President Chump

I have gone from an attitude of Donald Trump winning and I’ll have to accept it to remembering the Watergate era and a President who was forced to resign.

The sudden firing of FBI director James Comey rings of Nixon’s Saturday Night Massacre.

The Saturday Night Massacre refers to President Richard Nixon's orders to fire independent special prosecutor Archibald Cox, which led to the resignations of Attorney General Elliot Richardson and Deputy Attorney General William Ruckelshaus on October 20, 1973, during the Watergate scandal. Cox led the investigation about Nixon’s role in the attempted robbery of files at the Democratic National Committee’s office at the Watergate office complex in Washington D.C. These days, with everything on computers, a digital robbery is far easier and easier to get away with, as is the case of Russian/Wickileaks release of Hillary Clinton’s confidential e-mails.

Both Comey and Fox were investigating two Presidents whose paranoia is very obvious. Trump also fired Sally Yates, the acting attorney general holdover who remained in the position pending Senate approval of Trump’s nominee, Jeff Sessions. She was allegedly fired because of her refusal to support Trump’s aborted Muslim ban but she was, like Comey, investigating the Russian connection to the Trump campaign.

Towards the end of the Watergate investigation, as evidence mounted against Nixon, the then President became increasingly paranoid and tapes from his office confirmed his increasing anger to the point of rage. Trump doesn’t need to express himself in the privacy of the White House. His rampages take the form of Twitter tweets, often making little sense.

And then there are the attacks on the press. I was the editor of a weekly newspaper in suburban New Jersey during Vice President Spiro Agnew’s and Nixon’s resignations. Even a local weekly newspaper that covered town council and board of education meetings had tons of hate mail. We were accused of being impartial and slanting the news. Hard core Republicans insisted most of the editors were Democrats. In fact the owners of just about every newspaper in the country were Republicans. And how does this resemble Trump’s “fake news?”

Even in the Nixon era, the President addressed the working press. I vividly remember Nixon’s exchange with Dan Rather, the then CBS White House reporter. Nixon was asked a question by Rather and he responded by asking if he was “running for something.” “No,” replied Rather. “Are you?”

But these days, news organizations such as the New York Times, the Washington Post and CNN have been banned from the White House press office at times and Trump as repeatedly refused to answer questions, calling it “fake news.” At the same time, his chief advisor, Steve Bannon, was the CEO of Breitbart News  -- an ultra-conservative news organization well known as misleading and inaccurate according to fact checking organizations.

So Trump has gone way beyond what Nixon ever did in terms of dealing with the press. And that’s just the beginning. Trump was elected on campaign promises that most of those who opposed him said were unconstitutional or against the law.  A prime example is the Muslim ban. It was outright stopped by a federal court judge based in Hawaii. And the Trump administration blasted the decision. And, of course, there was the judge in a civil suit against Trump that was of Mexican heritage that Trump demanded to step down because he supported a wall.

There are many, many Presidential acts that have been embarrassing to the country and have made us look downright stupid in the eyes of the rest of the world, especially in England, Germany and Japan, our main military allies.  And I worry about Trump’s military orders, sending 50+ missiles into a Syrian airport and dropping a huge bomb. His refusal to state that he would not use nuclear weapons scares just about everyone except the terrorists.

I frankly don’t care that Trump has failed to implement most of his campaign promises. There is no wall. Coal miners and steel workers have not returned to work. And this is because their jobs have become automated, not because of environmental regulations being eliminated.

Nothing yet has been done about NAFTA; the Iran deal remains in effect; and we haven’t done much about ISIS.

Nixon once said, “I am not a crook.” What amazes me is that Trump, with his constant refusal to pay suppliers, declaring bankruptcy many times, cheating people with his “university,” and so much more that was known during the campaign still was elected.

The man is a divisive person, and he has done little to be the president of all the people. I know that people who disgust me are his key supporters. I know that his comments about women and minorities have created hard feelings. I see his cabinet as mostly white males and business and Beltway insiders. The swamp has not been cleaned up.

Today, Trump took a “mental health day” according to his embattled press secretary. My biggest issue is Trump’s mental health. Have the demands of the presidency made him unable to function? He is under attack from all sides, including his Republican allies. Can he hold up? It seems he isn’t doing very well at the present time. His sanity has been questioned in the campaign. Now, even more so.

I make many mistakes when I’m under stress. I say and do the wrong things. I frequently fail to engage my brain before I open my mouth. Trump and I are the same age and I can see my mental capabilities becoming reduced. I have a very hard time organizing my day. I have to write things down to organize simple tasks. I’m currently working on the back yard landscaping. I have to figure out the order of things. I find there are a dozen or so tasks to do and I have anxiety as to what to do next. I can envision Trump having the same issues. I am not surprised that he has family members close by in the West Wing. For several decades he has relied on family, and I hope that they and his advisors are enough to support him.

I doubt if he will be impeached unless there is absolute proof of cooperation with the Russians. The Republican Congressional majority will not permit it to happen. And so I ask that no matter how much you dislike Trump, I want you to pray for him. He is an emotionally fragile man, perhaps for a long time. And he is being overwhelmed by both his duties and the absolute political and personal hatred from so many. Trump, unwisely in my opinion, pays way too much to social media. It is the communication tool of the common people. There are millions who revile him as well as many who support him. He simply can’t set himself above the fray. Like most of us, his humanity is facing difficult tasks; unlike most of us, his tasks are overwhelming.