Bedside Manner

President Trump is a very good doctor with a very shitty bedside manner. We are all his patients now people ... which one is really more important?

Trump's Reality

Mika and Joe on MSNBC's Morning Joe proclaim (a fancy word for "yell") it at every opportunity -- Trump is crazy ... or Trump is suffering from early-onset dementia. A group of psychiatrists recently gave their group diagnosis that Trump was cuckoopie. And now Trump himself, in his tweets, is  sometimes showing a distorted reality ... he really didn't say what was on the Billy Bush "grab 'em by the pussy" tape. Or he fired Flynn because he lied to the FBI as well as Pence. (It is very unlikely he knew about the Flynn FBI lie which occurred, if it occurred at all, well after Comey's firing.)

Anyway, yes even I sometimes get twinges of concern over Trump's concept of reality. But these twinges have not yet overtaken my concern about the mania on the Left as they see Obama's crooked house being demolished brick by brick.

I am still willing to view Trump's sometimes quirkiness as a result of his oversized ego ... and it being an asset that keeps true nutjobs like lil' Kim off balance. The stock market is roaring not just because of Trump's recent tax win ... but because they see Obama's crooked house being razed.

Our "demented" president is doing things on the economic, immigration, anti-terrorism, trade, climate, and national defense fronts that are far more rational than our previous "sane" president. And, if you Hillary-ophiles think that your attempts at a slow-motion coup is perfectly rational, then I think you too need some couch time with those puffed-up psychiatrists who have diagnosed Trump as nuts.

Accuse me, if you will, of living in Trump's version of reality. But, when I see our previous understanding  of  what was sanity crumbling with each new sexual harassment revelation ... and many adults, like Mitch McConnell, buying into the Trump way, I am more comfortable with Trump's form of dirangement.

Defense

If Special Counsel Robert Mueller's investigation ever ends up in the House for President Trump's impeachment and possibly then in the Senate for trial, he faces a number of  problems that seriously undermine such a slow-motion coup effort. The defense attorneys for Trump would likely point out the following gaping holes (and others) in Mueller's evidence and process:

- The appointment of Mueller was the direct result of an illegal leak to the press by James Comey of his notes of conversations with President Trump after he had been fired as FBI Director by Trump ... see: The Hill Article.This vindictive motivation, as well as the fact that Comey and Mueller have a long-standing close relationship, does  cast a cloud over this investigation.

- The prosecutorial team that Mueller has assembled seems to be all partisan Democrats and Democrat contributors. This strongly suggests that this investigation is a political process and not a legal one ... see: CNN Story. Continued illegal leaks to the press from Mueller's  team and its assembled grand juries does nothing but reinforce this notion.

-If General Flynn is to testify at these impeachment events, it would be pointed out that his testimony has already been seriously compromised by his admission that he lied to the FBI and to Vice President Pence ... see: CBS Story.

- The lead FBI agent on the Mueller team has exhibited extreme prejudice against Trump and been dismissed ... see: Breitbart News Story and Powerline Blog Post.

- If, as it has been rumored, the Russian dossier was used as an excuse for FISA approval to surveil the Trump campaign team ... and this Russian dossier is proven fraudulent ... then much of the evidence so collected should be deemed tainted and inadmissible ... see: Real clear politics Story.

All this and more suggests to me that Mueller may be a dead man walking ... and that the Democrats' slow-motion coup may soon come to a dead stop ...

A Key Test

A key test for General Kelly as President Trump's new Chief of Staff will be whether the Mooch (the new Director of Communication, Scaramucci) reports directly to the president or must go through General Kelly. If he reports directly to Trump, Kelly will not last long. If he reports through Kelly, then Scaramicci will likely be a short timer.

Also I expect that White House leaks will stop post haste ...

Will be interesting to see ...

Brutally Honest

I doubt if anyone cannot see that President Trump has a compulsive personality. He himself confessed that he is a germophobe as a counter to the "golden shower" fake dossier that was being peddled by his detractors  earlier this year. Another manifestation of his OCD is that he is honest ... compulsively honest ... brutally honest. Recently he had second thoughts about the House-passed version of Obamacare replacement and he said, after having previously endorsed it, that it was too "mean" ... see: ABC News Story. This turn-around clearly doesn't endear him to those Republicans who voted for this bill.

Trump's brutal honesty has occurred over and over again ... often revealing truths that few politicians would touch. And I believe that this has recommended him to Middle Americans who are full to the gills with our many politically-correct fictions.  He even keeps insisting that his executive order against the 6 failed Muslim countries is a travel ban ... against his lawyers' advice. And how does he communicate these bon mots? Why over Twitter of course.

