REFLECTIONS

Winston Churchill is credited with saying, "Americans and British are one people separated by a common language." His was a deviation of the original line from an 1887 Oscar Wilde short story, “The Canterville Ghost,” where the narrator states, “Indeed, in many respects, she was quite English, and was an excellent example of the fact that we have really everything in common with America nowadays, except, of course, language.” In either case, we could drop the Anglican reference and still have an accurate description of these “United” States. America is a nation divided by a common language.

Americans are united by geography as we are bordered by the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans. Our official national language is English. Beyond that, we are a nation of 335 million individuals with 335 million opinions on virtually everything. To function as a nation, we adopted a representative democracy as our form of government. We recently exercised our democratic freedom and held an election for president.

I voted. My candidate didn’t win. I accept that it was a fair election. While I might not like the outcome, I will accept the result and move on. I am no less proud to be an American, to have served my country in uniform, and to still get a feeling of national pride when I hear our National Anthem. My American flag hangs proudly in front of my home, no matter who our president is.

If I can be grateful for just one thing in this election it is that it was decisive and not close. We avoided the chaos that might have ensued had it been a narrow victory in either direction.

I spent the first eighteen days of October on a transatlantic cruise vacation devoid of politics. I returned to the cacophony of political news that I tried to avoid. Fearing what was to come, I immersed myself in an all-consuming outdoor project. Without going into detail just know that it involved six 55-lb bags of cement and a body now in its eighth decade of life. Body aches, sleep deprivation, mental gymnastics, and physical activity were preferred over the pain of what passes for American politics.

While I did not watch television news, the election outcome was written in the clouds and in the air. I will not participate in the postmortem. Forensic analysis of an election gone horribly wrong is an exercise in futility. I will take my exercise in a manner that might be painful but where the outcome will be a successful project. I don’t know when I will return to watching the news.

Yesterday, with 90% of my outdoor project complete, I celebrated the event with my two Nicaraguan workers who did the heavy lifting, and Sue who had helped immensely and took pictures of the process. The workmen enjoyed Toña lagers (their national beer) while I had my traditional Guinness. Two nights earlier we closed our day with shots of Flor De Caña, a pleasant Nicaraguan rum. If DT is to be my future, I would rather it be Delirium Tremens than the other thing with the same moniker.

Last evening, thoroughly exhausted, I sat in front of my television and watched Bridgerton, a mindless historical romance set in the 1800s. My Fitbit watch tells me that I went to bed at 6:48, and got 10 hours and 51 minutes of sleep. My sleep score was 81 (considered Good). I can now complete my project at my own pace.

Reflecting briefly on recent political events, I remembered a favorite poem. I will leave you with the final verses:

The sneer is gone from Casey's lip, his teeth are clenched in hate,
He pounds with cruel violence his bat upon the plate;
And now the pitcher holds the ball, and now he lets it go,
And now the air is shattered by the force of Casey's blow.

Oh, somewhere in this favoured land the sun is shining bright,
The band is playing somewhere, and somewhere hearts are light;
And somewhere men are laughing, and somewhere children shout,
But there is no joy in Mudville—mighty Casey has struck out.

Signs of Aging

 

While on my occasional morning walk, I took a moment to reflect on my time in the neighborhood. We moved in almost 40 years ago when everything was still under construction. We watched as they put the roof on the house we had just placed a deposit on. The streets were freshly paved, the sidewalks were new, and the landscaping was sparse. I could stand in our elevated master bedroom and look through the opening that would soon have a window to see an unobstructed view of the traffic almost four blocks away. Today, a powderpuff tree blocks most of the view of my own fence.

When we moved in I saw an older neighbor, Pepe, roller skating down the smooth streets. I soon got a pair of skates and began my own exercise routine. About a year ago I saw Pepe walking with his wife and I stopped and chatted. He was well into his 90s and had slowed down quite a bit. Several months back I heard that Pepe had passed away. His widow sold the house, they had an estate sale of furnishings, and last week the last of their belongings were placed in the swale area for trash pickup. Life in the neighborhood moves on.

While my exercise routine normally involves about a half-hour bike ride with laps around the neighborhood, I recently added an occasional walk. I wear braces to support my aging knees and took to carrying a cane to help in case one of those creaking joints decides to act up. Slowing things down allows for a bit more reflection and observation in addition to exercising different muscles.

The smooth streets have been patched and repaired over the years and the once pristine sidewalks are cracked and lifted in places by the roots of large trees. Both I and the neighborhood have aged. I had a head start on the neighborhood as I turned 40 shortly after we moved in. My house wasn’t yet one. I won’t speak for myself, but the neighborhood actually looks better and has more character.

We have beautiful trees that provide shade. The stately 70’ Royal Palms tower over the Royal Poincianas with their 60’ canopies and seasonal orange or yellow flowers. Almost without exception, the houses are well-maintained and nicely landscaped. Thirty-two years ago, Hurricane Andrew damaged things quite a bit but we built back better.

Yes, the neighborhood and I have aged but we are still chugging along. This nostalgic mood was brought on during my morning walk when I stopped briefly for a rest in the shade of a large Arborvitae. It is a favorite spot as it is at the ¾ mark on my walk and is almost always occupied by an unseen mockingbird who loudly sings out that this is his tree. This morning as I stopped the mockingbird began his song just as my Spotify playlist serendipitously switched to begin the 1963, Inez and Charlie Foxx version of Mockingbird. I wouldn’t know how to begin to calculate the odds of this happening, but it was nice to enjoy the moment. 

