Week of 03/30/2020

Ending The “My President” Message
– by David Matthews 2

For the past three years, there has been a troll message uttered anytime someone posts some criticism of a certain orange-skinned narcissist that is currently inhabiting the White House.

“He’s your president.”

It’s meant to aggravate the critic, to remind that person that the subject of his or her criticism is still sitting in the highest office in America, and to maybe not be critical of that person since he is “your” president.

It’s actually the reverse of a certain mantra that I’ve been hearing for quite some time about how the current occupant in the White House is “Not my president”.  And by hearing it “for quite some time” I mean for longer than the current occupant in the White House has been there.

I’ll make this simple so that my critics and even red-hat supporters will understand:

Yes, Narcissist President Donald Trump is my president.

I am an American.  I was born American.  I was brought up American.  I continue to believe in the American system, even if it is flawed and twisted and corrupt and almost at the point of breaking.  We are not “there” yet, although that could change depending on the actions of said person in the White House.  I vote.  I have voted in every presidential election since I was legally able to.  And I have voted according to my conscience, not because some dominant party told me that I had to vote a certain way.

Because I am an American, I have to acknowledge that the person in the White House, if they have been properly elected and sworn in, is the President of the United States.  So that means that person is my president, whether or not I like that person or agree with that person or voted for that person or support that person or blindly worship that person or even despise that person.

Narcissist President Donald Trump is my president.  That is a statement of fact.  I am an American.  He is the president.  That makes him my president.

Do I wish it were otherwise?  Yes.  Do I wish there was someone else in that position who would be a competent leader and not abrasive and polarizing and self-absorbed and self-serving and self-promoting clown and doesn’t parade themselves like a spoiled pampered princess?  Absolutely.  But that person either doesn’t exist or they cannot get elected given our current corrupt and rigged political system dominated by two corrupt political parties and a media that loves a manufactured horserace.

So, yes, we end up with Narcissist Donald Trump as our president, fulfilling the prediction made over a century ago by my predecessor, H.L. Mencken.  Oh, and for the record, Mencken never made reference to that person being a fool or a narcissist.  Just a downright moron.  Anything more is needless embellishment.

But that does not mean that I cannot criticize that person in the White House.  That does not mean that I cannot questions his policies and actions and statements.  Saying that he is my president does not absolve him of criticism or question.

And that is what the red-hat trolls want.  They try to use the “he’s your president” dig to shut you up, to say that you cannot question the President of the United States, that you cannot criticize him, or mock him, or make fun of his eccentricities, or to call him out on his lies and false promises and his Munchausen exaggerations.

To which I say: over my dead body.

Let’s get brutally honest here... Myself and every other American have a constitutional right as Americans to call out those in office, to question their policies and actions and antics while serving in those positions of power.  That includes Narcissist President Donald Trump and the rest of his corrupt gang of toadies and bootlickers and enablers.  That right goes all the way back to the Revolutionary War and it is one of the core reasons why America broke from the British Empire in the first place.

In fact, it is because I am an American that I have, not just a right, but an obligation to question and to call out Narcissist President Donald Trump on his policies and antics and activities.  Because he is supposed to represent and serve all Americans, not just the red-hat cult followers and the corrupt special interests who support him.  Because his actions and activities do have an impact on myself and my family, just like state and local governments impact us.

I expect the President of the United States to behave like a statesman and a world leader, not some petty, spoiled, self-centered princess who throws temper tantrums on Twitter when people aren’t worshiping him.  I expect that person to answer a softball question that would ease any worries of a nation in crisis instead of attacking the reporter and his employers and the company that owns his employers for daring to ask it.  I expect that person to lead America through a challenge like a global pandemic instead of declaring victory before the battle is even halfway fought.  I expect that person to honor the past treaties and obligations made by his predecessors and to fix any discrepancies while in place instead of blindly cancelling them just so he can “rewrite” them as his own later on.  But the fact that the person in the White House doesn’t do any that does not make him any less my president.  It just means he is a bad president.  A horrible president.  Even an incompetent president.

Yes, red-hats, Narcissist Donald Trump is my president, just like Barack Obama was yours, no matter how much you have denied it.  How many of you who are saying “He’s *your* president” today were saying “Not *my* president” when it was Barack Obama?  How many of you were calling Obama’s presidency illegitimate, based on some made-up claim that he was born anyplace other than the United States?  Go ahead.  Own that hypocrisy.  It is yours!  If you believe in an afterlife, then you will have to answer to that later on.

