Bird-Dogging the 2nd Amendment? [UPDATED]

Again, like the last post, this is nothing more than plausible conjecture:

What if the 2nd Amendment was the ultimate target in Las Vegas?  What if the Las Vegas shooter really hated the 2A?  I mean, really hated it. Would he have been willing to kill?  Would he have been willing to die?  What better way to demonstrate that the 2A is prone to abuse than by amassing an arsenal?  Why have an arsenal when one modified gun was enough? [Update: Apparently, heat build-up prevents a single gun from firing reliably for more than a clip before cooling.]    What better way to illuminate a  "bump-stock" loophole than to use one in a massacre?  (Had you ever heard of a "bump-stock" before this?)   

Next, how would a 2A opponent pick a target?  Would he perhaps apply the Saul Alinsky rule for radicals:  "Make the enemy live up to its own book of rules."  Aren't country music fans among the biggest supporters of The Bill of Rights? [Update: Shooter considered several other music events other than this country festival.]

Finally, if the 2A was the target, would the shooter openly admit it, or would it better suit his purposes to cover his tracks?  Would he perhaps turn to radical Islam for cover?

I'm raising these questions only because we are dealing with a conspicuous lack of information.  Unlike every other event of this kind, we have no good answers four days in.  Social media is non-existent or on lockdown.  YouTube videos have been flushed down the memory hole.  Digital footprints are either nonexistent or have been erased.  The public information trail, for whatever reason, has been rendered cold.

Could the reason for this be that the truth goes against the Left's preferred narrative? Could the shooter, a middle-aged white guy, have been a Leftist 2A opponent? [Update: Still no inkling of ANY political or religious leanings four days in.]

What we do know about the Left is they are adept at using various diabolical techniques to achieve their goals.  Among them is a technique they have dubbed "bird-dogging".  The name comes from a hunting technique that employs the use of a dog sent into a thicket to stir up birds for the kill. 

Watch as Democrat operatives discuss bird-dogging:

Bird Dogging   

As if right on cue, the 2A hunters on the Left have dutifully been firing away at the 2A, NRA, and guns nonstop since Sunday.  I'm not suggesting any kind of coordination with the DNC, Democracy Partners, Americans United For Change, People For The American Way, Center for American Progress, or any other Leftist action group. Only that this guy may have decided on his own that the ends justify the means, to use another Alinsky-ism. 

Yesterday, the Sheriff made reference to possible "radicalization".  He did not elaborate, so we don't know if he was referring to Islamic radicalization, Alinsky radicalization, or some other form.  Of course, ISIS has claimed responsibility now twice, an unusual practice when they are bluffing.  [Update: ISIS has claimed credit three times now.]

Either way, it's possible both are true.  It's also possible there was no motive other than psychosis.  Of note:  ISIS includes the hashtag #GunControlNow on their posts taking credit for Las Vegas.  Which begs the question: who's bird-dogging who?  (see below)

    

With the digital trail non-existent, or wiped clean, we are left speculating to try and find a motive from the bloody breadcrumbs left in the wake of this horrific act.

Who was the shooter? [UPDATED]

Have you noticed the dearth of information about the Las Vegas killer?  It's uncanny.  No social media, no politics, no religion, no manifesto, no affiliations, nothing but dry and sketchy details about his past and present.  It's almost like the media is not looking, or has looked, and doesn't want to share what it knows.

Do you know any 64 year olds with no opinions on politics or religion?   

Meanwhile, the girlfriend is mysteriously out of the country, $100,000 wired to her, but she's emphatically NOT a person of interest,  her FaceBook account has been frozen, but there are some photos of her in Dubai.

We are going to need some time to sort all this out, but in the meantime 4Chan is hard at work:

[Update: This person is in all likelihood NOT the shooter.]

There is footage (since flushed down the memory hole by Google/YouTube) of a guy at an anti-Trump rally in Reno this summer who is apparently named "Steve" (some women can be heard greeting him) wearing a pussy hat and a Nasa tee shirt (apparently the shooter worked for a time at Lockheed Martin, a Nasa contractor).  Some 4chaner has looked at the available photos and finds a curiously similar scar on both the pussy hat guy and the shooter.

