Trump's Defenders

A new year, but the same terrible President.  Anybody who hoped that this year he would turn over a new leaf and be Decent Don rather than Trumpy the firebomber are to be greatly saddened.  After all, a 12 year old in an old man's body doesn't cotton to change very easily, does he? 

But I'm still amazed that his support continues to hold steady at around 38%.  I'd ask incredulously 'Who are these people?' but they are my family, my neighbors, my co-workers, and my friends in Christ.  They are living in a different world, perhaps, but I am still caused to tolerate them in love. 

Yet I'm amazed at the defenses these apologists give them.  There are 3, I think:
1)"Look at what he's done!  He gave us the Supreme Court!"  Yes, I'm certainly glad that the conservatives now look at the courts as nothing more than a political football to be won.  Any Republican president would have done this, but his supporters act as if he's saved the nation.  Gorsuch might well be a good justice, but some of his lower-court appointments...yeesh.  Thankfully a few of them have withdrawn after being shown to be incompetent or corrupt.  But more worringly are the many foreign service and other national security appointments going unfilled after he has ridiculed their work and driven many out.  The real work is done by people who do the work that leaders of both parties take credit for...but if there are not these people doing the work that goes unnoticed, how is Trumpy going to claim victories?  Good thing he has the Giant Button on his desk. 

2)"But...Hillary!"  I did not vote for Hillary...but playing the deflection game gets old and proves nothing.  If while growing up my brother had come home drunk, injured after a fight, and having wrecked the car, his defense of "But look at David!  He didn't make his bed!" would not have sufficed.  It's time for people to stop showing relief at what is not and face up to the reality of what is.  And what is, sucks. 

3)"I like Trump.  He's tough and doesn't apologize and makes us strong.  'Mercia!"  What saddens me about this excuse is that it is often up by many of the same Christian people who preach Godliness in so man aspects of life look at the bullying and hatred that is this man's language and then praise it.  It's as if people turn their brains off when it comes to this guy, accepting as good and righteous what in any other situation would be wholly unacceptable.  Taunting a nuclear rogue state?  Undermining the relationships that America has developed over decades of leadership by both parties?  Part of being President is about learning how to play nice with others. 

I suppose I can take solace in the fact that if the Democrats run somebody besides a convicted felon who has a dead hooker in the trunk of her car, they surely will oust Trump in three years.  But man, that seems like a long time. 

Deconstruction is easier than building up

Today is the election for the Alabama U.S. senator in which an accused pedophile with a history of being removed from office multiple times will likely defeat a former federal prosecutor with a history of putting away Klansmen because he has R after his name instead of D.  And, as voters know, this means they are true to the Constitution, live with integrity, and are specially blessed by God, while the other team hates God, hates America, and hates everything good. 

It amazes me how far our national intelligence and morality have plummeted in recent years, and this is just one of many examples.  I mean, when GOP now stands for 'Groping Or Perving', there's a problem.  Yes, I know...BOTH SIDES are wrong.  But at least the Democrats and liberals seem to be exiling their failures even as the GOP is intent on building them up higher and denying that they did anything wrong. 

(Take a breath.  Look at your own plank.  Realize that these problems are bigger than you.  Now, continue.) 

It's so easy to point out all the problems with our world...but to be honest, I am at a point that I have no idea (except the power of God) how to make things better.  The other day I figured out what my problem is...I know exactly what is wrong with something, I know how systems work, and I can see patterns.  But making something good out of it?  I'm not your man. 

So I was watching my daughter and her team play basketball, and it became very apparent that there were a lot of problems with their plan...they were not setting screens, the guards were not passing into the bigs, and they were not communicating on either defense or offense.  I could see all their problems...maybe I would be a good scout for a sports team, as I can always see the problems and what is being done. 

But, like a lot of Americans, I'm really bad about figuring out how to make things better.  I can yell and scream and point fingers, but fixing the problem, and building up my fellow man?  Nope.  This is why for all my morbid interest in politics, I have never had any desire to run for any public office except for the anointing of Dictator.  It's why I'm not a great coach...I can see what is going on, but I can't make the kids do what I want them to do in my mind.  It's why I stink at video games...I can figure out all the patterns within the game, but I don't have the ability to exploit them. 

Maybe our world is just too complicated today to make a difference in.  We'd rather just tear things and people down than build it up to something good. 

