Right: against the odds: Donald Trump wins a victory that almost no one predicted.
Reasons why Donald Trump should not have been confirmed as President of the United States
1. Donald Trump did not secure the largest share of the popular vote Those who dispute Donald Trump's mandate to become United States president have stressed that he did not win the largest share of the popular vote. The Cook Report's most recent national vote tracker figures (accessed January 1, 2017) tallied Hillary Clinton's vote as 65,844,610 and Donald Trump's as 62,979,636. This gave the popular vote to Clinton by a margin of 2.8 million or 48.2% to 46.1% Those who argue that this result is a perversion of democracy note that Hillary Clinton won the popular vote by a higher percentage than any presidential candidate who did not then go on to become president as a result of this voter support. Critics of this result claim that their concerns spring from issues beyond party politics. They claim that a result such as this indicates that there are major weaknesses in the United States electoral system. On November 16, 2016, The Nation published a comment by John Nicols titled 'Hillary Clinton's Popular-Vote Victory Is Unprecedented-and Still Growing'. Nicols argues that Hillary Clinton's winning margin in the popular vote indicates that there are fundamental flaws in the United States voting procedures. He states, 'This is about a higher principle than partisanship, and about something that matters more than personalities. This is about democracy itself. When the winner of an election does not take office, and when the loser does, we have evidence of a system that is structurally rigged.' It has also been claimed that since 2010 the Republicans have been successful in establishing gerrymanders (that is, drawing the boundaries of electoral districts in a way that favours one party over another) that have ensured them control of the United States Congress. In an opinion piece published in The New York Times Sunday Review on February 2, 2013, Sam Wang noted, 'Democrats received 1.4 million more votes for the House of Representatives, yet Republicans won control of the House by a 234 to 201 margin.' Wang explained the specific effect of Republican gerrymanders. He stated, 'In the seven states where Republicans redrew the districts, 16.7 million votes were cast for Republicans and 16.4 million votes were cast for Democrats. This elected 73 Republicans and 34 Democrats.' Critics have noted that such manipulations have now ensured that there is not only a Republican president, but that the Republicans also control the Congress. They maintain that the manner in which this has been achieved is a perversion of democracy. 2. Donald Trump is without appropriate prior experience Critics of Donald Trump's election note that he has does not have the experience base in government to lead the United States nor to be its military commander-in-chief. In a comment published in Vox on November 11, 2016, Zachary Crockett stated, 'We just elected the most inexperienced president in American history. In the office's storied 227-year existence - from George Washington to Barack Obama - there has never been a president-elect who has entirely lacked both political and military service. Donald Trump will change that... The previous US presidents (1789 to 2016) came into the White House with an average of 13 years in public office and 5.6 years of military service. Donald Trump's tally: zero - on both counts.' In an opinion piece published in The Huffington Post on March 2, 2016, Gautam Mukunda, Assistant Professor, Harvard Business School, stated, 'It is not hyperbole to describe him [Trump] as one of the most dangerous figures in American history. Given the stakes, blocking him from the Oval Office ought to be the overriding responsibility of everyone in politics, regardless of party. The only way someone like Trump should ever be allowed in the White House is on a tour.' One of the main bases for Mukunda's concern is the president's inexperience combined with his power to launch a nuclear attack. Bruce G. Blair, a research scholar at Princeton, has explained, 'The commander-in-chief's power is clear: He or she has sole authority to use nuclear weapons.' Similarly, Kingston Reif, of the Arms Control Association, has stated, 'The president has supreme authority to decide whether to use America's nuclear weapons. Period. Full stop.' Trump's critics are afraid that his inexperience could lead him to precipitate a global nuclear catastrophe. Nuclear analyst Miles Pomper of the James Martin Center for Non-proliferation Studies has stated, 'Basically the president has a hell of a lot of control over nuclear weapons. And there are a lot of contradictions in what Trump said about them during the campaign that haven't been resolved yet.' Donald Trump's critics also dispute the supposed value of his experience as a successful businessman. An editorial published in The New York Times on September 25, 2016, stated, 'Despite his towering properties, Mr. Trump has a record rife with bankruptcies and sketchy ventures like Trump University, which authorities are investigating after numerous complaints of fraud. His name has been chiselled off his failed casinos in Atlantic City.' The same editorial also suggested that Mr Trump's refusal to make his tax returns public is grounds for being suspicious about the nature of his business dealings. The editorial claims, 'Mr. Trump's brazen refusal to disclose his tax returns...should sharpen voter wariness of his business and charitable operations. Disclosure would undoubtedly raise numerous red flags; the public record already indicates that in at least some years he made full use of available loopholes and paid no taxes.' 