Of course, this is all conjecture and highly speculative, but if true explains why the media is not ever going to look into this guys politics or religion and why he just happened to murder a slew of flag-waving, patriotic, country music fans.

Lindsey Graham's Finest Moment

I have always considered Lindsey Graham to be a decent human being and a hard working Senator, though I don't often find myself agreeing with him.  That said, I am proud to say his 11th hour attempt to thwart disaster in healthcare is worthy of greatness.  I have almost no confidence in the Senate's ability to pass something of quality, but at least Mr. Graham and Dr. Cassidy are trying. 

Watch here as Mr. Graham and Dr. Cassidy address being attacked by comedian Jimmy Kimmel: 



For a full discussion of why the states, not the federal government, ought to be the ones providing the safety net in healthcare, please read "The Thelma and Louise Healthcare Bill".  Then send it to your Senator. 

It's Time for Special Prosecutor Rudy Giuliani!

Now that we know for certain that Donald Trump was right about being wiretapped in Trump Tower before the election, it's high time for a special prosecutor to look into possible abuses by Barack Obama, Loretta Lynch, James Comey, James Clapper, John Brennan, Susan Rice, Ben Rhodes and anyone else who may have had a hand in what is increasingly looking like Watergate on stilts.

This writer said the following at the start: 

After Donald Trump tweeted that Barack Obama had his ""wires tapped"", Barack Obama's response DID NOT DENY that Trump's wires had been tapped, only that he hadn't ordered it! 

A cardinal rule of the Obama administration was that no White House official ever interfered with any independent investigation led by the Department of Justice. As part of that practice, neither President Obama nor any White House official ever ordered surveillance on any U.S. citizen. Any suggestion otherwise is simply false.                                                       Barack Obama's response to Trump's accusation of "wire tapping" 

Translation:  It wasn't me who wiretapped you; it was Loretta Lynch!  You know, the grandmother who met on the tarmac with Bill Clinton to discuss their grandchildren in the midst of a DOJ/FBI investigation of Hillary Clinton? 

Of course, there is no need to ever perform a wiretap in the modern world, because all communications are recorded by the NSA.  Unmasking and leaking the names of U.S. citizens, then, becomes the issue and the crime.

Now we know it's all true.  Trump was right.  The entire Obama regime has been attempting a cover-up of what looks like extremely high crimes.  Many of them issued false denials under oath.  You don't do that unless you are covering-up something even worse.

The question is: what was the justification? Was there a legitimate reason? Was all this set in motion by a rigged dossier? Was that the purpose of the dossier? Who funded the dossier? Someone needs to get to the bottom of this. 

Just as Jeff Sessions recused himself over the Russia investigation he should probably do so now over "Wiregate". That would kick it to a special prosecutor.  I nominate Rudy Giuliani!       

Prediction: As the drumbeat for a special prosecutor builds, Donald Trump will make a deal with the party of Chuck and Nancy: wind-up Mueller's investigation, leave me and my pals untouched, let me have a few votes for this or that, and I'll refrain from putting Barack Obama and his entire cabinet and IC behind bars.  

Art of the deal, bitches.

Trump's Stock Market?

This is truly an historic stock market.  Since November 8th, 10 months ago, the broad market has risen about 20%.  But why?

Analysts will say we are in an unusual time of low interest rates, cheap oil, relative peace, and technological advancement.  True enough.  But those were all true before November 8th.

To be clear, we had already been in a multi-year bull market leading up to the election.  But instead of continuing on the same slope, or changing direction, stocks have been rising at an even higher rate under Donald Trump.  No serious person can say this change in slope has nothing to do with Donald Trump.

But there is a paradox in all this:  If stocks jumped immediately after the election of Donald Trump, why are they continuing to rise on their new trajectory now that his congressional agenda has hopelessly stalled?  You'd think the market would be savvy enough to see that Donald Trump has almost no congressional allies on either side of the aisle and will not be able to accomplish anything of significance through normal congressional order.

Apparently, the market doesn't care.

