Breaking it Down

Let's examine what is perhaps the most well-known, but often misunderstood, portion of the Declaration of Independence.  (These words are likely misunderstood because of a lack of carefully examining the weight of each word, which I'll attempt to do here.)  The Declaration is an even more important document to our republic than the Constitution.  For without the Declaration, there is no republic, and there can be no Constitution.

I have a friend who can undertake this exercise more knowledgeably and eloquently than I (and while he's not a politician, a lawyer or a historian, he is one of the smartest people I know), but here's my cut.

Let's break down this most fundamental, elemental portion of the Declaration, these 35 impactful words:

"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness."

1.  These things to follow are accepted as truths.  Not opinions.  Not beliefs.  Truths.  Not subject to debate.

2.  These truths are held by the authors (representing the People) to be self-evident.  They are obvious, they are clear, because of the truths themselves.  Self-evident: they are obvious because of themselves, of what they say.  Self-evident: because of what they are, what they say, they should be clear to all.

3.  Another very important point regarding these first seven words: these truths are not held to be truths by the authors, they are truths, and are held to be self-evident by the authors.  This is a vital distinction; the authors could have said, "We hold these to be truths, and to be self-evident."  That would mean that their status as truth would be conveyed by the authors.  Instead, the authors are saying that they are truths, period, and they hold them to be self-evident.  That removes any suggestion that whether they are truths is a matter of opinion.

4.  The first self-evident truth is that all men are created equal.  Now it's true that the Declaration was written before the suffrage movement or the end of slavery.  However, it has become generally accepted that this truth of equality applies to all races and creeds, and to both men and women alike.

Perhaps that perceived gradual broadening of the intent of the Declaration's authors is what has opened the door for so many to re-interpret the words that follow, namely the definition of what is a right as endowed by our Creator.  However, we don't know what the authors' original intent was.  Maybe it was already sufficiently broad to cover man and woman, slave and free, but they knew that, given the mores of that time, it would take many decades for the full weight of their words to be accepted by all.  Or maybe they actually did view women and slaves as less than equal.

No matter.  What is clear is that their following words did not leave open for interpretation any broadening of intent, because of the thoughtful and intentional use of what I believe is the most important word in this section of the Declaration.  But we'll get to that a little later.

5.  The second truth is that all men (people) are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights.  Now, whether you're a believer or not, this is very important, for several reasons.  First, we are endowed with these rights at birth (some, including me, would argue conception, but that's another argument for another day), by our Creator, meaning that they cannot be taken from us by government fiat.  They dwell within us as surely as our breath, our senses and our beating hearts.

Second, they are not granted to us by our government.  The implication is that these fundamental rights are above the ability of government to provide, that it is not government's role to be in the business of granting such fundamental rights.  The government can ensure the right to free speech, the right to bear arms, and other legal rights.  But these rights are so critically important that they transcend government's ability to grant them - and should transcend government's ability to impede them.  It's above their pay grade.

And third, these rights are unalienable.  Webster's defines this word in simple, but powerful terms:

Impossible to take away or give up.

Thus the authors of the Declaration are stating clearly that these rights come from the One who created us, whomever we may believe that to be; the important point is that they are ours, and no king, no president, no lawmaker can take them from us (at least not without a fight, but we'll get to that later also).

Now, on to the rights themselves, but first, let's consider them in light of two things: first, their unalienability, and second, the context in which the Declaration was written.  It was written to declare the independence (hence the name) of a nation of people from the tyranny and oppression of a centralized government that dictated their lives, their freedom, and their ability to achieve whatever happiness they chose in life.

Exactly the kind of powerful centralized government that would try to provide for our every need, by taking from us the means to provide it through our own choices.  Food for thought.

6.  Life.  We have the right to life.  It should be impossible to be taken from us.  Yet it can be, by criminal act, by accident, by war, by our own actions, and by the government, if a death penalty is imposed.  I'm not going to get into that debate here, other than to note that one's own rights end when they infringe upon the rights of another (this is a matter of logic in the academic sense, enforced by law).

What the authors were responding to was the fact that monarchs and other governmental authorities had been determining these rights for centuries, taking the lives or liberties of anyone who threatened or opposed them.  We find Biblical examples including Pharaoh and Herod, and more recent examples through the British monarchs our founders were declaring their independence from, right up to North Korea and Iran today.

7.  Liberty.  We have the right to live as free men and women.  (I'll avoid the debate over the fact that a number of the signers of the Declaration owned slaves.  That's a separate topic, best taken up by friends I know who are far more knowledgeable - in part because it would be a distraction from this discussion, and, more importantly, this discussion would be a distraction from that important topic.  Suffice it to say that I believe chattel slavery was the deepest stain on the fabric of our nation.)

Again in the context of the circumstances, the authors were declaring that no citizen of this fledgling republic would ever again be subject to the whims of a single despotic ruler.  In essence, they were raising a collective middle finger in King George's face.

These first two rights are indeed self-evident, and sufficiently clear.  We have the right to our own lives, and the right to our own freedom.  The next right contains a subtlety that is too often missed, but is critical in understanding the proper role of the government in this republic.

8.  The pursuit of happiness.  Let's first address happiness itself.  The authors don't define it, but leave it to each individual to define - again, a very important and intentional distinction.  For some, it may be unimaginable wealth, the ability to buy every thing and every experience one's heart desires.  Others may be perfectly happy with little in the way of material things, but want to be free from having to work their tails off, free from having to go to school beyond what's required, free from excessive responsibilities and worry.

For some, it's more about family and relationships.  For others, it may be about where they live.  It may be about the meaningfulness of the work one does, or one's pursuits and interests, or one's charitable work.  For many, it's a combination of at least some of the above.

One important point is that, again, the rights of one individual to pursue what makes him or her happy must not infringe upon the rights of another.  So while it might make one person happy to, say, get loaded and go joyriding, doing so puts others' right to life at risk.

However, this cannot be extrapolated to extreme arguments such as this: your right to pursue happiness by becoming wealthy interferes with my right to pursue happiness by having the government give me everything I want, so to pay for that you should be taxed out the wazoo.  (More on taxes later.)

9.  The most important word among these 35 is: "pursuit."

We do not have a right to happiness, however we define that.  Sorry if that bursts your bubble, or seems harsh, but the language is plain - self-evident, in fact.  Would being rich make you happy?  Fine.  You're free to pursue that (not by robbing a bank, by the way).  Invent something.  Work your tail off.  Save your money. Pursue your happiness.  Many have done it, from Sam Walton to Chris Gardner.

Would you be happy running a business, being a CEO?  Okay.  Be prepared to work harder than everyone around you to get there.  To work long hours once you're there.  To carry the burden of responsibility for everyone who works for you, plus any investors in the company.  To handle significant stress.  And to sacrifice other things, like time with your family, evenings and weekends off, vacations spent without checking your work email, etc.  Those things are part of the pursuit, and in a free, capitalist democratic republic, there's nothing stopping you.  (I'm speaking from personal experience here.)

Perhaps happiness to you comes from doing work you find meaningful, like teaching, for example.  I can think of few jobs more important.  Yet, you're also going to be making sacrifices.  A college degree requires sacrifice.  Then there's long hours for relatively limited pay, certainly not commensurate with the importance of the work, but in reality commensurate with the laws of supply and demand.  On the plus side you have high job satisfaction (again, assuming this is what makes you happy) and summers off.  (Lest anyone try to read anything nefarious into these comments, I have nothing but the highest regard for teachers, many of my friends and relatives are teachers, and if I could start my career over, with the benefit of hindsight, I'd rather be a teacher than a CEO.)  In any event, there's nothing holding you back from the pursuit of your dream.

Maybe you'd be happiest being able to spend a lot of time enjoying the leisure activities you prefer, in the company of your friends.  Maybe you're not interested in material things; all you need is a good pair of shoes and a backpack, and lots of free time.  You don't care about the walls that surround you or whether you have to share that space with a roommate or two.  You could be happy doing any work that permitted you those things you enjoy most.  Have at it - those opportunities abound.  (Come to think of it, that scenario sounds pretty appealing too.)  Just know that you may have to sacrifice some other things, like wages that would support a family of four with a house in the suburbs and a late-model car.

But no one is endowed by their Creator with the right to be a CEO, a teacher, or a free spirit hiking his or her way through life.  You have to pursue it.  And nothing is stopping you from that.

