Day 121 Nat'l Emergency: Disaster for Trump or the Country? The People Will Decide

The letter in Wednesday’s New York Times called the Trump presidency a “disaster, a record he can’t run on.”

I share the sentiment but disagree with the analysis.

One need only look to the Supreme Court and federal judicial appointments to recognize that for conservatives Trump has been a most successful president, defanging consumer and employee protections, undercutting Obamacare, dissolving the wall that separates church and state, providing religious cover for discrimination against women and minorities. It is a record Trump is proud to run on.

Or one could look to a watering down of environmental protections to realize Trump has succeeded in poisoning our atmosphere, polluting our rivers and lifting safeguards on national lands, to know that Trump has handed big business successes they never imagined. It is a record Trump is proud to run on.

One could look at our frayed international relations to see Trump has succeeded in making America a shadow of its once dominant position in the world, just what the isolationists along with Russia and China hoped to achieve. It is a record Trump is proud to run on.

One need only reflect on the universal meaning of the Declaration of Independence and Abraham Lincoln’s second inaugural address to comprehend that Trump has succeeded in pushing back against the twin drives for equality and tolerance for women and people of color to the joy of white supremacists. It is a record Trump is proud to run on.

One need only listen to the venom within political discourse to appreciate that Trump has succeeded in dehumanizing and demeaning political engagement, reducing it to an exchange of insults rather than ideas. Bullying vs. compromise. It is a record Trump is proud to run on.

One need only close one’s heart to the sorrow seeping through our land from Trump’s failure to act decisively in a timely manner to thwart the spread of the coronavirus, to accept Trump’s dismissal of science and medical expertise as a success against coastal elites. In his failure to express compassion for victims and their families, in his disdain for wearing a mask and shutting down schools and places of work, Trump not only places more importance on dollars over deaths but suggests a variation of his rebuke of John McCain, that he doesn’t like servicemen who become prisoners of war—he apparently doesn’t like anyone weak enough to succumb to COVID-19.  It is a record Trump is proud to run on.

Trump has brought the country to a tipping point.

It is said the only perfect vision is 20/20 hindsight. Four years ago one could only assume the worst based on his rhetoric.

Now, in 2020, Americans must choose if the trail Trump has led us on for four years deserves another four years. Or if the process of reconciliation can begin with a new president committed to our founding ideals no matter how imperfectly they have been realized in the past. 

Polls show Trump has support from less than 50% of the population. It is up to the majority to disavow Trump and his enablers in the House and Senate. Only the majority can turn Trump’s reelection campaign into a disaster—for him or for the country.

Memories from Holocaust Memorial Day

My grandparents—my father’s parents—Moses and Lina Fürsetzer, never made it to Auschwitz. Neither did my Uncle Max. Nor Aunt Klara. Neither did Uncle Willy’s wife and son.

Like almost all the 1,200 Jews of Ottynia in Galicia, in what is now Ukraine but back in 1941 was a small town in Poland, they were taken to a nearby forest and gunned down by Nazis and their local henchmen.

Willy evaded death that day because he already had been hiding in fields and, sometimes, in barns belonging to sympathetic peasants. He hid for some two years until the Russian army liberated the sector at which point he was drafted and sent to Siberia for military training.

In America since January 1939 my father knew nothing of his family’s fate as the few postcards that managed to come from his mother stopped arriving in the mid 1941. The progression of the war can be discerned from their stamps and postmarks. Polish stamps on the first. Russian stamps with CCCP letters on the second reflecting Ottynia’s location in the half of Poland controlled by the Soviet Union as part of the country’s partition with Germany in September 1939. CCCP stamps on the last postcard as well, but a fading postmark of a flying eagle carrying a swastika in its talons conveyed a message of impending doom.

After the war my father reunited with Willy in New York but the two never talked to their American families about what happened in Ottynia. Until one Passover about 30 years ago when my brother Bernie and I videotaped their memories of life in the shtetl and got Willy to recount his harrowing evasion from death.

We have no idea what happened to my mother’s family. Her father, Louis Gerson, perhaps Gershonovitz before being anglicized at Ellis Island, came to New York in 1920. His wife Sarah and their four children—Solomon, Pola, Sylvia (my mother) and Vicky—arrived in 1921. A fourth daughter, Lily, was born in America.

The Gersons came from Lodz, one of Poland’s largest cities. During World War II the Nazis confined Jews from the region in the Lodz ghetto, one of the most populous they established in conquered territories. Hundreds of thousands lived in the ghetto before dying there or being transported to concentration and extermination camps. 

I have no doubt members of the Gerson family were among the dead. My mother and her sisters never talked about it. Louis and Sarah died in 1951 and 1955, respectively.

As I have previously written about our experience at  Auschwitz I had not intended to write anything about the commemoration of the liberation of the death camp 75 years ago Monday (use the search engine at the top of the blog to read past articles about Auschwitz). 

Amidst all the articles on the impeachment trial and international commemorations of the liberation of Auschwitz, perhaps you missed a 5-4 Supreme Court decision that permitted the Trump administration to proceed with a plan to deny green cards to immigrants who might need public benefits like Medicaid, food stamps and housing vouchers. The plan is being contested in court, but the justices permitted interim implementation (https://nyti.ms/2RTmJPf).

Now Trump’s plan should be an impeachable offense. Not on a legal basis. On a moral one. Trump says he is against chain migration yet that is how his current wife’s parents came here. He is against illegal migrants working here but his resorts and golf courses routinely employ illegals.

 How many of our ancestors would not have been granted entry to America had Trump’s heartless guidelines been in effect when they landed on our shores?

From rags to riches is a foundational American story. Yet Trump’s policies would probably kibosh that ever happening again for an immigrant.

Auschwitz and Holocaust Memorial Day are reminders not only of mankind’s potential bestiality but also of what may transpire when people who have the power to help don’t. When people and governments who could extend comfort and protection don’t. When leaders hide behind conventions of government and do nothing instead of rising to the occasion to show their humanity.

Are You an ABT Voter—Anyone But Trump?

Are you an ABT voter—Anyone But Trump?

