Why Trump Has to Go

Unsurprisingly Trump was not removed from office after being impeached, but let us not be fooled into thinking that he was proved not guilty of what he was accused of. There was never any dispute over the basic facts of the allegations. What was in dispute was what the intent was, and whether the actions should have been grounds for impeachment. There was no way that Trump and his defenders could deny that Trump has asked Zelensky to “do us a favor though”, or that he had asked him to investigate the Democratic challenger who was polling highest at the time, that he had previously shown no interest in corruption in Ukraine, or that his personal lawyer was conducting a shadow foreign policy that was in the best interest of Trump’s personal interests, not the United States’ national interests or that every State Department official connected to Ukraine was aware that this was going on. All they could do was rationalize that Trump, as president, had every right, even a duty to do what he did. One of his lawyers even suggested that since all politicians believe that their re-election is in the national interest, a politician taking action that helps his re-election prospects is therefore acting in the national interest. No, the impeachment process was never going to remove a dangerous autocrat from power, but hopefully it shined a light on how far along the path to dictatorship we have come. But Trump still needs to go; we need to abandon the notion that we should impeach him again and concentrate on the election.

Why does Trump need to go?

Firstly, and most obviously, he is corrupt. His indiscriminate use of the word to describe anyone who dares stand up to him has watered down the meaning of “corrupt”, but Trump is corrupt for the simple reason that he continues to use the office of the presidency for his own personal benefit. The corruption is of two varieties. One is the use of the office to extend his own power. He has stated more than once that the Constitution gives him free rein to do anything. Shortly after Mueller concluded that he could not prove conspiracy or coordination of the Trump campaign with foreign election interference, Trump, presumably emboldened, actively solicited foreign election interference. He has installed an Attorney General who functions more like Trump’s personal lawyer than the head of the nation’s law enforcement agencies, who acts regularly to shield Trump from any further investigations. Trump has ignored the express will of Congress and bypassed them by diverting funds appropriated to the military to build his applause-line wall. He views Congress as a rubber-stamping body that exists only to put his will into legislation. The second type of corruption is financial. Unlike other presidents, he has retained ownership in a complex web of companies that he favors with government money. Foreign governments and domestic supplicants book his hotels; he spends virtually every weekend at one of his properties, with the property charging the government for the stay, including $650 per night room rates for the Secret Service.

Secondly, he is ignorant and incompetent. Not only did he come to the presidency without any relevant experience, but he is famously resistant to learning what he needs to know in order to do his job. Some of his supporters see his outsider status as a virtue. I can understand the appeal of that argument. Americans are often frustrated with our government, and we often elect people we see as outsiders to shake up the status quo. Nonetheless, once installed as the head of the government, any president has to learn how the government works. You have to understand that as president, you don’t make the laws, Congress does that. You have to understand how the economy works, or at least appoint people who do to advise you. You have to understand the limits of your power and authority. You have to understand the consequences of any actions that you might take. Trump understands none of this and is unwilling to learn. This goes beyond unorthodox policies or changing our priorities. This is a matter of unprecedented ignorance. 

Trump is extremely paranoid. Part of this relates to the previous point about his ignorance. No president can know everything. There are so many details, so much information, that it is easy to get overwhelmed. This is why a president has advisors. This is why a president relies on experts in various fields and in the different departments. Trump, however, believes that there is something called the “Deep State”, composed of career government workers who are out to get him. Even though many of these civil servants have worked through many administrations, both Republican and Democratic, Trump has decided that they are all “Obama holdovers” who have one goal: making him look bad. Even his own appointees are ignored and derided. The counterintuitive flip side of this is that he often makes decisions based on the last person who talked to him, or what he saw on “Fox and Friends”. This helps feed his paranoia and causes him to repeat ridiculous and easily debunked conspiracy theories, like the one about the DNC server being in Ukraine which helped fuel his attitude toward Ukraine.

Trump is incredibly thin-skinned. Every president in recent memory has been verbally attacked by those who vehemently disagree with them. None have taken the time to respond in kind as Trump has. But Trump’s verbal attacks include virtually everyone who not only attacks him, but so much as publically disagrees with him. It’s bad enough when he hangs stupid insulting nicknames on political rivals, but the smallest slight by a foreign head of state is enough for him to launch into a tirade against them. If this was an occasional outburst, that would be one thing, but it appears to be the method by which he makes decisions. Sycophantically flatter him and you can probably get him to do what you want, oppose him in any way, even obliquely, and you’re in for a barrage of attacks.

Trump foreign policy is extremely inconsistent. We go from threatening “fire and fury” against North Korea to exchanging “love letters” and ignoring nuclear escalation. Chinese President Xi is on one hand Trump good friend, while China is the target of punitive tariffs. Brutal dictators receive Trump’s effusive praise, while allies are mocked and punished with tariffs. One minute we’re “bringing the troops home” from Syria and Afghanistan, and the next we’re assassinating foreign military officials and increasing our troop presence in Saudi Arabia. For money. Which brings me to the lens through which Trump views foreign policy: money. We have military bases around the world, not only to help protect our allies, but to project American power around the world and to protect our national interests. Yet Trump views it as a financial transaction that we should be paid for. Global trade has always been a give and take. We protect some of our industries and other countries protect some of theirs. On average, the amount of goods subject to tariffs have been in the low single digits. Yet Trump has turned the tariff into a blunt instrument to ensure that we always get the best deals, no matter what the other country wants or needs.

Trump lies. A lot. Some people may say that all politicians lie. And to a certain extent that may be true, but no one lies to the extent that Trump does. A cottage industry of fact-checkers has sprung up to check everything that he says. Not only does he lie about his motivations and policy decisions, he lies about little, inconsequential things. He lies about things that can be easily fact-checked, sometimes by looking at a government website. He says something, then when questioned about it 24 hours later, he lies about it, even though there is a video recording of the initial statement. Some supporters may brush off his lies as unimportant, preferring to focus more on all of his “many and historic accomplishments”. But that’s often what he’s lying about. Much of what he claims he has accomplished in the past three years is either exaggerated, taken out of context, a continuation of trends from before his presidency, or completely made up. He hasn’t completely rebuilt a “decimated” military, he hasn’t revitalized manufacturing, he hasn’t brought in billions in tariffs from China, he hasn’t forced NATO member nations to “pay back what they owed us”, he hasn’t…well, you get the picture. The thing is, other than tough talk and bluster, Trump has not accomplished what he says he has accomplished, let alone what he promised that he would achieve. I mean, really – does anyone really think that we could have gone from the “American Carnage” to “American Greatness”, where our economy was in the pits and now it’s on the mountain top, where we were a laughing stock globally to being globally respected…in three years? Apparently he accomplished all this by way of threatening tweets and imposing tariffs. This new America, which we’re now supposed to “Keep Great” is an illusion.

Finally, Trump has ushered in a period of incivility that few would have thought possible. He has jettisoned any pretense at being a president of all Americans. He has categorized those who disagree with him as “enemies”, “sick”, “deranged”, and “haters of America”. He has attempted to undermine the free press. He has encouraged violence and the proliferation of hate groups. He has made it clear that he is the president only of those who unquestioningly support him. A president should be someone who represents all Americans, even those of the opposition party, even those with deep philosophical differences. Not someone who mocks and insults his fellow Americans.

Trump demonstrates his unfitness for office every single day.