Many Happy Returns
Returns Department
December 27, 2016
Returns: Next customer in line; may I help you?
Voter: Yes, I want to return this Trump I voted for last month.
Returns: And what day did you vote for Trump?
Voter: November 8
Returns: Hmmm, that’s a ways before our 30 day refund policy.
Voter: I am sorry. It was during one of your pre-Black Friday offers, and I got so excited with all the hoopla that I couldn’t wait.
Returns: I see. Do you have a receipt?
Voter: No. All I have is this I Voted sticker.
Returns: I guess that will have to do. Now, why are you returning your Trump?
Voter: Well, he was all exciting before the election. He wasn’t politically correct like the other candidates. He spoke his mind.
Returns: So, what is your problem?
Voter: Well, after the election, I realized he isn’t just politically incorrect. Actually, he’s crazy. He wants to start a new arms race. His tweets may get us in a nuclear war. He’s saying a bunch of stuff that will destroy the environment and the economy.
Returns: So you are saying your Trump is defective? Did you try turning him off and back on again? You know, a reboot?
Voter: Yes, I have tried that a bunch times, and each time he says even nuttier stuff.
Returns: And he didn’t say nutty stuff before the election?
Voter: Well, I guess he did, but I didn’t take it seriously. I mean the stuff Trump says about global warming! I’ve got beachfront property in Miami! A Trump presidency will ruin me!
Returns: And you didn’t consider this before the election?
Voter: No, I guess it didn’t.
Returns: And you didn’t read any of the product reviews?
Voter: No, and I guess I should have been suspicious when I went to vote and the Trump voters around me were wearing white sheets and hoods. The man behind the counter was covered with swastika tattoos.
Returns: So what do you want now?
Voter: Can I get my vote back?
Returns: Sorry, all votes are final. All I can do is substitute a different candidate.
Voter: OK, I’ll take the Hillary. I was going to go for Hillary before, but people told me I needed a Bernie instead. Then, I couldn’t have a Bernie so I took the Trump. Now, I want the Hillary.
Returns: Sorry, the Hillary is no longer available.
Voter: Are you sure? She really was a good candidate. She had reasonable policies. She was actually a lot like Obama. In fact, I really like Obama. Can I have an Obama instead?
Returns: Sorry, that selection is being termed out in January. You can’t have an Obama. All I can give you now is a Pence.
Voter: Isn’t that the one who thinks gay people can be cured and agrees with Trump that global warming is a hoax?
Returns: Yes, that’s the one. Do you want the Pence?
Voter: Is that all? Isn’t there another candidate I can have?
Returns: Well, if you really don’t want the Trump or the Pence, we might be able to get you a Paul Ryan. We would have to remove him from the speakership first. That’s the best we can do right now under the Constitution.
Voter: Paul Ryan wants to repeal Obamacare and Medicare and wants to privatize Social Security. No, I don’t want the Ryan either.
Returns: So what do you want?
Voter: I guess I’ll just keep the Trump.
Returns: But you said the Trump is crazy and would ruin the environment and the economy.
Voter: Yes, but at least he’s entertaining.
Have an entertaining new year, voters, a lots of luck.
I don’t like (Cyber) Mondays
I just spent another Thanksgiving weekend manually deleting emails that contain “Black Friday” and “Cyber Monday.” Each year I consider configuring my junk mail filter to delete them all automatically. Maybe, next year.
While many head to the malls on the Friday after Thanksgiving, I am one of those who celebrate Buy Nothing Day. Again, this year, I did not spend a cent that day.
And Cyber Monday? I can’t understand why this still exists. It may have had a purpose back in the early days of the Internet when people only had dialup modems at home and had to wait to get back to work in order to shop via a high-speed connection. Now, the only thing special is that online retailers use this day to offer big discounts. There is nothing to stop a few renegade retailers from proclaiming a Cyber Sunday and offering their discounts then. They can even have a Cyber Thanksgiving, so people can eat and shop at the same time.
Meanwhile, Thanksgiving weekend offered US voters another chance to experience buyer’s remorse. It came in the form of tweets from Donald Trump. Now he tweets that Hillary Clinton won the popular vote through election fraud. That’s a first for American politics; we now have a sore winner.
