Trump’s Moll

Donald Trump and his sycophants boast they’ve restored respect to the United States. It’s like their claim they’re rebuilding the military and the FBI. They’re all lies. The military isn’t in shambles, and they’re actually trying to destroy the credibility of the FBI.

Our nation lost a lot of respect from the rest of the world during the George W. Bush administration. Starting a war on false pretenses, destabilizing it, killing tens of thousands of people, and creating a haven for terrorists will do that. Also, when you attempt to demean an ally who disagrees with you by renaming french fries “freedom fries,” and your president can’t enunciate “nuclear,” respect goes out the window.

Respect toward the United States was rebuilt during the Obama era. Speaking coherently helps.

Respect for our nation is again falling into a gutter. The world looks toward Angela Merkel and Justin Trudeau to be champions of freedom and democracy, not Donald Trump.

People don’t respect you when they play to your vanities. They don’t respect you when it works. They don’t respect patronizing Nazis and pedophiles, verbally attacking women and minorities, and they don’t respect when you call the first line of freedom, a free press, enemies of your nation.

You are not respected when you deny there was an attack on your democracy by a hostile nation, despite your own intelligence agencies verifying it. Failing to protect your country, which you’ve sworn to do, is not respected.

You are not respected by expressing admiration for thugs, bullies, and autocrats who lead China, Russia, Turkey, and the Philippines.

You are not respected by pulling out of the Paris climate treaty, something that only one other nation in the world refuses to join.

When you proclaim Jerusalem, which the world recognizes as occupied territory, as Israel’s capital, you lose respect. When every single nation in the world disagrees with you, you lose respect. When your action gets your nation thrown out of the peace talks, you lose respect.

When your vice president is an ass-kissing weasel, you lose respect. When your entire party follows suit with the ass kissing, you lose respect.

When nearly half the nation selects a narcissistic, juvenile, sexist, racist, anti-Semitic ignoramus as its leader, the nation loses respect.

When you threaten to start World War 3, you lose respect. When you refer to your enemy, who has nuclear weapons, as “little rocket man,” you lose respect. When you lose a war of insults with Kim Jong Un, you lose respect and people start to believe you are a “dotard.”

When you send your ambassador to the United Nations to threaten and intimidate its members on how they vote in a meaningless, non-binding measure, you lose respect. When you threaten your allies, tell them you’re “taking names,” and will withhold financial assistance in the future if they don’t do what you want, you lose respect. When you attempt the aforementioned, ignoring the reality that there are upcoming votes that do serve your interest, you lose respect because they think you’re an idiot.

And your ambassador, who was formerly respected, has lost all respect.

And that’s the way it is, see…

Creative notes: This is kind of how I get an idea. I read the story of Nikki Haley attempting to intimidate the world at the United Nations. Immediately I think of how it’s Christmas time, and she’s putting everyone on a naughty list. The problem is, since it’s my first thought then other cartoonists will be drawing it. There’s always one, two, or 20 cartoonists who go for the first and most obvious idea and, I’ve seen a couple already. My second thought is how Trump is trying to use gangster diplomacy.

I thought of old-time gangsters and I google “who finished every sentence with ‘see’?” It was Edward G. Robinson who was in the film Key Largo. Then, I google images of Edward G. Robinson. And, just to cover my bases, I read his Wikipedia page, which I do for everyone I’m going to cover or who inspires a cartoon. Honestly though, the true inspiration is probably the caricature of him in the 1946 Bugs Bunny cartoon “Racketeer Rabbit.” I also googled gangster and 1920s slang for “party,” but I couldn’t find one.

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