President Trump’s approval rating falls again.  Soon it will be lower than Trump University graduates’ success rate.

The number of potential conflicts of interest that entangles this president is astonishing.  Here are just a small fraction of the issues:

Instead of putting his assets into a real blind trust with the trustees having no financial relationship to him, as former presidents did, Trump turned his company over to his 3 children.

Rudy Giuliani said using a blind trust would put his children out of work.  No problem there – he’ll just hire them.

Anyone wishing to influence U.S. government policy can now do so indirectly by benefitting Trump holdings.

The National Labor Relations Board enforces labor laws.  Since Trump properties have ongoing fights with labor unions, and the Board has previously ruled against him, he could reverse this because he appoints all 5 board members.

Foreign support seekers could show their appreciation for any help Trump could give by staying at the Washington, D.C. Trump International Hotel, at up to $20,000 a night.

He has business deals with foreign governments and individuals and 100 companies in 18 countries.  Helping them could help him.

An anti-nepotism law was passed in 1967, and yet Ivanka and Jared play major administration roles.

He owes hundreds of millions of dollars to foreign financial interests – including the Bank of China and DeutscheBank, which could influence U.S. economic policy.

He owns a vineyard that hires foreign workers.

He has said that “his brand is hotter than ever.”

He has said that the President is allowed to have whatever conflicts of interest he wants.  This actually is true, but other presidents in modern times acted as if the law did apply to them.

With his business interests spanning the globe, he can be influenced by allies, dictatorships and anti-American interests.

The Office of Government Ethics says he has not solved the problem of his conflicts of interest.

Because he needs real estate loans, he needs easy money from banks.  This is the reason he wants to dismantle Dodd-Franks.

 

It is painfully evident that the President is in it for one thing – enriching himself.

The President drove a truck the other day.  He found out that being in the driver’s seat scares the crap out of him.

Continuing on a bit from the last blog, although he speaks of mainstream media being “fake news,” President Trump’s favorite source of live news is Fox News.  Here are some of their fake news:

Asians aren’t liberals because they are hardworking.

Men should “dominate” women.

Fox commentator says she would look “fabulous” on food stamps because she would be so skinny.

Americans aren’t “pure” like Swedes because they marry “other species and other ethnics.”

The push for gender equality is no longer necessary.

Jesus and Santa are both white.

Infidelity can make a better president.

Poor people aren’t really poor, because they have refrigerators.

Liberal women should not be able to hold office.

Sponge Bob pushes global warming agenda.

Mr. Rogers was evil for calling kids special.

Rape doesn’t happen on college campuses.

Told a black Columbia University professor he looked like a cocaine dealer.

Young women interested in politics should go back to dating apps.

Obama will introduce Sharia law.

Servicewomen should expect to be raped.

World War II Japanese internment camps were successful.

Obamacare includes death panels.

 

The saddest thing is that so many people use Fox as their only source of (mis)information and believe this stuff.

Republican Senators passed the “Sell Your Privacy bill.”  Now Russia is even freer to check your internet history.

President Trump is always talking about “fake news.”  Apparently, his version of real news comes from two of his favorite journalistic paragons – Breitbart News (formerly headed by Steve Bannon) and the National Enquirer.  Here are a few of the headlines from each:

 Breitbart News – try not to gag:

Women suck at interviews.

The Planned Parenthood body count is up to ½ a holocaust.
Birth control makes women unattractive and crazy.
Donald Trump praises Breitbart’s political editor. (Gosh, really?)
Planned Parenthood has pro-Nazi roots.
Bill Kristol is a renegade Jew.
The Confederate flag proclaims a glorious history.
Would you rather your child have feminism or cancer?
Marxist global extremists control the Vatican.
Science proves it – fat shaming works.

 National Enquirer – try not to laugh hysterically:

For 2 years, Rita Hayworth was a zombie.

Fidel Castro said, “I killed JFK.”
Ted Cruz’s father linked to JFK assassination.
Michelle Obama’s 95 lb. weight gain.
Hillary gains 103 pounds.
Adam and Eve were astronauts.
Elvis and his mom were lovers.
Arizona man captured by UFO.
Carol Burnett was drunk with Henry Kissinger. (She won a libel suit for
    this.)
Princess Diana’s body is missing.
Hillary blackmailed the FBI.
Bigfoot found.
Bill Cosby had his son murdered.
Kris Jenner hid O.J.’s murder weapon.

