Tag Archives: Donald Trump

national news, political news

Once again: Trump didn’t win in a ‘landslide’

My head is exploding as I write these words.

The incoming White House chief of staff, Reince Priebus, has just said — twice, in fact! — that Donald J. Trump was elected “in a landslide” over Hillary Rodham Clinton on Nov. 8, 2016.

I am about to scream.

Trump was elected with 304 electoral votes; Clinton garnered 227 votes.

Clinton collected 2.8 million more popular votes than Trump.

Read my lips: That is not a landslide victory for the president-elect.

Priebus, appearing on ABC News’s “This Week” program, suffers from a form of selective amnesia. Yes, Trump won 30 of 50 states, as Priebus said; yes, again, he won “more counties” than any presidential winner since President Reagan in 1984.

However, we cannot cherry-pick certain barometers and use them to deliver a message that conflicts with reality.

I don’t question that Trump was elected. He won the states that he needed to win. He won more than enough Electoral College votes to be elected.

But if we’re going to pick and choose which criteria we want to cite, let’s try this: A switch of 175,000 votes in three swing states — Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania — and today we’d be getting ready for the inauguration of President-elect Clinton.

Landslide? Hell no!

national news, political news

Honeymoon? There is none for Trump

Have you ever seen a presidential transition that has hit as many land mines as the one that is about to conclude?

Donald J. Trump is going to become president of the United States with a public opinion approval rating in the 30s. Yes, that’s right: 30-plus percent of Americans approve of the 45th president. Meanwhile, the 44th president — Barack H. Obama — is about to leave the White House with an approval rating in the mid-50 percent range, which isn’t great, but it’s a damn sight better than what he was registering for much of his second term.

Presidential honeymoon period? There ain’t going to be one for Donald Trump.

Questions are piling onto questions about the new president. They include:

* Potential conflicts of interest involving his myriad business interests and the president-elect’s stubborn refusal to divest himself of the fortune he has amassed through real estate ventures around the world.

* Allegations of Russian spooks hacking into Democratic Party electronic files while looking for dirt to toss as that party’s presidential nominee, Hillary Rodham Clinton.

* The quality of some of Trump’s Cabinet nominees, such as the secretary of state-designate, Rex Tillerson, who is close to Russian President Vladimir Putin; housing secretary-designate Ben Carson, who once declared himself to unqualified to lead a federal agency; education secretary-designate Betsy DeVos, an avowed critic of public education; EPA administrator-designate Scott Pruitt, who detests the very agency he is being asked to oversee; attorney general-designate Jeff Sessions, who once was denied a federal judgeship because of his stated views on civil rights.

I am not predicting this will happen, but I won’t be surprised in the least if Donald Trump — somehow! — is unable to finish his term as president. There’s already dull roar developing about impeachment, given all the potential for missteps.

I have lived long enough to have witnessed a couple of presidential crises that tore the nation to pieces. The first of them came close to a presidential impeachment before President Nixon resigned during the Watergate crisis; the second of them occurred with an actual impeachment and Senate trial of President Clinton over a sexual relationship he had with a White House intern.

Tradition always has granted presidents a honeymoon period. They enter the Oval Office flush with high praise and hope. Donald Trump will have squandered that good feeling with his response to the criticism he has received. He tweets his rapid-fire reactions to seemingly every critical comment leveled at him.

So help me I am trying to give this guy some semblance of benefit.

Damn! I do not feel good about the presidential hand-off all of America is about to witness.

national news

Donald Trump: master of impeccable timing

I’ll admit that the irony of this got past me initially.

Then I read a piece from the Los Angeles Times: Donald Trump’s idiotic tweet about U.S. Rep./civil rights legend John Lewis is rife with irony because of its timing.

We’re entering the weekend in which we’re going to celebrate the birth of the great Martin Luther King Jr. — with whom Rep. Lewis marched during the height of the civil rights movement. Trump took the opportunity on this, of all weekends, to ridicule John Lewis as an “all talk, no action” kind of guy.

http://www.latimes.com/nation/politics/trailguide/la-na-trailguide-updates-in-a-weekened-celebrating-the-civil-1484407475-htmlstory.html?utm_content=buffer11bc9&utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter.com&utm_campaign=buffer

Lewis, in remarks to be broadcast Sunday, said he doesn’t consider Trump to be a “legitimate president.” He is deeply concerned about alleged Russian influence on the 2016 presidential election. I share his concern, but I do not consider Trump’s presidency to be illegitimate.

Still, Trump’s moronic response illustrates the utter tone deafness of the president-elect — who built his political career by perpetuating the myth that sought to delegitimize Barack Obama’s presidency by alleging he was born in a foreign land and, thus, was unable to serve as the nation’s first African-American president.

As the LA Times’ Cathleen Decker writes: “John Lewis is an icon of the civil rights movement who is fearless in the pursuit of justice and equality,” said Sen. Kamala Harris, the California Democrat. “He deserves better than this.”

https://highplainsblogger.com/2015/03/rep-lewis-still-stands-tall/

national news

Petulant POTUS-elect fires back at iconic lawmaker

I’ve already declared that I believe U.S. Rep. John Lewis’s declaration that Donald Trump is “not a legitimate president” went too far, that Trump is — in my view — legitimate.

