Tag Archives: Donald Trump

national news

Too early to assess Trump’s place in history

Leave a comment

Let me be crystal clear on a key point: Although I remain a fierce critic of Donald Trump in his role as president, I am not going to join many other critics in assigning his place in history among all the men who have served in the office.

Why not? Because I am willing to give the guy the tiniest benefit of the tiniest smidgen of doubt as to where he will end up.

The guy still has three years to go before he is shown the door out of the White House for the final time. He isn’t likely to don the statesman’s garb and act like a president. Events, though, could break in this guy’s favor.

There could be a peace agreement that ends the Russia-Ukraine war. There could be a treaty hammered out between Israel and Hamas, ending the siege in Gaza. China and other industrialized giant nations could find a way to end the burgeoning trade war that Trump launched with his tariffs on everything we import into the United States.

Whatever role Trump might play in all of this remains to be seen.

His utterly callous remarks in the wake of Rob and Michele Reiners’ murder were too much for many critics. I agree that Trump demonstrated a level of crassness that defies description. Many critics have gone on social media to declare Trump to be the worst president in U.S. history as a result.

I don’t expect any of what I have to might actually occur.

However …

They might take place. With that I am going to withhold final judgment just in case.

media news, national news

Right-wing response has been laughable

Leave a comment

Our friends on the right wing of the political spectrum make my stomach turn with laughable excuses for why some of them seemingly justify Donald Trump’s hideous statement on the stabbing murders of Rob and Michele Reiner.

Some of them have speculated that the left’s response to the assassination of conservative influencer Charlie Kirk has given them justification to make crass comments out loud about the Reiners’ murder.

Let me be clear about something. Many GOP pols have criticized Trump’s response as being “callous,” “unpresidential,” “beyond the pale,” and “just plain wrong.” Some of the critics have been longtime MAGA supporters of Trump, such as Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene … who’s now on Trump’s sh** list of former friends turned foe.

I just will add this. The president of the United States should always exercise restraint and good judgment when deciding to comment on matters such as the murder of celebrities whose fame spans the globe. Rob Reiner was an acclaimed filmmaker, director, actor, producer and, yes, a political provocateur. He despised Trump and said so regularly.

That was his right, as guaranteed under the free speech clause in the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. Believe it not, the president of the United States, by virtue of his very title, really isn’t entitled to speak as openly as Trump frequently does about his political opponents. Sure, he can do so without being prosecuted. However, custom simply means that just because he can do something that he really shouldn’t do it.

Trump crossed an important line of demarcation with that ghastly message sent out over Truth Social. One critic of this blog suggested to me that someone on POTUS’s staff likely wrote it and published it. Well, it still went out over Trump’s name and Donald Trump has seized control of its message.

It just goes to show what kind of individual this nation has elected to its most revered public office.

national news

I called my congressman and …

Leave a comment

Well, today I did something I don’t normally do and I am hoping to get a response from the fellow who represents me in Congress.

I don’t expect a personal message from Keith Self, a McKinney Republican. I merely want him to do as I have asked … which is to condemn Donald Trump for the hideous message he sent on Truth Social about the deaths of Rob Reiner and his wife, Michele. The cops have arrested one of the Reiners’ children and charged him with murder in the stabbing deaths of his parents.

I called Self today to ask him to speak out against the president’s ghastly, tasteless remarks about the death of the iconic filmmaker and his wife. Rob Reiner has been a vocal and stern critic of Trump, so I guess Trump must have felt justified in accusing Reiner of suffering from an acute case of “Trump derangement syndrome.”

Self has been one of the quiet men of Congress. He backs Trump to the hilt legislatively and politically. He is not known as a man who hogs the microphone. He ought to grab one now and tell the world what many of us already believe, which is that Trump’s remarks were cruel beyond measure.

I want to extend a word of thanks to the young staffer who took my call. She listened to my brief rant, and responded with a polite “I understand what you are saying.” She promised that Rep. Self will get my message. That’s all I want, for him to know that one of his constituents is mad as hell.

crime news

Trump denigrates Reiner’s memory

Leave a comment

ruth be told, I cannot bring myself to offer any analysis of the hideous message Donald Trump posted on the deaths of Rob and Michelle Reiner.

