Donald Trump and the New American Patriotism

Posted January 20, 2017 by danmillerinpanama
Categories: Trump and the Establishment, Trump inauguration
Tags: ,

Donald Trump and the New American Patriotism, Washington Free Beacon, , January 20, 2017

trumpinagspeechPresident Donald Trump delivers his inaugural address after being sworn in as the 45th president of the United States during the 58th Presidential Inauguration at the U.S. Capitol in Washington, Friday, Jan. 20, 2017. (AP Photo/Patrick Semansky)

Trump delivered his combative speech in the midst of the very establishment he is attempting to overthrow. Surrounded by Bushes, Clintons, Obamas, Bidens, and Ryans, Trump aligned himself with the crowd against the celebrities and VIPs on the dais. Mass rallies, social media, and sheer force of personality are his weapons as he attempts to defenestrate the ruling class in Washington and bring a new spirit of patriotism to America. He draws strength from his gut connection with Jacksonian America—a connection deepened and enriched by one of the most combative, polarizing, bold, evocative, and indeed revolutionary inaugural addresses in American history.

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Donald Trump’s inaugural address was a stirring call for national unity and a declaration of war against the establishment in Washington, D.C. The speech was vintage Trump: politically incorrect, critical of both parties, amped up, biting, strongly delivered, and wildly ambitious. Anyone who believed Trump would change his beliefs or style when he assumed the office of the presidency was proven wrong. He’s not going to change. And he’s not going to let up.

Trump espoused his worldview in remarkably few words. He is a vituperative critic of the post-Cold War international system. Where the architects of that system see it as a bulwark of stability and global prosperity, Trump sees it as diminishing the United States in favor of foreign countries and an international class of wealthy political and financial elites. Washington has been serving its own interests, he said, and not the people’s. That ends now. His America will turn inward, focusing on domestic stability, education, infrastructure, and jobs. The one exception will be the fight against Islamic terrorism, where Trump is prepared to join with autocracies in pursuit of common goals.

Trump forcefully rejected identity politics. Racial and ethnic identities, he said, are less important than our status as American citizens. “When you open your heart to patriotism, there is no room for prejudice.” There are no hyphenated Americans in this worldview, only Americans and outsiders. And Americans are to be privileged over outsiders. It’s been said that American presidents are replaced by their opposites. What a contrast to Barack Obama’s second inaugural address, where he called for a “world without walls.”

This was not a programmatic speech. There will be more policy specifics when Trump addresses a joint session of Congress on his budget proposal. Instead the inaugural address was Trump distilled: nationalist, populist, and ready to fight.

He better be. Trump delivered his combative speech in the midst of the very establishment he is attempting to overthrow. Surrounded by Bushes, Clintons, Obamas, Bidens, and Ryans, Trump aligned himself with the crowd against the celebrities and VIPs on the dais. Mass rallies, social media, and sheer force of personality are his weapons as he attempts to defenestrate the ruling class in Washington and bring a new spirit of patriotism to America. He draws strength from his gut connection with Jacksonian America—a connection deepened and enriched by one of the most combative, polarizing, bold, evocative, and indeed revolutionary inaugural addresses in American history.

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If You Thought I Was Kidding, Think Again!

Posted January 20, 2017 by danmillerinpanama
Categories: Trump agenda, Trump inauguration
Tags: ,

If You Thought I Was Kidding, Think Again!, Power Line,  John Hinderaker, January 20, 2017

Donald Trump’s inaugural address was historic. Not because it was good, although it was very good indeed. But because it didn’t give an inch. Trump’s message to the world was: if you thought I wasn’t serious; if you thought I might go native; if you thought the weight of responsibility might force me to accept the conventional wisdom; forget it. I meant every word I’ve been saying for the last two years.

There were very few fancy turns of phrase, and those felt slightly false. For the most part, Trump’s sentences were like sledgehammers. He appealed strongly for unity among the American people, but he didn’t back off from his critique of the Washington establishment, most of which was assembled before him. Washington has enriched itself at the expense of the American people, Trump said, but that will end.

