Posts Tagged → 2016
Forgive Me for Asking, But I Must
Forgive me, it is not my intention to cast cold water on our collective rejoicing at having President Donald Trump re-elected, again, and thus at having dodged the Democrat Party’s communist anti-democracy bullet aimed at America’s heart. It is true that Trump’s election gives us hope that our constitutional republic is not over. However, I feel like I am watching a repeat of 2016-2017, where highly qualified conservatives and Republicans were mysteriously bypassed, overlooked, left untouched by the then-new Trump Administration.
Well do I recall someone of real stature writing publicly then (2017-2018) about how mystified he was that no one from Team Trump had contacted him about any of the unique policy strengths he had, and how the new Trump Administration seemed disinterested or lost on whatever that policy subject was. Well, here we go again, from where I sit.
Trump supporters have learned to forgive the 2016-2017 lapses, missteps, failures, and missed opportunities as due to Trump’s unfamiliarity with government, his natural reliance upon long established and unreliable DC Beltway insiders, his understandably misplaced trust in deep staters and other bad actors, his misplaced faith in the weight of federal employees’ oaths of office.
We watched as Trump’s first term slowly, painfully, peeled away the mask from the hostile administrative state, generously bankrolled by American taxpayers and yet also so openly at war with us. We grudgingly learned to accept the stolen 2020 election as the cost of doing business within the parameters set for us by the establishment media, the administrative state, and its constellation of hostile non-government organizations, who then worked furiously from outside to undermine the very rules they set.
And so we miraculously prevailed in 2024, and America as founded yet lives again. And now we have earned the right to say openly, can we please not make the same and very avoidable mistakes again, this time around?
While President Trump is indeed appointing strong leaders who are willing to assertively implement his bold vision for a better government that is closely attuned to America’s founding documents and principles, one question has not been addressed: Who exactly is going to carry out these deep reforms?
With few exceptions (the US Dept. of Commerce being one), nearly the entire federal workforce was already openly insubordinate to President Trump the last time around. And there is no reason to believe that these public employees are going to honor their oaths of office this time. And if Trump follows through on the DOGE promise to eliminate entire federal agencies, and greatly streamline those that remain, then which law-abiding civil servants will there be to carry forward in those same agencies the Trump Administration’s policies?
Put another way, if President Trump installs leaders who, for example, change the name of the radicalized US Environmental Protection Agency, then which of the old USEPA staff will there be to then follow through with the systemic change through every artery and vein inside the old institutional body? If the federal government is going to aggressively do compliance checks or reel back in billions of dollars in Biden grants to far-left NGOs, then who exactly is prepared to hit that ground running? The current federal workforce is almost entirely unreliable, and if left in place, each and every federal employee will become a road block of one. The DOGE people had better be collecting lots and lots of names of prospective civil servants who are prepared to take the place of existing staff, who should end up fired from federal service for any number of good reasons.
House cleaning is promised, but who then moves into the house to give it new life?
Ending where this essay began, it is my turn to publicly complain: No one from Team Trump contacted me, way back in 2016-2020, or now, about my unique area of expertise. I am one of a very small handful of truly conservative Republicans nationwide with extensive hands-on experience with public land issues and wildlife habitat/ land conservation policy. No Trump staffer has called to ask my experienced opinion on federal appraisal standards, especially related to eminent domain, or on rights-of-way issues surrounding federal properties. To my knowledge, none of my few colleagues have been contacted, either. I am not looking for a job. I already run a small business that I really enjoy. But I am willing to volunteer my precious time to help shape sound federal policy that is a significant deviation from the longstanding horrible status quo.
President Trump has the loyalty of so many talented and experienced conservatives, any and all of whom will jump at the opportunity to simply help this one man (and his administration) who can save America. This is the big chance to get America back on track.
So why then do I feel like America via President Trump is once again missing easy opportunities to make lasting, good policy? If the right people do not identify and help fix these longstanding horrible policies, the civil servants will keep them in place, and we will miss a once in a lifetime opportunity for good government.
Another NFL season? Who cares
According to the aggressive internet advertising I have encountered, and clicked right through, another National Football League season has begun. And unlike my childhood and adulthood up until 2016, I now just don’t care. I won’t be watching any NFL games at home, I won’t be going out to a sports bar to watch a game, and I won’t be going over to a friend’s house to watch a football game.
