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Sorry, But Today’s Republican Party Is Destroying Our Country

May 25, 2017 by Mark

Day 195. 

I know that headline is a bit harsh.  But, with everything going on today it is hard not to say it.  We have reached a new low in politics in our country, and it isn’t getting better.  As a matter of fact, things are not only getting worse they are being cheered on by trump supporters.

Politics always brings out some of the bad in some of us, but this is really getting out of hand.  Things are getting so bad it is almost like my youthful days on the South Side of Chicago watching gangs face off.

Yesterday was full of news, and none of it was good.  Yes, we had more information reported about the Russian Hacking probes and how Russian Officials were caught by our spy agencies strategizing how they could use trump staffers to influence trump in a positive way towards Russia.  But, as it turns out, that wasn’t the worst of the news.  Rather is was expected since this scandal is growing by leaps and bounds every day.

Let’s recap a few of the things that took place just yesterday.  It kind of started off somewhat innocuous with testimony by Betsy DeVos trying to show how trump’s budget cuts to the Department of Education were actually good for students in America.

She was asked if there was any case of discrimination that a private school could do where she would step in and say you cannot do that if you receive federal funding.  It first came up when it was pointed out that a private school in Indiana said it would not accept LGBTQ students even if they were using vouchers from the Federal Government.  DeVos refused to say she would step in and tell the school they couldn’t discriminate like that.

Then she was asked about private schools who were forcing parents of children with disabilities to waive their rights under IDEA.  She then praised Florida for their program.  Which of course does already allow private schools to force parents with disabled children to sign away their IDEA rights.

According to DeVos we should let states “decide” if they are going to discriminate against any students if that is their choice.  After her testimony I came away with the distinct opinion that she really does want to dismantle our entire public school system.  I do have a question for Republicans and their “school choice” mantra.  When I was young, I went to private schools.  My parents had to pay for that private education on their own and got no “vouchers” from the Federal government.

As a matter of fact, when I attended private schools, the vast majority of private schools were Catholic.  Republicans were extremely against any idea that people who sent their children to a Catholic school should get any “vouchers” to help pay for it or even consider the idea of a tax break for paying for a private education?  What changed that makes “vouchers” so important today?

Maybe it is because that after school desegregation took place a bunch of so-called “Evangelical Christian” schools popped up across the south to keep white students from having to attend school with children of color.  That is when the cry for “vouchers” began, and not a day before.

The second thing we learned yesterday is that the biggest threat to our national security is none other than our beloved leader.  We already heard about his giving highly classified information to the Russians.  We also learned that it was Americans who leaked the name of the attacker in Manchester before the British were ready to release it.  They are so mad right now that they care considering not sharing information with us anymore.

Then in a phone call to the Butcher of Manila, Duterte, praising him for his “wonderful war against drugs” in his country, trump just couldn’t help but try to one-up him.  He actually told this butcher where two of our nuclear submarines were located.  We learned this from a transcript of the call by the Philippines.  It was reported by the Philippine press who actually had a copy of the transcript.  And, no one in the trump administration has pushed back and said it wasn’t true.

Our beloved leader just can’t help himself giving away our classified information to foreign countries.  He seems to think that it shows how smart he is.  Actually it shows just how STUPID he is.  Furthermore, it shows he cannot be trusted with our classified information.

We also discovered that members of his White House are simple liars.  They lied on their forms when trying to get their security clearances.  The main culprits are Mike Flynn, Jeff Sessions and Jared Kushner.  I don’t remember the exact wording, but there is a question that asks if you have had any contact with a foreign government or foreign government official.  All three said no.

Yet, all three did have contact with a foreign government official.  In the case of Flynn he was not only an unregistered foreign agent, he talked to the Russian Ambassador more than once during the campaign and during the transition period.

Turns out that Jeff Sessions did have contact with the Russian Ambassador more than once during the transition when he was a member of the trump team.  And, of course, Jared Kushner also had contact with the Russian Ambassador and with members of a Russian owned bank during the campaign and the transition.

I don’t know, but maybe the law changed under trump, but when I had to fill out this form, it was a crime to lie on it or to omit any information that was asked by it.   At the very least all three, well the two left in the administration, should have their security clearance pulled for lying on an official government form.

The third thing was the CBO score for the Americans Without Health Care Act.  The CBO did say one thing in the Republicans favor.  They said the act would cut the deficit by 119 Billion Dollars.  Wow, I believe that comes to about .002 percent of the deficit.  And, it is less than the original bill that never made it to the House floor for a vote.

On the other hand, it estimates that in the first year of its implementation 14 million people will lose their health insurance.  It also says that in the next nine years up to 23 million people will lose their health insurance.  It even had some bad news for people with pre-existing conditions that Republicans claim the act will “protect”.

According to the CBO score card, older people with pre-existing conditions will see their premiums go up about 850 percent.  That is including the so-called protections that states will implement to “out” themselves from the ACA protections now in place.  The CBO says the high risk pools won’t work the way Republicans claim it will.

Furthermore, rural hospitals will be severely affected by the bill.  Many of our rural hospitals rely on Medicaid to help keep them open since most of their customers are Medicaid patients.  With the massive cuts to Medicaid, those funds will dry up and these hospitals will be forced to close.

Additionally, many patients in nursing homes are also Medicaid recipients.  They are not just “poor people” they are middle-class people who worked their whole lives.  However, they ran out of money and cannot afford most private nursing homes.  As a result, they are forced to use Medicaid to pay for their care.  When the Republicans cut Medicaid, these patients will also be hurt.  What are you going to do if you parent or grandparent is tossed from their nursing home because of this act?

Finally, it is estimated that by the year 2026 50 million people between the ages of 50 and 65 will be without health insurance as a result of this act.  As you can see, this bill was really something for Republicans to board their busses and head down to the White House for a celebratory Frat Party after they passed it through the House.  As I wrote before, Republicans have decided that one of the biggest problem this country faces is that too damn many people actually have health insurance.  This bill will definitely fix it.

The final episode came last night in Montana.  There a special election is being held today for the state’s lone House Seat.  The Republican Candidate was expected to win big, but the race is much closer than expected.  The major factor in this race turns out to be the Americans Without Health Care Act.

The Republican Candidate, Greg Gianforte has declined to answer any questions if he supports the act.  But, there is a recording that shows him approving of the bill’s passage to supporters.  So, a reporter from the Guardian, Ben Jacobs, wanted Gianforte’s reaction to the CBO report.

Gianforte was getting ready to have an interview with a local TV Station.  Jacobs entered the room, saw that Gianforte was just standing around chit-chatting and approached the candidate ask his question.  According to Jacobs, instead of getting an answer, Gianforte picked him up and body slammed him to the ground.

Jacobs was taken to the hospital for evaluation.  He said he landed on his elbow and x-rays were taken.  I don’t know the result of those x-rays at this time.  Later Gianforte’s campaign put out a statement about the incident and they said that Jacobs:

…entered the office without permission, aggressively shoved a recorder in Greg’s face, and began asking badgering questions.  Jacobs was asked to leave.  After asking Jacobs to lower the recorder, Jacobs declined. Greg then attempted to grab the phone that was pushed in his face.  Jacobs grabbed Greg’s wrist, and spun away from Greg, pushing them both to the ground.  It’s unfortunate that this aggressive behavior from a liberal journalist created this scene at our campaign volunteer BBQ.

