He didn’t have to do this

With a Congressional hearing in full swing regarding Donald Trump’s firing of FBI Director James Comey, I can’t help but wonder whether Donald Trump, or “The Don” as I like to call him, ever has moments of wondering what the heck he’s doing this for.

By this I mean serving as President of the United States.

Melania reportedly didn’t want Trump to run, and who can blame her?

Like him or not, one thing is indisputable: this President has been in the crosshairs of attacks from literally his first day in office that are unprecedented in scope and relentlessness from the media, the Washington DC establishment, and the left across this country.

As I’ve written many times, Donald Trump was not my first choice for President. I found offensive many of the remarks he made on the campaign trail (these have been discussed and dwelt upon at such length by so much national media it is unnecessary to list them). But as primary season progressed, I started to take a closer look and listen. Three new impressions formed in my mind 1) Trump’s family, especially his children, stood by him with closeness, love, and what seems like deep, genuine respect and 2) he had a direct and honest way of communicating with the common people of this country that many found refreshing and inspiring and 3) As an immensely successful businessman in the private sector, he didn’t have to run for President in order to feel he had reached the pinnacle of his career, and so it seemed perhaps that some part of his motivation in doing this was actually to serve. He struck me as the type of individual who believes he can run things well, and no doubt in most respects he can (no one becomes and remains a billionaire for being incompetent). And so, with the open mindedness I believe is required of any critical thinker, I considered him.

I thought back to the several times I had crossed paths with “The Don” through the years here in New York. In each of these instances he seemed like an all right enough guy; certainly not the monster that some of my liberal friends seemed to believe. I had heard in national media reports how he can be vulgar, and seen him interact with other candidates such as Jeb Bush in a way that came across as bullying at times, and I didn’t like those qualities in him. But he also appeared honest and straightforward, at times warm, generous and compassionate, loyal and loving toward his family. In short, like most people, a real mixed bag. I also very much admired his age-defying, and generally limit-defying, personality; I recognized that at nearly 70, he was attempting the nearly impossible: to win the Presidency in a system in which the two dominant political parties have had a lock on determining our options for over 100 years. He was trying to do this as a kind of outsider, someone with more nuanced, individualistic views who seemed more a success-oriented pragmatist than an ideologue, and had the strong backing of neither party at the outset. His independence of spirit appealed to the independent in me.

As the hard left’s hysteria regarding him mounted (“Hitler! Fascist!”) etc., I found myself reconsidering him and thinking that, if the people who were saying and writing unkind things to my family members who were supporting The Don, attacking me for writing a nuanced article about this complex man, etc., believed his election would be the end of the world, maybe I should just give The Don the benefit of the doubt. After he secured the nomination, I decided to support him. (Due to the Iran deal, Benghazi, and other offenses I could never support Hillary Clinton, so refusing to support the only viable alternative seemed quixotic and even reckless to me).

At this point, I am hoping that, for the good of our country, for its economy and security, enough people would rather see The Don succeed than fail. No one who becomes a billionaire is incompetent, and the country could benefit from his skills.

Which brings me back to my initial point: he didn’t have to do this. At age 70, the man has driven himself to attain the near impossible – to be elected to the Presidency as an outsider. I believe he wants to succeed with every fiber of his being, wants to go down in history as a good President, and will use his considerable talents as best he can for the common good.

While the investigation may yet yield something concrete, at this point it hasn’t. Today’s headlines and news stories stress that Comey is accusing Trump of lying. But the only lies Comey is accusing Trump of relate directly to Trump’s opinion of Comey’s job performance (rather than accusing the President of lying about something factual, Comey is saying Trump “lied” when he said that the F.B.I. was in “disarray” and that Comey’s subordinates had lost confidence in him. To me, those statements are clearly matters of opinion, and Comey’s accusation has no substance because he’s not accusing Trump of anything provable. You can’t “lie” about a matter of opinion. Ask any employee fired for poor performance if his boss “lied” when he said the employee was doing a lousy job). The hearing and coverage are seeming like a witch hunt conducted by the many people in the establishment of this country who can’t stand The Don on a personal level, mostly. A few thoughts on this.

Strategically, the Republicans would have more to gain by impeaching Trump than the Democrats would. If he were impeached, we’d have Pence/Ryan, a solid ticket for working with the Republican Congress to advance a conservative agenda. (Reality is, Trump is not a big social conservative and is really more moderate. Social liberals have a lot more to lose if the Democratic establishment were to impeach Trump). Not to mention that Trump would probably be more beatable in 2020 than Pence would.

Republicans beware. The Don, probably more than any other president in our time, was elected by the people, many of whom love him. I’ll elaborate. Unlike Hillary, he did not have the backing of his party from the start. Nor did he have support from the mainstream media, or initially from influential donors with deep pockets, as he chose to finance his own campaign for the primary season. Nor did he have any elite segment of society – such as academia or celebrities – on his side. All the way through, these establishment elements were strenuously opposed to his candidacy and actively worked to undermine it. The fact that he won despite lacking these advantages suggests that many of the American people wanted him enough to disregard the messages they were being bombarded with continuously from the media, from their political party leaders, from gorgeous, talented celebrities giving away free concerts, etc. Though The Don lost the popular vote, when you consider that it was very close, and you factor in the enormous advantages over him that Hillary came in with, as well as the unremitting campaign on the part of these establishment elements to prevent him from getting to the White House, his election was was a real referendum on the establishment, a win for the common people.

Democrats beware (see above). Impeaching Trump will mean President Pence. Is that really what you want?

Here’s a thought for both right and left: now that he’s in office, what about giving this man a real chance to get something done?

Enough of the American people put him in office that, should either or both sides of the establishment refuse to back off and let him use the skills these people elected him for, they will have to answer to an angry public and a country so divided that governing may be close to impossible.

This entry was written by Heather Robinson and posted on June 9, 2017 at 1:24 am and filed under Blog. permalink. Follow any comments here with the RSS feed for this post. Keywords: Donald Trump, Melania Trump. Post a comment or leave a trackback: Trackback URL. */?>