Sure explains a lot, doesn’t it.

President Trump says big crowds won’t show up unless the Trumpcare bill passes.  Wait until he sees the crowds if it does pass.

With more revelations recently that the Gang of Trump has attempted to create the United States of Russia, let’s take a brief look at Putin’s Russia and see if we can find any parallels (taken from a variety of sources):

Putin suggests that the opposition undermines the country.

There has been a huge increase in Russian defense spending.

Putin has changed the political system and government structure to benefit his personal interests.

Russia’s money goes to Putin and his associates – not to the average Russian.

Putin promotes news reports that fail to comply with impartiality rules.

Russian laws have been passed that have led to LGBT harassment.

Putin has been accused of being fundamentally dishonest.

The Russian government has raised fines for those taking part in protests.

Putin canceled an agreement on the disposal of weapons grade plutonium.

Russia wanted to confuse and discredit the American election process.

Putin created a plan of fighting enemies to keep people from turning on him and saying, “Why don’t we have medicine and you’re rich?”

Putin wants more and more money so that he can be richer than anyone else.

Putin came to power under the guise of being a reformer.

 

We have to keep fighting to prevent the final outrage happening in Putin’s Russia:

Anyone who has the ability and popularity to challenge Putin is either exiled, arrested or killed.

The Budget Director said that it’s a “fairly compassionate budget.”  Marie Antoinette must have called the guillotine a "fairly compassionate haircut.”

Since virtually everyone on earth has discredited the President’s wiretapping claim, I thought it was time to revisit some of his ridiculous claims, tweets and promises:

President Obama wiretapped me.  WRONG

Mexico will pay for the wall.  WRONG

I will enact ethics reform to end government corruption.  WRONG  (ha, ha)

All undocumented immigrants will be out on day 1.  WRONG

I will prosecute Hillary Clinton.  WRONG

I will absolutely release my tax documents.  WRONG

I will stop North Korea’s nuclear program.  WRONG (but he did say N. Korea was behaving very badly – shame on them.)

I will drain the swamp and prevent conflict of interest. WRONG

All cabinet choices are “at the highest levels.” WRONG

There will be health insurance for everybody.  WRONG

There has been no contact between Trump associates and Russia.  WRONG

I don’t know Putin.  I do have a relationship with Putin.  I spoke directly and indirectly with Putin.  Take your pick on which is WRONG

Thousands of people were bussed to New Hampshire to vote illegally.  WRONG

I won the popular vote if you deduct the millions of people who voted illegally.  WRONG

Inauguration drew largest attendance ever.  WRONG

The administration is running like a fine tuned machine.  WRONG

Any negative polls are fake news.  WRONG

I will be taken completely out of my business operations.  WRONG

Sessions didn’t say anything wrong.  WRONG

 

There is so much WRONG with this administration, it cannot even be quantified.

The Budget Director says, “We can’t make single moms pay for public television.”  But we can make them pay for weekend trips to Mar-A-Lago.

The Budget Director says, “It’s a fairly compassionate budget.”  I guess Marie Antoinette called the guillotine a fairly compassionate haircut.

Today we look at the “compassionate” nature of the President’s budget as well as its “benefits” to a single mom, by looking at just a fraction of the programs to which it proposes eliminating or drastically reducing funding:

Assistance to low income people in paying their energy bills.

Habitat for Humanity – builds affordable housing for homeowners based on their level of need.
EPA – protects human health and the environment.
Meals on Wheels – delivers meals to individual who are unable to purchase or prepare their own.
Worker training and safety programs.
NASA – responsible for the civilian space program as well as aeronautics and aerospace research.
NOAA – warns of dangerous weather and protects ocean and coastal resources.
National Institute of Health – primary agency responsible for biomedical and health related research.
National Public Radio – produces and distributes news and cultural programming.
PBS – distributes programming such as Sesame Street to public television stations.
Health professional training.
Interagency Agency Council on Homelessness – rental assistance to low income people.
National Endowment for the Arts – support and funding for projects exhibiting artistic excellence.
Institute of Museum and Library Services – creating strong libraries and museums.
Smithsonian Institution – 19 museums, 9 research centers and zoo, with 156 million items.
National Gallery of Art - Western art from the Middle Ages to the present.
After school and summer programs.
Manufacturing Extension Partnership – helps small companies create and maintain good paying jobs.

