Only Ego- Maybe

Commander-in-Chief Donald Trump has ordered the Pentagon to plan a grand military parade to show off the military might (the North Korean way, from 2017, below) the entire world already recognizes.





Steve M realizes

But he's Trump, so he'll just spend hundreds of millions of dollars to ship weaponry to the streets of D.C. because he's an overgrown eleven-year-old boy still mentally living in the 1950s, and also because he's a crushingly insecure plutocrat who needs a steady succession of gaudy displays in order to feel that he's adequately demonstrating his own greatness to the world.

He's evidently confident that

This parade won't be part of a grand plan to crush democracy in America -- there won't be roaming goon squads, and a protest will probably be permitted, though at some distance from the main event. Trump might want the parade to intimidate foreign foes, but it won't accomplish that goal, because the military will probably agree to display only weapons our enemies already know about. This will just be a pointless moment of excess, with Trump using weapons the way, in his hotels, he uses gilt.

Fox will broadcast the entire parade live -- and in order to avoid McCarthyite attacks, so will MSNBC and CNN. The coverage on Fox will be ecstatic (I'm guessing the Fox & Friends crew will do the honors), while on MSNBC, Chris Matthews will probably match the Fox crew in enthusiasm, reprising his embarrassing performance on "Mission Accomplished" day in 2003.

And then it will be over, and we'll be the same country we were beforehand. Trump will have gotten his testosterone rush. The real work of harming America will be taking place elsewhere, in meetings of House and Senate Republicans and in Cabinet-level departments run by cynical, grasping officials who despise ordinary Americans.

SM argues that the primary danger is in overreaction by Democrats, thus

Seriously: Don't get worked up about this. If you get worked up about this, your resentment will be the story: There go the liberals, hating America again. Don't give them the satisfaction. Seventy-two hours after it's over, we'll be chasing some ridiculous Trump tweet, and no one will remember the parade even happened.

They won't remember, but that doesn't mean it would not have had its desired effect.  Researcher-journalist Sarah Kendzior, detecting a parallel between Central America's "spectacular states" and authoritarianism in the USA, has written

In 2010, Laura Adams, a sociologist who conducted extensive fieldwork in the nascent Central Asian states in the 1990s, published The Spectacular State, an analysis of Uzbekistan’s nation-building through massive public spectacle.

“A spectacular state,” writes Adams, “is one where, more than in other countries, politics is conducted on a symbolic level, promoting the state’s domination over the shared meaning of concepts such as heritage and progress.” The ultimate goal of the spectacular state is the restriction of the public sphere, where all ideas of culture and heritage are either filtered through – or respond to – the narrative of the state, ruled by a dictator who has developed a cult of personality. The nation becomes a brand; the dictator, a brand ambassador; the people, a captive audience.

In January, shortly before he began sweeping the primaries after months of hate rhetoric, Trump staged a rallyin which three girls–called “The Freedom Kids”–lip-synched a pop song praising the brutality of their incumbent leader. “Enemies of freedom face the music/ C’mon boys, take them down/ President Donald Trump knows how to make America great/ Deal from strength or get crushed every time!” they sang, dancing in their red, white, and blue outfits before an enthusiastic crowd. Many Americans found it baffling. For those familiar with the decadent patriotism of Central Asian national performances, which commonly feature declarations of loyalty from dancing children, it was disconcerting in its familiarity.

Adams notes that “spectacle enables elites to close opportunities for input from below, but without making the masses feel left out.” Spectacle soothes the masses while distracting them from their suffering. Trump, a master of the American reality TV genre which has made a spectacle of human suffering – he made “You’re fired!” a beloved tagline during one of the worst economic crises in U.S. history – knows how to make an audience feel included through the theatrical exclusion of others. This tactic carries over into Trump’s rallies, where protesters are booted — and sometimes beaten — with fanfare. It also carries over into his policies, which are structured around exclusion: a wall against Mexico, banned entry for foreign Muslims, a database for U.S. Muslims, and a media denied access unless they acquiesce to Trump’s demands.

