Category Archives: 2024 Election

June 19, 2024 · 2:25 pm

2024 politics moving into high-gear

Last week some right-wing media edited a video of President Biden in Normandy supposedly just wandering away from other European leaders for no reason. The truth was Biden walked over and gave a thumbs up to parachutists, who had landed nearby. There was also a right-wing edited video hit job alleging that Biden pooped his pants and that one garnered a good bit of right-wing media and social media mileage. Certainly, Biden shows signs of cognitive decline and while not as severe, from my observations, so does Trump, who just turned 78.

Of course, any time I try to be objective and honest, the Biden White House and their liberal media cronies will come along and launch some spin effort that is so outrageously dishonest and goes so far beyond the right-wing dishonest messaging they’re reacting to. With Democrats and their liberal media crowd when it comes to former President Trump it’s always full-throttle scorched earth mode. So, the White House came out and accused right-wing media of creating deepfake and “cheapfake” videos of Biden rather than just stating that some of the right-wing videos were edited and didn’t give the complete context. The videos weren’t deepfakes of digitally altered – they were just edited. By last night all over liberal media they were repeating the White House’s “cheapfake” spin lie.

Early in President Trump’s presidency he visited Japan and a video of Trump dumping his whole box of fish food into a koi pod after Japan’s prime minister, Abe, fed spoonfuls of fish food and led to liberal media condemnation. The truth was the video clip of Trump dumping the entire box was edited to create that narrative, because the whole video showed that Abe dumped his entire box of fish food into the koi pond and then Trump followed Abe’s lead.

The point I’m trying to make is one I’ve blabbed about many times – don’t trust videos without more information. In 2019, ABC used video of a KY firing range and said it was video from Syria. Routinely, videos from other places have circulated reportedly showing atrocities in Gaza. And, the entire BLM operation is about using video footage edited to advance their anti-police/black victimhood narratives and ignite racial controversies to advance their political agenda.

I’d like to believe being objective and telling the truth always matters, but watching the Biden White House’s over-the-top reaction, left me wondering if they deserved being treated fairly, then I caught myself. How we treat others is about our moral compass, not about the lack of theirs.

More and more people distrust the news media, across the board, so they’re reaping what they sow for becoming partisan hacks. The Democrats scorched earth spin war seems to be backfiring frequently, as more people realize they’re being deliberately lied to.

I hope the Trump crowd doesn’t go full scorched earth like the Democrats, because if Trump offers a positive message for America based on policies from his first term, he’s likely to win in November. What’s not to like about America being energy independent or being able to buy groceries without feeling gut-punched by the high prices? Even many Democrats now realize that Trump’s effort to secure our borders is a national security imperative, not evil racism or xenophobia.

Trump is acting more disciplined with his messaging this time around… and the Biden record is so dismal, despite his obvious cognitive decline. That said, I still expect top Democrat powerbrokers to try to replace Biden.

The 2024 election is in full swing.

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Filed under 2024 Election, General Interest, Politics

June 14, 2024 · 4:40 pm

We’re in a clash of civilizations, whether we like it or not

Today is Flag Day and the US Army’s birthday. I remain hopeful for our republic.

There have been lots of alarming happenings this week that revved up WWIII chatter in the news and on social media.

To understand what’s happening now in world affairs, I think a good place to start is to realize big power competitions are as old as time and we are in the midst of a big power challenge that’s been unfolding long before Trump ever entered politics.

We can go back to the fairly rapid collapse of the Soviet Union in 1989-1992 to see that the world power structure can change rapidly and pretty much in ways the overwhelming majority of the experts and pundits didn’t see coming. The end of the Cold War left the United States in a position of world superpower, which our leaders weren’t prepared for and more often than not didn’t leverage to America’s advantage.

The Reagan era ended and from 1992-2000 the Clinton administration kept trying to kowtow to and legitimize numerous miscreants and anti-American regimes around the world, while also embracing the role of world policeman and getting the US entangled in several UN interventions (some of which ended very badly). There was an emerging foreign policy view that the US should shift its world leader role to more of just part of a globalist alliance and subservient to UN agendas.

Early in GWB’s presidency 9/11, an attack on American soil, happened and from that point on America went full-throttle on a global war on terror, which later developed a parallel foreign policy pipedream of regime-change to implant democracy in hostile Islamic-ruled lands. Many Republicans and Democrats embraced this regime-change foreign policy – it wasn’t just one side. The idea that a sharia governmental system could also be transformed into a democracy was always delusional, in my view, since sharia law is a rigid theocratic system. That’s where US policymakers were though and in Washington, if a few prominent experts start selling a new policy, most of the other prominent ones will just get on board with it. Groupthink rules in US policy circles.

The Obama administration turbo-charged the regime-change efforts, that started in the GWB administration, with dismal outcomes to both the peoples we were supposedly saving by our regime change efforts and to the US military, which expended a lot blood and treasure, while remaining stuck in endless rotations to Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria and beyond. Decades of non-stop deployments degraded our military readiness, even before Biden came along and forced far-left social engineering policies on the US military. It’s a double whammy to our military, that has definitely left America’s national security in peril, I believe. Add in the Biden open border policies and America is at a very precarious point.

With all these efforts, the Obama policymakers operated as if they had no clue about the Cold War world map and many Republicans, who should have known better, jumped on board the regime change train too. The Russians deployed troops to Syria to prop up Assad, while the Obama administration went on the search for mythical “moderate” Syrian rebels to arm to fight both ISIS and Assad. I strongly suspect the CIA was engaged in gunrunning from Benghazi to Syria and that the “moderate” Syrian rebels they were arming were connected to Al Nusra, which was Al Qaeda in Syria. The Russians were Cold War allies of Syria and maintained a large naval facility at Tartus in Syria, so they weren’t going to sit by and allow the US to topple Assad.

The Obama administration also was ham-handed in Ukraine. Russia was propping up a friendly Ukraine leader, while the Obama team openly and clumsily aided the toppling of that leader. Russia responded by deploying troops into Ukraine and annexed Crimea. Well here again, the Russians had their Black Sea Fleet at Sevastopol, a port city in Crimea. The Obama administration tucked tail and didn’t challenge the Russian annexation of Crimea… exactly how the Biden administration later had the situation in Afghanistan blow up in their face and then just let the Taliban humiliate the US with that debacle of a withdrawal.

Putin read that Afghanistan debacle as a green light and launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine two years ago. The US isn’t “poking the bear” by aiding Ukraine, because the bear is already on the attack. China likewise is on the attack – floods of cyberattacks on US infrastructure constantly – to take down our grid and water systems.

It’s the Biden (Obama crowd) weakness that is emboldening Russia and China, because they want to usurp America’s role as the world’s superpower.

This is the big picture of what’s going on. Russia will hype how the US and NATO are escalating things by arming Ukraine and Ukraine attacking Russian assets and supply lines in Russia, but this is hogwash. Russia launched the full-scale invasion into Ukraine. Russia has continually saber-rattled threatening NATO, Poland, Sweden, Moldova and even the US. Russia has threatened nuclear war more than once since invading Ukraine.

Russia is now embarking on boldly approaching US waters off of FL and engaging in naval exercises in Cuba. This isn’t the US poking the bear, this is at the very least Russia and China testing to see how far they can go and if the Biden administration will grovel. At worst, Russia is positioning and training for some actual hostile actions against the US that would surely involve China, Iran and other regimes hostile to the US. Since China, Russia and Iran want to see the US relegated to the dustbin of history (Iran’s rallying cry is “Death to America!”) and this presidential election year will be ripe for exploitation to escalate internal chaos, so all cards are on the table.

Reagan would never have worried about “poking the bear” and for the life of me I don’t understand how craven and silly so much of the right-wing has become. Sorry, the reality is the US will likely be dealing with more challenges to US power, especially if we appease Putin on his Ukraine demands.

These challenges to the US’s world position will continue regardless who is elected in November and in the meantime America’s adversaries want to create as much chaos, division and turmoil in America as possible. The expanding power and influence of China, Russia and Iran will inevitably lead to more clashes.

