Donald Trump, whose unbelievably well
attended campaign stops have morphed into his own brand of group therapy (How wonderful am I? C’mon, everyone, count
the ways!), is dangerously close to becoming the Republican presidential
nominee, handily losing the general election to Hilary Clinton and giving the
GOP a richly deserved, cosmic comeuppance.
And I say this at the risk of Trump
turning my neighborhood into a Scottish golf course.
Finally - Trump’s primary opponents, who have long
since known better (which still excludes a few), are tepidly
stepping up to the political plate and hitting back some carelessly pitched
soft balls Trump has let fly about Muslim
national registries and 9/11
fantasy celebrations.
Well, good for them.
But you still have to wonder where any
of these people were in 2012 when Trump decided (as a potential GOP
presidential candidate), it was in his best political interests to go after the
Muslim-in-Chief.
A validated Hawaiian birth
certificate? A verified certificate of
live birth? No credible evidence to
prove Obama was born in Kenya? “I’m prepared
to take the president at his word”, John Boehner magnanimously intoned, helping
to propagate a talking-point that would side-step the question, keep the right-wing
base delusionally happy, and enable fellow Republicans to commit a sin of
omission in order to maintain a perceived political advantage.
Let’s be clear, if there ever was a remote chance Obama is not a
U.S. citizen, and an illegal occupant of the White House, the Republican
congress would have relentlessly investigated, impeached and then double-dared
President Joe Biden to pardon the disgraced, ex-president in order to avoid
excessive jail time. And they would have
been right to do so.
That’s what so galling about Trump’s superficial
and self-serving exploitation of an explosive, constitutional crisis.
In fairness to Trump (and you have to
“treat” Trump “fairly” lest he run a third-party candidacy), he did not
originate birtherism or the birther
movement.
And yet, even though he thoroughly
discredited himself four years ago from being taken seriously as a presidential
candidate today- here he is again. This
time, however, instead of Obama who was more than his match, he’s putting his reckless and hateful hands around every
minority group that might enable his campaign
For Trump, brown is the new black.
In 2012, the GOP enabled Trump by not
calling him out on the bizarre, birther
nonsense. 2016 is their chance to make
amends and save their political hides.
Unless, of course, they prefer to
watch the next Democratic administration from outside that “great big, beautiful wall”.