At some points, the speech was bracing. He pledged that the “civilized world” would wipe radical Islamic terrorism off the face of the Earth. That is something that most politicians wouldn’t say–not “radical Islamic terrorism” as much as his reference to the civilized world.

Some will say that Trump’s pledges to bring manufacturing jobs back to the U.S. and to reform our lavishly funded, but failing, public schools have no more prospect of success than Obama’s promise to stop the seas from rising. Time will tell. But after today, no one can doubt that Trump intends to put American interests first and to give priority to the “forgotten Americans” who more than anyone else fueled his campaign.

ONE MORE THING: CNN’s breaking news: President Trump is already signing executive orders. Good.

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Is the War Against Trump a Sideshow, or a Menace?

Posted January 19, 2017 by danmillerinpanama
Categories: Trump Hater's Club, Trump presidency
Tags: ,

Is the War Against Trump a Sideshow, or a Menace? PJ Media, Roger Kimball, January 19, 2017

(This is a follow up to Mr. Kimball’s article What Happens Next? — DM)

moreprotests3011865 01/18/2017 Protests against President-elect Donald Trump in Washington, D.C. Vladimir Astapkovich/Sputnik via AP

I suspect that, notwithstanding a lot of silly grandstanding, the leftover Left and the legacy media that supports it are going to be inhabiting an existential, if not a literal, menagerie. They will more and more be regarded as what they in fact are: toxic curiosities, pathetic, inadvertently funny at times, but mostly irrelevant and, because irrelevant, unheeded.

********************

I am not always able to peruse the comments here, but a couple of responses to my post yesterday caught my eye.

I was reflecting on what I think is likely to happen in a little less than 24 hours, when Donald Trump takes office. One correspondent was exercised that, though I now support Trump, I did not mention that I was once very critical of him. I have explained that in many posts (here for example, or here or here). Perhaps I should conclude every post with a codicil in small type explaining that past performance is no guarantee of future returns, that you may lose principle, and that I am liable to alter my views to take account of alterations in the world outside. Or perhaps not.

The other comment was more interesting: this correspondent took issue, not without some regret, with my suggestion that, after an access of wailing and gnashing of teeth, the hysterical Left would “subside into pathetic irrelevance.”

I did say it was an “open question” whether this would happen, but went on to argue that I thought the more histrionic examples of protest would fade away if Trump got the team he wanted and moved quickly and decisively to enact his agenda.

But my correspondent is wise to sound an admonitory tocsin.

It’s not just that the country is divided as it hasn’t been since, oh, 1860, but also that the Left, for a whole host of reasons, is weaponized in a way it hasn’t been since … well, I was going to say since the late 1960s. But the truth is that Trump is facing is a union of Left-wing animus and bureaucratized establishment spinelessness and accommodation that is probably unique.

“The Left,” writes my correspondent, “is not going to ‘subside into pathetic irrelevance’”:

They are growing even stronger and the right does not even resist, much less fight back. I think Kimball is right to say Trump fights back, but we as conservatives certainly don’t. We are a meek, submissive, cowardly group of citizens, easily intimidated, even bullied. I wish the election of Trump was a signal that we have stood up, but it is not.

There is, alas, a lot to this. “Heck,” continues this fellow:

… look what’s happening already. Republicans have the House, the Senate and now the executive branch — and they have spent most of their time so far in office setting up committees and hearings to hang themselves over how the Russians stole the elections from the Democrats.

Er, yes. That’s correct.

And further:

Trump has not spent one day in office and he has been largely delegitimized by the Left. He and the Republicans in Congress have been hemmed in and hogtied before the new Republican President has even sat down in the Oval Office. The inauguration is certainly going to be disrupted — and the Left has successfully bullied many from participating in the event.

Kimball sees the Left subsiding into irrelevance, I see the Left as a wave rising and rising, not even nearing its crest yet — but when it does, they will swamp us all. Which is what bothers me so much about the right. There is no urgency. They think it’s the ’80s, just meandering along without a care or wildly overconfident about their future. They have no war footing to be on.

Conservatives need to start organizing, and they need to start taking direct action.

