The Day the Dog Pulled the Curtain on the Fraud

I have a couple very good and very important books going right now, books I think every U.S. citizen should read as soon as they can possibly get their hands on a copy, or e-copy; “Hitler: 1889-1936 Hubris, by Ian Kershaw and On Tyranny: Twenty Lessons from the Twentieth Century, by Timothy Snyder.

Hitler is a bit of a slow read (most definitely not due to interest, rather due to the detail one must pay very close attention to) both books are a vital read, given the political scenario in which we find ourselves and our nation today.

While reading “On Tyranny”, I kept thinking of the old B&W movie “The Wizard of Oz”.  I’m normally not one who typically picks up on subtle symbolism in movies, or books.  It takes books with the obvious, such as 1984, Animal Farm, Lord of the Flies, etc., the kind of books intended to engage our imagination via symbolic characters and scenarios.

But; for some reason “On Tyranny” kept bringing “The Wizard of Oz” to mind for me.

In Oz, there’s apparently symbolism in almost every character, blade of grass and flower in the story, symbolism that has been debated for generations unbeknownst to me :-)

“Hitler Hubris”, no symbolism whatsoever is attempted.  It’s straight out in the open, even spelling it all out for the reader.  However; what it does expose is an extraordinarily frightening parallel between Adolph Hitler and Donald Trump; two men who’s contribution to society will live in infamy as long as there is even but one human being left on this planet with either a memory or the ability to read.

There have been and will always be characters in the history of humanity who will forever live in infamy. 

Some characters aren’t just equated with the worst of what society has to offer, but those who literally define the worst of the worst; sociopathic characters straight from Hell providing the very story of hate, deceit, treachery, ardent narcissism, arrogance, truculence, cruelty, dishonesty, aggression, pusillanimous, ignorance, ruthlessness, etc. etc. etc.

Most of those characters are already historic as of today; names such as Franco, Pinochet, Duvalier, Stalin, Pot, Amin, Mussolini, and of course Hitler.

However; one is creating his own repulsive story as you read this - Donald Trump; a “great and almighty wizard” who is certain he knows all and can even grant people’s most outrageous of wishes, simply by doing nothing but turning knobs, pushing buttons, pulling handles, and communicating from behind a curtain, in fear of dogs; dogs, like you and me, who have already pulled the curtain hiding his fraudulent existence.

Fortunately for the illiterate buffoon that he is, the curtain is limited to one-hundred forty characters or less, so his illiteracy, ignorance, and raw stupidity remain hidden to the less observant, and the foolishly devoted.  

I always use quotes in my posts, but I rarely use one to the extent that I’m using this, but it’s reason and relevance will appear very quickly.  

As you read the following, think of Charlottesville, Trumps campaigns wherein he gleefully threw voices of opposition out of his rallies and compared law abiding liberals to Right Wing hate groups such as the Alt-Right, KKK, and White Supremacists, a tactic used by ultra-nationalists to reduce to their level, all opposition, both in present and in historical pre-WWII Germany, as they rounded up all those they claimed were in need of elimination in order to  cleanse the Motherland of racial impurities.

“Most governments, most of the time, seek to monopolize violence. If only the government can legitimately use force, and this use is constrained by law, then the forms of politics that we take for granted become possible. It is impossible to carry out democratic elections, try cases at court, design and enforce laws, or indeed manage any of the other quiet business of government when agencies beyond the state also have access to violence. For just this reason, people and parties who wish to undermine democracy and the rule of law create and fund violent organizations that involve themselves in politics. Such groups can take the form of a paramilitary wing of a political party, the personal bodyguard of a particular politician— or apparently spontaneous citizens’ initiatives, which usually turn out to have been organized by a party or its leader.

Armed groups first degrade a political order, and then transform it. Violent right-wing groups, such as the Iron Guard in interwar Romania or the Arrow Cross in interwar Hungary, intimidated their rivals. Nazi storm troopers began as a security detail clearing the halls of Hitler’s opponents during his rallies. As paramilitaries known as the SA and the SS, they created a climate of fear that helped the Nazi Party in the parliamentary elections of 1932 and 1933. In Austria in 1938 it was the local SA that quickly took advantage of the absence of the usual local authority to loot, beat, and humiliate Jews, thereby changing the rules of politics and preparing the way for the Nazi takeover of the country. It was the SS that ran the German concentration camps— lawless zones where ordinary rules did not apply. During the Second World War, the SS extended the lawlessness it had pioneered in the camps to whole European countries under German occupation. The SS began as an organization outside the law, became an organization that transcended the law, and ended up as an organization that undid the law.

