Trump's Wall & The Art of the Deal

As I write this, about 20% of US Government employees are either furloughed or working without pay. This partial shutdown is occurring due to a disagreement over one item: funds to build a border wall along the US-Mexico border. President Trump, who initially said that he would "proudly" take responsibility for any shutdown, has since blamed the Democrats. He has accused them of not wanting border security, i.e. "open borders", not caring about crime that immigrants supposedly bring, and being motivated by the desire to deny him "a win".

The truth is that no Democrats support what he claims that they support. While it is true that Democratic Congressmen have in the past voted to fund walls along the border, those barriers, which in great part still stand today, were part of a broader plan for border security and immigration policy.

No one believes that there shouldn't be a border, or that we shouldn't screen people who want to immigrate to the United States. What Trump's opponents do believe is that our immigration policies should be more humane and that the process should be more expedited than it is today.

The Wall itself (when referring to Trump's idea of a wall at the border, I will capitalize Wall), however, isn't part of an integrated immigration and border security policy. Trump's policies (if you can call them that) are more often than not slogans that garnered excitement and applause at his campaign rallies in 2016. Trump may be incoherent, ignorant and incompetent, but one thing that he is good at is reading a crowd and feeding them lines that will keep their interest and stoke their enthusiasm. Trump tapped into a vein of bigotry that ran through significant portions of the electorate. Immigrants, especially those who entered the country illegally, were a convenient scapegoat for many of the problems perceived these people. When Trump needed to convince the immigrant-haters that he was their guy, did he craft, with the help of experts, a thought through plan for securing the borders? No, he found a simplistic, easy to articulate applause line: that he would build a "big, beautiful, Wall". This Wall was predicated on bigotry and became a "campaign promise" because repeating it over and over fed into the feedback loop between Trump and his supporters that was a typical Trump rally. Since being elected, the Wall concept (stretching the meaning of the word "concept") hasn't gained any more solidity. It's still a vague and nebulous thing wherein the specifics change depending on Trump's mood. In addition, illegal immigration has been steadily decreasing over the last decade. And there's much evidence that the criminals and drugs aren't coming in over the supposedly unprotected border, but by sea, through tunnels, smuggled in trucks. Budgets for monitoring and interdicting this illegal activity have been reduced since Trump was inaugurated. He has focused exclusively on a Wall. Trump has also not addressed how the Wall will deal with the long river border between Mexico and Texas, or all the private land that will have to be seized through eminent domain.

Trump has always promoted himself as a great deal-maker, it was one of the things that many of his supporters claimed would make him a great president. He appears to have no inclination to actually negotiate. Negotiation in good faith requires that you give something up, or give something to the other party to get what you want. But he has proved that for him, making a deal means making a demand and then digging in his heels until the other side acquiesces. The same with bipartisanship. For him bipartisanship is the other party doing what he wants. What's ironic is that, back in February, a bipartisan deal was on the table. The Democrats were willing to fund a border Wall in exchange for a path to citizenship for people in the DACA program. Trump refused to sign it because it did not include several other immigration-related things, such as an end to family-based migration (what he called chain migration ).

Trump doesn't have a plan for border security, he has an ego-driven desire for "a win" by getting funding for an applause-line campaign promise based on bigoted assumptions. He doesn't know how to deal, he has a toddler-level "understanding" that tantrums are a great negotiating tool.

Tariffs

What is a tariff? Simply stated, a tariff is a tax that a nation places on specific imports.

Usually the purpose of a tariff is to protect domestic producers. For example, American widgets retail at $10/dozen. On the other hand, Panamanian widgets retail at $7/dozen. Labor costs in Panama are lower, or perhaps Panama is subsidizing Panamanian widget manufacturers. If quality is comparable, American consumers of widgets will purchase Panamanian widgets. This will cause American widgets makers to lose business, perhaps closing widget plants and the widget workers losing their jobs. If the U.S. places a $5/dozen tariff on Panama-made widgets, then Panamanian widgets become more expensive than American widgets. There are several possibilities for what happens next.

All American widget purchasers could now switch to American suppliers, saving $2/dozen. The Panamanian widget companies would need to find another market for their widgets. If this happens, there is every possibility that the price of American widgets will increase, since the pressure of lower-priced Panama-sourced widgets has been eliminated. American widget purchasers, as well as anyone who purchases a product that contains widgets, will be paying higher prices. There is also the possibility that American widget producers won't have the capacity to replace the Panamanian production. In this case, Americans will be paying the higher price of the Panamanian widgets that now include the tariff. The government will certainly be collecting the tax from the Panama widget companies, but who is really paying? The consumer, of course. There is no scenario where the widgets, whether domestic or imported will decrease in price.

Then there's the specter of retaliatory tariffs. Panama will undoubtedly be issuing tariffs of their own, say, on fleegles. American fleegle producers will likely see the demand for their exports to Panama go down, as Panamanian fleegle buyers find cheaper alternatives.

Tariffs can be warranted in the case of a domestic industry competing with imports that are being sold below cost (kind of like the Walmart strategy!), or for propping up a fledgling industry. Rarely do  across-the-board tariffs make any sense.

What tariffs aren't good for is providing an inflow of "billions of dollars" from the country on whom tariffs are imposed. They cause chaos and confusion and are a blunt instrument for international trade relations.

Unfortunately we have a President who doesn't understand in the slightest how tariffs work.

Why I Won't Vote for ANY Republican

Once upon a time I voted for the candidate irrespective of party. I voted for Republicans, I voted for Democrats, I voted for Libertarians, I voted for Independents. I agreed with some of the things that Republicans did and disagreed with some of the things Democrats did. I voted according to whom I thought would best represent or lead my state, district, city or the nation.

That all changed for me after the 2008 presidential election.

The mission of the Republican Party, during the presidency of Barack Obama, changed from principled opposition to obstruction at any cost. And the cost turned out to be pretty steep: acceptance of the radicals of the Tea Party fringe as mainstream; acceptance of the virulent strain of bigoted and racist hatred of a black man who dared to run for president, including the claim that Obama was not a United States citizen, promoted vigorously by now-President Donald Trump; and a program of digging in their heels and mindlessly opposing and obstructing everything that President Obama did. This obstruction was fairly easy to spot, it required no interpretation or speculation, but was stated clearly by none other than the Majority Leader of the United States Senate. It was expressed throughout Obama's terms by dozens of fruitless attempts to repeal the Affordable Care Act and culminated in McConnell's refusal to confirm, or even hold a hearing for, President Obama's nominee for the Supreme Court, Merrick Garland. Republicans at every level of government seemed to be on board with this and Republican voters seemed to buy into the apparent racism and irrational hatred for Obama.

In 2016, when Donald Trump was elected President, it got even worse. Trump built upon the mindless and overblown demonization of President Obama, Secretary Clinton and liberals in general that prevailed among many Republican voters and made it the centerpiece of his governing style. He emboldened white supremacists, neo-Nazis and others and exacerbated the already deep divisions within the country. The mainstream Republicans could have stood against the worst of his impulses while still supporting his policies (if you could dignify his brainless meanderings as "policies") that they agreed with, but they didn't. The Republican Congressional leadership, as well as state-level Republicans only intensified their support for Trump. They were prepared to prop him up, no matter what outrages and idiocies he perpetrated, as long as they could get conservative judges and tax cuts for the rich. And they continue to prop him up in the face of graft and corruption on an unprecedented scale, as well as incompetence and ignorance in virtually all matters.

Now we hear that in two states, Michigan and Wisconsin, Republican lame duck sessions of state legislatures are in the process of passing laws that restrict the power of incoming Democratic elected officials, officials who are replacing outgoing Republicans. The same thing happened in 2016 in North Carolina. Here is Lincoln, local Republicans pushed through a charter amendment restricting a Democratic mayor, who had already declared that he would run for re-election, from running again. Our Republican governor has used his own funds to "primary" other Republicans who would not vote in lockstep with him. So, when "the people" speak by voting out Republicans, the Republicans petulantly change the rules so that the will of "the people" is circumvented.

While theoretically there may be decent Republicans out there, and some may be good for their states, cities, the nation, anyone who aligns themself with the Republican Party, has by default, aligned themself with all of the sins enumerated above. Someday the Republican Party may heal itself, but that day has not yet come.

