Is Trump TRYING to Lose?

Even with President Trump's failed and catastrophic response to COVID-19, the accompanying severe economic downturn, his numerous character flaws, his blatant racism, his corruption, lying, tweeting, psychopathic narcissism, misogyny, incompetence, grifting, lack of empathy, and the politicization of wearing masks, he was still in a competitive race with Joe Biden though trailing in all of the polls. If all of the Trump stars aligned, however, he still could pull it off.  #hocopolitics

What he lacks in skills and character, he makes up for it with bluster, self-confidence and hubris. Trump believes that he has the best political instincts (along with having hired the best people, attending the best schools and knowing the best words). Yet, recent self-inflicted miscues have called into question those instincts or leaving one to speculate if he is actually trying to lose.

For example:

Trump’s sabotaging of the Postal System: Our U.S. Postal Service, should never be considered a red or blue issue. It’s a red, white and blue institution, enshrined in our Constitution.  His newly installed Postmaster General GOP donor crony Louis DeJoy has begun the dismantling of the infrastructure of the postal system in several ways including removing and trashing high-speed canceling machines, rolling back overtime and removing outdoor mailboxes. These measures have resulted in significant delays in delivering mail and packages.

Clearly, DeJoy was under the direction of Trump to impair the handling of mail as the president has continually hammered away at mail-in ballots as being rife with fraud with not a shred of evidence to back it up. Under the guise of restoring fiscal solvency to the postal system, the timing of these moves less than three months away from the election is suspicious to say the least.

Trump publicly admitted such a strategy. “[Democrats] want $25 billion for the post office. Now they need that money in order to have the post office work, so it can take all of these millions and millions of ballots. Now in the meantime they aren’t getting there. By the way, those are just two items, but if they don’t get those two items, that means you can’t have universal mail-in voting, because they’re not equipped to have it.”

All Americans regardless of political party rely on the mail. It is revered by society, and the institution boasts an approval rating north of 90%. People depend on receiving medications, checks, subscriptions and the like and do not want this vital service weakened. Disabled veterans as well as others need medications that are often received through the mail. And the postal service employs over 90,000 U.S. veterans. That veteran organizations haven’t expressed their collective outrage is astounding. Moreover, mail is particularly vital in rural areas where most of the folks are Trump supporters. People like to receive their mail on time. So do small businesses. They like the postal system. This has been a political fiasco.

Trying to flatten Goodyear tires: Trump made an ill-advised move urging people not to buy Goodyear tires because the company does not permit workers to wear political campaign garb including MAGA hats. Despite lecturing Democrats for having a cancellation culture, Trump decided his fragile ego needed workers to demonstrate their love for him with donning his famous red caps.

Joe Biden gets it and fired off the following statement in response: “Goodyear employs thousands of American workers, including in Ohio, where it is headquartered. To President Trump, those workers and their jobs aren’t a source of pride, just collateral damage in yet another one of his political attacks.”

Ohio is a key swing state, and Trump cannot win the election without Ohio. Those employees whom Trump is trying to put out of work and others similarly in the manufacturing sector have families, friends and neighbors who may not want to vote for Trump after this boondoggle.

Welcome QAnon! Donald Trump will embrace anyone who likes him. Whether it is the neo-Nazis, KKK or brutal dictators and tyrants, if you like Trump or say nice things about him that’s all that matters. Another political loser has been Trump’s welcoming QAnon into the fold. QAnon is a group that has been identified by the FBI as a domestic extremist group. They traffic in bizarre conspiracy theories including the doozy that Democrats are Satan-worshippers and children-devouring pedophiles.

Undaunted, Trump supported and congratulated congressional candidate Republican Marjorie Taylor Greene who won a primary in Georgia and is likely to enter the mainstream by being elected to Congress despite her QAnon devotion. For instance, she had suggested that Hillary Clinton murdered her political enemies and ruminated on whether mass shootings were orchestrated to dismantle the Second Amendment.

QAnon members have reportedly engaged in violence and kidnappings. Trump said he knew nothing about the group (of course) but that they like him and they love our country. He refused to disavow the group and when told about their conspiracy theories and that they see Trump as a hero and savior in the war against pedophiles (oh, the irony!), Trump replied, “Is that supposed to be a bad thing?”

Several Republicans from former Florida Governor Jeb Bush to Representative Liz Chaney to strategist Karl Rove lambasted QAnon.

Nebraska Senator Ben Sasse saw the political danger of Trump’s embracing QAnon.

“If Democrats take the Senate, blow up the filibuster, and pack the Supreme Court — garbage like this will be a big part of why they won,” Sasse said. “Real leaders call conspiracy theories conspiracy theories.”

Lowering the bar on Joe: For the past several months Trump and his Republican cohorts could not successfully defend the president’s record so they attack their opponent Joe Biden. One of the avenues of attack is to paint Biden as a doddering old man who doesn’t know which side is up and cannot string two sentences together.

