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Joe Biden

Now We Know Why Fred Trump Put His Son in Military School: It Didn’t Work

October 1, 2020
by Peter Feinman

Now we know why Fred Trump put his son in military school. Everybody knows his son is immature child. He has been one for decades and will be until the day he dies. For whatever reason certain portions of his brain never developed during the maturation process. As a result through no fault of his own, he is trapped at the level of a seventh-grade smart-aleck-dumb-aleck, frozen in time, unable to change. Now the world has had the opportunity to witness him being his true self.

THE PUBLIC DISPLAY

The public displays of his immaturity as President are well documented. They can be seen in

1. his tweets
2. his press conferences
3. his rallies.

In each case, he is able to operate freely, unencumbered by adult supervision or even the pretense of it. He can tweet impulsively at any time of the day or night with no checks and balances on his thinking or, more appropriately, lack of thinking. If it feels good to his gut then it is worth tweeting or retweeting, no questions asked, no research required.

When Trumpicans say, as they do, they wish he would tweet less, they are saying they are aware he acts like a teenager and wish he would grow up. Still, he appoints the judges, builds the wall, and leaves the treaties they don’t like. Trumpicans overlook everything even when he calls them suckers, losers, and disgusting people.

Sometimes at press conferences, he will try to be adult. That can last for a while. Then he is asked some questions. The next thing you know, it is “Fake News” and “Nasty Cutie-Pie.” There are limits as to how long he can fake being an adult.

At his rallies, there is no control. He is in his element as a seventh-grade-smart-aleck-dumb aleck. He can carry on for as long as he likes. You can’t send him to the principal’s office. He is the superintendent.

All these examples mean, he has limited experience in a discussion between equals. And if the press gets uppity, he simply walks of the stage. Show over. He can’t do that in a debate.

THE PRIVATE DISPLAY  

As to what he is like in private meetings, we have to rely on the reports of others. Many people have described a damming picture of the immature child with limited attention span who is focused only on himself. The reports from former people in the intelligence services, the military, and the White House are fairly consistent. They paint of picture of a person out of his league who lacks the mental necessities and cognitive skills to do his job. They only task he seems to good besides promoting himself is being subordinate to Putin.

Thanks to the debate, we now have a glimpse of what those meetings must have been like…and still are. It is one thing to read about them in a book or hear someone describe them on a talk show; it is quite another to see such behavior first hand in the presidential debate. There were supposed to be rules. We saw how meaningless that idea was. Now imagine what it must be like in a meeting run by the person the country and the world just saw live on television. What a frightening thought. It is easy to understand how people who went to military school as adults and then made the military their career would have problems functioning in a meeting led by the person on display in the debate. How long do you think you would last in such a setting?

TRUMPICANS WITNESS THE TRUTH  

Presumably Trumpicans watched the presidential debate for themselves. Presumably they did so on Fox. Presumably they know the moderator was from Fox as well. In other words, when it comes to the debate there is no Fake News, no rigged format, no terrorist/anarchist/socialist participant. They saw with their own eyes how their Lord Savior, the Chosen One, Blessed Be his Name, acts. They are quite capable of drawing their own conclusions about what they witnessed without having the Fox Triplets tell them what to think.

Just in case they do need some help in understanding what “really” happened regardless of what they think they saw, the Fox Triplets are ready to show them the truth. After all, he “turned in the greatest debate performance in presidential history,” he said so himself.

In my last blog, I suggested there was one way the pending Constitutional crisis could be avoided. The more Fox News reports that unrigged non-fraud Fox polls (and other ones) decisively show a Biden victory, the more Trumpicans will become resigned to the uncomfortable truth that Joe Biden is going to win. That process may have started already.

The debate exposed some false stories the Fox Triplets have been peddling for months. I was going to write a blog entitled “How Long Can One Person Be on a Deathbed and Not Die?’ I refrained from doing so because that blog would have been posted the day Ruth Bader Ginsburg died after months of McConnell patiently waiting for her to do so. Still, the issue of the fraudulent claims about Joe Biden may finally have come back to undermine the validity of the Fox Triplets.

For months now, the pre-teens and friends have been having rank out contests: who could demean and insult Joe Biden the most. He wasn’t just hiding in his basement, he was in his nursing home. He wasn’t just in a nursing home, he was moments from death. He wasn’t just moments from death, he had died but no one could tell. The childish glee of the supposed adults was fascinating to watch not simply for its foolishness but for its shortsightedness. What did they really think would happen at the debate? Did they expect Joe Biden to keel over and die on national television? What did they think their credibility would be if it turned out that Joe Biden was quite capable of standing and surviving a 90-minute assault?

At some level, some Trumpicans must realize that the Fox Triplets’ description of Joe Biden was in error. Even the triplets know it. Hannity has abandoned that tact just as he once abandoned his attacks on Seth Rich. When the focus had switched to the tax returns prior to the election, the triplets were busy anticipating the Lindsay Graham its-almost-October bombshell on the Russia investigation. Meanwhile Durham’s investigation won’t be completed by Election Day. He knows what he has to deliver or be fired. Instead he is waiting until after the vote. That way when he announces there is no “there” there, just mistakes, omissions, and sloppy work but no Deep State conspiracy, he won’t pay the price for telling the truth.

So what Breaking News is left between now and Election Day? Just today, Pennsylvania and Texas announced they are going all out to suppress the Biden vote. They know the truth. The pandemic is not over. Ask Hope Hicks. There will be more disclosures from the Muller Report by November 2. What will be in them as to why the President wasn’t charged? And there are more polls. More polls delivering the same message: Joe Biden will win.

THE TOWNHALL DEBATE

Given the performance in the first debate, what can we expect in the second one? Suppose ordinary Americans ask questions that can be ignored when asked by the press? Will he just walk off the stage? Here are some possible questions real people might ask.

1. All the polls show that Joe Biden is going to win. Are they rigged?

2. I (or a loved one) served in the military (and was wounded or my loved one was killed). You avoided military service by pretending to have bone spurs. Am I (or my loved one) a sucker and loser while you are the smart one?

3. I paid $7500 in taxes last year, ten times more than you paid when you did pay taxes. Am I stupid?

4. Why are you subordinate to Putin? Does he have something on you? Is it because you want to build Trump Moscow? Is it because the alpha male is a father-figure to you?

How insulting will he be to the people who ask him questions? The town-hall format provides another opportunity for Trumpicans to witness the seventh-grade-smart-aleck-dumb-aleck in his element unless he has developed for extremely strong self-control between now and then. As the stakes get higher and time dwindles, the greater the pressure becomes.

The big mysteries are

1. Is there a straw that will break the camel’s back?
2. Are we reaching that point in these debates?

After all, what does he have to look forward to on the night of January 20, 2021? He will be a loser politically as he has been in business. His future is in court, jail, or prison and testifying to the FBI, the Senate, the House, and Adam Schiff. The closer that date comes, the more likely he is to self-destruct after having nightmares about polls and the loss of immunity. We may look back on the first debate as his calm one.

How Chris Wallace Can Save America from Chaos before November 3

September 29, 2020
by Peter Feinman

The Apocalypse is coming. Or so one would think based on the words and actions of the non-believing President who mocks the values of the white evangelicals who accept him as their Lord and Savior, the Chosen One, Blessed be His Name. The election is rigged. The only way he can lose is due to the greatest act of political corruption in American history replacing the 2016 election as the greatest political corruption in American history.

The son who is being compelled to testify under oath in court, apparently the first of many many times to come, has graciously shared with the American people that his father would accept the election results and participate in a peaceful transfer of power if Joe Biden won in a landslide. Since everyone knows that 306 electoral votes constitutes a landslide that means if Biden wins 306 votes or more in the Electoral College, its game over. Don’t hold your breath. However it does permit Biden an easy counterargument to the coming assault: You can’t contest a landslide election. Of course as we know from the statement in the 2016 by the still-Republican Party on fulfilling a Supreme Court vacancy, Republican promises aren’t even worth the used-toilet paper they are written on.

“LEE’S” CAMPAIGN STRATEGY

The present plan to divide the United States into two – a house masked and a house unmasked cannot stand – calls for a two prong strategy.