It's no accident that, as their organizers understand, parades are effective as bread and circuses.  They may serve a critical- though sublimely subtle- purpose as one of many spectacles, which in the whole are intended to make some people feel included and others excluded.  When the leader wishes to build the case for a military of unprecedented size, the dangers are greater. When the leader has shown a partiality for the most bloodthirsty genocidal individual in human history, the danger is greater still.  Although the peril is limited now, it is magnified exponentially in the unlikely event Donald Trump is re-nominated and re-elected (Russian parade plans, 2010, below).





Kendzior, who does not claim a crystal ball, probably understands this. (How it was done some 75 years ago is shown in video below.) She wrote her article 23 months ago.








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We Have A Criminal Justice System. Use It.

Responding to legislation pending in Florida, Politifact last month wanted to determine

whether undocumented immigrants were committing a crime by just being in the country.

According to legal experts, the answer is that most of the time, unlawful presence is not a crime.

When we checked with the Florida Conference of Catholic Bishops, Michele M. Taylor, the group’s associate director for communications, pointed to the 2012 Supreme Court case Arizona vs. United States. The majority opinion found that "as a general rule, it is not a crime for a removable alien to remain present in the United States."

Individuals who are unlawfully in the United States of America, most commonly by overstaying a visa, have committed a mere civil offense and are removed from the country and prohibited from entering for a specific period of time. Persons who have unlawfully entered the USA, however, have committed a criminal offense, though only a misdemeanor.

On Sunday in Indianapolis, a shared-ride vehicle pulled over to the side of the road and the driver and the passenger exited, whereupon

The car and the men were struck by a Ford F-150. One of the men was thrown into the center lane and was spotted, along with wreckage from the damaged vehicle, by a passing state trooper. As he slowed to stop for the crash, he struck the body in the center lane, officials said.

Before tweeting (the personal touch) his condolences to the family of the victim, President Trump tweeted “So disgraceful that a person illegally in our country killed @Colts linebacker Edwin Jackson. This is just one of many such preventable tragedies. We must get the Dems to get tough on the Border, and with illegal immigration, FAST!”

The President said nothing about the police officer. The driver of the Ford was 37-year Old Manuel Orrego-Savala, who gave an alias at the scene and was booked at the county jail for driving without a license and suspicion of drunken driving.  A citizen of Guatemala, he been deported in 2007 and in 2009, then sometime thereafter illegally re-entered the USA.  Immigration officials have lodged a detainer. Also

US Immigration and Customs Enforcement released a statement late Monday saying Orrego-Savala was previously convicted of driving under the influence in Redwood City, California, in 2005. He has other "misdemeanor criminal convictions and arrests in California and Indiana," the ICE statement said.





We don't know yet the circumstances of those "criminal convictions and arrests" in California and Indian. However, the bill introduced in the Florida House which gave rise to the Politifact analysis would "heighten the penalties for certain violent offenses -- including sexual battery, aggravated assault with a deadly weapon, murder, and the use of a destructive device such as a bomb -- if the defendant was in the country illegally."

Opponents of the legislation argued (accurately) that being in the country illegally is not a "crime." But there is no reason that a state should not authorize an enhanced penalty for an individual who commits a criminal offense while in the country illegally.We apply that principle to hate crimes, in which various states and  the federal government include enhanced penalties for bias-related crimes.

Hate crimes are considered particularly egregious- despite reasonable objections from civil libertarians- because of their impact upon the community, as well as upon the individual.  In many instances, incarcerating illegal immigrants rather than deporting them- after which they may return to the USA- or releasing them would often serve the interests of the community.

This won't happen, of course. Activists for comprehensive immigration reform will not be pleased if immigrants, even those who entered the country illegally, were jailed. The right loves the symbol of a wall and the ability to shut the memory of Mexicans and other people from their mind. But problems can't be wished away, and if Manuel Orrego-Salva had been incarcerated for earlier offenses, there might be one more pro football player alive today.