The fact is, me and the NFL are splits-o, over, finis, done, parted ways, divorced. Oh, I did my part as a fan; it was the NFL that caused our breakup. When the NFL’s strange public policy positions got me mad in 2015, the disrespectful kneeling by spoiled brats in 2016 got me furiously disconnected. I could not then relate to a business that deliberately stuck its finger in my eye and then expected me to overlook it and keep on keepin’ on. Nope. In 2016 I turned off the NFL TV and never looked back.
The situation has not been helped by a woke, racist, anti-America ESPN and fellow sports “media” outlets, in which the NFL continues to appear and participate, as if nothing is wrong. The situation has not been helped by the NFL adopting certain flags, colors, etc as statements about sensitive social issues and political policies that are guaranteed to drive away people who take their business with them. I always wonder what the outcome would be, the response would be, if the NFL jerseys and helmets sported the National Rifle Association logo….we know it would not be positively received by the ESPN et al “sports media” entertainment complex, which is really now just an adjunct of communist anti-America Hollywood.
I don’t think the NFL misses me, either. Occasionally I will be at someone’s home, or out with family, and a football game will be playing on a TV. My eye or ears will catch snippets of the game, and sometimes bits of the advertising during the game. So far the advertising ratio seems to (roughly) be about 25:1 aimed at American blacks over American whites. That disproportionate advertising effort tells us that American blacks are still loyal fans of the NFL, and very much the target audience of NFL games, while American whites have left the stadium, euphemistically and statistically speaking.
Incidentally, my disgust with NFL rubbing my nose in its leftist politics also bridges over into Penn State football. “The house that Joe [Paterno] built” has also left me in the dust, not so much the team or its management with the silly names on the jersey shtick, but Penn State University itself. My alma mater has gone totally woke, adopting policies and political positions completely at odds with my values. And at odds with the university’s own stated values of fairness, dedication to academic excellence, etc.
The way Coach Joe Paterno was mistreated by the PSU board of trustees didn’t help my view of the school. Then there was the unjustified hiding away of the Joe Paterno statue, and unjustified general official abuse of the golden Paterno name. PSU has done nothing of substance to correct its poor behavior. Instead its administrators and trustees and staff just keep on keepin’ on with the leftist nonsense, expecting me to get on board. Every year since 2012 PSU has found some new way to alienate me.
Despite receiving constant emails from Penn State and the PSU Alumni Association begging me to contribute and participate, I have backed away and found other ways to spend my time and money. Not getting back on that PSU train, despite five decades of dedication and personal participation.
So, just like I won’t support an NFL that aggressively adopts political positions that I cannot agree with, I cannot support a Penn State University that has adopted policies and politics that I cannot possibly agree with. The same goes for Major League Baseball, the National Basketball League, the National Hockey League, and a cornuplethora (thanks to John Correia for this funny word) of other now leftist-woke sports-entertainment institutions. All of whom seem to be doing just fine without me, I might add. If they missed me and my business, then they would have been courting me by dialing back the leftist politics junk. And they have not done so, but rather increased their leftist politics activism.
I will bet that if there is ever a need to financially support sports teams and leagues that have deliberately alienated their audiences by adopting leftist politics, and thereby lost a great deal of money, the political establishment will find a way to bail them out with taxpayer money. And we know the GOPe will make it happen.
Meanwhile, with the NFL out of my life I now have a lot more time and money of my own to spend on things that really bring me happiness. Reading on the couch next to my wife, visiting with friends and laughing about our kids, reloading antique black powder cartridges that became obsolete a hundred years ago, but which are still plenty effective for taking wild game at sporting distances, splitting firewood, studying the Bible, writing, there are so many productive uses of the time I used to mis-spend on the NFL.
So long, Screwy, I won’t see ya in Saint Louee, as Bugs Bunny would have said.
This election in one interview
If you want to know President Donald Trump like you have never seen him before, and if you want to know the news media like you see them every day but you did not realize just how evil and politically partisan they are, and if you want to know why anyone in America thinks anything negative about this incredible president we have, who should be at a 98% approval rating, then watch this interview with CBS political activist Leslie Stahl. Just watch it. Watch the whole thing.
