Like Deja Vu All Over Again

Today the president spoke at the United Nations for the second time. You might be wondering how different today's speech was from the one he made last year. 

Fear not, I've got you covered. Excerpts from 2017 will be in italics; excerpts from today's message will appear in normal font. Last year, he started out by telling the world how great he was.

Fortunately the United States has done very well since Election Day last November 8th. The stock market is at an all-time high -- a record. Unemployment is at its lowest level in 16 years, and because of our regulatory and other reforms, we have more people working in the United States than ever before. Companies are moving back, creating job growth the likes of which our country has not seen in a very long time. And it has just been announced that we will be spending almost $700 billion on our military and defense. Our military will soon be the strongest it's ever been.

This year was no different. Well, after the laughter, that is, when Trump proclaimed his accomplishments in less than two years to be greater than almost any administration in the history of America, it was no different.

America's economy is booming like never before. Since my election we have added $10 trillion in wealth. The stock market is at an all-time high in history, and jobless claims are at a 50-year ow. African-American, Hispanic-American and Asian-American unemployment have all achieved their lowest levels ever recorded. We have added more than 4 million new jobs, including half a million manufacturing jobs. We have started the construction of a major border wall and we have greatly strengthened border security. We have secured record funding for our military, $700 billion this year and $716 billion next year. Our military will soon be more powerful than it has ever been before. In other words, the United States is stronger, safer and a richer country than it was when I assumed office less than two years ago. 

Surely, his strictly American accomplishments were bigly meaningful for the rest of the world, right? He might have struck a more welcome tone with his chants of sovereignty.

We do not expect diverse countries to share the same cultures, traditions, or even systems of government. But we do expect all nations to uphold these two core sovereign duties: to respect the interests of their own people and the rights of every other sovereign nation. This is the beautiful vision of this institution, and this is the foundation for cooperation and success.

Strong, sovereign nations let diverse countries with different values, different cultures, and different dreams not just coexist but work side by side on the basis of mutual respect.

Strong, sovereign nations let their people take ownership of the future and control their own destiny. And strong sovereign nations allow individuals to flourish in the fullness of the life intended by God.  

Each of us here today is the emissary of a distinct culture, a rich history and a people bound together by ties of memory, tradition and the values that make our homelands like nowhere else on Earth.

That is why America will always choose independence and cooperation over global governance, control and domination. I honor the right of every nation in this room to pursue its own customs, beliefs and traditions. The United States will not tell you how to live or work or worship. We only ask that you honor our sovereignty in return.

Doing your fair share is another Trumpian theme, and one that he touched on last year as well as today.

The United States is one of of 193 countries in the United Nations and yet we pay 22 percent of the entire budget and more. in fact, we pay far more than anybody realizes. The United States bears an unfair cost burden, but to be fair, if it could actually accomplish all of its stated goals,especially the goal of peace, this investment would easily be worth it.

Major portions of the world are in conflict and some, in fact, are going to hell. 

I don't like much about the president, but that's a truly classic line, in fact.

The American people hope that one day soon the United Nations can be a much more accountable and effective advocate for human dignity and freedom around the world. In the meantime, we believe that no nation should have to bear a disproportionate share of the burden, militarily or financially. 

Now, remember that he started this year by saying how rich we are and all, which makes this next part kind of funny.

The United States is the world's largest giver in the world by far of foreign aid. But few give anything to us. That is why we are are taking a hard look at US foreign assistance... 

Um, what exactly do we need in terms of foreign aid, anyway?

We will examine what's working, what is not working, and whether the countries that receive our dollars and our protection also have our interests at heart. Moving forward, we will only give foreign aid to those who respect us, and frankly are our friends. We expect other countries to pay their fair share for the cost of their defense.

 And in closing,

The true question for the United Nations today, for people all over the world who hope for better lives for themselves and their children, is a basic one: Are we still patriots? Do we love our nations enough to protect their sovereignty and to take ownership of their futures? Do we revere them enough to defend their interests, preserve their cultures, and ensure a peaceful world for their citizens?

So let this be our mission, and let this be our message to the world: we will fight together, sacrifice together, and stand together for peace, for freedom, for justice, for family, for humanity, and for the almighty God who made us all. 

Thank you. God bless you. God bless the nations of the world. And God bless the United States of America. Thank you very much. 

And this year?

Together, let us choose a future of patriotism, prosperity and pride. Let us choose peace and freedom over domination and defeat. Let us come here to this place to stand for our people and our nations.  Forever strong, forever sovereign, forever just.

Forever thankful for the grace and the goodness and the glory of God. Thank you. God bless you, and God bless the nations of the world. Thank you very much. 

No Skin in the Game

The president's full statement yesterday afternoon on Charlottesville makes it pretty clear he has no skin in the game. 

