It didn’t take long. What people feared most about Donald Trump … his autocratic tendencies, his disdain and total lack of understanding of the Constitution, his disregard for the rule of law … has finally come to fruition.

People are comparing Trump’s firing of FBI director, James Comey, to Richard Nixon’s sacking of Archibald Cox, the Watergate special prosecutor.

Trump’s firing of Comey, while the FBI is in the midst of a counter-intelligence investigation into whether Trump or any of his associates cooperated with Russia during the 2016 election, is much worse.

Trump’s action is not meant to stifle an investigation into a president’s personal wrongdoing and cover-up, ala Nixon, but a probe into whether a band of Trump associates, during the campaign, colluded with a foreign government to influence the outcome of the presidential election.

Could there be a greater scandal than the possible subversion of our democracy by a foreign enemy … with Trump and associates as willing accomplices?

While Trump’s latest assault on an independent FBI has lead nearly all Democrats to call for a special prosecutor, or independent committee, to investigate “Russiagate,” only a handful of Republicans have joined the chorus.

One such Republican is John McCain.

“I have long called for a special congressional committee to investigate Russia’s interference in the 2016 election. The president’s decision to remove the FBI Director only confirms the need and the urgency of such a committee,” said McCain.

But for all his criticism of Donald Trump and his style of governing, the former “maverick” has gone along with Trump’s agenda. Yes, he has criticized some of Trump’s actions but when it has actually mattered, he has dutifully fallen in line.

For a small group of Republican senators, will it finally be country over party? Or will it be business as usual, allowing the most corrupt administration in recent history to continue to wreak havoc on our democracy?

It is time for moderate Republicans  such as Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-AK), Susan Collins (R-ME), Jeff Flake (R-AZ), Lamar Alexander (R-TN), Ben Sasse (R-NE), Lindsey Graham (R-SC) and John McCain (R-AZ to show themselves as the true patriots they claim to be. Talk is cheap. Action is what counts.

The fate of a nation may hang in the balance.

Photo | businessinsider.com

Ding-dong the witch is dead. Which old witch? The wicked witch, Obamacare.

Let the celebrations begin! After many false starts, House Republicans finally were able to put together enough votes to throw the proverbial bucket of water on that nasty old Obamacare.

Let Trump voters cheer the death of one of the most hated, demonized laws ever enacted. You know, the one with the black dude’s name attached to it. Let the “so-called” president tweet to his heart’s content about such a monumental victory.

But wait a minute. The bill Republicans passed today to replace Obamacare, the American Health Care Act, is not law … and will never be law.

The chances of this cruel, costly legislation ever being signed into law, in its present form, are just about nil. The Senate would have to come up with divine inspiration, or an assist from David Copperfield, to salvage this piece of excrement.

So why would House Republicans rush to pass bad legislation that isn’t healthcare reform at all but just a huge tax giveaway to the ultra rich?

It seems Trump, more than anyone else, was eager for a win. It didn’t matter what was in the health bill or how it would adversely affect many Americans, especially Trump voters. The bill passed and that’s all that matters! Celebrate good times, come on!

Ironically, before President Obama signed Obamacare into law in 2010, the Republicans tried scaring the American public with talk of “death panels.” They were warned the law created bureaucrats ready and willing to pull the plug on old granny. Of course this was shear nonsense hatched in the vacuous brain of former half-governor Sarah Palin.

But by voting to repeal and replace Obamacare with legislation that has been described as “morally reprehensible,” House Republicans have created real death panels for themselves … American voters.

Nate Silver of FiveThirtyEight.com writes:

The biggest effects of the bill will be on the millions of additional Americans who would go without health insurance if a similar bill is passed by the Senate. But it could also endanger the job prospects of the Republican members of Congress who voted for it and make a Democratic takeover of the House substantially more likely in 2018.

Okay, House Republicans were doomed no matter what they did … if they did nothing, after so many promises to repeal and replace, or voted for this absolute shiny piece of Trump turd.

Photo | theatlantic.com

In another place and time, news like this would be satire.

But in the age of Trump, anything is possible and the most absurd possibility is usually the most likely.

Trump’s pick to oversee the federal family planning program for low-income Americans is Teresa Manning. This is the woman who has said she opposes federal spending on family planning and has a long history of making false claims about women’s health issues.

