[Photo credit: Twitter: An anonymous Cypress Ranch High School senior from Texas posted this photo of students raising their hands in a Nazi salute and shouting “Heil Hitler” and “Heil Trump” while their class photo was being taken.]
I’m searching for a word. For something that will express my total and complete overwhelming feeling at the latest breaking news of Trump’s actions and words. I am not alone. Undoubtedly, all who can think in nonpartisan terms (known as critical thinking skills) are feeling the same way too.
Overwhelmed!
I’m searching for a word that will reflect our president’s state of mind. I’m searching for a word that will define our difficult times. I’m searching for a word that will sum up our society. I’m searching for a word that will save us. I am searching for my country. The country I knew just a few short days ago.
My search for a word to reflect Trump’s state of being is due to his incomprehensible, inexplicable, inexhaustible exhausting tweets, and his actions and words pouring forth unabated from him since Inauguration Day, which was just a relatively few long days and lonely nights ago: eighteen of ’em, to be exact.
My problem is that there is not just one word to describe Trump’s state of mind. Try as I might to get it nailed down to just one word, the best I have been able to do is to get down to just two words. President Trump is “pugnaciously truculent.”
There they are: pugnaciously truculent.
Trump is a quarrelsome, combative man who is scathingly harsh and aggressively self-assertive. He is your typical tyrant. A dictator in waiting who is now slithering around our Oval Office. He is a dismissive man. He is unqualified for the Office of President of the United States of America because he does not understand the term “public service” nor the roles of our three branches of government. He has a fundamental want of understanding, as explained in “Want of Understanding” (Peter K. Kelly, December 9, 2010, lexisnexis.com):
Want of understanding remains an amorphous concept. It has been held to be nothing less than a mental or physical disability rendering the fiduciary incapable of performing duties. When by reason of dishonesty, improvidence, profligacy, recklessness, or want of understanding, a fiduciary is unfit for the execution of office.
With that legal precedent of “want of understanding” in hand, Trump is through. He’ll be tossed out of office eventually, or hopefully simply resign in Nixon-esque disgrace. His one saving grace will come from, and God forbid it, a Reichstag Fire–esque terror attack upon our land that will empower him, as Hitler was, to seize absolute power from a fearful nation by passing a Reichstag Fire–esque Decree or an Enabling-esque Act—or to place America’s Patriot Act on steroids. It’s just a matter of time before one or the other occurs, his disgrace or his saving grace.
Maybe that’s what Trump is counting on—a saving grace. Maybe he is not the reactionary, parasitic buffoon, blowhard, the trite, unseemly man I think he is. Maybe he is not pugnaciously truculent. Maybe all the chaos he creates is actually a Hitler-esque mastermind plan to convert America from a democracy into a dictatorship? Just like what happened in Germany. Maybe? Maybe we better pray that we are not hit hard by terrorists similar to how we were on 9/11. If we are, we’ll probably hear this spew forth from Trump’s orifice:
Desperate times call for desperate measures. I am enacting martial law and suspending habeas corpus, restricting travel, suspending all the amendments to the Constitution, and disbanding the press. I am doing this to protect you. I have ordered the arrest and detention of all dissident political voices. All federal, state, and local law enforcement now fall under the command of the military. I am rendering the judicial branch moot. I am doing this to protect you.
Well, why not? He has the authority as president. He says that he respects the dictator Putin. That statement is still mind-boggling to me, because in regard to anyone whom I have respected, I have always endeavored to adopt the qualities that garnered my respect.
Trump said this to Bill O’Reilly: “I do respect him [Putin] . . .”
“But he’s a killer,” O’Reilly challenged.
“There are a lot of killers,” Trump responded. “We’ve got a lot of killers. What do you think? Our country’s so innocent?”
OMG! OH MY GOD! Wake up, America! Pay attention. Before it is too late . . . and the world makes a documentary movie about our wake.
Maybe Trump knows exactly what he’s doing: executing a systematic plan to have us attacked so he can merge America with Russia. That would be the largest merger in history. Remember that Trump is preoccupied by size: crowd size, ratings size, penis size. Any businessperson would want to be remembered for creating the largest merger in history, especially if he was embarrassed by having a small penis. Maybe Trump is astutely aware of his lack of girth and length, quite aware of what he’s doing, and also fully confident that his followers will capitulate freedom and will then both demand and back his ascension to Our Führer.
Maybe . . .
One thing’s for sure, Trump has no love for our land, nor anyone else for that matter. He’s a narcissist to the nth degree. He has no understanding or respect for how our nation is governed. Anyone who understands anything about our country, about its checks and balances, would never mock or debase a judge on the campaign trail, let alone do it if one were president of the United States of America. Trump has done that to two judges now. Maybe he knows exactly what he’s doing.
Maybe?
This is from the Dictator’s Playbook: first, create a scapegoat (check), then mock your political opponents (check), then make friends with other dictators (check), then demonize the press (check), then be dismissive of and delegitimize the courts and judges (check), then appear to be the messiah who rises from the ashes of a terrorist attack to save the day (coming soon to a town near you), then stand tall, for you are a full-fledged tyrant, a dictator to the nth degree (we better stop this box from being checked).
When President Trump tweeted, in response to a sitting federal judge of the United States of America issuing a stay on his Muslim ban executive order, he showed once and for all that he does not respect nor understand nor care about our nation’s checks and balances of power. He tweeted, “The opinion of this so-called judge, which essentially takes law-enforcement away from our country, is ridiculous and will be overturned!”
Donald, the judicial branch is the law of our land. It decides on merits what law enforcement can and cannot do. And for the record—you self-absorbed bastard—our courts are also in charge of you.
Unless, of course, the chaos you have created causes us to be attacked by terrorists. If that happens, Mr. President, know that all my writings were simply an attempt to amuse you, Mein Führer—heil Trump!
Postscriptum: I know that I laid out many more premises for searching for words than just the two I used to describe President Trump’s state of being. But I am too overwhelmed to continue further. I think I’ll just seek out some rum now instead. I’ll live to fight another day. I will now find my exit with this: I am searching for a word . . . hope. I am not hopeful that I’ll find it anytime soon. I am searching for America, land of liberty. I am searching for the country I love, the country I knew just a few short days ago.
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