EHT BIZARRO World of Trump in America (& a bit on China & Russia too)

Heads up, this is not short… TL;DR   and is meant to be read in chunks (for those wish to read some throttled and seriously restrained comments on the, alleged, deranged and imbecilic president of America)…

(Yes, the title – ‘THE‘ is reversed…)

Part I  A Strange America

So. What is happening to America and to democracy around the world? What happened to leadership that is democratic (not talking about the democratic party here)?  What happened to civility between individuals of American? What happened to respect and equality?

It should be pretty darn clear there is one clearly obvious nexus point for a great deal of this. All you need to do is look at who is sitting, undeservedly, in the White House… And many of us can guarantee that if the Electoral College had to do it again, they would not vote this person into the White House again (especially when the American people decidedly voted for someone else other than Trump – I believe it was Hillary Clinton, right…).

 

We live in Bizarro land. Yes, that is correct, we live in a world where the opposite of everything is taking place. If you have been choking on your own bile, every morning, ever since the 2016 Presidential election, there is a good reason for it – the ‘MOST’ wrong person is sitting in the White House.

As a result of who is sitting in the White House, here is a short list of what has been making you choke and gag, every day (likely all day):

• Illegal insider trading taking place on the White House grounds (corruption, right?) – and no concern from the president…
• We have an American ambassador Pete Hoekstra (Trump’s choice), to the Netherlands disputing his own words (this bullet is about a lack of integrity and honor). Hoekstra had stated in a 2015 conference on terrorism hosted by the right-wing David Horowitz Freedom Center – “The Islamic movement has now gotten to a point where they have put Europe into chaos. Chaos in the Netherlands, there are cars being burnt, there are politicians that are being burnt … and yes there are no-go zones in the Netherlands.” But in a later interview (Dec 2017) with the Dutch current affairs programme Nieuwsuur, Hoekstra stated that content was fake news – even though Nieuwsuur happily rolled the clip from the 2015 interview on air for Hoekstra. And no concern from the president as to how this looks for America, its people and its leaders…
• Firing of Inspector Generals for no valid reason, other than they were doing their jobs to stop/prevent illegalities, fraud and other behind the scenes shenanigans – it seems, allegedly, this president has no regard for law and order and the watchdogs looking to remove current and potential corruption and illegalities…
• Members of Congress and the Senate who, before this current president was voted in by the Electoral College, called the president to be by various monikers and endlessly mocked the large bodied and clownish person. But ever since this person got into the White House, these same Congressmen and Senators are kowtowing to this president, licking his boots (not literally BUT BLOODY WELL CLOSE) and allowing corruption of the law to take place (such as the emoluments clause where many believe this president is guilty of)
• This current inhabitant of the White House relentlessly lambasted Obama for going golfing but look at what is taking place. This occupant of 1600 is going golfing at something like 22% of his time in office (he has reportedly been on the grounds of his golf courses or played golf elsewhere 266 times since becoming President, and that’s as of May 24, 2020), at tax payer expense and at his own country clubs (NOTE: there was no legal divestiture for his business investments/control) – remember how he famously stated in 2016 “I’m not going to have time to go play golf.”
• Installing a new State Department secretary gutting the State Dept of most of the seasoned, experience, knowledgeable and respected bureaucrats – then not filling many of those positions. Do you remember that individual, that new secretary was Rex Tillerson… the oil CEO? Tillerson’s focus was not on diplomacy…
• The current White House occupant plays down, disregards or ignores calamities that have struck America – remember him throwing toilet paper to people who needed it (in Puerto Rico after Hurricane Maria) and he believed it to be some sort of game.
• What about ensconcing his unqualified children into very senior White House roles – what did they bring to the White House – or rather, what have they achieved that is worthy of talking about (no, not getting licenses in China to sell products) – many labeled these moves as nepotism but were unable to gain any traction on the violation of nepotism laws (we will need a future unbiased federal court to rule on this but that will be a long time out)
• Can we talk about the 2018 elimination of the NSC directorate for global health and security and bio-defense that would have handled the CoViD-19 problem in 2020 with speed and efficiency (it was eliminated, allegedly, because it was an Obama creation)
• Sheesh, this could continue on for page after page but you get the idea – we really hope so.

 

We, America, have someone who is supposed to be a world leader, sitting in the White House. Yet, instead of being that leader this individual has instead usurped: leadership, decency, democracy, a global role model status for anyone who wants to grow and be respected and become a leader themselves. (Note: the United States is not used in this paper because we are not a united country – we are more divided than ever before.)

We have people who want to flaunt the old 2^nd Amendment, the right to bear arms. The 2^nd amendment was completely relevant for the militia at the time when the British were prevented from taking over the American colonies in the 1700’s.

Yet today, we have many contemporary individuals today who have gun stashes of upwards of 20, 30 and 50 different weapons (with thousands of rounds) and these folks are not weapons’ collectors. As a former Marine, I actually like weapons as well but I have no need to collect weapons for fear of an invasion. Although, in case our government ever turns dictatorial, arms collection here will become a different endeavor…

But. Who is going to invade America?

• Has Russian been building up a secret army just off the coast of our country, but are so well camouflaged that we cannot locate or detect them?
• Maybe it is the Chinese with their Communistic world view?
• Or even worse, is it the poor hungry desperate immigrants without legal documentation invading America with their unseen deadly weapons?

Today, in 2020, we have a military, along with the National Guard. Neither of these entities were present back in the days of yore.

Do not get me wrong, as a former Marine, if this region I live in allowed weapons, I would buy a few as well – just not 20 – 50 of them or go storming some local state capital flaunting the weapons…

 

Part II             Logic, Strategy and Diplomacy

If decent, logical, serious individuals “STILL” have to continue to convince the American public of the wrong doings or ill-conceived ideas and just bad thought processes of the current president and it is not sinking in – something is wrong with a large percentage of Americans.

We have a president who is, allegedly, illiterate, indecent, corrupt, discriminatory (okay – racist) and who’s IQ, also allegedly, is not in a very decent range of intelligence. Besides lacking leadership skills, this individual also severely lacks any real degree of communication and diplomacy skill sets. If he did, America would not be seen in the light it is across the globe.

This individual cannot string together a sentence that makes any sense.  Well, hang on a moment. It may make sense if ‘you’ went to the same high school and college with this person and ‘you’ had the same classes with this person. We have no idea how well this individual did in school at any point.

So, you did not do so great in high school or college or grad school (wait, this person did not go beyond undergrad status) – so what? Grades reflect what one learns up to that point, with or without good teachers or a good educational system. What matters is if you continue to grow and do better after not doing so well at any level. What matters is if you continue to be better in your life.

Forbes magazine put out a story, as well as others, in Feb 28, 2019 where:

• Michael Cohen testified to Congress that, under directions from Trump, he sent letters to Trump’s high schools, colleges and the College Board (creator of the SAT),threatening them with legal action and jail time if they ever released Trump’s academic records. Cohen provided a record of one such letter sent to the president of Fordham University, which Trump attended for two years before transferring to complete his undergraduate degree at the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania. Trump’s high school has confirmed receiving an identical letter, while the University of Pennsylvania and the College Board declined to comment.

What is wrong is wrong…  That is not hard to see or to fathom.  If someone who is supposed to be a role model states: “Grab ’em by the pussy. You can do anything.” – that is not someone you are supposed to look up to or follow.  That is, unless you yourself are amongst the callous, gross, indecent minded imbecilic Cretin of the gutters. There is supposed to be something called, respect for others, no matter who they are. Wait a moment – there’s more. There is also:

• decency,
• equality,
• honesty,
• compassion,
• empathy,
• integrity,
• ethics and
  
• non-discrimination and
• diversity

Where has all of the above disappeared to from this current administration. It is as if the mass majority of individuals the current president selects and installs into a senior office turns out to be a dishonest, greedy, corrupt individual.

• Who in their right mind, in the top role position of the EPA builds a SCIF (a secure office) in their own office, when there is already an existing one, one floor away? Or has him/her chauffeured around in an armored vehicle when the position does not rate such a vehicle. Scott Pruitt wanted a ‘secure’ ‘sound-proof’ phone booth… That position does not require that kind of security.
• What about taking private jet rides around the country, at tax payer expense…
• What about going shopping on a federal jet, at tax payer expense (this was, allegedly, Mnuchin and his wife back in 2017 – recall Louise Linton’s extravagant and glorious exit and pose from the plane with the bags of purchased goods).
• There is so much more that could go here as well and if you did not live and breathe solely in a filter bubble, then you will know that there is more. But if you isolated yourself to a safe zone of like-minded individuals, none of whom dared to grow and venture forth to look at other possibilities, at other avenues – then it is likely you only know one silo or one tunnel vision cone of information. What you believe may be completely wrong. But due to being in that filter bubble, it is difficult to convince you to expand and do better.