So, as usual, a Republican candidate blamed the reporter, especially one he considers a “liberal” reporter for the incident.  There are two problems with the statement issued by Gianforte’s campaign.  Evidence shows he is lying.  Big surprise.

Jacobs was recording the questioning.  I heard the tape and there was no “badgering” by Jacobs unless you consider trying to get a straight answer from a politician badgering.  At no time did Gianforte ask or demand that Jacobs “lower the recorder”.  Jacobs’ voice was calm and polite.

Then there is a second problem with Gianforte’s version of the event.  There were witnesses.  Particularly the very TV news people who were there to conduct the interview.  It was a local Fox Station.

Fox News reporter Alicia Acuna, field producer Faith Mangan and photographer Keith Railey witnessed the incident, according to an account published by foxnews.com.  Acuna wrote in her account”

Gianforte grabbed Jacobs by the neck with both hands and slammed him into the ground behind him.

Faith, Keith and I watched in disbelief as Gianforte then began punching the man, as he moved on top the reporter and began yelling something to the effect of ‘I’m sick and tired of this!’ … To be clear, at no point did any of us who witnessed this assault see Jacobs show any form of physical aggression toward Gianforte, who left the area after giving statements to local sheriff’s deputies.

So, it is clear to anyone that Gianforte physically assaulted Jacobs.  Both the audio tape and the written statement from Acuna prove Gianforte is nothing but a bully who thinks he can get away with whatever he wants, just like his beloved leader, trump.

Before you start to tell me this is another of those “one-off” isolated incidents, please don’t.  You would be lying.  This is not a one-off.  This is a continuation of incidents that began with trump’s campaign.  Remember all of the violence at his rallies while he was egging his supporter on?  Remember him telling supporters to “knock the crap out of him.  Don’t worry I will defend you”?

Remember he is being sued right now for one of those attacks against protesters at his rally in Louisville?  And, remember his main defense in this case is he can’t be sued because he is president.

Then we have the case in West Virginia when a reporter was arrested in the State Capital Building while trying to get Price to answer questions.  He was yelling questions to Price and Kellyanne Conway when he was arrested and charged with “interfering with government business”.  The “government business” he was interfering with was Price and Conway walking through.  And, he did not impede their progress.

We also have a report of a reporter being pinned to the wall in the Capital when trying to ask Paul Ryan questions.  According to that report, the reporter was yelling questions when a member of the Capital police stepped in front of the man and backed him up against the wall so he couldn’t get close to Ryan.

All of this begs the question of just where in the hell, and in what time period do we live?  We have never seen such behavior in our country before.  We have seen it in other countries where dictators live and rule.  We saw it big time in Germany in the 30’s.  We saw it in Italy during the 20s and 30s.  We saw it in Iraq under the regime of Saddam Hussein.  We see it in Russia under Vladimir Putin.  And we see it in the Philippines under the Butcher of Manila.

We are now seeing it right here in the United States of America under our beloved leader, donald trump.  I am not sure if this incident in Montana is going to keep this fascist out of office.  With early voting and absentee voting, it is difficult to say a last-minute incident will have any effect on the outcome of the election.

We can only hope that if this fascist does win the election we can have some justice.  That justice would be to watch him get sworn into office, and then have the Montana State Police take him immediately to jail.  To me, that would be justice, especially if was on national television.  It was just reported that Gianforte was charged with assault for this senseless attack.

What is going on?  We have a Republican Controlled Congress that believes it is a great thing to throw millions of people off of their health insurance.  We have a president who not only agrees with that, he wants to make it worse.  His budget includes an additional $650 billion in cuts to Medicaid.  It also slashes programs that are intended to help people get by and improve their lot.

His administration is under counter-espionage investigation by the FBI and two different committees in Congress.  He openly gives away classified information to foreign countries, even if those countries are considered as adversaries.

We have seen a big uptick in violence at “political rallies” across the country, including now, an incident where a candidate felt “justified” to body slam a reporter to the ground because he doesn’t like the media.

But, if you think back just seven years, you could have predicted this violence at political rallies.  It was the Tea Party, not liberals, who were showing up at political rallies openly carrying guns.  Fortunately, we haven’t seen gun violence at rallies, yet.  But, is that because we are lucky?  How long before we do see gun violence at political rallies?

This isn’t about “sour grapes” because trump won the election.  This is about civility.  It is about ethics.  It is about our country.  It is about our democracy.  I am sure we will see lots of posts on the internet and especially on Facebook about how all of this is just another hoax.  I am sure the trolls will crawl out of their sewers to defend everything with ludicrous excuses and fake news.

But the fact is our country is in far more trouble than it was during Watergate.  At least during Watergate, the Republican Party placed the country above their party.  I am not so certain enough of today’s Republicans have the same patriotism as those Republicans in the 70s had.

I am sure that if any Republican in the House were to actually vote for impeachment, they would face immediate primary challenges from the wacko right.  And, being afraid of losing their gig, they won’t dare take this to the natural conclusion IF it goes that far.

All of the incidents taking place inside and outside of Washington are not sideshows.  They are what is really happening to our country, and we need to pay attention to them.  If we are to survive this calamity, we need the “real Republicans” to wake up and take back their party.  We need two viable and working parties to govern our country.  Having only one party is called an authoritarian government.

And, the shirts keep marching along.

 

 

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Unfortunately For Beloved Leader – Russia Just Won’t Go Away

May 24, 2017 by Mark

Day 194. 

As our beloved leader tramps around the globe trying very hard to look presidential, the Russia Investigation is not leaving him alone.  So far, there isn’t really a lot to talk about this trip.  He stopped over in Saudi Arabia where he signed some agreements over defense help and some economic things.  The total of these agreements is in the $360 Million range.

But, we also know that Saudi Arabia is not happy about the law that the Republican Congress passed allowing victims of the 9/11 attack to sue Saudi Arabia.  They want Congress and to repeal that law.  And, they want trump to help them get the repeal.  So, if that does happen, would that constitute quid pro quo?

In Israel, he stopped by the Holocaust Museum.  He signed the guest list with what seems more like a High School Yearbook signing.  I really hope and wish every day that if this clown uses the word “great”, or “outstanding”, or “bigly” again his orange dead tribble will catch fire on his head.  The child really needs to expand his vocabulary.

Even still, the Russia Investigation is taking its toll.  We found out that Bannon and Priebus were sent home early from the trip to keep tabs on that investigation and try to keep things under control until beloved leader returns.  We also learned that beloved leader has decided he better have a personal lawyer to help him navigate the problem.

Only, to my way of thinking, he is again showing just how dumb he is.  He has reportedly hired Marc Kasowitz as his lawyer.  He has used Kasowitz before and we will talk about that.  First, it must be pointed out that this is an unusual choice for one big reason.