It was ghastly, profoundly boorish, stated in the worst taste imaginable. I will share it here. You be the judge: “Rob Reiner, a tortured and struggling, but once very talented movie director and comedy star, has passed away, together with his wife, Michele, reportedly due to the anger he caused others through his massive, unyielding, and incurable affliction with a mind crippling disease known as TRUMP DERANGEMENT SYNDROME. He was known to have driven people CRAZY by his raging obsession of President Donald J. Trump, with his obvious paranoia reaching new heights as the Trump Administration surpassed all goals and expectations of greatness, and with the Golden Age of America upon us, perhaps like never before. May Rob and Michele rest in peace!”
national news, political news

Trump = racism, cruelty

Leave a comment

Donald J. Trump’s penchant for racist and cruel rhetoric was on full display this week and as usual, it was an ugly sight to see and an even uglier message to hear.

The president of the United States of America took particular aim at a member of Congress. She is Ilhan Omar, a Minnesota Democrat who emigrated to the United States from Somalia when she was a girl. She became a naturalized American and then a few years ago decided to delve into public service by running for a seat in the U.S. House of Representatives.

Trump has called her garbage. He labels her place of birth a “shithole country.” He wants her deported. He said Somalia is known only for corruption, violence, disease.

Trump’s moronic rant cannot be allowed to stand. Yet his Republican allies in Congress sit on their hands, keep their lips zipped tight and let the POTUS hurl epithets at a woman who chose to move to the Land of Opportunity to escape the dangerous surroundings of the land where she was born.

I’ll never understand why the GOP caucus allows this fecal-brained idiot continue to speak the way he does about one of their colleagues. Nor will I ever grasp why the MAGA cultists guffaw out loud at the tasteless rhetoric that flows freely from the mouth of their exalted leader.

I am not qualified to judge the job Rep. Omar does for her constituents. I do know that she gets re-elected to office every two years, which tells me that the residents of her district think she’s doing well for them. About all I know about Omar is that she is a stern critic of Donald Trump.

However, I am fully qualified to declare that an elected member of Congress, a citizen of this great land, deserves to be treated with respect … even from the man with whom she has serious disagreements.

Omar won’t get it from the man masquerading as president of the United States and it is to his everlasting shame.

media news

Political mystery: How does he get away with this?

One of the great American political mysteries keeps playing out and it continues to baffle many millions of Americans.

Donald Trump in the span of about three days totally reversed himself and told yet another in an infinite string of bald-faced lies as he sought to wiggle out of his initial statement.

Rachel Scott of ABC News asked Trump if he was going to release the video of the second strike in September of a speed boat off the Venezuela coast; the strike killed two survivors of an initial missile attack on the boat. Trump said he had “no problem” releasing it and said Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth could do “whatever he wanted” regarding the issue. Three days later, Scott followed up on her first question, reminding him that he said he would release the video, to which Trump said “You said that, I didn’t say it.” Then he turned to someone at the table and muttered, “She’s with ABC fake news.”

Trump’s Republican allies in Congress continue to keep letting him get away with (a) telling outright lies and (b) heaping verbal abuse on female reporters who are simply doing their job.

When in the name of decency and decorum will the GOP caucus in both congressional chambers wake up to what their hero is doing? He is denigrating his exalted office. He hurls epithets at journalists who are practicing a craft protected by the First Amendment to the Constitution.

He recently called a female reporter “piggie” while dismissing a question she posed to him aboard Air Force One. Trump continues to harangue reporters as being “stupid,” “incompetent” and purveyors of “fake news.”

Meanwhile, the men and women whose constitutionally granted power is being usurped by Trump sit on their hands and keep their lips zipped.

They are disgracing themselves and the offices they occupy.

crime news, military news, national news, political news

Bombing boats: self-defeating ‘strategy’

A whole lot of top U.S. military brass is weighing in on Donald Trump’s decision to order missile strikes on speed boats that allegedly are carrying lethal drugs into the United States of America.

You know the drill. We have sent an aircraft carrier strike force into the Caribbean Sea to look for boats that the Trump administration says are loaded with fentanyl. They’re killing people at sea, basing their actions on the aim of protecting U.S. citizens against the drug horror that allegedly is coming to this country from the speed boats.

The brass is saying: What a minute. Let’s rethink this nonsense!

What I am hearing is that retired general-grade officers are saying the better strategy is to board the boats, seize what they’re carrying, take the operators into custody and then interrogate them to get information on the drug networks for which they are working.

But … no-o-o-o-o! Trump and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth want to shoot first and ask questions later. What they are doing is destroying evidence they could use to prosecute the drug runners!

We have this ridiculous strategy that also has encountered allegations that the administration is committing a war crime by launching these “double-tap” air strikes to kill survivors of the initial missile strikes against the speed boats. And, get this: Donald Trump — who claimed to have bone spurs to avoid service in the Vietnam War — is talking openly about sending U.S. troops into Venezuela to launch a ground combat operation to root out the drug dealers. What the hell … ?

