I keep
hearing/reading a certain analogy in regards to President Trump. And in a way I see the appeal of the
analogy. It goes something like this.
“The
President is sort of like the pilot of the great big plane we are all flying
in. Much like you wouldn’t like the idea
of a pilot failing (even if you do not like them as a person) you should not
want President Trump to fail, or hope for that to happen.”
And to a
degree I agree. BUT, this analogy is
imperfect and works under certain assumptions.
1)
The flight in question is not a voluntary experience
for most of the people on this plane.
The only way off the flight is to “jump off” which would probably
analogize to your death.
2)
I and many others did not want him to be the pilot, so
I am going to complain about it at least as much as the guy who got the wrong
in flight meal would complain. I think
that is fair.
3)
Hoping for President Trump’s success also assumes a few
things like that he is a pilot, who knows how to fly the plane, knows where he is flying it to, and will know how to land it when he gets there. I am not sure that he knows these things.
4)
This also assumes Trump is not going to just fly the
plane up to a cruising altitude, sabotage the thing, and then parachute out so
as to collect on some insurance scam.
Which sounds plausible.
5)
Lastly, this also assumes President Trump is not some
agent of a foreign power who is going to fly the plane to the middle of nowhere
so everyone on board can be taken as political prisoners. And that place rhymes with Prussia.
Hoping for
someone to succeed is generally a good thing, but only when they
are aiming to do something kind to the rest of us. And beyond that they have to be able to
demonstrate both the mental faculties to accomplish that thing, and you have to
trust what they are saying by looking at their past actions and words.
When
President Obama took office various flavors of deplorable people said he was
going to take away everyone’s guns, declare Sharia Law, institute death panels
that would process the old and sick into early graves, and/or be a dick to
people. None of that came true, but it
is important to note that President Obama never said that he would do those
things.
Let me
contrast this behavior.
When I
speak out against President Trump, I am quoting his own words. In context.
I am pointing to things he did or did not do. I am looking at evidence, some of it too sketchy to base a solid opinion off of, but I am looking for and at EVIDENCE. I disagree with and am judging President
Trump by HIS WORDS AND DEEDS.
I am not making
up wild conspiracies. I am not protesting an empty chair. I look at a person who has been a public
figure for 40+ years who has stated goals that I disagree with and have
EVIDENCE to back up why I feel the way I feel and think the way I think.
If you want
to cheer for President Trump because his success is “our” success that is your
business. But if you expect me to cheer
with you, to “give him a chance”, or even to just stop speaking against him. YOU NEED TO GIVE ME EVIDENCE AS TO WHY I
SHOULD DISCARD ALL THE HORRIBLE THINGS HE HAS SAID AND DONE.
Right now,
there are people calling for the barring of refugees from our country because
they share the faith of some terrorists.
These human beings are children who have watched their world burn, women who
have seen their families die, men who do not want to be drafted into an army
that will kill innocent people, and some of them are probably rotten assholes
because there is never a short supply of those.
But right now people are calling for homeless and stateless refugees not
to come to the US because they look like someone we dislike.
I am speaking
against a man who has shown himself to be rotten. I do not want him to succeed because his
duplicitous behavior has shown him to be untrustworthy. I feel his success is
our plight. And I am basing this not off
racism, not off fear of a religious group, not off of jingoism, I am basing my
opinion off of what I know about him.
No comments:
Post a Comment