The last “big” case Kasowitz worked was defending Sberbank, a Russian government-owned bank, in a case before the Southern New York District.  Think about that for just one minute.  Our beloved leader thinks that hiring the lawyer for the largest Russian owned bank is a good choice to help him navigate the Russia Investigation.

But, it gets even better.  Kasowitz was the lawyer who handled the Trump U case that cost trump $25 million.  He was also the lawyer who let trump sue a New York Times reporter who wrote a book on trump and claimed in the book that trump was not worth billions of dollars, but rather in the $250 million range.

As usual, trump was furious at the slight to his ego and sued the writer.  He sued for $5 billion for slander.  In court, he could not show proof that he was worth a billion dollars.  At one point, he even said that his worth was based on “his feelings” at the time.  The case was thrown out of court, and an appeals court later tossed it as well.

This is the man who reportedly will “help” trump in his side of the Russia Investigation.  You would think trump would have learned his lesson in the past, but obviously he doesn’t learn anything.

Then we have Mike Flynn deciding that he doesn’t have to follow the subpoena he was issued for his documents involving his ties with Russia.  His lawyer claims that these documents fall under the 5th Amendment, which is dubious.  So, the Senate Intelligence Committee has subpoenaed his companies for the same documents.  As the two heads of the committee said, companies are not protected under the 5th Amendment since they are not people.

However, the biggest crash came when former CIA Chief John Brennan testified before the House Intelligence Committee.  During his testimony, he made no accusations and offered no “evidence’ as Republicans keep trying to say there is none.  But, he did say:

I encountered and am aware of information and intelligence that revealed contacts and interactions between Russian officials and U.S. persons involved in the Trump campaign.

He further told lawmakers that he could not say with certainty whether the president’s campaign associates colluded with Moscow.

But I know that there was a sufficient basis of information and intelligence that required further investigation by the FBI to determine whether or not U.S. persons were actively conspiring or colluding with Russian officials.

Republicans again tried to pin him down on whether or not he had “evidence’ of any collusion.  In very carefully worded responses he declared as CIA Chief he was interested in the intelligence and not evidence and the intelligence warranted further investigation.

Which brings us to another point.  This case of “evidence”.  It is my experience that evidence is gathered by investigation.  Investigations do not start only after hard evidence has already been found.  That is why they are called investigations and not just confirm the evidence things.

Republicans seem to think that if there is no outward “evidence” of a crime being committed, then there should be no investigation.  If that were true, then why were there so many “investigations” about Benghazi, even after other previous investigations showed no evidence?

We need to stop pretending that the Russians did not interfere with our last election.  And, we need to stop pretending that they won’t try again.  There is a lot of information that shows an investigation is warranted.  I am not saying that anyone is guilty of any crime.  But, there sure are a lot of circumstantial things that make it look bad for the trump campaign.  That is what the investigation should unveil.

I know I grew up and served during the Cold War, but I have never seen a campaign of either party so tied to the Russians as the trump campaign was.  That doesn’t mean they did anything criminal, but it does ask a lot of questions and those questions need to be answered regardless of what those answers are.

You especially need to have this investigation after our beloved leader’s behavior over this issue.  First, he claims that the Russians were not involved.  Then he says they might have been involved.  It turns out he lied about not knowing about Flynn’s connections with the Russians.  Even today, he tells associates that firing Flynn was a “mistake”.

Shortly after she informed the White House about Flynn’s lying about his contacts with the Russian Ambassador, Sally Yates was fired as the Acting Director of the Department of Justice.  Beloved leader used the excuse that she refused to defend Muslim Ban 1.0 in court.  That could be true, but the timing is very intriguing at best.

Then we have the firing of Comey.  Beloved leader had his surrogates run around telling everyone it was because of a memo written by the Deputy Head of the Justice Department about Comey’s handling of the Clinton email scandal.  Then less than 24 hours later he said it was because “I had that Russia thing on my mind and would have fired him regardless of the recommendation”.  Clear indication Comey was fired over Russia and not Clinton.

Yesterday there were more reports that trump asked the Director of National Intelligence and the Director of the NSA to “push back” against all of the media reports about Russia and say they had no “evidence that the president was involved”.  Both reportedly declined.

Then Coats, the Head of the DNI was asked explicitly if the report was true.  He refused to say yes or no but simply said that he didn’t think it appropriate to discuss his conversations with the president.  Most observers think that means “yes”.  Otherwise, he could have simply said no and ended the whole thing.

Finally, since trump continues to support his “good buddy” Mike Flynn, we need to remember what he said over the Clinton Email Scandal.  He said:

Anyone who takes the Fifth Amendment must have something to hide.

I guess that means, according to his “good buddy” that Flynn has something to hide by taking the Fifth.

Beloved leader has been in office less than four months.  And already there are more ethical questions about his behavior than we have had since the Tea Pot Dome Scandal.  His administration is under a “counter intelligence” investigation over possible collusion with a foreign government to sway our election.

He has accomplished virtually nothing while in office.  Oh, he has made it harder to buy a home for the first time.  He supports a “health care” bill that will throw at least 24 million people off of their coverage and increase the premiums and deductibles for addition millions of people with pre-existing conditions.

He has proposed a budget that will all but destroy the social safety nets while giving the rich a huge tax cut.  He plans to cut about 1.4 Billion dollars from Medicaid, a program he promised not to cut.  He will also cut money from Medicare if the Americans Without Health Insurance Act passes the Senate.

His budget will also cut funding for SNAP, CHIP, Welfare, the State Department, and a bunch of other programs like college grants and student loans.  The cuts to the State Department also cuts the spending for security at our Embassies and Consulates around the world potentially placing our diplomats lives in jeopardy.  Even Lindsey Graham said this budget would result in many more Benghazi’s.

Yesterday, when asked if the cuts to the Social Security Disability Insurance program would result in lower payments to people already on the program, Mulvaney said: “I hope so” (emphasis mine).  He claims that there are lots and lots of people in the SSDI program that aren’t really disabled.  Does he know what it takes to receive SSDI?  I am not saying that there aren’t any “fakers” on the rolls, but it isn’t enough to justify the cuts they are making to the program.

The budget also cuts deeply areas like the U.S. Coast Guard, Scientific Research, the National Health Institute, the EPA, Public Education, and just about everything that is not under defense or immigration.

Beloved Leader’s budget proposal does nothing except break at least seven campaign promises.  And, the people he will hurt the most are the very people who put him in office.  Rural areas will be especially hard hit, but he obviously doesn’t care about those people.

He has compromised highly classified information by openly giving it to the Russians without proper protocol.  He also possibly compromised one of our allies who gave us the information.

It is up to us to remember all of this throughout next year.  Republicans are so far supporting their hero in the White House, and they need to be replaced in 2018.  That will be the only way to save our country from this madman and his corrupt associates.  The only question is will we last that long?

And, the shirts keep marching along.

 

 

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Beloved Leader’s Budget Is A Blueprint Of How To Destroy An Economy

May 23, 2017 by Mark

Day 193. 

The upcoming budget from our beloved leader’s administration is a perfect example of fantasy in the real world.  This budget is the worst budget I have ever seen.  And, the arguments behind it are even more weird than the budget itself.