George W. Bush was quite conciliatory when he lost the popular vote to Al Gore by a narrower margin. He even put a Democrat on his cabinet. If Trump wants to heal the country and bring us back together, this is not the way to do it. In the short term, I expect his handlers to take his Twitter account away from him again. Over the longer term, I am expecting a rather short Trump administration. He may not even make it to the mid term elections before getting impeached or being forced to resign. Settling the Trump University lawsuit and admitting his Trump Foundation was a fraud is just the start. His refusal to sell his international businesses will continue to raise questions of conflict of interest. Then wait until his followers discover he is either unable or unwilling to deliver on his promises. Putting Hillary Clinton in jail? He has more or less acknowledged he has no legal case against her. Building a wall along the Mexican border and having Mexico pay for it? Yeah, right.
That’s why I am against any attempts to keep Trump from taking office. If he is denied his votes in the Electoral College, his supporters will have good reason to believe the system is rigged against them. If he actually becomes President, they will soon enough discover that they have been conned by a Reality Show TV star who became our biggest political con man. Let his own supporters hound him out of office. Of course, then we’ll be left with President Mike Pence. Good grief.
Yes, they really want to put Hillary Clinton in jail.
I have just sent the following email to President Obama:
I would like to share to the text of a email I just received from a group called Stop Hillary PAC. I have pasted it below. In short, they are looking for support to make good on Donald Trump’s pledge to put his opponent in jail. I have been reading suggestions that you pardon Secretary Clinton to prevent such a horrendous trial from taking place. I can understand people’s desires to spare Ms. Clinton from a grueling trial. However, I must say emphatically, do not pardon a person who has committed no crime. She has been cleared twice by the FBI. A pardon would give be interpreted as “proof” of wrongdoing.
Personally, I believe that the Trump administration would prefer to drop it as quickly as Trump dropped his birtherism. On the other hand, if the next president decides to make good on that promise, I say, “Bring it on.” I will do everything I can to stop such a miscarriage of justice. I hope we will have your support.
breaking-president-elect-trump-new-poll
Breaking: Urgent Poll – Immediate Response Required
We are conducting an exclusive survey of specially selected citizens. You have been selected. The following survey for tomyamaguchi@mac.com should be completed by 11:59 p.m. on Tuesday Nov. 15th, 2016.
—————-
Participant: tomyamaguchi@mac.com
Polling ID: #5837593
Polling Completion Status: Not Complete
—————-
Thank you for your immediate participation.
Official Poll Question: Should President-Elect Trump pursue criminal charges against Hillary Clinton?
President Elect Trump has repeatedly charged that Hillary Clinton is “guilty” of numerous crimes: Revealing classified emails, deleting official emails, obstruction of justice, lying to Congress, pay-to-play criminal activity with the Clinton Foundation, criminal neglect and lying that led to four dead Americans in Benghazi. Crimes that every other American citizens would already be in jail for.
Official Poll Question: Should President-Elect Trump pursue criminal charges against Hillary Clinton?
Yes, Pursue Criminal Charges →
No, Let Hillary Off The Hook →
Undecided →
(Click one)
If Trump Wins-one last post on this election
This will be my last blog entry before the election. I have been stating my reasons why Donald Trump should not be President. While Trump has shown himself to be uniquely unfit for that office, Hillary Clinton has shown herself to be quite fit and prepared to take on the job of President.
I know a lot of people intensely hate both candidates. 60 Minutes just did a piece on how no one is voting for their candidate, but against the opposing candidate. Their report featured Republican pollster Frank Luntz who believes this is a new phenomenon, going back to the Gore/Bush race in 2000. I’m afraid it goes back much longer than that. It started when political consultants like Luntz discovered that mudslinging works and you can manipulate people with language that invokes fear and anger. If you reinforce a negative image of a candidate, you can discourage potential supporters from coming out and voting for the candidate. So as more cash flows into negative ads, voting turnout keeps going down. Now, Citizens United has unleashed even more money into the campaigns, generating more negative ads. Don’t like the crop of candidates we have in these elections? It is amazing how many good people subject themselves to the humiliating process of running for public office. Hillary Clinton has received two decades of such vilification. Clinton continues to stand up to such vile attacks, giving me more reason to support her.