The Republican Story: What Will It Be?

 The Republican Story: What Will It Be?

Writers have generally accepted that there are seven story types. All narratives throughout history can be categorized into one of seven classic types. The struggle within the Republican Party to mold its narrative to gain the approval of a receptive audience continues. We can rule out Comedy and Rags to Riches even though elements of both can be found in isolated incidents. The Quest might be a contender where a protagonist and a collection of companions seek a common goal only to face temptations and obstacles. If this is to be the storyline type, would it be more Raiders of the Lost Ark or Monty Python and the Holy Grail?

No, I think we need to delve further into our classifications. Voyage and Return doesn’t fit here either as that would require learning lessons from past mistakes. Rebirth might fit as the Republican Party sought to change its ways to become a better party. If that were our story type we would certainly find that our Charles Dickens, A Christmas Carol plot failed and Scrooge only became more of a scoundrel.

This leaves us with the final two categories; Tragedy and Overcoming the Monster. Now I think we are on to something. In the former, the protagonist has a major character flaw which is ultimately their undoing. Bonnie and Clyde, Hamlet, and Citizen Kane are examples of Tragedy. Certainly, honest critics could easily find parallels with the trajectory of the current Republican Party story arc. Also tied for top consideration is Overcoming the Monster. Here an evil force threatens and must be defeated to avoid disaster. Examples here include Dracula, Jaws, and any of the James Bond series.

To help the reader decide I will leave you with the latest in the quest for Republican Party identity. While our story up to now has had more villains than a Batman marathon, this one might prove to be a unique nemesis. We have already seen the Joker (Rudy), Catwomen (MTG, Lauren Bobert, Laura Loomer), The Penguin (Roger Stone), The Riddler (Steven Miller), and Two-Face (Steve Bannon). I bring you North Carolina’s Lt Governor, Mark Robinson, the Black Nazi.

Mark’s story starts off in the Rags to Riches category where he was a furniture maker who became a politician. His Batman moniker is up for grabs, but he has called himself, The Black Nazi. This was his handle on a porn website according to CNN. Trump called Robinson, “Martin Luther King on steroids.” Robinson’s thoughts on abortion are that “women should be responsible enough to keep their skirts down.” Robinson fits right in with the Republican ideology calling transgenderism and homosexuality filth and links them to pedophilia. In a recent rant, Robinson went on about a broad list of “evil-doers” and while not specific in which of these were included among his “some folks” category, he shouted, “Some folks need killing.” He went on, “It’s time for somebody to say it. It’s not a matter of vengeance. It’s not a matter of being mean or spiteful. It’s a matter of necessity!”

Robinson’s vague list included those “torturing and murdering and raping,” and “wicked people,” and socialists and communists. He has called for the arrest of trans women and has pushed antisemitic conspiracies. He described Michelle Obama as a man. He denies that Nancy Pelosi’s husband was assaulted and has opposed federal law enforcement. His violent rhetoric declares, “We are in the process of the second American Revolution, which will remain bloodless if the left allows it to be.” His insinuation is that violence would be a consideration if the MAGA forces don’t win this election.

Trump’s handlers, if there is such a thing, were preparing to distance themselves when word that “The Robinson Story” was about to break. They already knew that Robinson had quoted Adolf Hitler and taunted the Parkland school survivors, but visions of a Black Nazi wouldn’t help Trump’s attempt to call for support of the state of Israel. Get ready for the standard Trump reply to such controversy, “I barely knew the guy.”

So, will this be a Tragedy or Overcoming the Monster story for the Republican Party? Will Donald John Trump be their Charles Foster Kane whose corruption of power and personal emptiness forces them to slide into oblivion aboard a metaphorical Rosebud? Whatever story type prevails, I think it is safe to assume that Ebenezer Scrooge will not redeem himself. For me, I find that: It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World.

The Apprentice President

 The Apprentice President

I recently saw a “man on the street” reporter ask a twenty-something why he liked Trump. His simple answer was one I had heard repeated many times, “He tells it like it is.” I will forgive this young man’s naivete and blame it on his limited experience and our marginal educational system. The richest and most powerful nation in the world ranks down around 13th place among developed countries. I will also place some of the blame on a government that allowed things to get to a point where they were so screwed up that a game show host would look better than the status quo. Trump won the 2016 election with the help of our Gordian Knot presidential electoral system we call the Electoral College, He got a few things right but, like his history in business, he got a lot wrong. Now he dares to test our short-term memory with his, “Are you better off,” question.

I will also have to give credit where credit is due to the Trumpster. He follows in a long line of hucksters, con men, and religious hustlers who use the vagaries of language to spew enough nonsensical crap to fill an unabridged dictionary. Somewhere within that word salad bar, everyone can find something that sounds appealing. While Jesus spoke in parables, Trump and his “mini-me” Vance speak in a mind-numbing language of lies, half-truths, and intentional misinformation. Listen long enough and you can hear something that sounds like a solution to your problems.