We have a left that’s become increasingly crazy and there are thousands protesting against Israel, who was attacked by Hamas and cheering on Hamas, a terrorist regime that invaded Israel and massacred over 1,000 people, mostly civilians. And and we have a right that likewise has become increasingly crazy and a crowd that believes not upsetting Putin and not providing Ukraine with arms will lead to peace. Putin invaded Ukraine in a bold effort to try to decapitate the government in Kiev, but there’s a segment of the right in America that blames Ukraine for all the problems. Putin will read the US and Europe abandoning Ukraine as another greenlight to embark on more territorial grabs, not as a time to broker a peace deal.

Has WWIII started? Well, I don’t expect the next major world power structure upheaval to be like WWI or WWIII, with massive armies and land and sea battles. I expect a lot more asymmetrical warfare and totally unconventional conflicts, which has already begun. How long could America withstand major asymmetrical attacks that succeeded, if the people are so divided and won’t unite to defend our homeland or they distrust all the information they hear? I’m more concerned about Americans being so divided than about what America’s adversaries are doing.

I expect things to get crazier as this year goes on, but I will continue to try to live my life as normally as possible – no matter what happens. During WWII British people packed tea and food to take to shelters during air raids and people in war zones still focus on everyday needs and taking care of their families. Trying hard to maintain as much normalcy in you life as possible, no matter what happens, is how you survive and thrive in adversity.

I’m thankful to live in America every day and today I’m proud to see the American flag still waving.

Note: I cross-stitched the picture above decades ago and still love the message: Our Country; Our Destiny.

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Filed under 2024 Election, Foreign Policy, General Interest, Politics

June 7, 2024 · 8:55 am

Word games escalate

A couple days ago I clicked on Time magazine’s May 28th interview of President Biden. Time actually has this quote on the transcript: “Below is a lightly edited transcript of the interview conducted by TIME Washington Bureau Chief Massimo Calabresi and Editor-in-Chief Sam Jacobs.” That adverb “lightly” made me distrust Time magazine’s recounting of this interview and I didn’t even waste my time reading any further.

A week ago we were bombarded with media hit takes, recognizable when across liberal media they start repeating the same words and phrases, on the verdict in a NYC court against former President Trump. This week Hunter Biden is on trial in a Delaware court room facing charges that he illegally purchased a gun. Both trials highlight a definite sleaze factor – Trump paying hush money to a porn star and Trump hired Michael Cohen as his personal lawyer and had him on the payroll for years, then there’s Hunter Biden’s drug addiction, sexual relationship with his dead brother’s widow, and a wide array of debauchery he personally chronicled on his laptop.

However, in all fairness the Trump trial had Trump being convicted on 34 counts, where the jurors didn’t even have to agree on the underlying crimes and I still don’t understand how federal crimes that the feds didn’t prosecute could be given new life as the basis for state crimes in NY. In the Hunter Biden case, its clear that Hunter Biden was a drug addict and he lied on his application for purchasing a firearm. Usually federal prosecutors guard their turf when states try to overstep, but in Trump’s case, the #3 lawyer at the DOJ joined the NY prosecutor’s team to get Trump. All of it will lead to more corruption, less trust in the criminal justice system and more abuses of power. America is on a very dangerous path.

Democrats are way more organized, ruthless, and shameless in lawfare and in their media spin war efforts. Yesterday, I saw a Dem talking point warning that Trump will try to throw his political opponents in jail… as Trump is awaiting sentencing in July and could have a Biden-supporting judge toss him in jail. It’s surreal at this point.

If you aren’t emotionally invested in one of the partisan sides, well, I think most people would consider America’s leaders and their families trashy and corrupt. The media, across the board, is trashy and corrupt too. However, Democrats and their liberal media friends have decades of experience running these elaborate spin war operations and Republicans only began to grasp the scope of the Dems spin information war since Donald Trump entered the political arena.

When it comes to sleaze, we can add in all these highfaluting, top former intelligence officials, who pedaled the Clinton campaign’s bogus Steele dossier, purporting Trump was colluding with the Russians and presented the dossier as a serious intelligence report by a former British spy. Along with the “dossier” (doesn’t that word sound official,) since 2016, the “consensus of experts via a letter released to the media” has become a common Democrat spin tool of persuasion. There have been a string of these letters, orchestrated by Democrats to fearmonger and spread lies about Trump and intelligence information, which the liberal media then puts on blast to amplify. In October 2020 many of the same officials who pedaled the Steele dossier in the media got behind a letter signed by dozens of former intel officials stating that the Hunter Biden laptop was Russian disinformation.

The mainstream media and social media companies tried to squash the Hunter Biden laptop story in 2020, but this week, the federal prosecutor in this Hunter Biden gun trial called a FBI expert to the stand, who testified under oath that the FBI had the Hunter Biden laptop in custody in 2019 – long before the November 2020 election and the FBI knew the laptop was Hunter’s and not Russian disinformation. Why didn’t the FBI issue any kind of statement in 2020 after those former intelligence officials released that letter? Did any of those former top intelligence officers contact the FBI for information? And, what does Anthony Blinken, Secretary of State, who reportedly orchestrated that intelligence officers’ letter spin effort, have to say?

In the past few days, media reports that top Democrat senator from NY, Chuck Schumer has a brother at some fancy law firm and his brother provided three of the firms top lawyers to be part of Alvin Bragg’s team to prosecute Trump. So, it wasn’t only the DOJ’s #3 top lawyer who assisted Bragg. And at the same time Democrats and their liberal media cronies keep blabbing about how serious these cases against Trump are, how they’re all about “protecting our democracy,” and how there’s nothing political about these cases.

No matter what happens to Trump, Democrats have normalized their scorched earth spin war, where they’ll spin up any lies with the aid of their media friends, if it advances their political objectives and now they’ve normalized using the courts to take down political opponents. It’s going to be very hard to reestablish boundaries in our politics, even if there’s a public demand for it. And once one side stakes out new political rules and boundaries, the other side will surely play by the new rules. The Trump campaign in the 2024 GOP primary adopted many of the same vile Dem spin game tactics against Ron DeSantis and at times both Democrats/liberal media and Trump mouthpieces were running the same orchestrated spin lies to destroy DeSantis.

All the words coming out of our political class ring hollow and sorry, the political class won’t save America. In 2024, Trump might look like the safer choice, even to Republicans and conservatives who cringe at Trump’s lying and baggage (for example, like hush money to a porn star and having sleazebag Michael Cohen on his payroll), but the truth is political partisans and our media, across the board, are 100% committed to escalating the spin information war, not ending it.

In 2024, we have two old men running for office – one whose cognitive function is declining rapidly and who has always been a big liar and the other doesn’t look well either and he too has always been a big liar. That’s the truth. We’re still left with picking the lesser of two evils. Even a conservative like me, who doesn’t care for Trump at all, can say Trump policies were better for me and my family and better for America, but what’s on my mind is this scorched earth spin information war could easily take more dangerous turns before we even get to election day this year. Democrats successfully used the FBI and intelligence agencies in their scorched earth spin operations, even when Trump was president. Now, Democrats control the executive branch. What’s left for Dem scorched earth tactics to stop Trump? We’re sure to find out in the next few months.

It’s been over 20 years that I’ve been blabbing about the danger of this spin information war having only one outcome – tearing our country apart and I still believe that. There is no 2024 candidate who is going to save America as long as Americans buy into this scorched earth spin information as an acceptable part of our political process

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Filed under 2024 Election, General Interest, Information War, Politics

June 3, 2024 · 11:42 am

Thoughts on the Trump conviction

Often with our American political dramas the media noise drowns out important bits of information and sweeps us along with narratives intended to fuel partisan divides and incite emotional reactions. That hype keeps people watching and clicking along, but often too many people just buy into the narratives and repeat the talking points fed to them. Those emotional reactions also drive poll numbers, which in this never-ending spin information war, get hyped by the media and political pundits and are a constant fixture used to sell the media narratives. This is a sophisticated form of manipulating and selling manufactured “public opinion.”