Donnie Two Scoops and Jim Acosta

President Trump and his supporters had been predicting that the 2018 midterms would be a "red wave" (of course attempting to flip the Democratic use of "Blue Wave". Most analysts predicted that the Democrats would take over the majority in the House of Representatives and that the Republicans would retain control of the Senate. The Republicans would pick up 4-5 Senate seats, with Democrats in states that Trump won in 2016 particularly vulnerable. The results were not that different than foreseen, with the Democrats doing better than thought. At most, the Republicans will have a net gain of 2 seats, assuming that the recount in Florida and the special election in Mississippi both go to Republicans. Democrats have netted an additional 35 seats, with a possible 39 when all the votes are tabulated. Democrats also picked up seven governorships. This was not a good election for the Republican party.

So what does Donnie Two-Scoops say about it? He calls it a "great victory". He whines about "the people not being told" about the Republicans increasing their Senate majority from 51-49 to 53-47 (maybe). He muses that other presidents have lost more House seats. The man is delusional in so many categories.

From a certain angle, you can look at the Senate results as a victory. Retaining the Senate majority means that Trump can still appoint federal judges, and even additional Supreme Court justices if the need arises. This is no small thing. The map, however, did favor Republicans. 23 Democrats were up for re-election versus only 9 Republicans (plus afew open seats). Most of the Democrats were running in states that Trump won comfortably in 2016. Four of those were voted out, but two Democrats won in previously Republican states. Democrats won 2/3 of the Senate elections. (The situation is reversed in 2020). There's no way that the House election can be viewed as anything less than a tremendous defeat. Notwithstanding the fact that President Obama suffered a much more stinging loss in his first midterms, the loss of so many Republican seats will guarantee that Trump will accomplish nothing legislatively these next two years. 

Of course, Trump is pretending that this is an opportunity for bipartisan cooperation. This might be the case if he and his Republican allies hadn't done all that they could to shut the Democrats out of any decision making, or if Trump's idea of bipartisanship wasn't limited to the other party giving in to his demands without any concessions on his part.

And now there's CNN's lawsuit on behalf of Jim Acosta. If this were any other president, I'd characterize Acosta's demeanor as rude and overly aggressive. And, even considering the White House's occupant, he's often over the top. But Trump has made his own bed. He's been rude and insulting to virtually everyone - not only the press, but legislators, our allies, even his own cabinet. Trump also seriously misunderstands the role of the press in a democracy. Their job is not to prop up the nation's politicians, nor to produce "positive" coverage, but to serve as an unofficial check and balance to the government, to ask the tough questions, to research and report on things that most of us don't have the time nor expertise to do. Trump does not like to be questioned, he bristles when his lies are called out and characterizes those who shine a spotlight on him as "enemies".

It will be interesting to see how the new White House "rules of polite behavior" plays out

Entitlements & The Social Security Trust Fund

Let's start off with what "entitlement" is not. It's not "welfare", i.e. payments to people who are not working for it. (The fact that there is no program called "welfare" and that most people who receive government financial assistance and are not disabled work is not the subject of this blog post).

An entitlement in the jargon of government is "a federal program, or provision of law that requires payments [to anyone] who meets the criteria". Under this definition Social Security, government pensions and veterans benefits are all entitlements. Other programs that require a specific Congressional appropriation of funds are called "discretionary". With discretionary programs a perfectly legal program can be effectively nullified if Congress defunds it, not so with entitlements.

So all those Facebook memes that you see raging about how your Social Security isn't an entitlement are not accurate. "Entitlement" isn't a slur. It means, by law, if you meet the criteria, the government has to give it to you.

The other misconception that many people harbor is that Social Security is "their" money and that they "paid into it" for their whole working life. That there is a "Trust Fund" that holds all of your accumulated "payments".

It's true that the more that you earn in your working life, the more that you will be able to receive in Social Security benefits, but you are no means guaranteed to receive everything that you "paid in" nor are you limited by that amount. You could conceivably die before reaching retirement age, or you could live for another 35 years after retiring. You are guaranteed, upon retirement, a certain monthly benefit until you die. But it will be limited according to how much outside income you earn or when you retire; neither of these have any connection to what you "paid in".

The Social Security Trust Fund does not exist like a giant bank account for all present and future Social Security recipients. Social Security is, and always has been, a pay-as-you-go program. The payroll taxes that current workers have deducted from their paychecks are used to pay the current retirees. Notice that I used the term "taxes". It's not your money, it's a tax that you pay that is used to fund the current expenses (retiree benefits). Tomorrow's workers will pay for tomorrow's retirees. So what is the Social Security Trust Fund? Every year (until 2018) the total of all payroll taxes exceeded the total of all benefits paid out. The surplus was by law, invested in Treasury Securities, not kept as cash in a government bank account.

(Why not a cash account? Several reasons. One, if the general fund budget is running a deficit, it will have to borrow money from somewhere to make up the difference. Better to borrow from itself, then have our debt held by foreign banks. Second, due to inflation, the value of the dollars in the trust fund, if they remained as cash, would decrease. The general fund pays into the trust fund interest on the treasury securities. )

This may be the source of the myth that various administrations "raided" or stole money from the trust fund. This is not true. The decision to run a deficit is unconnected to the availability of a "loan" from the Social Security Trust Fund. This shortfall would have been made up by issuing bonds or securities in any event.

A few paragraphs up I mentioned that until 2018 more was coming in than going out. So what's happening now? In the short term, the interest payments make up the difference, but each year the deficit between income and benefits will get wider. At some point, if the payroll tax and benefits both remain the same, the general fund will need to allocate funds to redeem the Treasury Securities held by the trust fund. It is estimated that by 2034 even the trust fund will be depleted. At that point it is further estimated that, if nothing else changes, the income from payroll taxes will be able to cover about 70% of benefits.

Nothing about what I have explained precludes the government from making changes to Social Security. In order to forestall the depletion of the trust fund they could scale back cost-of-living increases, they could raise the cap (income over around $130,000 is not subject to payroll tax), or raise the retirement age. They could lower the threshold upon which you start paying taxes on Social Security benefits, or lower the amount of outside income that you can earn before having your benefits lowered. In all likelihood any changes will affect future beneficiaries, not current ones.

Whatever happens, do some research and stop getting your information from Facebook memes

Why Do I Even Bother?

It has been a daily frustration listening to and reading comments from Trump supporters. How many times have we thought that he'd crossed some kind of line, only to experience the world stage equivalent of "hold my beer"?

There is certainly room for disagreement on the best way to run the country: nation-building vs. minding-our-own-business; multinational trade agreements vs. bilateral agreements; ignoring despotic regimes' abuses vs. taking action against them; the extent of the government safety net; eliminate regulations vs. more regulations; more or less immigration...and the list goes on. Many of these subjects can be negotiated and compromises can be reached. But that's not the way things are being done now, everything is a battle for the soul of our nation. The other side hates America. I put the blame for this squarely on the shoulders of the Republican leadership.

Politics has always been a dirty game, full of betrayals and back-stabbing. But the partisan nastiness came to a head, not during Trump's mosh pit of an administration, but during Obama's. Whether or not you believe racism played a part (I do), once the Republicans took back first one house of Congress, then the other, their whole plan was to obstruct everything that President Obama tried to do. Not just the things where they were ideologically opposed to, but everything. In addition to that, they stood by while the Tea Party fanatics painted President Obama as not American or as a terrorist sympathizer when they weren't describing his policies a communism. They stood by while the future president  Donald Trump stoked the "birther" nonsense. They refused to even hold a hearing on Obama's Supreme Court nominee and McConnell was quoted as saying that if Clinton were elected, they would refuse to confirm any of her nominees. They tied up Secretary Clinton in hearing after hearing about the deaths in Benghazi and stayed silent as she was tarred with the accusation that she was running a child sex ring in the basement of a pizza parlor! They were willing participants in the demonization of the Democrats.

Then came Donald Trump, insulting his way to the top of the heap.

Trump tapped into the gullibility of much of America, Americans who were primed by years of conspiracy theories and character assassination to listen to the hatred and raw demagoguery that he spewed.