To the naked eye, and to the founders, ours is a government of co-equal branches that make, enforce, and interpret laws.  The economy is impacted to the extent those laws interfere with or facilitate commerce.  

But under a microscope it really doesn't work that way anymore.  Today it is regulations, executive orders, and Fed policy more than laws that run the economy.  Congress, Chuck Schumer, Nancy Pelosi, Mitch McConnell and Paul Ryan are mostly just noisy bystanders.  Even the judicial branch is powerless because they have allowed this overreach for decades.

As government has assumed vast powers over every aspect of life in the U.S., more and more of that power has ended-up with one branch... the executive.

Donald Trump and his appointees have been quietly and effectively rolling back harmful regulations and executive orders.  During the campaign Trump promised to cut two regulations for every new one, and he is keeping that promise.  The markets understand the Trump agenda doesn't need Congress.

Even taxes, which are specifically enumerated to Congress under the Constitution,  are largely under the power of the executive.  

To the naked eye, and to most economists, it is marginal tax rates that have the most economic impact.  Economists endlessly discuss how best to structure a "progressive" and "fair" tax system. How much should we tax the rich, and how much should we tax the middle class, etc?  These are actually not economic questions at all in the long run.  They are political.

Under a microscope, or in this case more accurately panning out, it is total government spending that represents the true tax on a country.  If we borrow or create new money to help pay for that spending it still represents a tax, albeit a delayed one.  Total government spending and what value is obtained for those dollars has true economic impact, not what tax rate is collected from any one individual or class of individuals.

Modern Presidents have vast power over quite a bit of government spending and what value is obtained for each dollar.  The markets understand that Donald Trump is and has always been a rather frugal operator.  They expect him to do the same as President.

Markets move in both directions on countless variables, but as long as everything stays the same (wink, wink), expect the Trump market to continue to outperform.  

We're not supposed to be a one branch economy, but that's what we've become.

Bird Dogging the Cultural Revolution

Charlottesville was amazing and frightening on many levels.  To the naked eye it looked like one thing, but put it under a microscope and it looks like an entirely different and possibly more sinister thing.

To the naked eye some Nazi, KKK, and white nationalist loonies protested with torches and sticks, shouted racist slogans and ended-up murdering a woman who was there counter-protesting.  Of course, this was all Donald Trump's fault.

That is the narrative the media ran with and the one most Americans believe.  

But under a microscope a different picture emerges.  It turns out that both the protest and the counter-protest were primarily organized by Democrats.  This is significant because Democrats have a long history of using tactics like "conflict engagement"  and "bird dogging" to damage their opponents by diabolically provoking violence and creating negative headlines. (The term "bird dogging" comes from hunting by using a dog to flush-out birds for the kill.)

Don't take my word for it.  Here are Democrat operatives explaining these very tactics to James O'Keefe's hidden camera.  If you have the time to watch the whole sixteen minute video, I've embedded it below.  If not, here are some links that begin at the appropriate segments:  

Conflict Engagement and Creating Anarchy
Trained Agitators in Massive Numbers
Disguised to Look Like Ordinary People
Our Union Guys will do Whatever We Want
Importance of Media
Using "Trump Is A Nazi"
Bird Dogging
Bob Creamer is Diabolical


Does this mean that everyone there was a trained agitator?  Not at all.  There were real Nazi, KKK, and white nationalists in Charlottesville.  These morons are always marching somewhere.  In fact they marched throughout the Obama Presidency and even caused violence.  But the media never made a big deal out of it because they are a tiny fringe group and always will be. The only thing that has changed is now they are being employed as willing dupes and useful idiots in choreographed Democrat "conflict engagements" to hurt Trump.

The same thing can be said for the real anarchists and Communists who showed-up in Charlottesville.
    
