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Donald Trump

“PRESIDENT IS STILL A CHILD…” (Headline NYT July 8, 2020): YES! YES! YES!

July 9, 2020
by Peter Feinman
I Can't Grow Up. I Can't Get into School on My Own (https://www.musicnotes.com)

The opening sentence in the article is: “President’s niece describes him in a much-awaited tell-all-book as a child in an adult’s body… 

The President is still a child! For months if not years, I have been saying that Little Donnee Waney is a child. For months if not years I have been saying that he does not act childish, he really is a child. For months if not years I have been saying that instead of political talking heads, people should interview child psychologists, 7th grade teachers, 7th grade guidance counselors. Now finally, at last, to see a headline in The New York Times asserting that the “President is a child” is like a dream come true. YES. YES HE IS. YES HE IS A CHILD. YES HE IS STILL A CHILD. THE TRUTH SHALL SET US FREE!

My first major foray into the world of Little Donnee Waney, the child in the body of a man occurred in the blog Tom Hanks versus Our Immature Child-President (August 8, 2017) nearly three years ago. In that blog I compared the two 13 year-olds in bodies of adults, the one in a movie and the other in the real world. I analyzed them according to various attributes – Tom Hanks could read – and concluded:

Some of the silliest comments made on the cable talk shows have been “Now he has become presidential” or words to that effect. One has to laugh at the absurdity of such remarks. He was an ignorant immature child when his father sent him to military school in the vain hope that he would man up. He is an ignorant immature child now. He will be an ignorant immature child when he dies. And he still could be reelected in 2020 if the Democrats keep blaming Putin for their defeat and don’t have the vision to confront the shortcomings of their candidate and their party’s message.

These words have stood the test of time and even without the coronavirus the election isn’t over.

I returned to the theme earlier this year in Tom Hanks and Donald Trump, Round II (March 16, 2020). I wrote:

By contrast, Little Donnee Waney remained trapped, through no fault of his own, as an immature child in the body of an adult who never grew up. Consider these comments.

The comments referred to all the things an adult liar would never say because the adult liar would know they are false and they are easily proven false (15 becoming zero, miracle cure…). The immature child playing games in an imaginary world operates under different rules. SCHOOLS WILL OPEN! I SAID SO!

It’s not as if people were not aware of the shortcomings in his brain (New York Times Investigates the Brain of Donald Trump: President Has a Hissy Fit [April 15, 2020]). On the subject of his education, I wrote:

The key to leading him to knowledge appears to be the proverbial old-fashioned school marm. For all we know, Dr. Birx reminds him of teachers he had in elementary school, teachers before his father put in him military school in the vain hope that he would man up.

If he were in elementary school today, he would be classified as “special.” He proves the need for special-ed teachers who can give students the 1:1 time they need to be able to learn despite certain challenges.

This is consistent with Mary Trump’s suspicion that he “may have a long undiagnosed learning disability.”

We can observe the limits of his writing skills in his letter to Erdogan (Could Nancy Pelosi Become the First Female President?: A Constitutional Crisis April 3, 2020 [not likely now!]

Keep in mind the perfect third-grade letter to Erdogan which is going to figure prominently in the Unpresidential Library. This time we have another unsolicited public example of his cognitive skills. Chris Cillizza, CNN Editor-at-large, refers to it as an “utterly childish letter” [to Schumer] He writes the letter “reads like a sort of Mad Libs you might fill out and leave in the locker of your 7th grade enemy.” Sounds exactly like something I would write about the seventh-grade-smart-aleck-dumb-aleck. In fact, it is what I have been writing in blog after blog! He is not childish, he is a child. He has the brain of one.

How about his analytical skills (Hannity versus Mueller: Who Is the Better Dot Connector? January 29, 2018)?

The Two Dot President

About a year ago during an international conference, the President of the United States wandered off to chat with the Premier of Russia. It was an unscripted unplanned exchange with no aides participating. What did the leaders of these two nuclear powers talk about? According to the American leader the subject of their discussion was adoptions. The Russians had restricted the ability of Americans to adopt Russian babies and the American President sought to discuss that issue with his Russian counterpart. It certainly sounded innocent enough.

As it turns out like father, like son. The son also had had a meeting with the Russians and guess what? The topic he addressed also was adoptions. Here we had two meetings and both involved not collusion, not the removal of sanctions, and not the refusal to enforce sanctions, but a sincere effort to help unfortunate (white) Americans who can’t have children to adopt (white) children from Russia. What could be more noble and inspiring than to have the father and son team pleading for the Russians to help these Americans?

Two dots had been connected. When the President of the United States concocted this coverup story he did so by connecting two dots, his meeting with a Russian and his son’s meeting with a Russian. We would be remiss if we ignored how proud he was to make this connection, to have connected these two meetings into a single story. The Very Stable Genius was practically beaming with joy at this display of his mental prowess. All by himself, he had fabricated a story that linked two dots.

For our Two Dot President, this story represents the limit of his mental skills. He can’t go beyond the two-dot limit. It is the maximum of which he is capable. Think of his transactional foreign policy. It’s not just that he is incapable of a policy of win-win, two plus two equals five, and synergy, it is that he is limited by his mental capacities to only being able to think in binary terms. He genuinely is incapable of exceeding his two-dot limit. For higher order thinking to make sense of a large world, the Very Stable Genius needs to outsource his thinking to someone capable of connecting more dots, to Sean Hannity.

His shortcomings in this area have been aggravated by his excessive use of Twitter. It has made a bad situation worse. Consider these excerpts from “The High School We Can’t Log Off From” (NYT, 8/5/18 Print) by Jennifer Senior which I wrote about in my blog Omarosa and the President: A Case of Arrested Development – Suppose Life Is Not a Journey? (August 17, 2018).

Should we be surprised that a man who’s so frequently compared to a needy adolescent has chosen Twitter as his favorite medium?

Clay Shirky, one of the shrewdest internet theorists around, has noted that the faster the medium is, the more emotional it gets. Twitter, as we know, is pretty fast, and therefore runs pretty hot. (Emotional tweets, research has shown, travel more swiftly than anodyne ones.) We often become creatures of our limbic systems when we tweet. Our self-regulation deserts us (been there); our prefrontal cortex, responsible for executive function and impulse control, goes offline; we become reward-seeking Scud missiles, addicts in search of a fix.

We become, in other words, teenagers, who are notoriously poor models of self-regulation — in large part because their prefrontal cortices are still developing and their dopamine circuits are pretty busy seeking stimulation. The psychologist Laurence Steinberg describes adolescents as “cars with powerful accelerators and weak brakes.” The neuroscientist BJ Casey deems them “more Kirk than Spock.”

Putting aside this misunderstanding of Kirk, the real problem is Senior’s continued examination of Little Donnee Waney as an adult who is regressing to teenage behavior. Instead he really is that needy adolescent who never reached adulthood. Perhaps Senior will interview Mary Trump once the latter is able to speak publicly.

There is some valuable new information reported in the book. I always assumed Fred Trump made a donation to the University of Pennsylvania to obtain entrance for his “challenged” son. He still may have. Now we know how the transactional approach worked – the son hired someone to take his SATs. Will that person come forward? Undoubtedly, he also paid people at college so he could stay in college, maybe even with great grades, maybe not. Will those people come forward? Would you want to come forward if you helped “The World’s Most Dangerous Man”?

This information reveals that there was a time when THE DONALD knew he was not a very stable genius. Paying people to take tests is evidence that he lived in the real world and was aware of his limitations. There was a time when he knew he was not the smartest person in the room. This understanding raises the possibility that now he has lived his life as THE DONALD for so long, he is a permanent resident of his imaginary world scarcely in touch with the real world. He has become an episode of the Twilight Zone. He needs the professional political wrestling arena to live.

We also now know that Fred Trump would support a loser. Mary Trump paints a scary picture of the father. He demanded his children be winners or else. Yet he knew his son was a LOSER each and every time he incrementally gave the equivalent of $413 million in total to him. He knew his son was a LOSER each and every time one of his son’s businesses failed. He knew his son was a LOSER each and every time he interfered behind the scene.

“He is and always will be a terrified little boy,” according to Mary Trump. Exactly. Every decision he makes should be understood through this prism. And it’s only going to get worse for him. The real world is closing in on him in every judicial decision, every poll, and every coronavirus death. Imagine the shock the terrified little boy will experience that first time the jail doors slam on him at Rikers.

Ramses II and the Coronavirus: Lessons from the Pharaoh of the Exodus

July 3, 2020
by Peter Feinman
Pharaoh Smites the Coronavirus Plague (Art of Daniela Rutica https://www.facebook.com)

A stunning archaeological discovery sheds new light on the life and times of the great ancient Egyptian builder and his modern counterpart. This unexpected and vividly-colored treasure shows Ramses II smiting the coronavirus. He is depicted in the traditional Egyptian pose for defeating the forces of chaos that threatened the stability and order of the country. This plague is no match for the Pharaoh of the Exodus. Like a miracle it will just disappear. Soon.

