Re: Trump II

[JoeKitchen]

But say they knew what they were doing when they voted for Trump. Unfortunately, the people who voted for Trump represent only 27% of of the eligible voters. Of the total of 231,556,622 eligible voters, only about 60% (138,884,643) voted. That means 92,671,979 (40%) who didn't vote and the 65,979,879 who voted for Hillary were out voted by 62,979,879 of the voting population. That means the majority of the eligible voters didn't vote for Trump. That doesn't sound like much of a mandate to me...

Point in fact, Trump just barely won. If not for about 80K voters in Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania that gave Trump the electoral votes required to win, Hillary would be President now.

Although I do consider your points American and something you have the right to have, I have problems with the above. 

First, we are a republic, not a democracy, and everyone (at least politically involved) knew well before November 8th how we elect presidents.  Dems whining about winning the popular vote instead of looking inwards as to why they lost the electoral college is both pathetic and distressing at the same time. 

Second, the 40% of those who did not vote were not out voted ... by definition since ... they did not vote.  You can't be out voted if you did not vote. 

Furthermore, if you care so little about your own political leanings that you don't even go and vote, why should anyone, politician or not, care about your political leanings either? 

I mean this is why politicians pay so much attention to senior citizens; they are reliable voters.  Do I wish politicians would pay attention to people of my generation, yes, but I don't fault them for not, since young adults are unreliable voters.  You got to play for who shows up. 

[JoeKitchen]

I agree that President Trump won the election because of the antiquated Constitutional provisions governing presidential elections.  I do not regard him as fit for office and find his behavior demeaning to the majority of the American public that did not vote for him.

I see this statement over and over again, and it shows the gross misunderstanding and lack of knowledge of civics and the history of pure democracies by those who say it. 

First, the electoral college is not antiquated.  According to Google, antiquated means old-fashion or outdated.  Well, the Electrical College has been around only for the age of the USA; pure democracies, which is what you are advocating for, have been around for eons.  The Electoral College is not old-fashion in comparison; it's the opposite. 

Second, pure democracies don't work by the tyranny of the majority.  Having a pure democracy allows the majority to only consider what is best for them, eventually causing dissidents amongst the minority.  Read the Federalist Papers by James Madison for an argument against pure democracies with no checks on power that is more eloquent that what I can muster here. 

There are examples of this playing out through history that has indirectly led to the downfall of governments. 

Third, the Electoral College forces our presidential confidantes to pay attention to the entire country, which I see as a plus.  I don't know how you can't.  If presidential candidates ignore enough states, like the three in the Rust Belt, then they looses.  If a party ignores a state, it becomes a swing state and demands that that party start paying attention to it again or that state switches sides.  Such was the case in CA; CA was a strong republican state prior to 50 years ago.  FL has only recently become a swing state.  WV, which is why George Bush actually won (not due to FL) was ignored completely by Gore, since he knew for sure WV would vote blue, just like Hillary knew for sure PA, WI, and MI would for vote blue too. 

"It ain't what you don't know that gets you in trouble, it's what you know for sure that just ain't so."  Mark Twain

Last, as the quote above implies, it prevents complacency and arrogance.  What if, according to Colin Powell, Hillary did not "ruin everything with her own hubris" and actually paid attention to the Rust Belt?  A lesson I am sure our next candidates in fours years won't forget. 

I consider the Electoral College, regardless if my candidate wins or looses, an ingenious way to avoid to the pit falls of pure democracies and another great example of the many checks and balances our government has. 

[KLaban]

Referring to me? No apology forthcoming.

