It is incomprehensible, and downright scary, how Americans have elected as their president a man who knows so little about the system of government he is sworn to uphold.

America rejected being ruled by an autocrat at the moment of its founding. Instead of a supreme ruler, our Founding Fathers gave us the Supreme Court. Specifically, they gave us a Constitution that created a system of national government divided into three separate, but equal, branches: legislative, executive, and judicial.

The Constitution also created a system of “checks and balances” to ensure that no one branch of government would become too powerful.

In the landmark case of Marbury v. Madison (1803) the Supreme Court announced for the first time the principle that a court may declare an act of Congress void if it is inconsistent with the Constitution. Basically, the Court said it had the power and duty to be the final arbiter of the constitutionality of congressional legislation and executive action.

Donald Trump’s rushed executive order on immigration was not only poorly thought out and badly executed, it was universally deemed to be unconstitutional by people who know about these things … constitutional scholars.

The order, which halted refugee arrivals into the U.S. for 120 days and barred citizens of Iraq, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia, Syria, and Yemen from entering the U.S. for 90 days, was sure to be challenged in court.

Yesterday, a Seattle federal judge put a nationwide block on Trump’s order. When a judge issues a temporary restraining order, it is because he believes the side challenging the order is likely to succeed on constitutional grounds and immediate action is needed so as to prevent those affected by the order from suffering “irreparable injury.”

Instead of President Trump saying his administration would appeal the judge’s decision, our new wannabe tsar took to Twitter to mock the judge:

The opinion of this so-called judge, which essentially takes law-enforcement away from our country, is ridiculous and will be overturned!

It is one thing for a presidential candidate to disrespect a judge, as Trump did during his campaign, but the President of the United States?

Trump continues to prove he knows nothing about our system of government. We are not a nation ruled by men but by laws. His personal attack on a federal judge and broader disrespect for an independent judiciary, is not only unpresidential but unprecedented and unforgivable.

Photo | nbcnews.com

You were warned. You were urged. You were implored to do the right thing by your hero. But you wouldn’t listen. You just couldn’t overcome your distaste for Hillary Clinton and the DNC.

No, you felt evil Debbie Wasserman Shultz and the biased Democratic National Committee needed to be punished for having favored Hillary Clinton over Bernie Sanders in the Democratic primary. Those leaked DNC emails, courtesy of WikiLeaks and Russian Czar Vladimir Putin, got you so riled up you swore to vote for anyone but Trump’s “Crooked Hillary.”

So you decided to give your vote to a candidate who could not win (Stein, Johnson). Some of you gave your protest vote to Trump, believing he also was incapable of winning. Some of you even voted for Trump just to shake things up! And a good many of you simply decided to sit out the election altogether.

We will never know for sure if your actions (inactions) gave us President Trump. But your movement certainly didn’t help. One analysis of the 3rd Party vote concluded that if Hillary had received half of the Libertarian vote and half of the Green Party vote in 3 of the key swing states, we’d be celebrating the first woman president.

Many of you said you were disgusted having to choose between the figurative “lesser of two evils.” And now we have real evil occupying both the White House and the halls of Congress.

As the saying goes, elections have consequences.

Trump, in just a few weeks, is making good on many of his campaign promises … mostly the dangerous and crazy ones like the Muslim ban. Unfortunately for some Trump voters, buyer’s remorse is starting to set in. Instead of “draining the swamp” in Washington D.C., the politically inexperienced narcissist has succeeded in surrounding himself with billionaires, lobbyists and crackpots.

Your wish to harm Hillary through hateful rants on social media seems to have paid off… much like the fake anti-Hillary news put out by paid Russian bloggers. Unfortunately you’ve also punished a good many Americans horrified at what a Trump presidency will bring.

But I have to believe some of you are looking at the chaos Trump is inflicting on our democracy (and the world) and, just maybe, feel a tinge of guilt. … much like those Florida Ralph Nader voters in 2000 (who also warned you!).

(AP Photo/John Minchillo)

It was a great run … 240 years to be exact. The unique and improbable “American experiment,” begun in 1776, has come to a disappointing end. Somewhere, the Founding Fathers are weeping.

