The other day, when canvassing for Democrats in CA-13, we were confronted with a voter who said he intended to vote for Trump. His reason? “Trump is a good businessman and the economy was better when he was President.”
Whoa! You hear this sort of rationale a lot from Republicans — and even some “undecideds.” So it’s worth taking a closer look at it.
As for the economy, this has been debated endlessly in the media. Wage growth has exceeded inflation over the past few years — and unemployment is way down — and on and on. On paper, the economy is not worse now than it was four years ago. Quite the contrary; it is in excellent shape! Furthermore, most economists predict that Trump’s economic plan (such as it is) will almost certainly lead to a far worse financial future than anything Harris is proposing. But these arguments continue to fall flat and haven’t put much of a dent in many voters’ perceptions — especially when these voters stare at the higher prices of almost everything today, the result of several years of high inflation. So let’s reluctantly call this a draw.
Still, if we are really talking about how things were four years ago, it’s worth pointing out that we were in the middle of a pandemic four years ago — a crisis where thousands of people died unnecessarily because of Trump’s staggeringly poor management — including his recommendation that people inject bleach in their veins. And the economy was pretty much in shatters when he left office — which significantly contributed to why Trump lost in 2020. Somehow, all of this gets conveniently pushed aside by those voters who now give Trump a higher favorability rating than he achieved when he was actually President! <sigh>
But enough. Let’s move on from the state of the economy — to the assertion that Trump is a “good businessman.”
We are talking about someone has declared bankruptcy at least 6 times over his career — a sign of incompetence more than acumen. But Trump is not only incompetent, he is a deliberate fraud. Trump cheated with his so-called charitable foundation — eventually fined $2 million for misusing its funds to “further his political and business interests.” Trump University, another Trump grift, was shuttered years ago — after being ordered to pay a $25 million fine for conning its students into enrolling in a “sham university.” In 2022, Trump’s company was found guilty of a criminal tax fraud scheme that began years ago and lasted into his presidency. Most recently, Trump was found guilty of a massive financial fraud in New York State — and ordered to pay almost a half billion dollars in fines and interest.
This is the person that Trump supporters tout as a “good businessman”? The only way to square that circle is if his supporters choose to remain ignorant of the facts — and would rather believe Trump’s self-serving hype and lies.
But what about the future? How might this “businessman” perform if he gets to return to the White House? Not well. As quoted in a massive New York Times article, 91 people who represent Trump’s “family and friends, world leaders and business associates, his fellow conservatives and his political appointees” — many of whom worked with him in the White House — have been harshly critical of his intellect and competence — and describe him as unfit to serve as President. These are people who know him well and were supportive of him at one point; they are not his political opposition.
On top of all that, Trump has been convicted of 34 felony counts of election interference — related to covering up payments to a porn star. Trump is literally a crook. Trump has also been indicted for a criminal attempt to overthrow the 2020 presidential election and for inciting the January 6th insurrection at the Capital.
Finally, let’s take a brief look at Trump’s character. In his speeches, he talks like a playground bully — hurling childish insults on a daily basis. Most recently, he called the Democratic nominee for President, Kamala Harris, a “retard.” He spews harmful lies just as frequently — such as his completely false claims about the White House’s response to the recent hurricanes. In one instance, Trump claimed that Biden had not yet spoken the Governor of Georgia — just minutes after the Governor had gone on television to say he had spoken to Biden and they had had a very positive conversation. Trump also uses lies to promote his racist and xenophobic agenda, such as his absurd assertion that immigrants are eating their neighbors’ pets. Oh, one more thing: Trump has been held liable for the sexual assault (essentially rape) of E. Jean Carroll.
A “businessman” with all of this on their resume would never get hired as the CEO of any major corporation in this country. He wouldn’t even get as far as an interview. Trump is a “good businessman” only in the same sense that Al Capone was. Yet there are voters who seem ready to hire Trump as the CEO of the entire country — enough such voters so that Trump remains in a close race to be the next President of the United States!
Somebody please explain all of this to me. How does any citizen sweep all of this under the rug and conclude that Trump is worthy of their vote? How does any of this make sense? And why do Democrats apparently have such difficulty in getting this message across? How is this race even close? I will never understand it. I can only hope that, by the time the votes are counted, we see that enough citizens understood the dire threat that Trump represents so that he goes down in defeat.
Update: I just viewed last night’s opening segment of The Rachel Maddow Show. Coincidentally, it covers a lot of the same territory. Definitely worth watching!