At the climax of the well-executed Democratic National Convention, Biden delivered arguably his best political speech, thus nullifying at least for now, Trump’s characterization of “Sleepy Joe” or “Slow Joe.” The contrast from expectation to actual was so stark, it made Biden extraordinary and Trump completely foolish.

These are examples of Trump’s political self-inflicted wounds, but with the Republican National Convention coming up, I imagine there will be a bunch more. It will beg the question, is he trying to lose?

Beat the Press

Trump’s war with the media is a cornerstone of his strategy

“Fake News!” “Fake News!” “Fake News!” “Dishonest Media!” “Dishonest Media!” “Dishonest Media!”  These slogans are now boilerplate in President Trump’s tweets, (still) campaign rallies and press conferences. 

His attacks on the press began in earnest during the primary debates when he slammed Megyn Kelly for asking “tough” questions.  They escalated during the general election campaign when he dangerously incited his rabid supporters by pointing to the caged-in pens reserved for media at rallies and decrying that “they are the most dishonest people on earth.”

This loathsome behavior continued throughout the month after his inauguration and as recently as this past weekend tweeting that the media “is the enemy of the American people” and continuing the assault on the press at his comfort food campaign-style rally in Melbourne, Fl.

What gratitude!  #hocopolitics

In rather simplistic terms, the media, who he assails, made Trump. Because if his different style (many would say absurd) and his willingness to go beyond normal boundaries in discourse, the media took to Trump like seagulls to a pile of trash. 

They never let him out of their sight and followed him to each and every campaign event with the expectation or hope that something outlandish would be said that would make for interesting coverage especially on TV, which would boost ratings.  Rarely were they disappointed.

The upshot of this focus on Trump was that the other primary candidates were starving for similar attention, and for the self-proclaimed billionaire, Mr. Trump received oodles of free press while his opponents had to spend.

President Trump who gets his information from “the shows” eschews mainstream media except for FOX News, the unofficial media partner of the Republican Party, and also from such places as Breitbart News, Gateway Pundit, and InfoWars.

For someone who calls the mainstream media dishonest, Trump and members of his Administration hypocritically traffics in conspiracy theories and blatant lies.  From his assertion that his crowd size at the Inauguration was much larger than observed estimates to the ranking of his Electoral College victory as the greatest since Ronald Reagan, Trump cares little about facts, truth and honesty.

The media took to Trump like seagulls to a pile of trash. 

Then there are the fabricated stories he purveys, such as some unspecified horror going on in Sweden (nothing occurred), or his counselor’s mentioning the Bowling Green Massacre (no such event), or his press secretary’s description of the terrorist attack in Atlanta (he meant Orlando since the two cities are so close—400 miles apart). 

Why has he unleashed these non-stop attacks on the integrity of the press while his own statements are so frequently false? Anytime Trump’s weaknesses or worse are described in the media, even if they are totally accurate, he angrily charges “fake news” simply because he doesn’t like it or it makes him look bad.  Discrediting Trump’s image is considered a sin that requires a strong rebuke; self-preservation is his number one priority.

There is more.  Let’s go back to the primaries.  The supreme marketer was aware that if you repeat something often enough, it will stick, especially with his base.  “Lyin’” Ted, “Little” Marco, “Low Energy” Jeb were monikers that helped destroy the candidacies of Cruz, Rubio and Bush, respectively—Trump’s chief rivals.

Come the general election, “Crooked” Hillary took over, and his campaign narrative was built around that label.  Again, it worked, though many other factors were part of the mind-boggling upset.

Bring on the press. The “failing” New York Times, “Fake News” CNN,  “Dishonest Media”—repeat, rinse, spin and repeat.  It will stick, and it is vital for Trump and his presidency to discredit the media for two reasons.

One, the media fact-checks his statements and tweets and they are often false, inaccurate or exaggerated, made-up, or out-and-out lies.  He hates to be called out though it’s the press’ duty as stated in the First Amendment to keep the three branches of government accountable to the people, and the press is that vehicle. 

Second, it is my belief that if there are any serious investigations into the Trump campaign’s relationship with Russian intelligence officers prior to the election and there are findings that Trump and/or his campaign staff were in collusion with the Russians, Trump’s presidency could be in jeopardy.  

By discrediting the media ad nauseum, if and when these revelations come to light, he will have built a safety net of sorts and deny any such findings by blaming the press for the disclosures. People will discount those reports, because he is banking that the oft-repeated charge of “fake news” will resonate and the public will see him as a victim.

That may be his best strategy because much of his base will support him and blame the “dishonest media” for having an anti-Trump agenda. Will it work?  Time will tell.

In the meanwhile, the press needs to be vigilant and hold firm against these charges.  The First Amendment’s Freedom of the Press must be protected for the sake of our country.

“If you want to preserve — I’m very serious now — if you want to preserve democracy as we know it, you have to have a free and many times adversarial press," Senator John McCain said on Meet the Press this past weekend. “And without it, I am afraid that we would lose so much of our individual liberties over time. That’s how dictators get started.”

Yes, that’s how dictators get started.