count on for unequivocal support … so long as he doesn’t go against them.  And so he bends over backwards to stroke them.

Thus we witnessed yesterday his disappointingly weak response to the white supremacists’ marching in Charlottesville, shouting neo-Nazi slogans, and the resulting violence between them and the counter protesters, including driving a truck into a group of protestors, killing one.  He said not ONE word against the vileness of the white supremacists.   He did not mentioned them at all.

Instead, he equated both sides by condemning the violence on both sides and saying that we must come together.  Even some Republicans could not stomach the President’s lack of leadership and morality one this one, calling the marchers’ words and action “evil” and “domestic terrorism.”

In my previous post, I said that the President’s words and actions bring to mind Joseph Welch’s question to Senator Joseph McCarthy during the McCarthy hearings in the early 50s, “Have you no sense of decency, sir, at long last?”  

It is a sad day for our country.  We have had so many sad days since the inauguration.  Actually since his nomination.  I only pray and hope that masses of whites, people of all colors, will join together in public protest and say, “No, this hatred is not my America.  My America believes in the equality of all men.”  See www.americansolidarity.org.