18 II 2020: Let’s give Bob a break

Robert Philip Hanssen spied for the Commies for five or more years and provided them with tip-top secret information. He got a pass on the death penalty in return for cooperating with authorities, but even so was sentenced to 15 life terms with no possibility of parole. Can’t the President do something for Bob?

Trump has shown repeatedly the depth of his compassion. He got the murderous Seal off the hook for murder, he stands ready to pardon any of his flunkies who is convicted, and only today we read that he will grant clemency to Eddie Debartolo, a football criminal from a prominent familly.

Look here. Bob Hanssen gave up spying in 1991, that’s almost twenty years ago. He was a devout member of Opus Dei and sent his kids to Opus dei schools. He urged his pals in the FBI to attend Mass.

Obviously his ten-year career in espionage was a case of temporary insanity, a factor that was surely not taken into account at the time of his lynch-mob sentencing. The President of the United States could easily shave off a few life terms for Bob, or, though he would face criticisms from the pinko press, he could grant Bob a pardon, and return him to his loving family and to a nation that is always prepared to forget.

12 II 2020: Birds of a feather are crooks together

So Al Capone thinks the D.A. and Judge are being too hard on Frank Nitti. So he gets word out that he wants they should ease up and like magic the proposed sentence is reduced.

I read about something like this in today’s paper. Who says there is no honor among crooks? Trump has issued a back-door pardon to his faithful fixer, Roger Stone, and the so-called Justice Department welcomed this as another instance of the Dictator’s magnanimity and compassion and has caved in altogether. The government prosecutors have left the case so as not to have to participate in a total fraud. Trump says that Stone’s “is a horrible and very unfair situation.” Well, I guess Trump knows all about horrible, but how would he ever know, or care, what is unfair.

11 II 2020: Enlightened despot?

I read an article in the NY Times Magazine of 12 January about Mohammed bin Zayed al-Nahyan, the ruler of the United Arab Emirates. It reports: “Foreign diplomats have occssionally confronted MBZ (sc., Mohammed bin Zayed) about his country’s lack of democracy, and he has responded by saying something along the lines of ‘This isn’t California’: Lack of education and the prevalence of backward religious attitudes make autocracy necessary, he says.”

Lack of education and prevalence of backward religious attitudes in the U.S. led to the election of Donald Trump. It may be that the U.S. has regressed to the point that democracy has become unworkable.

5 II 2020: Can’t get the smell out so easily

There was no chance of ditching Trump. I knew it. Who didn’t know it? The fix was in. The majority of the “jurors” were either terrified or bought up or didn’t understand what was going on.

I was relieved that Nancy Pelosi did not have to shake Trump’s hand at the State of the Union address. Politicians often have to hold their noses momentarily, but Trump’s aura has the stink of an open grave that clings to anyone he touches for years. 

And the address showed Trump doing what he does best. It is really hard to tell the difference between the Super Bowl half-time show and one of Trump’s performances. If he’s re-elected, maybe the two events could be combined.

26 I 2019: Marsha shoots herself in the foot

Looks like Senator Marsha Blackburn took the gun she always carries in her purse and shot herself in the foot. I refer not only to her telling lies about Lt. Col. Vindman, but also to her “bad little girl” behavior at the impeachment hearings: bolting from the hearing for a television interview, acting out by pretending to read a book during the hearings, and tweeting from the Senate chamber. I guess her background in advertising isn’t working, so she is acting out “bad little girl” in a desperate attempt to win Daddy Trump’s attention.

This trashy woman is a true representative of the current Republican Party.

21 I 2020: Starr and Dershowitz come from the Epstein Sewer

I had not realized that Ken and Alan are old comrades from the Jeffrey Epstein legal team that fixed the deal with Alex Acosta. Working for Trump is, perhaps, a move up. Ken has been very understanding of sexual offenders, and represents the murderers at Blackwater. Dershowitz has specialized in sleaze, and is currently a member of Harvey Weinstein’s legal team. As a rule criminal lawyers are not regarded with the same suspicion and/or loathing as their defendants, but I think Trump, Starr, and Dershowitz are peas from the same pod.

20 I 2020: Impeachment trial as emetic

Tomorrow the trial, but it’s not a trial, it’s a political process, blah, blah.

Tomorrow the trial begins, and I’m trying to figure out how to avoid it. I’m already disgusted. One might think we were having re-runs of the O.J. Trial. Even Alan Dershowitz has shown up again. I think Dershowitz must be the Rev. Al Sharpton of trials, appearing in the right place and time to stay in the public eye. Mr. Self-righteous Ken Starr is going to hold his nose and come out of retirement to help God’s anointed. Both want a part in the week-long soap opera extravaganza in which Trump will be the hero who controls all the others from afar. All we need is Rudy Giulliani coming out of a tiny automobile with a mob of crooked Ukrainians.

And the “jury”! For most Republicans currently in the Senate the common good is of little to no importance — their sole goal is to be re-elected. And for fear of alienating some Trump voters they have enslaved themselves to a childish vulgarian bigot. Trump and his myriad toadies make me think of Rudyard Kipling’s epitaph for a dead statesman of WWI.

I could not dig, I dared not rob,

And so I lied to please the mob.

Now all my lies are proved untrue,

And I must face the men I slew.

What tale will serve me here among

Mine angry and defrauded young?


		


	



			
				



	

		
10 I 2020:  Suggestions and a query
	


	
	

	

A. Here is a short list of people I’d prefer not to see in the news:





1) Lindsey Graham — a complete disgrace.





2) Donald Trump, Jr. — He is not news until the law finally catches up with him. 





3) Harvey Weinstein — He is revolting. Just let us know when he is sentenced.





4) Mike Pompeio — Why repeat his lies, when tomorrow there will be new lies?





5) Same goes for William Barr, a flaming hypocrite.





6) and, most of all, Rudy Giulliani — never has so little managed to go so far.





B. Query: Why does the White House so regularly screw up, as in the assassination of Suleiman? The government is revealed as wholly uncoordinated. We learn that staff of the allegedly threatened embassies know nothing about a possible attack. The Secretary of Defense had no knowledge of imminent attacks. Indeed, evidence of the imminence of an attack is unavailable except to the President’s inner circle. Given the Trump administration’s history for withholding the truth and telling downright lies, why, in the absence of any supportive evidence, should we believe what they say?

		


	



			
				



	

		
6 I 2019: Where are our friends now? Oh, who needs friends?
	


	
	

	

Whether or not Trump’s “America First” policy was intended to alienate our friends and allies does not matter, it has had that effect. He acted against the advice of the military, guided by those seasoned statesmen Mike Pompeio and Mike Pence. Pence, I guess, was able to draw on his experience of Near Eastern Indiana, and Pompeio learned a lot, I’m sure, when he was trying to destroy the CIA. I’m sure Trump did not need a lot of persuading, for if there is any wrong-headed and immature advice to be had, Trump will find and follow it. Trump’s murder of Soleimani was so stupid, so naive, so inflammatory, that even our good friends the Israelis are keeping their distance.





So now, Trump, all alone (except for P and P, and Giulliani) on the Empire State Building is pounding his chest and firing off one grave threat after another, scared shitless of Iranian retaliation. He’s even going to bomb Iran’s cultural sites, a war crime … Trump probably did not know it is a war crime, but now that he knows it surely doesn’t matter.