General Discussion
Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsDan Rather pens the most accurate and powerful indictment of Trump's lack of empathy to date.
I have covered many presidents and many wars. Some of these wars were just and others not. All wars are bloody and full of pain, but some of the conflicts were mismanaged, leading to thousands of unnecessary deaths. Despite all of this, I do not know of any president who did not at his core feel the solemn burden of young Americans dying in service to country. But now we have a Commander in Chief who many feel does not understand this most basic human empathy.
President Donald Trump's assertions - more accurately his lies - about whether or not his predecessors, particularly President Obama, called or wrote to the families of the fallen has rightly been broadly condemned for its mendacity and insincerity. It should not be surprising coming from a man who mocked a war hero, John McCain, and attacked a gold star family, the parents of slain United States Army Captain Humayun Khan.
I cannot see into President Trump's heart. Nor can I measure his motives. But we can see that one of the most solemn roles of the office of the presidency has once again been subjected to his instinct for bombast, obfuscation, and self-congratulatory denialism.
Rather than focus on the words of the present I choose to pay homage to those who have died in America's wars by sharing a poem by the Pulitzer prize winning poet Archibald MacLeish who saw service in World War I.
The young dead soldiers do not speak.
Nevertheless, they are heard in the still houses:
who has not heard them?
They have a silence that speaks for them at night
and when the clock counts.
They say: We were young. We have died.
Remember us.
They say: We have done what we could
but until it is finished it is not done.
They say: We have given our lives but until it is finished
no one can know what our lives gave.
They say: Our deaths are not ours: they are yours,
they will mean what you make them.
They say: Whether our lives and our deaths were for
peace and a new hope or for nothing we cannot say,
it is you who must say this.
We leave you our deaths. Give them their meaning.
We were young, they say. We have died; remember us.
smirkymonkey
(63,221 posts)extvbroadcaster
(343 posts)The orange anus has a number of personality disorders. These of course make him unable to care about anybody unless they are buying one of his shitty condos. And even then he only cares until the check clears. He's unfit for office, and needs to be removed as soon as possible. Pence is terrible too, but at least he won't go pushing the nuke button because some sawed off runt in North Korea made him mad. Trump is a joke and it still amazes me he got elected. All those dopes that wanted their jobs back in the coal mine. Thanks, assholes!
no_hypocrisy
(46,121 posts)He is a nihilist.
Nihilism: A doctrine or belief that conditions in the social organization are so bad as to make destruction desirable for its own sake independent of any constructive program or possibility
For someone who's made a living building, he is amazingly destructive as a personality.
Example: Yesterday, he announced that "Obamacare" no longer existed. Gone. He did it.
KT2000
(20,583 posts)will not burden tRump and that is frightening. He truly does believe we are all here to serve and worship his spontaneous desires.
Initech
(100,080 posts)Nearly all of his tweets mirror what he watches on Fox News that day. He tweets and retweets Fox News people directly. He watches that damn network so much that you can hear 1-800 Empire commercials in the background on Air Force One. He really does think he's only president to people who watch Fox News. Someone really needs to take that away from him and make him do his job! Fox News is the 800 pound gorilla in the room in the White House.
evil old bastard Rupert Murdoch and dump speak regularly over the phone. Plotting no doubt how to keep fooling the morans and hand even more power to the oligarchy.
[link:http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/donald-trump-rupert-murdoch-phone-to-discuss-strategy-a7699601.html|]
gratuitous
(82,849 posts)You don't really need to see into President Trump's heart or measure his motives. Trump's actions shout what is in his heart and mind. Giving him the benefit of the doubt is an insult to the intellect and robs Trump of his due.
ffr
(22,670 posts)In fact, they're cheering right now for deaths in Puerto Rico and California. Guess why! They're blue.
That's pure cold-hearted vindictiveness.
Hekate
(90,714 posts)cwydro
(51,308 posts)Their words are heart wrenching.
leanforward
(1,076 posts)I've never read the poem of Archibald MacLeish. It went to the heart.
I have never cared for the guy in the white house. For me the door was slammed when he took on John McCain, last year.
As a teen my family was visited by a Company Commander and a Chaplin. You never forget.
Now, the guy in the white house can't keep his mouth shut. To me he would have coughed all night at the ambush point site.
He should have kept his mouth shut.
My purpose here is to honor those who have made the ultimate sacrifice. I usually say a few more at this point, but chose to say you will be remembered.