Kevin Siers
Charlotte ObserverJan 5, 2017 |
Thursday, January 5, 2017
Wednesday, January 4, 2017
Obstructing the Obstructors
Even though I realize that hypocrisy is all too common in D.C., I'm still angered when a brazenly disingenuous double-standard is shoved right in my face by a politician with no sense of shame whatsoever. I guess the voters in Kentucky are less sensitive than I am. They've been sending Mitch McConnell back to the U.S. Senate for 20 years.
Now Senate Majority Leader, McConnell did not invent the Republican policy of extreme obstruction of any bill or program not originated by his party, but he has certainly championed that policy over the last eight years. He is one of the main reasons the Senate has refused over the last ten months to do its job by holding hearings on Obama's last Supreme Court nominee. They didn't even bother making up a reason for this; they just said "it isn't going to happen."
Now, however, Republicans control House, Senate, and White House, and McConnell has experienced some bolt of enlightenment. Trump has promised Supreme court nominees who are nothing less than terrifying, and Democratic senators are saying they'll do their utmost to block all of them. And suddenly, McConnell is certain that such obstructionism is "something the American people simply will not tolerate."
I don't know if Democrats can rustle up all the votes they'll need to keep filibustering and otherwise blocking, but more power to them, I say. The GOP deserves a long taste if its own medicine. More importantly, the Democratic minority in the Senate is the only thing that stands between us and a nightmare Supreme Court.
The Empire's New Threats
Interesting editorial by José Padrón González, a priest and social activist, in today's (4 Jan) edition of La Jornada (Mexico). He says Mexico is facing a new threat from the empire (meaning the United States). He writes:
If your Spanish is up to it, see: http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2017/01/04/opinion/014a1pol
With great surprise and incredulity we unhappily witnessed the triumph, as they call it, of pomposity and arrogance, of hatred and racism personified by a business magnate, the truest representation of the most powerful imperialism. And the whole world shook. What's next, we all wonder.
(Con gran sorpresa e incredulidad vimos descontentos cómo triunfó, según dijeron, la elección de la prepotencia y la soberbia, del odio y del racismo en la persona de un magnate, el más fiel representante del imperialismo más poderoso. Y se sacudió el mundo entero. ¿Qué viene ahora?, nos preguntamos todos.)He calls on Mexico to improve its social justice internally, as a response to what he sees as increasing insults and threats to the nation of Mexico and to Mexican nationals living in the United States.
If your Spanish is up to it, see: http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2017/01/04/opinion/014a1pol
Is Kobach a Perfect Fit?
Two unsettling characteristics DJT has continually displayed are his undying and irrepressible love of himself and the lengths he goes through to defend every action, and every word to a fault; and his childish propensity to fantastic conspiracy theories and distrust of mainstream rationality. His current political career was launched with the birther theory soon after Obama’s election, for example; and the wild accusation that Muslims were “celebrating in the streets of Jersey” after 9/11 is clearly a figment of his imagination, but one that he would never come to own as fiction.
Will these disturbing parts of the Trump personality and psyche continue to be perpetual motion cogs driving, to one degree or another, his real time policies and political associations, and —Heaven or Hell forbid—and snap decisions dealing with issue of war and peace?
A story in the Witchita Eagle reported on November 30 that Kris Kobach, Kansas Secretary of State, doubled down on the Trump claim that he (Trump) would have won the popular vote in the Presidential election had it not been for “illegal aliens” voting in the election. This assertion reflects a little of both of the Trumpian flaws: massaging Trump’s fragile ego at the expense of maintaining an unprovable fairy tale.
That Kobach may have used this pronouncement as an butter-up, ass-kissing false news brief hailing the chief-to-be as a qualification of his loyalty and fitness to a job in the Trump administration beyond the temporary transition team slot he currently holds is likely. The Star-Telegram reports that a new czar-ship could be created for him, with which Trump could avoid the embarrassing rejection of the hardline anti-immigrant and possible white supremacist.
http://www.star-telegram.com/news/politics-government/article124274359.html
To add a dubious character like Kobach to a wider presidential footprint may fit quite naturally with the Trumpian Will of self and fiction.
A Child Moving into the White House (Political Cartoon)
Clay Bennett
Chattanooga Times Free PressJan 4, 2017 |
Monday, January 2, 2017
Might Trump Resign?
I might rightly be accused of wishful thinking, but I’m not the only American to speculate that Trump could resign during his first year in office. Make no mistake, he’s going to be sworn in on January 20th, something the Republican party will insist upon, if only to make any subsequent transitions of power manageably predictable. I imagine he’ll stick around as long as he thinks he’s getting something out of the deal, however it is that he’ll be measuring that.
