An unhinged Trump and another four years?

The Democratic impeachment of Donald Trump was destined to fail in large measure due to partisan politics in the US Congress. This was a fore gone conclusion and if the Democrats hoped the impeachment process would dent the credibility of the incumbent US President there was little mileage in that effort. Trumps resonance to his base and the undecided voters is not based on what is goon in human nature but more on the unsaid in decades of US politics. If Gray Hart in 1988 had to bow out of politics for his alleged affairs with women, Donald Trump in 2016 could flick off any political fall out even when his own words showed his misogynist trait because character is no more an issue for the electorate.

Trump's impeachment proceedings clearly highlight probable cause for impeachment, but without more witnesses enough wiggle room was there for Trump and his party to squeeze out of the discomfort of some on the line Republican senators from joining the impeachment camp. The thing about Trump has been that while he has elevated politicians lying to art form, his decisive and at times racial bias have become more the norm than the exception. His die hard supporters rejoice at his remarks against the Mexicans, Muslims and African countries (amongst others) because this is something they would have wanted to say themselves without being called 'politically incorrect'.

On the Democratic party side the impeachment proceedings were too rushed, leaving one to question why more witnesses were not brought before the House Committees; even though some subpoenas to Trump officials were ignored. On the broader political forum there is no denying the Democratic party has continued to be in disarray and the Iowa caucus fiasco only highlights their problems. Senior leadership of the party is lacking, and in general none of the current flock of Presidential hopefuls make one step back and say 'Wow'. The Obama legacy of a strong unified party has been left of the wayside, thanks in part of the Hilary Clinton era of an election run against Trump which lacked planning and intent.

What all this might mean is that a Trump re-election, as unpalatable as that may sound, his win in the 2020 election will not be because of him being the better candidate but because the Democrats are just not organized enough to have a charismatic leader to take on Trump. Much like boxing promoters one can only wish for a Trump versus Obama election fight but sadly that is not to be; even though I do believe Obama would have trounced Trump within the ten rounds. In a sense Michelle Obama against Donald Trump stands a better chance of winning than any of the current aspirants in the Democratic stable. This is not because the current coterie of Democratic candidates are not qualified enough, it just that they are not unqualified enough as Trump to tackle him on his terms; a dirty campaign!

Unless Trump does something more off the wall than he has done so far, and that is not impossible, the chances are that a Trump re-election, albeit with a smaller margin than 2016, is more than likely. A reinvigorated Trump with scale higher in his arrogance, and certainly we have a larger dose of his un Presidential style through the next four years. The impact of the trade wars he started may well come home to roost in his next term and any slow down will hurt the average American more than ever before. Will there be further attempts to impeach him? Highly doubtful unless the Republicans also lose control of the Senate, which is possible. Some Trump supporters may hope that a second term may bring out the better Trump and negate some of the damage he has done to the prestige of the office he occupies. This would only be necessary for the greater good of the Republican party because when it comes to congressional elections and local council politics the Democratic party has managed a better showing; they only seem to fail at the level of the national leadership.

Sadly for the impartial observer the next four years of an unhinged President Trump will be hard to follow. Frequent changes in his team, scandals and the general lack of an ethical bent to the administration will remain the order of the day. On the good side of things it will mean the end of the era of Trump, an era where crudeness, lack of honor and a slide into unhinged tweeting were the hallmarks of the Presidency.




 

Trump: Why is he weak with the Russians?

For the ardent students of history, especially in my age bracket, we have seen since the Cold War meetings between former Soviet and now Russian leaders with regular frequency. From the  spirit of detente to establishing a new World Order, the mood of these meetings ranged from the icy cold to the cordial and warm; yet the language of the dialogue and the public exposition of the content of the meetings was carefully picked. Each word, each gesture was carefully put in place to ensure that each side, especially the US was asserting its position.

President Donald Trump always has asserted that he has been more 'hard' on Russia than any of the recent Presidents before him. Talking the talk has been easy for this President, but when it came to walking the talk this week in Helsinki, President Trump not only stumbled but fell flat on his face at the feet of a gloating President Putin. One must assume that the diplomats and national security staff around this President would have briefed him in detail. Then we have to remember President Trump fancies himself as the most intelligent human on the planet and without a sense of history he failed miserably.

One has to then wonder why a President who has been tough on his allies, ripped up agreements, ridiculed opponents and anyone who has had the gall to criticize him suddenly is played by the Russians in plain view of millions of viewers. If he had come back from Helsinki after a bout of being tongue tied one could have asked why he didn't say this or that. On the contrary in one sweeping stroke he said he speaks for Russia, implied he believed in the Russian President more than his own intelligence experts and asked about the DNC servers, almost forgetting that he was in Helsinki and not on some right wing Trumpette political rally. So what is it that makes Trumps knees go shaky and his temperament become so submissive when it comes to a man called Putin?