I understand that all the work I have done can result in failure. Trump can win this election. He can do that because, not only does the right wing hate Clinton more than they hate Trump, they see how important the Supreme Court is in this election. We have one vacancy already and will probably have one or more in the next four years.
No matter who wins, two things will be certain for me. One is that I will wake up on Wednesday morning knowing I did all I could in this election. I spent more hours working on this presidential campaign than any other in my life. I knew that if I did not, I would regret it. On this last day of one more shift of contacting voters in battleground states, I have no regrets with that work.
The second thing I will be certain is that my work will not be over. A Trump win would make that work much more difficult, but I will still not be discouraged and give up, especially on the issue of climate change. Having two climate deniers in the White House will be a be setback in our attempts to put a price on carbon.
If Clinton wins, that work will still be difficult, especially if the Republicans still control the Senate and the House. That makes my work with Citizens Climate Lobby even more important. The only way to get a price on carbon is with a bill that has the support of both Democrats and Republicans.
If Clinton wins, the sad truth is that over 40% of the voters will wake up believing the election was stolen and the system is rigged against them The work to heal this nation will probably be the most difficult of all. For the sake of our democracy, we have no other choice than to try.
Tired of money influencing politics? You don’t want Trump.
If you are in the least bit politically active, you are probably tired of looking at your email inbox. The messages are urgent and straight to the point:
- Send money or we will lose.
- We are down in the polls.
- Our opponents are outspending us.
- It all depends on you whether we win or lose.
In 2012, I registered Republican in order to vote in the presidential primary. I have been receiving Republican fundraising emails ever since, even though I have not given them a penny. (Well, I did respond to a Trump fundraising letter, as I blogged earlier.) Regardless of party, the messages are all the same. Send us more and more money. Many people agree there is too much money in politics. How we get it out is the issue.
In the 2008 primary, I was registered Democratic and about to mark my vote-by-mail ballot. I was choosing between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama, two good candidates who had strengths and weaknesses. For me, Obama’s biggest weakness was his lack of experience in elective office, mostly in the Illinois legislature and a couple of years in the US Senate. On the other hand, Obama came with a lot of life experience, growing up outside the US and understanding what life is like for people who are not like us. He also had a lot of campaigning experience as a grassroots, community organizer. If you don’t have the skills to run for office, you will never get the chance to use your skills for holding office. Clinton had more experience than Obama, but I was concerned about the strong animosity against her, which I believe is rooted in misogyny.The right wing has been organizing since she was elected to the Senate, sensing that the White House would be her eventual goal. On the other hand, Obama would have racism to contend with as the first black nominee.
As I looked over my ballot, my housemate Bob came to my room to tell me the latest news he had heard.of a 527 political group calling itself Citizens United Not Timid. Yes, the initials spell out CUNT, and the man who organized the group is Roger Stone, who now works for Donald Trump. http://www.salon.com/2008/01/24/roger_stone/. As soon as I heard that, I was angry enough to mark my ballot for Clinton. I would go on to vote for Obama in the general election, but I am still proud of my vote for Clinton as a blow against such blatant misogyny.
The Citizens United that created the anti-Hillary movie and took its case to the Supreme Court was a different group, and that is a strange story. http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2016/09/time-trump-aide-sued-trump-adviser-over-anti-hillary-group-called-cunt. Both are examples of how big money has been used to create negative images of Clinton and her trustworthiness that are devoid of any evidence of wrong doing.
In her current run for the presidency, Clinton does rely on Super PAC money. She realizes she needs to use that money to combat the Super PACs that have been organizing against her for years. One that has been sending me emails calls itself the Stop Hillary PAC. It spent much of last year boosting Trey Gowdy’s Benghazi investigation. This year, they are supporting Donald Trump.
If elected, Trump promises more judges on the Supreme Court like Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas. Scalia and Thomas ruled in favor of Citizens United. He promised that to the religious right. In addition, he promised them to end the IRS rule that prevents churches from using their tax-free money to fund partisan political campaigns. I call it Citizens United for the Mega Churches.
