The night that Trump became our president
The Trump White House needed just a month to define itself as an instrument of designed chaos and smash-mouth politics. It threw sharp elbows at “so-called” federal judges. Kicked the mainstream media in the teeth. Told the U.S. Intelligence Community it’s acting like Nazis. And fired a salvo across the Atlantic at allies who now wonder whether NATO can dependably defend Western Europe.
On Tuesday, Donald Trump described how all that erratic distemper translates to policy, putting forth a plan to project American strength abroad and at home. “Our obligation is to serve, protect and defend the citizens of the United States,” Trump said with a chin held high. “America must put its own citizens first. Because only then can we truly make America great again.”
To set the country on that course, White House officials proposed earlier in the day to strengthen our military with a 10 percent or $54 billion increase in defense spending. That is a weighty hike, but well within historic norms, writes Sean O’Keefe, a senior policy analyst with the Bipartisan Policy Center’s national security program.
The so-called “America First” budget would also project authority on the home-front with greater support for the nation’s law enforcement agencies, the White House revealed on Tuesday.
The problem Trump faces is that he proposes to finance his surge in force projection with huge cuts in discretionary spending, substantial carve-outs from the agencies that provide social services to the American people and conduct diplomacy with friendly and hostile nations.
“The Trump budget,” said former George W. Bush speechwriter Michael Gerson “is the GOP stereotype on steroids. Take from the poor to give to the military. Trump will be defending a budget, as far as I can tell, [that] is unrealistic, cruel and obscene.”
But Republican lawmakers were on their feet virtually the entire speech, feeding off Trump’s confidence and celebrating the new opening to advance conservative initiatives.
Trump once again promised to protect American corporations, to free them from “job crushing regulation” and to “restart the engine of the American economy.” He vowed to stoke that engine by repealing and replacing Obamacare.
But none of this was the high point of Trump’s speech. For a man who spent his first month brawling with reporters and judges, Trump showed a softer side in his first speech to Congress, particularly when he honored Navy SEAL William "Ryan" Owens, 36, who died in a commando raid in Yemen.
Throughout the night, Trump took enormous pleasure introducing Americans in the audience who had endured tragedy or performed heroic acts. He expressed a decency that was missing in so much of the demagougery of the campaign trail.
Earlier in the day, the Trump administration signaled it was also tempering its hardline on immigration and plans to put forth compromise legislation that will work to achieve comprehensive reform; protect “Dreamers,” the young people brought to this country illegally as children; and to provide legal status for the undocumented who have not committed serious crimes.
This was Trump’s best day in the White House, because for the first time he expressed a desire to unify the country without baiting his speech with insults for his opponents.
It was a speech that expressed a modicum of decency that has been so lacking in a “movement” driven by anger and fear. Trump is an erratic figure, so he is unlikely to sustain the high notes he struck Tuesday night. But he would do well to learn from this performance and understand that only through such gestures will he ever help the country heal from one of the most divisive presidential elections in its history.
This was the speech he should have given Jan. 20 at his inaugural rather than the “American carnage” address he delivered on the Capitol’s West Front. That man looked small and petulant. This man looked presidential.