How a Poisonous Yellow Frog Explains Why Trump Leads the Polls

If you are ever in Columbia, keep your eye out for a tiny banana-yellow frog.

Brightly coloured animals in nature generally mean danger. Beware. The Golden Poison Frog is a prime example. It’s the world’s most toxic animal. You will find it hopping around on the forest floor in broad daylight.

It’s saying,

“Come and have a go if you think you are hard enough.”

And why not?

Nothing in nature can contend with this little demon — except one snake that has evolved to digest its toxins. The frog and the snake have been caught in an evolutionary arms race for the last several million years.

Each frog generation becomes a little more toxic than the last. Each snake generation is more tolerant of its poison.

They have ended up in this ridiculous situation.

This one tiny little frog has enough poison to kill 100 men. It absolutely does not need to be that poisonous.

When the frog gets stressed, it sweats out its poison, when it sees a predator or in unusual situations — like when a human, overwhelmed by its majesty, picks up this beautiful, bright, innocuous-looking frog.

The frog’s poison is the fastest-acting neurotoxin known to nature. It binds to nerve cells, leading to paralysis, heart fibrillation, heart failure, and death. All within three minutes of being handled.

What’s this got to do with Trump?

In the run-up to the 2016 election, Trump differed from any other modern-day presidential candidate. He was abrupt, aggressive, and unpredictable. He was in the early days of his toxicity.

The campaign lasted long enough for America to become desensitised to his rant and rails, his accusations of fake news and threats to lock up his opponents.

When Trump took his seat in The White House, his first proper news conference was unlike any America had ever seen from a new president. He lashed out at the media and called them loathsome liars and peddlers of fake news.

The journalists present were shocked at his outspoken and unsubstantiated views and not least at the casual racism he displayed toward a young orthodox Jew and an African American reporter.

Half of America and most of the rest of the world recoiled at his toxicity. But the snake of America chewed on his words and became further inured to his poison.

Politics wasn’t done like this.

Nobody had seen such unchecked lies come from the mouth of a president before, nor his menacing threats against his rivals. It was the bitter exhortation we’d expect from a gangster, not a statesman. It set the tone for the next four years.

Trump being elected president was unexpected. But most of America, and the rest of the world, believed he would settle into his role, take proper advice and show some magnanimity. Not so.

Trump ended 2016 with the malicious gleefulness of a mischievous child by tweeting —

“Happy New Year to all, including my many enemies and those who have fought me and lost so badly they just don’t know what to do. Love”

Trump tapped into the anger of his fans. Those who were suffering from the high cost of living, who believed they would have their guns taken away, who swallowed the lies about illegal immigrants.

They had had enough of normal politics and how they saw their country going to hell. He fed them more poison and the more they swallowed, the more they could accept the toxicity they were being fed.

Fast forward to today

Throughout his presidency, Trump’s toxicity created controversy after controversy. Impeachment after impeachment.

Yet, the snake kept biting and swallowing. Growing more and more hardened to the increasing doses of poison dispensed by their golden-haired leader.

Inevitably, there were casualties. Michael Cohen, Steve Bannon, Roger Stone, Paul Manafort, Michael Flynn, Rick Gates, George Nader, George Papadopoulos. Even his family swam in the same cesspool.

Poison is poison is poison.

On December 6, 2022, Trump’s company, The Trump Organization, was found guilty on all 17 charges of tax fraud after a trial in New York.

In New York, Trump faces 34 felony counts for falsifying business records, 40 felony counts in Florida for hoarding classified documents and obstructing the government, four counts in Washington, and 13 felony counts in Fulton County, related to his efforts to overturn the 2020 election.

In any normal society, in any law-abiding country, in any untempered mind, this alone would be enough for any sensible person to run and hide from a sweating golden frog.

Not the snakes. The snakes fed off the lather. They are still feeding off Trump’s lies, his vitreous rhetoric and his toxicity towards anyone who opposes him.

It’s the law of the jungle — anything goes. It is only for his self-interest. Donald J. Trump is using brute force in his struggle for survival.

In recent days, Trump has been reprimanded by Judge Arthur Engoron for turning his statements into a “political rally.”

In turn, Trump has called the judge a “wacko” and a “RADICAL LEFT, DEMOCRATIC OPERATIVE” in posts on social media.

The judge is doing his only doing his job. In the same way a scientist would put on thick rubber gloves to handle the poisonous Golden Frog, Judge Engoron is trying to avoid being touched by Trump's poison.

Unfortunately, for some scientists, poison can rub off. I just hope it doesn't get in someone's eyes.

Malky McEwan