I am bewildered that anybody still believes that Donald Trump is or ever was a great business man.
He is the child of great fortune.
He was given piles of money by his father while he was alive.
He inherited another pile when his father died.
He has filed for bankruptcy multiple times.
It is well documented that he swindled large numbers of contractors.
These are not opinions. This is not fake news.
If you have seen the TV series “Mad Men” you would have some idea of my work life in 1970.
When not yet 20, working in Philadelphia, my daily commutes through the downtown streets were filled with hooting construction workers. My office life was either being over-looked for advancement because that guy had a wife and kids to support or being looked over by too many men. It was regular leering and even man-handling.
I didn’t think myself naïve, but I was. My experience with sexual advances were from the man/boys my age. I could accept or reject these without any cause for concern or wonder about motive.
But when the president invited me to his office under the pretense of delivering a monthly report normally sent by circulating office envelopes, I had no experience for imagining an ulterior motive… at least not the first time.
My ego jumped to the “he must think I’m an important asset to the company and this is my chance to show how efficient I can be”.
The reality.
His secretary granted me permission to enter his giant corner office outfitted in walnut and leather. He met me at the door and quietly closed the door as I entered. My antenna buzzed, but I was still hopeful.
He offered me a chair as he leaned on his desk asking me harmless questions about the day and myself. Then the awkward pause.
I rose to excuse myself and he followed me to the door where he placed his hand firmly to keep me from opening it and with his other arm wrapped me up and hauled me in for a kiss.
This, my friends, is sexual harassment. Full stop. Had I not been me, the next thing to happen would be unwanted sex; yes rape. And even if I had raised holy hell about it, he would have gotten away with it. No question.
And, what pray tell, was the secretary guarding the door thinking at the time?
We’ve come a long way, baby.
In some ways, maybe too far.
Anytime there is an encounter between two people of an intimate nature, I believe both have a responsibility to choose how that encounter progresses. The glaring exception to this rule is when the two parties are mismatched in maturity or economic status.
These thoughts came to mind while I was watching a story unfold on the TV series “Last Tango in Halifax”. The scene was two characters whose names I’ve forgotten; a lesbian head of school (Joan) and a teacher (Mary) whom Joan has been given the plum assignment to interview a famous children’s author in front the whole school. Mary was chosen for the task because it is widely known that she is a super-fan and eminently qualified. The second reason was that the author now lives with Joan’s ex-husband.
Joan was married for many years and has two teenage children with her ex who is still sniffing about. She knew she was a lesbian before marriage, but “in those days” one just carried on.
More back story, Joan had married Lilian two years prior and Lilian conceived a child via an old friend. The day of Joan and Lilian’s wedding, Lilian while eight months pregnant died in an accident. The child survived.
Back to the story of Joan and Mary. Joan invited Mary to her home to discuss the details of the interview. Joan thinks she picked up “gaydar” and is anticipating an evening that might turn into something.
Mary arrives with flowers in hand and the two of them have a delightful evening that moves into the living room for more wine and conversation. There is much discussion about Joan’s unusual relationship with the author and her ex. Quantities of laughing are involved.
Mary becomes lubricated enough to question why Joan is the mother of a Black child. Joan does not hesitate to show Mary a picture from her wedding day and tell the story briefly.
Mary hackles rise and accuses Joan of sexual misconduct. Mary declares that she was invited under false pretenses and will not be doing the interview. She leaves in a huff.
The thing is; Joan’s invitation was primarily for the purpose of giving Mary the backstory on the author and to help organize the interview. Yes, Joan also thinks Mary is gay.
During the pleasant evening Joan made no advances, sat too near, touched Mary in anyway other than a normal hug at the door to say hello and welcome.
No words on Joan’s part could assure Mary that she was not a predator… mostly because Joan really thought (going in) that Mary was a kindred spirit and began to question her own role in the evening and if she was in fact, a predator. She is not.
