Trump Has Admitted His Guilt
June 1, 2018 at 2:50 pm | Posted in Abuse of Office, Crime and punishment, Disinformation, Enemies of Freedom, Presidential election | Leave a commentTags: 2016 Presidential election, Jeff Sessions, Paul Waldman, President Chump, President Trump, Putin, Washington Post
Men in Bramhall stocks, Bramhall, England, 1900, unknown photographer.
Trump has admitted his guilt, without realizing that he has done so.
This point was made recently by Paul Waldman, in an article in the Washington Post.
Quoting from that aricle, “According to a January New York Times story, when Sessions decided to recuse himself, “the president erupted in anger in front of numerous White House officials, saying he needed his attorney general to protect him.” (Emphasis added.)
There would be no need for the Attorney General to protect Trump from the investigation of Putin’s interference in the the Presidential election in 2016, if Trump had not done something illegal in connection with that election.
The Attorney General’s job is to protect the American people from crime, not to protect the President – or anyone else – from the consequences of illegal actions.
About the nature of Trump’s crime, we know only that it pertains to Putin’s interference in the Presidential election in 2016. That is the topic that always presses Trump’s buttons, and elicits his most feverishly desparate reactions.
Further evidence of Trump’s knowledge of his own guilt occured in Trump’s meeting with Sessions in March 2017. According to Paul Waldman’s article, “[Trump’s] grievance was with Mr. Sessions: The president objected to [Session’s] decision to recuse himself from the Russia investigation. Mr. Trump, who had told aides that he needed a loyalist overseeing the inquiry, berated Mr. Sessions and told him he should reverse his decision, an unusual and potentially inappropriate request.” Why would Trump need “a loyalist overseeing the inquiry”, if he wasn’t scared about some fact connected to this particular topic?
See also the previous post on this blog.
I know it won’t happen, but for such a hypocrite I cannot resist: “Lock him up!”
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Trump Is Guilty
May 4, 2018 at 7:38 am | Posted in Abuse of Office, Conceited, Crime and punishment, Disinformation, Dysfunctional Politics, Enemies of Freedom, Presidential election | 1 CommentTags: legitimacy of the United States government, New York Times, Putin, Robert Mueller, Trump
Old gavel and court minutes displayed at the Minnesota Judicial Center, photographed by Jonathunder, 2008-04-17.
Trump is guilty of something that causes him to frantically impede the investigation of Putin’s interference in the American election in 2016.
Trump is so guilty, that he opposes an investigation that every patriotic American would want to succeed, because the legitimacy of elections underlies the legitimacy of the American government.
Trump is so guilty, that he seeks to terminate the only activity that would exonererate him if he wasn’t guilty.
Trump is so guilty, that he seeks to terminate the only activity that would remove the cloud on his legitimacy.
For a summary of the issues, see the New York Times article on Robert Mueller’s questions to Trump.
Robert S. Mueller, III, director of the FBI from 2001 to 2013
Unpatriotic Devin Nunes, Unpatriotic Donald Trump
February 28, 2018 at 9:41 am | Posted in Abuse of Office, Disinformation, Dysfunctional Politics, Enemies of Freedom | Leave a commentTags: Devin Nunes, Donald Trump, Paul Ryan, Ruth Marcus, Vladimir Putin
Devin Nunes, U.S. Representative from California
Every loyal American would want the investigation of Putin’s interference in the 1916 election to get to the bottom of what Putin’s minions did, and how they did it. Every loyal American would want to refute Putin’s lies, and would want America to have the information it needs to craft defenses against Putin’s future attempts, both on this country and on its allies.
It is iron-clad logic, a simple syllogism: if every loyal American would want those things, then any American who obstructs those investigations and defenses is not a loyal American.
Devin Nunes is not a loyal American.
Donald Trump is not a loyal American.
Devin Nunes is not a patriotic American.
Donald Trump is not a patrotic American.
Devin Nunes is inadvertantly an agent of Vladimir Putin.
Donald Trump is inadvertantly an agent of Vladimir Putin.
Neither should ever have had access to classified information.