Although I was in no mood after Trump was elected to forgive or forget his misogyny, xenophobia and bigotry on the campaign trail, I thought for a brief moment that the immensity of the job would humble him. One of the first things that he said was that being president of all the people was very, very, important to him. But that humility didn't last long. And his supporters, despite frothing at the mouth in their frenzy to cheer on their new leader's hatred of the "other", were simultaneously in denial that he was spouting hatred. "It's the media" they would say, parroting Trump, despite virtually everything being readily accessible on video. Very little would turn out to be "anonymous sources".

Trump supporters excuse or rationalize his hatred, but they also brush aside his lies, either credulously believing them, even though they are easily disproved or debunked, sometimes by his own government, or decide that they don't matter because "it makes the liberals heads explode".

There's plenty to dislike about Trump, from his mocking of, well, just about everyone, to his cozying up to dictators while at the same time insulting our allies; from his threats to destroy some countries (North Korea, Iran) and invade others (Venezuela) while pledging to stay out of the internal affairs of others (Russia, Saudi Arabia); to his excusing the dismembering of a journalist who, while not a US citizen, was working for a US newspaper and a legal resident.

But lately, it's the lies.

Trump has always lied. He lied about where he got his money, about his success as a businessman, he lied about contacts with Russians. Trump lies even when he doesn't have to lie, when it's easily checkable. Lately though his lies seem to be targeted toward scaring his base into getting out and voting. He lied about nonexistent riots in California; he's lying about the Democrats wanting to cut Social Security when it's actually the Republicans who are talking about it. He's lying about an upcoming middle-class tax cut that can't exist because Congress is not in session, especially since it's supposedly ready to go before election day (oh yeah, he's studying it...hard). He lies so often and so outrageously that the safe bet is to just assume that he's lying until evidence to the contrary is presented.

So how can you trust someone like that? Even if he says something that you support, like tax cuts, how can you have any confidence that he's telling you the truth? The short answer is that you can't. He's untrustworthy. Yet millions of Americans think that the serial liar, who has screwed working Americans in business for years, is one of them.

A lot of Americans are stupid, a lot of them don't want to listen to reason, to logic, to the facts.

But some do.

I guess that's why I bother

Elizabeth Warren's DNA Test

Okay, so Elizabeth Warren's family lore included a non-specific Native American ancestor, Cherokee, if I remember correctly. If I had a nickel for every white person who claimed, without evidence or specifics that they were "part Cherokee", well, I'd have a lot of nickels! (And it always seems to be Cherokee for some reason). But what harm did it do? It was apparently a story that her mother & grandmother told...it was harmless. Warren never used her tenuously claimed minority status to gain any advantage, and she never claimed to be an official, enrolled member of any tribe of nation. Probably the only thing that can be laid at her feet was when, after being hired at Harvard, she listed herself as a minority in the faculty guide and allowed the Harvard administration to use her as an example of diversity within the faculty. It was something that wouldn't have drawn notice from anyone if her election opponent hadn't made it a ploy to undermine her. (He lost, she won).

However I believe that Warren erred in getting down in the muck with Donnie Two-Scoops. Her DNA test, even if it is legitimate, (which I am skeptical of) indicates that her Native ancestor is 6-10 generations back. The tiny percentage of her ancestry that this test claims as Native American apparently is less than the percentage that the average American white person can claim as Native ancestry. So what did she accomplish? She jumped through a hoop for a president who will undoubtedly use this information to further mock her. In fact, today, Trump babbled about his million dollar pledge to charity if she took the DNA test was only if she was a presidential nominee and in a decidedly creepy moment, said that he would administer the test himself (whatever that means), adding with a smirk that he "would not enjoy it". If you're going to try to appease this, as Rex Tillerson called him, fucking moron, you'll just dig yourself in deeper.

Not Surpised

The events of the last week culminating in the appointment of Judge Brett Kavanaugh to the Supreme Court shouldn't surprise anyone. Horrified us? Yes. Disgusted us? Yes. But surprised? Don't make me laugh.

As for Trump appointing conservative ideologues to the Supreme Court, that was kind of the point. There are areas where Trump does his own thing in opposition to conservative Republicans, like trade;  and areas where he allows the conservative Republicans to get what they want, like judicial appointments. And despite all the talk from the Republicans about appointing originalist judges who merely "call balls & strikes" rather than being activists on the bench, what they really want are judges (and Supreme Court Justices) who will advance a conservative agenda and continue to advance that agenda even when Democrats are the majority in Congress or are in The White House.

Television favorites such as Senator Ben Sasse suggest that Trump could have avoided the problems with Kavanaugh if he had nominated a different judge, particularly a woman. But Trump and the Republicans didn't just want a qualified jurist, they wanted someone who would be loyal, the benchmark by which all Trump appointees are appraised. So it is hardly shocking that Trump and his allies in the Senate would dig in their heels against any and all opposition, no matter what came up;  that they would hide 90% of documentation regarding his political activities behind presidential executive privilege; that even a credible accusation of sexual assault would not deter them.

Sure, some of them gave the appearance of believing Dr. Ford, but even if she were believed 100%, there was no way that this key appointee would be voted down, there is no way that the Republicans, and more importantly Trump, would suffer defeat at the hands of "the Left". It's not that some of them didn't believe, but it's that they didn't care. Getting Kavanaugh confirmed outweighed all other considerations.

And why is anyone surprised at the backlash against Dr. Ford? Trump has never shied away from insulting and demeaning those who stand against them. He started off attempting to sound even-handed, but quickly moved to his usual mode, mocking her at a rally and calling her testimony a Democratic hit job. And of course Republican Senators started piling on as well, including the implausible explanation by Senator Collins that she believed that Dr. Ford had been assaulted, just not by Justice Kavanaugh. They all quickly moved from skepticism about Dr. Ford's account to being unalterably convinced that she was lying. Is anyone surprised at that? Once the deal was struck, every opponent must be demonized.

Is anyone surprised that Trump got laughs and applause when he mocked Dr. Ford? That a percentage of Americans are more worried about false accusations, which are statistically insignificant, than actual sexual assault? And finally, is any surprised that some of us are outraged? That we have taken to accosting elected officials in airports and restaurants, blocking streets and disrupting Congressional hearings?

What are you going to do about it? Be outraged, accost, block, protest, yell, disrupt...do all those things, but don't forget to do one thing:

Vote.

Trumpisms

We've long since identified such obvious Trumpisms as "believe me" and "people are saying", but what about some of the lesser known idiocisms?

"If (or when) you look at (or into) [...]"
This is usually in regard to something that most people aren't questioning, but Trump wants to cause you to question. An example might be:
"Oh well, if you look at the statistics, of people coming - I didn't say about Mexic...I say illegal immigrants - if you look at the statistics on rape, crime, on everything, coming in illegally into this country, they're mind boggling"

Basically, he knows that few of his supporters will "look at it", they just believe what he says, and usually, when you do look at it, it's the opposite of what he's saying.

"We're looking at (or studying) that"
Not the same as "When you look at" - although both use the word "look".

"We're going to throw out a policy that appeals to my racist base, but that otherwise makes no sense"

Use of the modifier "wonderful"

1. Paul Manafort's wife
2. Meeting with shooting victims
3. Rex Tillerson
4. Ivanka
5. Donald Junior
6. Eric
7. Friendship with Macron
8. DREAMers
9. Eminent domain
10. Hurricane Harvey response
11. Michael Flynn
12. EU
13. Queen Elizabeth
14. Nancy pelosi (sarcastically)
15. Brexit
16. Relationship with Haitians
17. Brett Kavanaugh

Reminds me of VPW & LCM (if you know who they are) when he uses this word

Starting a tweet with "remember"
He usually follows "remember" with some half-baked, unsubstantiated opinion, such as "Remember, NAFTA is the worst trade deal in history", or "Remember, Mueller is leading a witch hunt"

The "Sir Alert
When Trump tells you that someone approached him and he starts the quote of what they said with "Sir..." you can bet that it's bullshit for example:

"So they said, 'Sir, do you mind cancelling Kansas tonight?' I said 'No way I'm cancelling Kansas, no way, no way'"

"Sir" is usually followed by some ridiculous story about someone approaching him to tell him how great he is or how wonderful is latest "policy" is

The Economic Idiot

It has become almost impossible to keep up with how off the rails our government, led by President Trump and the Republicans is. I have also surrendered myself to reality that most Trump supporters would continue to support him if he shot someone on Fifth Avenue. Every day brings a new outrage, a new lie, a new scheme for lining Trump's pockets and the pockets of his friends. And it's not as if he actually accomplishing anything. There's only been one significant piece of legislation that he has managed to get through Congress, the corporate tax giveaway of 2017 - and that's with a compliant and complicit Republican Congress. He hasn't built his Wall or put a stop to Muslim immigration, two things his racist base loved him for. Our military is still in Afghanistan.