Much like 12-year-old Regan (not Reagan) in The Exorcist, Trump can projectile word vomit and then speak in tongues to the delight of audiences everywhere. Unlike the movie vomit that was a mixture of corn syrup, food coloring, and cake dye, what is emitted from the oval orifice below Trump’s nose is a foul blend of hate speech, insults, lies, and promises of a life better than the last time he was at the helm of our country. Instead of “telling it like it is,” our orange-faced wannabe two-timer is pulling out the stops to do an end run on the Justice system to pardon himself and those he tricked during his kicking and screaming exit in January of 2021. He also plans to revive the cash cow that came along with his 2016 presidential term.

While Kamala Harris “wants” to be president, Donald Trump “needs” to be president. Some of his followers may like him because they think “he tells it like it is,” while others trust him because he has created the myth that he has been a wildly successful businessman. In a September 17, 2024, interview with the authors of a new book titled, "Lucky Loser: How Donald Trump Squandered His Father's Fortune And Created The Illusion Of Success," they told the story behind Trump’s mirage of riches. You can find the interview online so I won’t say any more than that Trump has failed many, many times in his shotgun “let’s see what sticks” form of business investment. His failures in his casino and real estate ventures were offset by his stint on The Apprentice and the endorsements he could tie to the successful show. The Apprentice is now gone so Trump “needs” to revive his persona as The Apprentice President.

I can understand the general frustration with our government. Our nation is complex and beyond the understanding of a single person who might be president. Therein lies the problem with the conservative Project 2025 which wants to simplify matters by putting one person in total control of everything. That might look good on paper but even a casual look will find the many pitfalls with this proposal. Even a vague knowledge of history will tell you how that has worked out for those who will be so governed.

We are a nation of individuals each with our own tinted glasses to filter what we see. Our biases can be based on personal experiences, religious beliefs, and cultural traditions. If you are looking to find acceptance of your racist/anti-Semitic/homophobic/xenophobic ideas, look no further. Somewhere within Trump’s ramblings you will find all these things mentioned, winked, nodded, or otherwise given the DJT seal of approval. If you think all abortion should be banned, Trump is with you. If you think there are many reasonable exceptions to a total ban on abortions, you will find that Trump has supported that position too. Whatever side of an argument you might be on, you can find a Trump video clip or Tweet to back your position.

Trump, The Presidential Apprentice, Season One, saw him held partly in check by advisors and experienced personnel who still had a shred of national pride and decency. If Trump, The Presidential Apprentice, The Sequel ever comes to be, just know that those guardrails have been removed. The training wheels have been removed. He will be free to treat our nation like he treats his many business ventures. If you are willing to throw our nation up against the wall to “see what sticks,” then perhaps you don’t know the man’s history like you should. If you want to vote for someone because you think they “tell it like it is,” you might want to know if they are right. Do they normally tell the truth?

UNITED States of America

 UNITED States of America

United we stand, divided we fall. A house divided against itself cannot stand. E pluribus unum, “from many, one.” These are all phrases that emphasize the importance of unity. We are the UNITED States of America. The fact, that we are a UNITED nation first and a collective of states second, seems to have escaped some people lately. One political leader in particular seems to think that it is “every man for himself, and only the strong (wealthy) survive.”

Only the Strong (wealthy) Survive

The preamble of our Constitution mentions that it was, “We the People of the United States…, that established this country. That Constitution and its Bill of Rights lay the foundation for a country united for a common purpose. It establishes our representative democracy with its system of checks and balances as the core of this union. We are a single nation that is currently made up of fifty states. We are not a collection of 27 countries that later formed an economic and political group like the European Union.

Capitalism is the second pillar necessary for the proper functioning of our democracy. It is the mandate of our government to provide the balance between the capital engine that fuels our democracy and the needs of its people. Neither can survive without the other. It is the taxing of capital that finances the needs of the people. The representative democracy of government decides the particulars of that taxation. Who gets taxed, how much they get taxed, and how those tax dollars are spent are decided by this elected government. Our problems today can all be traced back to this one function of government. It all comes down to money because money equates to power.

In the quest for money and power, some would seek to abandon our democracy so that they alone could dictate how the spoils of capitalism are managed to their personal benefit. Some envy the Viktor Orbáns of the world, or Vladimir Putin and Xi Jinping as they are strongmen who keep the very wealthy rich and crush all opposition to the detriment of their people. It is they who get to decide how much they get to keep and how much they will allow to trickle down to their people to keep them functioning and working to protect their rich lifestyles.

So far, our democracy has stood the test of time. Its first serious test was our Civil War. The second most serious threat came on January 6, 2021, when a sitting president decided that he wanted to remain the “strongman” in charge by denying the results of a fair election. Today we see a continuation of that assault on democracy where that same former president seeks to regain his position of power. He does this so he might retaliate against his oppressors and finalize the abandonment of our representative democracy for one more closely aligned with Hungary, Russia, or China.

The path to his success relies on making people believe that he is working to help the working class. He will continually tell lies to make his followers numb to his deceit. He will incite fear of immigrant hoards coming to take away our jobs, rape our women, drug our children, and eat our pets, to distract them from his true purpose. He will flip-flop on his once strong position on abortion and women’s reproductive rights by still claiming to one group that he alone overturned Roe v. Wade and to others that he is the champion of women’s reproductive freedoms. You get to choose which of his conflicting positions you want to believe. Believe whatever you want, he doesn’t care as long as he wins your vote.