So, this past week with the criminal conviction of former President Trump on 34 counts, there were important bits of information that weren’t hyped.

First there’s this bit of information: Prosecutors Met With Biden Admin Before 3 Trump Indictments. Alvin Bragg met with the Biden DOJ before filing state charges against former President Trump.

The next bit of information is in this MSN news story: Scrutiny of prosecutor Matthew Colangelo intensifies after Trump conviction. So, Colangelo was the #3 person in the Biden DOJ and he left that position in 2022 to join Alvin Bragg’s DA office in NYC. This guy left a top DOJ position to work in a city DA office… From this MSN story:

“Bragg plucked Colangelo from his top post at the DOJ to help with white-collar prosecutions in December 2022. Colangelo had little experience in that field, but he did have a wealth of knowledge about Trump.”

“Before working at the DOJ, Colangelo worked for Attorney General Letitia James, who investigated Trump for three years before bringing a massive civil lawsuit against him and the Trump Organization in the fall of 2022.”

After watching the Democrat efforts to use lawfare to destroy Trump’s 2024 presidential campaign, well, it’s obvious these legal cases are completely political and not about justice. The case that I thought had the most merit was the mishandling classified documents, but here again it’s hard to take that seriously considering President Biden mishandled classified information too and no charges were brought.

Then there was Hillary Clinton using her husband’s private email server, that he had set up in their home for his Clinton Foundation work, as her State Dept. server while she was Secretary of State. Of course, she also had classified information in some of those emails, that she mishandled. The Clintons, with the aid of the media, were able to spin Hillary into a victim of a right-wing witch-hunt and never honed in on why Hillary used Bill Clinton’s private server for her State Dept. work. Through all the investigative drama, it wasn’t until I read the FBI Notes, released in the Fall of 2016 that I understood the origins of the Clinton server – Bill Clinton had his aide, Justin Cooper, set up that homebrew server, for his foundation work. Hillary used other email providers for her email, until she became Secretary of State. According to the FBI timeline in their server investigation it was in the weeks before Hillary became Secretary of State, the Clintons had Cooper and Hillary’s campaign IT guy, Bryan Pagliano, upgrade the homebrew server, to accommodate Hillary’s State Dept. email load. That’s what the upgrade was all about – merging her State Dept. information with their Clinton Foundation business. So, she used other email service providers, then rather than use the State Dept. secure email system, the Clintons merged Hillary’s State Dept. business with their Clinton Foundation business on a homebrew server in their home. There was also the bleach bit server in Hillary’s email investigation and she never turned over many of the FBI subpoenaed electronic devices – she had numerous BlackBerry devices (some destroyed by Cooper with a hammer) and out of 5 iPads, only 3 were turned over to the FBI.

After all the Clinton corruption in 2016 from the email scandal to the bogus Clinton campaign smear operation “Steele dossier,” well, now we’re supposed to get outraged about Trump paying hush money to a porn star in 2016. Sorry, the two separate sets of rules, where Democrats, with the aid of the liberal media, can spin away all their crimes and then spin up Trump as the biggest threat to democracy, who’s going to destroy the world… well, I am done trusting anything the media reports. I also admit that after listening to many explanations on these charges against Trump, I was left shaking my head trying to understand the underlying crimes… and then I thought about all the Clinton campaign and Democrat efforts to corruptly “influence the 2016 election.” C’mon, some shady bookkeeping vs. the efforts of the DNC and Clinton campaign to hire Perkins Coie and Fusion GPS to concoct the Steele dossier.

In 2022, CNN reported: FEC fines Hillary Clinton campaign and DNC over Trump-Russia dossier research. This article states, “The Clinton campaign and the DNC never conceded that they violated campaign finance laws, but they agreed to drop their pushback and accept the civil fines, according to the FEC letter.” The DNC was fined $105,000 and the Clinton campaign was fined $8,000 and now we’re suppose to think Trump facing up to 20 years in prison is justice. From USA Today: “Each of the 34 counts Trump was convicted of individually has a maximum sentence of four years. Sentences can be imposed consecutively – meaning they must be served one after the other – but New York has a 20-year maximum consecutive sentence for Class E felonies.”

Clearly, there are two sets of rules when it comes to Democrats and Trump. The FEC dropped the hush money Trump matter, but then the Biden DOJ and Soros-backed prosecutors met and conjured up these 2024 campaign year cases against Trump hyping 2016 campaign actions. However, if you bring up the 2016 Clinton campaign corruption the mainstream media and Democrats insist it’s a witch-hunt against Hillary.

There are no guardrails left for Democrat spin information war, when the FBI buys into and sells Dem talking points like the white nationalism hysteria or Comey inventing an intent provision in the law to exonerate Hillary, or top intelligence officials routinely leaking information to attack Trump or signing a letter released to the media that the Hunter Biden laptop was Russian disinformation, to now they’re using lawfare and turning the criminal justice system into a potent political weapon to try to take out a GOP presidential candidate.

It won’t stop with attacking Trump. Anyone who gets in the way of the Democrats agenda will be targeted by the Democrat political machine. Supreme Court Justice Alito is under attack by Democrats and liberal media now for a flag his wife flew in front of their home. Justice Thomas is a regular target. We all saw what happened to Justice Brett Kavanaugh during his confirmation hearing. Democrats have no qualms about attacking some courts and judges in America, while they rant about “protecting our democracy” and how we must respect this NYC court verdict.

Beyond our shores, America is looking less and less like a shining city on a hill and more like a banana republic.

This intensifying “winning by any means necessary” could reach a tipping point quickly. Trump’s sentencing is scheduled for July and at this point, I won’t be surprised if this judge, who donated to the Biden campaign, imposes a sentence with jail time for Trump. I don’t think millions of Trump supporters will passively sit by and watch a former president, who they believe is a victim of corrupt Democrat prosecutions, be carted off to jail.

Democrats and their media allies are trying to ramp up branding Trump a “convicted felon,” but that’s likely to fall on deaf ears for half the country. We’re at a dangerous point when half the country loses faith in the rule of law and justice in America.

This presidential election year has now taken a dangerous turn and all bets are off on what happens next. Things could easily go off-the-rails very quickly, if Trump is sentenced to jail time.

It’s a good time for all of us to work on becoming better prepared for a bumpy road to the 2024 US presidential election. The 2020 election year dramas could very easily look like minor bumps in the road compared to the next few months.

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Filed under 2024 Election, General Interest, Hillary's Email Scandal, Information War, Politics

March 8, 2024 · 10:51 am

Biden delivers pitch-perfect State of Our Disunity address

Last night President Biden arrived late to deliver the annual State of the Union address. Once at the podium, the president bypassed the normal protocol of the Speaker of the House introducing the president and just launched into a vitriolic 2024 campaign speech.

He railed against Republicans and yelled for over an hour. There was no effort to speak of national unity.

Biden finally spoke the name of the young woman in GA, who was murdered by an illegal immigrant recently, but he muddled her name, saying “Lincoln” instead of Laken Riley and he blamed Republicans for the border problems. The truth is Biden rescinded all of President Trump’s tougher border policies in 2021 when he took office and that has led to this massive illegal immigration increase in America.

A man yelled out during the SOTU address and was escorted out by security. It was later reported that what he yelled was, “Abby Gate,” and he is a Gold Star father, whose son was killed during Biden’s disastrous Afghanistan withdrawal. President Biden has never spoken to this Gold Star father or spoken his son’s name publicly.

For Biden’s efforts, Democrats and liberals raced on social media and TV news to praise Biden’s “fiery” speech and cheer his vigor.

The president’s hour-plus diatribe was followed by the GOP rebuttal speech delivered by Alabama Senator Katie Britt. Britt used her kitchen as the backdrop for a high-pitched, roller-coaster of female histrionics that seemed overly staged and disingenuous.

Both speeches were just more bad political theater. To complete the evening’s political clown show optics, Rep. Rashida Talib and some her Democrat Squad members came decked out in black and white Palestinian keffiyeh scarves and Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene donned a red MAGA hat.

