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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsThe President Is Trapped
Trump is utterly unsuited to deal with this crisis, either intellectually or temperamentally.March 25, 2020
Peter Wehner
Contributing writer at The Atlantic and senior fellow at EPPC
For his entire adult life, and for his entire presidency, Donald Trump has created his own alternate reality, complete with his own alternate set of facts. He has shown himself to be erratic, impulsive, narcissistic, vindictive, cruel, mendacious, and devoid of empathy. None of that is new.
But were now entering the most dangerous phase of the Trump presidency. The pain and hardship that the United States is only beginning to experience stem from a crisis that the president is utterly unsuited to deal with, either intellectually or temperamentally. When things were going relatively well, the nation could more easily absorb the costs of Trumps psychological and moral distortions and disfigurements. But those days are behind us. The coronavirus pandemic has created the conditions that can catalyze a destructive set of responses from an individual with Trumps characterological defects and disordered personality.
We are now in the early phase of a medical and economic tempest unmatched in most of our lifetimes. Theres too much information we dont have. We dont know the full severity of the pandemic, or whether a state like New York is a harbinger or an outlier. But we have enough information to know this virus is rapidly transmissible and lethal.
The qualities we most need in a president during this crisis are calmness, wisdom, and reassurance; a command of the facts and the ability to communicate them well; and the capacity to think about the medium and long term while carefully weighing competing options and conflicting needs. We need a leader who can persuade the public to act in ways that are difficult but necessary, who can focus like a laser beam on a problem for a sustained period of time, and who will listen toand, when necessary, defer toexperts who know far more than he does. We need a president who can draw the nation together rather than drive it apart, who excels at the intricate work of governing, and who works well with elected officials at every level. We need a chief executive whose judgment is not just sound, but exceptional.
There are some 325 million people in America, and its hard to think of more than a handful who are more lacking in these qualities than Donald Trump.
snip
https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2020/03/presidents-character-unequal-task/608743/
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The President Is Trapped (Original Post)
catbyte
Mar 2020
OP
Stuart G
(38,439 posts)1. Thank You for posting this..K and R
Mike 03
(16,616 posts)2. Kick and Bookmarked
to print out.
MustLoveBeagles
(11,629 posts)3. K&R
Thomas Hurt
(13,903 posts)4. The amoral prick is being propped up by the governors and experts...
when they aren't licking his shoes.
Talitha
(6,611 posts)5. We need a wise, calm Leader. What we have is an ignorant, vindictive little bitch.
GopherGal
(2,009 posts)6. I object to that characterization
on behalf of bitches everywhere (canine and otherwise).
But I'll let it slide, knowing how affronted he'd be by the allusion to the feminine, given the insecure, sexist, ignorant, vindictive little turd that he is.