Some other things come into focus when further looking at Charlottesville under a microscope:

• In an amazing coincidence, it just so happens that Donald Trump owns a home and a business in... Charlottesville.
• The Mayor of Charlottesville declared in January that Charlottesville would be a "capital of resistance" to Trump's Presidency. 
• The Mayor also just happens to be a Democrat activist who worked with John Podesta at The Center for American Progress (CAP). CAP is a far left think tank and one of the bridge organizations between the official DNC and the "dark arts" operatives caught on camera above and below. 
• John Podesta founded CAP, ran the the Hillary Clinton campaign, ran the Clinton Foundation, and it was his embarrassing emails that got leaked during the election.  
• The activist Mayor deliberately had his police herd the protesters and counter-protesters onto a collision course for maximum "conflict engagement". He then ordered his police to stand-down.  
• The Governor of VA is also an activist Democrat, Clinton loyalist, and Presidential hopeful who plans on running against Trump in 2020.

A few days after Charlottesville, a pro-Trump free speech rally in Boston was labeled a "Nazi rally" by the Democrat Mayor of that city.  Democrats showed up en masse, some violently, to kill... free speech.  They were lauded by the media and the left and succeeded in shutting down free-speech. Featured speakers at the free speech rally included Jews, Indians, Blacks, and Whites.  That's a strange group of Nazis.  Here's what really happened in Boston: [VIDEO]

So how could these choreographed operations happen right under the media's nose without them even bothering to look under the microscope?  As revealed in the third clip above, these operations are disguised to never be traceable back to Democrat operatives.  Add to that the fact that the media has no interest in exonerating Donald Trump.  In fact they are complicit.  That's why they disingenuously reported that Donald Trump praised the racist protesters in Charlottesville as "good people".  What he actually said, and he repeated it several times, was that some of the protesters were just protesting tearing down a statue, and among that contingent, some were good people.  

Remember, the whole protest in Charlottesville was about protecting a statue of a guy who was a U.S. war hero, a top U.S. General, a graduate of West Point, and a powerful voice for reconciliation after the Civil War. .  In addition to that he was also a traitor and fought for the Confederacy, which is why the statue was slated for removal.

Fair enough.  If this was about just one statue, or two, or all Confederate statues, it wouldn't mean too much. But this movement has metastasized overnight into a full blown Cultural Revolution. Every statue, structure, institution, city, state, county, etc. named for a anyone who offends anyone must now be expunged.  The left wants to erase our history.

Mao Zedong, the Nazis, the Taliban, and ISIS did the exact same thing.  Mao wanted to erase all remnants of pre-communist China because history was a threat to communism.  Nazis burned books and worse for similar reasons.  The Taliban, ISIS, and all of kinetic Islam routinely destroy all remnants of non-Muslim things like statues, art, churches, ...and infidels.

The Cultural Revolution resulted in millions of deaths, set China back decades, and was a colossal failure on every level.  The Nazis and kinetic Islam had the exact same results.  What are the odds this will work for us now?

Watch the full video here.  YouTube/Blogger/Google makes embedding this video impossible.  

https://youtu.be/5IuJGHuIkzY

Marxism and Mobility

I'm not usually one to root for the Communist, but that's what I found myself doing the other day. As a student of economic history, I consider communism, and in fact all degrees of Marxism (which is always "progressive") antithetical to sustainable human well being.  Economic history bears this out. But there are some circumstances which make it excusable.    

To wit, the other day I read a Wall Street Journal book review of "Ants Among Elephants", by Sujatha Gidla. an account of life as an "Untouchable" in India.  The reviewer cited two narratives running through the book, the hardships of Ms. Gidla's Untouchable family, and their political views as communists.

Well hell, if I was born an Untouchable in India, I'd be first in line at the communist buffet!  India's caste system, despite efforts to end it, is still the mother of all mobility killers.  If your grandparents swept the floor, so did your parents, and so will you in all likelihood.  And it goes back countless generations.  Marxism is the only option when the culture won't abide.

I've never bought into the notion that income gaps breed Marxists.  That's not enough.  To me it's always been about economic mobility.  Think of any Marxist movement in history and you'll find, A) downtrodden people with, B) no hope of upward mobility.   The lack of hope is key.  We've had downtrodden socialists and communists in the U.S. since the late 1800s, but they never got much traction because we've always been the land of mobility.

All of which got me wondering:   Why in the U.S,  the world heavyweight champion of economic mobility, is Marxism ascendant today?

