10/16/20: Today, let’s dig
around in the garbage can that is the Trump administration and see what coffee
grounds, moldy melon rinds, and soiled diapers of policy and behavior we discover.
____________________
“He
is the most flawed person I have ever met in my life.”
Former
White House Chief of Staff, Gen. John Kelly
____________________
According to CNN, former White House Chief of
Staff Gen. John Kelly has been telling friends what he really thinks of his
old boss. “The depths of his dishonesty is just astounding to me,”
Kelly has said. “The dishonesty, the transactional nature of every
relationship, though it’s more pathetic than anything else. He is the most
flawed person I have ever met in my life.”
Sen Ben Sasse (R-NE) is no more a fan of this
president than Gen. Kelly. In a campaign call this week, a constituent asked
why he had at times been critical of Mr. Trump. Sasse decided to unload. He
said the man in the Oval Office “kisses dictator’s butts” and “sells out [our] allies.”
He warned that the Republican Party could be facing a “blue tsunami” in the
coming election.
Sasse wondered rhetorically why the GOP had signed
on for four years of Donald Trump. “What the heck were any of us thinking that selling
a TV-obsessed narcissistic individual to the American people was a good
idea?” The president, he continued, “mocks evangelicals behind closed doors,”
mistreats women and totally mishandled the coronavirus crisis. Trump spent federal
dollars “like a drunken sailor” and “flirted with white supremacists.”
Sasse added that the American people were tired
of the president’s “stupid political obsessions,” his “rage tweeting” and the
fact “his family has treated the presidency like a business opportunity.”
Even Caroline Rose
Giuliani, Rudy’s daughter gets involved. She has always been reluctant to advance herself based on her last
name. Now she announces, “I’m Rudy Giuliani’s daughter,” and she’s voting for
Joe Biden.
Why speak out?
“I’ve come to realize
that none of us can afford to be silent right now,” she says. This public break
with her father pains her, but she believes she has no choice. “I may not be able to change
my father’s mind,” she adds, “but together, we can vote this toxic
administration out of office.”
*
Crowd-surfing at a Trump
rally!
AND WE STILL can’t get a grip on the
coronavirus. On October 15, the U.S. had 63,486 new cases, the worst
one-day total in months. Another 892 Americans died.
If it’s possible, Mr. Trump is even more delusional
since recovering from his own bout of COVID-19. At another rally this week, he
told fans, “The light at the end of
the tunnel is near. We are rounding the turn,” on the disease.
One might have thought, considering his unfortunate battle with
bone spurs during the Vietnam War, that he would have steered clear of such
imagery. In the 60s, politicians and generals kept assuring us that they could
see a light at the end of a different tunnel; and we just had to believe them,
and we would soon win that war. It turned out that no one could ever drill
through the last mile of rock in the Vietnamese mountain and achieve victory.
And so, our side lost.
“Don’t listen to the cynics and angry partisans and pessimists,” Trump
told a cheering throng. He had this under control; and we should elect him
again, to run up an even higher body count in a second term.
To get a sense of the seriousness with which Trump fans are taking
all the “mask wearing” and “social distancing” warnings, consider the case of Vernon
Jones. Friday night the Georgia state lawmaker decided to go crowd-surfing at a
Trump rally. Jones, a renegade Democrat – and your side is welcome to him – didn’t wear
a mask. As for social distancing? Yeah, crowd surfing.
 |
Rep. Jones. |
*
IN BUSINESS NEWS, this was a tough week for the giants
of capitalism who run Pilgrim’s Pride. In a plea deal with the feds, executives
agreed to admit they participated in a price-fixing conspiracy involving chicken
breasts, thighs, drumsticks, and wings. The company will “fork over” (cheap
pun) $110.5 million to settle the case and make up for the fact
they were ripping off consumers.
Then again, it could have been worse. No executives
will be going to jail, unlike, say, an ordinary black teenager, who was
sentenced to five years in prison after he stole a pair of tennis shoes worth
$180. He did have a gun, so he was charged with armed robbery.
The moral of this story: If you want to rob
people, don’t bring a gun, bring some business acumen.
*
SPEAKING OF GUNS, the U.S. economy may be staggering along. But with all the current talk of “civil war” among Trump supporters, should he be defeated at the ballot box, and all the calming words offered by Mr. Trump regarding the coming “rigged” election, two areas of business are booming. First, gun sales have skyrocketed. In June, a record 3.9 million background checks were conducted. That would be the most in a single month since the system was created in 1998.
