‘He Has So Coarsened Our Politics That He Remains a Contender for the Presidency Despite Musing About His Opponent as a Gunshot Target’
One day after endorsing Hillary Clinton for president The Editorial Board of The New York Times has published a scathing take down and rebuke of Donald Trump’s candidacy for president.Â
In “Why Donald Trump Should Not Be President,” the Times states right up front, “Donald Trump is a man who dwells in bigotry, bluster and false promises.”
The Times editors label Trump and his beliefs, “matters of dangerous impulse and cynical pandering,” and observe his “freewheeling campaign” has been “marked by bursts of false and outrageous allegations, personal insults, xenophobic nationalism, unapologetic sexism and positions that shift according to his audience and his whims.”
The paper of record points to Trump’s “record rife with bankruptcies and sketchy ventures like Trump University,” and say his “brazen refusal to disclose his tax returns…should sharpen voter wariness of his business and charitable operations.”
The Times says Trump “always does make clear where his heart lies — with the anti-immigrant, nativist and racist signals that he scurrilously employed to build his base.”
And on policy, “NBC News has tabulated that Mr. Trump has made 117 distinct policy shifts on 20 major issues, including three contradictory views on abortion in one eight-hour stretch.”
Finally, the paper concludes, “Voters attracted by the force of the Trump personality should pause and take note of the precise qualities he exudes as an audaciously different politician: bluster, savage mockery of those who challenge him, degrading comments about women, mendacity, crude generalizations about nations and religions. Our presidents are role models for generations of our children. Is this the example we want for them?”
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Image by Gage Skidmore via Flickr and a CC licenseÂ