A man apparently incapable of speaking with any emotion unless he's talking about himself, bashing others (bad hombres, Muslims, members of the judiciary, his opponents, other Republicans, a Gold Star family, a bona fide American hero, members of his cabinet, former presidents, foreign allies, members of the media, etc.) or gushing about dictators and other horrible people, had this to say yesterday afternoon.  The words are his; the emphasis is mine. 

Thank you very much. As you know, this was a small press conference, but a very important one. And it was scheduled to talk about the great things that we're doing with the secretary on the veterans administration. And we will talk about that very much so in a little while. But I thought I should put out a comment as to what's going on in Charlottesville. So, again, I want to thank everybody for being here, in particular I want to thank our incredible veterans. And thank you, fellas. Let me shake your hand. They're great people. Great people.

Yeah, I guess as president, you should say something about a clash between White Supremacists, or White Nationalists (sorry - it seems they prefer the less direct term) carrying Nazi flags, Confederate flags, some wearing KKK regalia, and counter-protesters, the 'antifa' or anti-fascists. 

 But we're closely following the terrible events unfolding in Charlottesville, Virginia. We condemn in the strongest possible terms this egregious display of hatred, bigotry and violence (on many sides--on many sides). It's been going on for a long time in our country. Not Donald Trump, not Barack Obama, this has been going on for a long, long time. It has no place in America. What is vital now is a swift restoration of law and order and the protection of innocent lives. No citizen should ever fear for their safety and security in our society. And no child should ever be afraid to go outside and play or be with their parents and have a good time.

Many, many sides? Really? What side is it that drove the car into the crowd? Was that many, many sides, or was it just one side?  And whatever are you thinking, talking about children going outside to play or "have a good time" with their parents? Is that what they were showing on Fox News? 

I just got off the phone with the governor of Virginia, Terry McAuliffe, and we agree that the hate and the division must stop, and must stop right now. We have to come together as Americans with love for our nation and true affection-- really, I say this so strongly, true affection for each other.

Have I missed your affectionate offerings of olive branches to any of the millions of Americans you have offended since becoming a presidential candidate (and before).

Our country is doing very well in so many ways. We have record -- just absolute record employment. We have unemployment the lowest it's been in almost 17 years. We have companies pouring into our country, Foxconn and car companies and so many others. They're coming back to our country. We're renegotiating trade deals to make them great for our country and great for the American worker.

An act of terrorism just occurred in Charlottesville, and as president you can't help talking about your record, such as it is, after seven months in office? Do you really think that anyone gives a rat, at the moment domestic terrorism occurred in Virginia, about NAFTA and China? 

We have so many incredible things happening in our country, so when I watch Charlottesville, to me it's very, very sad. I want to salute the great work of the state and local police in Virginia. Incredible people. Law enforcement, incredible people. And also the National Guard. They've really been working smart and working hard. They've been doing a terrific job. Federal authorities are also providing tremendous support to the governor. He thanked me for that. And we are here to provide whatever other assistance is needed. We are ready, willing and able. 

Never mind that some question the response of law enforcement during the altercations before the 20-year old terrorist drove his car into a crowd marching in the opposite direction, including a hands off, stand down approach according to some - just make sure to mention yourself.

Above all else, we must remember this truth: No matter our color, creed, religion or political party, we are all Americans first. We love our country. We love our god.

Never mind that the Unite the Right rally participants apparently don't share your thinking that we all love the same god - nor do many Americans who don't worship 'your' god. Never mind that many of us don't worship a god at all - and we too, are Americans, just like you. 

We love our flag. We're proud of our country. We're proud of who we are, so we want to get the situation straightened out in Charlottesville, and we want to study it. And we want to see what we're doing wrong as a country where things like this can happen.

For starters, I suggest you study your own words, your campaign rallies, your tweets, your interviews, and more. And then study this Michael Jackson classic.  Or, you could study David Duke; he's certainly studied you:

We are determined to take our country back... We are going to fulfill the promises of Donald Trump. That's what we believed in. That's why we voted for Donald Trump, because he said he's going to take our country back.

Or, maybe you could study Steve Bannon, or Sebastian Gorka or your friend Alex Jones. Anyway, let's continue with your statement:

My administration is restoring the sacred bonds of loyalty between this nation and its citizens, but our citizens must also restore the bonds of trust and loyalty between one another. 

#WhatTheEverlovingSniff are you even talking about - "the sacred bonds of loyalty" between the country and its citizens? That's truly laughable given your appointments, your pronouncements, your actions, your exhortations of division throughout your official political career.

We must love each other, respect each other and cherish our history and our future together. So important. We have to respect each other.

If you had any skin in this game, you'd know that it is our very history that brought the alt-right and the antifa groups to Charlottesville in the first place. It is our very history - slavery, discrimination, criminalization, and more - that the alt-right and others absolutely do not agree on, will never agree on, and will never 'cherish together.'

