This is an archived article that was published on sltrib.com in 2017, and information in the article may be outdated. It is provided only for personal research purposes and may not be reprinted.

The vision of the future expressed in President Donald Trump's inaugural address might have been at least credible, if not altogether inspiring, if it had been better grounded in the truth about the past and present.

Sad.

In a mercifully brief speech Friday, the 45th president of the United States paid little heed to the tradition of trying to bring a great, and greatly divided, nation together. Instead, he decided to dance with those that brung him.

Aggressive and grim, he spoke mostly to the enraged and fearful voters from swing states who were receptive to his campaign narrative of a nation in ruins, under attack, hemorrhaging jobs and money and sovereignty itself. He offered yet another promise that, under his leadership, America will become great again.

Of course there are problems. Of course too many people have been left behind as the nation has recovered from the economic downturn that faced Barack Obama when he took the same oath eight years before. Of course people all across the nation have reason to think that their own government has not done right by them over the years, instead favoring those with inroads into the halls of power.

And Trump's focus Friday on the we of Americans, rather than the "only I" of his frightening speech at the Republican National Convention, was clearly an improvement. So were some phrases of inclusion that included, "When you open your heart to patriotism, there is no room for prejudice."

But for the new president to begin his administration by describing the state of the union as "American carnage," returning to his habitual references to "the poverty of inner cities," "the crime and the gangs and the drugs" and undefended borders again misleads the nation.

Crime is down. Illegal immigration is down. And many of the nation's "inner cities" are roaring back so quickly that the biggest problem they face is the lack of affordable housing.

Trump's vision of America First sounds far too much like America Only.

"Protection," Trump said, "will lead to great prosperity and strength."

If that is really Trump's plan, then he is envisioning a world where America will be the first to walk off the cliff.

With only 5 percent of the world's population, the United States cannot hope to build either a thriving economy or an effective national security structure without trading partners and military allies around the world.

And his cruel dismissal of America's educational system as "flush with cash, but which leaves our young and beautiful students deprived of all knowledge" is wrong on both sides of the comma. Even with consistently woeful funding levels, America is the envy of world for the innovation, technology and pure science it rolls out, year after year.

Of course, one major product of that innovation has been the automation that has come to be the core of industry all over the world. That, not exported jobs, is root of the "factories scattered like tombstones across the landscape of our nation."

The threat now is that, with so much of the new president's agenda based on imaginary threats and irrational solutions, any impulse he or others in the administration feel to truly help America move forward will be dismissed. And the very same special interests that Trump says are stealing away our hope will be the only ones in a position to guide our future.