Because the American federal government uses mercenaries in warfare and American state governments pay corporations to run prisons, the use of violence in the United States is already highly privatized. What is novel is a president who wishes to maintain, while in office, a personal security force which during his campaign used force against dissenters. As a candidate, the president ordered a private security detail to clear opponents from rallies, but also encouraged the audience itself to remove people who expressed different opinions. A protestor would first be greeted with boos, then with frenetic cries of “USA,” and then be forced to leave the rally. At one campaign rally the candidate said, “There’s a remnant left over. Maybe get the remnant out. Get the remnant out.” The crowd, taking its cue, then tried to root out other people who might be dissenters, all the while crying “USA.” The candidate interjected: “Isn’t this more fun than a regular boring rally? To me, it’s fun.” This kind of mob violence was meant to transform the political atmosphere, and it did.

For violence to transform not just the atmosphere but also the system, the emotions of rallies and the ideology of exclusion have to be incorporated into the training of armed guards. These first challenge the police and military, then penetrate the police and military, and finally transform the police and military.”

Snyder, Timothy. On Tyranny: Twenty Lessons from the Twentieth Century (pp. 45-46). Crown/Archetype. Kindle Edition.

A Letter of Guidance to an Illiterate, Obsessive, Narcissistic Juvenile.

Most of us have known about the “letters of recommendations” outgoing presidents leave for their successors.  Though; I’ve neither heard nor seen any of the contents of those letters until now, my assumption was that they contain information not meant for the public, or contain reasons many of the promises the incoming cannot be met.  Maybe parts of it fall well into that category, for it seems many “promises” the then candidates made on their campaign trails never see the light of day.

However; at least parts of President Obama’s letter have been publicized in the past two days by many media outlets, revealing words of encouragement and advice that any sane man would both appreciate and follow, from an outgoing president.

CNN printed this much of it, and who knows, perhaps it’s the full letter:

Dear Mr. President -
Congratulations on a remarkable run. Millions have placed their hopes in you, and all of us, regardless of party, should hope for expanded prosperity and security during your tenure.
This is a unique office, without a clear blueprint for success, so I don't know that any advice from me will be particularly helpful. Still, let me offer a few reflections from the past 8 years.
First, we've both been blessed, in different ways, with great good fortune. Not everyone is so lucky. It's up to us to do everything we can (to) build more ladders of success for every child and family that's willing to work hard.
Second, American leadership in this world really is indispensable. It's up to us, through action and example, to sustain the international order that's expanded steadily since the end of the Cold War, and upon which our own wealth and safety depend.
Third, we are just temporary occupants of this office. That makes us guardians of those democratic institutions and traditions -- like rule of law, separation of powers, equal protection and civil liberties -- that our forebears fought and bled for. Regardless of the push and pull of daily politics, it's up to us to leave those instruments of our democracy at least as strong as we found them.
And finally, take time, in the rush of events and responsibilities, for friends and family. They'll get you through the inevitable rough patches.
Michelle and I wish you and Melania the very best as you embark on this great adventure, and know that we stand ready to help in any ways which we can.
Good luck and Godspeed,
BO

Now, personally, had I received such a letter from anyone with the experience and credentials of President Obama, not only would I read it, I would memorize and recall it daily in an attempt to follow the suggested outlines of success.  The letter is not just a guide towards decency for all human beings, but to a successful role as the nation’s leader.

First Point of advice: Building Ladders to Success:  Use the gift of wealth and influence we have that many of the world will never see to build ladders for others to rise to success.

Sadly; the only ladder Trump has built is the ladder to HeII for the U.S.  Every effort Trump exerts is an effort to achieve a negative outcome for us all, placing us at the foot of that ladder, holding it steady while he, in his own world, climbs that ladder.

In his arrogance; an arrogance so absolute, so utterly extreme, Trump’s incapable of taking advice, incapable, of listening to any who have gone before him and learned the lessons from which he could benefit; he’s incapable of understanding that there are many, many who have gone before him who can guide him.

Instead, he took the opportunity to show his clownish, juvenile view of all who, in his mind, are beneath him (all other human beings), waving the letter mocking its sender as though it was a love letter between two lovers and he'd discovered it and wished to amuse and make himself feel taller than all others with it by exposing it to the world.