The notion that a diverse group of people could live together in harmony, ruled by law and governed by a majority of its citizens freely electing their representatives, had its appeal. But as the nation’s founders feared, without an informed electorate, majority rule could turn into mob rule and undermine the very rule of law (Constitution) upon which the nation was based.

Once a government can pick and chose which laws to obey, the game is over. Once rules can be changed midstream to favor a certain governing faction, say sayonara. Once citizens, either through apathy, complacency or ignorance, no longer care about fair play or how its government behaves, turn out the lights, the party’s over.

Yesterday, Senate Finance Committee Chair Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) pushed forward two of President Donald Trump’s questionable cabinet picks, advancing their nominations despite a Democratic boycott.  Even though rules require at least one member of the minority party to be present for the committee to vote on the nominee, Hatch suspended the rules.

Last year, after the sudden death of Justice Antonin Scalia, President Obama nominated Merrick Garland to fill the Supreme Court vacancy. Even though Article II, Section 2 of the Constitution clearly spells out the roles the president and the Senate must play in the appointment process, Senate Republicans, led by Senators Mitch McConnell and Judiciary Committee Chair Chuck Grassley, vowed to do nothing … not to meet with any nominee, not to hold any confirmation hearings, and not to vote on any nominee.

After an anti-corruption ballot measure passed in South Dakota this past November, Republican lawmakers refused to enact the measure which instituted campaign finance, lobbying reforms, public financing for campaigns and creating the first independent ethics commission in the state’s history. The Republican governor took it upon himself to declare voters were, “hoodwinked by scam artists who grossly misrepresented these proposed measures.”

And so it goes. See a common theme here from a certain political party?

The saddest part of American democracy’s death is that it was self-inflicted. No outside power toppled our democracy. Reagan’s “Shining City on a Hill” is no more. Through their choices, the American people simply decided to pull the plug.

Photo | intellectualtakeout.org

After only one week in office, the United States is on the brink of a Constitutional crisis. Trump’s string of executive orders have been so poorly thought out, so poorly drafted and so poorly vetted that many fly in the face of existing law and the Constitution.

But in a great democracy, people have the ultimate political power. Demonstrations against Trump and his band of alt-right cohorts are now a daily occurrence. Even some Trump voters who urged he be given a chance to govern are marching.

The new President has shown his hand and it is a loser. Trump has broken the record for the amount of time it has taken for the majority of Americans to disapprove of their president.

According to a Gallup poll, it has taken just eight days for Trump to gain a majority disapproval rating, with 51 per cent of Americans saying they disapproved of the President on 28 January 2016.

Democrats, and even some Republicans, are seeing the current occupant of the Oval Office, and his “amateur hour” way of wielding power, as a national security, and global, threat.

Conservative apologist, David Brooks, writes in today’s New York Times how many Republican members of Congress have made a Faustian bargain with Donald Trump.

“They don’t particularly admire him as a man,” writes Brooks. “They don’t trust him as an administrator, they don’t agree with him on major issues, but they respect the grip he has on their voters, they hope he’ll sign their legislation and they certainly don’t want to be seen siding with the inflamed progressives or the hyperventilating media.”

Brooks goes on to excoriate Republicans for putting party ahead of country… as if this is something new!

“The deal they’ve struck with the devil comes at too high a price. It really will cost them their soul,” Brooks goes on to say.

The coward Brooks doesn’t actually come out and say this but he implies that Trump in the White House is an “existential” threat and that, for the sake of the country and the world, Trump must go.

As Republicans control all levers of power in Washington D. C., it will take a brave Republican or two to denounce what is now being called “Trumpism” … a doctrine of hate promoting extreme nationalism, anti-globalization, xenophobia, and Islamophobia.

History, no doubt,  would look favorably upon any patriotic Republican with the backbone to forcefully come out against Trump by uttering the “I” word … impeachment.

Any takers?

Photo | politico.com

Donald Trump may go down in history as the “Burger King President.” There just isn’t any whopper he will not serve.

Most recently, Trump has claimed the media misrepresented the size of the crowd at his inauguration. He even had his press secretary, Sean Spicer, make a fool of himself by saying, with a straight face, “This was the largest audience to ever witness an inauguration, period — both in person and around the globe.”

