Is Donald Trump Real?

Many Trump supporters are no doubt bemused at reports that, as evidenced by opinion polls across the globe, the USA’s standing in the eyes of the world has fallen sharply under a Trump Presidency.  They will be further perplexed by the mixed receptions for the President delivered in countries usually friendly to the USA, and promised in those he is yet to visit.

And, they will ask, was the President deliberately snubbed by the wife of the Polish president?  And why was he isolated by other world leaders at the G20 summit in Hamburg?

They do not perhaps understand that these responses to Donald Trump reflect the widely held view that he is not even a halfway decent President – and, rather more importantly, the even more widely held view that he is even less a halfway decent human being.

It is no exaggeration to say that America’s friends around the world are aghast at the fact that American voters apparently believe that such a person is fit to govern and represent them, let alone to lead the “free world”.

Such views have been cumulatively confirmed as we learn more – from the President’s own actions and more particularly words (courtesy of Twitter) – as to exactly what kind of person he is.

It was hoped that the Donald Trump we saw on the campaign trail was a fabrication designed to capture headlines and attention, but one that would be put to one side in the unlikely (so it seemed) event that he would take up the reins of office.

Sadly, the man we saw during the campaign, having installed himself in the White House, has revealed himself to be the real Donald Trump, so far as there is one.

We now know beyond peradventure that the man who is President has the mind of an overgrown and spoilt schoolboy – a self-obsessed schoolyard bully, a bigot, a braggart, vindictive, ignorant, living in a comic-strip world, and with a prurient interest in, but limited understanding of, the opposite sex.

The juvenile behaviour, the “yah boo sucks” language, the trivial vendettas – most importantly, the inability to grasp what his role really entails, and the limitations which the constitution imposes on his powers – are all signs of arrested development, wrapped up in what passes for, just about, the body of an overweight male adult.

These flaws make it difficult to take him seriously.  He was probably wise not to echo JFK’s famous salute to the people of Berlin – “Ich bin ein Berliner” – when he, Trump, arrived in Hamburg.

But the problem is that American voters have entrusted him with serious powers – powers to decide between war and peace, powers to risk the future of the planet in respect of climate change, powers to deny 23 million Americans a semblance of effective health care for the sake of putting in place hundreds of billions of tax cuts for his rich friends.

And he is intent on further using those powers to divide races and religions against other, to portray his opponents as enemies, to promote – using his powers as President – his family’s and his own business interests, and to issue threats to a free press and an independent judiciary.

With each new self-inflicted wound, each new glimpse into a Presidential mind like a sewer, there is a sense of revulsion and disbelief.  America’s friends are unfamiliar with the intricacies of the American constitution, but they are increasingly desperate that “something should be done”.

If the President’s state of mind gives cause for concern, as it does – if he often seems lost and confused – what remedies are available?  If he loses touch with reality – and seems often to be acting out the role of an imagined Donald Trump as though it was just a televisual image in a fantasy world – what can be done to restore a sense of reality before irreparable damage is done?

The leaders of the Republican party bear a heavy responsibility.  Republican votes will be needed if effective action is to be taken.  They alone have the power to deliver those votes.  The question is – what takes priority, the interests of the party or the country – or, for that matter, the world?

Bryan Gould

7 July 2017