One popular theory is that in the information age, only tech geniuses and the hyper-educated can advance.  This leaves the less-educated feeling trapped.  Others say it's low skilled immigrants and an inner city underclass who see no way out.  All that sounds good, except most of the Marxists I know have graduate degrees!

Here's another theory:  In 1900, total government spending (federal, state,  and local) was around 7% of national income.  Today it's around 60%. *  As government and redistribution have grown, mobility has shrunk.

We keep trying to wipe out poverty and hardship by expanding government. Yet we still have poverty and hardship in about the same proportions.  What we're losing in the bargain is mobility.

This is the tragedy of Barack Obama, Bernie Sanders, and the modern Democrat party;  they see inequality and think bigger government and more redistribution are the solutions.   It's a cheap emotional appeal that voters increasingly fall for,  but it always makes things worse in the long run.  

What they miss is that we are not India. We have a long history of mobility that we've only recently lost.  For example, blacks moved into the middle class at a faster rate in the 1950s than they do now!  Astonishing when you consider the headwinds pre civil rights.

Perhaps in the back of voters minds, when they heard "Make America Great Again", they were thinking of our lost mobility.

The American Republic will endure until the day Congress discovers that it can bribe the public with the public's money.  - Alexis de Tocqueville, 1850s

*

Why The New Russia Revelations Matter [UPDATED]

[UPDATE AT BOTTOM]

Here’s what we know so far: 

The President used the IRS to suppress votes.

The President was caught on an open mic making secret concessions to Russia’s Putin.

The President was caught filling jumbo jets with U.S. cash and sending it to terrorists.

The President lied repeatedly about a major healthcare bill. 

The President deceived the American people about a deadly terror attack.

But that was a Democrat President named Barack Obama. None of it mattered because pop culture (media, academia, and entertainment) aligns perfectly with the totalitarian leftist agenda of the Democrats.  No transgression, no matter how serious, can ever mortally wound a Democrat Presidency.

That rule does not apply to lifelong Democrat Donald Trump.  Unfortunately for him, he ran and won as a Republican.

And up until this latest Russiagate revelation, Donald Trump had a plausible case that he was being witch-hunted on the whole Russia and collusion meme.  However, now that we know what was obviously known by deep state Democrats all along, that the Trump camp did in-fact seek and likely obtain Russian dirt on the Democrats, that plausibility reeks like last month’s covfefe.  What was theoretical is now settled science.

There will be serious questions asked by serious people in Trump’s own party - something Democrats never have to worry about. A serious Republican might say serious things to Trump in private. Then there’s the very serious matter of Robert Meuller who now has red meat on the bones of his investigation. 

Trump’s lies will not be excused as were Clinton’s or Obama’s.  His words, actions, and motives will be rightfully questioned and his agenda discounted.  Trump’s fate doesn’t concern me.  But the fate of the agenda does. 

Look, I never put stock in what politicians say.  Some are outright liars, some are honorable, and some swing both ways, yet there seems to be zero correlation between their veracity and the results.  All I care about are the long-term results, and I’ve liked Trump’s so far:  Stocks are screaming optimism, the invasion of illegals has stopped, Israel is once again treated like an ally, red-lines have been enforced in Syria and Afghanistan, terror supporting nations are on notice, ISIS is truly on the run, stupid regulations are being reversed, Neil Gorsuch is on the Supreme Court, the war on cops is over, and Obamacare and the tax code are on the brink of being improved. 

That’s why I’m sad about all this.  If the agenda stalls, it’s bad for the country.  It was entertaining watching Trump, Godzilla like, stomping on the Democrats and the Republican establishment.  Now it just feels like he’s stomping on his own agenda.  Sad! 

[UPDATE]

Nevermind!

The whole meeting at Trump Tower appears to have been a setup, a trap, by the same people we now know funded the dossier through Fusion GPS: Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama, and the DNC.  Fusion personnel met with Veselnitskaya both before and after the meeting with Donald Trump Jr., and Paul Manafort, et al.  And Fusion GPS was the source of the supposed dirt on Hillary Clinton that was the bait dangled in front of Donald Jr.!    