One thing that is doing well, is the economy. "Doing well" that is, for a certain value of "doing well". It is undeniable that unemployment continues to go down. Usually low unemployment goes hand-in-hand with rising real wages. Employers, competing for a smaller pool of qualified workers, compete with other employers by raising pay rates. But this hasn't happened. Average hourly  pay has gone up a paltry 2.7% while cost of living has risen by 2.9% - a net loss in purchasing power. Trump highlights the unemployment numbers (which he described as fake when he was a candidate, insisting the "real" percentage was closer to 40 than the actual number) and the "stock market". (see this blog post about the stock market:
https://tjpolitics.blogspot.com/2018/01/trump-and-stock-market.html )
So, while the owners of many stocks, on paper, have increased their wealth, it's not at all evident that this wealth has translated into better conditions for most Americans.

And it's not at all evident that the good things can even be attributed to Trump. Granted, nothing that he has done so far has caused the economy, as a whole, to tank. But for the most part gains in employment, investment, increased stock value etc, are merely a continuation of the trend that began early in Obama's first term. Whether or not you agree with Obama's policies, or attribute the growth to anything that he did, it's undeniable that all the positive trend that Trump cites are continuations of what had been happening for six - seven years before he was elected.

Since we're talking about the economy, Trump talks a lot about fairness in international trade and imposes tariffs and tears up trade agreements without any clear idea about what trade actually is. Trade is not a zero-sum game where if I win you lose. It's complex and there can be many winners. He seems to think that a trade deficit means that we are literally losing money or that reducing a trade deficit results in a smaller budget deficit, paying down the national debt. His ignorance was on display in his recent imposition of tariffs that had the result of closing overseas markets to American farmers, causing them economic hardship. He suggested that American farmers were patriotic and wouldn't mind taking the hit for the good of the country before approving a $12 billion bailout.

Getting back to corporate tax bailout, it was initially suggested that ordinary Americans would see "raises" in the thousands of dollars, and there was a flood of people talking about their bigger paychecks. More often than not, the math did not add up. Then the story became that the lower corporate taxes would trickle down to the workers as companies used their windfall to give their people raises. A small number of companies appeared to do that, although it was usually one-time bonuses, not raises, while even more companies used the lower tax bill to buy back stock, increasing the value per share and giving top corporate people bigger bonuses.

And finally, the hallmark of Donald Trump, not only as president, but for his entire life: lying. A large number of Trump's economic claims, when checked independently, turn out to outright lies, or at the very least, exaggerations.

Trump claims to have jump started the economy and made life better for all, but at best he has simply avoided bringing the whole thing crashing down.

Does He Think We're Stupid?

Does Donald Trump think we're stupid? If so, for about 25% of eligible voters he'd be right.

Early in his campaign he mused about whether he'd lose any supporters if he shot someone on Fifth Avenue in New York. Over the course of the last several years, it appears as if he's out to prove himself right. If he did indeed shoot someone on Fifth Avenue, how would he handle it?

• Remind us that New York is a liberal city
• Suggest that the victim was a terrorist
• Shout "fake news!"
• Wonder aloud whether NYPD Homicide detectives will be investigating "Crooked Hillary"
• Deny that he did it
• Tweet that it was a public safety measure
• Tweet that the victim was a journalist, and therefore an enemy of the people
• Deny that he denied that he did it

This week's shit show in Helsinki, following closely on the heels of the shit show at the NATO meeting, which featured some of the same people present at the G7 shit show - and don't forget the United Kingdom shit show...was to date the most disgusting behavior by a serving president...and that's saying a lot. 

Double negatives? Really? Once upon a time I was involved in a religious group that, among other things, encouraged us to consider the context when reading the Bible. (Not that they consistently did that, but it was good advice nonetheless) In other words you can't pick a verse in isolation and assign a meaning to it that is at odds with all other nearby or otherwise related verses. This is true in real life as well. When considering a politician's position, you can't just look at one speech, one tweet, or even one vote, you have to look at their entire history of public comments, written positions and voting record. Trump's backpedaling on his "I don't see any reason why it would be" [Russia] statement, claiming that he meant to say "I don't see any reason why it wouldn't be" [Russia], ignores the context of that statement. In the immediate context it makes no sense. Trump is being very obsequious to Putin, avoiding even the appearance of criticism.  This is in vivid contrast to his behavior with our allies, whom he berates and belittles, threatening and bullying, then lying about what he said. Answering that he can't imagine how it could have been Russia that interfered in our election fits right in with his public behavior during his joint appearance with Putin. 

In the follow up the next day, when Trump was reading his "explanation" of his "mispeaking", he did what he frequently does when reading one of his walk-back prepared comments: he interrupts himself, "explaining" what he is reading as if we're not operating under the fiction that it's his own words that he's reading. (Often he'll say something like "that's so true" in the middle of his comments). In his would/wouldn't comments he interrupted his prepared words to say "Could be other people, there's lots of people out there". And of course there's the wider context. Trump has on several occasions said that he supports our intelligence agencies and believes their conclusions about Russian interference, yet  he has consistently worked to undermine anyone who was investigating that interference and expressed doubt about Russia's role. 

Trump has been insisting that his deference to Russia is simply because it is in our best interest to be on good terms with Russia and that it's good "for the world" for us to get along with Russia. Yet he doesn't feel like it's "good for the world" to get along with anyone else, including our closest allies. He hammers them for not spending more on their militaries, and on allegedly unfair trade practices, ostensibly "Putting America First". He's willing to conduct a wide-ranging trade war rather than achieving our aims through negotiation, yet with Russia, he's willing to let bygones be bygones. 

Context. 

Does he think we're stupid? I have to conclude that he thinks that we are, and in the case of his die-hard supporters, he's right. People who supposedly love the military ignore or explain away his disrespect for "the generals", individual veterans who disagree with him and Gold Star parents; people for whom morality and religion are paramount are okay with his moral stench; working people cheer when he hands billionaires and corporations huge tax cuts in exchange for a paltry cut for them; those who thought a billionaire couldn't be bought are mute while Trump and his cabinet loot the treasury...and on and on. 

Yes, you people who continue to support him are stupid. At first you were "merely" okay with his misogyny, bigotry and xenophobia; those things are stupid, but if you were misogynistic, bigoted and xenophobic, then you got what you wanted. But rationalizing and excusing everything else, including the craven subservience of the past week makes you STUPID. 

Fuck you. 

Spygate and Other Paranoid Fantasies

It seems like a day doesn't go by without Trump coming up with insulting nicknames, inaccurate descriptions of events and hyperbolic assuming of the martyr mantle. His latest focus, if the man is actually capable of focus, is what he has been calling "Spygate".  Trump has been alleging that "Obama" embedded a "spy" in the Trump campaign "long before this Russia thing". If you get all your news from Fox & Friends or your friends' Facebook statuses, then you might assume that this is true.

At the end of this blog post I will include a link to a Wikipedia page that contains a timeline - much more information that I can include in one sitting! But suffice it to say that Trump's allegations that Obama was spying on his campaign, that any attention was for political reasons, that Trump was not told of potential Russian attempts to co-opt his campaign staff, even that the Mueller investigation is a "witch hunt" are 100% false. Her are a few facts - I'll try to keep it simple.

