Is It Possible There Is Nothing Nice to Say about Trump?

Donald Trump is a hated figure — more hated than any political figure in America. In Washington you can just assume that any random person you talk with agrees with you about that. The only comparable person in American politics is Richard Nixon, who my mother told me was despicable when I was about 6, long before Watergate — and she was right!

But if you and everyone you know passionately believe one thing while half the country believes the opposite, it may be time for a reality test. That is the purpose of this feature: not to persuade people that President Trump is any kind of good guy, but to ask whether it’s possible that he has done or said anything good during his campaign and the first months of his presidency.

The newspapers and other mainstream media outlets have cut Mr. Trump no slack. The Times editorial page urged the deputy attorney general, a career government lawyer, to “save your honor”: call for a special prosecutor to investigate the Trump campaign’s involvement with Russia and cash in a lifetime of probity chips if necessary to do it.

Let’s have a special prosecutor by all means. But is it true that Mr. Trump has no redeeming qualities (except that he evidently loves his family — and even that has gotten him into justifiable trouble)? Can it be that he lacks the moral character to hold a job once held by Nixon and the wisdom to hold a job once held by George W. Bush?

Maybe so. It does seem unlikely but perfect balance may be a distortion of reality. Many people do seem to think that our president is brainless, heartless, anything but spleenless. Drop a comment below to say what you personally think about him; There are a few interesting ideas that I’ll pass along over the next few weeks.

Then there is James Comey, the F.B.I. director whom Mr. Trump fired last week, ostensibly for bungling the investigation of Russian interference in the 2016 election and any role Trump’s people may have had in it. For honest liberals, there is a hypocrisy trap here.

Mrs. Clinton believes that Mr. Comey cost her the election by revealing, shortly before Election Day, that her emails were still under investigation. It’s hard to imagine that Mrs. Clinton wouldn’t have fired Mr. Comey too if she’d gotten the chance, which makes the whole fuss a bit suspect. It seems that both Mrs. Clinton and Mr. Trump had reservations about Mr. Comey. Mr. Trump is just the one who fired him. Does that qualify as saying something nice about the president?

Perhaps. Of course, when it comes to firing people, he’s had a lot of practice LoL.