“There was no poetry in the words delivered to a half-empty National Mall on Inauguration Day. ... What we got, coinciding with the first rain drops falling while Trump spoke to the nation he now leads, was a clenched fist — his own salute of nationalism and defiance, borrowed from political causes rooted in far different passions. He raised the fist while taking his place at the Capitol steps, and again at the close of a dark, soulless speech introducing himself as the leader of the free world.

”We might be able to ignore the fist had he mentioned liberty, the Constitution, equality for all, some joy note to American values. We might be able to give him a wider berth, an open heart, had he quoted Washington, from that humble first inaugural in 1789, or Lincoln, with his call to our better angels, or Kennedy's plea for a patriotism of selflessness.

“No, what we got was the clenched fist, to go with the rhetorical one: America first to fix American carnage.”

-- Timothy Egan, “A Clenched Fist for Day 1,” New York Times