11/28/2020 Corners Without Exits

Immediately after the election I wrote that I recognized Trump's chances were slim. I still feel the same. Right now I still hope Trump's legal team will show the court ample evidence of fraud and corruption in enough of the states of Georgia, Arizona, Nevada, Wisconsin, Michigan, and Pennsylvania to get the phony election results tossed, and I do believe they're phony, but for several reasons, I don't think the efforts will succeed.

1. The first reason is simple: there isn't enough time. The Electoral College is December 14th. An investigation into some, any, or all of the questionable occurrences in these states leading up to the election in changing their rules, often in ways not provided for in their state's constitution and election laws: the actual execution of the election itself by absentee, mail, early in person voting, and day of election in person voting, election infrastructure (especially the machines and software for collecting, storing, counting, and transmitting vote totals), and post-election decisions and actions, to be done right will simply take longer than till Dec 14th. So time is the first and biggest hurdle.
2. Democrats have home field advantage in most of the states under contest. Most of these governors, secretaries of state, state judiciaries, and election officials are partisans who won't support a real and thorough investigation, and frankly, it's likely in some cases because they're the ones who bent rules, thumbed the scales, or perhaps downright committed the fraud themselves.
3. Republicans can be divided into three categories: Never-Trumpers who are glad to see him moved out and who may have been co-conspirators in any schemes. Many of these are the "uni-party" types who are Republican in name only, but in reality they're just cashing in on power. Then you've got the chicken-shit Republicans. These chicken-shits have a lot of Democrats in their districts and are afraid to speak up for fear of losing the next election. And lastly, the Trumplicans, like myself. The problem with us Trumplicans is, we're the majority of the party, let there be no doubt, but because we're a new phenomena, the never-Trumpers and chicken-shits in most cases are the office holders in the states in question, and they don't recognize us as their primary constituency, if indeed they recognize us as constituents at all.
4. Judges will be loathe to take an action and ensure the election is policed and ensure electoral integrity. No matter what they rule, they'll be pilloried for involving themselves. And besides, considering the time constraints I discussed in the first paragraph, many of the corrupt acts will still fall short of evidentiary rules lacking the time consuming, full and thorough investigation that would be required to toss the result.

 

So, based on all the aforementioned, what do I think? Should Trump concede? No. Should he continue to fight? Yes. And we MUST concentrate on both challenging the corruption AND winning the Senatorial runoffs in Georgia, too. Should we leave the GOP and form a new party, the Great America Party or the American Greatness Party, the Patriot Party, or the America First Party? I think so. Not until after January 2021, but long the before 2022 Mid-Terms. This party should appeal to all the Trumplicans, all Democrats who aren't radical leftists, and especially to minorities who want opportunity, and to not be used to win Democrats and election and then set aside until the next campaign rolls around, and who don't want to be sold out by fat cats by both parties in favor of cheap overseas labor and corporate profits rather than their own financial well being. And this party would also favor and end to endless wars, something Democrats and Republicans alike seem to love more than our country itself.

I feel like both the election of 2020 and the future of the two party system equate to corners without exits. It's as if it's untenable to stay where we are, but within the framework of the system as it is now, there's no way out. It's time to rebuild it, and when we do, to install exits from thess corners.

11/23/2020 Why Did Trump's Legal Team Distance Itself From Sidney Powell?

 

Attorney Sidney Powell

Yesterday President Trump's legal team issued a statement that lawyer Sidney Powell was NOT acting as part of President Trump's legal team. "Sidney Powell is practicing law on her own. She is not a member of the Trump Legal Team. She is also not a lawyer for the President in his personal capacity," said a statement from Trump lawyer Jenna Ellis. This statement sent some waves among both supporters and opponents of Trump's legal challenges and objections to events surrounding the 2020 General Election Nov. 3rd. What is going on here? What about "The Kracken"?

This morning, Powell, through various spokespersons, stated the following:

"I agree with the campaign's statement that I am not part of the campaign's legal team. I never signed a retainer agreement or sent the President or the campaign a bill for my expenses or fees. 
 
My intent has always been to expose all the fraud I could find and let the chips fall where they may--whether it be upon Republicans or Democrats. 
 
The evidence I'm compiling is overwhelming that this software tool was used to shift millions of votes from President Trump and other Republican candidates to Biden and other Democrat candidates.  We are proceeding to prepare our lawsuit and plan to file it this week.  It will be epic. 
 
