Lady Gaga soars, Trump crashes, Putin wins and vets lose on Super Bowl weekend

Thank you, Lady Gaga! I actually retweeted someone prior to your Super Bowl halftime show that suggested that you might go off the rails and do something super political and you didn’t.

I apologize. You stuck to your announced halftime theme of inclusion but didn’t exclude those who may not agree with you on some pretty hairy issues — including me.

You stayed true to yourself by including the song “Born This Way” in your halftime repertoire.

Because you didn’t feel the need to shove your views in my face — two Super Bowls in a row! — you’ve earned some trust on my part. Thank you.

Speaking of trust, you must have had a lot of trust in the people who put together and operated the cables that gave you the ability to fly during your show.

You soared. Literally.

Meanwhile, our president crashed (metaphorically).

During an interview conducted by Bill O’Reilly on that same Fox network before the game, the president repeated his claim that he respects Russian President Vladimir Putin.

When O’Reilly pointed out that the autocratic Putin is “a killer,” the president replied, “There are a lot of killers. You think our country’s so innocent?”

And he went on to say that we (America) has made a lot of mistakes.

Yes, Trump is right that some Americans have been (and still are) killers.

Thank God. A large portion of the people we have killed would’ve taken countless other lives if they hadn’t been stopped dead in their tracks.

But what bothers me about all this is that it sounds like he is equating the actions of Vladimir Putin with those of American heroes.

Who knew that you, Lady Gaga, would do more to unite a nation on Super Bowl Sunday than a guy who promised to do so in his inauguration speech?

Trump will have to mount a Patriots-style comeback in order to win over some people who may have been warming up to him. But more importantly, he may have found himself in a position of winning back over some folks who overwhelmingly supported him during the election: veterans.

Yes, veterans. The people who voted for Trump by a two-to-one margin, the people who did the job Trump wouldn’t do when he received multiple deferments, the people who had high hopes for real change at the VA and instead got handed a guy who oversaw some of the most egregious happenings at its hospitals are the very same people whose actions Trump just equated to Putin’s.

Still, many veterans may be willing to give him another chance.

But it’ll probably take two touchdown drives, two successful two-point conversions, winning the overtime coin flip and then driving all the way down the field for a third time to win them back over.

Good thing Trump has Tom Brady in his corner.

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