Who in the name of gullible listeners does Ron Johnson think he’s kidding?
The Wisconsin Republican U.S. senator is now trying to take back what he told the radio talk show host the other day about the insurrection of the Sixth of January on Capitol Hill.
I am certain beyond a doubt that he said that the crowd that stormed Capitol Building would “never” do anything to break the law, that they have “great respect” for law enforcement and that had the rioters belonged to Black Lives Matter or Antifa that he would have “been concerned.”
Now the Cheesehead nut job says the media twisted his remarks. That his statements were taken out of context. Huh?
Respect for law and order, for the police? What about the cops who were injured by the rioters/terrorists? Or the young Capitol Police officer who died from his injuries?
I heard what Johnson said. I heard all of it. I know what I heard.
Ron Johnson said it. He needs to own it. Oh, and while he’s at it he ought to resign from the U.S. Senate.
This time change thing has produced more debate on whether we should keep it or switch to a permanent time standard.
To be honest, none of this affects me personally all that much, but if I had to make a choice, here is what I would suggest.
Switch to a permanent Daylight Saving Time. Make it national. Pass a law that says that all of our states adhere to the same way of determining what time of day it is.
Texas flirted with the idea of switching to either permanent DST, permanent Standard Time or keeping the status quo. The 2019 Legislature ran out of time to send the issue to the voters.
Now we hear a bipartisan group of U.S. senators backing a notion to switch to a permanent Daylight Saving Time arrangement, according to a report on National Public Radio.
When was the last time you had Democrats and Republicans agree on something? I know. It seems like forever.
Sen. Marco Rubio, a Florida Republican, is trying to resurrect the permanent DST issue. As NPR reports: He cited multiple benefits to permanent DST including potentially fewer car accidents and easing seasonal depression.
What’s more, according to NPR: The effort is supported by a bipartisan group of lawmakers, including Sen. Ed Markey of Massachusetts, who echoed Rubio in highlighting the potential benefits of extending DST. “Studies have found year-round Daylight Saving Time would improve public health, public safety, and mental health — especially important during this cold and dark COVID winter,” Markey said.
Not everyone is on board, according to NPR: Opponents of permanent daylight saving time note that winter mornings would be darker, with children more often having to wait for the school bus in the dark.
I happen to prefer the longer afternoon and early evening daylight, which DST brings to us. Remember, too, that one of the selling points of DST is that it would conserve electrical energy, given that we don’t turn our lights on so early at the end of the day.
I am not going to lose any sleep over this, no pun intended. I’m just delighted to see Democrats and Republicans agreeing on something … for a change.
President Biden, or more likely his White House team, has learned the lesson from an earlier legislative triumph that turned into a political debacle.
When Biden served as vice president in the Obama administration, he and President Obama’s team ramrodded through Congress a monumental legislative achievement: the Affordable Care Act. Biden famously whispered in Obama’s ear that its enactment was a “big f***ing deal.” And it was.
Obama then failed to sell the benefits of the ACA to the public. What happened then? Republicans took control of Congress in the 2010 midterm election, an event that President Obama described as a “shellacking.”
Fast-forward to this year. Biden has scored another huge victory with a massive $1.9 trillion COVID-19 relief bill. Its aim is to help Americans suffering economically from the pandemic that still grips the nation.
But … the president, Vice President Kamala Harris and their spouses are fanning out for as long as it takes to talk directly to Americans about why this package also is a big … deal. They want to avoid the thumping that President Obama took after scoring a big win with the ACA. The 2022 midterms are coming up in short order.
Joseph R. Biden brings important experience to the presidency that was sorely lacking in the individual he succeeded, Donald J. Trump.
I’ve talked already on this blog about whether President Biden will be able to shepherd an infrastructure bill through Congress. My hunch is that he stands a much greater chance of doing so than Donald Trump ever had. Why? Because Biden is a creature of Congress and Trump is, well, someone with zero government experience.
That kind of thing matters when a president chooses to operate the complicated machinery called the federal government.
Trump trumpeted his business experience as a selling point while winning election in 2016. I’ll set aside that he lied about his success as a business mogul. I believe we have learned that Trump’s business record at best is considered, um, checkered. He spent his entire professional life propping his own image up. Trump never grasped the concept of teamwork, which is an essential element of governing with a co-equal branch of government, the men and women who work on Capitol Hill.
Joe Biden, on the other hand, knows the Senate well. He was a major part of that legislative body for 36 years. He chaired key Senate committees. Biden developed first-name relationships with foreign leaders. He worked well with Republicans. He is fluent in the legislative jargon that senators and House members use among themselves.
This is the kind of experience that should serve President Biden well as he seeks to push an agenda forward. Trump’s experience in business, in show biz, in self-aggrandizement and self-enrichment provided a prescription for failure.