As is usual in a Republican budget, the poor and the working poor in our country are expected to take huge cuts to their benefits in order to give the rich huge tax cuts.  It is planning to remove billions of dollars from food stamps, WIC, Children’s health care, welfare, Pell Grants, Student Loans and a lot more.

It is also calling for huge increases in the defense spending and money for his stupid Berlin Wall.  The very wall that he claimed Mexico would pay for.   Then there is the trillions of dollars being given to the very rich in massive tax cuts.  And, of course don’t forget the trillions of dollars being handed out to corporations.

Some people are claiming that the elderly are not going to be hurt.  But, if you consider the fact that a lot of people in nursing homes get their money from Medicaid, they will be hurt by the massive cuts in that program.  How many will actually be thrown out of the nursing home they are in?  Medicaid is about to lose an estimated 800 Billion Dollars.

But, the argument they are using is pure fiction.  It is the usual Republican argument that people need to be removed from the social net and put back to work.  Yet, even though that sounds admirable, where are the jobs going to come from?

Beloved leader believes that his budget will grow the economy by over 3 percent.  That is also a fantasy.  And here is why.

We heard a lot of talk during the campaign about jobs being shipped overseas.  That was true.  However, what you didn’t hear was how many jobs have been lost due to automation of those jobs.  Most of the manufacturing jobs in this country have been lost to robots.  And, as the manufacturing industry grows, fewer people are being hired because the new factories are being automated as well.

That is really old news.  We have discussed automation before.  But, it is just beginning to ramp up.  The next industry to be hit with massive layoffs because of automation is the retail industry.  We are already losing massive amounts of jobs in that industry because of the internet.  More and more brick-and-mortar retail outlets are closing and losing business to the internet.

And, it is going to get much worse in the very near future.   According to a 56-page report by the investment advisory firm Cornerstone Capital Group roughly 6 million to 7.5 million retail jobs “likely will be automated out of existence in the coming years, leaving a large portion of the retail workforce at risk of becoming ‘stranded workers'”.

Retail cashiers will be hit the hardest with an estimated 73 percent of them being laid off due to automation.  Most cashiers in this country are women. The losses will also disproportionately affect the working poor, since most hourly retail workers live below the poverty line. About 16 million people, or one in 10 American workers, are employed in the retail industry.

“This in-depth examination of retail automation gives investors insights as they consider investment risks and opportunities,” Lukomnik of Cornerstone Capital Group said in a news release. “While the findings are important to investors, they should sound the alarm for economists and political leaders. The shrinking of retail jobs in many ways threatens to mirror the decline in manufacturing in the US. Moreover, in this case, workers at risk are already disproportionately working poor, so any disruption may cause strains in the social safety net and stresses on local tax revenues.”

The automation services that are disrupting retail employment can range from tablets where customers can check out without the help of a cashier to more complicated technologies like the robot that Lowe’s is testing that can interact with customers in stores and help them find the items they need.

Automation is also impacting the restaurant industry. The CEO of Taco Bell’s parent company said in March that machines could replace human workers in 10 years.

“I don’t think it is going to happen next year or the year after, but I do believe that probably by the mid ’20s to the late ’20s, you’ll start to see a dramatic change in sort of how machines run the world,” Greg Creed, CEO of Yum Brands, told CNBC. Yum owns a handful of fast-food companies including KFC, Taco Bell, and Pizza Hut.

Between the growth of the internet and the automation of jobs in the retail and restaurant industries, jobs will be lost in the millions.  Most of these workers are paid at or just above the minimum wage and the employees are considered the “working poor”.

Many others are working in the industry because they need more flexible hours to care for their families.  And, many are older people.  The retail industry employs lots of people across all spectrums of society.  And, they are all at risk of being “automated” out of work.

And, this is not their fault.  They are not sitting at home waiting for a government check, yet.  These people are hard-working people trying to support their families and trying to just survive in today’s world.

They are the very people that Republicans claim are eating up government money because they are lazy and don’t want to work.  Worst, these are also the very people who keep voting Republican and voted for trump because they promised more jobs.  Looks like that was just another empty promise unless you consider giving a robot a job as creating jobs.

That also brings us to the fantasy that the economy will grow over 3 percent.  How can the economy grow if fewer people are working?  Who is going to spend money and help the economy grow?  The fewer people working, the less money they will spend simply because they don’t have any money.

Using simple basic economics, that means there will be less demand for products.  Less demand means more supply and a downturn or recession in the economy.  Meaning the economy will not grow by 3 percent.  It won’t even grow by 1 percent.

Couple that with the massive spending increases in defense and border protection along with the massive tax cuts, the deficit has nowhere to go but up.  Meaning that the economy will probably slow down even more than by the simple rules of supply and demand.  We may even be looking at another crash of the economy.

Through its actions so far, this administration has proven itself to be a friend of the very rich and the enemy of everyone else.  They are trying very hard to eliminate the poor.  Not through actions that will help them get training they need to compete in today’s economy, but through blaming them for the economic problems.

People who need assistance have been demonized for generations by this Republican Party.  There are more and more Republican controlled states that want to drug test everyone who gets assistance because as we all know, people on the social safety nets are simply lazy drug users who don’t want to work.  They are placing all kinds of obstacles on the poor to get the money they need to just survive.

Don’t you find it funny that there is never a proposed drug test before the rich can receive those massive tax cuts?  That is because we all know that inherited fortunes means the inheritor is a good person and never uses drugs.  Yeah, right.

Ever since at least 1968, the Republican Party has been waging a war against the poor.  They believe that the poor should just be happy to live in the gutters and watch how the rich live.  They don’t believe in fair pay for workers, hence their hatred of the minimum wage.  They believe that if you cannot afford health coverage, you don’t deserve it.  They believe that only the wealthy deserve a college education and that the poor should just be servants to the rich.  Servants don’t need a college education.

The budget that will be rolled out today is a blueprint of this agenda of the Republican Party.  Beloved leader has taken it even further.  We have had all kinds of presidents in my lifetime, but this one is the most anti-poor president I have seen.

Of course, if this horrible budget does manage to get through Congress, and Republicans are itching to change the rules to insure their agenda goes through, then maybe it will be good for America.  Beloved Leader’s voters will be hit extremely hard by this budget.  Maybe, just maybe, they will finally see the light and realize just how horrible he is.

The down side is that we need the Clown in Chief to crash the economy which he seems hell-bent to do.  In that case, we all lose, again.  There is an old saying in this country that goes back years and years.  That saying is:”  “If you want to live like a Republican, vote Democratic”.  The economy has done much better under a Democratic President than a Republican President.

As the economy continues its steady growth under the policies and regulations the Obama Administration put in place after the crash of 2008, beloved leader and his administration is doing everything in its power to return to 2008 and a bad economy.  This proposed budget is a step in that direction.

And, the shirts keep marching along.

 

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Beloved Leader Loves Condemning Radical Islamic Terrorism While He Leads The Radical Christian Terrorists At Home

May 22, 2017 by Mark

Day 192. 

Yesterday we heard from our beloved leader as he gave a speech about Islam in Saudi Arabia.  He called on all Muslim states to “weed out this evil” of terrorism.  He said they should force all of the terrorists out.

