President Trump recently stated: "We have the greatest numbers of any president in the history of our country, and I can't get the word out. The only thing we’re doing bad at is public relations.” Yes and no.
To be sure, tens of millions of Americans do believe that Trump does have “the greatest numbers of any president in history.” But the fault for not getting that very positive news out does not rest with the president, his White House, or anyone in his administration. Unfortunately, in many ways across a very wide spectrum, they were doomed before they ever took power.
Just as they were doomed after Trump’s victory in 2016. And just as every Republican president, going back to at least Richard Nixon, has been doomed when either trying to publicize highly successful policies to the American people or highlighting those from the Democrats that were significantly punishing the voters.
The reason is simple and brutally effective. Going back at least six decades, the Democrats and their various allies have achieved vise-like control over what I call the “five major megaphones of our nation.” Those being: the media, academia, entertainment, science, and medicine. Much of that control came because of blatant discrimination waged against Republicans, conservatives, and people of faith.
So, who is at fault? The obvious answer is the Democrats and far left who have proven time and again that “the end justifies the means.” Is there any line they have not collectively crossed over the last number of decades to attain such all-encompassing power to censor, purposely spread false narratives, and cancel? Many would answer “no.”
While that is most certainly accurate, as the president bemoans his White House’s inability to get the truth out to the American people, I would stress to him that the fault ultimately does not rest with the Democrats, the far left, or even the rising socialists. Rather, it lies with Republicans, conservatives, and people of faith. At least those who have attained great wealth, power, and influence.
Why? The answer lies with a powerful passage from Teddy Roosevelt’s iconic speech, “Citizenship in a Republic,” delivered at the Sorbonne in Paris on April 23, 1910. In the speech, which became known as “The Man in the Arena,” Roosevelt rightfully stressed:
“It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again…who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat.”
Like it or not. Admit it or not. Those from the left and far left with great wealth, power, and influence have continually jumped onto the floor of that arena to fight – fair and dirty – to achieve their Machiavellian goals. But as they did so, they were aware of a critically important game-changer. That being that most Republicans, conservatives, and people of faith would never cross the lines they continually crossed and would never go “toe to toe” with them in battle on the floor of that arena.
The left continually creates or recognizes opportunities to alter the power dynamic via their wealth and ideology. But again, not so much from the wealthy Republicans, conservatives, independents, and faithful.
The left has baked into every cake the reality that many of the Right are too “civil, decent, and religious” to take them on. That they won’t cross the lines the left regularly crosses.
Six decades later, the results of that timid and “civil” philosophy are evident. The left does control the majority of the media, academia, entertainment, science, and medicine. And with them, much of the national narrative.
To those people of faith who believe it is better to wring your hands in frustration and do nothing as the far left takes more and more power and control from you, I would stress: “The Lord helps those who help themselves.”
I will not speak for President Trump, but in one way or another, his entire career has been defined by him continually jumping onto the floor of that arena to not only fight for what he believed in, but for the rights of others. Unfortunately, for the United States of America, he is the exception rather than the rule. Far too many of his contemporaries on the Right with wealth, power, and influence have morphed into “those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat.”
Four years ago, I authored a book seeking to protect our Founding Fathers from cancellation from the left titled: “The 56.” I have honestly long believed that Trump is imbued with the same mentality and fighting spirit of our Founding Fathers. For anyone who may doubt that, I would call your attention to his immediate reaction to being shot in an assassination attempt in Butler, Pennsylvania. This is the DNA of a fighter.
A man who years ago realized that to protect yourself, to protect your family, and to protect your nation, you do sometimes have to mix it up with those willing to cross any line to defeat you. But Trump can’t do it alone.
In a 2012 interview with the Chicago Tribune, multi-billionaire Citadel CEO Ken Griffin addressed this very issue when he said in part that he was “terrified” that the country was headed in the wrong direction. “I think [the ultra-wealthy] actually have an insufficient influence. Those who have enjoyed the benefits of our system more than ever now owe a duty to protect the system that has created the greatest nation on this planet.”
Why is the Trump White House “bad at public relations?” Because the deck was stacked against them decades before. A deck many of great wealth, power, and influence on the Right allowed to be manipulated against them.
While that is the troubling reality Trump now faces, it didn’t have to be that way then. And it does not have to be that way now.
But absolutely nothing will change unless Trump and Griffin are joined on the floor of Teddy Roosevelt’s arena by hundreds of wealthy, powerful, and influential Republicans, conservatives, and people of faith who finally decide to ask themselves the questions our Founding Fathers asked and answered over 250 years ago: “If not me, who? If not now, when?”
Your country is there for the saving. Stop being a cold and timid soul and know victory.
Douglas MacKinnon is a former White House and Pentagon official and author of the book: The 56 – Liberty Lessons from those who Risked all to sign The Declaration of Independence. Follow him @dougofskye.
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