Who deserves to be called "The Greatest," Donald Trump or Muhammad Ail? By Hal M. Brown

 

Trump is making the news (here for example) with his announcing that the country needs two new holidays, one each to celebrate victories in the two world wars.

Has any other president made the news at least once a week with lunatic ideas like those about Greenland, Panama, Canada a state, alligators in the Rio Grand, making the border zone a military base, making Gaza a resort, etc. Does he think of all these things himself? I might be impressed if he did.

This aside, Trump once again reveals how obsessed he is with taking credit for anything he possibly can brag about even though he had nothing to do with the accomplishment.

I need not elaborate on the how insulting this war victory holiday idea is coming from someone who earned the nickname “cadet bonepsurs” and who disparged veterans and POW’s, and is now allowing the VA budget to be cut.

The subtext of Trump’s “Make America Great Again” slogan is Make Me Greater Again and Again and Again. Trump believes not only that he is the greatest U.S. president in history, but that he is the greatest human being ever to walk the Earth. He thinks he’s smarter than Einstein and more powerful than a Jedi knight.

The Einstein level genius Trump is too uninformed to realize that Darth Vader wielded a red light saber, while Jedi knights fought with blue light sabres. He also shows his ignorance about Star Wars by posting an image of himself with bulging muscles. No character in Star Wars looked like this. 

Yoda was hardly muscle bound. For that matter neither was Darth Vader:

Trump keeps equating intelligence with muscles. He wants everyone to believe that he’s a world class golfer, and that this means he, putting myself into his mind, believes this proves overall he is the greatest everything. Add this to his being able to grab any woman by the genitals and having people kowtow to him cements this belief in his conception of himself.

If the personal slogan “I Am the Greatest” wasn’t already taken I wouldn't be surprised if Trump adopted it. He has basically said that he’s the greatest president ever. 

There’s no way he could say it the way Muhammad Ali did. Consider his own ballad:

This is the legend of Cassius Clay, 
The most beautiful fighter in the world today.
He talks a great deal, and brags indeed-y, 
Of a muscular punch that's incredibly speedy. 
The fistic world was dull and weary, 
But with a champ like Liston, things had to be dreary. 
Then someone with color, someone with dash, 
Brought fight fans a-runnin' with cash. 
This brash young boxer is something to see. 
And the heavyweight championship is his destiny. 
This kid fights great. He's got speed and endurance. 
But if you sign to fight him, increase your insurance. 
This kid's got a left. This kid's got a right. 
If he hits you once, you're asleep for the night. 
And as you lie on the floor while the ref counts ten, 
you pray that you won't have to fight me again. 
For I am the man this poem is about, 
the next champ of the world, there isn't a doubt....

Trump does have this proof that he’s the greatest. 

Muhammad Ali had this:

Mumammad Ali proved he had character by taking a stand against the Vietnam War, being a conscientious objector, and being willing to go to prison for this (see reference).

Ali had character. Trump is a character. 

If I could muster up some empathy for him I might be saddened by anyone who would think it was amusing joke about his being the next pope and posting an image of himself as a pope.

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Trump, Miss Manner's he ain't. By Hal M. Brown -- When it come to common etiquette Trump doesn't give two shits about respecting the feelings and sensibilities of other people or countries.

Most people, even Donald Trump, have probably heard of Miss Manners. They may not know this is the pen name of Judith Martin. I didn’t know this prior to beginning to write this Substack. 

This is from the Wiki page on her:

In 1978, Martin began writing an advice column, which was distributed three and later six times a week by Universal Uclick and carried in more than 200 newspapers worldwide. In the column, she answers etiquette questions contributed by her readers and writes short essays on problems of manners, or clarifies the essential qualities of politeness.

Martin writes about the ideas and intentions underpinning seemingly simple rules, providing a complex and advanced perspective, which she refers to as "heavy etiquette theory". Her columns have been collected in a number of books. In her writings, Martin refers to herself in the third person (e.g., "Miss Manners hopes...").

In a 1995 interview by Virginia Shea, Martin said:

You can deny all you want that there is etiquette, and a lot of people do in everyday life. But if you behave in a way that offends the people you're trying to deal with, they will stop dealing with you...There are plenty of people who say, "We don't care about etiquette, but we can't stand the way so-and-so behaves, and we don't want him around!" Etiquette doesn't have the great sanctions that the law has. But the main sanction we do have is in not dealing with these people and isolating them...

Martin identifies "blatant greed" as the most serious etiquette problem in the United States. The most frequently asked question she receives is how to politely demand cash from potential gift-givers (which she answers by stating that there is no polite way to do this), and the second most common question is how much potential guests must spend on a gift (determined by what the giver can afford, not by the event, relationship, related expenses or other factors).

This brings me to something that struck me in the New York Times today. The last two sentences in the following excerpt from their editorial board’s opinion piece “Trump’s Third-Term Musings Are Part of a Pattern” led me to make one comment.

The editorial concldued as follows:

In the decades since 1951, politicians from both parties occasionally called for the repeal of the 22nd Amendment, including Harry Truman and Mitch McConnell. But they did not argue that the amendment was unclear or could simply be evaded. They recognized that somebody who disagrees with a law should follow a legal process to change it. If Mr. Trump and his acolytes believe they have Congress and the states on their side, they are free to start a repeal campaign. What they should not do is pretend that any part of the Constitution is merely a suggestion. It’s the law.

My comment shown above was “What they are doing is treating the Constitution as a kind of Miss Manners guide to etiquette which is easily ignored and unenforceable.”

Next down the page were the following comments. They represent most of the other 168 other opinions and reactions posted at the time of this writing.

