Trump/Russia Inauguration Day protest
Yesterday, the U.S. Senate Intelligence Committee held an open hearing designed to lay out Russia‘s intentions and techniques (“active measures)” to influence the U.S. 2016 elections, and to propose actions and solutions to address them going forward. According to Independent Senator Angus King, from what he heard during the hearing, “we’re engaged in a new form of aggression, if not war,” from Russia. King’s statement echoed former Vice President Dick Cheney, who said a few days earlier that, “in some quarters,” Russia’s interference in the U.S. election “could be considered an act of war.” Witnesses at the hearing agreed that Russia is engaged in cyber “warfare” against the U.S. This is a crucial first step in investigating whether Donald Trump‘s campaign colluded with Russia to steal the 2016 presidential election.
Continue Reading »
0 Comments -
Leave a comment! Tags: 2016 Elections, cyber warfare, Devin Nunes, Dick Cheney, Donald Trump, Hillary Clinton, House Intelligence Committee, Michael Flynn, Paul Manafort, Preisdent Barack Obama, Roger Stone, Russia, Senate, Senate Intelligence Committee, social media, Twitter
Caricature of Trump White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer
For over 40 years, Donald Trump has been a media creature. He has successfully used the media, from his books to his TV and radio interviews to his reality TV shows to his tweets, to further his business and political interests. Trump’s love of the spotlight was well rewarded during the 2016 Republican primaries and general election with an astounding $2 billion or more of free media coverage. That’s why Trump’s rookie mistakes towards the media since stepping into the White House are so surprising.
Continue Reading »
0 Comments -
Leave a comment! Tags: 2016 Elections, CNN, Donald Trump, John McCain, media, Meet the Press, New York Times, Russia, Sean Spicer, TV, White House Correspondents' Dinner
Faux News, the original Fake News
In September 2015, we gave some recommendations on how to bypass the corporate mainstream media, which were doing an awful job reporting real news. We suggested that readers and viewers choose their own news sources, follow such sources on social networks such as Facebook and Twitter, and share important stories. This way, you can act as your own news editor and broadcaster. Given the mainstream media’s abysmal 2016 election coverage, and with Donald Trump now in the White House, these efforts are more important than ever.
Continue Reading »
1 Comment -
Leave a comment! Tags: Affordable Care Act, Congress, culture war, Dmytro Firtash, Donald Trump, media, Medicare, Milo Yiannopoulos, Obamacare, Republican Party, Russia, RussiaGate, Social Security, Sweden
Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin chairs Cabinet meeting in Moscow, Feb. 1, 2010. (AP Photo/Alexei Druzhinin, Pool)
Several weeks ago, Donald Trump kicked off a constitutional crisis by firing the Acting U.S. Attorney General, Sally Yates, after Yates opposed Trump’s Muslim Ban. Since then, after rulings by numerous federal courts, Yates’ view has been validated. Now it turns out that another correct decision by Yates, regarding Russia, was ignored by Trump and his White House staff, with dire consequences.
Continue Reading »
0 Comments -
Leave a comment! Tags: 2016 Elections, Carter Page, Crimea, Donald Trump, Hillary Clinton, Jill Stein, Michael Flynn, Muslim ban, North Korea, Paul Manafort, President Barack Obama, Rex Tillerson, RT, Russia, Sally Yates, Sergei Kislyak, Ukraine, Washington Post, White House
Anti-Trump protest, January 2017
Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.
–George Santayana, The Life of Reason, 1905
Massive protests are planned in Washington, D.C. and around the country against tomorrow’s inauguration of Donald Trump as President of the United States. Most of the people who will be protesting are on the political left. How many of these people voted against or publicly attacked Hillary Clinton when she was the Democratic Party’s presidential nominee? How many of them didn’t vote at all? If they did those things, they helped elect Trump. Protesting now is certainly in the American tradition, but voting smarter in the first place would have greatly reduced the number of things against which to protest, or even eliminated the need to protest at all.
