It isn’t often that I am cheered by something that Republicans do, but last week was an exception, and even then, my cheer definitely was limited.

The good news was that Donald Trump did not get the support of a majority of Republicans in Wyoming. I’ll get to the bad news in a bit.

Trump’s success to this point is discouraging, because it is based on the lie that America is somehow broken and we need him to “make it great” again. That’s not an unusual gambit for a politician running for president. This is a large, complex nation with a worldwide presence, there’s almost always trouble somewhere that can be exploited by a candidate who thinks America needs him above all others.

Still, Trump goes way overboard on the subject. Granted, there are issues facing America, but electing a charlatan who makes grandiose, and totally ridiculous promises won’t solve them.

I don’t need to list all the lies and absurdities of Trump’s promises. Unless you get all of your news from conservative commentators Patrick Buchanan and Ann Coulter, you already know what they are. Many of them are beyond the president’s powers, and some are probably altogether impossible.

Consider, for example, his 20-foot wall along the Mexican border, which will probably cause more problems than it will solve. Among other things, it will require trampling on the property rights of some landowners along the border, a rather un-Republican thing to do, and it will face some monumental engineering tasks.

It will also cost a bundle, and the idea that Trump can make Mexico pay for it is, to put it nicely, pure hogwash. Mexican leaders have, quite understandably, rejected the idea, so, unless Trump plans to invade Mexico, the wall will be paid for with dollars, not pesos. Those of us who, as patriots, do pay our taxes will be stuck with the cost, and it will be much higher than Trump estimates. I suspect the wall will be constantly in need of repair and maintenance, as well, raising the cost even more.

And it won’t work. One New York Republican refers to it as the “moron wall” and recently said, “Show me a 20-foot wall and I’ll show you a 21-foot ladder.” Other refugees might emulate the POWs portrayed in “The Great Escape” and tunnel under it, which some already have. Others will paddle around it and still others may find pilots willing, for the right price, to attempt clandestine flights under the radar to deliver people to the U.S. Wall or no wall, people who want to get here will find a way.

Some of Trump’s promises are simply ridiculous. A few months ago, he said that when he becomes president, store clerks will all say “Merry Christmas,” rather than “Happy Holidays.”  

I’d be really interested in how he thinks a president could accomplish that. 

Would he issue an executive order mandating the proper greeting? Would he require Wal-Mart’s security staff to spend their time monitoring the speech of checkout clerks instead of watching for shoplifters? Would he require a store to fire a clerk who gives his Jewish friend the wrong greeting, or would suspending him for a day or two without pay be enough? What about repeat offenders? Would a third offense automatically be considered a felony and mean a long prison term?

Now, before anybody takes the time to send me a nasty email or post an angry comment on the Tribune’s web page, I admit what I have just said is absurd, but that’s because Trump’s promise is absurd. He probably doesn’t even remember saying it, because he obviously doesn’t listen to himself.

Proof of that was evident last week because violence erupted when protestors offended some of Trump’s supporters. Other candidates, even Trump’s fellow Republicans, blamed the violence on both the tone and substance of Trump’s speeches. In those speeches, he talks about the old days, when such protesters would be “carried out on a stretcher.” He has said he’d like to punch a protester in the face and suggested that some of them should have the crap beat out of them. He has also promised he would pay the legal expenses for any of his supporters who are charged with assault. Worst of all, he consistently feeds the anger and fear of his supporters, identifying scapegoats they can blame for their troubles. Even if he doesn’t explicitly advocate violence, providing his supporters with someone to blame implicitly gives them permission to attack the scapegoats.

Yet when asked about last week’s violence and his own words that may have provoked it, Trump insisted that he did not say those things, does not advocate violence, and insists no one has been injured at one of his rallies. That means he either doesn’t listen to his own speeches or he doesn’t understand English very well.

It would be nice if we could have more civility in this election, but there seems to be too much anger among the voters for that to happen. Furthermore, too many politicians are trying to ride that anger into the White House. Trump is the most notorious for feeding that anger, but he’s definitely not the only one.

That reminds me, I said I’d tell you the bad news from the Republicans, so here it is. The good news is that Trump was not the “winner” among Wyoming’s Republican delegates. The bad news is that Ted Cruz was the winner. If you look at their respective positions on the issues, they are quite similar.

I’ll have more to say about this in the future, and I may even make a few Democrats mad.