Because many who voted for Donald Trump love our country and the ideals of freedom that made thirteen colonies revolt, I can’t help but try to articulate the danger Donald Trump poses to what we all love.

He sounded great on radio recently, smoothly mocking Democrats by complimenting them on creating the impeachment case “from nothing.” You’d never realize that the non-partisan General Accounting Office investigation had concluded that Trump’s Ukraine fiasco broke the law. Trump spoke persuasively of his “perfect” conversation with the Ukrainian President – although his own people immediately tried to hide the phone call’s summary to protect him. The call was part of a months-long effort to force Ukraine to announce a baseless “investigation” of Trump’s then-major political opponent. 

I admit I’ve never liked Trump. But even if a president stood for policies I liked, and values I embraced, I hope I’d reject him or her wholeheartedly if s/he were endangering our judiciary, our Separation of Powers, our Bill of Rights protections, and so much of our government, including the State Department and FBI. 

Trump says only lily-livered Democrats criticize him. But John Bolton, his hand-picked National Security Advisor, ridiculed the Ukraine episode as “that drug deal,” refused to participate, and says Trump is lying about it. General John Kelley, who provided adult supervision to the inexperienced Trump, says he believes Bolton.

The impeachment witnesses were respected, long-time diplomats (including highly-decorated war veteran Vindaman), plus Trump’s own Ambassador Sondland. Sondland contributed big bucks to get Trump into the White House.

U.S. Senator Mitt Romney was a Republican presidential candidate. And is deeply religious. He broke ranks and voted to impeach, on one count, explaining that Trump’s deeply repugnant conduct forced him to.

This week Trump sacked several witnesses, and threatened more. For testifying under oath before Congress. Probably truthfully, since contemporaneous documents supported their testimony and lying could have meant prison. Meanwhile Trump improperly denied investigators access to witnesses and documents.

Trump not only sacked folks for telling the truth, but interfered with the sentencing of his pal Roger Stone. Federal prosecutors recommended 7-9 years, Trump screamed, and the Department of Justice slunk back into court to suggest lighter sentences – as the four prosecutors resigned from the case. Even Nixon recognized that such conduct was completely wrong.

Trump does things U.S. leaders have never done. Things Putin, Stalin, Hitler, and Franco were infamous for. Things that directly contradict our rights as U.S. citizens.

We have freedom of speech. Our courts are independent of the Executive Branch. Most states prohibit sacking someone for whistle-blowing or trial testimony. Absent national security issues or disloyalty, we WANT people to speak out candidly, and testify truthfully. Dictators or corrupt city bosses interfere to get a crooked crony off, or misuse the law to punish people who criticize them. That ain’t the U.S. as our founders conceived it. John Peter Zenger must be barfing in his grave.

Attorney-General William Barr, once a principled conservative lawyer, has licked Trump’s boots throughout. Trump congratulated Barr for recommending a lighter sentence for Stone. Friday Barr announced that Trump’s improper and bullying tweets are making it impossible for Barr to do his job. 

I share the skepticism about established politicians. Much is wrong with our system. I too have wanted to throw a monkey wrench into the federal machinery. But now we all need to face the fact that Trump is a dangerous con man.

                                                            – 30 --

[The above column appeared this morning, Sunday, 16 February 2020, in the Las Cruces Sun-News, as well as on the newspaper's website and on KRWG's site.  A spoken version will air during the week on KRWG and on KTAL, 101.5 FM, Las Cruces Community Radio, and is also available on KRWG's website.]

[A friend who gently chides me for such things points out that to some degree Trump is not a departure from previous presidents but a somewhat grotesque exaggeration of faults many of them had in common.  He writes:

Your point is well taken:  Our current president is remarkably bold in his contempt for the rest of us.  Yet, he is just a brazen example of our history. . . . Trump is a total insult to honesty, decency and compassion.  He's only the latest in a long line of similar souls.  His predecessors just had better manners."

Certainly I didn't mean to say no president ever did more modest versions of what Trump does, or that none took some very wrong actions but were smart enough to avoid the prying eyes of journalists or reformers.  But my point is, that we mostly [with sad exceptions around the Palmer Raids, the 1932 Bonus Army, the post-WWII Red Scare, and the reaction to the civil rights / antiwar movement in my own time] have tried to respect our civil liberties and Bill of Rights.  Nixon was a smart lawyer who knew the rules, and though he secretly broke some, he would not have openly done what Trump does. My friend -- or Trump's friends -- might argue that there's something healthy and welcome about the very openness of Trump's lawbreaking.  He did try to hide the Ukraine extortion, but mostly he doesn't limit himself to quietly whispering to Barr that Roger Stone is a pal who was helping Trump's cause, he bleats like a stuck pig on Twitter and berates his enemies and those of his friends who let laws and civil liberties stand in the way of attacking those enemies.  That's not an unreasonable argument.  Yet when blatant intimidation of witnesses, manipulation of justice, and abuse of legal processes to punish those who speak out become accepted norms, I think maybe we lose something, even if the dictatorial process is less hypocritical.]