3. Donald Trump is a disruptive and divisive influence domestically Many of those concerned about the election of Donald Trump as President of the United States are made uneasy by the nature of the appeals he made while campaigning. He is accused of having fostered enmity, violence and disharmony within the electorate - a 'them' against 'us' mentality which many fear will damage the already strained social fabric of the United States. On March 14, 2016, the ABC published an analysis and commentary by John Keane in which he described the divisive behaviour observed at Donald Trump rallies. Keane wrote, 'What the world is now witnessing is a front-running presidential candidate who practises the vocabulary of friend-versus-enemy violence. He calls on supporters to raise their right hands in solidarity, praises strong-armed police tactics, surrounds himself with his own bully boys and federal Secret Service agents. The feverish crowds chant 'USA! USA! USA!' Hungry for revenge, and for dignity, they feast upon his crude rhetoric and macho body language. Dissenters are shouted down, pepper sprayed, arm wrestled, sucker-punched, their lives threatened by decent ordinary folks enchanted by the big mouth spitting words of fire.' Donald Trump has been condemned on the basis of the prejudiced and inflammatory language he has used. He has described Mexicans as 'rapists' and 'drug mules' and in an historical allusion referred to them as 'wetbacks'. He has described women who oppose him as 'bimbos'. His mantra of 'Make America great again' has been criticised for its implication that such a transformation requires the exclusion of many groups currently living within the United States, many of them citizens. In an opinion piece published in The New Scientist on November 10, 2016, Chris Simms wrote, 'Many of Trump's core messages strike the same divisive chord: there is a crisis of identity and the only way to get through it is to club together to fend off outside influences. We are great, but outsiders aren't to be trusted... Creating distrust in this way can result in enmity; if you're not with us, you're against us. Hardly the route to a united country or world.' Some commentators have suggested that children are particularly vulnerable to the damaging effects of racially and socially divisive propaganda. On April 13, 2016, the Southern Poverty Law Center published a comment by Maureen B Costello titled 'The Trump Effect: The Impact of the Presidential Campaign on Our Nation's Schools' Costello claims, 'The results of an online survey conducted by Teaching Tolerance suggest that the campaign is having a profoundly negative effect on children and classrooms. It's producing an alarming level of fear and anxiety among children of color and inflaming racial and ethnic tensions in the classroom. Many students worry about being deported.' Costello further asserts, 'Other students have been emboldened by the divisive, often juvenile rhetoric in the campaign. Teachers have noted an increase in bullying, harassment and intimidation of students whose races, religions or nationalities have been the verbal targets of candidates on the campaign trail.' 4. Donald Trump fails the 'character test' The 'character question' is regularly brought up with regard to a potential leader. What is usually meant by this is whether the individual concerned has the character traits that would make for an effective leader. This judgement is also sometimes overlaid with explicitly moral considerations. Thus commentators sometimes consider whether the potential leader has a past history of ethical behaviour which would inspire confidence regarding how he or she might behave once appointed leader. Within the United States this question became particularly vexed during Richard Nixon's presidency when he used illegal means to spy on his Democrat opponents when running for a second term in office. Nixon only avoided impeachment by resigning. The impeachment of Democrat president, Bill Clinton, for lying to Congress and the Special Investigator in order to hide the affair he had conducted with a White House intern emphasised the presidential character issue further. In 1972, following the Richard Nixon scandal, James David Barber, then chairman of the political science department at Duke University, surveyed previous United States presidents and attempted to categorise them according to the character traits which resulted in an effective presidency. The four personality types he determined were 'active-positive,' 'active-negative,' 'passive-positive,' and 'passive-negative' with the first classification being judged the most desirable. A number of commentators have classified Donald Trump as an active-negative. Aubrey Immelman of St. John's University and the College of St. Benedict has described Donald Trump's positive characteristics as 'a confident, outgoing tendency that will enable him to connect with critical