Chris asked me to write this. He wanted me to write it because we got into a long, drawn out and rather loud discussion last night over it. It was emotional, on my part at least. I got very frustrated because I couldn’t seem to voice what I wanted to, and Chris was offering me solutions and excuses for Trump. That wasn’t what I wanted. Also, this hits me differently, I think, as someone new to “right of the left.”
So let’s start at the beginning.
I listened to Trump’s press conference about the DC crash. I started watching with a certain amount of nervousness, because I know Trump often says things during stuff like this. I was expecting a few gaffes, but I kind of got thrown sideways (emotionally) over some of what he said. For those who want the full transcript, it’s here. I’ll be quoting from it below.
I was trying to not cringe over the commentary about how much better his (Trump’s) policies were than Biden or Obama’s. Frankly, when I’m tuning in to find out what’s going on with a crash, I do not want to hear finger pointing. Do that after, when we have facts in hand. But it’s Trump, and I put it off to grandstanding, which is normal for him no matter how much it irritates me. Then he said this:
“But we’ll restore faith in American air travel. I’ll have more to say about that. I do want to point out that various articles that appeared prior to my entering office, and here’s one. The FAA’s diversity push includes focus on hiring people with severe intellectual and psychiatric disabilities. That is amazing. And then it says, FAA says, people with severe disabilities are most underrepresented segment of the workforce and they want them in and they want them. They can be air traffic controllers. I don’t think so.”
I know people who do piloting and ATC. While I know that there’s been a push to get women and people with different skin color into ATC, I didn’t think they’d lowered their standards. I did 15 minutes of investigation, and according to what I read, their method of finding people had changed, but their requirements for hiring had not. As a side note, apparently I didn’t look back far enough, as there’s a Fox article about changes done in 2015. I didn’t look that far back last night. Regardless, I translate the above statement from Trump to say, “People in wheelchairs and who are mentally defective can be air traffic controllers.” That statement is not true. Looking back on it now, it’s one of Trump’s “aggrandizement” statements, making his claim sound bigger than it is. I believe Chris would consider it to be a gaffe or misspeak, as opposed to a lie. I called it a lie last night. I was wrong about it being a lie, but I don’t think I’m wrong that it’s a bad statement.
Then Trump said this:
“Then another article, the Federal Aviation Administration, –. This was before I got to office. Recently. Second term. The FAA is actively recruiting workers who suffer severe intellectual disabilities, psychiatric problems, and other mental and physical conditions under a diversity and inclusion hiring initiative spelled out on the agency’s website. Can you imagine? These are people that are … I mean actually their lives are shortened because of the stress that they have.”
Again, this just opens doors to the left, inviting attacks. The article he’s referring to is from January of 2024 (per several places tho I didn’t look it up). So he misspoke about the date. But the changes to the FAA hiring processes actually started before Obama’s era. And the FAA website, per several places including the Wayback Machine, hasn’t changed its requirements since before 2015. This means the same wording that is on the FAA website for potential ATC students is the same wording that was there during Trump 1.0.
My problem is that all this stuff is easy to check. It takes two seconds, and you can find the original documents, as I did. It’s obvious that Trump is just throwing shade at this point. I hate it, folks. Anyhow, at that point, he goes back to prayers for the victims, and then starts talking about how he listened to the tapes of the ATC and plane. He basically says that because he travels a lot in helicopters, he knows they can move around a lot, so therefore it was probably the Blackhawk’s fault. Again, this is just… not based on fact. And it makes me angry. What’s the point of putting people on to do an investigation if you’re just going to make claims like this? All the media is going to grab onto is what Trump said, and no investigation is even going to count now.
Of course, reporters immediately grabbed onto his statements about DEI possibly being behind the crash:
“Speaker 2: Mr. President, on DEI and the claims that you’ve made, are you saying this crash was somehow caused and the result of diversity hiring? And what evidence have you seen to support these claims?
Trump: It just could have been. We have a high standard, we’ve had a much higher standard than anybody else, and there are things where you have to go by brainpower, you have to go by psychological quality and psychological quality is a very important element of it. These are various, very powerful tests that we put to use and they were terminated by Biden, and Biden went by a standard that’s the exact opposite. So we don’t know.”
There’s just no evidence that testing was terminated by Biden. Changes were made long ago, and that might have led to the crash, but it wasn’t Biden. I’m all for slamming Biden to hell and back if he’s dome something, but … This wasn’t a Biden thing.
