Trump played golf on Martin Luther King Day.  He had originally planned to play tennis because he thought it was Billie Jean King day.

There will undoubtedly be numerous protest marches and demonstrations during 2018.  With the current incompetent, illegitimate, racist, corrupt, mendacious, despotic, Russian controlled administration still in place, I intend to participate in at least a few.  For those who think that political protests have little positive consequences, here are a few throughout American history:

·        Boston Tea Party – 1773 – At least 116 Massachusetts colonists participated, resulting in the first Continental Congress to consider a united American resistance to the British, a significant event in the growth of the American Revolution.

·        Women’s Suffrage March – 1913 – 5,000 women paraded in Washington, D.C., during which they were harassed with over 200 people treated for injuries.  Seven years later, the 19^th Amendment to the Constitution was passed, assuring voting rights for all American women.

·        Rabbi’s March – 1943 – 400 rabbis marched in support of Allied and American action to stop the destruction of European Jewry.  President Roosevelt refused to meet with the rabbis but eventually was moved to bring about a change in White House policy towards the Holocaust.

·        March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom – 1963 – 250,000 people hear Martin Luther King’s “I Have a Dream” speech advocating for civil and economic rights for African Americans.  The march is credited with helping to pass the Civil Rights Act of 1964.

·        Moratorium March to End the War in Viet Nam – 1969 – Over 500,000 demonstrators lead Richard Nixon to state, “Now I understand that there has been, and continues to be, opposition to the war in Vietnam on the campuses and also in the nation.”

·        Women’s Strike for Equality – 1970 – 20,000 marched for equal opportunity in the workplace, political rights for women and social equality in relationships.  Nixon acknowledged the credibility of the movement, and scholars say the strike was a significant spark for second wave feminism

·        National March in Washington for Lesbian and Gay Rights – 1979 – 75,000 marched to nationalize the gay movement.  The second march in 1987 was estimated at 750,000.  The 1993 march was estimated at 1 million. Colorado had just passed an amendment prohibiting laws protecting gays and lesbians.  President Clinton spoke, promising increased spending for AIDS research.

·        The Women’s March – 2017 – Crowds of around 500,000 in Washington and up to 5 million across the country, responded to the election of Donald Trump. Over 600 marches took place to advocate legislation and policies regarding human rights, women’s rights, immigration reform, healthcare reform, reproductive rights, the natural environment LGBTQ rights, racial equality, freedom of religion and workers’ rights.

·        The Women’s March – 2018 – 250 events are scheduled worldwide for this coming Saturday, January 20^th.  In Washington, an impeachment march is schedule in conjunction with this event.

If you believe that our country is being destroyed by those currently in power, keep an eye out for the marches and demonstrations occurring in 2018 and show your resistance by participation.

Trump tweets that he’s a stable genius.  The other horses agree.

Not that anybody could truly believe that this administration has any compassion for other human beings or animals nor concern for the environment, but let’s take a look at what they have done in the past year to denigrate, humiliate, isolate, eviscerate, subjugate, irritate, deprecate, alienate, eliminate and nauseate those who aren’t among the very wealthy of this nation: (and sometimes them as well):

·        Record number of 1^st year departures from high level positions in the administration – 34%.

·        Drastically decreased fines nursing homes must pay for breaking regulations on patient care.

·        Considers rescinding safety rules with regard to fracking and off-shore drilling.

·        Fired all of the HIV/AIDS Council.

·        Denied the existence of climate change.

·        Threw paper towels at Puerto Rico hurricane survivors.

·        Repealed net neutrality rules.

·        Failed to renew CHIP, which helps in covering health insurance to 9 million children.

·        Trump clashed with government ethics officer, leading to his resignation.

·        Decided (but maybe not) to reverse ban on importing African elephant trophies.

·        Trump called the post office dumb.

·        Continued multiple attempts to remove health insurance from 24 million people.

·        Trump endorsed an Alabama child molester.

·        Congress and Trump enriched themselves with a huge tax cut for the super-rich.

