To the Editor:

I confess without reservation or equivocation that Trump cannot be accused of “talking down” to people. He is talking “to” the people that, through his own time-tested personal calculations, matter to him most, namely, those who like him for myriads of reasons and praise his name. Call him a mentally unstable idiot all your inflamed heart and educated mind desires, this electoral-select president is a singular political phenomenon because he is playing from a totalitarian deck of cards with repetitive skill. Moreover, I surmise that he has risen to this presidential perch, knowing fully that the people duped most easily are largely uneducated, under-educated or miseducated, hence susceptible to the following: emotionally charged messages that repeat without much deviation, because this is what rings true in their ears; frequent distractions through the rerouting of messages when, say, the media pounces on him, often for sound reasons regarding substantive facts (and, of course, he calling the questioners “fake,” hostile and even enemies when doing so); mesmerized by his art of the deal, steal, and feel, which obviously keeps his loyalist lawyers engaged endlessly.

In sum, he keeps people razzle-dazzled by his sheer bravado and even stirs them to violent protest by his rabble-babble rousing tweetstorms or off-the-cuff remarks to the media before liftoffs to play golf or stride onto a stage at a campaign rally.

Trump is further confirmation that, yes, anyone can become president. Or a senator or a congressional representative or ...

Advice: Do something more important, even enlightening, where cruel and heartless political posturing and obstructing isn’t a game plan. Rather, endeavor to save a planet and its inhabitants that are faltering in so, so many ways.

We keep hearing that a democracy can be messy and tough, but can’t the politics of the day evolve even a smidgen in a positive direction after two and a half centuries? Or is political evolution impossible, even within a democracy? If so, humanity will need to save itself soon or perish.

Richard Joel Holmes

Hays