What you were endowed by your Creator with is a set of talents, abilities and interests that will allow you to pursue those things, no matter who you are.  Yes, there are people who, sadly, cannot pursue their dreams.  I'm not talking about the poor; there are far too many examples of enterprising, hard-working people who've overcome poverty to achieve great success in life, in business, in medicine, in academia, and in whatever other pursuits bring them happiness.  (Think Chris Gardner again.)

Nor am I talking about people who, sadly, place barriers on their own pursuits in the form of self-imposed limitations.  I'm talking about people who unfortunately have some physical or mental limitation that prevents them from the pursuit of their own definition of happiness.  And I'm afraid I don't have an easy answer to that particular conundrum.

I do believe that we have an obligation to help others.  We can fulfill that obligation voluntarily, assuming we do truly care about others.  And I'm also not opposed to limited government-provided basic assistance such as Medicaid, funded by tax dollars.  We just have to be careful about how far that goes, or we run the risk of straying from the reason for the very intentional use of the word "pursuit."  In other words, we begin to expect that the government will provide for the things that we have the opportunity to earn through that pursuit.

Does the worker at McDonald's have the right to sufficient pay to comfortably support a family of four?  Or as much pay as a teacher, or a nurse?  The answer lies not in the perceived relative importance of the work, nor does it lie in some sense of fairness, equality or compassion.

The answer once again lies in the immutable laws of supply and demand, and in our unalienable right to the pursuit of happiness.  I'm living proof that a guy who worked in a fast food job in college is capable of doing other things that pay more money.  And I've encountered numerous young people in fast food drive-throughs that I'd have hired in the brokerage firm I ran for 15 years in a hot minute, because of their great customer service skills.  If only they'd had the requisite knowledge to do the job - which they could have pursued (if I can do it, pretty much anybody can) - I'd have done so.

Now, you're perfectly free to spend the rest of your life serving up French fries and McNuggets.  Just understand that, again, there will be some necessary sacrifices involved.

The vast majority of us are endowed not only with these rights as set forth above, but with the skills and abilities to pursue our definition of happiness, if we'll only do it.  That's one of the wonderful things about the prescient vision that the authors of the Declaration laid out, and that has prevailed for more than 200 years.  Quite amazing, really, when you consider how many systems have failed in far less time.

Unfortunately, there is a mindset today that would threaten that vision.  One that suggests the government should ensure our happiness, and that others should be forced to pony up to provide that.  The definition of that happiness has been broadened to include things like health insurance, equal pay no matter the supply of or demand for the work, and myriad other "rights."  (Again, lest my words be twisted, I do believe quite strongly in equal pay for equal work, and I have applied it throughout my career when it was my decision to set pay.)

That broadening of the definition of happiness, of rights, and of the government's role in all of this, is not what the Founders envisioned.  Taxes were virtually non-existent in this country at its founding.  There was no income tax or estate tax or personal property tax.  The first taxes were tariffs on imported goods that were imposed at ports of entry, and an excise tax on whiskey.  (The horror!)

Nowhere in the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution or the Bill of Rights is there a promise (or even a hint) of the taking of money from one group of people in order to provide for the happiness of another group of people.  (In fact, the Revolution that precipitated independence was in part a response to excessive taxation, and to the tyrannical system that employed that practice.)

Granted, the Preamble to the Constitution makes reference to establishing justice, insuring domestic tranquility, providing for the common defense, and promoting the general welfare.  This means that:

• We are to be a nation of laws.  This is the system that ensures the logical precept that the rights of one do not infringe on the rights of another.
• We should have a means of keeping peace among ourselves and enforcing those laws - police, in other words.
• We should defend America and protect its citizens, thus we should have various entities to provide for our defense - an Army, a Navy, etc.
• We should promote the general welfare.  This is not to be misconstrued as creating a welfare state; that was not the framers' intent.  No, this speaks to providing the most basic of needs for those who are unable to otherwise meet them.  To ensure that we remain free to pursue our own happiness, not to provide that happiness for us.  To provide for basic roads and other infrastructure that assist in that pursuit.  To clear excessive regulation that would hinder that pursuit.  (The topic of the meaning of "promote the general welfare" could be a blog post all its own.)

The Declaration goes on to say that, if a government morphs into something that threatens those unalienable rights, it is not only the right of the people to "throw off that Government," but it is their duty.

There are those who would twist those words and claim that this is exactly what has happened since November 8, 2016.  To those people, I encourage a careful reading of the Declaration in its entirety (sober, preferably), including the words that precede this discussion of throwing off such a government:

"Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes ... But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government ..." (italics added).

If the perceived train of abuses and usurpations of our government is long, it has been imposed upon us by both Democrat and Republican, left and right.  No one on the left would accept that as truth over the eight years preceding the current administration, nor would anyone on the right have accepted it for the eight years preceding that.

In other words, you can't go around calling for impeachment every time your party's candidate loses a presidential election, especially within the first few months or so, claiming that the new administration is guilty of abuses and usurpations simply because it's in the hands of the opposing party.

Actually, I'd encourage a thorough and careful reading of the entire Declaration to every citizen, without the blinders of bias, but reading for true understanding of what was intended at the birth of our nation.

One final note: there is considerable debate over whether the Constitution should stand as written, or whether it was meant as a living document to be amended as times change.  There's a slippery slope between that and becoming a banana republic.  For example, a president of a country could seek to amend that country's constitution to eliminate term limits on the presidency, for the sole purpose of retaining power.  So the debate over whether our Constitution is a living document will continue.

However, one thing is certain: the Declaration of Independence cannot be viewed as a living document.  Otherwise, we might as well all be eating crumpets and drinking Earl Grey, whilst singing "God Save the Queen."

Le Raison d'Etre

That's French for "the reason for being."  Not yours or mine, but the Economic Curmudgeon's.  In other words, why do I write this blog?

I actually started it nearly ten years ago, just as the housing crisis was hitting full bloom.  Back then, I was still in the brokerage business, and still writing daily economic commentary for my firm.  So I was watching the numbers every day, and breaking them down.  (Yeah, I'm one of those people who thinks that's fun.  Wanna party with me?)

But it was also an election year, and there was a new kid on the political block.  One whose inexperience concerned me.  Feel free to disagree; it's okay, and it has no bearing on the reason for the Curmudgeon.  (By the way, the name comes from the fact that, at the time, I'd been pretty bearish on the economy for quite some time, so it only seemed fitting.)

I gave it up for quite a while after I left that world, but I picked it back up not too long ago.  Why?

Simple.  I have political views, as do most people.  But I get sick and tired of reading political crap on Facebook.  Show me your puppy pictures, your grandkids, your flowers, what you ate for lunch.  Tell me what's going on in your life.  Just spare me the Occupy Democrats memes, or the lengthy comments on the latest Trump conspiracy, or the relentless name-calling.

But I wanted to voice my opinions as well, especially to refute so much of the nonsensical misinformation out there.  However, I wanted to spare my Facebook friends who lean left having to read my political views, because I assume they'd no more want to do that than I'd want to read theirs (even though some of them still do post their views on Facebook, and that's okay with me - they're my friends, and my mouse wheel scrolls pretty fast).

So I decided to voice it here instead.  This is my space, and you're invited in - heck, argue with me in the comments, even.  I try to use reason (laced with sarcasm, as is my wont), and to actually read the source documents in question, like a proposed bill, rather than reading some biased news source's interpretation of it, and accepting that as gospel.  Hopefully some find value in that.

Now, I do post links on Facebook to most of my blog posts.  I do this because not everyone who wants to read the Curmudgeon's ramblings knows how to follow the blog, and because a good friend specifically requested that I post the links on Facebook.  And I've actually had a few hundred people read some of these posts, and several of my friends share them with their friends.

If you don't want to read my views, I figure it's easy enough to just not click the links and read the blog posts.  (Hint: if you lean left, you probably don't want to read this blog.)  Just scroll on by, like I sometimes do.  That way, my friends who see the world differently can still see my puppy pics (and trust me, the grandson pics will be coming soon), but they don't have to read my political views.

So why am I explaining this?

After my last post (the one about the Huffington Post article), I received the following comment on the Facebook link:

"I am disappointed that someone of your intellect, integrity, and education could hold these views. I am going to have to say goodbye to you as a FB friend. Wish you the best."