Now, to put things in perspective, items not affected by the budget:

Security costs for keeping the Trump family 100 miles away in New York: $410,000 per day.

Each weekend for the family at Mar-A-Lago: over $3,000,000.
Security costs for Trump son’s business trip: $16,000.
Total Trump travel and security costs for 4 years: $500 MILLION DOLLARS.

Trump has bragged about his tremendous wealth, so why doesn’t he pitch in on the expenses.  Instead, among other outrageous consequences, his budget could mean 200,000 people might lose the roofs over their heads.

Is this America????

Representative Chaffetz, who could argue with wanting an IPhone over a liver transplant?

Under TrumpCare, the poor will have to scale the wall to get into Mexico to get their medicine.

As a former environmental biologist, I believe in science!!  I am incensed at the Republican push to eliminate the Environmental Protection Agency.  Even before the House of Representatives introduced House Resolution 861 to terminate the EPA, the Trump administration eliminated the word “science” from the EPA’s mission statement.  I hope everyone remembers what your city’s air looked like prior to the EPA’s founding in 1970, because it will be even worse if this agency is sacked.

Here’s a look at some of the matters which are regulated by the EPA:

Regulations asbestos in schools, public and commercial buildings, cleanup sites and products.

Sets air pollution standards for carbon monoxide, ozone, lead, nitrogen oxides, particulates and sulfur dioxide.

Controls acid rain.

Regulates greenhouse gas emissions.  (If you don’t believe that greenhouse gases cause climate change, take a look at the planet Venus!)

Radiation protection standards.

Transportation pollution regulation.

Implementation of the Endangered Species Act.

Develops regulatory actions to protect children from environmental health and safety risks.

Enforcement of laws protecting human health from the harmful effects of lead and mercury.

The nation’s principal conservation agency, protecting public lands and natural resources.

 

So, if the Republican Congress has its way:  Our air and water will be polluted, there will no longer be public education, our wildlife will disappear, millions will be without healthcare, women will no longer be able to obtain healthcare at Planned Parenthood, unions will be banned, cities will be unable to protect their own citizens, legal abortion will no longer exist under any circumstances, investors will be screwed, and kids will be treated like slaves.  Welcome to the Republican vision for America.

In response to President Trump’s wiretapping claim, Senator Rubio said, “I’m not sure what he’s talking about.”  He might as well put that on a loop.

Dr. Carson, saying slaves were immigrants is equivalent to saying concentration camp victims were non-paying guests.

Throwing immigrants out and preventing immigrants from coming into our country is still a major aim of this administration.  Aside from losing all those people who build our houses, pick up our trash, flip our burgers, mow our lawns and a myriad of other jobs which nobody else in this country will take, there are the thousands and thousands of immigrants who have made enormous contributions to the American way of life.  Here are just a few of the notables:

 

Albert Einstein, Germany, Physicist

I M Pei, China, Architect

Irving Berlin, Russia, Composer

J J Audubon, Haiti, Ornithologist

Andrew Carnegie, Scotland, Industrialist 

Joseph Pulitzer, Hungary, Journalist

Madeline Albright, Czechoslovakia, Secretary of State

Nikola Tesla, Croatia, Inventor

Sergey Brin, Russia, Founder of Google

Alexander Graham Bell, Scotland, Inventor

Pierre Omidyar, France, Founder of Ebay

Maxwell Kohl, Poland, Department Store Founder

Jerry Yang, Taiwan, Yahoo! Founder

John Nordstrom Sweden, Department Store Founder

Nooshun Hashemi, Iran, Philanthropist

Jamshed Bharucha, India, Neuroscientist

Rupert Murdoch, Australia, Fox News Network

Arianna Huffington, Greece, Publisher

Firouz Naderi, Iran, Director at NASA

Arieh Warshek, Israel, Nobel Prize Biochemist

Romana Banuelos, Mexico, Secretary of Treasury

Domenico Ghirardelli, Italy, Chocolatier

Charles Elachi, Lebanon, Director Jet Propulsion Lab

Max Factor, Poland, Cosmetologist

Edward G Robinson, Romania, Actor

Al Jolson, Lithuania, Singer

Knute Rockne, Norway, Football Coach

Jule Styne, England, Composer

Elia Kazan, Turkey, Director

Maria von Trapp, Austria, Singer

 And special thanks to all of my grandparents for being immigrants to the United States.  Without them, I wouldn’t be here!!!