I think - and hope - Erik was referring to Trump ;-)

[JoeKitchen]

I was a political science minor in college with an emphasis on American government.  Without getting into the weeds the Electoral College was established because of the founder's distrust in absolute democracy.  It was the same reason that the senators were not elected by popular vote for a considerable period of time after the Constitution was adopted.  There has been a lot of scholarly articles written about the Electoral College over the years predicting that there would be continuing problems regarding a differential between the popular and electoral vote.
 I'm well versed in the Federalist Papers.
This is utter nonsense.  Candidates spend time and media money in maybe 10 or so states so I don't understand how you can say this is a national campaign.  Of course the media outlets in the those states love the Electoral College as it means big advertising money coming in.  Consider the top ten states by population which make up over 1/2 of the total number of citizens in the country.  Out of these states, candidates were very active in Florida, Pennsylvania, Ohio and Michigan.  There was some campaigning in North Carolina and next to NONE in California, Texas, Illinois, New York, Georgia and New Jersey not too mention most of the other states with lessor amounts of Electoral Votes (anyone go to the Dakota, Nebraska, Wyoming not to mention Alaska and Hawaii?).  Now maybe you consider that this means that Trump and Clinton paid attention to the entire country, if so you and I have differing views of what 'entire' means.  I still don't understand you you square paying attention to the 'entire country' and then not receiving a majority of the votes cast is then something meaningful.  President Trump is governing with a minority of support from the people in this country (unless you subscribe to the voter fraud agreement). 
That's pure nonsense as the US with its two party system and bifurcated leadership is immune to the problems that plague most parliamentary systems.

First, your first paragraph does not refute mine in the least bit.  I am well aware of the reasons for the electoral college being created and appreciate the brief partial history/reasons of/for it. However, if you intended to debate my comment, I fail to see how you did, and it appears very much like a red herring argument designed to change my attention. 

You said the EC was antiquated; compared to the only other option given so far, it is not.  If you have something to suggest other then a pure democratic vote or the EC, please let us know what it is. 

Now, although I do not disagree that there are flaws in the EC (after all, men are flawed), I do think it is a better system then a pure democracy, which has been shown throughout history as an unfair system of voting due to what James Madison so eloquently explains. 

Second, to say that candidates only campaign in 10 states only applies to single time frames, but if you look at the history of campaigns in general, they do represent the majority of the states, collectively. 

Humans are complacent creatures.  We tend to vote consistently and those who lead, tend to assume those peoples whom have been with them in the past will continue to do so.  So candidates partly rely on party lines and state affiliations on where to campaign (or really were not to).  Since so many states have a strong history of voting either blue or red, it is only natural to ignore those states and assume they are a sure win, or loss.  Better to spend time in the swing states, right. 

Eventually though, those in those states being ignored become dissident and start looking at the other side, creating opportunity for a shift.  As I am sure you know since this your subject, FL was not always a swing state and not campaigned in nearly as much. 

Also, consider WV, did anyone really think Bush could have changed that state?  No, which is why Gore ignored them and then Bush did just that.  Hillary ignored PA, WI and MI for the same reasons, and found out that was a bad idea. 

Although little serious campaigning has been done in those states and they are not part of your 10 (I assume), I am sure that will change in 2020.  Will we see more then just 10 states being seriously campaigned in?  Maybe, maybe not, however, if not, it will be a different 10 states then before, even if just by one, and the process will repeat itself somewhere else, in some other state, over time. 

That's the beauty of the EC.  Sure, it does not dictate that every candidate pay attention to every state in every national election, but it is more of a rotating act keeping hubris and complacency at bay.

Last, I never said the USA government is immune to problems present in other parliamentary governments, so I am not sure how you arrived at that.   

We have our own problems, some of which overlap with other countries, but hey, at least were not like Great Britain.  Watching parliament on C-Span is both entertaining and confusing, confusing because in that environment how does anything actually get done?

[JoeKitchen]

I imagine that you are not troubled by the five elections where the winner of the popular vote was not elected President.  I am troubled by it and believe as do the citizens of the states that have approved legislation that allows those states to cast their electoral votes in favor of the candidate that wins the popular vote.

[quot]Second, to say that candidates only campaign in 10 states only applies to single time frames, but if you look at the history of campaigns in general, they do represent the majority of the states, collectively.
This is certainly not the history in recent elections.  One cannot compare this election with those in the pre-Civil War era where there were far fewer people, fewer states, and it cost much less to campaign.
The EC votes don't change until after the 2020 election so we will have the same set up.  The only major state that "may" be more contested next time is Texas where the Latino vote is expected to increase significantly.  I don't see the politics of New York, California, or New Jersey changing at all.  All three states are also every expensive in terms of media markets so if the current Dem/Rep ratio stays as is and there is no reason to expect otherwise, the Republican candidate would be a fool to spend any money there. 
parliamentary governments under proportional representation regulations are as close to pure democracy as one can get.