(Note: I only added the italics because another FB friend suggested that it's easier to see something I've called out in quotes if I also put it in italics, when perusing FB on a phone screen.  I mean no disrespect to the commenter by using italics.)

I deleted the comment out of respect for that person, because frankly, I thought it made them look bad.  It basically reinforced everything I said in the blog post about intolerance of views different from one's own, and I didn't want to invite any further comments making that point.

A second reason I deleted it is that I find it rather undignified, if not downright sophomoric, to turn the process of unfriending a person on Facebook into a public event, inviting all the world to spectate.  Hey, you want to unfriend me on Facebook?  By all means, feel free.  Just go ahead and do it, though; no need to announce it to the world.  If you must, send me a private message first, explaining to me why you're doing it.

I promise I won't be offended, nor will I lose a nanosecond's sleep over it.  After all, it's Facebook, it's not life.  And besides, if our relationship was that tenuous, we never really had one to begin with.

Finally, and on a related note, the parting comment, "Wish you the best," seemed ... well, disingenuous, given what preceded it.

So there you have it.  I hope I can spare anyone else feeling the need to sever our Facebook relationship - publicly or otherwise - over the fact that I may see the world differently.  So again, if you've read this blog, and don't like what you see, and we're connected on Facebook - just scroll past the blog links I post, and focus on the puppy pics.  In fact, if you're in that camp and you've read this post, let me close with one:

(Charlie loves everybody, no matter what their political views are.  Maybe there's a lesson in that for all of us.)

I Don't Know How to Explain to You That You Should Think

The drivel below was penned by Huffington Post contributor Kayla Chadwick.  Now, I never would have seen it, because I don't read dreck like HuffPo, but it's been making the rounds on Facebook.  So here it is, followed by my observations.

"I Don’t Know How To Explain To You That You Should Care About Other People

Our disagreement is not merely political, but a fundamental divide on what it means to live in a society. Like many Americans, I’m having politics fatigue. Or, to be more specific, arguing-about-politics fatigue.

I haven’t run out of salient points or evidence for my political perspective, but there is a particular stumbling block I keep running into when trying to reach across the proverbial aisle and have those “difficult conversations” so smugly suggested by think piece after think piece: I don’t know how to explain to someone why they should care about other people.

Personally, I’m happy to pay an extra 4.3 percent for my fast food burger if it means the person making it for me can afford to feed their own family. If you aren’t willing to fork over an extra 17 cents for a Big Mac, you’re a fundamentally different person than I am. I’m perfectly content to pay taxes that go toward public schools, even though I’m childless and intend to stay that way, because all children deserve a quality, free education. If this seems unfair or unreasonable to you, we are never going to see eye to eye.

If I have to pay a little more with each paycheck to ensure my fellow Americans can access health care? SIGN ME UP. Poverty should not be a death sentence in the richest country in the world. If you’re okay with thousands of people dying of treatable diseases just so the wealthiest among us can hoard still more wealth, there is a divide between our worldviews that can never be bridged.
I don’t know how to convince someone how to experience the basic human emotion of empathy. I cannot have one more conversation with someone who is content to see millions of people suffer needlessly in exchange for a tax cut that statistically they’ll never see (do you make anywhere close to the median American salary? Less? Congrats, this tax break is not for you).

I cannot have political debates with these people. Our disagreement is not merely political, but a fundamental divide on what it means to live in a society, how to be a good person, and why any of that matters.

There are all kinds of practical, self-serving reasons to raise the minimum wage (fairly compensated workers typically do better work), fund public schools (everyone’s safer when the general public can read and use critical thinking), and make sure every American can access health care (outbreaks of preventable diseases being generally undesirable).

But if making sure your fellow citizens can afford to eat, get an education, and go to the doctor isn’t enough of a reason to fund those things, I have nothing left to say to you.

I can’t debate someone into caring about what happens to their fellow human beings. The fact that such detached cruelty is so normalized in a certain party’s political discourse is at once infuriating and terrifying.

The “I’ve got mine, so screw you,” attitude has been oozing from the American right wing for decades, but this gleeful exuberance in pushing legislation that will immediately hurt the most vulnerable among us is chilling.

Perhaps it was always like this. I’m (relatively) young, so maybe I’m just waking up to this unimaginable callousness. Maybe the emergence of social media has just made this heinous tendency more visible; seeing hundreds of accounts spring to the defense of policies that will almost certainly make their lives more difficult is incredible to behold.

I don’t know what’s changed ― or indeed, if anything has ― and I don’t have any easy answers. But I do know I’m done trying to convince these hordes of selfish, cruel people to look beyond themselves."

Okay, my thoughts.

This is nothing more than an uninformed, hypocritical, intolerant partisan rant wrapped up in a sanctimonious, holier-than-thou false sense of superiority.

Why uninformed?  In the first place, while Ms. Chadwick has read a study that claims that "fairly compensated workers typically do better work," she has apparently ignored the myriad studies that have shown that artificially raising wages above what supply and demand would dictate is a job-killer.  It leads to automation (order-taking kiosks in fast food restaurants) that replaces workers, employers cutting hours to cut costs, and small businesses hiring fewer people.

Moreover, a job flipping burgers at McDonald's was never supposed to provide for a family.  I worked in a fast food job my freshman year in college.  I also bagged groceries, made window screens for mobile homes, mowed lawns and worked a soda fountain at a drugstore during my youth.  I never expected any of those jobs to provide a living for me so that I could start and raise a family.  That's why I went to college.

(And lest anyone decry my "privilege" at being able to do so, note that my family at the time met the definition of lower middle class, and I had to pay my own way through school.  I worked my butt off, got two degrees, and realized the American dream: taking advantage of the opportunities afforded me by living in a free, capitalist democratic republic.)

She's also apparently ignorant of Medicaid, of the miserable failure that is the "Affordable" Care Act, or of the fact that health care is not a right, at least according to the Bill of Rights that the rest of us have actually read.

And she's ignorant of the fact that, if you're a homeowner, you do indeed pay taxes to support schools, whether you have kids or not.

Finally, she has totally misrepresented the conservative platform - and ethos.  It is well-documented fact that conservatives give more to charity, for example, than liberals.

I would in no way imply that all conservatives are caring, compassionate, selfless and tolerant.  Nor would I imply that all liberals are uncaring, lack compassion, are selfish and intolerant.  However, I can say with authority that the most caring, compassionate, selfless and tolerant people I know lean conservative.  And the most selfish, intolerant, uncaring people I know lean liberal.  Again, not all conservatives and liberals I know fit those descriptions, but that is the central tendency.

Maybe I hang out with the wrong liberals.  Maybe Ms. Chadwick hangs out with the wrong conservatives.  It would help, of course, if she'd actually have a conversation with them to learn how they feel, what they think and believe.  That would be ... well, tolerant.

Why hypocritical?  While Ms. Chadwick claims to care so much about the less fortunate, she callously assumes that someone living at the margin can afford to pay an extra 4.3% for their Big Mac.  Wage growth under President Obama averaged less than one-fourth that amount.

So if we assume that a family at the margin would see their food budget - a necessary, not discretionary, expenditure - increase by 4.3% when their wages under a liberal administration are increasing at about 1%, they're going to run into difficulty pretty soon.  Apparently Ms. Chadwick can afford such an increase in her spending; good for her.  However, a lot of folks can't, including the burger-flipper at McDonald's who's trying to feed his family - you know, the guy she cares so much about, but you and I don't.

Of course, you could buy your own hamburger at the grocery store and make your own burgers for a lot less than the cost of a Big Mac.  But then you'd put the poor burger-flipper out of work altogether.  Then again, what about the people who work at the grocery store?  Apparently Ms. Chadwick doesn't care whether they have jobs or not, since she seems to be too lazy to cook for herself.

Likewise with taxes to support public schools, for those without children.  I'm assuming she's proposing additional taxes on top of the taxes that already go toward public education; either that or she's just plain ignorant.  (I'll give her the benefit of the doubt and assume the former.)  Some people might not be able to afford a tax increase for that, in addition to a 4.3% increase in their food budget.

Or for government-subsidized health care.  How many marginal families' finances have been damaged by having to pay the increased premiums that resulted from ACA, or having to pay a tax because, while they don't feel they need health insurance at this point in their lives, they have to pay for it or else pay a surtax.  That surtax itself was cruel: it was imposed so that President Obama could say, "See?  Everyone is insured!"  That's like holding a gun to someone's head and threatening to kill them if they don't buy a house, then crowing about the record homeownership rate.

