All posts by Jim Daniel

POTUS Waterloo

Politics, , , , ,

I have waited till now to comment on the debacle of the GOP/Trump Healthcare reform also know as the AHCA in hope that things might settle down a little, silly me.  So here goes.

Ever since the Speaker withdrew the AHCA last Friday I have been hearing that it is going to be Waterloo for the Democratics and the ACA.  I agree, but not for the reasons most people think.  There were three armies at Waterloo and two of them won.  The battle the last few weeks over AHCA is a little like the campaign of the 100 Days that climaxed with the Battle of Waterloo.  In both cases the side that was expected to win easily, lost.  In both cases the side that won, won because of stubborn refusal to give up and by sudden break in the will to continue fighting by the other side when the  invincible is shown to not be invincible.

Everyone expected the Trump Whitehouse to be unstoppable with the Master Deal maker leading the way.  What they didn’t understand, even thought it was obvious from the start, was that Donald Trump had no understanding of how deals were made in politics.  Like many businessmen, Donald Trump, failed to understand one simple thing, you don’t make deals in politics the same way you do in business.  The rules are different,  measurement  of success are different, and the payoffs are different.  The people we would be working with to make the deal(s), some new this and some didn’t, and some didn’t care.

He also didn’t understand that you have to have credibility to make threats and that his business rep didn’t translate over to the political arena. What does this have to do with Waterloo you ask?  Well, Napoleon also didn’t understand the battlefield he was facing at Waterloo.  He underestimated the Generalship of Wellington and the misunderstood the tactics used by the British.  He also overestimated the drive of his Generals he detailed to ‘vigorously’ pursue the ‘defeated’ Prussians.  He also didn’t really understand the men he was leading, while brave and tenacious they were no longer the men who could face adverse results and comeback for more.

Like Napoleon, Trump, did not and does not understand the 247 people who make up the GOP delegation in the House.  These men and women have their own base of support and in many cases own little or nothing to either the National party or Trump himself for there seat in congress.  Unlike Trump, many hold very firm idialogical ideals that they will not abandon for a simple win, nor can mere money be their payoff. (Not only is it often illegal it is not why there are were they are.)  First he ignored them when he crafted the bill, or as some think excepted the bill crafted by the Speaker and just expected them to quietly vote for the bill.  When that didn’t work he tried threatening them, which most looked as simple bluster, and then he tried placating them, which they took as weakness.

Like Napoleon’s battle plan at Waterloo, Trump tried to just blast his way thru what he saw as just the weak oposition of the Democrats he found them stand firm.  Then he found out that people he had depended to gruard his flank weren’t there for him.  Finally when he asked his people to make a last ditch stand they turned their backs on him and said ‘NO’.

So yes, the AHCA defeat last Friday was a Waterloo, and the Democratics were Wellington.  BUT the Ogre is only bloodied and there is still a great deal of fight left in him so like Wellington they must follow up both closely and carefully.  The Freedom Caucus is still a power to be contended with as is Speaker Ryan.  All maybe wounded but as any experienced hunter, or plotico, knows, that is when they are most dangerous.

 

For those of you who will like to question my knowledge of the 100 Days and the Battle of Waterloo I attach here short bibliophile of books I have read on the subject.  It is not, I assure you exhaustive but merely the ones I still own after my drastic reduction library space a few years back.

The Waterloo Letters Ed. By H. T. Siborne

The Campaigns of Napoleon by David G. Chandler

The Anatomy of Glory by Henry Lachouque and Anne S. K. Brown

 

Pres. Jackson & Trump

Philosophy, Politics, ,

To be completely open and above board let me state from the start I have great differences of opinions with President Trump on Political and Philosophical grounds.  That said, let me say that’s I an not in the least surprised that he personally ranks President  Andrew Jackson as one of the great presidents.  I, on the other hand, do not.  To be honest, before I started reading both constitutional law and the history of the Native Tribes, I too thought he was a great General and President.  Of course my opinion was formed from what I saw in “Davy Crocket:  King of the Wild Frontier” (Disney) and “The  Buccaneer ” but hey, I was a kid.

After digging into the history of Pres. Jackson, both before and during his Presidency, I decided I did not like the man.  Some years later, as I got my degree in Political Science, I figured out that it was mostly because he was one of the first Populist of note.  He was a firm believer in the Manifest Destiny of the United States, but only for white  protestant men, the battle of New  Orleans not withstanding.

As President he is mostly know for two things, the political battle over the 2nd Bank of the United States.  I shan’t boor you by going into details of the fight, it is enough to say Pres. Jackson was against the Bank and did everything in his power to destroy it.  It was in this battle that he started to but heads with the Supreme Court and it’s first Great Chief Justice, Justice Marshall.  This is important because it was in the early 1800s that we as a nation decided that it was to be the body that would decide what was and was not Constitutional.  An it happened mostly because of Justice Marshall’s work.