The Initial Assault

The initial attack will be to deny Biden sufficient votes to win in the Electoral College. The exact points of engagement won’t be known until after the votes are tallied. Remember how in 2016, the number of supposed fraudulent votes changes as more were needed to claim victory in the popular vote. Still it is possible to make some predictions even before the actual number of votes needed is determined.

Presumably, some of the same states that pushed him over the top in 2016 will be the ones where the vote totals are challenged. Pennsylvania for sure, probably Michigan, and then Wisconsin, North Carolina, Arizona, Florida and Georgia if needed and if they voted for Biden. This list, of course, is subject to change. The goal of this engagement is to call into doubt as many states as are needed with an overwhelming number of lawsuits.

The Judicial Campaign

The second phase of the campaign is to have “my Court” rule in favor of the loser. Interestingly, the vacancy on the Court needs to be filled for this portion of the campaign to succeed. Supposedly it would be better to have ninth judge to prevent a 4-4 tie. That means the Chief Justice is presumed to support the Democratic-appointed judges so that the Court does not have a 5-3 split. Thus the ninth judge is needed on “my Court” to effect a split 5-4 decision and not a 6-3 one.

Regardless, the intent is to so overwhelm the Supreme Court with so many lawsuits that they cannot be resolved in time for the Electoral College convenes to vote. Therefore the Court will rule that the votes from the contested states cannot be included in that vote. The result is that Joe Biden did not win the majority of votes needed to be voted into office as President.

The Contingent Election

Obviously, someone briefed our ignorant President on the intricacies of Constitutional and electoral law. There is no way he could have known this on his own. For him to mention the 26 Republican state votes he would receive in the present Congress in the Contingent Election shows he was paying attention in this briefing. True, no one knows what the division will be in the new Congress. True, Nancy Pelosi will decline to seat the exact number of supposed Republican winners needed to shift the states to Democratic. True there will be a rash of lawsuits contesting that action. True, it will not be possible to resolve all the disputed Congressional seats in time for the January 20 inauguration. Hello, President Pelosi.

HOW CHRIS WALLACE AND FOX NEWS CAN PREVENT A CONSTITUTIONAL CRISIS

 Lately, there has been some discussion about what Fox News can do on Election Night to prevent the Apocalypse Now scenario where armed-people are rioting in the street throughout the country both for and against the results. The typical response is twofold.

1. don’t call the election prematurely – wait for the votes to be in even if it means not calling the election on Tuesday night

2. call the election for Joe Biden if the votes show he won.

Trumpicans like the Chinese only get their news from one source, the government propaganda outlets. If a tree falls in the woods and it is not on Fox, then nothing happened. They don’t know about the $413 million from Fred Trump that he lost or the $427 million from The Apprentice. So the hope here is that Fox News won’t launch the Apocalypse Now spiral into chaos through an incorrect call.

This analysis overlooks what Chris Wallace and Fox News can do between now and Election Day. How is it we are going through all these doomsday scenarios anyway? Would we be going through them if everybody expected Joe Biden to lose? No. We are going through them because everyone expects Joe Biden to win including his opponent.

Why does everyone expect Joe Biden to win? Because of the polls showing it. They show it nationally as well in the battle states. Even the Fox polls show Joe Biden winning.

Are the polls rigged? Does all the ranting and raving about the rigged elections apply to the polls? Is there any mail-fraud in the calculation of the polls including the Fox polls? Are illegal aliens voting in the polls including the Fox polls? Are people voting twice in the polls including the Fox polls? Is there any fraud at all involved in these polls that show Joe Biden ahead?

Will Chris Wallace and Fox News show their audience the results of the polls? Will Chris Wallace and Fox News show their audience the results of the Fox polls showing Joe Biden is winning? Will Chris Wallace and Fox News show their audience day by day until the Election that Joe Biden is winning?

I don’t know the answer to these questions, but I can speculate on the results if it does. If Chris Wallace and Fox News show their audience day after day in its own unrigged polls that Joe Biden is winning, by Election Day, their audience will know what to expect. They won’t like the results but they will have seen for weeks what is in in-store for them.  The more Chris Wallace and Fox News tell them that the unrigged Fox polls show Joe Biden is the winner, the more likely they are to accept those results on Election Day. At some point, the truth of those numbers may sink in. You will see in the body language. It will go from exultant to defiant to resigned. I am not saying it will happen; I am saying it could happen. The more Chris Wallace and Fox News report on the polls and the real world (coronavirus, taxes, disgusting people, etc.), the more the wind will be taken out of the sails of the Apocalypse Now scenario.

Consider this hypothetical. The current 49-42% popular split [it might even be more for Biden] converts to a 53.8% to 46.2% vote in a two-person race with the total of 100% of the vote. Incidentally, this remarkably means no change on the Republican side despite everything and the Democratic increase is due to the absence of a significant third party vote. It makes me wonder if there really are 9% undecided or not.

Now suppose 140,000,000 people vote, a slight increase from 2016 but who knows what the turnout will be. The 53.8% to 46.2% split means a popular vote roughly of 75.4 million for Joe Biden and 64.6 million for his opponent. Do you think the Supreme Court will overturn a roughly 11 million popular vote spread? Will the House of Representatives? Will the country? The more Chris Wallace and Fox News tell their audience the truth before Election Day, the less likely there will be a Constitutional crisis after Election Day.

Will California or South Carolina Secede First?

September 25, 2020
by Peter Feinman
Will Donald Trump succeed where Robert E. Lee failed?

Crunch time is coming. America’s Third Civil War is fast approaching the moment of truth. After weeks, months, and years of writing about it, the battle is now taking shape to determine if America continues to exist as a single country. Lincoln’s adage that a house divided cannot stand is true but not appropriate. We are not “a” house. We were two houses when we constituted ourselves in 1787. We were two houses when we fought the Civil War/War of Northern Aggression. We were two houses when we celebrated the Sesquicentennial of that war. And we obviously are two houses now in the coronavirus pandemic.

OUR BATTLE OF GETTYSBURG

Election Day will be our Gettysburg. The preliminary skirmishes have already started. The rhetoric anticipating the battle is being heard. Our historically ignorant President praised Robert E. Lee to an audience in Minnesota. The title of the local news article covering that story was:

Trump’s praise of Robert E. Lee gets pushback from Minnesotans proud of state’s role at Gettysburg: Minnesota soldiers played a pivotal role at Gettysburg, a major Confederate loss

Standing in the heart of a state that has gloried in its role in helping save the Union at Gettysburg, President Donald Trump extolled at length Friday the battle prowess of a seemingly odd hero — Gen. Robert E. Lee. Some Minnesota veterans and Civil War historians were surprised to hear the commander-in-chief lavish praise on a man who led the Confederacy’s fight against Americans trying to preserve the Union. “Had he won, we would be two countries,” state Sen. Jerry Newton, a veteran who served in the Vietnam War and the Middle East, said Saturday. “That’s just unconscionable for me, for him to make those statements.”

A painting at the Minnesota State Capitol depicting the First Minnesota Volunteer Regiment’s historic firefight on July 2, 1863, in the Battle of Gettysburg.

The Minnesota Republican Party and several GOP legislators and officials didn’t respond Saturday to requests for comment on the president’s remarks.

The very stable genius who speaks about Lincoln to Confederates now speaks of Lee to Unionists. But he is right to sense in his gut that we are at a Gettysburg moment.

WILL DONALD TRUMP SUCCEED WHERE ROBERT E. LEE FAILED?

Gettysburg marked the turning point of the Confederacy’s invasion of the North. Ultimately the United States did not become a legally divided country. The Union prevailed. The current un-Lincoln President favors the Confederacy over the Union. He has been quite open on his admiration for Confederate generals and the Confederate way of life. He practically sighs in disappointment over how close Lee came to triumphing over the Union.

This preference is not actually because he personally knows anything about the Confederacy beyond Gone with the Wind.  What appeals to him is the same thing that appeals to him with QAnon and white Protestant evangelicals: they support him. What else matters?  By contrast, the Union States tended to vote against him. The longtime faux Democrat and Clinton supporter naturally prefers the people who worship him over those who mock and investigate him.

