David Frum: Trump's Speech Can't Change Recalcitrant Realities

[babylonsister]

https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2017/08/trumps-speech-cant-change-recalcitrant-realities/537576/

Trump's Speech Can't Change Recalcitrant Realities

It was a performance that seemed designed to garner immediate approval, and it failed to grapple with long-term challenges.


David Frum 9:24 AM ET Politics

snip//


Look closer at the structure of Trump’s remarks. He opened by correcting not one bungle, but two: His indifferent response to the 10 missing American sailors in the naval accident of the destroyer USS John S. McCain—and his equivocations about the deadly violence of white supremacists after Charlottesville. Normally when a president opens a national-security speech with a reference to some sad recent domestic event, it’s a matter of basic respect—the equivalent of a moment of silence during a busy working day—before proceeding to the main content. A president never wants to seem so focused on a crisis overseas that he overlooks the flood or earthquake or hurricane back home.

Not this time. Those prefatory clean-up remarks were the real content of the speech, and everything else was just so many empty sentences and syllables, mingled with the usual boasting and self-praise: “When I became president, I was given a bad and very complex hand. But I fully knew what I was getting into: big and intricate problems. But one way or another, these problems will be solved. I'm a problem solver, and in the end, we will win.”

snip//

This speech, however, despite its billing, was not about strategic choices, not this year or next. It was about this week’s positioning. Within the closed-world of cable-TV chatter that matters so desperately much to this president, the tactic will work for a time. He probably enjoyed his morning TV viewing today more than he has enjoyed it in a long, long time. But he has changed nothing in either the domestic or international political situation, and that gravity will reassert itself very soon.

snip//

But if you do want one image to remember from yesterday, cast aside Trump’s theatrical performance of Monday evening. Pay attention instead to his behavior of Monday afternoon, when he waved aside all advice and glared directly into the solar eclipse. Truculent and self-harming: That’s the elected leader of the United States. Nothing will change that, certainly not words written for him or promises of action extracted from him. Those will flit and fluctuate from day to day, hour to hour, and will mean little enough at the time they are spoken. So it is with this highly advertised speech—but that, too, you knew already.

[trotsky]

1. "I was given a bad and very complex hand"

As opposed to Obama, who was given two Middle East wars and a trillion dollar deficit. That guy had it easy!

[NanceGreggs]

2. And ...

"I fully knew what I was getting into: big and intricate problems."

That's why he kept saying that he would 'fix' everything because it was all so easy.