This is all so twisted, so wrong, and such an abuse of power that it defies historical equivalent.  Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton weaponized the federal government and used it against their political opponents.  Party on, America.        

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Trump’s Tweets Explained

I’ve never been a fan of Donald Trump’s demeanor (accent on the “mean”).  All the derogatory nicknames, vindictive tweets, and constant dubious accusations turn me off along with many in his own party who should be his allies.  The latest episode regarding Morning Joe Scarborough and Mika Br … we’ll settle for Mika… has brought this issue once again to the fore. 

Though these tactics turn me off, I can at least explain them.  Am I a mind reader?  Do I have some special insight into Donald Trump’s inner psyche?  No, all I’ve done is read his books.  He explains exactly why he does this.  In addition, I’ve watched as several Republicans were chewed-up and spit-out by the Left’s tactics.  Apparently, so has Donald Trump.  I’ve also connected a few dots that others may have not. 

“The Art of the Deal”, published 30 years ago, explains many of the quirks that made Donald Trump the most unlikely President in U.S. history.  It also helps explain the Morning Joe tweets. 

"In most cases I'm very easy to get along with. I'm very good to people who are good to me. But when people treat me badly or unfairly or try to take advantage of me, my general attitude, all my life, has been to fight back very  hard."

                                                       Donald Trump, “Art of the Deal”, 1987

  

Donald Trump had a long and congenial relationship with Joe and Mika up until his recent tweet.  Or so it seemed.  The turning point was not Trump’s tweet, but rather Joe and Mika’s recent attacks on him.  He’s crazy, a dictator, and ruining the country are just some of the things now routinely said on Joe and Mika’s MSNBC show.  Given the above quote, is it any surprise he’s fighting back?

Ok, let’s stipulate that it’s just Trump’s nature to fight back hard.  Why go all the way to being outrageous like he did?   Why call them “psycho”, “low IQ”, accuse Mika of having a face-lift, and imply they were kissing-up to him at Mar-a-Lago?  Doesn’t Trump realize that by going over the line he is doing more damage to himself than to the object of his attack? 

"One thing I've learned about the press is that they're always hungry for a good story, and the more sensational the better...The point is that if you are a little different, a little outrageous, or if you do things that are bold or controversial, the press is going to write about you." 

                                                          Donald Trump, “Art of the Deal”, 1987

Nothing has confounded his critics more than Donald Trump’s unconventional tactic of courting controversy.  He built his business brand, and now his political brand, on his belief that all media is good media when one is on offense.  He goes out of his way to be outrageous, different, bold, and controversial.  He relishes the media attention and he seems not to care that most of it is negative. 

The experts said that tactic may work in Manhattan real estate, but it would never work in national politics.  (While not an expert, I was among them.)  Now he’s President and the experts have been embarrassed.  What do they do? Read his books and try to understand him?  No. They are at it again claiming Trump is not acting “presidential.”

What is “presidential”?  Is it the passive aggressive behavior of a President who hides his intentions, speaks in glossy platitudes, and weaponizes the IRS to attack his opponents, or is it the active aggressive behavior of a President who tells you exactly who he is, what he is, speaks bluntly, and openly attacks his critics on twitter?  It’s at least a question worth putting to a vote, as it was in November. 

Ok, let’s stipulate that this is just Trump’s modus operandi.  Why be mean about it?  Why call Joe a psycho and Mika low IQ? There are other ways to be controversial and get media attention.  There are other ways to fight back and still be classy.  Being mean just seems unnecessary and turns off many voters. 

“Nice guys finish last” 

                                            Leo Durocher, 1946

Donald Trump was born in Queens, NY, during the summer of 1946.  Also born that same summer, a dinger from where Trump was born, was the saying “nice guys finish last”.  Leo Durocher, the manager of the Brooklyn Dodgers, was conversing with a journalist when the kernel for that immortal phrase came out. 

Donald Trump had that aphorism marinating in his brain his whole life.  It has come to signify the essence of the Trumpian way - winning at any cost. 

While it alienates many, this trait undoubtedly has some value for a President.  Who would you rather go to war against, a nice guy or Donald Trump?  Who would you rather have to negotiate with, or try to take advantage of?

