Trump’s Broken Promises. (Part Ten – Personal Behavior)

The final installment of this series concerns the promises Trump made about his behavior. He derided anyone who claimed he was not presidential, claiming he would be the best president ever.

Andrew Jackson: One of the first clues that this would be no ordinary presidency came when Trump chose Andrew Jackson as his model and hung Jackson’s picture in the Oval Office. Jackson, of course, was a slaveholder and a racist who was responsible for The Trail of Tears which resulted in more than 45,000 Native Americans being removed from their homes in the Southeast and forced to march to “Indian Territory” – now Oklahoma.

Vacations and Golf: Trump ridiculed President Obama for playing golf while in office and promised that he would not take any time off for vacations or golf. In fact, Obama played golf a total of 113 times during his first term in office, mostly on military and public courses.

By contrast, Trump is projected to play golf 302 times during his term. Since becoming President, he has spent a quarter of his days at one of his golf properties charging Secret Service $650 per night for each officer. He even charges them for golf cart rental! That’s why his Treasury secretary has refused to reveal the resulting cost of Trump’s security until after the 2020 election. But the total is known to be in the hundreds of millions. By vacationing and holding meetings at his own properties, he also rakes in taxpayer money for other government officials. And lobbyists, foreign dignitaries and others seeking access to the president are encouraged to spend money at his hotels and resorts.

Tax Returns: Trump promised to release his taxes as soon as the audit was finished. He still hasn’t. And he has sued to prevent them from being released. The case has gone to the Supreme Court.

Sexual Assaults: Trump was famously caught on tape bragging about his sexual assaults and intrusions into the dressing rooms of teenaged beauty queens. But when numerous women came forward to accuse him of sexual misconduct and rape, including one who was 13-years-old, he said they were lying and promised to sue them after the election. He has not. But some of the accusers have sued him and more accusers have stepped forward. To date, at least 23 credible women have accused Trump of sexual misconduct. And one woman who accused him of rape has a court-mandated order for Trump’s DNA.

Private E-mail Servers: Trump promised he’d prosecute Hillary Clinton and lock her up for using a private e-mail server while Secretary of State. Instead, Clinton was fully exonerated after a lengthy investigation. Stunningly, many in Trump’s administration have also used private e-mail servers for government business, including his family members and his former deputy national security advisor who used a private server to discuss the transfer of nuclear technology to Saudi Arabia.

Lies: Trump has accused his political opponents, Robert Mueller, the media and Congress of lying. But even if they have (and they most certainly have not), Trump is the king of lies. To date, the Washington Post and other fact-checking organizations have documented that Trump has made more than 15,000 lies and misleading claims as of mid-December. And he seems to be lying at an even faster pace in 2020.

Republicans, Do You Ever Listen To Yourselves?

You blame Democrats for playing partisan politics with the Brett Kavanaugh nomination to the US Supreme Court while withholding mountains of documents from his time as a political operative, including the lengthy period he was investigating President Bill Clinton. You “plow” forward with the judiciary committee hearing while refusing to ask the FBI to investigate credible claims that Kavanaugh may be guilty of sexual assault. You schedule a vote for his confirmation the day after one of his alleged victims was set to testify before listening to her testimony. You say the process must not be delayed even though you left a Supreme Court seat vacant for more than a year, refusing to even schedule a hearing.

And then you voice outrage over politicization of the process? Really? Are you unable to hear the hypocrisy in that?

When pressed, you claim your actions are justified by the failed nomination of Robert Bork. However, you refuse to acknowledge that Bork promised to roll back civil rights gains if seated on the Court and that he had participated in the Watergate cover-up by firing Independent Special Prosecutor Archibald Cox on Nixon’s orders. And I’ll remind you that Democrats weren’t the only Senators who voted to deny Bork a seat on the Court. Six Republican Senators did, as well.

Despite extolling your religious and family values, you engage in victim shaming, saying that Dr. Blasey Ford must be lying since she came forward 36 years after she was nearly raped. Some of you excuse Kavanaugh’s alleged behavior claiming that “boys will be boys” and that “all teenage boys engage in groping and sexual assault.” Even some of your sanctimonious pastors excuse the behavior saying that it wasn’t sexual assault if he stopped short of rape or if she was unable to scream!

Do you not hear how cruel and obnoxious such statements sound? And your outrageous statements surrounding the Senate confirmation are just scratching the surface of your hypocrisy.

