By George Smith

We are better than this.

COMAYAGUA, Honduras (AP) — The 3-year-old girl traveled for weeks cradled in her father’s arms, as he set out to seek asylum in the United States. Now she won’t even look at him.

After being forcibly separated at the border by government officials, sexually abused in U.S. foster care and deported, the once bright and beaming girl arrived back in Honduras withdrawn, anxious and angry, convinced her father abandoned her.

He fears their bond is forever broken.

This month, new government data shows the little girl is one of an unprecedented 69,550 migrant children held in U.S. government custody over the past year, enough infants, toddlers, kids and teens to overflow the typical NFL stadium. That’s more children detained away from their parents than any other country, according to United Nations researchers. And it’s happening even though the U.S. government has acknowledged that being held in detention can be traumatic for children, putting them at risk of long-term physical and emotional damage.

“I think about this trauma staying with her too, because the trauma has remained with me and still hasn’t faded,” he said, days after their reunion. (Associated Press report)

Personal note: There is no justification, no excuse, no lapse in judgement sufficient to excuse this action against families seeking asylum in the U. S.

This has always been a nation of hope, of promise. What we are witnessing today is a mean-spirited, racist attack on people fleeing oppression, drugs, poverty snd violence. For-profit detention centers are fleecing the taxpayers and federal officials are applauding the staunching of the brown horde.

Pray. Pray our better angels rise up en  masse and lay waste to the very idea of superiority that is inflicting our federal decision makers.

We ARE better than this. Or ARE we?

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By Ron Munden

Two stories tell the story:

First –

Russia Says Trump Offered To Help Putin Fight Forest Fires In Siberia

President Trump spoke with President Vladimir Putin on Wednesday and offered U.S. help in fighting widespread forest fires raging in parts of Siberia, according to a Kremlin account of the call.

https://www.npr.org/2019/08/01/747196568/russia-says-trump-offered-to-help-putin-fight-forest-fires-in-siberia

Second –

Trump threatens to cut off federal funding for California wildfires

President Donald Trump tweeted Sunday morning his first comments about the wildfires blazing through California attacking Gov. Gavin Newsome saying he has done a “terrible job” of forest management.

For the record – 57% of the forests in California are federal land and under the management of the federal government, not the state of California.  So if Trump wants to point the finger at who has failed, he should rotate his finger 180 degrees.

This is just another incident that makes one question who Trump really works for. 

Only weeks ago he sold out our allies the Kurds and gave our enemy Russia what they wanted – control of Syria.  This decision will cost American solders their life and that blood will be on Trump’s hands.

Trump campaigned on making America great again but is spends a lot of time making our enemy Russia great again.

It is clear that Putin has Trump by the balls.  The only question is “What does Putin have on him?”

By George Smith

Okay, let’s play a childhood game: “Play-like”.

You remember it if your childhood days were spent in the 1950s and ‘60s: Play-like you are a princess or a Knight  of the Round Table or a rock singer or a movie star: That was the whole premise of the game.

I am, right this instant, playing this game: Play-like I am President Donald Trump.

Okay, cool! I am one of the most powerful humans on Earth; I am rich and married to a super-hot former soft-porn model who is, by all accounts, a dedicated mother.

I am also an abysmally poor liar, popping out  jaw-dropping untruths with the regularity of a kitten with diarrhea.

I open my mouth and I lie; I use my pointer finger or opposable thumbs to dash off 10 tweets a day and lie.

And my lies are of the pre-K variety, you know, lying about not taking a cookie when you have an oatmeal mustache on your face.

As president, my lies have substance and can literally adversely affect relationships with invaluable allies or even undermine basic tenets of democracy.

Listen up: I did not attend the G-7 discussion on climate change because I had important meetings with the leaders of Germany and India. 

What? Both leaders were at the meeting? Well, I just got my times messed up. 

I was actually on a phone call with China setting up important trade talks.
Say huh? China said there was no phone call? Well, there was one and I was holding the phone and talking tough, so I ought to know.

I don’t lie and anyone who claims I do, THEY are lying.

Oh, before I forget, big news: I played golf this morning and shot a 71. Yeppers, it’s great to be me.

By George Smith

I understand loyalty to a candidate on select issues.  Using pro-life as an example, i personally would never insert myself between a conscious choice between a woman and her doctor but I have empathy for those that do).

I am taken aback by friends who question whatever I write negatively about our president and label me a biased and left-wing nutso meadow muffin chunker. 

Have you ever noticed they never explain what twerks out of Trump’s mouth mean and offer their personal explanation.