In case there was any doubt about the identity of the triumphant Pharaoh, a second discovery confirms it.

1974 passport so Ramses could be flown to France for repair (https://www.ancient-origins.net)

With proof positive that the king in question really is Ramses II, there is no doubt that he is the wartime leader who was victorious against the coronavirus…plus it proves he can vote in the Georgia elections.

Astute readers may suspect that Ramses II really did not fight the coronavirus. True enough. But he did have a moment of truth that called into question his fitness to be Pharaoh. The incident in question was the Battle of Qadesh. It was fought around 1275 BCE in what today is Syria. The foe was the Hittites from Anatolia now Turkey. For its time, it was a superpower showdown, a rare direct confrontation on land between the two major powers of the region.

At the time, Year 5 of his 67 year reign, Ramses was comparatively new to the throne. He followed a successful father who was a strong military figure. Although Ramses did not have bonespurs, he did have a strong need to prove himself as an alpha male.

So off he went with 20,000 soldiers marching across Sinai and Canaan into Syria. This army was an impressive force on a scale rarely seen. Along the way, some spies from the other side were captured. They provided intel on the movements of the Hittites. It was bogus intel and part of a ruse. As a result, Ramses charged full steam into a trap. He barely escaped with his life thanks in part to the first time in human history when the “cavalry” arrived in the nick of time.

Ramses, who was the most modest person in human history until now, described his escape as follows:

My shield bearer saw the vast number of enemy chariots hemming me in, he blanched and fear gripped him. He cried out to My Majesty, “…we stand alone amidst the foe…” Then said His Majesty, “Stand firm, steady yourself my shield bearer. I shall go for them like the pounce of a falcon, killing, slaughtering, and felling them to the ground. I Alone Can Fix It”

Ramses then strode forward looking like one of Patton’s tanks lumbering across the countryside until victory was his. The Syrian Square belonged to him. He dominated it.

My army came to praise me, [amazed] at seeing what I had done. ‘I like this stuff. I really get it. ‘People are surprised that I understand it. ‘Every one of these generals said: “How do you know so much about this fighting?” Maybe I have a natural ability. Maybe I should have gone into the military instead of running for president.’ I took on millions of foreign lands, I …alone fighting the foreign armies.

So great was his victory that Ramses displayed it throughout the land in living color. Giant billboards of Egypt’s action hero appeared everywhere so the people could bask in the brilliance of their wartime king who had vanquished the forces of chaos.

Not exactly. There was a battle. The consensus among Egyptologists that at best for Egypt, the battle was a draw. Ramses failed to make any headway against the Hittites. However that did not prevent him from rating his performance a “10” and declaring he would not do anything differently. And that is the message his Fox propaganda network communicated to the Egyptian people throughout the land on its billboards.

What are the lessons for today?

INTERNATIONAL ARENA

Part of the reason Egyptologists don’t accept the government propaganda version of the battle is because an alternate version survives. Not only did the Hittites remain in Syria, not dislodged by the Egyptian king, they knew the message of the Egyptian propaganda. Later the Hittite king Muwatallis objected to the Egyptian portrayal of the battle: You fought alone? Really? Why should I trust you now in our treaty negotiations when you can’t even tell the truth about the battle? But Ramses wouldn’t budge. He insisted his version was the truth.

Credibility is an important part of international diplomacy. So is competence. Ramses could say whatever he wanted in the domestic arena. But outside the area he controlled, the view of him was quite different.

When people in the lands of Canaan, Russia, and China, realized that the king and superpower had failed they reacted as you would expect them to have reacted. They saw an opportunity to free themselves from Egyptian rule and they took it.

Here’s what I wrote over one year ago:

The rest of the world is already ahead of the Trumpicans. They learned that THE DONALD is merely a character in the professional wrestling arena and not a real person. They know when Bonespur Boy is forced to go into the arena in the real world that he will back down.

“If we were to believe everything Trump has said for the past three years, there would have been war with China, North Korea and Mexico,” said Joseph Fahim, an Egyptian film critic. “The guy’s a joke, he’s not serious. We don’t know if these threats are something to believe in, or just another of his many stunts.” (Iran Does Not Watch Fox: The Real World and the 2020 Elections, June 19, 2019)

Even before the coronavirus, he was a laughing stock. People laughed at him to his face at the General Assembly; they told jokes about him behind his back at international gatherings; they flew baby Trump blimps of him. Now Little Donnee Disinfectant has provided on indelible image of how much of a simple-minded ignorant immature child he really is. He is a buffoon everywhere even on Russian television. The proof that the world no longer takes him seriously can be seen in the actions of Russia and China. They know he is a weakling, a loser, and have no fear of him. Finally the European Union has called his bluff on coronavirus “happy talk”: Americans are not welcome here unless they quarantine first.

THE BELTWAY

Regarding Ramses false propaganda in the Battle of Qadesh, Egyptologist Mark Janzen wrote:

Yet there must have been numerous individuals ⸺ soldiers, officials, etc., ⸺ who knew the truth of the situation, namely that the campaign was unsuccessful…and word of this must have spread.

The same here. Inside the White House and the Beltway, how stupid a human being would you have to be not know that the President of the United States was a simple-minded ignorant immature child? Think of the books which have been published. Think of the recent disclosure by Carl Bernstein about the transcripts of the phone calls with international leaders. Did Anonymous leak those transcripts? Are the adult professionals in the White House tired of having this seventh-grade-smart-aleck-dumb-aleck constantly berate and belittle people for doing their jobs? Have they had it with the transfer/firing of people who placed loyalty to the Constitution and the security of the country above loyalty to a person solely focused on his reelection, who defers to alpha males, and who conducts himself like a narcissistic infant?

There is a limit to how long you can live a lie. There comes a time when all the “happy talk,” miracles, and embers just doesn’t cut it. Trumpican governors in Arizona, Florida, Georgia, and Texas have reached that point. They no longer have the option of being good vassals to the crown. His imaginary world doesn’t cut it in the real world. They can’t go along with the government propaganda anymore. They can’t pretend the battle was won … especially if anyone in their state wants to travel to Europe for business or pleasure. Who knows what parts of the world will quarantine them next. So much time lost. So much time wasted. So many people dead. All because they went along with the hype that the very stable genius had things under control.

THE TRUMPICANS  

That leaves just the people to catch on to the truth. Ramses disseminated his message of victory throughout the land using stone. Now the failed leader uses Twitter and Fox. Trumpicans like the ancient Egyptians and mainland Chinese receive their news only from one source – the government propaganda machine. The ancient Egyptian people never caught on to Ramses’s shortcomings. The American people who voted for him in 2016 are starting to catch on. They are recognizing that the country they love is now a world laughingstock. They are recognizing that the hospitals in their communities are being overwhelmed. They are slowly learning that real men do wear masks and real Americans can become infected and die. They know they can’t go to Europe. And if the Democrats aren’t buying commercials on Fox to connect Trumpicans to the real world, then their intelligence can be questioned, too. The coronavirus keeps spreading in the real world. We are not Australia, New Zealand, Japan, Uganda or Europe. We are a loser and all the world knows it. Even Trumpicans are learning it too: our leader failed us and he still hasn’t learned it.

 

P.S. There is one other alternate source of information about the reign of Ramses II, Pharaoh of the Exodus. Unfortunately Cecil B. DeMille didn’t include the Battle of Kadesh or the Canaanite uprisings in his version. That’s another movie.

Why Would Nikki Haley Want the Nomination? Which Nomination Anyway?

June 29, 2020
by Peter Feinman
And the Nominee Is... (Photo: Timothy A. Clary/AFP/Getty Images)

Note: I decided last week to write this blog this week. In so doing I gambled that there would be more of the same in the news but nothing drastic like the revelation of the Russian bounty on American soldiers and no American response. You never really know what to expect except that it will be something you never imagined.

As the days wind down to the Convention, once again the name of Nikki Haley is bandied about for a national nomination. That attention has followed her since July, 2015:

Haley’s decisive action to drive the final removal of the banner from statehouse grounds quickly and relatively cleanly in the glare of the national spotlight proved a well-timed audition for higher office ahead of the 2016 Republican veepstakes. Nikki Haley’s star rises as rebel flag comes down

Now here we are nearly five years later and her name is mentioned once again. But for which position on the national ticket? Haley is an ambitious adult who lives in the real world. Why would she want a position on the national ticket in 2020 anyway?

Let’s consider three scenarios.

