Trump Golfs, Washington Burns

Joe Biden will be president next Jan. 20—that’s not opinion, but reality. But reporting reality seems to be something that gets the media into trouble, these days. The media are not believed by close to half of the voting public, the 70 million to whom Donald Trump is speaking truth as he denies reality.

Trump being delusional, immature and incompetent are nothing new, and helps explain why he has been fired. It’s always been about Trump to Trump—working hard to govern the country was never his thing. He lazily spends his days golfing and watching TV sending out crazy rage tweets. And his refusal to see the hand writing on the wall, to so gracelessly ignore the need for an orderly transition of power—it’s all totally normal for this flawed, abnormal man.

And yet. The Daily Show’s video of the MAGA march on Washington, calling for something or other, was a bit scary to me. So many so willing to attack the news media on baseless claims emanating from that famous source of unreliable nonsense, Donald Junk-for-brains Trump. Democracy dies in darkness and darkness seems to be closing in.

And the Donald has no incentives, now, nothing to preserve except perverse fame. Republican voices calling on him to do the right thing have been few. And I can’t help but think that it’s not only his hyper-active stupid gland at work, nor just the now reflexive craven GOP fear of the far-right base that keeps this sad charade going. I think the tweet storms and dark conspiracy claims keep the Trump base riled and up and are an attempt to excite them and fund raise. It may yet fuel Trump’s next move, which no doubt will involve some sort of awful fact-starved media.

He always was a reality TV star more than he was a business tycoon. He was never a successful captain of industry, but a spoiled rich kid who played one on TV. And as ex-president, the star power of this dim man shines brighter than ever.

Others have noted that Trumpism isn’t over with the defeat of Trump. The MAGA minions march in Washington signals the start of the next campaign. (Yes, yes, violence bad, don't hurt the MAGA minions, they get to march, too--but really, now we're concerned about people attacking protesters? At least the lawless lefty loons weren't acting under the order of a would-be dictator clearing a street for a photo op).

The campaign of 2016, after all, never ended. Having been elected president with no clear idea of what the job was, Trump occupied his time reveling in his imaginary landslide and reliving the glories of victory by continuing the only thing he liked--rallies to draw adoring crowds. They are so important to him that he continued that during a pandemic--reveling in mask-less cheers as he hopped across the country, cheefully ignoring the safety and health of his MAGA-nation.

And the pandemic rages on. Our Dear Leader rage tweets, encourages street marches and does absolutely zero to battle the deadly virus that has already robbed us of more than 250,000 souls. He is not only doing nothing, but he’s preventing the future president from even making contact with the government employees who will have to play catch up and cleanup on this raging mess once the Orange One is finally rolled out of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue and the White House bleached from top to bottom.

Trump tweet, screen shot from my phone. I agree, get the straight jacket, but why do so many still believe him and still think it's the media that are lying to them?

I’m trying to see some light. I am happy Biden won. Yet I worry about my country when the right has continued to make the media the enemy. It seems like facts are the stranger in the this strange land.

And back in Iowa, a red-hot state of COVID-19 infections, our aw-shucks ol’ boy Senator, the Chuckster, tweets that he’s got the ’vid. He is not alone. My incoming representative in the House, “recovering” journalist Ashley Hinson, who left a career of reporting facts to joining a party that ignores them, also is isolated with the virus. Both report mild symptoms.

Get well, Chuck. Thoughts and prayers. But, can you also test positive for a backbone? Like maybe what the Dear Leader is doing (really, not doing) is not so OK?

Well, good, or goodish. Except a person with mild COVID-19 can breath out droplets that still may kill. And where, one wonders, did old Chuck and young Ashley encounter this virus? And why was it suddenly after the election that our governor, COVID-Kim, decided it was time to take sort of serious and mostly symbolic ineffective action?

Months too late, the gov says, Iowans are to wear masks, sort of. In big groups. Bars are closed—after 10 p.m. No sports. Except for the most popular ones at the high school and college levels. And before Nov. 3, we had all kinds of GOP campaign rallies, visits by un-wise men from the East, unmasked Republicans going together to cheer Trump and share infections, yet not a peep from COVID Kim Reynolds.

Chuck Grassley, above (official Senate portrait) and Ashley Hinson, below (image downloaded from her campaign web site and cropped) have tested positive for COVID19. Our elder senator and young congressperson-elect report their symptoms are mild. Would that it was the same for 250,000 Americans already lost and counting.

I don’t expect Chuck or Ashley to provide any leadership on the virus. They are too busy laying low when MAGA nonsense gets pushed via social media. And recovering from journalism.

And Trump? He’ll fire enemies, play golf and ignore the needs of the country. Because the needs of Trump have always weighed more with him than the needs of the country.

Meanwhile, the student staff at the newspaper I advise did some good work this week, including being direct with the powers-that-be that they are not doing enough to protect us. The students were writing about university administration—but the message they state holds true at the highest level of the land.

We must do more:

The young journalists get it. Why can't the recovering ones? You probably can't read this image of a newspaper page--here is a link to a PDF of the page. Their opinion columns are worth a read, too.

 

Gas Lighting Becomes the Nation’s Sport

Portrait of Donald Trump from Wikimedia Commons by DonkeyHotey: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Donald_Trump_-_Portrait_(19209678533).jpg

I have seen way too many comments from Republicans claiming the transcript of President Trump’s disastrous phone call with President Volodymyr Zelensky is a “nothing burger.”

How depressing. An incompetent U.S. president unleashes a confusing word salad in which two things still manage to be abundantly clear: 1) Donald Trump is delusional about kooky right-wing conspiracies—he displays an increasingly erratic and dangerous lack of grip on reality, and 2) Brazenly and openly, he abused the powers of his office to try to get a foreign power to influence the next U.S. presidential election.