This is significant in that in the 1830’s was the start of the ‘Trail of Tears’ or Indian Removals from the south east.  For me it is the Trail of the Cherokee and the case Worcester v. Georgia where the court ruled against Georgia and in favor of the Cherokees.  A decision that was written by Justice Marshall.  It is this decision that Pres. Jackson is supposed to have said “John Marshall has made his decision; now let him enforce it!” An let the removal of the Cherokees and the other four nations begin.  This not only resulted in the deaths of, at a minimum, of 25% of these nations it also was a harsh lesson to the Court that it did not have any means to enforce it decision if the executive does not cooperate.

That an Authoritarian like our current president admires Pres. Jackson does not  surprise me, his entire adult life Donald Trump was free to act, and does act, in an Authoritarian manner.  It kind of goes with being a multimillionaire (or billionaire) who has only worked in business that they own.  He, like Pres. Jackson, is used to just giving orders and have them followed out.  He has never, ever, really had to deal with being told “NO, you can’t do that.”  So, people, get ready for the following…..

Someday, maybe someday soon, Pres. Trump will be told by the Courts, or the Congress, or someone, that he can’t do what he wants to do and he will just go ahead an try and do it.  If it is with the Courts be ready for a Major Constitutional Crisis, if it is with Congress be ready for a Political Crisis that could destroy one or both of the major political parties.  In any case be ready for a country that is not like the country we had just a few short years ago.  An just like Pres. Jackson, Pres Trump will be used by Historians to make the point that the great change started.

Understanding Fake from Real, a logical view.

Politics, Rants, , , ,

Yesterday Pres. Trump made the following statement “The leaks are real, the news is fake.”  This has some people very puzzled, and well it should.  Not for bad logic, but for the very poor speaking style of of our President.  What I submit he was trying to say was:

Yes, the leaks actually occurred but the content in them is false, therefor the news stories are fake.

Unfortunatly this is not the common usage of the phrase ‘Real Leaks’.  When someone says a leak is real you are saying both that the leak actually occurred and its content is true/factual.  This is because in politics, ever since we’ve had politics, it has been rife with rumors, fabrications, stories, and out right lies.  A leak is only a leak if what is being told is indeed true.  Everything else is commonly know as ‘disinformation’.

We should not expect President Trump to be familiar with this set of definitions, after all he come from a business where the truth is what you say it is.  All marketing is true for certain shades of truth.  Donald Trump is a promoter, marketer, a snake oil salesman and like all such his relegation ship to the truth is very loose.  This why no one should take anything he says at face value.  We can not go by his words, only by his actions because his words have no fixed truth level.  The run the gauntlet of 1 to 99, where 0 is a full falsehood, to 100 is an absolute truth.

So lets give the guy a little slack here, let him say what he wants and just not pay it any attention.

 

NOT!

True Colors

Honor, Politics, , , , ,

Yesterday we got to see the true colors of Senate Majority Leader McConnel and it wasn’t  pretty .   During the heated debate over the Ratification of fellow Senator Jeff Sessuins to be our next AG he invoked rule 19 to force Senator Warren to sit down and shut out.  The cause of his outrage was Senator Warren reading into the record a letter from Cotetta Scott King,  opposing Sessions nomination to a federal judgeship back in the 1980’s.  Then, in the exact same debate, Senator Jeff Merkley (D-Or) read in the exact same letter, with the exact same wording with out so much as a peep out of the  sensitive Majority Leader. (Please note that there are, as of this writing, multiple reports of other Senators also reading into the record this same letter)

The Senator has shown to all his true Colors, now all we need to do is figure out what those colors are.  To aid in this I would like to quote the worlds greatest detective:

Once you have  eliminated the impossible,

What ever is left  hast  to be the answer .

Given that this letter has been read into the Senate record with out objection by two other Senators, both men, it is safe to say it was not just the verbiage of the letter that so offended the Honorable Senator. If it had been he should have also risen in objection to both Senator Merkly and Udal.  He did not!

So if it was not the text of the letter it has to have been something else, such as the delivery or the person reading.  As to the delivery of the reading of the letter what I have heard of Senator Warrens read, while it was not in the classic style of reading something into the record for forms sake, that is a dry,  bored drone we all know so well.  The worst that can be said it was forceful and  impassioned. So I can see nothing in the delivery that would call for invoking Rule 19.

So what are we left with, either it was Senator Warren, herself that the Majority Leader found objectionable or it hast to be that it was a woman who was saying these things.  At this moment I have no evidence to decide which is right.  So I ask you Senator McConnel, which is it?