I am really not troubled by it.  We can not approve of a system when it works in favor of our choices and then disapprove of it when it does not.  I believe that a popular vote will only eventually backfire and create more divide, and perhaps lead to another civil war.  It may take a generation or two, but the likelihood is strong. 

Also, like I said, the EC is flawed, but so is every other form of governance.  There is no perfect solution to governing man, and I would surely take the flaws of a superior system than an mildly overall flawed system. 

Second, we do not need to look at pre-Civil War eras; states have been ignored by their favored party and changed in the last century.  CA is a great example; remember, it use to be a strong republican state.  Texas use to vote strongly democratic.  They both changed in the middle of the last century. 

Now I purposely used CA and TX as examples above since you mentioned it would be unlikely that those states would change parties.  Well, they did once already (two counter examples here, remember you only one to disprove a statement).  Sure, it is not going to happen over 4 years, or even 8, but it certainly can happen. 

Last may I state here, you still have not argued against my rebuttal of your statement that the EC is antiquated, only provided more red herrings, although interesting and perhaps not intentional, distracting my attention, which is the very definition of a red herring argument. 

[JoeKitchen]

Texas as all the other southern states moved to the Republican column after the Civil Rights Act of 1964.  You can draw whatever conclusion you want from that.  California move away from the Republican party after Governor Wilson's xenophobic adoption of strict immigration controls at the state level.  This was amply documented in Kevin Starr's wonderful history of California during that era "Coast of Dreams:  California on the Edge - 1990 - 2003" where Repblicans today stand no chance of winning any statewide office. 
  One final try here.  The EC is inherently undemocratic in that it violates the 'one person - one vote' paradigm.  Because each state gets a minimum of 3 EC votes regardless of population, a vote in Wyoming counts more than a vote in California.  California gets 1 EV for every 508K people whereas Wyoming its 1 EV per 143K.  Thus a Californian has 1/5 the voting power of someone in Wyoming.  Slate published a good MAP showing the disparity.

I do not dispute your first paragraph.  However, they did change parties, regardless of how or why it happened.  To say it can not happen is contrary to history. 

Second, although I do agree (again) with the points you just made about the EC, that is still not a rebuttal, just another red herring. 

Your original premise that I took issue with was the EC is antiquated, not undemocratic.  If you feel you wrote antiquated by mistake, admit so, correct yourself and I will accept your new points as being another discussion, not a distraction. 

If not, you have neither addressed the premise in a logical manner about why the EC is antiquated (old-fashion and out-dated, nothing to do with undemocratic) when compared to the only other option listed, a pure democratic vote, which is a centuries old concept, nor have you provided another modern, more efficient and proven method of voting for national figures, which would by the definition of antiquated prove your point. 

[JoeKitchen]

We will need to let this one end on this point and we shall both declare victory for our respective opinions.

+1

[JoeKitchen]

Nope not fake, the NPD diagnosis is very real (see my OP and post on Facebook)...but it's also not sanctioned by the Psychiatric community in general because back in the 1964 elections, Barry Goldwater was diagnosed as not being fit by 1,189 psychiatrists out of 12,000 surveyed and the Psychiatric community came up with the Goldwater Rule

From the section about the rule:

"The American Psychiatric Association (APA) condemned the use of psychiatric commentary for political purposes, and nine years later declared unethical psychiatrists' public commentary on public figures who have not been personally examined and had not given consent for disclosure. This dictum, established as Section 7.3 of the APA Code of Ethics,2 is informally known as the Goldwater Rule."

But there's nothing to keep me from calling Trump a victim of Narcissistic Personality Disorder...

