By Joe Registrato, AliveTampaBay Contributing Editor
I met a girl once when I was much younger and unattached and hadn’t been completely overwhelmed in a romantic sort of way by any girl yet. This girl was very pretty, blonde hair and blue eyes kind of pretty, and said all kinds of things to me that no girl had ever said to me before, and, being young and easily excited, I was very taken by these things and more or less fell in love with her. I was convinced beyond all doubt that she was also in love with me.
Then one day I was leaving on a trip and she came with me to the airport to see me off. As we were walking along the concourse holding hands it became apparent to me that she was looking at male passersby and smiling at them. She even engaged a couple of them in small talk about the nasty weather that had blown up outside and wondered whether it was safe to get on an airplane on a day like that.
Then she remarked to me, “You know, honey, an airport is a great place to pick up men.”
Now you would have thought well, sir, if you have a single brain in your head you might see this kind of activity, accompanied by such a suggestion, an ominous sign that maybe, just maybe, this girl might not be that great an investment as a future long-term kind of deal. And especially me, whose father had beat into him on numerous occasions how easy it is to be taken in by the slick talker, the glib deal-maker, how to never buy into a deal until you’re certain, absolutely certain about the measure of the man (or in this case woman), you’re dealing with.
But did I? As Darth Vader famously commented when it looked like it was curtains for the Death Star: Noooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo. I did not. Instead, I went blithely along being suckered by this girl until she tired of the current circumstance and found a greener pasture.
And why did I not? Why would an otherwise at least half-way intelligent, college educated, normal person NOT pay attention to a signal as easy to interpret as big red letters printed on a white wall?
Because when you are, for lack of a better term IN LOVE, you are BLIND. Ever heard the term, Love is blind? Well, it is.
According to my research the man known as the Father of English Literature, Geoffrey Chaucer, used the term first in a work called Merchant’s Tale, circa 1405, and later the great bard Shakespeare repeated it in the Merchant of Venice in 1596. It’s an ancient malady, but remains prevalent in the human species.
It is not a term whose meaning is deep or difficult to discern. This one’s a piece of cake. When you love somebody, you tend to overlook flaws, even flaws that ought to be apparent to an insensitive person or someone who is not paying close attention because, well, us humans for all our smart and incredible instincts for survival, sometimes do not want to see flaws because flaws tend to tarnish the image and dull an otherwise perfect moment.
So. Enter Donald Trump.
Does anybody need me to suggest that Trump supporters, whether strictly Republicans or haters of Hillary Clinton or haters of anything that even remotely carries around the label of liberal, whatever that means, fell prey to that particular blindness Chaucer first described?
Could it be that these people were blind to who this man is, what kind of person resides in Donald Trump’s soul simply because they did not want to see it? I don’t have to use the ugly terms that people are throwing around today to show it. Just read the stuff, man, just look at him. But please, look at him with open eyes, not so star-struck with him or hate-struck for Hillary that you don’t see reality.
See, he’s a monster, plain and simple. Here’s another one: tigers don’t change stripes.
People who have hated Trump from the beginning are going around today saying, Huh? What’s everybody so shocked about? We’ve always known the guy was a total and complete jerk who had no respect for anything except himself. This last thing about grabbing woman’s private parts comes as no surprise to us. So how come you didn’t figure it out a long time ago?
This is why. Love is blind. These people were, and maybe remain, in love.
So, either wake up and see the man for who he is, or continue to deny there is an elephant in the room, and he’s not a pretty elephant.
The thought of Donald Trump being president of the greatest country on earth is sickening and impossible for me to fathom.
Donald Trump managed to avoid military service during the Vietnam War, but has the temerity to say in public and very sincerely that he prefers heroes that didn’t get captured when referring to John McCain, one of the great heroes of American history who was held as a prisoner of war when his aircraft was shot down over Vietnam. This is the man you’re supporting to be president.
Donald Trump is a man who accused a federal judge of being unfit to rule on a case that involved Trump because the judge is of Mexican descent. Accusing a federal judge of bias in a case with no evidence at all of that bias except the bias that is within his soul, Trump’s own bias of a racist. You want this man to be president? The land of Lincoln and Kennedy, that’s the man you want to be president?
Donald Trump is a man who has shown you the color of his soul, the fabric from which he is made, and shown it to you in unmistakable terms.
Anybody who can’t see it yet is certainly blind.
If this tiny voice has any truth or power or persuasiveness at all, I would use it to cry out to all Trump supporters to write him or call him or use his favorite means of communication, Twitter, to encourage him to show the American people he has within him an ounce decency and quit now, if for no other reason, to save himself from the disgrace of election day numbers.
Joseph J. Registrato is a journalist and lawyer. He was a news reporter, assistant city editor, city editor and assistant managing editor of The Tampa Tribune from 1971 to 1987. After graduation from Stetson College of Law, he was admitted to the Florida Bar in 1989, and was an assistant state attorney with the Hillsborough County State Attorney’s Office from 1989 through 1991. He was in the private practice of law for more than twenty years in the areas of family law, criminal defense and appellate practice. He is now an assistant public defender at the Hillsborough County Public Defender’s Office of Julianne Holt. He is a U. S. Marine Corps veteran and served in the conflict in the Republic of Vietnam in 1968-1969. Registrato is a contributing editor of AliveTampaBay.com.