In My Humble Opinion

No Matter What Trump Says

The first time I saw the characters IMHO in a text, I wondered what it meant. I was a little embarrassed that I didn’t get it immediately. Of course, I had to be told the meaning of LMAO as well. I wonder if President Donald J. Trump would ever use IMHO, not because he doesn’t have an opinion, but because he is the least humble person we have ever elected president.

After watching Michelle Wolf at the White House Correspondence Dinner (4-28-2018), I feel compelled to answer a few questions some people might be asking. HEY, all you people who think Michelle Wolf went too far, ask yourself this question. Does Donald Trump go too far? When someone is NOT politically correct, why are they so wrong? The Leader of the FREE world says that P.C. is bad for America. Did anyone hear that?

Michelle Wolf is a FREAKING COMEDIAN. She is supposed to piss us off and point out how silly and self-important we all are. It’s a little like Trump lambasting Jon Tester for disclosing Dr. Ronny’s nickname of “Candy Man.” Trump was angry and said how low it was to call someone names. Really, Donald? What about Rocketman, Lyin Ted, Crooked Hillary, Little Marco, Low Energy Jeb, Al Frankenstein, Mr. Magoo and on and on. It’s time someone demonstrated the pain that personal attacks create. Wolf is from Hershey, and you expected SWEET? Ha! I say, “You go Girl!”

The discussion about the First Amendment on the cable TV news channels is hilarious. The White House talking heads seem to be agreeing with the news heads that an apology is in order. Give me a freakin’ break! This ongoing misdirect that somehow the press is “unfair” to the President is funnier than some of the jokes that came out of Wolf’s mouth. Yes, she crossed a language barrier with several of her terms and subjects, but this will roll off the backs of hardworking citizens as just another demonstration of “those Trump haters.” Why would those from the 4^th and 5^th Estate be asking for a mea culpa from a comedian?

The other day Donald Trump made a statement with the Chancellor of Germany, Angela Merkel, sitting at his side. It was so alarmingly stupid and so unconnected to logic that my mouth fell open. Our president said that the reason people don’t like him is because he is doing a good job for America. He was trying to say that no one in another country will like him because he must get what America wants first. Unreal!

I wonder if any objective person can see their way to asking this simple question, “Why do people hate our country’s leader?” If I learned that a large percentage of my readers hated me, I would probably say, “Well, F.U.,” and urge them not to read what I write. One cannot worry about what people think when trying to present their thoughts, words or craft. That is why comedians and comedy writers will tell you that any filter on their brains will stop their funniest stuff from getting out. But that is not good advice for the President of the United States. He is not doing a show. He’s supposed to be leading our country.

Some loyal “basers” will not walk away from Donald Trump because they truly believe that he is the best thing that ever happened to America. Some people worship him. There, I said it. And, in my humble opinion, with the evangelicals giving this blasphemer cover they are much like tyrannical communists believing the “end justifies the means.” Hey, it’s their words. They will look away at his sins if they get another chance at making abortions illegal and having judges who pray before a vote. If you had any thought that the big, rich mega churches will protect democracy, keep praying. They only care about the turnstile at their door and raking in donations. They are the money-changers.

The fact that a comedian can get on national TV and say the things that Michelle Wolf did, is not only a great example of freedom of speech but shows that if you give someone a platform and they use it you have no right to whine and do that Monday morning quarterbacking thing with your not-so-humble opinions.

America’s public discourse is at its lowest level because of people like Donald Trump lying and using the First Amendment as a protection against sanity. As I have written, repeatedly, Trump’s biggest fault, and the Achilles heel that will eventually do him in, is his LYING. We cannot have a President who lies and disregards facts. It disrupts the daily duties of government. We waste too much time seeking a higher truth and debating the facts. Trump is disliked because he is a liar. Face it, we have a president who lies, constantly.

According to Politico Magazine, “Trump seems to lie for the pure joy of it. A whopping 70 percent of Trump’s statements that PolitiFact checked during the campaign were false, while only 4 percent were completely true, and 11 percent mostly true.” We know these percentages haven’t gotten better since he became President.

A Quinnipiac University poll from last November showed, “Thirty-seven percent of voters thought Trump was honest, compared with 58 percent who thought he was not.”

Figures from the Morning Consult’s survey said that, “Only 37 percent think Trump is ‘stable’ while, 51 percent don’t. Thirty-six percent think Trump is ‘compassionate.’ Fifty-three percent don’t. Sixty percent think Trump is ‘reckless.’ Only 29 percent don’t.”

So, when a 32-year-old female comedian gets up and blasts away at what she dutiful notes is a corrupt system of liars and lifers in the bureaucratic system of government, she is saying the same thing that got Trump elected. She slapped the media and their coverage, while also being rude to those people we are supposed to respect just for what they do. The irony and hypocrisy here is pulpable.

Why did we have to respect Sean Spicer when he was behind a podium, but we can totally disrespect him once he lost everything after lying his way to the top? Why can’t we disrespect people for who they really are?

Spicer was the MC at a wax figure reveal of Melania Trump at a museum last week. Trump ruins people which is a major disgrace to this great country. No compassion, no truth, no leadership, just a fat orange ego.

The First 200 Days Of Trump – ONLY ONE MILLION LEFT

These daily diatribes from a delusional blogger give you a day by day overview of the 45th President’s first two-hundred days in office. Follow Donald Trump through the tough times on his way to impeachment. Kindle Version HERE, or Get the printed book now, CLICK HERE.

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POOR RONNY JACKSON

Trump Ruins Another Chance

Donald J. Trump is a disastrous failure. He has clearly demonstrated the many disabilities which prevent him from doing his job as the top executive in the country. The case of Dr. Ronny Jackson is the latest example of the White House’s chaotic, haphazard journey through Governance 101. The people who surround this president have neither the nerve nor the knowledge to stop these horrific mistakes. Even the most unskilled observer can simply count the number of people who don’t work out in this administration. If you claim that you will have this “really great vetting” and then you have to reject people after you nominate them, you are a colossal crash.

