2016 March 16^th

Fox News and Morning Joe shared a guest today. Carly Fiorina did a gig on both shows. I guess she wants to keep her name in the public’s consciousness. I did not need to listen to Ms. Fiorina to know what she was saying or how she was saying it so I didn’t. Carly Fiorina is one perpetually angry woman who apparently believes that all her troubles and those of the entire civilized world are the fault of Hillary Clinton. Her angst is not surprising and it will continue until she discovers that most of it is her own fault. This woman was dismissed as CEO of Hewlett Packard after getting into a flap with the founder’s grandson; then she ran for the Senate against Barbara Boxer in California and had her head handed to her; then she tried for her party’s nomination for President with much the same result. Perhaps she needs some time for self-examination.

The leaders of both parties had splendid Tuesdays, and now we can see if they are magnanimous winners; well, they aren’t. Trump did call “Little Marco” and congratulated him for running a good race, but that was about the extent of any “make nice.” Trump did declare that if he was close to getting enough delegates and was denied the nomination there “might be riots in the streets.” This is what passes for Trump’s attempt to cool the heated rhetoric. He took another step closer to his party’s nomination while taking two steps back from winning the general election. Given that he is not at all likely to change, it is no wonder that the Republican Party leaders are pouring money into negative ads to stop him. The wonder is not that they are trying to stop him; the wonder is that they don’t understand how ineffectual their attempts have been. (See Mitt Romney’s non-effect on Trump’s campaign.)

 Trump’s followers are simply glued to the man. I have heard interviews with some of them and they remind me of the way bobbysoxers were screaming their devotion for Frank Sinatra in the mid-1940s. Indeed one concerned citizen even wrote to J. Edgar Hoover warning him of the threat to the country by such dedicated people if they became politically involved. Now they are. Trump managed a startling performance recently that suggests something unnerving about his sanity. One of the anchors interviewing him played a clip of him saying that he would pay the legal expenses of any of his followers who might be arrested for assaulting a provocateur at a Trump rally.  When the clip had finished playing Trump said, “I never said that.” Denying reality that blatantly is not a sign of robust mental health.