Donald Trump’s most humiliating moment yet
One could almost envy the Trump supporter for how little they have to remember. For us the embarrassment of riches that are the felonies, treacheries, bigotries, misogynies, calumnies, hate crimes, broken promises, petty vengeances, lies and sexual assaults of Donald Trump are so staggering in their number and dumbfounding in their implications, it’s next to impossible to keep track of them all. Oh for the simple life of the Trump apologist, who only has the discredited cry of “Benghazi” and “her emails” to remember, and no worries about those twin sophisms actually being investigated and exposed for the trivialities that they are either, because they already have.
Still, for my money, the scandal I like best is Donald Trump’s failure to disclose his tax returns. I realize that breaking his promise to show the American people his tax returns if elected president isn’t the most horrible thing Donald Trump has ever done, not by a long shot. No, I like it because I suspect that it is the one thing, more than anything else, that Donald Trump wants to keep hidden.
Showing his tax returns will embarrass Trump beyond any other thing he’s ever done. I also suspect that it will once and for all dislodge from Trump fandom those members of his base who depend on Trump being a financial genius for their continued support. Trump’s tax returns will show two things: that he isn’t nearly as rich as he says, and he isn’t nearly as smart as he says.
So despite reservations from committee member Ron Kind of Wisconsin, who says, “I’d suspect that Bob Mueller and his team are looking at that already,” House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Richard Neal plans to acquire and investigate Donald Trump’s tax returns. As Ron Kind aptly puts it, Mueller probably is also looking at it, but what harm can another set of eyes do? In the service of mortally humiliating Donald Trump, spare no expense, I say.
Whoever wrote what will probably turn out to be Donald Trump’s final State of the Union address, cannot seriously believe that a couple of rhetorical diads will halt Trump’s numerous investigations. There most certainly can be “peace and legislation” with “war and investigation.” The new people in Congress are smart enough to multitask. And, mark my words, they will expose Donald Trump’s tax returns.
Robert Harrington is an American expat living in Britain. He is a portrait painter.