Sunday, November 27, 2016

FROM PRESIDENT ELECT TO DICTATOR ELECT




Despite the dangerous and tumultuous times in which we find ourselves, never forget:

AMERICA
Thy safeguard, Liberty,
The school shall ever be,
Our Nation's pride!
No tyrant hand shall smite,
While with encircling might
All here are taught the Right
With Truth allied.
         
Do these words trigger an uneasiness or a niggling fear that something is very wrong with our country? It should. It is but a short leap for a President Elect to become a Dictator Elect. 


A DICTATOR CRAVES POWER AND PROMOTES NATIONALISM

A.HITLER blamed Germany’s problems on capitalists, communists and Jews after World War 1. HTLER’S Nazism represents extreme forms of Nationalism.

B. TRUMP blames Mexicans and Blacks for most of the violent crimes in our cities. Muslims are deemed terrorists because of their religion. TRUMP is a proponent of American Nationalism and has appointed Stephen Bannon 
(former head of  Breitbart News and Alt-Right Abettor) Chief Strategist and Senior Counselor to his Cabinet.



A DICTATOR IS NARCISSTIC.

A.  Stalin was so preoccupied with having power, control, prestige and vanity that he jailed and sent to Gulags anyone who disagreed with him.

B. Trump lashes out at anyone who disagrees with him or those whom he believes offends him. He uses Twitter to avenge himself and shame others. He hires (appoints) those who like and support him and fires people who don't.


A DICTATOR CONTROLS THE MILITARY

A.Francisco Franco created military tribunals that led to tens of thousands of executions and imprisonment.

B. Trump wants to strengthen the military so that it's "so big and so strong and so great" that "nobody's going to mess with us.”  Trump  supports using torture as an intelligence-gathering or counterterrorism tool.


A DICTATOR CONTROLS THE EDUCATION SYSTEM
B .Trump stated, “If we don't eliminate The Department of Education completely, we certainly need to cut its power and reach. We should have school choice (voucher system) and  include charter and magnet schools. Also I am cutting education spending and eliminating unions.

A DICTATOR ERADICATES CIVIL LIBERTIES AND PUNISHES ALL FORMS OF DISSENT


A. Labor unions under FIDEL CASTRO lost the right to strike. CASTRO abolished independent newspapers, persecuted religious institutions, and removed opposition to his rule.


B. TRUMP vilifies reporters and news organizations “ -- as "dishonest," "not good people," "sleazy, and among the worst human beings he has ever met.”
And he vowed the White House briefing room would be just as combative as the Trump Tower lobby, … should he ascend to the Oval Office.”
*
TRUMP would, “Bar Syrian refugees from entering the country and kick out any who are already living here.”
*
TRUMP would “Heavily surveil mosques in the United States. Trump has said he's open to the idea of closing some mosques.”

 TRUMP would deport all illegal immigrants.


TRUMP IS A CLEAR AND PRESENT DANGER TO OUR DEMOCRACY

In 1977,  former president NIXON remarked to David Frost, “That when the President does it (takes any action), that means it is not illegal.”

 (CNN)During his meeting with The New York Times, President-elect Donald Trump sent shivers down the spines of many observers when he announced that, "The law's totally on my side, the President can't have a conflict of interest.” Nixon didn’t believe he had any boundaries as President of the United States either.

As aberrant as Trump’s philosophy and abhorrent demeanor are, there is one 
quote that should send shivers down the spines of all people. TRUMP forewarns that, “(He) will be  unpredictable. "No one is going to touch us, because I'm so unpredictable.”  Point taken.



John Donne (1572-1631), Devotions Upon Emergent Occasions, Meditation XVII: Nunc Lento Sonitu Dicunt, Morieris:

"Perchance he for whom this bell tolls may be so ill, as that he knows not it tolls for him; and perchance I may think myself so much better than I am, as that they who are about me, and see my state, may have caused it to toll for me, and I know not that.
...
No man is an island, entire of itself; every man is a piece of the continent, a part of the main. If a clod be washed away by the sea, Europe is the less, as well as if a promontory were, as well as if a manor of thy friend's or of thine own were: any man's death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind, and therefore never send to know for whom the bells tolls; it tolls for thee."



 Live simply.
Speak gently.
Love unconditionally.

