Yes, yes, I know. It’s horrible, but one can’t look away. The slow-motion car wreck that, for many of us, is the U.S. presidency fascinates us with new footage popping up seemingly every day.
Trump offending here. Trump kowtowing there. Trump saying something one day while his staff then say the opposite the next. Or vice versa.
Trump not keeping his word. Trump keeping his word.
It’s all wonderfully terrifying.
Meanwhile, for others of us, the relentless media scrutiny has for a long time now seemed poisonously absurd. The president can’t say anything, do anything, go anywhere, or meet anyone without some pack of the left-leaning press howling about how gauche, or hypocritical, or imperious he is—as if Donald Trump was elected for his politesse rather than his politics.
So let’s take a break.
Keeping track of what Mr. Trump says he will do is clearly pointless, although only just more obviously pointless than meticulously recording what any other politician says he or she will do. What matters, of course, is what the president actually does and what he actually gets the rest of the U.S. government to do.
And what actually happens in policy will be reported in due course—less excitingly, but far more significantly.
Americans therefore can safely ignore the majority of news stories about President Trump, since they detail thises and thats the importance of which is impossible to gauge at the time—or perhaps ever.
And only a fraction of whatever he actually does will trickle down to affect Canadian lives—the lives of most readers of this post.
We must beware the “politics porn” being peddled even by the mainstream, “respectable” media. Breathless, close-up focus on Trump’s every gesture is, frankly, silly at best and prurient at worst.
[For the rest, please click HERE.]
