Scott Gunn
I decided to watch Mr. Trump’s inaugural address. Powerful words which reminded me of why he was elected, not by a majority of the people but a majority of states. I saw his audience, almost all white working class people, his forgotten America that made the bulk of his electoral victory. There have been four times where the popular vote was greater than the electoral vote. However, in three of those cases both were very close. This was not, and it showed me an extreme division in our country.
Personally, his speech did speak to me, and resonated things that I have thought for decades. Do I trust Mr. Trump? No, not at all. The messenger knows his audience because he has profited from them. Had he been a real estate developer of houses and apartments rather than hotels and casinos. Had he been a monogamous man who never viewed women as trophies. Had he been a conservative Republican mayor of Detroit who turned the city around the way another conservative Republican, Bret Shundler, Had he not resorted to extreme antics then I might believe him.
I want to believe him, but I’ve seen too many presidents with their speeches and nothing changes. President Obama wanted to rebuild infrastructure, and the GOP wouldn’t let him. Some governors wouldn’t except the federal money somehow seeing it as betrayal. If change is going to take place, I don’t think we can look to whoever is on the White House. We have to look to ourselves, who is the mayor, who is in charge of the county and so forth.
Does Mr. Trump and the GOP scare me? Sure they do, and I’m scared not just for myself but for a lot of other people as well. Do I harbor anger at this supporters? In general, I do not. Some of them may be people who are uncharitable and people best not to be acquainted with, but I think a lot of them do feel forgotten in the whole barrage of “white bashing,” political correctness, uprooting of social norms and all the rest of it. To say the GOP is only for the rich is a little odd considering that the most liberal cities are the most expensive to live in. I could afford to live in Tulsa, but I could never afford to live in Seattle again.