Presidential Lapdogs

It is the norm for presidents to appoint a cabinet, and other expert leaders, who support their agenda but who will also give them judicious advice. If wise, a president will heed this counsel before making critical decisions.  The purpose is to offer possible correction in decision making and increase the wisdom of presidential leadership. The citizenry relies on this counsel to assure them that the president is making decisions in the best interest of the common good.

But what if the president prefers not to follow this history proven style of gathered wisdom? What if the president believes his own counsel is superior to all others and cannot be challenged? What if the cabinet and other leaders are appointed as a cheer-leading group to affirm and fulfill the president’s infallible judgment? What if they are chosen to be his personal lap dogs?

A lapdog is a pet small enough of stature that it can sit in the lap of its owner.  Its purpose is to comfort the owner by continuously licking hands and face in supportive affection.  It never challenges its master’s wishes – only barking and tail-wagging in adoring support.

The term Lap dog has become a metaphor for someone who is an obedient and unquestioning servant to the whims of another – someone who is willing to ignore personal integrity for social and financial reward.  Nowhere is this illustrated more graphically than in Donald Trump’s appointments. He calls it personal loyalty, as if loyalty to him is synonymous with loyalty to the nation and its constitution. Anyone who does not submit their own views to this loyalty will find themselves in the dog-house. They will be relegated to insignificance, fired, or socially destroyed with vicious intent. The unprecedented and continuous turnover in the various key roles in Trump’s administration shows this loyalty measurement to be absolute. 

The present challenge of the coronavirus pandemic will be recorded as one of the most tragic periods in American history.  And a primary reason will be that the appointed leaders of Donald Trump’s administration proved themselves to be nothing more than lap dogs when the nation desperately needed them to challenge the audacious egotistical stupidity of his decision-making that greatly exacerbated the virus’s citizenry death toll and economic destruction.

Martin Luther King, Jr. once observed:

Nothing in all the world is more dangerous than sincere ignorance and conscientious stupidity.

Donald Trump may be beyond redemption when it comes to being able to step outside the verdict of King’s remark.  But there are ample people within his administration who know better and still remain his lapdogs.

Thus, it will not just be Trump who gains the damning historical judgment of being one of the most dangerous, destructive, and ignoble leaders in the nation’s history.  They will share this judgment – unless they decide to grow some personal integrity and challenge his leadership in a manner that will show them as more than mere lapdogs who only bow and wow.

Robert

Robert T. Latham

mythinglink.com