 

 

 

Trump's claims of wiretapping turn out to be Kellyanne Conway playing a game of telephone.

The Interior Secretary repeals the ban on lead bullets.  We need to do something with the extra lead that’s going to be in our water.

One of my friends for over 50 years sent me an email that I have permission to include here.  These are actual Republican bills introduced in this session of Congress:

1. HR 861 Terminate the Environmental Protection Agency
2. HR 610 Vouchers for Public Education
3. HR 899 Terminate the Department of Education
4. HJR 69 Repeal Rule Protecting Wildlife
5. HR 370 Repeal Affordable Care Act
6. HR 354 Defund Planned Parenthood
7. HR 785 National Right to Work (this one ends unions)
8. HR 83 Mobilizing Against Sanctuary Cities Bill
9. HR 147 Criminalizing Abortion (“Prenatal Nondiscrimination Act”)

I’d like to add some add a few more of them:

10. HR 1343 Revising rules increasing the threshold amount for requiring certain financial disclosures

11. HR 1264 Exemption from Rules and Regulations of the Bureau of Consumer Financial Protection
12. SB 452 Delay enforcement of National Ambient Air Quality Standards for Ozone
13. HR 1454 Exemption of certain 16 and 17 year olds from child labor laws.
14. SB 488 Raise the SEC threshold in which securities issuer has to give additional disclosures from $5,000,000 to $10,000,000

 

So, if the Republican Congress has its way:  Our air and water will be polluted, there will no longer be public education, our wildlife will disappear, millions will be without healthcare, women will no longer be able to obtain healthcare at Planned Parenthood, unions will be banned, cities will be unable to protect their own citizens, legal abortion will no longer exist under any circumstances, investors will be screwed, and kids will be treated like slaves.  Welcome to the Republican vision for America.

Only $20 million is available to build Trump’s Wall.  Apparently, it will be built of Cheetos.

The White House says Kellyanne Conway had no “nefarious motive” in plugging Ivanka’s junk.  She also had no brains.

Today’s blog topic is the discussion on the origin of the separation of church and state in the Constitution and its subsequent interpretation throughout the centuries.

Article VI of the United States Constitution states: “No religious test shall ever be required as a qualification to any office or public trust under the United States.”  The First Amendment states: “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof,”

It has often been said that the country’s founding fathers intended the United States to be a Christian nation.  This notion is not supported by any historical documentation.  The majority of the country’s founders, including Washington, Jefferson, Adams and Madison, considered themselves outside of orthodox religion.  It was actually Jefferson who coined the term “separation of church and state,” indicating that the church needed to stay out of the state’s business and vice versa, and that “religion is a matter which lies solely between Man and his God.”

In 1947 the U.S. Supreme Court affirmed this in a decision which stated: “The ‘establishment of religion’ clause of the First Amendment means at least this: Neither a state nor the Federal Government can set up a church.  Neither can pass laws which aid one religion, all religions, or prefer one religion over another.  Neither can force nor influence a person to go to or to remain away from church against his will or force him to profess a belief or disbelief in any religion.”

In 1981, Senator Barry Goldwater made a speech in which he stated, “By maintaining the separation of church and state, the United States has avoided the intolerance which has so divided the rest of the world with religious wars…We have succeeded for 205 years in keeping the affairs of state separate from the uncompromising idealism of religious groups and we mustn’t stop now.  To retreat from that separation would violate the principles of conservatism and the values upon which the framers built this democratic republic.”

It is even more imperative in today’s environment for this country to adhere to the Constitution.  Can you imagine what would happen if the government was sanctioned to commit religious intolerance.  It would be, well, Nazi Germany!

It’s estimated that it will cost $183 million a year to protect the President and his family.  Let’s just build a wall.

Spies withhold information from President Trump.  They’re waiting to give it to him at the Mar-A-Lago buffet line.

For years, the President and the Republican Congress have made it their top priority to repeal Obamacare.  In fact, Congress voted 6 times to repeal it and 54 times to cripple or delay it.  Since that would leave up to 26 million Americans uninsured, they now say they want to replace it with affordable healthcare coverage for all.  Of course, they have no f’ing idea how to do that other than, well, don’t get sick.  Let’s take a look at a century of Republican Congressional obstructionist history with respect to healthcare.