The coronavirus provides the perfect dividing line for America. The talk about how a virus doesn’t know politics is nonsense. As we have seen, the virus has been very targeted in the people it kills. It preys on the weak. It preys on the unhealthy. It preys on people who are vulnerable. The virus imprinted itself in the American culture as a New York disease that primarily effects people Trumpicans don’t care about anyway. Even after seven months, the virus has only minimally effected Trumpicans. The biggest impact has been economic due to the lockdowns. The political impact is to make the dividing line quite clear. Corvid-19 highlights that we really are two countries masquerading as one.

THE ELECTION THAT COULD BREAK AMERICA 

For several weeks if not months, people have been gaming out various “what if” scenarios for the post-election world. By and large, the results have been terrifying. Many existing laws and rules have never been tested. We never have had a President who is a law unto himself with no ethics, no conscience, and no morals. Truly the country will be in uncharted waters after November 3.

The one precedent is the election in 1876. At that time there were rival slates of electors just as there were from Mississippi in the 1960s at Democratic conventions. Just a little over a decade from the end of America’s Second Civil War, the country stood on the brink of beginning another one. In that situation as the clock wound down a deal was struck whereby the South would no longer be occupied territory. Violence was threatened. The newly-freed slaves were collateral damage. It was an ugly moment in American history. Neither of the two candidates then was the incumbent unlike the situation today.

So Tilden got something for stepping down. What does our incumbent want and what would he get if he steps down?

1. He wants to be president for life just like Putin and the leaders from Trumphole countries.

2. As the greatest President in American history, he wants to be President for four-terms (he probably doesn’t know that FDR didn’t actually serve for 16 years but somehow he does know that FDR was elected four times. Maybe his mother told about what life was like under Roosevelt.)

3. He never loses. He didn’t lose the popular vote in 2016, it was rigged and he is not going to lose in 2020 either unless it is rigged.

Is it just coincidence that just as the son is about to be hauled into court that the father reveals that there will be no peaceful transfer because there will be continuity? As the days dwindle to election, he can see the ghost of Christmas future more clearly in the legal problems of his son. He has nothing good to look forward to after leaving the White House so he has nothing to lose by doing everything he can to remain in it.

POSSIBLE SCENARIOS

1. What will California do if Pennsylvania attempts to steal the election? And New York? And so on? Regardless of all the legal shenanigans detailed in Gellman article in The Atlantic, there is the one scenario he only mentioned in passing: the threat of secession. Don’t expect the states to stand by idly if one tries to pull a fast one.

2. Who will Europe support? That’s obvious. Romney already played the Belarus card. The world laughs at America and pities the country because of its simpleminded immature child president. The world favors Make America Adult Again.

3. Who will Russia support? That’s also obvious. We just saw how the pro-Union people of Minnesota reacted when Robert E. Lee was praised in their presence. How will Trumpicans react to the world supporting Biden except for Russia?

4. Who will the American military support? It knows the incumbent is a moron who never stands up to Russia. Only one person can have the nuclear codes. Who will they be given to on January 20?

5. By that point the American people will have whipped into a frenzy. If Biden wins a plurality or majority of the vote, are his supporters going to accept a Biden defeat regardless of the various legal rulings? Will Trumpicans accept the Antichrist as President and life in hell on earth as their future?

Will it be time to recognize that the United States can no longer function as a single country, that we can’t live together?

Perhaps instead of discussing what to do if there are two claimants for the presidency, we should be discussing how each person can be president in separate countries over the people who voted them. Maybe we should be discussing dividing peacefully rather trying to be unified by force? Let’s ask the American people what they think.

When Experts Are Wrong, Criticize the People: The Unmovable 42%

September 17, 2020
by Peter Feinman
The Warning Democrats Ignored

Imagine a hypothetical where the experts are wrong. Yes, I know how difficult that must be to grasp, but try. Suppose there is a disconnect between what actual people in the real world do and what the experts say the people should do. Naturally, the difference can’t be due to an error by the experts so it must be due to the people. They are too stupid to know what is in their own best interests. If only they would be guided by the wisdom of their betters, everything would be alright.

STRANDED ON THE MOON

I first became aware of the shortcomings of the experts at some corporate retreats/training programs. There we were, a group of strangers gathered together to learn from the experts.  As part of the training in one exercise we were divided into smaller groups of probably ten people each. The problem posed to us was that we were stranded on the moon (pre-Matt Damon on Mars) or at another training session in the desert. We were never stranded on an island after a three hour cruise.

The instructors then gave each group a list of 20 items. They asked us to rank the items based on their potential contribution to our survival. After a short time, each group presented its rankings to the collective group. Then the instructors compared our rankings to those of the experts.

One of the 20 items was a gun. I always ranked it last. I always was outvoted.  The experts also ranked it higher. On the moon, the gun’s recoil could propel someone across a crevice. In the desert, the sound of the gunshot might attract the attention of the search party.

At this point, I suspect some of you have realized the absurdity of the expert opinion in the real world. Even Hollywood knows such expertise flunks the reality test. In the real world, the gun represents power. Assuming the existence of alpha males in the group or mean girls/queen bees, the gun meant there would be a battle to control it and therefore the group. It would not be used to propel someone across a crevice or to attract searchers, it would be used to kill or threaten to kill someone. Maybe at some point there would be a struggle for the gun, the good guy would prevail, fire the last bullet to get the attention of the searchers just before they disappeared over the horizon, and get the girl but that was not what the experts had in mind. Interestingly, I never proposed giving one person the gun and another person the bullets but as I recall the exercise did not allow for such creativity. Anyway, the lesson learned was that people may be experts in the lab without knowing squat in the real world.

WHAT’S THE MATTER WITH KANSAS (2004)

The book What’s the Matter with Kansas?: How Conservatives Won the Heart of America by Thomas Frank was another exercise in false expertise. The thrust of the book was to resolve the dilemma of why so many Americans vote against their economic and social interests. There had to be something wrong with these people since culture war issues trumped their economic and social concerns. It would be like supporting candidates who consistently favored tax cuts for the rich while giving you nothing. How could people be so dumb as to be shafted again and again while cheering the very people who exploited them? What’s the matter with these people?

The publication date of 2004 is most revealing. That election year was the last time and only time in the Baby Boomer Era a Republican presidential candidate won a majority vote. If it was written say a year before the publication date, then it was five years before Sarah Palin called for taking back the country and 13 years before the then long-time Democrat and Clinton supporter conned Republicans into thinking he cared about the little people the elitists fly over. To put those years in perspective, it means the Democrats had 13-year notice on the 2016 election and learned nothing during the interim except to pour more oil on the fire. Still it is questionable whether or not the Democrats have learned that there is nothing wrong with the people of Kansas except the way they have been treated by the elitists.

THE WAR OF NORTHERN AGGRESSION

With Civil War, the smug superiority of the condescending arrogant self-righteous elitists really shines through. Everyone knows the war was really about slavery. Everyone knows the claim abut state’s rights was just a smokescreen for the real cause of maintaining slavery. Everyone knows that the proponents of the Lost Cause are really backwards subhuman racists who should not be welcomed in polite society.

Now try listening. Confederates call the war the “War of Northern Aggression.” Why? Maybe they assigned that name to the conflict because it genuinely expresses how they felt.  Just as we know from feminists that rape is about power and not sex, so we should consider that for the Confederates, the war also was about the violation of their home. In the Union, the exploits of Sherman and Grant are heroic, to the people who lived on the lands ravaged and devastated, the view was different. “Damn Yankees” is not a slavery-based approbation. It is a response to the mentally and morally superior people who are the elect of God (or the goddess) who never tire of telling Southerners that they are inferior people. Today there are two peoples it is still acceptable to demean and insult: Nazis and Southerners. And then the mentally and morally superior people wonder why such degenerates vote for Trump. Obviously it’s because they are racists who want to bring back slavery. Then the superior people pat themselves on the back and bask in their moral superiority.