He goes on to mention Project Veritas, James O’Keefe’s great undercover video project as a model, or at least a “start” in this desideratum. Let me say in passing that I am a great admirer of O’Keefe, and I think his work exposing the hypocrisy and criminality of such leftish institutions as ACORN has been invaluable.

These observations are all on point. But I wonder if my correspondent isn’t a bit too pessimistic.  We’ll know quite soon, but it’s my sense that a lot of people on Team Trump understand the point of this story, reprised today by Glenn Reynolds at Instapundit:

There’s an old joke about a boy who complains to his mother that his little sister keeps pulling his hair.

“Oh,” responds the mother, “she doesn’t know that it hurts.”

A few minutes later, the mother hears the girl scream and runs into the other room. “She knows now,” the boy explains.

There’s a lesson for Republicans in that old joke, if they’re smart enough to absorb it.

I frankly have my doubts about “Republicans” as a whole. But about the Trumpians, I am more sanguine.

Donald Trump may invite Al Gore to Trump Tower for a chat. But he then nominates Scott Pruitt to head the EPA. (I loved the headline Pravda — er, the New York Times ran: “Trump Picks Scott Pruitt, Climate Change Denialist, to Lead E.P.A.” “Denialist,” eh?)

Trump makes peace with Mitt Romney. But he then nominate Rex Tillerson to be secretary of State.

CNN salivates over a wholly unsubstantiated, paid-for “dossier” against Trump. Guess what? Trump, brutally, calls out the network. And on and on.

Item: just yesterday, Trump proposed cutting the federal workforce by 20% and the federal budget by 10%. Good ideas!

I think there will be a lot of hysterical sideshows as the shock of Trump takes hold. It will doubtless be, as the cartoonist and blogger Scott Adams put, a “lesson in Cognitive Dissonance”:

As Trump continues to demonstrate that he was never the incompetent monster his critics believed him to be, the critics will face an identity crisis.

They either have to accept that they understand almost nothing about how the world works — because they got everything wrong about Trump — or they need to double-down on their current hallucination. Most of his critics will double-down.

And that brings us to our current situation. As Trump continues to defy all predictions from his critics, the critics need to maintain their self-images as the smart ones who saw this new Hitler coming. And that means you will see hallucinations like you have never seen. It will be epic.

Things could go south. Trump might do some stupid things. He might be unlucky with the economy or with the mess that Obama has left him on the international scene.

Clearly, the media is looking high and low for something, anything, to pin on him. And the Left might be even more insane and suicidal than I think it is.

But as I said yesterday, I suspect that, notwithstanding a lot of silly grandstanding, the leftover Left and the legacy media that supports it are going to be inhabiting an existential, if not a literal, menagerie. They will more and more be regarded as what they in fact are: toxic curiosities, pathetic, inadvertently funny at times, but mostly irrelevant and, because irrelevant, unheeded.

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What Trump is up Against

Posted January 19, 2017 by danmillerinpanama
Categories: Federal Bureauracy, Trump presidency
Tags: ,

What Trump is up Against, Power Line, Steven Hayward, January 19, 2017

(Forget the large federal building. Military surplus Quonset huts would cost much less and better serve the purpose. — DM)

I think Trump should build a large federal building in Nome, Alaska, and send as many DC bureaucrats there as possible.

*********************

A lot of people are thinking—and hoping—that Trump will be the third term of Ronald Reagan. Certainly his cabinet is to the right of Reagan’s first cabinet in many ways, and we have the experience of the Reagan years to appreciate better the massive opposition of what people are starting to call the “deep state,” a more accurate term perhaps for the menacing character of the administrative state.

I stumbled across a speech Reagan gave in 1977 that states the modern problem very well:

But how much are we to blame for what has happened? Beginning with the traumatic experience of the Great Depression, we the people have turned more and more to government for answers that government has neither the right nor the capacity to provide. But government, as an institution, always tends to increase in size and power, not just this government—any government. It’s built-in. And so government attempted to provide the answers.