• The FBI was investigating Russian "troll farms" as early as 2015
• The hack of the DNC server was confirmed to be by Russians
• The DNC was not the subject of an investigation, it was the victim of a crime
• The FBI did not ask for the physical server, therefore the DNC did not "refuse to hand it over"
• Documents hacked from the server, that reflected badly on Clinton & the Democrats was later released by Wikileaks
• There were a not insignificant number of Trump campaign staff that had questionable ties to Russia
• The British investigator Christopher Steele was initially hired by a Republican primary contender to investigate Trump's Russian connections through the firm Fusion GPS; when that person dropped out, the contract was picked up by the DNC
• Steele got some of his information from Russians (this is apparently the genesis of the charge the Clinton & the DNC "colluded" with the Russians)
• Some of this information implicated Trump campaign officials
• Steele reported his findings to the FBI
• Around the same time George Papadopoulos, a Trump campaign foreign policy advisor, told an Australian diplomat, during a drinking session, that the Russians had "dirt" on Clinton that had been passed to the campaign
• This was the impetus for the FISA warrant to begin surveillance of some members of the Trump camapaign, the "dossier" gave additional information
• Previous to this, conversations of Trump campaign officials were picked up as part of routine surveillance of known Russian agents in the United States
• On August 17, 2016, Trump was warned in an FBI briefing that it was likely that Russian agents would attempt to compromise members of his campaign.
• Everybody and his brother apparently had illegal or questionable meetings with Russians and then lied about them
• At some point, it's unclear when, the FBI sent Stefan Halper, a foreign policy scholar, to set up meetings with various Trump campaign officials to attempt to get information about any Russian connections. He was not embedded in the campaign, was not in any way part of the campaign, but met with individuals outside of campaign offices to gather information. There was nothing political about it. 
• Obama approached Senate majority Leader McConnell with the suggestion that they make a bi-partisan announcement regarding the known Russian interference
• McConnell refused
• Obama, concerned that a unilateral announcement would look like he himself was attempting to influence the election, made no announcement
• Trump characterizes this as attempting to safeguard Clinton's assumed election win
• Obama did, however, institute several sanctions against Russian entities
• In 2017, Trump fired FBI Director James Comey, the titular head of the Russia Investigation, which by this time appeared to involve Trump, or at least his associates
• Trump then bragged to Russian diplomats that getting rid of Comey took a lot of pressure off him
• Shortly thereafter, Rod Rosenstein, Deputy Attorney General, who had oversight of any investigation since Attorney General Jeff Sessions recused himself, appointed Robert Mueller III, former FBI Director, as Special Counsel to head the investigation
• Trump regularly criticizes Sessions for recusing himself, stating that if he knew that he's recuse himself he would have gotten someone else for the job
• Rosenstein, new FBI Director Wray, former FBI Director Comey and Mueller are all Republicans
• Trump has started characterizing the investigation as "13 Angry Democrats"
• Trump also paints any of the investigators who were in place during the Obama administration as biased

It's pretty obvious that there's at least cause for an investigation. Whether there was knowing conspiracy, or just ignorance, there are numerous reasons to look into what happened and who was involved. Whether Trump himself is implicated is an open question, but his well-known tendency toward micro-managing, it stretches credulity to imagine that he didn't know something was going on. 

Timeline:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_Russian_interference_in_the_2016_United_States_elections

Trump's "Animals" Comment

Hey Trumpists! Congratulations! You finally caught the media in a verifiable mistake! The so-called Fake News Media said that your hero called immigrants "animals" when the context (determined by listening to the entirety of his remarks) indicates that he was specifically referring to members of the MS-13 gang.

Or does it?

Trump has consistently conflated immigrants in general, not just illegal immigrants, but all immigrants, with the  MS-13 gang (when Hispanic) or with terrorists (when Muslim). His barely articulated policy on immigration comes down to: Hispanic Refugees = Murderers & Rapists and Muslim Refugees = ISIS sympathizers; both categories are painted as hating America. It doesn't matter to him that while some people entering illegally from south of the U.S. are gang members, the majority are people fleeing gang violence, the percentage of MS-13 members who are deported is less than 1% of the total or that many MS-13 gang members are U.S. citizens. MS-13 is an American gang that has attracted many immigrants. It doesn't matter to him that the majority of potential immigrants from Muslim majority countries not only are fleeing violence in their own countries, but have been painstakingly vetted before receiving permission to emigrate to the U.S.

So, it's perhaps understandable that many news outlets jumped on the "animals" comment without providing the context, seeing how neatly it fit into Trump habits of speech. But unlike the President, who never admits his mistakes, and sticks to his misstatements and lies no matter how much video and audio evidence stacks up proving him wrong, media outlets backpedalled and corrected their earlier statements.

So even with the most unforgiving take on the media's motives, you've got one. One up against the almost daily lies that flow from the President's Twitter account, his press secretary's statements and the defenses by his lawyers and sycophants. Even though Trump regularly accuses the media of making up stories, attributing stories to nonexistent sources and having it out for him, an amazing number of stories have later (or sooner) proved true.

So, I'm not really willing to give Trump a pass on this. He's either a bigot, or feigns bigotry because he knows bigotry plays well with his most ardent supporters. Yeah, I'm willing to look at the context, the full context of two years of candidate and President Trump making bigoted and hateful statements.

And for you Trumpists - apparently bigotry and hatred aren't disqualifying characteristics.

What does that say about you?

Walking on Water

A refrain that I often hear from Trumpists is that Trump could cure cancer (or walk on water or some other far-fetched event) and liberals would find fault. I don't know if they realize that that's the flip side to Trump's own assertion that he would lose no support even if he shot someone on Fifth Avenue. Like most people who are against Trump, I do find fault with him, no matter what he does. Not because I think that everything he does is wrong, or harmful, although at the moment I'm at a loss to think of anything that he did that I agree with. No, my problem with Trump is why he does things, and with the fact that his 24/7 lying casts doubt on whether he actually accomplished what he says he accomplished. Here's a few examples:

I believe that we should secure our borders. Not because I think that people who want to come here are bad people, but I think that there should be a process for admittance to the United States. On the flip side I think that the process as it stands is burdensome, and people fleeing gang violence or poverty often have no recourse other than entering illegally. I think that once someone has been here for a number of years and has demonstrated that they are a productive, hard-working member of the community, we should allow them at least the opportunity to convince a judge that should be allowed to stay. Right now men and women who have been here for decades, even those who have served in our military, are deported without a second thought. Trump's border security positions are not based on a sincere desire to keep our country safe, as he says, but are based on a hatred and bigotry toward "the other". How do I know this? I followed his campaign. He characterized Mexicans as rapists and drug dealers and Muslims as terrorists. His cries for a "big, beautiful wall" were nothing more than an applause line in his rallies, without an actual policy or plan to implement. His demands for money to build the wall are at odds with another applause line, the assertion that Mexico would pay for it. His budget cuts funding for proven border security measures such as upgraded radar and other detection technology, surveillance aircraft that track drug shipments, canine units, and personnel at ports where smuggling takes place. ICE has been rounding up of people who have been here for decades and have faithfully checked in with ICE and arresting and deporting them, despite his pledge that he would focus on criminal aliens. Instead ICE has focussed on low-hanging fruit such as people dropping their kids off at school, or showing up in court or at work. So, while Trump claims to prioritize border security and the safety of our citizens, what he is really doing is inflaming ignorance and bigotry and appealing to the least common denominator of the electorate. Why would I believe anything he says about the border, immigration, or public safety?

I believe that out tax code was in dire need of reform before last year's tax changes were instituted. It was complicated and despite tax rates increasing as ones income rose, the multiplicity of deductions, credits and incentives caused it to favor the wealthy. Trump and his Republican allies bragged that they would pass a "massive" tax cut, benefitting ordinary Americans, and that "historic" rate cuts to corporations would inject even more life into an already booming economy. What we got did include huge tax rate cuts to corporations without the accompanying loophole closures that we were promised. A handful of companies made sure that we knew about thousand dollar bonuses that their employees received, but less attention was lavished upon the plant closures or the companies that used their tax windfall to buy back stock, raising price per share and guaranteeing that the C-suite boys and girls (mostly boys) would receive princely bonuses, surely well in excess of a paltry grand. Meanwhile, many working class Americans received a tiny increase in take-home pay, while others saw an increase in their taxes. Simple math and five minutes studying the rate charts and brackets will reveal that anyone with more than two children earning around the national median income will see a higher tax bill. Despite this, Trump continues to brag that this was a "massive, historic, tax cut". He has rewarded himself and his billionaire buddies while throwing crumbs to working Americans. Why should I believe anything that he says when he claims that he cares about the middle class and working Americans?