Both speeches were an insult to the American people, talking down to us and worst of all using gimmicky ploys to try to manipulate our emotions.

Biden did make one big foreign policy announcement – a plan for the US military to spearhead building a pier in a Gaza port, to facilitate humanitarian aid deliveries to Gaza civilians. In typical Biden administration fashion – there were no details given, but Democrats roared with applause last night.

Israel and Egypt have maintained a blockade on Gaza for over a decade to deter arms supplies and counter Hamas terrorist activities and now Biden is suggesting putting the US military in the midst of this active Israel-Hamas war zone to build a pier. The same architects of the Afghanistan withdrawal debacle are still in the Biden administration and still in charge – no one was relieved or fired. These same people would be heading up this Gazan pier project. It’s an insane idea to stick American troops into some war zone as humanitarian workers.

So, there was the Gold Star father being led away by security, as he reminded us of the Biden Afghanistan withdrawal debacle, and along comes Biden to try to lead America into a “humanitarian” Gazan pier-building project in the middle of a hot war zone. Sure, that makes perfect sense…

It’s been reported that this Gold Star father has been arrested.

A ranting old man was talking about putting US troops into a war zone for a humanitarian pier-building project and he insisted at the same time that there will be “no boots on the ground” and Democrats happily cheered. An angry father whose son died as the result of a Biden foreign policy debacle was led away by security and arrested…

Who the hell is going to protect US troops while they build this pier?

The inmates are running the asylum – that’s the real state of our union.

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February 29, 2024 · 8:56 pm

Who’s really a RINO?

The Trump-loyal part of the GOP has been cheering the announcement that Senate Minority Leader, Mitch McConnell is stepping down. A sizable percentage of the Trump-loyal GOP are just like Trump – they weren’t involved in the Republican Party before the 2016 presidential election. I’ve been a pretty loyal Republican since 1980, when President Ronald Reagan was elected and now I consider myself a “none-of-the-above” when it comes to Washington politics.

Many of the Trump-loyalist comments I’ve seen online were trashing McConnell, saying good riddance and there’s a theme of how McConnell wasn’t a true “conservative” and now they’ll hopefully have some real conservative leading the GOP in the Senate.

One of Trump’s biggest weaknesses as president was his total lack of knowledge on the Constitution and how our federal institutions work – including the powers and duties of the President of the United States. Trump does not pay attention to details or study policies and his positions fluctuate constantly, based on what the buzz is in the media. Throughout his four years, he often announced policies or actions, then backpedaled when he was informed he didn’t have the presidential power to do that. He also believed that he could cut deals just like he did in the civilian business world and those invariably failed too or he’d pivot to some other spin battle with another liberal media personality or more often than not – target another “RINO” to attack. Of course, there was always the nebulous Deep State to attack to rally the faithful too. Despite, all that, there were many Trump administration policies that I supported and still do support – especially securing our borders.

Today I heard some Trump-loyalist comments online labelling McConnell as a “RINO,” which is completely absurd. McConnell has a decades-long track record of championing conservative causes and winning. And he was instrumental in there being a conservative majority on the US Supreme Court. The “RINO” smear that Trump-loyalists toss about constantly more accurately fits Trump, who was a NY liberal and Bill Clinton’s golfing buddy, before he decided to enter the 2016 presidential race than it does Mitch McConnell, who was fighting conservative battles back when Trump was cheering on Bill Clinton.

Trump’s doing well in the polls right now and the non-stop Democrat lawfare efforts to neutralize Trump’s 2024 presidential bid have been backfiring in dramatic fashion. Trump could very likely win the election in November. The Biden presidency, in my view, has been a total disaster, but the incendiary combination of Trump’s impulsiveness and the Democrat/liberal media deranged efforts to stop Trump could lead to more destabilization within America.

There’s no soft-landing regardless what happens in November, but when it comes to the Senate, I expect a Trump-loyalist led GOP in the US Senate to be much like the current Trump-loyalist led US House – constant in-fighting and a non-stop GOP circular firing squad – that will accomplish nothing. The Trump-loyalist faction in Washington loves to label and take out Republicans, who are effective at navigating within the US legislative institutions. Unfortunately, for the GOP, those purged knew how to cut deals and actually get legislation passed, while the Trump-loyalist crowd spends most of their time online, preening in front of media cameras, and smearing other Republicans as “RINOs.”

The big picture is America’s two main political parties are deeply fractured, corrupt and driven by radical factions. Both main parties are being hollowed out by extremists – the far-left in the Democratic Party and the Trump-loyalists in the GOP. Both parties no longer seem able to tolerate moderates or centrists, which is a symptom of how deep the partisan divides have grown in America. Within Congress, the only way to get legislation passed or stop legislation is to have seasoned legislators, who understand the intricacies of how the House and Senate function and can build consensus. That usually takes years of experience in Congress. Mitch McConnell was quite successful at that and so far the Trump-approved House Speaker, Mike Johnson, has been even more ineffective than Kevin McCarthy and the House GOP dominated by raging Trump-loyal firebrands has accomplished absolutely nothing.

Any political party led by people who are more committed to internal purges (destroying RINOs) over any sort of political platform that allows for differing viewpoints will become more and more dysfunctional and more radicalized. This bodes poorly for the longevity of the Trumpian GOP, once Trump is gone, and it bodes poorly for the GOP in the House or Senate being able to build consensus and pass legislation in the near term. On the other side, the Democratic Party keeps trying to appease the most extreme factions on the left, so there’s no moderating force to be found there. Both sides seem poised to become more radical and more extreme and that’s terrible for all of America.

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December 19, 2023 · 10:34 am

On the hunt for our American spirit

This is going to be a politics blog post of sorts, but here are three pots of cherry tomatoes I stuck on my back porch a few weeks ago. I had neglected the plants in my fall garden, so these have stunted growth and the tomatoes are tiny, but amazingly the plants are still producing. Out of the eight containers of cherry tomatoes, I picked three that looked like they might survive. These are from Burpee Veranda Red Hybrid tomato seeds and I’ve had more success in my backyard with this type of tomato than any other ones I’ve tried. Hopefully, some plant food and regular watering will help them along.

Now to the politics… Looking at where America is at and somehow believing a highly contentious presidential election year and an election, are going to do a single thing to pull Americans together seems delusional to me. I expect the divides to further deepen in the next year, but that doesn’t mean everything is hopeless..

After giving a lot of thought to our American political divides, first I’d like to give my short take on the 2024 presidential election. The 2024 presidential election can’t fix what’s broken in America.

The divides in our country can’t be healed with a presidential election, that half the country won’t accept as legitimate, and that’s where we’re at. However, I still hold out hope for America and after my quick presidential election take, I’ll explain why I’m still hopeful.

If Biden were to win – Trump supporters would be screaming the election was rigged or stolen. Mayhem would ensue.

If Biden dropped out and some other Dem. candidate won – same thing Trump supporters would be screaming the election was rigged or stolen.

If Trump won – Democrats and liberals would take to the streets with a march that would make the 2016 Women’s March and #Resist look like small fries. They would not accept the election as legitimate.

If DeSantis or Haley were to win the GOP nomination – Trump would not accept that gracefully and he’d set about to attack the GOP primary as rigged or stolen and discourage his supporters from showing up to vote. If either of them won, well, the Trump supporters and Democrats and liberals wouldn’t accept that as legitimate, especially DeSantis, since he’s determined to push back against the left’s “woke” agenda. Even though some leftie mouthpieces aren’t as harsh about Haley now, if she were to win, I just harken back to how Dems and the liberal media ranted about GWB and compared him to Hitler. This delegitimizing elections kicked into high gear in America in 2000, not 2016. The Clinton impeachment scandal and that scorched earth spin war effort (Carville called it going scorched earth) set this delegitimizing and stolen election politics into motion.

Add in all the other corruption into the mix – Trump corruption, Biden corruption, media corruption and seeing how the partisan political corruption has seeped into some of our most important institutions, like those tasked with safeguarding our national security and safety, well, I just don’t see much hope of Washington or politicians changing course and trying to work on unifying America.