The result is a fourth branch added to the traditional three of executive, legislative, and judicial: a vast federal bureaucracy that’s now being imitated in too many states and too many cities, a bureaucracy of enormous power which determines policy to a greater extent than any of us realize, very possibly to a greater extent than our own elected representatives. And it can’t be removed from office by our votes.

The last sentence here raises the central issue of Trump and Trumpism. The administrative state has dug in even more deeply since the Reagan years (a process that really started under Nixon, but that’s a long story for another time), and will be even harder to root out now.

Tevi Troy offers an important survey and tour of the scene in the current issue of Commentary, “Will There Be An Internal Revolt Against Trump?” Tevi very nicely gives a shout out a key line in my forthcoming book: “That bureaucratic government is the partisan instrument of the Democratic Party is the most obvious, yet least remarked upon, trait of our time.” Tevi goes through all the tricks bureaucrats use to frustrate a president or cabinet member it disagrees with. A useful primer that every Trump appointee ought to read.

My favorite example is one I have been saying for years:

An obstinate employee can’t be fired, as we have seen, but can be offered a job at the same level in North Dakota or another distant state. This does not have to be done too often before the word spreads that the politicals know how to use the tools at their disposal and that they are willing to employ them.

Forget North Dakota. I think Trump should build a large federal building in Nome, Alaska, and send as many DC bureaucrats there as possible.

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Actress: Wear hijab to inauguration to “stand in solidarity with our about-to-be-disenfranchised Muslim sisters”

Posted January 19, 2017 by danmillerinpanama
Categories: hijab, Trump inauguration
Tags: ,

Actress: Wear hijab to inauguration to “stand in solidarity with our about-to-be-disenfranchised Muslim sisters”, Jihad Watch, , January 19, 2017

(Don’t all good little feminists wear them? — DM)

More hysteria. Who is about to disenfranchise Muslim women? In any case, Kathy Najimy has now ably signaled her virtue, and can now sit back and enjoy the rounds of applause she will receive from the enlightened and intelligent, but where is her concern for Aqsa Parvez, whose Muslim father choked her to death with her hijab after she refused to wear it? Or Aqsa and Amina Muse Ali, a Christian woman in Somalia whom Muslims murdered because she wasn’t wearing a hijab? Or the 40 women who were murdered in Iraq in 2007 for not wearing the hijab; or Alya Al-Safar, whose Muslim cousin threatened to kill her and harm her family because she stopped wearing the hijab in Britain; or Amira Osman Hamid, who faced whipping in Sudan for refusing to wear the hijab; or the Egyptian girl, also named Amira, who committed suicide after being brutalized for her family for refusing to wear the hijab; or the Muslim and non-Muslim teachers at the Islamic College of South Australia who were told that they had to wear the hijab or be fired; or the women in Chechnya whom police shot with paintballs because they weren’t wearing hijab; or the women also in Chechnya who were threatened by men with automatic rifles for not wearing hijab; or the elementary school teachers in Tunisia who were threatened with death for not wearing hijab; or the Syrian schoolgirls who were forbidden to go to school unless they wore hijab; or the women in Gaza whom Hamas has forced to wear hijab; or the women in Iran who protested against the regime by daring to take off their legally-required hijab; or the women in London whom Muslim thugs threatened to murder if they didn’t wear hijab; or the anonymous young Muslim woman who doffed her hijab outside her home and started living a double life in fear of her parents, or all the other women and girls who have been killed or threatened, or who live in fear for daring not to wear the hijab?

Who is standing in solidarity with them? Those who taunt or brutalize hijab-wearing women are louts and creeps, and should be prosecuted if they commit any acts of violence. At the same time, the women who don’t wear hijab in Muslim countries are far more likely to be victims of violence than hijabis in the West. Who speaks for them?

wheresherhajib

“We should wear hijabs for Donald Trump’s inauguration in support of ‘Muslim sisters’, says US actress,” by May Bulman, Independent, January 19, 2017:

An American actress is encouraging women to wear head scarves on Donald Trump’s inauguration day in a show of solidarity with Muslim women who wear the hijab.