And why intolerant?  Because, like so many on the "tolerant" left these days, she refuses to have a conversation with anyone who doesn't participate in her groupthink.

Probably because she knows her assertions would be handily refuted.  So she resorts to this sanctimonious hogwash, and people who should know better buy it.  Sad.

I simply don't believe I should have to pay more for goods and services than what they're worth from a true economic (i.e. supply and demand) perspective, hence I don't want to pay an extra 17 cents for a Big Mac so the person frying it up can feed a family on starter-job wages.  (For that matter, I don't even eat at McDonald's.  From her post, presumably Ms. Chadwick does.  Maybe if she laid off the Big Macs, the rest of us wouldn't have to subsidize her health care.)

I do believe my property taxes should help pay for public schools, even though my daughter is grown.  In fact, they do.  The issue isn't paying for public schools, it's the dismal state of education in most of this country.  Let's fix that, even if it means a choice between public education in poorly-run districts and vouchers for private schools as an alternative.  I created a foundation to support private school education for kids in the poorest country in the world, because the government schools in that country are horrible.  Is that uncaring?  If not, why can't we do the same thing here at home?

And again, I don't believe health care is a right, though I support Medicaid to provide it to the indigent (and Medicare, because it's my money).  ACA is an abysmal failure.  The proposals to fix it thus far aren't much better.  So let's just go back to the days before Obamacare, or else let's truly fix the system, starting with FDA and tort reforms.

No, Ms. Chadwick, you and I are nothing alike.  But not because I don't care about people.  My attitude is far from, "I've got mine, so screw you."  You want to make that assertion?  Let's compare our charitable giving.  The taxes we pay.  Our record of volunteer work to help those less fortunate than themselves.  Honey, I'll bet you've never even seen real poverty.  I have.  So save your inexperienced sanctimoniousness for someone who's naive enough to accept it.  Others apparently are, but I'm not.

See, it's one thing to demonstrate your compassion with your words.  It's quite another to demonstrate it with your works.  So put your money - and your sweat - where your mouth is.  Or keep it closed.

In fact, Ms. Chadwick, I really can't think of anything that I need you to explain to me.  Do a little research, be willing to let some facts interfere with your biases, and gain a little life experience.  Then maybe we can come up with something you can explain to me that I don't already understand.  I won't hold my breath.

But really, it's okay that Ms. Chadwick and her devotees don't want to have a conversation with me.  I don't want to have a conversation with them, either.

That's not intolerance on my part.  It's simply a reflection of the fact that, while I could explain some things to them, I can't understand those things for them.

Catching Up - Play Ball?

Long time, no blog.  Between my work schedule of late and bonding with our new pup, Charlie, I've fallen woefully behind.  So I'm going to be playing catch-up, possibly in a torrent of posts.

Schedule notwithstanding, I couldn't bring myself to post anything in the immediate aftermath of the tragic shooting at the Republican team's practice for the Congressional baseball game.  Not because I'm a Republican (I'm not), and not because I have any stronger feelings about Republican Congressmen being shot at than Democrats.  All partisan violence is abhorrent to me.  In fact, increasingly, all extreme, over-the-top partisan rancor and rhetoric is abhorrent to me.

Time to tone it down.

One of the unfortunate by-products of the 24/7 cable news environment is the propensity to want to assign blame for things.  Within 24 hours of any incident, the finger-pointing begins.  Whose fault was it?  In my view, that tends to demean the tragedy itself, and turns it into an exercise unworthy of dignified consideration.

I've seen, heard and read blame being ascribed to the Left, to the Right, to Donald Trump, to guns, to the media, mental illness, and to just about everything but global warming.  To be sure, various factors play an indirect role.  But all that direct blame is misplaced.

First and foremost, blame lies at the feet of one James Hodgkinson.  He alone targeted his victims, for his own reasons.  He alone loaded his weapons and pulled the trigger, repeatedly.  The gun didn't fire itself.  No one on the left deliberately goaded him into taking this damnable action.  He is to blame.  Period.  And he paid the price for his deplorable actions.

Now, let's talk about influence.  Should he have had access to the weapons he had access to?  The rifle he used was not a particularly powerful one.  You wouldn't use it to shoot big game.  It fell well within his Second Amendment rights to own.

I posted on Facebook over a year ago about the gun issue, trying to bring sanity to the topic by defining what an assault rifle is and what an AR-15 is, because most people with strong opinions on the gun issue have no earthly clue what they're talking about.  Sadly but predictably, it didn't sway anyone from their pre-conceived notions.  The truth will only set you free if you recognize it, and truth has been devalued more than crude oil over the past several years.

The question of gun ownership among the mentally ill has been raised.  But I haven't read any credible account of the shooter to suggest that he was mentally ill.  Sure, he'd been the subject of other complaints: shooting his guns on his own property, domestic violence (which, sadly, is not indicative of mental illness; too many sane people abuse their loved ones).

Hodgkinson was, by all accounts, a successful business owner, a property inspector.  He was also radical in his political views.  And this is an important point:  there are a lot of people who are radical in their political views - on the left and on the right - who are perfectly sane.  Extreme, perhaps, but sane.  And the line between that extremism and violence can be thin.

The man was a Bernie supporter.  Bernie is anti-gun.  So it's hard to make the quantum leap that Bernie's politics encouraged this act, which Bernie himself described as despicable.  The perpetrator was anti-Trump; so are a lot of people who would never commit an act of violence on the basis of their political views.

Still, the rhetoric is pretty over the top.  Madonna said she'd thought about blowing up the White House after Trump was elected.  Kathy Griffin posed for her now-infamous picture with a fake beheaded Trump.  Snoop Dogg (why does this talentless guy still garner media attention?) featured shooting Trump in a video.  And on, and on.

Sure, there was equally disgusting anti-Obama rhetoric, just not nearly as much - Ted Nugent, the bombing of Emmanuel Cleaver's campaign headquarters, etc.  The "you do it too" defense just doesn't cut it here, but it points to the fact that the anti-"other side" rhetoric has gone entirely too far.

I found it ironic that, the day of the shooting, George Stephanopolous, ABC talking head, former Bill Clinton staffer, and Clinton Foundation contributor, wondered aloud whether the extreme partisan rhetoric in this country might have played a role in the shooting.  Hey George, you're part of the reason for that.  You foment that rhetoric at every opportunity.  So yeah, the media is complicit.  And I'm not just talking about George, or Rachel Maddow, or Chris Matthews, or Keith Olbermann.  Sean Hannity, Rush Limbaugh, and Mark Levin have also played a role in ratcheting up the partisan rhetoric.

The entertainment world also has to acknowledge a share of the burden.  Not just fringe no-talents like Griffin and Snoop Dogg, or talented (you have to admit, the guy is a brilliant guitarist) but fringe names like Nugent, but accoladed stalwarts like Robert DeNiro and Meryl Streep, have contributed to the current divide.

Then, let's talk about the gun debate.  Now, those guns didn't just up and load themselves, and fire at the Republican Congressmen on that baseball field.  But to listen to the anti-gun brigade, you'd think they had.  To her credit, even Gabby Giffords, herself the victim of gun violence, didn't go there in her comments after the shooting.  Again, re-hashing the gun debate here isn't going to sway anyone from their pre-conceived notions.

But some did take that extreme position.  One Facebook poster said that he didn't want anyone grieving beside him if they were pro-gun rights.  That's okay, dude.  I don't want to be grieving beside you, either.  Because my grief is genuine, while yours is disingenuous.  You're merely exploiting a tragic situation to forward your own political agenda, while I am truly grieving for the potential loss of life, and the very real loss of security.

Moreover, your intolerance of any view that differs from yours is a major part of the problem.  "I won't stand next to someone whose views disagree with my own."  Wouldn't it be more tolerant to say, "I want you to grieve alongside me, then I want to engage in a discussion with you, so I can try to understand where you're coming from, and have an opportunity to try to persuade you to my views"?  To be unwilling to even consider the opinions of others is a statement of extreme intolerance, and that's the first step toward a violent reaction to those whose views differ from your own.