 

Part III           The World

What happened to America’s global role of leadership and statesmanship? Again, a certain specific individual is what happened. America has become a laughing stock of and to the world. Our allies are alienated because of this individual. Our leadership on the world stage has eroded horridly to lower levels. It is only through the guts and leadership of certain state governors and mayors and some business leaders and numerous American citizens doing all they can to keep our head and chin up in the world.

As we can see, there are numerous leaders in other countries who want to emulate Trump and the fake news hoopla. And they have been as well as gaining incredible autocratic and dictatorial powers where the citizens of those countries (Philippines, China, Russia, Hungary, Brazil, etc.) are simply screwed and cannot seem to get out of the rut they find themselves in because those leaders have the military to back up any areas that the dictators/autocrats desire.

 

Look at China

There is no freedom of speech, no freedom of choice there. China forcibly removes freedom at every avenue it can, in order to “preserve the safety of people within its borders and preventing threats to a stable society” in their country from other sources.  This is a complete sham and the Chinese citizens are not all aware of it – because of the Chinese leadership’s control of all media and avenues of travel.

You also have to take into consideration that the Chinese leader made himself, ahh, sorry, the Chinese National People’s Congress voted that there be no term limits on the current leader of China. How nice is that – Dictator for Life, sorry – what was meant was, President for life of a country with 1.3+ billion people. This outcome was determined as follows: Two delegates voted against the change and three abstained, out of 2,964 votes. Nice, eh…? Almost a clean sweep.

Remember the Hong Kong citizenry acting to retain its freedom in late 2019 and the Houston Rockets manager Daryl Morey tweeted an image that read “Fight for Freedom. Stand with Hong Kong.” (By the by – EVERYONE should stand with Hong Kong as they lose their right to total freedom; loss of a free press, free speech, free movement, facial recognition surveillance {even more than what we have in America} and become a more communistic country – for those that choose to stay in Hong Kong – many will find some way out of that island country over the next several years – an exodus.) Before he deleted due to comments and stress from various avenues of contention. But – NBA Commissioner Adam Silver finally came around and supports Morey’s right to free speech. Of course, in return, China was appalled and had the gall to come back with:

• The Chinese-run television network said it was “strongly dissatisfied” with Silver’s remarks.
• “We oppose Silver’s claim to support Morey’s right of free expression. We believe that any speech that challenges national sovereignty and social stability is not within the scope of freedom of speech,” CCTV said in its statement in Chinese, which was translated by CNBC.

In reality, how in the heck can China, a Communistic society (but they really want to be Capitalistic, don’t they…) DARE to say that free expression that challenges ‘anything’ is not within the scope of freedom of speech???!!!!  Not when the Chinese government does not allow its own citizenry to any of it. China controls the media. China controls the countries internet access and continues to tweak their ‘Chinese Firewall’ in order to censor everything that travels over the air or via cables.

• People are not allowed to talk about leaders in a bad light, as other countries do.
• Any word that the Chinese government deems to worthy of censorship is blocked from the internet and not allowed on any media. Here is a fairly good article on “68 Things You Cannot Say on China’s Internet” https://www.nytimes.com/2017/09/24/world/asia/china-internet-censorship.html or this other article “In China, you can’t say these words” https://share.america.gov/in-china-you-cant-say-these-words/
• Take the Uighur (or Uyghur) situation in the XinJiang region. The Chinese government deems them to be dangerous and has razed many of the Uighur towns to the ground and put the people who once lived there, into camps (imagine something, kind of like a concentration camp – just not as horrific). Yet the Chinese calls them re-education camps where the Uighurs are required to shave their beards, removing that identity aspect. All movement is controlled by surveillance cameras (everywhere in Uighur inhabited areas, not just the camps) and identities. Uighurs are not even allowed to have certain tools because they could be construed as weapons. The Chinese have even gone so far as to engrave certain cutting tools with the owner’s identities on the tool AND then are required to check it out and return it like a library book (complete control of those tools) – controlled by the police.
• People of China face public shaming for spitting in the streets (it can be caught on camera and put up on a large billboard – live video) – but wait, it does not end there. The citizens can be assessed points in the Chinese “Social Point System”, which started in 2014. It is about regulating individual and group behavior for activities such as: bad driving, smoking in non-smoking areas, not paying bills on time, spending too much on video games. Now, if you acquire too many points, you can be: banned from flying or catching a train; banned from luxury options (like 1^st class seats); throttling internet speeds; being banned from the best schools (including your children). Think about that kind of restriction in the western world.
• China wants to own the SCS (South China Seas) instead of sharing, stating that territorial waters belongs to China and not shared amongst, the Philippines, Taiwan, Malaysia, Indonesia, South Korea, and says, basically that
  • there is no ‘freedom of navigation’ in that area to foreign military/navies
  • and going as far as building man-made islands and militarizing them to support the Chinese claim, even though the Hague is on the side of the Philippines as to the waterways is not owned by China

So, for a leader of one country to put their Big Brother restrictions on citizens of another country and expect other nations to kowtow “their own” draconian methods of “lack of freedom of speech” or “lack of freedom of action” – what does that does mean, hmmm…? 

How can the leader of a country with all these restrictions say they have a stable society when the society is controlled by the government and military?

The people:

• do not have any true freedom
• cannot congregate
• cannot vote bad leaders out either (so it seems)

What do you believe, does China have a ‘stable society’ or that free speech threatens another country’s national sovereignty?

            Chinese citizens will never see this paper within the borders of China because of the content of this paper.

 

Russian president – Putin. What can you make of this other president for life? He basically owns Russia and the people are somewhat locked into a state of hopelessness and are unable to do anything. It is somewhat hard to figure out how the people just do not create a national up-rising force Putin out, so we will not see that happen.

But how does a country’s President become a billionaire? It has been reported by several sources, one of which is the CIA that Putin has anywhere from $70 – $200 billion stashed away – yes, BILLION. Reportedly, he is at the $22 Billion mark. How does that happen, legally?

And do not get your hopes up to run against Putin because competition against him appear to have bad josh, bad luck. They die. They get poisoned. They gain criminal charges and if you have criminal charges in Russia, you cannot run for top offices, so they say. And let’s not forget the military and the underworld henchmen who just might, out of their love for Putin (yeah, right) take out the competition and it then becomes complete deniability for Putin and his party.

 

There is just so much more to be said about Putin, Xi, Maduro (Venezuela), János Áder (Hungary), Duterte (Philippines) and even more about Trump.

But where do we go from here? How do we do it? Well, education is one of the first steps – educating everyone and allowing everyone to vote is a second step. Ensuring EQUALITY is flat out the foundation and cornerstone of EVERYTHING from henceforth!  We all have to do better, not just in America but around the globe.

At the same time, we have to prevent other countries from interfering our countries elections. We have to prevent fake news from gaining ground (yes, the real fake news where there is no basis in reality and not ‘alternate facts’ as Kellyanne Conway stated it), while at the same time barring harmful and dangerous conspiracy individuals/groups.

 

All we can do is – TRY.

Be better than others and lift them up in turn. Stop stepping on the backs of others just so you can put your face in the spotlight. Just do the right thing. Most of all, it takes courage – courage to stand up and be counted and help make everyone accountable. Take U, she is a child and look at what she has accomplished and it was not out of wanting to be in the spotlight, it was due to making people aware that the world has to change regarding climate change.

But, individuals like the one in the White House, he has no courage whatsoever. He does not stand up for inequality. He does not stand up with empathy for those going through disastrous changes in their lives. He for sure does not have the courage to stand up and face America’s lack of true justice.

The American president does even have the backbone and courage to stand up and fight, internationally and collaboratively on CoViD-19 instead of finger-pointing. What individual in their right mind cuts out the World Health Organization and throttles the CDC…?

And not least, where is the courage to stand up against Police injustice in America, specifically against Brown, Yellow and Black people of this country…

But he does have an affinity, allegedly, for reneging on promises, greed and alleged corruption (*Ask the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York back back in 1979-1980 about Trump’s promise to give them the Bonwit Teller’s sculpture.)

We have to ensure respect, diversity, non-discrimination and equality are the bedrock of this country – maybe then we will actually be a United States.

 

*Bonwit Teller and the Metropolitan Museum of Art

Bonwit Teller closed its flagship store in 1979 and sold the property for $15 million to a Long Island real estate developer. Despite his plans to demolish the old Bonwit Teller building, the buyer promised to preserve the Deco grillwork and bas reliefs at the request of the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

The buyer was none other than Donald Trump. In 1980, Trump demolished Warren & Westmore’s elegant Art Deco emporium to make way for his $100 million Trump Tower. In what became a sadly typical turn of events, Trump cut corners everywhere he could and bullied those who stood in his way. To pour the foundations, Trump enlisted S&A Concrete, a known mob front for Paul Castellano and “Fat Tony” Salerno. He paid 200 illegal Polish immigrants as little as $4 an hour to work 12-hour days, 7 days a week. The so-called “Polish Brigade” worked without benefits, hard hats, and sometimes even homes – during the 1980 transit strike, many were forced to sleep at the construction site. Then there were the lawsuits. He sued the city for a tax abatement on the property. He sued one contractor for “total incompetence” and threatened to sue a labor lawyer for $100 million.

