I Speak Life!

TRUMP.  Let me tally up just some of the things...  1. Filed bankruptcy numerous times.  2. Has had countless business failures over decades that no one seems to talk about enough. 3. Has spoken over 4,300 lies and mistruths (and counting) since taking office a year and a half ago.  Has recently averaged around 8 lies per day and is getting worse. 4. Bragged about having power over women and being able to "grab them by the pussy." 5. Bragged about watching pageant contestants undress at his pageants. 6. Has been accused by many women of sexual harassment. 7. Referred to one of his accusers as not good enough for him to even consider.  8. Denigrated a war hero by saying that he prefers heroes who don't get captured. 9. Mocked a handicapped person. 10. Denigrated 2 minority gold star families. 11. During a celebration of the code talkers from the war, referred to a member of Congress as Pocaho...

I am very saddened with the loss of John McCain over the weekend, and repulsed at the President's response to John McCain's death. The White house reportedly had a statement prepared in alignment with past practice for when people of stature pass away.  The statement reportedly honored John McCain's service to country and called him a hero.  Trump, however, said no to that and said that he would be putting a tweet out.  The tweet read, "My deepest sympathies and respect go out to the family of Senator John McCain.  Our hearts and prayers are with you!" The tweet in and of itself is fine, but when you look at the entire context of what went on that led to that tweet, it is disturbing.  When looking at the overall picture, it looks as though a good statement for the public from the White House regarding John McCain's contributions to this great country was blocked by Trump, who wanted to put out the simple message above that doesn't talk about John McC...

I thought of this Blog after I watched a 32 minute interview between Chris Cuomo, CNN Television Journalist, and Kellyanne Conway, Counselor to the President.  The interview consisted of Kellyanne refusing to answer direct questions, continuously diverting to subjects completely opposite of the questions she was asked, and her talking over Cuomo the entire time.  This is the way of the Trump Presidency, and Kellyanne does it better than most.  She can talk in an interview for over a half-hour and never once answer one direct question.  She uses the questions to insert talking points not relevant to the conversation. She spends the majority of her time in an interview refusing to answer questions or talking around them by spouting off the number of times CNN covers other stories, and talking about how the media doesn't give the president a fair shake on the things he does that are great for the country. What I like about C...

So a lot has happened this week in Washington.  Cohen, Trump's former lawyer and fixer turned himself in to the Feds and struck a deal to plead guilty to 8 separate counts.  The counts alone could have gotten him around 65 years behind bars if he went to trial, but the plea deal gets him 3-5 years and opens him up to be used for his extensive knowledge of all things Trump related.  An interesting excerpt from Cohen's Plea Deal is listed below.  It can be hard to read based on the fact that names are replaced with general terms, but if you read along, it is fairly obvious who they are referring to.  Here are a couple of excerpts from Cohen's Plea Deal that are most concerning to Trump: First, in June 2016, a model and actress ("Woman-1") began attempting to sell her story of her alleged extramarital affair with Individual-1 that had taken place in 2006 and 2007, knowing the story would be of considerable value because of the election.  Woman-1 retaine...

Michael Cohen turned himself in to the Feds and Manafort is awaiting a long jury deliberation on 18 counts against him (and still has another trial after the current one).  First let me say that what really disgusts me is that had Trump not been elected President of the United States, people like Cohen and Manafort would have never been investigated or convicted of the crimes they committed.  I think one of the big problems we have in this nation is a failure to convict people guilty of white collar crimes (but that's a story for another blog). Having said that, we have two individuals who know a lot about Trump, likely know where many bodies are buried, and who are both looking at major prison time for the things they have done.  Cohen has gotten out in front of it all and turned himself in.  He likely has a lot of incriminating information on Trump. Manafort is facing the rest of his life in prison between the two court cases he is facing, and being huma...

This is going to be a light hearted blog.  I decided when going on a "staycation" that I would get some work done around the house and unplug myself from all news for over a week.  I wanted to get work done and spend some quality time with my youngest daughter. This blog is to explain the struggle I and many others have on a regular basis with the ever changing news cycles. Now, I have to admit that going for over a week without any news what-so-ever felt wonderful.  It was nice not seeing the constant negativity, and it was wonderful spending some quality time with my youngest daughter for a week while my wife and oldest were on a road trip.  I didn't check Twitter, watch the news or engage at all with any media source for the entire time I was off.  My mind was free of the stressors from the world around me and I was able to just let loose and have some fun.  That time I spent free of the news, however, came with a cost.  There are di...

