For the last couple of weeks I've been watching the mainstream media give more and more time to the preposterous idea that Donald Trump is a legitimate contender for the Republican nomination for President. I couldn't turn on a cable news channel or broadcast news channel for that matter without seeing Trump's face demanding he be taken seriously while spouting debunked birther conspiracy theories whenever he opened his mouth. I would look at him and my first thought wasn't,
"This guy would make a great president" so much as
"I wonder what his hair looks like when he gets out of the shower." I don't think
"Trump would be an awesome president." I think
"A Trump presidency would be a national embarrassment."
And now we get to see how thin-skinned The Donald actually is courtesy of New York Times columnist Gail Collins. Last week, Collins decided to turn in
a column deriding Trump for his headline grabbing ways, out-crazying the wingnut contenders by stealing the keys and taking a joyride in the Birther bandwagon. He insists on making his case with three year old debunked theories on the Kenyan-born, possibly Muslim, birth certificateless, Manchurian candidate President. He's made his main talking point that this fake controversy is "the
greatest scam in history." It doesn't matter that all these theories have been proven false. He's got people investigating and "they cannot believe what they’re finding." No details, of course, they just can't believe it. Maybe they can't believe their good fortune in being paid handsomely by Trump to investigate something that has been thoroughly exhausted; something that the Clinton campaign machine and the McCain campaign Edsel couldn't find. Something that can easily be Googled. Or maybe
Orly Taitz is giving him legal advice while cleaning his teeth.
But the Collins opinion was just too much for Trump to bear, so he wrote a
letter to the editor. A letter, that while insulting Collins for her "storytelling ability," sounds like it was written by a marginal high school student trying to sound smarter than he is. He then goes on to restate the whole birther nonsense, sticking to his guns, refusing to believe anyone or anything that proves the opposite.
Collins of course had to respond with
a rebuttal today including other crazy shit Trump has said these last few weeks, like it was Bill Ayers who actually wrote "Dreams From My Father" or that people who went to school with Obama never saw him. She goes on to once again disprove the ridiculous statements, but no matter. At this point, Trump is all in and nothing anyone says can make him think any different. ...Maybe that's how he bankrupted his casinos.
But here's the thing: if a New York Times opinion columnist gets him so easily riled that he feels the need to write a letter, how is he going to react to the constant ridicule from primary challengers and media personnel during the campaign? You can see how upset he gets when someone disagrees with him, how emotional he becomes when he feels he's being interrupted (see the
Meredith Vieira interview). How is he going to survive a year long campaign with that short hair trigger when Howard Dean was drummed out of the Democratic race in '04 for
displaying his excitement after the Iowa primary results?
But I suppose Trump doesn't have to worry about that, because there's no way he'll run. There's no way he'll want to be viewed under a microscope with such scrutiny. This whole thing is a ratings ploy for his reality show, nothing more. And the fact that
Republicans rate Trump second in a favorability poll combined with the antics of the fractured House majority being run by Tea Party freshmen
reveals the sad state of the Republican party.
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