The United States is extremely divided at this time, not percentage wise much different that previous years, but the division is becoming more extreme every day. There is virtually no middle left, hate crimes are rising so quickly (31% according to the NYPD) that New York City (where Trump lives) has formed a special police task force to combat anti-Muslim and anti-homosexual violence.
President Elect Trump has had little to say about this, but taking time to use Twitter to criticize the cast of political play Tony Award Winning Hamilton for making a respectful speech asking the VP-Elect Mike Pence to help heal the nation and again call for NBC’s long-running satire show Saturday Night Live to be closed down.
Epidemic of police killing Trump no recent comment
The United States is also experiencing an epidemic of police officer ambushes killing 4 officers in diverse locations just a day ago, apparently completely independently (not organized) and in situations where the officers weren’t involved in any police action. It is regrettably not unusual for shoot outs between suspects and officers trying to arrest them, but what is happening now is just random ambushes of uniformed peace officers usually just sitting in their cars on routine patrol. Russia has invaded and occupied a sovereign country Ukraine's Crimea and has joined with Syrian Dictator Bashar Hafez al-Assad in dropping poison gas on citizens of rebel stronghold Aleppo and targeting every hospital in the rebel-held area until today there is no organized emergency care, no working hospital, for 250,000 civilians.
President Elect Trump seems to have a very thin skin, famously feuding with a former Miss. Universe during the campaign, banning world-class news organizations including The Washington Post from his events, and generally starting twitter wars in the middle of the night (like any 13 year-old) with anyone who disagrees with him.
The problem spots around the world and all the potentially explosive situations such as North Korea where the nuclear-armed dictator recently had a motion picture company attacked in cyberspace for daring to make a satirical movie about him call for a calm President with self-control, not a loose cannon and worse yet a man who while looming large on TV seems to be a very small person.
Trump, too small for the office?
How else can you explain a billionaire President Elect tweeting that one of the most popular Broadway shows isn’t very good or that a late-night satirical TV show which started in 1975, should be taken off the air apparently simply for making fun of him. Apparently President Elect Trump doesn’t even understand the concept of satire because he complained that their skit about him were “one-sided” and “biased.” And, by the way, during the Hamilton episode, Vice President Elect Mike Pence waited politely until the end and has made no negative comments about the incident, later telling reporters, "I was not offended by the cast of Hamilton." So, while the Vice President Elect, who has virtually no actual power in our Republic, seems to be a reasonable, uniting, calm, and self-restrained person, he is a stark contrast to the President Elect
Perhaps the world can take comfort from the fact that many mediocre men have grown once in the office, or even better that during the campaign a senior advisor, Donald Trump Jr., once reportedly offered the Vice Presidency to Ohio Governor John Kasich promising he would be the most powerful VP ever, in charge of both domestic and foreign policy (leaving President Trump to light the White House Christmas Tree perhaps?)
The problem isn't that half the country disagrees with the President Elect's broad policies but that many people in both parties and among independents seem to feel that he is just too small a person for the most important, most influential, most dangerous job in the world.
(Note, disclaimer, I was a columnist for Post-Newsweek, The Washington Post organization, for a number of years)
