The presidency can illuminate excellence in a person. This is especially the case during times of crisis when some of the greatest presidents became greater. Those who maybe ain't so great maybe ain't so special in a crisis either. George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Abraham Lincoln, Harry Truman and Ronald Reagan were wildly different from one another but they shared the virtues that make a leader great: courage, commitment to principle and rule of law, respect for the responsibility bestowed upon them, and common decency. In other words: character.
Those who call themselves conservative used to say that character was crucial to the office and they were absolutely right. Things have changed since then. Nowadays character seems to hold no currency with supporters of the president. How much belligerence, incompetence, corruption, hypocrisy and dishonesty is enough for them to recognize that he has to go? If tribalism and ideological gangsterism are what matters to the Trumpist right, like it does for much of the identitarian left and virtually all of the anarchist and communist branches of the left, there will never be a recognition of Trump's manifest and manifold unfitness.
Each member of the Trump family has so flamboyantly demonstrated their unfitness for public service through their eagerness to praise totalitarian regimes and denigrate America's allies, their embrace of ludicrous conspiracy theories at the expense of civil and military service heroes, and their total disregard for the traditional legal and ethical standards that our leaders and public servants are traditionally expected to aspire to. Anyone who thinks that this president won't likely be confronted by anymore crises this year is delusional but they're going to have to explain why over 40,000 out of work and a six figure death toll is a record to be tolerated let alone rewarded.
Those flawed and humble men who stood where Donald Trump now stands understood duty, honor and sacrifice. They were asked to lead a revolution against a wealthy king and his superior military. Their revolution lives today. They were asked to stare down evil and destroy monsters. They did not blink. They were needed to keep the republic together when seditious malcontents in southern states tore it apart over the slavery question. They lead the republic through a bloody civil war and ended the ancient barbaric evil of slavery. They called Stalin's bluff in Berlin and made him retreat. They were asked to lead the free world and they lead it to the doorstep of the Soviet Union where they demanded freedom for Eastern Europe. Other presidents have tried to live up to the examples of Washington, Jefferson, Lincoln, Truman and Reagan and that probably made them better presidents than they might have been otherwise. Donald Trump will always be unfit to carry their luggage. A cult of criminals and charlatans holds power but without courage, humility or common decency they cannot lead. This experiment in presidential buffoonery needs to be wrapped up before the next crisis, but don't hold your breath. It turns out the president is surrounded by cowards, conmen and wet blankets who can't step up to remove this president because they are way too busy blowing him so hey won't tweet at them and rile up his army of imbecile bots to sick balls and threaten their families. MAGA indeed.
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