PENCE IS DUMPED

The most common position discussed is the vice-presidential nomination as a replacement for the incumbent Vice President. For this to occur, there are several decisions which need to be made.

First is that the reelection prospects are so dire that a Hail Mary is needed. This means that the person who thinks of himself as a winner who never loses has to admit to himself that as things stand he is a loser. Remember, in his mind, he won the popular vote in 2016, too. It is in that mind that the decision will be made. Can he admit for the record that he is headed for a defeat and needs the help of someone else to rescue him?

As of now, it would seem that he is not at the point. His first reaction upon learning of a poll showing Biden with a 14% lead was to sue. By now with virtually every poll showing Biden with a 50% or more support and/or a double-digit lead, he would have to sue almost all the pollsters in America including Fox. That doesn’t appear to have happened.

He knows the polls are against him now.

He knows there was no overflow attendance and a blue sea of empty seats inside at his rally in Tulsa.

He knows that Bolton’s book portrays him as begging for it from the Chinese.

He knows that the newest scandal shows him approving of Putin putting a target on the backs of American soldiers. MORE FAKE NEWS.

There is still is no sign that he has reached a point where he will admit he is a loser and ready to throw the Hail Mary. That could change at any moment.

Second, what are the ramifications of dumping his loyal Vice President? Mike Pence has sold his soul to be the successor, not the dumped one. While there is insufficient time to write a book between the time dumped and the election, there certainly is plenty of opportunity for him to go “Bolton” and do the talk shows. True after all his “happy talk” about the coronavirus, he has limited credibility. Anything he said could be considered sour grapes because he was dumped. Is dumping him a risk worth taking?

Third, even if the decision is made to dump the loyal Vice President and take your chances on what he might say, the question still remains why would Haley take the position? She would know it is being offered to her only as an act of desperation. Who knows what else will be revealed in the weeks and months to come. After all, who anticipated his latest example of submissiveness to Putin? To expect her to accept the Vice Presidency is like asking her to charter a plane to fly over the Atlantic Ocean so she can parachute onto the Titanic AFTER it hit the iceberg. For an ambitious person living in the real world joining the ticket as a replacement easily could be an act of political suicide.

Based on the above, my impression, for whatever it is worth, of Haley being the Vice President nominee has more to do with writers having too much spare time to spin scenarios than a likely event.

THE LBJ PRESIDENT

What about the position of President? Would Haley accept that nomination? Lately there has been talk [Morning Joe] about a supposed candidate with no vision or agenda for the second term, who seems to be going through the motions of running. Could he just to an LBJ and announce that he is not a candidate for the 2020 election?

For this scenario to happen, the same considerations as noted above would have to occur with one addition. The addition would be the realization that even the Hail Mary with Nikki Haley wouldn’t work. When the 2020 year began, there was a reasonable expectation of reelection. Sure the Democratic Party would win the popular vote as it always does with one exception during the era of Baby-boomer Presidents. But it was still possible to win the Electoral College despite being a popular-vote loser. Lately those prospects have changed. Instead of fighting over battle ground states, the newest trend is that the battle ground states could be swept by Biden. Then the fight will be over possible purple states like Texas. Given the rapid increase of coronavirus cases in Texas (along with Arizona and Florida), the election could be shaping up to be comparable to Obama in 2008 or Bush in 1988. Those results would have been considered impossible at the beginning of this year but now seem quite reasonable. And this is before the polls digest the latest scandal with Putin. It now has reached a point where even Trumpican Senators are getting nervous about the fate of the Republican Party.

The longtime pretend Democrat and Clinton supporter couldn’t care less about the fate of the Republican Party. It’s all about him. It always is. He could decide that he wants to go out as a winner with the greatest three years of any American President ever. Why risk defeat yet alone a humiliating defeat in November? He would have no problem leaving the Party in the lurch at the last minute and walking away.

But there would be consequences to such actions. The Trumpican Senate which prevented him from being removed from office would no longer protect him. I am not saying he would be impeached and convicted in his last few months. But all protections would be lost if he announced he wasn’t running again. He would be at risk for investigations by people out for blood.

And who would be the nominee then? Anyone with the Trump taint would be doomed in November. If the party wanted to save itself, prepare for 2024, and hope for the best, it would need a presidential candidate who could insult, mock, and demean Putin’s Pence as the Democrats will. Even then the likelihood of success would be minimal. So if the LBJ withdrawal occurs, why would Haley even try to pick up the pieces to salvage the election? In some vain hope that she will be remembered for her sacrifice and be nominated again? In 2024, it will have been76 years since Stevenson was nominated in consecutive campaigns and lost both. Even if the Party is abandoned at the last minute in July or August, I don’t see how it is in Haley’s interest to fill the void.

THE NIXON PRESIDENT

The Howard Baker moment has passed. Suppose the current Russian scandal proves the worst nightmares about an American President selling out his country [and for what in return?]. It is hard to imagine given the time constraints the Trumpican Senators supporting any drastic action against him. And leaving office early means loss of immunity at both the New York State and federal level.  Even Barr might grow concerned if the LBJ or Nixon precedents were followed. In fact, he may grow concerned anyway.

In conclusion, as of 6:45 PM June 29, 2020, when this blog was posted to the IHARE website, I do not expect to see Nikki Haley as a candidate for Vice President or President in 2020 with the caveat that at any given moment anything could happen which would cause me to change my mind.

Fox Triplets: Do You Want a “Socialist” America? Dump Trump Now!

June 25, 2020
by Peter Feinman
Red line is the poll results for Biden; the orange line his opponent

Fox triplets, do you want a “socialist” America? Then DUMP TRUMP NOW!

It’s time to live in the real world.

No more Tucker tirades about the unelected Fauci. It’s time to live in the real world. DUMP TRUMP NOW!

No more Hannity hosannas about Texas and Florida. It’s time to live in the real world. DUMP TRUMP NOW!

No more Laura LOL drug cures. It’s time to live in the real world. DUMP TRUMP NOW!

Do you have the mental necessities to read a graph? How come the number of cases in the European Union has dropped dramatically while America’s is rising? It’s time to live in the real world. DUMP TRUMP NOW!

Do you think after the struggle to control the coronavirus, the European Union will now accept the White House fantasies of 15 becoming zero, miracle cures, it’s behind us, and embers? It’s time to live in the real world. DUMP TRUMP NOW!

If our leader rates a “10,” then what would you rate the leaders of  Japan, New Zealand, Australia, Iceland, Singapore, Germany, Hong Kong, China and from other countries  that actually have contained the virus? It’s time to live in the real world. DUMP TRUMP NOW!

Do you think after the struggle to control the coronavirus, states like New York will now accept the White House fantasies of 15 becoming zero, miracle cures, it’s behind us, and embers? It’s time to live in the real world. DUMP TRUMP NOW!

If our leader rates a “10,” then what would you rate the governors of the states that actually contained the virus? It’s time to live in the real world. DUMP TRUMP NOW!

Our President said the way to improve schools is to slow down testing: fewer tests mean fewer failures. Problem solved. How simple-minded to you have to be to believe this? It’s time to live in the real world. DUMP TRUMP NOW!

Oh, wait. He said to slow down the coronavirus tests, not school tests. Fewer tests mean fewer infections mean fewer deaths. How stupid are you? It’s time to live in the real world. DUMP TRUMP NOW!

At Tulsa, here is what people who take this nonsense seriously had to say:

“This coronavirus is a little bit hyped. The media hypes things,” Anonymous.

If only FAKE NEWS knocked off their hyped reporting, there would be no talk of 120,000 dead and they would not be dead either…or the deaths aren’t really from the coronavirus anyway. Who knows how this unidentified electrician from Seattle is able to live in an alternate reality. The whole thing must be a hoax.

Other examples lends credence to the thinking it is a hoax.

“It’s all fake. They’re just making the numbers up. I haven’t seen anybody die, not from coronavirus. I don’t know anybody who’s got it,” said Mike Alcorn, Wichita, Kansas.

“I’ve been watching this closely over the last four months or so, and the numbers just don’t add up,” said Jeff Eskew, Oklahoma City, Oklahoma.

“[The virus] is a scare tactic more than anything. And I just don’t believe all those deaths are coronavirus,” said Donald Fanning, Wichita Kansas.

Do you see any global warming in your backyard? I don’t see any global warming in your backyard. It’s all fake, it’s all made up.

How can you even blame China for a hoax? How can China be at fault if it’s all fake? That’s like saying the Bolton book is a complete lie but the lies are classified so it shouldn’t be published.

Just because someone looks up to Putin doesn’t give him the right to play Russian roulette with the lives of the American people. Masks work. Is common sense illegal on Fox? It’s time to live in the real world. DUMP TRUMP NOW!

