President Donald
Trump’s trip to France was a train wreck.
First, he blew off going to an American military
cemetery to pay respects to fallen U.S. World War I soldiers
because of rain (everyone else showed).
Then he decided to skip a walk up the
Champs Elysee with the other world leaders, who were seeking to show unity with
each other — only he had Vladimir Putin arrived at the ceremony alone.
Lastly, he left early to avoid attending a Peace Forum,
If
those unforced errors were not enough insults to the military and veterans, he
has now suggested that votes cast by active duty be ignored.
Trump was referring to
the races in Florida, where the GOP candidates for governor, senator, and
agriculture commissioner were declared winners on election night. Now that the
votes from these races are being recounted, the outcome is very much in
question.
The Florida Election should be called in favor of Rick Scott and Ron DeSantis in that large numbers of new ballots showed up out of nowhere, and many ballots are missing or forged. An honest vote count is no longer possible-ballots massively infected. Must go with Election Night!— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) November 12, 2018
What Trump fails to
understand is that if that were done, all of the people who voted with an
absentee ballot may not have their voice heard.
These ballots must be mailed by
November 6th but have until the 16th to arrive. Many of the votes that come in
from outside of Florida and outside of the United States come from active duty
military members.
A large percentage of these votes — any that arrive between
the 6th and the 16th — will not count if Trump has his way.
Trump has a
longstanding problem consolidating the words he uses when he talks to and about
veterans and the military and the things he does.
While he never served in the armed services, he
manages to act like he has. He has referenced his time at a military boarding
school and seemed to believe that this counts as service.
This week, he told reporters(referring
to passages in Michelle Obama’s new book about her feelings about
Birtherism), “I’ll give you a little controversy back. I’ll never forgive
(President Barack Obama) for what he did to our U.S. military. It was depleted,
and I had to fix it. What he did to our military made this country very unsafe
for you and you and you.”
Meanwhile, Trump tries
to force the military to hold a ridiculously expensive North Korean style parade,
is the first president to NOT visit active duty military personnel, and
currently has thousands of troops on the U.S. border with Mexico to protect us
from a dangerous caravan of migrants who posed an existential threat to the
country before the election but vanished the day after.
Voting is probably the
most fundamental right we have as Americans and is a big part of what our
military fights for. Denying these people that right should fly in the face of
what all Americans believe about our nation but apparently not.
By saying only
the votes that could be counted on election say should count, Trump is telling
members of the military and their families that their voices no longer matter.
Author Alyson
Chadwick is a political, news and sports junkie and a comedian. She
is also a sad and frustrated Met fan, which is probably the most redundant
sentence ever.
