Tag Archives: Barack Obama

national news, political news

Trump, Obama now have become BFFs?

obama-and-trump

Donald J. Trump is making my head spin.

The man who demonized President Barack Obama as someone who wasn’t elected legitimately because he was born somewhere other than the United States now is seeking his immediate predecessor’s advice on Cabinet picks?

Is that what I’m hearing?

Trump told “Today Show” host Matt Lauer this morning that he and the president are getting along famously these days. He’s consulting with him. He considers the president to be a “terrific guy.”

http://www.politico.com/story/2016/12/trump-obama-consultation-cabinet-232304

Wow, man! I get that politics often is a contact sport. I also get that political foes can put past hostilities aside. The president-elect, though, is having to do so on many fronts.

House Speaker Paul Ryan called Trump’s statements about Muslims “racist.” Now he and Trump are speaking daily, Ryan said. The 2012 Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney said Trump is a “fraud,” a “phony,” a “con man.” Now he is considered a frontrunner to become secretary of state in the Trump administration.

The president-elect’s relationship with the president?

Trump was one of the leaders of the “birther” movement. He sought to turn Obama into some kind of pretend president. Then he said in a single sentence that the president was “born in the United States. Period.”

That makes it all better?

I am having trouble believing it. Just as I am having trouble believing Mitt now no longer considers Trump to be a fraud, phony and a con man.

Suppose it’s all true, however. I guess it only demonstrates what we think of politicians, which is that they rarely tell us what’s truly in their heart, that it’s all just so much baloney.

national news, political news

Obama critics won’t stop name-calling, either

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It’s going to be a difficult transition for many millions of Americans from the Obama presidency to the Trump presidency.

I totally am in that camp. I’m one of those Americans who’s going to have a tough time making that switch.

Yes, some critics of this blog — and some acquaintances of mine — have questioned why I keep commenting negatively about Donald J. Trump. “Move on,” they say. “Get over it,” they admonish me.

Well, OK. I will get over it. I will move on … eventually.

Perhaps I should offer a deal for those critics to ponder. How about many of them stop hurling epithets at the current president?

I don’t associate with those who’ve been amazingly harsh toward Barack Obama, his lovely wife Michelle — and even those precious and beautiful daughters of theirs, Malia and Sasha.

You no doubt have heard some of the hate that has spewed forth against the first family. Much of it is based on the president’s policies. Much of it also is based on more visceral feelings.

Let’s not pussyfoot around here. There has been a racial component to the criticism against the first family. No, I am not pointing the accusatory finger at all the critics. Those who’ve said things publicly through social media, though, have conducted a shameful smear campaign against  the president and his family.

Will I be able eventually to accept fully the election of Donald J. Trump as president of the United States? I am going to make every effort possible to do so.

But I won’t be badgered, pestered or browbeaten into doing so by those who have kept yammering negatively against the current president over matters that transcend public policy.

It’s not that I intend to deliberately return what others have flung at the man Trump is succeeding as president. Those who have said many ugly and hurtful things, though, need to understand that some of these wounds will take time to heal.

So, if some of us continue to complain out loud — and vociferously — about the policies being proposed by the current president, I’ll offer this response: Get over it!

International news, military news, national news, political news

Get rid of Flynn as national security adviser

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flynn

President George W. Bush was quite adamant when we went to war in 2001 against radical Islamic terrorists that we were not going to war against Islam.

President Barack Obama has echoed that mantra ever since.

So, who does the president-elect bring in as national security adviser, the guy who’ll advise him on how to fight groups such as al-Qaeda and the Islamic State? A retired Army three-star general who calls Islam a “cancer” and says Americans’ fear of Islam is “rational.”

Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn, moreover, apparently has ties with multiple foreign governments.

Flynn is now the target of groups asking Donald J. Trump to rescind Flynn’s appointment as national security adviser. They cite concerns over Flynn’s statements about Islam, Iran and whether his views would jeopardize a hoped-for peaceful settlement of the ongoing dispute between Israel and the Palestinian Authority.

http://www.politico.com/story/2016/12/michael-flynn-trump-appointment-advocacy-groups-232208

I don’t expect the president-elect to heed their call.

Indeed, Flynn is a noted hothead. He’s a brilliant military tactician. He also has the kind of personality that would clash immediately and often with the likes of retired Marine Corps Gen. James Mattis, who is Trump’s pick to be the secretary of defense; I will add that Gen. Mattis is a well-chronicled hothead himself, someone known to speak his mind freely.