Just because someone admires Queen Elizabeth doesn’t give him a 007 license to kill Americans. Masks work. Is common sense illegal on Fox? It’s time to live in the real world. DUMP TRUMP NOW!

Just because someone’s uncle was a supergenius doesn’t mean he knows what scientists are talking about. Masks work, Is common sense illegal on Fox? It’s time to live in the real world. DUMP TRUMP NOW!

LBJ knew when not to run for re-election.

Nixon knew when it was time to resign.

There are no Howard Bakers in the Senate

There are no adults in the White House.

It’s up to you Fox triplets to save America.

Do you want a Democratic White House, House, and Senate? It’s time to live in the real world. DUMP TRUMP NOW!

Do you want Biden to win by even a bigger Electoral College landslide than 306 votes? By a bigger landslide than the 332 of Obama? It’s time to live in the real world. DUMP TRUMP NOW!

Why do you criticize what is going on the cities and then support the one person who will make matters worse?  It’s time to live in the real world. DUMP TRUMP NOW!

Are you secretly working for Nancy Pelosi?

Are you trying to destroy the Republican Party?

Are you a minion of George Soros?

THEN DUMP TRUMP NOW!

The eyes of the world are upon us and what the world sees is a failed country with a laughingstock for a leader who is way out of his league. It’s time to live in the real world. DUMP TRUMP NOW!

Fox triplets: Rise to the occasion. Be a profile in courage. Save the country. It’s time to live in the real world. DUMP TRUMP NOW!

I am not so naïve as to think the Fox triplets will ever read or even know of this blog yet alone act on it. But it felt really good writing it.

DUMP TRUMP NOW!

Wishful Thinking and the Tulsa Truth

June 22, 2020
by Peter Feinman
A Blue Wave Coming (Matt Barnard/Tulsa World via AP)

We all engage in wishful thinking. It is one way to remain optimistic, to keep up one’s spirits, to have hope. It is also the proverbial Wiley Coyote running off the cliff – it works until you look down. Then SPLAT!

25th Amendment

Mike Pence has been a source of wishful thinking. When this administration began there were a series of blogs in History News Network (HNN) about him. They had to do with his activation of the 25th Amendment to end the current administration almost immediately. In a series of posts to  HNN, this contributor carefully explained how the 25th Amendment worked. But the analysis did not stop there. It was followed by a meticulously detailed description of every individual who would be involved in the implementation of the 25th Amendment to discharge the President and have the Vice President becoming the Acting President. The analysis demonstrated that the votes were there to make it happen. The writer confidently predicted that it would happen. If the current administration wouldn’t be the shortest on record it would be close to it. Obviously the 25th Amendment maneuver didn’t work or even happen unlike the Impeachment ploy. It should be noted that this writer also had confidently predicted that the 2016 elections would result in a Democratic victory with over 330 Electoral College votes and possibly over 350. All of this was pure wishful thinking. It gave the appearance of sound research while being based on absolutely nothing substantive. As you might expect, I don’t read this blogger anymore. The again that writer has refrained from making predictions and sticks to anodyne summaries of the past.

Michael D’Antonio

Recently Michael D’Antonio decided to engage in some wishful thinking. His article “Time for Pence to jump ship?” was posted on not HNN but CNN (June 11, 2020). D’Antonio wrote:

With a schism forming [in the Republican Party], the time is ripe for a high-level official to make the dramatic break that would signal that someone is ready to stand as the leader of the post-Trump Republican Party. I would nominate for this job, Vice President Mike Pence. Unprecedented? Pretty much. But the Trump era is unprecedented too, and Pence signaled, when he agreed that he would be Trump’s running mate, that he’s willing to do the unexpected.

Here we can observe three examples of wishful thinking:

1. That there still is a Republican Party – the Republican Party no longer exists except in name. Actual Republicans like Romney in the Senate and some governors are few and far between.

2. That there will be a post-Trump Party after 2020 – unless his health really takes a turn for the worse he will not leave the stage especially after defeat. And if Eugene Debs ran for President from jail, so can a convicted person today.

3. That Vice President Brown Nose is willing to do the unexpected.

D’Antonio compounds his wishful thinking with the following:

Pence should weigh the merits of declaring he won’t be vice president for a possible second term….Behind that mild-mannered persona lurks a savvy and opportunistic politician…. Conditions are perfect, in other words, for Mike Pence to observe that either he needs to spend more time with his family or believes the President would benefit from the excitement that would come were he to run with a fresh face — perhaps former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley — beside him. Pence could resign, saying Trump is just too loyal to fire him, and graciously make a path for himself to become the new leader of the GOP come the defeat of the Trump-Haley ticket in November.

It’s hard not to laugh when reading this. After all, D’Antonio is the author of Never Enough: Donald Trump and the Pursuit of Success and co-author with Peter Eisner of The Shadow President: The Truth About Mike Pence. He is a serious, reputable person. His opinions are sought on talk shows. Technically, he has made a case on paper of the merits of Vice President Brown Nose taking a bold dramatic action that would thrust him into a leadership position post-2020 elections. But in fact, what D’Antonio wrote is pure unadulterated wishful thinking.

The proof was shown a few days later on June 15, 2020. The headline for The New York Times tells the tale:

As Cases Rise, Pence Promotes a Misleading Claim About Testing.

The article recounts how Pence “encouraged governors on Monday to adopt the administration’s claim that increased testing helps account for the new coronavirus outbreak reports, even though evidence has shown that the explanation is misleading.”  Not surprisingly, the false claim was the same on previously made by the President and which would be repeated in Tulsa. Stop the testing means stopping the number of cases of new infections means the deaths decrease.

There is no sign of bold dramatic action. There are two ways the D’Antonio scenario could work. One is if he became convinced beyond a shadow of a doubt that there was no way the ticket was going to win, he could abandon ship for his own survival. Second, if he got wind that he was going to be dumped for Haley, he might bow out first. But either way, he still would be Vice President until January and still perform as a Brown Nose. The result will be he sold his soul for nothing.

Trumpicans and the Coronavirus

Tulsa exposed the wishful thinking of Trumpicans. Consider these examples:

1. “This coronavirus is a little bit hyped. The media hypes things,” Anonymous.

If only FAKE NEWS knocked off their hyped reporting, there would be no talk of 120,000 dead and they would not be dead either…or the deaths aren’t really from the coronavirus anyway. Who knows how this unidentified electrician from Seattle is able to live in an alternate reality. The whole thing must be a hoax.

This second example lends credence to Trumpicans thinking it is a hoax.

2. “It’s all fake. They’re just making the numbers up. I haven’t seen anybody die, not from coronavirus. I don’t know anybody who’s got it,” said Mike Alcorn, Wichita, Kansas.

3. “I’ve been watching this closely over the last four months or so, and the numbers just don’t add up,” said Jeff Eskew, Oklahoma City, Oklahoma.

4. “[The virus] is a scare tactic more than anything. And I just don’t believe all those deaths are coronavirus,” said Donald Fanning, Wichita Kansas.

Do you see any global warming in your backyard? I don’t see any global warming in your backyard. It’s all fake, it’s all made up.

How can you even blame China for a hoax? How can China be at fault if it’s all fake? That’s like saying the Bolton book is a complete lie but the lies are classified so it shouldn’t be published.

Remember, Trumpicans like mainland Chinese only get their news from the government propaganda machine. What are the odds on Fox showing how much better Europe has done then the United States in reducing the number of coronavirus deaths? What are the odds of Fox showing how much better countries from around the world have done in stopping the coronavirus? What are the odds on Fox showing the rise in coronavirus deaths in Trumpican states because it is not a New York problem anymore?  The Trumpican wishful thinking on the coronavirus will continue until Trumpicans start dying in droves and they all do know someone who died from it. I suspect, that little by little more and more Trumpicans will learn to live in the real world because it will become more and more difficult to live a lie.

THE TULSA TURNING POINT

I am going to go out on a limb with my wishful thinking. Tulsa was nothing like it was hyped to be or I expected it to be based on the hype. Tulsa may signal the turning point. For weeks now, Little Donnee Wanney has been the equivalent of a caged animal who hasn’t been feed. He was starved for the energy of a raucous crowd that would ignite his election campaign and power him to victory in November. Without the energy of Trumpicans he is just a tired irritable old man who has trouble walking down a ramp or raising a glass of water with one hand. With their energy he becomes the Lord and Savior, the Chosen One, Blessed Be his Name. There is no Plan B. He has no vision except that he be the center of attention and be re-elected so he can stay out of jail. If the defining characteristic of his campaign in 2016 is removed from him, he has nothing left but hissy fit tweets from his White House bunker. A crowd of over 6000 when 19,000 indoor and 40,000 outdoor were expected doesn’t cut it. Where were all the people! Have they seen the light?