                      





READ MORE











http://www.cnn.com/2016/11/26/opinions/checking-and-balancing-president-trump-zelizer/?iid=ob_lockedrail_bottomlist



http://nytlive.nytimes.com/womenintheworld/2016/11/23/in-impassioned-defense-of-press-freedom-christiane-amanpour-condemns-trumps-treatment-of-journalists/
http://www.cnn.com/2016/05/31/politics/donald-trump-veterans-announcement/


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Friday, November 18, 2016

Accurate and Prophetic H. L. Mencken Article on Presidential Elections

A repost from Dianne Rogers:

Ninety-six years ago, H.L. Mencken, a prominent newspaperman and political commentator wrote on what he determined to be the difficulties of good men reaching national political office. This was published on July 26, 1920 in the Baltimore Sun paper:

The larger the mob, the harder the test. In small areas, before small electorates, a first-rate man occasionally fights his way through,
carrying even the mob with him by force of his personality. But when the field is nationwide, and the fight must be waged chiefly
at second and third hand, and the force of personality cannot so readily make itself felt, then all the odds are on the man who is, 
intrinsically, the most devious and mediocre-the man who can most easily adeptly disperse the notion that his mind is a virtual vacuum.

The Presidency tends, year by year, to go to such men. As democracy is perfected, the office represents, more and more closely, the
inner soul of the people. We move toward a lofty ideal. On some great and glorious day the plain folks of the land will reach their
heart's desire at last, and the White House will be adorned by a downright moron.

 Truer words were never spoken!
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INSIGHTS FROM A FRIEND



I am posting the following letter I received from my dear friend, Dianne Rogers, with her permission. We go way back to the 70's when we met while working on our Masters' Degrees from The University of Maryland. We immediately connected on so many levels. Dianne is a woman who is an astute observer of human nature. She is well read and articulate. We have discussed many issues over the years. Whenever we need someone to listen and seek advice, we are only a phone call away. After receiving the letter, I had to share it. Dianne has delved into the essence of why Donald Trump is a threat, not only to our country but to the world at large. 


Marge,

I am not saddened by this election, I am disheartened. I am not hopeless but realistically cautious. Knowing the personality of the president elect, I am frightened for what his narcissistic, impulsive, socio-psychopathic, pathological lying nature might do to harm our nation. And the people he has surrounded himself with as his advisors, gives me more cause to be concerned. One example is his chief advisor who 
is a conspiracy theorist and whose negative attitude manipulates truth in a way never seen before on such a national level.

When recently asked if he had any regrets for his outlandish behavior during the campaign, Trump's response was "No, I won. I have no regrets." 
When asked during the campaign if he had ever asked God for forgiveness, is answer was "No, I've never done anything to be forgiven for."

I am sending you a wonderful piece written by Dr. George Lakoff * who is a cognitive scientist and linguist from the University of California
on 'Understanding Trump" which I hope you will find interesting reading. I remember learning about Lakoff in graduate school studying 
the link between linguistics, language and reading... 
I admire Lakoff's research and analysis and find what he has to say as very enlightening in terms of trying to understand the phenomena
of the election of such a man. 

My ultimate concern is this: What do we tell the children (especially our boys and young men? )
That it's OK to bully, to make fun of others that are not like us...disabled, foreign, other faiths or ethnic origins?
That it's OK to grab/grope/sexually attack girls because they can?
That it's Ok to use language that is offensive and divisive?
That it's OK to do these and many other things because "Well the president can do this, why can't I?" 

We have increased the number of hate groups in this country for the last 18 month by more than 100+.
There are now 892 separate hate groups who feel empowered to behave in a manner contrary to what we have always held as American values of civility, decency, integrity and honor. 
This man has repeatedly shown us, lo this past year and a half, that he does not hold any of those values as sacred.
And we will see in the future more and more of what teachers across the country are now reporting in their classrooms from kindergarten through high school: a rise in unacceptable behavior the likes of which we never dealt with in our years as educators...

For me, the bottom line is respecting all people and caring for your fellow human being as Jesus taught us to do. 
"Love one another as I have loved you"...
Every major religion on this planet holds true one major tenet: The Golden Rule- Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.
We are a nation of immigrants from many ethnic and religious backgrounds and to have a leader that denigrates so many is not only
intolerable but unconscionable to me.

Thank you for the opportunity to put down in writing what have been my thoughts for the past week...

P.S. I (did) read Kathleen Parker’s* piece in the Post and am not in agreement that he will change due to his seven decades of behavior that indicates otherwise.

As my Bill (Dianne’s Beloved Husband) would have said, "That's my story and I'm sticking to it." I am so thankful that he is not here to have to endure now, what he had to suffer for so many years of his life: racism and bigotry...which has reared it's ugly head in a way we have never witnessed before so very publicly.
So I take my lesson from the love that Bill showed despite the prejudice he endured:
He would pray for Trump's soul and so shall I.

