When Trump burst on the political scene, his smashmouth style was, shall we say, off-putting. Dan Bongino, also from Queens, told us this was just the normal style of speech in that area. And many of us voted for the Donald, knowing that the alternative was simply intolerable. We weren’t sure what he would do, but his opponent was guaranteed to do bad things.

For four years, in the face of relentless false attacks, Donald Trump got things done. Lots of things. But he didn’t drain the swamp. He fired FBI Director James Comey, installing in his place Chris Wray, who has been dramatically worse. There can be no whitewashing his investigations of concerned parents as “domestic terrorists.” He nominated Bill Barr to be Attorney General. Barr famously said he had seen “no evidence” of vote fraud in the 2020 election, but screamed at Colonel Tony Shaffer that Shaffer should stop investigating Pennsylvania vote fraud.

The list of failed appointees is long and distinguished, and Trump only seemed to discover the “Schedule F” option too late to implement it. He went along with “I AM the Science” Tony Fauci even when Dr. Scott Atlas told him Fauci was undercutting him. By all indications, Trump seems to believe in the bluster and bombast method of governing. He got some things right. Strategic ambiguity worked to keep Putin from crossing the Dnipro River. China wasn’t rattling so many sabers at Taiwan. But all the while, election fraud machinery had been running overtime, and the staff who actually implement policy blissfully ignored the President.

Image: Donald Trump and Ron DeSantis by Andrea Widburg

Any who have followed my posts will note that I have vacillated between support for Trump and for DeSantis. The reasons have varied from post to post, but one thing remains certain. If The Donald wins the nomination, he’ll have my vote because no Democrat is acceptable.

But I wonder… Is Trump actually capable of Draining the Swamp? Or is it just his standard Queens overstatement, amplified by anger at still being attacked for merely existing? This week Trump amplified my puzzlement by blatantly attacking two of his most loyal former employees, Kayleigh McEnany and Jenna Ellis.

Let’s get one thing clear. Trump saw something in each of these women that led to him retaining their services. But it wasn’t the fact that Trump hired them that made them successful. Two of his other hires make this clear. Omarosa Manigault was a Trump assistant in the White House, but performed badly, leading to her summary dismissal. Anthony Scaramucci became White House Communications Director, but only lasted about ten days. Each of these failed because of their own actions.

Kayleigh McEnany may have been a relative unknown when she was appointed by White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows, but she rapidly proved to be the best Presidential Press Secretary in recent history. She left with Trump as Joe Biden assumed office. Since then, her skills have landed her a high paid job as a political analyst on Fox News. For those of us on the spectator’s side of the television, she was even better than the stellar Sarah Huckabee Sanders.

McEnany received Donald Trump’s ire by (mis?)quoting the results of an opinion poll:

While we can argue over whether the poll was quoted correctly, Trump’s response is beyond petty and churlish. It’s just a schoolyard bully acting out. Because someone who worked for him said something less than glowing about Saint Donald, he went off on an unhinged rant. We can argue about mean tweets, but if you want to see a master at work, look no further than Ron DeSantis. He does not suffer fools gladly but still avoids acting like a bully.

Jenna Ellis’s service to Trump is even more remarkable. She is the author of two legal memos (following logic I laid out here) clearly elucidating the fact that VP Pence’s duty (not option) on January 6, 2021, was to send six slates of electors back to their state legislatures for final determination. The decline of America in the last two years is directly attributable to Pence’s failure to carry out his Constitutional obligation. Yet Trump is slandering her by claiming she has been divorced three times. What did she do to offend him?

Jenna Ellis’ sin may be the act of calling out Trump’s vulgarity.

Same guy who thinks it’s fine to encourage “gang banging” women.

This is a perfect example of how Trump’s vulgarity and the RNC’s pro-Caitlyn Jenner LGBTQ inclusivity has unfortunately been held up as the model by some new young Republicans.

Reject this. https://t.co/aDmT7L9i4k

— Jenna Ellis рџђЉрџ‡єрџ‡ё (@JennaEllisEsq) June 4, 2023

Or perhaps she is evil by pointing out that Florida has prospered because DeSantis actually did something more important than simply getting elected.

This is good. https://t.co/Jj3lSDXIeA

— Jenna Ellis рџђЉрџ‡єрџ‡ё (@JennaEllisEsq) June 4, 2023

Which brings us to Ron DeSantis. Donald Trump did not “put him over the top” by endorsing him during a failing campaign. He endorsed Ron before the Florida Congressman even announced that he was running. It seems likely that this was a result of DeSantis’ proposal to limit the Mueller probe to six months.

But even if Trump was the deciding factor, the rest was up to the new Governor. And DeSantis delivered. As a resident of Florida, I got to see his work up close, not the caricature Trump and the Left have presented.

Without Trump’s assistance, and frankly in opposition to The Donald’s unsupervised surrogates, DeSantis opened Florida up as soon as data showed that lockdowns, masks, and vaccination didn’t make things safer. Yes, he made the mRNA shots available to all that wanted them, but he never mandated them. Along the way, he has done so many good things that refugees from blue states are flocking to Florida, turning it deep red. None of this had anything to do with Trump.

Trump does not suffer fools gladly, but he hits them from every possible angle with nasty names and even false attacks. Unfortunately, he has developed such thin skin that he vigorously attacks those who fail at the moment to support him with adequate vigor. In this he violates Reagan’s maxim: Never attack a fellow Republican. He has memed DeSantis on a rhino, even though the two have very few substantive policy disagreements.

All this raises a question I raised about Joe Biden several years ago. Is Donald Trump starting a slide toward senility? Biden shows signs of prefrontal dementia with his memory loss, inappropriate behavior, and outbursts of anger. Trump has always been a wrecking ball, but he seems to have a problem identifying the enemy. His rising anger may be a sign of an incipient slide.

America needs a wrecking ball in DC. We must terminate the employment of every policy-making bureaucrat with prejudice. It took Trump four years to figure this out (Schedule F), and then he couldn’t implement it. DeSantis understands already that personnel is policy. He also understands that Article II, Section 1, Sentence 1, vests him with the unquestionable power to do it. When we have a candidate who appears to have forgotten who the enemy is, may be declining, and has alienated a vast part of the American electorate, we have to ask…

Is there a better choice?

Ted Noel MD is a retired Anesthesiologist/Intensivist who podcasts and posts on social media as DoctorTed and @vidzette. His Doctor Ted’s Prescription podcasts are available on many podcast channels.