OK, now let’s stipulate that Trump is a person who fights back, believes controversy courts media, believes any media is good media, and can be rather mean.  Why continue this tactic now that he’s President?  He won.  He’s got nothing to prove, right?  Why not dial it back and act presidential? All he should be concerned with is winning support for his agenda!

 

"Our weak response in defense of the president and in setting the record straight, is, I believe, one of the biggest mistakes of the Bush years."

                                                                                              Karl Rove, 2010

I think Donald Trump does not want to repeat this mistake.  He knows he is going to be attacked relentlessly no matter what he does because the people in media, academia, and entertainment, in other words the people who have the biggest megaphones, are almost uniformly Leftists.  So the choice is to absorb the blows, like George W Bush, or fight back the only way he knows.

George W Bush is by all accounts a gentleman.  He is a patrician, attended Yale and Harvard, a former Governor, and the son of a President.  He wore a tie and jacket every moment he was in the Oval Office. When he was attacked non-stop as a war criminal, liar, Hitler, buffoon, illegitimate President, and the man who collapsed the global economy, did he offer a defense?  Did he fight back?  Did he go on offense?  No.  He thought fighting back was beneath the dignity of the office.  He turned the other cheek out of a misplaced sense of honor.  In other words, he put his honor above the honor of those who voted for him. 

George W Bush left office with a 30% approval rating, the GOP lost the entire congress, the Democrats were able to unilaterally socialize control of medicine, and the socialist age of Bernie Sanders was begun.  To this day Bush is unfairly blamed for 9/11,the 2008 financial collapse, the collapse of Iraq, the mess in Afghanistan, ISIS, and herpes.  But at least he has his dignity, right? 

George H W Bush, Bob Dole, John McCain, and Mitt Romney all offered weak defenses against the Left’s attacks.  None went on offense.  All lost elections.  The last GOP presidential candidate to fight back hard was Ronald Reagan, who did it with class and humor.  He also lost elections before he won them.  Donald Trump has never lost an election. 

Ok, now let’s stipulate all the above.  Why do this on Twitter? 

“My fellow Americans…” 

                               Ronald Reagan, whenever he wanted to get his message across

Ronald Reagan understood, like no other President before him, that he would never get his message out if he relied on a hostile media.  He had to go directly to the people and he did so on TV, radio, and in print.  Reagan became known as “the great communicator”.  

Donald Trump won the Presidency because of his stream of conscience communication style.  In his own unpolished and unconventional way he is also a great communicator.  Trump’s Twitter account is just his favorite way of doing the day to day communicating.  It’s instantaneous and effective.  And it drives his opposition bonkers. 

The bottom line is; Donald Trump understands more about all this than he’s ever given credit for.  He codified his philosophy 30 years ago so none of this should surprise anyone paying attention.  He just is who he is.  It’s that simple.  It doesn’t make it right, but at least it can be understood.  

Oh, and he’s not crazy.

7 Reasons Donald Trump (and all Republicans) Are In Imminent Danger

(This was originally posted 4/2/17) 

1.  Almost all presidents have at least one serious attempt on their lives.  It's just a part of the job. That said, Donald Trump is in demonstrably more danger than any other president in recent history.  

• There was an assassination attempt on Donald Trump even before the election 
• Several people have jumped the White House fence, some with backpacks
• Members of the administration have been accosted in public
• The Secretary of Education is, or was, under the protection of Federal Marshals 
• There are weekly bomb threats against Trump Tower in NY
• Leftists have violently attacked Trump supporters before, and since, the election
• Prominent Democrats have actually called for violence* 
• Dozens of states and cities have openly seceded from federal immigration laws
• Democrats have been claiming Trump is illegitimate since election day
• The level of hatred and obstruction is unprecedented in modern times 

2.   Consider the rhetoric:

• He is: a tyrant, a despot, a racist, a bigot, a dictator, a liar, a demagogue, grossly unqualified, lacking in character, ugly, an idiot, a braggart, a buffoon, a monster, foul tongued, indecent, disrespectful to women, vulgar, intellectually lazy, a white supremacist, deranged from syphilis, disrespectful of freedom of the press.