Listening to Donald Trump on Fox News this morning (4-26-2018), I’m reminded of a babbling old lady on too much coffee. He talked more about Kanye West than Dr. Ronny Jackson. He bounced between subjects like a kid who didn’t take his Ritalin. Why does he feel the need to keep patting himself on the back? I guess now that President Macron of France is gone, he must pleasure himself. What a buffoon. He paints himself the victim and claims everyone is out to get him. Paranoia and power are never good ingredients to mix.

Our Great Orange Leader had a chance to move forward and find a highly qualified person to fix the broken Veterans Administration. It’s rather funny that he said he wanted his private pilot to run the Federal Aviation Administration and his personal doctor to run the VA. It’s like promoting the bag boy at the grocery store to head up the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Makes sense, right? I mean that kid handles more produce in a day than anyone presently in government.

Here are some basic stats on the VA from NBC News: There are 150 VA hospitals, 820 VA community-based outpatient clinics and 300 VA Vet Centers, which offer counseling, suicide prevention and other services. The expanding number of people involved in this enterprise is breathtaking. There were 5.69 million patients in 2013, with 8.92 million people enrolled in VA health care system. There are 3.84 million veterans getting VA disability compensation and 310,000 veterans receiving VA pensions.

The United States Department of Veterans Affairs claims that 377,805 people work for the VA and the American Federation of Government Employees represents 230,000 VA employees. It’s clear that the person who runs the Veteran Administration must have experience in dealing with a large labor force and unions. This is a major undertaking.

Perhaps Dr. Jackson has gotten enough beyond his personal problems and alleged prescription drug malfeasance such that he could have done a good job with such an important administration, but the damage is done. A person who was a trusted medical advisor to our Presidents is now not worthy of that job. He cannot stay in his current position, let alone be promoted.

But the more important aspect of this embarrassing event is that the President of the United States is not a clear-thinking human being. Dissonance, distortions and delusions have permanently damaged this dingbat’s brain. Listening to our raving lunatic of a president talking to his enablers on Fox News was frightening on many levels. When will someone explain to the Donald that his frame of reference on the people he considers for these jobs is limited and unqualified? He needs help but refuses to ask for it.

Before Trump antics delivers a massive dose of Ambien to the whole nation, there are some important issues to accomplish. First, we need to prepare the nation for a new president, albeit, President Mike Pence who would be a dull and dogmatically driven fake president, just like Trump.

This morning on Fox News channel, Trump dodged the questions about the decision of his personal attorney, Michael Cohen, to “take the fifth.” He is now distancing himself from Cohen and his businesses. For those playing along at home, taking the “Fifth Amendment” is a guaranteed protection in the Constitution that says no person “shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself.” Trump in the past has said, “The mob takes the Fifth Amendment. If you’re innocent, why are you taking the Fifth Amendment?” So now we see that the President’s “fixer” has been declared guilty by his boss.

Trump stood by Dr. Ronny Jackson for about 17 hours. That’s perhaps the maximum amount of allegiance that can be expected from the man who demands a loyal pledge from all his minions. Trump’s attacks on anyone with a critical word about him is a never-ending disorder that no doctor can cure. We are already seeing the president’s gentle but obvious disengagement from Michael Cohen. If Trump thinks he has a “get-out-of-jail” pardon card to finally put an end to all his pain, he is dreadfully wrong. The investigation into this corrupt administration and broke-dick president will continue and, in time, we will learn what is truly missing in Donald Trump. He has no core moral value.

The First 200 Days Of Trump – ONLY ONE MILLION LEFT

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OUR WACKO PRESIDENT TRUMP

Vindictive, Never-Ending Screeching

Here is a question one might ask. Why is the President of the United States so worried about all these investigations if he didn’t do anything wrong? Is he just a person suffering from paranoid schizophrenia with daily delusions and strongly-held beliefs that are untrue?

With the fear of what Robert Mueller’s investigation might find and the risk of something being on his lawyer Michael Cohen’s computers, Donald Trump is becoming boxed. While Cohen is investigated for criminal activity in the Southern District of New York, there are ominous footsteps. The office of the Special Counsel is getting closer and closer to releasing something big. And then we will know if this was that “witch-hunt” or a serious misuse of power.

The Great Orange Leader keeps tweeting. This was from Saturday 4-21-2018, “The New York Times and a third-rate reporter named Maggie Haberman, known as a Crooked H flunky who I don’t speak to and have nothing to do with, are going out of their way to destroy Michael Cohen and his relationship with me in the hope that he will “flip.” They use non-existent “sources” and a drunk/drugged up loser who hates Michael, a fine person with a wonderful family. Michael is a businessman for his own account/lawyer who I have always liked & respected. Most people will flip if the Government lets them out of trouble, even if it means lying or making up stories. Sorry, I don’t see Michael doing that despite the horrible Witch Hunt and the dishonest media!”

The Donald’s tweets on James Comey have reached critical mass with his suggesting that Comey should be jailed for leaking his personal recollections of each meeting with the President Elect and then President. This move, so tyrant-like, is pure candidate Trump. Does he truly feel a need to keep running even after he’s won? Trump will never escape his reputation as a huckster. His tweets declaring people guilty or innocent are unethical.

And what about the lip service of working to cure the drug crisis in this country? Only a blithering fool makes fun of alcoholism and addiction. Donald Trump lost a brother to addiction, but he feels the need to incorporate drug usage and drunkenness as a putdown of someone who talked too much. This Trump guy is mentally unwell.

James Comey pointed out that Trump never laughs, unless laughing at his own vindictive slams. How can someone who spends so much energy screeching out his dogma have time to guffaw? Most of what the Donald says is negative. He lives in a dark world of people out to get him, countries ready to screw America, politicians wanting to thwart his agenda and the evil press working to end his presidency. It’s clear he believes these things and they affect his moves and motives.