Then we heard Mike Pence, his empty suite vice president talk about “tolerance” towards opposing views on college campuses.  Pence decried the intolerance towards speakers on college campuses around the country.

I find both of these comments to be very disturbing.  I find both of these comments to be extremely prejudiced.  Not because they were given by so-called “conservatives” but because of the lies they were telling and because neither of these “leaders” of our country actually practice what they preach.

We all know that terrorism and intolerance are both evil.  We all know that terrorism is also an outgrowth of intolerance.  Especially when you talk about religious terrorism.  In the Middle East and other parts of the world, there are Muslim Extremists who are totally intolerant towards other religions and as a result they engage in serious terrorism.

That is evil in anyone’s definition of the word.  They are not interested in anything except their own fanaticism and thus are willing to kill others simply because they don’t believe the same thing as these fanatics.  They need to be rooted out.

However, they are not alone in their religious terrorism practices.  We have plenty of religious terrorists right here at home.  The problem is that no one in the political world wants to talk about it and no one wants to do anything about it.  Especially our president and vice president.  Rather, they are encouraging the practice of religious terrorism in our country because this terrorism isn’t the result of Islam, it its the result of Radical Christianity.  It is also the result of “conservative” intolerance.

As it turns out, the State of Texas has become our own version of a Caliphate of hate towards anyone who does not follow the Radical Christian Terrorist beliefs.  They are not alone either.  They are joined by states like Mississippi, Alabama, Arkansas, Oklahoma, Missouri and others.

The real danger is that these Radical Christian Terrorists are not all private citizens.  The real problem is they are actually in control of these state’s legislatures.  And, they are not afraid of their Radical Christian Terrorism being found out.  They are quite open about it and are very proud of it.

In the Caliphate of Texas, they are in the final days of their legislative session and are working very hard to pass their terrorist agenda into law.  And, their head terrorist is the governor and he is very willing to sign any terrorist bill into law.

At first they tried to pass an anti-LGBTQ law.  But that got stymied in their own legislature.  So, they have decided to tear the bill into parts and “add amendments” to necessary legislation so they can get their terrorist agenda into the law books.

Of course, they are masquerading these laws in the agenda of “Religious Freedom”.  Which tells you immediately that it is nothing more than a terrorist agenda.  The first big bill was HB 3859, that will allow state-funded adoption and foster care agencies to turn away applicants on religious grounds, denying parents who are LGBT, or even those who are Jewish, Muslim or atheist. It passed the Texas House and is now moving through the Senate, causing a great deal of concern because similar bills have been passed in other states, including in South Dakota this year.

This bill is nothing more that an open attempt to refuse the adoption of needy children to anyone who is not considered by these terrorists as “straight, homosexual, Christian” parents.  Then there is the insidious attempts to write discrimination into must-pass bills that have already been debated. An amendment added at the last-minute to a nursing care bill, HB 2950, for example, would bar the Texas Board of Nursing from punishing discriminatory actions if they are committed in the service of a nurse’s “religious beliefs.”

Under this amendment a nurse could cite his religious beliefs as a reason to refuse to care for a gay patient on the grounds that he believes homosexuality is a sin or is against his faith.  Likewise, a nurse who believes that men are the head of the household could breach client confidentiality to disclose a woman’s medical condition to her husband against her wishes.

Another amendment added to HB 2561, a pharmacy services regulatory bill, pharmacists could opt-out of the practices that are standard among pharmacists across the country, based on personal religious convictions. For example, a pharmacist could decide not to fill a prescription for hormone therapy for a transgender customer, claiming doing so goes against his or her religious beliefs about gender. Or, a pharmacist could use religion as justification to refuse to serve African-American customers because she believes the Bible mandates the segregation of the races.

There are two other bills that would regulate legal services, SB 302 and SB 303, that now have amendments which allow for religious refusal by state-licensed attorneys. If these bills become law with these amendments an attorney could deny his or her duty to inform a client about his or her rights in a divorce proceeding, for example, even trying to talk the client out of getting a divorce, all based on the attorney’s religious objection to divorce.

It is not hard to determine the true intent of these pieces of legislation.  They are intended to discriminate against and to scare all people in Texas who are not white conservative Christians.  These amendments and laws are intended to hurt people that the terrorists in the Texas State Legislature don’t like.  They are written and proudly put on display for all to see their intolerance against everyone not a white Christian.  In short, they are open displays of intolerant terrorism.  There is no other reason for them.

If you are going to write me that if you don’t like your lawyer, pharmacist, or nurse, get a different one forget about it.  If you are that intolerant of others, then you should not have chosen such a career in the first place.  There is no room in professions like these for intolerance.  Additionally, actions like these are in violation of the Ethics Oaths these professions are governed by.

Then we have another perfect example of intolerance on full display which is nothing more than a terrorist act.  This one comes due to the idea that the City of New Orleans is removing Confederate statues from the city.  This action is being taken after a vote of the city council.  Naturally, the white supremacists are up in arms and complaining the city is removing “our heritage” from city property.

In an attempt to stop other cities from taking such an action, the Louisiana Legislature is trying to pass a law that would make it ‘illegal” to remove such statues unless there was a “ballot” issue where the majority of the people vote to remove them.  Another attempt of a state legislature telling local governments what they can and cannot pass in their own jurisdictions.  Meaning, only the state can control a city’s monuments with the city paying for them, of course.

But the worst example of intolerant terrorism came not from anyone in Louisiana, but rather than a Missouri legislator.  On Saturday, Karl Oliver, a Republican member of the state’s House of Representatives described the “destruction” of Confederate monuments in Louisiana as “heinous and horrific” and compared leaders in that state to Nazis.

He said in his tweet:

The destruction of these monuments, erected in loving memory of our family and fellow Southern Americans, is both heinous and horrific.  If the, and I use this term extremely loosely, “leadership” of Louisiana wishes to, in Nazi-ish fashion, burn books or destroy historic monuments of OUR HISTORY, they should be LYNCHED!  Let it be known that I will do all I can to prevent this from happening in our state!

I find it ludicrous when any so-called conservative calls someone else a Nazi when they are trying to rid their community of white supremacist symbols.  After all, it was the Nazis who epitomized white supremacy.  Which tells me that erecting white supremacy symbols is more Nazi-ish than removing them.  Especially when the City Council votes to remove them.  They are the representatives of the city residents.

Plus, everyone who has followed my writing knows I consider these “white heritage” nuts to be traitors to our country.  They are more interested in pledging loyalty to a failed, losing party of a war, than to the country of which they claim to be patriots.

But, their view is the only view that matters to them, therefore, it is supposed to be the only view that matters to us.  That is the full definition of intolerance.  And, it is terrorism if you tell people if they disagree or remove a confederate statue, they should by lynched.

Far more Americans have been killed by Radical Christian Terrorists in this country than any other group, including Islamic Terrorists.  The difference is that when a Muslim commits a horrible act, it is automatically called terrorism.  When a Radical Christian Terrorist commits a horrible act, it is called a “one-off” or that person has “mental problems”.

