The Cheney Endorsement

In much the way that President Obama's frequent calls for gun control caused gun sales to skyrocket, I suspect that former VP Dick Cheney's endorsement of Kamala is likely to have the opposite result of what he hopes.  From the very start of the George W Bush presidency, Cheney was viewed as the brains behind the administration.  After Bush picked him for VP, the word was that he brought 'gravitas' to the ticket.  Yeah, because George W Bush is not the most eloquent guy.  The Democrats heaped nearly as much blame on Cheney as Bush for the Bush Era.  Cheney spent 8 years as a prime Democrat boogieman, a villain beyond redemption, a former CEO of Halliburton!  Whatever he said was wrong or a lie.  Today, voters should listen to him about who should be president.  Really?

The Bush Administration got the US involved in Middle Eastern wars in a big way with Afghanistan and Iraq.  Though the Biden Administration pulls us out of Afghanistan, it has gotten us entangled in a far more dangerous war between Ukraine and Russia.  Trump wants to stop the war; Cheney endorses Kamala.  Coincidence?  You remember when the Democrats were anti-war?

If a Democrat from 2005 heard that Dick Cheney was endorsing a candidate, the Democrat would vote for the opposition.  Has the party drifted so far that Cheney is now a good guy?  Oddly, I am reminded of FBI Director Comey.  Throughout the 2016 Campaign, he was a hated villain for his pursuit of Hillary and her email server.  There was a natural distaste for him among Democrats.  On one of those late night shows (Colbert or Maher, I think), it was mentioned that Trump fired Comey.  The audience cheered.  They weren't supposed to cheer.  You see, Comey was undermining Trump, so he was a good guy now.  You bumpkins need to keep up with the times.

Topsy Turvy!

Political Show Trial

It is a given that Trump cannot be convicted.  In any normal proceeding, the prosecutor would drop the case rather than have the jury acquit.  It is a waste of time and money to pursue a case that cannot be won.  So what is the point?

First, it is a political show trial.  The winning party wants to march the losing party around and throw rotten fruit.  Yeah, this is just the thing to promote 'unity' in the wake of a disputed election.  Brilliant.

Second, it is a distraction.  During the Obama Administration, there was always the latest scandal - at least on Fox News - that was overshadowed by the next one before the last one played out.  It turned out that the press, and the public, have a short attention span.  Obama would do something - say, the Iran Deal or drone strike an American in the Middle East, or say you could keep your doctor, etc - and the press would jump on it.  Before the story could really rise to the level of a national scandal, he'd rollout something else that would be the new feeding frenzy, the last one forgotten.  It was a surprisingly effective tactic.  In fact, because none of the stories was ever pursued in depth, he left office with a supposedly scandal-free administration.  Trump did something very similar.  He would diminish a war hero, imply a rival's father was involved in the Kennedy Assassination, spout demeaning nicknames, attack the press as fake news, and so forth.  While the media frothed on about his bad manners, he would advance his agenda out of sight.  While a pointless impeachment unfolds, all eyes will be on it.  What is going on where it matters?

Third, demonstrate the uselessness of the government.  Congress doesn't really do anything.  Despite being the first branch of government, it has voluntarily reduced itself to the third.  Each party plays defense for their guy in the White House and mostly follows the president's lead.  Rather than risk angering the voters by making any real decisions, they delegate all the tough decisions to the courts - who can't be voted out - or various bureaucrats - who also can't be voted out.

Forced to choose, I would select "all of the above."

Against the Trend

For the last 120 years, if an incumbent president received more votes in his re-election campaign than he received in his election, he was re-elected.  In fact, if the incumbent president merely maintained 90% of his original vote total, he has always been re-elected.  Until now.

Here is a chart that shows only presidents who were elected and then ran for re-election, which is why Theodore Roosevelt, Calvin Coolidge, Harry Truman, LBJ, and Ford are not included:

In 2008, Obama received 69.5 million votes but won re-election with 61 million votes.  By contrast, Trump won in 2016 with 63 million votes but lost re-election win 70.5 million (as of this writing) votes.  Joe Biden, who doesn't hold a candle to Obama in the charisma department, received 75 million votes.

What Law Did He Adjudicate?

