By George Smith

I have taught various management courses in adjunct positions for more than 25 years at various colleges and universities in three states.

I started researching and writing about politics in 1966 and for more than 50 years have seen and reported on the activities, actions and abominations of hundreds of politicians at all levels of the political  spectrum.

That does not mean I am an expert in business or politics, just that I have experience in research and writing about topics in those areas.

Look at this list:

Cruel.

Crude.

Antagonistic.

Misogynist.

Thin-skinned.

Attacks perceived foes on personal level.

Makes wild accusations based on whims, not evidence

Lacks empathy.

Petty.

Impatient to a fault.

Will not read important documents and reports.

Ignorant on many subjects directly connected to the job.

Believes “gut” over acclaimed experts.

There is no way that a person with this extensive list of faults could be selected as CEO of a major company or be elected to any public office. Yet, Donald J. Trump embraces all of these negative traits and was elected president.

Via frequent tweets, Trump brags about his prowess as a manager and leader even as he is daily giving historians ammunition to declare him the most divisive, abrasive m, corrosive and corrupt president in U.S. history.

Why do do many people follow this man with a cult-like fervor? 

To some, it boils down to a one-issue situation, i.e., abortion or immigration or the perceived need for religious freedom.

To others, Trump is seen as a leader in the white supremacy movement;m, the white-is-right believers that has abject racism as their core mantra.

And, a slice of his supporters sing his praises simply because he is seen as an outlier, someone from outside the political area whom they thought would hear their frustration and create change.

Trump has brought change: Regulations  that protected workers, the environment and the animal population have been gutted; public lands are being raped by big businesses who donate campaign funds to Trump; racist tension is back to the 1960’s level, with distrust between police and the people they are sworn to protect increasing exponentially and with protests and riots becoming along racial lines more commonplace.

This president has made sure to cut ties with longtime foreign allies, alienating friendly nations while cozying up to dictators, despots and third world strongmen.

He has not hidden the fact that he wants to dismantle any program from the Obama Administration, simply because he is piqued by the former president’s constant popularity and the fact Obama has more Twitter followers.

We are stuck with this petulant degenerate and will wake up every day wondering what new hell our president perpetuated via tweet overnight.

We are stuck through election day. Trump’s antics, incompetencies, malignant actions and benign neglect of traditional protocol will be a part of history. His supporters’ stated reasons for kowtowing to his bizarre and corrosive whims will also be examined by history’s prolific authors.

The final stories on leader and his cultish followers will be brutal. Count on it.

 

GIVE US YOUR FEEDBACK.  CLICK ON “COMMENT” TO TELL US WHAT YOU THINK or use one of the alternative methods for providing feedback.

click here to CLOSE THIS PAGE

By George Smith

To my friends and political frienemies who are hardcore on the Trump train. I feel for you, I really do. Carrying around that much angry and delusion is a burden.

And to those who believe immigrants are taking certain jobs:

Few WASPs over the age of 16 in this country would agree to do stoop labor or haul hay or pick peaches for anything less that $12-$15 an hour. And after one dawn to dusk shift, even that is iffy.

It’s called community culture. Some folks run to hard labor because it is necessary, while others run just as hard in the other direction because they hate hard work.

I decided to go to college when I was 14; that was the summer I tried picking tomatoes and cucumbers and hauling hay.

Nope. Nada. 

Uh-uh. Nyet.

The fact that some folks think U.S. citizens raised on social media, video games and hip-hop are going to do stoop labor is laughable and ludicrous.

Who do you think picks strawberries, blueberries, blackberries, watermelons snd cantaloupes that we, the self-entitled, gently place in our grocery carts?

Who stands elbow to elbow to elbow with other workers deboning chickens or cutting slabs of beef and pork into salable packages? Or pulling the entrails out of fish, goats and turkeys?

Be thankful for immigrants, illegal or otherwise; they do work that Most American citizens do not want to do, or cannot do.

And most of Americans are grateful for those who do. And damn well we  should be.