·        Trump spent 1/3 of the year at Trump-owned properties.

·        Reversed sexual harassment regulations.

·        Trump played golf 92 times since becoming President.

·        Delayed an HUD anti-segregation rule.

·        Trump lied nearly 2000 times.

·        Removed protections for national monuments.

·        Trump called Nazis good people.

·        Allowed schools to use higher standard of evidence for campus sexual assaults.

·        Supported a bill that would allow bosses to defer compensating employees for overtime work.

·        Attempted to roll back science in the Environmental Protection Agency.

·        Trump repeatedly insulted world leaders.

·        Reversed a regulation that restricts coal companies from dumping mining waste into streams.

·        Defunded a special program that provided critical breakthroughs in diabetes research.

·        Reversed rule to ban gun purchases by mentally ill.

·        Decided to stop enforcement of protection for migratory birds.

·        Reversed order banning federal contractors from discriminating based on gender identity.

·        Directed the IRS to ease enforcement banning churches from engaging in political speech.

These are just a few, and I sure didn’t find anything beneficial to me or my family!

It turns out that the witch hunt is actually catching a lot of real witches.

Let’s take a quick perusal through a few on the roster of Trumpist campaign officials, transition members, and administration appointees, to show their extraordinary honesty, competence, accomplishments and longevity (in case you didn’t get it, this is sarcasm).

·        General Michael Flynn – Advisor throughout entire campaign.  Named National Security Advisor.  Nineteen days later he resigned.  Has pled guilty to making false statements to the FBI, a felony.

·        Paul Manafort – Lobbyist serving interests of foreign governments.  Acted as campaign manager for 2 months.  Under indictment for conspiracy, money laundering, failure to register as a foreign agent and making false statements.

·        Rick Gates – Political consultant and business associate of Manafort, handling day to day activities of campaign.  Indicted with Manafort on same charges.

·        George Papadopoulos – Member of campaign’s foreign policy advisory panel. Pled guilty to making false statements to the FBI, a felony.

·        Sean Spicer – White House Press Secretary for 6 months, in which he made many false public statements.

·        Kellyanne Conway – Counselor to the President.  Uses the phrase “alternative facts” to cover lies, apparently violates ethics rules by endorsing Trump products and also violates the Hatch Act by endorsing political candidates.

·        Jared Kushner – the President’s son-in-law and senior advisor.  Failed to report over 100 contacts with foreign governments on his security clearance form, uses private emails for government business, told Michael Flynn to contact Russia and is allegedly currently awaiting indictment.

·        Jeffrey Sessions – Attorney General of the United States – lied about having contact with Russian officials, was forced to recuse himself from the Russia investigation and claimed he remembers nothing about anything.

·        Ivanka Trump – daughter and advisor to the President, advised him to hire Flynn as National Security Advisor and produces most of her fashion line outside of the U.S., which doesn’t do much for America First.

·        Mike Pence – Vice President of the United States, defunded Planned Parenthood in Indiana, stonewalled public records request, used a personal AOL email account to conduct official business which was compromised by hackers, opposes sex education and is a staunch opponent of efforts to expand LGBT rights.  He may or may not have known that Flynn lied to the FBI.

·        Stephen Miller – Senior Policy Advisor, who stopped the public from seeing a report that found that refugees had a net positive effect on government revenues and made false claims that thousands of illegal voters were bused in to New Hampshire.

·        Steve Bannon – White House Chief Strategist, advised Trump to attribute the Charlottesville violence to “many sides.”  Resigned/fired in August, 2017.

·        Sebastian Gorka – Deputy Assistant to the President, whose doctoral degree is in question and is considered widely disdained in his own field, resigned/fired one week after Bannon’s departure.

·        Betsy DeVos – Secretary of Education – In 1997 conceded that her family contributes money to the Republican Party to buy influence, has no experience as an educator, and advocates private schools being allocated funds from the federal government.

·        Anthony Scaramucci – White House Director of Communications, gave expletive-laden interview, launched an online media venture that published a poll for people to vote on how many Jews were killed in the Holocaust, resigned/was fired after 6 days.

