“His imagination must not be married to real power.”

The Republican who ran for President in 2012, Mitt Romney, strongly spoke out against the Republican who wants to run in 2016, Donald Trump.

Trump has been a fascinating, polarizing, and outrageous character in this election cycle.  Wildly popular with some, he’s equally unpopular with others.  I feel that polarization personally; there are things I do, and do not, like about him, and I feel both strongly.

But in his speech, Romney said one thing that distills and defines how I feel about Trump:

“His imagination must not be married to real power.”

This is an astounding phrase.  It’s elegant, clear, concise – and it encompasses all of the anxieties of his opponents and many bystanders.  It expresses in nine words the fear of what someone so unstable in speech and action might do with the power and authority of the Presidency.

Trump is indeed wildly imaginative – he’s a demagogue, a masterful manipulator of media and social media, outrageous, crude, and a ceaseless panderer to the many Americans angry at the politics of their country within and without the Republican Party itself.  He’s dishonest, inconsistent, contradictory, bullying, and he just makes stuff up on the fly.  The very things that inspire loyalty from his followers inspire fear and loathing from his opponents.

Will he use his executive power to expel entire demographics from the United States?  Unilaterally tear up treaties and trade agreements – the kind of actions that precipitate declarations of war?  Hire former The Apprentice contestants to Cabinet positions?

Do you want the guy who hints at his penis size during a nationally televised debate to have his finger on The Button?

“His imagination must not be married to real power.”

Many are criticizing Romney’s attacks on Trump – he is, after all, a leading member of the Republican establishment that has so angered and disillusioned its own supporters and has lost control of its own party with the rise of Trump.  I doubt his words will be effective in stopping The Donald’s momentum; if anything, such opposition from The Establishment will likely only increase his popularity.

But in that phrase, Romney spells out exactly why I felt such unease about Trump’s candidacy – and he did it better than I have been able to myself.  He didn’t change my mind.  He didn’t give me new information to mull over.  “He’s sayin’ what I’m thinkin’” – and better than I’ve thunk it.

That’s an indication of masterful communication: the ability to put someone else’s unspoken thoughts, concerns and opinions into words that the person may not have had before.

His imagination must not be married to real power.

What a statement.  It is very much in Romney’s voice and personality, too – it’s elegant but not flowery, plain-spoken, bereft of hyperbole, spoken with a gentle but resolute certainty.  This is how he usually speaks in public, and it makes me want to go back through his history to read his other speeches.  Whatever my opinion of Romney has been in the past, I have to reconsider it based on this phrase alone.

It remains to be seen whether his words, as powerful as they are, will have any real effect.  But no one who reads or hears it will misinterpret what Romney meant.  It’s the complete opposite to the obfuscation of Brother Lett in my previous post.