District Judge John Bates has ordered the government to restart the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program.  The DACA law was never passed.  Congress declined to pass the DREAM Act so President Obama issued an executive order for the government to enforce immigration laws as if Congress had passed a watered-down DREAM Act.  Let us ignore the legality of the president enforcing a law that was not passed and accept that the executive order was a temporary workaround.  However, executive orders are entirely under the discretion of the sitting president.  Obama countermanded many Bush executive orders and Trump can do the same with Obama's executive orders.  The president is not bound by the executive actions of his predecessors.  There is no law for a judge to rule upon.  He is ruling upon discretion that is completely in the hands of the executive branch.  Unless Congress has passed a law that changed the discretion since Obama implemented DACA, the court has no role if Trump used that same discretion to eliminate the program.  This is obviously judicial overreach and will clearly be overturned on appeal.  This is judicial activism.

DACA

 [The president] shall take Care that the Laws be faithfully executed

U.S. Constitution, Article 2 Section 3

The Dream Act, which was first proposed in 2001, was legislation that would allow those who are brought into the United States as minors to be granted a conditional amnesty.  Though technically illegal immigrants, they had no say in the matter and have spent the majority of their lives as Americans.  The Act has been debated repeatedly but never passed.  That last point is significant.  There was no law passed for the president to faithfully execute.  When President Obama pushed for the Dream Act, Congress declined to pass it.  Therefore, immigration law treats 'Dreamers' no differently than any other illegal immigrant.  The president takes an oath to faithfully execute the laws that have been passed, not laws he wished had been passed.  However, limited resources often mean that a president must chose where to put emphasis.  DACA was more than that.  President Obama implemented an executive amnesty that not only told prosecutors to ignore Dreamers but also granted legal status via work permits.  The president was not only being unfaithful to the laws that Congress had passed, he was enforcing laws that they did not pass.  Yet another impeachable offense by President Obama.  Of course, impeachment is pointless in our era and the Republicans were too spineless to use the power of the purse.

 

DACA is unconstitutional and should be revoked.  This is something Congress must legislate.  President Trump has provided Congress with 6 months in which to pass the Dream Act.  Let's see if they pass it this time.  If not, let the deportations begin.  Enforce the laws or change the laws but don't ignore the laws.  That is the path to anarchy and collapse.

Two-Faced Speaker

Having said all of that, there are people who are in limbo. These are kids who know no other country, who were brought here by their parents and don't know another home. And so I really do believe there that there needs to be a legislative solution.

Paul Ryan, Speaker of the House

Yet again, the speaker is showing his true colors.  When President Obama put forth the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) as legislation in 2012, the Congress - notably the House - shot it down.  Despite lacking any legislation, Obama directed the executive agencies to enforce immigration law as if DACA had passed.  Now that President Trump is proposing to enforce the laws as the Congress has written them and past presidents have signed them, Ryan has an about face.  Oh, he was only too happy to let Obama ignore the law while he could claim the moral high ground.  He was just fooling the rubes in flyover country.  It looks more and more like the two parties have been engaged in Kabuki theater, giving the impression that they oppose one another when they have really been working in concert.

 

Never trust a politician.

Transgender Ban

Much ink is being spilled over President Trump's reversal of a year old policy implemented by an out-going President Obama.  Most amazing was when Chelsea (formerly Bradley) Manning dared to blast the president.  Wow, there is perhaps the worst person imaginable to speak on this subject, a transgender in the military who betrayed the country.  It would appear that many believe there is a right to join the military.  No, there isn't.

When I was a senior in high school, an army recruiter came to campus.  He asked me about my interests and explained what the Army could offer.  His eagerness to recruit me evaporated when I mentioned that I was asthmatic.  Disqualified.  No hard feelings on my part.  On the football team, I often had trouble keeping up with my teammates.

 

Asthma is only one of many things that can disqualify one for military service.  Being too tall or too short, too thin or too fat, bad eyes, bad hearing, no high school diploma, criminal conviction, and more can result in disqualification.  Of note, mental disorders can also be disqualifying.  How is it that a biological male who wants to be female is not suffering a mental issue?  If the military doesn't have to put up with my asthma, why should they put up with their gender dysphoria?

 

Corporal Klinger (Jamie Farr) was a ludicrous goofball character on MASH.  He cross-dressed in order to get booted from the military.  Now cross-dressing and having the military pay for sex reassignment therapy is entirely acceptable.  How far we have come.