It would be different if President Trump had inherited a peaceful world. With more than 500,000 people dead in Syria and nearly two million refugees displaced, Trump’s answer was launching surgical strikes. The net result of his actions in Syria have not made a difference. He seems overprotective of Russia and not at all knowledgeable about how the Middle East works. Where is Jared?

With Iran aligned with Russia in Syria, it’s clear Trump is ready to terminate the U.S. part of the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) with Iran, which will leave our allies high and dry. If the pact falls apart, Iran will be able to restart a nuclear program and sabotage the United States’ deal-making credibility. Just when we are trying to do the same kind of deal in Korea.

In North Korea there is a hope that the Donald and Kim Jong-Un will meet and come to an agreement. However, anyone with diplomatic intelligence knows that this is a high-risk proposition. If Trump could achieve denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula, he would certainly win the Nobel Peace prize and could cement a second term. Do you have your barf bag?

What Trump does to himself is curiously wacko. Instead of working to be a good president, he spends too much time psychologically vomiting into his phone. His tweets are more like a daily visit to his shrink, where he can spew all the poison soiling his soul. Then when asked about those tweets, he merely repeats them in his speech without offering any illumination or support for his ambiguous words. It’s a never-ending, repetitious cycle of lies and misconceptions.

I would not be surprised if I were to wake one morning to learn that Donald J. Trump decided he no longer wanted to be president. In my dream, he decides to go back into business where he is arrested for past dirty deeds done. President Pence pardons him, and Donald resumes being the asshole he’s always been. He then builds his presidential library that holds all his books, you know, “The Art of the Deal,” the Holy Bible his mother gave him and all those crumbled pieces of paper containing his tweets. Real treasures.

The First 200 Days Of Trump – ONLY ONE MILLION LEFT

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THE COMEY BOOK

Trump Will Never Read It

I just finished reading the book and must say it was better than I had expected. But, like most books that focus on the beginning of a story, it’s impossible for the author to give us an ending.

By now, 80% of those who watch TV have seen James Comey’s face and might have heard one of his many interviews. Donald Trump fired the Director of the FBI on May 9, 2017 and first said the reason was the Attorney General and the Deputy Attorney General recommended the move.

During an interview with NBC’s Lester Holt two days later, Trump changed his story, claiming that firing Comey was his decision alone and citing the ongoing Russian interference investigation as the cause.

In that 31-minute interview, Trump said that Comey was a “showboat” and admitted that he asked Comey whether he was under investigation for alleged ties to Russia. Then Trump made the amateur mistake of saying he was thinking of “this Russia thing” when he decided to fire FBI Director James Comey.

The next day, while meeting with Russian ambassadors in the Oval Office, Trump said, “I just fired the head of the F.B.I. He was crazy, a real nut job. I faced great pressure because of Russia. That’s taken off.” This was first leaked to the New York Times, but most of the statements were verified by the Russian official version of the meeting.

Now we have a book by the fired James Comey: A Higher Loyalty: Truth, Lies, and Leadership. It has resurrected all the items that Trump would like to forget. Unfortunately for the Trump lawyers, their client has blasted out dozens of tweets to denounce Comey.

On the surface, the book’s intent is to discuss James Comey’s life and his advice on what makes good leadership. Nice try, but the real value of this book is the documentation of events during the months that James Comey served the Department of Justice and the FBI. Trump claims that Comey was the worst FBI Director in the history of the country. Trump obviously knows nothing about the history of the FBI.

Comey’s book is easy to read. If you are a policy wonk or history buff, it’ll be a rich source of quotes, especially if all this eventually sees the light of day in a courtroom. The number of large cases Comey has been involved with during his career as prosecutor and lawyer is amazing. He worked to get Martha Stewart behind bars. He was involved in the Scooter Libby leaking and lying case. He investigated the pardon of Marc Rich by President Bill Clinton. Side note, Scooter Libby was Rich’s attorney during the tax evasion case that propelled him to become a fugitive.

Some mock critics have slammed Comey for using the color orange to describe Trump’s skin or the need to mention the myth of Trump’s small hands. That is total bullshit on their part. Most of the narrative was written in almost lawyer-ese and the exposition was well done, albeit simple. Comey’s visual imagery isn’t literary genius, but it gets the job done. He doesn’t attempt to make fun of someone who everybody on TV already makes fun of, so the reviews are misguided, or perhaps partisan.

In many ways the book falls short on proof, mainly because Comey cannot disclose what he learned while being on the government payroll. But the tome does give insider glimpses into people like Jeff Sessions, Reince Priebus, George Bush, Barack Obama and others. You will come away with a truly dim view of some of them, while others show honestly true leadership.

What Comey doesn’t make a big deal about is his wish to have a special counsel in the matter of Russian Interference. He fails to take credit for his part in getting a special counsel appointed. The post-Trump meeting memos leaked to the New York Times by James Comey were a driving force in moving the “Russia-thing” into high gear. He downplays this fact and makes sure that he says “unclassified” every time he mentions his contemporaneous notes. Comey’s book will continue to deeply disturb our thin-skinned President because he cannot stop the details revealed in it.

And now, we get late breaking news that the Department of Justice has released Comey’s memos to members of Congress (4-19-2018). Less than an hour later they were circulated to the public, an ultimate act of transparency. These are the memos written by Comey and, according to his book, he gave a copy of each to his supervisors and placed them in a folder in his office. The contemporaneous observations add color to the conversations.

In one of the meetings with Trump, he claimed the President of Russia told him, “We have the most beautiful hookers in the world’. And under these same headlines we learned that Reince Priebus asked the Director of the FBI if there was a FISA warrant on Michael Flynn, who later pleaded guilty to lying to the FBI. This sure smells like collusion, obstruction and totally questionable activities to me.