Trump is now also questioning the fact that he lost the popular vote to Hillary Clinton by nearly 3 million. According to our “Burger King President,” his shortfall was due to voter fraud, more precisely, be believes between three million and five million unauthorized immigrants voted for Clinton.

But not all Trump whoppers are out-and-out lies. Some are just childish, vainful boasts.

During the presidential campaign, Trump claimed he knew more about ISIS than the generals. He stroked his ego by saying all of the women on The Apprentice flirted with him. He bragged about his high IQ. He claimed his fingers are long and beautiful. He blew his own horn by repeating he is very, very, very rich … to the tune of $10 billion.

But perhaps his greatest boast, made at the start of his presidential campaign, was that he “could stand in the middle of Fifth Avenue, shoot somebody,” and he wouldn’t lose any voters.

Everyone in the media laughed and ripped apart the 70-year-old man-child for saying something so completely nuts and outrageous.

In retrospect, Trump was partially correct about his seemingly inane bravado.

There is a certain segment of Americans (perhaps 25%) who will believe, as gospel, whatever comes out of Trump’s mouth. They will follow their leader to wherever he takes them. They will not believe their own eyes and ears. They will brand anyone who tries to disparage their beloved… “the enemy.”

Trump, to this group of loyalists, is less a president than a cult leader. And as with any such leader, Jim Jones of the Peoples Temple comes to mind, his followers will drink the Kool-Aid knowing full well it is laced with cyanide.

Logic, reason or even common sense will not get through to Trump’s cult followers. Unfortunately, for everyone else, their demented supreme commander is also the leader of the free world.

Photo | youtube.com

Make no mistake about it. The Trump administration just fired the first official salvo of a new American war. No, it’s not some sappy metaphorical war like the one on poverty, drugs or crime. This is a real war … on reality.

Of course, the signs that Trump would wage such a battle once in the White House were evident throughout his campaign. He denied being in favor of the Iraq War even though clear evidence showed otherwise. He denied mocking a disabled journalist even though there is actual video of him doing so.

Now we have Trump’s press secretary, Sean Spicer, in his first press briefing, disseminating what can only be described as an easily provable, eminently verifiable, out-and-out lie.

“This was the largest audience to ever witness an inauguration, period, both in person and around the globe,” claimed the new White House press secretary yesterday.

It doesn’t matter that evidence exists to prove his statement false. Visual proof shows Trump’s crowd was about one-third the size of the group that gathered for Barack Obama’s 2009 inauguration.

Defending Spicer on NBC’s Meet The Press today, Kellyanne Conway snapped at host Chuck Todd for having the nerve to call Spicer’s statement a “falsehood.” She preferred calling his words a presentation of “alternative facts.”

To Todd’s credit, he hammered Conway with “alternative facts are not facts. They are falsehoods.”

If we Americans are to defeat Trump and his dangerous, nazi-like war on reality, we need more Chuck Todd’s in the world.

But unlike Todd’s characterization of Spicer’s statement as a “falsehood,” we need to use a more basic, effective and simpler word.

When Trump or his surrogates do not offer up the truth, our press cannot pussyfoot by using words like misstatement, distortion, fabrication, untruth or prevarication. They need to call a spade a spade. In this case, they need to tell us what we just heard or read was a shameless, bald-faced LIE.

Photo | ALEX BRANDON/AP

***********************************  JANUARY 20, 2017  **************************************

Photo | newsl.org

Tomorrow, Donald J. Trump will be sworn in as the nation’s 45^th president. And at long last, conservatives will have taken “their” country back … as in backward!

Conservatives, by definition (and nature), fear progress. They long for the simpler days of yesteryear when everything seemed to make sense. For them, a return to the 1950s has always been their greatest wish.

Gee those days of Ike and “Father Knows Best” were so swell!

But exactly what made those bygone days so great? Why do conservatives believe the fifties were America’s golden age?

Unlike today, the 1950s were a time when everyone seemed to know his or her place. For blacks, it was the back of the bus. For women, it was the kitchen. For homosexuals, it was the closet. It was a time when few doubted we were a Christian nation. There was no war on Christmas by the godless media.

Oh to be back to those glory years of three TV networks, home milk delivery, LPs, fotomats, skate keys and S&H Green Stamps!

