Dear USA, We Need To Talk!

Well, my friends to the south of the border, you guys have had your first presidential debate of 2020 between Joe Biden and Donald Trump. I think I can speak for much of the planet when I say that many of us are a tad concerned.

What we watched on our TV screens was rather horrifying. That "debate" was painful and cringe worthy on so many levels. In fact, that wasn't even a debate. It was just a big temper tantrum by Donald Trump, with everyone else just being along for the ride.

I'm going to level with you: Your President is a complete a-hole. An overgrown child. He came across like a chimpanzee flinging feces around the stage. He was bombastic, loved calling everyone names, fought with the moderator, interrupted his opponent to an extremely excessive degree, came across as angry and vengeful, attacked the media and the election process itself, used his usual hyperbole to make baseless claims of how amazing he is, lied, lied, and lied some more, and generally came across as a ranting buffoon. It was insanity!

Now, ol' Joe Biden there did his best, I think. It wasn't a brilliant performance but I think he got dragged down quite a bit by how pathetic ol' Donnie acted. If Joe Biden was debating someone normal, I think he would have done a lot better. As it was, I thought he did way better than I expected, especially given the completely abnormal situation he found himself in.

And then there was the poor moderator, Chris Wallace from Fox News. Today, people were badmouthing him, saying he was a terrible moderator who couldn't keep control of things. Given what he was dealing with, I think he did the absolute best job he could. If Trump would just shut up and quit fighting with Chris, they could have gotten somewhere. But, Trump just couldn't do that. He couldn't help himself. He couldn't stop fighting with the guy. And what could Chris Wallace do? I mean, aside from calling for an end to the debate, or for a break so that everyone could go back to their corners and hopefully come back a little more clearheaded, there was not much he could really do. He had to treat Trump like the child he was and constantly attempt to get him to just, you know, act normal for a few minutes. Chris Wallace had the hardest job in the US for that 90 minutes, and he pulled through. Good on him.

But, here is what I can't figure out. When I looked at social media, I saw way too many people on there who seemed to think that Trump did a good job. How the frick can ANYONE watch that hot mess and feel that Trump came out looking good?? HOW!?

Look, ordinarily, the world kind of ignores the crazy leaders out there. But, the US is a bit different. You are the only superpower on the planet and what you guys do affects us all. The last few years we have had to put up with your idiot of a president, and we are all hoping that you get rid of the guy on November 2nd. In fact we are begging you to not re-elect him.

We are tired of his belligerence towards countries who the US is supposed to be allies with, while he praises countries that are generally seen as not aligned with the West. I mean, he seems to really like that Kim Jung-On dude. What does Trump see in him?? He will openly grasp that guy's hand, but not Angela Merkel's?? He has made it clear that he hates the EU and has done what he can to undermine it. He hates big blocs like that. He prefers dealing country to country and didn't play nicely with the EU. Sigh.

As a Canadian, I watched as he badmouthed us over the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) and demanded that the agreement be redrawn to favor the US over anyone else, with or without Canada's involvement. You know, because he's kind of a jerk that way. He kept saying that we were treating the US so awful and so unfairly. Really? REALLY? Pul-eeeeeeeeze!

Then there is the fact that he loves to make arbitrary and sudden decisions seemingly out of the blue that affect other countries (including Canada) without any thought to the impact to that country, or even his own. He has proven to be unpredictable, unreliable, arrogant and definitely not a team player. We can't deal with this guy! We need someone normal in charge of your country again.

As it is, even before Trump, the US relationship with the rest of the world has been a challenging one. We've always had to deal with a very bombastic superpower that likes to throw it's weight around and has a habit of getting what it wants, come hell or high water. But, at least it's had some decent leaders that other countries can deal with and respect. We've had some good times, America! We really have. That Obama guy? Ya, he was cool. Can we get another guy like him in charge? We could work with him.

But Trump? We just can't deal with him anymore. We can't do 4 more years of Trump! It is going to end badly for us all. Joe Biden summed up nicely what so many of us have wanted to say to Donald Trump for so long now: "Just shut up, man!"