Posts Made By: Mark Costello III

Well, earlier indications of the President-Elect's personality was one of the reasons for my vote for President going to ...

https://www.evanmcmullin.com/

... this guy. But you wrote "by every reasonable reading of U.S. election law, Trump won the Presidency fair and square" and that's for sure.

We could duck this question, since "by every reasonable reading of U.S. election law, Trump won the Presidency fair and square" and so whether he is suited to the position doesn't matter since on January 20, he's going to assume the position in the Oval Office. But FWIW, here goes.

The President has the - transcendental - power of the Bully Pulpit (Teddy Roosevelt). The new President needs a complete "do-over" or "overhaul" before he can use the Bully Pulpit with authority.

But the minimal office of the President is that of the Chief Executive of the US. One thing Mr. Trump seems to like doing is to delegate. If he appoints good people to his Cabinet and administration in general (many of his nominees are good people IMO) and if delegates material authority to them and to his Vice President, as he had offered to do for John Kasich...

(http://www.usnews.com/news/articles/2016-07-20/trump-made-a-powerful-vp-offer-to-kasich-report-says),

he will do OK, and even better if he remembers and acts on Teddy Roosevelt's advice, "Speak softly and carry a big stick," the new President will be OK. That is what I hope and pray for.

Clemson was in it last year, right? It looks to me as if the Tigers are coming back for more punishment . I don't have any reason to want the Tide to win or the Tigers to lose, and it would not break my heart if Clemson won it. But that is not something I expect.

This story misses something huge. It glosses over the fact that most of the initiatives protecting Joe's lifestyle go back decades, some of them about a century. These include Social Security, Medicare, Civil Rights laws, labor laws, laws regulating the pharmaceutical and food industries, ..., even some of the environmental laws. In glossing over this fact, it misses the point that the liberals championing the laws were a lot different from those that ply their trade in the halls of power today. Today's liberal, at least as he is projected today, champions restrictions on religious liberty in the name of tolerance and the slaughter of babies in the name of choice. That seismic shift that produced today's liberals occurred in the 1970s, about the time Justice Henry Blackmun built his machinery of death. But many of the liberals championing Civil Rights, labor laws, and Social Security before all of this turned out to be pro-life. Some of them were pro-life until they decided they'd rather be President. This includes Jesse Jackson, Bill Clinton, Ted Kennedy, and Al Gore. But others were (or are) always pro-life, including

Liberal Democrat Tom Eagleton (McGovern's first running mate)
Liberal Democrat Sergeant Shriver (McGovern's second running mate)
Liberal Democrat Bob Casey, Sr.
Liberal Democrat Bob Casey, Jr.
Moderate Democrat Joe Manchin
Liberal Democrat Harold Hughes'
Progressive Republican Mark Hatfield

I could find common cause with some of these guys on the initiatives mentioned above. But I'll NEVER identify with the Party of death before birth.

Gee, I wonder how many otherwise Democrats voted for Donald Trump on account of this? Probably a lot of Democrats just north and west of me did, maybe a bunch in Pennsylvania, Ohio, .... (Disclosure: I voted for Evan McMullin.)

David Cotterell said:

So, according to some CNN is waaaaaay over there in its bias and, according to others, FoxNews is waaaaay over in the other direction in its bias.

Most people here, left and right, will assume a story is false simply because of the source.

So, let me ask, in all innocence, where do you get your news? What do you feel is an unbiased, give-both-sides news source?

Dave

I get my news for mostly two sources:

1) Some from Fox.
2) Mostly from CNN.

I get a bit from NPR and CBS Radio, but very little, only if I'm in a car (with my wife for NPR).

As to what is an unbiased, give-both-sides news source? IMHO, neither.

Here's a longer take.

1)Of course, Fox has a conservative bias. But the thing is that they make no effort to hide it, so if I want to watch Fox, I can try to filter the conservative bias, that is, if I want to. They do have some shows in which they have liberal pundits and commentators. The only one of those I see is the one on Sunday evenings in which they have three commentators, a Republican Congressman emeritus, a former Democratic pollster, and Pollster-Expert Pat Caddell (who was a high school classmate). When I watch Fox News, its in the morning, which is not often since I'm at work then. It seems to me that they mostly just do news reporting and that seems to be pretty even-handed. I no longer watch the pundit shows like Hannity, O'Reilly, etc....

2) Of course, most of the people on CNN have a liberal bias. My distrust of them goes back to the days in which their owner Ted Turner laid down the law with an iron fist (e.g., don't say "foreign" but say "international."). It seems that CNN has moved from his grip a little and seems to be more even-handed. The reporters there seem to be a little more balanced and the analyses segments have conservative commentators. On this, it would be better if they include in addition to Trump spokespeople some conservatives not connected to the new administration like Will, Krauthammer, Sowell, ..., I'm seeing zero of those. Some more liberal CNN staffers singled out for "honorable mention" include

* Van Jones, who has proclaimed his attempt to understand "our" side, or at least the side of those who voted for the incoming President (which does not include me)
* David Axlerod, who in my hearing flatly rebuked the "not a legitimate President" people by stating that Trump IS the incoming President, and won the office fairly by all the rules which candidates play
* Smerconish (maybe not a liberal) who early on stated on the air that we all owe the new President a chance to show us who he is and what he will do as President.

https://www.yahoo.com/finance/news/the-trump-effect-white-house-claims-credit-for-dow-20000-152043940.html

Hi, Jim. You might be right and President Trump could be "crazy like a fox." Contrary to what some people close to me say, he is NOT stupid, I believe he's "bright." But still, on thinking about all of the things he's said, (take his speech at the CIA headquarters last Saturday for example), he is showing a distressing capacity for backslapping himself at the wrong times and talking before thinking, as it seems. I miss the Great Communicator's style of communicating.

