‘So now that American bombers have dropped special bombs on Iran, I am holding my breath (as I am sure millions more all over the world are doing just as well) because who knows what will happen next?’
ONE week ago, I wrote in this space that the world is in intensive care on three fronts: in the economic/financial front; in the environmental front; and the political front. I highlighted the fact that for the last front, the character of Donald Trump adds to the volatility of the situation. He doesn’t rub me as a calm and collected chap who values listening to a wide variety of advice and then takes time to ponder his next move.
By the looks of it, the only advice Trump likes to listen to is those in concert with his own opinion on the matter at hand; contradictory opinion is dismissed, and are dangerous to express in the first place. And this assessment of mine isn’t some from the world out of Trump’s mouth himself.
“No one knows (insert subject matter here) better than me,” Trump loves to say.
And all those who wish to remain in his good graces respond with “Amen.”
This is a problem with any leader of any organization, big or small, civic or corporate or government. It’s an even bigger problem when you’re talking about the leader of the most powerful country on earth today, military-wise. And the already huge regime becomes an impossible one when that lesser is an egotistic idiot, as Trump is.
Maybe calling him an idiot is too much. How can Trump be an idiot when he remains able to capture the imagination of a large swath of the American electorate even after 1) going bankrupt running a casino; 2) going bankrupt running a university; 3) going bankrupt running an airline; 4) going bankrupt selling steaks; 5) getting indicted more than 30 times; 6) being barred from doing business in the State of New York; 7) having his charitable foundation penalized for misappropriating funds for sick children; and 8) getting away with cheating on his first wife and then cheating on his second wife and then cheating on his third wife while paying off a porn stat?
To be able to pull all those off, and still get elected president twice, Trump cannot be an idiot. It’s the electorate that’s shown itself to be the idiot, not Trump. But egotistical, no question. As most presidents have been to different degrees anyway.
Except that with Trump, it’s always to an extreme.
And because you have a Trump and not a Kennedy (POTUS#35, a womanizer as well though far more refined) at the helm and with his finger on the nuclear button, the world is in a far more dangerous place today than it was during the Cuban missile crisis of nearly 63 years ago. That was when we came ever so close to a nuclear confrontation between the USSR (now mainly Russia) and the then USA (now the USA-SSR).
It is in far more danger because all foreign leaders need to do is brown nose Trump, and he is like putty in their hands. That’s how Russia’s Putin has kept Trump off the side of Ukraine and how Israel’s Netanyahu has Trump solidly in his camp — in both instances against all other advice.
So now that American bombers have dropped special bombs on Iran, I am holding my breath (as I am sure millions more all over the world are doing just as well) because who knows what will happen next? Iran isn’t the most popular kid on the bloc, to be honest, and it has alienated, if not offended, many of its neighbors since the Shah was ousted 50 or so years ago. But neither is the United States the most popular big power among citizens of the Islamic world, and they could react in many ways against America for its actions against Iran.
Add to this the feelings of many Muslim Americans who passionately threw their support behind Trump in the last elections because they saw him as the “peacemaker.” Where are the “Arab-Americans for Trump” now?
Holding their collective breath as well?