Neither should have future access to classified information.
Trump’s primary loyalty is to himself and to his “brand” – not to America, not to freedom, not to fairness, not to honest elections.
There are indications that the same is true of Devin Nunes.
Article II, Section 2 of the Constitution begins, “The President shall be Commander in Chief of the Army and Navy of the United States, …”
The writers of the Constitution never anticipated a President who favored an opponent of the United States.
Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump meet at the 2017 G-20 Hamburg Summit. Photo by http://www.kremlin.ru.
What about Paul Ryan?
Donald Trump shaking hands with Speaker of the House Paul Ryan at his February 28, 2017 address to a joint session of Congress.
Surely Paul Ryan had some sense of Devin Nunes’ personality and character before appointing him to the House Intelligence Committee.
Why then did Paul Ryan appoint Nunes as Chairman of the House Intelligence Committee?
Why did Paul Ryan even allow Nunes to be on that Committee?
Paul, please explain to the American people why you appointed Nunes as Chairman of the House Intelligence Committee.
Paul, now that you cannot miss seeing that you introduced a worm into the apple, what are you going to do about it? Are you going to re-assign Nunes?
Paul, are you, too, not a loyal American?
Paul, are you, too, inadvertantly an agent of Putin?
Paul, where are your primary loyalties? They seem to be to the Republican Party in its current debased form, not to America, not to freedom, not to fairness, not to honest elections.
As noted by Ruth Marcus in the Washington Post:
“Real patriotism would be not to denounce the “Russia hoax” but to insist that Congress — and for that matter, special counsel Robert S. Mueller III — get to the bottom of what happened in the 2016 election and, even more imperative, that the United States strengthen its defenses to prevent future meddling.”
#hashtagDonaldTrump
July 7, 2017 at 8:08 pm | Posted in Abuse of Office, Climate change, Conceited, Disinformation, Enemies of Freedom, Enemies of Planet Earth, Presidential election | Leave a commentTags: Charles Krauthammer, Donald Trump, Eugene Robinson, George Will, Joe Scarborough, John Baron, John Barron, John Miller, John Oliver, Kathleen Parker, Michael Gerson, Mika Brzezinski, Trump pretending to be other people praising Trump, Trump's impersonations
Artwork by Charles Raymond Macauley for the 1904 edition of The strange case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde by Robert Louis Stevenson. Publisher: New York Scott-Thaw
failing
lying
corrupt
fake
ignored
These are some of the adjectives that Trump tries to attach to the names of persons and organizations that he want to disparage.
He repeats these derogatory linkages relentlessly, trying to embed them into the public’s mind. After all, the one aspect of business that Trump has mastered is marketing.
Trump’s disparaging adjectives actually name his own deepest fears and guilty feelings about himself. They list his vulnerabilities.
That is why his menu of derogatory adjectives is so well-defined.
It is also the reason – besides marketing – why he uses them so obsessively.
Since these adjectives accurately describe Trump himself, it is easy to list what could become the most popular hashtags on Twitter. Here is such a list, expanded to include additional adjectives that accurately describe Trump, even though he does not habitually try to pin them on his enemies:
#failingDonaldTrump
#lyingDonaldTrump (see here )
#TrumpTowerOfLies
#corruptDonaldTrump
#fakeDonaldTrump (see here)
#ignoredDonaldTrump
#deceitfullDonaldTrump (see here and here)
#greedyDonaldTrump
#conartistDonaldTrump
#shallowDonaldTrump (see here)
#simplisticDonaldTrump
#ignorantDonaldTrump (see here)
#incompetentDonaldTrump
#inadequateDonaldTrump
#fragileDonaldTrump
#defectiveDonaldTrump (see here and here)
#unhingedDonaldTrump (see here)
#insaneDonaldTrump
#DonaldTrumpAtMar-a-Loco
#disastrousDonaldTrump (see here)
#dangerousbuffoonDonaldTrump (see here)
#PresidentChump (see here)
#AmericasMisfortuneDonaldTrump
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Who Should Squelch Lies and Trolls on Social Media?
