Our Fearlful Leader

The White House website transition went about as smoothly as could be expected, and while people have focused on what isn't there, it's time to move on to what IS. And what is more important in a Trump presidency than Trump's own mythology biography? And what a story it tells!

How does it begin?

"Donald J. Trump is the very definition of the American success story."

Which makes sense if your version of the American Success Story is to inherit your wealth from your father's company. Bonus points if that company is accused of profiteering on public contracts and also discriminated against tenants on a basis of race.

One paragraph consists of boring biography I imagine he has printed on the back of his business cards, and another longer paragraph discusses his path to the presidency, and this is where a close reading is most enjoyable.

Mr. Trump won the election on November 8 of 2016 in the largest electoral college landslide for a Republican in 28 years.

Whoa! 28 years! That's back in the 80s! I know Reagan was the president, and he won in landslide, right! But wait, 28 years ago is the 1988 election, in which George H.W. Bush defeated Michael Dukakis, whose campaign's greatest legacy might be the worst photo-op ever. It also ranks 22nd of 56 in percentage difference in electoral college votes, as opposed to Reagan's 1984 election, which ranks 5. Sure seems like he's referring to it as "28 years ago"  because Trump thinks big numbers are good, or because he is hoping whoever is browsing just assumes he's referring to the actual landslide.

Oh, wait, here we go - he mentions that election in another sentence!

He won over 2,600 counties nationwide, the most since President Reagan in 1984.

I wonder why he didn't just say 32 years ago? This actually is a noteworthy statistic, but one that says more about the urban rural/divide in our country than it does about Donald Trump. A serious topic, so I'll avoid it.

Additionally, he won over 62 million votes in the popular vote, the highest all-time for a Republican nominee.

Which would totally be impressive if the total turnout hadn't been climbing the whole time. How fast, you say? Well, it doubled from 68.8 million voters in 1960 to 138.9 million voters last year, so comparing total Republican votes is pretty meaningless. Unfortunately, if you rank him on the percentage difference (which would be unaffected by increases in population), you end up with him having the 58th largest difference in percentage points out of 58 elections. These are apparently not the sort of big numbers Trump wants advertised, for some reason.

For fairness sake, let's compare it to Romney, who won 60.9 million votes out of a total 131.4 in 2008. If we assume that he would win that same percentage if we just scaled up the election to the 138 million who voted in the most recent election, he wins (60.993 x 13.885 / 131.407 =) 64.463 millon, votes, which is more than Trump. Keep in mind, Romney was also running against some Barack Obama dude who I'm told was kinda charismatic, and not someone who almost half of the country apparently hated from the get go.

And here's a new low bar for expectations:

He also won 306 electoral votes, the most for a Republican since George H.W. Bush in 1988.

Sure, I guess we should skip over the past two when Republicans lost, that makes sense.  Trump is bragging about winning more electoral votes in 2004 and 2000. Congratulations on winning an election without resorting to using the words "dimpled chad?"  And last I checked, being more popular than Dubya was not the achievement politicians these days gun for. Before that, the republican candidates lost to the more popular democratic candidate, Bill Clinton (who won 379 and 370, for comparison). And Bush senior, commonly known as the most popular Bush to win the presidency, convincingly wiped the floor with Trump's toupee, winning with 426 electoral college votes.

The page goes on. Trump's not lying. He's like he 6th grader who carefully chooses his words to make sure that if he's ever caught, he can go back and say "I didn't lie." There are lots of reasons students do this. Laziness is one. I like to imagine these sorts of conversations in his reform school military prep days:

Donald, where's your homework?
I left my notebook at home.

Except this time, it's not just that Donald didn't do his homework. He's afraid and insecure, because he just lost the popular election as badly as an elected president has ever done, and now he needs to lead a government where his validity will be questioned every second, and if there's one thing someone with his insecurity issues can't stand, it's to have his authority challenged.

The best part? Everybody who's watching always knows the little sixth grader is a lying weasel, and it's only a matter of time until sort of kid loses friends. Trust me. I taught sixth graders just like him.