Another reason to be consistently against whatever Trump comes up with, even if it might sound a little reasonable at first is twofold. Trump is famously uninterested in expert opinion. Or even informed opinion at any level that does not buttress his own ignorance. In his first year he has consistently undermined and fired anyone who might disagree with him and didn't slavishly fawn over his every word. An illustrative example  was his National Security Advisor, H.R. McMaster. After ditching the lunatic loyalist Michael Flynn, Trump brought in McMaster, an active duty Army Lieutenant General who has a PhD in American history and is, by all accounts, brilliant. But his security briefings bored Trump and had to be dumbed down to hold his attention. Nuance, subtlety, shades of grey; these were all things that eluded Trump. But, despite his and his followers' wish otherwise, the world is nothing but shades of grey. The other half of this is Trump's predilection toward lying. Lying is his default position. He lies regularly and outrageously. He doesn't always lie just to cover up and obfuscate, he lies to brag, he lies because it will make him look good or his opponents look bad. He lies about lying. He acts as if there is no such thing as a tape recorder or a video camera or that everyone has cell phone cameras and recorders. Is he stupid? Deluded? Or does he just think we are? His lies are so far ranging that I can't trust anything that he says. So when he unveils a new policy, it's safe to assume that he either has no idea what he's talking about or that he's lying about it.

Finally, there's his crazed obsession with undoing everything that President Obama accomplished. Sometimes this aligns with mainstream Republican priorities, but often it's just mindless destruction. And it's personal. Let's not forget that Trump jump-started his political career by claiming, again and again, that President Obama was an illegitimate President who wasn't born in the United States. How else can you explain his antipathy to the Iran Nuclear "Deal" when he is planning on giving North Korea virtually the same "deal"? Or how he is undermining our nation's standing by pulling out of agreements negotiated in good faith?

To the Trumpists I say that if Trump is credited with curing cancer I'd have every reason to disbelieve it, or question whether he was getting kickbacks. And even if it were true, he still be an cheating, misogynistic, bigoted, xenophobic, bully.

Fuck him.

Taxes

Today is the deadline to file your 2017 federal tax return, the last where the old rates and brackets will apply. Social media is alive with pro-Republican pundits, Republican lawmakers, President Trump and his Trumpketeers and ordinary Americans who are proud that they didn't pay attention in math class because "they'd never use it". They're crowing about how this is the last filing under the old broken, failed system. They're bragging about how it's much simpler it is and how much more money we're all taking home.

Except it's not true.

It's simpler for married couples filing jointly who were itemizing deductions between $12,701 - $24,000. That the increase in the standard deduction, which will eliminate the advantage of itemizing anything under $24,000, but for the majority of Americans who didn't itemize before, there will be no change in complexity. As for tax cuts, many Americans will see a reduction in taxes, but many won't. How will the changes in the tax rates and brackets affect you? Do the math.

No, I'm not going to do the math for you. There are several web sites that list the old and new rates and brackets. Recalculate your 2017 taxes using the new numbers and see what you come up with. And don't get distracted by what your refund is, or will be; look at what your actual tax is and compare. But I'm going to bet that the chances of you doing that are negligible. Most people either believe the Trumpists and Republicans that it's a massive, historical tax cut or that it's nothing but a giveaway to the rich, without actually checking it for themselves.

I've done the math, and I know how it will affect me, and I can also calculate whether some of the claims that people are making about how much larger their paychecks are can be true. Spoiler alert: most are not.

The effect that the corporate tax cuts will have on ordinary taxpayers is less clear cut. We've seen reports of companies that have given out year-end bonuses to their employees. Of course we never hear about the vast majority of companies that aren't giving out bonuses. And we hear of hardly any who are increasing employee pay across the board. How tax rates influence corporate hiring and investment is a complex subject, and the anecdotal evidence of a few months into the new tax framework doesn't tell us much. What I do know is that businesses seldom do hings for their employees out of the goodness of their hearts. This is why I am highly suspicious of the companies who not only handed out bonuses, but made sure to publicly credit their decision to the tax  reduction, even though the tax impact won't really be known until this time next year. Wal-Mart is a good example. Much was made about their year-end $1000/employee bonuses, but it took a while for the news that only 20 year veterans got the full $1000 and that they were simultaneously closing hundreds of stores.

So, the moral of the story is to get out your calculator, or count on your fingers and figure it out for yourself.

Mueller

Following the raid on Michael Cohen's home and office (Michael Cohen - one of Trump's lawyers) President Trump has called the Mueller investigation "a disgrace"  and "an attack on our country". He has characterized the investigation as partisan, and on several occassions, "a witch hunt". But let's look at why there's an investigation in the first place, and why Robert Mueller is running it.

United States intelligence agencies, as part of routine surveillance of foreign agents, some operating within the U.S., became aware that Russian agents were in contact with members of the Trump campaign and other Trump associates and family members. This, along with the conclusion that the Russian government was engaged in actions to influence the 2016 Presidential election in favor of Trump, caused the FBI to begin investigating links between the Russian influencers and the Trump campaign. A key moment in the FBI investigation was when George Papadopoulos, a foreign policy advisor to Trump, told an Australian official that the campaign was receiving information about Secretary of State Clinton from the Russians. This was the catalyst for the FBI to seek a Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) warrant against Carter Page, a Trump associate. Later Christopher Steele, a former British intelligence officer, became aware of links between Russian intelligence and the Trump campaign and reported his findings to the FBI. (Steele was originally hired by a Republican group to investigate Trump, but was later funded by the Democratic National Committee [DNC]). Attorney General Jeff Sessions was also mentioned as possibly having made illegal contacts with Russians during the campaign, so he recused himself from oversight of the investigation.

Shortly thereafter Trump fired FBI Director James Comey. This was when the appointment of Mueller as Special Counsel to investigate connections between Russians and the Trump campaign happened. Rod Rosenstein, Deputy Attorney General, without apparently consulting with Sessions or Trump, announced that Mueller, a former FBI Director, would be heading up the investigation.

Despite Trump's repeated claims that it's been proved that there is "no collusion", Mueller's team continues to move forward, with a number of guilty pleas and indictments of Trump campaign officials and associates. ("Collusion" is not a legal term and has no meaning within the context of this investigation.) The investigation continues to find examples of illegal or questionable contact between Trump associates and Russians, as well as financial improprieties,  including money laundering.

Trump's continual attacks on Mueller and his investigators is also troubling. He has fired two of the top FBI officials, Comey and Andrew McCabe, who were involved in the investigation pre-Mueller. It has been leaked that he has discussed firing Rosenstein in order to put someone in place who can control Mueller, or even firing Mueller himself. He regularly excoriates Sessions for recusing himself, suggesting that if he knew about the recusal beforehand he would have nominated someone else for Attorney General. Trump criticizes Rosenstein and Mueller for conducting a partisan attack, even though they are both Republicans. The judge and US Attorney who approved the raid on Cohen are both Republicans appointed by Trump. Trump's tweets are a barrage of attacks seeking to undermine the investigation. Obstruction of justice is one of the things that Mueller is looking at. It's pretty scary when the one being investigating can fire the investigator.

Will Trump be the ultimate target?

Just The Facts Ma'am

News organizations, whether newspapers, cable networks or online providers, are made up of people, and as such bring with them the tendencies and biases of those people. It has been my experience, however, that most reporters are aware of their own biases and work hard to keep them out of their reporting. Individual reporters know that their continued employment is based on their reputation for unbiased and accurate reporting. At the corporate level, newspaper publishers and network CEOs, who are mainly concerned with profits, understand that long-term profitability is based on their readers' perception that reporting is accurate and unbiased. Publishing stories that are attention-getting yet based on unsubstantiated information, or worse, lies, may bring a short-term ratings or circulation boost, but is reputation damaging in the long term.