The issue, though, is Flynn and whether he’s a good fit to become national security adviser.

The advocacy groups asking Trump to rethink his appointment believe he is a terrible fit.

I happen to agree.

The national security adviser is a staff position and, thus, is not subject to Senate confirmation. Gen. Flynn’s status rests solely with the president he would serve.

Get rid of him, Mr. President-elect.

International news, military news

No apology coming for Pearl Harbor attack? It should

abe-obama

That settles that issue, I guess.

Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe is coming to the United States late this month for a state visit with President Obama.

He won’t apologize for what his forebears did on Dec. 7, 1941. You see, Abe will be at the place where the United States was drawn into World War II. He’ll visit Pearl Harbor, Hawaii. He’ll likely tour the USS Arizona Memorial. He’ll get to hear about the suffering brought to the men who are entombed in the shattered remains of the ship that still rest at the bottom of the harbor.

As the Associated Press reported: Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga said that ‘the purpose of the upcoming visit is to pay respects for the war dead and not to offer an apology.'”

Frankly, I wish he would at least offer an expression of regret.

We’ll learn in due course whether he changes his mind.

President Obama visited Hiroshima, Japan earlier this year. He didn’t apologize, either, for the atomic bomb that President Truman ordered dropped on that city. Then again, I don’t believe an apology — in that instance — was warranted. The Japanese started the fight with the sneak attack on our forces at Pearl Harbor; we finished it with the bombs dropped on Hiroshima and, three days later, on Nagasaki.

Abe’s circumstance, of course, is much different. He represents a government that in an earlier era talked to American diplomats about seeking peace while plotting an act of war.

He need not grovel. He need not beg for forgiveness. Indeed, U.S.-Japan relations are stronger than ever at this moment seven decades after the two nations’ forces fought each other to the death throughout the Pacific Theater of Operations.

http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/japanese-leader-abe-wont-apologize-at-pearl-harbor/ar-AAl9oyg?li=BBnbfcL

He’ll emphasize the “reconciliation” that has occurred. That’s fine. We all know that it is strong.

The act of war that precipitated the era of good feelings that followed, however, ought to require a statement of contrition from the leader of the government that caused all that senseless carnage in the first place.

national news

New president might face huge intraparty hurdle

mcconnel-and-trump

Donald Trump has good reason to smile.

He won the presidency over someone thought to be the prohibitive favorite. He is now selecting members of his team … to mixed reviews to be sure. Hey, what difference does it make? He won the election.

Now comes the sternest of tests for the new president. He has to govern alongside the very members of Congress he disparaged whenever he could; he demonized them; he called them names, such as “loser.”

I’m not talking about Democrats, mind you. I’m talking about Republicans who control both congressional chambers.

They’re grinning these days, too. I’m not sure whether they’re happy to be working with a fellow Republican (In Name Only) or whether they’re anticipating being able to stick it to the guy who called them all those nasty names.

http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2016/12/republican-party-obstructionism-victory-trump-214498

The Politico story attached to this post talks about how the Republicans’ strategy of “no” worked so well against President Obama. It also reminds us of how that strategy enabled them to win back the House of Representatives in 2010, the Senate in 2014 and now the White House in 2016.

Who do they get as president? The guy from within Republican ranks who ran against them!

All this sets up an interesting dichotomy for Republicans, many of whom are those “establishment” types who don’t trust Trump as being truly one of them.

It’s a given, of course, that Democrats who detest Trump are going to do all they can to stop anything the new president wants to do — much like Republicans sought to do when Barack Obama arrived in the Oval Office. The Politico article reminds us that the president got his $800 billion economic stimulus package approved in 2009 with virtually zero GOP support.

How is Trump going to cope with those Republicans who will resist him on, say, his enormous proposed infrastructure project? They keep telling us the Treasury doesn’t have the money.

I guess Trump could remind them that they didn’t have the money to go to war against al-Qaeda and the Taliban in 2001, but they did — while approving tax cuts proposed by President Bush. My guess is that GOP leaders in the House and Senate wouldn’t like to hear such a thing coming from one of their own.

We talked during the length of the election campaign that we were entering a new era. This would be the most unconventional election in history. That presumed a Hillary Clinton victory, for crying out loud.

The other person won. Let’s get ready for the most unconventional governance in U.S. history.

My often-trusty trick knee tells me the Republicans who run Capitol Hill might try to wipe the smile off Donald Trump’s face.

business news, national news, political news

Jobless rate falls; look for the critics to chime in

jobseeking

The U.S. Department of Labor has just released its latest job report.