Kathy Najimy, best known for starring in Sister Act and Disney’s Hocus Pocus, recommended women attending an anti-inauguration march in Washington on Friday wear a scarf around their heads, “hijab style”, as a way of standing with their “about-to-be-disenfranchised Muslim Sisters”.

In a statement posted on Facebook, 59-year-old Ms Najimy wrote: “We wanted to create an action, visible and easy, to proclaim our commitment to freedom of religion and to the constitution — religion or no religion.

“We intend to show that we stand in solidarity with our about-to-be-disenfranchised Muslim sisters.”

The actress insisted that such an act would not mean endorsing any religious doctrine, but “standing for freedom”, adding: “We support every woman’s right to worship as they wish and live in security and peace.

“We are by no means endorsing or aligning with any religious doctrine, but simply standing for freedom.”

Ms Najimy is leading a campaign group called Sisterhood of the Travelling Scarves in the nationwide call ahead of a women’s march on Friday, which is expected to see more than 100,000 people in Washington to protest against Mr Trump’s presidency, viewing it specifically as a “feminist issue”….

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MAJOR MOMENT: Donald Trump & Family Exit Official White House Plane, Arrive in D.C. for Inauguration

Posted January 19, 2017 by danmillerinpanama
Categories: Trump inauguration
Tags:

MAJOR MOMENT: Donald Trump & Family Exit Official White House Plane, Arrive in D.C. for Inauguration, Fox News via YouTube, January 19, 2017

(President Elect Trump returns the salute the way the Commander in Chief should. Remember Obama? — DM)

 

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10 Reasons Hamas Should Not Be in Any Government

Posted January 19, 2017 by danmillerinpanama
Categories: Fatah, Hamas, Islamic Jihad, Israel, Palestinian Authority, Palestinian elections, Palestinian state, Palestinian terrorists, Two state solution, unity government
Tags: , , , , , , , , ,

10 Reasons Hamas Should Not Be in Any Government, Clarion Project, Elliot Friedland, January 19, 2017

(Similar claims could be made legitimately about Fatah and Islamic Jihad. — DM)

hamasrallyHamas leaders at a rally. (Photo: © Mahmud Hams/AFP/Getty Images)

Fatah and Hamas, which control the West Bank and the Gaza Strip respectively, concluded an agreement to form a national unity government. The Palestinian Authority, which is the official body that rules the Palestinian-controlled areas, as per the Oslo Accords, will now begin the process of forming a new national council. The P.A. president is Fatah leader Mahmoud Abbas.

Hamas and Fatah also announced they will hold elections that will include members of the Palestinian diaspora. Elections were last held in 2007.

“We have reached agreement under which, within 48 hours, we will call on [Palestinian Authority President] Mahmoud Abbas to launch consultations on the creation of a government,” Fatah spokesman Azzam al-Ahmad told media.

Here are ten reasons why Hamas is not fit to be part of any government.
Hamas Is A Designated Terrorist Organization

Hamas is a terrorist group and is designated as such by Israel (obviously) but also the United States, the EU, Canada and Japan so this one should come as no surprise.

Hamas Deliberately Targets Civilians

Most recently Hamas praised the string of violent attacks that hit Israel over the past year and half.

In the last Gaza war, Hamas fired thousands of rockets indiscriminately at Israeli civilian areas. “Deliberate targeting of civilians by Hamas and other Palestinian armed groups defies humanity and is morally and legally reprehensible” Israeli left-wing human rights organization B’Tselem said about the last Gaza war.

They Use Civilians As Human Shields

According to the Geneva Conventions, “The presence or movements of the civilian population or individual civilians shall not be used to render certain points or areas immune from military operations, in particular in attempts to shield military objectives from attacks or to shield, favour or impede military operations. The parties to the conflict shall not direct the movement of the civilian population or individual civilians in order to attempt to shield military objectives from attacks or to shield military operations.”

Hamas does precisely this. In the last Gaza war, in 2014, Hamas ordered civilians to remain in their homes if they were about to be bombed. All the more gallingly, Hamas deliberately manipulates the inevitable civilian casualties that result, using the blood of Palestinians to purchase international sympathy.

