“The Resilience of Donald J. Trump”-Sydney Williams
President Trump is an anomaly – an oak that has not broken. Whether one is a fan or a critic of the President, one has to admit that no previous President has been subjected to such pressure by those who simply hate the man, not for his policy choices, but for his character. Yet, to borrow a word from Nassim Nicholas Taleb, he is “antifragile;”[1] he grows stronger under pressure.
Admittedly, there are times when it is difficult, even for one who finds the Left’s tactics offensively offensive, to defend the man – his spontaneous Tweets and his derogatory comments about those who oppose him. But then I think of the heinous treatment he has received by a far-left media and politicians who have abandoned all senses of decency and respect, and I recognize that it is not Mr. Trump who is in the wrong. And I think of the task he has given himself – the draining of Washington’s swamp, a swamp filled with administrators, lobbyists, journalists and elected officials, all members of the “deep state” whose life blood depends on a secretive and expanding bureaucracy. And I remember Senator Chuck Schumer’s warning to him against taking on the intelligence establishment. He did, and he has reaped the whirlwind of their fury. Yet his continued resilience is critical to the continuance of our democratic Republic.
He is called a demagogue, a populist, an authoritarian, a man able to rally people but undeserving of the office and unable to govern. He is compared to Hitler and Stalin. TV and movie celebrities have called for his assassination. Yet, he does not break. Not only is he resilient, but his energy, despite his age, is boundless. Like Abraham Lincoln’s inspired choice of Ulysses Grant, “he fights.”
Despite these constant attacks, consider his accomplishments – think of tax reform, which lowered corporate taxes and lowered personal income taxes, but raised them for the wealthy in high-taxed states, like New York, California, Illinois, New Jersey and Connecticut. Consider the originalist judges he has appointed, including two to the U.S. Supreme Court. He has taken on the over-regulated state. In his first twenty-two months in office, he issued 65% fewer “significant” regulations (those with costs that consume $100 million annually) than did President Obama at the same point and 51% fewer than did President George W. Bush. And he exceeded his goal of rescinding two regulations for every new one introduced.
At the same time, he has overseen an economy that has grown significantly faster than it did under his predecessor who had the advantage of an economy first recovering from a severe recession. On October 4, CNBC reported that there have never been so many Black and Hispanics in the workforce. The jobless rate for all workers, 3.6%, is the lowest on record. He has taken the U.S. out of the worthless Iranian nuclear deal and the toothless Paris Agreement. He has called out the United Nations for their subversive views toward Israel, and he did what every President has promised to do since 1995 when the Jerusalem Embassy Act was signed by President Clinton in 1995, he moved the U.S. embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem. He forced NATO members to increase spending for their own defense, and, as promised in his campaign, he has brought our soldiers home from wars where they served as police forces. He has directly confronted China’s stealing of our technology and highlighted the border crisis. He has met with the dictator Kim Jong-un, in an attempt to deter nuclear proliferation on the Korean Peninsula. At home, he has fought a culture of wokeness, political correctness and identity politics that threatens our schools and universities with ignorance, a lack of diversity of opinions and renewed segregation. As well, he has addressed the issue of victimization that serves to keep the poor and less fortunate in a perpetual state of dependency and despair.
His resilience is needed, for the media and political left have invested heavily in the narrative they have sold to the American people – an illegal President, a Russian agent and a man who seeks to destroy democracy. Democrats recognize that the best defense is a good offense. They are worried of the fragility of their arguments. It is possible, if not likely, that the forthcoming Justice Department’s Inspector General Michael Horowitz’s report on surveillance abuses by the DOJ and FBI, in regard to the Trump campaign and FISA Court applications in 2016, could implicate some big names, including James Comey, John Brennan, James Clapper, and even Hillary Clinton and President Obama. Attempting to deflect that report, as well as the investigation being conducted by John Durham into possible FBI misconduct, as it pertains to the Russian probe, has caused Democrats to go bonkers, with an impeachment without a crime and a whistle blower who will not appear. Without his resilience, Americans might never learn of the truth as to what transpired during the 2016 campaign.
In contrast to the ‘willows’ on the Left, like former New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg and Joe Biden who change policies as their audiences change, Mr. Trump does not pander to the media or tell selected constituents only what they want to hear, nor does he repeat to whomever will listen what is currently popular. The “fourth estate,” Edmund Burke’s term for an independent and disinterested press that he saw as a wall against corruption and collusion within government, has foregone independence and disinterest to become advocates. In a 2018 survey conducted by Arizona State University and Texas A&M University, and quoted by Kimberley Strassel in her book Resistance, only 4.4% of mainstream journalists described themselves as leaning right. Journalists report only that which accords with their preconceived ideas. Bias, as Ms. Strassel wrote, comes from “insularity.” It is unity of opinion that binds them.
Those who resist Mr. Trump consider themselves knights errant. They see themselves as the chosen ones to remove the man seen as the epitome of evil. In seeking to destroy him, they target all those who work with him and who support him, caring nothing for the effect they have on the individual’s family. Rough politics is nothing new. Congressional sessions leading up to the Civil War were sometimes physically violent. But today’s viciousness and vindictiveness on live TV and on social media are different. It is not just Mr. Trump. Those named or nominated to serve in Mr. Trump’s Administration are railed against on national television. Their families are subjected to personal attack; their homes are picketed. Who can ever forget the insults hurled at Justice Brett Kavanaugh by lying, supercilious and vindictive Senators? The willingness to destroy an individual’s family is new and ugly. It is no wonder that turnover within the Administration has been high.
While the resistance is about stopping Mr. Trump, it is also about protecting the privileged positions of members of the “deep state,” especially those who might be exposed by the Horowitz and Durham reports. And, keep in mind, Oak trees may break, but Willows die from rot. Mr. Trump’s resilience is critical to getting the truth out, then letting the chips fall as they will. Fiat Justitia ruat caelum.
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