I believe that Joan did nothing wrong. Mary reaction was over the top. A better response was “oh, I didn’t know you were gay”. Joan would have modified her thinking and the relationship would have remained in tact.
It left me wondering about many of the accusations currently flying through the media. People who work together often “test the waters”. Some people are more inclined to touch a shoulder or hover more closely. It doesn’t take much to modify the behavior of another who is getting too close for your comfort when the gesture is innocent.
Hourly workers who can be easily replaced are the most vulnerable. Even if these workers know how to push back, they risk losing their job. Most NEED their job.
However, in the case of a public official, it’s fair to say that the people working in close proximity these officials are highly employable. If you can put “personal assistant to a senator or mayor of a large city” on your resume, you are going to get the next interview.
So if that elected official is behaving inappropriately, just say so. The official has as much, if not more, to lose when you stand your ground.
Running to the papers two years after the fact smells fishy to me. Sitting before a Senate hearing 30 years after the fact does not…. those were very different days. The Me Too movement put a lot the crass behavior out of style… and that’s a good thing.
Before closing out this highly edited piece; I’ve been poking at this for days…
I am reminded that I continue to have the benefit of being me. I’m certain it colors the opinions expressed here. The root cause of the daily re-visit to this post is because I have no clarity in why I can tell the world to go away or please stay without saying a word.
An example is this experience from two years ago.
The pottery studio where I have gone for several years to “potter about” has gone through a series of studio managers. Josh was the latest. I was not impressed. His own work was uninspiring, his teaching skills were unimpressive, and he made no effort to keep the studio clean. Pottery dust is highly toxic.
The next semester came around and Josh was gone. The new studio manager (delightful) was not forthcoming about his reason for departure. I’m a nosey bugger so I kept niggling the new gal for why Josh left. She eventually caved and told me had been making numerous sexual advances to the other students.
Josh is around 30 years old. The average age of the women in these classes is closer to 60. It turns out he was hitting on many and had been pursuing one so aggressively that she finally reported him to the college.
At no time did Josh take a pass at me.
In all confidence I can say it wasn’t because he didn’t want to “hit that”. It was because he is a sexual predator and he knew without even trying that he would get no where with me.
I take…. pride in that truth even though I don’t understand why it is true.
I am left with this.
It’s unsettling to know we are more animal than we want to admit. Anyone receiving a report of inappropriate behavior must begin by assuming it is true. Further, there is no point in starting an investigation by asking the accused. Lies will ensue. The peers of the accuser will get you to the truth.
There will always be victims. There will always be villains. We are animals.
The best we can do is listen to the victims when they find their voice.
I have a relative, by marriage, that I unfriended because her posts were/are riddled with Qanon driven drivel.
Like any other human drawn to the train wrecks of life, I occasionally peek at her feed via my husband’s account. Never surprised, always wanting to call her out. Family, what are you gonna do?
This week she posted a meme itemizing the classic list of things that low to middle income families have always experienced. Crap, low paying jobs. Hand-me-downs. Nobody gave us anything. Didn’t have the finest house. Sick of those people looking for handouts.
She never went hungry. She had a decent education. I suspect not every aspect of her childhood was joyful which may contribute to her general anger with the world.
What she does not process is that the Black child three blocks over in the city where she was raised was treated like shit by anybody outside of his neighborhood because of the color of his skin. That, and the assumption that because some other kid that color did something bad, he will only ever do something bad.
Meanwhile, she has walked through that same section of the city with everyone assuming she is no threat at all even though she may have broken into the neighbor’s house just for fun.
It is impossible to the know the life of another without some effort.
I didn’t need to experience that young Black child’s life to accept his view of the world. He was not treated fairly.
Remembering the desire of well-meaning Christians kidnapping Native American children to save them from their savage lives, I might be honing in on something. Are white folk are still trying to “fix” the not white?