Best

Rod Kaufman said:

Educated at Harvard and Oxford. Impressive.
Wrote a book, too. On euthanasia and how appalling and illegal it is. Swell, so now that LIFE is so-all encompassing, instead of choosing a peaceful path, a terminally ill patient, writhing in agony when the morphine pump no longer works, takes out a revolver and blows their brains out so some loved one can find them like that. Or, some family is bankrupt when an Alzheimer patient exhausts their savings and becomes a ward of the state instead. Or, more murder-suicides occur when end of life is imminent and the suffering just can't be borne any further. LIFE must take precedence. LIFE must take priority over all other concerns, from birth on, without equivocation. LIFE is the determining factor, no matter what the circumstance. That's why he's absolutely, positively in favor of the DEATH penalty...

Ah, I see. He's in favor of delivering babies but putting some convicted murderers to death. Other people are all in favor of allowing the CHOICE to slaughter babies before they get a chance to breathe air but sparing convicted murderers from death.

Guess what? Some conservatives, maybe a few, could guess many that Mr. Trump would do many of the things as President and so did NOT vote for him. (I missed the ones about Frank-Dodd and the President's private e-mail server; both you and I missed the one about Mr. Trump hiring his own bodyguards to replace Secret Service agents.) A lot of them - us - wrote in someone else, since Billary was just as bad as you mention in your opening note.


There is one thing that CNN picked up. Whether for better (most cabinet picks, Supreme Court pick) or worse (the wall, the travel ban), the President is keeping his campaign promises....

Here're a couple of comments in response.

First, the new President is keeping - or attempting to keep - at least some of his "signature" campaign promises. This covers the attempted ban on Muslims and the attempted repeal and replacement of the AC - which made your list, and the wall and crackdown on illegal immigrants - which for some reason you omitted. Whether his actions here are good or bad, they are President Trump's attempt to make good his word which he gave during his campaign, something we'd expect of our President and in particular want of him if we voted for him (which I did not).

Second, concerning Line Item 2, the investigation is in progress and at least officially, we have to assume his innocence. If he is innocent, he had nothing to do with Line Item 1.

Third, concerning Line Item 3 on praising Putin and dismissing any concerns about his numerous human rights violations, yes, you're right. But replace "Trump" and "Putin" with "Obama" and "Castro" and the line item would be just as valid. Heck, even President Obama tried to cozy up to Vladimir Putin until the last year or so of his time in office.

Fourth, I'm grateful for most, if not all of Trump's cabinet appointments. I'm grateful for what the President has done or tried to do to block the promotion of death before birth. I'm especially grateful for his nomination of Judge Gorsuch to replace Justice Scalia on the U.S. Supreme Court, and will be very angry (but not shocked) if the Democrats use the filibuster to block him.

Fifth and finally, that's as far as I'll go in defense of the President. I can't really otherwise respond to the points on the list and expected that he would do most, if not all of these things. That is why I voted for someone else (Evan McMullin) for President while voting Republican for every other office up for voting....

David Cotterell said:

Recent quotes from Mr. Sessions:

"Separation of church and State is Unconstitutional."

“an extra-constitutional doctrine� and a “recent thing that is unhistorical and unconstitutional.�

Sessions, Pence, et al just can't wait to make Chrisianity the official religion of the USA.

In other news, "The Handmaid's Tale" debuts on Television this week...https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Handmaid%27s_Tale

Do any of you on the right want this movie/miniseries to be a documentary?

I fear for your country right now...if you cherish freedom as much as you often say here then you should be up in arms about some of Trump's appointees and associates...

Dave

(I wrote this post all by my self!)

This is the idea of *Separation of Church and State* you seek.


"Article 52. Citizens of the USSR are guaranteed freedom of conscience, that is, the right to profess or not to profess any religion, and to conduct religious worship or atheistic propaganda. Incitement of hostility or hatred on religious grounds is prohibited.
In the USSR, the church is separated from the state, and the school from the church."

From http://www.departments.bucknell.edu/russian/const/77cons02.html

I don't want it around here in the U.S, certainly not the way applied by "Unk Joe" and the atheistic minions who helped him terrorize his country. Rather, I subscribe to this from George Washington

"Of all the dispositions and habits which lead to political prosperity, religion and morality are indispensable supports. In vain would that man claim the tribute of patriotism, who should labor to subvert these great pillars of human happiness, these firmest props of the duties of men and citizens. The mere politician, equally with the pious man, ought to respect and to cherish them. A volume could not trace all their connections with private and public felicity. Let it simply be asked: Where is the security for property, for reputation, for life, if the sense of religious obligation desert the oaths which are the instruments of investigation in courts of justice ? And let us with caution indulge the supposition that morality can be maintained without religion. Whatever may be conceded to the influence of refined education on minds of peculiar structure, reason and experience both forbid us to expect that national morality can prevail in exclusion of religious principle."

From http://avalon.law.yale.edu/18th_century/washing.asp

I have no problems with churches not endorsing candidates or abetting them. In fact, I wish they wouldn't (black churches, please take note as well as Liberty U). But churches have E-V-E-R-Y right to speak out against loathsome practices like death before birth and to promote practices such as what Mr. Pence does in making good his word to his wife (it's called "fleeing fornication"), a practice which has been ridiculed by the left but which if adopted by men here would cut the incidence of death before birth here by at least a factor of 4.