Every September, as I'm getting ready to start another season of Weekly Mail, I go back to the very first post I made when we started up again in 2015. On that post, I wrote the following paragraph...
There are a lot of things that I like about Donald Trump and his run for the Republican Nomination. He's self made, so he's not beholden to special interests to raise money, He's also not beholden to the party line, as his plan to raise taxes on the wealthy have his fellow Republican's breaking out in hives, and although I realize he has had his share of business failures, he's also had some very huge successes.
There have been many times I have considered deleting this post, just pretending I started writing the following week. Most people would be none the wiser. But there's two big reasons I wouldn't do that. One because it's intellectually dishonest.
But also, it kind of serves as a lesson, as we once again, for the third time have to see the person I nicknamed Captain Orange, run for the highest office in the land. And the lesson is this..
It's not too late.
It's not too late to realize that everything about him is a charade, that at the end of the day, he's nothing more than a carnival barker, a street hustler.
A conman.
Look, I bought into it. Look at that paragraph, folks. He's self-made? Wrong, he inherited all that $$ from his old man. The money he has now is from slapping his name on things other people built. Just like he slapped his name on the tail end of the Obama economy. And from being a game show host.
Not beholden to special interests to raise money? For Christ Sake, every time he gets indicted, the first thing he does is ask "How can we fundraise off of this?" (And not for nothing, there are very few people on earth I can use the phrase every time he gets indicted about. Most mere mortals get indicted once or twice and then their careers are done.)
Not beholden to the party line? The party line for as long as I've been alive was making abortion illegal. Yeah, silly me, I figured the guy who cheated on his first wife with his second wife and his second wife with his third wife, and his third wife with a porn actress, and who knows how many others in between, would want to make sure, in case he slipped one passed the goalie, that at least they could have an abortion. But there he is, taking credit for appointing the three justices that helped overturn Roe v Wade, while whining that all he did was leave it up to the states. Right. States that want to make all abortions, no matter what, illegal.
I get it. Washington DC is dysfunctional. It seemed like a great idea at the time, to have someone come in from the outside, someone who had never run for office, someone who didn't need the job, to come in and clean it all up.
I get it.
Here's what I don't get.
How can anyone look at what he has done, both in the four years he was in charge, and the four years since he has left, and say-"That's the guy we need."
Again, forget what you thought before he won in 2016. Many of us were guilty of that. I was, at least in the very beginning. I thought maybe an outsider is what the country needed.
But not this guy. At this point, he is everything you wanted to get rid of in D.C.
And about a million times worse.
If you are being honest with yourself, you can't help but see it.
But too many people aren't being honest with themselves. Too many people are clinging to the idea that Trump was the guy who was going to "drain the swamp." when all he did was bring in his self-serving flunkies, who were either unable or unwilling (and usually both) to accomplish anything.
Too many people look at the list of indiscretions this man has committed and convinced themselves that the media has made the whole thing up. Fake news, they yell. Liberal bias they scream.
Guess what. I agree there is liberal bias. There is a great book called Media Inc written by Matt Taibi who makes the case that all cable news is about is selling a product. In the case of CNN and MSNBC, that product is left-leaning news. In FOX's case it's right wing news.
But here's the thing. There's a big difference between liberal bias and fake news.
You think the media is making up all of this?
They're making up how he has acted around Vladimir Putin? Taking Putin's word over that of his own intelligence team about Russian election hacking? And his letters to Kim Jung Un? Two dictators who he says himself he admires?
They're making up all the numbers of people who died because of the pandemic? I mean some of you think they actually made up the pandemic! Ask those families who lost loved ones or who are still recovering from long term COVID. Ask people who were working in the hospitals trying to save people or at the very least make them more comfortable before they passed. A lot of those doctors and nurses were wearing garbage bags instead of scrubs. I know because I saw it myself. But to you, I'm full of shit. Me and the liberal media.