She has been quoted as saying “contraception doesn’t work” and has referred to abortion as “legalized crime.”

Funny, right?

But is this any funnier, or more absurd, than Trump naming Rick Perry head of the Department of Energy? If you recall, during a Republican presidential debate in 2011, Perry tried to name three cabinet-level departments he would eliminate if he were elected. He successfully remembered the names of the first two (Commerce and Education) but forgot the third … the Department of Energy! Oops!

Trump seems to have a penchant for naming people to head departments they either have no experience with or are opposed to … or both. Just look at Tom Price, Health and Human Services; Betsy DeVos, Education; Scott Pruitt, Environmental Protection. All foxes hired to guard the henhouse.

Donald Trump is trying to make George Orwell, the author of the satirical classic Animal Farm, a prophet. Remember it was Orwell’s Ministry of Truth tasked with rewriting and distorting history. By appointing people to run the very agencies they are opposed to or are otherwise incompetent to lead, Trump is giving real meaning to the old Republican line that government does not work.

Ronald Reagan famously said the government is not the solution but the problem. Republicans since Saint Ronnie have done almost everything within their power to prove it.

Satire is “the use of humor, irony, exaggeration, or ridicule to expose and criticize people’s stupidity or vices, particularly in the context of contemporary politics and other topical issues.”

In 1882, the German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche said, “God is dead.”

In 2017, thanks to Donald Trump, add satire to the list of obituaries.

Photo | DavidGoldman/AP

The man called a “pathological liar” by a member of his own party is at it again.

If you recall, Ted Cruz, in an epic rant during the primary season, said this about his fellow Republican:

“I’m going to do something I haven’t done the entire campaign. I’m going to tell you what I really think of Donald Trump. This man is a pathological liar. He doesn’t know the difference between truth and lies. He lies practically every word that comes out of his mouth. And in a pattern that I think is straight out of a psychology text book, his response is to accuse everybody else of lying.”

Trump’s latest lie involves tax “reform.” Candidate Trump said he believed in raising taxes for the wealthy, including himself. However, his tax proposal, revealed yesterday by Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin, would do the exact opposite. It is a giant tax giveaway to corporations and billionaires.

As dishonest as this is, it does not even make our list of the “Top 10” Trump greatest lies. Here are the falsehoods that broke through to make the shameful list:

1. Repeal and replace Obamacare on day one
2. Secret plan to defeat ISIS in 30 days
3. Obama wiretapped his Trump Tower office
4. Mexico will pay for the big, beautiful wall
5. Drain the swamp (Washington D.C.)
6. Massive voter fraud
7. Biggest inauguration crowd in history
8. NSA and FBI told Congress Russia did not influence 2016 election
9. Won the most Electoral College votes since Ronald Reagan
10. Only deport “bad hombres”

Of course there are many other lies that emanated from Trump’s mouth starting the day he first announced his presidential bid. Remember Mexico is sending us its criminals, rapists and drug dealers?

As we near the end of Trump’s first 100 days in office, click here for a list of Trump’s first 100 lies as compiled by the Huffington Post (and it only took 36 days!)

Photo | nationalreview.com

One of the most absurd talking points coursing through right wing media is the claim that Donald Trump has done more in his (fill-in-the-blank) days in office than President Obama did in his two terms. Attack a Trump sycophant and you’re likely to hear this meme.

A surefire way to counter this lie and throw the Trump devotee off his or her game is to ask this simple question … “Name one thing Trump has done, so far, that has helped or improved the life of your average Joe.”

Wait for it. Wait for it.

After lots of head scratching, the Trump supporter may come up with this gem … “He appointed a conservative judge who doesn’t make law but follows the Constitution.”

Of course, Donald Trump had nothing to do with getting Neil Gorsuch on the bench other than to pick his name from a list of potential nominees given him. And the only reason he is a Supreme Court justice is that Senate Republicans changed a long-standing rule on how Supreme Court justices are confirmed.

No, this was not a legislative achievement. More like changing rules in the middle of the game to secure a victory.

Trump’s one attempt at making law was his push to replace Obamacare with Trumpcare. We all know how that turned out! The proposed legislation went down in flames at the hands of his own party.

In a very real way, the defeat of Trump’s healthcare law was a win for the average Joe. Not only did millions of Americans (many Trump voters) get to keep their Obamacare, but insurance premiums did not skyrocket for many middle and low income Americans who would have been most affected by Trumpcare.