However, we’re not hopeless. When people talk about other things, besides politics, usually they can still find some common ground. Although, just about anything can become a contentious political issue these days, we all have the power to try to start changing that. I need to work on moving away from the politics stuff too and especially the politics news. I’ve been trying to wean myself off politics news for a while. Then I’ll get caught up in some hot button political topic and do a bunch of googling, trying to figure it out – like the Twitter Files reporting after a House hearing a week or so ago. I wrote some blog posts and now I’m done with that (for now), because nothing I write about that is going to make a bit of difference. Plus, in the bigger scheme of things, what really matters is our families, our friends, our communities.

The partisan spin information war will continue to blow hot – because a lot of media and politicians get rich and powerful by fueling it. The rest of us just get played for suckers. That’s where the hope comes in. I think that since all the pandemic drama, the protesting dramas and all the never-ending political drama, many Americans long for a return to some sort of normalcy, where people aren’t consumed by political drama constantly. Most Americans also don’t want civil disorder or lawlessness. I still believe most of America wants a return to living where there’s a bit more tolerance and definitely stronger communities. These are things that are within the reach of every community to build, if we start making the effort. 

We have the choice to buy into the media-driven and social-media driven drama or we can work at weaning ourselves away from all the hot takes, the endless fearmongering and drama and the steady stream of “Us vs. Them” conspiracy theories that try to drag us down rabbit holes of distrust and division.

My father was a kind and good-natured man. He worked hard, was dedicated to his family, and he was one of those people who never met a stranger. He did watch the news and read the local newspaper every day, but he had no interest whatsoever in politics. He was more interested in local news and what was going on around him, oh, and his garden and yard. He had a gift for getting things to grow. That’s probably a healthier perspective. 

Most of these tempest in a teapot “national conversation” stories aren’t accurate or honest reporting, are skewed to advance a political agenda and have no relevance on anything really. There’s an entire class of political/culture punditry that makes locating videos on social media of the most extreme weirdos and then hyping them as representative of “the other side.” There are a lot of people who get rich off of this – on the left and the right. 

The demise of local newspapers has also pulled us away from paying close attention to our own communities. Cell phones leave many people living almost every waking minute transfixed on the little screen, and completely oblivious to what’s going on around them. Years ago, I quipped that America could be invaded and taken over and a sizable percentage of the country likely wouldn’t notice, unless it interfered in their cell phone service.

What’s happening right around us is way more important than some “national conversation” topic drummed up for clicks or to feed a political agenda. In any type of emergency situation – what’s going on locally is what we’re all going to need to be paying attention to. If we start working on building even a tiny bit of community around us, before there’s a crisis, well, we’ll be way ahead of the game in trying to weather those storms. We also might get better at bridging divides, one smile and small goodwill gesture at a time.

America is blessed with many natural resources, but one of our most under-utilized is our American spirit. Yes, that American spirit is still alive, if we just dig it out from under the pile of fear and hate-driven news/social media “information” overload. Americans are a people with a do-gooder gene in our national DNA. We pitch in to help other people and even countries, we rush to donate money, resources, and offer a helping hand. We can rekindle the American spirit without any government studies, new laws or government spending. We don’t need politicians for this at all – we can all begin to work on it and pass it on with a smile and lending a helping hand, as we can.

Changing our attitude and rekindling our American spirit doesn’t require some big national movement or setting up some organization or group. Any of us can work on this on our own or within our families or with a few friends or in our communities. Important things in life don’t really start with just a change of heart – it requires taking those first steps to really start. You can think about something for the rest of your life, but until you get up off your butt and start doing, nothing’s going to change.

Rather than looking at everything as Us vs. Them, I’m going to work on looking for tiny bits of common ground with people I disagree with on politics and hot button issues. With Christmas days away, this might be a good thing for many people in America to try.

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December 4, 2023 · 9:41 am

A bit of blathering about 2024

Fair warning, this is going to be a 2024 GOP presidential politics blog post. The Republican primary race still hosts a sizable field of contenders and since modern American politics runs on polling (a spin-driven business fueled by politicos and media in America), former president, Donald Trump has carried a wide lead all along.

I didn’t vote for Trump or Hillary in 2016, but in 2020 I was so alarmed by the bizarre from-the-basement Biden COVID Preacher campaign, that I did vote for Trump. The Jan.6th craziness and that entire “Stop the Steal” sore loser escapade made me regret that vote, even though the Biden years have been worse than I expected. In 2024, I won’t vote for Biden or Trump. I firmly believe it’s going to take a dramatic cultural shift, outside of our corrupted political system, to both Make American Great Again and “protect our democracy” that both parties keep yammering about.

My blog is filled with loads of posts about my belief that Trump’s a total fraud – Clinton friend and Howard Stern best bud turned into the GOP Savior was (and still is) too much for me to swallow, but millions of Americans got on the MAGA circus train and are still riding it. I understand why when I look across at the Democrats and liberal media chokehold on traditional American viewpoints and values. Now here’s where I see the GOP primary race.

The only two other GOP candidates with a shot, in my view, are DeSantis and Haley, who have tried various shifting messaging and staking of policy positions to gain some traction and momentum.

Haley has carefully avoided attacking Trump, while trying to don the cloak of foreign policy experience diva, of a former US ambassador to the UN… in the Trump administration. She’s largely pitched her messaging toward the NeverTrump and Trump-weary corner of the GOP and Independents.

On foreign policy, Haley puts forth many traditional Republican positions, that seem more in tune with pre-9/11 America. I understand Haley’s foreign policy positions, because they’re based on geopolitical reality, not populist pipedreams. Those positions are at odds with where Trump’s populist MAGA foreign policy circle seems to be at. Trump’s the GOP pied piper, who still merrily leads his followers along playing tunes of, not only MAGA and taking back our country, but he even offers foreign policy medleys to Putin’s a victim and NATO is our enemy too. Trump’s continuing his pattern of staking out wildly volatile policy positions. He often would announce policies that were at odds with his own administration policies, then he’d flounder around to talk his way around to his administration policies. Haley has gained a bit of traction and a bit of momentum, but she’s not making inroads into winning over MAGA Republicans, who still reportedly make up the majority of the party.

Haley likes to play the feminist card, selling a softer GOP feminist brand, which also includes playing the victim card, just like liberal feminists. With culture war issues, she often initially buys into the liberal media narratives, comes under attack from the right, then she backtracks and tries to find a position more in line with the MAGA part of the GOP. It’s doubtful she would take the fight to the liberals on most culture war issues.

Florida governor, Ron DeSantis, still sounds great on policy in interviews, but his campaign hasn’t been able to gain traction against the massive and relentless Trump and liberal media/Dem efforts to spin him into the dirt. DeSantis began trying to run on “fighting Woke” everywhere, from the schools, to the boardrooms, to the oceans white with foam… His campaign kicked off with a glitch-ridden digital launch on X/formerly Twitter, probably in hopes of trying to stake out territory owned by Trump.

Trump “owned the libs” on Twitter and used his personal Twitter account to demolish both Dem and the liberal media spin attacks throughout the 2016 campaign and his entire presidency. However, while Trump’s Twitter battles were important in the media spin war, his movement was born on the ground. His 2016 secret sauce, since the vast majority of Americans weren’t even on Twitter, was his big rally shows and that travelling political circus, which was a Hollywood-type production, selling populist snake oil along with red hats emblazoned with a new right-wing movement, MAGA. Make America Great Again rallies are where the MAGA movement really galvanized, not on Twitter. Twitter was where Trump learned to fight out spin battles against the liberal media/Dem pundit class and win.

DeSantis is great at interviews and discussing policy, but he’s awkward at the retail politics. The DeSantis X campaign fielded a constantly online cadre of personalities, many former Trump Twitter spin commandos, who tried and have failed to win over Trump supporters. Meanwhile, the Trump campaign launched non-stop personal attacks against DeSantis, his wife, his height, and even his boots. The Trump campaign attacks and the liberal media attacks against DeSantis have been largely identical – trying to mock and marginalize DeSantis and they’ve been successful.