 

Anything that detracts from the military mission should be rejected whenever possible.  Having transgendered soldiers serve openly may make the military more fair, but it doesn't make it more effective.  It is more important that it is effective than fair.

What a Difference 4 Years Make

During the 2012 Presidential Campaign, Obama ripped into Romney's views on foreign policy.  Here's the clip.  Obama mocks Romney for identifying Russia as the number one geopolitical rival.  He also gives him grief for making a nuclear treaty with Russia.  To read the news since the 2016 election, it looks like Romney was a seer!  He then attacks Romney for wanting more troops in Iraq.  As it turned out, ISIS exploded on the scene in 2014 and there was virtually no US presence to oppose it and the Iraqi army collapsed.  Gee, Romney is an oracle!  Then he hammers Romney for dithering on Afghanistan, apparently not having a mirror on hand to examine his own record on that account. 

Asked two years later - in light of troubles in Ukraine and Syria - if Romney was right on Russia being our primary geopolitical foe, Obama dodged a direct response to the question and offered vague analysis instead.

Though I'm certainly no Romney fan, he demonstrably had the clearer view on foreign affairs in general and Russia in particular.  Even Democrats would have a hard time justifying Obama's 2012 statements in light of current events.  If Russia has had as much influence as many Democrats are now saying, those above clips will eventually be cited like Neville Chamberlain's 'peace for our time' proclamation.  According to some accounts, Obama sat on his hands while Russian operatives rigged the election for Trump.  Thus, the effort to delegitimize Trump's election must simultaneously paint Obama as hopelessly clueless and incompetent with regard to Russia.

More Illegal Spending

Senator Chuck Schumer has observed that money spent on Obamacare was not authorized by Congress.  As all appropriations must go through Congress, that would be illegal spending, embezzling tax dollars.  Sadly, this is hardly big news.  Back in 2008, the Congress declined to allocate funds to bailout the failing car companies.  Despite this lack of authorized funds, President George W. Bush spent billions of tax dollars to prop up the car makers.  Impeachable offense.  Of course, he had a month left in office so it was hardly worth the effort.  Having spent the previous year blasting President Bush's executive overreach, President Obama purchased a controlling share of the car companies while still lacking an appropriation from Congress.  Impeachable offense.  Congress let it slide.  How can we now be surprised - or even upset - that the Obama Administration continued the practice of spending without appropriation?  Without this unauthorized spending, Obamacare would have crumbled even sooner.

 

It should be noted that such spending is a crime.  Obviously, no one is going to be prosecuted because those who broke the law are members of the Washington Elite and above such laws, especially if they are Democrats.  It is a certainty that neither party will look the other way if Trump tries to spend on his pet project - the border wall - without an appropriation.  Three cheers for a return of the rule of law!

Follow Your Logic, Chuck

I heard this clip on the radio while driving home today.  Senator Schumer blasts President Trump for doing 'virtually nothing' on trade relations with China and therefore looking like a '98-Pound Weakling.'  On the surface, that seems like a scathing criticism of the president, an effort to hold Trump accountable for his campaign promises.  However, there is another message that Senator Schumer has unwittingly given:

1. China is cleaning our clock, a claim that Schumer accepts.

2. Trump has done 'virtually nothing.'

3. Schumer believes that presidents can modify US Trade policy.

4. If Trump has done nothing, existing policies are unchanged.

5. The existing policies are those of President Obama.

6. Therefore, Senator Schumer is calling President Obama a 98-Pound Weakling.

 

Amazingly, I agree with Chuck Schumer!  Next, Senator Schumer will blame President Trump for the $20 trillion debt.

Whose Economy Is It?

Trump taking credit for Obama's economy is like someone inheriting millions from his dad and bragging about what a smart businessman he is.

Oliver Griswold, Twitter

 

As seen on Facebook, this is pretty funny. Throughout the Obama years, the anemic economy was blamed on the mismanagement of the Bush Administration. I recall posing the question that, if Romney won, would he be inheriting the Bush or Obama economy? Indeed, Obama's first term saw an average growth rate of less than 1%. His second term was quite a bit better at 2.1% but still anemic by historic standards. Let's explore the numbers, shall we.

 

 

Obama had inherited the worst economy of any president shown and it got worse. He is the first president since Hoover who never saw a year break 3% growth. His best year – 2010 - is worse than Bill Clinton’s worst year -1995. George W Bush does not compare well to Clinton either. The direction of the economy since Clinton left office has not been promising.