Weinstein, et al

The news continues to be depressing.  Currently, amidst the slog that is Trump, health and environmental warnings, and the Royals beginning their long generational slide into the abyss, we have a huge sexual harassment scandal in which a high-ranking Hollywood executive has lost his power and influence after decades of terrible behavior.  The fallout is that scores of other spotlighted people are being dragged through this...Kevin Spacey propositioned a teenager many years ago, Andy Dick licks people, and George Bush the senior acts like a dirty old man.  It's sad, really, even though hopefully the public shaming will hopefully people putting a stop to terrible behavior.  As a dad, I pray that my daughter will never have to go through what many women through the ages have endured.

Yet I can't help think that this is yet another story in which the chickens have come home to roost.  Men have always behaved badly, I suppose...in the Bible Xerxes gets his XXX rating by plowing through a whole generation of women looking for a replacement wife, and things haven't gotten much better in the years since  Celebrities and powerbrokers have always gotten away with bad behavior...how many of the legendary Wilt Chamberlain's 20,000 supposed lays were not consensual?  Heck, we have a sitting president who made some of his reputation as horny business mogul who would brag about grabbing a woman's 'p****' when she was not expecting it or walking in on teenagers getting dressed in beauty pageants.  Sexuality has been glorified as the right of the powerful, and now with western equality being our god, everyone else as well.  With glorification, abuse will soon follow on its heels.

As always, we want all the pleasures of sexuality without any of its drawbacks.  Will we continue to celebrate all the glories of our modern sexual freedom and then continue to be so surprised when this freedom is so badly abused?  Something's gotta give.

Grumpy Old Guy #31

I'm driving a shuttle route last night and most of the kids are fine, but a little boy, about 6, keeps standing up and jumping around in the back.  Three times I have to get on the intercom, 'Sit Down!'  I don't like being that guy, but kids in the aisle or standing up, that's dangerous. 

So we get to the final drop-off point and as the boy is coming off I have him stand on top of the engine compartment and tell him that he has to do better sitting down, that he can't be jumping around on the bus.  We're a quarter of the way through the school year, he knows this by now but he doesn't care.  But then his brother, probably a year older and is waiting on him says, 'He can't sit down!  He has ADHD and that's why he acts like this.' 

To summarize: a seven-year-old is already making excuses for his younger brother as to why he is the way he is.  Where did he learn these things?  Most likely from his parents, who likewise make excuses for his unacceptable behavior.  This child is likely to through life with people making excuses for him, instead of simply saying 'No, you can't do this.' 

It's easy to bag on people I don't know well, but most kids really don't have ADHD.  Most of them are simply over-sugared, over-caffeinated, over-stimulated, and under-disciplined.  And when they act like this, everybody then looks for an excuse besides what's obvious.  No wonder I have a headache. 

Posture and Flags

So.  The current national conversation is not how our President is pushing us towards war, nor how once again the Congress is trying to take away health care from the poorest amongst us, nor the horrible hurricanes hitting the gulf coast and Caribbean.  Nope...it's about whether or not NFL players should stand during the national anthem.  I am so glad (sarcasm) we are focusing on such important things.

Personally, I stand for the flag and the national anthem and the nation as a whole, not for the President or the Congress or anything else.  I think there are other, better times for people to protest than this, and the fact that kneeling now seems to have become the 'cool' thing to do makes me suspicious.  Considering how much even the wealthy NFL owners have responded negatively to Trump's statement that people who kneel during the anthem are 'sons of bitches', I know that much of what is going on is more about Trump and his persecution complex than anything.

Yet people who kneel or sit during the anthem as a protest against whatever do not bug me nearly as much as the many other ways people disrespect the flag, many actions which are actually against the federal code.  This article in the Huffington Post in particular I thought was excellent.
-When dumb rednecks (most are great people, but some are morons) fly the U.S. flag beside the Confederate flag out of the back of their pickup until it is ripped mostly to shreds.
-When politicians use the flag as a lapel pin because they are afraid of what constituents will say if they don't.
-When cheap, disposable plastic flags are passed out like candy at parades even as they will loudly say that they are 'made in China'.
-When businesses use the flag to try to sell things.
-When people put writing or other symbols on the flag to get a political agenda across.
-When people wear flag-themed clothing and they do it very sloppily.
-When people combine images of the flag, screaming eagles, and other quasi-patriotic images to say something along the lines of 'America!  Kneel or feel our boot in your ___!'

There are so many instances in which the flag has been abused in ways far worse than in the posture of athletes.  Just when I think that our country can't get any dumber, we knock a few points off the 'ol national IQ.