Let’s look at your leader. You howl about our government being controlled by the East and West Coast elites, yet you chose to vote for a billionaire from New York who inherited millions. You talk of “draining the swamp.” To do that, you voted for a man who has long-time mob ties and who has bullied the individuals and small businesses who worked for his organization, often refusing to pay them for their work. Moreover, once in office, he filled his cabinet posts with people who have used their positions to fill their own pockets and to offer sweetheart deals to lobbyists.

You angrily protested and threatened President Obama when he signed a stimulus bill to drag the economy out of a ditch – a ditch you created. You screamed that the resulting deficits and the growing national debt were going to ruin our country. But you’re now perfectly okay with the much larger deficits caused by your party’s trillion-dollar gift to the wealthy and corporations in the form of tax cuts.

You claim yours is the party of family values, yet you voted for a man who is thrice married and has bragged about his sexual assaults and perversions. A man who cheated on his wife with a porn star. A man who carried on a near year-long extramarital affair with a Playboy playmate. Worse, his long-time “fixer” pleaded guilty to writing checks on his behalf to cover it up.

You say you want to restore the US as a Christian nation (something prohibited by the Constitution), yet you follow a president who spends his Sundays playing golf at his own resorts so he can charge the government for the rooms and golf carts needed for his Secret Service protection. He couldn’t cite a verse from the Bible if it wasn’t on his teleprompter or scrawled on a note. Even then he’d probably screw it up. You claim that your president was sent by God to save America. Really? Who knew that God so loved pussy-grabbing misogynists and racists?

You blame immigrants for all of your problems. Yet your president hires immigrants to do the labor at his resorts, instead of hiring American citizens. What’s more, his wife is herself an immigrant who, without a green card, illegally took modeling jobs away from American citizens before marrying money. Then she engaged in the so-called chain migration you so deplore by bringing her family to the US.

You chant “freedom” while denying African-Americans, Native Americans, and LGBTQ citizens the same freedoms that you enjoy. At the same time, you refuse freedom to refugees of violence and war. You call for young Latin Americans – even those who have served in our military – to be deported from the only country they’ve ever known. And you praise your leader for ripping immigrant children from the arms of their parents and placing them in cages?

You wave the flag in an ostentatious show of patriotism and you claim to support the troops. Yet you say you hate liberals and Democrats more than the nation that interfered in our democracy. You support our enemies over our long-time, loyal allies. As for supporting the troops, you voted for a gutless man who refused to take a stand on the Vietnam War, instead claiming a deferment for bone spurs. The same man who verbally attacked a war hero who was a member of his own party and a Gold Star family who gave a valiant son in service to our nation. A man who plans to reduce funding for Veteran’s health care.

You claim to believe in the rule of law, but you ignore the growing list of guilty pleas and indictments of the president’s closest friends and campaign staff. You think the Russia investigation is a witch hunt that should be stopped. Instead, you want to conduct yet another investigation of the president’s former political opponent. In fact, you don’t even want to wait for another investigation of her imaginary crimes, as you chant “lock her up.” You look the other way after mass shootings, even after the slaughter of elementary school children, offering nothing more than “thoughts and prayers.” And you stand silent when your president equates Nazis and White Supremacists to those who nonviolently protest their hate.

You and your media pundits claim that Democrats and liberals don’t try to understand you. You claim that we don’t listen to you. I beg to differ. We’ve been listening to your anger and your hatred for the past decade and longer. I wonder if you’ve been listening to yourselves.

#MeTooLate? #MeTooLittle? Or #MeTooFar?

The #MeToo movement represents a welcome change for our culture. It has drawn attention to a problem that has been allowed to continue for far too long. But it also raises a number of questions.

Should an accusation of unwanted touching be treated in the same way as an accusation of sexual assault or rape? What should be the required burden of proof? What should be the statute of limitations? Do we want to punish those who committed despicable acts decades ago? If so, for what types of actions? Is a single, unsubstantiated accusation enough to destroy a career? Have we suspended the presumption of innocence? What can a person do to reinstate trust?

Senator Al Franken was forced to resign over a photo taken years before he was elected to office. Does the accusation that he rehearsed a kiss and the accusations of inappropriately touching others rise to the same level as the accusations of rape and pussy-grabbing by President Trump? If so, why shouldn’t Trump also be forced to resign? Why was he elected to office in the first place?

I’ve personally witnessed “hands on” management. When I asked my female co-workers about it, I was told not to worry – that the man was harmless. What should I have done? Should I have continued to question his actions? (I was nearly fired for calling attention to the issue.) Should I have reported him to authorities when his victims wouldn’t?