GIVE US YOUR FEEDBACK.  CLICK ON “COMMENT” TO TELL US WHAT YOU THINK or use one of the alternative methods for providing feedback.

click here to CLOSE THIS PAGE

By George Smith

Meanwhile, while we are getting goid at isolating, let’s take a hard look at reality.

Reality 1: The debt and deficit are at record levels, thanks to the Trump/GOP tax cuts, which made the rich  richer, big companies more profitable and allowed top management to get record big bonuses.

Reality 2: With the debt and deficit at already record levels in 2017, cutting taxes only increased the debt and  deficit, as did borrowing money for stimulus money. 

Reality 3: Trickle-down economics has never worked and never will.

Reality 4: The unemployment figure, thanks to the pandemic, slow response by the federal government and chaotic response on all fronts when the problem was finally acknowledged, is approaching that of the Great Depression. 

Reality 5: With millions out of work, less income taxes (much less!) are being collected.

Reality 6: The bipartisan stimulus money had enough loopholes and negligible oversight to guaranteed a big slice of the funds went to BIG businesses, BIG farmers and BIG special interest firms and GOP donors.

Reality 7: Money for pressing needs for American citizens — rural health care, fragile bridges across the nation and highway infrastructure.— will be non-existent because of realities listed above.

Reality 8: This administration and its party faithful are  more concerned about stock market numbers  and election poll numbers than in saving lives.

Reality 9: The officials of the Trump regime are more concerned about kowtowing to the president than in doing the right thing for the citizens of this nation and the world.

Reality 10: This president and his pride of lackeys will go down in history as the most unconscionable, corrupt, unempathetic, and malignantly ignorant administration in this nation’s history.

Reality 11: What else should we expect when the country is in the hands of a sixth-grade  bully who enjoys publicly ridiculing anyone who disagrees with him with derogatory nicknames — Fat Jerry, Pocahontas l, Sleepy Joe, Little Marco, etc. — and who is the definitive expert on every subject from space travel to the stock market to response to a pandemic and the proper treatments and medicines with which to combat it to the psychology of male/female relationships.

Looking with a non-critical eye, there are those who claim this country is blessed.

Reality 12: And, with those citizens, President Trump is well pleased.

GIVE US YOUR FEEDBACK.  CLICK ON “COMMENT” TO TELL US WHAT YOU THINK or use one of the alternative methods for providing feedback.

click here to CLOSE THIS PAGE

By George Smith

If you did not watch the Trump Show on Fox News Sunday night, you missed:

— An adjective-laden, discombobulated rantfest where the president consistently showed his inability to answer a question directly.

— Trump put on display his PhD level ability to deflect the most simple question and either turn it into an attack on Barack Obama, China, Democrat governors or the media.

— Twisted the U.S. coronavirus death
numbers (68,000-plus) as a positive number rather than as an indictment  of this administration’s numerous missteps, l miscalculations and initial slow response.

— Repeatedly lied about actions taken or not taken relating to the pandemic.

— Was superficially off-putting by responding to one distraught woman who was getting evicted by simply stated she would “get a better job.”

The level of his empathy to the death toll, to the cries of help from states, first responders and hospitals is somewhere two digits south of zero.

 He is, in a word, an embarrassment, a national disgrace, a clown who is not funny, a political Pennywise who is deviously evil in action, word and deed.

Anyone who still supports this rumbling, bumbling fool has a full share stake in that embarrassment.

GIVE US YOUR FEEDBACK.  CLICK ON “COMMENT” TO TELL US WHAT YOU THINK or use one of the alternative methods for providing feedback.

click here to CLOSE THIS PAGE

By George Smith

This is not a lecture missive, not an attempt to change your mind about supporting the president.

This is an honest attempt at starting a dialogue about why you support this president. I cannot understand how any thinking individual with an IQ in the double digits can legitimately claim that President 45 is the best president for the times, unless…you are a one-issue voter (anti-abortion, immigration, or are monied gentry with a political connection to the administration).