 

 

Both Bush and Obama had good excuses for a weak start. Bush had to contend with the Tech Bubble bursting and then 9/11. Obama started his presidency with the economy plunging into the deepest recession since the Depression. On the other hand, both Bush and Obama entered the presidency with plans to expand government. Bush had No Child Left Behind and the Medicare Part D Drug Benefit already in the queue when 9/11 prompted the creation of the Department of Homeland Security. Likewise, Obama entered with the promise of a health care overhaul, an $800 billion stimulus, and what eventually became the Dodd-Frank Act to further regulate the financial sector. Therefore, both entered in difficult economic times with plans to expand the scope and expense of government.

 

President Clinton’s first term had a very respectable average growth rate of 3.3%, despite his raising taxes and trying to nationalize the healthcare system. In 1996, he declared the era of big government to be over. His second term saw a phenomenal average growth rate of 4.4%. Moreover, the federal debt shrank during this period and the government was running surpluses.

 

Expectations play a big role in business investment. If the president comes into office with plans to increase the cost and burden of government, business waits to see how much more burdensome it will be and if its business model will still be profitable. On the other hand, if a president announces plans to reduce the cost of government and reduce regulations, capital starts flowing since the future environment will be better than the current one. Thus, Trump’s stated goals of repealing the Affordable Care Act (less burden), cutting taxes (less cost), cutting regulations (less burden), and reducing the federal workforce through attrition (less cost & burden) all indicate that the business landscape will be better tomorrow than it is today. The Trump Economy started on November 9th.

Worse than Watergate?

Mark Levin, a conservative talk show host and former member of the Reagan Administration, makes the case of Obama Administration spying on the Trump Campaign by citing left-leaning news sources.  Of course, citing these same sources with equal brevity, one can make the case that Trump's Campaign was deeply entangled with the Russians.  However, which story is more prevalent?

That is the secret of spin, slant, and fake news.  When the accusation comes on page 1 and the retraction on the following day appears on page 20, how many readers will have read the former but not the latter?  Is that by accident or intention?  For weeks on end, the news will report about a hate crime, but when the victim turns out to be the perpetrator, silence.  The news had given the impression that rape is common and widespread on college campuses but every story that gets wide coverage turns out to be false.  The media picks which stories will go viral and which will get a mention - so they can honestly say they covered it - and then never go anywhere.  The majority of the media (ABC, NBC, CBS, CNN, New York Times, Washington Post, LA Times, etc.) are staffed with Democrats.  It's an echo chamber run on confirmation bias.  The fact that the word 'narrative' is so popular in news coverage today speaks volumes.  The Op Ed page has invaded the whole of the news industry.

 

The Russia story is bogus.  It was used as a means to get a FISA judge to approve surveillance.  Russia had no reason to prefer Trump over Hillary.  Obama was the best US President Russia ever had.  He stood by with empty words when Russia invaded the Crimea.  He was flexible on weakening the US military.  He stood by as Russia sent forces into Syria.  He managed to improve the relationship between Turkey and Russia, which is not beneficial to America.  He gave billions of dollars to Iran - a Russian ally in the Middle East - and lifted sanctions, again benefiting Russia.  He nixed our missile defense agreement with Poland and the Czech Republic, which pleased Russia.  While Obama's Secretary of State, Hillary approved the sale of 20% of the US uranium mines to a Russian mining company, Rosatom.  With a series of victories like that, why would Russia want an erratic real estate mogul who keeps saying, "Make America Great Again" rather than Obama's chosen successor?  It sure looks like the Russia story is a clear case of projection.

 

As for the spying, one must ask what did Obama know and when did he know it?

Watergate Redux

In 1972, members of the Nixon campaign sought to steal documents and plant bugs in the offices of the Democratic National Committee at Watergate.  President Trump claims that the Obama Administration - which was actively campaigning for Hillary Clinton - did the same.  Here are a couple of Trump's tweets on the subject:

Terrible! Just found out that Obama had my "wires tapped" in Trump Tower just before the victory. Nothing found. This is McCarthyism!

 

How low has President Obama gone to tapp my phones during the very sacred election process. This is Nixon/Watergate. Bad (or sick) guy!