• If he is elected we will: leave the country, secede, refuse to follow federal laws.

• He should: be assassinated, be impeached, be removed, go to hell.

• His way of speaking and writing is: silly, slip-shod, loose-jointed, lacking in the simplest rules of syntax, coarse, devoid of grace, filled with glittering generalities.

• He and his entire cabinet are not equal to the occasion and are full of incapacity and rottenness. 

Except those were not said about Donald Trump.  Those were all things said about Abraham Lincoln!** The rhetoric is identical.  What it all amounts to is, like Lincoln, Democrats don't just disagree with Donald Trump, they hate him.  

There is a big difference between hate and dissent.  Dissenters claim that the other side is wrong. Haters claim that the other side is evil,  and when it comes to evil, no tactic is off-the-table.   Murder, violence, lawlessness, civil disobedience... all justified in the face of evil.


3.   In many frightening ways Trump and Lincoln are walking the same path.

Lincoln was considered evil and hated by Democrats because he was a threat to slavery.  Slavery had become an entrenched entitlement for southern Democrats.  It was legal, it went back generations, and it was very lucrative.  Lincoln was trying to kill the Democrat's golden goose.

Trump is a similar threat to entrenched Democrat entitlements.  Among them: Socialized Medicine, open borders, control of the vast bureaucracies, union power, illegals able to vote, etc. These are today's Democrat golden geese.

Unless I'm missing something, no entitlement has ever been completely ended without a civil war.            

4.  Four Presidents have been killed in office, three Republicans and one Democrat.  The odds of being killed in office are 3 times greater for a Republican, and the odds of taking a bullet are 1.6 times greater.  Of the 8 shot, 5 were Republicans and 3 were Democrats.   All presidents who were killed in office were done so from the Left (and that's not a reference to the direction of the bullets). 

• Lincoln, a Republican, was killed by a Democrat actor
• Garfield, a Republican, was killed by a lawyer who spent time on a "free sex" commune (though he was nominally from the same party) 
• McKinley, a Republican, was killed by an anarchist
• Kennedy, a Democrat, was killed by a communist

Of course, all were probably deranged,  but it is noteworthy that no president has ever been killed by a conservative, or even by someone to the right of them.

    

5.  Ronald Reagan was the last Republican president to be shot.  In many ways Trump and Reagan, (along with others, most notably Lincoln) share at least one interesting trait: they were seen as ideologues.  By that I mean they had specific issues they were committed to and were willing to unapologetically fight for.  In Reagan's case it was broadly getting government off the back of the people, lowering taxes, deregulation, standing up to foes.  Trump, though a Democrat for most of his life, seems particularly ideological when it comes to similar things:  enforcing borders, reducing the "administrative state", restoring the rule of law, fighting jihad, etc.

Like Trump, Reagan was hated by Democrats, painted as evil, dumb, dangerous, crazy, etc.   Reagan was shot in March of his first term.    

6.  The Russian collusion meme is part of the whole attempt to label Trump evil.  It was Ronald Reagan who labeled Russia (USSR at the time) the "evil empire".  Democrats always scoffed at that characterization.  Remember the famous debate exchange between Barack Obama and Mitt Romney, where Romney singled out Russia as our "top geopolitical foe"?  Obama snarked, "The 1980s called and they want their foreign policy back".  Now the tune has changed because Democrats figured out they could augment their characterization of Trump as evil by tying him to the "evil empire".   By doing so they have been able to peel off some of his weaker, hawkish, GOP support like McCain, Graham, et al.        

7.  The government, regardless of who's in power, t is largely a Democrat institution.  That includes the Secret Service, FBI, career DOJ, etc.  These unionized, mostly Democrat, government entities are responsible for the President's safety.  Though they are usually considered to be above politics, will they perform as they should if they become convinced the man they are protecting is evil?  Will they take a bullet for a man they are told daily is Hitler?

  

*     Loretta Lynch calls for "blood and death in the streets"

**  The anti-Lincoln Tradition

      "Lincoln is an Idiot"