THE POLITICALLY CORRECT AND 2016

By now there is no excuse for not knowing that Politically Corrected People (PCP) were more of a determinant than Putin in deciding the 2016 election. I am not going to repeat here example after example from previous blogs or from the ones I have been saving, where Trumpicans express their revulsion at the PCPs. If anything, that revulsion has intensified. Snowflakes in schools and colleges cringing at the mere sight of murals or sound of words! The toppling of statues! The declaration of superiority with the capitalized B in black! Truly the American world is coming to an end. Democrats have expressed no desire to celebrate America…such declarations would only antagonize the Woke who want to replace July 4th with 1619.

Trumpicans may not know anyone who died from Covid-19, but they all have stories to tell about another action against America taken by the PCPs, they seen them on Fox.

As it turns out, Trumpicans are voting for their self-interests but no one until the candidate who thinks with his gut actually listened and understood what those interests were. If people are voting against their economic and social interests perhaps something else is more important to them. Perhaps telling people over and over again they are backward, inferior, and consigned to the demographic dump heap of history isn’t an inspiring message. Perhaps telling people they have nothing to look forward to isn’t an inspiring message. Perhaps elevating people here illegally to the same level as those who are here legally isn’t an inspiring message.

If this country is to remain a single country, a big “if’, then it will become necessary for people to talk to each other. That is not possible now. Neither party is attempting to transcend the differences that divide us. Centrifugal forces rule the day. Thomas Friedman suggested Joe Biden should go on listening tours to Trumpican areas. Not preaching tours, nor haranguing tours, nor lecturing tours, but listening tours. Even Donald Trump tried a town hall with people who are not loyalists. Never again. It didn’t go well. He will never expand his base. Can Biden do better? Does his empathy and sympathy skills extend to people who oppose him? If he expects to govern then he will need to listen to the Trumpicans as well as to the Woke.

What Will Never-Trump Republicans Do After the Elections?

September 15, 2020
by Peter Feinman
Lincoln Has Fallen: What Will Never-Trump Republicans Do?

Over four years ago, on March 2016, I wrote a blog entitled R.I.P. Party of Lincoln (1856-2016). At that time, I did not know the Republican Party would become the Trumpican Party. I did know that the Republican Party was no longer the party of Lincoln. His name was rarely invoked. Even today it rarely is by the President of Malice except when he favorably compares himself to America’s greatest President.

Still, the legacy of Lincoln lives on among the few Republicans left who have not succumbed to becoming Trumpicans. Within the Party, their resistance is futile. They have made themselves known through ads which effectively exposes the shortcomings and dangers of the current President. However those ads will not reclaim the Republicans who have become Trumpicans. Any deprogramming efforts will require substantially more resources, time, and effort than a mere commercial provides…including the desire of the Trumpican in the first place to become a Republican once again.

Ironically, the showcase for the Never-Trump Republicans was the Democratic National Convention. On that virtual stage, these Republicans were welcomed. However in a time when all the Republican presidential nominees in the 21st century are persona non grata in the Trumpican Party, it is difficult to know where these Never-Trump Republicans will align themselves after the elections. Will they continue to support Joe Biden and the Democrats for the next four years? Will they start a third party?

Back on February 29, 2020, I wrote

Rick Wilson, Richard Conway, John Kasich, and Bill Weld can struggle all they want to regain control of the Republican Party but it is not going to happen. At present Lincoln Republicans have no political party. Neither do admirers of Teddy Roosevelt, Dwight Eisenhower, Ronald Reagan, or even the Bushes. So how will they vote? What will they do now that the Republican Party despises them? (The Socialist versus the Trumpican Smackdown: What Are Democrats and Republicans to Do?)

Now we know how they will vote. Bu we don’t know what the plans are for the future.

In a well-meaning op-ed column, David Brooks wrote:

My guess is that if Trump gets crushed in the election, millions of Republicans will decide they never liked that loser and jerk anyway. He’ll get relegated to whatever bargain basement they are using to hold Sarah Palin (Where Do Republicans Go From Here?, August 9, print).

There is a lot of wishful thinking in those guesses. Think of what has happened in the short interval since those words were first printed. Now think of the impact all those events have had on his popularity. Try “unchanged” since last year at this time.

The one possible glimmer of hope for Brooks is the idea of “loser.” If, and it is an “if,” Trumpicans lose the White House and the Senate and fail to retake the House and if there isn’t a national melt down and Joe Biden does become President, then Trumpicans will be faced with the prospects of Democratic control. Will Trumpicans be content to remain loyal to the loser through 2024 even while he is being prosecuted and perhaps jailed? In my last blog, I asked the question of what Sean Hannity will do if confronted with a Democratic sweep and only a loser to oppose them. At that point will Hannity’s desire to stop the Democrats trump his loyalty to a loser? No one knows now but it is possible to support some Trumpican ideas without supporting the person who has no power future political future.

If, and only if, he is pushed off the stage or is confined to OAN broadcasting from Rikers, who, then, will fill the leadership void? Will the Never-Trump Republicans then be able to regain the support of the former Republicans? Such a prospect seems unlikely. More wishful thinking. One should keep in the mind that none of the multitude of Republican candidates in 2016 assuaged the angst the Republicans felt. All those candidates fell by the wayside. Nothing that has happened in the last four years indicates that Never-Trump Republicans can wrest the leadership position from the defeated and criminal loser or that the party members will follow them.  Everyone now is jockeying for position to be the successor who will save the party from ruin< Meanwhile he is not leaving the stage and still could win.  You don’t hear much talk about 350 Electoral College votes for Biden now do you?

To return to the Brooks column, in it he dutifully identifies four possible prospects for the future leadership of the Republican Party:

The post-2020, post-Trump Republican future is … is embodied by a small group of Republican senators in their 40s, including Marco Rubio, Josh Hawley, Tom Cotton and Ben Sasse. They all came of age when Reaganism was already in the rearview mirror. Though populist, three of them have advanced degrees from Harvard or Yale. They are not particularly close to one another. They may be joined by a common experience, but they are divided by ambition.

Brooks then proceeds to examine the strengths and weaknesses of each of them. This analysis would be perfectly legitimate in normal times, but the one critical lesson of the last four years is that these are not normal times. It is not possible to develop a modified Trumpism to reach out to a larger share of the electorate when the main actor still hogs all the attention. No Trumpican can stand up to him. Besides, one should keep in mind that the Republican presidential popular vote electoral record in the baby-boom era is abysmal. If the boomer candidates leave the stage, there is no inherent reason to believe that next generation will do any better. Remember THEY ALL WILL CARRY TRUMP TAINT. They will have to explain their support as even more and even corruption and criminality is revealed in the ongoing investigations.

Strange at it may seem, there are some Republicans left in the White House. Consider the following excerpts from the acceptance speech at the Trumpican National Convention.

Because we understand that America is NOT a land cloaked in darkness, America is the torch that enlightens the entire world.

 Gathered here at our beautiful and majestic White House – known all over the world as the People’s House – we cannot help but marvel at the miracle that is our Great American Story. This has been the home of larger-than-life figures like Teddy Roosevelt and Andrew Jackson who rallied Americans to bold visions of a bigger and brighter future. Within these walls lived tenacious generals like Presidents Grant and Eisenhower who led our soldiers in the cause of freedom. From these grounds, Thomas Jefferson sent Lewis and Clark on a daring expedition to cross a wild and uncharted continent. In the depths of a bloody Civil War, President Abraham Lincoln looked out these very windows upon a half-completed Washington Monument – and asked God, in His Providence, to save our union. Two weeks after Pearl Harbor, Franklin Delano Roosevelt welcomed Winston Churchill, and just inside, they set our people on a course to victory in the Second World War.

 What united generations past was an unshakable confidence in America’s destiny, and an unbreakable faith in the American People. They knew that our country is blessed by God, and has a special purpose in this world. It is that conviction that inspired the formation of our union, our westward expansion, the abolition of slavery, the passage of civil rights, the space program, and the overthrow of fascism, tyranny and communism.

 In the left’s backward view, they do not see America as the most free, just, and exceptional nation on earth. Instead, they see a wicked nation that must be punished for its sins.

