Will Trump ever learn that his words matter?
For Donald J. Trump to have anything remotely resembling a successful presidency, he has to learn that words matter when they are uttered and written by the president of the United States.
His injudicious use of words during his campaign and presidency are too numerous to count. He has used them to bully, threaten and taunt. His grandiose, indiscriminate, intemperate and unfiltered choice of words has defined his presidency. To some it shows he is different. But different is not necessarily better.
Instead of demonstrating leadership skills, Trump’s words project the image of a clownish buffoon who can’t get out of his own way.
The latest case in point is his profound bungling of his response to last week’s tragic events in Charlottesville, Virginia. A demonstration by alt-right sympathizers and neo-Nazi groups chanting racist slogans was met with a counter- demonstration. The confrontation turned violent, and eventually an alt-right sympathizer drove a car into a group of the counter-protesters, killing one young woman and injured many others.
Trump’s initial words were tepid at best. He also avoided calling out the white supremacists and Nazis. The reaction to his word choices, even from his own party, was overwhelmingly critical. And some members of his vaunted business advisory councils resigned.
Trump chose to deride those CEOs for leaving, saying they weren’t taking the job seriously and bashing their industries.
Two days later, after a planned statement on the economy, he read a statement that denounced and condemned Nazis, the Ku Klux Klan, racism and violence in general “in the strongest of terms.”
This might have signaled a welcome reversal. But a day later he revised the narrative again, this time placing equal culpability on those who were on the dead woman’s side of the confrontation.
That did it. Many of the CEOs who had remained on the councils repudiated his comments about the violence and resigned. The exodus was so great that Trump was forced to shut down the councils.
Mind you, these councils were the crown jewels of the Trump administration. They were to be the gathering of the great corporate minds to help him solve all of the nation’s economic problems, including how to bring manufacturing back to America, a major campaign promise. Poof, gone.
We would like to think a mass defection by so many industry leaders, usually stalwarts of Republican administrations, might make Trump realize his words matter when they come from the president of the United States. It appears unlikely. He disbanded the advisory groups formed to give him legitimacy, and went back to tweeting.
The latest case in point is Trump’s profound bungling of his response to last week’s tragic events in Charlottesville, Virgina. His initial words were tepid at best, and the reaction to his word choices, even from his own party, was overwhelmingly critical.