Category: Trump effect

In the past forty-eight hours, Trump has demonstrated that not only is he a narcissistic, incurious bully, but that he is dangerously out of control.  On Sunday, Trump callously derided Sadiq Khan, the Muslim Mayor of London, in the immediate aftermath of a horrific terrorist attack.  In a move right out of the Fox News playbook, Trump quoted a sentence fragment out of context to make it appear that Khan was minimizing the seriousness of the attack.  In a moment when any sane world leader, let alone the leader of Britain’s closest ally, would have responded with solidarity and compassion, Trump chose instead to stoke Islamophobia and score cheap points for his fearmongering policies.  Trump repeatedly demonstrates that he has a boundless capacity for boorishness. Continue reading “Vote as if your freedom depends on it”

June 3, 2017

It is an article of faith that humans are complicated beings, capable of both great good and devastating evil. We are taught that no one is all good or all bad and that even the most flawed human beings have redeeming qualities. Trump and his administration contradict that benign view on an almost hourly basis. The vindictiveness, dishonesty and cruelty behind every decision, large and small, are confounding. We vainly search for a shred of human decency or morality, only to come up empty, time and time again. Continue reading “Power – Use it or Lose It”

If we had any doubt that the election of Donald Trump has unleashed a hateful, destructive force in this country, we need look no further than the news of the last week. Hot on the heels of the murder of two Good Samaritans who were courageous enough to stop an assault on two sixteen year old African American girls, we have seen a noose hung inside of the National Museum of African American History and Culture and the “N” word spray painted on the Brentwood home of NBA great, LeBron James.  Princeton Professor Keeanga-Yahmaata Taylor canceled two West Coast speaking engagements after receiving a torrent of violent, racist, sexist and homophobic threats in response to the Fox News broadcast of a clip of Taylor calling Trump a “racist, sexist megalomaniac.”  The escalating violence against and intimidation of African Americans is not confined to the stereotyped states of the Old Confederacy.  White Supremacists have waged violent attacks in the mid-Atlantic and the Pacific Northwest, in New York and California.  This is a national contagion. Continue reading “Destruction by design”

On Friday, we once again received alarming news of the latest victims of white supremacist rage in a seemingly unexpected place. Army veteran Ricky Best and recent Reed College alumni, Taliesin Myrddin Namkai Meche were stabbed to death in Portland, Oregon because they interceded to stop Jeremy Christian’s racist harangue of two Muslim women on a rush hour commuter train. A third Good Samaritan, Micah David-Cole Fletcher, was also stabbed, but narrowly survived. Continue reading “Memorial Day”

An honest examination of the events of this past week leads inexorably to the conclusion that the Republican Party, from top to bottom, is nothing more than a criminal enterprise. They are unabashed in their naked pursuit of power and pecuniary gain at any cost, no longer bothering with the pretense of fealty to the Constitution or any vaunted patriotic ideals.      This may sound hyperbolic, but not if we look at the evidence. This week alone, we’ve seen a now victorious Republican Congressional candidate respond to a reporter’s legitimate question on his position on the AHCA in light of the CBO score by violently assaulting the reporter. Even more disturbing than Gianforte’s assault was the number of Republican politicians and commentators who excused it or mocked Ben Jacobs’ decision to press charges. From Governor Greg Abbott joking about shooting reporters to Laura Ingraham jokingly comparing Jacobs to the victim of high school bullying, the layers of wrong are almost too numerous to unpack. The common thread is that Republicans are endorsing violence as an appropriate response to inconvenient policy questions from members of the press. Continue reading “A Criminal Enterprise”

In the kakistocracy where we now reside, every day is like a dystopic, “Groundhog Day.”  The details may vary, but the themes remain depressingly consistent:  widening evidence of treasonous corruption from everyone in the Trump administration; fresh assaults on our basic human rights; and policy decisions driven by the idea that the desires of the ultra-wealthy trump the needs of everyone else. Continue reading “Groundhog Day”

On Saturday night, Second Lieutenant Richard Collins III was murdered by a white supremacist student on the campus of University of Maryland, College Park.  Lt.. Collins, who had taken an oath to “support and defend the Constitution” was murdered by a terrorist who belonged to a white supremacist Neo Nazi Facebook group.

Lt. Collins’ murder, though shocking, did not happen in a vacuum.  Throughout this year, the University of Maryland, along with other campuses around the country, has seen a spike in racist incidents.  On four separate occasions, white supremacist flyers were posted on campus. Continue reading “Don’t bring a knife to a gunfight”

We all breathed a sigh of relief when Ron Rosenstein decide to repair his shredded reputation and appoint former FBI Director, Robert Mueller as Special Counsel, charged with investigating the extent of Russian interference with our elections and the Trump campaign’s collusion with those efforts.  Mueller, given his reputation for being exacting, honest and apolitical, is precisely the right person for the job.  Mueller’s appointment ensures that his results will be widely seen as credible and free from any partisan bias. Continue reading “Work to Do”

The events of the last two days have left us white knuckled in fear and horror. We wonder aloud if there is no depth to which the Batman villain in The White House will not sink.  On Monday, The Washington Post broke the story that during his jovial meeting with the Russian Foreign Minister and Russian Ambassador, Trump revealed top secret, code word classified information that we obtained from an ally. The Post reported that Trump disclosed the fact and location of an ISIS plot – enough information to allow Russia to determine the source of that intelligence.  This disclosure was in direct contravention of our reciprocal agreements with allies, which provide that the United States and certain countries share intelligence with one another on the express condition that it not be shared with third parties without that country’s express prior permission.  Continue reading “We had better be loud”

It is tempting to indulge in schadenfreude at the escalating chaos surrounding Trump in the wake of last week’s events.  Trump’s abrupt firing of FBI Director Comey, followed by a fusillade of lies from his spokespeople about his rationale, and culminating in Trump’s admission to Lester Holt that he fired Comey because of the “Russia thing,” may mark a turning point in his presidency.  If polls are to be believed, many of his supporters now support an independent investigation into possible collusion of the Trump campaign with Russian interference in our elections.  Republican lawmakers are gingerly beginning to step away from the train wreck in the Oval Office.  We should be clear that this does not represent a sudden outbreak of courage, but rather a recognition that Trump’s volatile and irrational behavior threatens the Republican legislative agenda. Continue reading “The danger of Schadenfreude”