Response to A Government of One

(See: Just Above Sunset: A Government of One)

Some things that we are missing here:

Although it may have already been widely known before this whistleblower blew the whistle, it seems that by promising to release Congressional funds to Ukraine in exchange for help “getting” Biden — if, indeed, that is happening — Trump is attempting to bribe Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.

That may not seem like a big deal but it is bigger than merely breaking election laws (which is something else he is doing), since “bribery”, aside from being a “high crime or misdemeanor” in itself, in that it is wrong-doing specific to Trump’s high position in the government — that is, something you or I would not be capable of committing due to our not having that power — it is also the second of two specific grounds for impeachment listed in the Constitution:

The President, Vice President and all civil Officers of the United States, shall be removed from Office on Impeachment for, and Conviction of, Treason, Bribery, or other high Crimes and Misdemeanors.

Also, the fact that he may be involved, through “his" justice department, in blocking the Intelligence Inspector General from releasing information to Congress, and thus impeding its Constitutional responsibility of investigating the executive branch, means he may also be obstructing justice.

And when you think about it, remember the Mueller team looking into whether Donald Trump committed “collusion” with a foreign government to interfere in America's elections? If it turns out he indeed prodded Ukraine into damaging the electoral chances of candidate Joe Biden, as suspected, then it’ll be pretty hard for him to get away with that “No Obstruction, No Collusion” stuff this time, since that will be obvious to all that this is exactly what he’d be doing.

And by the way, something that is also not being much talked about is the fact that Trump seems to be reluctant to fulfill our traditional role as “protective umbrella” of oil in the Gulf, such as in the Saudi raids, which may be sending a message to Russia that we will also not fill the similar role, under NATO, of protector of former Soviet members from being reclaimed by Russia. If this too happens, we will have even more evidence of Trump’s collusion, “after the fact”, with Putin.

It seems amazing that the founders hadn't anticipated what we should to do with a president like this one, but apparently the 1787 Constitutional Convention was dragging on into an unusually uncomfortable summer, and in the hot hall, with the windows shut to keep curious outsiders from hearing what was going on, rather than work any longer on creating an office of the chief executive, everyone just decided to go back home.

Still, at some point in our not-too-distant future, we need to somehow find a way to make changes to the Constitution, in order to provide ways to prevent any American president — especially one ignorant of how America came to be the way it is, but is still determined to rid it of its distinguished history — from flushing his country down the crapper.

Response to Constructive Disbelief

(See: Just Above Sunset: Constructive Disbelief)

I like your theory, that Donald Trump is asking Americans for their "willful suspension of disbelief" in exchange for him supplying them with more excitement than they’re used to receiving from their supreme leader.

Of course, he’s gotten used to his audiences doing that, having performed in so-called "reality television", and while it probably did work on those people out there who chose to watch his show, he forgets that for most of us out here didn’t watch it. He’s relying on a deal made with a receptive but relatively small audience, forgetting that it’s an agreement that doesn’t come with the unwritten social contract implied in Democratic governance, which is the contract that most of us have with him.

In short, the American people didn’t hire him to entertain us, we hired him to execute the policies that we, the majority, through our elective representatives, want him to do.

He seems to be making the mistake that virtually all his predecessors had the decency to avoid, which is playing to the peanut gallery that elected him instead of using the opportunity provided by his accidental victory to build on his base and to govern for all Americans, even those who didn’t vote for him. And if he thinks that pleasing the minority instead of the majority of the country is the proper thing to do in this situation, he should stop and examine how he’s destroying the country, and then do the decent thing by just resigning.

And while he’s up and reexamining his abilities, he should stifle that silliness about him being an “artist” at making "great deals” — a reputation apparently birthed from somewhere inside his own skull and popularized by his former alter ego spokesman, “John Barron”, back in his New York City days — since it’s becoming more and more evident to everybody that his deal-making skills rival, say, those of the late Yasser Arafat, which is to say, "Lots of whiz-bang excitement, but in the end, nothing worth bragging about.”

He may think the public doesn’t mind his constant bullshitting, but he’s wrong; we do. All he need do is ask us.

Response to The Fog of Doubt

(See: Just Above Sunset: The Fog of Doubt)

So in the original “The Emperor’s New Clothes” story, nobody in the empire had the guts to tell him he’s naked, but in our version — that is, the one the planet is being forced to endure presently — EVERYONE is telling him what he needs to hear, but he just refuses to hear us!

And so what’s the moral of this version?

The lesson here is, President Fruitcake — who not only imagined someone told him Dorian would probably hit Alabama, but is now imagining that he heard the so-called “fake” news media apologize for doubting his word! — is even more delusional than we originally thought! Maybe someone should start dusting off those “25th Amendment Remedies”. 

Have you noticed that just about everything everyone has been observing lately about Trump only serves as evidence that he’s suffering from some mental disorder? For example, those words of Barbara Res: "To him, all the watching TV and tweeting is work, so he believes he’s on the clock 24-7, 365.”

Do totally bonkers people even know they’re bonkers?

He seems to never be in touch with reality. He seems to act on the assumption that there is no actual reality until he himself creates it, such as the whole business that all the experts were 95% sure the hurricane would hit Alabama. Doesn’t he realize that this sort of thing can be checked out? No, he doesn’t, because in his mind, all that’s needed is for him to say all these people were saying this back then, and Presto! They were saying it!

No joke, this guy is seriously ill!

But you know, his mental health notwithstanding (I don't like the idea of picking on mentally ill people), I might be persuaded to favor the nuking of those hurricanes, but only if it could be guaranteed hat Trump himself would be personally hand-delivering the bombs.

And as for the great stock market that Trump is riding to victory in 2020?

I’m surprised that nobody's talking about today’s economy as being a huge bubble, kept afloat by speculators who are misplacing their faith on all these Trump-supporting Tinkerbells who naively believe, for example, that coal is coming back, and so is manufacturing, and that Donald Trump, being a highly experienced businessman, not to mention a “stable genius”, will WIN the trade war he's waging on the rest of the planet!!

Our fate, once again, totally depends on the Wall Street Bubble People! We’d like to think they don’t know what they’re doing, but they do! The Bubble People only pretend to be ignorant of the fact that they’re invested in a bubble that will sooner or later burst. In truth, they are only gambling that they’ll know how to time it so they can sell out before the high prices come tumbling down.

As for me? It’s the same thing! I’m just hoping that our financial guy, the man in whose hands my family's investments are trusted, will know what to do once that long-overdue Apocalypse finally comes to town.