9 February 2017: Resign
Email sent today:
9 February 2017
Dear President Trump,
I believe that it is in your best interest, and that of your family and friends, for you to resign. There are several reasons:
1. You won. Fair and square. Against all odds. That was your main goal, and you were successful. Achieving anything else significant will extract a huge cost.
2. Staying in office is hurting and will continue to hurt your businesses. Already, there have been numerous boycotts. Those opposing you or anyone else have much stronger motivation to act than your supporters. You should expect a growing number of boycotts, in varied forms, in the months to come.
3. Staying in office hurts your family. This happens in every administration, but in most cases, those families have grown up in the political world, and expect it. Your family has not, and will suffer more. Their business interests will be harmed – Nordstrom is just the beginning. Your family will be personally attacked, regardless of what they do. You may not care about attacks on you, but do you want your family to go through this?
4. With all due respect, you do not currently have the emotional capacity for the office of President. Most Presidents, after enduring decades of attacks, have grown a thick skin. You have not. Your opponents know how to “push your button”, leading to tweets that make you look childish. It is getting worse. Is this what you want?
5. With all due respect, you do not have the mindset to be President. As an entertainer and businessman you were never wrong and never in doubt. But being President is an extremely difficult job. Nobody knows the answers. Yet this office has not made you more humble or more reflective.. As a physician, I suggest that you are showing the beginnings of neurodegenerative disease. You seem unable to differentiate truth from falsehood, or good from bad. I am a pathologist, not a neurologist, and I have not examined you personally. But your inability to conform your behavior to your new circumstances suggests you do not understand fully the world you are living in.
6. Inevitably, perhaps sometime soon, your friends and family will force you out of office. Perhaps you think you are doing a great job, and all criticism is by “losers”. But eventually, your friends and family will stop covering up for you, and will force an exit strategy upon you, which will not be pretty. Better to resign now, under your own terms.
Sincerely,
Nat Pernick, M.D.