The Suit

@BillBramhall NY Daily News Dec 19 2019

The President of the United States is not a person. The President is a suit, and a person wears that suit for a term of four to eight years. The Suit has its own powers and the wearer of The Suit can wield those powers while they are wearing The Suit, much like a suit of armor, or like Iron Man. It is also, however, a garment of service, like a butler's tuxedo or a military uniform. It indicates that the wearer has a purpose and that purpose is to serve and protect those for whom they are charged to care.

But make no mistake: those awesome powers belong to The Suit, not to the person wearing it. That person is only renting it for a limited time from the United States of America, and, per the terms of the rental, is expected to return it in as good condition as when it was received.

The wearer of The Suit can treat it with respect - they can keep it clean, keep it washed and ironed and fresh. They can mend it if it needs it. They can treat it gently so that it will be useful for a long time. They can wear it only when appropriate, so that on the occasions it is worn, it is taken seriously. They can keep The Suit looking good, so that the wearer of it exudes purpose and dignity and strength, inspires confidence, respect and trust, and when it is time to take off The Suit, it is in as good or better shape as when it was first put on, so that the next wearer may get as much good use out of it as the current wearer.

Or, the wearer of The Suit can soil it, stain it, tear it, wear it out. They can use it to intimidate, to dominate, to further their own selfish ends. They can stretch it out so badly by self-indulgence that it won't fit anyone else. They can damage it so thoroughly that it can't be worn again.

Donald Trump is sh*tting the pants of The Suit.

He believes that Donald Trump is in charge of the United States of America, not the President. He doesn't understand that he is not The Suit. Or, maybe he does. Maybe he knows that The Suit rightly belongs to America, but he is trying to steal it for himself.

This is what autocrats do. People like Putin or Kim Jong-Un or Xi wield personal power as themselves, not as temporary representatives of a sovereign nation. They take to themselves the resources of an entire country for their own benefit, enrichment and power, and view their country as existing to serve them, instead of being servants to their country. This is what Trump longs for and aspires to.

His idea of 'leadership' is his personal transactional relationships with world leaders one-on-one, not US policy painstakingly hammered out by the State Department in concert with Congress, the Department of Defense, and longstanding treaties and understandings with our allies and adversaries forged over decades. He thinks it's none of our business who he talks to and what he says to them, as if he was just a private individual - a private individual who is not accountable to anyone, least of all the people he supposedly represents. He wants to be the most powerful person on Earth, without any limits. He spits on the Presidential Records Act and doesn't think anyone should listen to or take notes about his conversations with heads of state, especially the autocrats with whom he identifies.

Donald Trump has no intention of being in service to anyone. He has never understood the concept of service, public or otherwise - he only understands obedience and loyalty from others to him, not to others from him. He expects to be served, not to serve. He does not understand that The Suit, with all its mighty powers, represents the ultimate in service to your country and that you are entrusted with the care of The Suit.

And so, he is befouling, ripping and destroying The Suit, believing that it belongs to him to do with whatever he wants. He becomes furious at any attempt to restrain his wanton mistreatment of The Suit, because he considers it to be his personal property. And he is aided and abetted by those who also benefit from his misuse of The Suit, like dressing up in a bank guard's uniform to let his accomplices into the vault.

He has publicly stated (in that 'joking but not joking at all' childish attempt to say what he means but avoid responsibility for what he says) that he does not want to give back The Suit when the time comes to turn it back in. He has said that he can do whatever he wants with it and that the real owners of it have no say about how he treats it. He calls anyone who opposes him 'traitors' who should be punished, since he sees no difference between loyalty to him and loyalty to America. And he dares anyone to try and do something about it, knowing that the real owners of The Suit fear that, in struggling to restrain him from misusing it, The Suit itself may get torn beyond repair.

So, he continues to sh*t the pants of The Suit, knowing that if he can't keep it, at least it will be unwearable by anyone else when it is taken from him.