Here's what I wrote in my Facebook post:

Narcissistic Personality Disorder (from Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM5)) is a serious personality disorder. According to the DSM-5, individuals with NPD have a pervasive pattern of grandiosity (in fantasy or behavior), need for admiration, and lack of empathy, beginning by early adulthood and present in a variety of contexts, as indicated by five (or more) of the following:
1. Has a grandiose sense of self-importance (e.g., exaggerates achievements and talents, expects to be recognized as superior without commensurate achievements)

2. Is preoccupied with fantasies of unlimited success, power, brilliance, beauty, or ideal love.

3. Believe that he or she is “special” and unique and can only be understood by, or should associate with other special or high-status people (or institutions)

4. Requires excessive admiration

5. Has a sense of entitlement

6. Is interpersonally exploitative

7. Lacks empathy: is unwilling to recognize or identify with the feelings and needs of others

8. Is often envious of others or believes that others are envious of him or her.

9. Shows arrogant, haughty behaviors or attitudes.”

Note, that phrase as indicated by five (or more). Trump ticks all 9 and then there's the degree of which the individual suffers the disorder. Trump doesn't exhibit a mild form of any of the 9 criteria, Trump exhibits an excess of each of the 9 criteria.

I'm pretty sure it is not in America's best interest to have somebody suffering from NPD to be President...

Before I answer this, Trump was not my preferred choice.  To be honest, I really would like to see Paul Ryan in charge, or, at the very least, get Trump off twitter.  How many problems would that solve if we just got him off of twitter. 

However, didn't the republicans catch flack during the campaign for all the TV diagnosing, without an actual examination, they did on Clinton?  How is this different? 

I think Michael Wolff, in so many words, explained rather well on what's going on in the news right now. 

[JoeKitchen]

Except that the Rethuglican wing of the Corporate Incumbent Party, did everything they could to stymie Obama's policies, and even his choice for the Supreme Court. Of course, when Democrats threaten the same thing, that's an anti-democratic outrage.

That's politics, it's a blood sport, always has been, always will be, regardless of time or country.  If you can't handle it, go home. 

To whine about the opposition shows that you are either thin skinned and/or ineffective. 

Don't believe me?  Both Clinton and Obama had essentially similar hands dealt to them.  They both had control in the first two years and lost it to a combative opposition party.  Remember, Newt and the congress shut down government for a longer period of time then did the tea party.     

Clinton still got stuff done; Obama whined. 

[JoeKitchen]

Not really.  During the Reagan years there was a lot of collaboration between parties to get things done.  I can remember being a a couple of Congressional hearings back then where Republican Senators were praising their Democratic colleagues and thanking them for working so hard to get a particular piece of legislation passed.  Dan Quayle used to remark how well he worked with Ted Kennedy on health legislation.  Things changed when Gingrich declared war on the Democrats and was able to lead the party to victory in 1994 when they took over the House.  The House has remained rancorous ever since.  The Senate still worked in bipartisan directions until McConnell and Reid rose to power in their respective parties and then the Senate became as rancorous as the House.

The nice thing about archiving things is how some of these old statements are catching up to current members.  I just wanted to point out a bit of history from one who was there at the time.

Alright, you got me Alan. 

Politics can be blood spot, and is frequently, but frequently it is not either.  The period you mentioned is an example of it not; I could give periods when it was worse then today.  Lincoln's presidency comes to mind, and that was after half the congressman on the other side stop participating in congress.

We could go further back, say look at Themistocles (and yes, I had to Google check on how to spell his name) in Greece to show how difficult politics is. 

It's not for the faint of heart regardless of how "easy" it is at the time. 

I don't blame it on Newt Gingrich either; I blame it on social media and our current news state.  They profit off of division; if it bleeds it leads.  And part of it is cyclical too, just like so many other things. 

However, my point was that regardless of how bad your opposition is, it is still possible to achieve successes without resorting to temporary executive orders and complaining eternally, which is what Clinton and Lincoln did.  Or you could do what Themistocles did, and trick your entire country and hope that it pays off in the end, which it did. 

[JoeKitchen]

exactly ! this means (1) he never has any real information ("believes") and (2) he naturally takes sides ... and UNIAN naturally picks what to report, just like the opposite side does... both sides have reasons both to escalate and not, but to use source that does not present any alternative point of view speaks for itself.