“the result of a consistent and total substitution of lies for factual truth is not that lies will now be accepted as truth, and the truth be defamed as lies, but that the sense by which we take our bearings in the real world — and the category of truth vs. falsehood is among the mental means to this end — is being destroyed.”  Hannah Arendt

As he has done for all previous elections, he is making claims that the upcoming election will be corrupt. If he wins, it will be the best election ever. If he loses, he told you he would be robbed by a corrupt election process. All of this is to establish motivation for another coup attempt. He has threatened violence again if he is not elected. He still refuses to accept the results of the 2020 election, except privately where he has admitted he, “lost by a whisker.” That “whisker” was 7,059,547 popular votes. That’s one big whisker. Luckily, that popular vote also translated to an electoral college win for Biden. Trump also lost the popular vote to Clinton in 2016 by 2,865,075 votes but won the electoral college because those two million plus voters didn’t live in the right states.  

A vote in Wyoming is worth 3.65 times what it is worth in California

It is not time to swallow the MAGA lie that America needs to be “Great Again” when it has always been great. It will continue to be great as long as it is UNITED. We need to protect our democracy and remain the UNITED States of America and not fall for the false promises that will lead to the strongman form of government promised by Project 2025. You know that title. Trump hasn’t heard of it, doesn’t know what it contains, and doesn’t like what it says if he had read it. It outlines what Trump’s wealthy benefactors have set forth for the elimination of checks and balances so that they can manage the faucet of capitalism to better control how much drips to feed the needs of its people.

No, this is not the time to abandon our democracy. No, it is not the time to abandon our election process. No, it is not the time to abandon our system of checks and balances. No, it is not time to create an all-powerful executive branch of government. No, it is not the time to shift the power of our government to become fifty individual states with fifty different sets of laws that no longer protect our established freedoms. It IS the time for unity and a time to protect the UNITED States of America.

Florida: Government in the Moonshine

 

Florida voters overwhelmingly approved our Government in the Sunshine Law which meant we wanted to know what was going on. For Governor DeSantis it has been a non-stop “lights out” policy. He doesn’t want citizens to know what he is doing unless it is something popular that he can campaign on.

Most recently, a state plan to commercialize nine state parks and build golf courses, 350-room hotels, pickleball courts, etc., was “outed” by a whistleblower. The public outcry was deafening. The plan was quickly shelved and DeSantis “pulled a Trump*” by stating he knew nothing about the planned bulldozing of state park habitat.

Of course, this outing of a secret plan resulted in James Gaddis being fired for “conduct unbecoming…” The fact that state law prohibits such secret plans and the secret meetings was of no concern for DeSantis. Laws are for other people. Fast-tracking environmental destruction for commercial development takes priority in the realm of Ron DeSantis.

This doesn’t mean the commercial takeover of Florida parks is off the agenda, it only means they will go “back to the drawing board.” The secretive land swap of 300 acres of state forest land to a Hernando Country golf course company doesn’t show up on the agenda for the upcoming September 12 meeting of the Acquisition and Restoration Council. That’s why they call them secrets.

A DeSantis spokesperson said state lands need to be more accessible. He went on to say this was an “exciting new initiative.” I guess electric golf carts scooting across a manicured green fairway in what used to be a forest could be seen by golfers as making the area more accessible. Golf carts don’t do well in forests.

Maybe DeSantis could take Trump’s advice and rake the forest floor to allow electric carts. The trees could be left as hazards to make the play more interesting. Add a few alligators around the tees and greens, a few wild boars, and a Florida panther or two, now you are talking excitement. The Dragon Snow Mountain Golf Club in Lijiang, China holds the record for its par 72 course. Florida could top that with a little planning.

Footnote: *Trump didn't invent the "I know nothing" dodge, Sgt. Schultz had it perfected long ago.

Footnote 2: The addition of Florida panthers might be difficult as their numbers have dwindled due to habitat loss. Hmmm?

Trump: The Art of the Con and the Grifting of America

Early in the 20^th century, George C. Parker sold the Brooklyn Bridge, Grant’s Tomb, the Statue of Liberty, Madison Square Garden, and the Metropolitan Museum of Art.  He did this numerous times using fake documents and a fake office. 

Bernie Madoff bilked investors out of over $65 billion in a decades-long Ponzi scheme through his investment firm.  Bernie hired his brother Peter, his niece Shana, and his sons Mark and Andrew in various positions.  He conned some of the best and brightest in the financial world.  He promised lavish returns but simply deposited investor money in a bank account and provided phony statements while using the bank account to freely support his lavish lifestyle.  Of the $65B lost, only $4B was returned.

In the accompanying graphic, I have also included Charles Manson among these otherwise financially successful con men only because he “conned” cult members into committing murder on his behalf.  He targeted emotionally insecure social outcasts and manipulated them with drugs, sex, and a quasi-religious combination of Scientology and Transcendental Meditation.  Manson personifies the psychopathic individual with his extreme lack of empathy and his ability to be charming, manipulative, and exploitative.  All are requirements for a proper con.

This brings us to the final, perhaps the greatest con man of them all, Donald J. Trump.  "The Donald" would certainly try to convince you that he is the greatest of anything you might mention.  While he might be loathed to tell you, that he is a con man, this would be in keeping with another philosophical observation.  To quote the famous line from The Usual Suspects Verbal Kint, aka Keyser Söze, “The greatest trick the Devil ever pulled was convincing the world he didn’t exist.”