This is not to say that news organizations don't have a point of view. The point of view can manifest itself as being partial to one party or the other, or being pro-business or pro-labor. In a newspaper, the point of view is expressed on the editorial page, as well as in opinion pieces, where contributors give their views on various subjects. Point of view can also show up in what news is printed, since obviously you can't print everything. But in the news section of a newspaper, facts are king. Printing clearly biased information, slanting coverage, or outright lying is not in the newspaper's long-term interest.

This is not to say that one should believe without question everything that you read in the newspaper or hear on television or radio. Get your information from multiple sources. Educate yourself on the difference between the opinion or analysis that a news organization offers and the facts that they are reporting. Learn to spot signs of bias in news reporting and allow for it.

One of the things that you hear from Trump and his supporters is how the mainstream media "has it out for Trump" and that an overwhelmingly high percentage of articles are negative. Back in December 2017 a Pew Research study concluded that only 9% of articles about Trump that expressed a positive or negative tone were positive vs. 91% negative.  This does not say that 91% of articles about Trump were negative, it does not say what percentage expressed a positive or negative tone. If only 20% of articles expressed a "tone", then only 18.2% of the total were actually negative. The study also doesn't  define "negative". If an article reports that President Trump has made a statement but pointed out that what he said was factually inaccurate, is that negative? If he announces new tax law changes but the article points out how they're not cuts for most Americans or disputes his prediction of how the economy will be affected, is that negative? I don't think it's inaccurate to say that much of what Trump says betrays at least an ignorance of the subject, or that he often makes up "facts" on the spot, or not infrequently out and out lies. Pointing this out is not negative. Pointing this out is not an attack.

Newspapers and other news organizations are not constituent parts of the checks & balances system envisioned by the founders, but they are an important, independent, source of information; so important that the very first amendment to the Constitution guarantees freedom of the press.

Our current President has done more to undermine the credibility of the free press in this country than any previous chief executive. His constant cries of "fake news" whenever something is reported that he does not like has carried over to many of his supporters, who will echo his "fake news" label at all critical reporting. A large percentage of Americans believe that most of what is reported by the mainstream media is "fake news". Where does that leave us? Are we really ready to rely on one politician for our facts? Do we want a situation where only the words of one man are deemed reliable? Many Americans have no problem with this.

Steel Tariffs

Nothing is simple these days, if it ever was. The current flap about tariffs and trade are only the most recent example. Wound up in that debate is the issue of "buying American".

I'm, in principle, a "buy local" guy. I'd rather go to The Mill than Starbucks for my overpriced caffeinated beverages for example. For years I worked for a locally-owned grocery store chain. When the national and regional chains started showing up in Lincoln, the company made much of their local roots, spotlighting that Hy-Vee was Iowa-owned, Walmart was Arkansas-owned and Trader Joe's was "Germany-owned". At the time I commented to the company president that people will only switch to our stores if we were better than the others, not because we were a local company. People will look out for their own best interests, and if that means shopping at the lower-priced Arkansas mega-retailer or the cool German-owned-with-the-California-vibe store rather than the local store, then they will. The same goes for "buying American". People will continue to buy foreign cars if they are priced right and are of adequate quality as long as they perceive that they're getting a better deal than with the American car manufacturers.

So we have two competing priorities: do we force people to buy American, thus supporting American business and jobs while simultaneously causing prices to go up, putting a burden on consumers, or do we allow unfettered free trade, allowing consumers to choose the best deal, while imperiling American businesses? The problem with tariffs supporting American businesses is that any lower-priced competitors are pushed out of the market, compelling consumers, which are sometimes other businesses, to pay higher prices. In the current example we will see some revitalization of the steel and aluminum industries, but what about car companies, which utilize steel in their  manufacturing? What about the numerous other companies that use steel? They have now been saddled with higher costs which will either result in higher prices for their products, layoffs, or both. Everything is connected. You can't isolate the US steel industry, take action to prop it up, and believe that there will be no downstream effects.

This is not to ignore that, in some cases, the prices of foreign goods are kept artificially low due to government supports and subsidies and that products are dumped into the US market below cost with the goal of driving domestic competitors out of business. This is not unheard of: how many local businesses did Walmart cause to go belly-up by undercutting their prices? On the other hand, consider how many businesses learned to adapt, becoming leaner and more efficient in order to battle Walmart. In this case a punitive tariffs might be in order. Sometimes foreign goods are cheaper due to lower labor costs. In all cases, targeted tariffs would make more sense. This is why we have trade agreements. We negotiate with individual nations or groups of nations; agreements may favor one segment of the economy while disfavoring others. NAFTA is an example of this - manufacturing and the attendant jobs moved to Mexico to take advantage of the reduced labor costs while agriculture benefited due to expanded markets. A good trade treaty benefits all sides; it's easy, however to pick aspects of a treaty and paint it as "unfair" when taken out of context of the rest of the treaty.

Trump talks a lot about the trade deficit that we have with many nations. (He also talks about trade deficits that we have with countries that we actually have trade surpluses with). A trade deficit can be a bad thing. Consistently buying more than we sell can be an indication that we have a weak manufacturing sector. It's unclear which is the cart and which is the horse in this metaphor though. A large trade imbalance also means that non-Americans are holding large amounts of dollars, which, if they are sold in quantity, could result in a devaluing of the dollar, making it costlier to purchase imports.

But Trump talks about a trade deficit as if we are losing money. Every dollar of a trade deficit represents a dollar's worth of goods or services that someone or some business in the US purchases. It is not money flowing out of the country. It's a complicated subject that cannot be reduced to sound bites, memes or applause lines at campaign events. Trump is ignorant about most subjects that one would expect a president to be conversant in; he is resistant to advice from people who are conversant, even expert in these subjects. He doesn't understand economics, but he does understand people and how to push their buttons and play on their ignorance to garner the applause, support and adulation, and eventually votes.

Trump's Pennsylvania Appearance Campaigning for Republican Candidate

Trump's latest speech campaigning for a Republican candidate went about how you'd expect it to:

• Started off talking about steel. "We're saving The Steel". 

He claims that "a lot of steel mills are opening up because of what I did". It's true that some steel plants have announced that they will be ramping up production in anticipation of increased demand due to imported steel being priced out of the market.

• Moves on to "there's a lot of evil in Washington D.C." and "there's a lot of fake, fake media". 

For an administration that's mired in scandal and being actively investigated by the FBI, it takes a lot of chutzpah to point the finger at others. 

• Next, he claims credit for the Olympics being successful, says that President Moon of South Korea said that "Without Donald Trump the Olympics would have been a total failure", then adds on "it's true". 

What specifically, or even generally, did Trump do to save the Olympics? And of course, saying "it's true" usually means it's not. "Nobody's going to say" - yeah because it's not true. 

• "It's a little hard to sell tickets when you think you're going to be nuked"

North Korea wasn't threatening to nuke anyone until Trump started his fire & fury bullshit. 

• Calls Chuck Todd a "sleepy-eyed son of a bitch"

Does this require any comment?

• Puts down Clinton announcing in 1999 that an agreement had been made with North Korea, contrasts with Trump the same year saying that "we have to take North Korea out"

None of Trump's supporters seem to notice that despite his derision of former Presidents having "talks" with North Korea, and his bellicose threatening, he is now agreeing to "talk" to North Korea.

• Complains about NBC negatively reporting on him even though he "gave them great ratings" for The Apprentice for 14 years

Once again, a fundamental lack of understanding of how a free press works

• Incoherent babbling about Obama

Once again, comparing himself to Obama. A President's accomplishments should stand on their own, shouldn't need to constantly compare himself to a predecessor

• Attacks GW Bush over his wars 

The crowd doesn't respond

• Brags about 98% of ISIS territory being liberated

First of all, they don't need land, Al Qaeda never did and second, thanks Kurdish Pesh Merga, Turkey and Iraqi Army

• Defends his "joking" about the US needing to try that "President-for-Life" thing that Xi in China is doing

Trump just doesn't understand when it's appropriate to joke and when it's not. If not for his history of autocratic tendencies, maybe we all would have laughed with him. Take into account that he congratulated Xi on his attainment of lifetime power. Why is okay for Xi, but not okay for Venezuela? Oh yeah: chocolate cake.

