This Is Not Normal

In quick succession over the past two weeks we have been hit with Omarosa’s tell-all book, “Unhinged” followed by excerpts from Bob Woodward’s book “Fear,” and then the New York Time op-ed. All of these as well as Michael Wolf’s “Fire and Fury” paint a disturbing picture of what goes on in today’s White House. 

That, of course has unleashed volumes of denials, confirmations, accusations and presidential tweets.

The fact is, there is nothing in any of those writings that we haven’t heard or read or even suspected before, except for the admission that there are people who watch over our president and sometimes intervene before he does something disastrous. We knew that too. That doesn’t make it less frightening.

I am glad Gary Cohn was there to take that paper off the president’s desk that would have removed us from the trade agreement with South Korea or the one pertaining to the trade agreement with Mexico and Canada.  I am glad that one of the generals looks things over and stops the actions that will start World War III or nixes the plan to assassinate Hassad. I am glad that dozens of other things have been stopped. But terror is a cold splash in my face as I wonder what has not been derailed that we aren’t aware of, because I do not believe anyone is telling us the whole truth. We get surprises far too often for comfort.

I want to know which people thought it would be a good thing to separate children from parents seeking asylum in the US and deport the parents to “send a message” to other asylum seekers. This was not oversight or a failure to prepare as we originally thought. This was purposeful and cruel and creates a list of problems and questions. Why would they want to take in thousands of unaccompanied minors to become wards of the State, to be cared for at government expense,indefinitely, instead allowing the parents the opportunity to work and contribute to their support while their claims are reviewed? Who benefits from this?

I wonder if there is one cabal or multiple cabals that work concurrently. Might they eventually become competitive or even confrontational and turn into something far different?

This is not normal. This is not good. This is not right.

Even more chilling is the knowledge of the reason these people feel it is necessary to manipulate the president. “He has attention deficit,” someone says. He can’t stay focused on a report, a meeting, a problem or a discussion for more than a few minutes. He has the capabilities of a 5^th grader. He operates entirely on impulse and can forget within a day or two, what was important to him two days earlier. Or, I would assume, what might be important to the running of this country. He is incapable of making good decisions, based on history and facts.

This seems extremely dangerous to me. He has been given great power and he is without the tempering qualities we usually expect from other people. If he is an intellectual 5^th grader, he is an emotional toddler, completely lacking the social filters of empathy and integrity. Whether he is trying to deliver a message of sympathy or get around the rules and regulations in place to safeguard the ethics of his office, he blunders, without a hint of understanding. He uses the justice system, his presidential powers and even the military to exact retribution for real or imagined slights from others and to reward his supporters.

We already know that trump cannot tell the truth, maybe can’t even identify the truth. When he lies, whether it is by mistake, exaggeration, lack of research or on purpose, it becomes part of the job descriptions of the entire staff to double down on that misinformation or explain it away in the most unbelievable fashion. I know this, regardless of what his followers and his lackeys say, because I watch most of the press conferences and most of his speeches, in-spite-of how painful it is, so I will know if a reporter is taking a sentence out of context and creating an entirely incorrect narrative. They are not. They don’t have to. Spokesman Matt Schlap suggests the solution is simply to not fact check him on anything.  I disagree.

I know the travel ban that wasn’t a ban, that was enacted without a plan or preparation, was a ban on Muslims. I know this because he (Donald J. Trump) announced on national TV that he was going to stop all Muslims from entering this country until he could figure out what’s going on. You remember, that don’t you? So, it doesn’t really matter how many times he had the order written and rewritten to include countries with different cultures and religions. We heard what he intended to do, and he tried to do it. That is truth.

I know that he has selected his picks for Federal Judges and Justices because they favor overturning Roe vs Wade and because they support big business needs over the needs of the individual. We don’t have to ask the nominees because Trump has already told us. As an added balm to our irritation, they each tell us they are not planning to do either one. Why would they have to do this if the threat were not real?

I know how he feels about Hispanics, because he told us first thing what he thinks of them, not that he’s really all that sure exactly which nationalities are Hispanic.  We know he is racists, because we hear him make racist remarks or rude remarks to and about people with brown or black skin. He was sued for racial discrimination when he and his father would not rent an apartment to a black woman. He equates brown skinned people defending themselves from white people, with white people committing unprovoked violence on people with brown skin. It isn’t the same.

I know he has an unnatural need to please Vladimir Putin, because he cannot ever, under any circumstances, condemn Putin’s actions or words, even when they are contradicted by our own intelligence and the intelligence of our allies. I know because of the lilt in his voice when he makes those senseless statements.

I know he is a liar, because I listen to what he says. I listen to his correction or lack of one. I fact check the fact checkers. I do my research and I pay attention to what is happening each day and I know when he lies. 

I then watch the press conferences and hear the press secretary compound his lies.

Even when he puts his words in writing and tweets them out, the staff ends up having to try and disclaim them. That’s not what he said. We are spinning his words to mean something different.  He really meant to say … something else. Those too are lies. Those especially, are lies, because they are constructed out of the need to disguise the truth we all hear. They are designed to make us believe we don’t hear or see what we just heard and saw. This is gaslighting.

This is not normal.

He was not prepared for the demands of this office. He has surrounded himself with others who were/are equally unprepared and unknowing. He rejected most the experienced people and let them go. He does not understand the difference between running the government and running a corporation or a money laundering scam. His objective has never been to take care of the country. It has always been to benefit himself first and his family next and his current allies third.

I have great fear about how he handles crises. The fact that he refuses to even acknowledge the actual facts about an event and will not learn from his mistakes will not make us a better nation. It can be deadly. Will he declare war, invade a country based on what he hears on FOX/News? What will happen if Russia attacks us or one of our allies? Well we have seen what happened with the attacks on the election processes all over the world. Nothing of significance. How will he handle the storms on the East Coast? Will he declare an emergency only for the states that support him and his party? Will we have other Puerto Rico’s to work through?

I have not forgotten Steve Bannon announcing to the Republican Convention that the plan is to deconstruct the current Republican party and then the government. Are we going to just sit quietly and allow it to be done?

I consider us to be in a very dangerous place right now. We don’t have an effective leader and we aren’t sure who is guiding him or what their focus is. We cannot believe what the president says or the official word from the White House. We can’t trust that the best thing for the country is being done and we can’t feel that we are being protected from our enemies.

A lie is a lie. Reality is not what he tells us. Now that Manafort is talking to Mueller and trump has much to worry about, he is not tweeting. Does this mean he is being contained, some way? How? What if he slips away from whoever his keeper is today? 

This is not normal. This is not okay.