Dump Trump

Same old Trump, same old lies

Charlie: I watched all of Donald Trump’s performance (and it was a performance with him playing the role of Donald Trump) on the CNN Town Hall from New Hampshire and came away with the same first impression as all the commentators from CNN and elsewhere: This guy is older but not one iota wiser than he was in his first term as president, in which he played a lying cartoon character’s role. Then I had another thought much later in the evening. Trump is like an old man living in a special world of his own creation full of fawning admirers. It is a place where he can cast out whatever lies he chooses and draw the expected adoring response. The Roman Caesars had the coliseum, where they held public spectacles for the same purposes. We have TV and the internet for that now. I think what CNN delivered Wednesday was certainly mostly spectacle, especially for the peanut gallery of blind loyalists who attended the event. Trump was, of course, triumphant. He could tell by the cheers. He ignored the questions and used each one to launch into his diatribe about....whatever. But he should keep in mind the words of the servant dispatched to follow arrogant Roman generals celebrating their own victories. He would come close and against the roarof the adoring crowd, whisper, “Memento Mori.” (Remember! You must die!) Kind of brings you back to earth.  Trump will face a different world when he leaves the fold of fawning Republicans and marches into a general election campaign, where he may very well face his own political demise, and someone should keep whispering that in his ear. Jim, what did you take away from the event and what did it tell you about what’s to come?

photo by Katherine Auguste

Jim: You know, I think the pity of the whole performance is that there’s not really anything new for me to say. Same old Trump, same old lies. I’m bored with the bully. I think the competition between former President Trump and President Joe Biden speaks to a larger truth. We have two old men hanging on, fearful of what? Losing power? Their bulbs already are dimmer. If the CNN spectacle is any indication, the campaign now underway will just sap more of their energy. I can call them “old” because I am of their age. I feel just as wise and good as I did twenty years ago. But that doesn’t mean I should cling to the past to prove I can still win a race or dance until midnight. (I never could and never would.) One of the great things about age is the peace it brings, the wisdom that comes with learning from mistakes, the renewed appreciation for the wonder in a child’s eyes, the quiet thrill of coming up with the right word without any help from ChatGPT. Republicans and Democrats should push Trump and Biden aside while we still have time and give the country fresh faces. Joe Biden has accumulated much wisdom in his long and storied political career. I’d like him to give us more of his wisdom instead of another campaign. Trump? I suppose he’s learned a thing or two. As he proved on CNN the other night, though, he doesn’t show it. Charlie?

Charlie: I certainly can’t disagree. We need new faces and fresh ideas, particularly from the Democrats. I would not support Trump if you had a knife to my neck. He is as bad as he was when he left the White House, and the performance offers no sign that a personal reform is coming. The other problem is the Republicans. Let go of this awful man! He will drag you right down into a pit of his own strange fantasy, fractured foreign policy and domestic despair. He was a terrible president, and he did, indeed, lose the last election. The other question that is bothering me just now is one about media. Is this how CNN and the rest are going to cover the upcoming campaign? Saying a candidate has too many lies to fact check is a cop out. Add more fact checkers! Don’t give candidates a chance to manipulate interviews. And push them hard on where they stand on central issues, war in Ukraine being the biggest one at this stage. If you are not clear about who is right or wrong in that conflict, don’t bother to show up. Finally, if we don’t find some way to control fools and crazy people with firearms, we might as well just set up a “Department of Hopes and Prayers” to reflect the fact we have just given in to murderous violence as part of daily life. Jim?

Jim: I fear we are in for a repeat of the last election. National media organizations embrace horse race coverage of Trump and Biden because it gives them clicks and numbers — pixie dust on their digital footprints. Saturating the airwaves with who’s up and who’s down coverage turns me off. The political media treats voters as an afterthought. I think you can trace the lack of trust voters express towards politics and the media to the kind of coverage that ignores their voices. I’d love to see far more reporting on voters. They are the ones who really count in an election. They’re more important than the candidates, particularly if we’re looking at a race between two old men repeating stale promises crafted by campaign consultants obsessed with telling America what they think voters want to hear. I know my appeal to have Trump and Biden stand down is not realistic. Both candidates are too selfish. We still have a long way to go, though, and perhaps some of those fresh faces will jump into the fray.

Charlie:  It’s so frustrating to realize that all media seems able to do is gin up another version of what happened last time. If we need new candidates in both parties, I think we need new media, too. Or at least a media that comes at these contests from a different direction. We have the technology to do that, but not the guts. If I were running the world, I would pick 50 choice areas around the nation, staff them with 50 vetted volunteers, and focus just on what people think in those areas. I would not allow people to be predictive. I would just want my people to be taking temperatures all the time. They would file them into a mapped website so people could click their hearts out whenever they want. Humans talking all the time. I would send my reporters, unannounced, to the most interesting spots to talk to people about what they are saying. And why they are saying it. If we keep on doing the same old thing and expect a different result, then that’s proof that we all have an undiagnosed mental problem we need to address.

—James O’Shea and Charles Madigan

James O’Shea is a longtime Chicago author and journalist who now lives in North Carolina. He is the author of several books and is the former editor of the Los Angeles Times and managing editor of the Chicago Tribune.

Charles Madigan is a writer and veteran foreign and national correspondent for UPI and the Chicago Tribune, where he also served as a senior writer and editor. He examines news reporting, politics and world events.