We first look at Medicare.  In 1965, 69% of Democrats voted to create Medicare, while only 33% of Republicans did so.  Ronald Reagan, prior to becoming President, said Medicare would lead to the destruction of freedom.  Barry Goldwater said it was like giving the elderly vacations and free beer and cigarettes.  In 2009, 137 House Republicans voted to replace Medicare with subsidies that would lose value over time.  In 2011, a majority of House and 40 Senate Republicans voted to phase out and privatize the program.  In 2015, the Republican House voted to cut $148 billion from Medicare’s budget.

Now to the rest of the population.  In 1929, the Republican Congress allowed the expiration of an Act which provided funds to states for prenatal and child health centers.  Although Presidents Roosevelt and Truman had attempted to pass a plan for national health insurance, when the Republicans gained control of Congress in 1946, they had no interest in enacting national health insurance and failed to pass President Truman’s National Health program.

In 1974, Senator Edward Kennedy proposed a national healthcare plan that would be administered by private health insurance companies and financed by workers and employers.  Instead, Republicans proposed Medicredit, which would be financed by premiums reimbursed by a tax credit, which of course would be of no benefit to the poor, who didn’t itemize deductions.

In 1995, the Republican Congress drafted bills that would repeal tough standards for the quality of care in nursing homes, which was passed by a Democratic Congress in 1987 to address shockingly deficient care in some nursing home.  In 2015, 41 Republican Senators voted against a bill that would expand and improve health care services to veterans and their families.

Apparently, taking care of our old and sick is not high on the Republican to-do list.  The rest of us must take whatever action we can to make certain that they do not get the opportunity to reverse the progress made in the last 100 years.

(Just as an aside, in 1935 Republicans said Social Security was equivalent to slavery and dictatorship.)

58% of the country find President Trump embarrassing.  I guess the other 42% just pretend they don’t know who he is.

Sean Spicer said our relationship with Mexico is “phenomenal.”  That one doesn’t even need a punchline.

 

I’m anticipating participating in my first protest march on April 15th, a national demonstration demanding that President Trump release his tax returns.  Even though Kellyanne Conway says nobody cares about his tax returns, I anticipate millions of us will contradict her.  In my state, we are also promoting a ballot initiative that would require all state and national level candidates to release the last 5 years of taxes before being allowed on the ballot.

I got to thinking about the meaning and history of peaceful political protest in this country, and the current efforts to undermine our First Amendment rights.  The First Amendment to the Constitution protects citizens’ rights to assemble and protest.  In our history, there have basically been two types of protests – peaceful marches and assemblies, and civil disobedience.

An early peaceful American demonstration was the Woman Suffrage parade of 1913, in which approximately 8,000 women marched in the District of Columbia to advance the cause of women’s right to vote.  This milestone will soon be honored on the redesign of the U.S. ten dollar bill.  Perhaps the most famous demonstration was the Civil Rights March of 1963 at which 200,000 peaceful orators and musicians championed equal rights for all, and Dr. Martin Luther King gave his famous “I Have a Dream” speech.  In 1969, 500,000 people marched in Washington to protest the Vietnam War, and we know that this eventually led to the downfall of President Lyndon Johnson.  Of course the Women’s Marches of January 2017 are now legendary, with over 4 million participants nationwide.

The other protest type is civil disobedience, which was a term coined by Henry David Thoreau in his refusal to pay the state poll tax which was meant to enforce the Fugitive Slave Law.  Civil disobedience is the deliberate refusal to obey governmental laws that one feels are immoral, and it is therefore subject to legal consequences.  Examples of this type of protest are the Boston Tea Party, Rosa Parks’ refusal to go to the back of the bus (which was then breaking the law), and numerous civil rights sit-ins.

Of course, my intention is to participate in peaceful marches.  However, Republican legislators in 28 states are attempting to blur the distinction between the two types of protest.  Proposed legislation ranges from levying five years in prison for interfering with traffic to permitting the government to seize protestors’ assets under a racketeering law meant for organized crime figures and terrorists.  These proposals are blatant attempts to block the Constitutional right of assembly and our right of dissent.

The good news is that there are millions and millions of us who will continue to peacefully protest, and fortunately legal experts unanimously agree that such attempts would not survive a Constitutional challenge.  Just in case, though, I hope some of my Facebook friends could come up with some bail money.