By Mark Azzara
My Dear Friend,
Donald Trump is a genius. But don’t misinterpret what I just said.
At Thursday’s Republican debate Trump was asked to explain how he could go from being a staunch Democrat to a Republican, from adamantly pro-choice to pro-life. He simply said anybody can change his mind. Maybe, but it sure looks to me like Trump is running as a Republican because he wants a Democrat to win the election. If he doesn’t get the nomination he said he may run as an independent, thus sucking potential votes away from the GOP nominee and guaranteeing that the Democrat wins.
But more important, Trump is making astoundingly absurd statements while trumpeting himself as a Republican. His true genius is in his unspoken message: If I’m not the GOP nominee, someone who is like me in a lot of ways – with the same twisted, stereotypical thinking and pea-brained solutions – will be the nominee. No matter whom the GOP nominates he will be a version of me.
Trump said a lot of things at the debate that make it clear who he is. Example: Defending himself for the four times his companies declared bankruptcy. He said he simply took advantage of the law, which he said is what any savvy businessman (especially the ultra-rich) would do. Hidden message: That’s who Republicans represent – people who take advantage of the law for personal profit. And the crystal clear implication is that this is who we’ll get if we elect a Republican.
I also commend his honesty. He said he has given scads of money to politicians on both sides of the aisle. That way, when he needs something, he only needs to knock on those politicians’ doors and demand repayment for his largesse. He sees nothing wrong with this kind of legal bribery. It’s just part of the cost of doing business. And he’s painting the entire Republican establishment with the same brush.
Perhaps most brilliant of all (although, strictly speaking, Trump had nothing to do with it) his center-stage performance occurred on the same night that Jon Stewart bade farewell to “The Daily Show” on Comedy Central. No sooner did the debate end than Stewart’s farewell began.
A video commentary on Stewart from The New York Times said he’s gone from a satirical critic of the political establishment to being its newest member. He was pals with all the insiders, who craved the opportunity to be ridiculed by him and who took potshots at him on the way out the door. I particularly enjoyed how Sen. John McCain manipulated a Stewart-like puppet, after which he said, “So long, jackass.”
Every politician would love a gig like that. And quite a few of them, especially the more self-deprecating, might actually be pretty good at it. But who among them is the one man in America who could amuse all of us – get us to laugh out loud – and thus deserve to take Stewart’s seat? None other than Donald Trump, who has spent the past few months doing what Stewart did for way more than a decade – exaggerating, at his own expense, the weaknesses and foibles of politicians.
Comedy Central would score a brilliant coup if it could get Trump to renounce his presidential bid by offering him his own weekly political-satire comedy show. We could all laugh at a buffoon who is so dumb he thinks we’re laughing with him rather than at him. He would be living proof of everything Stewart railed against for 16 years.
At lunch today I told some counselor/friends in their break room, “After watching the Republican debate last night I feel a lot better about myself.” Compared to some of them (but not all of them, by any means), I’m brilliant. Compared to some of them, my desire to see that right triumphs makes me appear saintly.
I’m not knocking the Republican Party or any individual candidate (apart from Trump). I’m not endorsing Democrats either. In fact, after Hillary Clinton’s recent demand that Americans give up their religious beliefs when they conflict with legal rights, I think she’s in the same league as Trump.
What I object to is the political circus we are witnessing. Perhaps Stewart’s biggest effect was that he taught all these politicians that the fastest way to get noticed is to make such an outrageous fool out of yourself that voters will elect you just to keep you around a little longer to amuse them. But politicians no longer need Stewart to belittle and degrade them. He’s stepping aside because, as the Republican debate proved, they’re now able to do it on their own.
The majority of Americans may not want to stop laughing because they know that if they do so the next step will be to cry – to weep over a nation where lunacy has replaced logic, contradiction has replaced compromise, hubris has replaced humility and greed has replaced God.
Many Americans say they don’t believe in hell. But I guarantee you they’ll believe in it if Trump or Clinton gets elected. And if living in hell is the only way to get us to believe in God, well then, so be it.
All God’s blessings – Mark
I would hardly characterize Trump as a staunch Democrat. He history is for a more than a decade under Ronald Reagan he was a Republican. He then switched for a decade to the Reformed Party when Ross Perot ran for office until about the 2000, then he switched to Democrat in the early 2000s until the election of President Obama, then he turn to the Republicans again and importantly appearing on FoxNews. In all cases he parroted the party line at the time. Trump has always been and always be about Trump, the ego. His positions only puppet what thinks people want to hear so he can aggrandize himself. His campaign is helping other Republicans by neutralizing the Tea Party favorites like Perry, Cruz and Paul, while allowing the establishment Republicans like Bush, Walker, Kasich, and Rubio to look distinct and presidential. His threat to run as independent is not if he loses, but how much respect the Republicans show him. Give him a prominent place in the RNC convention and maybe his own show on FoxNews he will be happy.