Why might Trump resign? There’s actually a long list of reasons, beginning with the likelihood that even a year ago he didn’t really think he’d win. Nobody can read Trump’s mind, but he never seemed to have a serious agenda for governance, nor a clear understanding of what the job of the President is or what he’d do with it. Looking at that, many of us can’t help but speculate that his original aim was either to build some position of influence over government as an outside commentator, or merely to create a new kind of TV show. It certainly looked to me that he was as surprised as I was to realize he might actually win the presidency, and he has been scrambling ever since.
Trump is going to get very frustrated with the limitations on the office of the presidency. He seems to be having a tough time coming to terms with the fact that he can’t rule by fiat and that negotiations both domestic and international can require patience and finesses, two things he manifestly lacks. He’s likely to chafe badly at the glacial pace of government affairs and at the need to work cooperatively with others.
Trump has already demonstrated that he has an extraordinarily thin skin, something few politicians can afford. His tendency for divisive rhetoric already has and will continue to provoke harsh criticism, even derision from opponents both here in the U.S. and abroad. As a candidate he was free to deal with that however he wished, but as president he’s going to have to be more restrained, and that’s going to be very difficult for him. Every president in my lifetime has had to be able to ignore intense ridicule at times, but there’s good reason to doubt that Trump can learn to do that.
Of course, his large and complex business dealings will present an ongoing problem. The simple fact is that he stands to earn more income from sources other than his presidential paycheck. He’s going to make a show of distancing himself from his business interests, but it’s difficult to imagine him not intervening if circumstances get difficult. The result is that at least at times he’s going to have two very demanding jobs that are going to interfere with each other. If he’s really forced by circumstances to choose between them, I think he’ll follow the bigger pile of money.
A lot depends, one might guess, on how long and to what degree Trump and the Republican party can work together. As a Republican president with a Republican majority in the House and Senate, Trump could have a level of power few presidents have experienced. But that power is based in cooperation, in the ability of Congress and the White House to work together. Republicans were reticent about Trump precisely because he’s a loose cannon, an unknown quantity, a Republican whose ideological alignment has never been put to the test. If Trump and his supposed party start short-circuiting each other’s agendas, Trump will experience a level of frustration few presidents have ever known.
Of course, none of this is conclusive. Trump could decide he’s in this for the long term. Maybe people like me are simply incapable of visualizing four years of President Trump.
Why might Trump resign? There’s actually a long list of reasons, beginning with the likelihood that even a year ago he didn’t really think he’d win. Nobody can read Trump’s mind, but he never seemed to have a serious agenda for governance, nor a clear understanding of what the job of the President is or what he’d do with it. Looking at that, many of us can’t help but speculate that his original aim was either to build some position of influence over government as an outside commentator, or merely to create a new kind of TV show. It certainly looked to me that he was as surprised as I was to realize he might actually win the presidency, and he has been scrambling ever since.
Trump is going to get very frustrated with the limitations on the office of the presidency. He seems to be having a tough time coming to terms with the fact that he can’t rule by fiat and that negotiations both domestic and international can require patience and finesses, two things he manifestly lacks. He’s likely to chafe badly at the glacial pace of government affairs and at the need to work cooperatively with others.
Trump has already demonstrated that he has an extraordinarily thin skin, something few politicians can afford. His tendency for divisive rhetoric already has and will continue to provoke harsh criticism, even derision from opponents both here in the U.S. and abroad. As a candidate he was free to deal with that however he wished, but as president he’s going to have to be more restrained, and that’s going to be very difficult for him. Every president in my lifetime has had to be able to ignore intense ridicule at times, but there’s good reason to doubt that Trump can learn to do that.
Of course, his large and complex business dealings will present an ongoing problem. The simple fact is that he stands to earn more income from sources other than his presidential paycheck. He’s going to make a show of distancing himself from his business interests, but it’s difficult to imagine him not intervening if circumstances get difficult. The result is that at least at times he’s going to have two very demanding jobs that are going to interfere with each other. If he’s really forced by circumstances to choose between them, I think he’ll follow the bigger pile of money.
A lot depends, one might guess, on how long and to what degree Trump and the Republican party can work together. As a Republican president with a Republican majority in the House and Senate, Trump could have a level of power few presidents have experienced. But that power is based in cooperation, in the ability of Congress and the White House to work together. Republicans were reticent about Trump precisely because he’s a loose cannon, an unknown quantity, a Republican whose ideological alignment has never been put to the test. If Trump and his supposed party start short-circuiting each other’s agendas, Trump will experience a level of frustration few presidents have ever known.
Of course, none of this is conclusive. Trump could decide he’s in this for the long term. Maybe people like me are simply incapable of visualizing four years of President Trump.
Sunday, January 1, 2017
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