·        K. T. McFarland – Deputy National Security Advisor, admitted in an email that Russia had thrown the USA election to Trump, urged Flynn to contact the Russians, resigned/was fired after 3 months.

·        Sarah Huckabee Sanders – White House Press Secretary, purveyor of lies, deceptions, evasions, absurdities, delusions, distractions and photoshopped pies.

·        Others who resigned from their position – Reince Priebus, White House Chief of Staff; Katie Walsh, White House Deputy Chief of Staff, Carl Icahn, Special Advisor to the President; Chris Christie – Chairman of the Opioid Commission; Boris Epshteyn – Assistant Communications Director; Keith Schiller – White House Director of Oval Office Operations, Stephen Shwarzman, Chairman of the Strategic and Policy Forum.

·        Withdrew from nomination for positions – Tom Marino – Drug Czar; Andrew Puzder, Secretary of Labor; Vincent Viola, Army Defense Secretary; James Donovan – Deputy Secretary of the Treasury; George Nesterczuk, Director of the Office of Personnel Management, James Clinger – FDIC Chair; Jamie McCourt – Ambassador to Belgium; Daniel Craig, Deputy Administrator FEMA.

·        *Actually quite laughable* Kathleen Hartnett White – Nominee for Environmental Quality Council Chair, cannot answer even basic questions about climate and science.  If you want a bit of comic relief, watch her struggle on you tube.

·        Rex Tillerson – Secretary of State, on the positive side, he called Trump an effing moron, but he will probably be fired soon.

·        Donald J. Trump- President of the United States – You can conjure up your own comments here.

And then, a few honorable Obama era holdovers:

·        James Comey – Former Director of the FBI, fired by Donald Trump for refusing Trump’s request to go easy on Mike Flynn and to halt the Russia investigation.

·        Sally Yates – Former Deputy Attorney General – fired for refusing to defend an unconstitutional executive order and for warning the Trump Administration about Michael Flynn.

·        Walter Shaub – Former Director of the U.S. Office of Government Ethics, resigned in July because the White House set a tone from the top that ethics doesn’t matter.

Let the “witch hunt” continue.

The fake Trump twitter fan created by Russia isn’t as worrisome as the real Trump twitter fans.

Donald Trump has shown repeatedly that his goal is to become dictator of the United States.

Here are some of the sinister statements and activities which demonstrate his intentions:

·        Claims that he alone can fix America.

·        Says nobody knows more than he does about debt, taxes, the internet, banking, and the U.S. system of government.

·        Criticizes the legitimacy of judges (even referring to their racial heritage) who oppose his policies.

·        Denigrates the entire U.S. justice system calling it a joke and a laughing stock.

·        Threatens to impose martial law in Chicago.

·        Hides the sources of his income although he promised to provide his tax returns.

·        Fires FBI Director for accelerating the investigation into Trump team’s collusion with Russia.

·        Publicly encourages Russia to interfere with U.S. elections by hacking into opponent’s emails.

·        Wants to change libel laws to punish those who criticize him.

·        Says, “It’s frankly disgusting the press is able to write whatever they want.”

·        Called for his political opponent to be jailed – just as Putin has done.

·        Wants to “close the internet up in some way.”

·        Is frustrated he cannot interfere with the FBI and the Department of Justice in order to target his opponents.

·        Uses the presidency to promote his hotels.

·        Claims legitimate protestors are paid.

·        Has asked for death penalty sentence prior to trial, jeopardizing the prosecution.

·        Attempts to influence the outcome of ongoing investigations.

·        Encouraged violence against his political critics.

·        Delegitimizes the press by calling them “fake news.”

·        Has praised dictatorial despots.

We need to continue to RESIST.

Secretary of State Rex Tillerson called Trump a moron.  Tillerson needs to apologize to morons.

Back in February, I enumerated a number of symptoms of malignant narcissism and invited comparisons to Donald Trump.  Folks, it’s even worse than that.  Malignant narcissism is classified as a personality disorder, but Trump has virtually every single symptom of psychosis.

