Tag Archives: Joe Biden

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Let’s await the ‘phony’ and ‘fraud’

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Mitt Romney told the nation midway through the 2016 presidential campaign all about Donald John Trump.

The 2012 Republican presidential nominee spelled it out in a 17-minute speech. He said Donald Trump is a “phony” and a “fraud.” Yet the 2016 GOP nominee won that year’s presidential election by offering phony promises and running on a fraudulent background.

Trump is going to try to sell a nation once more on the phony, fraudulent past and seek to persuade Americans that what they have seen and heard is part of some mysterious Deep State “fake news” media conspiracy.

The Republican National Convention will unfold Monday in Charlotte, N.C. It will be a virtual event just as the Democratic Convention turned out to be.

Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden awaits the nomination of Donald Trump, who is going to tell the nation that life is good on his watch, that his administration is conquering the coronavirus pandemic, that the economy is just swell, that the United States enjoys the respect of the rest of the world and that he is protecting our troops who are waging war against international terrorists.

It’ll all be lies. He will lie and lie again and again.

The most astonishing aspect of his lying will be that about 40 percent of voting public will believe every lie he tells.

Donald Trump’s fraudulent term as president has been brought into the sharpest relief possible.

The economic collapse caused by the pandemic has wiped out every bit of job growth we have experienced over the past decade. Our troops face additional threats abroad because of the bounties that Russians are paying to Taliban terrorists for every American they kill on battlefields in Afghanistan. The pandemic itself is continuing to sicken and kill Americans daily. Most of the rest of the industrialized world has contained the virus and world leaders now look at Americans with pity.

Get ready for the convention/clown show that will unfold in Charlotte. I will grit my teeth and recall that Mitt Romney pegged Donald Trump perfectly when he warned us of what we would get were he ever elected president.

If only all of us had paid attention.

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Words of wisdom

I want to share the following message on my blog. It comes from a well-known actor/director/social activist. He makes his case for voting for Joe Biden for president of the United States.

Take a look at it. It’s a nicely crafted essay. I’m out:

“I have a lot of vivid memories of growing up in Los Angeles in the 1940s, but one in particular keeps coming back to me today, in these troubled times. I remember sitting with my parents — actually, my parents were sitting; I was lying on the floor, the way kids do — and listening to President Franklin Delano Roosevelt talking to us over the radio. He was talking to the nation, of course, not just to us, but it sure felt that way. He was personal and informal, like he was right there in our living room.
I was too young to follow much of what he was saying — something about World War II. But what I did understand was that this was a man who cared about our well-being. I felt calmed by his voice. It was a voice of authority and, at the same time, empathy. Americans were facing a common enemy — fascism — and FDR gave us the sense that we were all in it together. Even kids like me had a role to play: participating in paper drives, collecting scrap metal, doing whatever we could do. That’s what it was like to have a president with a strong moral compass. It guided him, gave him direction, and helped him point the nation toward a better future.
Maybe this strikes you as simple nostalgia. I’ve got a touch of that, sure (who doesn’t right now?). But I’m too focused on the future to sit around pining for the old days. For me, the power of FDR’s example is what it says about the kind of leadership America needs — and can have again, if we choose it.
But one thing is clear: Instead of a moral compass in the Oval Office, there’s a moral vacuum. Instead of a president who says we’re all in it together, we have a president who’s in it for himself. Instead of words that uplift and unite, we hear words that inflame and divide. When someone retweets (and then deletes) a video of a supporter shouting “white power” or calls journalists “enemies of the state,” when he turns a lifesaving mask against contagion into a weapon in a culture war, when he orders the police and the military to tear gas peaceful protestors so he can wave a Bible at the cameras, he sacrifices — again and again — any claim to moral authority.
Another four years of this would degrade our country beyond repair. The toll it’s taking is almost biblical: fires and floods, a literal plague upon the land, an eruption of hatred that’s being summoned and harnessed, by a leader with no conscience or shame. Four more years would accelerate our slide toward autocracy. It would be taken as free license to punish more so-called “traitors” and wage more petty vendettas — with the full weight of the Justice Department behind them. Four more years would mean open season on our environmental laws. The assault has been ongoing — it started with abandoning the historic agreement that the world made in Paris to combat climate change, and continued, just last month, with using the pandemic as cover to let industries pollute as they see fit. Four more years would bring untold damage to our planet — our home.
America is still a world power. But in the past four years, it has lost its place as a world leader. A second term would embolden enemies and further weaken our standing with our friends.
When and how did the United States of America become the Divided States of America? Polarization, of course, has deep roots and many sources. President Donald Trump didn’t create all of our divisions as Americans. But he has found every fault line in America and wrenched them wide open.
Without a moral compass in the Oval Office, our country is dangerously adrift. But this November, we can choose another direction. This November, unity and empathy are on the ballot. Experience and intelligence are on the ballot. Joe Biden is on the ballot, and I’m confident he will bring these qualities back to White House.
I don’t make a practice of publicly announcing my vote. But this election year is different. And I believe Biden was made for this moment. Biden leads with his heart. I don’t mean that in a soft and sentimental way. I’m talking about a fierce compassion — the kind that fuels him, that drives him to fight against racial and economic injustice, that won’t let him rest while people are struggling.
As FDR showed, empathy and ethics are not signs of weakness. They’re signs of strength. I think Americans are coming back to that view. Despite Trump — despite his daily efforts to divide us — I see much of the country beginning to reunite again, the way it did when I was a kid. You can see it in the peaceful protests of the past several weeks — Americans of all races and classes coming together to fight against racism. You can see it the ways that communities are pulling together in the face of this pandemic, even if the White House has left them to fend for themselves.
These acts of compassion and kindness make our country stronger. This November, we have a chance to make it stronger still — by choosing a president who is consistent with our values, and whose moral compass points toward justice.”
– Robert Redford, July 8, 2020
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How to watch the RNC?