I went to high school with someone who is a professor of history.  In his graduate classes, if a student hands in a paper that only sites sources from one side of a particular issue, it's a guaranteed F. 

[Raul_82]

Because he is no longer campaigning? Shouldn't someone in his office behave act as a president for all Americans?

Voting for someone in the hopes that he will change the MO after the election is not a very bright idea. However I don't think most of his voters were expecting any different and so far they seem pretty chill with everything that's going on.

[Manoli]

Do I have all of the above correct?

You missed one out - Rick Perry as Energy Secretary.

A genius who, during a a televised debate in 2011, said he intended to eliminate the Depts of Commerce, Education and, though he couldn't remember the name, Energy ~). [NYT]

The previous two secretaries, under Obama, were physicists: one with a Nobel Prize, the other a professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.  Perry holds a bachelor's degree in animal science from Texas A&M university.  It'd almost be comical except that the agency manages the nuclear weapons stockpile and oversees American programs on nuclear nonproliferation.

[KLaban]

and if your grandma 'd have those balls... Trump played the game to win according to the rules and won, so suck it up.

Sounds like a Trumpism if ever I heard one.

I detest this anti-democratic attitude. Did the Rethuglicans just 'suck it up' when Obama won the presidency? No, they didn't; they did everything they could to frustrate his plans, including the descent into lies & misinformation that has so underpinned Trump's whole campaign & presidency so far. US democrcay isn't a one-time event, something that happens just every four years. Democracy is a process, on-going, never settled. Yes Trump won, but a fair bit of gerrymandering (aka 'cheating') underpinned that win. He won whilst losing the popular vote. He still won, but that's no reason why the rest of the people should just 'suck it up'. They have the right to complain, bitch & moan, protest, agitate for change, lobby their representatives, bitch & moan some more, throw legal challenges at the administration, refuse to comply with instructions and unjust laws, and to say "Not in my name" when Donald Little Hands tries to impose his racist, misogynist, hate-filled policies. Other than that, I agree with you 100%.

^
This.

[JoeKitchen]

I'm sure you're a great teacher as was my wife.  She did Special Ed language and speech in classes from one to four children who had psych problems as well.  Tough environment.  The problem is that the public school system and the unions work in ways that increase learning failure.  Some teachers should be fired but can't due to unions.  And the system protects kids against teachers because the politicians who want votes in the election backup the parents in situations where the kids should be disciplined and aren't.  So the teachers hands are tied.  Discipline breaks down and the good kids who want to learn fall behind as well.  That doesn't happen in charter schools  because the parents are on the teacher's side.  They want their kids taught right and won't put up with any BS from their own kids like when we were kids.  If my teacher told my parents I was acting up (can you believe that?), it was my parents that slapped me on the side of the head.  Today, the parents complain to the school officials that the teacher is giving their kid a hard time and the kids act out worse.  It's nuts!  Good minority parents are desperate to get their kids in good learning environments - hence their support for charters that Devos supports.  It's the unions that are opposed to her. 

If the Feds provide money to the state, some of it should be for public and some for charters and some for vouchers to allow competition to improve schools overall.  Teaching requirements though should not be mandated from Washington as I believe each local community knows best how they should teach their kids.    For example, because of federal funding requirements, my wife wasted about ten minutes of every period filling out federal forms on her class teaching procedures.  That was ten minutes every period that should have been spent with her kids.  It's these wasteful requirements from Washington that just don't help at all.

Also, throw in there common core and all of the other requirements coming down from Washington.  The amount of time lost to testing is absurd.  Not to mention you are always told not to teach to the test, but then told if your students do poorly you could be out of a job or have funding decreased.  So really, the only option is to teach to the test. 

And insofar as even local and state broads deciding on what to teach, that can be a disaster as well.  I use to teach high school math in NY state and we were the only state to have a Math A and Math B course, which integrated all of the fields of mathematics (you would teach in high school) into one.  This does not make sense since geometric proofs have nothing to do with algebra and so on, they are all separate fields of study that build upon each other.  It is much better to teach one field consistently over a long period of time so the students can build upon there knowledge instead of jumping back and forth. 