I covered the BIG 3 Platform stances yesterday (Death Penalty, Abortion, 2nd Amendment).  Today I will talk about a few other stances I have on issues important to Americans. Social Security - At this point people are living longer and fewer workers are working to support the increase in retired Americans drawing Social Security.  The Social Security Administration has been using the interest on its securities to cover the shortfall since 2010, but the fund will currently run dry by 2033 if we don't do something to fix the program, as without a fix, they will need to use the securities themselves to pay out, and eventually the money will be gone completely and we will no longer have enough to fund those receiving benefits.  What's the fix?  There are many ways the program can be changed to make it viable again.  The most common sense one that I believe in is to raise the maximum taxable earnings limit for paying in to the Social Security Program.  In 2...

So here is where we get to the meat and potatoes of politics.  Someone sharing the personal political views they have as an individual is something people don't do all the time.  Often times, people keep their views of major issues to themselves to avoid conflict.  Today, I am going to share with you all my views on some major hot button issues.  The Death Penalty - This has been a subject I struggled with personally for many years.  There was a portion of my younger years when I was pro-death penalty.  That was, however, an uninformed and simply emotional stance I took at that time because I hadn't really thought it through.  I simply thought, if you perform these horrible crimes, you don't deserve to live.  In my adult life, I have been educated, I have researched death penalty history, I have looked to the morality of the death penalty, and am vehemently against the Death Penalty.  One of the things I looked at in my research w...

Over the past week I have had 5 separate people contact me through direct messaging or ask directly on a thread where I fall within the political spectrum.  I feel it important to inform people who do read my blogs where I stand, so that is what this blog is going to be about.  First, I am not a Republican, Democrat, or Independent.  I am a Centerist.  Centerists don't have party lines.  They believe that solutions are more important than the bias.  Centerism is a political ideology based on reason and pragmatism considerate of short and long term thinking.  Centerism is not defined by compromise or moderation, but is considerate of them.  It is about achieving common sense solutions that appropriately address current and future needs, support the public trust, and serve the common good with consideration of risk and capacity in context of these needs.  Centerists should be motivated by the strength of their reasoning and the wisdo...

The number one topic of discussion surrounding the Mueller Investigation right now is the Trump Tower Meeting that took place in 2016 during Trump's campaign for Presidency.  Why is it the topic of discussion right now?  Well, let's just say it is partly because the Trumps can't seem to get their "Facts" (Lies) straight regarding the meeting, how it was set up, what it was about, and who knew what when.  Donald Trump has denied having advanced knowledge of the Trump Tower Meeting since it hit the news last year, but the evidence and timelines just seem to point to a different set of facts...he knew.  I am going to walk you through the timeline of events and correspondence and you can come to your own conclusion, but I think it is fairly obvious when you put everything together.  Let's start with who was at this meeting in June of 2016.  You had Donald Trump Jr., Jared Kushner (Son-in-Law and Senior Advisor to Trump), Paul Manafort (FMR Campaign Chairm...

The President and his cronies, on HUNDREDS of occasions, have said that there was NO COLLUSION!  Why do they continue to drive that narrative, and why do they continue to use that specific word to drive it? The truth is they know that specific word isn't in the law as being an illegal act (other than in Anti-Trust cases), but if you look at the definition of that specific word, and dig just under the surface of the ridiculousness we are hearing out of Washington on a daily basis, it can become very eye opening.  COLLUSION - Secret agreement or conspiracy especially for an illegal or deceitful purpose. Trump and his cronies have been throwing the "No Collusion!" catch phrase around now for a long time, but it has ramped up in recent months as the ongoing investigations surrounding Trump's former Campaign Manager and Lawyer have both presented the possibility of incriminating evidence against Trump.  After the recent Cohen Tapes came to the forefront and after ...

So I wanted to single out a subject that greatly bothers me at this point, and that is the President's attacking of the Free Press.  It has been happening since well before Trump even ran for office, and has become significantly worse in recent months.  Trump has went so far as to call the press, "The Enemy of the People". I wanted to talk a bit of history here to really get to the root of why that phrase is so concerning to me when the President of the United States uses it. The words "ennemi du people" were extensively used during the French Revolution.  On 25 December 1793, Robespierre stated, "The revolutionary government owes to the good citizen all the protection of the nation; it owes nothing to the Enemies of the People but death."  The Law of 22 Prairial in 1794 extended the remit of the Revolutionary Tribunal to punish "enemies of the people", with some political crimes punishable by death, including "spreading false news...

I have sat and tried to figure out for the past couple of years how Trump has such a strong and devoted base of supporters; people who, regardless of what comes out of the President's mouth or policies, support him unconditionally. I finally think I figured out where some of it came from.  People around the country have been unhappy for a long time due to many different things.  Political parties have grown apart to a point they aren't willing to listen to or work with one another. People wanted something major to change; a shake up of massive proportions to improve our way of life in this country.  They saw the possibility of that in Trump.  He was a rich businessman who didn't have a filter and who denigrated those who stood up against him.  He had catch phrases that people liked, made promises that he said he would keep, and created nick names for all of his political foes.  Watching the Republicans going up against him until he was chosen as the Rep...