The reasoning:

John Baron, a spokesman for the Trump Organization—who, the New York Daily News discovered, turned out to be Donald Trump himself in disguise—told the Times that “the merit of these stones was not great enough to justify the effort to save them.” He said it would have cost $32,000 to remove the sculptures and cited appraisals by three independent appraisers that found them to be “without artistic merit” and worth less than $9,000. Their removal, he said, would also have delayed demolition work by at least a week and a half. (Trump, as himself, later estimated the cost of preserving the panels at $500,000.)

 

Trump = NYET!!!

For those who do not know, “Nyet” means ‘No’ in Russian.

The current president in the White House, well, not an individual a fairly large number of us would ever want to protect or give our lives for or share a fox-hole with. However, in doffing our hats to the Secret Service, in protecting the position for whichever person is serving as president – YOU DO AN OUTSTANDING JOB!!!

Now, getting back to the current American president and NYET.

• N = Not a role model any person alive on the planet would want to emulate. Who in a sane state of mind would willingly emulate a known pathological liar (there are many documented incidents out there and the reason why he is desperately striving to hide his tax and all financial records from ‘anyone’ ever seeing those documents).
• N = Narcissistic – [Okay, okay, okay… I snuck in a second ‘N’ but saying N^2YET or double N,YET does not translate well….] Need we say more – this is beyond the pale in the lengths this individual goes to, to say “Hey, look at me, I am the best there has ever been. We had the largest turnout ever for when I was sworn in. I have had more progress in the first year, no, the first six months of being in office. Everyone loves me, it does not matter that they are all dictators and authoritarian leaders who suppress their own people – why, those leaders control the voters, sorry, the votes by means of controlling the media and military and law enforcement. Those leaders are doing a wonderful job in their countries.” — In the meantime, in as many countries as possible, humanity is trying our best to remove all dictators and authoritarian leaders from office and move to a democratic process – and yes, it includes, China, Russia, Turkey, Iran, Rwanda, Chile, Brunei, Venezuela and more (do not forget N. Korea).
  
• Y = Yearning to be even more Narcissistic, to be the one in the spot light even if it means shoving a Prime Minister out of the way in a highly public venue (recall when our president did that to the Prime Minister of Montenegro back in May 2017 at that NATO meeting….?).
• E = Ethics – well, there ‘APPEARS‘ to be no ethics at all where it concerns this American president. All that ‘SEEMS‘ to matter to this person is whether he can line his pocket with more profits (allegedly of course) or not and how he can put in place more yes men/women who will kowtow to him regardless of what the subject matter is. It could be putting in place people who knowingly vote in favor of this president – without any foresight on their part as to the amount of damage, harm and financial cost will take place as a result of their caving in… Wait, it is also possible these individuals may not care about the future results and only want the instant gratification they gain right now – as willing sycophants…
• T = Transparency – Can anyone in America explicitly and without qualifiers say that this current president is transparent in all matters? In any matter? We have a president who seems to solely embrace obfuscation (i.e. excessive lying), opaqueness, deceit and ever constant misdirection (in our intelligence world, it would be considered a successful misinformation campaign…). 

What is it going to take for Americans to come to their senses and see through whatever facade this president seems to have thrown up to bedazzle (blind) people to his many negative faults.

This of course is aimed at the many people who blindly follow this president without thinking through the logic. Are these people following the president:

• through so much delusion because they cannot use logic and think about the strategic benefits of doing certain activities?
• because these followers want to return to the 1960s and back, where people of a certain ethnicity (we have faith that you can figure out what is being discussed in this bullet) and primarily male had control of everything and suppressed people of color and women and gay folks? Do these followers really want to return darker days of suppression and repression; forcing women into back alley abortions; causing disenfranchised minorities turn to violent means to get the right to vote and be put on the same playing field as others?
• because the filter bubbles they seem to have been ensnared in is so reinforcing due to its brainwashing effects – that they can no longer see the abundant truth that is out there and easily found (ask the anti-vaxxers who slowly discovered that the anti-vaxxer world is full of deceit and lies)?
• willing to forego civility and return to barbaric methods to force out people of color and immigrants from America? Originally, this land belonged to people of color (Native Americans and Mexicans) – the land was taken away from its rightful owners by force and forced those people at that time into subjugation as well as bringing over slaves to build “their empire” – please remember that

This country has spent a significant amount of money in slashing successfully working regulations and practices and reverting to older, harmful and damaging practices. We now allow the:

• oil industry to oversee their own safety program in the ocean drilling zones (think back to the massive oil leak from the ocean floor when the safety valve failed on that drilling rig).
• energy companies to dump toxic waste into rivers – if you believe this is incorrect, go check out the ‘current’ practices Duke Energy of N. Carolina is able to do now (and keep potash dumps in mind when you do your own research…).
• Dept of Education to implement programs that are geared towards private schools and vouchers – INSTEAD of focusing on ‘PUBLIC education‘ and improving it to where it should be, ACROSS the board, in all communities, in order to match other countries with better educational programs and successes.

And you know what else that is even scarier?

It is going to take America decades to recover from the wasted efforts and revenue lost in the 2016 – 2020 time frame. From:

• tracking down and proving all the illegal activities (by this individual and those that this person put in place around him) prior to getting into the White House and since getting there,
• bad social and economic programs,
• poor diplomatic relationships with other countries – explicitly our long time allies to poor economic associations with our N. American neighbors and other prospering and suffering countries around the globe.

Think about it, health care, financial reform (in the public / private sectors as well as in politics), economic growth.

And let’s not forget the amount of incivility introduced into the world of politics and public discourse as of 2016 when this president brought gutter level conversation, interaction and thinking with him to the world stage. What sane, forward thinking leader would ever utter the words “I could stand in the middle of 5th Avenue and shoot someone and not lose votes“? The worse of the worse came out of the wood works across America with other bad world leaders uttering the same garbage.

It is going to take us a long time to start bringing civility, where more people care about each other instead of reverting to denying them rights and space. It will take time for growth, for all, to take off again in America.

Do we have time…?  Look at the current lack of progress and thinking on Climate Change in America…. that should be the canary in the coal mine as to the path this country is on… We have a leader that has no path forward with regards to; diplomacy, military superiority in the in the name of peace and not fear, economic prosperity for all and a strategy as to how America and the world can grow – together.

 

Oh! And yes, this is the person that others refer to as the “Orange Man” and other ignominious titles/handles…

Hmmmm, a “possible” Chinese spy caught at Mar-a-lago – really?

So, does this not sound like a diversion tactic to anyone else? Anyone? Anyone….

What spy, with the deep pockets of a nation-state who can afford to have and use highly sophisticated spy craft and all the tools that go along with that – why would one make such a loud ruckus while carting around clumsy tools?

Did anyone notice the other real spy, the quiet one that was able to slip in and out with the better tools while the loud and clumsy “possible” spy was apprehended? Anyone?  Anyone… 

Now, with some hesitation on my part, there may not have been another one (spy, saboteur, whatever…) – that day…

It is just that, the various hats I’ve worn have been making me cringe inside.

My strategic brain is screaming, really, no one is making comments about this being a diversion?

My national security intelligence brain is screaming, come on, why not use an old tried and true ruse to get the better ‘spy’ inside with. i.e.: micro-recording devices, using microwave burst technology – designed to destroy itself after a certain amount of time. And other high tech tools such as bug size recording (audio & visual) devices (not roach size but fly or flea size) at their disposal.

My cyber security brain is screaming – really, bringing in malware on a USB drive (I believe that is what it was if I’m not mistaken). As if this woman was going to get close to a computing device to plug it in – but then again, it is Mar-a-lago, where many people with money and their flock come and go.

So, if there was a spy infiltrating that resort, how do you sweep it? How much manpower do you allocate to sweep? When do you sweep it? Do you allow the president, who with a small brain overrules everyone around who would know better, to continue going to the resort?

Then there are other questions, such as, who else had legitimate access to the resort and turned by greed to perform nefarious deeds. What about individuals who for various reasons were coopted (blackmailed/threatened) to do black deeds at the resort.

There are many, many, many things wrong with this picture and we have an individual sitting in 1600 Pennsylvania Ave who seems to be oblivious to real world activities, needs and demands.

A real spy could have easily gotten access, what is a $250,000 membership to a nation-state actor with deep pockets, over the past couple of years. Hey, the president who did not give up his investments and businesses as he should have, did tell the world, his resort is open for membership and business is booming…

What do we do as a nation for security when the top individual invites the world in the front door.  It is like watching a Vampiric horror movie where the unwitting home owner tells the vampire, sure, come on in for a drink….

A Successful Manchurian Candidate…? Maybe, Just Maybe…

Well, here we are in 2019 and we still have this current individual in the White House, our American President.