My take on things.
I’m new to “right of left.” I’m squeaky new. You’ve all seen my progress, and I’ve tried to be very transparent about things. What I haven’t changed are my morals and ethics. The Left changed, and I stayed where I am. Y’all (imo) moved slightly toward center, and that’s how I ended up being “right of left.” But I have not changed my views. I have changed opinions from time to time, due to learning new information. When I’m wrong, I try to be gracious and admit it right away. But my base beliefs in the world and in how I and our leaders should act has not changed.
I didn’t want to listen to the press conference, because I knew there’d be unscripted moments and Trump would put his foot in it. He has a history of it, and I swear to all that’s holy that I want to chisel the words “the greatest” out of his brain with a cheese grater. I was braced for it. What I heard from him (please note, “what I heard” does not necessarily mean “what he said” in this case) was that the crash happened because the helicopter didn’t move in time, and that it was the air traffic controller’s fault because they were a DEI hire, with a strong implication that the ATC was disabled in some way.
I listen. I listen hard. I repeat things if I’m not sure I understand nuance. I watched department heads and Vance get up after Trump with that “oh geez we gotta fix this” look on their faces, and their body language was not happy like I’ve seen it in the past ten days. I know I wasn’t the only one who heard what I heard in Trump’s speech. And this morning, I know that for certain, because most of what I was freaked out over last night is in this morning’s paper, splashed across the headlines.
I’m new. I know Trump isn’t going to be perfect, but man, this hurt. I’m already in a position where I have to hide under a fucking bush (politically/metaphorically speaking) so I don’t piss off the people who put food on my table. Now I have to listen to them scream about stupid shit Trump said. It fucking hurts, guys. I’m over here, “right of left,” and I’m not going anywhere. But I hate it right this second. Trump walked right into it. He said stuff that had no place being said during a “say prayers for the poor dead people” speech. He said stuff about DEI hires that he simply doesn’t know (because no one does yet, which is why there’s a fucking investigation going on). He said stuff about ATC and the Blackhawk pilot that he doesn’t know. No one does. Because the investigation is ongoing. Why couldn’t he just stick to the facts? Why did he have to go off into lala land with stupid statements that I just KNEW were going to end up in this morning’s headlines?
If Trump had just stuck to the “thoughts and prayers” line last night, and then let his people vet information so he could say with authority that the ATC or the heli pilot were at fault, it would have been better. It is not good that he spoke opinions, stated like facts, and they were wrong.
Late last night, I ended up paging Chris to apologize (some parts redacted because they were private):
“I am sorry for letting my emotions run high. I guess there are still some things that I can’t talk with you about until the following day or a couple of days later when I’ve had time to chill. I am not giving up on the right and I am not giving up on Trump, and I’m sorry if I communicated that because that was not my intention at all. I don’t feel as if I’ve said anything wrong, as in factually, but I very obviously did a poor job of communicating and for that I am extremely sorry. All I can say is that I will keep working at learning more and better ways to communicate with you and others. I’m sorry for my part in the upset tonight. I’m not angry with you or your opinion. I was struggling because I didn’t feel like you were hearing me, but I know a lot of that is on me for not communicating well enough. And for letting my emotions get in the way. I am very bad at stopping the emotions and I’ll continue to work on that too.”
The left, as the right likes to say frequently, runs on emotions. Last night, my emotions were high. I was angry, and I was upset. I hate being in a position of listening to people crow over how horrid Trump is because he said stupid shit. I hate it even more because I really can’t say anything in return. The frustration is stifling. And every time Chris opened his mouth to say something, I wanted to scream. It felt like (note the phrase) he was just defending Trump “because Trump.”
I am not going to cease holding President Trump to the highest standards. That’s *my* ethics/morals in action. I hold everyone in the Presidential office to those standards. I would have done the same (albeit with more expectation of failure) for Harris, if she’d won. I did the same for Biden, Trump 1.0, and Obama. I will call out gaffes and wrong-doing and wrong-speaking on Trump’s part when I see it, because that is the right thing to do. I ask myself, would I call out Biden on this? The answer is yes, so I’d better damn well do the same thing for Trump. The rules apply to *everyone*. I know, it sets me up for disappointment. But if I lower the bar, am I not simply accepting defeat, accepting that bad behavior is okay?
It’s a rough day for me, folks. I’m tired. I hurt, both physically and emotionally. I’m going to go read for a bit.
Ally out.
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