With Trump about to assume the office of president, conservative Republicans think they have a man in the White House who will rubber stamp their legislation rolling back progress made by Democrats since FDR.

Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid? Chopping block. A woman’s right to abortion? More restrictions. Public education for all? Not so fast. Environmental protection? Less regulations. Voting rights? More obstacles. Marriage equality? Let’s get back to the Bible.

Yes, conservatives can’t believe their good fortune. Many think they are only one Supreme Court justice away from having it all.

Unfortunately, President Trump may just surprise them. He is not ideologically driven as they are. The fact is he has no core political convictions …. zilch. He just may bend to public opinion that is dead set against conservative regression.

“Yesterday! Yesterday! I love ya Yesterday! You’re only a day away!”

Photo | pinterest.com

In 1729, the Anglo-Irish writer, Jonathan Swift, wrote an essay entitled A Modest Proposal. More precisely, the full title of his work was A Modest Proposal for Preventing the Children of Poor People From Being a Burthen to Their Parents or Country, and for Making Them Beneficial to the Public.

Swift suggests a way for the impoverished Irish to ease their economic troubles … sell their children as food to rich gentlemen and ladies!

“A young healthy child well nursed, is, at a year old, a most delicious nourishing and wholesome food, whether stewed, roasted, baked, or boiled; and I make no doubt that it will equally serve in a fricassee, or a ragout,” Swift suggests.

Of course, anyone who took a college course in English literature would know this essay is one of the finest examples of political satire ever written. Through seemingly well-reasoned hyperbole, Swift mocks the heartless attitudes of his time towards the poor, as well as British policy toward the Irish in general.

My guess is that if Swift wrote such an essay today, in the age of the Internet, more than half of those reading the piece would take it literally!

We as a nation we are losing the ability to separate fact from fiction… to think critically,  The art of satire is slowly dying, if it is not already dead.

Our educational system is broken when the ability to detect and appreciate satire, especially political satire, is gone.

My modest proposal for 2017, and beyond, is that we stop focusing so much on science and math for our kids at the expense of the humanities.

Yes, in times of economic stress such as these, studying history, philosophy and literature may seem like a big waste of time. But a liberal education is what molds us into well-rounded individuals able to navigate whatever comes our way.

Flexibility, creativity, critical thinking, logic and reason, along with strong communication skills, are at the core of a liberal arts education. With fake news and misinformation all around us, the ability for rational thought is needed now more than ever.

I can easily imagine a reader’s comment to Swift’s proposal in today’s age of social media:

“You are one sick dude. Don’t you have any regard for life? … especially your own kids? You should be hung!”

Photo | usnews.com

It is almost universally agreed 2016 was a crappy year.

We recently suffered the deaths of Carrie Fisher and her mother, Debbie Reynolds, … only one day apart. This came on top of some really big music legends joining that big “nightshift” in the sky: George Michael, David Bowie, Prince, Glenn Frey, Maurice White, Keith Emerson, Leonard Cohen, Leon Russell and Greg Lake.

Yes, every year sees the names of many music superstars on the “check out” list. But so many, so young, so soon?

In world and national events, you had the following tragedies (in no particular order): Syria, Haiti, Zika, Orlando, Charlotte, Nice, Brussels, and Berlin.

But perhaps the biggest downer for most Americans, and all peace-loving people of the world, was the election of Donald J. Trump as president of the United States.

That the greatest nation on earth … Reagan’s “shining city on a hill,” could elect as their leader an infantile, narcissistic con man is too much for many to bear.

Yet as hard as it may be accepting the fact that a carnival barker was elected president of the United States on November 8^th, it is even scarier facing the reality that this same person will officially be elevated to our nation’s highest office on January 20, 2017.

When Donald J. Trump has the power to actually sign bills into law … bills that the Republican-controlled congress is salivating to get to his desk, that’s when the real scary part begins.

The Affordable Care Act? Fugetaboutit! Social Security and Medicare? Fugetaboutit! Environmental protection? Fugetaboutit! A woman’s right to choose? Fugetaboutit!

Yes, 2016 was a bad year. But 2017 could make crappy 2016 smell like roses in comparison.

It is distressing when, for many people, avoiding nuclear war would be a sign of success for the coming year.

Image | photogiz