In an apparent effort to distract from the fact the Republican-led Senate cannot pass any version of the long-sought-after repeal-and-replace legislation, Donald Trump has abruptly thrown transgender folk under the bus.
Not that his largely homophobic base will give a crap.
I was frankly amazed at all those mewing tones coming from Trump at the Republican Convention, where the man all but transformed himself into a simulacrum of a human being on the subject of the LGBTQ community. (He seemed to hit the "Q" a little hard each time he recited the letters, which he did repeatedly, his golden promises to make.)
Is this some sort of master plan? Did Trump sidle up to other fringe groups so he can fire them down range in an emergency? Like when the bear is gaining on him and he needs to jettison some tasty morsel to keep those big sharp teeth out of his hindquarters?
As for the Republicans, they have but one reasonable path: to help the Democrats twiddle and twang Obamacare into some sort of viable shape. Failing to repeal-and-replace, some Republicans will fall under the wheels of their own political rhetoric—though they may recover some momentum by appearing to come to the aid of those Republican governors who can't see giving up Obamacare at this point, especially not when it might be fixed.
Trump will hate it like poison, of course, but I suspect he'll make a forceful statement that will make it seem like tweaking Obamacare was his plan all along. The idea that some folks wanted to repeal the law of the land will be made to sound ridiculous.
(Recall his words confirming Barack Obama was born in this country after all. PERIOD. As if Trump were not the beast hounding the man on the subject.)
Of course, the Republican failures in Congress are not the only creatures nipping at Trump's rump. There's the Russia Thing.
His own son admits slavering at the mouth over the possibility a high-ranking, government-backed Russian lawyer could deliver dirt on Hillary. That the woman could not come through does not mitigate his crime.
(If a bunch of guys get together and pool their money to hire a hit-man, the fact the fellow missed his shot, or simply grabbed their moolah and scrammed out of there, doesn't lessen their crimes that much. It's still felonies all around, for conspiracy to murder.)
The fact that lots of politicians would have taken that meeting (as Trump proposed) doesn't transform their crimes into May flowers. Those guys tried to collude, as best they could.
Trump's attack on Jeff Sessions continues. The thing he's upset about—that his Attorney Genera recused himself from the Russia investigation—is very old news, but suddenly Trump can't stop referring to it. Clearly the President wanted an AG who will protect him from unwanted investigations.
Lately, Trump has been criticizing Sessions for not prosecuting Hillary Clinton for her email server crimes. Trump has been quiet about this stuff since getting elected, but the subject is back and starting to heat up.
I think what is happening is that Trump has found the presidency not to his liking. Nobody is doing what he wants doing. There's no loyalty anywhere.
He's brought in a junkyard dog, Anthony Scaramucci, to run the communications department—a designated leak killer. (Nixon's boys called themselves "plumbers.") This guy's job is shake things up, and he's working it. Says he's loyal to the President despite negative things he's said about Trump in the past.
Trump keeps doing the sort of stuff he can do without Congress: Executive Orders.
He seems determined to dismantle the entire Obama administration, one chunk at a time. If the signature item (Obamacare) is beyond his reach, the man will do everything else he can. During the campaign, Trump called Obama the stupidest President this country has ever had, so all his accomplishments are fair game.
For a while Trump seemed mollified by his meeting with Obama in the White House before the inauguration. But all that ended when Trump found out the sick son-of-a-bitch wiretapped him in Trump Tower. It's an act of treachery that cannot go unavenged!
Trump revisits the glory of the campaign trail as often as he can, recently acting so bizarrely at a Boy Scout Jamboree the leaders had to issue an apology to the kids.
The man is coming unglued with the frustration of not getting treated the way he imagined he would as President. Deference and loyalty is what he expected, eager young men leaping into action to do his holy bidding.
Instead, if Trump can't scrape away on a piece of paper to make something happen, nothing gets done at all. This is not what he signed up for!
So the wheels on the bus go round and round, nicely greased by the guts of the fallen. (The standard mystery: Did the guy fall, or was he pushed?)
Trump now has his eye on special counsel Robert Mueller, ringmaster of the Russia Circus, despite warnings from Congressional Republicans.
Is there another bloodbath coming?
Trump needs to know: When you stab a man in the back—or in the front, Scaramucci-style—an unexpected obstacle may causes the knife to stall momentarily. The murdering hand slips forward, onto the blade, and the stabber is himself deeply cut.