As Trump approaches his first 100 days in office, many disillusioned Trump supporters are starting to realize that less from Trump may actually be more.

Perhaps this is the reason why many Americans are not upset seeing their president spend so much time golfing at his Florida resort … as opposed to “working hard” behind his desk in the Oval Office.

Photo | washingtonpost.com

Donald Trump’s job approval rating fell to a dismal 36% in the most recent Gallup poll (3/27), following the House GOP’s failed effort to repeal and replace Obamacare.

The man who promotes himself as a winner is actually the biggest modern-day presidential loser at this stage in his administration.

In another poll conducted by FiveThirtyEight (3-29), Trump’s job-approval rating is slightly better at 41%. Still, only 69 days into his presidency, Trump is by far the lowest rated of any of the past 13 presidents during the same period.

Here is FiveThirtyEight’s chart comparing Trump with recent presidents on day 69 of their administrations:

As you can see, Trump is the only president with a negative net rating (-11.1).

Trump supporters crowed their man would be unlike any other president. In a very real but ironic way, they were spot on.

Photo | theslot.jezebel.com

Candidate Donald Trump sold himself to the American people as a winner. He promised if they elected him president, they would start being winners too. In fact, there would be so much winning people would get sick of it.

“We’re going to win. We’re going to win so much. We’re going to win at trade, we’re going to win at the border. We’re going to win so much, you’re going to be so sick and tired of winning, you’re going to come to me and go ‘Please, please, we can’t win anymore.’ You’ve heard this one. You’ll say ‘Please, Mr. President, we beg you sir, we don’t want to win anymore. It’s too much. It’s not fair to everybody else. And I’m going to say ‘I’m sorry, but we’re going to keep winning, winning, winning. We’re going to make America great again.”

Two months into his presidency, Trump voters are still waiting for the winning to start. Instead of being a victor, it seems President Trump has been a loser, with one set back after another.

Here is a list of Trump’s losses so far:

1. He lost the popular vote by the biggest margin ever for a “winning” president.
2. He lost on the “Muslim” travel ban … twice.
3. He lost his first National Security adviser.
4. He lost out on Mexico paying for the big, beautiful wall.
5. He lost out on repealing Obamacare.
6. He is under investigation by the FBI.
7. He has the lowest approval rating so early in his first term.

Historian Douglas Brinkley, the best-selling biographer of presidents Gerald Ford, Franklin Roosevelt, and Theodore Roosevelt, told The Washington Post, “This is the most failed first 100 days of any president. To be as low as he is in the polls, in the 30s, while the FBI director is on television saying they launched an investigation into your ties with Russia, I don’t know how it can get much worse.”

Even conservative pundit, Charlie Sykes, quipped on MSNBC, “Yeah, so far the only president who had a worse 100 first days would be William Henry Harrison who didn’t last past 30 days.” Harrison died of pneumonia one month after taking office.

It appears the only winners so far have been those Americans opposed to Trump’s agenda. They are saying, “with winning like this, who needs losing?”

Photo | theonion.com

He was going to be their hero. He was going to shake things up in Washington D.C. like no career politician ever could. He was going to stand up for the forgotten man (and woman). He was going to fatten their wallets!

For a significant number of Trump supporters, the dream of finally having a champion-in-chief of the common folk has been shattered. The excitement they felt on inauguration day has turned into regret. Former devotees now openly admit Donald Trump has taken them for a ride.

Trump’s failure to repeal and replace Obamacare with a GOP healthcare plan that he promised would be more affordable, expand choice and ensure “health care access for all Americans” is just the latest blow to a love affair gone bad.

Even the more ardent Trump backers are upset with his rushed, ill-thought-out “Muslim” travel ban now blocked by the courts.

Many Trump followers have been shocked to learn that American taxpayers will be paying for his big, beautiful wall, not the Mexicans.

There are some voters who take offense at Trump’s frequent weekend getaways … and all the additional security expense they entail. Three million dollars for the president to golf at his luxury Mar-a-Lago resort, they ask?

Some disillusioned supporters say they had hoped Trump would act more presidential once in office. A few even admit to wishing he would act more like Obama!

There is a Twitter feed specifically for Trump supporters who feel let down by the man they helped put into the Oval Office. The feed had 25,000 followers even before Trump took office. The current following has climbed to over 250,000 of mostly exasperated people who claim to have voted for Donald Trump.

