One of the many absurdities being echoed today in the
establishment media by both politicians and journalists
is that Donald Trump is “unfit” to be president.
I am not speaking of those who oppose President Trump’s
policies, dislike his public persona, recoil at his tweets,
and generally disagree with him. All of these are quite
permissable and legitimate in a free country.
But “unfit?” What about liberal icons like Woodrow Wilson
and John F. Kennedy? President Wilson had a stroke on
October 2, 1919 while in his second term in office. He was
clearly physically and mentally “unfit” for the rest of his
second term during which his wife in reality ran the
government. In his first term, by the way, he promised that
the U.S. would not get involved in World War I. He then
led the nation into the war in 1917. Wilson was also a
notorious segregationist.
From the moment (and before) he was sworn in as president
on January 20, 1961, John F. Kennedy was physically “unfit”
because he had, and knew he had, a rare fatal adrenal
condition (Addison’s Disease) which at that time had no
cure. He was in constant pain every day he was president,
was heavily drugged by his physicians, and wore a back brace.
He had been diagnosed with this disease before being elected
president, kept it a secret, and could have died at any time.
Some might also assert that he was morally “unfit” to be
president because it is now known that he was a serial
sexual predator throughout his presidency, including having
young women secreted into the White House. I am not even
speaking here of his early disaster from the aborted invasion
of Cuba or his complicity in the growing U.S. role in Viet Nam.
But do you hear today about either of these liberal icons being
“unfit” for office?
I am not here agreeing with, or disagreeing with, President
Trump. The reader can make his own judgment about
whether they like or dislike him and his policies. I have in
the past criticized him and praised him on different occasions.
But Donald Trump was elected president of the United States.
I think those who claim he is “unfit” for office are, intentionally
or not, attempting to cancel the 2016 election. I know of no
physical or mental condition which renders Mr. Trump “unfit”
for office, especially at the indisputable levels that made
Presidents Wilson and Kennedy truly “unfit.”
That does not say Mr. Trump should not be opposed or
criticized. The remedy for whose who feel that way, however, is
to defeat his party in the 2018 national midterm elections, and
then defeat him in his re-election effort in 2020.
We are also enduring today, primarily through the media, an
orgy of dropping names (and statues) from public view. The
discussion of which public figures from the past deserve to
be honored is a legitimate one. But when ESPN removes an
announcer who happens to be named “Robert Lee” from its
programming, you know the discussion has become a form
of hysteria. As John Hinderaker points out on Powerline.
Coca Cola was invented by John Pemberton, a Confederate
Lt. Colonel from Georgia (and a slaveowner). Does that mean
no liberal can drink, Hinderaker asks, a coke? When business
institutions and their CEOs panic and cower in the face of
this hysteria, you know the discussion is out of hand. Should
my alma mater, the University of Pennsylvania, disown its
own founder Ben Franklin (and one of the great minds of his
age) because he was once a slaveholder? Should the
Democratic Party be dissolved today because it was, more
than a hundred years ago, pro-slavery and opposed to giving
women the vote?
Tiny groups on the far left and the far right who have no
widespread public support have deliberately tried to provoke
this hysteria. It’s time for all those, liberal, centrist, and
conservative, to call this hysteria out.
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Copyright (c) 2017 by Barry Casselman. All rights reserved.
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