A Presidency Sinks Because of Its Own Stupidity

There is no other way to describe it.

Today’s paper announced that the mere cost of renaming the Department of Defense to the Department of War will top $2 billion. Two thousand million dollars to change a single word, and I call that stupid, arrogant and self aggrandizing.

The Orange Man, and the alcoholic child he appointed as Secretary of Defense, are men of little character and even less bravery. Our current president dodged service during Vietnam, with a phony bone spur diagnosis. Hegseth deployed as a Reserve officer, had his rank raised to major, and never commanded troops in combat.

No dishonor there, as I was in the Army Reserve as well, serving between Korea and Vietnam as a corporal in the medical corps. I was never called to Vietnam, never faced enemy fire, and counted myself very lucky.

But Department of Defense isn’t bold enough, brave enough and heroic enough for either man. Hegseth summoned 800 Flag Officers from their overseas duties to the Pentagon, to scold them for honoring their defense of peace. Not warlike enough. There’s a new sheriff in town, and gunslinger-Hegseth is the self-appointed man, god help us.

The military has reminded the president that he is their civilian leader, but their oath of office is to the Consitutiion.

The Orange Man has already threatened to ‘take Greenland by force,’ leave NATO if it doesn’t shape up to his expectations and invade Venezuela if it doesn’t change its democratically elected leadership to suit him.

America’s largest aircraft carrier task-force stands by in the Caribbean for that purpose, at who knows what cost. Thus far the Orange Man directed military strikes on five unidentified speedboats, killing their occupants and claiming to have saved more than 100,000 lives because the maneuvers thwarted drug smuggling. With no proofs, in a recent press conference, he claimed “Every boat that we knock out saves 25,000 American lives.”

There is no evidence that these are drug carriers. Some legal experts claim the military action is illegal under maritime law or human rights conventions and the attack contradicted longstanding U.S. military practices. Further evidence, as if any were needed, that America has become more war-monger than peace-keeper.

There is, of course, the American defense of Israel’s genocide in Gaza.

That’s what we term an ‘own goal’ in sports terminology, the only difference being that this one cost a million innocent civilian lives, most of them women and children who will never recover from the trauma. The United States provided the weaponry for that debacle, and the trauma is ours to bear. Stupid as the decision was, Joe Biden shares that shame with the Orange Man.

Elsewhere, during a White House press conference alongside French president Emmanuel Macron, Trump was asked about trade between the US and neighboring countries Mexico and Canada.

“I mean who can blame if they made these great deals with the United States, took advantage of the United States on manufacturing, on just about everything - every aspect that you could imagine they took advantage of,“ he said. “I look at some of these agreements and I say who would ever sign a thing like this. The tariffs will go forward, yes. We’ll make up a lot of territory. Our country will be liquid and rich again.”

It was the Orange Man who signed “those things”.

In a recent brag on Truth Social, Trump suggested he is “the only President” to have donated his salary – $400,000 annually.”

Presidents John Kennedy and Herbert Hoover donated their presidential salaries. Neither president spent eye-watering sums of public money playing golf, or successfully made billions by suing major media outlets while in office. No other president had a personal website devoted to selling his branded products.

Stupid is as stupid does.

As a side issue (and just for fun) according to the tracking website Did Trump Golf Today?, 24.5 per cent of Trump’s presidency has been spent golfing. The Orange Man has already spent more than $71 million on golf rounds, about $2 million every time he tees it up.

And then there’s tariff policy, another word for a tax on American consumers.

Administration policies have raised costs for working and middle-class Americans due to the president’s irrational, unpredictable approach to policymaking and running the government. His mismanaged tariff policies, with their shifting rationales, arbitrary formulas and repeated changes, rate as five-star stupid. Depending on his moods, and who whispered last in his ear, they disrupt nearly every aspect of the U.S. economy. Businesses delay investment and hiring, both increasing costs and undermining faith in the rule of law that is the bedrock for ongoing investment in the American economy.

The Supreme Court has not even decided if his tariff policies are legal. But, they’re workin’ on it.

If so, consumers will pay hundreds of billions in rising costs for almost everything they buy. If not, the government will have to repay hundreds of billions in tariffs already paid. That’s a tragic ‘either or’ that was applied to nations across the world by a president who hadn’t the slightest knowledge of how tariffs affect trade, or who pays the bill.

Stupid, and very expensive.

So, what’s the end-game in terms of America’s world reputation?

There’s no way to know.

Our nation was once the poster-child for freedom and opportunity. We welcomed “the tired, the poor, the huddled masses yearning to breathe free, the wretched refuse of your teeming shore. Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me, I will lift my lamp beside the golden door!”

These days we can’t heal our sick, feed our hungry, or shelter our homeless, much less the tired and huddled masses from elsewhere.

They have quintupled since I was a young man. We were smart in those earlier days and have become stupid in our middle age.

It’s not the Orange Man’s fault, so paint him with other brushes, but not that one. He is the result, rather than the cause. My friend Mark Twain has this to say,

“...there are some things that can beat smartness and foresight. Awkwardness and stupidity can. The best swordsman in the world doesn’t need to fear the second-best swordsman in the world; no, the person for him to be afraid of is some ignorant antagonist who has never had a sword in his hand before; he doesn’t do the thing he ought to do, and so the expert isn’t prepared for him.”

I call Twain my friend, because his wisdom spans the decades. A friend can do no more than that. A case can be made that we Americans, in spite of our eagerness and goodwill, are the ignorant antagonist.

But Twain gives us hope.

We are not stupid, not in our entirety.

Thus, Learning the ways of the sword may save us from drawing it.