Second highest month: March 2020.
Alcohol consumption has also risen
steeply during the pandemic. Americans report that they are drinking more days per week (this blogger is up to eight), and drinking to excess more
frequently (defined as five drinks for a man or four for a woman in the course
of a few hours). According to a report by ABC, “Heavy drinking among women
especially has soared.” In a May survey of businesses, alcohol sales were 34.2% higher
versus the same period in 2019.
*
CONFIRMATION HEARINGS for Judge Amy Coney Barrett wrapped up Friday, with Republican senators expressing undying love for the nominee. Yet, when Mr. Trump was asked during his town hall meeting on Wednesday if he hoped Barrett would be the deciding vote to overturn Roe v. Wade, he dodged answering like a coward dodging the draft, claiming tender feet.
He said he had no idea how she might vote on the matter and didn’t want to know. He said he hadn’t asked, because that would be unethical and wrong and violate all his cherished standards.
Barrett, herself, pretty much
told senators she had no opinions on any cases that might come before her, should
she be elevated to the highest court in the land.
If she had been asked, “Would you agree, if you were seated on the Supreme Court, to allow cannibalism, if someone said it was essential to their religious ceremonies?” she would have demurred. She said, again and again and again, that she could not respond to questions about hypothetical cases.
She did, however, venture an uneducated guess when pressed about her stance on climate change. At first, Judge Barrett said she really hadn’t studied the issue and could not offer an opinion.
Sen. Kamala Harris,
questioning her from COVID-19 quarantine, pressed her to give some sort of
answer, posing several simple questions. Did she believe smoking caused cancer,
for instance? Barrett did. Did she think the coronavirus was contagious?
Barrett agreed it was. Then: Did the judge believe climate change was really
happening, and was human activity the cause?
Barrett, whose father is an oil executive, responded, “You asked me uncontroversial questions, like Covid-19 being infectious or if smoking causes cancer” to elicit “an opinion from me on a very contentious matter of public debate,” climate change. “I will not do that,” she added. “I will not express a view on a matter of public policy, especially one that is politically controversial.”
On that note,
A few examples from this week.
Scientists in Australia say more than half the corals in the Great Barrier Reef have been killed since 1995. The culprit: hotter oceans, a direct result of climate change.
The reef covers 133,000 square
miles and can be seen from space. Now the whole reef
may be dying.
Protesters in Mexico have taken over the La Boquilla Dam on the Conchos River, a hundred miles south of the U.S. border. Under existing treaties, Mexico and the United States commit to sharing water from several rivers. Now, climate change means a hotter, drier region and less water on both sides of the border. Farmers in the State of Chihuahua fear that if they send water to Texas, they won’t have enough to raise their crops next season.
According to Christopher Scott, a professor of water resources
policy at the University of Arizona, tensions between the neighboring nations were
already high. Now, “they’re just made so much worse by climate change.” The
farmers in Mexico, he explained, “are in a fight for their lives, because no
water, no agriculture; no agriculture, no rural communities.”
The Cameron Peak Fire in Colorado has exploded and burned through 158,000 acres. That makes it the largest wildfire in state history. The Pine Gulch Fire, which was finally contained only last month, was the largest fire in the state until now, having burned through 139,000 acres of tinder-dry forest. That would be 464 square miles of America, gone up in smoke.
Massive fires in California have reduced 4.1 million acres of the Golden State to blackened wasteland. That’s by far the largest area burned in any single year. Five of the six largest fires in state history have raged in 2020. The total area burned would be equal to 6,406 square miles, equivalent to torching Connecticut.
Hotter, drier weather – climate change, in short – is turning the Western United States into a tinder box.
Friday morning, regardless, President Trump denied a request from California for federal disaster funds because…
...he’s a super-sized asshole.
Like so many other decisions
by the President of the United States, this one is quickly overturned by the mercurial
man in the Oval Office. Facing blowback from people capable of human emotion
and Republican lawmakers in Congress, Trump agrees Friday afternoon to release disaster relief
funds.
*
Trump goes golfing with a kleptocrat.
THE TRUMP ADMINISTRATION may soon be able to add another felon to the Wall of Dishonor.