Here is what I see here:
->President Trump is calm, in control, a perfect gentleman, and direct
->President Trump is incredibly smart and in control of the facts about an incredible array of policy issues that I myself could never master. And I have been doing public policy in one form or another my entire career. Trump has been doing it for less than four years…
->President Trump directly answers a nonstop litany of disruptive, petty and rude questions, about half of which have no bearing on anything of substance and meaning, but which are designed to personally harass and harangue the President of the United States.
->President Trump politely ends the interview when he is told Vice President Pence is about to enter the room, although his antagonist, Leslie Stahl, has about a hundred more ridiculous accusations she would like to throw at him.
->This is not a normal interview. Leslie Stahl does not ask “hard questions,” nor does she ever answer the hard questions that Trump poses to her. Rather, she makes mostly aggressive declarative statements, to which Trump must respond defensively, many of which and maybe all of which are factually untrue. Like her assertion that he is responsible for Michigan governor Gretchen Whitmer’s own negative public standing (recall that Whitmer, whose cruel face and malevolent eyes make her look just like Cruella DeVille from the Disney classic 1001 Dalmations, has had an authoritarian shut-down of Michigan, except for her own husband, who gets to go sailing while the little people are not allowed to). She also constantly interrupts Trump. This behavior makes Stahl an unapologetic political activist, not a reporter.
->Leslie Stahl shows zero interest in the Biden corruption scandal that is unfolding by the hour. She shows zero interest in the biggest political scandal in American history, which is the Obama Administration SPYING on a political candidate, his campaign, and then his incoming administration, that being Trump. In case you did not know, it is incredibly, unbelievably, terribly, totally ILLEGAL to spy on Americans like this, and especially on political opponents. In sum, Leslie Stahl, like the rest of the mainstream media, is 100% in the camp of the other political party, and she is doing everything she can to coverup for them, protect them, and to attack their political opponent, President Donald J. Trump. CBS “News” is not a fair-minded arbiter of truth and accuracy, they are dishonest liars.
Let us call this recording an “engagement” between two opposing forces. What we see is one side that is trying to support, defend, and protect America, and the other side, CBS “News” and Leslie Stahl, trying to do everything they can to destroy America. This is not journalism, it is a political attack. And as President Trump points out repeatedly to Leslie Stahl, she would never and has never asked any questions like these of his predecessor, Barack Hussein Obama, nor of Joe Biden. We know this is true because we have never seen a recording of any kind of encounter like this in the history of our nation. No other president has been tested and abused and undermined like President Trump has.
And it is all because Leslie Stahl and her fellow political partisans want the power that Donald Trump has. They could not win it fair and square in 2016 and they are now trying to make sure that he does not win it again fair and square in 2020.
For those people who wonder about people like me, and why we are so devoted to President Trump, this recorded encounter shows you exactly why. Trump is honorable, good, smart, and direct. He is not evasive. The “news media” AKA the propaganda arm of the Democrat Party, is not any of these things, but instead the opposite: Bad, dishonest, conniving, and acting in bad faith.
Tonight’s presidential debate between Trump and Biden, and “moderated” by a far-left political activist masquerading as a “news reporter,” is likely to end up being the same thing as this interview here. And it is precisely why so many Americans have artificially negative views of Donald Trump. The press/ news media are trying to destroy Trump so they can take his power and keep it for themselves, and no voter should ever allow that to happen.
If you love America, if you want America to succeed, to have a strong economy, to be safe and stable, then vote for Donald J. Trump on November 3rd. America has not had a president this good in generations.
This is a calm, articulate, intelligent man who loves America and refuses to put up with any BS
This is Leslie Stahl, a fake “reporter” and big hypocrite who harangued and criticized America’s president about wearing a mask, and yet she herself does not wear one. Stahl is a political activist and nothing more
MIchigan governor Gretchen Whitmer has rightfully earned the scorn and fear of people across the world. Her evil eyes …it is why she is called Cruella DeVille
MI guv Gretchen Whitmer — Yikes, scary lady!
Gretchen Whitmer must have sat for this updated version of Disney’s Cruella DeVille from 1001 Dalmations movie
Original Disney cartoon of Cruella DeVille from 1001 Dalmations movie…now why would anyone want to compare Cruella DeVille to Gretchen Whitmer? Not fair to Cruella!