Want to change Trump’s mind? Lay off the insults
CONDEMNATION of Donald Trump and his policies reached its zenith last week when former president Mary Robinson added her prestigious anger to the seething cauldron of national indignation. Other politicians also chastised the US President: first the Taoiseach and then the Tánaiste, then on to the Dáil’s most shrill and competitive backbenchers.
A rift in Cabinet between independent ministers Shane Ross and Finian McGrath emerged over the depth of disdain the Taoiseach should convey to the White House.
Some want the Taoiseach to snub his St Patrick’s Day invitation and close down the US pre-travel immigration clearance facilities in Ireland – self-harming responses that can only hurt the national interest.
Calling him names is unlikely to help change an opponent’s mind, particularly if he is the narcissistic president of the world’s most powerful nation. And the more they ratchet up the volume of their insults, the more virtuous the Trump critics appear in the echo chamber of social media. But their showboating anger will do nothing to change Trump’s policies.
Irish critics of President Trump say they share their anger and indignation with the US Democrats who Trump demolished in the election.
Some Democrats want to set up a ‘Herbal Tea Party’ to resist the new president at every turn in Congress, a mirror of the Republican Tea Party that obstructed President Barack Obama.
Others chanted, ‘Can’t Build A Wall, Hands Too Small,’ or confronted his supporters wearing ‘Trump Has A Tiny Penis’ lapel badges.
Texas Democrat Beto O’Rourke from El Paso is planning to run against Republican senator Ted Cruz in 2018 and warns against Tea Party-style obstruction: ‘Democrats want government to work,’ he says.
He is also against making bad jokes – ‘to mock the office is to show disrespect for his [Trump’s] voters,’ says O’Rourke.
He cites Texan friends who agree that Trump is a ‘bad guy’ but still voted for him because he said what he was planning to do – build a wall and bring back factory jobs. They said they could not say what the Democrats’ policies were.
US investment in Ireland has been a godsend and we Irish have enjoyed influence far beyond our size. And at least once every generation, we exercise the right to attack a US president – remember Nixon, Reagan, George W Bush and now Trump?
Trump has done some very offensive things and made even more crude remarks; he is a bully and boorish. He should be persuaded to amend his most offensive policies and retract objectionable statements.
And we should, as Hillary Clinton said when Trump insulted her, go high when he goes low. And above all, remember not to insult the people who voted for the US President.
Roman orators taught that to win an argument, you must first win the goodwill of your audience. You cannot change a US president’s odious policies by belittling the people who voted for him.
SUCH was the intensity of the media disapproval of Stephen Donnelly, I thought he had joined a satanic cult. But it was an anticlimax – he had joined Fianna Fáil.
He was initially elected a TD for Wicklow in 2011 as an independent, and as a former employee of the most famous management consultancy he speaks fluent McKinsey, a regional dialect of civil service Mandarin.
Ordinary people usually react to management consultants with the same suspicion Basil Fawlty greeted psychiatrists, but Donnelly is liked and respected by his constituents and peers.
The two women with whom he founded the Social Democrats say he is ‘workshy’ – he denies it and, as a gentleman should, refuses to return the insult.
A working knowledge of McKinsey-speak will be invaluable for him wrangling the complexities of Brexit with other egghead consultants.
Still, his ethereal manner and professorial demeanour will not endear him to other Fianna Fáil frontbenchers with less impressive credentials seeking a seat in a future cabinet. Yet he appears to be a decent man, although the description ‘team player’ has yet to attach to him. I wish him well.
PROPOSED legislation for supervised heroin-injecting centres in Dublin may find its place in the history books – as potentially the most foolish and damaging plan ever conceived to deal with drug addiction.
The devil is in the detail. Gardaí say it would be impossible to police, and they have a point: to escape prosecution, anyone possessing drugs anywhere in Dublin could claim to be going to an injection centre.
Ireland does have the highest proportion of intravenous drug users in Europe and the rate of drug-related deaths is three times the EU average. We do have an enormous problem – but this legislation could make it worse.
Minister Catherine Byrne plans to bring the legislation to cabinet on Tuesday – and Minister Finian McGrath is going to object to it. Maybe someone senior in cabinet will send a note to the Department of Health: ‘Must try harder.’
THE Catholic Archbishop of Dublin has an unfair advantage when he takes on politicians – Diarmuid Martin is not only more gracious but also wiser. When the Taoiseach was wagging his finger at President Trump for banning refugees, Archbishop Martin wondered aloud about the number of Syrians admitted to Ireland. Then he asked Mr Kenny to be as ‘courageous and frank’ dealing with Trump as he was about the Catholic Church. In an unprecedented attack by a Taoiseach on the Church in 2011, Mr Kenny criticised the ‘dysfunction, disconnection, elitism, and narcissism’ of the Holy See.
★★★★★