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12/13/2024

THE PERILS OF SUCCESS
* What if Trump's victories, not his misdeeds, advance his downfall?
* Plus: Where have our heroes gone?

WHAT IF WE’VE HAD IT ALL WRONG?
     In looking for Donald Trump’s downfall, we’ve been expecting that a heinous self-inflicted episode would be his undoing – that elusive “He’s gone too far” moment: his salacious “Access Hollywood” tape comments;” his traitorous role in the Jan. 6 insurrection; his slurs against military veterans.
     But what if it’s success that finally undercuts him?
     I’ve been thinking about that possibility since Trump’s stunning victory on Nov. 5, when he won not only the Electoral College count, but the most votes overall – and he didn’t even have to lie about it.
     To say nothing of the fact that his MAGA thugs gained control of the Senate and held onto the House.
     Too much winning.
     I mean, what happens when your luck – which never is an infinite commodity - runs out? What goes up, must go down. The bigger they are, the harder they fall.
     Take what happened Dec. 12. The president-elect had what the New York Times postulated as possibly “Donald Trump’s Perfect Day.”
     He simultaneously was named Time magazine’s “Person of the Year,” and was given the “honor” of ringing the opening bell at the New York Stock Exchange, as cries of “USA,” “USA” sang out.
     But what if his Perfect Day was actually Peak Trump?
     Could this have been the moment when there was no more “up,” and from now on, Trump’s public and private life would be relentlessly downhill and not in a pleasant way.
     I’m a believer in life’s perverse physics.
     It works this way: things are actually the opposite of what they seem. A victory turns out to be the beginning of the end. Losing is the opening chapter in a story about a promising future.
     Understanding that Trump’s lizard brain is uniquely unknowable, I wonder if this is something that troubles him.
     Does his massive, far-reaching winning streak - so relentless, so expansive, so unfair, so undeserved and so perverse - begin to prey on him? Does he ruminate in the wee hours, wondering that maybe his number is up, that he’s exhausted his personal supply of close calls, chance escapes and unexpected victories?
     Does he worry that, having dodged a literal bullet, he’s now threatened by a virtual one?

             WHERE HAVE ALL THE HEROES GONE? PART 1
ONE OF THE LETDOWNS of the current Trump phenomenon is its disappointing dearth of heroes on what has become a bleak and troubled political and cultural landscape.
     Christopher Wray did not have to announce his resignation as FBI director, timed to Trump’s assumption of the presidency on Jan. 20.
     Wray actually has three years left on his official stint as head of the nation’s premier law enforcement agency. The 10-year term was deliberately set to straddle presidential administrations, an attempt to insulate the FBI from political influence and whim.
      A president has a right to fire the FBI chief, and Trump had vowed to do so if Wray had decided not step aside. And there’s little doubt that Trump would do what he said.
     But by forcing Trump’s hand, Wray would have stood tall for the FBI, demonstrating that the agency is not a president’s plaything, forcing Trump to challenge its independent traditions.
     Wray, at least from the outside view, has been a credible leader, with little to apologize for. He could have let his record speak for itself and the credibility of the agency.
      Now, Trump has an unobstructed course in putting a patsy in charge, most likely his designated director, Kash Patel, who is sure to work diligently to corrupt the agency with political investigations and policies.

          WHERE HAVE ALL THE HEROES GONE? PART 2
U.S. SEN. JONI ERNST, an Iowa Republican, seemed to have had reservations about a particularly noxious Trump appointment, Pete Hegseth, whom the president-elect nominated as secretary of defense.
     Hegseth has said in the past that women shouldn’t serve in combat, and he’s been investigated for, but not charged with, sexual assault.
      Ernst is a combat veteran and a sexual assault survivor.
      But after she wondered about Hegseth’s qualifications, she was subject to intense MAGA pressure, with threats of being challenged in a primary in 2026.
     Later, while not endorsing him, Ernst said she had had an “encouraging” meeting with Hegseth, and that she looked forward to supporting Pete the Creep through a “fair hearing.”

           WHERE HAVE ALL THE HEROES GONE? PART 3
IT'S NOT TRUE THAT AMERICA is without modern heroes.
     At least we have Luigi Mangione. He’s the suspected assassin of Brian Thompson, the UnitedHealthcare CEO who was gunned down in New York City on Dec. 4.
     The killer left behind shells inscribed with “deny,” “defend” and “depose,” part of the vocabulary health insurers use in deflecting patients’ coverage.
      Instantly, sympathy bent toward the alleged murderer.
     “He took action against private health insurance corporations,” wrote one admirer on the social platform X. “In this house, Luigi Mangione is a hero, end of story!”
      The real villain? The Pennsylvania McDonald’s restaurant , where folks told the cops that a man who looked like the fugitive’s photos was eating. Mangione’s arrest prompted online negative reviews of the fast-food outlet, forcing Google to take down the phony notices.
                                                                              * * *
     A FBI chief caves.
     A combat veteran retreats.
     An accused murderer is lionized.
     And 37 days from now, Donald John Trump, a crook, a liar, an abuser of women, an insurrectionist and a bully, will be sworn in as our country’s role-model-in-chief .

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12/3/24

12/4/2024

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BIDEN'S BETRAYAL

    (Note: This post originally went out as an email because I wasn't able to access the website service. I apologize for using the word “betray” that was the centerpiece of an earlier post – but no other word fits.-   Brian Jones)

PRESIDENT JOE BIDEN, by pardoning his son, Hunter, has disgraced the presidency, destroyed his legacy and betrayed all who trust in justice.
    Biden has cleared the way for Donald Trump to continue his abuse of the presidential pardon powers, which began in Trump’s first term and is sure to accelerate in his second.
    If Trump, for example, carries through with his threat to pardon the outlaws who overran the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, the excuse should be written large on Washington’s memorial’s and buildings:
   “Joe Biden did it, too.”

I’LL NOT GET BOGGED DOWN in Hunter’s crimes and travails.
   What counts is that he was convicted by a jury of federal gun charges and pleaded guilty to tax evasion charges.
    Beyond those crimes, he traded on his father’s name for years in his business deals.
    That the Biden family has been beset by tragedy, a terrible car accident, his Hunter's brother’s death from brain cancer, Hunter’s drug addiction, is truly sad.
    It's no excuse for the misuse of the Constitution’s unique pardon authority to keep a family member out of the slammer.

COMPOUNDING THE PARDON DISGRACE is Biden’s version of the Big Lie. He and his spokespersons repeatedly said that he would never use those powers to protect his son his son.
    For example, after Hunter’s gun conviction last June, Biden said:
    “I abide by the jury decision. I will do that and I will not pardon him.”
    The pardon means that we cannot believe a word he says.
    About anything.

I BELIEVED IN JOE BIDEN. And maybe you did, too.
     I thought he had rescued the United States from the depravity and disgrace of Donald Trump’s first term; I respected the way he returned the country to its normal, if imperfect, function. And all of that eloquent "soul of America" stuff.
Which is now meaningless.
    One of the few defenses that the forces of good have had following the Nov. 5 election has been the moral authority against which to measure Trump’s corruption.
    Now Biden -- selfishly, hypocritically, faithlessly -- has stripped the country of even that standard.
    We are betrayed.

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12/13/2024

THE PERILS OF SUCCESS* What if Trump's victories, not his misdeeds, advance his downfall?* Plus: Where have our heroes gone?

12/3/24

BIDEN'S BETRAYAL

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THE PERILS OF SUCCESS
* What if Trump's victories, not his misdeeds, advance his downfall?
* Plus: Where have our heroes gone?