I also worked with two men who were later proven to be sexual predators. I suspected these men of inappropriate behavior. Should I have accused them without evidence? And, if I had, what would have been the consequences?

When I was in a position to hire, I was offered sex by young women who wanted a job. Should I have reported them? A few of my female clients made it clear to me that they wanted a sexual relationship. Should I have reported them? If I did, would anyone listen to me?

These are all serious questions. They deserve serious consideration.

The unfortunate reality is that sexual improprieties are commonplace. We – both men and women – have witnessed them for decades. We have all heard about the “casting couch.” Many of us have made jokes about it. Doesn’t that make us all a little guilty – at least guilty of indifference?

Now that the issue has finally been brought to the forefront, what happens now? Will there be real change? If so, will that change extend, as it should, to all industries? Or will we quickly tire of the issue, pronounce it fixed as we have with other important issues then turn our attention elsewhere?

On The Late Show with Stephen Colbert, Jodie Foster made an excellent point when asked, “What next?” In response, she suggested that, if we are to make real progress toward equality, we need to have a serious conversation about the issue. We need to listen to each other and make a serious attempt to understand all of the issues involved. That’s excellent advice!

The Many Reasons Donald Trump Can Never Be My President.

1. He spent years undermining a sitting president by claiming that the president was not a citizen of the United States.
2. He broke a 40-year tradition of presidential candidates releasing tax returns. What is he hiding?
3. He has a long record of refusing to pay small businesses for work on his properties.
4. He has long bullied his critics by initiating frivolous lawsuits.
5. He has reputed ties to the mob.
6. He has licensed his name to foreign governments that use slave labor to build resorts.
7. He hired a campaign manager with ties to foreign governments that oppose democracy.
8. He openly praised the dictator of our nation’s chief rival.
9. He mocked a reporter with a physical disability.
10. He was recorded bragging about his sexual assaults of women earning him the title, Das Gropenfuhrer.
11. He has been accused of raping a 13-year-old girl.
12. He has been accused of being a serial sexual assailant.
13. He offered few policies to “make America great again.”
14. The policies he did offer were racist and unconstitutional.
15. He encouraged violence and racism at his rallies.
16. He refused to disavow the support of the KKK and other racist organizations.
17. He encouraged a foreign government to meddle in our presidential election by stealing confidential information from his opponent.
18. He refuses to disentangle himself from his business interests, creating conflicts of interest worldwide.
19. He refuses to hold press conferences to answer the questions of journalists preferring, instead, to communicate by Tweets.
20. He lost the popular vote by nearly 3 million votes and won the electoral vote by carrying 3 states by a total margin of fewer than a 78,000 votes. Yet he claims to have won by a “landslide.”
21. He has undermined the current president by interfering in foreign policy before his inauguration.
22. He has threatened other governments by tweet.
23. He used his status as president-elect to broker deals to benefit his family businesses.
24. He was elected as a direct result of the meddling by a foreign dictator, according to all of our intelligence agencies.
25. He not only refused to accept the findings of our intelligence agencies. He demeaned them.
26. He was elected as a direct result of voter suppression of minorities.
27. He has appointed a racist and originator of fake news as a senior adviser to the White House.
28. He has selected cabinet appointees who, instead of being reformers, are openly antagonistic of the departments they have been chosen to lead.
29. He nominated a racist to become Attorney General.
30. He nominated a close friend of Vladimir Putin to be Secretary of State – a oil executive whose company has a $500 billion deal at stake with Putin’s state-owned oil company.
31. Before inauguration, he recalled all US ambassadors.
32. He requested names of individuals within NASA who have been assigned to the study of climate change indicating that they will be singled out for punishment.
33. He requested names of individuals within the Energy Department who have worked to combat climate change.
34. He has sought waivers from government nepotism laws in order that he may appoint family members to positions within his administration creating even more conflicts of interest.
35. He has clearly demonstrated a lack of understanding of the Constitution and the office he will hold.
36. He has a long history of vindictiveness and he will hold the codes for our nuclear weapons.
37. He is filling the White House with family members and business partners.
38. He insulted and demeaned a Gold Star family.
39. He is a serial liar.
40. He exhibits all of the characteristics of a narcissistic sociopath!

The Politics Of Accusations, Conspiracy Theories And Propaganda.