 We must reclaim our independence from the left’s repressive mandates. Americans are exhausted trying to keep up with the latest list of approved words and phrases, and the ever-more restrictive political decrees. Many things have a different name now, and the rules are constantly changing. The goal of cancel culture is to make decent Americans live in fear of being fired, expelled, shamed, humiliated, and driven from society as we know it. The far-left wants to coerce you into saying what you know to be FALSE, and scare you out of saying what you know to be TRUE.

 Our country wasn’t built by cancel culture, speech codes, and soul-crushing conformity. We are NOT a nation of timid spirits. We are a nation of fierce, proud, and independent American Patriots.

 We are a nation of pilgrims, pioneers, adventurers, explorers and trailblazers who refused to be tied down, held back, or reined in. Americans have steel in their spines, grit in their souls, and fire in their hearts. There is no one like us on earth.

 I want every child in America to know that you are part of the most exciting and incredible adventure in human history. No matter where your family comes from, no matter your background, in America, ANYONE CAN RISE. With hard work, devotion, and drive, you can reach any goal and achieve every ambition.

 Our American Ancestors sailed across the perilous ocean to build a new life on a new continent. They braved the freezing winters, crossed the raging rivers, scaled the rocky peaks, trekked the dangerous forests, and worked from dawn till dusk. These pioneers didn’t have money, they didn’t have fame– but they had each other. They loved their families, they loved their country, and they loved their God!

 When opportunity beckoned, they picked up their Bibles, packed up their belongings, climbed into covered wagons, and set out West for the next adventure. Ranchers and miners, cowboys and sheriffs, farmers and settlers – they pressed on past the Mississippi to stake a claim in the Wild Frontier.

 Legends were born – Wyatt Earp, Annie Oakley, Davy Crockett, and Buffalo Bill.

 Americans built their beautiful homesteads on the Open Range. Soon they had churches and communities, then towns, and with time, great centers of industry and commerce. That is who they were. Americans build the future, we don’t tear down the past!

 We are the nation that won a revolution, toppled tyranny and fascism, and delivered millions into freedom. We laid down the railroads, built the great ships, raised up the skyscrapers, revolutionized industry, and sparked a new age of scientific discovery. We set the trends in art and music, radio and film, sport and literature – and we did it all with style, confidence and flair. Because THAT is who we are.

 Whenever our way of life was threatened, our heroes answered the call.

 From Yorktown to Gettysburg, from Normandy to Iwo Jima, American Patriots raced into cannon blasts, bullets and bayonets to rescue American Liberty.

These are not the words of a Trumpican, they are the words of an anonymous Republican in the White House. That writer shows Never-Trump Republicans a way forward. It is not possible to regain leadership in the Republican Party by replacing Trumpicans. It is not possible to expand the electoral reach by being Trump-lite. It is not possible to be a positive force for America’s future simply by stopping the malice. To regain control of the Republican following an electoral ruin, a Lincoln for the 21st century is needed or else the country will remain divided into two houses that can’t live together.

Will Sean Hannity Be Howard Baker?: Suppose He Wrote a Tell-All Book

September 8, 2020
by Peter Feinman
Who Will Be Howard Baker? (www.123rf.com)

Tis the season of tell-all books. We have heard from the niece, the fixer, the national security director and will hear from the Watergate reporter again. There have been disclosures from the sister and about the military. Even the former BFF of the trophy-wife First Lady has weighed in with tales of corruption. All these testimonials to President Swampbuilder are impressive. None have made any political difference.

But suppose Sean Hannity wrote a book about his experiences with THE DONALD. Hannity has had extensive contact up close and personal, enough to see the truth. Certainly he has had as much opportunity as Putin, the European leaders, and various people who have worked in the White House and who all know the truth about THE DONALD. According to some reports, Hannity knows that he is dealing with a “battrump” bozo. So why not write a book about it and make a fortune?

One reason why he can’t write such a book now is precisely because that book could make a difference. Millions of people via radio and TV rely on Hannity for the truth. His blessing counts. If he withdrew that blessing now during a presidential election, the odds are it would negatively impact the vote for the wrong side. The beneficiary would be Sleepy Creepy Joe Biden, the corrupt one-step-from-death lackey of the younger Socialists really running the Democratic Party. Hannity opposes that victory regardless of whether the opposition is from a Republican or a Trumpican. Under no circumstances would he do any anything to aid and abet the enemy.

But what about after the election? Suppose come January 20, 2021, Hannity is faced with the trifecta of Democratic power: the House, the White House, and the Senate. Then what? Hannity has faced this situation before. He would stand ready to oppose the Democrats just as he did during the Obama years. The question he would ask himself is what is the best way to do so after the vaunted Red Wave sweeps the Trumpican Party from power? What is the best way to resist the Democrats going forward given the likely changes due to the 2020 census? What is the best way to resist the Democrats in upcoming elections in 2022, 2024, and beyond?

Previously I have suggested that even Senator Ron Johnson might return to the real world after the 2020 elections [Mitch McConnell: Howard Baker (Time to Go) vs Stay the Course (Go Down with the Ship), June 8, 2020]. If Wisconsin votes Biden, the champion of it was really the Ukraine who meddled in the election might want to reconsider that position if he intends to run for reelection in 2022. Similarly his sidekick in stupidity, Senator John Kennedy also might want to express in a folksy way that he had been a blithering idiot when reciting Putin talking points.

By contrast, one person would remain as unchanged as his hair (unless he is caught in the wind and rain). THE DONALD will keep ranting and raving that he was defeated in a rigged election, the greatest and most corrupt political scandal since the one perpetrated against him in the 2016 election. He immediately will begin campaigning for his comeback in 2024. In between all his court appearances in the civil and criminal courts in New York and who knows how many federal districts (Brooklyn, Manhattan, and Washington?), he also will appear before various Senate and House committees that now will be unleashed against him. Yet somehow, he will find the time to launch his 2024 campaign.

Similarly Sean Hannity might face a moment of truth after the election as well. He may have no choice but to tell the truth about his meetings and conversations with the President of the United States. After all, he is not a lawyer so they are not privileged. There is no freedom of press issue since these conversations were as an advisor and not a reporter. Subpoenas will be issued against him to compel testimony about his participation in the Ukrainian extortion, abuses of power, and whatever strikes the interest of the Congressional investigation committees. If Hannity chooses to defy the subpoenas, Attorney General Adam Schiff with great glee and satisfaction will add criminal charges to the list and throw him in jail.

Therefore at some point fairly soon after the election, it may be in Hannity’s best interests both personally and politically to tell the truth about his contacts with THE DONALD. Whether he likes the political results or not, there is a part of Hannity that has enough sense and expertise to be aware of the lay of the land in the real world come January 20, 2021. Even if the masses of Trumpicans profess loyalty to their Lord and Savior, the Chosen One, Blessed Be his Name, Hannity will realize the necessity of charting a new path. He will recognize the futility of having a serially indicted/convicted/incarcerated criminal as the leader of a successful comeback against the Democrats.

At that point, Sean Hannity might become Howard Baker. To do so, he will have to do what no Trumpican has been able to do or is likely to do. No elected Trumpican, no formerly elected Trumpican, and no appointed Trumpican, is going to tell THE DONALD enough is enough. Hannity might. He would inform the Trumpicans that if they want to oppose the Democrats, that it will be in their best interests to become Republicans again. He will inform them that they need to put THE DONALD behind them and move on or else the Trumpicans will become as irrelevant nationally as the Republican Party now is in California or New York. He will thank THE DONALD for what he achieved but assert that for the good of the country – not that THE DONALD would ever sacrifice his own personal interest for the country. What’s in it for him – it is time for him to leave the stage and let others carry on the battle against AOC, Biden, and Pelosi. And that means all the Trumps!

I am not saying that Hannity will pursue this course of action in the event of a 2020 Democratic trifecta and Red Wave drowning Trumpicans. I am saying that Hannity will have arrived at the proverbial fork in the road. One should not doubt the heady experience it was for him to have the President of the United States at his beck and call. On a strictly psychological level, these four years had to have been a rush, a constant high. Now it will be over. He will feel the disappointment. He will feel the Trumpican pain. He may even decide to wallow in it on a show that nobody in power cares about. Or he may chose not to retire from relevance but to fight on in the real world by becoming Howard Baker and announcing to the world that it is time for THE DONALD to go. Depending on the election results, we will know soon enough what choice Hannity makes.