Look, I'd like to be able to say that the rhetoric is equally bad from both sides of the political spectrum.  Maybe it's a function of who I'm friends with, or what news outlets I follow (for the record, I have friends from all walks of the political spectrum, and I watch CNN, ABC, CBS, Fox, CNBC - an affiliate of NBC and MSNBC - Bloomberg, One America News, and BBC, and I read news outlets ranging from Al-Jazeerah to Der Spiegel; I also don't read blogs like Drudge or Occupy Democrats, because they're ... well, factless garbage).

I'd like to be able to say that, but in the current environment ... I'm afraid I can't.  I see more vitriol from the left than from the right these days.  Probably because the left lost an election they thought they couldn't lose, to a candidate they thought they couldn't lose to, and they're still bitter about that.  Fine.  So focus your energy on how you're going to keep that from happening in 2018 and 2020.  Don't re-litigate 2016 at every turn, and vow to do your damnedest to eradicate the outcome of 2016.  That only fosters notions of desperate action as the only alternative.  We survived eight years of Barack Obama; we'll survive four years of Donald Trump.

Consider Nancy Pelosi, the crowned queen of the Democrat party.  Less than 24 hours after the tragic shooting, she was blaming Republicans for the outbreak of violence, which totally negated any positive remarks she made on the House floor in the immediate aftermath of the shooting.

Simply put, Nancy Pelosi is a despicable human being.  Always has been, always will be.  Probably best to just ignore her, and look forward to the happy day that she steps down from office.

So we're left with an abhorrent act committed by an abhorrent individual, crazy or otherwise.  What we do with that will determine whether this politically caustic environment continues to spawn acts of violence, or whether we return to a world where we all accept the realities of a democratic republic, in which sometimes our "side" wins and sometimes it loses.

We tend to forget that what divides us is smaller than what we share in common.  We are all human beings.  We are all Americans.  We all want the best for all citizens of this republic.  We differ greatly on what that looks like, how it's realized.  But at the end of the day, we want the same thing.  We shouldn't be killing each other over how we get there, or wanting to kill each other over how we get there.  Family members shouldn't be unfriending their relatives on Facebook over their political differences.

When we reach that level of intolerance, we are only promoting the kind of intolerance that inevitably leads to tragedy.

Unconditional Love

You won't get it from your spouse.  Oh, husbands and wives love each other, and there has been many a great love story throughout history.  But unconditionally?  We do a thousand little things that get on each other's nerves.  They start out small, but can snowball out of proportion in a hurry.  We push each other's buttons.  And there are those things said that shouldn't have been said, those things unsaid that should have been.  We get absorbed in our own worlds, and don't always listen or give our undivided attention.

We're human.

You won't get it from your parents or your children, either.  If you're a parent, you know that indescribable feeling when your child is born, or when you first bring your adopted child home.  But you also know the times they test you, try your patience.  If you don't pay attention to your kids, you'll be paid back in spades.  And hell hath no fury like a two-year-old that doesn't get what he or she wants.  As parents and children, we love deeply, but not unconditionally.

We're human.

No, the only two sources of unconditional love are God and dogs.  (Note the similarity?  Same three letters, different order.  Probably no coincidence.)

I've experienced both, but I'm not here to preach.  Let's talk about dogs.

We've had three miniature Schnauzers: Dominic, Kramer and Max.  Max is still with us and going strong at 14 years of age.  We had to say good-bye to Kramer (Max's litter mate) almost a year ago.  And Dominic, who we got a couple of years before Max and Kramer, died in my arms about four years ago.  Dom and Kramer were both blind in their later years, and Max is deaf.  Dominic struggled with diabetes, a couple of bouts of pancreatitis, and other issues, but before that he was the strongest, fastest, smartest dog we'd ever known.

All three of them have shown us the kind of love that only a dog can give.  They want you to play with them, pet them, pay attention to them.  If you're too busy (or just think you're too busy), they're still going to come to you later with the same expectant joy.  "Maybe this time you have time to play, or to sit a while with me on your lap?  Please?"

If my wife was crying, Dominic was in her lap, kissing away her tears.  Kramer was her little stalker, following her throughout the house constantly - so much so that she took to carrying him around in a shoulder bag so she could get household chores done, like a little marsupial dog.  And Max just wanted your hand on him - constantly.

So many times we let our dogs down, we disappoint.  Every time, they come back.  All is forgiven.  Then that day comes when we have to say good-bye, and we're filled with regret - just one more day, we pray.  But how many days did we spend doing our own thing, when we could have spent time with them?  And yet, as they're departing this world for the next, they don't accuse.  They just want us to be there for them in those last moments, our hands on them, hearing our voices one last time.

I could write a book about Dominic, Max and Kramer, but I want to talk about another dog today.  Because this dog perhaps embodies unconditional love more than any I've known.  See, we got our other three guys as pups.  They never knew a life without a nice home, cold days spent indoors, regular grooming, proper food and care, a big backyard, and plenty of love.  They never had to deal with neglect, never had a reason not to trust people.

Meet Charlie.

We brought him home today.  This is Charlie as he looked when we met him at his foster home two days ago:

Pretty happy, right?  Looks pretty good, right?

This is Charlie's "before" picture, taken by The Rescue Project as they found him:

Yes, it's the same dog.

Charlie is somewhere between five and eight years old, so we're told; we'll have a better idea when we take him to our vet next week.  Reportedly, he spent those years either chained in the back yard or in a kennel in the basement of his previous owner's home.

The amazing people at The Rescue Project found him a couple of weeks ago.  They are saints.  They go into the community looking for neglected/abused animals, and try to persuade the owners to surrender them.  In this case, the owner agreed to surrender Charlie (they called him Harley, but he just has that Charlie personality, don't you think?)

I'll give the owner a modicum of credit for that, but that's as far as I can go.  How anyone can neglect a pet to that degree is beyond my comprehension, or ability to forgive.

A wonderful groomer went to work on Charlie, and he got happier with each chunk of matted fur that came off.  When she was done, an adorable mini Schnauzer was unveiled.

He looks like Dominic, floppy ears and all.  He's a bit bigger than Max, like Dom was, and has the coarser coat that Dom had, instead of Max's soft fur.

He doesn't appear to have been abused, just neglected (as if neglect warrants the word "just").  He doesn't shy away from people.  When you reach out to pet him, he doesn't cower or growl.  The look on his face is expectant joy, anticipation of the connection dogs crave, not fear.  He doesn't know a stranger - he took to us immediately.

Now, here's the lesson in this:

You'd think it would be hard for a dog like Charlie to trust.  To expect attention, to give love that, in his experience, won't be given back.

Not Charlie.

He is unafraid to show his love and seek ours, fully expecting that we'll give it back.  He is trusting enough to let us pick him up, believing he'll be safe in our arms.  He's happy, and he's confident that he will remain so.  He believes in us, even though he only knows us as humans, and has no reason to believe in humans.

And he will be happy.  We'll earn his belief in us, even though he gives it freely without our having yet earned it.  This guy is going to have the home he's deserved from birth, for the rest of his life.  He'll go on walks, he'll roam a big back yard (with a fence to keep him safe - no more chains for Charlie), he'll chase squirrels and birds.  He'll look out the window and bark at everything that moves, master of all he surveys (just like Max).  Hopefully, he and Max will cuddle together, like Max and Kramer did.  Max already wants to play with him.

He'll learn to obey, because he wants to please, and wants to be a good dog (so at some point, he'll hopefully stop trying to mark every corner of the house).  He'll be well-fed (but not overfed), he'll receive the best medical care (shout out to the fine people at Camelot Court Animal Clinic).  He'll presumably sleep in his kennel, but I won't be surprised to find him in bed with us and Max.  I'll re-learn to sleep on a sliver of bed.

And he'll be loved.  He'll receive attention, he'll be cuddled and petted.  He'll be allowed on the furniture - he's family, after all.

But ...

He won't receive all the attention he craves.  His "Let's go for a walk!" looks will sometimes be met with indifference, as we're too busy, too preoccupied to take the time.  "Maybe later," we'll say.

And yet, the next day, even if we don't make good on our half-hearted promise, he'll be back at our feet with the same look on his face.  We'll feel guilt for not taking him yesterday, but all will be forgotten and forgiven as we clip on his leash.  He'll be perfectly happy to give us all of his love, in exchange for however much of ours we'll give.

He will love unconditionally, in other words.  And we will not.  Because we're human, and he is above that human condition.

But maybe, just maybe, as we consider how Charlie spent the first years of his life, we'll do a little bit better.  By him, by Max, and by each other.