I consider myself a good-government progressive. Therefore, I intend to look carefully over time at how well our government functions with a president who knows which levers to pull and which buttons to push.
Texas two U.S. senators, Republicans Ted Cruz and John Cornyn, voted against the COVID-19 relief bill, they say, because it is “mislabeled.”
They contend that it is too full of money that seeks to satisfy liberal/progressive interest groups and political activists.
Pardon my Greek, but these two alleged legislative representatives are full of sh**.
Is the bill the perfect remedy to help Americans back from the pandemic precipice? No. However, it does contain sufficient help for those who have suffered grievous economic hardship. Moreover, it sets aside money to continue the development of vaccines that are rolling out as we sit here that will help inoculate more of us against the virus.
How many ways do we have to explain how this process works to the ideologues/demagogues who populate the supposedly loyal opposition to President Biden?
I keep hearing the canard about how only 9 percent of the money goes directly to COVID-19 relief. That’s another crock of fecal matter. CNN.com provides a link that explains what is in the bill.
If you look at the items lined out, you will understand that the word “directly” is critical. I concede that not all the funds go directly to aid with COVID-related relief. However, much of the money serves the purpose, such as nutrition aid, or housing aid, or tax credits for individuals and families.
The impact of the pandemic has been sweeping and it has hit Americans thoroughly. That is why President Biden insisted that Congress should “go big” in seeking relief for Americans. He settled on $1.9 trillion in relief. I get that it isn’t cheap. However, I am willing to endorse this notion because of my belief that the federal government should answer the call when emergency strikes.
Last time I gave it any thought, I consider the killer pandemic a first-rank national emergency that needs a proportional response.
Sens. Cruz and Cornyn — and the rest of their GOP colleagues in both congressional chambers — are on the wrong side of this debate.
The thought occurs to me that President Biden’s election in 2020 has produced an anticipated but highly underreported positive effect.
During the term of Donald J. Trump, there appeared — anecdotally, at least — to be a serious spike in destroyed friendships and other relationships among longtime friends and significant others.
I lost a few friends during the past four years over intense political differences. I am not proud of whatever I might have contributed to those falling-outs.
Trump is gone from the White House. Probably forever. Joe Biden’s term has begun and I am going to suggest right here that we might see a serious leveling off of the kind of animus we witnessed or heard about during Trump’s term as president.
That is a good thing. Don’t you think?
President Biden is a student of the school that suggests that political adversaries need not be enemies. Trump didn’t operate at that level. He seemingly has few political friends beyond the cultists who pledge that goofy fealty to the man. But, oh brother, he has developed more than his fair share of political enemies. Trump also has dished out the enemy label as well.
Biden rolls differently. He cultivated a reputation as a U.S. senator who was able to reach across to Republicans. He brought those decades of Senate experience to the White House as vice president in the Obama administration.
My strong sense is that as president, Joe Biden will soothe the roiling waters that have swamped friendships and spoiled many family dinners across the land. I cannot presume that would be his strategy. It’s just an effect of the kind of leadership skill he has demonstrated over his many years in public service.
Do I expect a restoration of my lost friendships? I am not holding my breath. I do expect there to be a diminution of the friendship fracturing moving ahead during the presidency of Joe Biden.
Many of you who read this blog might have presumed that I expect President Biden’s term in office to go without hiccups, missteps, mistakes. You would be wrong.
I do not expect perfection from the president. All I demand of him should be that he own his mistakes when they occur and he is able to understand that they, indeed, are mistakes. It is a quality we did not see in the man who preceded Biden in the nation’s highest office.
Donald Trump was incapable of owning a mistake. A misstatement? That was even more out of the question! He never admitted lying to us … about anything!
President Biden has been in office for a little more than 50 days. By my count, he’s made one semi-serious goof: He declined to issue sanctions against the crown prince of Saudi Arabia, Mohammad bin Salman, for ordering the ghastly murder of U.S. journalist Jamal Khashoggi.
There will be more errors. Joe Biden is as human as the rest of us, which of course goes without even mentioning.
I am not setting the bar too high for President Biden. Nor should anyone who expects honesty and truth-telling from our president.
He’s already scored a big legislative victory in getting congressional Democrats to hang together in approving a $1.9 trillion relief bill aimed at helping Americans survive the COVID pandemic. Next up? It appears to be a huge bill to improve our infrastructure: roads, bridges, airports, rail lines.
Donald Trump talked a great deal during his term about improving infrastructure, but he never delivered the goods. Why not? Because he did not have a lick of political/legislative/government experience when he became president.
President Biden cannot claim inexperience as his fallback in the event of failure. He served 36 years in the Senate and eight years as vice president in the Obama administration. Now, whether he succeeds in pushing infrastructure improvements over the finish line will depend on whether he brings his vast experience to bear.