Every math teacher I ever spoke to felt the same, however the state board (which at the time only had one person who actually taught, albeit 30 years removed) keep on pushing it down our throats.  (This is no longer the case, but it took a long time and lots of money wasted on text books and supplies for the state to finally figure it out.) 

Another great example was that we needed to use writing in some form in every single subject including math.  Now one could argue that with geometry, this is essential, and it is.  However, the writing here was not what they preferred, sentences and paragraphs to explain an outcome.  High school students, even the good ones, have a hard time with proofs written in paragraph form, so we start them out with writing steps instead of complete sentences and paragraphs.  Not to mention even the best students in high school do not have writing skills developed enough to handle abstract writing. 

Now beyond geometry, no high school math teacher I spoke could figure out a way to use writing in algebra, trigonometry, calculus or even the super basic home ec. courses.  We asked repeatably for examples to reference and were told, "they're out there, just research on the Internet."  We could never find any and were constantly told we were not looking hard enough. 

Another gem, teaching kids why 3 times 4 is 12 instead of making them memorize their times tables.  Once again, sounds good, but when you are doing complicate algebra problems, it really slows you down if you constantly need to use a calculator to perform simple multiplication and division.  (I really blame a lot of high school math problems on grade school teachers.  Sorry, I've known too many that are okay with opening saying they are horrible at math, instead of being embarrassed by it, which should be the case, and avoid thoroughly teaching the subject.) 

All this, and the politics of teaching destroyed all my interest in remaining a teacher and now I'm a photographer full time.  Every now and then I think about it I am reminded that it has only become worse since I left and don't regret moving on. 

When I was teacher, I was, like most, a staunch liberal and democrat.  Now that I have 10 years worth of running a business, I look at all the problems caused and feel the opposite. 

Now this is not to say most school districts are in shambles; they are not.  However, the inner city schools are and they need a change.  You can argue that all we need is more money, but when has that argument ever not been used by government cronies when talking about a failing government system?  Plus, we have for years been giving more money all for not.  Time for a something else. 

Am I happy with the choice?  No.  I really would prefer someone with thorough teaching experience, but I cant support someone who is against charter schools at this moment in time. 

[JoeKitchen]

Teaching to the test is poor teaching at best.  Our public school system does not use that approach and students do very well.  However, the common core was designed so that students had a standard for which to learn.  This is the crucial fact in light of the disappointing performance of American students versus their foreign peers.  If you don't like the common core, what type of standards do you propose? 

The bigger issue with DeVos is her support for vouchers and that they might be used to send kids to religious schools.  Of course this likely would be struck down as unconstitutional.  Also Obama's Education Secretary was not opposed to charter schools. 

Our school district doesn't have them because the public schools are so good that there is no outcry for them.  It depends on where one lives.  also in rural areas where the student populations are already low, charter schools are likely not to get any support.

On the first point, I absolutely agree.  However, not teaching to the test is often not the case, especially when money and school reputations are on the line.  No matter what teachers are told to do, they are always held to the results of the state and federal test scores of their students.  This creates the situation where teachers start teaching to test, even if inadvertently, and it gets much worse in a subject with lots of material that need to be taught in a time frame not really long enough, like mathematics. 

I use to be so jealous of history teachers; if they took a day off, they could just have the students watch a movie and catch up when they got back.  The math curriculum was so jammed packed that taking one day off could really screw you up, especially with subs, most of whom had little to no skills in math, and could not control a class room. 

In the second point above, I would seriously hope that that would be deemed unconstitutional.  Even though I am a conservative, it is only on the economic side.  I am one of the most non-religious people you could meet and I am always extremely frustrated by the religious right infiltrating the republican party, which is against almost all of our founding fathers principles. 

Last, I totally agree on the last point.  Charter schools are not needed in almost all school districts.  In the city where I live, I believe though they serve a good purpose. 

P.S., I did not notice the the question you asked in the first paragraph.