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Secrets

Donald Trump didn't tweet Monday morning about Nick Foles, the Philadelphia Eagles, or even kneeling for the American flag, but instead

Little Adam Schiff, who is desperate to run for higher office, is one of the biggest liars and leakers in Washington, right up there with Comey, Warner, Brennan and Clapper! Adam leaves closed committee hearings to illegally leak confidential information. Must be stopped!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) February 5, 2018

While psychologists call that  psychological projection, traditionalists call it "the pot calling the kettle black." "Fire and Fury" author Michael Wolff maintained

Many of the leaks that he would come out and rail against started because (Trump) gets on the phone at night with this coterie of friends and billionaires and motor-mouths. Then they call other people to say "Oh my God, this is what he said." And then athose people call other people. And suddenly you have leaked... This is all Donald Trump.

And then Donald Trump calls Adam Schiff "one of the biggest liars and leakers in Washington."  Of course, there is no bigger liar and leaker in Washington than President Trump. Democrats constantly remind voters that the President is a liar but are far too reticent to charge him with being the Leaker-in-Chief, such as when

The intelligence that President Donald Trump leaked to top Russian officials in an Oval Office meeting in May concerned a highly sensitive Israeli special forces mission, it has been revealed. The operation, which took place in February 2017, involved commandos infiltrating an area under the control of the Islamic State militant group (ISIS), to place a surveilance device. The intelligence obtained through the device prompted a short-term ban on laptops on flights from several majority-Muslim countries to the US and the UK.  

The target of the operation, according to a Vanity Fair report published on Wednesday, was an ISIS cell attempting to recreate a weapon developed by a top Al-Qaeda bombmaker. The weapon consisted of an explosive device that could be concealed inside a laptop and smuggled past airport security checks, raising the spectre of high-casualty attacks against civilian airlines....

Trump was bragging to other important people- in this case Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and Russia's then-ambassador to Washington Sergei Kislyak- that he knew classifed information which few other people were important enough to know. Moscow likely would pass it on to Israeli enemies Syria and Iran, but so be it.  Thus

“If this report is true, then giving those details about operations is something that is exclusively out of the question,” says Major (res.) Aviv Oreg, former head of the Al-Qaeda and global jihad desk for Israel's Military Intelligence, told Newsweek over the phone.  “I’m sure Israel will have second thoughts about giving information.”

“This is like something that has never been seen before,” he said. “You delivered to a third party all the details of how the secret service operates in Israel, how they are operating in the field in Syria. This is totally unacceptable.”





When the President revealed to his buddies the city in which the surveillance device was placed, he probably put into jeopardy the source of the information for the Israelis.

Not surprisingly, he may have done the same with the five-page memorandum from White House lawn ornament Devin Nunes. Former FBI double agent and Trump critic Naveed Jamali, who believes Carter Page may have been a double agent ultimately working for the FBI (at 14:20 of video below), notes

Remember @ValeriePlame and how that turned out? This is far far far worse. Assets have to know their identity can be protected. #nunesmemo

— Naveed Jamali (@NaveedAJamali) February 2, 2018

It’s not just an attack on the FBI @JoyAnnReid it’s an attack on those civilians here and abroad who are working in sensitive undercover positions around the world. https://t.co/ftSq6obeNC

— Naveed Jamali (@NaveedAJamali) February 1, 2018

Democrats have  been less aggressive than they can, and should be, in charging that the President himself is actively aiding the Kremlin. Whether Trump himself has been recruited as an agent by Moscow, he has been, and remains, captain of Team Russia.




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The President Who Knows More About Humility Than Anyone

John Turner of Patheos, not a Trump supporter, has insight into what he recognizes as "the sturdy alliance between white evangelicals and Donald Trump."

He points to two passages of the President's State of the Union message. In one, Trump recognizes (to inevitable applause) police officer Ryan Holets and his wife and remarks

Thank you, Ryan. Last year, Ryan was on duty when he saw a pregnant, homeless woman preparing to inject heroin. When Ryan told her she was going to harm her unborn child, she began to weep. She told him she didn't know where to turn, but badly wanted a safe home for her baby.

In that moment, Ryan said he felt God speak to him. You will do it, because you can. He heard those words. He took out a picture of his wife and their four kids. Then he went home to tell his wife Rebecca. In an instant, she agreed to adopt. The Holets named their new daughter Hope. Ryan and Rebecca, you embody the goodness of our nation. Thank you.