The nation added 178,000 private-sector jobs in November. The unemployment rate fell to 4.6 percent. Both numbers were better than economists had forecasted.

Good news, yes? Well, not exactly. That depends on a single political factor, or so it seems: your political persuasion.

President Barack Obama has overseen an astounding string of consecutive months with job growth: the count now stands at 81 months. When he took office in January 2009, the nation was shedding three-quarters of a million jobs a month; we were in the midst of that worldwide economic/financial collapse, if memory serves.

Jobs are up.

The jobless rate is down to 4.6 percent. That’s the lowest since the days of the Clinton administration.

Good news, yes?

http://www.msn.com/en-us/money/markets/stock-futures-mostly-flat-after-jobs-report-beats-expectations/ar-AAl2Dyb?li=BBnbfcN

Hold on! Not quite. Obama critics cite something called the “workplace participation rate.” That includes a metric that measures the number of people looking for work. When the jobless rate falls to this kind of level, the critics suggest that’s a symptom of folks who no longer are “participating” in the job search.

Thus, the good news becomes bad news … according to the critics.

There used to be a time when you could measure joblessness and economic health using the number of jobs being created and the rate of unemployment.

Jobs are up. Joblessness is down.

That’s no longer good enough.

My head is spinning.

national news, political news

Voter math is the same, no matter how you spin it

avote

I’m having some fun rattling the cages of my friends on the right by reminding them that Hillary Rodham Clinton has a significant — and growing — lead in the popular vote over Donald J. Trump.

They, of course, remind me — correctly, of course — that Trump won the votes that actually elect the president, the Electoral College.

Now comes a new spin that is born out of an old one. They are reminding me that Trump won many more counties across the country, that Hillary’s votes were gathered in the large urban areas — such as Los Angeles, Chicago, New York. They also seem to infer that because her votes are clustered in the larger metro areas that they somehow are less representative, or even less legitimate, than the vast expanse of territory that Trump was able to claim on Election Day.

Hold that thought!

Mitt Romney also won more counties than President Obama in 2012; but the president corralled 5 million more votes than his challenger. Sen. John McCain also won the vast majority of counties in 2008, but Sen. Obama piled up nearly 10 million more votes than McCain.

And yes, we heard much the same refrain from the losers in both those elections: Sure, Obama won, but Romney/McCain each carried more actual real estate than Barack Obama.

Sure thing, but human beings cast votes. More of them voted for Obama than they did for either of his presidential challengers.

I need no reminders that Trump’s victory was forged in Rural America. He turned out the rural vote precisely to counteract the large urban vote that Clinton was sure to get. It turns out that his rural vote outnumbered Clinton’s urban vote — in the states that mattered. I refer to those swing states that voted twice for President Obama.

However, I refuse to accept the notion that Clinton’s popular vote is somehow de-legitimized because of where her massive vote totals are being compiled.

“We are” — as the young state senator from Illinois reminded us during his keynote speech at the 2004 Democratic National Convention in Boston — “the United States of America.” We aren’t divided into political parties, said state Sen. Barack Obama. We are one nation, undivided and united, he said.

So it is that our votes all count the same. Whether they are come from large cities or small farming communities, they all are tabulated together.

Thus, Hillary Clinton’s popular margin — sitting currently at 2.5 million — is the product of a targeted effort to boost turnout in strong Democratic bases within our cities, it remains irrefutably a national total.

Donald Trump has been elected president. I accept Americans’ electoral verdict. I don’t like it, but it’s what we’re going to get.

Accordingly, it would do the other side just as well to accept the notion that while Trump won where it counted the most, Hillary Clinton — and those who voted for her — still command a significant voice of opposition to the policies that the new president is about to drop on the nation’s lap.

International news, military news, national news

Mattis at Pentagon? Not as bad as some others

mattis

James Mattis is Donald J. Trump’s pick to be defense secretary.

OK, from my perch here in the middle of the country, the retired Marine Corps four-star general looks to be not as bad as some of the other selections the president-elect has made to fill out his Cabinet.

He is just four years on from hanging up his greens, which means Congress will have to enact a law that gives him a waiver from existing law; current statute requires a seven-year interim between military and civilian service. Congress waived the requirement when General of the Army George C. Marshall was picked by President Eisenhower to be secretary of state.