I want to learn, to understand what it is about Trump that deserves such unvarnished loyalty from his followers.
Here are some facts, based on research, reading, analysis and prayerful thought. I invite anyone to comment on these statements and give sources as to any erroneous material.

1. The president said, “No one could have predicted this (pandemic). In 2014 President Obama, in a future-looking speech during the Ebola scare, said another pandemic would be coming and said this in a speech to the United Nations: “And even as we meet the urgent threat of Ebola, it’s clear that our nations must do more to prevent, detect and respond to future biological threats – before they erupt into full-blown crises.” The next day he hosted  44 nations to advance “our global health security. And we will work with any country that shares that commitment.”

Additionally, in 2017, as the power of the presidency was being transferred, Trump’s team was given a briefing on pandemic responses created following the Ebola crisis.

Why does the president almost daily say a pandemic could not be expected? And, why does he say repeatedly that he accepts no responsibility for the government’s slow response to the pandemic. 

2. Why is President Trump pushing for an anti-malaria drug to be used on the coronavirus? He is not a doctor and has no medical training. Does it not concern you that the Trump Organization and key advisor Rudy Guiliani have stock in one of the biggest companies manufacturing this specific drug?

3. It is a fact this president lies with regularity, almost 17,000 lies told in tweets and speeches in less than 40 months. Any reasonable explanation from a supporter would appreciated.

And, finally:

4. The national debt will have increased by more than $5 trillion by the end of Trump’s first term, an increase of about 20 percent. This is  due to the tax cuts, which greatly benefited big corporations and the ultra-rich, the touted “military buildup” and the response to the pandemic.  What is fiscally “conservative” about this administration, a main plank in the a Republican Party platform?

Seriously, I encourage an open dialogue in these (and any other) points. I want to understand but have heard no hard “facts” from supporters other that “he does what he says and says what he means” and “he is a businessman, not a politician.” 

GIVE US YOUR FEEDBACK.  CLICK ON “COMMENT” TO TELL US WHAT YOU THINK or use one of the alternative methods for providing feedback.

click here to CLOSE THIS PAGE

By George Smith

The elephant in the room keeps getting bigger. And no one with any national status is talking about it…at least in any way, shape or form that is breaking through the constant clamor of “COVID-19”.

The elephant? National deficit and debt.

In the past decade, since the “fiscally conservative” Republican Party controlled  both houses of Congress from 2010 to 2018 and the presidency since 2017, the debt has increased exponentially.

The last time the federal government had a surplus was under President Bill Clinton. (Go ahead and check. I’ll wait.)

In February 2020, the public debt of the United States was around $23.4 trillion, more than $1.29 trillion more than a year earlier, when it was around $22.1 trillion. (Note: A trillion has 12 zeroes/- $1,000,000,000,000.

And, that does not include the $2.200,000,00,000 just approved in democratic socialist stimulus checks approved this week by a bipartisan vote in both houses.

And, a second round of bailouts for other needy entities, like non-profits will be rolled out soon.

The national debt now stands just shy of $26,000,000,000,000. (1,2,3….12 zeroes. That’s right..) so, I owe more than $69,000 for my share of the debt; my supreme spousal unit also owes that amount. So do our six kids and their kids and the baby born a few minutes ago.

The so-called tax cut in 2017 added $2-plus trillion the debt .. and few in power blinked an eye. 

The elephant in the room is sick with a disease with a worse disease than COVID-19. Our elected officials — all those who think the elephant is a “fig newton” of their imagination and will, somehow, some day, just magically vanish — are guilty of dereliction of duty and malignant neglect of their fiduciary responsibilities as gatekeepers of tax dollars.

Of course, in times like these, drastic actions must be taken to preserve the republic.

But when the debt burden becomes too heavy to bear — and it will — the resulting tumult will make the coronavirus pandemic look like a few people with bad allergies.

Count on it. The clock is ticking.

GIVE US YOUR FEEDBACK.  CLICK ON “COMMENT” TO TELL US WHAT YOU THINK or use one of the alternative methods for providing feedback.

click here to CLOSE THIS PAGE

By George Smith

First, I do not consider myself or Bobbie Jean McCarty Smith as collateral damage or expendable.

