At this point, it's perhaps pointless to point out (redundancy intended) the dramatic contrast in character between trump and his predecessor. But it is worth noting that the seriousness with which Barack Obama approached the duties and responsibilities of the Oval Office is probably best symbolized by the full head of grey hair he developed before he completed his first term. It's difficult to imagine an obnoxiously image-conscious showboat like donald trump allowing such a thing to happen to his gold-plated faux-exceeding hairline -- ever. Indeed, judging by what's been seen of his work ethic thus far -- delegating, Twitter -beefing, and watching Fox News as the weeklong lead-ins to weekend getaways at Mar-a-Lago -- it's easily assumed that trump regards America's quintessential expression of political accountability -- "the buck stops here"-- as a strictly fiduciary ideal that has no place in politics or as a measure of how to manage one's personal life.
As it is, when considering what's believed to have sparked his desire to capture the Oval Office, it becomes difficult to accept trump's essentially bootleg presidency as a valid expression of the institution of the presidency as envisioned by the Founding Fathers. Anyone who's paid any attention to trump over the past 15 years or so probably recognizes that when he finally acted on what's been regarded as a longstanding desire to capture the White House, that decision did not stem from trump having been himself captured or otherwise enthralled by its prestige perhaps the way an Olympic athlete dreams of one day capturing a gold medal.
Nor could it be assumed to have been generated by an intensely patriotic determination within him to become a significant part of the history, tradition, panache, and all else that the White House has come to represent. Instead, it is more likely that the humiliation he suffered at the hands of Barack Obama at the 2011 White House Correspondent's Dinner inspired trump's desire to run. So, despite the populist nationalism he appoints to the slogan "Making America Great Again," it was in fact, not patriotic fervor; but instead immense personal vanity -- a considerably lower calling -- that fueled trump's desire to follow in Barack Obama's footsteps.
"When the going gets tough"
By now, all layers of speculation about trump's character have been removed. It's fairly well established that expedient mendacity -- lying out of convenience -- is the prevailing focus of any donald trump strategy for handling personal and presidential responsibilities. Most Americans recognize that like Mexican drug lord Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman" -- an infamous escape-artist -- any corner in which trump finds himself trapped, either personally or politically, invariably leads to an escape of his own making to a place of comfort. Americans know that we can always count on donald trump to require continuous doses of reassurance, especially during times when a dose of courage would be far more essential. Unlike the valor shown by first responders in times of major crisis, there has never been a valiant rush by trump directly into the aperture of responsibility for his lies or misdeeds.
Indeed, with trump, it's been exactly the opposite. When the going gets tough, trump gets going -- off to find the proverbial "warm place to sh*t" -- escaping either straight into a realm of dodgy, linguistic sleight-of-hand, and self-assuring rhetorical fantasy, or headlong into a cascade of stage-managed adulation from a swooning gallery of die-hard supporters.
"We all know dogmatists," notes David L. Wolfe in Epistemology: The Justification of Belief "who are more concerned about holding their opinions than investigating their truths. If they are mistaken, they will never discover it; they have condemned themselves to perpetual error."
Truly. And, in trump's case, expediency will perpetuate a compulsion to seek out anyone willing to help further build on his decades-long legacy of perpetual error. It also quells any thought of perhaps considering the stealth appointment of a special White House staff psychiatrist to help work through denial issues.
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