Continue Reading »
0 Comments -
Leave a comment! Tags: 2000 election, 2016 election, Al Gore, Democratic Party, Donald Trump, George W. Bush, Hillary Clinton, Iraq War, Jill Stein, Ralph Nader, recession, Republican Party, Russia, Vladimir Putin
Anti-Trump protest in New York City, Nov. 12, 2016
Donald Trump was able to get away with pretty much anything while campaigning for president, from admissions of sexually predatory behavior to numerous false statements. Now that he’s the president-elect, however, Trump is discovering that preparing to govern is something very different from campaigning. Trump has already gotten into a bunch of sticky or questionable situations just days after the election:
Continue Reading »
0 Comments -
Leave a comment! Tags: Breitbart, Bridgegate, Chris Christie, Donald Trump, Hillary Clinton, Ivanka Trump, Japan, Mike Flynn, Mike Pence, President Barack Obama, Russia, Steve Bannon
Republican Party bends to Donald Trump
This week may well be viewed as the week in which the Republican Party died. After Party primary voters chose Donald Trump as their presidential nominee in May, Trump this week chose Steve Bannon, the chairman of right wing website Breitbart News, as his campaign manager, effectively shunting aside Paul Manafort, an experienced GOP strategist and lobbyist. Today, Manafort resigned from the Trump campaign. While Manafort was facing a Russian influence scandal, had become a lightning rod for negative publicity and thus had to go, he was at least a mainstream Republican who deals in reality. Trump’s choice of Bannon as a replacement for Manafort pushes Trump’s presidential campaign, and thus the Republican Party, further into fake conspiracy theory territory.
Continue Reading »
4 Comments -
Leave a comment! Tags: 2016 Elections, Bill Clinton, Breitbart, Democratic Party, Donald Trump, GOP, Hillary Clinton, Paul Manafort, Republican Party, Russia, Supreme Court, Twitter
Donald Trump on the campaign trail in March of this year.
Donald Trump is not having a good week. Trump managed to cast himself as both unpatriotic and treasonous within the space of a few days. First, Trump invited Russia to commit cyber espionage against the U.S. in order to influence the upcoming presidential election in Trump’s favor, which many have called possibly treasonous or at least a violation of the Logan Act. Then Trump attacked the Gold Star family of Captain Humayun Khan, a U.S. soldier of Muslim faith who was killed in Iraq in 2004 while protecting his troops. Not surprisingly, Hillary Clinton‘s lead against Donald Trump is now growing.
Continue Reading »
0 Comments -
Leave a comment! Tags: 2016 Elections, Crimea, debates, Democratic Party, Donald Trump, Ghazala Khan, Hillary Clinton, Humayun Khan, John McCain, Khizr Khan, NFL, Presidential debates, Republican Party, Russia, Ukraine, Vladimir Putin
Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders at recent unity event in New Hampshire
The diverse, outspoken and sometimes raucous Democratic Party was on full display on Day 1 of the Democratic National Convention (DNC) in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania yesterday. This is the party whose unity is likened to “herding cats.” On the other hand, the outbursts from some delegates at the convention hardly spelled doom and gloom, as some chattering heads on the cable TV news networks intimated. Rather, if you caught the unfiltered convention proceedings via live stream or C-SPAN, you saw a political party reach a noisy state of unity, as only the Democrats can do.
Continue Reading »
0 Comments -
Leave a comment! Tags: Al Franken, Bernie Sanders, climate change, Democratic National Convention, Democratic Party, Democratic primaries, DNC, Donald Trump, Elijah Cummings, Elizabeth Warren, Hillary Clinton, Michelle Obama, Republican National Convention, Republican Party, Russia, Sarah Silverman, Supreme Court
President Bill Clinton once proclaimed, “the era of big government is over.” That did not turn out to be entirely true, but what we all should want is good government. The Winter Olympics in Sochi, Russia are a good example of bad government. A personal anecdote from here at home provides an example of good government.
Continue Reading »
