Trump Is Not Smart Or Competent - But He Is Stubborn

(Cartoon image is by Clay Bennett in the Chattanooga Times Free Press.)

Donald Trump is not an intelligent man. We know that by the people who knew him in the past. His college teacher called him the dumbest student he had ever had. And we know that Trump is not competent to hold the job he has. One just has to look at his huge list of failures. After calling himself the great dealmaker, he has yet to complete a single deal for this country.

But he is stubborn, and is utterly incapable of admitting he made a mistake and correcting that mistake. His rampant narcissism precludes the possibility of that.

A few weeks ago, Trump started a trade war with several entities (China, Mexico, Canada, and the European Union). He was certain that he could bully those countries into doing what he wanted by imposing tariffs on some of the goods they sell to this country. It hasn't worked.

Those countries simply responded with equal tariffs on American products. Now farmers, companies, and consumers are beginning to hurt in this country. A smart person would realize he had made a serious mistake, declare victory in the trade war, and remove the tariffs. Trump is not doing that. He's now threatening to up the $34 billion in tariffs on China to about $500 billion -- which would cover everything China sends to the U.S. (probably with the exception of the goods Trump and Ivanka get made in China).

Who will pay this new tariff? The American consumer. But Trump is too stupid to realize he's just levying a tax on Americans (and driving many of his farm supporters out of business).

Then we have his embarrassing (and possibly treasonous) behavior in Helsinki. After attacking our best allies, he fawned all over Vladimir Putin -- the most dangerous dictator in the world. He said the United States was to blame for not getting along with Russia, ignoring all the aggressive actions by that country (including attacking our country during the 2016 election season with computer hackers). Once again, he shared his doubt that Putin had instructed his military intelligence to launch the computer attack on the U.S. -- even though our intelligence agencies showed him proof that this happened a couple of weeks before he was sworn in.

He received serious blowback for his embracing on Putin. But he couldn't admit his mistake. Even when he tried to admit that Russia had attacked the U.S., he added "but it could have been someone else". Now he is compounding his mistake by announcing he has invited his buddy (Putin) to visit the White House this Fall. Is he going to repeat the same mistakes he made in Helsinki? It's very likely.

The crazy part is that he's doing all this just before an election. His stubborn narcissism keeps him from understanding that he's hurting the chances of a lot of Republicans running for office, and increasing the chances of Democrats flipping Congress. If I was a Republican running for office, I would be quaking in my boots watching Trump.