We will not allow this great Republic to be stolen by communists from without and within or our votes altered or manipulated by foreign actors in Hong Kong, Iran, Venezuela, or Serbia, for example, who have neither regard for human life nor the people who are the engine of this exceptional country. 
 
#WeThePeople elected Donald Trump and other Republican candidates to restore the vision of America as a place of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.   
 
You may assist this effort by making a non tax-deductible contribution to www.DefendingTheRepublic.org.  #KrakenOnSteroids"
 
Sidney Powell"

There are some relatively simple explanations, although exactly which, or what combination of them is the real reason, I'm not privy. But here goes:

1. Sidney's statements have just been too outrageous and Trump and or his legal team decided it was better to have some degree of separation from her at this point. "Releasing the Kraken", etc., forced Trump to create political space between Powell and his own team's work.
2. Trump's team and Powell are taking a divide and conquer approach, where his team will focus on certain aspects of the challenge, and Powell on other, different aspects.
3. Powell is raising money to support her efforts, via the link in her statement, above, and this creates legal technicality as far as Trump's standing as POTUS and financial disclosure and restriction laws.
4. There are certain things that in his standing as POTUS, Donald Trump can't challenge in court legally, but if Powell, acting independently as a representative of other concerned and aggrieved citizens can.
5. Powell is gunning for corrupt Democrats AND Republicans, and the fallout of her work could have far reaching implications that traverse the aisle AND transcend 2020, going back maybe as far as 15 or 20 years. She alleges, among other things, that Bernie Sanders was cheated in 2016, knows he was, and that his silence was bought off.
   

Whatever is is, whether she's simply gone off the deep end, or that there are legal technicalities that require the separation, or political ramifications that require same, of all the people I've followed in the Washington D.C. political and current events scene, I trust Sidney Powell more than 99% of everybody else. She indicates she will stir up a legal and political shit-storm with a filing most likely this week. I can't wait to see what that is.

A closing note: I don't know precisely what it is that Sidney Powell will allege this week, nor do I know specifically against whom the allegations will be brought forward. But I don't care what political party, country, state, city, or branch of government those allegations may be brought against. If they're accurate and these people are as corrupt as it appears she will say, then I hope she nails every one of the dirty bastards.

11/20/2020 - 1 Unpopular, Alternate Take, a National Embarrassment

The kinds of ballot and election fraud and incompetence we are seeing in jurisdiction after jurisdiction: "oops, look, here's 2500 more ballots!" "ballots were wheeled in in the dark of night through the back door", "dead guys still voting", "nursing home ballot roundup campaigns", "Gift cards for voting? Nothing to see here.", etc., have been going on forever. Likely more of a factor in a lot of local and statewide races, let there be no doubt, political operatives, community activists, and election officials have put their thumb on the scale many, many times in elections across our country, going back further than any of us would even hazard to guess, and right on up to 2018 and 2020.

So what was different in 2020? Two things: 1) Trump was the target of most of these mom and pop up to larger organized efforts to take the presidency, and the bastard unexpectedly and inexplicably 9from their perspective) got so many votes that extraordinary measures were necessary. And in doing so, they got sloppy. 2) Trump is assembling all these reports, an avalanche or reports, many of them in isolation either weakly explainable on their own, but even if not, small enough to be dismissively brushed aside as not impacting the larger outcome. He's also assembled a team of aggressive lawyers who WILL fight the corrupt system and it's good old boys and girls who normally pull this kind of shit with impunity. And in ones and twos, looked at in isolation, apologists look at each of these goings on, as they happened in other years, and conveniently say, "No big deal. There's no significant election fraud or ballot fraud in the U.S."

If you ask me, this stuff's been dirty from the get-go, not just this go-round. But it's been their swept out of sight, their 'dirty little secret'. In 2020, a dirty little secret wasn't going to beat 73 million (or more) votes, so they had to take far more drastic action, AND Donald J. Trump isn't going to let people pull that stuff, even if it turns out it doesn't make the difference in the election, and go down without throwing the people who did this to him a full on shit grenade.

Even if Trump's challenges aren't successful, I presently only give him a 15-20% chance maximum, I hope at a minimum the end result is ample election reform that eliminates all the dirty little secrets that apologists tell us didn't really matter for once and for all. Because the way we do this is an embarrassment. A full-on, undeniable, total, national embarrassment.