Even though it has been penned multiple times since 2016, some of us believe we have, or rather Putin has, a successful Manchurian candidate – in the White House…

Can we prove it? No, not now. Maybe never but with everything taking place – is it so very difficult to ‘not’ consider that possibility that Trump is one?

With all of the:

• Vitriol spewing forth across America as a result of who occupies the White House;
  
• Corruption erupting out of very specific outlets (Manafort, Flynn, possibly Jared Kushner and Donald Trump little one, Zinke, Pruitt, etc.) – all close to the President;
• Closed door meetings between our American President and other world leaders (i.e. let me kill off this measure and you can do that effort – think of the now highlighted  illegal back door deal of Flynn and the almost nuclear sale to the Saudis – that whistle blowers thankfully brought into the open);
• Rolling back of critical regulations that were created to help everyone, not just elitist individuals;
• Anger against immigrants, specifically coming from one individual in the White House – yet, somehow, he was able to gain an EB-1 “Genius Visa” or “Einstein Visa” for his wife to live in America (and through her, to emigrate her parents here);
• Individuals gaining VERY high level security clearances that NO ONE else would ever successfully obtain with a significant amount of errors and omitted facts (i.e. Jared Kushner); and
• Disillusionment emanating publicly from other world leaders due to our American ‘Leader’

Why would one not consider the Manchurian candidate possibility…?

We were supposed to be continuing to grow, getting away from fossil fuel and the negative aspects (i.e. health) it engenders, coming together as a people, yet, now we have multiple cases of individuals coming out of the woodwork to cause pain and death (i.e. Comet Pizza in DC, a die hard conservative living out of his Trump plastered van and now a Coast Guardsman plotting to kill public figures in the political and media arena) because they want America to revert back to, what, an older period of time; a renewed sense of power they had ‘back then’…? This is not a time for this country to become ‘us’ versus ‘them’ – we are not supposed to be going in that direction. This is a time for “US”, to be going forward, together.

Is this maddening and chaotic divisiveness the intended result, that is, if we do have a Manchurian Candidate on our hands.  Or is it just good old fashioned corruption and greed for the “good ole boys” network… one where the previous American president was slammed for going golfing, yet for the current president – it is essential to take time off and go golfing, at his own country club, during his “executive time”….

   Time will tell.

Trump and his Reality Show Love Affairs with Dictators, errr, Leaders

NOTE: Remember, do your own due diligent research and deep critical thinking – think for yourself after hearing commentary from other sources who may or may not be qualified to provide you with the necessary and relevant material/analysis.

Hmmmm, still finding it very, VERY difficult to understand why the people who voted for our American president still want him as the president.

We have a problem in America. We have a president who seems to be on a roll with himself and other heads of states, the wrong kinds of heads of state.

• Trump: Hey, didja see me with Kim Jong Un?   Done. Check.
• Trump: Hey, didja see me with Putin in Helsinki? NAILED IT!!! Check.

So, what is next with Trump – maybe Erdogan?

• Trump: Hey didja see me with Turkey’s dictator, sorry, president (for life) – HEYYY, that is a magnificent mansion you live in… maybe I should have one like that too, paid for by my base (and even those unenlightened people who ‘did not’ vote for me…).

Then too, could Syria’s Assad be in Trump’s sight-line as well, maybe?

• Trump: Hey didja see me with Assad? He has quite the way of putting down civil disturbances. Why, he even has Putin on his side to help him out…

Trump appears to have no idea as to the magnitude of what he is doing to America; its economics, its educational system, its welfare system, its environment, its, well – I could go on but it is as if the people who need to wake up (Trump’s base and a fairly large number of politicians which is an even larger oddity in itself), they just do not get it. They still want Trump in office when the man should be removed as soon as possible.

It’s likely that Putin is laughing his butt off right now after his ‘summit’ with Trump. (It is also likely that Kim Jong Un is still laughing his little body hard as well, especially after Kim, ahem, theatrically blew up his nuclear reactor site. Many of us know that if the intent was to truly blow up that site, the explosive/kinetic force would have been exponentially much larger than, what was that – blowing up the entry way into the site. Folks, just go back and look at it again through the eyes of a diligent observer and equate the size of the blast with the area that was to be destroyed)

Trump, as it has been stated multiple times today, has basically dismissed the intelligence community’s assessment of Russia. And then had the audacity to say that “we’ve all been foolish about our relationship with Russia.” Has Trump not read ANYTHING over the past 2 decades about Putin and Russia???? One has to wonder if Trump even knows that Putin is a former career KGB officer…

What do we have to do is to get “MORE” people {somehow} to wake up and push a movement to impeach Trump before he causes even more damage to America and the global alliance of allies…

UPDATE: Trump came back and stated, 36 hours later that he ‘did’ agree with our American IC (intel community, of which I was a part of for a while). Interesting….

Trump Fallacy & Mueller’s Tasking = Uncover Alternative Facts, Collusion and Obstruction of Justice

Very sorry in advance. This paper started out as a brief half-pager but the more thinking put into this paper regarding Mueller’s investigation and Trump himself, ummm, errrr, the paper grew a bit… The two areas are too intertwined. This is not a ‘dog whistle’ but a thought paper, one for which it is hoped that those few people who do read even a small part of it will start their own expanded thought process and create a cascading effect within their circles (filter bubbles or not).

 

Well, whaddaya think…?  Here we are, still, at the crossroads of historical significance with the current American president. And no, we are not using the term United States, because we are not united – there is too much divisiveness in America, too much selfishness. Coming together only during disasters and shootings is not nearly enough to say the country is united. We have to think about everyone; from the rust belt, to the mid-west – in addition to the west and east coasts, from the farms to the cities, from the poor to the rich.

We are here with Trump and his merry gang of, ???, others?  Not sure what to make of these folks and really do not want to just parse out any puerile knee-jerk name-calling.

The ‘Trump Fallacy’. Yes, there it is, the Electoral College missed the boat on “believing” they were voting in who the American people wanted as the next American president. As many people who did their own research and thinking know, the Electoral College was wrong, many of the Electoral College members just voted too soon and did not wait for more vote counting. (Or, and these are only guesses here: a) they voted on Trump out of fear of some of the more rabid Trump supporters or b) a really wild guess here, some of the Electoral College voters were paid to vote for Trump {let’s hope this really was not the case}). The American people voted for the other presidential candidate by ~2.9 million more votes. Simply put, more Americans voted for Hillary Clinton than any other losing presidential candidate in American history… {Clinton’s votes = 65,844,954 / Trump’s votes = 62,979,879}

The Trump fallacy is that too many people believed Trump was their salvation. That Trump was going to restore a dying industry (coal) to its former black lung and asthma inducing glory. That Trump was going to make America the single greatest power on Earth. That Trump was going to put a chicken for every pot in America (do your research please, this is a Truman reference) while at the same time; putting in unqualified individuals in the nation’s highest offices, individuals who really had no business being placed in these positions. America was actually growing prior to Trump being selected by the Electoral College. As a result, Trump put in place individuals who wanted to take America backwards or did not know how to move America forward:

Ben Carson – HUD Secretary, installed because, as he stated, he used to live in the projects (so did this writer)

Betsy DeVos – Education Secretary, installed because she ran some Charter schools and since taking office, never visited some of the worse national school districts (ask Michigan if DeVos even contacted them) – DeVos wants to have more charter schools and leave the public schools to die off – that is the image we perceive. The problem, public schools are important and they need funding and improvements (too many teachers are buying their class supplies with their own small amount of money they earn)

Scott Pruitt – EPA, installed because he is a friend of the oil industry…? (what EPA secretary ever attempted to obtain a sound proof phone booth in their office, or bullet resistant office furniture and seats in bigger armored limousine…?) This individual also wants to continue making oil a dominate energy source when green energy (Wind, Solar, Ocean waves, etc.) is continually growing, even energy companies are buying up 10 – 20-year green energy contracts (but not making much noise about it).

Zinke – Interior, a person who claims to be a geologist but did not go the complete route a real geologist takes to gain that title of being a geologist (yes, he did take geology courses as an undergraduate but that is not all it takes)

Let’s just stop here, you get the picture. Right? RIGHT….??

But, as many people are now fully aware, not just across America, but across the planet – Trump never was qualified to sit in house of 1600 Pennsylvania Ave. Many people have known that since the 1990’s. Many of his base have been finding out the painful way over the past 17 months that the current president is not and never was qualified and is incapable of being qualified. Now, the remainder of his base, for whatever reason(s), they may never recognize that fact – but they may, after America goes through more harm, damage and ridicule over the next 12-24 months…

Just because someone has the loudest voice or biggest bull-horn, it does not mean that person has the right take or the best solution on anything. Listening to someone like that may just take you on a very bad bus ride… People have to learn to keep an open mind with the possibility that someone else’s opinion may be better or even right. People have to be better and learn to adapt to a changing global landscape by keeping an open mind and boosting their own intellect rather than relying on others to spoon fed what may be contrarian information (i.e. egregious or little lies).

