Trump degrades the office of the president

By Dorothy Inman-Johnson
Special to the Outlook

It is crazy that First Lady Melania Trump is kicking off a campaign against cyber-bullying when her husband, the President, is the biggest cyber bully in the country. She might want to start her campaign at home, and see how that works out before tackling the whole country. His most recent attack on Mika, “Morning Joe”, is a prime example of the work needed with her own husband before she tries to cure the problem in America.

 
Here’s Trump’s June 29 tweet.
“I heard poorly rated @Morning_Joe speaks badly about me (don’t watch anymore). Then how come low IQ crazy Mika, along with psycho Joe, came to Mar-a-Lago 3 nights in a row around New Year’s Eve, and insisted on joining me. She was bleeding badly from a facelift. I said no!”
As corrected by Joe and Mika, they visited Trump as invited guests; and there was no facelift or blood. He made these vicious and false statements about Mika in a childish temper tantrum because his behavior as President was being criticized on the Morning Joe Show.

 
Never in the history of our country has there been a President who exhibits more infantile, thuggish, unhinged behavior as Donald Trump. The man is obviously up all night monitoring political and late night comedy shows to determine targets for his tweet attacks. It begs the question; shouldn’t the President of the United States have much more important things to do than to send nasty tweets to people who criticize him? Yet, Melania defended his behavior with a statement through her spokesperson, “As the First Lady has stated publicly in the past, when her husband gets attacked, he will punch back 10 times harder”. Her comment made it clear she approves of her husband’s irresponsible, vulgar behavior toward women as she claims to be a champion against bullying.

 
He is preoccupied with abusive words and actions particularly directed toward women; and no one should find this behavior acceptable from the President of the United States. He called Rosie O’Donnell a slob, fat, and ugly; bragged about lewd acts and assaults against women, called Clinton disgusting for taking a toilet break during a pause in a debate, criticized another woman for having to leave a meeting to breast feed her baby; and talked publicly about Megyn Kelly’s menstrual cycle after becoming angry with her as a debate moderator.

 
His media spokesperson, Sarah Huckabee Sanders, stated “He’s not going to sit back and be attacked by liberal media, Hollywood elites, and when they hit him he’s going to hit back. Look, the American people elected a fighter. They knew what they were getting when they voted for Donald Trump”. The most interesting thing about Sarah’s comments is the fact that neither Trump nor his staff realize that his voters wanted someone who would fight for them, not an egomaniac that can’t stop thinking about himself long enough to work for the good of the country.

 
There has never been a President who was not criticized daily. Thankfully, however, past Presidents showed the class and dignity called for by the Office of President of the United States. Trump clearly does not demonstrate those required characteristics. He chooses to act on his basest instincts instead of recognizing that our country is judged by the world based on his behavior as our President. Richard Nixon, Ronald Reagan, Jimmy Carter, Bill Clinton, George Bush, and Barack Obama were viciously attack both politically and personally. Yet, they remained focused on the serious job they were elected to do, with no time or interest in making low-brow attacks on their critics. Trump was one of Obama’s biggest critics_ claiming his citizenship was in question, and even that he did not earn his Harvard law degree as a result of his intelligence and hard work. He constantly attacked President Obama on a very personal level; and since Trump’s election, he has been absolutely obsessed with erasing Obama’s legacy.  Could it be jealousy? Yet, Obama never stooped to Trump’s level. Obama and Michelle always made us proud by “going high when others go low”, and representing our country with class, intelligence, grace, and dignity.

 
Trump has made the United States, previously the leader of the free world, an embarrassment to Americans and our international allies. It will likely take many years after Trump leaves office to repair the damage he has done and regain our standing in the world.

 
The current President has not figured out that in Trump Tower as a private citizen, he represented himself, his family, and his business interests; but in the White House, he is President and represents America.  And America deserves much better.

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