In the
rhetoric of Donald Trump, mendacity and cynicism compete for equal time. It is
hard to say which prevailed today as the Republican Party standard-bearer, a
man who pretends to the most powerful political office in the land, tweeted
this at his followers: “Appreciate the congrats for being right on radical
Islamic terrorism.”
This came in
the wake of the most horrific mass shooting in the history of the United
States—a slaughter of fifty men and women in an L.G.B.T. night club called
Pulse, in Orlando, early Sunday morning. Trump allowed that he didn’t want
“congrats” so much as he wanted “toughness & vigilance.” Just as
profoundly, he announced, “We must be smart!”
Trump also
told his followers—and hence the world—that President Obama should “immediately
resign in disgrace” for failing to “mention the words radical Islam” in his
remarks on the shooting. And, he suggested, Hillary Clinton might want to get
out of the Presidential race for making the same sin of omission in her
statement.
With every
month, it has become clearer that Trump is a makeshift politician, whose rancid
wit resides in his willingness to say whatever it takes to arouse the fears of
a political base. He might have started his campaign with the idea of winning
some votes and publicity, increasing his profile as a marketing whiz, and then
dropping out. Good for business! But now that he has stunned the political
world—and, likely, himself—he has shown little inclination (or, perhaps,
capacity) to grow into his role, to modify his language, be it for the sake of
the Republican establishment or of simple decency. He’ll have none of that.
Whatever inflates his sense of self and prods the anxieties of the
country—that’s what works for him.
From the New Yorker, read it HERE
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