What we appear to have in the American psyche now, more than ever, are a lot of individuals who for some reason have subconsciously (or consciously) given up their prerogative to do their own critical thinking. We have more people in America (and other countries for that matter), who seem to prefer to let other, less informed and ill-meaning people do the thinking for them.

Not really clear why so many Americans do not do their own critical thinking, AFTER they do their own research of course. So many Americans seem to relish listening to whisper campaigns, conspiracy minded talkers (many of which appear to not do their own due diligence prior to trotting out their various topics/dialogues) or flat-out liars. And to put an icing on the cake, these narrowly focused individuals spread the untruths on social media, in their own filter bubbles or other venues, therein causing a feeding frenzy using the bad information.

What happened to the thinking process of these people along the way of their life? What is wrong with dissent and conflict in a civil manner? People do not have to physically attack others who do not agree with them but some do. All you have to do is go to some colleges where speakers are attacked, by thrown objects and even physically. This harkens back to those Salem days of witch craft and hysteria arose – all because the person being accused of being a witch had a physical disorder or thought differently. It is as if the control mechanism in the brains of so many people is in a state of permanent shut down and they do not know how to turn it back on… Is America going backwards because free thought is being shut down.

— Hate speech or racial supremacy speech or bullying does not count as being healthy free speech.

The Trump fallacy has lowered the bar for ethical standards and personal integrity. Too many people around the American president are picking up the bad role model habits of this president. For example, early last year, January 2017, we had a woman go on live television and tell the American public about ‘Alternative Facts.’ By now, nearly everyone on the planet should know that alternative facts are just lies. For those that do not believe this, hint: an alternative to truth is a falsehood, or a lie. Many of us do not know of any other alternatives, so if you do know of something concrete to describe or define ‘alternative facts’, please let the rest of us in on that little-known tidbit.

Or worse still, we have public officials in congress and the senate who knowingly and unabashedly spread falsehoods because they believe it is something the president desires. And as a result, we have deepening political partisanship, worse than ever (no, not pointing a finger at just one party).

 

Now, getting to Mueller and his investigation of collusion (Russians), his team is outstandingly quiet on what they have to date. That is the way it is supposed to be. No lawyer or prosecutor in their right mind is going to give up valuable information in advance of the conclusion of their investigation or prior to the convening of a court case.

What many are not thinking of is the possibility that Mueller, in his role of special prosecutor, may have quite a bit of evidence at hand to make a significant blow to those who mistakenly believed that they could do what they want with the political system and the constitution. Think about ‘fixing by your neighborhood fixer’ and flat out ‘bribery’, basically, think about corruption. Mueller may have extraordinary data to prove Russian collusion with the Trump campaign. Mueller ‘may’ also have an abundance of data in regards to ‘obstruction of justice’. The obstruction of data ‘may’ be aimed at those surrounding Trump, now and in the past – all those folks who have spat out and are currently spitting out lies, misleading information or other diversionary tactics, with the single goal of getting Trump out of hot water.

What is happening to ethics and integrity in the world? It seems a person’s word and bond are not as valued today in some certain circles. It seems that various people, highly educated people to boot, seem to have willingly and completely lowered the bar for their personal standard and do not mind the occasional bit of lying in the workplace or political/justice systems or even outrageous acts of corruption that we all see every week in the news in some city.

  

 

Disheartened yet? No, chew on this then. Here is something that some/many people may not talk about or even think of. There are so many Americans out there, in all levels of society and various positions of power who only think about pleasing themselves and those around them and to hell with everyone else.  This is where discrimination kicks in or continues to spread… And no, you do not have to go and do any copious and deep research on this, just look around and listen to the conversations of other people – on the train platform, in bars, at any sports venue, etc.  Especially when the talkers believe no one else is listening to them.

There are a large number of Americans who refuse to listen to other arguments and opinions, just because those arguments come from someone else. It does not matter if the other person making the argument is a highly educated expert in their field, or that other person may not have advanced degrees but is a well-known specialist. Or, it could just be a neighbor down the road. And please, do not let it be a valid argument from someone of color, or a woman, or someone from a different religion – because then, the one who refuses to listen to a different opinion digs in even more and is blinded by their personal discriminatory beliefs instead of considering that other opinion and having a dialogue.

The sad news for those kinds of thinkers is that we are all in this together, Americans cannot continue to have discrimination and keep putting in place, demarcation lines, visible or otherwise (you know, where people of one race moves out of a neighborhood because ‘certain’ kinds of other people move in…). We have to eventually “all” come together and recognize “others”. People of all colors are important. People of both genders and now, adding trans-gender folks to the mix are “all” important. Young and old alike are important to any society. The poor and the middle class are also important to any society, not just chattel to cast aside when the wealthy or the well-off are finished with them for the time being.

Enough people in America, and around the world, have been suppressed for too many centuries (yes, centuries) – we have to boot strap and bring everyone up, to improve standards in America and around the world.

 

So, work on thinking for yourselves and what is important to all of us. We cannot continue to have siloed (discriminatory) societies when we all breathe the same air and travel the same roads – doing so just makes it that much more expensive just to maintain all the various silos of – we need this or they (others) do not need that (this or that). Doing so only brings back (or keep in place) inequities that many of us want to see go away once and for all.

Let’s all think about actually draining the swamp of corrupt individuals who only want to aggrandize themselves and line their own pockets and do something real. Like vote out those who are corrupt and vote in others who want to help everyone, not just people who look like them…

If people out there choose to not think for themselves and continue listening to others who erroneously and intentionally misled them, we are all in trouble. We will continue to see this uptick in Fascist talk and actions; more talk and activity from white supremacists who believe the world (or certain portions of it) belongs only to them; more talk from nationalists/populists who only promote ideals that ‘appear’ to make their followers happy (think about Hitler).

Seriously, work on raising the bar on your personal ethics and integrity. Those two areas alone are something that would bring America back again instead of sliding down the magic rabbit-hole of lies and corruption in all areas and levels of government (and all other areas of life to boot). Seriously, again, stop condoning things that you know are wrong. i.e. there was one individual who stated “”You get a mulligan,” said Tony Perkins, head of the Family Research Council” in talking about the immoral behavior of Trump. Grabbing women by the “pu_ _ y” is not something one gets a mulligan over… Nor was the situation when Melania Trump had their child and Trump was galivanting around…

Would you rather have a role model with poor moral standards, who knowingly lies (i.e. in 1980 Trump agreed to turn over to the Metropolitan Museum of Art the gilded 20-by-30-foot nickel grillwork of interlocking geometric designs and a pair of 15-foot-tall Art Deco panels “depicting stylized, partly draped female nudes,” from the Bonwit Teller building he was tearing down to build Trump Tower – but then reneged on the promise and destroyed the art work), and encourages physical attacks (recall the sports arena incident where a white guy, as he was walking up the steps to leave the stadium, went out of his way to punch a black guy who had stood up to wait his turn to leave) or would you rather follow a sanitation worker (or home care assistant) with a big heart, higher ethical and integrity standards as a role model to live and grow your lives…?

Hint: some of us would rather follow the latter role model and not someone who wants to perpetuate the past where honest public officials are cast out for working on the straight and narrow rather than allowing certain illegalities go unnoticed and unpunished (remember Sally Yates who was ousted from the DoJ and Preet Bharara formerly of the Southern District of New York)…

 

Lastly, please, for many folks out there – try to stop being malleable, weak-minded and easily manipulated individuals. Do not just jump on the very first thing you see or hear, look for corroborating information to make a more informed opinion. Try to think for yourselves and for the future of America, all of the Americans, not just certain groups of people or certain colors…

We need to bring America back from the fringes of becoming a true international laughing stock, for which we are to a small degree, thanks in no small part to what has been happening over the past 17 months.

New U.S. Tax Plan: I’ll Be Spending My Retirement Paying Down The Increased National Deficit

Yes, you heard right. Someone had asked the question “Hey, what are you going to do in your retirement? “

Yes, now that American House and Senate passed the new “Tax Reform (Tax Plan)”, this unfortunately is going to be the fate of many, many Americans.

This is for the Electoral College and the people who voted for this current president, who is causing a ripple effect of greed, pigs feeding at that swamp trough (the so-called swamp draining that was to take place, yeah, that never took place – it expanded in a somewhat vicious and explosive manner). Folks, you sure picked a winner, one who is causing some real pain and angst to spread across the country, now and over the next decade… Lovely, isn’t it…

 

Here, let’s take a look at an example of another individual who believed a “wonderful new tax plan” would change the state. That individual is, the wonderful Kansas governor (just being facetious here), Brownback, as he tried to impress and win the hearts of all those wonderful Kansans. Brownback, back in 2012, started putting in place a massive tax cut scam, err, scheme to show the country that he could do that successfully and grow his state.