I know the reason: They cannot defend statements like these:

—“Mexico will pay for the wall.”

—“I alone can fix it.”

—“think I am, actually humble. I think I’m much more humble than you would understand.”

—”Sorry losers and haters, but my I.Q. is one of the highest—and you all know it! Please don’t feel so stupid or insecure. It’s not your fault.” 

—”My fingers are long and beautiful, as, it has been well been documented, are various other parts of my body.”

—”I think the only difference between me and the other candidates is that I’m more honest and my women are more beautiful.”

—“You know, it really doesn’t matter what [the media] write as long as you’ve got a young and beautiful piece of ass.” 

—”There has to be some form of punishment (for work men for  abortion)…you go back to a position like they had where they would perhaps go to illegal places, but we have to ban it.” 

—”Free trade is terrible. Free trade can be wonderful if you have smart people. But we have stupid people.” 

—”These are stupid people that say, ‘Oh, didn’t Trump declare bankruptcy? Didn’t he go bankrupt?’ I didn’t go bankrupt.”

—”For evangelicals, for the Christians, for the everybody, for everybody of religion, this will be, may be, the most important election that our country has ever had. And once I get in, I will do my thing that I do very well. And I figure it is probably, maybe the only way I’m going to get to heaven. So I better do a good job.” 

And, the two statements that created an undeniable need in me to vote ”against” Trump  and rail against his messidency until I go toe’s-up:

— “If Hillary Clinton can’t satisfy her husband what makes her think she can satisfy America?”

—”They don’t write good. They have people over there (New York Times) , they don’t they don’t write good. They don’t know how to write good.”  

I can write good at times. I know how to vote good, too.

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By Deloris Munden

On Saturday I noted in my journal there had been a mass shooting. Little did I know I would be writing the same thing on Sunday.  My only comment was thank God the shooters were white.  If someone of color would have done this that would be something you could get your teeth in. 

The man who occupies 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue said it has come down to video games and mental illness. And “perhaps” it is time to take some action.

How quickly our nation forgets these horrific acts. Are parents afraid to let our children go to school or a movie or a mall. We are becoming prisoners of fear.

And where are our countries’ leaders? They are on their 5 week holiday so they can reach out to their constituents.

What would our “leaders” do if one of their family members had been shot? Business as usual? Write notes, say our “thoughts and prayers are with you” or would they put off their vacations, go back to D.C. and start to work. Would Trump give them a deadline to prepare a bill that he would sign that was not focused on video games or mental illness but on controlling high power weapons.

Search your soul and say what if I had lost a loved one.  Is your representative funded by the NRA? If so, think long and hard about voting for him or her. After all we pay their salary, their take from the NRA is just “walking around money.”

The Hill — By Jordain Carney

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) blocked two election security measures on Thursday, arguing Democrats are trying to give themselves a “political benefit.”

The move comes a day after former special counsel Robert Mueller warned about election meddling in 2020, saying Russia was laying the groundwork to interfere in the 2020 election “as we sit here.”

Senate Minority Leader Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) had tried to get consent Thursday to pass a House bill that requires the use of paper ballots and includes funding for the Election Assistance Commission. It passed the House 225-184 with one Republican voting for it.

But McConnell objected, saying Schumer was trying to pass “partisan legislation.”

“Clearly this request is not a serious effort to make a law. Clearly something so partisan that it only received one single solitary Republican vote in the House is not going to travel through the Senate by unanimous consent,” McConnell said.

Under the Senate’s rules any one senator can request consent to pass a bill, but any one senator can object.

Schumer argued that if McConnell didn’t like that bill “let’s put another bill on the floor and debate it.”

Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.) also asked for consent to pass legislation that would require candidates, campaign officials and their family members to notify the FBI of assistance offers from foreign governments.

McConnell also objected to that bill.

In his testimony before Congress on Wednesday, Mueller warned about continued Russian interference in U.S. elections.

“We are expecting them to do it again during the next campaign,” Mueller said.

Schumer cited Mueller’s testimony on Thursday as a prime example that more legislation is needed from Congress.

“It was important for all us to hear straight from Robert Mueller’s mouth that the threat from Russia and other foreign adversaries seeking to meddle in our elections is very real and still very much ongoing,” Schumer said.

“Mueller’s testimony was a clarion call for election security. Mueller’s testimony should be a wake-up call to every American, Democrat, Republican, liberal, conservative, that the integrity of our elections is at stake. … This is all about the future of this country,” he added.

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