Tulsa is more than just a campaign event. True he can use it to take credit for making the country aware of a holiday that has been celebrated for 155 years. That is no small achievement. But Tulsa may be more remembered as a Toto moment. The curtain has been pulled backed. He looks not just like a loser to Biden but weak and wrong on everything: coronavirus, the economy, China, race, the courts, his niece, and his finances. Right now it seems as if the refs will have to throw a red flag for piling on just to save him. The military is not going to support him if he loses the election and claims “foul.” Even Barr seems to have his limits. President One-Term won’t want to leave the White House, but who will be left to help him remain there? All the adults are gone, the only ones left are loyalists and the son in-law. It will be easier to get him to leave the White House following an election defeat than I previously had thought. Perhaps Brian Williams is right to have started a countdown.

Play Ball: The Tulsa Template for Professional Sports

June 19, 2020
by Peter Feinman
Tulsa Shows the Way (https://www.etsy.com)

The Tulsa template for professional political wrestling provides the way for professional sports to return to action. Since March, professional sports have ceased. Sports headed towards season-ending championships including at the college level came to an abrupt halt. Sports warming up for the coming season never got started. Tournaments were rescheduled or vanished for the 2020 year. The U.S. Open (tennis) aims for a regularly scheduled tournament this summer with no fans. It seems it also won’t have some of the top male players either and who knows if players will be willing to travel to New York. The U.S. Open (golf) coincidentally is scheduled this summer for New York as well. It plans to play but with no word on whether or not spectators will be allowed and if so, how many. Meanwhile, everyone holds their breath for Friday Night Lights high school football, Saturday college football, and Sunday-Monday-Thursday professional football.

The Tulsa template this June 20 shows how games can be played with full attendance. The model is for an indoor arena so surely it will work outdoors as well. The model is for 20,000 people so it certainly will work for smaller crowds and should work for larger crowds outdoors in larger arenas. Real men don’t wear masks and real Americans don’t get COVID-19 so since sports fans are real men and real Americans there is no risk there. Besides as everyone knows the coronavirus is yesterday’s news. It’s over…but just in case, make sure that all attendees sign an insurance waiver so we don’t go bankrupt!

Here is a model that all professional sports can follow. Once again, the very stable genius has solved a problem the so-called experts have failed to solve. Remember how he solved the problem of forest fires in California: MAKE AMERICA RAKE AGAIN. Remember how his uncle was a supergenius. Remember how Little Donnee Disinfectant visited the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and said:

I really get it. Maybe I have a natural ability.

Seriously, wouldn’t the world be a better place if he had become a scientist. Think of all the discoveries he would have made.

Tulsa is just the start of the summer and fall political campaign. It shows that a full season of sports events can be scheduled as well. Of course, matches only can be held in Trumpican states. The New York Yankees will be unable to play in New York as long as the Democratic New York State Governor follows the advice of real scientists. The Yankees will have to play their games in a Confederate State. Similarly, the New England Patriots will have to follow their former quarterback south if it wants to play. The Republican Massachusetts Governor is not a Trumpican.  At this point, no one knows if professional sports will follow the example of the professional political wrestling and conduct their seasons in the South. But they will know that they can and the fans will demand it.

So as things stand, America can look forwarded to a summer of rounding up Trumpicans and herding them into arenas. While there, they will breathe on each other for hours, inhale each other’s droplets, and prove that the so-called scientists don’t know what they are talking about. Anthony Fauci has complained of an anti-science bias in America (see Darwin and COVID-19: Science in America). Now there will be an opportunity for Trumpicans to expose the fallacies of Fauci and the medical advice on the coronavirus. Once that happens, it will be PLAY BALL for college and professional sports.

The Trumpican rallies can be seen as a counter to the post-George-Floyd protests that have rocked the land. And these rallies probably will be without the physical violence that has occurred elsewhere….unless you are a black female reporter with a mask! One should anticipate a rip roaring fusillade of insults to come gushing forth. Look how long it has been since he has been able to deliver a full-throated performance.

Regardless of your personal views, we are witnessing an historic event. If the accounts of 800,000 people wanting tickets to attend are accurate, that is an extraordinary event in American history. It is reminiscent of the attendance in the Great Awakening with George Whitefield. This is not a Frank Sinatra, Elvis, the Beatles, or Woodstock event. Trumpicans are not attending for mere entertainment. They are attending for hope and salvation.

Hundreds of thousands of people are eager to see their Lord and Savior, the Chosen One, Blessed Be his Name. They are more than willing to sign insurance waivers because of their complete faith that the coronavirus is gone and couldn’t affect them anyway. They are here because they support the last line of defense against chaos. Only one person stands between the America they love and the total breakdown of society. They can see the foreigners all around them eager for the chance to take over the country after the rigged November elections. They know how perilous the situation is.

We can anticipate from now to November, the arenas of the country will rock to “Four More Years (at least!), Make American Great Again Again, Save the country, Lock her up, Build a wall, Deep State. Maybe some new material will be tested to see what works. The drumbeat over rigged elections will start now. It will be repeated incessantly. By the time of the actual election, Trumpicans will know the one and only way their Savior can lose is if the game is rigged.

For Little Donnee Wannee, these professional political wrestling matches are a matter of life and death. His life and his death. He has been cooped up in the White House for far too long. He needs the energy of the crowd roaring as he does the penguin walk, mocks Biden, and distributes free bottles of disinfectant to anyone who wants it. He needs their energy to sustain him against the Socialist Democrats, to sustain him against John Bolton, to sustain him against his niece.

The stakes are quite high.

P.S. We need to clarify the issue of Juneteenth and the Tulsa riots. When I first heard about the June 19 scheduling, I never considered that it was a racist act. I know anti-Trumpers were quick to jump to the conclusion that the racist bigoted president had just committed a doubly offensive act. My reaction was quite different. It never occurred to me that anyone in the White House [except a black Secret Service agent] even knew about Juneteenth or Tulsa. We are dealing with a person who blames the Baltic states for the breakup of Yugoslavia, who thinks the Canadians burned down the White House in the War of 1812, who thinks 306 Electoral College votes is a landslide. If your first reaction is that his decision was a racist action and not the action of a genuinely ignorant person then you are no better than someone who didn’t know Britain was nuclear armed and that Finland was an independent country. Just because he is a racist does not mean all his actions are racist. Sometimes they are just those of an ignorant person. Tulsa on the 19th was one such example. To those who criticized the racist action, the proper response is FAKE NEWS!

8:46 AM 9/11 to 8 minutes 46 seconds, 2020: What Happened?

June 11, 2020
by Peter Feinman
From 9/11 to May 25, 2020 (https://knowyourmeme.com/)

The numbers 8:46 may become bookend numbers for a transitional period in American history. The first is the time when a jet plane commandeered by Islamic terrorists crashed into one of the World Trade Towers in Manhattan. The second is the amount of time a Minneapolis cop knelt on the neck and back of black man who then died. Each event set off chain reactions. The worlds of these two incidents of death are very different.

9/11 8:46

The attack on the World Trade Center lead to responses which are not possible today. In France the headline of the newspaper Le Monde was “Nous sommes tous américains — We Are All Americans.” Parisians gathered at Notre Dame to sing “The Star-Spangled Banner” [how did they know the words?]. The French built 82-foot-tall scaffolding replicas of the now collapsed buildings. The sign on the buildings read: “Les Français N’oublieront Jaimais. The French Will Never Forget.”

Nineteen years later the French may still remember but it is a different United States they see today. The eyes of the world are still upon us but what do they see now.

1. They see a simple-minded immature child president who is a buffoon and laughing stock.

2. They see a country that has abandoned of its own free will its position of leadership in the world.

3. They see a country which failed to manage the coronavirus in a spectacular display of ineptitude, declare victory, and move on content to have 800-1,000 deaths a day forever.

4. They see a country divided by racism preparing to refight the Second American Civil War.

At times like this they must wonder what happened to America or have their eyes been opened to longstanding but buried truths?

At home, the situation has changed as well. After 9/11, the members of Congress, meaning of both parties, stood together on the steps of the Capitol to sing God Bless America. That could not happen today.

The coronavirus clearly shows that even when faced with a deadly attack that far exceeds the death totals from 9/11, Vietnam, and Korea combined, that We the People that cannot come together. We can’t because we aren’t really one people, we are two houses.

By now it is well-known to Trumpicans that CORVID-19 is a New York medical emergency and not an American one. Real Americans don’t wear masks because real Americans aren’t infected. CORVID-19 is a disease of New Yorkers, nursing homes, prisons, and meatpacking plants operated by both legal and illegal immigrants. Why should real Americans care?

