This past week we visited Washington, DC for a couple of days, enjoying Smithsonian museums. In one of our walks we happened upon a building site with a bright blue banner above the sidewalk protection rigging with the word TRUMP in huge letters. It was a development for a new hotel, but it felt like political advertising. Here it is from an article in the Washington Post.
Granted, it is in a serif typeface as Trump uses for his properties, and he uses sans-serif for his official campaign logo. Still, the color of blue is unmistakable, he’s using his building sites as campaign advertising. I’m no expert, but I’m sure this skirts some kind of campaign laws.
Which brings me to the point that’s been circulating for me for weeks and then Trump just freely announced it, for Trump, this is war. And, we all know, there are no rules in war, contrary to whatever civilized nations have tried to cobble together. The above, is just a minor example of skirting/ignoring rules because, rules are for losers. Winners go to war and ignore the rules.
So, what we’ve been seeing is Trump at war, rallying his troops to do horrible deeds (at a Trump rally, his supporters were recorded beating a black man to shut him up), playing to their prejudices, never retreating in the face of facts (Trump refused to back down from false and racist statistics), always attacking, always certain of victory, etc.
The low blow that really set me off some weeks back was something else. I think Trump is just plain mean. When you mock a person’s disabilities in an effort to discredit their reporting, that shows a man with no apparent sense of decency (a phrase that needs to return to currency).
While it is hoped by the remainder of the Republican party that Trump’s numbers finally slide to oblivion, the fact is the emerging alternative is not altogether better: Ted Cruz. He’s not Trump-lite. He’s Trump with a better sense of how to resonate with a wider political base. Worse, he will look sane after Trump. If Trump had not been in the contest, however, Cruz would have been considered the bombastic hate-spewer. Trump has given Cruz a shield that reads, “At least he not Trump.” It’s pretty grim in the Republican party right now.
Times of Bernhardt 