Yes, Narcissist President Donald Trump is my president, just like Barack Obama was, just like George W. Bush was, just like William Jefferson Clinton was, just like George H.W. Bush was, just like Ronald Reagan was, just like Jimmy Carter was, just like Gerald Ford was, just like Richard Nixon was, and just like Lyndon Johnson was my president.  And, starting with Carter, I have been a critic of every president in one way or another.  Anyone who has ever been a regular reader of my column knows that I’ve been critical of every president online since Clinton.  That does not make any of them any less my president.  But what that does is it makes me a much better American than those who expect nothing but blind cultish worship for “their” leader and have nothing but a venomous revulsion for anyone else in the position.

It was former Interior Secretary and retired general Carl Schurz who said it best following the Civil War: “Tis not, 'my country right or wrong'; tis, 'my country, that which is right to be kept right, that which is wrong to be set right'.”  The same can be said of those who lead it, no matter who that person is.

Week of 03/23/2020

We *All* Need A Bailout.  But...
– by David Matthews 2

Most of this commentator’s life has been one where my gains and victories were negated or watered down by what I refer to as the conditional ‘But’.

As in, “Congrats on winning that contest... but you were the only one that entered.”  Or, “You got the job... but there were no other applicants and nobody else wanted it.”  Or, “You won the game... but it was an easy game to win.”  Or, “You’re right... but that’s just common knowledge.”

The conditional “But” has destroyed any sense of achievement or accomplishment in what passes for my life.  And it only seems to apply to my gains and victories, never to my defeats or failures.  Those are always absolute.

Well it is high time we apply that conditional “But” to something else.

At the time of this article’s posting, we are in the start of Narcissist President Donald Trump’s Recession, sparked by the devastation caused by the coronavirus global pandemic.  Whole nations have forced themselves to lockdown, shutting down stores, businesses, daily operations.  In America, states are forcing themselves into lockdown, also shutting down stores, businesses, whole industries.  Hoarding of supplies by self-centered opportunists have led the rest of America to panic over where our own home essentials will come from.

The financial crack house known as Wall Street is collapsing.  Businesses are laying people off out of necessity.  People aren’t travelling.  They can’t go to restaurants to enjoy a sit-down meal.  Concerts and conventions, even political rallies – the narcissist’s favorite activity – are shut down.  Schools are closing.  Graduation ceremonies have been cancelled.  Gas prices may be going down, but how many people can truly get gas for their vehicles when they’re out of work and forced to stay home?

All around the world, we are seeing some twisted and bizarre distancing that resembles player-created characters in an MMORPG that can interact, but only from a distance.  Intimacy, interaction, human contact, is dead at least for the time being, and maybe even for a long time if we treat this as “the new normal”, which it should never be.  That interaction, though, has also been key in our business dealings.

So, yeah.  We got a Narcissist Trump Recession.  That is a given.  Maybe even a Narcissist Trump Depression.  Maybe even a Narcissist Trump Collapse.  He seems to make it worse every time he opens his mouth in front of cameras, because, every time he does, the financial crack house called Wall Street drops even further.  Well, he is the one that claims to do things bigger and better than ever before.

Now the talk is what to do about it.  We need a bailout.  Everyone is screaming about needing one.  Airlines, automakers, small businesses, Big Corporate, Big Hospital, Big Insurance, Big Pharma, Big Banks, Wall Street, and, of course, human beings... the ones that are really supposed to matter.

We all want a bailout.  We all “need” a bailout.  Every one of us.

But...

But do we all really need a bailout?

You know who will get bailed out first.  Big Business.  Big Corporate.  Big Banks.  Big Insurance.  Big Healthcare.  Big Pharma.  Big Farming.  Big Airlines.  All of Narcissist Trump’s buddies.

And if the last bailout twelve years ago is any indication, they’ll get those bailouts – without condition – and will turn around and engage in stock buybacks and declare the bailout as profit and then screw over their own customers just for sadistic pleasure and further profit margins.  And then they will lecture the rest of us about fiscal responsibility and saving for rainy days and the rest of us should just tighten our already-tightened belts and reach for those bootstraps that no longer exist.  Then, after that, they will pay their Trump Party friends (formerly known as the GOP) for their generosity and to continue to disable and dismantle whatever safety net exists.  This is what they’ve been doing with every bailout they get.  They get that money and then continue to act recklessly and wantonly to maximize their profits at the expense of everyone and everything else.

