I forced myself to watch the State of the Union address and the final days of the impeachment proceedings against President Donald Trump. Post-traumatic stress doesn’t even begin to cover the result.
There is a bit of hope. I used to be the most immature person I know. Today, I am far more mature than most of Congress.
Granted, this is nothing to brag about, because so is the average high school detention class, a car full of circus clowns and perhaps even the participants in a soccer riot.
Trump emerged as the gloating victor, Nancy Pelosi as the thwarted kindergartner. Not only was I embarrassed to be an American, but for a while there I also wished that I belonged to a different species.
That’s government. When people don’t get what they want for “Christmas,” out come the tantrums.
I appreciate that we all are entitled to our own political opinions. But as someone more interested in human behavior than politics, I tend to travel both sides of the road. Behavior says a lot more than ideals.
For example, when it comes to politics, I’m more of a Rep. Ben McAdams guy than a Sen. Mitt Romney guy. But guts are guts and should be noted.
As near as I can tell, the most mature person in the mess was Romney. It takes a lot of strength to defy your associates over your conscience.
I don’t have much of a conscience. But people I know and respect who do have told me that it took a lot of courage for Romney to do what he did in casting a guilty vote against the president.
On Thursday, Trump acknowledged that he has done things wrong in his life, but — and here’s the kicker — never intentionally. Meaning any wrongdoing he ever committed was entirely by accident.
Ha! If this is true — and it’s not — he’s the only person in the world who has ever caused a single problem simply by not paying attention. That alone should disqualify him for the job of president.
Unlike Trump, I’ve done a lot of things wrong — almost all of them on purpose, including some of which I’m still rather proud.
But I’m not the president of the United States, any of its lesser leaders, a well-respected religious figure, a beacon of hope to the downtrodden or much of a good neighbor. Hell, I can’t even drive well. Very little should be expected of me.
I couldn’t make it all the way through Trump’s self-congratulatory speech Thursday. Had there been even a hint of “look what we got away with” in the blathering to friends and supporters, I might have stuck with it.
On the other hand, I didn’t bother to watch any of House Speaker Pelosi’s wrapup of how things came off the rails. After her grade-school stunt following Trump’s State of the Union address, she should stick to paper shredding instead of government.
Then again, she’s entitled to express her opinion. I wouldn’t blame anyone for tearing up this column. Just make sure it’s real paper and not your computer monitor.
Maybe Pelosi should take a note from the president and claim that tearing up his speech was entirely unintentional.
It’s not her fault that her hands went off by accident.
Robert Kirby is The Salt Lake Tribune’s humor columnist. Follow Kirby on Facebook.