The President later commened

we are joined by one more witness to the ominous nature of this regime. His name is Mr. Ji Seong-ho. In 1966, Seong-ho was a starving boy in North Korea. One day he tried to steal coal from a railroad car to barter for a few scraps of food, which were very hard to get. In the process, he passed out on the train tracks, exhausted from hunger.

He woke up as a train ran over his limbs. He then endured multiple amputations without anything to dull the pain or the hurt. His brother and sister gave what little food they had to help him recover and ate dirt, themselves, permanently stunting their own growth.

Later he was tortured by North Korean authorities after returning from a brief visit to China. His tormentors wanted to know if he’d met any Christians. He had and he resolved after that to be free.

Turner  comments "no evangelical Christian listening to the address would have missed it. Ji embraced Christianity, and in so doing, 'he resolved to be free.'”  He recognizes Trump "has hired some good speechwriters, who know what will resonate with evangelicals and with many other Americans at the same time."

True, but color me cynical.  The message resonates with average Americans because they are feel-good stories which avoid explicit reference to Christianity.  Instead, Trump subtly mentions Seaong-ho's "tormentors wanted to know if he'd met any Christians." Similarly, the Holet moment was powerful for viewers intent on convincing themselves they are "pro-life," as if their critics are anti-life, and not have to face the reality that they are pro-forced birth. The nod and wink can be quite effective,

Still, pro-Trump evangelical Christians should not be let off so easily, and not only (or primarily) because Trump carried on an affair with a pornographic star while he was married. And he specifically should not be given the pass for his State of the Union message that he has by white evangelicals.

The President's address was  not only an orgy of right-wing ideology. It was an orgy, a celebration, an endorsement of self-congratulation.  At every opportunity, Trump not only encouraged applause but unashamedly led the applause himself.  This was no mere pat on the back but a blatant, even unparalleled, display of  brazen egotism.





That is clearly acceptable to the religious right- possibly, even welcomed.  However, someone (probably Solomon) wrote in Proverbs 3:34 "Toward the scorners he is scornful, but to the humble he gives favor."  Peter (in his first letter, verse 5:5-b) repeats “God opposes the proud but shows favor to the humble,” as does James, who in chapter 4 repeats the admonition and adds "humble yourselves before the Lord, and he will lift you up." Jesus himself warned (Matthew 23:12) "For those who exalt themselves will be humbled, and those who humble themselves will be exalted."

By contrast, Donald J. Trump has boasted that he knows more than does anyone about: taxes; banking; money; politicians; trade; ISIS; "the horrors of nuclear;" and the VISA "system."  And "there is nobody bigger or better at the military than I am." Unfortunately, there also probably never has been a politician on the national scene who is better at, or knows more about, conning people than he does.  Politically conservative evangelicals have not been the only victims, but they're probably at the head of  the line, and are determined to remain there.




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Donald Trump's America

Amidst the fifteen "average Americans" whom President Trump brought for his State of the Union address to the Capitol in his orgy of self-congratulation, the President attempted to paint a picture of a strong nation, one confident, strong, and united in purpose. Merely twelve months after he took office, America no longer is the land of "carnage," with Trump declaring "the state of our union is strong" and once almost literally wrapping himself in the flag:





All of us together, as one team, one people, and one American family, can do anything.  We all share the same home, the same heart, the same destiny, and the same great American flag.

President Trump also decided to "call upon all of us to set aside our differences, to seek out common ground, and to summon the unity we need to deliver for the people."  Following the unrest in Charlottesville, Virginia in August, former KKK grand wizard and nation's premier racist outside of the Trump Administration David Duke tweeted "Thank you President Trump for your honesty & courage to tell the truth about #Charlottesville & condemn the leftist terrorists in BLM/Antifa."

It seems some young people took Duke's praise of President Trump to heart. Evidently, "white supremacist propaganda on college campuses" in the USA "tripled in 2017" as Newsweek (via Raw Story) reports

The Anti-Defamation League (ADL) released a report this week that showed a dramatic surge in reported white supremacist flier distribution between 2016 and 2017.

Only 41 incidents were recorded during the fall semester of 2016, a number that sharply rose to 147 in the 2017 fall semester.

Jonathan Greenblatt, ADL CEO, said that protecting freedom of expression and supressing hate groups are both important but a line must be struck.

