In the wake of the shooting in Alexandria, Virginia, where Republican members of Congress were targeted by an angry, abusive left-wing gunman, calls have gone up on both sides of the mainstream political spectrum for there to be less violent rhetoric and more seeking of common ground. President Trump himself called for such comity shortly after calling the Democrats "obstructionist" and shortly before he accused Democrats and Hillary Clinton of having their own ties to Russia.
But I'm going to rise above petty partisan concerns in order to say something that, while not exactly nice, is completely sympathetic to Donald Trump:
The President is a sick old man who is being taken advantage of by the people around him.
See, I was listening on the ol' NPR last Friday as President Donald Trump made some short remarks in a joint press conference with Romanian President Klaus Iohannis. Trump sounded weak and bored, as he usually does when he's doing something other than praising himself. But what was also noticeable on the radio, when you're not watching his grotesque, puffy face, glistening with a sweaty sheen, is how labored his breathing was. This was an effort, just standing there and reading some remarks. Like an out of shape guy going up multiple staircases, pausing at a landing to catch his breath, Trump sounded worn out, in a way that, say, Bernie Sanders and Hillary Clinton, one a bit older and the other slightly younger than Trump, never have.
Trump's health is failing. Physical and mental. If that wasn't obvious from his constant asides and inability to stay on point, here is one of his answers during the press conference: "I can tell you that there are many American investors right now going to Romania and investing. In fact, I was given a chart just before our meeting, and we have people going over to Romania and investing, and they weren’t doing that a number of years ago." A "number of years ago," Romania was a Soviet bloc country that didn't allow investment from the west. He might not know. He might not care. Or, equally likely, he might be completely divorced from the reality of the situation.
But beyond ignorance, there is Trump's reliance on the same phrases over and over. Calling on another reporter, Trump said, "I've got the microphone. If I could only sell that. If I could only sell it. Who would like to ask -- should I take one of the killer networks that treat me so badly as fake news? Should I do that?" He is constantly repeating "fake news," and, now, he's added "witch hunt" to his repertoire.
He has his various obsessions. He's never stopped talking about his election win. In that news conference last Friday, asked about why he felt "vindicated" by James Comey's testimony before a Senate committee, Trump responded, "Yesterday showed no collusion, no obstruction. We are doing very well. That was an excuse by the Democrats, who lost an election that some people think they shouldn't have lost, because it's almost impossible for the Democrats to lose the Electoral College, as you know. You have to run up the whole East Coast and you have to win everything as a Republican, and that's just what we did. So it was just an excuse." It's the same story all the time. I'll leave it to people with medical degrees to attempt a diagnosis, but every person I've known who has Alzheimer's or some form of dementia repeats the same stories over and over to the same people.
A few days later, on this past Tuesday, Trump was talking about health care and said, "Don't forget, on June 16th -- June 14th is my birthday, but June 16th was the day I announced that I was running. Some people said, 'Really? Not going to happen.' And it happened." Obviously, he's upset that everyone doesn't just automatically love him and celebrates what he sees as an improbable victory.
On and on this list could go. His inability to take a short walk in Italy. His constant lashing out. His sullen addiction to TV news. His new obsession with the investigation against him. The fact that the Vice President meets with more foreign leaders than Trump does. Actually, Trump meets with very few people.
If he wasn't a wealthy media figure, Trump would have been in a home or hospital, getting the care he needs. Instead, he is allowed to continue in this charade of leadership because it allows the people around him to get what they want, whether it's a repeal of the Affordable Care Act to please the GOP congressional whores, the reversal of humane executive orders on immigration to satisfy the racist nativists, the juice to seal deals for his terrible children, and more. Nobody really freaks out when Trump makes the pronouncements he does because they all know that, ultimately, he's just a mascot and not the one in charge. That was made perfectly clear when he turned over determinations about troop levels in Afghanistan to Secretary of Defense Mattis.
They will keep Trump propped up, even if he becomes a zombie version of himself, Strom Thurmond-like, in order to keep their agenda going or until he's so tainted by scandal that he becomes a vortex, taking down everyone with him. They will push that weak, sick old man until they've used him up.
And, frankly, I couldn't really be bothered to give a single, sad fuck about that shitstain of a human other than to recognize that this is likely what's happening.
So that's my attempt at being nice to Donald Trump.