Here are some of the symptoms exhibited by a psychotic, which were culled from a variety of sources.  Put them together and they spell Donald Trump:

·        Thoughts and emotions are so impaired that contact is lost with external reality.

·        Have delusions they believe are real.

·        Behave and communicate in inappropriate, unusual, bizarre and incoherent fashion.

·        Changing topics frequently and erratically.

·        Difficulties with social interactions.

·        Noticeable deficits in normal behavior.

·        Holding on to false beliefs without evidence.

·        Illogical belief that they have special powers or skills.

·        Inability to think logically, to communicate and to relate to others.

·        Unshakable and irrational belief in something untrue, even when overwhelming proof is presented to disprove it.

·        Exaggerated sense of importance.

·        When challenged on beliefs, they appear irritable and unwilling to accept other people’s opinions.

·        Difficulty remembering names.

·        Inability to learn things.

·        Prone to using insults.

·        Difficulties conforming to behavioral standards and social cues.

The man belongs in an institution – and it isn’t the presidency.

In light of the current attempts to deport Dreamers, I thought I would repeat my blog of 6 months ago, enumerating just a few of the immigrants who have made huge contributions to our country.  Remember, those of us who are native-born are Americans by accident of birth; those who choose to come here do so because they believe in the promise of America.


Throwing immigrants out and preventing immigrants from coming into our country is still a major aim of this administration.  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!!!

 

Nobody needs a permit to fight Nazis.

The recent events in Charlottesville along with Trump’s immoral response that further revealed his true nature, prompted me to again peruse the book entitled “Hitler’s Willing Executioners,” by Daniel J. Goldhagen, an in-depth study of the causes of the Holocaust.  The lessons to be learned are undeniable, and yet they are currently being denied. 

The following paragraph is a direct quote, but subsequent notations are my paraphrasing:

The [perpetrators] were Germans acting in the name of Germany and its highly popular leader, Adolf Hitler.  Some were ‘Nazis,’ either by reason of Nazi Party membership or according to ideological conviction; some were not …The perpetrators killed and made their other genocidal contributions under the auspices of many institutions.  Their chief common denominator was that they were all Germans pursuing German national political goals.”

People who staffed the political system as well as the broader German public, accepted Hitler’s authority as desirable and legitimate.

Hitler’s non-interventionist leadership style created a great deal of leeway for subordinates to design the policies.

Germans deemed the press to be especially “poisoned.”

The German government temporarily settled on legally and administratively isolating Jews and pressuring them to emigrate.

German society was focused on an urgent threat with accusations of rape and murder against Jews.

The Holocaust constituted actions at odds with the intellectual foundations of modern western civilization, as well as Christian and secular ethical norms and yet everyday Germans accepted them.

Historically, the expression of nationalism has gone hand in hand with the expression of antisemitism.  In Germany and elsewhere, nationalism and antisemitism were interwoven ideologies.

Calls were made to keep the Jews out and to expel those already in the country.

The Nazi Party was the most radical political party in history to gain control of a European government and it did so through electoral means.

The Nazis came to power due to a confluence of factors, including the seeming threat of a leftist takeover.  Many Germans voted for the Nazis as the only political force that appeared capable of restoring order and social peace and of restoring Germany’s status as a great power abroad.

 

Keep in mind that a German government spokesman has said that the Charlottesville events were diametrically opposed by the entire German government.  Apparently, Germany has learned the lessons, but Trump denies those lessons.

For the multimillions of us who are appalled and worried that history is repeating itself, we must continue to fight with every ounce of strength.  We will OPPOSE hatred, racism, white nationalism, Nazism, fascism in all forms, voter suppression, exclusionism, bullying, suppression of the press, antisemitism, anti-religion of any kind, anti-diversity, anti-immigrants, the KKK, and DONALD J TRUMP.   We will continue to say, “NEVER AGAIN,” and “WE SHALL OVERCOME,” and we will act on our words.  Our gloves have come off.  I know that I will be marching again!