This fraudster in chief is out of ever-lovin’ control!

national news, political news

The longer he stays …

Gotta make an admission … which is that the longer we have to endure Donald Trump’s ignorant idiocy the more I miss traditional Republicans, the men and women who stood for principles they hold dear.

I have admitted on this blog that for as long as I have voted for president, dating back to 1972, I have voted for Democratic nominees. It hasn’t been a partisan thing but rather based on the candidates’ philosophies and those intangibles we all seek in the individuals we choose to lead our nation.

I came close to flipping, in 1976. I had to hold my breath just a bit to vote for Jimmy Carter. I thought about casting a vote for President Gerald Ford. My feelings for President Ford were more or less based on one of those intangibles. I just liked the man.

Now I am yearning for someone who cares about principle and who acts on some moral authority he or she can claim. That includes Republicans!

We don’t have a principled man in the White House. We have an immoral/amoral moron. He sees every single political relationship he has forged as a transactional event, which he can parlay into something that benefits him. He has demonstrated racist qualities time and again. He is ignorant of the document he was supposed to protect and defend. Trump doesn’t appreciate that dissent not only should be welcomed, but it is guaranteed in the Constitution’s First Amendment.

Trump is a Republican In Name Only. The RINO in chief doesn’t adhere to traditional GOP principles. The Party of Lincoln, which welcomed political diversity, has been shoved aside. The party of Trump is something quite different … and despicable.

If only the real Republicans who are left standing in the political arena could find the backbone to stand up to this fraudster. If only …

military news

Partisan divide over a war crime

Should anyone be surprised that Democrats and Republicans can look at the same video evidence that seeks to explain whether a war crime took place and come to radically divergent views on whether a crime exists?

Not me. Nope. I guess I could have predicted that congressional Democrats would be aghast at what they saw while Republicans accept it as a proper response.

At issue is what they call a “double tap” on a speedboat allegedly carrying drugs from Venezuela to somewhere in the United States. Naval jets blasted the boat to smithereens in September and then returned to finish the job by killing two survivors who were clinging to the shattered remains of the boat. Critics accuse Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth of committing a war crime, as the rules of war state specifically that the survivors should have been captured and taken into custody. Republican lawmakers see it differently, contending that the survivors were trying to flip the boat back and I guess start it up to continue its mission … whatever the hell it is.

I haven’t seen the video so I cannot comment on its content. However, I saw video of the initial strike and it looked for all the world that the first missile delivered a serious kill shot on the watercraft.

Here’s the deal. The craft was spotted just off the Venezuelan coast. about 1,200 miles from Florida. For the speed boat to make it all the way to U.S. territory, it would need to refuel dozens of times along the way. Was this boat really a legitimate target for the U.S. Navy and was it actually packing the drugs that Donald Trump says?

Once again, we see a Defense Department acting on a shoot first-ask questions later policy.

I want to see proof that these craft are, in fact, carrying drugs and that they indeed are headed to our shores to inflict pain and suffering — and worse — on Americans. We are getting nothing close to evidence to back up the Trump administration’s assertions about what is going on.

Dude just wants to go to war. Oh, wait … he’d better ask Congress for permission first. That’s in the Constitution, the document that Trump likely has never read.

medical news

This idiocy takes the cake … seriously!

Donald Trump continues to violate the Law of Idiocy by lowering the standard to never-before-seen levels.

Take his response recently during a two-hour Cabinet meeting about the MRI he received from the White House medical staff. A reporter asked Trump about the exam and its purpose. What were the docs looking for? the reporter wondered.

Trump answered with a lie that defies one’s ability to understand anything. You can’t make this up.

He said he “didn’t know” the reason for the MRI. Many millions of us have gone through an MRI procedure. It involves lying perfectly still on a tube that makes a whole lotta noise. It usually takes about 30 minutes to complete the exam.

You must understand this: There isn’t a medical doctor alive today who doesn’t tell the patient precisely why he or she is being asked to subject themselves to such discomfort. That only can mean that Trump lied about his supposed ignorance about why he received the MRI. Why in the name of medical malpractice would Trump have to lie about that? Never mind. He probably wants to hide whatever medical condition from which he might be suffering. Can’t reveal his humanity … y’know?

Anyhow, he lied about a subject that should become public knowledge. After all, he is the president of the U.S. of A., and that includes millions of us who don’t give a damn about the man personally, but who do care about whether our government is working for us.

And this moron is the nation’s chief executive!