If ISIS Attacked NYC Would Rick Scott Care?

September 3, 2020
by Peter Feinman
This time, will Robert E. Lee win and destroy the Union?

With about one week to go before the 19th anniversary of the Al-Qaeda assault on the United States, it is worth pondering what has happened in America since then. At that time, despite the turmoil of presidential politics with impeachment and Florida, when the nation was attacked it was possible for Democrats and Republicans to stand together on the steps of the Capitol and sing God Bless America. No such unity is possible today between Democrats and Trumpicans. America consists of two peoples still bound in a single political entity but no longer functioning as one. Whether we separate into separate political entities or remain as one is what the current war is all about.

The coronavirus is different than Pearl Harbor or 9/11. The earlier two events were recognized as attacks on America, all America, the entire nation. The country responded as one. By contrast, the coronavirus never was perceived as a national threat. Health officials understood that the virus represented a national threat. Sometimes they even said so especially if they did not work for the Federal government. Those employees were often muzzled and/or undermined.

From the onset, the White House including an assortment of Trumpicans in various positions, viewed the coronavirus as a Democratic problem and not an American one. In the beginning, this was an easy decision for the scientifically-challenged to make. The virus hit hard in New York. Day after day, Americans watched a city under assault in painful gut-wrenching scenes. No other location in America was experiencing that horror. But for Trumpicans it was as if the Germans were bombing London alone so why should the entire country care.

This scenario played out for weeks if not longer. The disease infected cities, especially cities governed by Democratic mayors in states governed by Democratic governors. And the people dying weren’t even people the Trumpicans cared about anyway. But the economic decline was hurting Trumpicans. So did stock market decline. But now the stock market has recovered. The President dedicated to making rich people richer gleefully noted when it had returned to its former heights. The coronavirus problem was over, it had been solved.

Since the problem was a Democratic one, no national leadership was required. Trumpican governors in Arizona, Florida, Georgia, and Texas had everything under control. There would be no repeat of what had happened in New York City. Even though under Article 2, a non-Democratic President had the powers of a king, the world’s worst manager and career business failure knew better than to put himself in charge of the response to the virus. Let others carry the ball and bear the blame while he took the credit.

In the months to come, nothing altered this perception of the coronavirus as a Democratic problem. That view remains prevalent with Trumpicans. One thousand deaths per day over an entire country of 330 million is barely noticeable compared to one thousand per day in Queens or New York City as a whole. Despite all the talk about superspreader events, Trumpicans attending those events at an Arkansas Memorial Day pool party, Tulsa political rally, or South Dakota motorcycle gathering have not died in droves or barely at all. Maybe if it had been Tom Brady and not Tom Seaver who had died with Covid-19, Trumpicans would get the message that the virus is a threat to the country. So far it hasn’t happened. It’s not going to happen. The only news that might affect the vote is the coming announcement of a vaccine…not that Trumpicans would be vaccinated anyway. In the meantime, Trumpicans have discounted the virus as a threat to them beyond the flu and remain loyal to the person who kept real Americans outside the cities safe.

This attitude carried over into the aid packages. Once relief had been passed to help rich people get richer or at least maintain their wealth, the enthusiasm for aid relief dissipated. If people received $600 instead of $300, what would be their incentive to work? If Democratic states were bailed out, that would be rewarding states for being expensive, ineffective, and overstaffed. Why should people in Florida bail out those loser states like New York? It’s not like anything had been done to help New York during the past three years anyway. That will teach that other Queens boy who is really the boss.

Now the antipathy has been openly expressed. The war has been declared. The line in the sand has been drawn. President of the United States has said to the Governor of New York: DROP DEAD! There is no need here to repeat the vituperative exchanges which followed between the two Queens combatants. Suffice, it to say, it was a no holds-barred clash involving even relatives of the fighters.

Two points stand out so far.

1. The Governor has yet to call for the defunding of the Confederacy for the over $20 billion surplus in tax monies the state sends annually to the federal government.

2. The contrasting images of the one person are really remarkable to behold. Based on his real estate years in New York City, Little Donnee Waney is pond-scum slime. He was a successful clown but a failed businessman and human being. He never was accepted by the New York elite try as he might to be accepted. Even after being a long-time Democrat and Clinton supporter, he realized that he had no future in politics or business in the city and would always be a pariah. He was cruel, mean, nasty, and incapable of telling the truth besides being a simpleminded, ignorant, narcissistic bigot.

On the other hand, as THE DONALD, he is God’s gift to America. America should be thanking him for the sacrifices he made of his own free will to help his country by becoming America’s greatest president ever and at great personal cost. He is America’s Lord and Savior, the Chosen One, Blessed Be his Name and he will lead America to victory over the new ISIS, the socialist Democrats who aren’t even real Americans anyway.

The battlelines have been drawn and the war is underway. In the next two months, Americans will scarcely know the world outside America exists. All attention will be on America’s Third Civil War. Even before Election Day, the hostilities are underway. Cuomo may be called back to television frontlines to give daily updates on the ongoing war with the Trumpicans. In fact, maybe even two Cuomos will be speaking daily on the war just as they did when one was infected and the other struggled to stop the spread…unless, of course, Chris becomes a casualty of this war.

In a way, the open declaration to defund Democratic cities does America a favor. Perhaps now we will stop pretending that it is politics as usual or just another presidential election. The coronavirus is not the existential threat to the continued existence of the United States as a single political entity. The current salvo against the Democrats is just one example of the scorched earth war that will only get worse. Tom Friedman, the longtime reporter on Lebanese civil war politics, wrote back on August 19 (print):

Here is a sentence I never in a million years thought that I would ever write or read: This November, for the first time in our history, the United States of America may not be able to conduct a free and fair election…[T]hat would not result in just a disputed election…that would be the end of American democracy as we know it. It also isn’t hyperbole to say it could sow the seeds of another Civil War.

The threat is real.

Yes, it is. The battle is engaged. Militias will be on the march when called. This president genuinely could succeed in accomplishing what Benedict Arnold and Robert E. Lee could not. Is Joe Biden up for the fight of his country’s life?

America Can Still Win World War IV: Harris Helps

August 12, 2020
by Peter Feinman
It Looks Like the Borg Will Win but in the End the Federation Triumphs

America can still win World War IV.

America was on the winning side in World War I which may have ended due to the flu pandemic of 1917 causing no soldiers being able to fight according to the most ignorant President in American history.

America was on the winning side in World War II which may have ended after the flu pandemic of 1917 according to the most ignorant President in American history and who actually participated in a D-Day commemoration.

America was on the winning side of World War III (the Cold War) although Putin considers that loss to be the worst day in Russian history.

America could win World War III.02 if it had an adult President who was not an alpha male wannabee subordinate to alpha male Putin.

World War IV is different. China may not have the nuclear arsenal of the Soviet Union or Russia but it does have formidable economic power. It is quite focused on becoming the leader of the world befitting its heritage as the Middle Kingdom.

KOBE AND CORONAVIRUS: MEANING FOR WORLD WAR IV (February 4, 2020)

This blog was the first one I wrote this year on this topic. At that time, China seemed to be on a roll in its quest for world leadership…just as it is now. The blog cited various articles written about this quest and noted some problems:

1. demographics
2. world reaction to its treatment of Moslem Uighurs
3. Hong Kong’s desire to be free
4. the coronavirus.

China also was aided by the United States. It had wreak havoc with its alliances, abandoned being the City on a Hill and had no interest in being the last best hope of humanity.

The one positive note from an American point of view was soft power. The global reaction to the unexpected death of Kobe Bryant was a dramatic if tragic example that the eyes of the world still were on the United States.  The world pays attention to what is happening in America more so than it does in China.

What has happened since then?

