Admit it, Trump lovers, the President gets things wrong

TRUMP lovers LOVE Trump but the idea he can do no wrong means his fans never want to hold him to account. And that’s dangerous, writes Rachel Corbett.

US President Donald Trump acknowledges supporters during a Make America Great Again Rally on April 29, 2017 in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. (pic: Alex Wong/Getty Images/AFP)

EVER since Franklin D. Roosevelt entered the Oval Office in 1933 the achievements of each administration have been measured by the fairly unrealistic yardstick of the first 100 days.

Lucky for Roosevelt, he had the benefit of a Congress left reeling after the Great Depression, who would have pushed anything through to get the country moving again. He also didn’t have to deal with people shouting outrage on Twitter every five minutes.

But the truth is, it’s an almost impossible milestone even, as Trump discovered, when you control both houses.

As a result, this past week the media has been flooded with analysis, both good and bad, of Trump’s first few months in office.

And while every president over the past 80 years has had to deal with the same scrutiny, you could argue Trump set himself up for a slightly more aggressive grilling thanks to the loftiness of his campaign promises.

Ever since he announced he was running for president he’s told us if he made it to the Oval Office he’d drain the swamp and fix all the stuff that’s broken in about five minutes.

Sure, love Trump if you wish but make sure you still hold him accountable. He has been afforded a fair bit of power, after all. (Pic: Alex Wong/Getty Images/AFP)

Unfortunately, despite unsurprisingly claiming his first 100 days has been “just about the most successful in our country’s history”, he also casually mentioned “I thought it would be easier”.

While Trump has definitely accomplished some things since his inauguration and those should be applauded, an analysis of his achievements shows he’s currently broken 80 campaign promises and kept seven.

Not great odds for a guy who claimed: “We’re gonna win so much you may even get tired of winning.”

But despite the stats proving Trump may have slightly over-estimated his ability to get things done, his most vocal supporters clearly don’t want a bar of it.

This week, they’ve been outraged at Stephen Colbert’s scathing review of Trump’s first 100 days.

Fans of The Donald were upset at a comment in the final moments of Colbert’s Tonight Show monologue where he made a pretty crude joke about the President and Vladimir Putin.

I’ll concede the gag in question was pretty unimpressive.

The monologue went from clever satire to petty name calling and I think he could have articulated his point more intelligently, so I understand why Trump fans may have felt it was a bit too much.

The rant was in retaliation for Trump’s comments during an interview with CBS political director, John Dickerson.

Dickerson, a respected news journalist and colleague of Colbert’s, asked the President whether he stood by his comments that Obama was “sick”.

Clearly unimpressed with the question, Trump declared the interview over and retreated to his desk to pretend he was reading something very important.

The move looked particularly petulant since only a few moments before Trump had told Dickerson he refers to his TV program Face the Nation as Deface the Nation.

Clearly the guy can dish it out but he can’t take it.

Since the monologue aired, Trump supporters have set up a firecolbert.com website and @FireColbert twitter account.

Sure, the joke wasn’t terribly highbrow but the vitriol of the resulting backlash is a little concerning.

As someone who doesn’t attach themselves to any political party, I admit I often envy the passionate connection to a cause that some people have when it comes to politics.

It must feel nice to see yourself as staunchly red or staunchly blue but the problem with that comes when the attachment to a political party, or in this case, president, becomes so single minded you lose your ability to assess their behaviour critically.

It is impossible for anyone, no matter how much you love them, to be right 100 per cent of the time.

A man wears a mask with the face of Donald Trump, as he takes part in the 100 Days of Failure Protest to mark the first 100 days of the Trump administration on April 29, 2017 in New York. (Pic: AFP/Kena Betancur)

It also serves absolutely no purpose, if your desire is to constantly improve the society in which you live, to refuse to admit the person you trust with your vote never gets anything wrong.

To call for Colbert to be fired for throwing insults at a guy who has based his entire campaign on throwing insults, seemed a little rich to me.

I get it, Trump lovers LOVE Trump and that’s great but the idea he can do no wrong means his fans never want to hold him to account and for democracy to function properly, political leaders need to be held to account.

Trump spent the entirety of his campaign telling disaffected Americans that he was there for them. That his greatest concern was getting their lives back on track.

He managed, despite living in a gold-plated apartment in one of the most expensive cities in the world, to convince people who so badly wanted to be heard that he was going to fight with them against the elite.

If anything, the grandiose nature of these promises means the people who went out and voted for him should be even more interested in holding him to account for the things he’s said.

Since getting into office comments such as “nobody knew health care could be so complicated” and “I thought it would be easier” have proven that most of the things he promised during the campaign were made without any understanding of how the system works or whether they were actually achievable.

And yet millions of people put their lives in his hands.

While I’m bewildered at most of the things he’s done and spend most of my time staring in wide-eyed amazement at the words that come out of his mouth, I must admit I’m rooting for the guy.

Surely, no matter what you think of him, it’s in all our best interests for him to prove the haters wrong and be the kind of president his voters want him to be.

But no matter how much he promised or how much you love his cavalier “tell it like it is” attitude, that doesn’t mean the person you love can’t get it wrong.

Blind faith in politics is a dangerous game.

@RachelCorbett