This division between the not-a-house divided but two houses played out in the relief packages to help people, businesses, and states get through the crisis.

Donald J. Trump 10:41 AM – Apr 27, 2020

Why should the people and taxpayers of America be bailing out poorly run states (like Illinois, as example) and cities, in all cases Democrat run and managed, when most of the other states are not looking for bailout help? I am open to discussing anything, but just asking?

These thoughts were echoed by Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and the Senate Trumpicans who see no need to assist Democratic states like New York during this national crisis that isn’t really a national crisis. Overlooked in the debate is that New York paid $26.6 billion more in taxes in 2018 than it received back, a testament to the weakness of the New York State federal delegation compared to the Confederate federal delegations. What happens if New York State tires of subsidizing the Confederate states and decides it needs the money itself?

8 MINUTES 46 SECONDS

The death via kneeling has had a profound effect on American politics and society. We are just starting to see the impact in the polls. It still is too early to know how it will play out.

One regrettable type of response has been how to exploit the death to your own advantage.

One way has been for mostly young black males to exploit the absence of police to smash windows and loot expensive stores. Obviously these instances are the favorite of Fox.

A second way has been for the alpha-male wannabe commander in chief to demonstrate that he is a real man. He has done so with his comic-book-tough talk to governors on phone calls. He has done so by pretending he was inspecting the White House bunker. He has done so by dominating Lafayette Park in one of the greatest displays of false bravado in American history. He has done so by using his generals as props. In so doing he has learned that he can’t count on them to do his bidding for photo-ops against the American people exercising their constitutional rights. He has even learned that Bill Barr of all people has his limits in his loyalty. Despite all this, he will continue to act tough and talk up his great victories before loyal Trumpicans at his professional political wrestling arena events beginning June 19 in Tulsa.

A third way has been to ramp up efforts to purify America. Monuments will be toppled. Once the forces of purification have been unleashed, it is impossible to tell where it will end. This Columbus Day during the election countdown is sure to provide multiple battlefronts as America’s Third Civil War heats up.

A different and optimistic way also is possible. The murder of George Floyd can be a catalyst for an intense, often painful, and hopefully honest discussion about the place of Middle Passage blacks and Confederates in the United States. Remember “malice towards none.” There are too many people involved to wish away the current situation or to solve it unilaterally. A national discussion where one side simply condemns the other as inferior, terrorist thugs, or people who need to repent their sins will be destructive. Much of the discussion will be at the grassroots level which is good since it will be harder for the conversation to be hijacked. But ultimately not everything can be solved at the local level. No matter what people work out involving the local police that will still leave the damage caused by interstate highways that ripped neighborhoods to shreds.  Given the failure to develop a national solution to the coronavirus, it is impossible to imagine how we can develop national solutions to the problem of race in America with the current political environment in Washington. Someone is going to have win America’s Third Civil War and I hope it is We the People.

AMERICA’S THIRD CIVIL WAR

As stated in previous blogs, my expectation was that America’s Third Civil War would heat up after the presidential election. It appears that more people now recognize the possibility of the culture war becoming a civil war.

Thomas Friedman (May 13, 2020, NYT, print): Having a pandemic is really bad. Having a pandemic and a civil war together is really, really, bad. Welcome to Donald Trump’s America 2020 [written before the murder of George Floyd]

Paul Krugman (June 2, 2020, NYT, print): And Donald Trump, far from trying to calm the nation, is pouring gasoline on the fire; he seems very close to trying to incite a civil war.

Thomas Friedman (June 3, 2020, NYT, print): I am not at all certain that we will be able to conduct a free and fair election in November or have a peaceful transition of presidential power in January. We are edging toward a cultural civil war, only this time we are not lucky: Abraham Lincoln is not the president.

The Confederacy is back in the news big time. We see it in the conflict over the military bases with Confederate names. We see it in the conflict over Confederate statues. It’s as if the America’s Second Civil War never ended. Probably that is because it hasn’t.

No matter the election results, a battle will ensue. It is already underway.

Monsters from the Id: Does Trump Know a Krell Society Is Suicidal?

June 10, 2020
by Peter Feinman
The Monster from the Id Has Learned to Tweet ( https://www.imdb.com)

Spoiler Alert: “Monsters from the id” is a key phrase in the sci-fy classic Forbidden Planet. The story takes place in the 22nd century. It involves a rescue effort of a previous ship and colony. The would-be rescuers learn that the people from the first ship had died a hideous death. They were ripped apart by some apparently monstrous and invisible force. Only one couple survived.

The planet had been inhabited by the now vanished Krell people. It turns out that these superior beings had transformed themselves from physical beings into ones tapped into the energy of the planet. One unexpected problem occurred. The transformation brought their ids with them. Given the virtually unlimited energy now at the disposal of the Krell, it was only a matter of a very brief time before the monsters from the id led to destruction of all of them until none were left. When one of the humans gained access to the surviving Krell technology, it was the monster from his id that destroyed the other members of his crew and started to destroy the crew of the rescue ship.

We do not have a device that can transform physical beings into energy but we do have the technology to unleash the monsters from the id on the world. The technology that enables the destructive power of the id to wreak havoc is Twitter. Through it the impulsive thoughts of a person may become a veritable smoke monster from Lost as its viciousness is released into the national discourse.

This ability to instantaneously transform thought into verbal energy via Twitter is easily abused. It is a technology that should only be used by adults and which can be quite dangerous in the hands of an immature child. Back on August 2018, I explored the intertwining of Twitter and adolescence (Omarosa and the President: A Case of Arrested Development – Suppose Life Is Not a Journey?) I quoted Jennifer Senior’s op ed on the topic (“The High School We Can’t Log Off From” NYT, 8/5/18 print). She wrote:

Twitter is a dark reservoir of hatred, home to the diseased national id. It turns us into our worst selves — dehumanizing us, deranging us, keying us up, beating us down, turning us into shrieking outrage monkeys hellbent on the innocents of Oz. It uncomplicates complicated discussion; stealth-curates our news; hijacks our dopamine systems, carrying us off on a devil’s quest for ever more dime bags of retweets and likes.

Most Twitter users know that the medium has an unfortunate tendency to transform adults into anxious adolescents. But perhaps it’s time to start thinking about this problem clinically. The fact is, Twitter is changing us — regressing us — in ways developmental psychologists would find weirdly recognizable.

Should we be surprised that a man who’s so frequently compared to a needy adolescent has chosen Twitter as his favorite medium?

For the 7th-grade smart-aleck dumb-aleck, Twitter is the perfect invention.

To substantiate her perceptions Senior draws on an internet expert.

Clay Shirky, one of the shrewdest internet theorists around, has noted that the faster the medium is, the more emotional it gets. Twitter, as we know, is pretty fast, and therefore runs pretty hot. (Emotional tweets, research has shown, travel more swiftly than anodyne ones.) We often become creatures of our limbic systems when we tweet. Our self-regulation deserts us (been there); our prefrontal cortex, responsible for executive function and impulse control, goes offline; we become reward-seeking Scud missiles, addicts in search of a fix.

She still is focusing on the mature adult. Her analysis is based on adult having a developed prefrontal cortex going offline. She has overlooked the situation of an immature child in an adult body who does not have a developed prefrontal cortex such as our Little Donnee Waney.

MONSTERS FROM HIS ID

Regrettably we just experienced an instance of Twitter at its worst. Lately our immature child president with no self-control or superego has been giving full vent to the monsters from his id. First there were his series of tweets accusing Joe Scarborough of murder. Now he is piling it on a critically hurt 75-year old who had the misfortune to be knocked to the ground while peacefully protesting. By the time Little Donnee Waney and his Fox (and OANN) Flying Monkeys are done, this person will have become the second Seth Rich, a key operative in a terrorist conspiracy to take down the duly elected President of the United States who is America’s greatest President and who has done more for black people than any president save maybe Lincoln.

In my previous blog [Mitch McConnell: Howard Baker (Time to Go) vs Stay the Course (Go Down with the Ship)], I posited that Mitch McConnell was going to have a decision to make about the 2020 elections. At some point he was going to have to decide what his assessment was of the prospects of Trumpicans maintaining their Senate majority and what could be done if those prospects were negative. I suggested the situation was not immediately urgent, it was fluid, and you never know what might happen next.

Little did I know how right I was. A day later, the embattled simple-minded President succumbed as he always does to the monsters from his id. Like the little child scared of every noise or bump in the night, Little Donnee Waney saw an evil terrorist conspiracy where none existed (just as he had done with supposed fraud in voting by mail). He immediately unleashed the monsters from his id on the world.

“Buffalo protester shoved by Police could be an ANTIFA provocateur. 75 year old Martin Gugino was pushed away after appearing to scan police communications in order to black out the equipment. @OANN I watched, he fell harder than was pushed. Was aiming scanner. Could be a set up?”