Donald Trump bills himself as an outsider who is unbought by special interests. I blogged earlier how that is a myth. Trump is in the pocket of the religious right and, possibly, the Russians. He uses his wealth for lobbying and promoting his own business interests.
That is another reason I urge voters to reject Trump. We need to overturn Citizens United and get Supreme Court justices who recognize the corrupting influence of money in our democracy. I have heard some argue that money does not influence elections, using examples where the candidate who spent the most had lost. I have my own theory of how the current system hurts democracy, though I don’t have evidence to back it. I have been observing how the percentage of voter participation continues to decline as the money spent on campaigns continue to grow. Much of that money has been spent on negative ads. Even though people say they don’t like the negative ads, the sad fact is that those commercials are effective. They are effective at suppressing the vote. They are designed to get supporters of the attacked candidate to give up and not bothering to vote. (Trump is relying on voter suppression to get elected. During the primaries he told those who were not supporting him to not vote. Not voting in this election is giving Trump exactly what he wants.)
If you want to stop the obscene amount of money going into our elections, you are better off with Clinton, not Trump.
If you think there is no difference between the two candidates, I ask you consider this.
What’s the difference?
In my last post, I expressed my own dissatisfaction with the current two-party system. At the same time, I have a problem with the concept of “voting for the lesser of two evils.” For one thing, I do not believe that people are inherently evil. Candidates can be flawed, inexperienced, or unfit for office. Evil, no.
I don’t believe Donald Trump is evil. My arguments against Trump are that his personality is deeply flawed, he lacks the needed experience, and he has shown himself to be unfit to hold public office. All candidates have flaws and come to the job with various levels of skills and experience. It is impossible to find a candidate without flaws. Candidates, like all humans are imperfect. No matter whom we vote for, in one way or another, we will be disappointed.
That is why, when I go to the polls, I choose candidates I believe would be the least disappointing. If I find that the major candidates running for a particular office to be completely unacceptable, I have no problem registering a protest vote, such as a write-in candidate or another listed candidate who has no chance of getting elected. That is not the case in this election. I have no problem casting my vote for Hillary Clinton.
I know there are many on the left who dislike and mistrust Clinton. They supported Bernie Sanders and are angry with a primary process and Democratic Party establishment that clearly favored Clinton. The Wikileaks email dumps have been designed to further feed the anger of Sanders supporters. Even before Sanders jumped into the race, Democrats on the left were showing their dissatisfaction with Clinton. Groups such as Move On and Democracy for America were actively campaigning to draft Elizabeth Warren. I am actually thankful to Sanders for taking that heat off of Warren, who clearly wants to stay in the Senate and continues to be effective there. Sanders also made Clinton a better candidate in the general elections, as Clinton did for Obama in 2008.
I find it incredible for liberals to hold the belief that there is little or no difference between the two major presidential candidates. Did we not learn from the 2000 election? Does anyone still believe there was little or no difference between Gore and Bush?
Think of the Supreme Court. I keep wondering why liberals seem so unconcerned about the selection of future Supreme Court justices. Conservatives are certainly concerned. That is why many of them are falling in line to vote for Trump. They are willing to look beyond his flaws because he has promised them justices in the mold of Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas. The court majority that ruled in favor of Citizens United included Scalia, Thomas, and the appointments of George W. Bush. And one more question: do you think that if Mitt Romney had been elected president in 2012 we would only have 8 judges on the court today?
When I think of anyone considering Trump, I imagine a scene from one of the old Warner Brothers cartoons where a man lost in the desert comes upon a pond of water. Next to it is a crudely painted sign with a skull and crossbones and the word DANGER.. The dried skull of a Texas Longhorn rests disembodied by the bank. As the man goes to drink the water, the skull open its jaws and moans out, “You’ll be sorry.”
Given the increasing impact of climate change and the window for corrective action steadily closing, the election of two science deniers, Trump and Pence, will be more than a disappointment. They will take this country on a dangerous course that will be very difficult, if not impossible, to reverse.