Donald John Trump has perfected, with some alacrity, the ability to grab the spotlight and demand attention.  He needs an audience.  He often accomplishes this simply with his outrageousness.  He could fill another book that might be titled Trumpism: The Art of the Buffoon.  Just like many of the other “isms,” Trumpism is not a complex or hard-to-understand construct.  Know the man, understand the philosophy.  At his core, Donald John Trump is the essential con man.  If you can comprehend what motivates a man who exploits others by gaining their confidence, you begin to understand The Donald.

George Parker sold a mile-long bridge and Donald Trump sold a miles-long wall of xenophobic hate.  Bernie Madoff conned financial institutions before being caught and Donald Trump has conned the banking industry and others resulting in over 3,500 legal suits.  When Trump pulled off his most outlandish con, the presidency of the United States, he had taken his bluster and grift to a new audience.

To call confidence schemers con “artists,” asks us to acknowledge that some manner of talent is inherent in the individual.  I would argue that, while this might be a learned behavior or skill, to call it "art" is to degrade all other skills and abilities that seek loftier goals.  Cheating others may be interesting to study or watch as a spectator, perhaps in a movie like The Sting or Catch Me If You Can, but fraud victims most often have a less tolerant viewpoint.

Con "artists" generally have dark psychological defects that few would describe as talents beyond some measure of comparison with others of the same devious mindset.  Among these are psychopathy, narcissism, and Machiavellianism where manipulation of others to their detriment brings pleasure to the perpetrator.  The exploitation of the gullible most often involves an attack of the human frailty of the “mark.”  Psychopathy is manifested by illogical emotional responses, a lack of empathy, and poor behavioral controls that may predict criminal behavior.  Subtypes of psychopathy may include narcissism, sadism, or simple antisocial behavior.

Since one of the traits peculiar to con artists was named after him, a brief background on Niccolo Machiavelli might be helpful.  He is also called the father of modern political philosophy.  He was a Florentine diplomat who lived during the Italian Renaissance.  His observations of history and personal experiences led him to proclaim that politics has always involved deception, treachery, and crime.  Machiavelli wrote Discourses on Livy which provided a foundation for modern Republicanism. While such political realism may have been as accurate then as now, it is hardly something we should aspire to or tolerate.

While true Republicanism as a political ideology has many valid and worthwhile virtues, putting those ideas into practice is where Machiavelli’s deception, treachery, and crime create our current problems.  Civic virtue, rule of law, and self-governance sound good but implementation can be difficult.

The World According to Trump, aka Trumpism, flourishes under his predisposition to manipulation.  While Trump lacks any historical sense, he is a master manipulator.  In the dark triad of psychological traits, Trump scores the trifecta.  His Machiavellian manipulation coupled with his psychopathy and narcissistic personality disorder make him a most evil politician. 

In psychologist Dale Hartley’s book, Machiavellians: Gulling the Rubes, he describes these master manipulators as hardwired to lie, cheat, scheme, and betray.  Hartley says that these con artists are easy to identify by their persistent behavior where they view all human interaction to be contests between winners and losers.  If this winners and losers theme sounds familiar you have obviously listened to at least one of Trump’s diatribes.

In the toolbox of the proficient con artist, you will find another trait, charm.  They can turn it on by pushing your buttons to make you feel special.  They also know those buttons to push that get you angry and motivated to take action.  All they need to do is stir the anger and point you in a certain direction to vent that anger.  Create the problem then identify a “solution” even if closer scrutiny would reveal better options.

Donald Trump has been working the long con for years.  His is not some carefully planned complex scheme but an adaptation of a lifestyle that fulfills his narcissistic craving for adulation and praise.  He keeps score on several fronts.  The long con is all about leverage.  Profits decide winners and losers in financial transactions.  There are also things like crowd sizes and items that can be measured to tally the score.  Even if you don’t have the biggest or best of something, you can certainly tell people yours is the best, then repeat the Big Lie with conviction enough times so they become believers.

Con artists are very confident and cocky with an overvaluation of self-worth.  They are arrogant and abusive when challenged.  In Trump’s case, he can also use his perceived wealth to garner trust.  Many people will tell themselves that: he has all that money so he must be good at what he does.  Trump’s displays of wealth and prosperity and his violent outrage at any information that would degrade that perception, tell you just how much it means to him.  It was no accident that he began his successful presidential bid by descending a golden escalator with trophy wife number three.  Create the illusion and the rest is simple.

Trump grasping the brass ring

Trump is not some Bernie Madoff running a decades-long Ponzi scheme.  He isn’t that clever.  He is just a Machiavellian personality who has worked his narcissism from a stint as a game show host to grab the Commander in Chief’s ring from his perch atop his plastic horse on the US political carousel.  The best cons leave the subjects still loving the perpetrator.  To the con artist, the marks, suckers, stooges, mugs, rubes, or gulls (from the word gullible), deserved to be fleeced for their foolishness and greed.

Footnote:  While this topic of con MEN seems a bit sexist, a number of women have been adept at this "trade," and perhaps we don't know their numbers because they are better at it than men.  Big Bertha Heyman (5’ 4” and 245 lbs) conned men pretending to be a wealthy woman unable to access her fortune.  Barbara Erni traveled Liechtenstein dressed lavishly with a large ornate trunk that she insisted be stored in the most secure room in the building.  Her accomplice would climb out of the trunk, steal everything of value, and climb back into the trunk.  Elizabeth Bigley, aka Cassie Chadwick, claimed to be the illegitimate daughter of billionaire industrialist Andrew Carnegie.  She let it be known that he provided her with riches to keep quiet which tempted banks to offer her loans.  The banks were duped out of an estimated $20M for their greed.  In a variation of the Bigley scam, Therese Humbert claimed to be heir to the fortune of an imaginary millionaire who had but one condition, the money would be locked in a large safe until her younger sister could marry.  A huge loan against the safe’s contents financed her lavish lifestyle until creditors demanded it be opened to find a brick and an English half-penny.

