In recent days, president-elect Donald Trump reminds me of an arsonist who started lots of fires and is now playing firefighter, running around trying to extinguish them.
He’s trying – so suddenly – to be level-headed, acceptable, conciliatory. Last I heard, his plan for the Big Wall at the border now includes fences, too. Will it amount to a pretty little white-picket fence with cute daisies planted all along it? Trump fans don’t want to hear that. They want thousands of miles of bricks-and-mortar – the real thing.
Some Trump enthusiasts already have buyer’s remorse after they heard Trump say Obama is a great guy, that parts of Obamacare should remain intact, that the Clintons are good people, that a total ban on abortion would be virtually impossible to realize. What?! Has Trump already morphed into one of the deplorable Washington insiders so reviled by his loyal supporters? What next? Naming Hillary as FBI director? Holiday parties with Barack and Michelle and Bernie?
After such a nasty campaign, sharp-fanged antagonists – most notably Trump – are pretending their vicious hostilities were just one big dinner-table Jell-O fight.
Fuzzy-wuzzy choruses of Kumbaya are rising ‘round the national campfire. Whoa, behold! From whence comes this dulcet sound?
Before I wax skeptical, let me hasten to add: The harmony is make-believe, but (show or not) it’s a good thing – for now anyway. That’s because one of America’s bedrock traditions is the amicable transfer of power even in divisive times like these. During this brief truce, we can all take a deep breath, a time to grieve or to celebrate, and a time to start thinking of ways we can – maybe – work together.
Tall order – it won’t be easy. The divisions, the wounds, are deep. Those of us who dislike Trump intensely and who thought he would be a dangerous president will not change our minds any time soon. Carried away by wishful thinking, we predicted his defeat with a sense of vast premature relief. We were wrong, but so were many Republicans who supported him but said he didn’t stand a snowball’s chance in hell.
Trump’s electoral-vote stunner carried echoes of the famous photo of a beaming President Harry Truman holding up an early-morning edition of the Chicago Tribune with a big headline proclaiming “Dewey Defeats Truman.”
Suddenly, in the bitter dawn of the morning after, we, Clinton supporters, can relate emotionally to the Romney folks who were convinced they were about to win the 2012 election right up until the wee hours when their hopes took a nose-dive.
Yes, Trump won; he is our president, like it or not. I don’t like it, nor do the 60 million-plus people who voted for Hillary and/or against Trump, and who gave Hillary the popular vote. No Kumbaya for us, thank you very much.
We Hillary voters have good reasons to worry about what kind of president Trump will become and what will become of our country. For one thing, if he doesn’t surround himself with dedicated public servants who can keep him in line and help him focus his short attention span, he will flail off in all directions, as he did during the campaign – until his zookeepers tamed him during the last days.
How are we supposed to gather ‘round the unity campfire when we vividly recall the 18 months of Trump’s hateful bigoted outbursts aimed at just about everybody and everything? Are we supposed to forget all that bully-boy bluster?
We who so dislike Trump should actually wish him success – even through gritted teeth – because just imagine the catastrophic alternative if he doesn’t succeed, if the loose cannon gets any looser? It’s a frightening prospect. But the trouble is that presidential success would mean he would have to become virtually a new man from what he has been for the past 18 months. A new-and-improved Trump? That’s a tall order.
Questions loom: When will Trump the narcissistic tycoon/TV star morph into a president with gravitas, inclusiveness and policy-savvy? What will happen when he learns that being president is the most difficult job on the planet, riddled with tough decisions, hard realities and shifting situations that don’t fit into his list of wand-waving promises?
We are called upon to show respect to this man who showed no respect whatsoever to so many individuals and groups during his foot-in-mouth campaign. Respect must be earned, not ordered. Can the leopard change his spots and earn all Americans’ respect?
Maybe President Trump will surprise us all with some sound policies and wise decisions. Miracles do happen. And if he comes through with something good for all Americans, believe me, I (surprised) would be among the first to praise it and to write about it.