And for that, we can thank Charlie.  Like all dogs, he'll have made the world - and the people in it - better for his having been in it.

The Distractions Have Become the Focus

Occam's razor is being dulled.  By dullards.

By the most elementary definition, Occam's razor postulates that the simplest explanation is probably the correct explanation.  In today's political climate, however, there is a growing reluctance to accept the simple explanation, but to cling to an alternative explanation that is so meandering in its "logic" that it defies comprehension.  To wit:

Parties to the Trump campaign had contact with the Russians prior to the election.  The simple explanation is that a Trump administration wanted to forge better relations with Russia, at the same time putting Putin on notice that, unlike Barack Obama, Trump isn't going to be Putin's whipping boy.  Trump, after all, has already struck at Syria, enforcing the "red line" that Obama backed away from, even though that rankled the Russians.

The alternative explanation is a convoluted conspiracy theory that resurrects The Red Scare, and suggests that Trump and Putin are besties.

Trump jokingly said during a debate that he hoped Russia found Hillary's "lost" emails.  The simple explanation was that Trump was being Trump, speaking without thinking and making a stupid joke.

The alternative explanation is that Trump actually invited and encouraged Putin, in front of millions of TV viewers, to hack the DNC's servers, ridiculous as that notion is.  (Never mind the fact that, at the time, no one on the left screamed, "Conspiracy!", because everybody on the left smugly assumed Hillary would win.)

Hillary Clinton lost the election.  She lost states like West Virginia, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin.  The simple explanation is that she didn't campaign in Wisconsin, and she promised to take a lot of jobs away from coal miners in those other states.  You don't ignore a state, or threaten people's livelihoods, and expect to win the minds and hearts of voters.  Especially with the pain of the Great Recession so fresh in people's memories.

The alternative explanation is a combination of racism, sexism, bagism, shagism (John Lennon reference - get it?), homophobia, Russian meddling, James Comey, deplorables, and whatever other excuse Hillary can come up with to compensate for the undeniable fact that she was a horrible choice of a candidate who ran a horribly flawed campaign.  Even the bumbling Joe Biden has acknowledged that, and no amount of head-bobbling on Hillary's part could change it.

Trump withdrew America from the Paris Accord.  The simple explanation is that it was a crappy agreement, entered into without proper approval, that would have penalized the U.S. for the strides it's already taken in reducing emissions, at great cost, while allowing the worst offenders to continue their offenses.

The alternative explanation is that TRUMP HATES TREES AND WANTS THE WORLD TO END!!

Et cetera.

Russiagate.  Comeygate.  NATOgate.  Parisgate.  Melania-jacketgate.

The Left has a new weapon in the war on Trump, and it's distraction.  Manufacture a new "scandal" every day, and cover it 24/7 to shift the focus to it.  The mainstream media is more than willing to help in the effort.  George Stephanopolous, Rachel Maddow, Keith Olbermann and Martha Raddatz are at the Dems' beck and call in deploying this strategy.

Activist judges, many of them Obama appointees, are also at the ready.  They will challenge every executive order, inciting the administration to re-do what it has already done, rather than trying to do anything new.

Those matters will distract the administration from pursuing its policies.  The Left knows this, and knows that they cannot stop those policies from being put into action through legislative means, because they lost the White House, the House of Representatives and the Senate in the election.  So they have to do something, anything to stop those policies from being enacted before the mid-terms, when they hope to win back control of at least one of the houses of Congress.

At which point they'll continue to ensure that nothing happens in Washington.  And thus they distract.

Make no mistake, these are manufactured "scandals" intended to do nothing more than obfuscate.  And this is the shiny new wrench in the toolkit of partisan politics.  The wrench that will be thrown into the works of policy change, change that the people voted for.

So tax reform, health care reform, border security, fighting terrorism, all the things that the voters wanted in November, will have to wait.  Indefinitely.  To hell with the will of the voters; there are partisan interests and political careers at stake here!

And what of the Republicans?  John McCain et al appear to be jumping on the Dems' bandwagon, focusing on the distractions.  Why?

Here's the insidious truth; pay heed:  Donald Trump promised to return government to the people.  Say what you will about the guy, it's refreshing when a President invites a bunch of plumbers into the Oval Office because it's THEIR house, paid for by the sweat of their brows.  Far better than somebody who sells nights in the Lincoln bedroom to his influential friends, like Hillary's philandering husband did.

And guess what?  The government - the old guard, the McCains of the world - don't want government returned to the people.  They want the people to serve them, not the other way around.  (By the way, if you want to learn what kind of a guy John McCain is, google "Keating Five."  I knew of that scandal by way of the fact that I started my career as an S&L examiner during the thrift crisis.  McCain has always been a palm-greaser, a favor-grantor.  A politician of the old school of back-room deals cut in smoke-filled rooms.  That's why I was never able to bring myself to vote for him.)

So why were the Dems able to coalesce behind Barack Obama, if the GOP won't stand behind their party's President now?  Why were the Dems able to work with Obama to move his agenda forward?

Simple.  Obama favored bigger and bigger government.  Government not of, for or by the people, but over the people.  So the Dems got on board, because that's their platform.  So, sadly, did too many Republicans, because that perpetuates their power.

And when not enough Republicans did get on board, Obama advanced his agenda through the unilateral fiat of the executive order, the phone and the pen, as he put it.

Trump has done that, too.  But Obama had the courts on his side; after all, he appointed the judges.  Those same judges who now thwart his successor's orders, but stood idly by while the guy who appointed them wielded his pen.

Career politicians profit by perpetuating their time in power.  (So do their friends, who line those politicians' pockets.)  So they rally behind the champions of big government, but are threatened by those who would return the government to the people.

Yet, that's what the people have said they want.  We're sick and tired of politics as usual in Washington; that, after all, is precisely why Donald Trump won (the simple explanation, yet again).  Hopefully, we wake up and send a message in 2018, similar to the message sent last year.  Hopefully, it's not too late.

In the meantime, I fear the distractions have become the focus.  And thereby the focus is lost.

Random Saturday Musings

First, some follow-up points on my latest post regarding the U.S. withdrawal from the Paris Climate Accord:

• I mentioned that the Athabasca glacier in Alberta has receded a little less than a mile over the last 125 years.  So logic would tell us that the glacier began that process in 1892, correct?  (Actually, it was probably even earlier; at one point, much of northeast Kansas was covered in ice.  I'm glad it's not today.)
• In 1892. Benjamin Harrison was President.  The gas-powered automobile was not yet in production.  The U.S. population was about 63 million, less than a fifth of today's total and about equal to the combined populations of California and Texas today.  Utah, Oklahoma, New Mexico, Arizona, Alaska and Hawaii were not yet states.  In other words, the glaciers were receding long before our world was filled with cars, long before the carbon footprint was a thing, long before sign-waving protesters screamed about climate change before climbing back into their gas-burning cars and driving back to their coal-fired electricity cooled homes.
• Could it be that the Athabasca glacier is receding in part because, in an effort to educate the masses about the impact of global warming, the Canadian government transports tourists across it in massive, 30-ton, diesel-powered vehicles?
• The day the withdrawal from the Paris Accord was announced, a very well-educated, successful woman commented to me, "We don't need coal!"  She made this comment while we were sitting in her air-conditioned boardroom, with the lights on and our laptops plugged in, the Keurig and mini-fridge running, in the state that leads the nation in consumption of electricity fueled by coal.  She is also passionately anti-Trump.  Obviously, there are a lot of people who don't understand this issue, but form their views about it based on party affiliation.
• So Elon Musk dropped off the President's business advisory council.  Pardon my yawn.  Massive government spending on climate change directly benefits Musk's companies, which are innovative, but famously unprofitable.  Without government subsidies, they'll be even more unprofitable, and could fail.  Too bad, Elon,  Figure out a way to make an unsubsidized profit through alternative energy, and you're our biggest hero.  But don't suck our tax dollars to prop up your little experiments, especially when your net worth is about $13 billion.
• Meanwhile, kudos to President Trump for being that rare politician who appoints a guy like Musk to his council, then doesn't grease his palm with the people's money.  Trump did what he thought was the right thing, even if it cost him an influential guy like Musk.  Most politicians sacrifice the right thing to give special favors to their friends.  Nobody else is talking about this.
• CNN is gushing over French President Macron's English-language response to President Trump's decision to pull out of the accord (like the fact that the guy can speak English is a big deal - hey, je parle Francais, un peu).  One talking head went so far as to declare him "the new leader of the free world."  Please.  The guy was only elected 20 days ago, and thus far all he's accomplished has been kissing Angela Merkel's skirt.  Declaring him the new leader of the free world at this early juncture would be as premature as handing a U.S. President the Nobel Peace Prize less than nine months after his inauguration, for doing nothing more than going on a global apology tour.  Oh wait ...
• Consider this: the U.S. didn't pull out of the Paris Accord because we're planning to revert to wholesale pollution and destroy the earth, nor because Donald Trump doesn't believe in climate change.  We pulled out because we're already doing our part, and we don't need to subsidize those who aren't, and who won't well into the future.  The U.S. has reduced its carbon footprint dramatically over the last few decades, so let's let the rest of the world do their part.
• Now, some would argue that saving the world from global warming is so important that the U.S. should be willing to subsidize other countries' efforts.  Those same people would argue, in the next breath, that the U.S. shouldn't be the world's cop.  Can't have it both ways: the U.S. should save the world from one threat, only to sit back and see it destroyed by another?  Folly.  Besides, I don't need some kid living in his parents' basement, playing Guardians of the Galaxy after he gets done with his shift flipping burgers at McDonald's, spending my tax dollars so freely.  Let the people who buy into the notion that climate change is our biggest threat donate their money to combating it, rather than demand everyone else foot the bill.  Meanwhile, I'll keep driving my 35mpg car and picking up other people's trash.