Blacks, Native Americans, Jews, Muslims, Hispanics, Asians do not need to be fixed. They don’t have to dress like “us”, talk like “us”, live like us.
What needs fixing is the notion that we walk through the world thinking our way is the best way, the right way.
The only right way to live is to live a life that does not harm another’s.
Me having more than the next guy does not require me to share all that I have. It does require me to support reasonable taxes in support of the community and to volunteer my time and assets to causes I care about. It does require me to assume the best of others until they prove themselves unworthy.
Were is not so serious, I would laugh in the face of most folks in my circle who carry on about government interference and wasted spending. The only wasted spending is the money spent on stuff they don’t want.
With little effort, the breakdown of federal spending shows where the money goes and more importantly where it doesn’t.
But I digress, back to the poor, pitiful relative. She is pitiful, but not poor.
In the interest of family harmony, my pity for her must override my blaring desire to tie her down and pour facts down her throat. At the end of the day, I don’t mind that she is a hate-filled human spewing her indignation. I do mind that she is training two children to be the next version of her.
A special right or favor granted to a person.
The thing about privilege is most of mine or yours; we have no clue what many of them are.
When I walk into a room of strangers, it is rare (as in, maybe ten times in my 70 years) for these strangers to turn and look with those eyes that say, “Who let you in?”
There are thousands of things available to me every day of my life that no one ever gave me permission to have or invitation to share. These things are just there by virtue of the world I was born into and the “privileges” received along the way of the flowchart already drawn at the time of my birth.
I’m not talking about affluence… born on a farm, Dad milked cows, I wore hand-me-downs until they wore out, mostly homemade gifts for Christmas until I was in my teens.
I am talking about a wonderful public school education… the middle class kids living in a generous, affluent county.
I am talking about being relatively attractive in the America girl kind of way.
I am talking about being taller than average.
I am talking about strong genetics resulting in over-all good health.
I am talking about two parents who took excellent care of us, took no prisoners, and encouraged learning on countless levels.
I am talking about teachers who brought out confidence. Provided engaging conversation. A school with art, music, shop, car repair, woodworking, sports of all kinds…. except golf for girls (it was the 60s; Title 9 is awesome).
There have been decision points along the way that are/were entirely within my control that could block future privileges — rob a bank; that will rearrange many privileges.
But, oddly, because we float comfortably in our known universe, we don’t always know what we are missing. What we might have had. What we might NOT have had.
Until it smacks you in the face.
This week’s “first world problem”. A player competing in the women’s NCAA basketball tournament published a picture of their workout room…. one stack of free weights. It was posted opposite the men’s workout room…. a fully equipped fitness center.
My first golf club (like most private clubs) had a women’s locker room. It was not spacious, but it had lockers, two showers, a row of four sinks, four commodes. There was an adjacent room about the size of a moderate walk-in closet with a bench, bulletin board, and wall mounted counter for keeping binders. Functional.
By word of mouth, I discovered that the men’s locker room was larger, the lockers were wood, there was a lounge with a bar, and a sitting area with chairs and tables to gather to play cards.
I’m okay with the larger space, there was a ratio of about 20 to 1 of men versus women golfers in the membership. It was not the scale, but the quality of the amenities that was grossly unfair.
Being the charmer I can be, I was invited (had the privilege) to serve on this club’s advisory committee… the owner’s handpicked group of members to serve on a committee with no power but gave the membership-at-large the false sense that we members had a say in club operations.
Being the pain in the ass I can be, there came a time during one of these committee meetings that I shared with “the boys” that the women’s locker room could use some attention. My request was not being taken seriously so I said bluntly, “It’s about time you guys saw the women’s locker room.”
I swear, all men have this 10 year boy in them that never dies. Some of the men blushed at the prospect of even thinking about doing such a thing. They all made childish jokes as I opened the door to the mysterious land where the cute Mrs. Jones gets undressed.
Then they saw what I was talking about.