That did not happen. Many of the steep tax cuts put in place, ahhh, they were repealed already or are in the process of going the way of the DoDo bird (last seen sometime in the mid-17th century). After the tax cuts started hitting, you know (well, many of the logical and long-term thinkers knew) that school budgets were going to be cut. They were.

Also, city employee staffing (fire fighters, police and housing budgets) was also cut to help make up shortfalls. Here are a few more ‘fiscal policy’ victims that hit Kansas (http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/opinion/zorn/ct-kansas-brownback-trickle-down-tax-fail-zorn-perspec-0621-md-20170620-column.html):

Public schools were planning to close early for lack of operating revenue. Kansas was shorting pension funds, skimping on road improvements, cutting Medicaid and slashing outlays for state universities.

Here is another quote from the article that is simply brilliant:

“It absolutely should put an end to the theory that tax cuts for the rich end up helping everybody, but you can’t kill it. It’s a vampire idea. No matter how many times it’s proven wrong, it keeps coming back.”

 

So, what is the lesson with these so called “tax cut plans” that will grow the economy?  And if you wish, ask the successors to Reagan and then even Bush (41) how they might feel about tax cuts. If the former was alive and the latter was allowed to answer.

The lesson is, which I am quite sure you already know the answer. When you cut taxes, the state and the nation take in less revenue. Then, how does the country or state make up for that shortfall – well, of course, you cut services everywhere. Cutting services makes for an excellent model of spending less money. However, when services are cut, the average citizens start getting hurt, big time.

• Needed services see reduced hours and/or reduced staff (which in turn puts an extreme workload on the remaining staff members).
• Fire in your neighborhood, hmmm, let’s see how many trucks are available since they took a hit in staffing (and if you need EMS, well…. they may be understaffed as well)
• Hospitals, doctors and nurses – well…. You might want to bring some aspirin with you because, as the tax cuts kick in, there is no mandate to have individuals have medical coverage – and when many of these who do not want medical coverage all of a sudden have an emergency, where do the go? Yes, they go to the emergency room. And what does that do, why, yes, the young man with the blue baseball cap, needed services get sucked into the emergency rooms along with the need for more funding and it has to come from somewhere. So be warned – do not get sick, there may not be enough regular medical coverage to handle the mundane, day to day medical issues (tax cut sucked up any extra cash lying around).
• Nice, serviceable roads to drive on, forgeddaboutit, they fall into disrepair – causing you to suffer car / truck damage. Be sure to up your vehicle insurance as you’re likely to have more bent wheel axles from bad roads (and yes, failing bridges).
• And do not forget about national and state parks and other areas – they may be closed or have reduced hours as immediate victims of revenue shortfalls due to this ‘grand tax plan’… You might have to re-think your vacation/week-end plans.

Then, what is the result of multiple services being cut, wait – why, yes, the older guy in the Hawaiian shirt – you hit it bang on, states start imposing cost hikes on many things in the state. And, oh yes, the young woman in the brilliant teal blouse, you are correct – the states start begging, dang, sorry, requesting the federal government for hand-outs, errr, more funding relief.

So, yes, again, so – what are you going to be doing over the next decade as this ‘grand’ tax cut plan starts biting while the national deficit continues to balloon with that purported $1.5 Trillion figure (which I am fairly certain it will swell far beyond that) is tacked on to the CURRENT national deficit.

It simply has not happened wherever and whenever tax cuts, to help corporations and the “middle/lower” class citizens, are put into law. Tax cuts end up being repealed with taxes going up again by another administration. Most corporations and wealthy individuals do what I (joe citizen) do, reinvest that money in myself (maybe in a savings or, gulp, a ‘401k’ account) for my own future. The majority of the companies who were “supposed” to be re-investing in its workforce to grow the company and those workers and by extension, the country – it just does not happen.

Do you think it is going to happen with this new, ‘grand’ tax plan? An expansion of growth across all American sectors…  Hmmm…. Think long and hard and most of all – do your own research (move away from the conspiracy theorists and hate mongers), then make that determination.

Your retirement may be in jeopardy because many states are going to be going hat in hand to the federal government for those hand-outs for the average citizens – us. And who will be looking out for you, guess who – it is going to be up to you to ensure you have enough salted away in your nest egg. That or continue working until you’re in your 70’s and 80’s…

 

What happened to strategic thinking in our government?  Where did it go? Where are all the forward thinkers? There are supposed to be adults in the American Congress, Senate and White House. Wait, I forgot, many of them were pushed out of many federal entities because they were smart and they used science-based as well as evidence-based data to drive new ideas and to disprove invalid/incorrect viewpoints. (Golly, I really hope I won’t get into any trouble for using words the HHS is attempting to ban from scientific and other professional use in HHS & CDC – Fetus, Transgender, Diversity, Vulnerable, Entitlement and the two I mentioned {that is, if this actually is a true situation…***}.)

We, Americans, cannot even put in place a decent equitable number of women and other ethnic groups of people in these institutions. This is because so many people are only thinking “right now, right here and for me only” – instead of what is ahead, down the road, 5, 10 or 20 years to be who we can truly be.

Leaders of the free world, hmmm, not sure about that anymore, it appears the best and brightest gave up and left a lot of the slower thinking, short-term thinkers and less savvy individuals in charge, those who appear to only want to line their pockets.

Our future of growth looks bleak, very bleak and it will take quite some time to recover to where we, Americans, are great again. It’s the people, all the people, not just any one party over the other – it is not Conservatives or Liberals or Libertarians or Green Party or Religious groups or Atheists or gays or transgender or old or young or women or men – it is the people who come together for common good.

What we have right now is: “Me, me, me – gimme, gimme – I don’t want to share. I don’t want diversity. I want people to be like me and that’s it.”  That is what is scary, the lack of diversity – those not willing to embrace diversity in all of its wonderful possibilities.

*** A Seven-Word Mystery at the CDC https://www.bloomberg.com/view/articles/2017-12-19/a-seven-word-mystery-at-the-cdc

 

Electoral College and Alabama – Molesters and Sexual Harassment in Public Office

People of Alabama and Electoral College, what is occurring today is what you have wrought by disregarding common sense, dignity, respect and common courtesy.

Alabama, if the majority of people vote for this “Judge” Roy Moore, be prepared for the onslaught and backlash against the entire state of Alabama. Are you prepared for the results of what you do if Moore wins?

• People across the country will start shunning your state (that is quite possible)
  
• The Alabama state pile of revenue will slowly start to decrease as people recognize the backward thought processes of voting for a child molester “allegedly” and putting that person into one of the highest offices in America
• Americans will start deciding that Alabama is not on their vacation list
• Companies will likely start doing some deep thinking about their own brand and reputation and start deciding to sever ties with Alabama
• Etc., etc., etc. Hoping you get the picture by this point

Why in the good name of reality are Alabamians willing to vote for someone who has already proven that his thinking is not for the good of “all” people, but only for some? What is wrong with thinking of and respecting other people who are gay, different races, foreign or female (women are not inferior to men and should not be treated as chattel as if we are back in the 16th or 17th century)? There is nothing wrong with people from those categories, the problem is with the people who think ill or less of them.

The problem is with the people who believe they are better than people in those categories without even:

• Talking to and with those folks as equals and
  
• Granting respect and common courtesy to others

Why would anyone want to grant the authority and power to someone else who is categorically (“allegedly”) a child molester?  Is it all because the political race is between a Conservative Republican and a ‘demonic’ Liberal Democrat? Sorry, I got carried away there doing my own research listening to some of the conservative talk show hosts, the really radical ones.  This paragraph is a bald-faced hint that you, the reader should be doing your own research about ‘facts’ and then do your own thinking to come up with your own conclusions as to reality. Don’t just listen to haranguers who constantly badger and slight others “without doing their own research!”

 

But wait. I almost forgot. The Electoral College, despite all available knowledge and the undeniable number of American voters voting for the “other” party – the Electoral College voted in a premier sexual harasser for the Presidency of America… Electing the current President of America opened the floodgates for uncivilized interactions. Yes, I am talking about civility because that makes many more situations work. Civility helps in diplomatic situations instead of throwing Twitter spitballs at everyone else who disagrees with you – this is called puerile behavior (for our current President that means ‘childish’ behavior).

The current American president makes many of us ashamed and embarrassed when we face other nations around the globe. Prior to living in the White House, our current president constantly bashed President Obama for taking the vacation trips that he did because they were wasting tax payers’ hard-earned money.

Well America, guess what?  Us American citizens are spending a whole heck of a boat load of money because of the current disrespectful, blow-hard, semi-literate (sorry but that got away from me too) American president is wasting GOBS of money on vacation trips AT LOCALES that financially benefit him (Trump) because he did not divest his portfolio or create a blind trust for “everything.”

We, America, are wasting GOBS of money in going around in circles on stupid situations EVERY SINGLE TIME he opens his rather large mouth. We have to have other people apologize, if you can seriously call it apologizing when they spew circuitous language.

