Donald Trump's real talent -- his only talent -- is knowing how to pick a fight. On Friday night he targeted players in the NBA and the NFL. At a rally in Alabama, he told his rabid followers:
“Wouldn’t you love to see one of the NFL owners, when somebody disrespects our flag, to say, ‘Get that son of a bitch off the field right now, out, he’s fired. If NFL fans refuse to go to games, until players stop disrespecting our Flag&Country, you will see change take place fast. Fire or suspend!”
And, everywhere you looked yesterday, you saw athletes showing the Moron-in-Chief their fists. Some put their anger in words. Lebron James tweeted: "Going to the White House was a great honor until you showed up.” New England Patriots owner Robert Kraft -- up until now a Trump supporter -- expressed his "deep disappointment."
Kraft stood behind his players," Michael Harris writes, "ten of whom declined to stand for the national anthem before Sunday’s game against Houston. Harris believes this is a fight Trump can't win:
Trump is headed for a bruising. It may have started out with [Colin] Kaepernick, but the ranks of those alarmed about racism in America is growing, just as Muhammad Ali electrified the anti-war movement in 1960s. It is no accident that Kaepernick is often seen sporting a T-shirt with Muhammad Ali’s face on it.
People love their sports and their players in a way politicians can only dream of. Trump has made a potentially fatal miscalculation in picking a fight with athletes the vast majority of the ‘deplorables’ who support him adore. That said, there were lusty boos at Foxborough when so many of the home team Patriots took the knee. Which is just to say, as wrong as Trump is, he is not alone in his warped patriotism.
And that really is the point. Trump's ignorant bluster is still a minority opinion. He knows he lost the election. He is in office because of an historical fluke called the Electoral College. And that fact is driving him crazy. That is why he can't get over Hillary. With each passing day, he increasingly looks like a man with a single digit IQ.
Image: The Baltimore Sun