So, when foes and even friends keep telling him to stop tweeting, they are, in essence, saying, "stop being so brutally honest!" But, again, this is not who Trump is. He is compelled to say what is now on his mind even if it is inconsistent with what he said last month. And clearly, in his current position, new information is constantly causing him to see new truths ... which he is then compelled to disclose.Your standard politician would either not change his/her mind under such circumstances, or confound the media with doublespeak. But not Trump.

The result of Trump's OCD? He is quite good at getting good things done. But he makes lots of enemies. He is accused of lying. He is accused of being mentally unbalanced. (In the DC swamp, telling the truth is crazy.) He has hosts of equally unbalanced (mostly liberal) elites wishing him dead ... or impeached ... or neutralized in some way. (Kinda like a group OCD, no?)

Why? Perhaps it is because politicians and the media are not used to dealing with brutal truth tellers?

Reading Between the Lines

In preparation for today's melodrama in Congress, former FBI Director Comey's testimony about his interactions with President Trump, may I recommend that you read a very good, careful lawyer, John Hinderaker's parsing of Comey's prepared remarks ... see: Powerline Blog Analysis. Take a few minutes to understand what Comey may possibly be up to.

For myself, I find it revealing that Comey was so meticulous in his approach to Donald Trump ... yet so sloppy in his handling of the Hillary Clinton affair last year ... see: Comey, I Shrunk the Fibs ... and, in general, how blatantly political the FBI had been under his tutelage.

Robocars

Our technology oracles have assured us that automous autos (robocars) are a coming phenomona and very soon steering wheels and break pedals will disappear as software will more safely guide our cars, trucks and busses along all our roads, streets and byways.

Now some thoughts ... I have had cruise control on my car since 2006 and I have used it probably three times ... and never in the last eight years. Also Donald Trump says one of the things he regrets most about being president is that he no longer can drive a car.

What do these two facts suggest about the actual future of robocars?

Rhetoric

Here are the concluding lines of  last night's address to Congress by President Trump. Surprisingly, I thought for a short while he was  transformed into a classic rhetorician (I think Melania was crying) :

When we have all of this, we will have made America greater than ever before. For all Americans.

This is our vision. This is our mission.

But we can only get there together.

We are one people, with one destiny.

We all bleed the same blood.

We all salute the same flag.

And we are all made by the same God.

And when we fulfill this vision; when we celebrate our 250 years of glorious freedom, we will look back on tonight as when this new chapter of American Greatness began.

The time for small thinking is over. The time for trivial fights is behind us.

We just need the courage to share the dreams that fill our hearts.

The bravery to express the hopes that stir our souls.

And the confidence to turn those hopes and dreams to action.

From now on, America will be empowered by our aspirations, not burdened by our fears — inspired by the future, not bound by the failures of the past — and guided by our vision, not blinded by our doubts.

I am asking all citizens to embrace this Renewal of the American Spirit. I am asking all members of Congress to join me in dreaming big, and bold and daring things for our country. And I am asking everyone watching tonight to seize this moment and — believe in yourselves.

Believe in your future.

And believe, once more, in America.

Thank you, God bless you, and God bless these United States.

But Nancy Pelosi and Al Franken did not seem to be moved ...

A Dark Cloud

Billionaire liberal Jeff Bezos not only runs Amazon, personally owns the Washington Post, but, since 2013, also has had a $600 million contract with the CIA to run a huge server farm (also known as the "cloud") for it ... see: The Nation Article. Can we call this a "dark cloud"?

Bezos has an instinct for the levers of power ... the dominant Internet retailer threatening the entire brick-and-mortar retail world, running the major inside-the-beltway media outlet, and a cyber connection to our intelligence community. President Trump also has an instinctual understanding of this potential threat not just to him ... but to our country. Basically, Bezos is as great a tyrannical threat from the left as the left imagines that Trump is from the right.

There is another epic battle of the ideological Titans brewing here which, I predict, will break out before Trump leaves office.

Misjudgment

The Seattle, Washington "so-called" judge, James Robart, who blocked President Trump's temporary immigration ban from the seven terrorist-packed countries, claimed, as part of his decision making process, that no immigrants had been arrested for terrorism or terrorist-related activities hailing from these countries since 2001. WRONG! There have been at least 76 ... see: Breitbart Article for all the details. And part of the reasoning for this misjudgment on Judge Robart's part was that these terrorist statistics had been jealously guarded by the Obama administration. I wonder why?

This egregious error in the imposition of this judicial stay of Trump's travel-ban executive order should be more than sufficient to overturn it by the Ninth "Circus" Court panel in San Francisco. I'm not holding my breath ...