America, The Greatest Show on Earth

 

P.T. Barnum and James A. Bailey coined the term, The Greatest Show on Earth to describe their American circus extravaganza.  They have traveled throughout America since 1871.  By the 1920s the circus had been bought out by the Ringling brothers who continued and expanded the show to include over 1,000 people with 16 camels, 26 elephants, and 335 horses.

Circus Clowns 1906

I vaguely remember going to the circus when I was probably eight.  This guess is from research that indicates that the Ringling Circus made a tour that ended in Miami on November 22, 1953.  1957 was the final time they used tents before switching to arena venues.  Future shows were at the Miami Beach Convention Center in the 60s, and the Miami Arena in the late 80s.  I remember working across from the Orange Bowl in a nearby office complex when a circus elephant walked by my second-floor window having broken loose from a parade on the street.  My only other circus references are from the many movies like The Greatest Show on Earth and Trapeze.

Having just witnessed the RNC and DNC conventions with their choreographed shows, the circus analogy came to mind.  Every four years the presidential political circus comes to town.  After the conventions, they take the show on the road for the final push before the big election.  Like the circus performances of old, the modern political circus has its high-wire acts, clowns, hucksters, and a freak show that is not to be missed.  The only thing missing is the animal acts unless you count the childless cat ladies.

Both sides feature inane rhetoric and to quote Jimmy Durante, “Everybody wants to get into the act.”  At the RNC Convention gathering, Arizona Republican Kari Lake’s speech ran over, and she was twice warned to “get off the stage.”  The second warning added the additional line, “Trump waiting.”   A short time later, Teamster president, Sean O’Brian was seen supporting Trump before he was nudged aside by an impatient Trump. 

That part of the clown show was disconcerting if one only considers the fact that it was Joe Biden in 2022 who provided the Teamster’s pension fund a one-time $36 billion bailout to halt the threat of pension cuts for 350,000 workers and retirees.  Those workers are generally in trucking, warehousing, and food processing industries.  While it was certainly a questionable use of tax dollars to support and keep solvent a private pension fund, one economist pointed out that annual tax benefits to higher-income taxpayers through 401k plans is much higher than the Teamster bailout.

The political circus too is expensive.  The cost of the 2020 presidential election was pegged at $6.5B.  The whole dog and pony show is a phenomenal waste of time and money.  We have political “entertainers” who are anything but entertaining and whose only talent is making promises for which no one holds them accountable.  It is like watching a high wire act where the cable is on the ground and nobody cares if they fall.  Telling listeners that they will do something that is beyond their control is the height of comic theatre.  When the circus leaves town and the elections are behind us the only thing that remains is the elephant dung and deflated balloons.

You would think that America, The Greatest Show on Earth, could come up with a better system for filling the most important job in the world.  So, we will continue to spend billions of dollars, listen to empty nonsense, and cast our vote for whoever pisses us off the least.  For now, the clown car is still circling the ring and the only mystery that remains is how many clowns are inside.  

It can be noted that the original PT Barnum circus toured in 1871 on two different trains, a Red Tour and a Blue Tour with each featuring different full three-ring productions.  Each train traveled on a two-year tour taking December off.  Sounds like a political campaign, just on a tighter schedule.

The Giant of Cardiff

“There’s a sucker born every minute.”  Ask most people who said that and PT Barnum’s name will be a common answer.  Like much of history and politics, this is probably BS.  Closer to the truth is that it was said OF PT Barnum and not by him.  You see, there was a famous hoax called the Cardiff Giant.  The “giant” was actually a ten-foot-long block of gypsum that had been sculpted to resemble a petrified American goliath.  It was buried and then “discovered” by “accident” and then promoted as the Giant of Cardiff.  When PT Barnum tried unsuccessfully to buy the hoax for his sideshow he then created his own fake of the fake giant.  The owner of the “real” giant when told that Barnum was showcasing his own giant he proclaimed, “There’s a sucker born every minute.”

Politics and the circus, the parallels are endless.  Perhaps the politicians of today would be wise to heed the advice of PT Barnum who really said, 

"It is of no advantage to advertise unless you intend to honestly fulfill the promises made in this manner."

 

 

 

 

RFK JR's. Support Brings More to the Table for Trump

 RFK Jr's. Support Brings More to the Table for Trump

The RFK Jr endorsement of Donald J Trump provides some mental stability to a campaign beleaguered with the stigma of crazy, bizarre, and the forever-accurate moniker, weird. With Trump regularly worrying about electric boats sinking in shark-infested waters, windmills killing whales by driving them insane, and the late great Hannibal Lecter who would love to have him for dinner, RKF Jr. can spread the crazy to include brain parasites, cocaine, dead bears riding bicycles through Central Park, sexual assault, and philandering on a par with the Trump's high standards.