11/20/2020 On the New CCP Virus Restrictions

After seeing some comments on a post I made about the virus yesterday, there were some replies I didn't get back to. I want to clarify and amplify my discomfort with recent mandates by governors.

California Governor Newsome

 

To begin with, I know that the number of cases is on the rise. This was expected and predicted last spring. I remember clearly Dr. Fauci saying we were likely to see this. I do believe the accuracy of the numbers we've been told, i.e. cases, hospitalizations, ICU availability, and fatalities, are dubious at best. But that being the case, there is surely a surge in case numbers, regardless of how inflated they may be. And I do, to the extent I think is appropriate, respect the seriousness of this disease, especially as it threatens elderly and people with co-morbidities like my parents, etc. I'm not in denial about any of that, so throwing a chart showing me a sharp upward curve as a response to my objection, in this case to Minnesota's restriction to having visitors in a household who don't live there doesn't sway me much.

Minnesota Governor Walz

 

Further, I am not even saying that government mandated restrictions: closures, numerical limits on get-togethers, or restrictions on out of household visitors, curfews, venue capacity limits, social distancing requirements, mask wearing, and hand washing aren't helpful.

 

Illinois Governor Pritzker

 

I am saying that SOME of these restrictions and requirements, in coming in the form of government mandates, make me uncomfortable and leave me questioning if one size fits all mandates are in everyone's overall best interest. For example on the get-together restriction which set me off, here's perspective. Let's say that grandpa and grandma are quite elderly. They have some greatly shrunken and finite number of Thanksgiving and Christmas holidays left in their lives. In such a situation, where catching the virus at Christmas, for example, is not a certainty, but a possibility, and where the Christmas gathering can, with some effort, be done in a way to minimize that possibility, why would we deny them the family time when we all know good and well that any and every Christmas moving forward, including this one, might very well be their last?

Here come the closures!

 

I also believe that mandated closure of businesses: salons, gyms, restaurants, bars, shops, etc., while presumably in the overall best interest of the health of the community at large, encumbers the community at large, in this case represented by the same government that is mandating the closure, to protect and compensate businesses and workers in the same breath that puts them out of work. Not that I am advocating such a closure, but I am saying if Governor so and so mandates a closure, those affected by it need to be protected financially.

 

Detroit, April 2020

 

I do not deny the virus is a concern and warrants being addressed. But the solutions have adverse impacts, too. Financially individuals are hurt. Businesses which perhaps operated on the borderline of profitability are being and will continue to be lost forever. Teachers may be doing their best with remote learning, but kids ARE losing out academically, socially, in every way that being at school benefits kids. Elderly in nursing homes and shut-ins going without visitors are suffering horribly in being deprived of family contact. People with depression and other mental illnesses are suffering doubly in all this. Alcoholism and addiction has to be increasingly problematic, as are suicides.

So my objection is to "one size fits all" mandates, because one size doesn't fit all and we all know it. One size fits most? Maybe. One size fits some? Surely. One size fits none? No, I wouldn't say that at all. The bottom line is that I know some people can manage through this very well by following recommendations and guidelines. Other people are stupid, inconsiderate, and irresponsible. I don't know exactly where the line of demarcation should be in terms of the government mandating these things. But I do know I will continue to ask questions and to object when it seems a mandate might just as well serve the public if it was a recommendation or guideline and some personal responsibility were expected of us as opposed to punitive measures, the effectiveness of some which is dubious at best, for example mandating mask wearing out of doors in a park, or closing a place of business at 10:00, as if 9:59 p.m. is not so risky, but 10:01 p.m. is.

My last thought: I am responsible, considerate, and cognizant of how my own behavior might put me or people I love at risk, and I try to act accordingly. But neither am I in the Marines anymore, and your governor is not my commanding officer.

11/19/2020 Why I Shudder at the Thought of a Joe Biden Presidency

Joe Biden, likely to be our 46th President

I shudder at the thought of a Joe Biden presidency, which I concede appears to likely be what is in store for my beloved country. Here are a few reasons why I feel that way:

Kamala Harris - This despicable woman could be President of the United States. I am ready for a woman of color to be our Chief Executive and Commander in Chief, but Senator Kamala Harris isn't her. She's too liberal and too dishonest for me. At a time when our country needs racial healing, she advocates for a racial crime hoaxer like Jussie Smollett and raised money for Black Lives Matter criminals and terrorists in Minneapolis. She's a big NO from me and a big reason Joe scares me.