Here’s the entire long post from George:

To a considerable degree, of course, Trump is grandstanding to his MAGA devotees with such talk. And it is indeed somewhat concerning given the fact that Trump has revealed that he has no real knowledge of the US Constitution and it's controlling role. But as worrisome as these pretensions are it is perhaps yet another sign too that Trump is not of sound mind? After all, over the past twelve months we've essentially traded in one elderly man for another. And we did so with some concern that the first one, Joe Biden, was suffering from cognitive decline due to aging. So should we really be surprised that we may now be encountering the reality of what happens when a POTUS begins to mentally "slip"? In 2024 the Democrats themselves tore down Joe Biden by calling into question his mental state. It was an act of political self-harming that has had dire consequences for the Nation. We cannot and should not expect the Republicans to act similarly now with regard to Donald Trump. He's apparently mentally slipping badly while tossing out Executive Orders on whim and fantasy. Yet the media remains silent to what is actually going on. I'm not worried about Trump having a third term. I much more concerned with how are we going to survive his second?

Here are the next comments (click to enlarge)

Getting back to good manners and etiquette and Donald J. Trump, who, lest we forget is the president. He’s president of the United States, not the president of Delta Tau Chi fraternity, otherwise known as Animal House.

Trump certainly knows how to mind his manners when he wants to. He just doesn’t give a shit about behaving in a way that adheres to any rules of etiquitte, let alone the rules in the United States Constitution.

Why make sure he follows the Constitution, the Law of the Land, when he treats the simple rules of good manners as irrelevant? These rules, while not actual laws, are all focused on behaving in ways that respect the feelings and sensibilities of other people. They require that one be sensitive to whether things they say, write, or do will offend someone. Offending other countries, which of course are collections of people, fuggedaboutit.

From wearing a blue suit to Pope Francis’s funeral to posting a photoshop of himself as the next pope, he insulted Catholics around the world. According to the dress code required by Vatican officials for Pope Francis' funeral, men were required to wear a dark suit, along with a long black tie. Trump showed up in blue. (Read article in Snopes.)

You can see the contrast in colors between what he wore and what Melania wore below.

Click to enlarge full image.

Some people on X tried to excuse this by trying to find other men wearing blue suits and noting that Zelenskyy didn’t even wear a suit.

The salient point here isn’t whether or not the blue suit was appropriate attire for this solemn occasion. 

The point is that if he gave a damn about good manners he would have worn the traditional black suit with a black or dark tie. I doubt he even thought about this. He probably just decided to wear this on a whim. Below is Trump with his signature red tie when he addressed the United Nations:

At least he didn’t wear a suit with a bright red tie at the funeral, let alone one of these:

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Mike Pence seems to seek redemption. He owes us more. Start by saying Trump's name. He's not Voldermort. By Hal M. Brown -- NJ Today said Mike Pence eloquently carved up Trump and MAGA with the precision of a surgeon.

 

Read how New Jersey Today characterized Mike Pence’s speech at the John F. Kennedy Profiles in Courage Award ceremony last night here.

Here’s an excerpt:

In those comments alone, Pence reiterated that Trump lost the election, that election deniers (like the current vice president) are liars, and that Republicans who have kissed the ring must be replaced in order to “find our way forward as one nation.”

And then Pence — who sacrificed his political career by resisting Trump — stuck the knife even deeper into his former boss.

“When I think of that fateful day four years ago, the only heroes I saw were wearing uniforms,” Pence said.

Pence, in singling out the heroism of the Capitol police, refuted Trump’s insistence that the rioters and insurrectionists who tried to overthrow the election on his behalf were patriots who deserved pardons.

The Daily Beast’s take on this was not kind.

Their article (here) begins:

Former Vice President Mike Pence decided not to mention his old boss when he went to pick up a ‘courage’ award for defying him.

Pence received the John F. Kennedy Profile in Courage Award at the JFK Library in Boston Sunday for his refusal to endorse false claims that the 2020 election was stolen from Donald Trump—which made him the No. 1 target for Trump’s supporters during the Jan. 6 riots.

The JFK Library Foundation lauded Pence for “putting his life and career on the line to ensure the constitutional transfer of presidential power on Jan. 6, 2021.” Despite this, Pence failed to mention Trump in his 10-minute acceptance speech.

Yesterday I wrote about how this might troll Trump into a late night rage attack against Pence and the Kennedy Library (here). You can watch the entire 50 minute ceremony here or just fast forward to Pence’s speech.

As far as I can tell Trump had no reaction to this and my hunch is that he didn’t watch it. For one thing, it wasn’t on regular TV and could only be viewed on streaming video. It’s possible segments of it will be aired on TV today.

We may never know what Pence was feeling when the following photos were taken:

Pence seemed to worship Trump like he was a deity, if not the Second Coming. 

I think he should look at his receiving this award as the beginning of his redemption, but see this only as just the first step. He’s made it clear how he feels about Trump now. Treating him as a character in the Harry Potter books who don’t dare utter the name Voldemort he should emulate Harry, Ron, and Hermoine who called him by name.

This is from an article in Screen Rant:

In the books, Deathly Hallows introduced that a Taboo curse was placed on Voldemort's name. The curse made it possible for anyone who said his name to instantly be located by the Death Eaters, giving them the ability to find whoever said it.

For full redemption Pence has to explain why he was taken in by Trump, reveal how he felt and thought about Trump and what he was doing at the time, and explain how he feels about it at present. He must offer a full throated apology and not be content to bask in the afterglow of what he did on January 6th..

Addendum: 

Steve Schmidt wrote this before the awards ceremony. He was harder on Pence than I was. Read Mike Pence is not a 'Profile in Courage' here. He begins as follows:

“Tonight, Mike Pence will receive a ‘Profile in Courage’ award from the JFK Presidential Library. Mike Pence is many things, but a ‘profile in courage’ is not one of them.

Mike Pence is an arsonist.”

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