Hamas Steals Palestinian Aid For Military Purposes

Hamas receives a lot of aid from around the world for the Gaza strip, which is frequently the subject of international aid campaigns. Yet Hamas steals much of this aid for its own purposes. “From our own investigations we found that out of every 100 sacks of cement that come into the Gaza strip [from Israel], only five or six are transferred to civilians,” said Israeli Foreign Ministry Director-General Dore Gold. “A hundred sacks is what is necessary to rebuild a home, the rest are confiscated by Hamas and used for military purposes.”

Hamas uses the cement to construct multi-million dollar tunnels via which it hopes to carry out cross-border raids into Israel to murder Israeli civilians and attack Israeli soldiers.

In August 2016, Israel leveled charges against Mohammed el Halabi the head of World Vision in Gaza for allegedly funneling tens of millions of dollars earmarked for humanitarian purposes to Hamas for its terrorist activities.

Hamas Steals Money From Palestinians to Enrich Their Leaders

Hamas controls the lucrative smuggling tunnels that bring goods into Gaza from Egypt. They tax incoming products for revenue. “Most of the money that went into the pockets of people in the Gaza Strip was obtained through tunnel deals and the creation of a flourishing smuggling market, which it is believed has created several hundred millionaires in the Gaza Strip, although most of the people there don’t live like that,” Col. (res.) Moshe Elad, a lecturer at the Western Galilee Academic College who served in a variety of senior military positions told Globes. “The man pulling the strings from Egypt with the tunnels is none other than the number two man in the Muslim Brotherhood, Khairat el-Shater. His connection with Hamas was ostensibly for Islamic religious purposes, but they actually built a prosperous business, which earned phenomenal profits.”

Hamas also receives donations, both from wealthy Muslims in America and internationally, but also from state sponsors such as Saudi Arabia, Iran and Qatar.

This money has been appropriated by the Hamas leadership who enriched themselves at the expense of Palestinians. The inner circle of Hamas are millionaires.

Hamas Executes Dissenters and Stifles Critique

Hamas routinely carries out extrajudicial killings, abductions and torture of dissidents within the territory it controls. This includes supporters of rival Palestinian factions such as Fatah (with whom Hamas will now be forming a unity government) as well as those accused of collaborating with Israel.

Hamas is not believed to conduct fair trials.

In 2014 during the last Gaza war, Hamas carried out a campaign of targeted killings and abductions detailed in the Amnesty International Report entitled “‘Strangling Necks’ Abductions, Torture And Summary Killings Of Palestinians By Hamas Forces During The 2014 Gaza/Israel Conflict.”

“In the chaos of the conflict, the de facto Hamas administration granted its security forces free rein to carry out horrific abuses including against people in its custody,” said Philip Luther, Amnesty International, then Director of the Middle East and North Africa Programme at Amnesty International. These spine-chilling actions, some of which amount to war crimes, were designed to exact revenge and spread fear across the Gaza Strip.”

Nor did this stop after the war. “Palestinian governments in both Gaza and the West Bank are arresting and even physically abusing activists and journalists who express criticism on important public issues,” Human Rights Watch said as recently as August 2016.

Hamas Wants a Theocratic State and Murders LGBT People

Hamas is an affiliate of the Muslim Brotherhood, which is pledged to establish an Islamic State as a final goal. It terms itself “The Islamic Resistance Movement” and article one of its founding charter reads “The Movement’s programme is Islam.”

Although Hamas is continually on a war-footing and has therefore been less focused on establishing a sharia-based system of governance than other Islamist groups, it still takes the time to implement sharia governance where it can.

In this vein Hamas has imprisoned women for sex outside marriage.

Hamas Persecutes the LGBT Community

In January 2016, Hamas executed one of its senior commanders after allegations of gay sex emerged. John Calvin (not his real name) is from one of Hamas’ most important families and fought for and gained asylum in the United States because if he returned to Nablus he would be murdered.

These are rarely mentioned by those in the “Queers for Palestine” movement.