The metal lockers had rusty, bent corners. The shower stalls had mold crawling up the tile walls and the shower heads were caked with calcium build up. The sinks had gunk around every faucet. The carpet inside the door was worn thin. The bouquet of fake flowers, covered in dust.
I didn’t bother to look at the owner’s face. I was more interested in the face of the advisory committee president. My deed was done.
We didn’t get a larger space… there was no space to be had. But the space was gutted and redone within six month.
The gal who posted the picture of the free weights did more to advance the condition for women’s sport than any collection of words could ever do.
People need to see their privilege in contrast to understand just how unfair some situations can be for those without privilege.
It is especially hard within the context of the realities of life. There is no such thing as equality, as in everybody gets the same thing. Life is not like those parents who fuss about making sure that they spend the same amount of money on each child for Christmas.
I don’t expect to have a private jet just because Oprah has one.
I don’t expect to have to sleep under a bridge a few nights a year just because a homeless person does.
I do expect that when I see another human who has been left so far behind; I will first have empathy and then take what actions are available to me (repeating the inequity, voting for people willing to make change) and to never let others less empathic to brush it away.
To live in country like the United States of America can be tricky. The citizens of my generation were taught to stand on our own two feet. I have stood on my two my whole life, bolstered by privilege I did not know I had for oh, so many years.
When did grabbing a crotch become an expression in dance?
Why does it persist?
Can we please stop changing the clocks?
Advances in medical science have made invitro fertilization possible. There are couples today who would have been “barren” just 30 or 40 years ago. There are now advancements in medical science that make it possible for a person with a confused genetic design to repair the parts that do not fit with their mental understanding of who they are as a person. Doctors have been changing ears and noses and fat placement and breasts and asses all in the interest of making a person feel better about themselves. How then, is it so horrible that a person who wants to change their physical appearance to match their sexual identity? I submit that having to live in a body that does not match your brain is far worse than a flat chest.
And while we’re at it. This ballyhoo about men becoming women and then wanting to compete in sports is down right silly. No actual, fully functioning, properly genetically aligned male would cut off his junk to win a trophy.
Why is anybody still talking about the royals and Oprah?
What is wrong with Tucker Carlson?
What is right with Donald Trump…. no, make that any Trump or Kushner or Miller or Barr?
I have been taking drugs for the last four month that warn of unexpected weight loss. Why doesn’t the scale move?
Not a question…. I want to be in a room with 20 teenagers while they listen to the following; Inagaddadavida by Iron Butterfly; Nessun Dorma by Pavoratti; Peter Gunn by Henry Mancinni; Beethoven’s Fourth… I guess the question is, would they sit still and listen or groan about that stupid old music?
When will network dramas stop using random drum sequences to punch up the story line?
Will the bad guy not run when the cop drama says, “stop, police.”?
When did resignation and impeachment become the only response to an elected official disappointing us? Isn’t that what elections are for? I get it if the official BROKE THE LAW, but crappy behavior is not an impeachable offense.
Do you suppose Lee Westwood would come to dinner if I asked him? I’m thinking it would be a very entertaining evening.
Why did Tiger run off the road? I’m just a little curious.
How is it that so many Americans do not understand that the Corona virus caused far more damage than necessary because for the first ten month there was fool in charge? Put on your old Romper Room thinking caps and image a president who said… starting in March , 2020 “We are expecting a virus to come to our country very soon, if it is not here already. All indications are that it could be highly contagious and so there are some important steps that I ask all citizens to do. Starting now, please limit travel to the bare necessities. While in public, please use a face covering to block the transmission of the virus. Wash your hands regularly and definitely after you have been out in the public…. shall I go on?”
There are people RIGHT NOW who are afraid to take the vaccine because of the suspicions planted by Trump and his ilk. Donald Trump was vaccinated in January… way ahead of the crowd and never told anybody. He still won’t make a public statement about it. What is wrong with this man?