Live simply.
Speak gently.
Love unconditionally.
                            

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Thursday, November 10, 2016

The Trump Presidency

The Trump Presidency

It is 3:52 AM on Thursday, November 10, 2016. I can’t sleep. My thoughts are a hamster on a wheel. They have been since waking up to the news that Trump won the presidential election. In spite of the documented stories about Trump’s business dealings, his lack of any moral code, and his vindictiveness, people still voted him in.   
No use dredging up the multitude of reasons why this is untenable and foreboding.

The Republican majority in Congress is already sucking up to Trump’s strong-arm tactics lest they be subjected to his rancorous diatribes. Already, Mitch McConnell is boasting, “Trump can unravel nearly everything Obama did, including labor rights, equal pay, workplace safety, environmental safeguards, and The Affordable Care Plan. (All on Day One) Women’s rights are over. The health, safety, and welfare of American citizens will not be a priority. Women, children, the poor, and the elderly will suffer the most. The Supreme Court will make a mockery of equality and justice. 

Trump’s supporters want change at any cost. They have opened Pandora’s Box and the evils of the world have been unleashed. There are serious consequences ahead for all Americans and the world as we know it. When one party dominates a nation, it is not a democracy but a dictatorship.


 Trump is not now or ever will be my president. I am disconsolate.





Read more:




http://www.nytimes.com/2016/11/10/business/economy/trump-rides-a-wave-of-fury-that-may-damage-global-prosperity
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Sunday, November 6, 2016

Do You Have An Antisocial Personality Disorder?

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REPOST: HILLARY CLINTON WANTS TO BE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES-NOT YOUR MOTHER

REPOST: HILLARY CLINTON WANTS TO BE PRESIDENT-NOT YOUR MOTHER




National Catholic Reporter
THE INDEPENDENT NEWS SOURCE


Jamie Manson  |  Nov. 1, 2016



On the first evening of the Democratic National Convention, the team at the "PBS NewsHour" kicked-off its coverage with group interview of Robby Mook, Hillary Clinton's campaign manager.
Taking his turn to question Mook, "NewsHour" commentator and New York Times columnist David Brooks focused on Clinton's low poll numbers in the category of "likeability and trustworthiness."
"Could you give us an anecdote or two," Brooks asked, "of her being nurturing, kind, surprising to the public image?" Brooks chuckled as he said the word "kind."
In the three months since the convention, in a campaign that has offered one stunning double standard after the next, it almost goes without saying that no journalist would ever think to question a male candidate's capacity to be "nurturing" or "kind."
But by using such maternal adjectives, Brooks inadvertently revealed one of the key reasons, I believe, that so many still insist that Hillary is unlikable: she just doesn't come across as a mother figure.

Last week, a Public Religion Research Institute poll reported some relatively good news: only 38 percent of white Catholic women now support Donald Trump.
But there was troubling data as well: 58 percent of white Catholic men, 71 percent of white evangelical Protestant men, and 60 percent of white evangelical Protestant women still support Trump.
These figures are especially disturbing since, in addition to his volatility, his use of racist, xenophobic and sexually predatory language, his limited ability to articulate sentences, and the fact that he is radically unqualified for the job of president of the United States, Trump's behavior and beliefs hardly reflect Christian or Catholic values.

So what, then, could be the tie that binds Catholic men, and evangelical men and women, to Trump? The answer, I believe, lies in Catholic and evangelical understanding of the role of women.
Catholic teaching, particularly in John Paul II's Theology of the Body, makes clear that men and women have different, but supposedly complementary, purposes. Men are leaders, women are nurturers; men are actors, women are receivers. Even the writings of Pope Francis routinely reinforce that a woman's highest purpose is the birthing and mothering of children.
Though Catholic women in the U.S. have largely rejected the church's teaching on women and gender roles, many Catholic men, unaware of the depths of their privilege in the church and society, have been slower to reject these teachings.

Catholic teaching on gender roles does resonate deeply with evangelicals and conservative Catholics, who strongly object to feminism and feminist ideas about women's equality, and who regularly exalt women's primary identity as mothers and caretakers.
Looking at Clinton's sometimes-fraught history with the media, one could almost pinpoint the origin of her so-called unlikeability to that fateful moment in 1992 when a reporter from ABC's "Nightline" asked her why she chose to continue practicing law after her husband was elected governor of Arkansas.
"You know, I suppose I could have stayed home and baked cookies and had teas," Clinton explained, "but what I decided to do was to fulfill my profession, which I entered before my husband was in public life."