We, America, are going to waste even more money when we (Americans) finally remove this individual from the White House and his boatload of swamp mates (because Trump forgot, even with “his great memory”, to drain the swamp and put in place unqualified individuals that ‘he likes’). We will have to restore:

• Many lifesaving regulations, such as clean air and clean water (no more dumping – again)
• Financial regulations back to a decent level where Elizabeth Warren started having success – the CFPB (for Trump, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau)
• Federal Lands to preserve lands and parks AND American Natives legacies
• Labor regulations for fair or better pay and not sweatshop conditions

All of this because the current president and many of his cronies hated/despised/disliked (whatever Trump thinks) the last President, Barack Obama. Instead of being jealous of the last president’s successes, use them and build on them – how hard can that be? Is the current president the role model you really want to look up to, to emulate and even worse, have your children follow…? Where cheating and lying is the norm in his everyday life. Remember, he lied about his family being from Scandinavia when actually, they are from Germany (again, do your own research so you can believe your own results)…

 

Come on people, WAKE UP! This is about progressive change for the future. This is not about selfish thinking in the immediate moment – it is not just about you. It is about all of us. If we continue to have divisive attitudes about others, we will slowly (or rapidly) delve into another era of robber barons, an era we worked so hard in trying to get out of. Do you really want to go backwards in time where suppression and repression were the key weapons of those who want to remain in power while you scrape by with crumbs? We are supposed to be progressing and moving forward, together. But, no one can just hand you progress, you – yes, you – you will have to show a concerted effort in wanting to do your part in growing. This is growth in yourself and growth with others, together.

We cannot move forward if so many people are willing to squabble over such backward thinking. Look at Roy Moore, he apparently believes the last and best time in America’s history when we were great was when Blacks were slaves. For those who are not up to the challenge of doing your own research, here are a few links to reputable news sources (these are not Fake News sites):

http://time.com/5056590/roy-moore-america-great-slavery/

http://www.latimes.com/politics/la-na-pol-alabama-senate-runoff-20170921-story.html

https://www.usnews.com/news/national-news/articles/2017-12-08/roy-moore-chastises-america-praises-putin-in-newly-resurfaced-interview

Here is what Roy Moore responded with to a question at the September 17^th Florence rally:

At Moore’s [17 September 2017] Florence rally, the former judge outlined all the wrongs he sees in Washington and “spiritual wickedness in high places.” He warned of “the awful calamity of abortion and sodomy and perverse behavior and murders and shootings and road rage” as “a punishment inflicted upon us for our presumptuous sins.”

In response to a question from one of the only African Americans in the audience — who asked when Moore thought America was last “great” — Moore acknowledged the nation’s history of racial divisions, but said: “I think it was great at the time when families were united — even though we had slavery — they cared for one another…. Our families were strong, our country had a direction.”

At the same event, Moore referred to Native Americans and Asian Americans as “reds and yellows[.”]

 

The reason for specifically not using the term United States is because we simply have too many people who are too divisive in America and are too bitterly against harmony and accepting people for who they are. These divisive individuals would rather force everyone to be like them instead of accepting differences.

Instead of helping each other, even with something as minor as respect for one another and the willingness to listen to one another – we are in a more overt battle with our fellow citizens.

All because of the Electoral College putting in place someone who never should have seen the inside of the White House for any reason. But now, he has access to the Nuclear football…

Lunacy – Politics, Dictators (& Trump) and Race

It is now 2017 and we, as a global people, are facing more and more lunacy in the world.

In Turkey, we have Erdogan who constantly expands his political powers to where it is reaching dictatorial levels. When you:

• Modify the political system;
• Suppress journalists, military, educators, other political parties and
• Control the media
  

— you are a dictator.

In Venezuela, we have Maduro with his recent critically gained presidency. Currently he is an authoritarian (some of us prefer the term ‘dictator’). He appears to be on a track to continue absorbing more power – by rewriting their country’s constitution, even while it is reported that 98% of the country’s people rejected that idea. Approximately, 3.6 million people voted according to an independent analysis. Here are a few of the actions he, Maduro, has implemented or rather, allowed to take place:

• delayed elections,
• jailing of opposition leaders,
• increasing influence of the army, and
• efforts by the government-appointed courts to curtail the powers of the opposition-held national assembly.

Note, he has the backing of Russian and Cuban leadership…

In Iran, Hassan Rouhani, won the recent presidential election to continue holding office. One item he ran on was to include women in the cabinet. That, as it turns out, did not occur – it is an all-male cabinet…  That is not progress. He ran on the platform of being a reformist.

In Russia, well, actually, do we need to add anything more on him than what we already know of him (and Medvedev)…? When you:

• Control the political system (arrest opposition on false charges of embezzlement in order to label the person as a criminal, which under Russian laws, the person cannot run for certain offices);
• Control the country’s media (to spread whatever propaganda is desired); put in a VPN prohibition (so citizens cannot have secure & private communication with the outside world);
• Use your police force, your military & intelligence services to force how ‘protest rallies should be held (i.e. maximum of 250 people and constrained to protest only within a few block area)’; and
• Control state conglomerates in order to line the leadership’s pockets with BILLIONS of dollars (& Swiss Francs, Euros, British Pounds and even Bitcoins)

— if that is not dictatorial, not sure what else it could possibly be.

In China, we have a country that wants to be capitalistic but is still hugely communistic. This is a country that:

• Is also banning private citizen use of VPNs – sorry, correction, citizens can ‘apply’ for use of a VPN (but that means that citizen would have to provide a back door {or front door} into that VPN’s communication path…
• Has a Communist party with significant control over the country’s media – with an iron fist.
• HAS BUILT a man-made island in the South China Seas (Spratly Islands) in order to, ahhh what was it they stated (one reason) – to protect their sovereign rights and regional territories. Remember, that area is a hotly contested area for “centuries” by countries in the area (Taiwan, China, Vietnam, with Malaysia and the Philippines).
• Wants foreign investors (tech) to give up source code to ensure there is nothing hinky or spying related in order for those foreign firms to do business in China.
  
• Still has huge human rights issues (think Falun Gong and {two spellings} Uyghur & Uighur people of western China)
• Wants to completely take over Hong Kong despite what China promised in 1999 (freedom to continue progressing)
• Suppresses all (or as much as they can find) negative commentary regarding the country and the political leaders

In America, we have someone who may not be dictatorial but is clearly not of the right mettle (and state of mind) to run a country and grow.When we have:

• An EPA that is relaxing/eliminating rules/regulations left and right to allow toxins into the air and water, it is a very bad sign.
• A Dept of Education that believed that HBCUs were a wonderful alternative and is attempting to have more charter schools across the country AND not listening to the educators in her own Department – that is a bad sign for our children and future leaders.
• An Attorney General that should not have been appointed to being with (there are all kinds of reasons to choose from if you wish to do a little research and analysis of your own) – that is a bad sign for the country’s law enforcement system.
• A Commerce secretary who wants to relax rules and regulations (just recall the sweat shops and lack of workplace violations of yesterday) – we have a problem in that more business will start doing what they want to do without protecting their employees.
• A secretary of State who does not talk to his own senior leadership nor allow press conferences – that is a bad omen of things happening behind closed doors.

So, that list could have easily continued but many of you know the shortfalls of our current administration. We now come to our president – a choice that the electoral college should never have made when the popular national vote was overwhelmingly in favor of the other candidate. We have a president who:

• Listens to select individuals, who may not be qualified to provide those kinds of opinions
• Says whatever he wishes without ANY deep thoughts or consideration, from what we observe – he likes to gain information and content from Alex Jones
• Gives oversight and strategic control of the military to the generals – that is a bad idea (extrapolate down the road and into the future – you’ve got a big brain to do so)
• Is a completely bad and wrong role model for youth growing up, who aspire to be someone important – do we want that kind of leader sprouting up everywhere in 10-20 years…? He is definitely not a role model for many of us.
  
• Allegedly cooked the books for his Grand Hyatt hotel partnership in New York in the mid-80s (here is one link but please do your due diligence: http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2016/10/trump-files-how-donald-screwed-over-new-york-city-his-tax-bill/) – Trump had ordered the Grant Hyatt to change its accounting methods to lower its reported profits. Check out what the city’s auditor general at the time (Karen Burstein) reported. And he, Trump, is well known for stiffing everyone he can, from lawyers to chefs in order to get out of paying for it.
• Barely raises an eyebrow at the Charlottesville, VA white supremacist rally where James Alex Fields Jr, allegedly killed, via a hit & run, a female pedestrian and injured 19 others (ala, an ISIS style vehicle attack). And if I’m not mistaken, he was on the stage behind  and on Trump’s right at some Trump rally late last year or earlier this year. Some media outlet should do a facial scan for this person in the archives – to see what kind of rally he and his friends were attending.  And also, no, Obama did not raise the white racist, supremacist, Nazi spectre when the idiot, Dylann Roof, shot the people in the church. But that was a different scenario – this time (Charlottesville) it was a massive gathering the day after a Tikki firelight march by, hmmmm, individuals of a certain color. The tension and hatred was already at a known and anticipated high level (witness the police and state trooper presence). The Charlottesville situation was not a surprise but our president only gave a rather tepid response for this mass gathering and protest that many people have likened to Hitler and his brown shirts…

The U.S. has a president that is causing this country to waste more money and time on stupidity and inane actions, not just domestically but globally, than we should have to. NOTHING is really getting done and please do not tell the rest of us that he is bringing back manufacturing jobs, those numbers are not significant, especially not for the long run.