We are both “semi-colon” people; you know, like when a writer inserts a semicolon, we ain’t done yet.

Yet, at almost 75 and 73 respectively, that’s the status assigned to us by Texas Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick who suggested some deaths should be considered acceptable to jump-start the economy due to the economic slooow-down caused by the coronavirus pandemic.

This is the headline that stopped me on my tracks Tuesday; “Texas Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick Wants to Sacrifice Seniors to Save the Economy”.

Patrick said, “No one reached out to me and said, as a senior citizen, are you willing to take a chance on your survival in exchange for keeping the America that all America loves for your children and grandchildren? And if that’s the exchange, I’m all in.”

Wait! Whoa! Calf rope! King’s X! Stop!

Is he saying that a few hundred (thousand?) funerals of Baby Boomers are a good trade-off for opening up

restaurants, schools, movie theaters and concert venues?  Is my life or the life of even one American of any age  an even swap for being able to go to Disney World a little sooner than is medically advisable?

Is he basically saying that this virus could take his life (or mine or your’s) and death would be better than a repressed economy?

Surely, that is not what he’s suggesting, right?

Where could this elected public  official be getting this ingrown-hair-into-his brain idea?

Earlier in the day President Donald Trump and his chief economic adviser, Larry Kudlow, said that the economic cost of shutting down the country in order to stop the spread of COVID-19 may not be worth it.

Do individual Americans get a vote? Do I get a choice on whether I stick around to love my wife a while longer, wrap my kids and grandkids in fluffy hugs and try and be a contributor to society…OR take an early dirt nap so you and the other survivors can  walk in on Obese Thursday at Golden Corral and chow down on the mile-long grease-goodies buffet?

Is this what our leadership has come to…saying that it’s okay if government shuts down the shutdown and I succumb in the aftermath, and if I should die it’s a small price to pay for a stable stock market.

Well, shut the front door!

If you, Dan Patrick, want to go toe’s-up for a 10 point jump in the Dow Jones, get after it, Brave Bubba!

But leave me and mine out of your myopic schemes. We’ll face whatever comes by standing strong and not laying supine while someone drones on with a syrupy eulogy.

GIVE US YOUR FEEDBACK.  CLICK ON “COMMENT” TO TELL US WHAT YOU THINK or use one of the alternative methods for providing feedback.

click here to CLOSE THIS PAGE

At least Emperor Nero supposedly only fiddled while Rome burned; he didn’t tell the Romans that the fire was no big deal.

President Trump squandered two precious months trying to downplay the coronavirus while attempting to talk up the stock market. We still have no idea how many Americans are infected, because the administration bungled diagnostics. As of a few days ago, South Korea had conducted up to 700 times more tests per capita than the United States.

Trump’s passivity will cost lives, but we can still make preparations before hospitals risk becoming overwhelmed by a pandemic that is both more contagious than the seasonal flu and apparently many times more lethal. Dr. Tom Frieden, a former director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, warns that in a plausible worst-case scenario, this virus could kill more than one million Americans.

After speaking to epidemiologists and public health specialists, I have a list of some practical steps that the president and other officials should take immediately, while there is time.

1. Invest in a huge rollout of free testing so that we know who is sick. The University of Washington set up a drive-through system so that certain people can be tested without contaminating a clinic.

2. Cancel large gatherings in parts of the country where community transmission is occurring, as Gov. Jay Inslee has done in Washington State. Employers should encourage people to work from home where possible. Even with social distancing, more than one-third of Americans may eventually be infected (a worst case is that 70 percent become infected, as Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany has cautioned for her country).But lives will be saved by flattening the curve so that infections grow more slowly. We are much better off if 100 million Americans contract the coronavirus over 18 months rather than over 18 weeks, and this also gives scientists the chance to test treatments and develop vaccines, and to see if warmer weather helps. South Korea’s experience suggests that aggressive measures, well short of China’s, do help.