When FBI Director James Comey announced last week that the FBI was reviewing emails that could be pertinent to the Hillary Clinton case, it was quickly publicized by GOP congressmen as the FBI “re-opening the investigation of the Clinton private email server.” That, in fact, was untrue. The new announcement was referring to the discovery of emails on former congressman Anthony Wiener’s laptop which was shared with his wife, assistant to Clinton, that MAY have a bearing on the Clinton case – emphasis on MAY. The FBI had not yet read the emails in question – indeed it had no warrant to do so – so it could not conclude that the emails provided any new insights into the original case.

There was nothing to indicate a change in the FBI’s original conclusion that there was no evidence that Clinton had committed a crime, and no reason to prosecute the former Secretary of State. Yet the media and Republicans quickly turned Comey’s vague announcement into yet another unsubstantiated accusation against the Democratic presidential candidate.

That’s what the GOP and Donald Trump do best – make accusations against Hillary based on supposition, innuendo and wild conspiracy theories. And the media did what they do best – seeing a story that could increase ratings and readership, they pounced on it. Reading the headlines alone, one would have concluded that the FBI had found a smoking gun showing that Hillary was guilty of a crime. There were even headlines suggesting that she would be impeached should she win the White House! Following the sensational reports, the media then tried to backtrack in order to give the impression that they were functioning as real journalists. But the damage had already been done.

Before we all jump to conclusions, we should all do what the media should have done…take a deep breath and look at the facts.

For context, you should know that most levels of the federal government are technically challenged. Case in point: When President Obama took office, he wanted to continue to use a Blackberry so that he could manage all of his communications on a single device. The NSA originally told the president that his request could not be met. But, after much discussion, the NSA found a way to make it possible while keeping the president’s communications secure.

Upon her appointment to Secretary of State, Clinton asked for the same kind of system. But the NSA refused. So Clinton did something similar to what her predecessors had done. She chose to use her own email server in order to keep all of her unclassified communications on a single device – a server that she shared with her husband, a former president of the United States. (It should be noted that the server had been approved by the Secret Service and though the official State Department email system was hacked during Hillary’s tenure, there is no evidence to indicate that Clinton server was hacked.)

It is also important to note that all official State Department business is conducted by secured phones, diplomatic pouches or by wire. Emails are simply used for correspondence between State Department employees. And Hillary’s email was only used by her closest associates.

Given that it was well-known that Hillary intended to run for president again in 2016, it’s easy to see why her emails were of such curiosity to the GOP. It is equally easy to understand why she would delete any personal emails that would reveal details of her impending political campaign.

Though she has stated that she regrets using a private server and has publicly apologized for it, there is absolutely no indication that she compromised national security or broke the law. But her actions and the subsequent refusal of the FBI to recommend charges, have made for a good conspiracy theory invented by the GOP and reported by the sensation-seeking press.

In fact, it’s like all of the other GOP-created accusations against Clinton: Whitewater, Travelgate, Fostergate and Benghazigate. They all consist of wild accusations with little substance. That’s why, though the accusations have been thoroughly investigated at the cost of hundreds of millions of taxpayer money, no charges have ever been filed.

Yet, based on the belief that where there’s smoke there’s fire, suspicion and innuendo fueled by Republicans and the media have hung over the Clintons like a cloud.

For some reason, the same kinds of suspicion are seldom applied to Republicans. For example, the four Republican congressmen who led the charge to impeach President Bill Clinton for lying under oath about his dalliance with a White House intern were, themselves, guilty of the very same kind of transgressions or worse. One, former Speaker Dennis Hastert, was found guilty of child molestation.

And during this presidential campaign, the very same people who yell “lock her up” at Trump rallies are more than willing to ignore even worse accusations about their own candidate. Donald Trump is facing multiple accusations of sexual assault, having even bragged about them in an off-camera recording. He is also accused of having highly questionable financial ties to Russia and Vladimir Putin. Worse, he is facing multiple legal cases against the Trump Foundation and Trump University. And, while Hillary is endorsed by virtually every major newspaper and media outlet in the US, Trump is endorsed by the KKK and the Alt-Right.

Further, Trump refuses to follow decades of precedence and release his tax returns. He has all but admitted that he used some highly questionable loopholes to avoid paying nearly a billion dollars in taxes. He has reported ties to the mob. Worst of all, he is being sued for raping a 13-year-old girl!

These aren’t mere accusations. These are charges of substance. And they make the accusations against Hillary pale in comparison. But, for some unexplained reason, instead of cringing in horror at the actions of the tangerine one, supposed Christians have circled the wagons around a candidate that violates every single value they claim to espouse.

Go figure.