There, no doubt, is a solid base of Trump supporters who will never give up on their man. These are the people Trump had in mind when he boasted he could shoot someone in the middle of Fifth Avenue and not lose support.

But for many voters, especially those who reluctantly voted for Trump, less for his promises and more because they hated Hillary so much, the regrets will just keep on coming.

Photo | upi.com

Just when you thought Donald Trump couldn’t make it more obvious he’s the most unqualified, and dangerous, person to ever occupy the Oval Office, he finds a way to prove you wrong.

In an interview with Time’s Washington Bureau Chief Michael Scherer, the 70-year-old president, who has boasted he sees a 35-year-old when he looks in the mirror, sounded more like a petulant five-year-old playground bully.

At the end of the interview, in which Scherer confronts Trump on the serious issue of credibility, more specifically his lack thereof, Trump answers, “I guess, I can’t be doing so badly, because I’m president, and you’re not.”

And that wasn’t the most cringeworthy part of the conversation!

Trump proceeded his schoolyard taunt by telling Scherer, “I’m a very instinctual person, but my instinct turns out to be right.”

So we have the leader of the free world admitting he listens to his gut more than the sound advice of experts? We have a leader who is guided more by what he feels to be true than what’s actually true?

If these statements were the ramblings of an unenlightened senior citizen who never gained the wisdom that normally comes with age, we could simply ignore them.

But this man is the President of the United States!

Even though Scherer presented Trump multiple opportunities to walk back some of his more obvious lies, Trump wouldn’t have any of it.

Yes, he was wiretapped by Obama. Yes, there was a terror attack in Sweden. Yes, Ted Cruz’s father palled around with Lee Harvey Oswald. Yes, Trump saw thousands of Muslims celebrating on 9-11 in New Jersey. Yes, 3 million undocumented people voted in the 2016 election.

Scherer asked Trump, “But you would agree also that some of the things you have said haven’t been true.”

The reporter then observed, “But traditionally people in your position in the Oval Office have not said things unless they can verify they are true.”

“Well, I’m not, well, I think, I’m not saying, I’m quoting, Michael, I’m quoting highly respected people and sources from major television networks,” Trump replied.

And there you have it. Trump is not just making stuff up!

Seriously, can a president get his information from any more highly respected news sources than Fox News and the National Enquirer?

Photo | time.com

In a largely underreported news story, a group of citizens has initiated a case with the Supreme Court of the United States to nullify the 2016 U.S. presidential election.

A petition for a writ of mandamus has been filed asking the Court to take mandatory action in the name of public duty. The writ – filed Jan 18, 2017 by Diane Blumstein, Donna Soodalter-Toman, and Nancy Goodman – has been assigned a docket number.

The gist of the petitioners’ argument is that under Article IV § 4 of the U.S. Constitution, it is the job of the federal government to keep U.S. territory safe from foreign invasion. The Constitution stipulates, “The United States shall guarantee to every State in this Union a Republican Form of Government, and shall protect each of them against Invasion.”

The petition cites as evidence of such an invasion the Russian hacking of our presidential election and asks that Trump’s victory be nullified on the grounds that cyber-territory in the U.S. was invaded with the intention of altering the results of the presidential election. The petitioners seek an entirely new election.

The High Court has scheduled a conference for March 17, 2017.

While this is good news for those holding out hope that the election results may be undone, legal experts are predicting the petitioners’ chances of prevailing are slimmer than Trump having graduated the University of Pennsylvania summa cum laude.

In a story on the subject, Occupy Democrats described the court action as “a longshot,” later indicating the petition “has a 1% chance of even being heard by the court, let alone of being decided favorably” for the petitioners.

But isn’t the fact the Court assigned a docket number and a conference date a good sign?

No. According to Counsel Press, a consulting firm, the Court’s action is not an indication the Justices have decided the claim has merit and ought to be discussed. A spokesman for the firm even speculated the individuals who filed this petition had a better chance of winning a Powerball lottery than of seeing their petition move forward.

Could all this obvious futility be why the case has remained largely unnoticed?

The bottom line seems to be don’t look for this court to get involved in the 2016 presidential election as it did in 2000 with Bush v. Gore.

Sad.

Photo | REUTERS/Larry Downing