And; this effort is not entirely due to Trumps absolute ineptness at virtually everything he does, but many of his efforts seem to be intentional disregard for the purpose of childishly thumbing his nose at President Obama.  Trump’s obsessive character trait will not allow him to accomplish anything other than to display his obsession for revenge politics, his bigoted perspective of the world and his disgusting treatment of the poor and disabled.

However; remember those academic credentials he flaunted not long ago? “I went to to better schools and received better grades than any of them did.

Well, I suppose, if “you're like this really smart guy who earned a four-year degree at Wharton's School of Finance and Commerce”, you have the right to flaunt that degree in the faces of the likes of Bill Clinton, a Rhodes Scholar (something that would make graduating from Wharton's look like graduating from pre-school), and Obama's Occidental College, Columbia Thesis for his Master's Degree, and his Doctorate in Constitutional Law at Harvard Law School.

Well, I take that back. I doubt you have any right at all to compare yourself to either Bill Clinton or Barack Obama in any form of education and certainly not in intelligence. That Wharton degree?  Keep it for when we have a TP shortage.  It’ll look really good next to your gold-leafed vanity mirror.

Trump’s myopic view of the world is a direct result of his extremely sheltered, wealthy childhood.  Though most wealthy children grow up with a healthy perspective towards life and are highly educated, Trump’s dangerous narcissism accompanied with his pampered childhood has created a man whose only thoughts, indeed obsessions, are of himself and how he can get more for himself.  

His arrogance undoubtedly interfered drastically in the outcome of his education, too arrogant to listen to anyone.  What else would explain his semi-severe illiteracy?

However; I simply don't see any effort whatsoever by Trump to follow the advice of forty-four on any of the 4 main points he suggested.  In fact; what I do perceive are a malignant narcissist’s efforts to, not just ignore them, but to make every attempt to deny and defile the very nature of the advice.

Second Point: Leading the World.  In President Obama’s words; “American leadership in this world really is indispensable. It's up to us, through action and example, to sustain the international order that's expanded steadily since the end of the Cold War, and upon which our own wealth and safety depend.” 

But; Trump is nothing, but the world’s worst leader, perhaps ever.  And; in that, I don’t mean bad because he leads us down the wrong path, though that is indeed what he’s doing.

What I mean is he is utterly incapable of leading men and women towards any path; towards any goal.  The man doesn’t even understand the skills it takes for good leadership and he is abdicating every leadership role the U.S. has taken decades and many wars to build, both amongst allies and adversaries alike.

There are many leadership styles, but few to which followers respond well.

Simply through watching him, I can guarantee I know which style of leadership he subscribes to; the style that those most new to leadership, or those who are far too arrogant to learn ALWAYS use.

Trump views leadership as something that automatically comes with and from position and, as a result, the autocratic style that accompanies him and those like him, is oppressive, ineffective, caustic and ruinous at best.

His arrogance and narcissism prevents his learning anything new.

He will never learn anything; anything at all.  Rather; he’ll continue to view those he sees as his “followers” as disposable, even useless sheep who don’t have the brains to follow his “highly valuable” leadership and should be responding to his autocratic rule, or they’re committing acts of treachery.  Hence, Sally Yates, Preet Bharara, James Comey, Steve Bannon, Sean Spicer, etc, etc….are no longer around.

For all of us who have held leadership roles, we know precisely how hard we must work to EARN the respect of those we lead; how tenuous that leadership can be, how difficult it is to attain, and how so very easily it can be lost.

The long, arduous work had already been accomplished for Trump, all the incompetent fool needed to do was to continue the forward progress.

But, in true Trump fashion and perhaps even through his seething hate for President Obama, or just his sheer embarrassment with himself upon learning he can’t lead, he turned his back on the world and in doing so, placed the interests of you and me, the U.S. and the entire planet in the trunk of the car he’s driving, peddle to the metal, towards the cliff.

But; you can be sure he’ll leave a note behind blaming someone else for his leadership flaws though - probably his lifetime friend Thomas Jefferson b 1743, d 1846, who somehow shared his anger with the U.S. for the U.S. Civil War, fifteen years after his death.

Trump refuses to assume the role many world leaders look to for help in their own nations, because he’s afraid doing so will expose a massive weakness in a man with far more weaknesses than he has strengths.  He can’t lead anything or anyone, especially globally.  The only thing the clown does is leaves decision-making to others as he goes golfing every weekend, then blames any missteps on whomever he can find close at hand.  It’s no wonder he thought leading the nation as a part-time job.

Third point: “we are just temporary occupants of this office. That makes us guardians of those democratic institutions and traditions -- like rule of law, separation of powers, equal protection and civil liberties -- that our forebears fought and bled for.”

