“The Democrats have been telling us Trump’s reelection is a threat to democracy. In fact, they were so concerned of this threat, they staged a coup, ousted their democratically elected incumbent, and installed Kamala Harris.”
— Jim Gaffigan, at the Al Smith Dinner
Archive for the ‘Presidency’ Category
Friday, October 18th, 2024
Wednesday, September 11th, 2024
“I honestly believe that the rise of alternative media in this country, and the legacy media’s track record of horrific embarrassments, like covering up the Hunter Biden laptop story and lying to the American people about the mental acuity of President Joe Biden, have built up a bullshit tolerance for media spin in the average American.
More people know today that the left-leaning media has a narrative and lies to them than ever before. This debate will be different from other ones because it’ll eventually be looked at in that context. And when people go back and watch how the moderators constantly argued the merits with Trump while leading Harris in her answers to multiple questions, this debate will be revealed for the biased farce that it was. And then — mark my words — it will do more harm than good for Kamala Harris.”
Tuesday, July 30th, 2024
“The evidence was in plain sight. The question for historians is ‘Who knew the fix was in?’ And equally importantly, how could these powers behind the throne unseat Joe Biden the candidate and still leave the nation in the hands of Joe Biden the president for another six months?
That dangerous proposition is why we can’t wait for history’s verdict, and why it is imperative for journalists to dig down immediately and unravel the plot that sought to undermine not just Biden but America’s democracy and left us weaker and wounded on the international stage.
You can bet the mainstream media won’t take up the challenge. They have bought wholeheartedly into the narrative that Biden is an American hero for resigning his campaign, so it will depend on a fearless outsider like Sy Hersh or Bari Weiss to get to the truth. Let’s hope they get to it before Election Day.”— Frank Miele
Sunday, July 14th, 2024
“We are seeing how, in broad daylight, it is not actually Joe Biden making the decisions and calling the shots — whether it be related to economic or foreign policy — it’s the Tony Blinkens and the Jake Sullivans and the Hillary Clintons and Lloyd Austins who are making these decisions, which should be troubling to every American because we didn’t vote for any of those people …. a huge problem for us as Americans to have someone in that position who is incapable of fulfilling that responsibility. He should not be in that position, but we also shouldn’t be under any kind of illusion that, should he be forced out or choose to leave, that anything will be different with a President Kamala Harris or anyone else that they choose to fill that position. The Deep State — the military industrial complex — they will continue calling the shots. They only care about power. They don’t care whose face, whose picture is hanging on the wall.”
— Tulsi Gabbard
Thursday, June 15th, 2023
“Federal officials, particularly at the Justice Department, must align their conduct to the Bill of Rights. They cannot act in ways that deny due process of law; they cannot take steps to strip defendants of property except in accord with the law, etc. These external legal constraints on their conduct do not mean that these officials, of necessity, must be freed of the meta-constraint of heeding the leadership of the President on pain of facing removal from office and replacement by an official who will obey the President. Put differently, these external legal constraints as applied to the Attorney General do not mean that the Attorney General must be independent of the President. For the President is also bound by the Bill of Rights.
“The President’s role in the constitutional structure is unique, and the remedies for presidential violations of law of sufficient moment are to be found in impeachment or at the ballot box. No part of the Constitution allows the creation of one or more officials who stand above and outside the President’s unitary authority over the Executive Branch.”— Jeffery B Clark
March Ex(clusion) — fourth day
Friday, March 4th, 2022“Many called former U.S. president Barack Obama the ‘greatest gun salesman in America’ due to his support of strict gun control measures. Similarly, I believe Justin Trudeau will be remembered as the greatest Bitcoin salesman in Canadian history.”
– Frank Holmes
I don’t know what I’d be thinking today, with the dismantling of my CHANGE OF SEEN exhibition, if much of the artwork was not on its way to a new venue, thanks to Kate S of Arts Connect. My first all-collage landscape show is over, and I have much more for which to be grateful than any justification for critique. Beyond multiple deficiencies in the venue, I am enormously thankful to have been offered entrée to the Lexington art scene. Meanwhile, the war against Ukraine continues, with no ceasefire on the horizon. Yes, he is “Vladimir the Terrible,” but that is no reason to escalate a conflict that could bring catastrophic harm to the American people, far out of proportion to our interests in Eurasia. Too many are needlessly playing with a fire that could burn millions. Shouldn’t our leaders be brokering a peace, instead of throwing around gasoline?
Today’s sight bite— Driving along Clays Mill to check out my favorite chinkapin oak, —c-l-i-c-k— as grand a spectacle in the nude as he is with a full set of leafy clothes.
