From: Doug Otto
Columbus
A few days ago, I saw a Facebook post that really bothered me. I can’t stop thinking about it because I know it reflects the viewpoint of about 30 percent of my fellow Americans. Here are the points the author made about the president of the United States:
• Don’t care about his character, just his accomplishments
• Booming economy
• Low unemployment
• African-Americans back at work
• Staying up late to greet returning POWs
• China returning to negotiating table
• Strengthening Israel
• Freeing Iran
• Tough on terrorism
• Loves America; proud of flag; American hero
I don’t know the man who wrote this, but after observing his love of our president, I am curious to know if he is aware of any of the following facts. These are not gleaned from the liberal media. Quite the contrary. They are from a Jan. 20 article in the Washington Examiner, a long-time conservative publication.
Do you think Mr. Trump has noticed any of these facts about himself?
• Habitual lying
• Vindictiveness toward everyone who doesn’t agree with his every thought and action
• Unwillingness to pay attention to advice from expert government professionals
• Support of the policy to separate thousands of children from their parents without any plan to reunite them
• Befriending the world’s most despicable dictators while alienating leaders of countries that have been allies for decades
• Turning his back on Puerto Rico regarding disaster recovery
• A tax plan that benefits only the rich while widening the gap between the wealthy and the rest of us
• Attack on the Affordable Care Act without caring that millions of Americans would become uninsured and would allow insurers to deny claims for pre-existing conditions including pregnancy
• Obsession to build a border wall that all who know about immigration problems say won’t solve anything
• Consistently blaming others for anything that goes wrong and always taking credit for anything that he perceives to be good
• After promising to bring drug prices down, he supported massive tax breaks for pharmaceutical companies which they used to buy back stock while continuing to increase prices
• Telling border officers to break the law, and he would pardon them
There are countless more examples, but I defer to the late-Joseph Welch who testified in the McCarthy hearings of 1954. If we could resurrect Mr. Welch today, I believe he would repeat the comment to our current president that he made to Sen. Joe McCarthy. “Until this moment, senator, I think I have never really gauged your cruelty or your recklessness. …Have you no sense of decency, sir?”
Trump is a reprehensible human being with no moral or ethical compass and absolutely no empathy. I respect traditional conservative beliefs. But surely Republicans can find someone better than him. To make a real contribution to America, the author might join in a search to find that better person. He won’t have to go far. He can just stop the first person he sees on the street and ask them if they would like to be president of the United States.
