Has President Donald Trump become part of the USA's political establishment?

September 24, 2017

Has President Donald Trump

become part of the USA's political establishment?

By: Steven G MacLeod

Donald Trump now President of the United States of America, is one of the most polarizing figures of the 21^st century, and by his own admission in his book Art of the Deal when he was a child “people either liked me a lot or didn't like me at all.” He has been given almost messianic status by some of his supporters, who claim that Mr. Trumps election was nothing short of divine intervention while those who oppose Mr. Trump as President accuse him of being an authoritarian dictator, a racist, and a NAZI. These are all extreme claims to make and in the end amount to nothing more than dirt slinging between supporters and opposition, but illustrates this no shades of grey attitude that has developed. To his supporters he is the only person who can “make America great again” and Mr. Trump has been quoted saying as much during his acceptance of the republican nomination “I alone can fix the system” and to his opposition he is the embodiment of what is wrong in America and will only work towards marginalizing minorities and taking America away from social progression. For those of us who can still see the world in the shades of grey that it truly is, what do we think is actually going on with Mr. Trump and his white house? Is the President really a political outsider which is true when you take into account that this is Mr. Trumps first serious dive into politics as a politician, but someone who is as wealthy and influential as Mr. Trump must have been involved in some form or another in the political world of the USA for decades. My best suggestion to getting an idea about Mr. Trump is reading his two books Art of the Deal and Surviving at the Top, these two books if read from an unbiased position give us some keen insights into how Mr. Trump views the world around him. He has deep respect for “smart tough people” as written in Surviving at the Top even likening this respect to that held for athletes, you can imagine then how he must view those he views as weak or ineffectual, which is incidentally how he views those in the established political structure of the United States. To boil down to what I mean is that in these two books Donald Trump comes across as someone who recognizes the wealthy position he comes from right from childhood, and the pitfalls that come with having an attitude of privilege, he also talks about his childhood stating he was a mischievous child who liked to “stir things up”, “it wasn't malicious so much as it was aggressive.” Also Mr. Trump states in the Art of the Deal that he doesn't spend anytime worrying about what else could have or should have been done. Mr. Trumps own words seem to align pretty well with how we see him operate as President not afraid to shake things up and continuously moving forward. For good or bad Donald Trump for all outward appearances is exactly the same guy after becoming President as he was before. Now what about political ties or affiliations? Well the most evident is his long standing relationship with the Clinton's, which appears to have been absolutely destroyed by the election, however Mr. Trumps actions during and after the election are suspect, from not moving forward with prosecuting Mrs. Clinton and her staff over the “unsecured servers” after being elected when he had repeatedly said he would, to worsening relations with Russia, large military strikes in Syria and Afghanistan as well as implicating Iran and antagonizing North Korea. Does this seeming shift mean that President Trump is now apart of the mechanization's and plans of the established 30-40 year career politician's? We can all imagine a scenario where shortly after taking office Mr. Trump attends a private meeting with those representing said established politician's and effectively told play ball or your the next John F Kennedy. However possible it seems unlikely to be the case, what seems far more likely is that for better or worse Donald Trump is just being Donald Trump, and as he said himself “people either liked me a lot, or didn't like me at all”.

(wikipedia, “Art of The Deal” Donald Trump, “Surviving At the Top” Donald Trump, “Psychoanalyzing the left and right after Donald Trump” Robert Samuels)