HONG KONG

Last August, I wrote a blog, When Will the Borg Assimilate Hong Kong?: Is Resistance Futile? At that point in time, the situation seemed fluid and it was possible to imagine a positive outcome. By this year, that optimism was silly.  Instead, the new circumstances were Borg to Hong Kong: Resistance Is Futile (Not in America), June 2, 2020. The situation now is more bleak. China is rounding up dissidents in Hong Kong the way the American authoritarian leader would love to be able to do in the United States.

CORONAVIRUS

What can you say about the Chinese and American handling of the coronavirus? Despite the horrid start back in February, China successfully has controlled the spread of the virus. The example of the United States is an embarrassment by contrast. America has shown the world that it is led by a simple-minded incompetent person who is out of his league in coping with the disease. For the first time in American history, other countries pity us. Yet 41% of the American public still accept the American President as their Lord and Savior, the Chosen One, Blessed Be his Name. After all, there is no coronavirus on Fox. Problem solved. Meanwhile, the world laughs at us as it quarantines us.

GEORGE FLOYD

At first glance, one might think the murder of George Floyd and the subsequent demonstrations reflect poorly on America in the global arena. There is no doubt that Floyd and Corvid-19 have exposed an ugly underbelly of the American Dream and way of life. Nothing is hidden. Everything is revealed. The shortcomings and problems of the country are there for all the world to see.

That is exactly the point. This ugly America is also an example of America’s soft power. The ugliness is not hidden now but shown on American media and the internet which has no government firewall to prohibit it. It has sparked events in other countries as well. People in other countries would like the opportunity to protest freely. People in other countries also have issues with statues, monuments, memorials, and race. So while China is busy showing the world that it is just another authoritarian thug (with a lot of power), America has shown the world the right of the people to express themselves, rights which people in many countries do not have. America does not only mean the President of the United States, it also means the people throughout the country.

KAMALA HARRIS   

 Joe Biden’s selection of Kamala Harris to be his Vice Presidential candidate and possible successor as President is another example of America’s soft power. There is more to the country than the white racist in the White House. This is not to deny his strong support for being a bigot, but to point out for all the world to see that he does not dominate the country as if it was limited to Lafayette Square. Harris immediately connects the presidential election to two other countries: India and Jamaica. Those ancestral ties link America to the world in a way that could never happen in China. She shows that immigrants to the United States really can live the American dream. From this point forward, her very existence becomes a continually shining soft power symbol of America that China cannot match.

AUTHORITARIAN LEADERS

There is one final example of soft power that can propel the United States into a position of world leadership if the country wants it. We have the opportunity to remove our authoritarian leader. We can do what China, Russia, Iran, Venezuela and others cannot do. Furthermore we have the opportunity to do so comparatively peacefully through the democratic process. It is a shock that the United States actually has an authoritarian leader in the first place. There is no doubt that American democracy has taken a beating in the last 3+ years. There also is no doubt that the American authoritarian leader will do everything he can like any dictator in a Trumphole country to preserve his power. He may even be successful. I have written before about my doubts on whether or not the United States will celebrate its 250th birthday and with the same political boundaries it has today. Regardless of what the current polls say, it’s not over until the fat lady counts every contested ballot.

Even Steven Calabresi, co-founder of the Federalist Society, has written that the American authoritarian leader’s tweet on postponing the election “is itself grounds for the president’s immediate impeachment again by the House of Representatives and his removal by the Senate” (“Trump Wants to Postpone the Election. He Can’t,” NYT, August 1, 2020, print).  The day the Flying Monkey Attorney General indicts the Deep State should be the same day the Democrats begin the second impeachment and the removal of the Attorney General. This is not a time for the weak.

Wicked Witch of the White House Dispatching His Flying Monkeys to Secure the Election

So what does all this mean for World War IV? Right now this is the sweet spot for China just as it is for Russia. True the United States is fighting back against China but it has made no effort to regain its position as world leader. It has made no effort to mend its relationship with its nominal allies as it continues to do Putin’s bidding. All that can change in a few months. Vice Presidents are known for traveling the world although generally for funerals. Look for this one to travel the world to help Make American Great Again and regain for the United States the Number #1 position in the world.

Who Will Be Biden’s Attorney General?

July 29, 2020
by Peter Feinman
Atticus Finch he’s not.

Right now the attention is focused on Joe Biden’s vice presidential selection. Any day now, we will learn who Biden has picked to be his running mate. At that point there will be a lot of discussion about the meaning of the choice. What does it mean for the future of the Democratic Party? What does it mean for the 2024 election? Strangely enough, the meaning for the 2020 election may be comparatively muted. Based on the polls, Biden doesn’t need any help to win beyond what he is already getting from his opponent, the incumbent. The polls indicate a potential, stress the word “potential,” landslide by even more than 306 Electoral College vote landslide of the 2016 election. I do not mean to detract from the significance of the vice presidential choice, but as we were reminded in the House hearings on Tuesday, the position of Attorney General can have a greater immediate impact than that of the Vice President in the operations of an Administration.

Biden’s Attorney General will have a heavy workload. While drapes should not be measured in advance, there is a benefit to exploring what will be on the Attorney General’s plate. The choreography of actions needs to be created. Who will ask for what, when, and where will it be delivered? There will be new Congressional committees come January, perhaps even a new majority in the Senate. Actions will need to be coordinated.

DOCUMENTS

Various entities have subpoenaed documents from this Administration which have not been forthcoming. Is there a list of these documents? Shouldn’t one be created if there isn’t? We know that it is possible to prepare boxes of documents in advance to be delivered once the Court gives the all-clear sign. If an accounting or financial organization can prepare to deliver requested documents even though the Court might rule in the negative, then the appropriate government entities should be able to prepare similar boxes of information. The signal will be once it becomes known sometime in November or December that there will be a change in government on January 20, 2021. It should be possible for Congress to develop a list of these documents and to serve the appropriate people and entities on January 21, 2021 if not earlier. The Department of Justice may have to wait or perhaps some of the districts will act immediately even before there is a new Attorney General.

PEOPLE

Various people have been subpoenaed during this Administration who have not been forthcoming. Various people have not been subpoenaed since it was thought to be fruitless to do so. If Biden becomes President, then presidential immunity and executive privilege for the former government employees are no longer issues. Similarly people who have been afraid to testify may be eager and willing to do so. While the personal lawyer may still claim attorney-client privilege, virtually everyone else is accessible. It should be possible for Congress to develop a list of these people and serve them with subpoenas on January 21, 2021 if not earlier. The Department of Justice may have to wait or perhaps some of the districts will act immediately even before there is a new Attorney General.

INSPECTOR GENERALS

Various Inspector Generals during 2020 have either left their position (and the government) or been squelched in their efforts to pursue investigations. Who are those people and what are those investigations? Again, the list needs to be compiled. Should someone be reassigned back to the former position? Should people be rehired to their former position? You can’t tell the players without a scorecard so someone needs to compile the scorecard and have it ready. Perhaps some of these people should be invited to the swearing-in ceremony as well.

INVESTIGATIONS

What are the investigations which need to be pursued? What are the investigations which need to be dropped?

For example, sometime before the election, perhaps in October, the current Attorney General will indict the Deep State. Based on the economy, the polls, and the number of people dead due to the coronavirus, these indictments may not carry much weight. The only people who may consider the indictments valid may be those who believe in demon COVID-19 cures and that 99.99% of the people infected are cured without any ill-effects so why shut down the economy. My prediction is the indictment of the Deep State will be the same game changer hydrochloric acid or whatever has been for the pandemic. It will seem like an act of desperation. Still these indictments may be open on the books of the Department of Justice if and when the Biden Attorney General takes command.

By contrast suppose the Mike Flynn and Affordable Healthcare Act cases are still active. There is a need to compile a list of the current (and expected) cases that will be dropped or reactivated.

Then there are the new investigations. Swampbuilder has done a superb job creating the most corrupt cabinet in the history of the United States…and some of those Secretaries may still be in office. But let us not forget the current Attorney General himself. How many investigations will there be into him?

CHOREOGRAPHY

In the event of a change of government, there is a choreography which needs to be worked out. I am not referring to the normal transition steps which are followed especially between Presidents of different parties. One can take for granted, there will be no cooperation at the highest levels between the outgoing and incoming Presidents. The outgoing one will not accept that he is the outgoing until his Court rules that he is.