"While campuses must respect and protect free speech, administrators must also address the need to counter hate groups' messages and show these bigoted beliefs belong in the darkest shadows, not in our bright halls of learning," Greenblatt said in a statement issued alongside the report. "There is a moral obligation to respond clearly and forcefully to constitutionally protected hate speech."

The report followed 216 college campuses across 44 states, including Washington D.C.

According to the report, Texas was the state hit hardest last year, with 61 incidents, closely followed by California, which suffered 43 incidents.

Over half of all the incidents were committed by Identity Evropa a neo-Nazi and white supremacist organization focussed on the preservation of “white American culture” and promotion of white European identity.

The report said that varied messages were delivered through the flier materials, ranging from promoting a white supremacist group to trumpeting the urgent need to “save” the white face.

It is unclear whether this is what Donald Trump, presiding over the country as hatred is ramped up,  meant when he declared "together, we are rediscovering the American way."  He ignored the topic, which may have been an act of mercy. Otherwise, he might have pointed to a couple of incidents and assured us "you also had some very fine people on both sides."









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"H"

It doesn't matter with whom Donald Trump is sleeping (or rather, not sleeping). It is important to determine who paid Stormy Daniels, why, and where the money originated, to shut her up in October, 2016 about her affair with candidate Trump.

Alas, that story is being underreported. Not so the kerfuffle about the allegations in "Fire and Fury" that the President has been sexually involved with Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley.

Those accusations come from individuals attempting to determine who author Michael Wolff was referring to when two weeks ago on "Real Time," he suggested to Bill Maher (video below) that the President was currently having an affair, but "I don't have the blue dress."  He added "It's toward the end of the book. You just have to... you'll know it. Now that I've told you, when you hit the paragraph, you'll say 'bingo.'"





Politico reports

Wolff, the author of the incendiary but error-specked book “Fire and Fury: Inside the Trump White House,” was on set with Brzezinski on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” on Thursday for a conversation that initially focused on the ongoing Russia investigation.

The conversation quickly turned to remarks Wolff made last week on HBO’s “Real Time With Bill Maher,” where Wolff claimed to know that Trump was having an affair but could not responsibly say with whom. Instead, Wolff pointed viewers to a passage located somewhere at “the end of the book” that would single out Trump’s mistress.

Readers quickly identified a passage in which Wolff wrote that Haley “had become a particular focus of Trump’s attention, and he of hers” and another in which he wrote “that [Haley], with requisite submission, could be his heir apparent.” Haley, in an interview with POLITICO, called Wolff’s insinuation “disgusting” and “highly offensive.”

But Wolff insisted, much to the agitation of Brzezinski and others on the “Morning Joe” set, that he had not made any suggestion about Haley.

“I found it puzzling that she would deny something she was not accused of,” he said. “I didn't infer anything about Nikki Haley. What I inferred was that the president is — is that many of the people around the president believe he is still involved with various women.”

The host was not amused and

After some back and forth, Brzezinski suggested to Wolff that he “might be having a fun time playing a little game dancing around this, but you're slurring a woman. It's disgraceful.” Wolff once again insisted he had not made any insinuation about Haley, to which Brzezinski replied, “Come on. Are you kidding? You're on the set of ‘Morning Joe.’ We don't BS here.”

Wolff then asked Brzezinski to read to him the remarks he had made in which he supposedly had accused Haley of having an affair with the president. The demand, which Brzezinski refused, was apparently the last straw.

“If you don’t get it, if you don’t get what we’re talking about, I’m sorry. This is awkward. You’re here on the set with us, but we're done,” she said. “Michael Wolff, thank you. We're going to go to break now. Bye, everyone. We'll be right back.”





Wolff should not find it puzzling that Haley has flashed so much anger about a relationship she denies  she is in. However, you the reader are now given the opportunity to view both of Wolff's interviews, the first on "Real Time" and the second on "Morning Joe," an opportunity Brzezinski denied her viewers.

And with good reason.  However slimy and profit-driven Wolff is, he never stated that he was referring to the former South Carolina governor.