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A lot of people are outraged over Kathy Griffin's latest stunt, and are plastering stories about her all over social media.  I'm not going to do that.  In fact, I'm reluctant to even mention her here.

Why, you ask?  Shouldn't I be outraged?

Perhaps.  But I understand why she did it: she's a relatively talentless attention junkie who has made a career of trying to extend her 15 minutes of fame by being outrageous, since she can't do it on the merits.

She likes to brag about all the talk shows and venues she's been banned from as a result of her shenanigans.  She proudly created and starred in a reality TV show about being on Hollywood's D-list, probably because she's bitter about the fact that she lacks the chops to make the A-, B-, or even C-list.

She pranced topless beside a road in Miami while the paparazzi snapped away, and even posted some of the images on her own Twitter account.  Most celebrities who get caught au naturel try to suppress those photos.  But they've typically become celebrities by being talented, and don't need the extra publicity.  While everyone else participated in the Ice Bucket Challenge a few years ago, she did so fully nude and on camera.

I would have to imagine those images are far more disgusting than her most recent one.

Thanks to all the attention she's been getting, she's been able to command headlines, even calling a press conference and playing the victim card, and pointing out that Ted Nugent did something equally reprehensible (ah, the "you do it too" defense - the last resort of small but guilty minds).

I'd rather not play her game by spreading her name all over social media, drawing more attention to her like a fly to ... well, you know.  When people do that, Kathy Griffin wins.  Let her fade into oblivion, where she belongs.

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I've been wanting to address this for a while now.  I cringe every time I hear some anti-war lament about "sending our sons and daughters into harm's way."  Do these people think the government goes about raiding people's homes, snatching little Bobby or Suzy from their cozy beds under the cover of darkness, and sending them off to slaughter?

Last I checked, we have a volunteer military.  People sign up to defend this country, even if that requires the ultimate sacrifice.  And the military people I've known are more than ready to go defend the U.S., even if it means risking their own lives.  Remember the surge in enlistments that took place after 9/11?

Sure, there are a handful who join up for the pay and benefits, but when they get their deployment notice, they say, "Hey, that's not what I signed on for."  Thankfully, they're few and far between.

If my own daughter or son-in-law enlisted and got sent to the front lines, I'd worry about them.  I'd pray for their safe return.  And if, God forbid, they lost their lives, I'd be crushed.

But I wouldn't blame the government that deployed them after they volunteered to serve.  I wouldn't disown them for that choice.  I'd be proud of them, and I'd honor their memory each and every day.

The military folks I know understand that while drone strikes can be effective, there is no substitute for boots on the ground in some applications.  A drone strike did not take out bin Laden, nor did a spy satellite locate Hussein.  We want them on that wall, we need them on that wall.

I hate the notion of war, of armed conflict, of people having to kill other people in order to achieve peace.  There should be better ways, but sometimes there aren't.  Especially if the other side doesn't want to achieve peace, and insists on continuing to threaten lives.

Had the U.S. never engaged in armed conflict, we'd all be singing "God Save the Queen" or shouting "Sieg Heil."

****************************************

So, in my last post I mentioned the fact that I'm going to be a grandpa.  And I do worry about the world we're going to leave to that precious lad.  However, I don't believe his biggest threat will be eking out an existence in a barren desert with no food or water, thanks to global warming.

I worry about a world in which people have to live in fear of violence, and not just from terrorism.  The anonymity of social media has made snark en vogue.  I used to comment that people would say things on social media they'd never say to someone's face.  Sadly, that seems to no longer be true in a time when people get into fistfights on airplanes, or at political rallies.  When protesters punch police horses, for crying out loud.  A time when civility is dead.

I worry about a nation in which you have to work for more than half the year just to pay your tax bill.  A nation where the government rules the people, instead of the other way around.  Where the minority rules, where we're so divided that civil discourse is impossible, where the media controls the message, and where the outcomes of free and fair elections are only accepted by those who voted for the winner, with everyone else claiming they don't have a President, yet demanding their rights as a citizen.

I worry about him not being able to find a job in high school, because all the menial jobs are required to pay a wage that would support a family of four, so automated kiosks have replaced those jobs.  So he has to wait until he has a degree to be able to learn the value of work, of managing his own money, of contributing to his own support.  I worry that he won't be able to afford a car, because emissions standards have priced them out of reach for all but the wealthy.

And I especially worry that my grandson won't be able to avail himself of one of the most valuable benefits of a college education: exposure to multiple, divergent viewpoints that will expand his horizons, encourage spirited but respectful debate, and allow him to use his God-given judgment to form his own world view.

But I have hope.  I see it when I see his parents not succumb to the media spin, the thought police, the temptation to be nasty to other people.  When they champion values like hard work, personal responsibility and thrift.  When they show a willingness to listen to others' views, whether they agree with them or not.

Sadly, crazy has become the new normal, and vice versa.  Thankfully, there are still those who are fine with being the neo-crazy.  I'm putting my hope in them, for my grandson's sake.

We'll Always Have ... Paris?

Let me state for the record that, while I would not be labeled an environmentalist - at least not by those on the left (most of whom, by and large, do not truly understand or embrace environmental issues) - I do care about the environment.  I care about the environmental legacy we leave our children, and our grandchildren.

Oh, did I mention I'm going to be a grandpa in November?  Every kid needs a curmudgeonly grandparent, yes?

I'm one of those guys who, when hiking, picks up other people's litter and packs it out.  I don't litter, myself.  My car is "greener" than most, getting about 35mpg.  (Take that, Al Gore.)

I once worked with a woman who smoked, and I'd go outside with her on her smoke breaks and we'd talk.  She was liberal, and very keen on environmental issues, as she'd point out while she puffed away.  Then, she'd flip her spent cigarette butt into the flower beds outside our building.

Yes, I believe we should continue producing fossil fuels, because that's what drives the world, still (as the climate change fanatics prove in their energy consumption habits).  I believe there are significant risks related to nuclear power (see Chernobyl), I believe wind farms are a blight on the landscape, and solar is great, but expensive.

I don't, however, subscribe to some Ayn Rand notion of development as the highest and best use of all resources.  (For the uninitiated, Ayn Rand was an uber-libertarian author who penned the classic, "Atlas Shrugged," a great read.  In it, she postulates this notion to the point of asserting that all of our mountains, streams and other natural treasures should be put to productive capacity in order to maximize output.)

Maybe, but I disagree with the notion.  I love the mountains, the beaches, the forests, the fertile valleys, and the land in between.  And, as a still-occasional cyclist, I like clean air.  (This is the basis for my objection to wind farms: ever drive from San Bernardino to Palm Springs?  The otherwise beautiful mountain landscape is marred by those ugly white windmills.  Should we sacrifice the aesthetics of the environment for wind power?  I say no.)

I don't believe the sky is falling, but I do believe we need to continue to address these issues - but rationally, and with a sense of economic balance.  I also believe that advances in technology will make sources like solar energy more affordable, and I'm all for heating and cooling my house with the sun.