Her response was quickly interpreted as a disparagement of stay-at-home moms.
And regardless of what Clinton would accomplish on behalf of children and families in the years since, she would be branded as a cold, calculating, ambitious and inhuman creature who eschews what many of us have been taught to believe is a woman's greatest vocation in life: to be a mother, a nurturer, a homemaker.

Sure, some argue that they don't like Hillary because of Benghazi, or her misuse of an email server, or the Clinton Foundation's alleged practices. "She is corrupt" and "she is a liar" are two frequent refrains. But the truth of the matter is, as The New Yorker recently stated:
Clinton is distrusted in ways that have little to do with her own choices, beyond the choice to be part of public life. She has been the target of twenty-five years of hatred, misogyny, and conspiracy-mongering, endlessly metamorphosing from one confected "scandal" to another.
The dislike of Hillary has always been far more personal than professional. This is made clear in the criticisms regularly lobbed at her, all of which could probably be divided into two categories: supernatural and unnatural.

The "supernatural" attacks are most obvious in Trump's likening her to the devil and declaring that she has hatred in her heart. His supporters' chants of "lock her up" evoke the frenzied malice of angry mob at a witch trial. Campaign slogans demand that this diabolical woman be taken down, or even taken out: "Hillary for prison"; "Trump that bitch"; "Kill the bitch of Benghazi."
She's often called "the lesser of two evils," though no one ever seems to account for what precisely she has done to achieve such a cosmic level of darkness.

The "unnatural" criticisms can be more subtle, but they are plentiful: "I just don't like her"; "she can't connect with people"; "she is unrelatable"; "she is robotic."
Whether metaphysical or personal, all of these potshots aimed at Clinton ultimately say the same thing: she just doesn't feel like a natural woman. She's not the kindly, nurturing mom that she, by the very fact of her gender, ought to be.

Even some of those who support Clinton feel compelled to name their unease and distrust of her. It's not uncommon to hear people, who are otherwise progressive and reasonable, say, "She's far from perfect," or "She just doesn't seem nice," or "I just can't get excited about voting for her."
Such reactions are visceral, not substantive. They are qualifiers that are never applied to male candidates. Indeed, they sound much more like the grumbles of a petulant child, than the mature, informed assessment of a presidential candidate.
Since she first came into the public eye during her husband's presidential campaign, Clinton has been challenging traditional gender roles, and now she is bidding for the most powerful job in the world. If she becomes president, she will become a global symbol of women's equality.

As I wrote in my column back in August, Catholic women who seek equal roles in the church through priesthood are treated with deep suspicion. They are condemned by the hierarchy for acting against the natural order and are often criticized, by both men and women alike, for being controlling, power-hungry and ambitious.
The parallels between the demonization of women who seek equality in the church and women who seek equality in political office are not coincidental. Church teaching has greatly contributed to the demonization of women who aspire to be leaders and women who pursue power equal to the power historically allotted to men alone.

Last week, NCR's Tom Reese wrote, "the white Catholic vote has proven to be one that has been most in play during this election. Where they finally land could determine the election."
Election Day, in some ways, promises to be a day of reckoning. As Catholics go to the polls, they, too, must reckon with the ways in which their inculcated understandings of women and traditional gender roles might be contributing to their dislike of Clinton.
As Catholics, we have been so schooled in the veneration of the perfect mother that it may be hard to discern the depths to which the image of the fantasy maternal figure is distorting our perception of the first woman who could become our president.

By obsessing over Clinton's personality traits, rather than focusing on the abilities and experience she would bring to the presidency, are we participating in the infantilizing Catholic idea that women should be judged based on their capacity to nurture and be kind? How can we stop perpetuating a culture where a woman's value is determined by how motherly we perceive her to be?

Hillary Clinton wants to be president of the United States, not your mother. She is the most qualified, capable and experienced candidate to run for this office in generations. The only person she needed to mother was her daughter, Chelsea, and she has done a fine job of that.

Hillary Clinton is not an unnatural woman. What is unnatural is the obstruction of women's talents and abilities from all forms of leadership, which for millennia has stunted the growth of untold communities, religious groups, and nations. We have seen the damage that the restrictions on women have done to our own church. Let's not allow the most dangerous presidential candidate in U.S. history to become leader of the free world simply because we cannot discern, like mature adults, the best choice for our country's future.


[Jamie L. Manson is NCR books editor. She received her Master of Divinity degree from Yale Divinity School, where she studied Catholic theology and sexual ethics. Her email address is jmanson@ncronline.org.]

https://www.ncronline.org/blogs/grace-margins/hillary-clinton-wants-be-president-not-your-mother



Live simply.
Speak gently.
Love unconditionally. 
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