So now Congress, which is portrayed in the Comey book as inflexibly partisan and totally ineffective at challenging Trump, will get a shot at seeing the real deal. This will bring the whole mess back into the light of major media outlets. And, predictably, Trump will constantly berate, denigrate and demean this Justice Department veteran.

James Comey released his book now because he doesn’t want the greater good of his words to be lost in time. We are an instant gratification society, so don’t read the book if you are looking for new information. Trump is a chump and the book shows us why. And our Great Orange Leader will never read the book, but he should.

The First 200 Days Of Trump – ONLY ONE MILLION LEFT

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MORALLY UNFIT

Can Donald Trump Save his Presidency?

There is something sickening in the unseasonable winter winds blowing up the east coast, hitting both Washington and New York City. Those who voted for the President of the United States learn each day that he is not quite what they thought he was. Those of us who have never supported him are finding that he is much worse than we ever believed.

As James Comey continues his book selling tour of the media landscape, we cannot see what is on the horizon for Comey, but it’s becoming clear that Donald Trump is going to have to do more than tweeting to escape his self-inflicted credibility problem. He has entered the labyrinth, and in the end, he will have no one to guide him out.

First, let’s look at the story that got less coverage because of the high courtroom drama taking place in New York. While everyone was focused on Comey and Michael Cohen’s mystery client, Trump was up to his old tricks with Russia.

Nikki Haley, the U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations, said that additional sanctions would be placed on Russia because of their involvement and lack of preventative action in the chemical attack by Assad in Syria. While French President Emmanuel Macron took credit for convincing Trump to keep some troops in Syria, Trump took his eye off the ball back home.

Mr. Trump changed his mind about pulling out of Syria. Now he has changed his mind about imposing Russian sanctions after naming them in the announcement to bomb Syria. What is going on here?

Underneath the announcement of additional sanctions that were to be announced on Monday (4-16-2018), our Great Orange Leader must have heard Putin’s footsteps coming up the hallway because he quickly rescinded them. Once again, Trump is more interested in placating Putin than confronting that leader and his misdeeds. Could it be that the Russians have something on Trump as Comey suggests?

With Trump’s “attorney,” Michael Cohen, being under criminal investigation, the Donald is acting more like someone who has something to hide rather than an open, transparent person. Trump was quick to Twitter with more than 100 words condemning the seizure of Cohen’s data with the cry, “Attorney-Client privilege is dead!” Then Trump sent in his new personal attorney to argue for protection of his communications with Cohen.

What took place in New York yesterday was the same kind of circus we have been subjected to again and again with this White House and President. We learned that Michael Cohen had only three clients in the past year. One, Donald Trump, who he protected with a hush-payment to a porn-star. Two, top GOP fundraiser Elliot Broidy, who he shielded from a damaging paternity P.R. nightmare with a payment of $1.6 million to a former Playboy model. Broidy resigned from his post at the RNC after the settlement was revealed. If you are keeping score, a one-night stand gets you $130K, a ten-month affair nets $150K and impregnation goes for $1.6M.

Three, the mysterious client that Cohen and his attorney attempted to cloak turned out to be Fox News channel’s Sean Hannity. As soon as this revelation hit the fan, Hannity was quick to point out that he was never represented by Cohen in any legal matter and never paid him for any advice on what he said were real estate matters and involved no third parties. Hannity, not a true newsman or journalist, never revealed that he was a Cohen client, even when helping him through his nightly harangues about the FBI raids on his TV show which, according to Variety magazine, tops 3 million viewers.

What does it mean to be a “client” of a lawyer? The attorney-client relationship is created by an agreement of representation. It can be verbal, but usually is detailed in a written engagement agreement. It’s important to point out that a lawyer has ethical duties to prospective clients, current clients, and former clients. You don’t have to pay an attorney for representation, but whether you are a perspective client, a current client, or a client from the past, your communication with that lawyer is protected. There is an exception however, the privilege cannot be used to conceal a crime. As a person of privilege, Donald Trump has used that advantage in his business career to work around rules, laws and regulations. While Trump continues to go soft on Russia, Russians and Russian interference, America is seeing one of the worst side shows in its history.

We have learned about “taint” teams and how the law works with the clear message that no one is above the law. With all the daily “BREAKING NEWS” reports, we have a sense that this President cannot exist without chaos and confusion. He even seems perplexed about what he has and hasn’t said.

Does he really believe that the sanctions he requested were not supposed to be executed against Russia? It’s the old case of the boss who yells and screams at his workers, “Who’s stupid idea was this?” and the workers reluctantly answer, “That was your idea.” The closed-minded boss can only deny he ever proposed the idea. Trump paints himself into the corner all the time, proving that he is truly UNFIT to be President.

James Comey claims the President is “morally unfit” to serve but gives him a pass on the mental piece of the puzzle. One day, he says no one has done more to confront Russia, then the next day we get this from his talking sour-head, White House Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders, “Sanctions were merely under consideration.”

In August 2017, long before the Syrian chemical attack, Congress passed a measure to add Russian sanctions. Trump signed it, and then ignored it. Right after signing, Trump said, “The bill remains seriously flawed — particularly because it encroaches on the executive branch’s authority to negotiate. Congress could not even negotiate a health care bill after seven years of talking.” Even though Trump signed it, he was more interested in putting down Congress instead of taking up the battle against Russia.

For the 60% of Americans who don’t believe this guy, Trump would have to disclose everything about his business and financial structure to save his presidency. He would have to demonstrate, beyond a shadow of doubt, why he gives Putin a pass. Right now, he appears to be the Manchurian Candidate. You might want to watch the movie.

The First 200 Days Of Trump – ONLY ONE MILLION LEFT

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“MISSION ACCOMPLISHED”

Three Strikes and We’re Out!

There is a wonderfully appropriate lyric from the Lynyrd Skynyrd song Simple Man that goes, “Forget your lust for the rich man’s gold, all that you need is in your soul. And you can do this, oh baby, if you try. All that I want for you, my son, is to be satisfied, and be a simple kind of man.”

