Trumped up on Trump

By Ray Regan 

Trump! Trump! Trump is a term in card games. Today, it's a stand-out name that brings up emotions in folks all over the world:

• joy
• pride
• faith
• anger
• rage,
• disgust. 

I'm in the neutral camp, or I like to think I am. It's a big shame because I protect myself by not getting sucked into the media frenzy and feeling the juiciness of my anger and disgust.

I read theSkimm, which covers world headlines with humour. My wife and millions of other people around the world delve into every word to feed their anger.

I tell people I owe him (Trump), because my wife has turned her anger away from me and toward Trump. We (my wife and I) get along quite nicely now.

Most people of reason see him for the divisive, small-minded racist that he is and worry about his actions affecting the world order, the environment and a life away from war. "The world order" sounds a little 1984ish, a futuristic, totalitarian surveillance state.

The puzzle is why people support him, idolize him? Like the Republican party  and his "base."

How do these, many educated intelligent people live with his bizarre behaviour, his vulgar statements about women and people of colour. 

How do they support him and filter and ignore his derogative statements and actions? We can only speculate. And the overabundant media coverage I mentioned, I think he has raised the ire of intelligent journalist.

They sooth their anger by writing negative op-eds about him or reporting his buffoonery on TV daily. It feeds his fire!

On the human side, I have compassion for Trump; he is suffering. Trump must struggle mentally every minute of the day. His mental health, his mind must be on the edge of disaster. Who would want to live in his fear filled, troubled, jealous, hateful head? 

If he had been born in another circumstance — in poverty, the middle class, or born black — he'd be just like us, another angry person who never got the affection, recognition and caring from a father, a father who suffered and didn't know any better himself.

He has power, that's our worry.

I didn’t think he would last; I didn't think he would win the Republican nomination; I didn't think he would win the presidency. I thought he would implode over some slight, maybe a critical tweet from Lady Gaga that would push him over the edge.

Said this every year, but...

The bottom line for me — I'll do something when it becomes appropriate; when he does something, an illegal act so outrageous that even his evangelical base can't deny (not a marginal Democrat, trumped-up past action), something blatant. I'll get active and do whatever I can to help get him out of office. 

I just hope it's not too late.

Ray Regan is a grandfather and writer living in Chester County, Pa.

This article is written by or on behalf of an outsourced columnist and does not necessarily reflect the views of Castanet.