RUTHFULLY YOURS

It’s fair to ask how Donald Trump went from celebrity real estate developer to the man most detested by about half of Western society. We think we know this vilification happened.

Read on.

In 1949, William Randolph Hearst, owner of the largest newspaper chain in the U.S., sent a two-word message to his editors: “Puff Graham.” It made evangelist Billy Graham, in Los Angeles for one of his early crusades, into “an instant celebrity nationwide,” according to the Los Angeles Times.

“The sudden front-page coverage showered on Graham by Hearst newspapers in mid-October (after three weeks of little notice) was quickly matched by other newspapers and news magazines – literally a media circus descending on his rallies under a big tent,” says the Times.

Graham’s fame soared as he later appeared on the covers of the day’s leading magazines, from Time to Newsweek to Life.

The Billy Graham Library calls Hearst’s order “a watershed event,” and Graham himself thanked Hearst in a letter, telling him that “Literally millions of church people across the nation are rejoicing and thanking God for your interest and backing of the recent Los Angeles evangelistic campaign.”

We don’t discount the possibility of divine intervention, but Graham’s popularity is owed in large part to the power and reach of one man (who might have been moved divinely to “puff” the evangelist).

Quite clearly, we’ve seen the opposite happen in the case of Trump. It’s not unreasonable to conclude that one powerful and influential person, but more likely a cabal of the powerful and influential, sent a two-word message somewhere around 2015: “Get Trump.”

Before he was a presidential candidate, Trump was a superstar. He was a frequent and popular guest on Oprah Winfrey’s shows. In 2000, Winfrey, who had a warm relationship with Trump, and might be the original media influencer, wrote a letter to the future president in which she said “Too bad we’re not running for office, what A TEAM!”

Twenty-four years later, she endorsed the Democratic Party’s ditzy candidate, Kamala Harris – despite Trump telling talk show legend Larry King in 1999 that if he ran for president on the Reform Party ticket in 2000, Winfrey would be his first choice for a running mate.

In Trump’s pre-candidate history, he was a friend of the Clintons. They attended his 2005 wedding to Melania, and Hillary even kissed the newlyweds.

Trump, in fact, donated more money to Democrats than Republicans from 1989 to 2010. Hillary Clinton, who took contributions from Trump and several members of his family; the late Nevada Sen. Harry Reid; Obama chief of staff Rahm Emanuel, who “is gearing up to run for president“; and Bill Clinton through the Clinton Foundation were Democrats who happily pocketed his donations. On at least two occasions, Trump was registered Democrat.

Impossible as it sounds, Trump was given a standing ovation for his 2011 appearance on “The View,” and was greeted politely, if not solicitously, by Joy Behar and Whoopi Goldberg, both of whom have since lost their minds over Trump. The late Barbara Walters, the show’s creator, told him, “whenever you’re on with us, we’re happy.” It’s arguable that “The View” co-hosts and audiences have since become some of his most vicious critics.

Trump was also once considered “America’s business icon,” a “budding media darling,” “the definition of an American success story,” and was known as the rich but empathetic man who talks “to porters and maids.” He was so popular not that many years ago that he had his own brand of retail products, which Macy’s once relied on to “build its image as a national brand.” He was, simply put, “a popular celebrity.”

To our memory, he was never called a fascist, Nazi, aspiring tyrant, authoritarian, racist or bigot during this time. But someone gave the orders, and Trump was consequently villainized, smeared, maligned, and dehumanized. Two people have already tried to kill him, and no one knows how many more want to because they’ve bought the left’s lies and misinformation. More than half of self-identified leftists say killing Trump would be a justifiable act. The outpouring of mindless hatred toward the man is psychotic.

To think this happened organically is to believe that the anti-DOGE protests aren’t astroturfed but a grass-roots movement of Main Street Americans. Someone or someones somewhere saw Trump as a threat to their political hegemony and sent out word that this meddlesome man must be removed. The campaign might eventually succeed, but it will have come at the cost of the well-being of tens of millions of Americans who are suffering from Trump Derangement Syndrome and might never recover their mental health.