I am sure the Generals who consulted Donald Trump on the Syrian crisis were cognizant that they had to keep it simple for our Great Orange Leader. Perhaps when Trump played with his little toy soldiers as a young boy, he wanted to command that green plastic army having total world power. Still, he is a simple man.

His telling tweet after those “precision strikes” on known chemical research facilities and factories in Syria clearly showed this president’s lack of sophistication, “A perfectly executed strike last night. Thank you to France and the United Kingdom for their wisdom and the power of their fine Military. Could not have had a better result. Mission Accomplished!”

Maybe the Donald lives in an alternative universe with his “alternate facts,” but it’s clear that by using the words “Mission Accomplished” he has seriously damaged his brand. Could Trump have forgotten the George W. Bush “Mission Accomplished” speech, which took place on the aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln on May 1, 2003? Does our President not remember Bush’s monumental screw up? It remains one of our country’s great punchlines.

Whatever, that didn’t prevent President Donald from using the term after three sites in Syria were targeted, bombed and taken out in retaliation for Bashar al-Assad’s use of chemical weapons in Douma, a town south of Damascus. Now we must deal with the reality that Trump believes this maneuver is a total fix for what has ailed Syria and the world for the last eight years.

The far-right conspiracy theorists quickly latched onto a strange idea. They felt that the chemical attacks were not perpetrated by Assad and the Syrian army but were a photo opportunity and invention of a rebel group or, worse, Russia bating the U.S. into war. I’m not sure why Alex Jones of InfoWars would adopt such a wacko position, but then there is little he does to win a Nobel Peace Prize.

During my research while writing the book If God Could Cry, I was nose down for two years on about a dozen tomes about Islam and the Middle East. I discovered a diverse group of opinions about the challenges on the ground, and I developed a better understanding of the region’s people and what drives their conflicts. My study revealed a never-ending string of decisions and mistakes pushed onto the Middle East nations. Each move was a big foot stomping a tube of toothpaste. What looked like a quick way to solve a problem was simply making a mess.

Back to Syria, aside from the baked-in conflict of the Sunni and Shia family argument that has been going on for 1400 years, we have the geo-political problem of two varieties of leaders in the Levant.

One is the supreme leader based on Sharia Law, basically a theocracy. The other is the totalitarian leader, with fascist and dictator leanings, who applies Sharia to the people they rule. Nowhere in this mix is a democracy. And, make no doubt about it, Bashar al-Assad is that kind of total dictator who was appointed to the position by his late father, Hafez al-Assad, a despicable blood-thirsty king.

There are probably very few people in America who believe the reports from Douma and have seen the video of poisoned children, who would argue that the actions taken by the joint efforts of British, French and American troops were unjustified. But that brings us to the next step in this process. What is our strategy and what happens now?

The Lynyrd Skynyrd song urges the simple people to beware of “lust for the rich man’s gold.” If you believe campaign-Donald, this is the oil living underground in the Middle East. The lyric references that which resides in the simple man’s soul, and here is where Donald Trump gets confused and vague. It makes one wonder if this simple man even has a soul.

He wants the satisfaction of the world thinking he is good, but he dodges the heavy lifting of understanding the true nature of the problem. He never mentions that Assad and his war machine have killed 500,000 people using big bombs and guns – no gas was needed. Politically and morally, our Orange Leader doesn’t want to think about the five million people who left Syria and are now refugees. He has openly classified such exiles as UNACCEPTABLE and DANGEROUS to America.

The real mission in Syria should be regime change, highly unlikely to be accomplished by any country or leader. Israel doesn’t want an Ayatollah in Syria, Iran does. Russia would like to take the place over, like they did in Crimea, but that would cause major problems for the West and would cost the Russian people a mountain of rubles.

So, here we go again. It’s another example of other countries trying to “do what is right” by changing the world when, deep down inside, they know that they cannot go too far without upsetting the apple cart. It would be nice for five million people to return to a peaceful home country. One could say the same thing about the expatriates of Mexico, Honduras, Venezuela or El Salvador.

Donald Trump is finding out the hard way that he cannot be an “America First” president and please all its citizens. He cannot be an isolationist and anti-globalist, while claiming he wants to help the children of the world. Trump doesn’t stay on his own message, and when he uses someone else’s, he looks foolish. Mission Accomplished? Really Donald? You should have run that one by someone smarter than you.

The First 200 Days Of Trump – ONLY ONE MILLION LEFT

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TWO WARS AT ONCE

Trump – Comey – Trump – Assad

There are times in every presidential administration when someone writes a book that is critical of the present occupant of the White House. We now have two books, Michael Wolff’s Fire and Fury and James Comey’s A Higher Loyalty. Both of them are direct hit jobs on President Donald J. Trump and the way he does business in Washington.

As President Trump was trying to decide what to do about HIS red line in Syria, the talking heads on TV were reading excerpts from the leaked Comey book. How fitting.

What has happened here is that the clearer, more informed minds of our Generals and Commanders in the field have temporary talked Trump off the ledge of war.

An important aspect of the Syrian conflict is the teaching moment it presents to our naïve and misinformed leader. The stakes involve a decision to go face to face with Russia and Trump appears to have blinked. We may never know if Trump used a communication channel to the Kremlin to find out how serious Putin was with his warnings, but the net result is that Trump can use Nikki Haley to work some magic at the United Nations to get the support of other nations.

We already have buy-in from the U.K. and France, but what about bringing Assad to the world court and charging him with war crimes? Why not figure out a way to get him out of control? Oh, that’s right, those are the same things Obama did and all he accomplished was a promise from Russia that the chemical weapons would be destroyed. That didn’t work. And when Trump was so emotionally overtaken by pictures of kids who were poisoned by Bashar al-Assad, he wasted 59 tomahawk missiles scorching an airfield that was up and running again in a few days. That didn’t’ work.