The Desantis Iowa strong campaign, hyping visiting all 99 counties, in hopes of using an Iowa primary win to fuel support in other early primary states hasn’t budged the national polling. Beyond the initial interest in his Iowa campaign, there are so many other things going on in America (and beyond) for there to be much national interest in rather low-key campaign events in rural Iowa counties. Currently, the DeSantis campaign reportedly is under another reorganization shuffle and defections from his campaign to the the Trump campaign will likely intensify, unless there’s some dramatic change.

The biggest miscalculation seems to have been DeSantis’ decision to try to out-MAGA Trump and win over loyal Trump supporters by attacking Trump. There’s a glaring double standard when you listen to many Trump supporters – none of the rules of behavior they hold for everyone else ever apply to Trump. Trump even has taken to spewing lines about how he’s shouldering all these politically-motivated lawsuits for his followers – he’s your savior, doing it all for you.

Meanwhile, DeSantis promises to slay all of MAGA world’s enemies that Trump failed to do. While he has been a very successful governor, tackling the federal bureaucracy isn’t FL. Trump is light on details and big on vaguely defined promises, but DeSantis buries his own broader message in so many policy plans and promises, that it just sounds like too much noise at this point. DeSantis demolished CA governor, Gavin Newsom in a Hannity debate last week, but here again, in the bigger picture, I doubt that will result in a boost in his poll numbers.

Most of MAGA world still seems to live where hazy memories of 2016 euphoria linger, 2020 “stolen election” anger still burns, but most of all the wreckage of Biden policies hits them in the face at the gas pump, in the grocery store, when they wonder about their next electric bill… or WWIII erupting. Yet the Biden administration keeps selling Bidenomics and telling Americans the economy’s doing great. And along with all the economic disasters, remnants of the destructive “Defund the Police” policies continue to erode public safety in cities all across America, our borders are not secure, and the multitude of liberal culture war battles from transgender issues, guns, to free speech controversies still burn hot. The Biden presidency poll numbers are consistently bleak.

President Biden has worse poll numbers than Trump and the other Republican candidates. Despite all the difficulties in Dems trying to switch to another candidate, somehow, some way, I won’t be surprised if Biden isn’t the 2024 Democratic nominee.

Barring some major upheaval, Trump is on the path to the 2024 GOP nomination.

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August 25, 2023 · 1:28 am

A long ramble about the GOP debate & Trump

I did watch the GOP debate Wednesday night. So, first I’ll do a quick rundown of how I think the candidates did:

  • DeSantis – won, but no break-out moments
  • Vivek – will probably get a bit of a bounce due to some of the GOP now loves sideshow antics
  • Nikki Haley – performed better than expected
  • Tim Scott – a few good moments, but faded as the debate went on
  • Chris Christie – way more subdued than expected
  • Mike Pence – preaching to a GOP about principles that the Trump GOP replaced with unswerving devotion to Trump.
  • Asa Hutchison – came across as angry and bitter – a relic from an older GOP.
  • Doug Burgum – governor of ND, unknown nationally – came across as a really nice guy.

Now for a bunch of rambling opinions, here goes.

There’s probably a good portion of Trump’s hardcore base who consider everyone other than Trump, and whoever his current groupies surrounding him are, as part of the Deep State. A lot of terms get thrown around in MAGA circles that are the same sort of “othering” that people on the right accuse the left of doing to demonize and marginalize them. MAGA Republicans fume about being labeled Deplorables, but they throw out RINOs or neocons or communists labels constantly And no, DeSantis did not call MAGA Republicans “listless vessels,” because in context, he was speaking about Republicans in Congress, who only kiss Trump’s butt rather take action based on principles.

Certain names, like Paul Ryan or Trump’s vice president, Mike Pence, get spit out like curses. The people who believe Trump is the only person who can “save” America, won’t be persuaded to even consider any other GOP candidates. I’ve never been that dedicated to a politician and I sure was an admirer of President Ronald Reagan, but I still saw his flaws and I disagreed with him on some issues. Trump loyalists are all-in on Donald J. Trump – no matter what he says, no matter what he does – they will support him – no matter what. And they demand no accountability for mistakes he’s made – like keeping Dr. Fauci in charge of COVID policy up until the day he left office

I recognize my views aren’t what “most other Americans” believe or think, but within our very partisan echo-chambers – Trump supporters believe most of America believes what they do and Democrats believe most of America believes what they do. America is over 334 million people – that’s a whole lot of people to assume that most of them believe the same thing you do. While I am not big on trusting polls, consistently both Trump and Biden have very high negatives across the political spectrum. I’ve always been rather a contrarian and am used to holding opinions that aren’t popular and I’m fine with that.

There are plenty of Republicans, who are sick to death of Trump’s sideshows, sick of all the chaos and long for there to be some principles to the GOP platform, beyond loyalty to Trump. These people aren’t all RINOs – many of them are committed to conservative principles and the Constitution. There’s also a faction of Never Trump, former Republicans, who threw in their lot with Democrats in 2020 and became Biden supporters, but I truly believe most of the ones in the media were bought and paid for, to be Trump-bashers on liberal media.

Some of Trump’s most devoted mouthpieces were Democrats and became Republicans like 5 minutes ago and some, like Trump himself, have closer ties to the Clintons and George Soros than any Republicans in Congress. Trump was golfing buddies with Bill Clinton for years, after Clinton left office, and he was friends with both Bill and Hillary Clinton. Trump made a call to Bill Clinton in 2015, to discuss entering the 2016 race – that’s how close they were. Bill Clinton urged Trump to run (the perfect Bill Clinton triangulation strategy formed – portray Bernie as the far-left kook and Trump as the far-right kook, clearing the middle path for Hillary.) Hillary was such a terrible candidate that even Bill Clinton’s brilliant political strategy didn’t get her past the finish line. I thought the Clintons were total crooks and corrupt to the core – but I also think Bill Clinton is a political genius. Trump squeaked by in 2016 (Hillary won the popular vote with 48% to Trump’s 46%). I live in a world where I look for information and facts – Trump’s 2004 Trump Tower Chicago project was funded by Deutsche Bank and a trio of hedge funds – one which was Soros backed. Here’s a bit from Wikipedia:

“On October 16, 2004, Donald Trump and Hollinger International, the parent company of the Chicago Sun-Times, completed the $73 million sale of the former home of the newspaper a week after it relocated.[95] On October 28, 2004, Trump held a ceremony to begin the demolition of the former Sun-Times Building.[96][97][98] The demolition and construction were financed by a $650 million loan from Deutsche Bank and a trio of hedge funds, one of which George Soros backed.[99]“

For me, DeSantis’ strongest selling point wasn’t in the debate. I watched him during Hurricane Ian and saw principled, servant leadership, day after day, as he led disaster relief efforts in FL. I realized then that if there was a crisis and he said, “Come on, follow me!” I would trust him to try to get us safely through the crisis and I haven’t felt that way about Trump, Biden, any other politicians in a long, long time. Biden is a walking disaster all by himself – just look at his handling of this Maui wildfire disaster. We have the situation in Maui right now, with a president who didn’t want to interrupt his vacations and all he had to say was, “No Comment” for almost a week.

Trump was more invested in fighting the liberal media and Democrats during more than one disaster – especially with the hurricane in Puerto Rico. The Democrat mayor of San Juan was waging a political sideshow against Trump and Trump was battling her and the liberal media – all while the people of Puerto Rico were suffering. And yes, Puerto Rico has big problems with corruption, but the President should rise above all that and put getting help to suffering people first. DeSantis just focused on disaster relief and he ignored the liberal media efforts to bait and attack him.

I disagree with Trump, DeSantis and most other Republicans on Ukraine, because I see the situation not as simplistic as just stop sending money and Ukraine is “not our problem.” Nikki Haley made a case for not abandoning Ukraine, somewhat, and so did Chris Christie.