Our Economy - I see Joe heading right back down the same paths Donald Trump was rescuing us from: excessive regulation and red tape to stifle businesses and economic growth. Business will again be seen as an evil to be addressed rather than the engine that can improve all American's lives. I foresee Joe re-entering the Paris climate accord. I also see him allowing predatory trade practices and trade deals with our competitors overseas, especially China. I don't know that Joe will totally tank the economy, but I have no doubts he will stifle it and it will be on nothing that resembles the trajectory Donald Trump had it on prior to the pandemic.

My 401K and Retirement Savings - I played by the rules and saved aggressively for today. I'm thankful for my blessings, but also proud that I saved for today. Between the economic impacts cited in the preceding paragraph, and the mentality of much of the left toward investment and Wall Street in general, I am afraid of the impact on my savings and my future.

Amendment 2A the Right to Bear Arms - Joe has said he would levy a tax on each gun we own, and ban online gun and ammunition sales. At the same time he holds hands with the same fucking morons who want to defund the police and look the other way or even support and advocate for the violent, criminal terrorists Antifa and Black Lives Matter.

Intrusive Government - If you look at the difference in strategy to deal with the CCP Virus between right and left, the fundamental difference boils down to the government's role. And while this concern is highlighted by differences in how this virus is addressed, it's not a concern I would limit to the one issue. Joe and the left see a government that is much more active and involved in everyday lives as a necessity. I am not saying I don't see a role for government, but there does not seem to be a fair trade-off where government fiat and mandate end and personal responsibility begin. We need more guidance and guidelines and less mandate. The Governor of Minnesota yesterday prohibited all social gatherings, even in our own homes, even when those with whom we would gather can social distance. The left is all for this kind of intrusive government involvement in our lives. When the government mandates businesses close or infringes on our rights, it is incumbent on the government to do everything it can to make those impacted by their mandate whole somehow.

Race Relations - Democrats focus on race in ways that don't help black people (or any other people). Policies supposedly intended to make race relations better instead interject race and racial tensions into everything. I am not saying that it isn't well intentioned, I am saying it doesn't work and makes things worse, not better. Joe, as would any Democrat more than likely, will march to the beat of that same drum. Among the things Democrats, including Joe, need to do, is to stop calling those of us who disagree with many of their pet policies and desires to address race as being racist just for having the audacity to disagree with them.

The Green New Deal - I concede that many aspects of the deal are well-intended, but those same policies, regardless of intent, will destroy people's lives and destroy our economy. Just like with the pandemic, if the government is going to impose rules that decimate the coal, oil, auto, and other industries, then it becomes the government's responsibility to make those adversely affected by the government mandate whole again somehow. I am not saying I support such mandates as the Green New Deal would impose, but I am saying that if those mandates are imposed, the government can't leave coal, oil, auto, and other workers flounder in an economy in which they're no longer welcomed to participate. Walmart only needs so many greeters, and that sort of work is great for a segment of the working class, but doesn't replace blue collar production work economically.

China, Russia, Ukraine, etc. - Joe and Hunter made deals. I can't bring myself to believe Joe isn't beholden to some foreign governments and entities. Not good.

Do I need to go on? Probably not. Suffice it to say, if Joe is sworn in in January, I will be looking as open-mindedly but as critically as I can at his Cabinet appointments, his various agency appointments, judicial appointments, his initiatives and programs, and Executive Orders. While I will try in each case to see where each is well-intended, I will also look at how each impacts me, my family, and our nation. If something looks like a positive to me, I will be honest and say so. If it doesn't, I'll say that also... if Twitter and Facebook will let me. I'm only being slightly facetious.

11/16/2020 Ballots - Legal, Illegal, Tainted

 

What would make a ballot illegal?

• The ballot was cast by a person who is not eligible to vote, i.e. not a citizen, not registered, etc.
  
• The ballot was cast by someone who is not a resident in the precinct or jurisdiction where they cast it.
• The person who cast the vote is someone other than the registered voter.
• A ballot cast by a person registered in multiple jurisdictions who votes more than once.
• A ballot that was cast AFTER the polls close. This does not include ballots cast by persons who were in line at their polling place before the polls closed who waited there until they could cast their votes, nor does it include people who voted by mail whose ballot was mailed and postmarked prior to the voting deadline.
  

What would make a ballot tainted?