Donald J. Trump, Mar 4, 2017

 

Is that crazy talk?  Sadly, no.  The Obama Administration tapped the phones of the Associated Press for two months.  Even more invasive measures were taken against Fox Reporter James Rosen.  Edward Snowden was sufficiently alarmed that he went public with leaks revealing mass surveillance.  The Obama Administration used the Espionage Act of 1917 to punish leakers rather than to prevent espionage.  Add to that Krauthammer's view that the outgoing administration left "landmines" to hobble the early days of the Trump Administration.  With all that in mind, was this the kind of administration that would pull a Nixon?  Yes it was.

 

Obviously, it remains to be proven.  Trump makes wild claims (e.g. Inauguration crowd size, electoral college margin, etc.) but he is in a position to know what government agencies have been doing; they all report to him now, even if reluctantly.

Breaking the Elite Clique

I had mentioned in an earlier blog that Trump's election expanded the potential nominees.  I had offered Bill Gates, Jeff Bezos, and Mark Zuckerburg but Oprah Winfrey is also qualified by our new standard.  She is tremendously successful in a variety of enterprises, has name recognition as great or greater than Trump, and - unlike Trump - she is almost universally loved.  Though she didn't think she was qualified, now she thinks perhaps she is.  Although Oprah and I are on different sides of the political spectrum, I would rate her as more qualified than most Democratic politicians because she has been successful in the private sector.  Politicians with a long and distinguished career in government think nothing of piling regulations, taxes, and other burdens on the private sector but Oprah has been on the receiving end of that.  Also, she has more character than most politicians.

 

This is exactly why the insiders are up in arms.  Trump has vastly expanded the competition.  The cozy little clique of Harvard and Yale graduates have controlled the presidency since 1989 and are furious that their reign has been interrupted.  A third of all presidents have gone to Harvard, Yale, or Princeton.  These universities are churning out a professional political class which has become the American aristocracy.  In order to save the clique, Trump must fail.  Trump must fail so badly that the voters realize their error and never commit it again.  Then the aristocracy can claim that it takes a particular education to be president and only we chosen few may apply.

 

Here are the last 8 elections.  Only schools that were attended by multiple nominees are highlighted.

 

2016 - Trump (U Penn) vs. Hillary (Yale)

2012 - Obama (Harvard) vs. Romney (Harvard)

2008 - Obama (Harvard) vs. McCain (Annapolis)

2004 - Bush II (Yale & Harvard) vs. Kerry (Yale)

2000 - Bush II (Yale & Harvard) vs. Gore (Harvard)

1996 - Clinton (Yale) vs. Dole (U Kansas) vs. Perot (Annapolis)

1992 - Clinton (Yale) vs. Bush I (Yale) vs. Perot (Annapolis)

1988 - Bush I (Yale) vs. Dukakis (Harvard)

 

Only Dole and Trump did not attend Harvard, Yale, or Annapolis.  Trump is the first person since Reagan in 1984 to win without having attended Harvard or Yale.  If she runs, Oprah attended Tennessee State University.

Insiders vs. Outsiders

George W. Bush spent the entirely of the Obama Administration in silence.  He didn't speak out when President Obama unraveled Iraq and unleashed the disaster that followed.  He didn't speak when Obama led us into Libya, from behind.  He had no public comments about IRS targeting or the executive rewriting legislation without including the legislative branch.  He didn't feel the need to defend his record when Obama or his surrogates blamed virtually every problem on Bush.  No, he was quite comfortable to retire from the national stage and let President Obama have his turn.

Today, President Bush decided it was time to speak.  He offered a not-so-oblique criticism of President Trump and his treatment of the media.  Interesting.  He hadn't felt compelled to comment on Obama wiretapping the Associated Press or naming James Rosen as an unindicted co-conspirator so he could really spy on him.  No problem with Obama constantly denouncing Fox News.  Nope, nothing to say then.  Huh.

What could explain this change?  George W. Bush is an insider.  Like President Obama, he went to Harvard.  Like President Clinton, Hillary Clinton, and John Kerry, he attended Yale.  He is a member of the elite, a member of a dynastic family that goes back his grandfather, Senator Prescott Bush.  Heck, his great, great grandfather graduated from Yale in 1844!  Though they may not have titles like Baron, Earl, and Duke, we have an aristocracy in the United States and they are extremely unhappy that some peasant who went to Fordham in the Bronx is president!  A mere businessman lording over the anointed?  The horror!

