Dear America: You Want it All…But You Can’t Have It
Watching Donald Trump cruise to victory in last night’s Super Tuesday primaries- I felt my grip on reality slipping away. Perhaps this is how a black hole begins. Maybe this insanity will become so powerful that it will begin to gobble up all reality around it until we are sucked into negative space and oblivion. Could this be real? Could Donald Trump- a racist clown, a blowhard buffoon- actually become president of the United States of America? After last night I think it is time for everyone to wake up and realize that this is a real possibility.
My wife is depressed this morning.
“I don’t understand.” She mumbles to herself as the news ticks off Trump’s victories.
She finally stops pacing and looks at me.
“What do people think he is going to do for them?”
Well, that is a good question. I didn’t know what to tell her. We sit in silence for a while. I have to go to work. I sit on the subway. The question gnaws at me. What do people think Trump is going to do for them? What is his allure beyond the “he tells it like it is” shtick? What is it about Trump’s pitch that has so many people buying in on him. He is clearly resonating with a lot of Americans. But what do they want from him? What do you want Americans?
You want a president who is a good businessman?
Trump is a mediocre businessman at best. His businesses have filed for bankruptcy 4 times under his watch. Sure, he is worth 3 billion dollars (this is even questionable) but analysis of his fortune shows that investing his father’s money in a regular index fund like the S&P would have yielded him approximately the same fortune as all of his real estate ventures. (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/aj-agrawal/trumped-the-donald-has-fi_b_8403708.html) In other words, money makes money-no matter what. All Donald Trump’s fortune proves is that he is not a complete moron, and he didn’t squander his massive inheritance. He’s a great businessman, I don’t think so, so stop saying it.
You want a president who will take on the “Terrorists”?
Donald Trump’s hard line rhetoric on terror will create far more terrorists than he “takes out.” Imagine the recruiting power of this quote:
“The other thing with the terrorists is you have to take out their families, when you get these terrorists, you have to take out their families. They care about their lives, don’t kid yourself. When they say they don’t care about their lives, you have to take out their families”
You may think Obama has been soft on Terrorists and ISIS, but I assure you you do not want the President of the United States proposing killing the wives and children of anyone- even terrorists. Any serious effort to curb terrorism is going to require a huge amount of international support- support Trump is unlikely to get with his bullying rhetoric. Trump will not make a dent in terrorism. If anything he will increase it.
You want a president who will get rid of illegal immigrants?
And what will you eat? CNN recently published a great article on the disastrous effect deporting illegal immigrants would have on the American agricultural industry ( http://www.cnn.com/2016/03/01/politics/donald-trump-2016-dairy-farmers/) If you don’t want to read it all, just check out this quote from Republican dairy farmer Mike McMahon
“It’s so easy to blame these Hispanic workers for taking their jobs,” said McMahon, a Republican who admits to hiring workers with questionable documentation. But he added, “I can tell you they’re not taking jobs. They are filling holes. We need these people. I cannot get local workers to do the jobs that that these guys are doing. And every other dairy farmer will say the same thing.”
That’s it in a nutshell. Immigrant workers are simply not taking American jobs. There is not an illegal immigrant sitting across from you at your interview for Merrill Lynch. This is pure rhetoric meant to inflame people by prodding at their latent or not-so-latent bigotry. You may think you want to “build that wall” America, but you will wish we hadn’t when you have no milk to dip your Oreos in.
As far as Trump’s claims to illegal immigrants bringing crime into the country, this is not only false, but in fact the opposite is true. According to a recent University of Massachusetts study, first generation immigrants are actually considerably less likely to commit crimes than native born citizens. You can read The Washington Post’s excellent article on that issue here: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2015/07/02/surprise-donald-trump-is-wrong-about-immigrants-and-crime/ Since there is no data to back up any of his claims on crime, and the negative economic effects of his plans far outweigh any “so called” positives- the only argument for Trump’s immigration stance is pure racism. Are you really that racist America?
You want a President who will “Make America Great Again”?
Pu-lease. Here is a list of things Trump has proposed over the past few years:
Eliminating the Environmental Protection Agency
Eliminating the Department of Education
Total Shutdown of Muslims entering the United States
No more multiple vaccinations for children
De-funding Planned Parenthood
He has also claimed that climate change is a hoax, called women “pigs, slobs, and disgusting animals”, and purportedly has said “laziness is a trait in blacks.” He additionally claimed in one quote that his IQ was “one of the highest” whatever that means.
Is this is your idea of a great America? A country full of sick, uneducated children. One overrun with pollution. An America that bans visitors based on race, that forces poor people to have more kids rather than provide them access to contraception. An America that is overtly sexist, racist, and one that is run by an egotistical megalomaniac. An America that will kill the children and wives of suspected terrorists?
If that is the America you want Americans, then by all means vote for Donald Trump. Build that wall across the Mexican Border. Then, why not, build one across the Canadian border too. Then we can all be trapped in a hell of our own making. One Nation, under Trump, with bigotry and injustice for all.
“Every Nation gets the government it deserves” — Joseph de Maistre
Yes they do. I hope we deserve better.
