The Oppenheimer Report 11/14/16

Over the past 25 years since I began writing this weekly report, I have had more than one cynical, opinionated, off-color thing to say about politicians. It would be easy to spew today, less than a week after the election that surprised so many. Goodness knows, I’ve read and heard plenty of spewing about Donald Trump over the past weeks, but I have nothing to say that I have not already said about the man. Over the past few months, I’ve been offering my unsolicited opinion about the Trump phenomenon, just as the rest of you have. After he ran away with the Republican primaries, I was deeply concerned that his unlikely ascendance to the highest office in the country was becoming more and more likely. To me, that spoke to the nation’s largely unrecognized discontent. Now, as the world lets out a collective gasp of fear and indignation, I reprise a letter I wrote to an old friend, who expressed her despondency the day after last Tuesday’s election results…

11/9/16 Dear C,  I am a diehard Republican, but I crossed party lines to vote for Hillary this time. While I am terribly worried about what a Trump presidency may foretell, I am somewhat philosophical at this point.

We all know Washington is broken. The Wall Street debacle in 2008 was an outrageous abomination, as was the Savings and Loans scandal in the 1980s. Buy now, pay later. Business as usual led us to a $30 Trillion deficit and there is no indication that a Clinton presidency was going to do anything but exacerbate that problem. The stock market was supposed to tank today, and it did not. Today, black is white, and white is black. I do not know what the future will be, but I’m not jumping ship yet. I am still an American citizen and I still love my country, in its entirety.

This election was a shot across the bow of democracy; Americans have been living in a house of cards for decades, and sooner or later the shit was going to hit the fan. I have despised Trump for 40 years, since my days at Saperston Real Estate. His arrogance and lack of class or grace goes against everything I believe in. But he is a shrewd business man and hopefully he knows how to put a team together. My slim hope is that he will achieve what no other leader has recently done: put the country back on track. Hatred and bigotry are alive and well in America – Trump did not invent them - he simply used them to get where he needed to be. The man is a shameless opportunist, and always has been. He effectively tapped into the lowest common denominator of human behavior to get where he needed to go, and I do not believe the entire block of the electorate that voted him in is stupid or hateful. You may find that, for all his toxic rhetoric, the growing constituency of disgruntled Americans who feel betrayed by their government will come together, and all this nonsense about walls and Islamophobia will simply evaporate. That is my hope anyway. He will have to dial his crap back now if he wants to achieve anything in Washington, and perhaps he will do some of the constructive things he claims he will – untangle the tax code, disassemble the deplorable campaign financing system, re-negotiate our trade deals and bring jobs back to America. Regardless of what his perceived “beliefs” are – and we don’t really know -  if he restores ANY prosperity to this foundering country, the results will be good. If he doesn’t make good, is he any different from the career politicians? 

This seemingly horrible development may in fact be exactly what democracy is. You can argue about the unfairness of the electoral college or that only the haters were heard, but he won, fair and square, and against all odds. If I can forget the asshole Trump is and look at what happened, democracy worked. He didn’t buy the vote; look at the machine against which he prevailed. It’s nothing short of remarkable. Bernie couldn’t fight Hillary’s machine, even though we all know he was the people’s choice. The DNC was not going to let a socialist run against the elephants (and presumably lose). Trump is not beholding to PACS and he is as much a threat to the Republicans as he is to the Democrats. He shrewdly tapped into the disgust over the status quo, and found his majority. Americans decisively voted for change, and whether or not it was the right decision, it may mean there is hope. His success or failure as a president is a question for the history books. My hope, however tenuous, is that this lightening rod for controversy will now settle down and Trump the blowhard will turn into a conduit for much-needed reform. Maybe, just maybe, he can put together a plan to unify this completely divided nation. I see the same hatred you see – but you might be surprised to hear some of the things JFK said and did, and he was much loved during his presidency. Sadly, hypocrisy is an almost constant by-product of the political system.

Pollster, predictors, media, politicos, spin doctors … America rejected all of them, and all the money on both sides could not bring this guy down. To me, that is hopeful. Trump is not a puppet of the Koch brothers. Maybe, if he can accomplish this unimaginable feat, he can make the positive changes that will help right the ship of state. In fact he is no worse than the partisan bastards that make up our Congress right now. The team he picks will be telling. That is my concern right now. Despise the man, by all means, but focus on the possible good that can come from all this. I’m as lost and fearful as the rest of the world, but Donald Trump did not create the mess we’re in. We, our complacency, and the officials we elected did. Imagine what would happen if half the money we lost on campaign financing and un-collected taxes was diverted to low income housing or to feeding the poor. When America is most down and out, that is when she shines. This may be the wake-up call that brings the pendulum back to center. I do not think this is the end of the world, only time will tell. One thing is for sure: we Americans need to wake up and see our part in the big picture. Sometimes democracy is not pretty.

Be well my friends!  Jamie

RIP  singer/songwriters  Leonard Cohen (82) and Leon Russel (76).

   - Written by Jamie Oppenheimer c2016 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED