On Presidents' Final Days

I don't think any of my followers know who Baruch Korff was. (Click here to read of his his dubious role in American history.) Suffice it to say that in Richard Nixon's last days as POTUS in the summer of 1974, Rabbi Korff was among his handful (I use the word advisedly.) of supporters. As I read reports regarding Stephen Miller's dreadful performances on this morning's talk shows, I couldn't help but compare him to Korff: a toady who has pledged unwavering loyalty to his superior and who's really in over his head when he tries to defend him. If Miller is the best Trump can come up with as a spokesman, the current Administration's staff is even weaker than I thought—and that's saying something.

An election night memory

In 1992, my—then—fifth grade daughter was given a homework task of coloring in the states on a US map as they went for a particular candidate: blue for Clinton; red for Bush; green for Perot. It wasn't long into the night before she stated about her green crayon, "Well, I guess I won't be needing THIS tonight."

The punch line

My wife has just encountered a serious problem with her MacBook Pro. Somehow it acquired the hideous MacKeeper and just won't let it go. Thus, she asked me this morning if I could go to the Apple Store in West Hartford and have it removed. I told her I'd contact the Genius Bar there and make an appointment. She thought I was kidding when I referred to the "Genius Bar" at Apple stores, but when I assured her that such things existed, she quipped, "I thought it was a place where Donald Trump had drinks." The insanity of this election has done wonders for her sense of humor.

What We're In For

Trump is the kind of guy (He's not unique.) who thinks he can do no wrong, and therefore consistently blames outside elements for his shortcomings. Thus, when he loses the election—a demonstration of a failed venture—it seems to me certain that he will deny his own failure and will claim it's been rigged.

What if Obama had been white?

In looking at a recent post by Laura Clawson wherein she avers correctly that

Republicans [maintained] they were going to block everything President Obama tried to gain partisan points and make it easier to defeat him in 2012

it occurred to me that this set of circumstances was made so much easier by the fact that Obama is an African-American. That is, the hoi polloi willing to listen to the nonsense Repubicans have been spouting for the past number of years certainly are more willing to back any anti-Obama policy because they can't get past the fact of Obama's heritage. Even when it comes to such an advantageous perk as health care, the Republican lackeys can't get past their prejudice. To be sure, there's a reason Repubs have opposed every single beneficial proposal BO has made, but it's clear (to me, at least) how their followers have accepted their foolish and disadvantageous contrariness.

Two degrees of separation

I see that Mitch McConnell defeated Tea Party challenger, Matt Bevin, last night to procure Kentucky's GOP nomination for Senate. It's not the superannuated McConnell who's caught my eye in this, but his challenger, for Matt Bevin is the same guy who got $200K from CT after his bell factory in East Hampton, CT burned to the ground: another typical "keep your hands off my Medicare" Tea Partier who badmouths government largesse, but is only too willing to accept it when it's given to him. The worst part of this whole thing is that I GAVE MONEY to this cretin after the awful fire occurred. Moreover, I encouraged the local chapter of the NHS to do the same. If I'd known what his political leanings were, I might have been a bit more discreet.

When the political becomes personal

I see that Senator Rob Portman (R-OH) has come out (so to speak) in favor of gay marriage, after his son identified himself as homosexual. His rationale:

"As a congressman, and more recently as a senator, I opposed marriage for same-sex couples," Portman writes in an editorial published today in the Columbus Dispatch. "Then something happened that led me to think through my position in a much deeper way." In 2011 Will, then in his first year at Yale, told his parents that he is gay; that knowledge, Portman writes, "prompted me to consider the issue from another perspective." Deciding that the Bible's "overarching themes of love and compassion" and gay couples' status as a "a potential source of renewed strength" for the conservative instution of marriage overrode his faith-based objections, Portman had a "change of heart": "I believe all of our sons and daughters ought to have the same opportunity to experience the joy and stability of marriage."

Portman's reference to the Bible is almost laughable as it seems that only now has he discovered love and compassion in his Christianity. I.e., there really is more to the issue than Leviticus 18:22. In a nutsehell, this pretty much demonstrates the narrow mindedness of Republicans. Viz., only when an issue becomes personal can they be counted on to show any kind of integrity. Arthur Miller wrote an entire play regarding a similar issue and came to the same conclusion: It isn't enough to zero in on one's own comforts; rather, one must regard everyone (or, at the very least, one's constituents) as "all of our sons and daughters."