Israel Withdrew From Gaza And Hamas Turned it Into A Terrorist State

In 2005 Israel completely withdrew from the Gaza Strip. In 2007 Hamas took over and turned the enclave into their own personal fiefdom.

Governmental errors in the Israeli withdrawal notwithstanding , Hamas demonstrated its lack of commitment to its own people and to the path of peace by choosing rejectionism and violence instead.

Hamas Perpetrates Child Abuse

Hamas trains young children in its military training camps to indoctrinate them with the group’s Islamist and jihadist ideology and train them for hatred and warfare.

This is backed up by Hamas media outlets which produce children’s programs that inculcate the next generation with the Hamas ideology.

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Cartoons and Video of the Day

Posted January 19, 2017 by danmillerinpanama
Categories: Humor
Tags:

Via YouTube

 

H/t Vermont Loon Watch

the-salute

 

farewellobama

 

H/t Vermont Loon Watch

brother

 

H/t Kingjester’s Blog

transfer

 

H/t Freedom is Just Another Word

mommy

 

nogo

 

hardquestion

 

H/t Vermont Loon Watch

ask

 

receive

 

H/t Townhall

demsafespace

 

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Trump’s inaugural speech and the empty chair Democrats

Posted January 19, 2017 by danmillerinpanama
Categories: Absent Democrats, Trump inauguration
Tags:

Trump’s inaugural speech and the empty chair Democrats, American Thinker, Jim Yardley, January 19, 2017

Now that Inauguration Day is upon us, what should President-elect Donald Trump do or say in response to the nonsense exhibited by Congressman John Lewis and a third or more of the House Democrats?

It would be beneath our new president to make acerbic comments about the absence of so many Democrats during the inaugural ceremonies.  Absenting themselves can only be seen with the same eyes, and the same attitude, mature adults would have in watching immature children running around with their hands over their ears while screaming “La..La..La..La..La!  I can’t hear you!”

I would not, however, try to pretend that there was nothing unusual going on.  I would go to the Senator Blunt, master of ceremonies for the inauguration and insist that the sixty or so seats that were reserved for Democratic Party members not be used for anyone else.  I would ask that the master of ceremonies move every single one of those seats together.  And leave them together. And leave them empty.  I would want them not only isolated but be able to be clearly seen and photographed, videographed and televised as a gaping hole in the audience.

If I were the new president, I would address portions of my speech directly at those empty seats.  I would tell the remaining audience members something similar to “I’m sorry that those sixty odd people are not present to hear what I’m about to say.”  Then address the absent members of Congress explaining what his goals for the nation and his plans for his administration are over the next four years.

Addressing empty chairs is not a particularly new idea.  Anyone who has paid attention to politics over the past eight years I’m sure remembers the address by Clint Eastwood to an empty chair during the 2012 Republican convention.

The fact that President Trump would address empty chairs would plainly emphasize which of the two political parties we suffer through every day is the current source of discord and demonstrates an unwillingness to even listen to anyone else’s ideas.

It’s the kind of thing that will make ordinary citizens begin to wonder which group can be classed as mature and which must be classed as childish.

 

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The Thrill: The Story of Chris Matthews and Barack Obama

Posted January 19, 2017 by danmillerinpanama
Categories: Chris Matthews, Media and Obama, MSNBC, Obama thrill
Tags: , ,

The Thrill: The Story of Chris Matthews and Barack Obama, Washington Free Beacon, , January 18, 2017

MSNBC host Chris Matthews infamously pronounced that a 2008 speech delivered by Barack Obama gave him a “thrill going up my leg.”

As this new Washington Free Beacon supercut shows, that thrill remained for the next eight years. The liberal cable host called Obama perfect, incorruptible, and post-racial, claimed he had “never done anything wrong in his life,” and was fond of chalking up opposition to the Obama agenda to racists, racism, and being racist.

Such was Matthew’s love for Obama that he thanked Superstorm Sandy for coming along in 2012 and helping the president’s successful reelection bid, a remark for which he later apologized.

Obama is leaving the White House, but the Tingle is surely there to stay.

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