Speculation is that the Russians have some smut on the man who sits in the Oval office from his raunchy (alleged) nights when he was in Moscow years ago. Personally I think this is not something that would bother Trump enough to sell out his country over; after all his loyal supporters, including the evangelists, forgave him for grabbing women by their........So what is the Russian Achilles heel that prompts this out of character submissiveness.

Here is my theory, and I insist it is a theory but it merits a thought.

Perhaps prior to 2015 Trump had borrowed money from Russian banks and oligarchs to build his golf course in Scotland. This could well be around $400 million. We know that a Chinese bank leant Trump companies $500m related to an Indonesian project. So it is likely that with US banks unwilling to lend to him given his past defaults, he often did turn to foreign banks. It is possible that before he announced his bid for the Presidency he could have transferred these loans to either his sons names or his daughter's in laws companies. However it is possible that the underlying assets did not change hands and the loans were simply taken over. 

Now imagine that these loans are in default or chronic delays in payments! Given that Trump never disclosed his tax returns for this period because doing so would show the changes on the liability side of the balance sheet. This puts the Trump Presidency at huge risk because it violates election laws and thus keeping all this silent is what the Russians have on him. 

To me the leverage on Trump has to be more than sex, and this can only be a money connection hence my theory.

Trump: Visited again.

My friends joke that I seem to have a vendetta against a certain Donald J Trump, even though I admit I am at times infuriated by his words, and actions and the persona of the man who has debased the office of the President of United States and conned millions of people into believing he is the real deal. Yes he has done a few good things, the initiative with North Korea (still a long way to go) and reduced taxes but most of all the only good he has done is made us realize how gullible we can all be.

D J Trump, the ultimate opportunist, was clever to notice the cracks in American society and in the American mind set and no matter how ugly the consequences of prying open that crack he felt it was the one ace he could play that might just work. This crack revealed the fears of the disfranchised Americans, the blue collar,mostly white workers, the ultra conservatives who in their hearts never liked the 'others', the many who privately felt their jobs had been stolen by not only the immigrants, both legal and illegal, but also the worker in China, Indonesia or where ever he may be. Opening this crack wider would be flirting with the likes of the KKK and their many cousins, calling a ban on 'all Muslims' from entering the United States of America, and even picking an ugly fight with a gold star parent.

Politicians bend the truth rather habitually, Mr Trump, as candidate Trump, went one step further, he habitually told lies, even privately gloated about how he told a lie to the Canadian Prime Minister. Till last count he had crossed 2,149 misleading statements, and he is by no stretch of the imagination finished this ploy. He talked of a wall that Mexico would pay for, and then when that was not going to happen he brought the immigration issue including the DACA regulations to the forefront and deflected from his promise of Mexico paying by suddenly asking Congress to approve the cost.

The Democrats, led by Hilary Clinton and her clan, played into the game, running a reactive campaign, over confident that Trumps gaffs, including his boast of grabbing women by their private parts would sink him. So much so Hilary and Co lost sight of the fact that their vote bank of blue collared workers was slipping away and she did not even bother to go and bolster support amongst the very people who normally would have voted Democrat, but Trump somehow spoke to their fears better than she ever could. Tinged with over confidence Hilary Clinton faded, even though one may argue that the email scandal so near the election eroded her vote bank even more drastically in the key states. While the popular vote remained in her camp she just did not have a strategy for the electoral college.

I assumed after the election Donald J Trump would somehow become Presidential in his demeanor, somehow the Oval Office does that, we saw that with Bush Jr, and others before. The resonance of the oath taking ceremony had not yet left our ears and the first of the many lies came from the White House over the size of the crowd at the inauguration ceremony. This time it was not President Trump but his press secretary lying for him. But the undertone was even more sinister, it was like President Trump and his cronies want the world to somehow accept that he is more popular, more smarter and better loved than his predecessor, Barrack Obama. In the months that followed everything that President Obama did had to be unscrambled and attacked. It was almost like some White Supremacist had drawn up a list of things that need to be attacked that were done by the first black President of the United States.

On a global level President Trump has embarked on an even more bizarre journey. Hugging the adversaries of the US, ridiculing its allies, and in the midst of it all launching a trade war which no one, not even the mighty United States can win on its own. The Russian President Putin could not have asked for a more likable ally in the world than Donald J Trump; after all he is dismantling or at least undermining NATO, imposing tariffs on the best trading partners of the US, and in a sinister sense working to Kremlin's agenda and perhaps the slogan of Making America Great Again is working to Making Kremlin Great Again.


I then stop to think of this is a more societal context. Perhaps Donald J Trump is right that the soul of America does not want immigrants, that the average American does not want a Muslim living in his neighborhood, that the US farmer wants America Great Again even if he has to burn his crops because the trade war means he cannot sell his grain to China! Perhaps in the past two decades the average American I met in my many visits to that lovely land has changed from the curious, warm hearted welcoming American, to a NRA sticker branding white supremacist who this time around would not welcome me for the BBQ in his back yard. Perhaps the US is going to become isolationist leaving the world for the Chinese and Russians to carve up between them, and withdraw itself into closed borders (as opposed to controlled borders), nagging problems with neighbors and torn up alliances and abandoned allies.

