THE ELECTION–2016 VARIETY

Posted on October 26, 2016 Updated on October 14, 2016

Some folks may recall my reaction when Donald Trump announced in 2015 that he was running for President.  My exact words were: “You gotta be kiddin’ me!”

It was a joke.

It ceased being funny some months ago.

My initial reaction was followed by my “sharing” a good many posts on Facebook.  Some I shared because I hoped others would find his outlandish claims as appalling as I did.  Others, just because they were funny (there were cartoons about Hillary that were pretty amusing, too).  But mostly I shared—and continue to share—because I truly believe DT would be a monumental disaster for the nation I love.

I probably would not mind his grandiose claim that he will “Make America Great Again” if I did not think it is already pretty damned great; or if he would tell us HOW he going to achieve any of the plans he mentions in vague, generalized statements; or if he would even acknowledge that, contrary to his claim at the GOP convention, he “alone” CANNOT achieve any of his agenda.  A good history or civics book could tell him in an instant that NO President can act unilaterally without running into major roadblocks from Congress—which, after all, is made up of the “People’s Representatives.”

He is NOT going to overhaul the tax code alone.

Nor is he going to eliminate the IRS or the VA or any other agency that he decides he dislikes.

He is not going to defeat ISIS by himself.

He does NOT “know more than the generals do”—nor is he going to get away with firing these men who had to first have approval from CONGRESS to be where they are.

DT’s supporters take sharp exception to one’s comparing his style and rhetoric to that of Adolf Hitler.  Again, a good history book might help: it will show phenomenal parallels.  While Americans in the 21^st Century are not suffering to the degree that Germans did in the 1930s, many of our neighbors truly are suffering, for they have not shared in the recovery from the recession as much as others have.  It is easy to understand their frustration with a government that often seems to have forgotten them.   But I sincerely hope they will rethink DT as a solution to their—our—problems.