US Presidential Election Part II: A Campaign of Insults and Lies

• Opinion by Farhang Jahanpour (oxford)
• Monday, November 23, 2020
• Inter Press Service

By all accounts, it’s clear that President Trump has misplaced his bid for re-election, however lots of his supporters nonetheless proceed to assert that he has gained. Greater than two weeks after the election when courts have dismissed claims of vote rigging, and a majority of world leaders have congratulated the incoming President Biden, Trump’s makes an attempt to undo the election end result have been a farce. 

In latest days, the courts have once more dealt a sequence of lethal blows to Trump’s claims of a stolen election. On November 20th, Georgia completed its statewide audit of the votes, confirming that President-elect Joe Biden had defeated President Trump by 12,284.

In an uncommon transfer, Trump invited Republican Michigan lawmakers to the White Home, presumably to affect the end result of the certification of votes. On Saturday 21 Nov, the Michigan Republican Celebration and Republican Nationwide Committee despatched a letter to the State Board of Canvassers asking them to delay certification for 14 days. However the Michigan Division of State mentioned delays and audits were not permitted by law, and confirmed that Biden had won by greater than 154,000 votes within the state.

In Pennsylvania, Trump’s attorneys sought to invalidate thousands and thousands of mail-in votes the place Biden has a margin of greater than 81,000 votes within the state, however Federal Decide Matthew Brann of the US District Courtroom within the Center District of Pennsylvania, a widely known Republican, dismissed the lawsuit saying “like Frankenstein’s Monster” it had been “haphazardly stitched collectively”. Brann added: “… this Court has been presented with strained legal arguments without merit and speculative accusations, unpled in the operative complaint and unsupported by evidence.” 

Within the face of compelling proof that Trump has misplaced the election, many consultants see his continued refusal to concede as setting a harmful precedent and posing a risk to democracy. Some have argued that “Trump has never been more dangerous than he is now”.

“On his darkest day, Richard Nixon would by no means have attacked democracy the best way Donald Trump has now completed,” John Dean, who served as White Home counsel for Nixon, instructed AP. “At the potential of losing, Trump has shamed himself and soiled the American presidency. God save us when he actually loses.”

The Republican Senator Mit Romney put it greatest in a tweet: “Having didn’t make even a believable case of widespread fraud or conspiracy earlier than any courtroom of regulation, the president has now resorted to overt strain on state and native officers to subvert the desire of the individuals and overturn the election. It’s tough to think about a worse, extra undemocratic motion by any sitting American president.”

Earlier than some members of Trump’s base begin feeling nostalgic about Trump’s interval in workplace, it is very important remind ourselves of among the most important traits of that period and what it represented domestically and internationally.

Trump performed his 2016 presidential marketing campaign through the use of very insulting phrases in describing his rivals, one thing which he continued to do after being elected president. Actually, it may be argued that he by no means stopped campaigning, and his conduct in workplace was virtually a protracted marketing campaign for re-election. 

In the whole US historical past, no president has ever insulted his opponents, together with the main members of his personal get together, in the best way that Trump has completed. These are simply among the phrases that he used incessantly to consult with some main US politicians: Sleepy Creepy Joe, Dishonest Obama, Crooked Hillary, Nervous Nancy, Wild Invoice, Loopy Bernie, Little Rubio, Mendacity Cruise, Little Bloomberg, Leaking Sneaky Dianne Feinstein, Wacko John Bolton, Low Power Jeb, Jeff Flakey, Leaking Comey, Al Frankenstein, Pocahontas, Corrupt Kaine, and so on. 

These weren’t meant as phrases of endearment or jokes, however as deliberate insults to demean, belittle, bully and intimidate his opponents and incite violence towards them. Throughout his debates with 2016 Democratic Candidate Hillary Clinton the group typically chanted “lock her up”, and Trump cheered them on.

I’m wondering if Trump has ever bothered to suppose what individuals in different nations would possibly consider US politicians when a US president describes his colleagues in these unflattering methods. No marvel that the US status on the earth has plummeted underneath Trump.

Trump repeated the identical disgusting sample of conduct through the 2020 election marketing campaign in direction of former Vice-President Joe Biden and his working mate Senator Kamala Harris. Harris is the primary black girl and the primary South Asian American girl to be chosen as vice-president. She has had a distinguished profession as a senator and Lawyer Normal of California, and is very educated. But, Trump insulted Harris’s intelligence by saying that her presidency can be “an insult to our nation.”  

Not solely did he assault her insurance policies, but additionally used private, racist and sexist insults towards her. Other than claiming that she can be “a giant slasher of funds for our army”, Trump repeatedly accused her of being “disrespectful and nasty”. Throughout an interview on eight October 2020, Trump falsely mentioned that Harris was a communist and twice referred to her as “a monster”.

He slammed Harris’s remedy of Brett Kavanaugh throughout his affirmation listening to for his nomination to the US Supreme Courtroom, saying “That was a horrible occasion. I assumed it was horrible for her. I assumed it was horrible for our nation. I assumed she was the meanest, essentially the most horrible, most disrespectful of anyone within the US Senate.” Throughout the election marketing campaign he mentioned of her: “Kamala Harris is absolutely Bernie Sanders with a skirt”, describing her as “shameless” and “clearly willing to do anything for power.” That is paying homage to the best way that Trump typically speaks of girls and other people of shade.

At a rally in New Hampshire in late August, the President asserted that Harris wasn’t competent to be a US president in ready, including: “You realize, I wish to see the primary girl president additionally, however I do not wish to see a lady president get into that place the best way she’d do it — and she or he’s not competent. She’s not competent. They’re all saying, ‘We want Ivanka.’ I don’t blame you.”    

Actually, shortly after profitable the presidency, Trump appointed his daughter and son-in-law to senior political positions with none apparent benefit or on their half. This could solely be thought to be an excessive act of nepotism, nearly unprecedented underneath former administrations. 

It’s outstanding that each one his marketing campaign speeches consisted primarily of slogans and insults and had been nearly completely missing in any insurance policies or visions for the long run.

The language that Trump has adopted to consult with his rivals and even colleagues isn’t the sort of language that a US president or certainly any first rate individual ought to use in reference to distinguished individuals.

Trump launched a brand new degree of crudeness and vulgarity to US politics and made use of phrases that belong within the gutter, not in a severe presidential marketing campaign. He has demeaned the workplace of the US president, one thing which will take a very long time to beat.

Farhang Jahanpour is a former professor and dean of the College of Languages on the College of Isfahan and a former Senior Analysis Scholar at Harvard. He has additionally taught at Cambridge and Oxford universities. He additionally served as Editor for Center East and North Africa on the BBC Monitoring from 1979-2001.

© Inter Press Service (2020) — All Rights ReservedOriginal source: Inter Press Service