Now all Trumpican candidates and Mitch McConnell have a totally unexpected decision to make.

IF THEY RUN, THEY CAN’T HIDE

Things were bad enough already for Trumpicans seeking to maintain their majority in the Senate. Even prior to June 8, Trumpicans knew that the majority was at stake. As if the real issues ⸺ coronavirus, recession and unemployment, China ⸺ partially due to the President’s ineptitude and mismanagement weren’t enough, he has gone out of his way to complicate the election for them. First, there was his domination of Lafayette Square in the greatest military victory by and American President ever (The Battle of Lafayette Square: The Greatest Victory in American History).  Second, there was his monsters-of-the-id tweet about someone even older than him being a key operative of a terrorist conspiracy. Third both he and the Trumpicans are learning that it’s not Law and Order as usual.  It seems as if every Trumpican senate candidate should have a giant bottle of hydroxychloroquine, disinfectant, and antacid on their night stands.

If McConnell didn’t have a headache before, he should have one now. In the previous blog, I discussed Ron Johnson and how the Wisconsin Senator might want to reassess his Trumpican loyalty come January, 2021 when his re-election campaign starts. Consider how this loyalist tied himself up in a knot in response to this latest expression of the monsters of Little Donnee Waney’s id:  he hadn’t seen the tweet, but he also didn’t want it read to him. “I would rather not hear it,” he said as he ducked into an elevator.

Some Senators don’t have the option of ducking the issue for long. For loyalist Steve Daines of Montana, his re-election campaign just became more difficult. “The violence we are seeing across the nation is heartbreaking. We all need to pull together — both for civility and peaceful dialogue.” What are he and the other Trumpican candidates going to say when asked during the campaign:

When the President said the number of coronavirus cases would drop from 15 to zero, did you believe him?

When the President recommended trying disinfectant as a cure, did you agree with him?

When the President suggested Scarborough was guilty of murder, did you agree with him?

When the President said he went down to the bunker to inspect it and not for safety as Bill Barr said, which one do you believe?

When the President said Gugino was a terrorist agent, did you believe him?

So why don’t Trumpicans tell the truth? Do they still live in fear of the monsters from his id and the base that he can release? What is he going to do? Tell people not to vote for the disloyal incumbents and candidates? They should stay home instead? They should just vote for the President and leave the remaining ballot lines blank? They should let the Democratic candidates win?

As I said, Mitch McConnell has a decision to make. He does not have the luxury of coping by being in denial in response to polls that the presidential campaign does. At any moment another monster from his id may be released on the world to make matters even worse. And by the time McConnell decides he needs to do something about it, it will be too late. In the movie Forbidden Planet, the heroic captain acted in time, got the girl, and they rode off into galactic space together. Unfortunately for McConnell, this is the real world. The immature child president playing imaginary games can unleash the monsters from his id at any moment. He will continue to do so until the Red Wave does to the Senate in 2020 what it did to the House in 2018.

 

Todd Alcott (https://davallone.tumblr.com/post/125863268306/monsters-from-the-id)

Mitch McConnell: Howard Baker (Time to Go) vs Stay the Course (Go Down with the Ship)

June 8, 2020
by Peter Feinman
Will the Red Wave Be as Successful in 2020 as it was in 2018? (amazon.com)

Mitch McConnell has a decision to make…if he hasn’t made it already. McConnell is an adult. He lives in the real world. The Senate Majority leader has a transactional relationship with the President of the United. McConnell’s decision will be based on his analysis of the political situation and the November elections. Whether or not his assessment turns out to be accurate is not the subject of this post. Instead it is to examine the parameters of that decision-making.

McConnell’s political agenda is a fairly simple one.

1. Help rich people get richer
2. Appoint conservatives to judge positions
3. Don’t help, you know….those people.

His assessment of the election results will be based on how those results affect his ability to achieve his agenda.

HELP RICH PEOPLE GET RICHER

To fulfill this objective requires the support of the House, the Senate, and the White House. Following the 2016 elections, McConnell had this trifecta. As a result he was able to pass a tax cut for the wealthy. This goal already was part of the agenda for the former party of Lincoln even prior to the election.

McConnell recognizes that those days are over. That political confluence is not likely to return. If anything the 2020 census will probably make it even more difficult to attain the political trifecta. At present if he wants to help rich people get richer, he has to do so through economic recovery acts. Otherwise, there would seem to be little he can do anymore to help rich people get richer in this Congressional term or the next.

APPOINT CONSERVATIVES TO JUDGE POSITIONS 

To fulfill this objective requires the support of the Senate and the White House. During the past three years he has had exceptional results in appointing conservatives to judicial positions. McConnell recognizes that the window of opportunity may be closing here due to the loss of the Senate, the White House, or both. As a result he has been seeking the retirements of older judges so he can replace them with young conservatives. So far that initiative has not been successful. Still, one can anticipate that he continue to appoint these judges right up to the very last  moment on December 31 if he can depending on the election results.

If there is no change in the Senate and the White House, then the urgency is off and McConnell can wait to the new session.

If there is a change in only the White House, then the urgency remains and he will seek to use every moment he has left. In the next session, he will oppose the nominations of new Democratic President. He will stymie the recommendations of the former Democratic Vice President just as he had done to the former Democratic President.

If there is a change only in the Senate, then time is urgent.

If there is a change in both the Senate and the White House, then time is urgent.

So at this point, it is in McConnell’s interests to appoint as many conservatives to judge positions as he can.

DON’T HELP, YOU KNOW….THOSE PEOPLE

McConnell has had two opportunities this year to help people he does not want to help. The economic freefall as the result of the coronavirus forced his hand to provide temporary relief including to the people who were hardest hit by the virus. Now that the medical crisis officially is over and the economy officially is back from the recession, McConnell has put the brakes on any additional help. Why should expensive Democratic states that subsidize the Confederate states with their taxes get any assistance to perpetuate their wasteful ways helping the wrong kind of people?

McConnell supported the efforts of the commander in-chief to use military force to liberate Lafayette Park from the heavily-armed terrorists who had surrounded the White House.  The death of George Floyd has witnessed four previous presidents preaching unity. What an excellent opportunity for McConnell beyond boilerplate to spurn any sign of compassion or desire for unity in the country when it includes the wrong people.

McConnell needs to maintain control of the Senate so in case Biden becomes President the world isn’t turned topsy turvy and the rich are called upon to help those who aren’t rich.

SENATE ELECTION PROGNOSTICATIONS

What is McConnell’s assessment of the Senate election results?

At present the Senate configuration is as follows:

51 Trumpicans
45 Democrats
2  Independents who caucus with the Democrats
2  Republicans who caucus with the Trumpicans

Previously, I had raised the question of how Mitt Romney would caucus in the next session (Where Will Mitt Romney Caucus in 2021?). Depending on the Presidential and Senate election results, his vote could be the determining one in who controls the Senate. Now there appear to be two Republicans with Alaska Senator Lisa Murkowski joining Romney. Together this amplifies the power of the Republicans in determining the control of the Senate in the next session.

Consider this quite possible scenario: the Democrats lose one seat in Alabama and pick up three in Arizona, Colorado, and Maine. Under these results the Senate configuration will be:

49 Trumpicans
47 Democrats
2   Independents who caucus with the Democrats
2   Republicans.

How will the two Republicans caucus if they have the power to decide who controls the Senate? In the interim, the Trumpicans will continually demonize Murkowski as a traitor, will not support her if she chooses to run for re-election, and will not welcome her in the Trumpican party.  In other words, the Trumpicans will do everything they can to encourage her to caucus with the Democrats in 2021 where that one vote might mean the difference. The other Republican Senator already voted to remove the President from office and is on the trump list. If the Democrats prevail in the Presidential election, it is easy to imagine the two Republicans caucusing with the Democrats.

This analysis excludes the other potential seats which also may be won by Democrats. Since all the candidates haven’t even been selected yet, it is too early to be realistic about the final results in the Senate. In addition, who knows what other events will occur between now and November (or October with early voting). It’s not so long ago that the coronavirus dominated the news. Now that the President of the United States has dominated Lafayette Square as he deployed his forces to take back the country, the results of his great victory have yet to be factored into the polls. What will the reaction be when coronavirus deaths in the United States hit 200,000? What will happen in the international arena? What will the response be to the October indictments of the Deep State including Obama and Biden as co-conspirators? So it easy to understand why predictions for the Senate remain fluid.

One should also keep in mind, that depending on the election results, Trumpican Senators up for re-election in 2022 may experience an agonizing reappraisal. If the vaunted red wave predicted by the Trumpican in chief dooms Trumpican control of the Senate as it did the House in 2018, then Trumpican Senators may want to reevaluate their position.

