He's Not Funny, Folks

A comedian friend of mine used to say when evaluating a colleague, “I know funny, and he isn’t.” Is anyone really enjoying Donald Trump? If I hear one more person say, “Isn’t it great how he’s shaking things up?”… No, I’d better not say what I might do.

Let’s see, he’s given us Mexican rapists crossing the border, John McCain not being a war hero, and the cell phone number of a fellow Republican he disagrees with. If Mr. Rogers were here, he’d be channeling Rick Perry: “Can you say, ‘Commander-in-Chief’?”

That’s not just a snarky comment. Donald Trump is showing us what kind of battles he picks – and one of the biggest jobs a U.S. president has is picking battles. If the battles Trump has been picking represent what he thinks will win him the presidency, what kind will he pick if he were actually elected? (A concept which is, thankfully, very remote).

In the case of McCain, one could actually make a semantic argument over the use of the word “hero,” though anyone who spends years as a POW has to be given some credit for simply surviving. And, of course, Trump never had to serve one minute in the armed forces, so he doesn’t have the standing to even raise that issue.

This is about judgment. I actually wouldn’t have minded if McCain had become president himself – but he picked Sarah Palin as his running mate, or at least let others pick her for him. What did that say about his judgment? I didn’t think anyone could possibly make me miss Sarah Palin, but Mr. Trump has done it. The sexist pig in me says she is much nicer to look at.

In a perfect media world (that I controlled) I would cease on principle to give Donald Trump one more second of airtime, drop of ink, or digital keystroke. Don’t we have better things to do? Can’t somebody just make him go away?

As for Trump “shaking things up” in the GOP, is the party, or the nation, that bored? I live in California, but I don’t sit around longing for the next earthquake. They usually just cause damage. And Trump is just shaking the surface anyway. The Republican Party needs to be shaken to its foundation if it expects to survive this Trump, or future Trumps – or survive, period.