Rumors that RFK Jr’s brainworm left an unflattering review of the cuisine on Yelp are totally suspicious and should be considered without merit. In keeping with RFK Jr’s other work, such a statement cannot be evaluated without additional review data. In the worm’s defense and by RFK Jr’s. own admission, it was a tragic story. RFK JR. said, "A worm that got into my brain and ate a portion of it and then died." Depending upon the timing of the worm's demise, he might not have had time to even write a Yelp review. However, Mr. Worm’s death would substantiate that the cuisine would be suspect and not up to even Hannibal Lecter’s standards.

Yes, the misbehaving, under-achieving playboy with generational wealth, who regularly champions his anti-vax cause, can bring a proper level of science to a possible cabinet post of Health Secretary in the Trump administration. Perhaps he can get to the bottom of the previously untested bleach injections and bright light inside the human body treatments as a welcome alternative to those crazy injections that he fears.

The other thing RFK Jr brings to the Trump campaign is a measure of balance. You see, he, like Trump, has felony convictions. In 2001 a Virginia jury convicted Kennedy of two counts of distributing cocaine base, and one count of conspiring to distribute five kilograms or more of cocaine and fifty grams or more of cocaine base. Like Trump, he is working on his third wife. RFK Jr’s second wife hanged herself after reading Kennedy’s personal journal where he recorded his sexual encounters with 37 different women. He also has a sexual assault allegation with the part-time babysitter of his children. When asked about the allegation he responded, "I am not a church boy. I had a very, very rambunctious youth. I said in my announcement speech that I have so many skeletons in my closet that if they could all vote, I could run for king of the world."

With all the Bizarro World that RFK Jr. brings to the table, Donald J. Trump almost looks normal. The emphasis here is on the word, “almost.”

FOR IT IS WRITTEN...

 

Those four words are generally a preamble to a statement claiming moral superiority based on some religious scripture.  It would be the speaker's claim that all arguments to the contrary are moot because their interpretation of some religious text makes their point for them.  Logic has no place in the discussion if it contradicts whatever they claim, “is written.”

One reference, Wikipedia, estimates that there are currently 4,200 religions, churches, denominations, faith groups, etc., in existence.  There have been thousands of religious variations over the course of humankind.  These religions govern ethics, morality, and lifestyle based on ideas about the cosmos and human nature.  Humans are drawn to religion to provide structure in their lives and to perhaps explain those things about their own existence they don’t understand.

On the current world stage, we have an ongoing war between at least two religious ideologies in Gaza and its surrounds.  We have an American political candidate with questionable moral standards selling Bibles and promoting a religious theory that the government should control the human reproductive process.

Many of these established religions have a formalized written rulebook.  Christians have their Bible, Islam has the Quran and Hadith, and Jews have the Talmud and Torah.  The origins of these religions go back thousands of years.  Judaism is over 3,500 years old, Christianity is over 2,000 years old, and Islam for Muslims goes back over 1,400 years.

I only mention these three religions now as they are part of the current strife in the news.  As has been the case for millennia, battles are being fought using the written word of their religious beliefs as justification.  I will ignore the underlying causality that is the real motivation in much of this chaos, the human lust for power, money, and control of others.

If we look back historically at the text that is the foundation of these religions, we find common themes.  While most claim some divine inspiration as the source for the material in their respective texts, all were written by men.  Many of these texts describe events and provide explanations.  They provide mandates and structure for “keeping the faith,” laws if you will.

While I won’t get into burning bushes, talking clouds, dream visions, visiting spirits, etc., that many of the writers of scripture claim as inspiration, I just know that many of these religious stories and themes are older than the existing “written word.”  Long before much of this was written down for inclusion in these religious guidebooks, the same or similar stories were being told.

Many of us know the first five books of the Hebrew Bible are the Old Testament of the Judeo-Christian tradition.  This original text was the legal code of the time and was used as the mediator of law.  Central authorship is rather vague but is largely attributed to Moses.  It was written down in something called the Babylonian Talmud around 200-500 CE (Christian Era aka AD).  The origins are even older and date to around 600 BCE from a variety of unconnected materials.  I don’t mention this as a lesson in religious doctrine but only to point out the length of time (800 years ??) of its development and the opportunity for change and varied interpretations of events.

This brings me to the Epic of Gilgamesh.  If you know of this collection of Sumerian poems from ancient Mesopotamia (modern-day Iraq), you are certainly better read than am I.  I came across this reference while researching the previous paragraph.  My religious education amounts to but five years of Catholic school and memorizing Latin I didn’t understand.

It seems that this Epic of Gilgamesh was unknown in modern times until its discovery in the 1850s when 15,000 fragments of Assyrian cuneiform tables were found in an ancient library.  These “texts” date to 700 BCE and mention legends associated with an extended period around 2600 BCE.

Now that we have some context of time for this Gilgamesh legend, I will mention just one of the stories to see if it sounds familiar.  It is of the Great Flood sent by the deities to destroy civilization in a cleansing of humanity for a “rebirth.”  This same myth occurs in many cultures including Hinduism, Greek mythology, the Genesis flood narrative with Noah, Mesopotamian flood stories, and the Cheyenne flood story.  It seems that everyone enjoys a good flood yarn.

In the Gilgamesh version of the flood, the highest god Enlil, decides to destroy the world because humans have become too noisy.  The god Ea, who created humans out of clay and divine blood, secretly warns the hero Utnapishtim of the impending flood and gives him detailed instructions for building a boat so that life may survive. 