Former Republican National Committee deputy finance chair and presidential pal Elliott Broidy has been charged with conspiring to violate the Foreign Agents Registration Act. Broidy hoped to finagle favorable treatment from the federal government for a variety of sleazy characters. One was Malaysian prime minister Najib Razak. (Razak has since been ousted from office, tried for embezzlement, and sent to prison after he and his cronies masterminded a massive fraud and got away, temporarily, with an estimated $4.5 billion that belonged to the Malaysian people.) Broidy’s efforts included setting up a round of golf between Razak and the president at Trump’s private club in Bedminster, N.J. Later, he tried to help gain protection for Razak’s accomplice, and current fugitive from justice, Jho Low.
Broidy was also involved in efforts
to help the Chinese communist government get its mitts on a mysterious
Chinese billionaire named Guo Wengui, at the time living in the United States.
Broidy enlisted former Trump campaign aide Rick Gates in this effort. Prosecutors
say Gates was paid $25,000 monthly for his work. (Gates has long been
cooperating with investigators.)
With Broidy, of course, the weird connections spread in all directions. When former Trump adviser Steve Bannon was arrested this summer, he was enjoying himself aboard Guo’s 151-ft. yacht, Lady May. Before that, Broidy reportedly impregnated a Playboy Bunny. Michael Cohen, Trump’s personal lawyer, helped arrange a $1.6 million payoff to keep the Bunny from spilling her story. And, of course, the Bunny went on to have an abortion. Broidy was also known for his “fine work” in tandem with George Nader. In 2018 the pair pushed President Trump to meet with the leader of the United Arab Emirates, who, along with the leaders of Saudi Arabia, hoped to convince the U.S. to take a strong stance against rival Qatar.
Nader, who served as an adviser to the president during his first run for office, has also had his name added to the Wall of Dishonor. In his case, he plead guilty recently to a charge of child sex-trafficking.
So, in just one story about Team Trump, we have:
Bannon: charged with embezzlement.
Broidy: now indicted.
Cohen: pled guilty to nine felonies, two of which he
committed at the urging of “Individual 1,” an unindicted co-conspirator.
Gates: pled guilty to multiple felonies; became a cooperating witness in the Mueller investigation.
Low: indicted on multiple charges; fugitive from justice.
Nader: serving ten years in prison.
Razak: found guilty of fraud and sentenced to pay a
fine of $50 million and spend twelve years
behind bars.
– and –
POSTSCRIPT: No day is complete without the President of the United States making some absurd statement. Yesterday, during an evening town hall meeting on NBC, Trump cited a study by CDC that he claimed warned of the dangers of mask-wearing in a time of COVID-19. In fact, “just the other day, they came out with a statement that 85% of the people that wear masks, catch it.”
Terrifying, if true.
But…not
true.
The dummkopf president made the same claim during a morning appearance on Fox News, and again during a packed afternoon rally in Greenville, N.C. No one at either Fox or attending the rally saw the illogic in Trump’s claim; but on NBC, moderator Savannah Guthrie fact-checked the president as soon as the last crazy syllable spilled from his lips.
“They didn’t say that,” she responded. “I know that study.”
“Well, that’s what I heard. And that’s what I saw,” Trump
replied defiantly.
That meant today, CDC was forced to clarify the matter again – and basically explain that the boss had no clue. Even Trump’s former head of the FDA, Dr. Scott Gottlieb, felt the need to speak up.
On CNBC, he explained:
Masks are not a panacea, but
they’re going to afford you a level of protection. In an environment where the
alternative is having a raging epidemic that’s going to force some kind of
economic dislocation, I’d rather try to get everyone in masks and I’d rather
try to get them in high-quality masks because we know it’s going to slow down
the transmission. It’s going to have an impact.
So, once again, where the pandemic is concerned, the president does more harm in a typical day than good.
And that wasn’t the only lowlight of the evening, courtesy of the President of the United States. Guthrie also challenged him on the accuracy of a retweet he issued on Wednesday. In the original tweet, from a QAnon account, a novel conspiracy theory had been advanced. Supposedly, Joe Biden was behind a plot to take out the group of Navy SEALs who killed Osama bin Laden – despite the fact that every Navy SEAL involved in the bin Laden raid is still alive.
Trump didn’t bother to defend the accuracy of the claim. He only suggested to Guthrie that because he read it on the internet it might be true! He called the original tweet “an opinion of somebody and that was a retweet. I’ll put it out there. People can decide for themselves. I don’t take a position.”
Yeah, I’m just the president, putting out nonsense, and if my
supporters fall for it, what are you gonna’ do?
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