THE TRUMP PHENOMENON

TRUMP THE GENUINE ARTICLE

Everyone is talking about "The Donald". My eldest daughter, a high school teacher, who normally votes Democratic, admitted that she can't stop reading about or listening to Donald Trump interviews. "He's so entertaining and different. I can't help myself", she admitted to me the other day.

I admit to the same effects. Or is this effect some kind of "Donald" hypnotism?

What is this "Donald" paralysis that has raged across the country since August 6th? My first thought was that the reason we are so interested in Mr. Trump is that he stands way above the Republican slate of 2016 candidates. This 2016 group arrived on the scene perhaps aith expectations set too high. These candidates were touted prior to the first debate by the pundits as "the best, the smartest, most experienced field of candidates in a long time" Really? Perhaps that impression may have stood until the candidates hit the Fox News stage on August 6th. After that, their supposed "smarts", wit, charm, and plain attractiveness turned out to be simply Fox News hype. None of the candidates came up to xpectations. All their, foibles, "bumples", ignorance, and awkwardness was on display for the Nation, with one exception--Donald Trump.

Let's take a quick tour of the Republican field of candidates. The GOP has offered up a group which simply do not measure up to "presidential" stature. Among them are two freshly elected, wild-eyed Senators who will shut down the government at the drop of a pin. Another is a verified snake oil salesman from Arkansas. There is a nice Afro-American, retired surgeon, a non-politician, with a book to sell. (This latter candidate-category..the black non-political candidate..has become almost a cottage industry for Afro-Americans and is now a traditional offering of the lilly white GOP). For the female voters, the GOP is offering a past woman Fortune 500 CEO ( released by the Board for poor business judgment with a $40 million dollar golden parachute! ) This woman candidate is also bereft of experience in elected office (her only connection with politics being a Senate candidacy rejected by the voters). The GOP is also presenting several governors who have run their states into voter despair and red ink by legislating as right-wing ideologues, just to prepare themselves for these very Tea Party dominated primaries. Also running is another Bush. One would be correct to think that the nation (as well as Momma Bush) was tired of having this family name on the White House entrance door. This Bush, eschews his surname and calls himself "JEB"....for perfectly good and obvious reasons. JEB seems to be running for this office because his Pappy said he had to do it. Although he is supposed to be the "Good Bush" and was early on being preened for the Presidency, but before he could act on his father's wishes his older brother "W" sneakily slipped in ahead of him and won the 2000 nomination. "W" couldn't quite seal up the 2000 election coming up short a few electoral college votes. So JEB as Governor of Florida had to do some arm twisting on the Florida election board to actually get "W" into the big leather chair in the Oval Office.A seat JEB thought he deserved. (History has proved he was probably correct on this score. His brother managed to make an awful mess in his years in office...under the tutelage of the evil wizard Cheney) Though JEB is supposed to have been the "smart one"--he can actually converse in Spanish---he, like all the other GOP field, seems not to quite match up with his published CV. In public, he has sadly demonstrated a tendency to stumble with syntax and sound more like "W" than expected. That is, though he is claimed to be the "smart one" all of this is family-relative and compared to the average non Bush guy, he does not seem to be so sharp. As a result of these failings his cowboy-booted foot seems to be found lodged in his mouth much too frequently. Perhaps unlike his brother, he has enough self-awareness to affect his demeanor which tends, during his stump speeches, to recall the unpleasant look of a scared deer in headlights.

Then, we have the entertaining New Yorker, multibillionaire, realtor, successful businessman, entrepreneur, TV personality, and performer Donald Trump who, right now, far and away leads the pack in the opinion polls by three to four hundred percent. My first explanation of "the Donald's" popularity was that in comparison to the weak and inexperienced candidate field the American people rated Mr.Trump as top tier. In that dull group the flashy, brash, "the Donald" stood out. But with his continued phenomenal successes in the public opinion polls in Iowa and New Hampshire, and even nationally, Trump seems to be truly popular with the GOP electorate. There must be some other reason other than lackluster competition.

What is his attraction? Perhaps it is just the fact that Trump is authentic, and sincere in his patriotism and says what he actually thinks. One may not agree with his pronouncements but at least they are his own. He is not a weaselly politician. Since he is self-financed, he can say what he thinks and is confident, well informed and unafraid to state his opinions. He is forthright. He is decidedly NOT a Pinncchio, operated with strings by an unseen Gippeto. He does not have the slim smooth hand of a Koch brother stuck up his backside working his mouth. He has not been bought and sold. He is not reading a political script presented to him with his "donation" check. He does not have to run back to his donors to ask if "that was OK to say?" (unlike Scott Walker who actually had to return several times to his donor base to find out what was in his acceptable script). Walker in one instance, had to confirm with his Koch Brother handlers that he could agree with Donald Trump's idea of building a wall across the Mexican border. They must have said he could agree with Trump. But warned him that he was acting too much like a wimp and his funding might be withdrawn if he didn't "man up" to Trump.. Walker came back intending to out Trump Trump. His idea? build a 5000 mile wall along the Canadian border to match the one along the Mexican side! Walker seems to be taking lessons from his Likud mentors on this matter.

Trump on the other hand is his own man. He makes his own decisions. Why does that set him so far apart from the others? Because the American political system has been highjacked by the rich and wealthy. The New York Times reports that there are as few as "400 families" who have donated more than half of the candidate"s cash. These families can control the candidates, they control the agenda, and they are attempting to control the elections. They buy up the candidates, who then are propped up before the public to repeat the words the donors provide them with.

So Trump's popularity may be simply the fact that the American public likes the "genuine article". Trump is what he says he is. His candidacy is refreshingly open and transparent. That can not be said about the others who in order to remain viable must deal with an often secret donor base. Perhaps the American GOP voter has wisely decided that it is wiser to support an actual person, rather than the cardboard representative with mechanical moving mouth parts. That concept of freedom and honesty is very attractive to the American GOP voter and I suspect it is also attractive to others who may not always vote Republican. The Donald may become a true political phenomenon.