Politics

'You Have to Wonder Whether This Presidency Is Salvageable' -- Nolan Finley

August 17, 2017, 5:20 PM by  Alan Stamm

Pummeling of "President Many Sides" comes from many sides this week.

Some Michigan critics are predictable, such as Debbie Stabenow, John Conyers, columnist Rochelle Riley and commentator Jack Lessenberry.

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Nolan Finley: "He comes across now as an angry, humorless man at war with everybody except his narrow base."

Others who're equally harsh are less expected, such Macomb Congressman Paul Mitchell, a Republican elected the same day as Donald Trump, and now Nolan Finley, opinion editor at The Detroit News. 

"There are many sides to blame for the unrest in America. Including Donald Trump," begins Finley's sharp-edged column Thursday, which notes "the president’s bizarre equivocation in assigning fault for the bloodshed in Charlottesville over the weekend."

The lifelong Detroit journalist, whose traditionally Republican editorial page drew national attention by endorsing Libertarian candidate Gary Johnson last fall, says he was "resigned to the reality of [Trump's] presidency and committed, for the good of the country, to his success."

The president strains that commitment. "No administration has disintegrated this rapidly," Finley says bluntly:

He’s become even more erratic, more combative, more paranoid and more offensive. What charm he exhibited on the campaign trail has disappeared. He comes across now as an angry, humorless man at war with everybody except his narrow base. Those hard-core supporters are the only ones he speaks to. He will not do one thing to broaden his appeal.

Now, you have to wonder whether after barely seven months this presidency is salvageable. . . .

Those who bargained that Trump was worth tolerating because he’d work with a Republican Congress to adopt a conservative agenda must now see that it’s not going to happen.


Read more:  The Detroit News


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