Wait. Before we get into the original subject of this blog, let me aver that I believe The New York Times, specifically columnist Bret Stephens, must have hacked my iPhone. Heck, if Jeff Bezos’ iPhone could be hacked, who am I to think mine couldn’t, especially when it contains a really juicy story idea about ABT voters. And to show you how nefariously ingenious The Times’ caper is, the paper also ran an Op-Ed piece entitled “Jeff Bezos’ Phone Hack Should Terrify Everyone” (https://nyti.ms/37oujrL), directly above a Stephens article on ABT voters. How cunning to try to misdirect the scent of the crime from its editorial room.

Late last week I started writing a blog on ABT. As I often do, I wrote the beginning on my iPhone in bed before sleep stopped my progress. But I couldn’t fall into deep slumber. Too much on my mind. Too many tasks to accomplish. So I wrote a To Do list in my iPhone before finally allowing zzzz’s to overwhelm my consciousness.

Not suspecting any skulduggery I posted a Friday blog on my recent purchases of cardigans instead of the Anyone But Trump theme.

Imagine my excitement then when Saturday afternoon I opened The Times to see the following headline:

“Anyone But Trump? Not So Fast,” a column by Bret Stephens printed directly under the aforementioned opinion piece on Jeff Bezos (https://nyti.ms/2Rnl0mc). 

I quickly checked my iPhone for literary comparisons to what Stephens wrote. After all, it is not uncommon for good ideas to simultaneously formulate in the minds of several journalists. That’s when the hacking was “revealed” to me. Revealed might not be the right term, for my ABT story and my To Do list were nowhere to be found in my iPhone.

Now, some of you might be thinking I just forgot to save the ABT story. You know, you’re thinking he’s already admitted to being “old,” another synonym for forgetful or just plain tech-challenged. Yeah, true on all counts. But why would I lose the To Do list, as well? I’m thinking The Times hackers stole that file to really mess with my sanity.

I’ve no proof for these wild allegations. Just a deep-seated journalist’s hunch. Or more probably, a pixieish imagination. Anyway, time to talk about ABT and Stephens’ analysis.

I am an ABTer, though I admit I am not enthusiastic about any of the choices Democrats are proffering. There’s goodness in most of them and cautionary traits as well. Unlike many punsters on the left and right I do not fear a Warren or Sanders presidency tilting our government too much to the extreme. None of the Democratic candidates has the bellicosity Trump has displayed to cower the party into cult-like submission. Any Democratic president will have to work with Democrats in Congress to forge consensus, middle of the road changes that first and foremost restore progress achieved in the Obama years to environmental, civil rights, labor, health care, and abortion rights causes, to name a few initiatives. 

Anyone, I believe, would be better than Trump. 

In offering a defense against Trump’s impeachment, Stephens wrote, “First, the argument (for impeachment) overstates the extent to which this presidency has eroded the foundations of liberal democracy at home and abroad. Has Trump abandoned NATO? No. Has he lifted sanctions on Russia? No. Has he closed the borders to all immigrants? No. Did the president steal the midterms, or stop Congress from impeaching him? No. Has he significantly suppressed the press? Again, no.”

I disagree.  Has Trump weakened respect for the judiciary? Yes. Has he weakened our constitutional checks and balances system of government? Yes. Has Trump strained relations with allies? Yes. Has he eroded the credibility of our intelligence and law enforcement services? Yes. Has Trump strengthened the dark forces of white nationalists? Yes. Has he emboldened despots and autocrats around the globe? Yes. Has Trump corroded America’s historic values? Yes. Has he debased the bond our word used to be throughout the world? Yes. Has Trump made lies and falsehoods the new standard of presidential speak? Yes. Has he made Americans and the rest of the world lose trust in what America stands for? Yes.

But all of those actions do not rise to the level of an impeachable offense. They just show he is a bad, dangerous president. 

What are impeachable offenses are his attempt to extort Ukraine into interfering in the 2020 election by announcing a corruption investigation into his political rival, Joe Biden, in return for a White House meeting and the transfer of withheld military aid approved by Congress, and the obstruction of the House of Representative’s probe of his actions by refusing to release documents and allowing his aides to testify about the Ukrainian affair. 

Stephens and I shared an editorial construct. But we diverged in our execution. I prefer mine to his. I hope you do, too.

Wimping Out: While I’m blasting away at The Times, let me also opine that the flagship newspaper of American journalism wimped out when it came to its dual endorsement of Senators Elizabeth Warren and Amy Klobuchar as the best choices for the Democratic Party presidential nomination. 

I’m not against the failure to choose a singular candidate. Rather, what immediately struck me as cowardly is the decision to publish the joint endorsement on a Monday, not on Sunday. 

I know that Monday, January 20, coincided with commemoration of Martin Luther King Jr. Day and was exactly one year prior to the inauguration of our next president, but if The Times wanted the biggest bang for its buck it would have printed its choices in the issue with the largest circulation of the week (1,087,500 copies)—the Sunday edition—which enjoys readership almost double that of the weekday issues (571,500).  

Impeachment Charges, Biden Lets Loose and Historic Facts

Here’s an example of what one of my graduate school journalism professors called a “nothing new” headline:

“House Impeaches Trump.”

Here’s another example:

“Senate Acquits Trump.”

It doesn’t take a genius to know as sure as the first headline will be realized before Christmas, the second will follow in short order, possibly before the end of January.

Unless Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has an epiphany and switches his allegiance from the autocratic orangeman in the White House to the U.S. Constitution there is scant expectation Trump will face any penalty greater than history’s assessment of his guilt. 

However, in the debate over what charges the House of Representatives should level against the nasty-man-in-chief, there is an important bit of politics that must be played out. Should Trump be charged merely with abusing the power of his office for personal and political gain through an attempted bribery of the president of Ukraine to investigate Joe and Hunter Biden in return for arranging a White House meeting and unfreezing Congressionally approved military aid, or should the House lay out a laundry list of offenses including obstruction of justice? 

Those in favor of the former argue it would be a more focused indictment, easier for the public to wrap its mind around. That argument, however, presumes the possibility of a conviction. 

Ha! It will never happen (not “would never happen” which implies “maybe;” under McConnell it is a certainty the Senate will not convict).

The Democratically controlled House, therefore, should engage Republican hands by throwing the kitchen sink at Trump, forcing GOP senators to go on the record to condone each and every behavior that is injurious to American interests and constitutional norms. Make each senator run on his or her compliance with actions they would never tolerate if a Democratic president undertook them. 

A Biden Bite: A show of raw emotion was just what Joe Biden needed to spark his candidacy. But I would suggest the former vice president should not have called an Iowa farmer a “damn liar” during a campaign stop Thursday for regurgitating Trump and Fox News charges that he sold access to the Obama presidency and helped his son Hunter obtain a lucrative job with an energy company in Ukraine, a position for which he had no experience.

Instead of directly insulting the 83-year-old retired farmer, Biden should have countered thusly: “You’re repeating falsehoods, lies, that were created by Russia and Vladimir Putin and promulgated by his corrupt ‘useful idiot’ in the White House and his unscrupulous supporters in the House and Senate. You’re repeating a false narrative which is undermining our democracy.”

Biden took a more in-your-face response. It displayed fire in the belly that has been lacking and, if he is fortunate enough to secure the Democratic Party nomination, will be required if he is to successfully confront Trump.

Historic Facts: Just when you thought the public could not get any crazier, here are two stories that boggle the mind:

A majority of Republicans believe Trump is a greater president than Abraham Lincoln (https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-7742883/Majority-Republicans-think-Donald-Trump-better-president-Abraham-Lincoln.html). I’ll let you parse that one without further reflection on my part.

Here’s the Mideast Problem in Brief: In a speech in November, Riyad Al-Aileh, a Palestinian political science lecturer at Al-Azhar University, said Jews only came to the region “as invaders 70 years ago.” Another Palestinian “intellectual,” Abir Zayyad, an archaeologist and member of Fatah’s Jerusalem branch, asserted “We have no archaeological evidence of the presence of the children of Israel in Palestine in this historical period 3,000 years ago, neither in Jerusalem, nor in all of Palestine.” 

So there you have it—A rejection not only of Jewish heritage in the land of Israel but also, by inference, of the existence of Jesus, his visit to the temple in Jerusalem and his later return to the city, his trial and crucifixion. A rejection of Roman historical records. It makes one wonder how any peace can be achieved when one side is so delusional. 

Expect Impeachment But No Conviction

After three sometimes gripping, at time contentious, sometimes pedestrian days of hearings by the House Intelligence Committee, the questions to be answered are, Did Donald Trump’s actions rise to the level of an impeachable offense? And, given the Democratic Party majority on the committee and on the Judiciary Committee which would have to pass impeachment charges, and its majority in the full House of Representatives which has to affirm the charges which would then be sent to the Senate for consideration, is there any prospect that the Republican controlled Senate will vote to convict and thereby remove Trump from office?

Yes, the House will vote along party lines to impeach; no, the Senate will not vote to remove.

There was no smoking gun testimony as there was during the Watergate hearings and impeachment inquiry. No secret tapes (as far as we know). Nothing and nobody to testify to direct person to person dialogue with Trump about his actions to withhold congressionally approved military aid to an ally unless Ukraine investigated Joe and Hunter Biden.

Unless, and it is a big unless, former national security director John Bolton chooses to testify. Assuming, of course, that he would finger Trump for actions specifically in violation of his oath of office. 

At the end of the day Trump will get off with no more than a slap on the wrist. Like a cookie jar pilferer who gets caught by an admonishing mother, he no doubt will return to equally provocative acts, believing that as long as the Senate remains Republican controlled he will be immune from removal.

Here’s another question central to our democracy—when, if ever, will Republicans return to their long held beliefs? When will they once again condemn executive office overreach? When will they recall their opposition to a ballooning national debt and their desire for a balanced budget? When will they again champion unfettered foreign trade not hamstrung by tariffs? When will they advocate for strong and respectful international alliances? When will they rebuke a president who trusts Russia more than his own intelligence agencies?

Is the answer only when Democrats regain the presidency?

Have we so tribalized our politics that we cannot accept any action by a president from the opposition party, and the corollary, that we blindly accept whatever “our guy (or  gal)” does?

Has our politics become so toxic that anyone we disagree with immediately becomes the object of smear campaigns and physical threats? 

Don’t expect answers from me. I’m as perplexed, as depressed, as woebegone as you. 

Sell the Sizzle, Not the Steak

Robert Mueller’s testimony Wednesday on his investigation of Russian meddling in the 2016 election and possible conspiracy and obstruction of justice by Donald Trump, his campaign and administration reminded me of one of the first tenets of successful marketing I learned when I started covering retailing back in 1977: 

“Sell the sizzle, not the steak.” Presentation, not taste, was more important in restaurants trying to capture consumer acceptance. The concept applies to almost all consumer goods. Watch most automobile ads and you’ll see what I mean. Car ads sell you a feeling, an experience, not an actual product.

Sadly, watching or listening to a 74-year-old man dodder his way through six hours of grueling and grilling testimony, roughly half of which was intended to pierce his patriotic professionalism in defense of our country while his detractors defended a would-be despot, was an exercise so painfully depressing Gilda and I independently had to turn off the broadcasts we were tuned into in separate rooms, she while doing her yoga, I while eating my breakfast. 

Bob Mueller was no 34-year-old John Dean testifying cooly and controlled before Congress about a “cancer” growing on the presidency of Richard Nixon. Of course, most of the country wasn’t alive back in 1973 when Dean testified during the Watergate hearings while his wife Mo (Maureen) sat pertly and stoically behind him, her blonde hair pulled back tightly in a bun. 

The substance of Mueller’s findings were already known from his 448 page report. Anti-Trumpers wanted bold vocal confirmation that obstruction of justice had taken place in the Oval Office, that Russia had compromised the election. They had to settle for a less powerful than hoped for performance. 

Pro-Trumpers—in other words Republicans and the man himself—reveled in the optics. They claimed no verbal knockdown meant they won the day, ignoring Mueller’s assertion his report did not exonerate Trump from a charge of obstruction and that once he left office he could face prosecution. 

For those who didn’t tune in for all six hours of testimony, their take on the proceedings came from their main news outlets. So their views were reinforced. 

Few minds, I would think, changed opinions on the matter. You either like Trump or fear for our republic. 

Underpinning Kamala Harris' Popularity Wave

Turns out I am part of the wave Kamala Harris is surfing towards the lead of Democratic Party presidential hopefuls. 

Right before dinner Monday evening I did something I normally resist: I answered a land line telephone call from a number I didn’t recognize because the screen indicated the caller emanated from New Haven where Gilda and I lived 42 years ago. 

An elderly gentleman—I could tell he was elderly by his slow, raspy voice, his cheerful colloquial demeanor and the way technology challenged him—said he was calling from the Quinnipiac University national poll. 

Having employed consumer researchers for my magazine for more than 30 years, I am a sucker for surveys if they don’t interfere with what I am doing. He caught me at a good time. 

I haven’t chosen a preferred candidate, though I have opined that Joe Biden should be given a chance to strut his stuff to determine if he is 2020 qualified and not stuck in a 20th century time warp. Sadly, last week’s initial debate revealed him to be slow-footed in word and thought. Donald Trump must have been salivating at the prospect of squaring off against him.

On the other hand, Harris followed up on her sharp questioning of Trump Supreme Court nominees with a piercing attack on Biden. For those who later complained that she bushwacked Biden with a well planned foray, I say it showed she would be adept at confronting and countering Trump during a debate (assuming the chicken-in-chief agrees to participate—mark my words, he will at first reject any debates and then, in what he, in his own mind, will consider a majestic concession, will agree to debate three times). I want a candidate who prepares, does homework. Biden’s people had prepped him, but he failed to rise to the occasion. 

So I gave Kamala Harris a vote of confidence, though not an unqualified endorsement as I yet don’t know enough about her.

“A new national Quinnipiac University poll, released Tuesday, July 2, shows Biden, who once led the field by around 20 points, now clinging to a two-point lead over California Sen. Kamala Harris, 22 percent to 20 percent,” The Daily Voice reported. (For you political nerds, follow the link to Quinnipiac's release: https://poll.qu.edu/national/release-detail?ReleaseID=2631)

Now, one debate does not a president, or a party nominee, make, or break. But the winds of change are blowing hard, fueled by Trump’s take-no-prisoners stands on immigration and the detention of asylum seekers, census citizenship questions, tariff wars, relations with allies and Russia/North Korea/Iran, climate change and a host of other issues.  

Biden’s early strength came from the Afro-American community and senior citizens. It is dissipating. Biden is a “Yeah, I’m comfortable with him” vote. Harris, on the other hand, will ignite passion among black and hispanic voters, and among old-time liberals. Unless he shows more vigor during subsequent debates Biden would be no match against Trump. Harris has shown herself to be a sharp inquisitor and someone who could hold her own against a man.  

Hip, Hip, Hooray to the Queen's History Lesson

Let’s give a traditional British cheer to the Queen—Hip, Hip, Hooray; Hip, Hip, Hooray; Hip, Hip, Hooray—for her nuanced yet clearly distinguishable and distinguished public rebuke of Donald Trump’s disruptive attacks on global institutions that have safeguarded democracies since the end of World War II.

Speaking in what the Daily Mail called “code,” Queen Elizabeth II’s toast during the formal state dinner for her visitor included the following: “After the shared sacrifices of the Second World War, Britain and the United States worked with other allies to build an assembly of international institutions, to ensure that the horrors of conflict would never be repeated. While the world has changed, we are forever mindful of the original purpose of these structures: nations working together to safeguard a hard-won peace.” (https://mol.im/a/7100721)

It could hardly go unnoticed that Trump has questioned the value of NATO, has sharply criticized several of its members including the leaders of Germany, France and even Great Britain, has sided with NATO’s chief adversary, Russia, and has sought to undermine the European Union. 

The queen’s foray into tactful but forthright diplomacy was a deviation from her normal, at least in public, arms-length distance from politics. Contrast that long held behavior to that of Prince Charles who has been reliably reported to be eager to confront, or shall we say, educate, Trump about the realities of climate change. 

For his dinner toast, Trump  lavished praise on the 93-year-old monarch who has provided “seven decades of treasured friendship.” He called her “a great, great woman.” 

“On behalf of all Americans, I offer a toast to the eternal friendship of our people, the vitality of our nations, and to the long-cherished and truly remarkable reign of her majesty, the Queen,” he said. 

Trump also said he was toasting the “common values that will unite us long into the future—freedom, sovereignty, self-determination, the rule of law and reverence for the rights given to us by Almighty God.”

By including “self-determination” Trump may have been signaling his support for Brexit, a stance he has openly endorsed. 

How Trump will react to the gloved hand rebuke by the queen is unknown at this time. It is doubtful he will call her “nasty,” as he did her granddaughter-in-law, the Duchess of Sussex (Meghan Markle). Trump loves pageantry, even if it casts a shadow on him. All he will remember is the sumptuous surroundings of a state dinner in Buckingham Palace, with all eyes on him and the queen.

History, Realpolitik Lessons from Khashoggi Killing

Here’s what history teaches us: When an absolute monarch or would-be-monarch-with-absolute-powers expresses displeasure with someone within their access there are bound to be sycophants who will eliminate the source of that displeasure. 

Did Henry II of England command the death of Thomas Becket, archbishop of Canterbury, or did he merely express frustration of his one-time friend and current antagonist when he is said to have said, “Will no one rid me of this troublesome priest?”

Who knows? All we do know is that four of Henry’s loyal subjects rode to Canterbury and did away with Becket in the cathedral. 

That was in the year 1170. Yet, even in medieval times kings accepted responsibility for actions taken on their behalf, at least when the murdered is well known and admired by the populace. So Henry accepted blame and took some, light, punishment. 

In 21st century Saudi Arabia—among the remaining principalities that could pass for having Middle Ages morals and values—the monarchy is not prone to accept human frailty or responsibility, no matter how damning the evidence of its complicity appears to be in the murder of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi, an outspoken critic of the Saudi regime living in the United States. Khashoggi was killed October 2 inside the Saudi Arabian embassy in Istanbul by a Saudi hit squad linked to the crown prince after he was lured there on the pretense he could obtain proof he had divorced his wife so he could legally marry his Turkish fiancee (Though Turkey is an Islamic country, it does not accept polygamy.) 

Targeted assassinations of a country’s dissidents are not exclusively a Saudi province. Kim Jong-un has dispatched operatives to permanently silence voices, even those of relatives, he doesn’t want talking about his treatment of North Korea. Vladimir Putin has seen fit to rid the world of Russian truth-sayers about his autocratic rule of Russia.  A common thread among these tyrants is that with impunity they care not that these rubouts may occur on foreign soil. 

(These assassinations are distinctly different from those perpetrated by Israel. Israel has killed terrorists involved in the murder of its citizens and those who incite other to seek its destruction. Similarly, the United States approved the assassinations of al-Qaeda and ISIS leadership.)

The brazenness of the Khashoggi killing, with lurid as yet unconfirmed details of torture, dismemberment with a bone saw, and the pathetic, infantile attempt to explain away his disappearance and subsequent admission of the cause of death, has challenged the sensibilities of many in the Western world and those in the Middle East who are not in the Saudi sphere of influence.

But let’s keep in perspective the fact that Khashoggi was a journalist, a contributor to The Washington Post. Had he worked in another profession, or for a less renowned publication, the American furor over his murder might have been no greater than the outcry over the deaths of the 45 other journalists killed around the world in 2018. 

As he hardly has met an autocrat he doesn’t feel akin to, Donald Trump is loathe to criticize the Saudi monarchy. He is mindful, some say too mindful, of the extensive investment Saudi Arabia intends to make in American arms and aircraft (Trump inflates the price tag, but it is substantial in dollars amounts and the number of jobs it will support). As with other presidents before him, Trump’s response to Saudi indiscretion is tethered by realpolitik. 

The bottom line is America will hyperventilate for a while over Khashoggi’s assassination, Saudi Arabia will remain ruled by reactionaries, and despots will continue to confront, assault and kill their adversaries wherever they choose. Recall that for all his bluster about Saudi Arabia’s complicity in killing Khashoggi on Turkish soil, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, president of Turkey, had no regrets about having his thugs attack protesters during his visit to Washington last year. 

John McCain, an American Hero, but a Conservative in Policy and Heart

I admired John McCain, the maverick Republican U.S. senator, former prisoner of war who endured more than five years of captivity and torture in North Vietnam and who dramatically gave a thumbs down to Donald Trump and Mitch McConnell’s plan to kill Obamacare, despite his overall disapproval of the Affordable Care Act. Yes, McCain had his moments during a distinguished life and career that ended Saturday, four days shy of his 82nd birthday. He deserves to be lionized for a life lived to the fullest. 

But let’s not forget in his heart McCain was a conservative. Had he outpolled Barack Obama in 2008 the Supreme Court today would look vastly different. Absent would be Sonia Sotomayor and Elana Kagan. The court’s tilt to the right would be so steep a slant that it would be decades before even a semblance of balance could be attained. The judicial packing of conservative judges on lower federal benches now underway by Trump would have been part of a sustained 16 year program started by George W. Bush and continued by McCain. 

Let’s not forget he elevated Sarah Palin to national status. She might well have been his successor as president. McCain opened the door for an inexperienced, unprepared, uninformed blowhard of a candidate to be accepted as appropriate for the most important position in the world. 

Let’s not forget he was a military hawk. Would he have engaged us in Ukraine or would Russia not have dared to take over Crimea and mettle in eastern Ukraine? Would he have pushed for involvement in the Syrian civil war? Would he have triggered a military response to North Korea’s quest for a nuclear bomb? Would he have escalated our commitment in Iraq and Afghanistan or, as a veteran of one futile war, seen the absurdity of winning any Middle Eastern conflict? 

McCain was a straight talker. He took principled positions. He understood the need for bipartisan governing. He worked with liberal senators on such issues as immigration reform and campaign finance reform. But let’s not forget: he was a conservative. Social programs to provide a safety net were not his top priority. He did not champion civil rights. 

He believed in America. Perhaps his most enduring moment came not when he defied an egotistical, mean-spirited, cold-hearted incompetent president at 2 am on the Senate floor by casting the decisive vote on Obamacare, but rather when he defended candidate Obama in 2008 as a man and woman challenged his religion and allegiance to the United States. McCain forcibly, passionately, refuted them. He disagreed with Obama’s policy ideas, but never questioned his patriotism or qualifications (https://youtu.be/jrnRU3ocIH4).

How different the tone of government would have been under McCain compared to what we have today.  But let’s not conflate McCain with compassionate Republican conservatism. All that Trump has done domestically to reduce protective regulations on business, the environment, voting rights, social services and labor safeguards would have transpired under any Republican president, including McCain. on the other hand, we probably would not be in a trade war with anyone or be hostile to our allies and friends around the world. Russia would not be favored over our intelligence and law enforcement agencies. Flattery would not be the sine qua non for foreign relations. 

John McCain was a tower of a man. He was a patriot who ably represented his state and country. These last two years he was a noble foil to the fool in the White House. With his death (and the pending retirement of senators Jeff Flake and Bob Corker) reason and rational thought have departed the GOP side of the Senate (save, perhaps from Ben Sasse). We are left with no mavericks but with lemmings blindly in lockstep with a leader racing to the edge of the precipice and beyond. 

Yiddish "Fiddler": A Reality Check on Survival

One of the eternal laugh lines of any staging of Fiddler on the Roof, including the production in Yiddish currently playing at the National Yiddish Theater Folksbiene inside the Museum of Jewish Heritage in Lower Manhattan, comes in the opening song, “Tradition.” 

As Tevya the milkman introduces the audience to the varied characters that populate his shtetl hometown of Anatevke, a pious resident asks the rabbi if there is a proper blessing for the Tsar. 

Of course, responds the rabbi. He chants, “May God keep the Tsar … far away from us!” 

Like Jesse Green of The New York Times who reviewed the play (https://nyti.ms/2JtZnJW), Gilda and I shed more than a tear or two as we sat through a preview last Thursday. We know but a handful of Yiddish words, but as veterans of prior Fiddler productions (including, for me, the original Broadway cast starring Zero Mostel), the story line and songs required little translation, though the theater provided both English and Russian supertitles on both sides of the stage. 

Through the decades since its debut in 1964 Fiddler has conjured up a fantasy world of the hardscrabble peasant life—make no mistake about it, most Jews were peasants in the shtetls of the Pale of Settlement, the restricted zone to which Jews were confined by the tsars. Nevertheless, they no doubt loved Mother Russia and were truly saddened when uprooted from their homes. Even those who came to America shared fond memories with their descendants.

Jesse Green wrote the Yiddish version of Fiddler evoked the “sound of my own grandparents and all they lost in leaving their Anatevkes.

“Fiddler on the Roof always makes you cry for that loss.”

Yes, tears do flow, but a reality check is in order. Had they stayed in the Pale, Gilda likes to point out, they likely would have perished, if not during World War I, surely during the second world war. 