The thing about believing it’s just as simple as stop sending money to Ukraine is that both Russia and China have global economic and territorial expansionist ambitions. I’ve heard more than one Trump person online talk about the threat of China and BRICS expanding and saying we should be focused on China, not Russia. That’s absurd. Russia and China have been longtime allies and partners. The BRICS founders were China, Russia, India and Brazil. Both China and Russia pose some serious threats to US interests and them working together against our interests is even more of a concern. If we walk away from both our NATO allies and Ukraine, we won’t have any friends left in the world. NATO came about in 1949 and it’s a treaty passed by the Senate. It’s a law the president must honor. We have a security agreement with Ukraine, that came about in the 90s after the USSR collapsed. It’s called the Budapest Memorandum – it’s not a treaty, so a president can just not honor it.

If we abandon Ukraine, China and Russia would be even more emboldened than they’ve been after the Biden administration Afghanistan withdrawal debacle. That debacle likely emboldened Putin to launch a full-scale invasion of Ukraine, in the belief the Biden administration and Europeans would not respond.

Too many Americans see things only through a Dem vs. Repub. lens, while the rest of the world sees us as just America. It would be very hard to create some America First vision of American greatness if America abandons it’s closest allies and just gives carte blanche to Russia in Ukraine. All of America’s adversaries would be emboldened if we abandon Ukraine and our European allies. We would be much weaker and no other countries would trust us – and they’d be rushing to cut deals with the strong horses on the world stage – Russia and China. Foreign affairs is a lot more complicated than just do A or B, because all the other countries involved have their own interests and concerns.

Yes, the past 20 years of regime-change and democracy-building in places most Americans don’t care about – like Iraq and Afghanistan or Hillary’s Libya mess, have been failures and I don’t want to do that anymore either, but I also don’t think America becoming an isolationist country will keep us safe. The past 20 years of failed regime-change/forever wars policies were a disaster, but isolationism has a much longer history of failing and coming back to bite America in the butt – usually in that we were unprepared for war and to defend our nation. A lot of people, even Trump, blab about what a great president Reagan was, because Reagan transformed the conservative movement in America and he stood firm challenging the Soviet Union and the Soviet Union collapsed. I formed a lot of my foreign policy views during the Reagan years. Reagan was about peace through strength.

None of the GOP candidates on stage or Trump are where I’m at on foreign policy and Biden and Democrats are a complete foreign policy nightmare (and that’s why so much of this Ukraine effort is failing, I think). I feel the dumbing down of America has reached critical mass, when I listen to so much of the political discourse these days, especially the Vivek silliness or the MAGA crowd talking points like MTG and Kari Lake or Steve Bannon’s blustering “burn it all down” crap.

It’s much easier to get involved in military adventures than it is to get out of them, as we learned in the 1990s and all through the Global War on Terror/regime-change adventures, so just jumping ship on helping Ukraine would likely be very messy, especially if both Russia and China (and other adversaries, like Iran) read that as a green light to move full-speed ahead with their own territorial aspirations, while here in the US, we had an American President who is even weaker than Joe Biden on responding. Biden did send money and weapons to Ukraine (not timely and definitely lacking any coherent strategy – but he did send aid). Trump and some of the other GOP candidates are stating they won’t respond – it’s just “No more money to Ukraine!” and “No more wars!” Problem solved. And some of these same people complaining about aiding Ukraine are also alarmed at the BRICS expansion… wonder how much they think BRICS will expand if the US abandons Ukraine and our NATO allies (who stuck by us in Afghanistan for 20 years). How on earth they believe abandoning our closest allies will Make America Great Again, baffles me.

On domestic policy, I support DeSantis’ efforts to push back on woke policies and support of strong law and order policies. I also heard other candidates express various positions I agree with – except for Vivek, who’s staked out contradictory positions on just about every issue. Plus, I found his antics annoying and his grandiose big talking points total nonsense.

Mike Pence is now a pariah in the MAGA GOP and I think he did the right thing on January 6th to certify the electoral college vote. I don’t think J-6 was an insurrection and I also don’t think it was some Deep State plot, but I do think the events that day were disgraceful. Trump’s demands had no constitutional foundation. I remember the Dems 2000 election efforts – hanging chads in FL. Trump’s J-6 effort topped that in being disgraceful by a long shot. Pence spoke up at the debate about the question on promising to pardon Trump, if Trump were convicted and he was president. Pence got roundly booed for stating what the pardon process is. Here again, I felt like a dinosaur, because treating these constitutional processes with due deference and diligence is vital if we’re going to protect our constitutional republic. It’s about way more than loyalty to Trump, it’s about fidelity to the Constitution. It’s not just liberals who are trying to tear apart the foundation of our republic – it’s many Republicans too, who have bought into all these special rules for Trump.

I want one set of rules for everyone and that means that this Dem lawfare to bury Trump in indictments is thoroughly corrupt and it’s appalling to see this mugshot fiasco to try to humiliate Trump and these other, mostly lawyers. These indictments also will bury them in legal fees. This is the road we’re on ever since the over-the-top raids on the homes of Paul Manafort and Roger Stone. Last year there was also a federal raid on the home of Trump attorney, Jeffrey Clark. He was marched outside in his boxer shorts and the video was leaked to the media. He was asking if he could put his pants on.

Trump used his mugshot as his first post on X (formerly Twitter), so he’s back to his old tweeting stomping grounds. An interesting thing about X is that since Elon Musk bought it, it seems like a lot of liberal journalists and Dem politicians left or aren’t active there anymore. I am sure they have their own online meeting place now, but the Twitter Trump owned is no longer the same.

The first Republican debate didn’t change anything in the GOP field as far as Trump maintaining a big lead. The GOP field should start to thin out quickly. And, no, contrary to Kari Lake posting over and over on X, that the other candidates must drop out and support Trump and declaring the primary’s over, it’s still early days. Lake who is still grifting for money to continue her “stolen election” sideshow in AZ, thinks the primary’s over, because of polls that are getting hyped. Not a single Republican vote has been cast in the primary yet. It’s a bit hard to swallow that this Obama/Kerry supporter is now ordering Republican candidates to drop out of the race – no need for Republicans to get to vote – just shut up and, unite behind Trump, while she’s still contesting the 2022 election she lost in AZ.

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August 18, 2023 · 8:53 am

Can DeSantis find his footing?

Next up is a blog post on FL governor and 2024 GOP presidential candidate, Ron DeSantis, who I consider former President Trump’s main competitor out of the GOP field of candidates. This post will be a challenge for me to try to be a bit objective, because I really like DeSantis and hope he ends up being the GOP presidential nominee.

DeSantis is from a working class background.  He’s 44 years old, attended Yale University, graduated from Harvard Law School, then joined the US Navy as a JAG officer.  He served in Iraq.  He was elected as a FL Congressman and served 5 years in the US House of Representatives. Then he was elected as the governor of FL and also reelected as governor of FL.  Married and has three young children.  That’s the short bio.

While in Congress DeSantis was one of founding members of the Freedom Caucus, a group of very conservative Republicans, who formed their group to promote a very conservative agenda.  He’s considered one of the most conservative Republicans and he was a strong supporter of President Trump.

While I knew who DeSantis was when he was in Congress and as governor of FL, when he really started making national news was during 2020, during the pandemic.  He began to defy the edicts coming for President Trump’s Warp Speed guru, Dr. Fauci.  President Trump criticized DeSantis for defying Dr. Fauci and doing away with the lockdowns in FL. He also pushed for protecting people’s jobs if they decided against getting the COVID vaccine.  He quickly become public enemy #1 of the Democrats and liberal media for challenging the pandemic social mitigation rules.  He also has been in the midst of the battle against Critical Race Theory being taught in FL schools, pushing back against a lot of the trans movement  and woke craziness.

I was sort of ambivalent about him though, because sometimes it seemed to me he was too much like Trump with the “owning the libs” press events and pushing back against liberal news media.  Although, I agreed with most of his policy initiatives, the Republicans spending too much time in front of cameras, talking big and delivering little, has become all too common.

