During the campaign many of us worried that President Elect Donald Trump was too thin skinned to be our President. His middle of the night tweets and name calling of his opponents caused us to worry that he didn’t have the temperament to lead our nation.

We were told that once elected he would become more presidential and in the immediate days after the election we did not see the rants that caused us concern. He wanted us to believe that he had matured and gained a respect for the office he will soon occupy.

Despite our skepticism we hoped he was right. This past Friday, Vice President Elect Michael Pence attended the Broadway play Hamilton and Mr. Trump fed our gravest concerns.

History buffs like me celebrate the fact that a play about Alexander Hamilton creates buzz. Anything that informs Americans about our history is a good thing.

And I applaud Mr. Pence for attending. At the end of the play, during the curtain call, the actor who played Aaron Burr, Brandon Victor Dixon, read this to Mr. Pence:

Vice President Elect Pence, we welcome you and truly thank you for joining us here at “Hamilton: An American Musical.” We really do. We, sir, we, are the diverse America who are alarmed and anxious that your new administration will not protect us, our planet, our children, our parents, or defend us and uphold our inalienable rights, sir. But we truly hope that this show has inspired you to uphold our American values and work on behalf of all of us. Again we truly thank you for sharing this show, this wonderful American story told by a diverse group of men, women of different colors, creeds and orientations.

While Mr. Pence was gracious, Mr. Trump was not. Once again he took to Twitter to charge that the cast was “very rude” and demanded that they apologize.

When asked about this, Kellyanne Conway responded by asking why anyone should care.

Ms. Conway, here’s why we should care: Mr. Trump has shown us again and again that his thin skin occupies too much of his attention. The job of President will require him to “keep his eye on the ball” and not be distracted by the petty events.

Frankly I believe that Mr. Dixon showed incredible respect and restraint and I applaud him and the cast of Hamilton.

Starting on January 20, 2017 Mr. Trump take on a responsibility that should consume his attention 24/7. I, along with the cast of Hamilton, and many other Americans, fear that he will focus his attention on settling petty scores instead of ruling our nation.

For decades we’ve been hearing about term limits on politicians. I think it’s a bad idea but the quaint concept of the “gentleman farmer” who serves briefly and returns to the farm doesn’t appear to be leaving soon.

Never seeing a populist movement he didn’t like, President Elect Donald Trump has recently proclaimed: “Drain the Swamp,” or impose term limits on Congress.

I think term limits are a bad idea because there is a learning curve to governing and right now the more experienced representatives (who, by the way, keep coming back because their constituents like them) mentor the new ones. They have the institutional memory but with term limits they go away. This places the institutional memory with career staffers and lobbyists. I have a great deal of faith with the staffers but if the representatives are still learning the job, the lobbyists have an unfair advantage.

Anyway, back to the swamp. While not true, it’s a common belief that Washington D.C. was built on a swamp. This makes “draining the swamp” a good bumper sticker.

When I grew up in nearby Virginia we thought of swamps as bad places, breeding grounds for mosquitoes and places unfit for swimming or boating. Draining a swamp was seen as progress.

But in the years since, we’ve learned that swamps are critical to the ecosystem and now call them wetlands. And we’ve learned that draining swamps is a bad idea. In 2005 the city of New Orleans suffered horrific floods with Hurricane Katrina. The horrific flooding was caused not just by the rain, but also because of a storm surge that previous wetlands would have stopped. You can read an excellent article here. Basically there were several causes of the disappearance of the wetlands but the result was clear: New Orleans was decimated by Katrina because the wetlands (swamps) were not there to protect it.

As a postscript, Mr. Trump’s nominees include Senator Jeff Sessions who has been a senator since 1997, Mike Pompeo who has been a representative since 2011, and Reince Priebus who, as RNC chairman has lived in Washington since 2011. I guess they won’t be drained.

As I write this we are in day 8 of President Elect Trump’s plan for his administration. These transitions always look a little chaotic as the President Elect chooses his cabinet and senior advisors. Trial balloons are released and shot down, old friends and colleagues jockey for positions, and anonymous leaks to the press rocket up.

That said, this process appears unusually chaotic. There are several examples, but let me choose one: New Jersey Governor Chris Christie. During the primary process he was one of the first ex-competitors to endorse Mr. Trump (February 26th).

Mr. Trump rewards loyalty and Mr. Christie’s background in law enforcement appeared to give him an advantage in running the Department of Justice as Attorney General.

A few days ago Mr. Christie was “purged” from the transition team with little explanation. Frankly, I originally thought Mr. Christie was seen as tainted because of his involvement in bridgegate and that now appears to be wrong.

There is good reason to believe that his sudden exit has more to do with something that happened in 2005. Mr. Trump’s son in law is Jared Kushner and has become one of Mr. Trump’s closest advisors.

Mr. Kushner’s father, Charles Kushner is a real estate developer. In 2005 he was convicted of making illegal campaign contributions, tax evasion and witness tampering and sentenced to two years in federal prison (he served one). The prosecutor? The United States Senator from the District of New Jersey, Chris Christie.

I guess it’s true that revenge is a dish best served cold.

I don’t make this point to say that Mr. Christie’s past has come back to haunt him, but to say that Mr. Trump’s son in law has harbored this grudge. In a well run campaign and transition, Mr. Christie would never have been seen as a serious candidate for Attorney General. His sudden fall from grace shows that the transition team has little temperament for the job ahead.