The doofus Trump hasn’t a clue as to what integrity is and the moron certainly doesn’t understand the separation of powers.  I can tell you as surely as I’m sitting here writing this this evening, Trump views himself as THE POWER.  Kim Donald-dung.

He’s made that abundantly clear on multiple occasions in his legal battles over the Travel Ban, his efforts to deport masses of people that even includes U.S. Citizens.  He attacked the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, threatening to “break them up” because they ruled against his travel ban directed towards Muslims.

Trump was really castrated and infuriated when another Appeals Court shot down his travel ban again, and a Federal Judge blocked part of Trump’s sanctuary cities executive orders.

NONE of his appointees have a clue as to what they’re supposed to be doing and have no understanding whatsoever of their limitations of power.

Jeff Sessions made that perfectly clear when he stated “I really am amazed that a judge sitting on an island in the Pacific can issue an order that stops the president of the United States from what appears to be clearly his statutory and constitutional power,” when speaking of the Federal Judge Derrick Watson’s ruling.  In other words; “I don’t see how a mere judge has the power to rule against tyranny and dictatorship”.

Trump’s efforts to ramrod laws limiting the powers of the EPA were blocked as well when the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia  prevented Scott Pruitt and Trump from rolling back dozens of President Obama’s environmental rules restricting methane emissions.

Trump has made it perfectly clear too, on where he stands with civil liberties in his comments about Charlottesville and his continued vehement remarks and adamant support for those comments backing the White Supremacy groups.

Despite President Obama’s efforts to guide him, Trump’s continuous lies, falsified story-telling; stories such as General Sherman, during the US/Philippine war in 1891, rolling bullets in pig’s blood before killing “Muslim Terrorist” POWs.

His lies to the Boy Scouts of America; and then of course, there’s truly the absurdest of absurdity: Trump insisting, despite the efforts of all the people who tried to inform him of the error in his claim “he has a close friendship with Frederick Douglass”.  Insisting that it was once again the fake press who has  made a mockery of a personal friend of Trump’s, Frederick Douglass by claiming he’s dead”.   The same Frederick Douglass who died over 132 years ago:

“Based on what Betsy said about me, we could really use Fred’s energy around here,” Trump said.

He lashed out at the press for reporting that Frederick Douglass was dead, calling those reports “very unfair.”

“That’s a nasty thing to say about someone who is alive and doing a great job,” he said. “This is why the press is failing and it's failing very, very badly.”

And with that, I can write no more absurdities, or my own mind will explode.  But then, I have a few more months of Trump before he pushes the U.S. beyond the breaking point and we collectively say to Trump; “your fired”, you moron.”

The Battle of the Kim Twins

Battle of the Kims

As is the norm, I spent the morning yesterday catching up with the news.  The news is my heroin, with which I must have my fix before I can function throughout the day.

Hopelessly addicted and frequently spending hours reading as many sources as I can find on any event, or topic that catches my eyes.  As painful as it is, I’ll even read Fox News just to make certain I’m not developing a closed-minded perspective, although watching Chris Wallace and Shepherd Smith provide some much needed grounding with that media outlet.

Then it happened; this morning, I came across a story on TomDispatch titled “Trump And The Geopolitics Of Crazy”.

I’ve been insisting that Trump and Kim were identical mental twins with absolutely nothing upstairs between the both of them, since November 2016, so I’m not certain the title was intended to solicit the comparison it did, or it was simply coincidental since I’ve already seen the twin vibe between the two in action.

Reading the headline, my mind immediately filled in the blanks and was again reminded of the undeniable commonality of the two most insane leaders the planet has likely seen in many decades - Kim Jong-un and Kim Dung-un.

It’s as though we have two dead planets caught in an a shrinking orbit around one another with an eminent collision in the very near future.  A collision that will; note I did not say could, but WILL create a catastrophe beyond anything we’ve witnessed as human beings.

I wondered; Is there even an ounce of hope that Trump’s Americans will finally realize the error of their horrendously poor decision in November 2016, and like me, to the core of their inner self as did I, see and feel the dire consequences this situation constructs?  Understand the very high potential for the complete destruction of the entire planet?  And, if they do wake up, will they demand Congress do something about the one lunatic we can?

Though I’ve tried to ignore for eight long, frightening, humiliating and embarrassing months, the desperation that is now welling up inside me like a pending heart attack thumping against the inner walls of my chest reminds me daily of the fears, the shame and the concern for all civilization.