Trump needs to know that wound can get infected, sometimes fatally.
(By the way, RIP Anthony Scaramucci.)
Friday, July 28, 2017
Tuesday, July 18, 2017
PART TWO, PART TWO
A while back, in a post called PART TWO, I talked about how the police make arrests—and how ignoring the request to turn around and put your hands behind your back can lead to some very rough treatment.
At that time, I had some advice for handling the police. Now I have some advice for the police—and for the law: Back off!
Some background: You may have noticed on several network newscasts a story about high-speed pursuits in the city of Los Angeles. A grand jury there concluded the cops need to back off and let some of those guys keep on driving.
It made me wonder if a similar attitude might work in the case of folks who don't wish, for whatever reason, to be taken into custody.
Obviously, you can't apply this to guys with guns and bad intentions.
But a lot of the time, it may be possible to skip Part Two and just let the individual wander off. Wander off, that is, with a special penalty applied.
Recall on the news a month or so ago, video of a fellow standing in the open door of his car with his hands up. The cop hauled off and punched him in the face. Brutal behavior, no doubt, but as a startup to Part Two, not that unreasonable. The cop simply had no reliable technology for physically placing the man under arrest.
But suppose the police could offer the fellow an alternative:
"All right, look. I get that you're refusing to submit to arrest. I told you to turn around and put your hands behind your back, and you were like, no way, man. Okay, I get it. But make no mistake, you're still under arrest—you're just not in custody, that's all. You've decided to go another way. Okay, fine, but listen up. You can walk away, right now. And it's not a trick. I won't try to grab you. Just walk away. But you need to know there will be consequences for this action. A warrant will be issued, and at some point you will be grabbed up and taken into custody. After that, if you're convicted, whatever fine is imposed, whatever jail sentence is named, you'll be on the hook for three times that amount. A thousand dollar fine will be three thousand. Six months in jail will be a year and a half. And so forth. You'll also lose the right to bring a civil suit against the city or the police department. But it's entirely your choice. If all this sounds good to you, fine. Go for it. But on foot, okay? Because we'll be impounding your vehicle."
See, it's like getting a traffic violation in a construction zone, where fines are tripled. Who knows, informed of the serious consequences, maybe some folks would reconsider their initial decision to defy the arresting officer.
Others will hit the road, defiant. Maybe they think they can avoid the police for the rest of their days. Or maybe they're convinced no jury would convict them of the crime the police allege.
(And maybe they're right about that. A lot of folks beaten by the cops during an arrest end up with the charges dropped—though that might be a public relations thing.)
Either way, nobody goes to the hospital. Or to the morgue.
What do you think, worth a try?
At that time, I had some advice for handling the police. Now I have some advice for the police—and for the law: Back off!
Some background: You may have noticed on several network newscasts a story about high-speed pursuits in the city of Los Angeles. A grand jury there concluded the cops need to back off and let some of those guys keep on driving.
It made me wonder if a similar attitude might work in the case of folks who don't wish, for whatever reason, to be taken into custody.
Obviously, you can't apply this to guys with guns and bad intentions.
But a lot of the time, it may be possible to skip Part Two and just let the individual wander off. Wander off, that is, with a special penalty applied.
Recall on the news a month or so ago, video of a fellow standing in the open door of his car with his hands up. The cop hauled off and punched him in the face. Brutal behavior, no doubt, but as a startup to Part Two, not that unreasonable. The cop simply had no reliable technology for physically placing the man under arrest.
But suppose the police could offer the fellow an alternative:
"All right, look. I get that you're refusing to submit to arrest. I told you to turn around and put your hands behind your back, and you were like, no way, man. Okay, I get it. But make no mistake, you're still under arrest—you're just not in custody, that's all. You've decided to go another way. Okay, fine, but listen up. You can walk away, right now. And it's not a trick. I won't try to grab you. Just walk away. But you need to know there will be consequences for this action. A warrant will be issued, and at some point you will be grabbed up and taken into custody. After that, if you're convicted, whatever fine is imposed, whatever jail sentence is named, you'll be on the hook for three times that amount. A thousand dollar fine will be three thousand. Six months in jail will be a year and a half. And so forth. You'll also lose the right to bring a civil suit against the city or the police department. But it's entirely your choice. If all this sounds good to you, fine. Go for it. But on foot, okay? Because we'll be impounding your vehicle."
