A Washington Post story reminds us that President Trump isn't very good at his job:
President Trump proclaimed in a freewheeling speech to a conference of conservatives last weekend that “America is winning again.” But his administration has been on a pronounced losing streak over the past week.
... Late last week, Trump flew home empty-handed from a summit with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un in Hanoi — and, within days, new satellite images appeared to show that the North was secretly rebuilding a rocket-launching site.
On Tuesday, the Department of Homeland Security announced that unauthorized border crossings have spiked to the highest pace in 12 years — despite Trump’s hard-line rhetoric and new policies aimed at deterring migrants.
And on Wednesday, the Commerce Department said that the nation’s trade deficit is at a record high — in part due to punitive tariffs Trump imposed on allies and adversaries. Trump vowed throughout his 2016 campaign and during his presidency to shrink the trade deficit....
Also, the federal budget deficit is up 77% this year. There's no infrastructure plan. There's no Trump health care plan that will magically cover everyone at much lower cost, as Trump promised. Opioid deaths are still high.
Trump opponents in Congress pursue evidence that he's a criminal and a pro-Russian fifth columnist. Commentators and online snarkers note that Trump is lazy and addicted to TV and golf. Democrats on the campaign trail downplay Trump, talking instead about the agendas they'd like to enact.
All that is appropriate -- but as a result, there's very little discussion of whether Trump is succeeding on his own terms. No, wait, that's not accurate -- conservatives regularly proclaim that Trump is winning spectacularly in everything he attempts. That message isn't being effectively rebutted by the left and center, which would rather talk about Russian collusion and Stormy Daniels payouts.
Many Democrats who want to win back the states of Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin are focused on whether the party should nominate a moderate, a male, a white person. They're concerned with rebuking Ilhan Omar and shushing Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.
Maybe they should try pointing out -- to the white heartlanders who tell pollsters they "somewhat support" Trump rather than "strongly support him," or the ones who warily voted for him in 2016 and are now on the fence -- that Trump is not doing what they were rooting for him to do if elected. He's breaking promise after promise. We keep saying that Trump is a larger-than-life grotesque monster. Maybe we should be saying he's simply a lousy president.
Our portrayal of Trump as an outsize villain elevates him. Saying he just plain sucks at his job would bring him down to size.
Crossposted at No More Mr. Nice Blog