There will be no gathering of marbles spilled, or a rapid closing of a book far too frighteningly realistic to read.

It is as unimaginable as it is inescapable and reprehensible; the United States has managed to unite the worst election results, EVER, with decades of ignoring an imbalanced political leader obsessed with obtaining the nuclear plague.  And now; we have a new one who’s obsessed with unleashing the largest collection of that plague on the planet. And if they do wake up, will they join me in demanding Congress do something about this lunatic? Just as with Kim Jong-un, Kim Dung-un has become a cult and I fear it will be damned difficult to rid ourselves of the Dear Leader.

Trump’s bottomless and lightless pit of mental ineptness makes it impossible for him to lead a troop of Boy Scouts, much less the United States.  His disturbing mental short-circuit that gives rise to the battle of the Kims is as obvious as the sun creating daylight.

The man is utterly incapable of governing and of leadership, which is precisely why he hides behind Twitter; hoping he can somehow sway the public and Congress alike to just take his direction in the form of one hundred forty characters or less.

Like a teeny bopper, incessantly tweeting disparaging remarks directed towards the person(s), or media with whom he’s agitated on that particular day.  The mindless moron can’t comprehend the responsibility that is his to bear and is oblivious to the dire consequences the United States is reaping in his ineptness.

Rather than face those he “fires” face to face like a man, he either tweets it, or sends an errand boy to do his work for him.  He’s even tweeting, rather than speaking directly to Congress, that he’ll shut the government down if he doesn’t get his way with his wall of shame.

Even he knows he’s incapable of leadership.  His only experience with such is directives and directives is not governing.  The simple reality is that he’s doing everything in his power to turn our republic into a tweeting dictatorship.

So; as if the news wasn’t perilous enough, I watched Kim Dung-un’s completely disconnected, incomprehensible rant, the likes of which even he hasn’t topped.  Yet!

In his usual style, he spontaneously concocted lie after lie, bogus story after bogus story, all in a string of disjointed, disconnected nonsense; stories that were nothing more than the rantings of the lunatic he is, none of which had anything whatsoever to do with the needs of the United States, or even his obscenely early reelection campaign.

In the juxtaposition of the recent Trump election with the existence of Kim, we now live in an extraordinarily frightening and unstable environment, with two raving psychopaths in both the western and eastern hemispheres of this planet; our home; our ONLY home.

There exists a very real and firm (27.6%) nexus between terrorism and mental illness and that nexus is currently in manic mode in the Battle of the Kims as they, together, terrorize the entire planet.

The results of the November 2016 election gave us our very own illiterate, disjointed from reality, dictator Kim Dung-un and he’s doing all he can to return the United States to the pre-20th Century mentality, wherein hate, xenophobia and racism was the accepted norm.

Trump represents the same ugly, unacceptable, oppressive form of government that exists in North Korea today; a psychopathic dictatorship governing with extreme dogmatic rule; the dismantlement of our eyes and ears in the behavior of government - the media, the destruction of our freedom of speech, reversal of scientific findings and even inhibiting future scientific research.

The Battle of the Kims could very well usher to the front row, the dismantlement of our republic, or even worse; the destruction of the entire planet and the ONLY way we’re going to prevent that is to never stop calling for Kim Dung-un’s removal.

A Fool and His Puppet Master

Image Courtesy; Comedy New York

Trump’s latest in a long string of very poorly considered political moves and thoughtless efforts will accomplish far more than he could have ever hoped.

With his absolute lack of understanding in the realm of global politics; his sub-zero knowledge of economics; even in his completely self-indulging overestimation of support for his presidency, he will achieve a great deal more than he had hoped to accomplish.

In his case; infamy is a gross understatement.

Trump’s ignorance and his overzealous attempts to appease his small, ever-shrinking base of supporters who blindly agree with everything Trump, will likely accomplish irreparable damage to his own presidency.

His foolhardy, thoughtless actions will most assuredly do likewise to the United States as well, devastating decades of efforts by Republicans, Democrats, Libertarians and Independents alike to place and keep the United States in a role of global leadership.

His actions to date alone has caused damage that will take years, if not decades to repair, and we haven’t even reached the five month mark into his presidency.  It makes me shudder to think how this bodes for us all in the ensuing three years and six months; if he even makes it that far.   

The most recent and likely the most foolish move Trump has made to date will NOT put “America First”, rather it will be placing us somewhere in the back rows of the nose-bleed section of the ball park; hell, if we can even get into the ball park.