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It pains me greatly to ask this, but I must.

How in the world am I going to watch the Republican National Convention after having my spirits lifted from the Democratic National Convention?

The RNC is set to nominate the most loathsome individual I have seen in my lifetime to the office of president. They anointed Donald Trump their party’s nominee in 2016 and then he surprised practically every political pundit/analyst/observer on Earth by actually winning the election.

He is likely to deliver the same hideous sort of speech late in the week when he accepts the nomination a second time. The speakers will seek to paint this individual as something he most certainly is not: a statesman, a leader. He is nothing of the sort.

Indeed, when Democratic nominee Joe Biden pledged on Thursday to be a “president for all Americans,” my mind drifted immediately to the horror being brought at this moment to our friends and family members in California. Fires are threatening lives up and down the state.

Where is Donald Trump’s expression of support? When has he said he would devote all federal help possible to assist those Americans? Trump does not see himself, in my view, as their president. He is president only to the base that stands with him and his ghastly pronouncements.

I’ve never had to deal with this immense gulf between candidates of opposing parties competing for the presidency. To be candid, it makes me quite uncomfortable.

In 2008 and again in 2012, I watched the RNC with considerable interest as the GOP nominated, respectively, two fine men with stellar records of public service: the late John McCain and Mitt Romney.

In 2000 and 2004, I was able to watch the RNC nominate George W. Bush.

It is remarkable, indeed, to think that President Bush and Gov. Romney, two of the GOP’s three most recent nominees will not take part in this year’s virtual convention. Sen. McCain, were he around, certainly would want to stay far away from any political event having to do with Donald Trump.

I’ll suck it up and watch at least part of the RNC that’s coming up. However, I might have to clear the room of any objects I could throw at my TV.

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Birtherism takes new twist

The remarks of a desperate man are to be taken seriously, because there’s no tellin’ precisely what might fly out of his mouth.

Donald Trump went to Scranton, Pa., this week and offered a truly bizarre twist to the “birtherism” theory that has become all the rage — yet again — among right-wing politicians.

He said, according to the Huffington Post:

“He’d say he was born here,” Trump told listeners in Scranton. “But he left when he was like 8, 9 or 10. So he left 68 years ago, he left — a long time ago. So I view it differently. He wasn’t born here. He abandoned Scranton!”

Trump conceded: “His family had something to do with that, you know, his parents. But he left Scranton.”

Trump is talking about Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden, who was born in Scranton, but left when his family moved to neighboring Delaware. Biden is proud of his Scranton roots and he mentions it often while campaigning for president.

But what the hell is up with Trump suggesting that Biden might not have been born there?

Someone might need to take Trump’s temperature. His desperation might be getting to him.