So, I’m going to give the tsar a pass. Not a blessing, and surely not the kiss of friendship, or is it fealty, proffered by Donald Trump to Russia’s current nominal tsar, Vladimir Putin. 

Jesse Green and millions of other Jews in America, Israel and numerous countries around the globe are alive today because the rabbi’s blessing to keep the tsar far away fell on deaf ears. Or, perhaps, God took the request literally and arranged the mass emigration of his chosen people to safer lands not ruled by a tsar. 

Far-fetched? Could be. But as The Times headline observed, “Fiddler in Yiddish? Sounds Crazy, Nu?”

Timing of Trump Presidency in the Balance

In life, it is said, timing is everything.

The future of Donald Trump’s presidency, it may be said, hinges on timing. If one believes the dumpster-in-chief will fire special counsel Robert Mueller, the question becomes not why, but rather, when.

If he wields the twitter ax before the November elections he would galvanize an already white hot opposition, perhaps fueling enough rage to flip the House and Senate into Democratic control. Impeachment proceedings would surely follow in the new year when the next Congress convenes.

He may, therefore, wait to dump Mueller, along with Attorney General Jeff Sessions and Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein until after the elections. But that route risks providing Mueller with more than seven full months to further his investigation of Russia’s influence and interference in the 2016 elections and the Trump family’s ties to Russia. 

Does Trump want, in his mind, to be a political piñata seemingly forever? According to CNN, Mueller has indicated he has four main topics he would like Trump to address through questioning: his “role in crafting a statement aboard Air Force One that miscast Donald Trump Jr.’s campaign June 2016 meeting with Russians in Trump Tower, the circumstances surrounding that Trump Tower meeting as well as the firings of FBI Director James Comey and national security advisor Michael Flynn” (https://www.cnn.com/2018/03/21/politics/mueller-four-main-areas-questions-trump/index.html).

Though he has repeatedly said he would welcome talking with Mueller, Trump’s propensity to fabricate and dissemble could place him in jeopardy of perjury. It is hard to imagine any intelligent lawyer permitting Trump to appear under oath before Mueller. Of course, that presumes Trump would listen to any lawyer. He believes he always knows best.

During his campaign Trump boasted he would hire the best people (considering how many firings, resignations and abuses of taxpayer money his appointments have racked up, it is startling to think anyone has any confidence in Trump’s capacity to select competent, honest people to serve in his administration). 

Trump lambasted George W. Bush for his foreign policies, particularly as they affected the war in Iraq. So one wonders how he could hire John Bolton as his new national security advisor. Bolton was a prime contributor to Bush’s foreign policy team (https://nyti.ms/2pz9SnY).

Bolton is as hawkish as they come, giving credence to speculation that Trump is surrounding himself with voices that prefer to counsel combat versus conflict resolution, be it with Iran, North Korea or any other trouble spot. 

Timing, again, comes into play. Trump wanted a tougher team behind him, with Bolton and secretary of state nominee Michael Pompeo, rather than General H.R. McMaster and Rex Tillerson, as he prepares to meet with North Korea leader Kim Jong-Un and reaches a decision on staying in or abrogating the Iran nuclear deal. 

In the context of what is good for the country or what is good for Trump, he might favor hostilities as history has shown that at least at the beginning of combat the public rallies around a president. 

In the end, however, a sufficient number of voters will come to their senses. As long as the Democrats do not choose an unelectable alternative, Trump’s tenure in office is just a matter of time ticking off until January 2020, or sooner. 

Kasich Is All Cuddly But at Heart a Conservative

You have to hand it to John Kasich, the governor of Ohio, who failed in his attempt to secure the Republican Party presidential nomination but who continues to try to present himself as a reasonable, humane, thoughtful, non divisive alternative to Donald Trump should there be a vacancy, for any reason, at the top of the 2020 GOP ticket. 

Kasich appeared on Late Night with Seth Meyers a day before Trump delivered his State of the Union address Tuesday. He sounded soooo normal. And Meyers, usually a sharp observer of the political landscape, fell into the trap Kasich set. 

You see, Kasich is a conservative. His tone might be different, more pleasing, than Trump’s, but his substance, the outcome of his actions, were he to inhabit the White House, would not be materially different.

Like an old sweater one wears around the house, Meyers felt comfortable talking kumbaya with Kasich. (Here are two clips encompassing the totality of the interview:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AJ4sZY_RowM

and https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gnd-dyL5SIE) 

But Meyers never asked him any nitty gritty questions about what the Trump administration has done and if he would have done the same or acted differently.

What, for example, is Kasich’s position on coal? Is he in favor of softening environmental regulations on coal mining and burning? What’s his position on alternative energy sources? Would he permit oil and gas exploration along our coastlines?

Would he have nominated Neil Gorsuch to the Supreme Court? In general, what criteria would he use in selecting federal judges?

How would he have fixed Obamacare? 

What are his beliefs on abortion and funding of Planned Parenthood for non abortion related activity?

What are his positions on NAFTA, the Paris climate accords, NATO, the Keystone Pipeline, the Trans Pacific Trade Pact, the United Nations, Jerusalem as the location of our embassy in Israel, the prison at Guantanamo Bay, the Iran nuclear deal?

How would he resolve differing views on the Dreamers? Would he build a southern border wall? What, if any, changes would he like to see in our immigration policy?

Does he believe Russia interfered in our 2016 election? 

Is he comfortable with the influence the religious right is having on government? 

Is the new tax plan acceptable to him?

Many of these questions can be answered by looking at Kasich’s Web site (https://www.johnkasich.com). For example, Kasich champions his opposition to abortion and funding of Planned Parenthood. 

We live today in a sound bite world. For Meyers (and, to be honest, lots of other TV hosts) to give Kasich and other politicians a soapbox to sound statesmanlike without providing specifics would result in saddling us with another Trump, albeit with a more teddy bear demeanor.

We would be shaking our heads and wondering how we got duped again. Meyers is an entertainer. I get that. But he has injected himself five nights a week into the political dialogue so he needs to step up from one dimensional attacks on Trump’s behavior to offer constructive alternatives. 

Have more respect for, and confidence in, his audience, that viewers want not just jokes but hard information when interviewing Kasich et al, as he has done with his Closer Look segments. 