Despite one's conviction that anthropomorphic activities is, or is not causing climate change, his decision will have a devastating effect on many aspects that will do the U.S. harm in "bigly" ways, ways not even directly connected to the climate change facts.

Here is a substantially truncated list of the damage Trump has just caused the United States with his mindless move to remove the U.S. from the Climate Change Accord.  A move undoubtedly conjured up by his puppet-master, Steve Bannon, for certainly the mindless malignancy on humanity that is Trump is far too consumed in his own minuscule world to think even beyond his own front door.

Economy:  Economically, Trump is driving us hard towards a devastating impact with a concrete wall, and not the wall he foolishly promised his fellow xenophobes.

The job growth in green industries is just beginning, yet they're outgrowing and providing far more jobs than the fossil fuel markets could possibly accomplish.

Our only hope now, is that corporations, such as those who openly oppose Trump’s foolish behavior, buying full page adds in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, and the New York Post;  Apple, Microsoft, Facebook, Google, Adobe, Blue Cross Blue Shield, Danfoss, Dignity Health, Gap, The Hartford, Hewlett Packard, Ingersoll Rand, Intel, Johnson Controls, Levi Strauss, Mars Incorporated, Morgan Stanley, national Grid, PG&E (Pacific Gas and Electric), Royal DSM, Salesforce, Schneider Electric, Tiffany & Co., Unilever, VF Corporation, continue to protest Trump’s mindless maneuvers not only meant to appease a minute number of Trump followers, but a move of which Trump himself is too dimwitted to understand the extremely negative ramifications.

Corporations that also include Tesla and Disney Corporations, whose leaders both left the President’s Business Advisory Councils, and many more.

Along with corporations whose leaders understand the very negative impact this utterly moronic move will have, many cities and states, blue and red alike, have also taken exception to his ignorance: Austin, TX; Milwaukee, WI; Washington DC; San Diego, Ca; St Louis, MO; Pittsburgh, PA, Charlotte, NC; Massachusetts; Washington; Ohio.

Trump is very fond of claiming all news not praising him as “fake news”, but Trump’s fake claim that he is doing this for the Coal Industry is as fake and empty a promise that can be made, for the coal industry jobs losses are not due to the Paris Accord, but to automation and the very fact that green businesses are literally taking away fossil fuel jobs with competition.

Competition: The very heart and soul of business.  Yet; once again, the blind followers of partisan politics are falling for a fool’s promises that can be demolished with five minutes worth of research.

A lazy man’s preference is to let others do their thinking for them.

Global Leadership:  Rather than “Making America Great Again”, Trump is rabidly pursuing a course to demolish everything decent the United States stands for, from religious freedom and racial tolerance to global leadership. 

Between this decision and his continuous negative comments about NATO, Trump has sent the world the message that the U.S. is no longer interested in playing a leadership role among the world's nations; PERIOD!  He has effectively abdicated our role in all leadership roles, leaving other nations, as my best bud abroad clearly pointed out to me, such as Germany, China and Japan who are eagerly willing and waiting to take the position and run with it full steam ahead.

I doubt many of you, outside Trumposphere, have to think very hard to remember the results of the last time this very scenario played out in global politics.

This list of damages to the credibility, leadership, economy, simple humanitarian efforts, etc. is, as I stated, extremely truncated, for I would need to literally write a book on the harm that Trump has already caused you, me, the nation, and indeed the entire planet.

And the truly frightening thing is; he’s done so in less than five months.

Trump's "America First" nonsense is accomplishing the precise opposite of what his empty words imply.  Instead; he is taking the U.S. full speed astern, reversing decades of efforts to truly keep America a fair and equal participant in the planet’s political and economic actions.

In his zero-sum game, it must be a winner (Trump) and a loser (the entire planet); nothing else is even possible in his feeble mind.

So, you must consider; is that in fact the goal of Trump’s puppet-master, Steve Bannon too

And the answer to that is a resounding YES!

You’re Right; There IS a Problem With The Media - It has Always Been Bias

More than I can recall at any point in my lifetime, we hear how U.S. media outlets are no longer trustworthy; how everything they report is “fake news” and; “they are nothing but bias rags for corporations”.

And; as if they are themselves the “sole harbingers of truth, justice and humanity”, there’s not one politician anywhere on this planet who hasn’t blamed the media for the errors/missteps that lead to their failures and/or demise.

Indeed, in the United States, the media seem to have become more despised, unethical, and despicable than even the politicians they report on; something I find incredulous.