Unfortunately in the current environment, students are tested on a national and state level, so twice.  This just waste too much time and puts too much stress on the teachers making sure they cover everything.  I do agree we need standards, however I would prefer to see them at the state level.  Leave it the case that suits can be brought against the state by citizens within federal court if they feel certain requirements are unconstitutional, but leave it at that. 

Now, insofar as disappointing scores, I feel this is quite misleading.  Many countries separate their students in high school in different curriculums, such as college bound or trade bound, but only really test the college bound students and publish those scores.  We though are trying to teach all students to the same level (accept for special education and developmentally challenged.)  Second, increase in education does not necessarily equate to an increase in success.  So trying to get all students to a certain higher level is not necessarily going to improve the overall economic success. 

I know body shop repairman with nothing more then a high school degree that buy and sell both me and you. 

I guess I could also add a third here too.  I thoroughly believe the biggest problem with out school system is the decrease in family values when it comes to education.  Students who are smart tend to have parents who really push them and keep up on their education.  Every smart student I taught had parents who came to every parent teacher conference.  The bad students, I never heard from or meet their parents no matter what (until maybe the last week of school asking what was wrong with my class since their child was failing.)  I'm not sure how you fix this. 

[Manoli]

So, I recently read an opinion in the The Guardian that seems to make a lot of sense...

As does the conclusion to this one, today ..

Whether or not the current stay on Trump’s US entry ban stands, this early confrontation with the checks and balances built into the US constitution reveals a basic ignorance and superficiality in his attempt to impose a “strong man” rule on America. The founding fathers put these checks and balances in place to prevent the rise of a tyrant. Resisting tyranny was the central premise of the republican (with a small r) tradition of political theory on which the 18th-century American revolution rests.

In our horror, we are missing the point that perhaps Obama has grasped. The Trump “movement” – as Trump likes to call it – died on inauguration day. That row about the numbers of people in Washington’s National Mall? It mattered. For without a mass movement that makes itself physically – and dangerously – felt on the streets, there can be no future for Mussolini-style bluster.

Trump has a stay-at-home electorate of reality tv fans. It is the left who are on the streets. It is his enemies who have the youth, anger and numbers.

Obama is smiling because he knows this is going to be the most ineffectual dictatorship ever – and soon we won’t be worrying about Trump. We will be deriding his incompetence.

[JoeKitchen]

Not just today!  As anyone who has read the works of the great American political scientist, Richard Hofstadter, well knows, anti-intellectualism has a long and storied life in the US.  In fact it was the title of one of his books.

BTW - Nordstrom stock is up another 3% this morning.  Keep up the Tweets Mr President!!!

Come on Alan, I would expect you of all on this forum to know ...

Short term increases in stocks should not be used for investment advice nor counted as gains.  We need to wait and see what goes on those racks next and how well they sell. 

[JoeKitchen]

Yes, I know that!   By the way, the President's counselor, Kellyanne Conway is in hot water as she told everyone watching Fox and Friends this am to go out and buy Ivanka Trump clothes and jewelry.  Apparently she isn't aware that this violates the ethics laws that she is subject to as a government employee.  It keeps getting funnier with each passing day.

It's interesting for sure, but I think most of what is being published in the news thus far is just banter, on the left and the right.  I think congress is giving them a grace period to complying with the law, on the ethics and business side, since no one there has ever been in politics before. 

It will probably turn out to be an year, then elections campaigns will start setting some republicans straight.  Will Lindsey Graham be the first to take on Trump?  They do hate each other; maybe we will find out his new cell phone number. 

However, one silver lining is that Trump has backed off his stance on reversing relations with Cuba, or at least that is what it appears to be. 

I was in Cuba three weeks ago, and if Cuba becomes more capitalist to the point were you can invest and then the congress opens it up to to allow us to do so, I know where a good amount of my money is going. 

You never know, there ain't no Trump hotels there yet, so maybe that will bug him enough.   

[HSakols]

If we go to war with Namibia, I'll enlist just for the landscape and music!
This is pretty funny!
Namibia First

The whole world is trolling Trump