By: George E. Curry
At the Democratic National Convention last week, Hillary Clinton and her supporters were too kind by simply saying: Love Trumps Hate. It’s a matter that extends far beyond the concept of love. It would have been more accurate to have said: Knowledge Trumps Ignorance.
President Obama was correct to assert, “You know, nothing truly prepares you for the demands of the oval office. You can read about it, you can study it, but until you’ve sat at that desk, you don’t know what it’s like to manage a global crisis or send young people to war. But Hillary’s been in the room. She’s been part of those decisions. She knows what’s at stake in the decisions our government makes, what’s at stake for the working family for the senior citizen or the small business owner, for the soldier, for the veteran. And even in the midst of crisis, she listens to people and she keeps her cool and she treats everybody with respect.
“And no matter how daunting the odds, no matter how much people try to knock her down, she never, ever quits. That is the Hillary I know. That’s the Hillary I’ve come to admire, and that’s why I can say with confidence there has never been a man or a woman, not me, not Bill Clinton, nobody, more qualified than Hillary Clinton to serve as president of the United States.”
He could have added that, in contrast, there has never been any major-party candidate less qualified than Donald J. Trump to serve as president of the United States.
When it comes to domestic and international issues, Trump is an ignoramus.
The always boastful Trump claimed that Russia wouldn’t invade Ukraine under his presidency. The only problem with that is Russia has already invaded Ukraine, a former Soviet peninsula. It did so in 2014, triggering economic sanctions from the U.S. and European countries that are still in place.
His comment followed another display of ignorance when he said Russian President Vladimir Putin and Russia are “not going into Ukraine, okay, just so you understand.” Clearly, Trump does not understand.
Responding to Trump’s bizarre claim that Russia would never invade Ukraine under his leadership, Senior Clinton Policy Adviser Jake Sullivan said, “What is he talking about? Russia is already in Ukraine. Does he not know that? What else doesn’t he know?”
Plenty.
He also doesn’t know that you don’t invite the Russian intelligence services or any other foreign power to hack into the emails of your presidential opponent. Trump said at a news conference, “Russia, if you’re listening, I hope you’re able to find the 30,000 emails that are missing. I think you will probably be rewarded mightily by our press.”
At his July 27 news conference, Trump said, “Putin has said things over the last year that are really bad things. OK? He mentioned the N-word one time. I was shocked to hear him mention the N-word. You know what the ‘N’ word is, right? He mentioned it. I was shocked. He has a total lack of respect for President Obama…”
However, FactCheck.org stated, “We scoured the internet and published reports archived by Lexis-Nexis and could not find where Putin ever used that racial epithet. Neither could the Washington Post or CNN, which wrote, ‘There are no published reports to back up Trump’s allegation about Putin’s use of the racially derogatory term, however.’
“Two experts on Russia told us via email that they had never heard of Putin using that term.
“‘In Russian, the N-word does not begin with ‘N’ – and Putin’s English is pretty rudimentary,’ said Stephen Sestanovich, an expert on Russia and the former Soviet Union at the Council on Foreign Relations.
“‘I have no idea what [Trump] is talking about,’ added Fiona Hill, an expert on Russian affairs and director of the Center on the United States and Europe and a senior fellow in the foreign policy program at the Brookings Institution…”
As we have seen in case after case, Trump doesn’t know what he’s talking about, either.
Beyond his being a blank sheet of paper on issues, the notorious liar is a mean-spirited, insensitive bully.
That was on display in his attack on two Muslim American parents whose son, Army Capt. Humayun Khan, was killed in Iraq in 2004. With his wife at his side, Khizr Khan, a Pakistani immigrant, spoke at the Democratic National Convention last week in Philadelphia.
“If it was up to Donald Trump, [our son] never would have been in America,” he said. “Go look at the graves of the brave patriots who died defending America – you will see all faiths, genders and ethnicities. You have sacrificed nothing and no one.”
Firing back, Trump ticked off a list of business success, none of which remotely qualifies as a personal sacrifice. To add salt to the wound, he told ABC News: “‘If you look at his wife, she was standing there. She had nothing to say. Maybe she wasn’t allowed to have anything to say. You tell me.’”
The mother, Ghazala Khan, revealed that she was in too much pain over her son’s loss to speak.
A new Washington Post/ABC News poll found that two-thirds of American voters believe Trump is unfit to be president. Knowledge Trumps Ignorance every time.
George E. Curry is President and CEO of George Curry Media, LLC. He is the former editor-in-chief of Emerge magazine and the National Newspaper Publishers Association News Service (NNPA). He is a keynote speaker, moderator, and media coach. Curry can be reached through his Web site, georgecurry.com. You can also follow him at twitter.com/currygeorge, George E. Curry Fan Page on Facebook, and Periscope. See previous columns at http://www.georgecurry.com/columns.