While Americans continue to suffer desperately amid a recession and COVID-19 pandemic, President Donald Trump spent the holidays playing golf. After vetoing the National Defense Authorization Act, Trump said that he was sending the COVID-19 stimulus and omnibus spending bill back to Congress because he wanted larger Americans' payments.
"What we expect of our presidents is to have a steady hand on the tiller guiding the ship of state to safety," said conservative commentator David Gergen. "And here we have a president who is acting like a drunken sailor on the bridge. He's lurching in all sorts of directions and leaving millions of Americans uncertain about where their next dollars are going to come from to put food on the table, to stay in the homes they have, to keep their cars, pay mortgages. All these things are in flux right now."
One thing Gergen did say Trump was right about, however, is that the $600 payments to Americans is a joke. It has been nine months since the CARES Act, which delivered $1,200 checks to people to help stimulate the economy.
"It's very little," said Gergen about the $600. "It's right to raise the number. But if you're going to have a negotiation and you're the president of the United States, you need to be a powerful player at the table. Your voice needs to be heard in the process in order to get things done. Every president has been successful, an active participant in the negotiations. This president deigned not to join the negotiations and let it slip past him. That is why it is so insane. And why we all have a sense of -- this man is out of control."
See the full discussion with Gergen and Susan Glasser from The New Yorker below.
Trump is like a drunken sailorwww.youtube.com