What’s for dinner? I can not tell you how much I hate this question.
My pal who put us in the wrong car called the next day to apologize for her behavior and to ask if I had her phone…. or her coat.
I did not.
My last recollection was giving her the phone as we left the restaurant.
“Is it in the back seat of your car?” “No.”
“Give me 24 hours to try to find it.”
So, I did what I thought I could do to locate her phone. Checked at the club, requested a community broadcast. The 24 hours passed and I sent her a “no luck” email.
The next morning I received an email from a guy who used to work at my golf club. He hasn’t worked there for over a year. His note says, I found this phone at one of my rental properties, do you know who it belongs to?
How is this possible?
Two random women get into a random car that belongs to guy golfers staying in a random rental house that is managed by a guy I knew only as a member of club where he used to work.
All of this… he remembers my name, he has my email address (why?) and he has my friend’s phone… and jacket! And a pair of golf pants.. but that’s another story.
So I go to his office and get the phone and coat, reject the offer of the pants and we both carry on about how weird this whole story is.
Then he tells me his perspective before we met for the exchange….
The rental house had been occupied by sixteen loud, messy young men.
He wondered, “What was this old lady from Pinehurst doing at this party?”
“Hey, Matt! Who you callin’ old?!”
I used to share a monthly column by this name with my dear old pal “Aitch”. The column goes back years before I met Aitch. He wrote it with another golf buddy who sadly died after an unsuccessful heart transplant.
It was with some trepidation that I suggested to Aitch that I become his new monthly foil.
We had a grand old time trading barbs. The publisher denied my request to open one column with “Howard, you ignorant slut.” It would have been a big hit with the readers.
Aitch is still among the living, but not thriving. He had to retire from our monthly duel. His replacement never got the concept and the column has now died of unnatural causes.
I don’t spend as much time thinking about golf these days. Another semi-monthly column was clobbered by Covid cutbacks.
But then a moment in a golf tournament will prick up my ears and annoy my golf sensibilities.
Ironically, it is about divots.
It’s late in the round and Lee Westwood’s tee shot ends up in a fresh divot in the middle of the fairway. He was in contention. And, by the way, it hit the shot out of the divot without obvious complaint. The ball landed on the green in regulation.
The great howl goes up about how the Rules of Golf are terrible. Nobody should end up with a bad lie after a great shot. What is a divot if not Ground Under Repair?
Horse Hockey and Nonsense.
These “play it up” people do not understand the fundament premise of golf and take no time to understand it.
It’s not their fault, entirely. The PGA Tour broadcasts play on the most pristine courses in the world. The bunkers that are supposed to be hazards are groomed to perfection. These elite players prefer making a shot out of a bunker over a closely mown area at the exact same distance form the hole.
Golf was invented in a meadow, played with sticks and rocks and the primacy rule was and is “Play It As It Lies”. From there the rules guys began a series of exceptions for when the player clearly had no way of playing the ball in the situation it found itself…. in ponds, up in trees, against rocks, can’t find it, went so far afield that you are in the enemies yard (out of bounds).
Having moved from the cow pasture to land groomed to be used only for golf, the makers of the course included some bits that one would never be find in pasture… tee markers, benches, paved paths, metal plates with water below to pop out as needed. The rules decided they better come up with a way to deal with these. They are grouped under the name “obstructions”. Note; trees, bushes, footprints, and random holes made by other golfers are not on the list.
And now is as good a time as any to note that there is increasing evidence that giant divots are not necessary for the construction of a great golf shot.
I say to all these whiney players, if you want a perfect lie for every shot, stick to well maintained putt-putt courses. There are dozens in Myrtle Beach.
Meanwhile the “real golfers” will take a whack at the ball, go find it (hopefully) and deal with whatever trouble or perfection the golf gods have granted with another try at reaching the hole.
Never once have I heard a player say, “I hit that shot so badly. I don’t deserve this fabulous outcome. I’m going to add another shot to my score to make it fair for the other guys.”