constituencies, mobilize popular support, and retain a following and his self-confidence in the face of adversity.' Immelman described Trump's negative characteristics as 'a predisposition to be easily bored by routine (with the attendant risk of failing to keep himself adequately informed), an inclination to act impulsively without fully appreciating the implications of his decisions or the long-term consequences of his policy initiatives, and a predilection to favor personal connections, friendship, and loyalty over competence in his staffing decisions and appointments-all of which could render a Trump administration relatively vulnerable to errors of judgment.' Psychologist Dan P McAdams has come to similar conclusions. He has suggested that Donald Trump's extroversion is likely to result in high risk-taking. 'Like Bush, a President Trump might try to swing for the fences in an effort to deliver big payoffs-to make America great again, as his campaign slogan says.' McAdams has also commented, 'The real psychological wild card, however, is Trump's agreeableness-or lack thereof. There has probably never been a U.S. president as consistently and overtly disagreeable on the public stage as Donald Trump is... Research shows that people low in agreeableness are typically viewed as untrustworthy. Dishonesty and deceit brought down Nixon and damaged the institution of the presidency. It is generally believed today that all politicians lie, or at least dissemble, but Trump appears extreme in this regard.' McAdams' overall conclusion re a Trump presidency is 'In sum, Donald Trump's basic personality traits suggest a presidency that could be highly combustible... He could be a daring and ruthlessly aggressive decision maker who desperately desires to create the strongest, tallest, shiniest, and most awesome result-and who never thinks twice about the collateral damage he will leave behind. Tough. Bellicose. Threatening. Explosive.' 5. Donald Trump is a threat to world peace and order Critics have claimed that Donald Trump's lack of experience in international affairs and his ill-informed attitudes are likely to destabilise international relations. In June 2016 The Australian Institute of International Affairs published a comment by Marek Wasinski titled 'Donald Trump's Foreign Policy Stances: Unpredictability and Neo-isolationism'. The analysis points to Trump's support for isolationism, that is, having the United States withdraw from its alliances and current obligations to other nations and suggests that this could undermine stability in international relations and threaten the security of many American allies. Wasinski notes, 'Trump has not hesitated to undermine the current administration's policy of close cooperation with U.S. allies. He questions the principle of providing security to other countries, which he says should not take place at the expense of the United States. He also states that he would be ready to accept the withdrawal of U.S. troops from South Korea and Japan... If Trump wins, he may change the attitude of the U.S. to NATO.' In an article published in The New York Times on November 11, 2016, Max Fisher noted that trump's isolationism extended beyond political alliances and included a rejection of free-trade policies and scepticism about international co-operation to combat global warming. Fisher wrote, 'He has threatened to pull out of the World Trade Organization and called the North American Free Trade Agreement "the single worst trade deal ever signed in this country." And he said he would "cancel" the international agreement on combating climate change, reached last year in Paris.' Critics are concerned that such positions could trigger world-wide recession and vastly reduce the effectiveness of attempts to reduce global warming. Critics are also concerned by Trump's apparent willingness to ease relations with Russia and by his declared admiration for Vladimir Putin, the current president of the Russian Federation. Wasinski further notes, 'Trump openly suggests the possibility of a return to "reset" with Russia. He plans to talk with Putin about a new arrangement of bilateral relations, despite the fact that the current U.S. attitude to Russia is that Moscow is in breach of international law with its ongoing occupation of Crimea and eastern Ukraine.' This analysis argues that Trump's apparent policy would pose a threat to world peace and order. Wasinski suggests, '[Trump's] nationalist and populist statements indicate a tendency to cynicism and unwillingness to cooperate, even with other allies. If such tendencies were to dominate U.S. foreign policy under a Trump administration, it could pose a serious risk to peace in Europe by provoking Russia to escalate its revisionist policy.' Concern has also been expressed about Donald Trump's uncertain and potentially escalationist position on nuclear weapons and their deployment. Trump has suggested that more countries should acquire nuclear weapons, to protect themselves without Washington's help. When asked about his readiness to use nuclear weapons, Trump replied, 'Somebody hits us within ISIS, you wouldn't fight back with a nuke?' |
Found a word you're not familiar with? Double-click that word to bring up a dictionary reference to it. The dictionary page includes an audio sound file with which to actually hear the word said.