Trump and Lenin
It is never Donald Trump’s aim, in a dispute, to win his opponent over to his own views. He doesn’t even truly address his opponent. The people for whom his words are intended are the witnesses to the dispute. Trump’s aim is always to ridicule his opponent, to compromise him in the eyes of witnesses.
Trump’s concern in an argument is not with truth but with victory. He needs, at all cost, to be victorious, and he is happy to employ any rhetorical means. He is equally ready to trip his opponent from behind, to give him a metaphorical slap in the face or to daze him with a metaphorical blow on the head.
I didn’t write these words. They were written about V.I. Lenin by World War II reporter and novelist Vasily Grossman in his novel Everything Flows. I changed the past tense to the present and Lenin to Trump. Irrespective of time and place, how eerily similar they are.
Sanford J. Smoller,
South Miami
This story was originally published January 14, 2016 at 5:35 PM with the headline "Trump and Lenin."