Another Unforced Error for Trump

Donald Trump has managed to create yet another controversy about himself, based, as closely as I can tell, on his massive ego and loose lips. We know Donald's philosophy on "live and let live". It's basically: "Fahgetaboutit". He has been famously quoted:

"When somebody screws you, screw them back in spades." And "When someone attacks you publicly, always strike back."

His wife has been quoted as saying when someone attacks Trump he "hits back ten times as hard". She was probably quoting him.

Khizr Khan, the father of a Muslim US soldier killed in Iraq in 2004, made some disparaging remarks about Trump at the Democrat's convention. I'm shocked! Someone saying mean things about a Republican at a Democrat convention...whowouldathunkit?

Now, I'm not a presidential candidate, nor do I play one on TV, but I can think of a number of ways The Donald could have responded to Khizr Khan's emotional outburst at the Democrat convention:

1) Do nothing. Period. Be the bigger man. Khizr Khan was a grieving father who took a cheap political shot at Trump. Trump could have ignored the slight and the day after the convention, Khan would have gone back to the anonymity he enjoyed prior to his fifteen minutes of fame.

This is, as we have seen, not within Trump's makeup. By firing back at the wrath of Khan, he gave the story legs to carry it through several more news cycles.

2) He could have said, "Mr. and Mrs. Khan, first let me express my deepest sympathies for the loss of your son. I can't imagine the depths of grief you must feel over the loss of a child. I can tell that you're angry, but I'm a little bit puzzled that you're angry with me, when it was Hillary Clinton who voted to authorize sending your son in harm's way."  That way, it humanizes him and with a little political jiu-jitsu, turns the discussion to one of Hillary's weaknesses with her base.

3) Pundit John LeBoutillier went so far as to suggest that Trump might have created an endowment seat in Captain Khan's name at his alma mater to honor his service. A scholarship or donation to a military charity in the Captain's name could have gone a long way to prove himself the bigger man.

Instead, you have a person with a massive ego, who must punish every slur and slight against him, getting into a pissing match with a Gold Star family, as no doubt the Clinton campaign wanted him to do, and then to have such an Obama grade tin ear that he would compare the sacrifice of losing a child to his "creating thousands of jobs". Newsflash, Donald. Creating jobs to further your own financial gain is not a "sacrifice". It could be asked if you, born to wealth, wealthy in your own right, have ever in your life made a genuine sacrifice. Certainly not as great as that of losing a child. Did you "sacrifice" your first two wives so that you could score a younger hotter one? /sarc

In one fell swoop, the Hillary camp baited Trump into overreacting, attacking the parents of a slain soldier, giving false equivalence to the word sacrifice, which could demonstrate that he is out of touch, and created an equal narrative to match that of Hillary's treatment of Sean Smith's mother.

Now granted, the liberals have not covered themselves with glory here. One writer said of Patricia Smith, "I would like to beat her to death."

Patricia Smith was able to testify about the lack of honesty and moral character of Mrs. Clinton. Khizr Khan distorted what Trump had said for political theater. Trump, in taking the bait and dignifying the slurs with a response, has badly miscalculated and made it a bigger story than it was or had to be, and made himself look smaller in the process.