Russian collusion in 2016—not proven, but likely. That Russia interfered in 2016, proven beyond doubt. And here comes Donald Trump in 2019, calling a fellow TV star who become president in this crazy era, acting treasonous.

There, I said it: The T word. Trump the traitor. And you know how we used to treat traitors when we were smarter, right?

No, I don’t want an act of violence against the president, so don’t refer me to the Secret Service. I’m echoing his own inappropriate words, which he used on the whistle blower who blew the lid off this latest Trump scandal.

And, let’s consider this. Regardless of what you think of the whistle blower and their potential political motives, they filed a report in the system and let the U.S. government investigate. It was not the whistle blower who attempted to go outside of the law to draw in a foreign nation to further personal political gain.

The traitor in this tale is the addle-brained old man who has such a hypnotic hold on the Republican party that even now the senior senator from my state has attacked Democrats for looking into this scandal.

I read the transcript, too. Instead of a nothing burger, it’s 100 percent pure Angus bullshit. True, I’m not a lawyer and may need some help understating the legal ramifications, but besides appearing, as he usually does, incapable of normal human speech, let’s just review how much wrong burger there was from Trump and his criminal gang in the White House before and after this call:

• Trump puts a hold on military aid to Ukraine, a democracy threatened by an anti-democratic Russia. He then calls the president of said country and, when asked about the aid, immediately launches into his personal political agenda. None of the moves our president has made here make any policy sense in terms of his doing the job the minority of voters elected him to do. There is no hint in the call that Trump was trying to advance a government interest on behalf of the U.S. In this whole scheme, it was clearly Trump pushing Trump, the country be damned.

• Trump desperately seeks any dirt he can on Joe Biden through Joe Biden’s son’s connections to Ukraine. This is not a new story, and the true “nothing burger” is that there is, at this point, no apparent reason to investigate Hunter Biden. One odd attribute of Trump is that he projects his flaws onto his opponents—corrupt politician who makes shady deals on behalf of a sleazy family? His name isn’t “Biden,” it’s “Trump.” When Trump howls at the moon and invents crazy nicknames, so often it’s such a weird mirror of his own flaws.

• Trump’s minions spring into Keystone Cops action after the call. It’s hot, let’s classify with the deepest secrets! A complaint is filed that by law triggers a report to Congress, let’s ignore the law! When the heat gets too hot, an edited transcript will show what a great call it was! When the transcript lands like a javelin missile and suddenly impeachment is in the air, lets get our talking points in order—and email them to Nancy Pelosi!

And then there are Trump’s Tweets this week. President Trump has been singing like a canary, and it’s not pretty. Besides inappropriately attacking a 16-year-old girl who is a climate activist, he is suddenly ranting in all caps in a fire hose of nonsense. He’s injured, he’s hurt, he’s screaming—and he appears to be unhinged. This crazy Twitter twit is the President of the United States, who claimed in 2016 that it was so easy to act presidential. Still waiting.

Yikes. Nothing burger? More like tons of crazy burger.

Dear Chuck and Joni: I know politics is hard, but how far will you go for political advantage? Are you really willing to put all of our political norms at risk—to burn down the house rather than have new tenants move in? And how in the name of any sane universe can the problem that you see in this mess be that Democrats don’t like Trump?

Where is your duty to the republic, to law, to the Constitution?

If you want to be a true patriot now, then it is time to clearly articulate that what Trump has done this fortnight is out of bounds, so far beyond a Sharpie tumor on a weather map that it’s time for you to face the facts and to tell the truth.

You’re not just the Republican senators from Iowa. You are United States senators from Iowa, sworn to uphold the Constitution. For all our sakes, stop the nonsense and do some upholding.

This is clearly beyond a nothing burger. I did read the Mueller Report, and it wasn’t as empty as some seem to think and portray—there were impeachable offenses there, too. Be that as it may, maybe people of good heart can disagree on that report.

But the call to Ukraine? To say there’s nothing there is to gaslight us. We can read it and see it. Don’t try to say it’s OK. It’s clearly not in the neighborhood of OK. Don’t turn away from it. This is our president trying to get a foreign leader to dig up political dirt for him on a candidate for his office. You must, if you care about the country, call Trump out.

Ingrid Bergman from "Gaslight."
Public domain publicity image.

Trump is making it clearer day by scandalous day that he needs to be ousted from the oval office—either by voters or by the Senate acting as a jury.

And at this point, it’s beyond a doubt that there is a case to be made to impeach Donald Trump.

Maybe in the end, you would conclude, based on the testimony presented, that it’s not a case worth convicting Donald Trump on, but the recent events have opened a required path. An investigation here is necessary, and you must support that point if you are truly going to be a patriot. Let the committees meet and call witnesses and stop hassling about whether the House needs to consider impeachment.

It must. Not for partisan points, but because the Constitution and its norms and our continued republic requires it.

So, Sen. Grassley: Near the end of your long public service, will you be remembered as a clear thinker with a backbone who spoke the truth, or as another of the sycophants who has climbed aboard the gaslight express? Are you willing to stand up for what you know to be true?

And Sen. Ernst—where is that spunky Iowa girl who was going to make corrupt politicians squeal? You wore our nation’s uniform to defend it. More than when you were serving in that uniform, your nation needs you now. It’s time for you to stand up for the truth, which means confronting your party and an errant President. It’s your duty. No gaslighting. You know it.

God save the republic. Because Iowa Republicans don’t seem to be interested in that job.