In Hindu mythology, the great flood also involves a hero, Manu, who is told to build a giant boat.  In an Iranian religion, the same story is told when the god Ahriman tries to destroy the world with a drought which is ended when another god, Mithra, shoots an arrow into a rock causing a flood and only one man survives in an ark with his cattle.  The North American Cheyenne also has a flood myth involving the Missouri River Valley.

It seems that, while there are variations in the details of the characters, these flood myths were stories told and retold by a variety of cultures over thousands of years.  The fact that it is also in the sacred scriptures of modern religions provides some foundation for skepticism for the literal interpretations of these “good books.”

None of this is to say that religions are based wholly on “fake news” and don’t provide some structure for good, but to use the written words found in a sacred text as the end-all for further deliberation or discussion is wholly without merit.  Religions may be the foundation for moral guidance but should never be used to dictate our actions when they countermand common sense.  Remember this when anyone again uses, “It is written…” as some preemptive argument.  Religion has its place in society but one person’s religion and their interpretation of its doctrine should never be used as a mandate for governance.

The Modern Stepford America

 The Modern Stepford America

In an excellent article from The Hartman Report, shared by my friend Henry Popkin, “The Dark Side of the Tradwife Movement,” I found that while I knew something of the information covered, I was unfamiliar with the term, “tradwife.” Further reading and research found that it refers to the “TRADitional” role of the female in marriage as one of homemaking and child-rearing. Having been raised in an “Ozzie and Harriet” household (my brother was even named Ricky) I understand the concept and appreciate some of the benefits of such an environment. It worked for us in the 1950s and 60s before I went away to college. At some point, however, my parents both were wage earners with my mother joining my father in the real estate business.

Ozzie, Harriet, David, and Ricky
The Nelsons

While times may have changed, the mindsets of a few remain mired in the past. In the Hartman Report article, the plight of many women in this draconian post-Roe world sponsored by Donald J. Trump and his fellow “Stepford Men” on the Supreme Court and in Congress, was brought to light. The harsh reality of what they had “accomplished” was related to one tale where a woman (Amanda) who suffered a life-threatening ectopic pregnancy was denied proper medical care. She was denied treatment because, even though ectopic pregnancies left to their own fate result in near-certain death of both the woman and the fetus they are carrying, the doctors are threatened with 91 years in prison if they treat a woman after a bundle of cells in the microscopic zygote begin to twitch. This twitching of cells in the zygote is defined in law as a “fetal heartbeat” even though there is no fully formed fetus or discernable heart.

The end result of these new “freedoms” mandated by the Supreme Court is that the states now have the right to impose their own laws guided by whatever religious morality happens to dominate their individual state legislatures. In Texas, Amanda went into sepsis, nearly died, and lost a fallopian tube in the process. Any future attempts to have children would require an expensive and painful IVF procedure. But if she wants to follow that route, she had better hurry because Republican-led legislatures want to outlaw IVF. From their lofty moral ground, legislatures want to dictate how, when, and why a person should get pregnant, what their doctors are allowed to do to protect her life, and even mandate that she should die so that they might sleep in self-righteous peace.

Tradwife

In true Stepford Wives fashion, the robot-like females of this new Republican utopia will feel like they have just stepped out of a time-traveling DeLorean and awakened in a 1950s sitcom, albeit one without humor or laugh track. While the choice to be a homemaker is laudable, it can only be so if it is still a choice made of free will and not the result of some legal mandate. If we ever return to a world in which a family can have the replacement level fertility rate of 2.1 kids and live a full happy existence on a single salary, perhaps more people would elect to have one parent stay home. Or not. It should be their choice.

The Hartman article went on to remind us of what that past meant for half of our population. Since women might get pregnant, employers before 1964 could deny a woman employment. Until 1974 home sellers and real estate agents could refuse to sell a home to a woman. Before 1988, landlords could refuse to rent to women. Husbands could legally rape their wives before 1993. It was the Equal Credit Opportunity Act of 1974 that finally allowed women to get a credit card in their name without a male co-signer.

The Cleavers, Leave it to Beaver

Harriet Nelson, June Cleaver, Lucy Ricardo, and Donna Stone all wore high heels and dresses, cooked dinner for the family, and raised the kids. It all looked idyllic on a 21-inch black and white television screen. As Joanna Eberhart eventually realized in the quaint little town of Stepford, Connecticut, appearances can be deceiving. In twenty states, Republicans have taken the right to terminate an unwanted pregnancy away from women. They also want to take away the right to contraception so many more women would be forced to leave their jobs or be faced with the difficulties of holding down a job (or two) while trying to raise children. In the words of JD Vance, women should stay home and serve their husbands. His implication is that women in the workplace drive down wages by competing with men for jobs.

If you think we should, as voiced at the beginning of each Lone Ranger television episode of the 50s, “Return with us now to those thrilling days of yesteryear,” and force women to become the new June Cleavers of the future, my guess is that you and your “tradwife” will be voting for Donald Trump and his sidekick, JD Vance. If, however, you think women are fully capable of being more like Daenerys Targaryen in Game of Thrones and can be strong, confident, and courageous, you would be voting for Kamala Harris and Tim Walz.

“I am Daenerys Stormborn of House Targaryen, the Unburnt, Mother of Dragons, Khaleesi to Drogo's riders, and queen of the Seven Kingdoms of Westeros.” “I am the blood of the dragon. I must be strong. I must have fire in my eyes when I face them, not tears.”