And, both our beloved leader and our vice president are mum on all of this Radical Christian Terrorist activity.  See, you don’t have to “kill” someone to be considered a terrorist.  You merely need to make them afraid of going out on the streets, or in their own home, or know that they can be discriminated against simply because they are different.

The laws being passed in the Caliphate of Texas and other Republican controlled states are forms of terrorism because they formally make discrimination “legal”.  You won’t hear beloved leader or our vice president voice any condemnation of these acts either.  Beloved leader got elected because he ran a hate campaign.  Our vice president signed such terrorism laws while he was Governor of Indiana.

If beloved leader is really interested in “weeding out terrorism” he needs to begin at home.  If he really wants to make terrorism something to be afraid of carrying out, he needs to crack down on the Radical Christian Terrorists in our country.

If pence is really interested in ending intolerance, then he needs his own “come to Jesus moment” and start condemning the very laws that Texas is passing and the ones he signed into law in Indiana.

I am not holding my breath about either of these cowards doing anything different.  They are part of the radical Christian terrorists and they are very proud of that fact.  All of this is proof of the conservative Republican agenda to remove all non-white, non-Christian people from the country.  They want a white only, Christian only country.

Only once they get it, they will work to eliminate the Christian sects they don’t like either.  So, you are in the crosshairs too.  Unless you are part of the Radical Christian Terrorist organization.

And, the shirts keep marching along.

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Beloved Leader Heading Overseas – What Could Possibly Go Wrong?

May 19, 2017 by Mark

Day 189. 

Later today our beloved leader is heading overseas on his first foreign trip.  He plans to visits places like Saudi Arabia, Israel, the Vatican, Belgium and Italy.  What could possible go wrong?

Just look at the wonderful week he has just completed.  He fired his FBI Director and had his surrogates lie about the reason.  He then told us why he fired him.  It was because of that “Russian thing”.

The next day he gave away highly classified information to the Russians.  Then he had McMasters go out and lie about that by saying it never happened.  Only the next day admitting that he did give them the information and McMasters then trying to say it was okay to do so.

He met with the Turkish strongman at the White House, then watched as the strongman’s body guards attacked protesters in front of the Turkish Ambassadors residence.  The action he took after this incident was his usual nothing.  Oh, he called the Ambassador to the State Department, but no one was thrown out of the country for the attack.

There is video showing the strongman talking to his body guards before the attack, and then him standing there watching with approval as they attacked the protesters.  Beloved leader must have approved of the attack since he didn’t do anything of consequence in response.

Now he is off on his first foreign trip.  He claims that he is going to try to bridge the differences between the “three great religions”.  Yeah, like that will happen.  He is even going to give a speech about Islam in Saudi Arabia.  And, that speech is being written by one of his advisors who said the Muslim Ban was the best accomplishment of trump’s administration.  He has also said that Islam is not a religion, but rather a disease.  And, he is the one writing the speech on Islam beloved leader is going to give in Saudi Arabia.  What could go wrong?

He is going to visit Israel right after he gave the Russians that highly classified information which NBC News is reporting came from, you guessed it, Israel.  Then, one of his top advisors claimed that the West Wall was not “in Israel it was in the West Bank”.  How’s that for greasing the skids before you visit the country that claims the West Wall as their holiest place on earth.

We also learned that beloved leader wanted to visit Masada.  However, he had to cancel the trip because it turns out that you cannot land his helicopter at the “historical heritage site”.  Why would anyone who knows anything about historical sites and religious sites even contemplate using a helicopter to get there?

While in Italy, beloved leader is going to meet with Pope Francis.  The very Pope that trump doesn’t like and the very Pope that has said some real unflattering things about trump.  What could possibly go wrong?

He is also going to meet with our NATO allies.  Yes, the very alliance that he claims is antiquated and thinks owes us lots and lots of money because he doesn’t understand the alliance agreement.  Additionally, they are going to hammer him on the Paris Accord that is set up to fight climate change.

Our European allies are not thrilled with trump’s plan to “pull out” of the agreement.  As a matter of fact, they are really pissed off at the suggestion of our pulling out.

I also wonder just how he tends to explain that little faux pas about giving the Russians that highly classified information.  How does he explain his willingness to share with the Russians information that we didn’t even share with all of our allies?  That one little thing could spell doom for beloved leader and his attempt to tell NATO how great America is at “leading” the free world.

Since he took office, beloved leader has pissed off our German allies.  He backed the Fascist candidate in the French election.  And, he even managed to piss off our Australian allies.  So, what could possibly go wrong?

It seems funny to me that about the only time I see trump really smiling and having a great time is when he is meeting with dictators.  He smiled broadly when he met with the Turkish strongman.  He really had a great time when he met with the Russians.

But, when he met with the Australians he didn’t smile.  When he met with Angela Merkel, he wouldn’t even shake her hand for the pictures.  And, he never smiled when he was with her.

So, we have a president about to leave on a nine-day, five country trip overseas whose campaign is under criminal and counter espionage investigation for possible collusion with the Russian Hacking.  He is damaged at home over these investigations and his poor handling of the Comey firing.  His lack of care with highly classified information.  And, a legislative record of absolutely no accomplishments.

We are about to be represented by a president who has accomplished nothing, knows nothing, and is totally incompetent.  He has heaped praise on our adversaries and pissed off our allies.

I ask again, what could possibly go wrong?  Maybe those huge cheering crowds when he leaves in the cartoon above are hoping he will never return.

And, the shirts keep marching along.

 

 

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We Are Screwed No Matter What Happens With The Special Counsel

May 18, 2017 by Mark

Day 188. 

Yesterday the Department of Justice announced that they have ordered a Special Counsel to oversea the Russian Hacking and any possible collusion between them and any member of the trump campaign.  That announcement was met with hails of praise about the decision.

I agree that we do need a special counsel or special prosecutor because it is time we actually find out what happened, who may have been involved, and how we are going to make sure it doesn’t happen again.  And, quite frankly, the Congressional investigations are running at a snail’s pace with no sign they will pick up anytime soon.

We also had a report that Mike Flynn told the trump transition team that he was under investigation by the FBI before he took the position of National Security Advisor.  According to the report, Flynn told the now White House Counsel about the investigation on January 4.  Before the inauguration.

Which begs the question of how could trump still name him as National Security Advisor when he knew Flynn was under investigation for his time as an unregistered foreign agent for Turkey?

We also had a report that Kevin McCarthy, the second in command in the House Republican Caucus told a group of Republicans in 2016 that he thought trump was on Putin’s payroll.

On June 15, 2016 McCarthy said:  “There’s two people I think Putin pays: Rohrabacher and Trump.”   Some of the Republicans laughed but McCarthy quickly added “swear to God”.  These comments were actually taped by someone, and the tape was listened to and verified by The Washington Post. Rep. Dana Rohrabacher is a Californian Republican known in Congress as a fervent defender of Putin and Russia.

When the story first broke both Ryan and McCarthy claimed the conversation “never happened”.  But, when the Post told them they had the tape, they changed their story.  Instead of it never happening, they said it was a “bad attempt at humor”.