 

So, with that list above – definitely not an all-encompassing list of lunatic actions around the globe but it seems to be a glide path for disaster if we do not somehow come together to make change happen. Selfish racial beliefs are not beneficial for a society as a whole – it should be societal belief of everyone helping everyone (no, I’m not intimating that we should be become a socialist society, sorry). We should be working, together, around the globe to make life better for everyone. We, the U.S. cannot even:

• Make health care affordable to everyone, from poor to middle class in this country when there are other countries who are making it work by using one form or another of Universal Health Care or a One Payer system.
• Improve our infrastructure system.
• Innovate and improve our educational system so that it is equitable for all, not just pockets of people scattered around the country.
• And for sure, we are still leap years behind where we should be where it comes to diversity and dropping discrimination of all forms (race, gender, age) to historic lows.

Instead, we, Americans, have a president that seems oblivious to who he has selected to help run the country – oblivious to what he is saying to the world (where he is a laughing stock, check it out) and oblivious to the image he projects to others outside of his base (which appears to be shrinking, finally).

We should still be the leader of the free world, but that may be gone now in no small part due to our leader. And without having that kind of leader status, we may be a contributing (not root) cause to the rise of lunacy in the world – in race, politics and pop-up dictators.

 

Part 2 – Donald Trump: Taking America Backwards & Laughing Stock…. Very Sad

Continued from Part 1 @ https://patrick642nu.wordpress.com/2017/06/04/part-1-donald-trump-taking-america-backwards-laughing-stock-very-sad/

 

Medical Care – Universal Health Care[1]

For decades, there have been individuals who wanted to put something like Universal Health Care (UHC) into play, people such as; Theodore (Teddy) Roosevelt (1901-1909), FDR (1935 & 1939), Harry S. Truman in 1949 as part of the Fair Deal to our last president (Obama). You can also check Wikipedia[2] if you wish but do your own reading and thoughtful introspection.

So, what’s the big deal about UHC, our future – that is what is at stake? At stake is a future of healthier individuals, across the country. It is a future where costs will actually be lower because early care will preclude major medical disasters later and there will be no monstrous medical bills to be picked up by the families involved and tax payers due to an escalation of emergency room visits…

My thoughts on what these past presidents and current UHC (or Affordable Care) leaders thinking is that we need to cover everyone to bring down emergency room visits; to bring down the costs of catastrophic medical situations so that down the road, we Americans, will not have such significant numbers of people across the country without coverage. We would have in the future, a greatly reduced number of Americans without serious medical problems because the medical problems would have been caught very early in life and prevented. And the problems would have been prevented at a significantly fraction of the cost, instead of letting it go festering on for decades, with each year seeing more of that families (and tax payers – think emergency rooms) money going down the drain when it could have been prevented due to long-term thinkers who have been trying to get UHC instilled into the American psyche.

Just imagine more people:

• With healthy looking teeth so they can go and gain better jobs instead of being automatically assigned as a person of low income and low intellect and passed over for someone else who simply looks better
• Walking around on healthy legs or prostheses instead of a stump and a crutch(es) or obsolete decrepit wheel chair
• With the ability to see rather than being blinded due to malnutrition or bad school lunch plans and more

Do you not believe UHC would better everyone? Okay, think about an event occurring where you lose your high paying job and you were the primary bread winner with a great insurance plan. Well, your plan is gone and you suddenly find yourself in a medical catastrophic situation and it is going to be hugely expensive. What are you going to do? Bemoan the fact that you have UHC at that point.

Grow up people, stop thinking about yourselves because you have a better life – think about others out there who are not as fortunate as you.

Wouldn’t you want to see:

• Every American in this country reaping the benefits of great health care 10 years from now? {That 10 year number is only an educated guess as to we could start seeing better health care efficacy…}
• A dramatic reduction of emergency room visits 10 years from now, while at the same time – a significant reduction of tax payers paying for so many unnecessary ER visits?
• No more prohibitively expensive and labor sapping hospital visits 10 years from now because preventive UHC took care of problems before they exploded into the problems they are today?

We can do that!!!! But we have to agree to do this now, as a country. We cannot just provide UHC for the elite and better paid Americans and continue arguing and kicking this can down the road, EVERY SINGLE BLOODY YEAR as we are doing now!!!! We can change that paradigm!

 

Laughing Stock?

Back to the U.S. becoming the laughing stock country. Is that true, what do you think? Remember, do your own research and analysis; do not rely solely on news folks (TV or radio), or talk shows, or conspiracy theorists and only your inner circle – expand your horizons.

Why can’t the U.S. spend more money, evenly, on all levels of education to ratchet up the education and knowledge of American students? Why can’t the U.S. be like Canada, Great Britain and Germany[3]? Education goes a long way in making for a better citizenry… And we, the U.S., we need to do better if we want to be ‘the’ world leader – we need better education to get there. Check out a Pew article[4] for some info on where we stand.

 

What about international diplomacy? You too must think this is a laughing stock situation, right? Look at the current secretary of state, Tillerson – a person who does not grant interviews and press conferences. He wants to do mostly behind the scene affairs. Do you believe that is an open and transparent way to handle diplomacy, not sharing information with the country he represents?

Oh wait-a-minute that does not really matter. Our president and OMB person (Mick Mulvaney) want to cut the budget for State Department and USAID because we do not require or need this kind of effort around the world. Surely you believe this is laughable too… Right?

 

What about cleaner air, well, no? Apparently we not require or need this either. Our latest president and EPA head seem to believe their own knowledge on climate change and disregard what scientists who have been studying this for years. We should let companies dump waste in rivers and pollute the air, sure why not…? That is quite laughable, the president and EPA head that is, oh and include Bannon in that lot.

 

What about all the extraordinarily significant amount of time the U.S. is spending on the current president, his family, inner circle of administration officials and business cronies staying at Mar-a-Lago and at Trump Tower? Do you not believe this is laughable enough? Why yes, it is. The U.S. is spending far too much time on illicit activities, ummm – excuse me, alleged illicit activities. And we are spending far too much money on all of this as a result.

And the end result is that, most of the other hard stuff is not getting accomplished. Here are some of the things not getting done like; infrastructure (roads, bridges, dams, levees, power grid, water, etc.) across the country, all of which need attention. Then there is the tax reform; there is equality in the work place which needs more attention.

Take a look at the rampant, vitriolic, unvarnished display of outright racism being displayed across this once great nation. This is worse than when the last president was in office. And remember, that last president did not spew nonsense and idiotic content such as “knock ‘em out,” or “grab ‘em by the p_ _ _ y” or even using 7^th grade language for that matter – sometimes, just sometimes, using ‘plain spoken language’ can mean talking down to someone and insult that person’s intelligence….

What is going on? What is happening to this once great country? Why are so many people willing to condone this current president? Why condone someone who continues to willingly lie to the country, to the world – on multiple topics? And many people were (and are still) willing to continue listening to and believe in this individual even though what this current president promised will never happen again (think coal and massive manual manufacturing)…

More people in this country need to start thinking of each other, no matter their race, religion, age, gender, sexual preferences or what part of the country they live in. We are all here together, right now.  Look at each other, deeply look at each other and consider the travels and hardship they may have endured to get to where they are now (of course I’m talking about honest, hard work and legal efforts). And remember that no matter whom you see in front of you, or whether they live 2,500 miles away, that other person may be smarter than you and have better cognitive skills than you. These are people who are walking around right now – with or without:

• a college degree (that other person who ‘looks’ unintelligent may hold several degrees including a doctorate for all that you are aware)
• a family trust fund
• the best looks
• the best smile or
• the best speech abilities / speaking mannerisms.

So take note, that other person just may be a better person than you – rich or poor though they may be…

 

[1] “A Brief History: Universal Health Care Efforts in the US,” 1999, www.pnhp.org/facts/a-brief-history-universal-health-care-efforts-in-the-us

[2] “History of health care reform in the U.S.,” retrieved June 3, 2017, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_health_care_reform_in_the_United_States

[3] “Best Countries for Education,” March 7, 2017, https://www.usnews.com/news/best-countries/best-education

[4] “U.S. students’ academic achievement still lags that of their peers in many other countries,” February 15, 2017, www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2017/02/15/u-s-students-internationally-math-science/