I guess they are also making up the fact that Trump, in maybe one of the few things he managed to get right, was able to get funding to get the vaccines up and running. Only after his minions told him that some of his supporters were anti-vax did he act like someone else came up with that.
They're making up what happened on January 6th. Making up stories about cops getting killed, politicians running for their lives, our government being attacked by nothing less than domestic terrorists? They're making up the fact that several people, including Kevin McCarthy and even his own kids pleaded with him to call it off and he did nothing? They're also making up the fact that Trump wants to pardon the very same people who were determined to kill Vice President Pence, Speaker Pelosi and anyone else who stood in the way of overturning a free and fair election?
And of course, they are making up the fact that the 2020 election was free and fair in the first place. That every legal challenge was overruled, even by judges appointed by Trump himself. That Dominion voting systems was paid almost $1 billion, that two elections workers in Georgia can move into Rudy Guiliani's swanky apartment in Manhattan pretty much anytime they want because he falsely accused them of election impropriety.
It's all bullshit?
All of it?
And these are just the big ones. And in years past any one of these indiscretions would at the very least disqualify you from seeing the White House again. Shoot, in a sane world, it would land you in prison.
Yet, here we are. Just hours away from the 2024 election.
Kamala Harris isn't perfect. Neither is Joe Biden. I don't agree with everything she says or all of her policies. Same with him. But I do believe that they care about this country and that they are not bigger than the office they are seeking/currently holding.
I felt the same way about Barack Obama.
And John McCain
And George Bush, both of them.
And both Clintons.
Even Richard Nixon. For all the crap he pulled, nobody ever questioned his love and honor for his country. I once read a book where the author asked someone about Richard Nixon, and the person being interviewed answered. "An absolutely brilliant mind. One of the brightest, most well-read people I have ever met."
The person being interviewed who gave that answer was Jimmy Carter, the man who was elected to the presidency in part because of Americans anger towards Watergate. Jimmy Carter was another man who put his country before himself. As did the man he defeated for the White House, Gerald Ford.
Ronald Reagan too.
Trump isn't just the worst President in my lifetime. (I've mentioned all the people who have been President in my lifetime above, and some who ran against them) He's the worst to ever hold the office.
By far.
In 2016, he ran as a lark. In 2020, he ran because he was power drunk. He's running now because it's the only way he knows for sure he won't be going to jail. He's running because it's the only way he knows he can definitely make himself richer. You think you are making America Great Again when you donate to his campaign, or buy his hats, and sneakers and whatever other shit he's selling you. All you are doing is giving your money to him.
And you think he's insulting other people. You think he's insulting the libs.
You think he's insulting me.
He's playing you for a sucker. There's no bigger insult than that.
I was really going back and forth on this. I know most people have their minds made up, had them made up a long time ago. I also think the idea of losing friends and fighting with family over politics is generally stupid. Every once in a while, I look at my FB memories. I see some of the heartfelt messages I received after particularly hard times. Some of the kindest messages I received are from people who have Add Friend next to them. Meaning they were FB friends of mine and now are not. I can't say for certain, but I believe most of those former connections, became former connections because of things I've said about Trump.
It's too bad, but it is what it is.
There are some people whose posts I see and to be honest, I couldn't care less if they clicked the unfriend button. They're so far down the rabbit hole, they are beyond being rational with. They're the basket of deplorables Hillary talked about. I saw a meme saying that some of these people have gotten so bad, you wouldn't tell them where Anne Frank was hiding.
I'm not writing this blog to them.
I'm writing this to you. The Trump supporter who thinks Trump is simply the lesser of two evils. Who thinks he's just a big mouth but not a criminal. Who still thinks he's an outsider, a self made man who is self funding his campaign. Who mean tweets but still gets things done, unlike Biden who make nice tweets but gets nothing done. To those who probably wouldn't invite him to your house or let him alone with your daughter but shit, he's better than Kamala or Sleepy Joe.
It's not too late.
Please think logically. You really don't think it's all made up do you?
All of it?
Do you?