Rejecting Trump is the best way to save the Republican Party
I have been blogging whenever I can on the reasons why I believe Donald Trump is completely unfit to be president and why he should be rejected by the voters on November 8. I suggested there may be 50 reasons, probably more. I doubt I will come even close to listing 50 before election day. I think I can do a few more. Today, I want to explain why I believe rejecting Trump is the best way to save the Republican Party.
In my last post, I shared my response to a fundraising letter from the Trump campaign that included a postage paid envelope. (BTW I received a second letter and envelope several weeks after the first. I’m still thinking about what to send back.) In that response I wrote, “I have voted for Republicans in the past. Would I vote for Republicans in the future? When I find a Republican who takes global warming seriously and listens to scientists. When I find one who doesn’t engage in immigrant bashing or appeals to white supremacists. When I find one who really supports LGBTQ rights. Until then, you’ve lost me.”
It is true that I have previously voted for Republicans. I voted for John McCain in the 2000 primary and Arnold Schwarzenegger in his re-election as California governor . Being a Republican on the right side of the climate issue was a major factor in my selections. I want to support Republicans who share my concerns on issues that are important to me.
My Irish Catholic parents were lifelong Democrats. Growing up in the depression, they idolized FDR. Electing an Irish Catholic president in 1960 was a dream come true for them. While I maintained my liberal bent in adulthood, I drifted away from the Democratic Party and viewed myself more as an independent. I came to reject the two-party system that has defined American politics since the early nineteenth century. There has to be a better way to select candidates. My late housemate Bob Berry also believed in a multi party system. His efforts to revive the Whig Party was mostly a joke that reflected his own frustration with the system that has come to be known as choosing between the lesser of two evils. For a number of years I was registered as a Whig.
When I have changed my registration to Democratic or Republican, it has been to be eligible to vote in that party’s presidential primary. in 2012, I registered Republican to vote for Jon Huntsman, another Republican who understands climate change. Obama was running unopposed as a Democrat, so no contest there. Unfortunately, Huntsman dropped out before the California primary. I ended up voting for Fred Karger, the first openly gay presidential candidate for either party. Since then, I have been on a number of Republican email lists. The emails keep coming, even though I have not given a penny.
This year, there was no question which party I would be selecting for the primary election. I could not find a single Republican that I could vote for in good conscience. I found several good candidates running as Democrats and finally selected Clinton as the best fit for that office with the best chance to win.
Then Trump became the Republican nominee. That is when they lost me. I can no longer go back to the Republican Party in its present form. Thanks to Donald Trump, I am for now a committed Democrat.
If the Republicans lose control of the Senate, they can blame Trump for their loss. In all of those fundraising emails I receive from Republican candidates, Trump’s name has not appeared even once. Democratic emails proudly align themselves with their presidential ticket.
In addition, to being unfit for the office of president, Trump has shown himself to be an incompetent campaigner. The California primary is a good example. We now have two Democrats running to replace Barbara Boxer, who is retiring from the Senate. That is because Harris and Sanchez received more votes than any of their Republican challengers. In California, the top two vote getters move onto the general election, regardless of their party affiliation. Meanwhile, Trump had sewn up the nomination before the primary. He came to the state and campaigned anyway, for himself. A seasoned candidate in Trump’s position would have looked at the field of Republican candidates and selected one that would have the best chance of coming in second and going to the general. Then campaigning across the state with that Senate candidate would have made sense. Even if the Democrat has the overwhelming advantage, the Democratic Party would still need to divert resources to prevent an upset. Guaranteed that the next senator will be a Democrat, the party is free to spend more in battleground states. Then again, the Republican candidates may have found Trump so toxic that none of them wanted his support. Trump ended up with less primary votes than Bernie Sanders, anyway. His time in California was a complete waste.
I feel for the conservatives’ dilemma. For them, Clinton is too liberal and Trump is completely unfit. I once suggested that they vote for Gary Johnson. He did, at one time, have the opportunity to gain the 15% of the polling numbers he needed to get into the debates. Since then, he has been fading with a series of “Aleppo moments.” Even before that, conservatives where jumping ship to the Clinton camp, including newspapers that have never endorsed a Democrat in their entire publishing histories. They know that a vote for a third party candidate only improves the chances of a Trump win. For them, that is reason enough to support Clinton.
