Donald Trump Wont Be Mentioned Again on Roseann

(CNN)ABC'south decision to cancel Roseanne Barr'due south eponymous show following a racist comment she made almost former Obama assistants official Valerie Jarrett on Twitter was shocking for two reasons.

First, considering it amounted to a TV network drawing a moral line in the sand -- insisting that no amount of money or ratings gave Roseanne the right to express views that ABC described in a statement as "abhorrent, repugnant and inconsistent with our values."

2d, because that decision to take a moral stand represents a stark contrast from the moral relativism preached by the president of the United States.

Donald Trump is different from anyone who has held the office before him in all sorts of ways. But, to my heed, the biggest -- and most critical -- deviation between Trump and his predecessors is his total abdication of the concept of the president equally a moral leader for the country and the globe.

The examples of this sort of behavior are legion.

• Trump impersonated a disabled reporter during a campaign oral communication and not only refused to apologize but insisted that attempts to say he was doing exactly what he was doing was evidence of the "fake news" media.
• Asked by CNN'due south Jake Tapper about white supremacist David Knuckles's support for his candidacy, Trump played dumb. "Just so you understand, I don't know anything near David Duke, OK? " Trump told Tapper. Nether force per unit area, Trump eventually disavowed Duke.
• When and so-Fox News ballast Bill O'Reilly -- in an interview during the 2022 Super Basin -- noted that Russian President Vladimir Putin was a "killer,' Trump responded: "There are a lot of killers. We've got a lot of killers. What, practise you remember our state's and so innocent?"
• In the summer of 2017, Trump suggested there was arraign "on many sides" of the white nationalist-provoked violence in Charlottesville, Virginia. "I watched those very closely, much more than closely than y'all people watched information technology," Trump lectured reporters at the time. "And you accept -- you had a group on one side that was bad, and you had a group on the other side that was as well very violent, and nobody wants to say that, simply I'll say it right now."
• When multiple women came forrad to allege that Alabama Senate candidate Roy Moore had sought relationships with them as teenagers -- and in several cases had forcibly grabbed or kissed them -- Trump at kickoff threw his hands upward, arguing that Moore denied the allegations, so who was to say what the existent story really was? Later, fifty-fifty though Moore offered a k full of goose egg prove that disproved the women's claims, Trump endorsed the Alabama Republican and held a campaign-manner rally but across the Alabama edge days before the vote.
• After news bankrupt that two ex-wives of so White Business firm staff secretary Rob Porter had alleged abuse, Trump said this of Porter: "He says he's innocent and I recollect yous have to recollect that. He said very strongly yesterday that he'south innocent simply you'll have to talk to him about that."

There are lots and lots more than examples just like these, but you lot get the point.

Trump merely does not see the earth in terms of moral/immoral or right/wrong. He sees the world through one and only one lens: Friend/Foe. Or, understood slightly differently: Skilful for me/Bad for me.

Trump's refusal to condemn white nationalist violence in Charlottesville was born, in large office, out of his distaste for the political left. His refusal to condemn Moore'southward behavior was the direct event of his own experiences denying a series of allegations fabricated against him by women during the 2022 campaign.

That is non an alibi for Trump. Far from it. Merely an endeavour to explain.

The fact is that this is not a person who views his role in anything close to the same way that the other people who have held the aforementioned office did. While few of them were perfect -- and some similar Richard Nixon and Bill Clinton failed in major ways -- they all believed in the basic thought that function of their job (and a large part of it) was to lead the country to the moral high ground. And that the all-time style to do that was through personal example. By taking the high route, by condemning hate and intolerance, they believed they showed the country the best of what we could be.

Trump's entire entrada and presidency has functioned every bit a rejection of past presidents -- and all that they believe. That included the idea that the president has some sort of broader responsibility to the body politic on morality.

Do whatever the hell yous want to practise equally long as you lot win, was Trump'due south implicit message during the 2022 campaign. Who are these elites to judge y'all and your behavior? The world is a fight for survival. Might makes right. History is always written by the winners. And then on.

All of which brings me back to ABC's decision to fire Roseanne. There is niggling question that the comedian'due south bear witness was, by Trumpian measures, a success. Its ratings were heaven loftier.

Now, it's possible that this decision was motivated by advertisers' negative responses to the tweet. But every bit CNN reported, only 2 weeks ago, Barr was the centerpiece of ABC's upfront presentation to advertisers in New York.

ABC could have kept the show on the air, making the case that while they abhorred Barr's views, the bear witness was near much more than her -- and was the launching point for lots of important societal conversations.

That would have all been PR speak for "the bear witness rates extremely well and makes ABC lots of money," of class. But they could accept gotten abroad with information technology.

ABC executives chose non to go downwardly that path. Instead, they chose to make a very clear and public statement that doing the correct affair sometimes (frequently? always?) matters more than than making money.

What if Trump'due south reaction to the Roseanne firing was simply an echo of the ABC statement? Something like: Roseanne's Twitter argument is abhorrent, repugnant and inconsistent with American values, and I support ABC's decision to cancel her show.

The chances of Trump doing that are beyond miniscule, because of his total disdain for the idea of the presidency as a position of moral leadership. Rather, what I would look from Trump is a tweet -- or a series of tweets -- using the cancellation of "Roseanne" to argue about the corrosive effect of political correctness and the toxic bear on of Hollywood's liberalism.

Those are debates worth having. But that's not what Roseanne'southward tweet or ABC's decision to fire her are nigh. The issue hither is whether racism, plainly expressed, should be condemned and penalized in this state.

ABC says yes. What does Donald Trump say?

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Source: https://www.cnn.com/2018/05/29/politics/donald-trump-roseanne-cancellation/index.html

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