What the Donald is finding out is that all the things he thought he could fix with his big, round mouth are more difficult than he ever imagined. In fact, they are just as tricky as they were for Obama, two Bushes and Bill Clinton. While all this is going on, James Comey’s book is about to drop and the sound it will make will surely drive this ego-maniac more insane.

Comey could be painted as a just another fired, disgruntled employee arguing his case to the world, but what his book will do to this administration could be harmful to our country. While Trump and his team should be focusing on the Middle East, they will be diverted into a war posture against Comey, which they will expand to include the slandering and defiling Robert Mueller. Word on the street is that the RNC, a political party, will buy ads to discredit the investigation into Russian meddling in our election.

Chemical weapons are against the law, so is torturing a captured enemy, but that didn’t stop Dick Cheney and his neo-con war machine. It would be highly unlikely that anyone in the World Court would be convinced that America was a creditable witness to these high crimes and misdemeanors, but you still have that red line that both Obama and Trump painted in the sand. If the Armed Forces of the United States were thrown into a conflict in Syria, Trump’s premise that we wasted money and got nothing in Iraq and Afghanistan goes out the window.

There was a window of opportunity for Trump to maintain America’s leadership role in the world, but that has closed. When Turkey, Russia and Iran met to divide Syria, two messages became clear. First, the U.S. was not at the table, meaning we didn’t care. Second, we didn’t care about Assad’s thoughts. Putin wants a warm-water port and Iran wants to force Syria into their version of Islam. The supreme leader, Ali Khamenei of Iran, has a goal of maintaining religious and political power over Syria, no matter who the leader might be.

All this is way over Donald Trump’s head. He doesn’t get the nuances and intricacies of the Middle East. He jobbed out that responsibility to Jared Kushner, who has remained invisible and silent through this and most other matters. What does this person do and why is he there?

Trump has been handed a Rubik’s cube which has been tortuously turned and worked by previous administrations. There are no secret codes, no money that can be paid to release us from this quagmire. Even if we were to remove Assad from power, there is no plan for handling the resulting vacuum. If the RNC spends millions to discredit the Special Counsel, the investigation will at least show that James Comey’s observations are more credible than false.

But the President has his bully-pulpit, a.k.a. Twitter, and he soon responded to his very own personal war, “James Comey is a proven LEAKER & LIAR. Virtually everyone in Washington thought he should be fired for the terrible job he did-until he was, in fact, fired. He leaked CLASSIFIED information, for which he should be prosecuted. He lied to Congress under OATH. He is a weak and untruthful slime ball who was, as time has proven, a terrible Director of the FBI. His handling of the Crooked Hillary Clinton case, and the events surrounding it, will go down as one of the worst “botch jobs” of history. It was my great honor to fire James Comey!” TRUMP ONLY CARES ABOUT HOW HE’S VIEWED, NOT WHAT IS RIGHT.

The on-the-job training of our Great Orange Leader is utterly tiresome and unproductive. If only someone would step up and take the wheel of this runaway train. Why do we have to wait four years? We don’t need to be fighting more wars. It’s time we give peace and order a chance.

The First 200 Days Of Trump – ONLY ONE MILLION LEFT

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GAS KILLING ANIMAL AND THE CLOWN

Trump’s Lack of Gravitas in Foreign Affairs

In the last 500 days, I have written over 150,000 words about Donald Trump, his reactionary behavior and his small mindedness. I never said I would be objective and have openly admitted that I never respected him, and I hated his TV show.

I lived in New York for 16 years and had a front row seat for the Donald Trump show, before he was a political candidate or president. Most of the time I cast aside his actions and opinions as the raves of a rabies infested mind. He rarely made sense, and it was obvious that each of his statements either made himself look better or discredited someone else. I never sensed a drip of reason from this headline-making rich guy. He was a simplistic fool, born with a silver spoon in his mouth. The metal must have leaked into his frontal lobes.

Anyone in the world can read any tweet that is posted to @realDonaldTrump. Now that the Donald has been sworn in as the President of the United States, we have more than just a reality TV series cliffhanger to consider. This man can now curtail justice in our courts, run up our country’s debt or, worse, get us into another war.

There should be someone filtering his emotional, unreasonable and unresearched viewpoints. But that is a stupid pipedream that will never happen. He will tweet us into a trade war or a real war, and no one will stand up to him. Trump is addicted to social media with the same reckless abandon of a 14-year girl or the local high school bully.

Trumps Tweets of April 11, 2018, “Russia vows to shoot down any and all missiles fired at Syria. Get ready Russia, because they will be coming, nice and new and “smart!” You shouldn’t be partners with a Gas Killing Animal who kills his people and enjoys it! Our relationship with Russia is worse now than it has ever been, and that includes the Cold War. There is no reason for this. Russia needs us to help with their economy, something that would be very easy to do, and we need all nations to work together. Stop the arms race? Much of the bad blood with Russia is caused by the Fake & Corrupt Russia Investigation, headed up by the all Democrat loyalists, or people that worked for Obama. Mueller is most conflicted of all (except Rosenstein who signed FISA & Comey letter). No Collusion, so they go crazy!”

Some people use the phrase, “Bull in a china shop.” I prefer to employ a visual of the direction a full balloon takes when let loose. Trump is all over the place, and when he receives any criticism he tries to fix the story, change the narrative or cast disparagement on people or institutions.

His misplaced ridicule may make him feel better, but it clouds the discussion and comprehension of what is really happening. This was the tweet he sent today (4-12-2018), “Never said when an attack on Syria would take place. Could be very soon or not so soon at all! In any event, the United States, under my Administration, has done a great job of ridding the region of ISIS. Where is our “Thank you America?”

This is exactly the reason he should NOT be allowed to tweet. Sorry, but all this yak-yak, throw-up-in-my-mouth justification that the President needs to tweet so he can communicate his thoughts directly to his “base” without the “censorship” of the mainstream media is a false narrative. And, really, why would the leader of the free world need a “thank you?” Insecurity reigns supreme.

