The Trump administration is continually roiled with controversy, lies, and broken promises, yet his approval rating remains high among Republicans. How high is that support? Well, 90 percent, according to a recent Gallup poll. No matter what happens, his supporters cheer him on.
It makes you wonder what the hell is wrong with these people.
Friday in his column, The Washington Post’s Eugene Robinson came up with the answer, and he also suggested a new slogan for the Trump campaign:
“Promises made, promises not kept, but I’m betting my voters are too stupid to notice.”
Robinson details all of Trump’s broken promises, starting right off with his promise to make Mexico pay for his controversial border wall”
“Trump promised to build a border wall along the 2,000-mile southern border, with the cost of the ‘big, beautiful’ barrier to be borne by Mexico,” Robinson writes. “Trump made this pledge dozens of times in a call-and-response ritual at his campaign rallies. ‘Who’s going to pay for the wall?’ he would demand, and the cheering crowds would yell the answer: ‘Mexico!'”
That promise was quickly shut down by Mexican officials who made it clear that not one peso would be used to build that wall. And when Trump subsequently asked Congress to fund the wall, he was shut down (pun intended) quickly. Even though Republicans ruled the congressional roost for two years. Then he declared a national emergency to try to pilfer funds from other projects, and that’s gone nowhere fast.
But that’s not the only thing, Raw Story reports. Trump clearly has a poor understanding of how the global economy works, Robinson writes. The president promised to reverse trade policies that he said “allowed the rest of the world to play Americans for suckers.” Trump talked at one point about the U.S. balance-of-trade deficit as a yardstick that measured the “stupidity” of previous administrations for allowing trading partners like China, Mexico, Germany, and Canada to treat the U.S. like a doormat.
Then he launched a series of trade wars, saying this would solve the problem.
“I love tariffs,” Trump said with his usual bombast.
So then what happened?
Well, this announcement Wednesday from the Commerce Department is what happened: The overall U.S. trade deficit in goods reached an all-time high of $891 billion, Robinson writes.
“The deficit with China, Trump’s principal target — the amount by which the value of imported goods exceeded the amount of exported goods — reached a record of $419 billion.”
Robinson added that economists view this as a sign that the U.S. economy is doing reasonably well:
“But according to Trump’s understanding, or misunderstanding, it is an abject failure,” he writes.
Trump has also dropped the ball on his promises to overhaul The Affordable Care Act, the nation’s infrastructure, and his efforts at diplomacy with North Korea are dead in the water. And his promise to “drain the swamp” in Washington has not transpired.
The result?
“Perhaps the most corrupt administration in U.S. history, riddled with nepotism and teeming with swamp creatures,” Robinson writes.
Sure, a scant few of Trump’s promises stuck, but most sank like a stone.
“Trump did fulfill some promises he made to far-right ideologues (appointing archconservative judges) and the ultra-rich friends he sups with at Mar-a-Lago (cutting taxes for the wealthy). Overall though,” Robinson notes, “his administration has been a great big failure.”
He can’t help but wonder why Trump’s supporters are so doggedly faithful.
“He apparently believes his loyal supporters are the dumbest, most gullible people on earth. We shall see if he’s right.”
Unfortunately, this is probably one of the few things Trump does get right.
And this video more or less supports that idea.
Featured image license CC SA 2.0 by Gage Skidmore via Flickr