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Watched this boy with empathy

I couldn’t help but feel my heart pounding hard as I watched a 13-year-old boy tell the world about the kindness extended to him by Democratic Party presidential nominee Joe Biden.

Brayden Harrington has a stuttering issue he must confront every day. He delivered his remarks with supreme courage during the virtual Democratic Party Convention this week. He got most of his remarks out without a hitch. Not all of it, though.

Biden overcame a stuttering issue as he was coming of age. He would read poetry, forming words carefully to avoid getting caught up in a stutter. I admire his courage, too, in fighting through the debilitating impediment. I also will pray for the future progress of young Brayden as he makes his way through life.

I also would tell him, if given the chance, that he must prepare himself for more of the mistreatment I am certain he has endured already from his peers. I won’t call them his “friends,” because real friends wouldn’t subject him to the bullying and humiliation he likely will experience … and has experienced already.

I know how it goes. I felt it, too. I once had a serious stuttering problem. I cannot say it is totally eradicated. Words still trip me up on rare occasions. As a teenager — indeed, well into my high school years — I struggled with speaking, particularly in front of large groups of people.

Two of my classmates in high school heard me once stumble while trying to say my own last name during a class project. They just split a gut, man! For the rest of my high school years these two fellows would mimic that moment of supreme embarrassment.

Well, that was then. The here and now is quite different. I have conquered that demon … more or less. Oh, those two guys? One of them is now deceased. I saw the other one at my 50-year high school reunion in 2017. We chatted amicably as if nothing ever happened during the bad old days. I hope he reads this blog and recognizes himself in it.

Hey, I don’t hold any hard feelings toward him now. I damn sure did back then.

So, I salute young Brayden Harrington for standing before the entire world and speaking out on behalf of a politician who knows the battle he is enduring.

Could I ever do such a thing when I was 13 years of age?

Not on your life!

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Final report is in: Russia attacked us!

I guess you can file this in the “Better Late Than Never” category of official government findings.

The U.S. Senate Intelligence Committee, the panel run by a Republican Party majority, has concluded what many of us knew already: Russia attacked our electoral system in 2016 seeking to aid in the election of Donald J. Trump.

It is a bipartisan finding. It lends credence to the assertions delivered by special counsel Robert Mueller III, who told us in 2019 that Russia attacked us and that they will do so again this year. The report confirms all of that.

It also puts to rest any phony denial — supported by Trump — that Russia didn’t do what has been alleged all along.

Recall that Trump stood next to Russian dictator Vladimir Putin and openly dismissed reports from our intelligence experts that Russia had interfered in our 2016 presidential election. He sided with his pal, Vlad, standing before the entire world.

The Senate Intelligence Committee’s report now has put to rest any notion that Trump might try to foist on us that the Russia probe was a “hoax,” a “witch hunt,” or a fishing expedition.

It was none of any of those things. Indeed, the Senate findings also suggest that there was, indeed, “collusion” between the Trump campaign and the Russian goons who hacked into our electoral system. Does that sound like “exoneration”? Not to me!

CNN reports: The report is all the more remarkable because it was led by then-Senate Intelligence Chairman Richard Burr, a North Carolina Republican, and Democratic Sen. Mark Warner of Virginia. The report provides an exhaustive, bipartisan confirmation of the contacts between Russians and Trump associates in 2016 — and it was the only congressional committee that managed to avoid the partisan infighting that plagued the other congressional investigations into Russian election meddling.

What do we do with this report? It will remind me — just a chump voter and blogger who happens to be an American patriot — of the corrupt nature of Donald Trump’s political team … then and now.

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Let’s not get ahead of ourselves

Stories like the one published today by Politico give me the heebie-jeebies.

It talks about how Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden already is forming a “government” and speculates on who might fill key Cabinet posts.

Read the story here.

Why the nervous jerks? Why am I sweating bullets? It’s easy to answer.

Donald Trump is capable of doing damn near anything to pilfer this election, to do whatever it takes to win.

I get that Politico is merely reporting what it learns, which is that former VP Biden is beginning to look beyond the election coming up in 70-some days. I just dread the prospect of Trump finding a way to win a second term and effectively destroying the nation that we have come to know, revere and cherish.

