I could dice this standard issue Trump Derangement, Axis of Unethical Conduct parroting, Big Lie-stuffed, steaming pile of partisan offal into smithereens in a response to him, but all that would accomplish is to hurt his feelings, lose me a freind, and get me flamed by strangers in his bubble. Would there be a point in doing that? I don’t see it. So my friend remains one more victim of the 2016 Post Election Ethics Train Wreck. There are millions of them. Here is the post. I’ll comment briefly at the end….

“Trump is, by far, the worst president in U.S. history. He’s unstable, erratic, and self-aggrandizing. He lies constantly. And he’s not a leader. A leader LEADS; he gets people to follow him, within his country and abroad. A leader understands the art of compromising when needed, to keep everything moving forward. Trump knows how to belittle others. He knows how to behave like an extortionist (like threatening our NATO allies that he will leave NATO unless they do as he says). But that is not leadership.

 

“The chaos at the airports and the chaos in the middle east are all reflections of Trump’s poor leadership skills. He’s good at throwing tantrums. But he’s not good at working with others–whether it’s the Democrats he will need to resolve the TSA mess or the allies he will need if he wants to get the Strait of Hormuz open and keep it open so that oil can freely flow.

 

“What are Trump’s priorities? He’s big on putting his name and face everywhere. His signature is now going to be added to the dollar bill; no US President ever had his signature on our currency. His face will appear on a commemorative coin that our government will produce in July, in conjunction with the 250th birthday of America. Why? That’s the sort of thing a dictator does–put his name and face on money–it’s not the American way.

 

“Trump went into this war with Iran half-cocked, without making any attempt to first get support from the US public, Congress, or our allies. And Iran–by stopping the flow of traffic through the Strait of Hormuz–is damaging the economies of countries all around the world. Trump does not know how to solve this. He is frustrated. He lies and says Iran is dying to make a deal with us. But they have us over a barrel right now. Oil prices will not be coming down any time soon; they will continue to rise. In the mean time, we’re lifting sanctions we’d wisely placed on Russia and Iran–giving money to our adversaries.

 

“If China were to attack Taiwan right now, there’s little we could do to stop them. And Taiwan produces 90% of the microchips we need to keep our economy–and our military–functioning. Meanwhile, we must borrow money to fund this war in Iran. Our national debt keeps growing. (And don’t forget–in just eight years, we reach the point where we won’t be able to fully fund social security anymore. Is anyone in Washington proposing doing anything to address that impending crisis?)

 

“Trump says he doesn’t need anybody else; he doesn’t need our longtime allies. But we’re heading towards an international recession, due to this war he chose to start. And he doesn’t seem to see what’s coming.”

Well.

1. We judge Presidents by their own objectives, results and policies. There is literally no factual basis to call Donald Trump the “worst President” of even an unsuccessful one unless “worst” is defined as “the President whose policies I disagree with the most.” That is like a Thirties conservative saying that FDR was the worst President ever, or a Southern Democrat in the 1860s saying that Lincoln was the “Worst President Ever.” Trump has had one of the most consequential, transformative first year of a term in Presidential history, and the most consequential first year of a second term of any President. Anyone calling Trump the worst President after living through the Biden disaster automatically destroys his or her credibility. If the writer wasn’t a friend, I would have stopped reading after the first sentence.

2. “Unstable…lies constantly.” Two well-established Big Lies and Trump Derangement narrative stand-bys. I’m sick of writing about them.

3. “The sort of thing a dictator does.” Except Trump is obviously not a dictator. He is using Presidential powers that exits to be used. All the self-promotion is obnoxious and hands his foes sticks to beat him with, but it has no substantive impact at all. What difference does it make whose signature is on the dollar?

4. The nonsense about seeking support from the public, Congress and allies before attacking Iran: utter ignorance. Roosevelt was waging war against Germany secretly because the public was still frozen into isolationism. Lincoln didn’t have public support for the Civil War. Presidents have typically manufactured justifications for wars they have decided were in the nation’s interest: the Mexican War, the Spanish-American War, World War I. The attack on Iran, like the removing of Maduro from Venezuela, required secrecy, and the only ally the U.S. could trust this time was Israel. The President had the power to take action against Iran, and half of Congress is determined to foil any policy, domestic or foreign, that Trump proposes. My freind is apparently a fan of Obama’s pusillanimous “leading from behind” style.

5. China “could invade Taiwan” and then all sorts of horrible things might happen. “Future news = Fake news” If China was going to risk invading Taiwan, doing so while Biden was non-President was the perfect opportunity to do it. There is “little we could do to stop them”? I’ll take that bet.

6. The United States has to borrow money to do anything. Both parties have abdicated responsibility for the debt, and both parties—and the public—are estopped from blaming anyone but themselves and their elected officials for the looming debt disaster.

7. Trump is at fault for the Democrats withholding funding for the TSA to virtue-signal to their radical base that they oppose deporting the millions of illegals their party allowed across our borders, even though ICE is funded through 2029? How does that work? That’s another place where I would have stopped reading if someone else had posted this.

I could fisk the rest, but it’s a waste of my time. When someone gets to the point that they are relying on biased and dishonest sources and lack the skills, curiosity, integrity and perspective to independently challenge what his or her friends are saying, listening and considering are not options.

It’s tragic.