This especially true since the invention of television.  I’ll explain the reason for this in a moment, but first I want to make sure you understand, that blaming the media is an exercise in finger-pointing in which I’m not even remotely willing to participate.  And I fervently hope, that if you are one who does, despite your favored rag and your suspicion that all other rags are printed by the Devil himself, you stop such foolish and supremely dangerous behavior immediately.

While I’m certain there is an abundance of misinformation in the media, that does not mean, or even imply, that the media are completely corrupt and useless.  In fact; nothing could be farther from the truth, and no single comment could be more damaging to freedom itself, if taken as absolutely as people appear to be doing with Mr. Trump at the helm of His Majesty’s Ship, “Destroy The Free Press”.

Despite that common misconception, there remains to be an absolutely vital need for media in our daily lives; media who give us our daily bread.  I’m referring to media who go far beyond simply informing us of the accident at the corner of Main and Main, or advising us that the weather is going to be cold and snowy, despite the fact that it’s the middle of August in downtown Miami.

Media; one of the very reasons the first amendment exists, cannot be painted with that “bigly” and broad hegemonic paint brush Mr. Trump so loves to do, with his alternative facts, in his alternative universe.

We, as U.S. citizens, have grown far too fond of dismissing media as the enemy, when they provide information we dislike and with whom we disagree as we praise our preferred outlet(s) as if they’re the very tools with which the the words of the gods themselves are written, all the while, not even considering the implications of this behavior.

But; here’s a fact, a REAL, indisputable, historically observed and proven fact; the reality is that they’ve ALWAYS been filled with bias and erroneous information.

According to this source; “The Hoover Institution”, it has been bias since the early 19th Century (for those of you with the brains of Trump, that’s the 1800’s).

“The roots of media bias go back to the nineteenth century, and complaints about bias in part reflect a questionable idea about the media’s role and purpose: that newspapers and other dispensers of public information exist to transmit objective, factual information gleaned and communicated by credentialed professionals.
In fact, the notion that reporters should possess Olympian objectivity is relatively recent. In the nineteenth century, most newspapers were explicitly linked to a particular political party and the economic interests of the publisher. In California during the Gold Rush, for example, the San Francisco Alta California was the enemy of Democratic governor John Bigler, whose press champion was the Stockton Republican. Most of the coverage of crime during this period––particularly the spree of the Mexican bandit Joaquín Murieta and the state-funded posse that tracked him down and killed him––reflected those political interests and loyalties rather than mere facts. Moreover, the stories were written in a florid, dramatic style more suitable for a dime novel than a presumably more sober newspaper. Of course protestations of objectivity and accuracy were made, but these were understood to be mere rhetorical camouflage for the editorial opinions sown throughout most news stories.
The tradition of lurid sensationalism, scandal-mongering, and exaggeration put in service to profits and a political agenda continued in the “yellow journalism” famously on display in the circulation war between the Hearst and Pulitzer newspapers in the late nineteenth century. More significantly, that was also when the progressive movement promoted the notion that the proper function of the media was to instruct and shape the opinions of voters too uninformed and irrational to be trusted with making the right choice based on facts alone.”

What??? You gasp.

Yes!  I’m not promulgating alternative facts here.  Even the “Center for Journalism Ethics” agrees;

“You don’t need to have a degree in history — or even to have paid much attention when you suffered the US history survey course as an undergraduate — to know that American newspapers were very partisan in the 19th century.  “Editors,” wrote one historian, “unabashedly shaped the news and their editorial comment to partisan purposes.  They sought to convert the doubters, recover the wavering, and hold the committed.  ‘The power of the press,’ one journalist candidly explained, ‘consists not in its logic or eloquence, but in its ability to manufacture facts, or to give coloring to facts that have occurred.”

Bias and the media have been uneasy partners since long before journalism planted its roots in 15th Century Europe and American Colonies.

Harboring a bias either in favor of the King, or in favor of the Continentals, printed journalism has ALWAYS formed opinion, politics and nations.  Indeed, within the same continental townships, there were opposing views in the printed press; those supporting the King and those protesting the same, all printed up nice and neat for us to decide, right in the midst of the American Revolution.

In fact;  Journalism has been the very means with which to propagate the words and direction of the wealthy rulers for a minimum of five hundred years, after Johannes Gutenberg created the first printing press; a new tool shining the first light on the Dark Ages.  And, just as it is today, it was also used as an instrument of protest.  Media aided and planted almost every revolution man has ever been involved in.