See, it's like getting a traffic violation in a construction zone, where fines are tripled. Who knows, informed of the serious consequences, maybe some folks would reconsider their initial decision to defy the arresting officer.
Others will hit the road, defiant. Maybe they think they can avoid the police for the rest of their days. Or maybe they're convinced no jury would convict them of the crime the police allege.
(And maybe they're right about that. A lot of folks beaten by the cops during an arrest end up with the charges dropped—though that might be a public relations thing.)
Either way, nobody goes to the hospital. Or to the morgue.
What do you think, worth a try?
Friday, July 7, 2017
MR. TRUMP'S LOST CAR KEYS
Donald Trump is fond of pointing out there is no evidence of any collusion between himself, his campaign people, or his transition team and the mysterious folks running the Russian hacking thing.
Fact is, he only admits there is a Russian hacking thing for the purposes of yelling at President Obama for not stopping it way back during the 2016 campaign.
Trump apparently insisted repeatedly that then FBI Director James Comey make a public announcement that evidence of collusion is lacking.
But the real answer is still pretty obvious: The investigations are ongoing, and nobody knows what will turn up or when that might happen.
Say you're looking for your car keys. That's a thing, right? When you're looking for your keys, you might have to go at it for awhile. Out here in the real world, one tends to search until something turns up.
What you don't do is check a couple of likely places, conclude there are no car keys—that there never were any car keys—and call an Uber.
In Trump's world, on the other hand, no one has to search for anything. The man knows ahead of time there are no car keys. In fact, the very concept of keys—or of some device that can be placed in operation with keys—is in his opinion ridiculous and illusory. #FakeNews!
Check it out: No car keys. No cars. No method of transportation. No concept of moving from one place to another. No evidence of any other place but right here or of any other time but right now.
I tell you, the guy's some kind of Zen master!
He knows there's no evidence of collusion because he knows what he knows. How can your own brain lie to you about something so important?
A thing is what it is, and what it is is what you want it to be. By definition.
That's top of the line Human Knowledge, folks, the sort of thinking that gets you through your life.
Trump meets with Putin today at the G20 in Germany, and the word is the President will probably not bring up the hacking thing. Trump's latest statement suggests he thinks Russia might be involved, but a lot of other countries or people might also be involved.
As he keeps putting it: Nobody knows.
He's probably still thinking of that 400-pound man lying in bed with a laptop, causing trouble between pizza deliveries—a guy who never has to worry about the location of his car keys. He's got nowhere he needs to be.
Fact is, he only admits there is a Russian hacking thing for the purposes of yelling at President Obama for not stopping it way back during the 2016 campaign.
Trump apparently insisted repeatedly that then FBI Director James Comey make a public announcement that evidence of collusion is lacking.
But the real answer is still pretty obvious: The investigations are ongoing, and nobody knows what will turn up or when that might happen.
Say you're looking for your car keys. That's a thing, right? When you're looking for your keys, you might have to go at it for awhile. Out here in the real world, one tends to search until something turns up.
What you don't do is check a couple of likely places, conclude there are no car keys—that there never were any car keys—and call an Uber.
In Trump's world, on the other hand, no one has to search for anything. The man knows ahead of time there are no car keys. In fact, the very concept of keys—or of some device that can be placed in operation with keys—is in his opinion ridiculous and illusory. #FakeNews!
Check it out: No car keys. No cars. No method of transportation. No concept of moving from one place to another. No evidence of any other place but right here or of any other time but right now.
I tell you, the guy's some kind of Zen master!
He knows there's no evidence of collusion because he knows what he knows. How can your own brain lie to you about something so important?
A thing is what it is, and what it is is what you want it to be. By definition.
That's top of the line Human Knowledge, folks, the sort of thinking that gets you through your life.
Trump meets with Putin today at the G20 in Germany, and the word is the President will probably not bring up the hacking thing. Trump's latest statement suggests he thinks Russia might be involved, but a lot of other countries or people might also be involved.
As he keeps putting it: Nobody knows.
He's probably still thinking of that 400-pound man lying in bed with a laptop, causing trouble between pizza deliveries—a guy who never has to worry about the location of his car keys. He's got nowhere he needs to be.
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