The impact of this is far reaching as social media exaggerates the platform of debate. Indeed people do not discuss issues they argue them now and even blatantly fight over them, throwing in the good measure of fake news to skew the battle lines in their favor. Political tolerance has been washed aside to the extent that even social tolerance is now not visible on the edges of this divided society. Discussion even with facts does not work because of perception of facts have been bent out of shape on both sides of the divide. One has to now define our friendships with those of differing political views with the adage 'lets remain friends but not discuss politics!'

Whether Trump caused this societal paradigm shift or merely saw it as a useful tool to exploit is debatable. The fact he fueled the fires of hate was enough and when he had that one historical moment to change the tempo and tenor of his message to one of tolerance he let it go after his inauguration.  Instead he embraced the division, fed the fire with more lies and hate, creating a sense of the victim remedying the flaws of many Presidencies before him. The appeal of the evangelists who see him as some Christian savior resonated in his sense of self importance and perhaps he truly sees himself in the only possible way he can; as the greatest of all times!

If this is a societal shift then the politics of hate and division that President Trump started as an election ploy have now seeped into the grain of the US national psyche; something that cannot be washed away with soap and water. Yes poison does leave the body of the victim, before it kills him, but this will not go away on its own. His base, as he calls it, will forgive him for his fornication, for his hatred, for his lies and hell even if he steals, but then is his base larger than the values that have always held the United States of America as the land to which the hopeful aspire for freedom and liberty?

Why Trump Offends me?

Donald Trump has, through the politics of fear and division, become the sole Republican candidate for the US Presidential race; however he represents all that I find offensive. Offensive may sound a rather harsh word to describe a man who may, if such a tragedy were to happen, become the US President, but realistically there is nothing 'presidential' about the man. His views on women, hispanic people, and muslims all reek of a hateful venom that is not befitting of the stature of the Oval office.

However, this is a personal view and hence from the perspective of a Muslim his broad brush scathing characterisation of Muslims is not just xenophobic but down right ignorant. While I was born a Muslim, over the past five odd years I embarked on a more deeper journey to understand my religion and to study and even question some of the views about Muslims and some of the views of the radical stream of Muslims. It is very evident to me that the problem is not with Islam but with some of its followers, who have a twisted view of message. This is not different from the fact that many religions have die hard radicals, be it Christianity or even Buddhism (reference the radical attacks by Buddhists in Burma), the actions of such group do not make all Christians or Buddhists or for that matter any religion terrorists and undesirables.

While Mr Trump was a day ago back pedalling on his comment that he would not allow 'any' muslims into the US to now say it is only a 'suggestion', the hard reality is that he has already shown his true colours. This is not political rethinking, this is blatant lying. Sadly the electorate that he appeals to is ignorant of the Islam and for that matter most things outside the US, and a message of hate and fear resonates well with them. I am sure that if Donald Trump was asked if he has even read one book on Islam, (other than the xenophobic anti Islam books) or had an intelligent discussion with an Islamic scholar the answer would surely be in the negative.

In Great Britain, in contrasting style, the city of London elected Sadiq Khan as the first Muslim Mayor. While me may all focus on the fact that he is a Muslim, Sadiq Khan is actually many things; a British citizen, born of Pakistani immigrant, a European modern thinking Muslim, a father, a lawyer and a politician and a Londoner. In this interdependent world we all have many sub identities which put together the person we are, and the reality is that I can be modern thinking Muslim who believes in the social fabric of union rather than division. What Trump needs is a serious sit down with Mr Sadiq Khan and be open minded enough to learn a think or two about tolerance.

I have been to the United States many times, and yes at times, after 9/11, had to wait two or three hours to be cleared to enter the country, but without reservation every American I have met has been open and accommodating and tolerant. From New York to Dallas, from California to Denver, from Chicago to Florida not once has anyone been put off by my religion, ethnicity or country of origin, if anything people have been pleasantly curious. Trump is changing this by appealing the a minority of ignorant people who are fearful of anything foreign to them and feeding this fear is what is offensive.

The hope I hold is that the average American is decent, welcoming and friendly and shuns the politics of hate and division and perhaps deep down realises each one of them is a descendant of an immigrant, (barring the Native Americans), and in the Presidential election these people will speak up through their vote. This is a time for unity of acceptance and tolerance, this is a time for understanding and embracing the differences, it is a time for healing and growing stronger in the community of nations. The message of Mr Trump is the anti-thesis of everything that is hailed as good and decent in society, and in this basic stance I find him offensive, and no amount of somersaults and change of position will not change the fact that the basic nature of this man is petty, hateful and rude.