• Election officials or judges changing voting rules or timelines in a manner contrary to the US or relevant state constitution, or contrary to local election law.
• Election officials disregarding processes designed to eliminate illegal ballots and mixing ballots which were not validated in accordance with legality safeguards required by statute, i.e. chain of custody, signature or identification verification, or time of postmark, and mixing those ballots with legally cast ballots. This taints the entire batch.

If every illegal and tainted ballot in the 2020 General Election was thrown out, I do not know if President Trump would have won Wisconsin, Michigan, Pennsylvania, Nevada, or Georgia. But if I thought that every ballot cast was subjected to scrutiny to ensure legality by poll workers, and ballot handlers and counters AND former VP Joe Biden came out on top, I would disappointingly accept that unfortunate outcome. So far NOTHING has been said or done that gives me confidence that election officials in any of the aforementioned states, possibly other states, handled things by the books. Starting in the months leading up to Election Day we saw rules changes, bent, and disregarded, ostensibly to make voting easier during a pandemic. Many of those changes made illegal voting, ballot fraud easier, and cause, in my opinion, the tainting of many otherwise legally cast ballots.

Here are some things I'd like to understand better:

• How is it that Joe Biden outperformed President Obama and former First Lady Hillary Clinton by such large margins? Twelve million more votes than Obama in 2012?
  
• Why did election officials in Pennsylvania, Georgia, and other jurisdictions suddenly stop counting votes on election night?
• Why did Joe Biden perform so well in Detroit, Milwaukee, Philadelphia, Atlanta, and Pittsburgh in comparison to his performance in other cities?
• What explains the massive number of Biden votes with no other votes down ballot? Was there a similar number or percentage of Trump only votes?
• It seems illogical that the GOP won back quite a few seats in the House of Representatives, seems to have held its own in the Senate, and lost the White House. What explains the disconnect?

If you ask me this whole damned election is tainted. Maybe it's not so, but nothing gives me confidence that that's the case. Nothing.

 

11/14/2020 Distrust, Distrust, and More Distrust

 

Distrust

The breaking story yesterday, about how military officials lied to, or euphemistically 'misled' the President on troop levels and kept our troops in Syria, knowing full well it was against his orders infuriates me. Here's a link to the NY Post version: nypost 11/13/2020 And out of my fury, came not so much a realization, but a reality.

I no longer trust our military officials at the highest levels. This includes, but is certainly not limited to former high level USMC generals who I formerly revered and respected.

I absolutely distrust nearly the entirety of the US intelligence community. For five years these bastards have tried and in many cases succeeded in undermining the President of the United States.

I do no trust the US Dept. of State, especially career bureaucrats who think they make and manage foreign policy with authority that supersedes the President's.

I do not trust our FBI or Department of Justice personnel at the highest levels. None of them. I had hopes that AG Barr and various US Attorneys he supposedly had investigating corruption would right the wrongs of the Rosenstein, Comey, and McCabe era, but clearly I was wrong.

The only Democrat in office I trust is Rep. Tulsi Gabbard, unfortunately I don't agree with her politics enough to support her, but she seems the only one with a single iota of integrity. The rest I assume are lying whenever they speak 100% of the time.

I don't trust establishment Republicans. I don't trust the Republican Party as an entity.

I generally don't trust lawyers in politics, and I don't trust most Senators. I trust Senators who are lawyers least of all.

I don't trust corrupt elections officials. I don't know that Trump would have won, but from September, maybe before, they were doing everything they could to stack the deck.

I don't trust the result of the 2020 election. I believe there was cheating, we are being lied to, and accomplices in government and the media will swear to ANY lie they need to to advance their agenda and objectives.

I don't trust major television news on ANY of the big channels. They're far more political operative and propagandists than they are arbiters of true and accurate information.

I don't trust most political pollsters, especially those associated with aforementioned news propaganda organizations. But add in the political think tank and academia run pollsters, too. They knowingly lie and distort to put forward the narrative that best supports the political wants of their corporate and campus masters.

I don't trust big tech - Facebook, Twitter, Google, etc. I don't know that this needs a lot of explanation.

I don't trust MOST of what we've been told about the CCP Virus. Yes, the virus is real. Yes, there are valid concerns and it is a real threat. But the extent of the threat and almost all the data we've been fed is inaccurate, narrative shaping bullshit.

I remember I used to wonder why it was some people liked to live in remote places in Idaho and Montana and the like, far from people and far from the reach of all of the above. The realization, or should I say the reality of that sentiment makes perfect sense to me now.