Fake News

President Trump was at Mar-a-Lago this past weekend when a young girl was found unresponsive at the bottom of the swimming pool there. Trump jumped into action pulled her from the pool and performed CPR on this little girl for 45 minutes until a miracle occurred ... she finally coughed up water and came around. She was rushed to the local hospital in Trump's limousine with our president by her side ... and was eventually given an all-clear by the doctors there. Trump stayed at the hospital with her parents overnight until this girl was able to pass all the required neurological tests. Before our president left he gave this waif's parents a check for $50,000 to make sure she received all the needed continuing physical therapy ... and promised to pay for her college education.

On Monday the New York Times and Washington Post reported, quoting unnamed sources, that Trump had abandoned his family for the entirety of this past weekend and was suspected of having a suspicious and inappropriate relationship with an underage Florida girl ... and spending the night with her in a private room. After this minor's parents had discovered this incident, President Trump was reported to have paid them off handsomely.

Virtue Signaling

In order to keep you, dear readers, up to date on the latest lingo, this blog's lesson today is on "virtue signaling." This term relates to the melodramatic "holier than thou" mulings of the  multitude of protesters of President Trump's temporary immigration ban from seven terrorist-infested countries. Celebrities and politicians are elbowing each other out the way from in front of the nearest microphones to profess their virtue ... how this Trump action is discriminating against the Muslim religion ... which it clearly isn't. It is merely an attempt to tighten up the vetting processes in these dangerous countries to try to reduce the risk of allowing sleeper terrorists into our country.

Hillary Clinton quickly chimed in with, "That's not who we are." Chuck "Tiny Tears" Schumer publicly turned on the waterworks to demonstrate the extent of his virtue. Our acting Attorney General, Sally Yates, threw herself on her sword over this moral travesty by refusing to defend it at the DOJ ... got fired by Trump ... and became the instant hero of the legions of Soros-backed moonbats. Even our ex-president could not wait two weeks before trying to shame his replacement by issuing his own shining virtue signal from a sunny Caribbean beach.

Yes, this executive order was not communicated well or implemented smoothly ... some rookie mistakes ... but it was legal, caused relatively minor dislocation and is supported by the majority of Americans ... those of us who would rather be safe than sorry.

Inflation

Inflation is a damnedable thing. It is both the devil and an angel simultaneously. It clearly damages the poor without a cushion of interest-earning  savings, the elders living on a fixed income and companies without pricing power. But it benefits those with large debts at a fixed rate of interest ... like mortgage holders and governments burdened with big debts with long maturities at relatively low rates.

Like today, a surfeit of money in the United States does not necessarily create inflation ... particularly if labor is not in short supply. Although it appears on the surface that we currently have a low unemployment rate, this number is misleading due to a very large number of those not looking for work. And the influx of H1-b immigrants also keeps high tech salary growth down. Therefore employment cost pressure is currently low. However, if President Trump can cause an economic boom for middle America and slow down H1-b immigration, there well could be a shortage of blue-collar and white-collar workers ... resulting real wage pressure ... and overall inflation well beyond the Federal Reserve Bank's goal of 2%.

Once this beast inflation is set loose, vicious feedback will kick in and it won't want to stop at 2%.

Add to this a trillion dollars of infrastructure spending certainly will increase our national debt and inflation. If Trump follows through with his pledge to lengthen the maturity of our national indebtedness, we might be able to inflate our way out of our current fiscal insanity ... like we did after World War II when we let inflation cure our huge debt burden,

So here are my current inflation predictions under Trump.... particularly if he serves two terms:

- Spend like mad on infrastructure, health care and rebuilding our military
- Extend the maturities of our then fast-growing national debt ..  maybe even longer than thirty years ... hopefully at relatively low rates
- Put pressure on the Fed to let inflation run ... possibly into the high single digits which will monetize this debt
- But still, longer term, try to bring government spending more in line with increased tax revenues generated by a booming economy

Is this all good? What other choices do we have?

Headlines

Pun Translation: Booze Cruise

These headlines are real ... they have all been discovered on Internet news sites:

CA to teach LGBT curriculum -- to 2nd graders

Protester Lights Himself on Fire While Trying to Burn American Flag

[Joy] Behar: 'Republican Party platform is like Mein Kampf'

Michael Moore: 'Trump is going to win'

New homeowners find dead body in bathroom

'Black Lives Matter' leader recommends 'don't vote'

Tesla stock falls after Musk 'Master Plan' unveiled

NBA moves All Star Game out of North Carolina due to Bathroom Law

L.A. times suggests militdary coup against President Trump

Mark Cuban lashes out at Trump ... calls him 'loud guy in the suit'

Chicago: 33 shot in one day

Restaurant slammed for 'BLACK OLIVES MATTER' ...