So … what does Trump do? He responds to Lewis — perhaps the most legendary member of Congress — with a couple of tweets.

“Congressman John Lewis should spend more time on fixing and helping his district, which is in horrible shape and falling apart (not to……mention crime infested) rather than falsely complaining about the election results. All talk, talk, talk — no action or results. Sad!” Trump wrote in two tweets Saturday morning.

I want to repeat the ending: “All talk, talk, talk — no action or results. Sad!”

Good ever-lovin’ grief, man!

Given that the president-elect seems to know nothing about our history and the role that many brave men and women played in shaping it, I feel compelled to remind everyone that of all of Trump’s critics, John Lewis has more than earned his right to speak out.

http://www.politico.com/story/2017/01/trump-john-lewis-233630

He stood with the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. He marched with him across the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, Ala. He faced down racists, was beaten to within an inch of his life — on more than one occasion — while speaking out for the cause of equality for all Americans. He participated in boycotts, protests, marches, demonstrations.

For the president-elect — a man with zero public service experience — to denigrate a critic as renowned and beloved as Rep. Lewis is to yet again demonstrate his utter and absolute ignorance of an iconic figure’s stature.

national news, political news

IG takes aim at FBI boss

2 Comments

James Comey is under the microscope yet again.

The Justice Department’s inspector general is launching an investigation into the FBI director’s conduct in the days immediately preceding the 2016 presidential election.

At issue is whether Comey’s 11th-hour letter to Congress about Hillary Rodham Clinton’s e-mail controversy had a direct impact on the election outcome.

Clinton believes it did. Donald Trump, who won, is dismissing the impact of the letter. Wow! Imagine that.

http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/dems-outraged-with-comey-after-house-briefing/ar-AAlQa9c?li=BBmkt5R&ocid=spartandhp

What gives this upcoming probe its legs is that the IG works also for the Justice Department, the same agency that employs the FBI director.

Comey’s letter is believed by many to have stalled Clinton’s momentum in the final days of the campaign. Trump’s team contends that their guy was gaining momentum anyway and would have won with our without Comey’s intervention.

Of course, it should be noted that Comey said a few days after announcing he had sent the letter to Congress that his agency determined — as it had done in the summer of 2016 — that Clinton didn’t commit a crime in her handling of the e-mails.

The Clinton team, though, believes the damage had been done.

Comey has drawn intense and angry fire from congressional Democrats who believe his letter — which he revealed 11 days before the election — was directly responsible for Trump’s victory.

My hope for this probe is that Trump will let it go forward. If he calls off the DOJ dogs — or fires Comey — after he takes office, the president-elect will unleash yet another storm of suspicion that he has something to hide.

Let’s answer the question: Did the FBI director act improperly when he injected himself and his agency directly into an intense campaign for the presidency of the United States?

This inquiring mind wants to know. I am quite certain I am not alone.

national news, political news

Hold on, Rep. Lewis!

I have great respect and admiration for John Lewis, one of the most iconic members of the U.S. House of Representatives.

This brave and gallant man who was nearly beaten to death during the civil-rights marches of the 1960s, has not only survived, but he has become one of the great voices of Congress.

But he is getting way ahead of himself when he calls Donald J. Trump an “illegitimate” president.

Why is that? Rep. Lewis is concerned about the Russian involvement in our electoral process and allegations that Russian geeks/spooks sought to influence the outcome of the 2016 presidential election — in Trump’s favor.

http://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing-room/news/314234-john-lewis-trump-isnt-a-legitimate-president

Let’s hold on, sir!

I happen to share your distaste of Trump as a president. Believe me, I preferred the other major-party candidate over the Republican nominee. I also am concerned about the Russian involvement as confirmed by U.S. intelligence agencies.

However, nothing at all has been established about whether Russian hackers had any tangible impact on the outcome of the election. No one has proved that Russians tilted significant numbers of Americans to vote for Trump over Clinton.

I’ve never been prone to question the “legitimacy” of presidents elected in a controversial manner. I never once, not for a second, questioned President George W. Bush’s election in 2000 — even with the Supreme Court ruling and the fact that he got fewer popular votes than Al Gore. The U.S. Constitution worked as it was supposed to work in that election and Bush’s presidency was granted its legitimacy at that time.

Donald Trump won more Electoral College votes than Hillary Clinton. He, too, is a “legitimate” president-elect by virtue of collecting enough of the votes that count to be elected.

Unless someone can determine beyond a doubt that Russians — or some mysterious unknown intervener — actually had a tangible impact on the 2016 presidential election, then calling Trump’s presidency “illegitimate” is a major step too far.

Do I wish the outcome had been different? Absolutely! It wasn’t. Too bad for those of us who voted for someone else. I’m going to wait to see how this Russian-hacking probe plays out.

medical news

House prepares to burn Obamacare to the ground

I told you I would say something good about Donald J. Trump when the opportunity presents itself.

It just has.

