Wednesday, June 29, 2016

"If Trump Lost, Would He Concede?"-New York Times

HA! EXCELLENT QUESTION!

He gave a gracious concession speech in Iowa, and then took it back, lol, accusing Ted Cruz of some Canadian chicanery. Did he concede in the other states he lost? Or just "move on"? I don't remember.

The worst word in Trump's limited vocabulary is "loser." He lives in a bit of a literal and figurative fantasy world and has such an outsized and unwarranted ego it will be hard for him to self-label.

The hallmark of mature democratic societies is the willing transfer of power and Trump is neither mature nor does he believe in democracy. He is like his homeboy Putin! Conversely, in banana republics like Russia and Florida there is a history of never conceding. Trump can be a gracious winner (sometimes not) but he is a "sore loser."

Trump lies, to himself and more so to voters but that very "liar-ness" means he knows the truth; he is a "bottom-line" guy who sees truth in numbers: money, polls, votes cast. Unless the general election is Bush v Gore or Nixon v Kennedy close, he's going to believe those numbers.

Trump congratulates himself on the showing he has made. And by God, he deserves his self-congratulations. Even if he gets slaughtered in November he will always have the spring and summer of '16.

Trump has said that he ran for president because he didn't want to be "laughed at" anymore, he wanted to be "taken seriously" as a political figure. This is what fellow-racist, fellow-protectionist, fellow-nationalist Nigel Farage said to the European Parliament the other day:

"When I came here 17 years ago and I said that I wanted to lead a campaign to get Britain to leave the European Union, you all laughed at me.

"Well, I have to say, you're not laughing now, are you?"


No!

This is what Trump said right before the New Hampshire primary:

“A lot of people have laughed at me over the years. Now, they’re not laughing so much.”

No!

Being "laughed at" is synonymous with not being "taken seriously," but it is not precisely reversible. That is: not being laughed at does not equate to being "taken seriously." You can be: ignored; you can be held in contempt by others; hated; feared. Very few "laugh at" Donald Trump anymore, that is true-but he is not "taken seriously" as "presidential timber." Few ever looked at Donald Trump and thought, "That's a president right there." He has embarrassed himself, his (current) political party, his country. Sometimes you laugh at someone who is embarrassing himself like Trump is, sometimes you don't, you turn away, it's mortifying  to look at. You don't laugh. You "take seriously" the embarrassment the person is causing to all, the damage he has caused, real and potential.

Trump, and this is my bet, will concede when he loses in November (if the result is incontestable) because he will not consider himself a "loser." In his mind, in everybody's, he got too many votes to be "laughed at." He won't realize until after the election that he did not achieve the other near-synonymous goal of being "taken seriously." He will come to realize that when he is shunned.