Consider Wisconsin as an example. In 2016, Wisconsin was not Trumpican during the primary. It barely was so in the Presidential election.  In fact, the then Republican Senator won by a larger margin. Since then the Senator has converted to the Trumpican cause and is gung ho on indicting Deep State Democrats. However, also since his election, Democrats have won statewide elections for governor and a state judge. Democrats also have gained popular vote victories for Congressional and state legislative seats but due to gerrymandering have been unable to turn those state majorities into victories. That may change after the 2020 census. Regardless, in statewide Senate election in 2022, Johnson will be running as a Trumpican. Or will he like other Trumpican Senators running in 2022 see the light and have a change of heart? Will it be too late?

Everything above is based on possible scenarios. The situation is very fluid. Maybe we will try again to buy Greenland? Maybe a hurricane really will hit Alabama? Maybe North Korea will launch a missile or detonate a bomb or both? So as McConnell assesses the situation for the Senate, there are a lot of variables to consider. As we get closer and closer to actual voting, many of the variables will stabilize. Then it will be possible to get a better fix on the results. Then it may be too late to do anything about the prospective results if they are adverse to McConnell who himself is a candidate. In the meantime, McConnell will do everything he can to appoint conservatives as judges and not to help you know…those people despite everything which has occurred.

Mount Rushmore Opportunity for a Little Little Boy: Does He Know It?

June 5, 2020
by Peter Feinman
The Macho Macho Boy Twins (Photo: AP)

In American history, there have been three existential moments when the fate of the United States was at risk: creation, secession, and depression.

CREATION

At the birth of the country, there was no guarantee that it would be successful. There was no guarantee that the fledgling states would successfully constitute themselves. One person made a difference and earned the reputation as the indispensable person. We will never know if without George Washington, the United States would have been created or not. What we do know, it is not simply by chance that he was in that position. People picked America’s first action hero to command the American forces and people wrote the Constitution with the expectation that he would be President. He fulfilled expectations.

SECESSION

At the secession, one may reasonably posit that the election of Abraham Lincoln triggered the event. But the idea that America was a house divided already was known. If it hadn’t been Lincoln’s election that immediately led to the Second Civil War, it would have been something else. It is easy to imagine that America’s Second Civil War could have ended with two separate countries as we are today except not legally. No one anticipated that Lincoln would become America’s greatest president outside the Confederacy. He exceeded expectations.

DEPRESSION

At the depression, one may reasonably posit that the election of Franklin Delano Roosevelt was a direct result of the failure under Herbert Hoover. Roosevelt was elected to save America. No one knew that there would be a second and unrelated threat looming just years away –World War II. Similarly, Roosevelt’s success in the 1930s during the depression did not necessarily mean he was right person to be the wartime leader. Roosevelt first fulfilled and then exceeded expectations when the second threat arose.

Today, if one would to identify the three greatest American presidents, outside the current White House and the Confederate states, the answers would be Washington, Lincoln, and Roosevelt. Historians can play the “what if” counterfactual one on do times make the person or does the person make the times. The other Roosevelt is likely to be a favored choice for Presidents who could have risen to the occasion to save the country had the opportunity existed. It is a lot easier to select Presidents who would have failed miserably had they been President during these crises or whose shortcomings precipitated the crisis in the first place.

MOUNT RUSHMORE OPPORTUNITY

At this moment in time, America experiences multiple threats. The times cry out for a Mount Rushmore President to lead us from the calamities facing us. It seems as if fate is piling it on, confronting America with one challenge after another. We are facing:

1. the attempt by the Middle Kingdom to wrest world leadership from us

2. America’s Third Civil War

3. the global coronavirus crises

4. the global economic recession if not depression

and, of course, below-the-radar, climate change which hasn’t disappeared from the real world even as it recedes from the news media due to all the other events.

To some extent, during the 2016 election We the People given our Electoral College system picked a President to deal precisely with most of these issues.

With climate change, the choice was simple. The candidate who denied that climate change existed and who claimed it was a Chinese hoax won. As one might expect, the anti-science values of his supporters carried over into other science-related issues. He has meet expectations.

With China, the choice also was simple. The winning candidate was one who had no interest in America’s role in human history or position in the world. Everything was transactional. Everything was a zero-sum game. There were no allies, only transactional relationships. We pulled out of the anti-China alliance the previous President had put together. The new President did so because he vowed to undo whatever Obama had done. The new President did try to apply his transactional zero-sum values to trade the Middle Kingdom but so far without much to show for it. Now he is trying to blame China for the coronavirus crisis and turn China into Mexicans and Salvadorans. That will work with Trumpicans again in the election but has little substance in the global arena. He has not met expectations but is still trying; plus the game has changed due to the new circumstances.

With America’s Third Civil War, the choice also was simple. The winning candidate made no attempt to be President of We the People. He made no attempt to be an e pluribus unum President. He saw that America was not a house divided but two houses. He did not divide America, he exploited the divisions which existed. The longtime pretend Democrat and Clinton supporter realized he had no future there just as he had none with the New York elitists whose approval he craved and never received. Instead he became a fake Republican, heard the call of Sarah Palin to take back the country from you know….those people, and answered the call. As long as Trumpicans think he is fighting for them against the terrorists, they will continue to accept him as their Lord and Savior, the Chosen One, Blessed Be his Name no matter what else happens. He is meeting expectations and still fighting as the battle is not yet over.

With the coronavirus, that was unexpected. Just as Roosevelt had been elected for one crisis, the depression, and then had to face another one, so to now there was a second crisis unrelated to the first. The winning candidate was elected to save real Americans by taking back the country, not to fight a virus. Whereas Roosevelt proved successful in dealing with the unexpected, the same does not apply now. Success if fighting against immigrant people does not translate into success in fighting against an immigrant virus. Still, he has claimed success, asserted he wouldn’t have changed anything, and declared himself a “10.” The wartime President against the invisible enemy has won and saved over 2 million American lives in the process. By November, the coronavirus crisis will be over if it isn’t already and who will remember the problems of the spring.

With the depression, again the unexpected occurred. The United States economy already was on its way back in 2016. The one action taken to help rich people get richer did not contribute to a more successful economy. Now we are on our way back. By November we will be back and who will remember the problems of the spring.

To recap, the winning candidate did do what he pledged to do…up to a point. He did wreak havoc with the international arena. He did ignore climate change. He did fight immigration. He did insult, demean, and mock the politically correct, the news media, and the Republicans who did not accept the new Trumpican order. He did not end Obamacare. He did not return manly manufacturing jobs to the United States. He did not return manly coal mining jobs to their former number. He did save America from the coronavirus and did rebuild the economy. So despite his dishonesty, ignorance, narcissism, above-the –law behavior, and conduct as a seventh-grade-smart-aleck-dumb-aleck, he had and still has a legitimate chance win the Electoral College again.

What is important to realize is that the immature child playing imaginary games where he makes up the roles genuinely believes he has succeeded as a wartime general and that Trumpicans accept his version of the truth as communicated via Tweets and Fox.

WARTIME GENERAL FOR AMERICA’S THIRD CIVIL WAR

The same considerations apply to the ramped up Third Civil War in the wake of George Floyd’s death. Bonespur Boy is seeking to replicate his wartime victory over the coronavirus over the thugs and terrorists.

“We will end it now.”

“If a city or a state refuses to take the actions that are necessary to defend life and property of their residents, then I will deploy the United States military and quickly solve the problem for them.”

“My administration will stop mob violence, and stop it cold.”

“These are terrorists. These are terrorists. And they are looking to do bad things to our country.”

“Only I can save our country because I am a very stable genius, the smartest person in the room.”

You want empathy? Try weak wimpy sleepy Joe Biden. I will dominate the streets. I won the battle of Lafayette Square (The Battle of Lafayette Square: The Greatest Victory in American History). Real men don’t wear masks. Real men don’t go into bunkers (except to inspect them!). I am Macho Macho Man like Putin, ruler for life as I should be, too.

Obviously it is only because of Divine Providence, that at this moment of existential crisis, that our Lord and Savior, the Chosen One, Blessed Be his Name, is here as President of the United States. He saved the economy once, he will do it again. He saved the country from the coronavirus. He will take back the country for real Americans. Truly we are blessed that at this moment of existential crisis, we have a President equal to if not superior to Washington, Lincoln, and Roosevelt. And if you don’t believe me, just ask him.

For all his talk about having the greatest first year if a President ever,

For all his talk about having the greatest first two years of a President ever,

For all his talk about having done more for black Americans than any President except Lincoln,

He had a legitimate opportunity in the real world to become one of America’s greatest Presidents if only he knew it and was capable of rising to the occasion.