Alternative Universe: What alternative universe does Donald Trump live in? Prior to delivering his State of the Union speech he said his goal would be to end the divisiveness that has existed in the country for many years. 

It’s a laudable objective but does he not recognize that he is a prime reason we are a polarized society? 

From his despicable advocacy of the birther movement questioning the legitimacy of Barack Obama’s presidency to his abusive comments, delivered live and in tweets, mostly about women but also about anyone who disagrees with him, to his embrace of neo-Nazi and alt-right leaders and members, to his denigration of national organizations such as the FBI and the CIA, Trump has done more to divide our country than any president of the last century. 

It’s no wonder that Kasich thinks being a “good guy” might be enough to propel him forward. 

Melania Has Earned Our Pity

Consider the symbolism of First Lady Melania Trump’s visit to the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, DC, Thursday while her husband junkets in Davos, Switzerland, among the corporate and political elites he has long disparaged. 

Consider the visual impact of the ultimate trophy wife staying home, foregoing an international stage, instead visiting a museum with a message of tolerance and engagement to prevent bigotry and its physical consequences.

Consider the humiliation Melania has suffered within the last month. In “Fire and Fury,” Michael Wolff’s tell all about the first hundred days of the Trump administration, she was displaced in bed by a cheeseburger. Even more ghastly was the revelation the philanderer-in-chief not only cheated on their marriage but did so within weeks of her delivering to him a son. Will she ever again be able to look upon Barron without visualizing Trump in his tighty-whities chasing porn star and director Stormy Daniels around a hotel bed, or being spanked by her with a rolled up copy of Forbes magazine featuring Donald, Donald Jr. and Ivanka pictured on the cover? (to those seeking the salacious details, here are three links: In Touch Weekly: http://www.intouchweekly.com/posts/stormy-daniels-full-interview-151788;

Daily Beast: https://www.thedailybeast.com/stormy-daniels-friend-trump-chased-her-in-hotel-room;

Mother Jones: https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2018/01/stormy-daniels-once-claimed-she-spanked-donald-trump-with-a-forbes-magazine/)

Consider the symbolism of visiting the Holocaust museum on the day Trump advanced a program to restrict entry into the United States, entry denied to hundreds of thousands of Jews trapped in Nazi Germany and its occupied territories three-quarters of a century ago. 

Consider this visit to a memorial dedicated to victims who were denied their humanity even as she suffered indignity and humiliation heaped on her by her husband.

Consider a visit to an edifice dedicated to the tragic consequences of denying safe refuge to people persecuted for their religion even as the supposed “leader of the free world” disparages Islam and seeks to deny its adherents the opportunity to seek safety and freedom in America.

Consider the history of American inaction and indifference 90, 80, 70 years ago as refugees sought shelter but were turned away because of racist, bigoted immigration laws even as Trump seeks to close the door to America during the worst ever global displaced person crisis. 

Consider visiting a museum dedicated to the tragic aftermath of American xenophobia and isolationism, to the failure to maintain U.S. global leadership that allowed despots to march unchallenged across continents while Trump and his narrow-minded acolytes reject evidence of Russian interference in U.S. and foreign democratic elections, even as right wing movements, here and abroad, are given succor and retweets by a base and egotistical president with no appreciation of historical context. 

One wonders if Donald Trump has visited the Holocaust museum, not just for a fly-by tour as he did at Yad Vashem in Jerusalem last year, but to study in-depth the disastrous effects of prejudice coupled with an ultra-nationalist credo. Saturday is International Holocaust Remembrance Day. What message should we expect? https://nyti.ms/2FjYbHp

Melania has taken more than her fair share of jabs from late night comedians, some justified, some not. Consider many of the (cruel) comments collateral damage for signing onto the macabre display of Trump’s presidential campaign and time in office. 

She is now seen as the cuckquean of an inveterate womanizer, a man we have come to learn has the temperament and attention span of a child. She has become the object of our pity. No matter how many millions or billions she might be entitled to, we all wonder, is it worth it? 

New Year's Surprises and Resolutions

Have you broken your New Year’s resolutions yet? I am not in the habit of making any resolutions, not that I consider myself perfect in all ways. I just don’t see the need to focus on an arbitrary day to begin any transformative plan.

But I have been mulling a change that would affect you as well. I am considering reducing the percentage of blog posts that deal with the Trumpster. It is hard to imagine anyone who has launched more terabytes into the blogosphere but I will try my best to adhere to my resolve.

So what will I write about? Life. Just ordinary life. Take, for example, the surprise that greeted Gilda and me when we returned home from a less than 24 hour trip on Monday. The intake pipe to the master bedroom’s bathroom toilet froze during the frigid cold snap. Good thing our house has three bathrooms.

It wasn’t the first time we experienced this inconvenience since we remodeled the bathroom 13 years ago and put the toilet, and the offending pipe, up against an exterior wall (in the 20 year priors to the remodel, the pipe never froze as it was attached to an inside wall). 

Apparently, according to our plumber, frozen intake pipes next to exterior walls are a common predicament during prolonged cold snaps accompanied by high winds. All we could do, he related, is hope, and pray, the pipe wouldn’t burst while we warmed up the wall with a portable heater. After several hours we were back in business.  

More Tales From the Cold: Thursday’s “bomb cyclone” blizzard dumped eight inches on our driveway and front walk. But the high winds kept most of the snow from sticking to our solar panels. Around 4:15 pm I confronted the inevitable, suited up in snow pants, boots and balaclava and spent the next 45 minutes making sure to propel the fluffy snow in the direction of the wind. It was, actually, one of the easiest snowstorms I’ve ever had to clear.

Time to Break My Resolution: Heck, you might think I have no willpower, but keep in mind four days have gone by since the New Year began. So here are some Trumpian thoughts:

In case you haven’t heard about it, there’s an informative article in The New Yorker by Evan Osnos detailing how our bumbler-in-chief is making China great again. Here are two links, one to the print article (https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2018/01/08/making-china-great-again) and the second to an interview Osnos did with Terry Gross of NPR’s Fresh Air (you can either read the transcript or click on an audio link: https://www.npr.org/2018/01/03/575288560/journalist-as-u-s-retreats-from-world-stage-china-moves-to-fill-the-void).

