Damning Donald Trump with faint praise
I think every so often we should take a step back and try to view the Trump presidency from the lens of pre post-truth America. Admittedly, when I did that, I found that Trump’s presidency looked even worse than I think many of us perceive it now. In particular, it’s easy now to overlook comparatively minor Trump misdeeds that would have led to serious investigations in administrations past. Not long after doing this, a friend of mine brought up a very good point, another I think many of us don’t quite give due attention or adequate perspective — what has Trump actually accomplished? The answer should tell us a lot about what a second Trump presidency would look like.
My quest to find good things Trump has accomplished ended rather quickly. I was able to find a few things: (1) USMCA led to better labor standards in Mexico, (2) Trump signed an executive order banning bump stocks (which effectively turn semi-automatic guns into automatic guns, (3) the First Step Act expanded earned-time credits for prisoners and gave prisoners more opportunity to transition into society via halfway homes and similar initiatives, (4) NATO allies have increased defense spending (which is a good thing depending on your priorities and weariness of Russia), and (5) gave the okay to have Daesh leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi killed. While, arguably, there is a little more than this, there really isn’t much. Additionally, you have to wonder how much of these five things I’ve listed actually were Trump’s ideas. I’m guessing none were.
By contrast, Trump has a veritable mountain of misdeeds that, in my view, so greatly dwarf any of his accomplishments that it clearly shows he’s the worst American President in history who didn’t commit genocide, labeled “Lest We Forget the Horrors: A Catalog of Trump’s Worst Cruelties, Collusions, Corruptions, and Crimes,” with number 43 being at the time of his inauguration. At the time of publication, this list is 796 atrocities long, and that doesn’t even include July 2020.
I encourage you to read through some of these atrocities and share them. People cannot forget, cannot let this feel normal, cannot justify, and cannot be complacent. If Trump were elected again, I bet that this list would more than double because he would feel more emboldened, unchecked, and powerful than ever. A second term would not be the same kind of bad—it would be worse.
So, what has Trump accomplished since being elected? The answer is clear: net positives for his and his family’s bank accounts, his rich buddies’ bank accounts, white supremacy, fascism, and foreign adversaries.
Democracy thrives in snarkiness