June 30, 2017 at 8:25 pm | Posted in Disinformation, Enemies of Freedom, Presidential election | Leave a commentTags: Elizabeth Dwoskin, Facebook, fake news, harassment, lies, President Chump, social media, trolls, Trump, Twitter
John Bauer (1882-1918), artist, in 1915: “Look at them,” troll mother said. “Look at my sons! You won’t find more beautiful trolls on this side of the moon.”
By now you have read and seen the damage caused by the flood of misleading or harassing material on social media. Vulnerable teens have committed suicide, ordinary adults have become fearful and intimidated, fools have become enraged vigilantes, racists have infected those with weak mental immune systems, and President Chump has been elected.
Elizabeth Dwoskin’s recent article in the Washington Post describes how Twitter and Facebook and Google are trying to weaken the flood.
Colin Crowell is the Vice President of Policy at Twitter. Dwoskin’s article quoted something that Crowell had written recently, and it is worth discussing here, because it states a misunderstanding that is prevalent in all of the major social media companies.
Dwoskin wrote, ““We, as a company, should not be the arbiter of truth,” Crowell wrote earlier this month. He emphasized that Twitter users — “journalists, experts, and engaged citizens” — tweet side by side to correct public discourse every day in real time.”
The fallacy in Crowell’ argument is that the corrections are not really in real time. They are never soon enough. The misleading material reaches the public before any retractions or corrections appear, and sits out there, at least briefly unopposed.
Correcting misleading material is like closing the barn door after the horse has escaped.
Only a tiny fraction of those who see the misleading material will ever see the retraction or the correction.
Even among those who do see the correction, the first-seen version often makes the deepest impression.
The timing is such that most of the simple-minded and all of the malicious will propagate the uncorrected version.
Sociopathic liar that he is, Donald Trump regularly exploits this weakness of all of the media: public appearances, TV, the print media, and the social media.
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That the misleading material is seen first, and the stickiness of first impressions – those are inconvenient truths for the social media giants. The social media giants do not want the expense that would be required to pre-disinfect the stream that flows onto their platforms, nor do they relish the potential legal battles that any gate-keeper may face.
Good technical and legal solutions are not yet known. But at least the social media should drop the self-serving illusion that they can evade at least some gate-keeping role.
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President Chump, You Cannot Distract Us
June 6, 2017 at 7:59 am | Posted in Abuse of Office, Conceited, Disinformation, Enemies of Freedom | 1 CommentTags: Emmanuel Macron, leak, Leaker in Chief, Mar-a-Lago, Mar-a-Leako, President Chump, security risk, Trump
Orangutans can use objects in creative ways. Photo taken by Postdif from Wikipedia, at the Philadelphia Zoo on 8 May 2010.
To President Chump –
When others point out inconvenient facts about you, one of your favorite tactics is to change the subject. You deliberately do something attention-grabbing, to distract the public’s attention away from the inconvenient facts.
When there are questions about the connections of you and your gang to Putin’s regime, you squawk instead about how those inconvenient facts became widely known. You squawk about leaks – you, who said “I love Wikileaks” during the campaign, when leaks had been crafted to harm your opponent, just like the more recent “leaks” that were crafted to harm Emmanuel Macron‘s campaign for the Presidency of France.
That doesn’t work any more. We are on to you.
Speakers and posters at the March for Truth on June 3 said so, loud and clear.
Every morning, you will wake up to us asking again about your taxes.
You will wake up to us asking again about your conflicts of interest.
You will wake up to us asking again about your loyalty.
You will wake up to us asking again about whether you are a security risk – you, the first US President ever to have been called The Leaker in Chief. (Yes, that was one of the posters at the March for Truth.)
Perhaps Mar-a-Lago should be renamed Mar-a-Leako.
The March for Truth on June 3, 2017, in Portland, Oregon, which was one of its many cities. Photographed by ‘Another Believer’.