I get it.
Human’s are tuned to patterns. Things don’t really come in threes. We just keep counting until we reach three.
Three is the magic number. One or two are not enough… four, too many. Not at all sure why this is true, but we humans are fond of multiples and prefer an odd number. Ask any artist.
This week I had two vibrations. If it were just me looking for a pattern, there would have to be three. No, just two.
Sometimes it is just one.
This is my truth. I feel vibrations. Not really feel, but the thought comes to me, usually just as I awake, that it’s time for me to touch base with a person. It could be someone I spoke to the day before, more likely someone I have not spoken to for months… even years.
Event one… my friend who recently moved out of state. “Hi! Haven’t talked to you in a while. Thought I would check in.” The email exchanges revealed nothing of importance in her life; the usual joys and woes.
Less than 24 hours later she sent another email saying that the house she has been trying to sell for over a year finally closed. The vibration was the stress she was feeling about the pending transaction. She didn’t mention it for fear of jinxing the deal.
Event two… my friend down the road. The whole covid thing makes everyone forget how many days have gone by. I probably hadn’t seen her in four months; a long time for us. “Hi! Isn’t it about time we had lunch?”
She leaped at the offer.
Lunch was difficult. I arrived late and she was already tipsy from at least two glasses of wine. The conversation deteriorated. By the time the food arrived she was close to out of control… extremely unusual for her. Clearly drunk, she complained about her children trying to tell her what do to (stop drinking so much, mom). She got angry with me for agreeing with her children.
In the next ten minutes I knew we had to get out of this room… the dining room of her own country club populated with people who knew her. I was embarrassed for her. I was worried for her.
When she stood up there was no question she was “falling down drunk”. She intended to drive herself home… it’s less than a mile away. I stood between her and the car door and held my ground. She was not going to drive that car.
She relented and gave me the keys. The key wouldn’t go in the ignition. My drunk friend tried to “help”. I pressed the “lock door” button on the key and a car two spots over beeped. This was not her car.
The story goes on from there, but in the end, I got her home and held my cool until I got back to my own home where I collapsed until a lump of tears.
The next day she called to apologize and to thank me and to say that yesterday was the second anniversary of her husband’s death.
I don’t keep these kinds of dates in my head.
All I had was the vibration that hit me four days before.
How many other people in the world have these vibrations? Do they recognized them? Do they ignore them?
If you have ever had this odd idea to call or write to somebody you hardly ever see, don’t ignore it. The feeling is real.
My favor vibration… it took me until I didn’t feel it any more to know it was real. My father died in 1985. The home my parents shared had a little one-car garage across the driveway from the back door. It was built one summer by the whole gang in residence. Dad and the grandkids (many of them under 10 years old) that sawed and hammered and painted, signed their names to the door jam.
During my occasional and all too short summer visits it was common to walk up and down the driveway between the two doors. It would feel like walking through a breath of wind.
My mother died in 2005. The next time I walked that path, the sensation was not there.
He didn’t need to be there anymore.
There hasn’t been much in my life these past months.
The most likely reason is that I blew my wad fussing about getting The Former Guy out of office. I probably didn’t do all that much accept make sure my vote got in on time.
There are still so many voices running through my world trying to tell us that Biden didn’t win fair and square. I hang my “yes he did” hat on one tiny story. One tiny vote.
My friend said something like this…. I voted for Biden because my grandchildren made me.
How many other grandparent were berated by a younger family member to stop listening to Fox and Brietbart and all the rest and spend a few minutes a day reading the words of long-standing Republicans like George Will?
Or maybe it was as simple as “Grandma, if you vote for that pig, I’m never talking to you again.”
Of course, never would probably be until Christmas, but Granny would feel the icy wind for many months to come and Granny’s don’t like that.
Regardless, the wave of relief that came the week after Election Day was crumbled on January 6th.