He did say that it was toward the end of the book. However, that was probably a mistake because this passage was only in the middle (chapter 17) of the book:

Wolff probably faced a conundrum once speculation focused on Nikki Haley. He could have said definitively that it is not Nikki Haley, but then would have all but revealed the name. He could admit he made an error in stating that the relevant passage was not necessarily toward the end of the book, and it would have become clear whom he was writing about.With so many critics arguing that Wolff's tome is not credible, it is odd that no one has suggested he was wrong in his recollection of the location of the pertinent passage.

 It is very unlikely (not impossible) that Nikki Haley, formerly a governor and state legislator in South Carolina, would indulge the carnal desires of a misogynistic, 71-year old narcissistic, lying braggart.

Haley, with a professional life aside from Donald J. Trump, would have more to lose than to gain. Not so every woman in the Administration, including another whose professional career largely depends on Donald Trump and whose last name begins with the same initial.

Trump may be having no affair at all. Yet, insofar as he may be, Mika Brzezinski and other individuals who have so feverishly rushed to the defense of Nikki Haley should consider that Michael Wolff never was referring to the country's Ambassador to the United Nations.




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Pathetic, And Not Even A Response

In my immediately previous post, I criticized forced-birth advocates for their cowardice in promoting legislation, nationally and within states, which would punish doctors while absolving women of all responsibility for violation of laws restricting abortion. But not all cowards are Republican.

Donald Trump's State of the Union address was ideologically extreme, extraordinarily self-congratulatory, and boldly dishonest. It also was framed to appear bipartisan, as Grump, wrapping himself "in the same great American flag," declared "all of us, together, as one team, one people, and one American family, can do anything" and called on Congress "to craft a bipartisan approach to immigration reform."

In his "response" Joseph P. Kennedy was extremely bipartisan and stunningly empty. In a speech billed as the "Democratic Response to the State of the Union," Representative Kennedy mentioned the name of the fellow who gave that address exactly zero times.

The Massachusetts Democrat failed to addresss issues critical to liberals/progressives and Democrats, including privatization, the minimum wage, and the widening income gap.

He said nothing about Citizens United or the role of money in politics or about voting rights and voter suppression.  He uttered the phrases "global warming" or "climate change" exactly as often as he used the word "Trump." He mentioned "an all out war on environmental protection," neglecting to tell us who was waging it.

He advocated "A good education that you can afford," a goal even some conservatives would support in theory. Still, Kennedy said nothing about Betsy DeVos and what she is doing to individuals with student loans  while promoting for-profit education scammmers and dismantling public education.

He said nothing about housing and hunger, and the words "poor" or "poverty" escaped his lips with the same frequency as did "Trump."

He sympathized with "the parent who lies awake terrified that their transgender son or daughter will be beaten and bullied at school" but nothing about the parent frightened that an advocate of the Second Amendment- pimped for by the President moments earlier- may one day barge into the school with an assault weapon and cut down her child.





No one wants her transgender son or daughter beaten and bullied but there was no indication that the Massachusetts Democrat wants to hold anyone accountable for that. He'll blame no one, not even  a President who moments earlier took credit for "historic actions to protect religious liberty," including the right to discriminate at schools against those same transgendered students.

Congressional Democrats booed when the man whose name was not uttered by Mr. Kennedy remarked "Under the current, broken system, a single immigrant can bring in virtually unlimited numbers of distant relatives." However, the word "immigration" never was mentioned, and the word "immigrants" only once, when the man representing Fall River, Massachusetts and speaking from Fall River, Massachusetts boldly praised "a proud American city, an American city built by immigrants."

He mentioned "Muslim" or "Islamic" as often as he did "Trump."  He couldn't muster even a nod to criminal justice reform, stating only "You bravely say, 'me too' you steadfastly say, 'black lives matter.'"  Responding to the president who has tried to cut off funding for Planned Parenthood, Kennedy avoided the term "reproductive freedom," instead coming out fearlessly for women's suffrage.

Word has it that Chuck Schumer and Nancy Pelosi chose Joseph P. Kennedy III to represent their party in its non-response to project a younger image. For all those who noticed, the man whom Kennedy was too intimidated to mention and whom he would not criticize was a scant 70 years of age when elected.




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