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The ‘Racist Right’, Not the ‘Alt-Right’, and Not ‘White Nationalist’
May 16, 2017 at 2:11 pm | Posted in Conceited, Disinformation, Enemies of Freedom | 2 CommentsTags: alt-right, John Woodrow Cox, Laura Vozzella, Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact, nationalist right, Nazi, racism, Richard Spencer, Stephen Bannon, Washington Post, white nationalist, white racism, white supremacist
A dune-dwelling Aptostichus sp from Baja California. Photo by Marshal Hedin.
There is no such thing as the ‘alt-right’.
What presently calls itself the ‘alt-right’ is really the white-racist right.
It is racist because because the group favors people solely on the basis of birth – upon skin color and ethnic ancestry – not upon earned achievement (moral/humanitarian, intellectual, artistic, or athletic).
The present usage of ‘alt-right’ is a ‘framing‘ trick, designed to hide the group’s goals behind a phrase that sounds more benign than ‘white racist’ or ‘white supremicist’.
In part, Richard Spencer’s appropriation of the term was probably because ‘alt-right’ sounds almost like ‘all right’. That would heighten the mask of benignity.
The term ‘alt-right’ is camouflage, like the false surface created by a trap-door spider.
Promyrmekiaphila burrow entrance closed, in northern California. Photo by Marshal Hedin.
Spencer also uses another phrase as camouflage: ‘nationalist right’.
In using that phrase he wants to hide behind the long pedigree of nationalism, in an attempt to pass his radical position off as being somewhere on the mainstream spectrum.
But he reveals the racism underneath by having used his new term at demonstrations against the removal of monuments to the Confederacy. No matter how the racists try to deflect attention from the fact, the Confederacy was an attempt to ensure the long-term survival of slavery. That reveals that white-racism underlies the ‘nationalist right’.
When coupled with Spencer’s views and goals, it is impossible to forget an earlier use of ‘nationalism’ as a camouflage for racism. ‘Nazi’ was the abbreviation of the German words for National Socialism.
This is not just guilt by association. There is evidence for a real connection.
John Woodrow Cox interviewed Richard Spencer at a party that Spencer’s group held in Washington, DC, not long after Trump’s election. Some at the party gave a Sieg Heil salute. At one point, Spencer said “Let’s party like its 1933.” Spencer had previously dated an Asian-American woman, but now regrets his deviation from racially-pure behavior. He said that he would never again date a non-white woman and that interracial relationships should be forbidden. Cox asked, “How, in a nation with more than 100 million blacks, Asians and Latinos, could a whites-only territory be created without overwhelming violence?” Spencer’s answer: “Look, maybe it will be horribly bloody and terrible.”
Just last week, Spencer led two rallies in Charlottesville, Virginia, opposing the removal of Confederate memorials there. One of those rallies was lit by torches. Charlotteville’s Mayor pointed out the wrong-headedness of the rallies, evoking a storm of racist tweets. One of them said “I smell Jew.” (The Mayor is Jewish.)
(Interestingly, one of the chants at the second rally was “Russia is our friend”. An echo of the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact.)
Every time that you say or write ‘alt-right’ or ‘nationalist right’, you are falling into the trap, and are inadvertantly advancing the white racist cause.
Promyrmekiaphila burrow entrance open, in northern California. Photo by Marshal Hedin.
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Dishonorable Devin Nunes: What Are His Loyalties?
March 29, 2017 at 12:18 pm | Posted in Abuse of Office, Disinformation, Dysfunctional Politics, Enemies of Freedom, Presidential election | Leave a commentTags: Adam Entous, Devin Nunes, Devlin Barrett, Ellen Nakashima, Greg Miller, House of Representatives, Julie Tate, Karoun Demirjian, Philip Rucker, Putin, Robert Costa, Russian interference in the Presidential election
Illustration of the Devil in the Codex Gigas, folio 270 recto, early 13th century, by Herman the Recluse of the Benedictine monastery of Podlažice.
To what Is Devil Nunes loyal?
The one who is better known as Devin Nunes (R-Calif.)
