Monday, August 22, 2016

Pivot on This, Donnie!

Wow! Keep pivoting on this and soon you'll rotate on it, Baby! 
(Seems just a bit angry, y'think ... I guess that's so) 



It is not the most surprising piece of the puzzle that is this US election cycle ... I refer to Trump's repeated  acts of nasty speech, his rhetorical "I'm not but others are saying" and the frequent stories that turn out to remain unverified. What is most surprising for me is this idea of the Country waiting for him to grow up ... to act "presidential" .... to pivot. In previous postings, I referenced Charlie Manson as one who was not expected, as we all seem to be saying, to pivot.

I have long been disturbed by both politicians and pundits who treat the governance of nation (one of three enterprises that Freud labeled as impossible professions) as a game. Fancy footwork, a little hocus -pocus mumbo jumbo and what I've come to call in these pages 'journalistic neutrality' and nobody accuses you of playing favorites and the country stops expecting truth. I remember at a cocktail party a doctor telling me that he had to leave his lawyer wife. "Nothing with her has to do with truth or decency ... only with what's provable in a court of law."

What is so patently clear is that Herr Drumpf has shown himself to be lacking ... I don't know that he's a racist or a bigot ... I'd almost prefer that level of honesty. No. I see nothing but a late middle-aged man (like me!) who has failed to demonstrate to me the existence of any reservoir of interest in much more than self-aggrandizement. Nothing appears to matter beyond the recognition by his audience that he is a great man ... the greatest man! Whenever, whoever or whatever shows a chink in that thin armour? That moment, that person, that reality must be sufficiently depreciated so as to restore that grandiosity. A clown with many masks and no one in the costume. It's not that the Emperor has no clothes but rather that the Emperor is no more than his costume. Sad!


I keep coming back in my mind to a comment made by Henry Curtis Patey, a founder of residential treatment and founder of a school for very bright and very disturbed kids at which my wife and I worked 40+ years ago. I asked him about the line he used in firing staff who lived on-campus with the residents when he would call them and say:

"Do you want to meet your replacement or don't you care. 
Please move out within 24 hours."

Sounded almost Trumpy, aye. Henry, who was in his mid-late 80's, explained:

"I can teach a person techniques. 
I cannot teach a person the difference between right and wrong.
When I see a staff member doing something that destructive ... 
I know they're not changing any time, soon.
They gotta go ... and now."

The fantasy that a foul-mouthed school-yard bully who has led many people and Atlantic City, for that matter, into economic ruin will pivot en pointe into Albert Schweitzer,  the Kaiser Franz-Joseph and Mahatma Ghandi is arguably crazy:

... CRAZY ... M'SCHUGGA ... BANANAS ... CRACKERS ... & ... BATS.

What would a pivot look like? Let's see ...

Drumpf would have to pivot and stop lying about:

  1. Who wrote "The Art of the Deal"?
  2. Whether he had any evidence at all that Obama was born elsewhere than Hawaii?
  3. Whether he saw Muslims dancing in Jersey?
  4. Whether he saw money offloaded from planes in Iran?
  5. Whether a lawyer told him not to share his tax returns?... and for each ... was he lying when he asserted these things.

Little Donnie would have pivot to:

  1. Stop offending people of Mexican descent, including judges (100 million+ people).
  2. Stop offending Muslims (25% of the Population).
  3. Stop offending women (50% of population).
  4. Stop offending soldiers (like McCane).
  5. Stop offending people who did him no harm (like Mrs. Khan).
  6. Stop trash-talking anyone who disagrees with him (93%* of the World). 

Donald would need to pivot, as well, away from:

  1. Being a jerk!


Hey ... if DJT pivoted this much, his motions would develop that tornadic rotation of a petard upon which no one (though some people have said "someone") should be hoisted.


Ride it, Boy!
&
Ride that Wall, Drumpf!





* 93% ... I just made that up but it is election season, jah?


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