This took place exactly one day after the news broke about the hacking of the DNC.  And, right after Ryan and McCarthy came out of a meeting with Ukrainian Prime Minister Volodymyr Groysman, who had described a Kremlin tactic of financing populist politicians to undercut Eastern European democratic institutions.

Getting back to yesterday, when the news of the special counsel was first announced, trump seemed to be happy and claimed it would end in total clearance for him and then he could move on with his agenda.  In a written statement he said “A thorough investigation will confirm what we already know — there was no collusion between my campaign and any foreign entity.  I look forward to this matter concluding quickly.”

That story changed big time today.  In his usual Cowardly Lion manner, he tweeted this morning:  “it is the single greatest witch hunt of a politician in American history!”  Then just to make sure he threw red meat to his base he tweeted:  “With all of the illegal acts that took place in the Clinton campaign & Obama Administration, there was never a special councel (sic) appointed!”

Naturally he gave no indication of any of the so-called “illegal acts” by either Clinton or Obama.  The one thing you can say about the Obama administration is that they were not involved in anything “illegal”.  You may not like the man.  You may even hate his guts.  But, he was never at the center of any scandal nor did he get involved in any illegal acts.  Even Republicans called him “no drama Obama”.

But trump can’t stand the fact that his “team” appears to be neck-deep in Russian scandals.  His former Campaign Manager had dealings with “Russian backed Ukrainian government that was ousted by the people.  There are reports of his money laundering for Russians.  And then we learned that somehow he received a $3 Million mortgage that was mysteriously paid off for him.

Mike Flynn went to Moscow to sit next to Putin at a dinner for RT and was paid
$35,000 for his speech without reporting it.  He was a paid foreign agent for the Turkish government during the campaign and did not register as one.  He reportedly told trump team that he was under investigation before the inauguration.  Then he took the position of National Security Advisor and sat in on highly classified briefings that could have affected his client, and Russia.

As reported, there have been at least 18 undisclosed meeting between the trump transition team and Russian officials including ones involving Kushner, Sessions, and that infamous “phone call” about sanctions Flynn made.  Beloved leader call this a witch-hunt.  He calls this a hoax.  He calls this “fake news”.

To add insult to injury, beloved leader was as the Coast Guard Academy’s graduation ceremony yesterday.  During his speech he complained about how the media was out to get him.  He then bragged, again, about his victory.  He tried to tell the graduates to “fight, fight even when thing are against them”.

That is good advice since his administration wants to slash the Coast Guard’s budget.  They want to cut about $25 billion form the Coast Guard.  Including cutting all of the funding for new equipment the Coast Guard desperately needs.  Yet he had the audacity to claim that the Coast Guard was “necessary to help him fight to keep America Safe”.  Hard to do when you cannot afford the very operations that do that now.

And, all the while, we don’t hear anything of consequence from the Republicans.  Both Ryan and McConnell are fuming over the special counsel appointment because they didn’t want one named.  They both said so many times so they cannot be happy right now.  Still we hear the usual silence from them and their party.

Then we come to the final point.  Mike Pence.  As I wrote the other day, I believe Mike Pence is a co-conspirator in all of this.  I do not believe that Pence was lied to by Flynn but Pence was trying to cover for Flynn.  I believe he knew all along about Flynn’s actions and his not being registered as a foreign agent all the while working for trump and Pence’s campaign.

I further believe that in terms of domestic policy Mike Pence is far more dangerous than trump.  With the way trump behaves, we cannot be sure that he will rubber-stamp anything that Republicans in Congress put in front of him.  We know for certain that Pence will.

During his term as Governor of Indiana, Mike Pence was atrocious.  His poll numbers were at rock bottom which is why most people believe he even took the position as the running mate for trump.  He was the driving force behind the anti-LGBT laws passed in the state.  His track record of voter restriction, anti-LGBT laws and anti-civil rights are well-known.

He is a strong believer that rich people should pay less in taxes than you do.  He believes that health care is a privilege not a right and is in full support of the Americans Without Health Care Act.  If we wind up with a president pence after all of this, we can be sure that our country, domestically at least, will be far worse off than it is now.

As Grover Norquist once said, Mike Pence would be that President with “enough digits to hold a pen and sign everything Republicans put in front of him”.  Some are hoping that Pence will get caught up in all of this as well, and will be forced out.  But, that isn’t all that great either.  Remember the next one in line is none other than that unintelligent wank Paul Ryan.

When Richard Nixon was forced out over the Watergate Scandal, our country had one hope.  We had Gerald Ford sitting as the Vice President.  Ford was a moderate and there was hope that the nation would survive the scandal and get back to normal.  With Pence the sitting Vice President, I  don’t have that same hope for the country.

In the year 2017 we face a real problem.  We have an administration that has tried to “run things” like a dictatorship.  We have a political party, the Republicans, who want to dismantle our democracy.  We have another political party, the Democrats, that react to events rather than planning a real resistance that could put a stop to all of this.

What we really need is some people with cool heads and a plan to fight back.  What we need to have is people who love this country more than they love their party and power.  There are some Democrats who are remaining cool-headed and wanting to get to all of the facts no matter where they lead.  There are beginning to be cracks in the Republican side who want the same thing.

The problem is that there aren’t enough of them yet.  The leadership of the Republican Congress is still hiding their heads in the sand.  Or, should I say they have their heads up their asses.  As a result, we won’t know the extent of this problem for months if not years.

Only, it really doesn’t matter how this all plays out.  If trump is exonerated, he will remain in power and continue his authoritarian form of government.  He will be able to pass laws to “jail” journalists that write things against him, which is what he wants.  He will be able to destroy the country we all love.

If he is found to be involved in this mess, he will be forced out of office, if Republicans have the guts to impeach him and hold a trial in the Senate, and we will end up with president pence.  Which would be no better than having president trump.

Because the 2016 presidential election was a disgusting soap opera instead of a real campaign, we wound up with president trump and vice president mike pence.  As a result, we find ourselves in totally uncharted waters.  There is a major scandal hanging over the White House, and there are no heroes who will ride to our salvation.

To put it very bluntly, no matter what happens from here, we the American People are fucked.  We lose no matter how this plays out.  All of this played out in full during the campaign.  The very fact that trump refused to agree with out intelligence community that is was the Russians who hacked the DNC showed just where his loyalties lay.  His comment about hoping the “Russians would hack Clinton’s emails” showed that he liked the idea Russia was involved.  So, this was all foretold.

The best lesson to take from all of this is how important it is to actually participate in our election process.  Maybe if Americans took their responsibility to get out and vote seriously, we wouldn’t be where we are today.  If you didn’t vote last year and are looking for the real blame, look in the mirror.

And, the shirts keep marching along.

 

 

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Republicans Won’t Split With Beloved Leader No Matter How Much The People Want Them To

May 17, 2017 by Mark

Day 187. 

If you think that everything swirling around our beloved leader is finally going to split him from the Republican Party, think again.  The last few weeks are living proof that Republicans are far more interested in screwing non-rich Americans than they are in protecting our country.