Based on his stonewalling of investigations into Russia’s role, and his frantic attempts to divert the focus of the investigation away from Russia and away from Trump’s campaign, and toward the patriots who alerted the country, and his secret nightime trip to confer with the White House, it appears that Devin Nunes’ loyalties, in their order of importance to him, are
- First, Devin Nunes himself, followed – possibly closely – by his family.
- Second, Trump, followed – possibly closely – by the Republican Party in its present grotesquely deformed version.
- Third, possibly the United States, possibly including the district that he supposedly represents.
Given that order of priorities, it is not fitting that Nunes should be a member of the House Intelligence Committee, much less that he should chair it.
Nunes was in Trump’s transition team. Yet he claims that there is no conflict of interest for him to lead the investigation of contacts between Trump’s campaign and Russia.
The conflict of interest is clear. Nunes cannot be objective about this issue.
In attempting to deflect attention away from the real danger – Putin’s mafia – Devin Nunes betrayed his country.
He doesn’t belong in Congress.
For his future, his best career option is to apply to become a caddy at one of Trump’s golf courses.
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Donald J. Trump is Persona Non Grata at our house
March 5, 2017 at 10:28 pm | Posted in Conceited, Disinformation, Enemies of Freedom, Enemies of Planet Earth, Presidential election | Leave a commentTags: Fortune magazine, John Baron, John Barron, John Miller, John Oliver, Soutern Poverty Law Center, The New Yorker magazine, Trump, Washington Post
Detail of the Preamble to the Constitution of the United States, retouched by Bluszczokrzew .
Donald J. Trump is Persona Non Grata at our house.
We will not welcome him in, nor shake his hand. In fact, we will not let him in. We do not want to see his face – not in person, nor in the news. We do not want to hear his voice, nor his self-serving opinions.
This rejection also applies to John Miller and to John Barron/John Baron, if Trump again lies by pretending to be them, and feeds major newspapers “their” views on Trump, in a bizarre attempt to trick the newspapers into adopting positions favorable to Trump’s ‘brand’. For examples of Trump doing this, see here, here, here, here, here, here, and here.
Yes, the same Donald Trump who claims that every unfavorable news report is fake “news” has tried repeatedly to create fake news.
A national organization should host an online registry where millions of Americans, and millions in other countries, could declare that Trump is persona non grata to them, too.
The hosting organization should not be one like CREDO Action nor MoveOn nor the ACLU, whose positions on other issues are divisive enough to repel many of those who would otherwise sign against Trump.
The Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) would be an ideal hosting organization. (The SPLC’s scope is much wider than its name indicates: it monitors and educates against bigotry and injustice against every ethnic group.) So would any major environmental organization.
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Streep Versus Creep
January 16, 2017 at 6:48 pm | Posted in Conceited, Disinformation, Enemies of Freedom, Enemies of Planet Earth, Fairness, Presidential election | Leave a commentTags: Ann Hornaday, Dana Milbank, Donald Trump, Elahe Izadi and Amy B Wang, Emily Heil, Eugene Robinson, Glenn Kessler, Hank Stuever, Helena Andrews-Dyer, John Howard, Kathleen Parker, Margaret Sullivan, Meryl Streep, Serge Kovaleski, The Trump Regime, Vera Coking
Meryl Streep, 16 February 2016, usbotschaftberlin, https://www.flickr.com/photos/usbotschaftberlin/24452956954/
During the recent Golden Globes ceremony, Meryl Streep described how revolted she had been by Donald Trump’s bullying parody, at a campaign event on November 24, 2015, of Serge Kovaleski, an excellent reporter for the New York Times, who happens to be disabled. An astounding video containing both Trump’s jeering, and Streep’s comment on that jeering, is viewable at the beginning of the online version of Ann Hornaday’s article in the Washington Post about the Golden Globes event. An excellent article by Elahe Izadi and Amy B Wang also contains the video, along with the complete transcript of Meryl Streep’s remarks.
Trump, being Trump, responded by lying, in a tweet, that he hadn’t been jeering at Kovalevski. The video shows clearly that he had been jeering, in exactly the manner of a schoolyard bully. An eye-opening analysis by Glenn Kessler gives the background to Trump’s jeering, and to Trump’s multiple lies about it.