3. Expand telemedicine so that patients can get medical advice while staying home. The aim is for people to NOT go to a doctor’s office or E.R. unless necessary.

4. Plan for hospitals to be overwhelmed, as happened in Wuhan, China, in Iran and northern Italy. Epidemiological models suggest that by April we could have millions of Americans infected, and the danger is that people with other ailments die for want of care in the chaos. Epidemiologists suggest that we could easily see 100 million infections of the new coronavirus in the United States, of which 5 or 10 percent might require hospitalization and 1 percent might need a ventilator. That could mean almost one million people needing ventilators just for Covid-19, though not all at the same time, yet we have only about 72,000 full ventilators in the United States.

5. Cancel vacations of health workers, bring back retired doctors and nurses, and repurpose cardiologists and pediatricians to deal with a torrent of coronavirus patients — in expectation of record numbers of doctors out sick. We should prepare to allow military medics to assist in E.R.s as well.

6. Make nursing homes, assisted-living centers, homeless shelters, prisons and dialysis treatment centers safer, by encouraging use of personal protective equipment and limiting visitors.

7. Make plans in case first responders, such as firefighters and ambulance paramedics, become sick in large numbers. That may mean calling in the National Guard.

8. Ensure that as many people as possible have access to medical care. That means expanding Medicaid in remaining states, and establishing a mechanism so that no one needs to pay (including a co-pay or deductible) for testing for or treatment of Covid-19.

9. Congress should promptly pass legislation (shamefully stalled for the last 16 years) mandating paid sick leave for all workers.

10. Greatly step up production of personal protective equipment needed in hospitals. Some hospitals are already running short of N95 masks, and America’s emergency stockpile has only 12 million N95 masks — approximately a one-day supply for the country during an epidemic.

11. Prepare for public school students to attend classes remotely in parts of the country most affected. Researchers found that during the 1918 Spanish flu, cities that canceled schools and public gatherings — and did so early — fared better than other cities. Unfortunately, today at least six million American schoolchildren don’t have internet access at home; that may mean that schools hand out hotspots, and laptops to students without computers. A nonprofit called FirstBook is trying to send out six million books to low-income schools so that kids can at least read while at home.

12. Instead of bailing out airlines or cruise lines, make people in quarantine eligible for unemployment insurance and waive work requirements for benefit programs. Don’t let struggling families become homeless because they suddenly can’t make the rent or meet mortgage payments.

Enough fiddling, Mr. President. Let’s roll.

GIVE US YOUR FEEDBACK.  CLICK ON “COMMENT” TO TELL US WHAT YOU THINK or use one of the alternative methods for providing feedback.

click here to CLOSE THIS PAGE

By George Smith

Don’t misunderstand. I am not a Bernie Sanders acolyte. 

I like most of his plans,. But (and this BUT is of an Andre the Giant proportion) his plans are just words. You know, like Trump’s mouthings are just words.

I want America to shine, to take care of those that can not take care of themselves, to be, once again, that “shining beacon on the hill” for people of the world.

In his zeal, Bernie is willing to tear  asunder the fabric of his party, just as Trump has transformed the GOP into his crass, dishonesty image.

Bernie’s plan is not doable. Programs that are considered “socialist” will never get through Congress. And, the monied interest in the US will not sit idly by and let it happen.

This country, thanks to Donald Trump and his rabid followers, and those just-as-rabid aginners, is as divided as any tome since the Vietnam War.

Bernie, like Trump, is a tear-down-to-build-up self-ordained reformer.

Neither man has the ability nor the inclination to bring folks together, to compromise, feeling it is perfectly appropriate  to shun  certain segments of the country in order to reach their personal and political goals.

The next president needs to be of the Solomon caliber, not a red-faced, screaming “rouser” that further divides the country.

That said, I will vote for the Democratic Party candidate. Trump is not just killing his  party, he is undermining the foundations of this country.

GIVE US YOUR FEEDBACK.  CLICK ON “COMMENT” TO TELL US WHAT YOU THINK or use one of the alternative methods for providing feedback.

click here to CLOSE THIS PAGE