When I say “destroy” the nation, I am not suggesting he is going to torch the White House, burn down the Capitol, throw out the Supreme Court. I do intend to suggest that Trump will leave a virtually indelible imprint on the institutional framework of the government crafted by the framers. And I don’t like what I have seen so far.

I don’t like the massive rush toward environmental deregulation; I don’t like his federal court appointments; I detest his effort to dismantle the Affordable Care Act; I hate the manner in which he has isolated this nation from the rest of the shrinking world; and I damn sure hate the way he makes out with dictators and disparages our intelligence network.

Accordingly, I want him defeated as much as the next guy. Maybe more than the next guy. Which makes me nervous as hell when I read about Joe Biden forming a “government.”

The former vice president has to pour every bit of energy he has into defeating Donald Trump. Then he can take the next step, which is to form a government that can repair the damage that Trump has inflicted on our republic.

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One man mocked; the other man helped

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It was a moment during the Democratic National (virtual) Convention that to me spoke volumes about the differences between Joe Biden and Donald Trump.

Biden featured a young man, Brayden Harrington, who had a terrible stuttering problem. The former vice president also conquered a stuttering handicap he had a child. Biden reached out to the youngster, lent him his emotional support and helped him fight off the debilitating handicap.

On Thursday, the youngster appeared in a brief video that meant to call attention to the empathy and compassion that is part of Joe Biden’s makeup, part of what drives him daily. “About a  few months ago, I met him in New Hampshire and he told me we are members of the same club. We stutter,” Brayden said, stumbling over his words.

The other picture you see here is taken from a 2016 campaign appearance in which Trump mocked a disability suffered by a New York Times reporter, Serge Kovaleski. He mimicked the reporter in hideous fashion. The social media image has gone viral and it speaks to the ghastly impulse that too often overtakes Trump, who has no discernible empathy or compassion bone in his body.

I thought I would share these thoughts just to remind you of the choice we all get to make this fall as we elect the president of the United States.

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No tweets from Joe during RNC?

I am going to express a fond hope for the next week while Republicans nominate Donald Trump for another term as president of the United States.

It is that Democratic presidential nominee Joseph Biden will refrain from launching into Twitter tantrums as Trump keeps telling lies while the party nominates him.

Trump, of course, was busier than the dickens this week as Democrats conducted their virtual nominating conviction. Each tweet demonstrated Trump’s smallness, his pettiness, his petulance. I get that the individual has 80 million Twitter followers — give or take — and he’s mastered the medium as a way to make policy statements even when they surprise his own senior staff.

Biden is wired differently, or so it seems. He’s a good bit more thoughtful than Trump, which well could mean that he’ll be discreet and patient before making a public policy statement via Twitter.

That’s my hope, at least, while much of the nation watches the RNC do its job.

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Way to go, Joe

I am joining the chorus of Joe Biden supporters to declare that Thursday night’s presidential nomination acceptance speech, while perhaps not a grand slam home run, could pass as a stand-up triple.

I am giving the Democratic presidential nominee credit for stepping up his game, for offering a glimpse into the future he foresees if he gets elected president and for reminding us — without overdoing the rancor — that Donald Trump has failed in his primary mission as president, which is to protect Americans.

The former vice president had a big hurdle to clear. It was erected the previous night by vice presidential nominee Kamala Harris and, of course, by former President Barack Obama and their respective speeches to the nation.

Biden cleared the hurdle. I am more than satisfied with how he comported himself and how he delivered an important message to those of us who wanted to hear what the nominee had to say.

My major takeaway? Joe Biden intends to lead us out of the darkness and into the light.

Even on his best days, Donald Trump cannot stop alleging that America has lost its way, that we no longer were great, strong and economically healthy when he took office. Trump has told those myriad lies for too long.

Joe Biden reminded us that the pandemic needed Trump’s attention from the very beginning. As a result of his early denials of the seriousness of the COVID crisis, we have lost too many American lives and seen too many more infected by the killer virus.

Trump and the Republicans get their turn next week. They, too, will conduct a virtual convention, with Trump set to accept his party’s nomination with a speech delivered from the White House.

I’ll state it once more: My mind is made up. There is no way on God’s precious and fragile Earth that Trump will earn my support. However, I intend to watch the Republican show if only to see how they intend to defend the indefensible … which is Donald Trump’s record in the only public office he ever had sought.