 

Trump is a modern day Andrew Jackson.  Jackson had a mini-rebellion against the establishment, expanding the franchise and getting far too friendly with the common folk.  Like Trump, Jackson was hardheaded and not prone to eloquence.  Where John Quincy Adams and Henry Clay - who were rivals in the 1824 election - joined forces to deny Jackson the Presidency, Republican and Democrat elites are determined to protect the prerogatives that have taken more than a century to build.

 

This is not a left vs. right conflict but an insider vs. outsider one.

"You're Fired!"

Acting Attorney General Sally Yates refused to defend President Trump's executive order that imposed a 90 day entry ban from several countries.

"You're fired!"

Until Jeff Sessions gets confirmed, Dana Boente is the new acting A.G.

Yates will be a liberal hero for the rest of her life and I suspect this will be equated with the Saturday Night Massacre before long.  However, the president is the chief executive.  He's the decider, as George W Bush put it.  If you don't like his decisions, resign.

 

As a political move, this only serves to escalate the current outcry.  Of course, with Trump's everything at once approach, this may be forgotten history tomorrow night when the Supreme Court nomination battle begins.  Trump is generating so much outrage in such a short period of time that the outraged will become exhausted.  Of note, this is a strategy from the Obama playbook.  Before the Republicans could move against Obama's latest outrage, he rolled out a new outrage.  Fast and Furious, IRS targeting scandal, Bowe Bergdahl prisoner swap, Iran ransom payment, 'flexibility' for Vladimir after the election, ISIL is the JV team, undeclared war in Libya, etc.  There was always new bad news to make everyone forget the old bad news.  However, Obama usually waited a week or two before rolling out the latest disaster.  Trump is rolling them out daily.  Hourly!

 

Trump should call a dozen or so bureaucrats to the White House every week, sit them around a big table, and fire one or more of them.  On camera!  It would be a ratings monster!  I never watched The Apprentice but I would watch that.

 

"Assistant Undersecretary of Fiji Trade Relations Smith, you're fired!"

 

"Executive Assistant Secretary of Fiji Trade Relations Johnson, you're fired!"

 

"Superfluous Supreme Fiji Trade Representative Harris, you're fired!"

 

Might Trump deliver on the eternal Republican promise of shrinking government?  That would be unexpected and marvelous.

Too Many Laws

A quick online search reveals that an exact count of Federal Crimes is unknown.  There is the distinction between laws and the various regulations that inevitably sprout from those laws.  One estimate from 2015 stated that there were "at least 5,000 federal criminal laws, with 10,000-300,000 regulations."  It is the responsibility of the executive branch to enforce all these laws  However, as we have seen, there is a lot of wiggle room.  Obama opted to overlook immigration laws even while he enacted new laws like the Affordable Car Act and Dodd-Frank Act.  Even with the vast resources of the US government, only so much can be accomplished.  Thanks to this vast sea of laws, executive discretion has more impact than Congressional legislation.  Immigration law appears to flipped on a dime in the wake of Trump's inauguration but it is just that he has chosen to enforce laws that Obama put on the back burner.  Moreover, Trump has already put Obama's emphasis on Climate Change on the back burner.  One country, one set of laws, two dramatically different outcomes based on who occupies the White House.  To prevent these swings, we need to rollback the scope of the Federal Government.

 

The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.

10th Amendment of Constitution

 

The Constitution grants no authority over education: Abolish Department of Education.

 

The Constitution grants no authority over healthcare: Abolish Department of Health and Human Services.

 

The Constitution grants no authority over farming: Abolish Department of Agriculture.

 

The Constitution grants no authority over labor: Abolish Department of Labor.

 

The Constitution grants no authority over housing: Abolish Department of Housing and Urban Development.

 

The Constitution grants no authority over energy: Abolish the Department of Energy.

 

All of these departments were power grabs by the central government.  Homeland Security is the latest new department but at least there is authority granted in the Constitution for national defense.  Even so, we should abolish this one too.  Return it all to the states or the people and, if there is an actual need, they are more than capable of resolving it on the more local level.

 

Paring back the scope of government would dramatically limit the discretion of the executive.  Thus, a change in the head of state would have far less impact than it does today.