Hornaday notes that Trump’s jeering was “to distract his audience from the fact that Kovaleski caught him in another lie, about Muslim Americans celebrating on Sept. 11, 2001” Glenn Kessler’s article provides abundant evidence confirming Hornaday’s statement. Jeering to distract attention away from Trump’s own lies is a standard Trump tactic.
Hornaday notes that Trump’s tweet also called Steep “an “overrated” actress and “a Hillary flunky””. As was just mentioned, a standard Trump tactic is to smear anyone who points out any of his errors. Another standard Trump tactic is to claim that his critic is an unpopular has-been.
A tweet by a twit,
Who is full of it.
That is, who is full of himself!
Trump’s tweets and his public statements are his way of flailing about against critics, and against inconvenient truths (to use Al Gore’s indispensible phrase).
When Trump senses a threat, verbally he writhes frantically, like a startled snake.
American pipe snake = false coral snake (Anilius scytale). Photographed 12 December 2007 by DuSantos.
Trump flails about because he cannot use logic. He cannot use facts. He has never cared about either logic or facts, so he never learned how to use them.
So Trump has left only bald unsupported assertions.
Trump finds unsupported assertions to be a congenial tool. After all, Trump has a history of pretending to be other people , sometimes “John Miller”, and sometimes “John Barron”. While pretending to be these other people, Trump says about Trump what Trump would like to have had other people say about him. That is a con-man’s tactic.
This is a variant of Trump’s tactic of claiming that un-named “other people say” or “many people say”. Trump ascribes to these invented people the inuendo that Trump wants to plant.
To be charitable about it, Trumps false statements are not always deliberate lies. Sometimes Trump makes an unfounded statement simply because he cannot distinguish how the world is from how he thinks the world ought to be. At any moment, Trump’s idea of how the world ought to be is the same as whatever would have best served Trump’s current purpose. This is a natural confusion for anyone who thinks that the Universe revolves around him. A prime example of this facet of Trump’s fun-house mirror is his habit of asserting that each source that points out his flaws is “failing” or “overated”.
Trump likes to pin disparaging labels on other people to ‘re-frame the discussion’. Sometimes this is simply a smear tactic. At other times, as with Trump’s jeering at Kovalevski, it is a tactic for drawing attention away from a fact or a question that is unfavorable to Trump.
‘Lyin Ted’, ‘Lyin Hillary’ – you get the idea. The smears are rarely founded on fact.
Margaret Sullivan has recently written an incisive overview of Trump’s approach to using lies as a tool.
Since Trump’s labels and tweets are designed to re-direct the conversation, ‘most convenient for Trump’ usually means that Trump’s smears ascribe to Trump’s critics Trump’s own unsavory traits.
A recent example of a different aspect of Trump’s lies is his claim that before his inauguration, Washington DC had run out of inauguration gowns. Trump’s claim was quickly refuted . But Trump didn’t care: he relies on the fact that his original bombastic claim will stick in the mind better than will its later disproof.
When Trump was told about the Putin-authorized spying on him – and the resulting cyber-theft of Trump’s personal and financial data – Trump’s immediate reaction was to deny that it had happenened.
The most charitable way to describe Trump’s tweets and public statements:
Trump gives himself a colonoscopy, and reports what he sees.
Schematic overview of colonoscopy procedure
Trump will be the first President in US history to constitute a major security risk.
This is important, so lets consider it further.
Trump finds Putin’s authoritarianism more congenial than the checks and balances of a free society.
Trump doesn’t understand the value of a free society, so he never bothered to understand what is required to sustain a free society.
So Trump does not accept America’s founding ideas.
Trump does not even know what America’s founders sought to accomplish.
Trump mistakenly takes ‘Amass wealth! WIN! WIN!’ to be America’s defining goal.
So Trump does not even know what he should be defending.
That is just part of why he is a security risk.
Trump will be the first President whose loyalty to the United States is questionable.