The president-elect has admonished Republican members of Congress about whether they should repeal the Affordable Care Act without having a replacement law ready to go.

http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/us-house-republicans-to-vote-on-obamacare-repeal/ar-AAlQhoT?li=BBmkt5R&ocid=spartandhp

According to Reuters: “The president-elect, who takes office on Jan. 20, pressed lawmakers this week to repeal and replace it ‘essentially simultaneously.'”

Yes, Trump has applauded House members’ swift action to repeal the ACA. He’s also been mindful of the consequences of peeling away health insurance for 20 million Americans who have purchased coverage under the ACA.

It’s not as if congressional Republicans haven’t had time to cobble together a replacement plan. For six years, since the ACA was approved, the GOP has been harping and carping about the need to replace it — with something! House Republicans filed a lawsuit to repeal the ACA. They wrung their hands and griped out loud continually about an insurance law that was patterned — interestingly enough — after a Massachusetts law endorsed and pushed by Republican Gov. Mitt Romney.

House repeal doesn’t spell the end of the ACA. The repeal effort still has to jump through the Senate hoops, too.

However, the president-elect’s insistence that Congress have a replacement plan ready to go “simultaneously” is the more reasonable and humane approach.

medical news, national news, political news

Dr. Carson’s HUD nomination: most puzzling of all Trump’s picks

Of all the people nominated by Donald J. Trump to join the new president’s administration, the one that continues to puzzle me the most is his pick for secretary of housing and urban development.

Ben Carson ran against Trump and 15 others for the Republican Party presidential nomination in 2016. He ended up in the campaign-trail ditch right along with the rest of them.

Here are two elements that trouble me greatly.

Trump said some amazingly harsh things about Dr. Carson, a noted pediatric neurosurgeon who retired from his medical practice to become a politician. Carson returned the fire to the eventual GOP nominee. They went at each other with rhetorical brass knuckles.

Second — and this came from Carson’s own mouth — was that he declared himself unqualified to lead a Cabinet agency. His spokesmen said managing a massive federal bureaucracy didn’t fit into his skill set. After the election, Carson in effect took himself out of the Trump administration mix for the most straightforward reason possible: He admitted to being unable to do the job.

But then … ?

Trump picks him to run HUD! The nomination raised eyebrows all across the nation. Didn’t this fellow just say he couldn’t do the job? Didn’t the good doctor admit to being — essentially — unfit to become a Cabinet secretary?

Now he’s going to lead an agency that, among other things, tends to the needs of poor Americans who need government-subsidized public housing.

The brilliant doctor has no knowledge of how to oversee such a massive operation.

Dr. Carson is a brilliant man. I do not intend to disparage his intelligence. But holy cow, man! His learning curve is going to be steep, as in monstrously steep.

Is the doctor up to the task of learning how this agency works? I have to wonder.

media news

Trump-Media feud will poison the nation

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KdNjK4UoWxk

I was quite uncomfortable watching this exchange the other day between Donald J. Trump and a reporter for CNN.

It speaks so brightly to what we can expect from the next president of the United States. He called CNN a “fake news” organization because it reported on a story published by another media outlet regarding allegations that Trump has improper dealings with Russian government officials.

Oh … my!

Jim Acosta, the CNN reporter, sought to ask Trump a question after the president-elect had criticized CNN’s credibility and its newsgathering and reporting. He deserved to ask whatever question he wanted to pose and Trump needed to respond directly to whatever question Acosta would ask.

No. Instead, he chose to outshout the reporter and turn to someone else. This is not how you act “presidential,” Mr. President-elect.

military news

New defense boss breaks with commander in chief-to-be

Imagine that … the man picked to lead the Defense Department thinks Russia is our No. 1 worldwide adversary and he’s sounding a good bit more anti-Kremlin than the man who nominated him, Donald J. Trump.

What’s going on here? Sanity is breaking out within the budding Trump administration.

Trump’s CIA director-designate, Mike Pompeo, calls waterboarding a form of “torture” and says he would refuse to obey a direct order to invoke “enhanced interrogation” techniques on enemy captives. Trump campaigned on a pledge to restore waterboarding.

Now we hear from Defense Secretary-designate James Mattis, who tells us that Russia is our top adversary and that the United States should honor the nuclear arms-production agreement it struck with Iran. Let’s see: Trump is buddies with Vladimir Putin and he says he’ll tear up the Iran nuke treaty when he takes office.

Mattis isn’t too keen on either matter, he told the Senate Armed Services Committee.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/senate-set-to-question-trumps-pentagon-pick-veteran-marine-gen-james-mattis/2017/01/11/b3c6946a-d816-11e6-9a36-1d296534b31e_story.html?hpid=hp_hp-top-table-main_no-name%3Ahomepage%2Fstory&utm_term=.2af606a6369a

Mattis is a retired Marine Corps general with plenty of combat experience. The man is a plain-spoken, in-your-face general-grade officer.

He said this about the Iran nuclear deal: “I think it is in an imperfect arms control agreement — it’s not a friendship treaty. But when America gives her word, we have to live up to it and work with our allies.”

I’m beginning to believe Trump might be surrounding himself with at least a couple of reasonable minds on his national security team.

He will need their wise counsel. I hope the hothead/know-it-all/commander in chief chooses to heed it.