• Claims that news organizations ratings will tank if he is not re-elected, throws in his usual slur "Pocahontas" at Warren. 

He's got a point there, news organizations are guilty, in my opinion, helped vault Trump into his present position. But they managed to survive before him and they'll survive after him. He couldn't resist his slur against Warren though

• "African unemployment"?

*sigh*

• He doesn't think he has a problem with women, says 52% of women voted for him

I think it was 52% of white women, but for the life of me I can't figure out why so many women so no problem with him, just like I am bewildered at how many Christian Evangelicals support him

• Repeatedly calls Rep. Maxine Waters "low IQ"

He insults everybody, but he seems to reserve special contempt for women

• Trump admits that he proposed his DACA "solution" because he knew the Democrats would reject it

His opponents are not surprised, his supporters don't care that he just admitted to duplicity

• Knocks Reagan on trade

The audience doesn't respond when he puts down Reagan's trade policies, they don't have a ready-made chant when one of their heroes is insulted

• Trump takes credit for Handel's win over Ossof in Georgia

Trots out some confusing and probably irrelevant numbers to prove that he made the difference (in a safely Republican district, Ossof the Democrat lost by 1.5%

• Rambles on about how he doesn't know what tax reform is - "I call it TAX CUTS!"

Yup. Big tax cuts for the rich, tiny tax cuts for the working people. I love how he brags about his phenomenal ignorance

• Bitching about crowd size again

Size apparently is very important to Trump

• Rambling about The Wall and NAFTA and trade deficits

Starts out by criticizing Mexico for not wanting to pay for The Wall, then immediately criticizes the Democrats for not funding The Wall. Says we are "losing" billions, when he is talking about the trade deficit

• Death Penalty for Drug Dealers!

He loves dictators, he uses Duterte as example of how to deal with drug dealers. Then confuses The Philippines with Opium-era China. Next up, using Singapore as an example of how to deal with crime. 

• MS-13: "We liberated those towns, Hillary wouldn't have liberated those town"

More of the ongoing conflation of MS-13 gang violence with run of the mill refugees and immigrants

• Claims that "thousands" were turned away.

While Trump does often draw some large crowds, his crowd size estimates are often at odds with the listed capacity of some of the buildings where these events are held. And you would think that some of Trump's people would put together some video evidence of people being turned away.

• Being Presidential

Seems to think that Presidential = Stiff, Boring and Robotic. No "Presidential" means taking the job seriously instead of a big joke

Right after he was elected Trump said that he wanted to be "the President of all the people, because that is very, very important to me" . I was angry because the implication was that we were supposed to forget the hatred, the insults, the xenophobia and misogyny that came out on the campaign. I needn't have worried because it all continued after the election, with extra helpings of ignorance. 

Guns: Stop Pretending That They Aren't Part of the Problem

What do we do about the increasing occurrence of school shootings, as well as other mass shootings?

To start with, no one is suggesting that we ban all guns or that the government confiscate people's guns. No one is suggesting that guns cause these killings. These are strawmen that the NRA-philic are putting forth.

I have heard these reasons put forth by those who would twist logic into a pretzel in order to deflect any role that the availability of guns plays in these shootings:

• It's mental illness. Trump hit this one right off the bat. He conveniently forgot that he eliminated a regulation that would have prevented mentally ill people from owning a gun
• We don't discipline our kids. I believe the Las Vegas shooter, as well as the shooter who killed five police officers last year, were well into adulthood
• No prayer in schools or the shooter hadn't known Jesus
• General decline in society
• Wimpy Hipsters (yes, I heard that one today)

The problem with these so-called solutions is that they're not really solutions, they're excuses, they're distractions from the fact that the common denominator isn't a person's mental state, the way that they were raised, religion or whatever else...it's easy-to-find, easy-to-use...guns. We're not going to eliminate mental illness, we aren't going to guarantee that everyone discipline their children the way you think that they should be disciplined, prayer isn't coming back to public schools and being a non-Christian doesn't make you a bad person, let alone a mass murderer. Saying that these shootings happen for one of the above reasons just serves to take the spotlight off the fact that they were mass shootings. 

I have also heard the following as "solutions":

• Arm the teachers. The same teachers who aren't given enough pencils
• More armed guards, including police and possibly veterans
• Basically, more guns

Among those enamored of the gun culture, the solution to every problem, like the guy who thinks every problem looks like a nail because all he has in his toolbox is a hammer, looks like more guns. Sure, guns have always been part of American life. At one time a large percentage of Americans got their meat by way of hunting and hunting is still an important part of many people's lives. Citizens should be able to be able to protect themselves. In lightly populated areas the police may be an hour's drive away - you'd better be able to defend yourself and your family. But gun culture has evolved way beyond that. Listen to the people who believe that the purpose of having guns is to hold off the government in case...in case what? In case fringe conspiracy theories actually come true? While there's always been hunting rifles in the pickup truck racks and handguns and rifles for self defense, it's only been the last few years where the open carry fetish has gained traction. Now we have opposing groups of demonstrators, who a few years ago might have tussled in the street and thrown a few punches, armed and brandishing their weapons. We had one man fire a shot at another in the Chartlottesville demonstrations earlier this year. We have had anti-Muslim demonstrations by heavily-armed men outside mosques. It's gun porn. 

Ask law enforcement what they think about "good guys with guns" and how difficult it would make their jobs if everyone was firing at the "bad guys". Ask teachers what they think about being asked to arm themselves in the classroom. Armed guards? There have been armed guards at several schools where these shootings have taken place. 

Gun rights supporters, at least those who are extremist in their views, will always frame solutions in a way that results in more guns. And they will always misrepresent their opponents' arguments as "they're coming for our guns".

Whether it's mentally ill people using guns to kill large numbers of people, radicalized domestic terrorists using guns to kill large numbers of people, jilted lovers using guns to kill large numbers of people, disgruntled former employees using guns to kill large numbers of people, people who received no discipline as kids using guns to kill large numbers of people, or people who wouldn't have killed large numbers of people if only there had been prayer in schools, the common denominator is guns being used to kill large numbers of people. However crazy, however radicalized, however disgruntled, however divorced from morality, these shooters would have been hard pressed to kill large numbers of people without weapon that was designed to easily kill lots of people very quickly. 

The counter argument is that someone who wants to kill will find a way. But what are the alternatives? Knives are deadly, but how many people can you kill with a knife in the 3-5 minutes that these mass shootings take? What about a bomb? It's happened, but you generally don't go to a bomb show and buy a bomb. You have to construct your own, which takes time. A newly popular method of mass murder seems to be running over people with a car. Already barricades and bollards in public places minimize the damage that a car can do. It isn't even arguable that a semi-automatic weapon can do the most damage and can be operated by someone with scant training. 

Then there's the "good guy with a gun" theory. Search long enough and you will find examples of a shooter being stopped by an armed bystander, but you'll not need to search for very long at all to find examples where shooters went on a rampage even though there were people nearby who were armed, even many situations where there were specifically trained and armed security officers on site. The short time frame in which carnage can be meted out makes the "good guy" solution not much more than wishful thinking. In addition, if everyone is opening fire, how does law enforcement weed out the "good guys" from the "bad guys"? And how do we avoid "good guys" from killing other "good guys"?

One of the gun fetishists' arguments lately has been to use Israel as an example of a heavily armed populace where there are few mass shootings. What is glossed over is that the majority of civilian gun-owners in Israel have had military training. There are intensive background checks and universal registration that must be renewed every three years. Non-military veterans cannot own a gun until reaching the age of 27. So it's not just that they have a lot of guns, they are responsible about it. Everyone who wants to carry a gun is vetted...extreme vetting if you will. And a big difference between us and Israel is that in Israel, gun ownership is regarded as a privilege, not a constitutional right. Our Second Amendment has been an idol which has been mindlessly worshiped. 

The gun rights people are right, guns aren't to blame for these killings. Guns don't cause people to kill. But unlimited access to weapons that have no purpose other than quick, efficient killing does contribute to the ease with which these killings take place. It's about time we end our idiotic love affair with unrestricted gun ownership, stop mis-characterizing those who want to do something about it and take some god damn action.