The Politics of Personality

I love the political season. Every four years, I enjoy watching the strategy and the machinations of both political parties on their race for the White House. To be honest, I usually tire of the spectacle by late October and am ready for them to just get on with it already. I have to admit, that point has come a little early this year. Here it is only the second week in September and I am already sick and tired of both candidates running for President. Why? Because neither candidate is talking about issues or policy. Granted, Hillary is trying but the noise from the Trump campaign is making it difficult. We know why the Trump campaign is not talking about issues, because they really do not have any, and their policy proposals are non-existent. Every day on the cable news stations and from the political pundits we get a barrage of personal garbage about one or the other candidate. Of course, until now, all the Trumpers could say about Hillary was one word, “emails” as if that summed up her inability to do the job as President.

I think it is oddly funny that every time a Trump surrogate is asked a question about what Trump would do in a given situation as President, all they can say is that they wouldn’t do it like the Democrats have done. Kellyanne Conway was challenged about this the other morning by Charlie Rose on CBS and her response was that he would have to ask Donald Trump knowing that if he got the opportunity, it would be in the future and he would have forgotten the question by then. I must hand it to the Trump campaign, they know how to create a narrative and force other candidates to play at their level. Even Hillary is beginning to succumb to his ways and she must be vigilant to avoid that from happening. As the 16 other Republican candidates learned earlier this year, if you play at Trump’s level, you lose. He is the master of the politics of personality.

Now with Hillary Clinton’s health as an issue in the campaign, expect that to be all the Trump campaign talks about for the next week deflecting yet again their lack of policy proposals and their “secret” plans for the running of this government. Stay tuned.