Was it that you could not stand a mere female saying something about a fellow man and you thought in this new age of Trump no one would dare call it out?

Or was this just you exercising your power in a small petty way to embarrass a fellow senator you happen to be at odds with?

Of Hate and Terror

Philosophy, Politics, , ,

I’ve waited till now to talk about the horror that happened in Orlando till now to let thing settle out a little. It seems to me that one. Of thing things that is being talked about is if this was a “Hate Crime” or an “Act of Terrorism”. First off, under the law there is no reason why it can’t be both. Often people do things that are more than one thing. I’m sure you all can come up with examples on you own so I shan’t bother too.

What happened in Orlando was a crime who’s motive was hate pure and simple. Weather it’s purpose was also to inspire terror for political or religious reasons we may never know. The perpetrator does not seem to have left any manifesto tell us why he did what he did nor what he wanted to accomplish by his actions. With out this it becomes very hard winkle out just what his motivations were. To help you out here are some thoughts. Of mine.

From several of his statements the investigators have so far deduced that he, the perp, a deep and abiding disgust of male homosexuals, that is Gay Men, and that he was deturmand to do something about them. Given this it is easy to say he did commit the crime of premeditated homicide and his motive was hatred of Gays. This means we can feel safe in charging him with both the crime of Homicide and with the crime of “Hate Crime”. (One point here is I don’t know enough about Florida law to say if this would be separate charges or if “Hate Crime” is just a mitigating factor)
Now on to if what happened was an “Act of Terror”, as the law understands it. First let me make it very clear that I do not Beale for one instant that a great deal of Terror has resulted from the events in Orlando. It harcons back to the bad old days of the closet for the LGBT community. I feel sure that if this had been a night club for Catholics, or for Backs, or Native Americans, et al, we should have no trouble at all in jumping to the conclusion that this was an “Act of Terror” but because it was “Gay’s” we stop and wonder. This is a debate we should not be having, I say that ANY mass murder is ‘prima facia’ an act of terror and should be treated as such. If you wan’t to say it wasn’t then it is up to you demonstrate that it wasn’t.
We may never know if the purpose of the Orlando Mass Murder was to instill terror in the LGBT community. An, except from a leagal standpoint it doesn’t really matter. What matters is that terror has been instilled and these fellow American need our help. We need to show them we understand their fear, and anger. That we are just as horrified by what as happen as they are and we are going to do everything in our power to help them. To this end I say the following:

To all those Christians who preach hatred, loathing, combination to the LGBT Americans I say this
“Get thee behind me Satan
You may thank you are doing God’s work but you are not.

Judge Curiel & One No Trump

Philosophy, Politics, , , ,

Judge Gonzalo Curiel

For the past couple of days I have been following the media struggle with Trump’s latest comments.  It has brought to light a long and traditional problem in American politics.  Specifically, how can you tell if a person is racist, sexist, anti Semitic, et al.

This is a problem I’ve been dealing with since I really became aware of politics way back 1968.  For ease of reading/writing I will only talk about racist but feel free to use any other ism/ist as you wish.  It all works the same.

I’ve heard multiple times people who are asked if Trump’s comments about the Judge, Gonzalo Curiel, means he is a racist?  Are the comments racist.  An other derivations on the theme.  For the first day or so most people dodged the question and tried to talk about something else.  In the last day or so more people have been saying the statement(s) were racist but that that doesn’t mean Trump is a racist. Or they say they can see into Trumps hart or they can’t read his mind so they can’t say if he is or is not a racist.  For what it is worth here are my two cents.

As I said before, I’ve been dealing with this problem of deciding if someone is a racist or not for a very long time (see above) and the best advice I ever got is this. “Until you can look into a man’s sole you have to judge a man by what he says and does.”  We have to judge Donald Trump by both his words and deeds.  When it comes to the judging I’ve always tried, and sometime succeeded, to err on the side of understanding.

When someone says or done something racist I try to let them recant (correct) what they have done or said.  After all we all act badly from time to time.  BUT when someone repeatedly keeps doing or saying racist things or when they ‘double down’ I have to take them at their word and that word is I’m a racist.

In the case of Donald Trump, for me he is a racist.  Not the worst that I have ever known, not by a long shot, but still a racist.  Something to remember this election year.

California Primary

Politics

I-Voted-2014110356This is a little late as I like to do it the Tuesday before Election Day but better late than never.  It does not mater to me if you are a Democrat, Republican, Libertarian, Green, American Indepent, or Not Declared.  If you haven’t voted already remember that June 8th is Election Day here in California and get out and vote.

I hold this to be a fundamental truth, the more people who vote the better our nation will be. I also hold that if you don’t bother to vote you give any right or Privlage to complain about who got elected.