Donald Trump: The Ignoramus Who Would Be President

Donald John Trump: The paunchy balding billionaire with the dyed ducktail comb-over wearing figurative jackboots who decided on a whim to run for president with virtually no relevant background, who has been a free-associating bloviator with abandon before huge campaign crowds for nearly a year, and who has convinced me that it is necessary to write about him again in spite of my intense distaste for even the most innocuous publicity about him. He won’t go away, the public won’t disown him in spite of his tendency to blurt out terminally offensive remarks about minorities, women, the disabled, and anyone who disagrees with him, and his careless insults have been obliterating much of the prestige and glory that the United States has accumulated in the 240 years since the Declaration of Independence.

How is Donald Trump an offense and menace to this country and to the rest of the global community? Let me count the ways.

First, the following comment today from Republican consultant Mike Murphy:

“He fails my commander-in-chief test. I think he is a stunning ignoramus on foreign policy issues and national security, which are the issues I care most about. And he’s said one stupid, reckless thing after another, and he’s shown absolutely no temperament to try to learn the things that he doesn’t know, and he doesn’t know just about everything. . . . The guy has a chimpanzee-level understanding of national security policy.”

Which was preceded by the following from Paul Krugman of The New York Times:

“Truly, Donald Trump knows nothing. He is more ignorant about policy than you can possibly imagine, even when you take into account the fact that he is more ignorant than you can possibly imagine. But his ignorance isn’t as unique as it may seem: In many ways, he’s just doing a clumsy job of channeling nonsense widely popular in his party, and to some extent in the chattering classes more generally.”

Today Donald Trump came into his own, ignoramus-style:

— He consulted with 93-year-old Henry Kissinger, Secretary of State under Richard Nixon and the co-creator of the secret Cambodian bombing campaign of 1969 and other horrors, meant to coerce the North Vietnamese military to abandon their Cambodian sanctuaries. (The campaign was code-named Operation Menu and included Breakfast, Lunch, Snack, Dinner, Supper, and Dessert.) It was a total failure and further inflamed U.S. public opinion against the continuation of the Vietnam War. Kissinger has remained resident in the U.S. for a long time because he fears being arrested for war crimes if he leaves the country. Trump’s purpose in consulting the eminence grise of the Nixon administration was to appear statesmanlike, to acquire foreign policy bona fides, to reassure both American voters and the global community that he could develop an adequate understanding of how the rest of the world wages or prevents war, controls the nuclear arms race, participates in intercountry organizations such as G8 and G20, consults together to deter and counter international terrorism, and conducts a panoply of other necessary actions. It is highly unlikely that he made much headway in a single afternoon session at Kissinger’s Manhattan apartment, but Donald likes to think of himself as a quick study, a very smart businessman who always wins. Why should global warfare be any different?

— Trump blithely asserted that “I would speak to [North Korean dictator] Kim Yong Un” without further ado, ignoring the history of the Korean War and subsequent stalemate that has been in effect since 1953—more than sixty years—as well as the inconvenient fact that diplomatic preparation and informational research are necessary prerequisites for such an important contact. This after casually indicating that U.S. troops should be withdrawn from Japan and South Korea, which should, rather, according to Trump Game Theory, develop their own nuclear arsenals for protection from North Korea (although neither wishes to take such steps). This from the potential future Commander in Chief, also a draft dodger who claims to have been prevented from serving in the Armed Forces due to heel spurs that entitled him to a medical deferment. And coming after Trump’s previous statement that he will bomb ISIS with nuclear weapons ”back to the Stone Age” (as if any reasonable military person could trust The Donald with the nuclear codes, which state of affairs makes reasonable people break out in a cold sweat).

— Trump has repeatedly indicated his contempt for the staunchest and most necessary and effective allies of the United States, including but not limited to NATO, the European Union, The British Prime Minister, and the new Lord Mayor of London Sadiq Khan, a Muslim who has been highly critical of Trump’s reckless religious extremism statements about Muslims and his intention to bar all Muslims from the U.S. Khan responded to Trump’s recent intention to make an exception for him to visit the U.S. although he would ban all other Muslims:

“Donald Trump’s ignorant view of Islam could make both our countries less safe. It risks alienating mainstream Muslims around the world and plays into the hands of the extremists. Donald Trump and those around him think that Western liberal values are incompatible with mainstream Islam. London has proved him wrong.”

— Trump’s purported intention to make peace with Fox News broadcaster Megyn Kelly dissolved into non sequiturs, and when confronted with his use of the word “bimbo” to describe Kelly, all Trump could say in “retraction” was, “You’ve been called a lot worse.” Yah. You betcha. By Trump himself. And unknown numbers of misogynists inspired by him.

— Trump publicly released the names of eleven possible Supreme Court justices whom he would consider nominating if and when he is elected President and has taken office, although it is apparent that none of the eleven sitting conservative state and federal judges were consulted in advance about the release of their names, and surely some of them would decline to be nominated following their sudden exposure to public scrutiny by a controversial presidential candidate without warning or consent. Although several of those proposed justices are women, none are Latino, Asian-American, African-American, or Native American. All appear to be Christian. This when the stalled nomination of Merrick Garland, Chief Judge of the Federal Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia, by President Barack Obama in March 2016, a month after the death of Justice Antonin Scalia, continues with no end in sight and with Senate Republicans continuing to vow to block any vote on the Garland nomination during the rest of Obama’s term. (In return, Harry Reid has promised to deny Republican Senators any recess until Merrick gets a hearing and an up or down vote.)

— Trump speculated on vice presidential picks even though he has yet to achieve the status of Republican nominee, and indicated he will demand that each such potential nominee provide his or her income tax returns, this in spite of Trump’s outright refusal to provide his own income tax returns, claiming that since they are being audited by the IRS (all returns since 2008), he “cannot” release them until the audits are concluded, a possibility that takes us six or more years into the future. So Trump’s gross income, business deductions and expenses, assets, employers, charitable donations (such as the still incompletely remitted $6 million he claimed he raised on a veterans’ web site in January for the benefit of twenty-two veterans’ charities, which sum landed in a private Trump account and is still more than 50% undistributed to the veterans’ groups), and his effective tax rate payments in recent years on his enormous income. And Trump’s brand-new filing of a required Federal Election Commission disclosure statement does not clarify matters that would be revealed on income tax returns although they do indicate that Trump holds bonds in at least two companies that he criticized on the campaign trail. Back to those premature VP possibles: none are Latino, African-American, Asian-American, or Native American. All seem to be Christian.

— The 2012 Republican nominee Mitt Romney, who had been trying mightily to recruit a third-party candidate to splinter the Trump vote and challenge the Democratic contender, today threw in the towel and admitted defeat. It is hard to predict what disaffected conservative politicians and voters will do next: sit this one out, cross over to vote for Hillary Clinton, or hold their noses and vote for Trump.

Dear Reader, did you follow all that Donald News for one day? My head is spinning and my liar meter has been zinging off the charts all day. Time for more truth-telling and less mendacity.