Instead I am referring to the physical aspects of the transfer of power. If Joe Biden is sworn in as the new President, where will the former President be at that moment? He will not be there to watch the sleepy-creepy-corrupt person who has lost his mental faculties take office. It will be difficult enough for the current President to accept the concept that THE DONALD is a loser. Especially if he is a loser to someone who received more than 306 Electoral College votes. The loser will not participate in a public ceremony before a crowd bigger than his own inaugural crowd in 2016. He will not have the image of him as a loser become a defining one for him.

So where will he be? Will he be in Florida playing golf? Does Florida have an extradition agreement with New York? I ask because the moment he no longer has presidential immunity is the moment he can be served. Certainly by New York State and by the Department of Justice as well. If he resigns an hour before so his Vice President who is now President can pardon him, he is still subject to state law. He also still can be subpoenaed for investigations at the federal level. That means he will subject to contempt charges if he is a no-show and be confronted with a perjury trap if he does.

There is not an urgent need to select a new Attorney General, but it should not be postponed to next year either.  It is not too early to plan ahead. The immediate legal battle is the post-election one. It will be fought over a rigged vote. The issue will be not so much people here illegally but on mail-in fraud. It will be fought in the states where the claims in aggregate will make a difference in reversing the Electoral College vote. Many of those battleground states are governed by Trumpicans so it will be their ineptness which will be on trial. And if the fight does drag on for what purpose? A do-over election? What’s the remedy? How long can the current Attorney General drag the battle out? Maybe it will be Nancy Pelosi picking the new Attorney General after all! (Could Nancy Pelosi Become the First Female President?: A Constitutional Crisis)

Borg to Hong Kong: Resistance Is Futile (Not in America)

June 2, 2020
by Peter Feinman
Is Resistance Futile for Hong Kong? Is It Futile for the Federation? (https://www.startrek.com/database_article/borg-cube)

Back on August 7, 2019, I wrote a blog entitled When Will the Borg Assimilate Hong Kong?: Is Resistance Futile? I did so triggered by the title of an article “Can Hong Kong’s Resistance Win? (NYT July 14, 2019). I even speculated that the reporter might have had in the Borg in mind when contrasting China and Hong Kong:

If human beings have other wants or needs ⸺ like independent thinking, free expression or person happiness ⸺ well, those are things for our rivals, the Western democracies to pursue. The West’s production model is less efficient than ours. Ours has “Chinese characteristics.”

In that blog, I noted that China has its own Hannitys and Huckabees. It has its own propaganda machine that even surpasses Fox. It even matches the Fox techniques. Chinese are graduates of the Laura Ingraham School of Spin. As one Chinese professor said in support of the Chinese government against the Hong Kong Spring:

They are obviously actors, not Hong Kong citizens.  

Ingraham could not have said it better herself. In fact, she has said it. The same technique is being used today in America in reference to “outside agitators.”

The NYT article reported that activists who claim Hong Kong has a unique identity that needs to be protected are called “localists.” They advocate for independence, an increasingly taboo subject. The localists differentiate themselves from mainland Chinese. They do so by employing derogatory language. They call the mainlanders “locusts” [not “animals’ or “scum” or “lowlifes and losers”] and “invaders.” By American standards, these localists in support of Hong Kong independence are using racist language. They compound the derision by referring to the people of China as being from “Chee-na” instead of “China.”

Pro-Chinese people understand the insults and have responded in opposition to such castigation of mainland Chinese. As one individual said:

We’re all Chinese people with yellow skin. Why are you discriminating against your own people? 

So the pro-freedom and independence people use demeaning language to belittle and mock the locusts who invade their land and overwhelm their communities. The pro-government people refers to the Asian people of color as “yellow.”

The issue then as it is now really wasn’t so much “if” the Borg would assimilate Hong Kong as “when.” Evidently, China decided now was the time.

Why?

Why did China decide that now was the propitious time for its Bill Barr to legally swallow up Hong Kong into the Chinese legal system?

The answer really should be obvious. The Wolf Warriors smell the weakness in the global arena and are ready to feast on America and the world.

In response to the Pompeo accusations on the coronavirus, the Global Times, a nationalist Chinese newspaper, stated:

“Such lunacy is a clear byproduct, first and foremost, of the proverbial anxiety that the U.S. has suffered since China began its global ascension. It is also a combination of envy and panic on behalf of Washington elites.”

CCTV reiterated the message:

“If this evil politician Pompeo is allowed to continue his swaggering bluff, one fears that the United States ‘great again’ can only be a joke.”

Sounds like China recognizes the weakness of the United States. Every move by our immature child President to withdraw from the global arena either from an international organization or geographic presence, is matched by Xi seeking to fill the vacuum. The brilliant success of the ‘America Alone’ policy was on full display at a recent W.H.O meeting. George Bush’s “coalition of the willing” a scant generation ago was reduced to a pathetic attempt to gain Taiwan admission into the very organization the United States was about to leave! The feeble attempt highlights the decay and decline in American power under the lack of leadership by Little Donnee Wanney. Or should one say he has reaped what he has sown.

The Global Times was back at it when the weak President ramped up the rhetoric promising fire and fury as had never been seen before.

“Washington is making a bigger gamble, but America’s economy is not as fat as it once was, and it still coughs from the coronavirus. Their extreme tactics amount to nothing more than the slow suicide of a superpower.”

Given the success of regime change and behavior modification from sanctions in Cuba, Iran, North Korea, Russia, and Venezuela, it is hardly surprising that the current manufacturing center of the world is dismissive of the threats from the fading giant.

Quite the contrary. The Wolf Warriors are moving ahead on all fronts. China is aggressive against India, Malaysia, Taiwan, and Vietnam in addition to Hong Kong. Who is going to stop them? It is not as though China doesn’t have its own friends in Asia either like Nepal, Pakistan, and the Maldives. Meanwhile the United States is pretending the coronavirus crisis is over and is facing its own internal problems. Now the United States is the awkward position of defending the right of Hong Kongers to be free while calling for the domination by force of Americans seeking justice and equality. So far Xi has just proposed unleashing his Bill Barr; by contrast, Macho Macho Boy is calling for American troops to crack down on the agitators even when they are peaceful and white.

Here one may observe why although resistance is futile in Hong Kong, it is not in America. True the world is watching the riots just as it watched the failure of America to manage the coronavirus crisis. The eyes of the world are still upon us no matter what we do. But what is it we are doing? The story is not yet over and there is more to see than the looting and burning.

The world will also see police chiefs and officers kneeling down, hugging, and shaking hands with protesters.

The world will also see governors defying the President’s “request” for National Guard troops to be sent to the capital to protect the President.

The world will also see governors defying the President’s threat to send military forces into the states if he decides to do so.

And what makes you think the generals will obey a command from the Commander in-chief to send troops into American states to suppress American people?

What makes you think the troops if they do go will fire on the American people? Troops who are minorities themselves. Troops who may be from the very area they are called upon to secure. Troops who may even know people in the crowd. The American military is not the Department of Justice. The generals are more likely to be loyal to the Constitution than the individual who happens to be President. If Bonespur Boy tries to intimidate the military into playing his game of domination, he may be in for a surprise. Generals are not Trumpican Senators who have sold their soul and will roll over like obedient dogs at whatever whistle he blows, command he issues, or photo-op he desires.

The world will also see that America has an alternative to the current President. Countries throughout the world are familiar with the idea of Vice President from one administration challenging the President of the current administration. The current crisis has liberated the former Vice President and current Presidential challenger from his basement prison. He is now free to roam around the country, to offer an alternative, to bond with protesters, to show empathy, to hug people. Will the American President call upon American forces to fire upon his Vice President opponent if he stands with the protesters?

The situation between China and America is quite different. The Wolf Warriors will move aggressively secure in the knowledge that there is no one to stop them. By contrast, the America people, the American governors, and the American military will not be cowed by Little Donnee Wanney. And the world will see both countries in action almost on split screen as just happened with the current President and former Vice President. In that comparison, the world will also see why it wants the United States to be the world leader. All we need is a President who accepts that role and has vision for the 21st century.