Tuesday, January 19th, 2021
“Now, as I leave the White House, I have been reflecting on the dangers that threaten the priceless inheritance we all share. The greatest danger we face is a loss of confidence in ourselves, a loss of confidence in our national greatness. No nation can long thrive that loses faith in its own values, history, and heroes, for these are the very sources of our unity and our vitality. At the center of this heritage is also a robust belief in free expression, free speech, and open debate. Only if we forget who we are and how we got here could we ever allow political censorship and blacklisting to take place in America. Shutting down free and open debate violates our core values and most enduring traditions. In America, we don’t insist on absolute conformity or enforce rigid orthodoxy and punitive speech codes. We just don’t do that. America is not a timid nation of tame souls who need to be sheltered and protected from those with whom we disagree.”
— Donald J Trump, Farewell Address
Sunday, November 1st, 2020
“You can see that this person has certain obnoxious characteristics and certain skill sets that bring results, and you can guarantee that after we are the beneficiaries of the results, that he’s not going to be on PBS in ten years with ex-presidents shooting the breeze. It’s just not going to happen. He’s going to be persona non grata.”
— Victor Davis Hanson, 2/13/20
Monday, February 6th, 2017
“Mr. Trump has overloaded all circuits. Everything is too charged, with sparks and small shocks all over. ‘Nothing feels stable,’ I mused to a longtime Washington media figure at a dinner the night before the Prayer Breakfast. ‘Nothing is stable,’ she replied. Earlier, on the Hill, a veteran conservative member of Congress, speaking of the president, got a puzzled look: ‘There’s no calming with him. It’s Look what I can do now!’”
— Peggy Noonan 2/2/17
It’s showtime, America . . .
Friday, January 27th, 2017
It occurs to me that if the Trump presidency is overly problematic, it can in many ways be transcended as an aberration, but Hillary Clinton was an embodiment of everything abhorrent in the existing political class, and that is why so many considered him the lesser of evils. This entire notion is beyond the typical progressive. There are times when things boil to a point more critical than political agendae. Things were due for a major disruption of the status quo. It looks like the new administration sees the first order of business to be a striking of as many blows as quickly as possible in the culture war (from political correctness to the distorted role of the media; from American exceptionalism to traditional constitutionalism). It will be interesting to watch the convulsions and to see if more good comes out of this than bad. I long for the viewpoints of Heston, Kemp, and Snow, but I’ll just have to think for myself and stay clear-headed about what is proving to be a very complex dynamic.
Now what?
Wednesday, November 9th, 2016
1:43 pm — So here we are. A shocking upset that developed state by state, well into the early hours of this morning. The possibility of a Trump win became plausible after Florida, and then Ohio made it even more conceivable. Up to that point, I had been totally convinced that Hillary would prevail. I was as wrong as those who voted for her. Too many Democrats were content to denigrate a massive chunk of the population and missed the mood of the electorate. They would have done better with James Webb, who has understood what was happening. They should have read BORN FIGHTING. The pollsters were astonishingly wrong. I think the Democrats would have preferred to have known they were behind. The media bias appears to have backfired. It energized those who felt disaffected and may have convinced members of the liberal coalition to believe that a second Clinton presidency was a done deal. Two major factors that not many are talking about today: the NRA ground game and the defection of countless union members to the Republican candidate (a throwback to the 1980s). Apparently, Clinton under-performed among educated white women, who identified less with their gender and more with the security concerns and economic uncertainties that Trump exploited. After an overnight scare, the markets have stabilized a bit today, but I expect continued volatility and perhaps a sharp technical correction over the coming weeks. At any rate, I didn’t see this coming — for Trump’s populist uprising to carry the day — and, sadly, I cannot foresee any kind of “honeymoon,” in spite of the millions who yearn for a national healing.
“We don’t for a moment think that every Trump voter shares his darkest views or instincts, only that they were willing to accept them as a way of casting a vote against ‘the system,’ as they’ve seen it. Now, their candidate is the system, and we’ll be there to hold him to account for how he runs it.”
— Jon Avlon, The Daily Beast
Tuesday, August 2nd, 2016
“Humans appear to have some need to look down on someone; there’s just a basic tribalistic impulse in all of us. And if you’re an elite white professional, working class whites are an easy target: you don’t have to feel guilty for being a racist or a xenophobe. By looking down on the hillbilly, you can get that high of self-righteousness and superiority without violating any of the moral norms of your own tribe. So your own prejudice is never revealed for what it is.
“What does it mean for our politics? To me, this condescension is a big part of Trump’s appeal. He’s the one politician who actively fights elite sensibilities, whether they’re good or bad. I remember when Hillary Clinton casually talked about putting coal miners out of work, or when Obama years ago discussed working class whites clinging to their guns and religion. Each time someone talks like this, I’m reminded of Mamaw’s feeling that hillbillies are the one group you don’t have to be ashamed to look down upon. The people back home carry that condescension like a badge of honor, but it also hurts, and they’ve been looking for someone for a while who will declare war on the condescenders. If nothing else, Trump does that.”
