Trump was mocked ruthlessly by Obama et al. at the 2011 White House Correspondents’ Dinner.
He was corrupt for decades through the 80s and 90s and eventually grew into a dependency on money from Russian oligarchs. They laundered and he ameliorated debts he accrued from exceedingly poor business decisions and kiting loans and generally robbing Peter.
He joined the bloated collection of Republican contestants in the 2016 presidential election with gross absurdity: gliding down an escalator in a gauche-looking hotel lobby in front of a crowd paid for their attendance (to be repeated many times later). John Oliver notably and–regrettably–mocked him and his chances as did everyone. Craven and slightly un-craven presidential-hungry politicians were skewered by him with base taunts. The constituency groomed by Fox News and trash AM Limbaugh decades before in an attempt to destroy liberal policies arose to destroy the ugly conservatives that benefitted, until they didn’t. The golem ate its creators.
Hillary was too much of a policy wonk, too much of a Democrat, and too much of a Clinton.
The results were no less gauche and maybe we deserved it but no we really didn’t I don’t think or at least hope we didn’t. He started his iconoclastic retribution towards Obama childishly enough with a boast (eventually doubled- and tripled-down with cringe-inducing ferocity by his first-of-many press secretaries) that his inauguration crowd was larger than Obama’s. More grave attacks on the previous president’s accomplishments followed. Obamacare, the Iran nuclear deal, the TPP, NAFTA, the Paris Climate Accord, and any number of greater or lesser thorns. For Trump, the bad became the enemy of the good.
Hungry for vengeance against immigrants, Trump attacked Muslims with the protracted attempt at an emergency, short-term travel ban (eventually implemented in part and months after the original request was to expire), a horrific caging of children at the southern border that only grows more horrific, and an attempt to strip citizenship from foreign-born citizens. This all started with a dream of a wall.
In Helsinki, he stated that he trusted Putin over the US intelligence agencies. In front of Putin. In front of a disbelieving world.
Alliances with Europe and Canada were destroyed as new ones were formed with North Korea and Russia.
During the Obama administration, Republicans petulantly held up a Supreme Court nomination, along and with equal importance, many federal judgeship positions. Under Trump the SC position and federal positions have been quickly filled; many of those federal positions filled by the grossly inexperienced. To extend for decades.
Supreme Court Justice Kennedy retired.
The fight for his replacement started from a list provided by the Federalist Society. Going off script, Trump chose a judge who would allow a president to pardon himself, who would eliminate separation of state-level prosecutions when federal pardons are granted, and who–after being investigated for sexual assault in college–declared that the investigation was a product of, though not exclusively, a Clinton conspiracy. His accuser acted with more judicial propriety than him.
The women fought against the nomination and were both inspiring and heart-breaking, echoing the bravery of Christine Blasey Ford’s testimony.
I’m not sure where we go from here, but Sarah Kendzior has said from the start that it will get much, much worse. So probably further down.