I think I understand somebody wanting Donald Trump as president… don’t agree with them, but I get the whole “I got mine, go get your own” attitude that pervades that collective.
But how any American citizen could support, condone, excuse, explain, forgive the actions of that mob on January 6, 2021 is beyond my comprehension or empathy. Especially the elected officials who continued to mouth the stolen election.
In order to keep my sanity, there is much of that day that I have to compartmentalize. Otherwise, the rage would consume me.
These days I try to remain amused by the pundits badgering the Biden administration about not doing enough fast enough. The guy was elected during an insurrection and walked into an office with no corners filled with the trash left by the other guy. The guy who said masks are dumb. The guy who said this thing that has now cause a half a million death is just the flu.
It’s like being the housekeeper coming into a frat house after a pledge event and 20 minutes later somebody saying, “You haven’t cleaned this up yet? What the hell have you been doing?”
Scribbling always reveals the hidden gem… the thing that got me scribbling, hidden behind that opaque wall in my head.
While scrolling through Twitter (a terrible habit, not unlike rubber-necking on the highway) there came an image of a golden/glass tower; almost an obelisk as the rendering of the Trump Presidential Library — the epitome of an oxymoron. His “library” could be stored 32G thumb drive.
The creepy part was the 750 comments added to the Brietbart story from the idol worshippers wanting to know where to send their donations and begging to know the opening date and crowing about how wonderful it would be if it were to open before the Obama library.
No matter how calm Biden and his press secretary make me feel on any given day, I know that cancer is still out there. There is a tumor yet to be excised. It’s a big one. It will take careful surgery and a lot of post-op rehab to find the United States of America that the Founders tried so very hard to map out for us.
Sure, the Founders were a bunch of land owning men of privilege, many of them slave owners. And when they said “All men are created equal” they didn’t mean everybody, but that’s okay. Great men and women who came after read the words and knew full well that if these same men had come together 100 years later than they did, they would have meant “All”.
Because the human race changed in those 100 years. Slaves were freed in those 100 years. Women’s voices rose in those 100 years. And all those voices rise still.
There will never be a time in America when we will have economic equality. It is not in the nature of man. But it is in the nature of God that men will eventually see that no man need be hungry or cold.
The time of O’Rourke will rise above the “Cruz” because anybody can see that one is a better human being, and better Christian, if you will.
The Republican Party can not be the party of family values and honestly stand with the likes of Cruz. Were it told as a fairy tale, all would know played the villain.
And so… I have wandered into this corner. Not unusual.
I will return on another day. With luck it will only mention Trump because he will be a felon.
Hollywood has ruined us.
Take a moment to think of all the politicians portrayed in movies; Mr. Smith, Bartlett, Henry Fonda in Failsafe, Dave.
Good men doing the right thing. We all know what the right thing is.
There is a difference between wanting states to have more control over the lives of her citizens than thinking the federal government is the most efficient way to solve the problems of all citizens…. perhaps over simplifies, but I think it’s the core of Republican vs. Democrat.
We can arm wrestle that all day long.
But the right thing… that’s telling us the truth. The right thing is accepting all the weight of the oath of office even if it means some segment of your electorate is going to try to put you out of office.
The right thing is many times the hard thing.
But too many politicians are coming to the microphone, posting on twitter, sending emails that are at best Pablum and worst, not answering the question at all, just repeating some disconnected loop of sounds they have used for the entire tenure in office.
The strongest indicator that Trump needs to be stopped is the fact that so many Republicans are “afraid” to stop him.
The proven way to deal with a bully is to gang up on him and tell him the truth. Then ignore him… just ignore him. Don’t give him another thought. His fire will burn out because his fuel is attention.
 | eyreish on Mr. Smith |
 | Gray In The Woods on Mr. Smith |
| Gray In The Woods on Ramblin’ Rose |
| Gray In The Woods on Mom |
| Gray In The Woods on December 26 |