— J D Vance 7/22/16
Wednesday, July 6th, 2016
“James Comey gave us every reason to look upon that stage in Charlotte, North Carolina, with abject disdain toward two of the biggest liars in U.S. political history. When Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton stood together on that stage, you saw two people who abandoned Americans to die and lied about it. We saw on that stage that the new American socialist party resembles the old Soviet politburo where there are no rules for the few — but rules, laws and edicts for others. If you looked upon Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton on that stage yesterday and cheered, the day after our 240th American Independence Day — you are no Patriot and citizen of this Republic. You are nothing more than, as Vladimir Lenin stated, a ‘useful idiot’ — and a supporter of liars.”
— Allen West 7/5/16
Wednesday, June 15th, 2016
“Meanwhile, many on the right — not to mention a Republican presidential candidate — immediately turned an atrocity into an argument for a ban on Muslim immigration. Such a ban would not have stopped a killer born and raised in the United States, but it would surely encourage more potential “lone wolves” to believe that America regards Islam itself as the enemy. Indeed, banning Muslims as if they were all part of an undifferentiated blob of terrorists just happens to echo the Islamic State’s propaganda.”
— Jonah Goldberg 6/15/16
March EX-EX
Thursday, March 3rd, 2016So, the March EX-EX stands for Exercise-Experiments. I’m using the tablet of 4×5 miniatures on paper to jump-start this whole thing until I get into the collage-a-day groove. Meanwhile, The Donald is coming on like an arrogant, loudmouth, brattish, flim-flam strongman — making a mess of things with his cartoon show. It would be hilarious if the stakes were not so high. Can he be stopped?
Thursday, January 21st, 2016
“Trump is a philosophically unmoored political opportunist who would trash the broad conservative ideological consensus within the GOP in favor of a free-floating populism with strong-man overtones.”
— Jonah Goldberg 1/21/16
Friday, November 20th, 2015
“But last week’s Paris attack was different. It was about radical, violent Islam’s hatred of the West and desire to kill and terrorize its people. They will not be appeased; we won’t talk them out of it at a negotiating table or by pulling out of Iraq or staying out of Syria. They will have their caliphate, and they will hit Europe again, as they will surely hit us again, to get it. So again, the only question: What to do? On this issue the American president is, amazingly, barely relevant. The leaders and people of Europe and America will not be looking to him for wisdom, will, insight or resolve. No commander in chief of the U.S. armed forces can be wholly irrelevant, but to the extent one can be, Mr. Obama is.”
— Peggy Noonan 11/19/15
Monday, November 10th, 2014
Tomorrow is Veterans Day and, sadly, I am thinking less about the men and women who have served and more about the current commander in chief. America elected someone she thought was a catalytic figure, and still longed for true leadership four years later, but the man has squandered nearly every opportunity provided by the flow of events. He and his apologists will always attempt to persuade otherwise, with excuses that historians must soon discard when the comparison to effective presidents is made. Ultimately, leaders are never judged by the nature of any obstacles they faced, but by the magnitude of difficult personal achievements in spite of them.
Wednesday, November 5th, 2014
“I am not on the ballot this fall. . . . But make no mistake — these policies are on the ballot, every single one of them.”
— President Obama in Chicago 10/02/14
It’s only about We if it rhymes with Me
Monday, January 21st, 2013
This president— who today begins his second term in office —never has been the leader to competently unify our country. He merely has been clever enough to prevent anyone else from doing so. He has blunted the ambition of his rivals (the Clintonians) and kept his opponents fragmented (the Republicans), without offering serious solutions to grave problems or paving the way for someone who will. His emphasis on “We” must be interpreted in the context of his purposeful rhetoric of condescension, exclusion, and division. The feel-good unity of “We the People” is actually a call for solidarity within his collectivist coalition and a message to those who disagree with his priorities and policies to fall in line or back out of the national conversation.
Pick up where you left off
Tuesday, November 6th, 2012Quoting Jesus of Nazareth, Abraham Lincoln told America, “A house divided against itself cannot stand.”
The election results are clear. Very little has changed, and all the deep division resumes again tomorrow. It looks as though the president has earned a second term with fewer electoral votes than he won the first time, and with a popular-vote margin that falls short of a mandate. Although the man has succeeded in putting together his “pied piper” coalition once again, he is not the unifying leader he claims to be, and, sadly, never was.
State of the Union
Wednesday, January 25th, 2012This president is like a man who convinced a woman to marry him by promising her the world. Years later, giving serious thought to a divorce, she points out that he hasn’t delivered, and he begins to make all the old promises again as if none of it had happened. Fool me once, shame on you; fool me twice, shame on me.