 

Based on 2009 numbers, the abolition of the above departments would result in $1.3 trillion in in savings and a reduction in the federal workforce of 560,000 people.  Let's see, divide 1.3 trillion by 330 million and you get $3,940 per person in the US.  Of course, the budget has gone way up since then so the dividend would be even bigger.

Party Before Country?

In the recent campaign, information hacked from Democratic campaign operatives was provided to WikiLeaks.  WikiLeaks published the private communications, damaging the Democratic campaign, even costing her the campaign.  The source that leaked the information to WikiLeaks - generally agreed to be Russia or Russian-aligned hackers - has been attacked by President Obama.  He expelled Russian diplomats and has ordered an ongoing investigation into the hacking.  This is serious business.

In 2010, secret communiques and files were stolen from the US Military.  The documents included State Department profiles of Icelandic politicians, airstrike videos, detailed logs of the Iraq and Afghan Wars, diplomatic cables, files related to Guantanamo Bay, and much more.  The documents were provided to WikiLeaks, who published the vast trove.  It was an intelligence disaster, revealing secrets and harming US standing.  The culprit was quickly nabbed.  Bradley - now Chelsea - Manning was convicted on 21 charges and sentenced to 35 years in prison.  President Obama commuted the majority of Manning's sentence so that he will only serve 7 years, 20% of the original sentence.

What explains the difference in how Obama treats the hackers?  Manning's theft and release of information hurt America but Russia's theft and release hurt the Democrats.  One is more serious than the other, but not the one you would think.

Crazy Days Ahead

I saw the following headline and just gaped:

 

How Would Disney Princesses Fare In Trump's America?

 

The first picture is Jasmine and Aladdin suffering tragedy.  Various other princesses are also shown to be doomed for hardship.  This is in Forbes!  Here is an article about the hypothetical lives of fictional characters in an as yet unrealized America.  How will Scooby Doo fare?  It may be that this is nothing more than click bait, a story so ludicrous that people will be lured to Forbes.com and perhaps check out other articles while there.

 

When Obama was inaugurated, Newsweek had a cover proclaiming that We Are All Socialists Now.  Socialism - a system with a track record of shortages, corporatism, and mass murder - was presented as a good thing.  Meanwhile, Trump, who was the most leftist candidate of the Republican field except for his immigrations stance, is going to deport half of the Disney Princesses.  When Rush Limbaugh hoped Obama failed to implement his agenda, he was excoriated by Democrats, Republicans, the media, comedians, entertainers, and assorted others.  With Trump, it is the highest form of patriotism to hope he fails.  Sure looks like party-affiliation makes all the difference in how one is viewed and portrayed.

Election Hacking Hoax

When someone claims that an election was hacked, what does that mean?  The most reasonable interpretation would be that someone either changed the votes or altered the counting of the votes via a computer.  Did the Russians access computers in Michigan, Wisconsin, and Pennsylvania?  No.  Did they somehow hack into the machines that tally the vote counts and transfer some Hillary votes to Trump?  No.  So, the most reasonable interpretation of "The Russians hacked the election" is completely wrong.  What did the Russians do?

The Russians managed to hack DNC servers and also access John Podesta's email.  They released this data to WikiLeaks (WikiLeaks denies that Russians were the source, but they would be required to deny anyone to protect their sources).  WikiLeaks then started posting it and it had an impact on the election.  The Clinton Campaign did not respond to the veracity of the leaked emails but rather attacked the source of them.  So, it's all true but you shouldn't have them.

 

However, if you are going to get all huffy about another country trying to fiddle with your elections, maybe you shouldn't be doing the same.  For instance, Obama helped fund the opposition to Netanyahu in Israel.  His administration was transparently hostile to Netanyahu.  This is how we were treating an ally but we should demand that a foe not do something similar to us?  Was the election hacked when the New York Times published Trump's 1995 tax return or was that just good reporting?  If something harming a Republican - say the Pentagon Papers - is released, the leaker is celebrated.  But if information harmful to Democrats is released, let's attack the source - WikiLeaks, Russia, Ed Snowden, etc.

 

As a geopolitical foe, we should expect Russia to attempt to influence our elections to best benefit them.  I trust that our intelligence agencies are doing their best to influence our foes' politics for the best interests of America.  It is the governments' job on both ends to prevent the other.  Who was on watch for us during this recent hacking?  Rather than blaming Trump and declaring his election illegitimate, should we not be looking squarely at our failed cyber security strategy?