And our future is a joint venture only in that it is our future - but it is not, again, a 'cherish together' future in the eyes of many, when one group wants to eliminate the other, oppress the other, stake a higher claim on their Americanism than the other - or it feels that way to the other side, whether it's angry white men like the ones on the alr-right or their opponents like the ones that were mowed down. What history and future are you cherishing, and with whom?

If you had any skin in the game, you would not be spouting emotionless, #MAGAfortunecookiebullshit -- you'd be screaming "radical right-wing terrorism" from the roof of the White House as you did "radical Islamic terrorism" so many times over the years.

Ideally, we have to love each other.

You actually said that? Tell you what -- you go first. Move on us like a bitch and show us the love.

Get rid of the alt-right members of your administration. Take back a single hateful discriminatory, sexist, violent comment you've made just in the last two years. Apologize to a single person - not a whole race, religion, or country - just a single person.

Try loving someone else for a change.

Trump in Transition (v13)

President Trump is opening his administration with a flurry of photo op signings of Executive Orders and memorandums, most of which are not surprising based on what he said he was going to do on Day One, a bigly huge list of things that he was going to solve immediately.

While the 'immediately' thing didn't happen with all of them, he's moving a quick clip as long as staffers and advisers are there to keep him on track and get his mind off his losing the popular vote, or having the biggest Republican Electoral College victory since Ronald Reagan, except for the biggest one since Ronald Reagan which belonged to George H.W. Bush (and which dwarfed the Trump win), or the size of his Inaugural crowd which is the biggest one ever, except that it's not, or millions and millions of 'illegals' voting, which to me is not the same as millions and millions of 'illegal votes' but that might just be splitting hairs.

What he did say today, however, when he signed documents to get things moving again on the Keystone XL pipeline and the Dakota Access pipeline, both of which have been on hold and are now "subject to renegotiation by us" whatever that means, is that things are going to be American.  (Um, as an aside, is 'bigly' bigger than 'XL'? Because if yes, then they really should rename the Keystone thing.)

A memo to the Secretary of Commerce requires an approach to using American steel in pipelines, follows:

The Secretary of Commerce, in consultation with all relevant executive departments and agencies, shall develop a plan under which all new pipelines, as well as retrofitted, repaired, or expanded pipelines, inside the borders of the United States, including portions of pipelines, use materials and equipment produced in the United States, to the maximum extent possible and to the extent permitted by law. The Secretary shall submit the plan to the President within 180 days of the date of this memorandum. 

Further, it specifically defines what constitutes made-in-America steel.

 "Produced in the United States" shall mean: (i) with regard to iron or steel products, from the initial melting stage through the application of coatings, occurred in the United States. (ii) Steel or iron material or products manufactured abroad from semi-finished steel or iron from the United States are not "produced in the United States for purposes of this memorandum (iii) Steel or iron material products manufactured in the United States from semi-finished steel or iron of foreign origin are not "produced in the United States" for purposes of the memorandum.

I have no concerns with requiring American made steel on projects - great idea! I'm not sure how many companies in the US can meet the requirements in the memo, or if they have the capacity to produce enough steel to meet the demand created by this type of order, which I anticipate will also come into play with Trump's infrastructure plans, for example. I suspect if this is a problem, it's one the e steel industry will relish solving.

Also unknown is if only American steel companies -- not the foreign companies that have American subsidiaries, but truly American-owned companies -- will be allowed to participate on pipeline projects and infrastructure projects.

Similarly, it's unknown how far to take the requirement for "equipment" to be made in the US. Does that mean heavy equipment, such as the cranes used to set pipes into place? Does it include the equipment used to weld the sections together? And does it include everything in between? If not, it should.

And are only American workers going to be allowed to work in the plants that are manufacturing the steel and the "equipment" and are only American workers going to be allowed to work on these projects and all of their related components?

Because that would be really taking #BuyAmericanHireAmerican to the fullest extent, right? American-owned companies hiring American workers to build American products used on American projects built by American workers...

The problem with taking this to its logical end - all American, all the time - is that we have American workers working for foreign-owned companies right here on American soil. And I can't tell yet whether that's OK because those are American jobs, or if it's bad because those are foreign companies that drove American companies out of business, even though they're employing American workers. (And yes, as I write this, I can see one of the cats chasing her tail in the other room.)

Another question I have is whether it would be OK to build shiny new American-owned factories, using American labor and American materials, in right-to-work states where the wages are lower and don't provide "good, solid, middle class wages" or if the factories need to be built in the Rust Belt states where unions come into play and drive up the labor costs and product costs and are to blame (according to some) for the mess in American manufacturing today?

Or would it be un-American to dictate where the factories get built in America, as long as they're built somewhere in America, by Americans, and pay some kind of wages to American workers?

Lord, this is going to be confusing.