–The first non-politician or military member in American history to be elected President.
–Being the first President to Summit with a North Korean leader and walk on North Korean soil. I’m not sure what is going to come out of this, and maybe his efforts backfired but a historic and previously unthinkable milestone in diplomatic history. I’d even like to think that if Donald stops being a dick, Biden would use him in a Jimmy Carter role to get back any future American prisoners.
—Operation Warp Speed. Trump and Pence, in the debates, promised he would deliver a COVID vaccine by the end of the year. We can question what he did to make this happen more than any other President, but the fact is under his watch, it will be shortly delivered to our shores, even if not everyone is going to get it right away.
–IIRC he issued orders to stop the hunting of endangered elephants, and wolves.
I’m sure there is more. Now if you are a Trump fan, I get it: you will want to post page after page of what you think are his accomplishments. I’m more interested in what haters like me will begrudgingly give credit for.
It’s a baby step toward criminal justice reform but it is a step in the right direction.
I don’t know how much credit the President should get for it, but it did happen on his watch and he signed it.
He got the Republicans to tear off their mask of propriety and euphemism and expose themselves as the party of racist power-hungry fascists, unmoored from any form of loyalty to democracy or human morality, that they’ve been dogwhistling about for the last forty years.
I don’t know how much Trump was involved, beyond taking credit, but the agreement Pompeo shepherded between Israel, the UAE and Bahrain is an eminently good thing.
and along the same lines:
Trump’s administration did one thing that was actually a major statement of good morals:.
Telling the Palestinians to stop glorifying terrorists who blow up restaurants and buses full of civilians.
This should be a no-brainer, but no other American president has had the guts to state a simple truth.
(Trump himself is too stupid to understand the issues in the Middle East, or to have thought of the idea himself. But he gave his son-in-law authority to do it,…so.yeah, I’ll give credit to Trump…)
Also–demanding that the Palestinians to accept that Israel exists, and they should start learning to compromise instead of calling for its total destruction. (by moving the US embassy toe Jerusalem,recognizing the Golan Heights)
I will say that the Trump administration has been good for the nuclear community.
According to those in it, the Department of Energy has been much more responsive to permitting and funding new technologies than those in the past.
I think that this was less good leadership, and more a matter of no leadership, allowing the very smart people at the DOE to do their jobs without political interference. And I do worry a bit of a too permissive culture when it comes to regulating nuclear technologies, both for the direct issue of accidents stemming from a lack of government oversight, as well as the optics of having less oversight over nuclear technologies possibly causing a public backlash, even without any sort of incident.
In any case, progress in the nuclear field has gone further than I think it would have under a Clinton administration. Hopefully a Biden administration builds on the work, rather than rolling it back or stagnating it.
Undermined by his constant denial of COVID, his objections to all anti-COVID measures and his refusal to accept any responsibility.
Also, his way of supporting Operation Warp Speed had the effect of reducing confidence in any early vaccine.
Having no experience in government myself, I usually think Presidents do a much better job at it than I would even if I don’t agree with them, but Trump is an exception. It’s the rare thing he does that I don’t think I could have done better myself.
But I’m not sure if I would have committed to buying the Pfizer vaccine so far in advance so I can’t fault him on that even if it means the vaccine rollout takes longer. However, everything else about Covid from his end has been massive and the worst governmental failure in terms of lives that America has ever seen.
Indeed. But yes, in the general thrust of other posts in this thread, his list of accomplishments such as there are will be heavily weighted in the direction of things where he did not get in the way of someone else’s work and progress as long as it scored a “win”. Which TBH had probably been the case with many other presidents in many other issues.
As to the “left handed compliments” (can one still say that?), he has made it patent that a lot of what we thought were the rules that kept Presidents in line were nothing but traditions and unspoken gentlemen’s agreements, and we may get to actually legislate in black and white what some specific things the President can and can’t do.
Finally, on his watch, a tennis pavilion was built. A nice place (according to Mel) for future first families to gather. It’s for those time when a giant white mansion just won’t do.
He legitimized White Supremacism in the eyes of many closet racists and galvanized their movement to a height it hasn’t seen since the pre-civil rights era.
He increased the turnout at the presidential election.
He has improved his handycap.
He has stabilized quite a lot of foreign regimes who really needed propping (Turkey, Brazil, Saudi Arabia, Russia…)
He has put Slovakia on the map (or was it Slovenia? ) Well, his wife anyway.
First president I can remember who did not leave the White House (no pun intended, the sentence is not finished yet!) full of cat’s or dog’s hair.
He has put Twitter on the map. I mean: on the DSM.
He has coined fancy new words, like hamberder and covfefe. Good words, the best words.
Gee, this is turning out harder than I thought, who would have known? Gimme a couple of days, I might come up with something more.
) Well, his wife anyway.