Donald Trump is self destructing right in front of our eyes
After having it pointed out to him that he keeps confusing Barack Obama with Joe Biden during his speeches, Donald Trump has undertaken some not-so-subtle damage control. In a move reminiscent of an Elon Musk apologist, Trump has been insisting that there was no confusion in the first place because, according to Trump, Obama is secretly in charge of Joe Biden, that Obama is running the government because Joe Biden is too old. So that’s what he meant all along, you see?
Ah, so it wasn’t a faux pas after all, it was a cunning plan! How on earth are we expected to keep up with the dizzying machinations of these masters of 3-dimensional chess?
But that’s not the funniest part. The funniest part is, while trying to fix one minor problem with an obvious lie, Trump created a much larger problem. As long as he was talking about Obama, as long as he was in the neighbourhood so to speak, Trump decided to mention that he will “never give up” trying to repeal the Affordable Care Act, better known as Obamacare.
Needless to say, that is another way this inept fool keeps sticking his foot in his stupid mouth. Trump has a talent for turning off on-the-fence independent voters with his extremist rhetoric. Millions of Americans are supported by Obamacare and they do not want to lose it.
What’s more, Trump has a baffling but tiny and persistent support from people of color, the vast majority of whom are in favor of the Affordable Care Act. Trump hasn’t only stuck his foot in his mouth, he has shot himself clean through that foot with an unforced error that he could have easily avoided by never mentioning Obamacare again.
But Trump is stupid, so of course he mentioned Obamacare. In doing so Trump has probably lost what little support he had among many in that small number of people of colour.
Why does Trump hate Obama (whom he once referred to as “Obamna”) so relentlessly? Because former President Obama is a man of colour who graduated from Columbia University with a 3.7 GPA, then he was accepted into Harvard Law where he was president of Law Review and graduated magna cum laude. Obama did it by himself, not with a rich father’s legacy, but on pure merit.
Also, President Obama embarrassed Trump at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner where he produced his birth certificate, in a stroke disproving Trump’s racist “birther” conspiracy theory. In other words, Trump is deeply jealous of Obama, he was bested by Obama and he hates him because Trump is a racist and Obama is a man of colour.
Of course, these are all side issues and table scraps. The larger points are ultimately more important. Those points are that Trump is a traitor, a rapist, a white supremacist and a career criminal. We can be amused by his occasional gaffes and his petty and inept jealousies, but we must not let them distract us from the fact that Trump is a criminal and a menace to democracy.
The good news is that Trump has once again harmed his chances for 2024. His chances were poor anyway, but I understand if you’re worried. It’s natural to worry when so much is at stake. For instance, we know intellectually that airliners are safer than cars, but that doesn’t stop us from getting the jitters when we board a commercial flight.
So let this be of comfort. Donald Trump is self-destructing right before our very eyes, and we get to savour and enjoy it in real-time. Next will come his criminal trials, and we can watch him get further destroyed by the overwhelming evidence of his guilt. And, as ever, ladies and gentlemen, brothers and sisters, comrades and friends, stay safe.
Robert Harrington is an American expat living in Britain. He is a portrait painter.