Life

Leona O'Neill: Good riddance to Donald Trump, a bad example for kids everywhere

Donald Trump has spent the past four years of his presidency setting a terrible example for children around the world. As Leona O'Neill points out, president elect Joe Biden and his vice Kamala Harris have a lot of healing to do – and not just in their home nation

The soon to be former president, Donald Trump
The soon to be former president, Donald Trump The soon to be former president, Donald Trump

UNLESS you've been hiding under a rock for these last few weeks and therefore not positively glued to CNN 24/7, you'll know that Donald Trump has lost the presidential election.

When Joe Biden and Kamala Harris take over the White House come January, they will hopefully put a little soothing balm on a hurt and divided American society and in turn help heal the world following what was one of the ugliest and shameful episodes in modern political history.

Four years in, Donald Trump's actions are almost too awful and numerous to list. We thought he could get no worse than caging children and building walls to keep Mexicans out, but he spent four years disrespecting everyone from women to black people to Muslims to members of the media to the military to the almost quarter of a million people who perished in the coronavirus crisis.

Trump's reign held a mirror up to the very ugly side of America and indeed worldwide society. We had to endure words of racism, hate and division spoken from the highest seat of power in the land. Trump's highly disrespectful misogynistic, racist, discriminative and idiotic, vitriolic and often bizarre comments have been pumping into living rooms not just in America, but across the world, for far too long.

People have been looking to the president for moral guidance but found him sorely lacking in decency, having crass in abundance; his actions and his words have been replicated around the globe, particularly here in the West where we have such close ties with America.

And our children have endured terrible lessons as a result. Soon after news broke that Trump was defeated on Saturday, I think CNN commentator Van Jones summed up why we were all feeling so relieved, breaking down on air while explaining why a Biden win was so monumental.

"It's easier to tell your kids that character matters. It matters. Telling the truth matters, being a good person matters," he said.

"It's easier for a lot of people. If you're Muslim in this country, you don't have to worry if the president doesn't want you here," he went on, becoming visibly upset.

"You don't have to worry if the president's gonna be happy to have your babies snatched away, send back dreamers for no reason. A lot of people really suffered. You know, I can't breathe. You know that wasn't just George Floyd, a lot of people felt like they couldn't breathe.

"You're waking up and there are these tweets and you just don't know. You're going to the store and people who have been afraid to show their racism are getting nastier and nastier to you, and you're worried about your kids, and you're worried about your sister.

"And this is a big deal for us – just to be able to get some peace and have a chance for a reset. And the character of the country matters and being a good man matters. You know, I just want my sons to to look at this."

I think his sentiments are echoed all around the world today. For four years the words coming from the White House acted like Brillo pads on our souls, they sought to divide people, to fuel hate and chaos. Now we can see the path that led Donald Trump to the White House – one paved with misogyny, racism, xenophobia and extremism – has been demolished, and a calmer, steadier, more emotionally mature captain has thankfully taken the wheel of the ship.

And our children can see that while nasty bullies who thrive on hurting others might get lucky once, ultimately they will be beaten.