Gen. Mattis has gotten some high marks. According to the Washington Post: “The president-elect is smart to think about putting someone as respected as Jim Mattis in this role,” said a former senior Pentagon official. “He’s a warrior, scholar and straight shooter — literally and figuratively. He speaks truth to everyone and would certainly speak truth to this new commander in chief.”

The new president will need some truth-tellers in his inner circle. I would hope that Mattis provides that role.

Mattis is a former head of the Central Command and has extensive experience plotting military strategy in the Middle East. He’s a tough dude.

He’s also a blunt talker who’s spoken ill of the nuclear deal hammered out by the Obama administration that seeks to prevent Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons.

http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/trump-has-chosen-retired-marine-gen-james-mattis-for-secretary-of-defense/ar-AAl18p1?li=BBnb7Kz

Still, I kind of like this selection as defense boss. Mattis is far superior for this post than Betsy DeVos is for education secretary, Jeff Sessions is for attorney general and — oh, perish the thought — Sarah Palin could be if Trump picks her to head the Department of Veterans Affairs.

It is rather fascinating, though, that an individual who said he knows “more about ISIS than the generals, believe me,” would pick one of those generals to lead the nation’s military establishment and, thus, carry the fight to the Islamic State.

My strong hunch is that Trump doesn’t know more about ISIS than Gen. James Mattis.

national news, political news

Palin emerges in Trump Cabinet search … finally!

aaky9hd

Therrrre she is!

Sarah Palin has come out of hiding. The former half-term Alaska governor — and 2008 Republican vice-presidential nominee — now might be in the running for a spot in Donald J. Trump’s Cabinet.

For what post, you might ask? Secretary of Veterans Affairs.

And what, you also might ask, are Gov. Palin’s qualifications for that post? About the only thing I can come up with is that her son served a couple of tours during the Iraq War, then came home and got arrested on weapons charges, to which he pleaded guilty. Palin then blamed the Obama administration for ignoring veterans’ health care issues and suggested that was the cause of her son’s legal troubles.

There you have it. That’s all the qualification the president-elect might need in this highly critical position.

http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/trump-may-consider-sarah-palin-for-va-secretary-source-tells-nbc/ar-AAkY9HF?li=BBnb7Kz

Palin has not distinguished herself since she and Sen. John McCain lost the 2008 presidential election to Sens. Barack Obama and Joe Biden. She has starred in her own reality TV show, been a contributor to the Fox News Channel, been the subject of some gossip tabloids, watched a few of her kids get into trouble with the law.

My biggest concern for the president-elect, if he’s seriously considering Palin to head the Department of Veterans Affairs, is whether she’ll “go rogue” in the manner she did while running as Sen. McCain’s VP running mate.

We keep hearing how Trump doesn’t much cotton to subordinates stealing his thunder. The way I see it, Palin has made a bit of a habit of doing that very thing.

Still, the idea that Trump might even be thinking about placing Palin in his Cabinet suggests — to me, at least — that the GOP talent pool available to the president-elect is mighty thin.

national news, political news

Yep, Trump is ‘my president’ … for better or worse

trump-wins

I’m hearing some troubling notions from those who voted on the losing side of a presidential election.

Donald J. Trump, some of them are saying, “is not my president. I didn’t vote the guy and he ain’t my president.”

At the risk of sounding sanctimonious and self-righteous, I’d like to offer a rebuke to that sentiment.

I didn’t vote for him, either. I detest the notion that he is about to become the 45th president of the United States. My visceral loathing of him is deeper than anything I’ve felt for any of his predecessors.

He is my president, though.

Why? Because as president he will offer policy prescriptions that affect every American. I’m one of ’em.

I intend to fight him whenever I can through this blog. It’s my right as an American to speak my mind and to protest what my government is doing. I will do so vigorously when the moment presents itself — and so far, those moments are coming with stunning frequency.

Trump is my president, nevertheless.

This “ain’t my president” mantra is far from new. Republicans/conservatives yapped the same nonsense when Barack Obama was elected in 2008 and re-elected in 2012. Democrats/liberals yammered the same lame refrain when George W. Bush was elected in 2000 and re-elected in 2004. You can go back as far as you want in history and dig up statements from those who said the very same thing about past presidents.

Me? My inclination — no matter the outcome — has been to accept the result. I might not endorse it. Sure, I’ve swallowed hard plenty since the Nov. 8 election. I’ve done so before.

I won’t, though, accept the idea that the man who’s about to take the oath of office isn’t my president.

I detest the notion of Trump having the word “President” stated and/or written with his name. I also reserve the right to be critical — even harshly so — of my president.