One of my takeaways from Osnos was that we no longer have just Russia to worry about concerning the integrity of our elections. Here’s a short clip from Osnos:

“I asked a strategist in Beijing, this very prominent figure, a guy named Yan Xuetong. I said, how long does the period of strategic opportunity last for China? He says, well, it lasts as long as Trump is in office.”

Thus, not only Russia but China, as well as other countries that have stroked Trump’s ego, such as Israel, Saudi Arabia and the Philippines, have a vital national interest in keeping the dumb-as-a-loon-in-chief in office in 2020 and in retaining a Republican controlled Congress in 2018. 

Interference in our electoral processes may well become commonplace, but Trump and Attorney General Jeff Sessions are more interested in stopping state sanctioned marijuana sales than in preventing the sanctity of our most cherished right. 

News Flashes: One of New York WCBS TV’s field reporters Thursday evening confirmed that “slush is wet!” 

Does anyone else find it amusing that ABC News correspondent Eva Pilgrim reports out of Boston? 

Was anyone else surprised Gail Collins did not include any mention of Seamus, the dog Mitt Romney strapped to the top of his station wagon when taking his family on a vacation years ago, in a New York Times column about Romney’s potential candidacy for the Senate seat being vacated by Orrin Hatch? (https://nyti.ms/2E38sXV)

Over and Over, Trump Reuses Catch Phrase "Like the World Has Never Seen Before"

They’re not the same vibes—unless, of course, you happen to live in Seoul or Guam or Hawaii—as back in October 1962 when the world thought it might be coming to an end as Russia and the United States eyeballed the brink of mutually assured destruction over missiles based in Cuba, but the tension everywhere is still palpable as our unpredictable, unrestrained mad-libber-in-chief practices schoolyard diplomacy with  an equally juvenile despot longing for recognition as a world leader.

Donald Trump’s “fire and fury” ad-lib response to North Korea’s nuclear threat was widely reported. But it took Stephen Colbert Wednesday night to put Trump’s coda “like the world has never seen before” in context. He aired clips of the Trumpster using the same tagline at least four times before, when speaking about his political movement (12/8/16), unleashing an energy revolution (8/8/16), economic deals (8/27/17) and airports he’s landed in (3/29/16). https://youtu.be/xzdaSklrg6w?list=PLiZxWe0ejyv8l1W8d5rKFdHYSYIqkpf7b.

Trump doesn’t mangle the English language as, say, George W. Bush sometimes did. Yet, despite telling us he has the best vocabulary, he constantly repeats words, such as “sad,” “amazing,” “beautiful,” making it understandable that he would repeat a catch phrase “like the world has never seen before” whenever he wants to add emphasis to his hyperbolic pronouncements. In so doing, however, he waters down the impact. So sad!

Dennis Prager Brings Out Conflicting Emotions

How am I supposed to react when I see a person I went to school with for 16 years be the subject of an Op-Ed piece in The New York Times? And then, before I complete a blog about it, another Times article shows up in the Arts section Wednesday concerning a different controversy involving him. So what am I to feel?

Envy? Pride? Impressed? Depressed?

Conservative columnist Bret Stephens chastised Dennis Prager for recently tweeting the (liberal) media was a more existential threat to America and Western civilization than Russia. Among other things, Prager is dismissive of actions on college campuses that have shut down conservative speakers (https://nyti.ms/2tsxZIU and don’t forget to link to Prager’s online column for Townhall). 

For those who don’t know, Prager is a talk radio host, a prolific writer and co-author with Joseph Telushkin of two books on Judaism. Dennis and I were schoolmates through three different schools during our elementary, high school and college years. As high school freshmen, while our class was studiously trying to master French (ou est la bibliothèque?) at the behest of Mr. Rosenthal, Dennis was peering at a book under his desk teaching himself Russian. 

His intellect was what we would now call “gifted,” though back then, 55 years ago, it was unrecognized. We were in the B class. So was Telushkin. I spent the four years of high school in the same classroom with Joseph, but our ties go back even earlier. We were sleepaway camp bunkmates for four or five summers at Massad Aleph during our pre-teen years. Joe was not the best of athletes, but a fun guy to be around. 

In high school, he, too, never seemed intellectually challenged. One of my memories of Joseph was watching him play desktop golf during class. This was pre computer days. When I refer to desktop golf I mean there was a hole carved into the top of his wooden desk. He would make mini golf balls out of paper scraps, and from different spots on his desk would flick the wads of paper with his finger toward the hole. 

Aside from his dedication to the game, Joseph’s other defining characteristic was a spot of white hair at the front of his otherwise dark locks. He’s balding now so you’d never know it was there.

I’ve known for years, decades actually, that Dennis Prager held and espoused conservative views. Many, too many, of my Brooklyn Hebrew high school classmates do.

But I must say it goes beyond the pale (an intended pun, as the phrase “beyond the pale” comes from the tsar’s restriction on where Jews could settle in Russia) that anyone could equate a free and vibrant press with existential threats. It is widely agreed that democracy, a central platform of Western civilization, is strongest when the press is diverse and unfettered. 

Of course, voices on the left decry press outlets that advocate restrictive voting rights and repressive prejudicial laws while supporting a strong man president unchecked by Congress or the courts.

But let’s not give liberal media and activists a pass. Liberals have their own set of biases playing out in another Prager chapter. 

One of Dennis’ lifelong passions has been classical music. Often he conducts orchestras for charitable causes. He signed on to lead the Santa Monica Symphony Orchestra August 16 at the world renowned Walt Disney Concert Hall in Los Angeles.

But his writings and rantings, specifically about LGBTQ issues, offend several members of the volunteer orchestra who refuse to play for him and want his invitation to conduct rescinded (https://nyti.ms/2vdl1OL).

So far Prager and the leaders of the orchestra are standing firm. Good for them. And bravo to those musicians who decline to participate. We should not condone intellectual boycotts no matter how repulsed we are by someone’s political or social stances. No one is forcing anyone to attend the concert or a lecture or watch a cable news station. 

Nor should we condemn individual musicians whose conscience does not allow them to perform. Keep in mind, members of Congress have chosen not to attend presidential addresses. Protest is a right enshrined in the Constitution. 

So, how do I feel? Sad, actually, that our country has devolved into a seemingly non stop pissing match where opponents barely respect their adversaries. Sad, because their antipathy often devolves into disrespect. Sad, because I doubt this condition will change in the foreseeable future.