Some, such as myself, will even argue that the Bible is itself bias media, for it was absolutely used to spread Christianity, and people eat it up, despite the utterly outlandish stories contained within and the vast existence of other religious belief systems that had been around for many millennia prior.

In the hope that I can rely upon your education to recall the events that lead us from those Dark Ages to the present, let’s return to the 21st Century, amidst an endless paradox; the forever raging and ancient battle of “whose rag is telling the truth and whose is lying beyond belief.”

The cold, stark reality of “free press” is that no human being is even capable of being bias-free.  It is literally impossible to make that claim and to insist it upon others simply shows one’s ignorance and sheer stupidity.  Especially considering the fact that those who do so are simply insisting that the rag they despise, reflect their own perspective, rather than give them "false information".

This is due to one reason and one only - hegemony; the condition that’s engrained into each and every one of us; past, present and future, as a result of the socio-economic conditions into which we were born and raised.

So; how do we find the “real truth”?

While reporting as objectively as possible IS their job, it IS NOT the job of the press to give you the truth.

I’ll repeat that; IT IS NOT the job of the press to give you the truth!

It is, no more their job to provide you with the truth than it is the prosecutions and/or defense’s jobs in a trial to provide the truth to a jury.  Rather; their job is to present fact and anyone who’s ever served on a jury knows; fact is not crystal clear, but muddy as hell. 

Likewise; it is the job, of the press to provide, to the best of their ability as hegemonic human beings, to report the facts as they are.  It is then YOUR job to make the determination of what those facts represent; be it true or false, or in the vernacular of Mr. Trump “fake or real”.  

Again!  It’s YOUR job to determine truth in what you’re reading.

And in that responsibility, you cannot shirk.  It is yours permanently and you cannot take that monkey off your shoulders and put it on those of the press, the politicians, your neighbors, your children, the cops, or the preacher; it is YOUR JOB ONLY.

If we assign this task to anyone other than ourselves, the risk of censorship is massive.

Absolutely and without exception; the most important function of a free press is that it reports to us; you and me, the behavior, events, issues related to and the direction our government is taking us.  In every sense of the phrase; they are our eyes and ears, sending us the information that’s vital for a functional republic such as ours.

You but need think of how despotic governments around the globe currently operate - “state owned media”, with which the State promulgates propaganda, eliminates opposition, hides the facts, and even expands its own powers, all while we’re blissfully unaware.  So, next time you feel like joining in on the choir’s song, you must make damned sure you know what the choir is singing, or you could be singing your own death song; along with that of 300 million + U.S. citizens without even realizing it.

Remember! Without a free media to report the facts, we have a horrifying scenario in which our government can and DOES operate in secrecy.  It has happened right her in the U.S. in the South, prior to the Civil War and later in many bar backrooms of the old “boss politics”.  

A secret government is not, in any manner, a government of free people.

This cannot be stressed enough:  If we follow the current Administration’s insidious direction, in undermining, castigating, and discounting the media, we are, each and every last one of us, in deep peril.

To make it easier to shirk our responsibilities, we now we have a new player in the search for the truth, one that’s far more insidious and covert than any written media could possibly be - televised media.  More hindrance than help, televised media only adds to our human tendency to kick back and let others do our jobs. 

We watch Fox News and accept for truth, the extraordinarily heavily biased representation of fact, leaning in their preferred direction and call it a day on our efforts to seek the truth.  Or; we watch MSNBC and accept extraordinarily heavily biased representation of fact, leaning in the other direction and call it a day on our efforts to seek the truth.

With a few exceptions, factual televised media is almost non-existent.  The very dynamics of the interactions between the human mind and television supports far more influence-peddling than does the printed media.

Television is absolute in its ability to cement the opinions of the watchers.

Now, here’s why you CANNOT trust television news.

There’s a reason televised media is completely consumed with, even overpowered by commercials, and a reason the relativity of commentary and news has changed dramatically since the invention of television.

That simple reason is; television literally rewires your brain and both the televised media and their commercial sponsors want to be there when it does.

So put aside that remote, turn on your PC, and start reading, reading, reading and reading.  Spend as much or more time reading the news than watching it and I promise you; at the very least, you will be a better reader, and at the very most, you’ll be very well informed in local, national and global events, culture and simple awareness.  And; be it Fox News or MSNBC, RT, or AlJazeera, don’t just read your preferred source.  The ONLY way you’re going to find truth is through assimilation of a variety of perspectives.

The absolute worst thing you can do to yourself, is to limit your information solely to the comfort level you find most appealing and you will not only do yourself an injustice, but every other human and animal on Planet Earth.