The Confessional

Donald Trump: Father I have sinned. It has been two weeks since my last confession.
Priest: Yes my son ... what sins have you committed during this time?
Trump: Well Father I did covet my neighbor's wife and made advances toward her.
Priest: Did you consummate this relationship?
Trump: No. but I sure tried hard enough.
Priest: Anything else?
Trump: Yes, Father ... I spoke with profanity ... but I didn't use the Lord's name in vain. I did call Rosie O'Donnell a fat pig.
Priest: That's OK. She is. What else?
Trump: I refused to pay the full bill of an architect who did a lousy job.
Priest: Did you compensate him fairly?
Trump: According to my lawyers, I did.
Priest: Is that it?
Trump: Just one more thing ... I fat-shamed an employee who broke her personal contract and gained 40 pounds.
Priest: OK, then Mr. Trump. Say 20 Hail Mary's and 10 Our Father's ... and apologize to that woman.

Priest: Next!

Hellary Clinton: Father I have sinned. It's been 30 years since my last confession.
Priest: What sins have you committed?
Clinton: Well, Father, by my inaction, I caused the deaths of four of my employees ... and then lied about it to their parents.
Priest: OK, anything else that you want to confess?
Clinton: Yes, Father, I started two wars in the Middle East that have cost hundreds of thousands of innocent lives.
Priest: (Gulp) And?
Clinton: I also have been careless with state secrets which may have changed the international balance of power and even cost the lives of some secret agents.
Priest (fidgeting): Sigh! ... anything else?
Clinton: Yes, my husband has raped some women and violated others ... and I destroyed their reputations in the national media.
Priest (now profusely sweating): I hope there's nothing else.
Clinton: Yes there is. I sold access to our government for a bunch of big contributions to a phony charity my family controls and uses as a honey pot.
Priest: Please! No more!
Clinton: Not enough time to list them all ... but, oh yes, I have committed perjury and have frequently borne false witness to the American people..
Priest: Stop! I am going to have to take this up with the Bishop. Come back next month for your penances ... but, in the meantime, don't run for any public office.

Honey Pot

We knew it was coming … President Obama needs more money to fight the Ebola crisis. And of course the Republicans will give it to him … as emergency funding … above the sequester spending limits. Can the Republicans do anything else with the November elections looming?  And Obama's crew knows this all too well. Just last week the Congress allocated $88 million to fight Ebola and this coming week watch for the administration to ask for ten times that amount … see: Huffington Post Story. Where will all this magic money go?  With Ron Klain now writing the checks (see: Fletcher's Castoria Blog Entry) anybody with any grey matter left knows full well where … well disguised, but still into the Democrat's re-election honey pot ... that's where. 

Are there not thousands of shovel-ready Ebola jobs out there?

Rich vs. Super Rich

Hillary Clinton has dug herself into a public-relations hole with her statements about not being wealthy. And she then doubled down by saying that she and Bill were not "rich" because they pay an ordinary income tax rate ... a snide reference to Mitt Romney who mostly pays a capital gains rate.  The Clinton's easily qualify as being rich ... or in the 1% club. Hillary was surely confusing being rich with being super rich. And when these two were in the White House or in the State Department they certainly lived like they were super rich ... possibly this is one reason that they want these circumstance back

The world knows that the Clinton's are easily plutocrats with their large government stipends, secret service protection, two mansions, their multi-million dollar book advances and their six-figure speaking fees. One might also include daughter Chelsea in this category ... she who lives in a $10.3 million apartment and earns $600,000 per year for very little productive work ... see: National Review Story. And add to all of this Clinton wealth, the mega-million dollar (mostly Arab-funded) Clinton Foundation which is a bottom-less honey pot for this family and their large posse of hanger-ons.

But the question does pose itself ... what does being super rich really mean. That old saw that you are not rich if you have to ask the price of anything ... doesn't cut it anymore. So I have constructed what I think would be a newer and better set of tests to determine if one is truly a member of the 1% of 1%-ers ... or super rich.

- If you never wear the same clothes twice
- If your butler has a butler
- If you no longer go to St Barth's because of all the hoi polloi
- If you live off of the interest on your interest
- If you buy a sports team just so you can get the best seats
- If you promise not the bequeath anything to your children
- If you call for higher taxes on the wealthy
- If Warren Buffet asks you to lunch
- If your chauffeur drives his own Maserati
- If your yacht has its own helicopter
- If there are rooms in your mansions that you have never visited

Although they are now only rich, I have no doubt that the Clinton's are well on their way to being super rich and, if they reside once more at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, they will make our current lush-loving residents there look like pikers.