Local opinion: As a matter of honor, what would it take?

I have an associate named Ernest whom I’ve known for over 50 years. He is a man of strong character. Borrowing the Bard’s language, his life “hath had some smatch of honor in it.”

Ernest has been faithfully married to the same woman for 45 years. He was an army veteran of 20 years and fought bravely in Vietnam. He was and is proud of his military record, and he still holds disdain for Jane Fonda, draft dodgers, and those who spat on the uniform of his brothers in arms when they returned to the States. Ernest’s closest friends are veterans. His father was killed in action while fighting the Nazis during WWII. To this day, Ernest generally dislikes Germany and its people because “they killed my father.”

I’ve always sensed Ernest did not quite approve of me because I held a 2-S deferment while earning my degree, and I participated in antiwar protests. Still, in my mind, Ernest’s dudgeon toward certain people and groups is at least consistent with his values and with the way he’s lived his life.

In contrast to Ernest, the felonious occupant of the White House (the FO) has lived a life filled with dishonor.

Trump has been serially unfaithful to all his wives and paid illegally for the coverup of his tryst with an adult film actress. A jury of nine men and women found him liable for sexually abusing E. Jean Carroll; the judge later stated that her rape allegations against him were “substantially true.”

He avoided military service with a convenient bone spur diagnosis. He disrespected John McCain’s heroic imprisonment in enemy hands, saying he “liked people who weren’t captured.” When a severely injured veteran sang “God Bless America” as part of a welcome ceremony, he told General Milley, “Why do you bring people like that (the wounded) here?”

Trump skipped a planned visit to Aisne-Marne American Cemetery in France because he didn’t want the rain to mess his hair, and he didn’t think it important to honor American war dead — this fact reported by four people with firsthand knowledge of his last-minute decision that day. Trump said, “Why should I go to that cemetery? It’s filled with losers.” In other conversations, he mused, “Who were the good guys in this war? (WWI)” He couldn’t understand why the US would intervene on the side of the Allies against Germany in that war, calling the 1,800 marines who lost their lives at Belleau Wood “suckers” for getting killed.

Trump was invited to a wreath-laying ceremony by families of troopers killed in the last days of America’s Afghanistan expedition. Some of his team took photos and filmed on the cemetery’s grounds, which is a violation of US Army regulations and federal law, especially in using the cemetery for political purposes.

One Arlington official intervened, but he was pushed aside by Trump’s team as the disrespectful, illegal photo session continued.

Now, the FO has appointed a scantily qualified Fox News commentator, against whom there are credible allegations of public drunkenness and spousal abuse, to lead the Department of Defense.

One would think the FO has earned Ernest’s contempt. Yet, Ernest has voted for Donald Trump three times (as have many married men, as have many veterans). I wonder what it would take for him (and them) to withdraw support for the FO. If, rather than attacking E. Jean Carroll, Trump had assaulted Ernest’s wife or his sister, would that be enough? If, rather than merely suggesting that Ernest and his father are suckers and losers, Trump spat on the graves of his father or his fallen comrades, would that bring him around?

Or is the FO right? — “I could stand in the middle of 5th Avenue and shoot somebody and I wouldn’t lose voters.”