If he does, great! If he doesn’t, he’ll need to tell us why he failed.
I expect that level of honesty from our president and I remain hopeful we’re going to get it from Joseph R. Biden.
Donald Trump’s post-presidential existence cannot possibly end well.
I say that without any knowledge of whether he will be indicted by two states that are pursuing criminal charges against him. Even if no indictments will be part of Trump’s future, my gut tells me he is likely to be scarred forever by the pursuit of the Fulton County, Ga., district attorney and the Manhattan DA up yonder in New York City.
The Fulton County DA is pursuing whether Trump violated state law by pressuring the Georgia secretary of state to “find” enough votes to swing the state’s 2020 presidential election result from favoring President Biden to favoring Trump. This investigation appears to be fairly straightforward and reasonably uncomplicated.
Fulton County DA Fani Willis is an experienced prosecutor and she has vowed to spare no effort in following the evidence that she will present to a grand jury which will decide whether to indict Trump.
The Manhattan case, led by Cyrus Vance Jr., is a whole lot more complicated. As I understand it, Vance is examining whether Trump violated campaign finance laws in paying off a porn star to keep quiet about a sexual liaison she and Trump allegedly had in 2006. Oh, and Trump denies it happened — but he paid her 130 grand anyway! Go figure. He’s even hired a prosecutor experienced in racketeering cases to help him make the case.
I cannot possibly know whether either prosecutorial team is going to bring formal charges against Trump.
However, my sense of understanding of how history looks back on political figures tells me that historians are going to judge Trump’s time since leaving office harshly. That prosecutors even are considering whether to file charges suggests to me that Trump will be scarred for life.
At least a good number of “checks” are showing up this weekend in Americans’ bank accounts, thanks to President Biden and his Democratic Party allies in Congress, who worked to enact the COVID relief package over the strenuous objections of their Republican “friends” and colleagues.
But wait a minute.
Now comes word from around the country that Republican members of the House and the Senate are trying to take credit for something they opposed. I hear, for instance, that Sen. Roger Wicker of Mississippi, one of the 50 Senate GOP “no” on the relief package, is heralding the benefit it will have on education in his state.
Yeah, keep talking Sen. Wicker. The voters in Mississippi ought to be wise to what’s up with him.
This kind of doublespeak occurs from time to time. Lawmakers who find themselves on the wrong side of public opinion look for ways to weasel their way into voters’ good graces. It turns out the COVID relief package totaling $1.9 trillion is quite popular with the masses out here. Eighty-plus percent of Democrats favor it and a slim majority of — gulp! — Republican voters look kindly on the government relief effort.
None of that swayed the GOP cultists in Congress to sign on.
However, here they are, trying to glom onto the benefits being sent out en masse to those who have been devastated by the coronavirus pandemic. They have lost their jobs, not to mention lost their loved ones, to the disease. The package provides unemployment relief for the next several months and seeks to lessen the misery that has befallen so many millions of us.
What’s more, President Biden spoke to us the other evening and implored Americans to help in steering the nation away from the effects of the virus. “I need you,” he implored, which I consider to be a marvelous about-face from the “I, alone, can fix it” mentality offered by Donald John Trump.
However, don’t be fooled by the GOP fools who are trying to hoodwink Americans into thinking they played some role in bringing this relief to beleaguered pandemic victims.
Imagine that the world’s most exclusive club — the men who have served as presidents of the United States — would erect a tree house to have their meetings.
I can picture them nailing a sign on the door that reads: No Soreheads Allowed. Or, how about No Seditionists Allowed?
Well, you get my point, I reckon.
The ex-presidents club now contains four men who’ve served in the nation’s highest office. The actual number of former POTUSes, though, is five. The most recent ex-president, Donald J. Trump, is likely to be permanently excluded from club meetings.
Former Presidents Obama, Clinton, Bush and Carter all have something in common that appears to be missing in Donald Trump. They love this country more than they love themselves. They also value the office to which they were elected.
Trump took office in January 2017 and immediately denigrated the service of all his predecessors. He spent his entire four years in office engaging in the type of self-aggrandizement that was the hallmark of his entire professional/adult life prior to running for public office.
Then came the climax of the hideous example he set. That was when he refused to accept that President Biden defeated him in 2020 and then incited the insurrection that erupted on the Sixth of January, causing the House of Representatives to impeach him for a second time.
The four active members of the Ex-Presidents Club — along with their wives — took part in a public service announcement touting the COVID relief legislation that Joe Biden managed to get approved through Congress. Donald and Melania Trump were nowhere to be seen or heard.
Don’t misconstrue my thoughts. I don’t give a rat’s a** about Donald Trump. I just mention all this because of the post-presidential scorn he is going to experience. It is unprecedented and to my way of understanding Donald Trump, there will be no way on Earth that he ever will redeem his shattered legacy.
