Dear Donald Trump: Don't Kick Puerto Rico While It's Down

Mr. Trump:

I'm not an American, nor do I claim to be. I'm not someone who is hugely political, and many times, I'm not a big fan of the leadership of my own country, let alone someone else's.

I am, however, a big fan of knowing when to treat someone, or in this case a group of someones, with simple human decency. I've not yet decided whether you simply lack empathy or you are just determined to lash out at everyone because they disagree with you, regardless of what's going on at the time. I get that you are probably not in the best mood lately, what with the third failure to repeal Obamacare and being all wound up because of the #TakeaKnee movement. I get it. You ran on the idea that you were going to repeal Obamacare, and you're now faced with the prospect that it's possibly just not going away, which I'm sure infuriates you. You can blame whomever you'd like for Obamacare just refusing to die, but sir, you need to take a look at what you're doing altogether, because you are missing what's important.

#HurricaneMaria slammed into the island of Puerto Rico, and a good lot of the island remains cut off from various other parts of the island due to destroyed roads. A lot of the infrastructure is simply destroyed or gone, and at least 90 to 95 percent of residents are still without power. The mayor herself, Carmen Yulin Cruz, is forced to live in a shelter due to her own home having been destroyed, and you decide to kick her and other Puerto Ricans while they are down.

"Such poor leadership by the Mayor of San Juan and others in Puerto Rico who are not able to get their workers to help," you reportedly said, as always, via Twitter. "They want everything to be done for them when it should be a community effort."

Sir, Puerto Rico is a United States commonwealth, which means you and your government are as responsible for the well-being of its citizenry as you are for the citizens across the United States. Instead, you bash them with no real understanding of what is actually happening on the ground. Puerto Rico has been struggling with financial issues of one stripe or another for a long time, and instead of lobbying people to help those who are right now simply struggling for survival, you decide to point out its staggering debt.

Just what the hell is wrong with you?

Mayor Yulin Cruz is among those struggling to survive. She, like so many others, is in a shelter, wondering about food and water. There are several areas throughout the island that are simply cut off due to storm damage, making the whole logistics of trying to ensure people are getting food and water inherently difficult and time-consuming. She's trying to cope with her own staggering losses as well as the losses suffered by her people in Puerto Rico, because she knows she has a job to do. That job includes asking for help from the leader of the United States. With all that is on her plate right now, there should be little wonder about why her approach might be a little less than ideal.

But of course, you have far more pressing concerns, don't you?

People's right to protest - peacefully, I might add, with one of the most respectful gestures I could possibly conceive of - during the national anthem is apparently of higher priority than the crisis in Puerto Rico. Anyone who has disagreed with you directly is almost immediately name called, and whatever the person has said resoundingly criticized without foundation. Here's a suggestion: rather than griping about how someone else is complaining about the job you're doing, rather than enjoying your vast wealth in your warm, comfortable home or resort, trade places with the San Juan mayor for a couple of days and see what happens to your own disposition.

Try and coordinate efforts to get people supplies for basic survival with sections of an island cut off from each other and see how quickly the job gets done.

Also, try and do it as you wonder when the next shipment of supplies comes to you and gets out to your people, while you wonder if you have anything salvageable - whether that's memorabilia or just clean clothes - in your destroyed home.

All I can do as a Canadian is watch and try to assuage my children's fears about a world where one of the most unkind - and I'm using the term loosely because that's the most polite term I can conceive of - men they've ever seen is running the country using behavior that would have gotten them grounded most of the time.

Grow up, sir.

You're playing with people's lives, and you should be ashamed of yourself.