What Now?
Bum-Rappery
I’d be willing to bet that, besides the ample negative press our heaven-help-us president considers “ fake media,” he suffers daily from the supposed bum raps that land heavily on his equally ample ego. Tough stuff, for which it may by now be obvious, I have no sympathy.
Perhaps the only good news as – in mid-August – I write this, is that his Republican colleagues are bailing … they may be creepy-crawling away, but at least some are … fleeing. It’s taken too long, and too many stark experiences for them to act; they’re fast running out of time to hope – pray? – that he will “rise” to the position.
Their fear of Trump may surely be warranted! Once, in the days of “The Apprentice,” Ivanka Trump tut-tutted a contestant for holding grudges. But dad cut her off: “Who doesn’t bear grudges? I do! Nobody takes things more personally than me. I hate them – (his antagonists) for the rest of my life. It’s probably wrong – but I hate them! I hate ‘em! I never recover from it.”
That’s clear.
Besides the obvious peril we’re in, we’re in danger of losing any sense of humor. Even Gail Collins, whose wry and humorous take on our American life has amused us for decades, can’t come up with a light-hearted take on Trump. “In less than one week,” she writes of the Charlottesville tragedy, “he’s managed to put on one of the most divisive, un-helpful, un-healing presidential performances in American history.”
(Instead of raving about Trump, I had every intention of engaging my nearly lost sense of humor, to tell you how my sister’s last visit with us went – during a time when my techno-genius husband wasn’t ‘round to … umm…take care of things…things that he oversees, versus, say, me. Those of you who share with we sibs certain techno-moronic anti-attributes will sympathize; when she went back home, she left her list of the “technical challenges,” she experienced in our condo: “the washer, dryer, toaster, coffee maker, computer, CD player, the television set and the microwave.”
Have you noticed that no appliance in contemporary life says “off,” or “on,” “hot” or “cold,” anymore? I’d say we were showing our age, but our neighbor Harry, down the hall, beat a daily path to our door to rescue us – and he’s older.
I really, really hope this resonates….Gulp.)
Never mind our other highly amusing anecdotes of the month. One of these days, we’ll regain our sense of humor.
Ross Douthat, in the N. Y Times, nearly out-did fellow columnist Charles Blow in his fuming piece about the president’s campaign against Jeff Sessions (who, amazingly, survives at the helm, to date!): “… it’s basically madness all the way..: bad policy, bad strategy, bad politics, bad legal maneuvering, bad optics, a self-defeating venture carried out via deranged-as-usual tweets and insults. “
And he concludes, “This president should not be the president, and the sooner he is not, the better.”
Not, indeed, a bum rap.
Category: National News