Our Great Orange Leader needs the instant gratification of his inner thoughts blasting out on a social media platform. He seems to be trying out policies or thoughts on the internet, testing them in a sense. Sometimes his staff, cabinet and experts will tell him that there may be possible misinterpretation of what he has said, then he tries to repair the damage. He demands his underlings to lie daily, then throws them away when he is bored. Trump may think he is declaring opinions, but he doesn’t realize that what he types on Twitter, is policy. Those are legal documents.

Syria using chemical weapons is not a good thing. The bashing of Obama for creating what appeared to be a red line in the sand has pushed Trump to be less thoughtful and more aggressive than necessary. The Donald has painted his own red line because of this. He over-reacts to critics and ignores any semblance of diplomacy.

The posturing and flamboyant language of threating Russia and blaming the investigation on Russian interference as the catalyst for a bad relationship with Putin is, once again, the balloon uncontrollably flying around the room. Congress is limp and ineffective, failing their Constitutional responsibility to pull this president away from his warlike actions.

Unfortunately, the 9-11 attacks created a more liberal viewpoint of the president’s powers of waging war and “defending” our country. It’s time to revisit this and define the exact powers of war a president holds, and to determine the difference between defending our country and taking pre-emptive actions on foreign soil.

A true hawk on this Syrian crisis would call for regime change, but who wants to deal with Russia? It’s the one country we cannot trust Trump to handle properly.

Trump’s mouth has gotten himself into trouble and we are on the edge of war because this jerk of a president tweets before he thinks. On the campaign trail, he warned that if America voted for Hillary Clinton she would draw the country into war. Well, look who’s getting us into war now.

Trump is a liar and an unfocused human being. His picadilloes of vanity, narcissism and needy stage performances can be ignored, but his addiction to power, sex, love for his “base” above the rest of the country and a false belief that he knows better than anyone else is hurting America. He is known to have bribed his way out of problems. His morality can be and should be questioned by the evangelicals and conservatives in this country.

Trump needs to get the fuck out the White House before we are thrown into another unending war. Mike Pence is not a suitable replacement but, for now, President Pence will at least listen to the people and God more than the almighty dollar. Trump is a loser, a bum, and it’s time for us to get rid of him.

The First 200 Days Of Trump – ONLY ONE MILLION LEFT

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FEDS RAID TRUMP ATTORNEY

Attorney–client privilege is dead!

There is a big difference between someone “breaking into” your property and a group of G-men knocking on your door holding a search warrant. We’re about to see that attorney-client privilege is not a loophole to get away with committing a crime.

If any people in the Trump circle who may have been witnesses to wrongdoing, or who may have been involved in illegal activities, believe that being a buddy with the Donald is a “get-out-of-jail” card, they are terribly mistaken.

Michael Cohen is a lawyer who is so close to the President and his companies that he has the status of a fixer and consigliere. This makes him more than an attorney of record. He was an employee of the Trump Organization. Trump and Cohen are so tight that, according to Cohen, he paid hush money to a porn star out of his own pocket without even telling Trump. This is bad legal form and, in the state of New York where Cohen practices, it’s a kind of proxy power of attorney that could place Cohen’s legal license in jeopardy.

When we heard from candidate Trump that he would hire the best people and that the government would be a well-run, efficient machine, we wondered what would happen. Now we know. This is a giant, rolling ball of confusion. Things said and things done have no clarity or purpose. The quick knee-jerk reactions and reparsing of verbal pronouncements by the President’s staff show a lack of organization, forethought and concentration.

We get it. One of the people who knows more about what Trump did and didn’t do over the last ten years has been raided. His computers, phones and tax documents were confiscated by the FBI. The Donald is completely freaked out. He opened a high-level meeting with top-ranking military personnel with these words, “So, I just heard that they broke into the office of one of my personal attorneys—a good man, it’s a new level of unfairness.” Trump’s unscripted moment continued with, “It’s an attack on our country in a true sense. It’s an attack on what we all stand for.”

It’s funny that the President would use the same words to describe this federal crime investigation as many intelligence experts and Congressional oversight members used to describe what Russia was doing during our elections. Trump has never used the words “attack on what we stand for“ to describe the interference and conspiracy to disrupt our elections.

With a meeting to decide what to do about the possible chemical warfare being waged against the Syrian people by their own leader, our kingpin was sitting with his arms folded across his chest in a protectionist position, whining about this latest move by our Justice Department. His priorities are obviously misdirected and horribly inefficient. He should have never let the press into that Pentagon meeting. It’s clear that he can’t kept his eye on the ball and concentrate on being President. If you have nothing to hide, then stop telling the world you have nothing to hide.

What our Great Orange Leader doesn’t comprehend is that Mueller’s investigation didn’t carry out these raids. Here’s what we learned from Michael Cohen’s attorney, Stephen Ryan, “Today, the U.S. attorney’s office for the Southern District of New York executed a series of search warrants and seized the privileged communications between my client, Michael Cohen, and his clients.”

If the State of New York and the U.S. Attorney’s office there handles the case against Michael Cohen, Trump will not be able to pardon Cohen. This is a brilliant move by the Special Counsel’s office. It puts Cohen in a bind and cuts the communication cord between the White House and the Department of Justice, thwarting any interference Trump might attempt. Prosecutors in the Southern District will simply say, “We’ll take it from here.”

If Trump were to fire Jeff Sessions or Rod Rosenstein because they refuse to fire Mueller, someone else would have to be appointed. This would lead to a tough hearing in Congress asking for a guarantee of independence. It would all continue from where it is, and that is the beauty of our system and government structure. The Judiciary, Executive and Legislative branches must operate legally and independently.

As Trump cancels his trip to South America this weekend under the premise of wanting to watch the Syrian situation, we know he’s agonizing over the domestic legal problem he faces. Trump thinks that if he was away, he would be out of the loop, such strange paranoia.