In the last few weeks our beloved leader fired the Director of the FBI.  He had his surrogates tell us that it was because of his sloppy handling of the Hillary Clinton scandal.  Then 24 hours later he announced that it was more because of the ‘Russia thing” that he was thinking about when he made up his mind to fire Comey.

The very next day, he met with the very people that the Russia thing was all about.  He met with the Foreign Minister of Russia.  And, without saying ahead of time, he had the Russian Ambassador, the one who is behind all the Flynn thing, in the meeting as well.  We only found out that Kislyak was in the meeting because the only news organization allowed in the meeting, TASS took pictures of the meeting and there was the Ambassador laughing it up with our beloved leader.

Later we discovered that beloved leader shared highly classified information with the Russians.  Problem was that the information came from one of our partners, and they had not given trump permission to share it with the Russians.  Nor, did trump even bother to talk about sharing the information with his own intelligence team.  Maybe that is why our journalists were not allowed into the meeting.

Additionally, the information he shared could be very hazardous to the people who gathered it in the first place.  Meaning they could be found out and even possibly killed because beloved leader likes to brag about what he knows.

When this story broke, trump hauled out McMaster, his National Security Advisor, to denounce the story as being false.  But, McMaster did not say the part of him sharing highly classified information was false.  A sort of non-denial denial.

Then the next day, trump tweeted and said that maybe he did share the information, but as president he has the right to do so.  Even McMaster defended the “passing” of the information to the Russians.  That is quite different from what McMaster said during his very brief news conference.

Then yesterday, the New York Times revealed that Comey had sent himself a memo concerning a meeting he had with trump in February.  He claimed that trump said “I hope you can let this thing with Flynn go.  He is a good man and I hope you can see clear to let it go.”  In they eyes of most sane people, trump was asking Comey to drop the Russia Investigation and the Investigation into Flynn.

Naturally, the White House denies this latest from Comey.  However, his sidekicks don’t seem too quick to question the authenticity of the memo, just how bad it was for Comey to even write it in the first place.  The memo also states that trump suggested that journalists who print “leaked” information should be put in jail.  Something that goes against the First Amendment especially the part of a free press.  It also goes against that little troubling thing for trump called “due process”.  But, what the hell, if you are tying to be a dictator, laws don’t matter to you.

This is where the Republican party comes in.  As well as those idiots at Fox news who live and die for trump and would love nothing more than for trump to lock up their competition so they can become the formal propaganda machine for trump and his administration.

Dave Weigel tweeted this:  Rep. James Comer, a member of the Oversight Committee, says Trump may well have been joking to Comey. “It looks different on paper.”

John Bresnahan tweeted:  Heard this last night from some Rs on Hill. “Trump was just spouting off, wasn’t serious attempt at obstruction.”

Marianna Sotomayor tweeted:  A senior WH official tells @PeterAlexander that POTUS wasn’t telling Comey to end Flynn investigation and suggest this is the way he speaks.

Avi Asher-Schapiro tweeted:  Meanwhile, on Fox, @BretBaier responds to reports that Trump asked Comey to consider imprisoning reporters by saying “maybe he was joking”.

Then we have Paul Ryan saying “we should look at the facts”.  But then added, just to give cover to his fascist friend: “Some people are out to harm the president.”

Yeah, but not as much as you and your president is out to harm the American People.  You are actually willing to put lives at risk by taking away people’s health care in order to give a huge tax cut to the rich.

Then there is Rep. Barry Loudermilk (R-Ga.) attempting to mount a legal defense of the president. He claimed the Comey memo qualified as “hearsay”, and that therefore it is inadmissible. According to past precident in court cases, an FBI agent’s contemporaneous notes are widely held up in court as credible evidence.

But, in order to make Comey the villain, Jason Miller, a former Trump campaign spokesman who backed out of a White House job after allegations surfaced he had an affair with another transition official, argued Comey’s habit of writing down conversations ― standard practice among law enforcement and in the business world ― was “weird and vindictive.”

“It’s absolutely absurd the president supposedly made such a comment and director Comey sat on it for three months,” Miller said Tuesday on CNN.

He added: “It’s a little bit weird and vindictive on Comey’s part that he had a little diary that he could play gotcha with.”

But Hugh Hewitt led the real conspiracy theory topic and tried to make Comey look like he was the criminal.  On his radio show Wednesday, Hewitt ridiculously compared Comey to one of his infamous predecessors ― J. Edgar Hoover, who “kept files on everyone, and that as a result he was untouchable.”

“And so if Comey has a vast trove of notes, I want to know when did they begin, about whom and what subjects are they on?” he said, while speaking with Sen. Ben Sasse (R-Neb.), who sits on the Judiciary Committee. “Yes, I want to know whether President Trump obstructed justice, and that’s an open question. But I want to know about what was the FBI director noting and not telling you, because I read that hearing. He should have brought this up to you then.”

The point is obvious.  The Republican wacko fringe has their puppet in the White House.  Yet, they are willing to say and do anything to defend someone who is acting like someone who presents a “clean and present danger” to our country and our democracy.  You may ask “why would they do that?

The answer comes in their policies.  First they want to take away health care from millions of people because obviously the real problem in America is too many people have health care.  And, if they can give the rich a tax cut at the same time, even better.  Hence, the Americans Without Health Care Act.

Secondly, they want to give themselves, their donors, and the very rich a huge tax cut.  Although taxes are lower than they have ever been in our country, except when there was no income tax, they still claim it is too damn much.  Well, it too damn much for rich people to pay.  You can pay more, that is okay.

Third, they believe that corporations should pay even less taxes than they do.  About half of the S&P top 500 corporations don’t pay a dime in corporate taxes now.  But, Republicans say that is too much and all companies deserve to have their taxes slashed “hugely”.

They want you to keep believing their lies about how tax cuts to the rich and corporations creates jobs.  We already know that is a lie because they have tried that gimmick before, more than once, and no jobs were created.  Only the rich got richer and we all paid the price.

Finally, and I know this one is stretching things, but I do believe it, they want the economy to collapse again.  They want all of the regulations that are in place to protect us from another economic collapse eliminated and allow financial industry to run roughshod over us.

If you are asking why, you aren’t alone.  But let me explain.  See they are totally against the minimum wage.  They believe that companies should be able to pay whatever they think is “reasonable” wages to their workers.  If the economy totally collapses, they believe that the surviving companies will take over the market and pay wages well below today’s minimum wage.

Today’ Republicans will even change the law to make it legal for that to happen.  They want to return to the days when companies made all of the rules.  Made all of the profits, and paid slave wages to their workers.  They also created “towns” that workers had to live in, for a huge rent, and purchase all of their goods at the company store.  In other words they want to return to the days when the company owned you.

For these reasons, don’t expect Republicans to split with trump anytime soon regardless of the havoc he creates.  They have the very person in the White House that will sign the legislation to make this all come true.  If Republicans need to rubberstamp everything trump wants, including destroying our democracy, that is the price they are willing to pay for their anti-American agenda.

Today’s Republicans look over to Russia and see how Putin has made his cronies billionaires and think trump will do the same for them.  That is the Republican agenda.  You and I don’t count now, and never did to these buffoons.

And, the shirts keep marching along.

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