Trump seems to be more loyal to Putin than to the US. Trump certainly believes Putin more readily than he believes the CIA and the FBI. Trump accepts Putin’s statements immediately, without any scepticism. At first Trump unconditionally rejected the CIA’s and the FBI’s findings – despite the evidence for them. Then he grudgingly accepted some aspects of those findings, again without having any non-subjective basis for rejecting the finding that Putin’s scheme had helped Trump. As Kathleen Parker (a Republican) asks in a valuable op-ed, “Well, didn’t it? Didn’t Trump loudly call upon Russia to hack Clinton’s emails?” Two valuable op-eds (here and here) by Dana Milbank discuss the bias of Trump and his circle toward Putin.
The only possible conclusion: Trump is more loyal to Trump than to the US.
Trump has no self-control. His fragile self-esteme gives him a thin skin.
When opposed or disparaged he thrashes about defensively.
He deludedly thinks that his gut reactions are better than learning the facts, and are much better than thinking before reacting.
Those are the many other reasons why Trump is a security risk.
Imagine that your job was to vet applicants for security clearances, and to either approve or disapprove their applications.
Would you approve this unstable, flailing Trump?
I wouldn’t.
Trump poses a dilemma for those loyal Americans who are tasked to divulge sensitive information to this flailing buffoon who lacks all self-control.
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Now consider Trump’s slogan, ‘Make America Great Again’.
Leave aside the fact that both Trump and his followers often twist the slogan into ‘Make America Grate Again’.
Leave aside also that a notable segment of Trump’s followers interpret the slogan as ‘Make America Hate Again’.
Consider instead why America was great in the 1950s and early 1960s, at least for some of its citizens.
At that time, many formerly economically and poltically important countries were still reeling from the physical devastation that had occurred on their soil during the Second World War. Their economies had been destroyed. Their infrastructure had been destroyed. Some countries even had to reconstruct their political structures.
For example, rationing continued in England for many years after the end of the Second World War.
None of those handicaps existed in the US, Canada, Australia and New Zealand. Of those four countries, the US had – by far – the largest economy and the largest manufacturing capability.
Our manufacturing and transportation infrastructure had swelled during the war, and our political structure was intact. We were able to supply what the ravaged countries needed to buy.
Few other countries could compete with us in that respect. Many of the other unravaged countries were still colonies, or were economically very undeveloped for other reasons.
In those days, manufacturing required many laborers. Automation was limited. Filling orders, monitoring inventory, keeping records, sending written or oral messages all required human hands. That meant a huge demand for human labor.
Labor couldn’t cross borders easily. Shipping was slow or expensive, and was itself labor-intensive. So the demand for labor was futher concentrated in the few favored locations.
That concentration of advantages will not happen again.
Trump will not be able to produce the job landscape that he promises.
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There is much discussion these days as to whether respecting the office of the President entails respecting Trump.
Respecting an office means respecting its intended role – its potential contribution to society.
Respecting an office does not entail respecting any particular occupant of that office. Whether a particular occupant earns respect depends upon the occupant’s principles, virtues and weaknesses.
It is impossible to repect the upcoming occupant of the Presidency.
Trump is both creepy, and a creep.
Creepy? Witness Trump’s remarks to Billy Bush. I’ve never encountered a man whose locker-room conversation was as despicable as Trump’s. Trump needs Tic Tacs for the brain.
A creep? Witness Trump’s attempt to boot Vera Coking, an elderly widow in Atlantic City who merely wanted to live the rest of her days in her own home, with its treasured memories. Trump wanted the spot to make more parking for his casino.
Proto-President Creepy Creep,
Sneers at the humaneness of Meryl Streep.
A poseur at charity, secretly selfish and cheap.
Weak self-esteem, hidden by boasts in a heap.
Hidden also by smears that convince only sheep*.
Deceitful disgusting defective Donny The Creep.
A twisted brain, and a heart of ice.
Defective Donny just isn’t nice.
Sad!
Mad!
Bad!
* No insult is intended to bovine sheep, only to human sheep.
On January 20, 2017, President-elect Creepy Creep will become President Creepy Creep.
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