Trump is not only an anti-globalist and isolationist, he is also someone who likes to stay home when things are going badly. His cocoon this week will be filled with only those who can boost his self-esteem and give him the advice he wants to hear. Some of those surrounding him could be legal minds suggesting ways to battle those who are out to get him. Today, Trump tweeted, “A TOTAL WITCH HUNT!!!”

And in the end, we will learn the truth. The most important goal of this whole mess is finding a way to bring trust, honor and respect back to the office of the President of the United States. We must all know that no one is above the law. For someone who called himself a “Law and Order” president, there seems to be very little order or respect for the law. How did this happen?

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PAIN & BIG PRICE TO PAY

Trump’s Premature Pull-out

We knew it was going to happen. People warned us that it was going to happen. But now we see the result of someone who doesn’t calculate his comments or comprehend the weight of his words. Let us review.

Just last week, seemly out of the blue, President Donald Trump said, “I want to get out. I want to bring our troops back home.” And he added the snarky comment, “We’ll be coming out of Syria, like, very soon. Let the other people take care of it now.”

It reminds me of a wild New Year’s Eve party I had one night at my home where there were so people they could hardly move. A woman dropped her plate of food on the carpeting and started to walk away from her mess. I suggested she clean up the dropped plate, she turned to me and said, “They have people to take care of that.”

For most of Trump’s life, someone else has always taken care of things. When he wanted to keep someone from talking about him, he would have someone else write and execute a Nondisclosure Agreement. When he was tired of the woman he married, he would call in some lawyers to clean up the mess.

But now, Trump is the President of the United States and the words he uses, whether out loud or online, have major consequences. There isn’t a fixer to call. Clearly, he was suggesting an almost “mission accomplished” moment when he said, “We are knocking the hell out of ISIS and that once that’s done we’ll be coming out.” The assumption that ISIS is anywhere close to giving up shows this man’s inability to follow the intelligence and understand fundamental facts from the front line.

One of the things that makes Trump so effective with his base is his way of talking in simple terms and use of generalizations. He makes bold, naïve statements, and the bobblehead dolls of the heartland nod and believe in their Great Orange Leader. He discounts basic facts, like we have fewer troops in Syria than Mr. Trump is sending to the Mexican-U.S. border: 2,000 vs. 4,000. Does that mean ISIS is less dangerous than women and children in the “caravan” coming from Honduras? These facts don’t matter in Trumpworld.

Something happened right after Trump made his careless statement about Syria. The ruthless dictator, Bashar al-Assad, once again dropped chemical bombs on his own people. John McCain was quick to suggest that Assad did that because of Trump’s premature pullout statement. Wow, the senior Senator from Arizona is suggesting culpability on Trump’s part.

The last time Assad used chemical weapons, Trump finished his second large piece of chocolate cake and launched an airstrike on an airbase in Syria.

This time, Trump was quick to Tweet this reaction: “Many dead, including women and children, in mindless CHEMICAL attack in Syria. Area of atrocity is in lockdown and encircled by Syrian Army, making it completely inaccessible to outside world. President Putin, Russia and Iran are responsible for backing Animal Assad. Big price to pay. Open area immediately for medical help and verification. Another humanitarian disaster for no reason whatsoever. SICK!”

In just days, we’ve gone from pulling out soon, rubbing our hands and saying basically our work is done here, to the realization that ISIS is only part of the problem. It’s a complicated civil war with three or four factions, interference coming from Russian and Iran and the desire to push the Hezbollah party into power. Both Russia and Iran will not take any aggression sitting down.

Not only are the Russians warning Trump not to retaliate in Syria, they are reacting to an early Monday morning bombing of a major air base in central Syria. Russia’s Defense Ministry claimed that two Israeli F-15 jets launched eight guided rockets from Lebanese airspace into Syria. Will Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu upstage Trump and take the frontline for him in this war?

If Trump would have just slowed down and gathered advice from his experts first, he would have avoided this kind of embarrassing international blunder. There is clearly no diplomatic filter on the @realDonaldTrump twitter account. We knew it was going to happen; people warned that it was going to happen, but this vain and uncontrollable man doesn’t care what smart people think. He cannot separate the smart from the loud.

The Donald told us that we might feel a little pain with his Trade War that he is conducting against China, Canada and Mexico, but he’s now asking us to pay more for his imaginary long-term gain. It’s a giant trickledown con job. The price increases will wipe out any gains people achieved with the tax cut.

Trump cares more about putting down Obama’s Syria “red line” comment than acknowledging that, no matter what he does, someone will have to pay a price in Syria. If our President gets involved and starts to drop bombs, he will piss off his boyfriend Putin. If he does nothing, he will look weak and all the Trump haters will accuse him of hypocrisy. There are no right choices here. We need, and don’t have, a president who puts America First, not his ego and shallow knowledge of the political landscape in the Middle East.

Gee, where is Trump’s big Middle East peacekeeper Jared Kushner? I guess a person who owns properties on the West Bank in Israel would not be that objective in this discussion. I’m not sure why Jared Kushner is even a part of this story.

The cunning military intellectual, General McMaster, is gone. Now Trump gets to test his brand-new security adviser, John Bolton, on his first day at work. To bomb or not to bomb? Action or inaction? As Trump says when he is befuddled and flustered, “We will see.”

Whatever the Russian spy network has on Donald Trump, or whatever embarrassing bank entanglements he is keeping from the American public, they probably don’t mean anything now. Trump is trying to figure out whether he wants to go up against Russia on the world stage. Putin could release what he knows about Trump, but that is too obvious for a former spy.

With Syria in Bashar al-Assad’s grip, nothing is going to change. Like his father, he will bomb and poison his people until they bow to his authority. Trump best be wearing his big-boy pants this week. He might also want to have a few spare trousers on call. When he finally hears the truth about Syria from Bolton, he will be losing more than his credibility.

The First 200 Days Of Trump – ONLY ONE MILLION LEFT

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