As a Californian, I know I could easily vote for a third party candidate without fear of losing the state to Trump. I would certainly do that if I felt the Democratic candidate was as equally unfit for office. On the contrary, Clinton has shown herself to be quite fit and worthy of my vote. More importantly, I want to make sure that Trump is soundly defeated by double percentage digits. Then Trump would have less of an argument that the election was rigged against him, though I am sure he will argue that anyway. More importantly, I want the Republican Party to reassess its direction and return to the mainstream with candidates who could earn my vote.
I am still dissatisfied by our current to two-party system. A one-party system would be even worse. If Trump succeeds at destroying the Republican Party, we will need to create a better party or parties to take its place.
My Donation to Donald Trump
A few weeks ago, I received a fundraising letter from Donald Trump. I decided to send him a donation in the postage paid envelope that came with the letter.
My message on the back of the letter:
I have voted for Republicans in the past. Would I vote for Republicans in the future? When I find a Republican who takes global warming seriously and listens to scientists. When I find one who doesn’t engage in immigrant bashing or appeals to white supremacists. When I find one who really supports LGBTQ rights. Until then, you’ve lost me.
Khizr Kahn lends his pocket constitution.
Trump’s Gettysburg Address
Imagine it is Thursday, November 19, 1863. A terrible, bloody battle has been fought during a brutal civil war. Now the leader of our country has come to address the gathering on the former battlefield where many of the fallen combatants are now buried. The assembled focus attention on him, awaiting his words of inspiration and solace.
In 1776, the founders of this great country, and it is a really great country. Honestly, the greatest country in history, folks. The greatest in the world. Nobody second to us. Nobody. And this great country founded in 1776 (that was 87 years ago, friends) by our great forefathers, and they really were so great. Really the greatest. And they founded this great country 87 years ago, and so we don’t want to lose it. No way are we losing it. We’re not gonna screw this up.
So now we’re in the middle of this civil war, and we need to win it, and I mean we need to win it bigly. We can’t lose this war. Now, when it started, I really didn’t want this war. I said, “Hey, if those folks in the South want to split, I say let ‘em split. Just let ‘em go. Who needs ‘em. Just let them go, and they’ll come back to us begging. They’ll be begging to come back to us.” That’s what I said when the war started.Just let ‘em go. But we’re in this civil war now so we gotta finish it. And I’m the only one who can finish this war, folks. I’m the only one who can win it. We just gotta finish it. And when it’s finished, I’m sure those folks in the South will come back. Many people say they will be coming back, and they’ll be happy to come back, and we can get some good ideas from them. Those negro workers they got do amazing work. We should have them working for us. I can make some great deals to get those negroes working for us.
Let me tell you what an honor it is for me to be speaking to you on this battlefield today. It’s a lot easier being here today than it was a few months ago ‘cause there was a lot fighting going on then. It is so much easier to be here today than last July. And there were a lot of good soldiers here then, and a lot of them got shot. I like soldiers. I prefer the ones that don’t get shot. Seriously. You can’t do much fighting after you’ve been shot. But a bunch of soldiers got shot, and now we have to bury them. So we’ll just bury them here where they got shot. It makes things so much easier.
Some folks say nobody will remember what we did here today, but I don’t know, folks. I don’t know. I think people will remember. They’ll certainly remember me, the greatest president in the history of this greatest country.
And this will be great place for a cemetery. I hear many people say it will be a great place to visit. I may even build a few hotels here. People will have a nice place to stay when they visit.
You’re gonna be so happy when I win this war. You won’t believe how happy you’ll be after I win this war. You’ll be thanking me every day for being so happy after winning this war. Believe me. Then America will be great again. The people will be great again. And I will be great, as always.
Now imagine it is noon in Washington, DC on January 20, 2017. He has just taken his hand off the Bible after taking the oath of office. He strolls to the podium, and stands before a bank of microphones. The whole world is listening, and President Donald J. Trump is about to speak.
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