These entities don’t need bailouts.  Certainly not the unconditional bailouts that they’ve been getting all this time.  They need to be held to the standards they demand on the rest of us. Some of those executives may even need prison, but, given the malignant and malicious leadership in place today, you know they’ll never get that either.  Cripes, some of those criminal executives may even get the Medal of Freedom from the Narcissist when this is done.

Do you know who really needs a bailout first and foremost?  People!  Human beings!  Hard working taxpayers who have been systematically screwed over by the Trump Party (formerly the GOP) and all of those “Big” entities for decades.  You cannot have a business if you do not have consumers, and that is what human beings are.  We are the consumers!  We are the ones that keep the economy going.  Not Big Corporate.  Not Big Banks.  Not the crack house that is Wall Street.  Moms and Pops and Grandmas and Grandpas and the grown-up kids and grandkids.  We are the ones that buy the merchandise in the stores.  We’re the ones that take the trips and go on vacation and buy those homes and cars.  How can we buy those things if we have no money?

Here’s the problem... if you give people a one-time check, or even a two-time check, they’re not going to run out and buy that big-screen TV that you want them spending it on.  They’re not going to put that money down to buy a new car or a new home.  Certainly not at the amounts that are being hashed about in Washington.  The real people are going to put that money aside to help pay for those bills that they have been struggling to keep up.  You know... those bills from Big Banks and Big Corporate and Big Pharma and Big Hospital that are still due even though those entities are also getting bailed out first.  So not only are those entities getting bailed out, but then they’re getting *our* pittance of a bailout as well!  Talk about double-dipping!

If that wasn’t bad enough, we need to seriously ask where those one-time or two-time checks to the taxpayers are going to come from, because if they were anything like the last time almost 20 years ago, then they are not going to come from the same slush funds that will be used to bail out the “Big” entities.  When President George W. Bush gave out “stimulus” checks to the American people, they came from advances on our next tax refunds.  So if you took the $300, that amount was then removed from your next tax refund.

So... show of hands... how many of you hard-working Americans expect to get $1200 or $2400 from this year’s tax refund?  How many of you think you’ll get that next year? 

If those “checks” come from the same place as the ones from Bush Junior, then you will see millions of Americans get hit with a sizeable tax bill next year instead of a refund.  And you will have nobody to thank for that but Narcissist President Donald John Trump and his Trump Party schemers, including “Moscow Mitch” McConnell in the Trump Party Senate, with a portion of blame to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and her fail machine for allowing it in the name of “expediency”.

Let’s get brutally honest here... if Narcissist President Trump was in any way a competent and responsible leader sincerely interest in real change, instead of a vain and pompous self-serving demagogue who flakes out and attacks people at the simplest of snowball questions, then he’d be pushing to help out people first instead of the “Big” entities. 

If one were truly interested in helping out real people instead of “Big” entities to minimize or recover from this upcoming financial collapse, then this is what would need to happen...

First, as much as the “fiscal conservative” people would hate it with venomous revulsion, we would need to spend some serious money on the American people and also keep programs like Medicaid and Medicare and Social Security and SNAP going.  This needs to be first and foremost.  People need to spend money for businesses to keep going.  Put the horse in front of the cart for once.

Second, if any of the “Big” entities expect to get any bailout money, then they also need to put a freeze on any debts they have on the American people.  Yes, car loans and mortgages and student loans and hospital debt and credit card debt need to be frozen for at least one year if those “Big” entities are expected to get bailout money.  They can be either forgiven for that period or they can be just held in place, but if you expect people to spend money on the economy, they cannot do that if you’re demanding them to pay those debts first.

Third, stock buybacks need to end.  Period.  That is what was used to screw over the American people instead of investing in jobs twelve years ago.  All stock buybacks do is limit available stocks, which make their value rise even higher for those who don’t give them up, and also increase the profit margins of the company in question.

Fourth, this needs to be an opportunity to set aside the idea that profits should be the end-all-be-all for business at all costs.  That kind of thinking has been creating the situations that have led to bailouts for decades now.  Any kind of credible leader should be pushing to help Main Street, not Wall Street, and to help our street, not K-Street or C-Street.

I know these are pie-in-the-sky ideas, even if they are practical and would work to help out the economy.  The people in Washington today would not consider these ideas because they are so in bed with the “Big” entities and with K-Street and C-Street and their “Prosperity Gospel” fanaticism.  They are the ones that would give out the financial lifeboats only to their friends and tell the rest of us on the economic Titanic to just rotate the deck chairs.

But these ideas do need to be said... just in case there is a competent leader somewhere in the Internets.