Trump’s sideshow politics, that Trump the reality star, “You’re fired!” image, is what many of his fans love the most and DeSantis seemed to be a Trump, Jr., with “owning the libs” with his clashes with the media as governor and I discount most of the political theater as just politicians suckering us.  It was during and in the aftermath of Hurricane Ian in the fall of 2022, that I really changed my opinion of DeSantis.  I live in GA, so I usually watch hurricane and storm coverage news from the Southeast a good bit.  Day after day he held press briefings and was all over the state.  What struck me was he knew all the details of what was going on all over the state, what relief efforts were in the works, and he was surrounded by state and local officials, both Democrats and Republicans, with whom he seemed to have a very good working relationship.  It was his attention to detail and being a hands on leader that caught my attention and changed my mind.  He was a calm, competent, totally-engaged leader in a crisis. 

When he entered the 2024 presidential race, he decided to go with announcing his campaign online on X (Twitter), rather than a conventional speech. It was filled with technical glitches and since only a small percentage of the country is even on X, I thought that was a bad idea.  Then the Trump team smear attacks and the Dem smear attacks broke with a a fury and that’s a 24/7 thing on X and in the media.  Trump’s team has stuck to vicious personal attacks, even attacking Casey DeSantis’ looks.  There have been memes of her making her look like Eddie Munster or all sorts of stupid memes of DeSantis mocking his looks. Here’s July 2023 Newsweek story on the attacks on Casey DeSantis: Is the Viral Casey DeSantis’ Eyebrows Photo Real?  One day the Trump/Dem smear crowds were attacking DeSantis and his wife for campaigning in Iowa and being terrible parents and accusing them of abandoning their three young children.  They have their kids with them campaigning and when the kids are with them at events, they get attacked too. 

There hasn’t been a single substantive attack on DeSantis on policy from the Trump campaign that has merit or is truthful, it’s all about being disloyal to Trump, vicious memes, and lies.  I was outraged at so much of the liberal news media pile-on attacks, especially against Melania – she didn’t deserve any of that , so the attacks on Casey DeSantis really disgusted me and that they have been coming from the Trump campaign has been really disappointing – but not surprising.

There have been many attacks about DeSantis being on the spectrum, or autistic.  DeSantis does appear a bit socially awkward at times and nerdy, but he’s sure done a lot of things in his 44 years – Yale, Harvard, Navy officer, Congressman, governor  and he was a star athlete in college playing baseball, so despite being a bit nerdy, that sure hasn’t held him back. Rather than trying to  be like Trump or stage-managed so much, he’d be better off just being himself.

There was an orchestrated liberal media attack on Melania’s Rose Garden renovation that made me realize that the liberal news media is so corrupt that they will run any Dem smear effort, without a moment’s hesitation, no matter how dishonest.  I challenged the Rose Garden spin attacks against Melania on Twitter, because all the information on the Rose Garden renovation plans had been reported by Melania and the WH prior to her unveiling of the completed project. CNN and other news orgs, ran those stories, yet, they were trashing how the renovation turned out and spreading crazy lies about the project. 

A “renowned historian,” who sits on MSNBC and constantly blabs about Trump being “an authoritarian,” was blabbing that Melania’s Rose Garden design was “authoritarian,” even though she put together a team of experts, who researched the Rose Garden history and came up with the plans.  All of the flower choices were the subject of media pile-on attacks, here’s a Reuters fact check on one:  Fact check: Melania Trump’s Rose Garden redesign did not remove rose bushes from all first ladies since 1913.  I have been following this Dem spin info war for decades now and it really is a Dem/liberal media effort to control public opinion.  One of the craziest spin attacks during the Rose Garden media meltdown was a charge that Melania removed all the colorful flowers and only used white roses, so it was a racist design.  I actually used quotes from liberal news media – their own reporting on the Rose Garden renovation project from before this crazy spin attack to challenge these tweets.  The white roses were JFK tea roses…

While this political meme stuff sounds silly – it’s meant to destroy people’s reputations and marginalize them.  Saul Alinsky’s Rules for Radicals, provides the left’s playbook and he advocated ridicule as man’s most potent weapon and he also was all about “pick a target, freeze it, personalize it, polarize it.  It’s easy to dismiss crazy spin attacks as just trivial online stuff, but besides how destructive they are to civil discourse, they fuel partisan, class, and often racial divides 24/7.  And they aren’t just online – the spin attacks get amplfied quickly online, then the other news media & other media venues take them and amplify them across all other media – so they permeate the culture.  You wonder why America is so divided, well, this spin information war has been blowing across all American media now since the 1990s -dedicated to amplifying these divides – especially racial divides since the Obama years. 

Even after Melania left the WH there was another effort to repeat all those Dem/liberal Rose Garden attacks again and that’s what’s important to remember – the Left will never stop repeating their spin lies – they will keep relaunching them, no matter how many times they have been debunked.  Here’s a report from April 2021 in The Guardian: Restorationists urge Jill Biden to erase Melania Trump’s Rose Garden makeover.  That’s why I keep warning about this spin information war – they will keep repeating their spin lies, over and over,  until their lies drown out the truth.

DeSantis has not had an impressive campaign in the roll-out and opening weeks.  He’s reshuffled his campaign, which was badly needed, and seems to be finding more effective ways to get his message across. His overly aggressive online team was overshadowing him and his message and they have toned it down a bit.  They were trying to be just as in-your-face as the sleazy Trump smear team and it wasn’t working. Hardcore Trump supporters don’t have any standard they hold Trump to, but they get outraged if Trump is attacked. 

Can DeSantis win the GOP nomination, sure it’s possible, because that Trump and Dem non-stop hyping polling drama is really just part of their effort to promote Trump in the primary.  Dems want Trump as the GOP nominee, because they believe he’s easier to beat than DeSantis.  They’ve used this strategy before – in the 2016 GOP primary liberal media gave billions of dollars worth of  free media to Trump, to disrupt the GOP primary and in the belief Trump was the GOP candidate who was easiest to beat.  Trump barely defeated Hillary.  In 2022, Dems were pouring money & effort into promoting the worst, far-right, kooky GOP candidates in primaries again.  Here’s a November 2022 USA Today report: Democrats spent millions boosting ultra right candidates in midterms. The strategy worked.   For any who doubt that some Dem operatives are working with the Trump campaign to attack DeSantis, there was a Politico report yesterday: The Hard-Tweeting Defense Lawyer GOP Candidates Have Learned to Fear.  Here’s a tidbit:

““I’m probably the top anti-DeSantis person on Twitter. So if [rivals] have something anti-DeSantis that they want to get into the mainstream, they’ll send it to me,” Filipkowski said, without disclosing the name of anyone on the Trump campaign he’s worked with. The Trump campaign declined to comment.

Loomer said they speak occasionally. “He knows I’m a Trump loyalist, and I know he doesn’t like Trump, and despite our differences, we have found common ground on making sure Ron DeSantis is never elected president of the United States, ever.””

The Dems, liberal media and Trump team are all making DeSantis their #1 target, but his campaign has made a lot of unforced errors too.  Here’s a post from X about DeSantis being the Trump team’s main target:

Regarding this comment about Trump attacking DeSantis 3 days before the 2022 FL Gubernatorial election here’s a Nov. 2020 report from The Hill: Trump attacks DeSantis amid positive press: ‘An average Republican governor’.

Despite my dislike of Trump’s character, I can still see he’s been the target of the most relentless Dem/liberal media smear effort I’ve seen thus far and I thought the Kavanaugh smear campaign was as low as they could get. Clearly we haven’t reached the bottom yet. Unfortunately, Trump is willing to play by the Alinsky rules too and not only against the liberal media and Democrats – he’s out to destroy Ron DeSantis.

Despite all the media and Trump team hype that the 2024 GOP primary is over and Trump won, not a single vote has been cast yet. Trump definitely is the clear leader and most likely GOP candidate. Then again in the 2016 GOP primary, Jeb Bush was the most likely GOP candidate.

I still hope Ron DeSantis is the 2024 GOP candidate.

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Filed under 2024 Election, General Interest, Information War, Politics, Uncategorized