Especially if said house is a shack on a beach on some idyllic island.

Having said all that, I don't get the hoopla over President Trump's decision to withdraw the U.S. from the Paris Climate Accord.  Let's unpack the issue.

First, those who are screeching about it likely haven't read the agreement.  This article provides an excellent recap, for those who are willing to take the time to read it objectively, rather than just screaming that the world is going to end from global warming in five years (take that, too, Al Gore):  http://www.nationalreview.com/article/434412/paris-climate-agreement-americans-foot-bill-no-effect-climate

In short, the biggest polluters in the world - China and India - are party to it.  However, they basically agreed to nothing in terms of their emissions.  In fact, taken as a whole, the agreement - according to the experts, not Fox News - would only reduce global warming by a minuscule amount in the long run, if at all.  And, of course, the U.S. - which has already taken a leadership role in the strides we've taken to address environmental issues - is expected to make the biggest commitment, in terms of reducing emissions and ponying up money (yours and mine, let's not forget) to subsidize the rest of the world.  To the tune of $100 billion.

No, thank you.

Yet again, those decrying the withdrawal haven't read the agreement, wouldn't understand it if they did, and don't walk their own talk.

Those same people likely heat their homes with natural gas, or electricity that in part comes from coal.  Many of them use wood-burning fireplaces and/or stoves.  They love their fire pits.  They drive gas-burning cars, even for short trips - say, down to the mailbox.

They decry the impact on the glaciers - the glaciers! - but have they ever seen one in person?  I have.  I visited the Athabasca glacier in Alberta, among other glaciers I've seen in Canada and Alaska (by the way, I highly recommend a trip to the Banff/Lake Louise area in Alberta - indescribable beauty).  Signs there (which, incidentally, didn't grow there naturally) indicate how much the glacier has receded over time - a total of a little less than a mile over the last 125 years.  The horror.  I'm getting warmer just thinking about it.

Well, for one, the glacier is nearly four miles long still, so - if we hadn't done anything to slow down climate change, which we have - it would theoretically be gone in about 500 years.

I rarely agree with Keynes, but I do agree with his assertion that, in the long run, we're all dead.  In fact, 500 years from now, my grandchildren's grandchildren will be long gone.  For perspective, 500 years ago, Columbus had barely discovered this rock.

Moreover, this is a straight-line extrapolation of the last 125 years, which is folly for a couple of reasons.  One, as noted, we are addressing climate change, and will continue to do so.  And two, this may not be a linear function.  Places where glaciers exist are still damn cold, and they're not likely to turn into temperate deserts in the next 1,000 years, no matter what Al Gore says.

And there are a lot of glaciers; Athabasca is but one of them.  Fly from Anchorage to Seattle and you'll see dozens on a clear day.  (I've done that, and have the photos to prove it.  The Paris-Accord-withdrawal-screechers probably haven't.)

Look, climate change happens.  There was an Ice Age, if you remember your history classes.  It ended.  (There were also dinosaurs.  Does anyone on the left bemoan the extinction of the velociraptor?)  Does man influence climate change?  You bet.  Is that influence as dire as Al Gore would have you believe, as he flies from stop to stop in his fuel-guzzling jet to preach his nonsense?  Nope.  Should we just eliminate man altogether, and hope that the velociraptors come back?  I'd rather not, for my grandchildren's sake.

The climate change-istas always cite "the science," and label anyone who disagrees with them a "denier."  (Ah, how the left loves their labels.)  The vast, vast majority of them couldn't understand the science if they took the time to educate themselves on it.  But Bill Nye says it, they believe it, that's that.  Seems kinda silly to get your science education from a pseudo-Captain Kangaroo, but if that's all you can understand, go for it.

Yes, climate change is real.  No, it's not our biggest threat (take that, Bernie and Hillary).  I still shovel a foot or so of global warming off my sidewalks every other winter or so.

Free-market mechanisms will do more to address the issue than government mandated initiatives or ridiculously ineffective multi-nation "accords."  (In fact, the Honda Accord has done more to slow climate change than the Paris Accord ever could.)  Driverless cars are an example of a market disruptor that will have a positive influence.

So in summary, this is like any other issue the Left screams about: they haven't read the source document, they don't really understand the issue, they don't practice what they preach.

But President Obama got us into the Paris Accord, which makes it sacrosanct to them, and Donald Trump is pulling us out, which automatically makes it a bad decision.

There's a Bull Market in Tinfoil

Let's begin by talking about the Washington Post story that purportedly revealed that President Trump disclosed "highly classified information" to the Russian Foreign Minister and Ambassador.  Then, we'll address the leaked memo penned by fired FBI Director James Comey that indicated that Trump asked him to back off investigating former National Security Advisor Michael Flynn, whom you will recall resigned from his post after it was revealed that he had lied to Vice President Pence regarding communications with Russian leaders.  Finally, we'll turn our attention to the appointment of a special counsel to lead the investigation into ties between the Trump campaign and the Russians.

First up, the WaPo story.  It asserted that, in a meeting with the two Russian diplomats, Trump disclosed "highly classified information" regarding potential terror threats.  That intel was purportedly provided by a U.S. ally with significant knowledge of terror threats, particularly related to ISIS, Syria and Iran.

The WaPo story went on to name the threat disclosed: that terrorists may use laptop computers and tablets carried on board flights to hide bombs that could be detonated in mid-air.

Here's the problem: if WaPo knows the specific threat, how is it "highly classified information?"  Moreover, by publishing the story, didn't WaPo itself disclose that information to the world, including the terrorists, any of whom could google the WaPo story and find the threat that we've learned of?

Critical thinking is clearly dead.  Because the people who lap this story up like mother's milk don't think about things like that.

Further, what's wrong with a President sharing that information with any other country that might aid in the fight against the spread of terror?  (Recall that a Russian jetliner was downed by terrorists in 2015; they might have a vested interest in this.)  For that matter, what's wrong with sharing it with all of us?  I fly a lot; I'd like to know what threats are in the air, literally.

In fact, the WaPo story rightly noted that no laws were likely broken, as the POTUS has broad powers to disclose information, determining on the fly whether it's classified or not.  It would be a different matter entirely if he had told the Russians what our nuclear response times were, as Hillary Clinton did when she announced them to the world during a debate last fall.  Of course, that was a non-event in the mainstream media.

Moreover, in March - well before the meeting between Trump and the Russian diplomats - both the US and UK implemented bans on laptops and tablets in carry-on luggage on flights originating from a handful of Middle Eastern and North African airports.  So the threat was known to all at that point, or at least to all who pay attention to such things.

The story went on to note that the ally that provided the intel is one that has expressed frustration in the past over the U.S.' handling of intel that country provided.

Again, let's apply that endangered species, critical thinking.  One, "in the past" implies that the Obama administration may have played fast and loose with intel that this ally provided.  And two, if WaPo knows who the ally is, as its story implies, that casts further doubts on the notion that this information was "highly classified."

But in journalism and partisan politics, if you say it enough times, it starts to feel like the truth.

On to the Comey memo.  It was leaked, interestingly enough, after Comey was fired, and was allegedly produced by Comey following a meeting with Trump just after the inauguration.  In that meeting, Trump supposedly appealed to Comey to back off the investigation of Flynn (who was fired for lying to the VP about his Russian contacts, not for the content of those communications).

Okay.  Have you ever been an employer?  If so, you're familiar with the term "disgruntled former employee."  As a CEO, I once fired a guy for egregious cause: stealing from the company.  He went on to file an arbitration claim against the firm, and to smear the firm's name among its clients.

However, we had him dead to rights, courtesy of incontrovertible evidence that he stupidly left on his computer and in his desk.  So he lost his arbitration case.  But he did manage to sway a few clients he was close to, that didn't understand the term "disgruntled former employee."

When someone's been fired, it's always prudent to take their allegations against their former employer with a healthy dose of salt, especially if they had every opportunity to disclose those allegations prior to being terminated.

As did Comey.  In fact, if he knew, as FBI Director, that Trump had attempted to obstruct justice, and failed to report it, he himself is guilty of a felony.  Comey is in a dangerous Catch-22 situation here.  He either implicates Trump in an obstruction charge and goes to jail for not disclosing it as soon as he knew of it, or he backs off and admits that he exaggerated the content of the conversation recorded in the memo (which was likely penned after he was fired; after all, he now has time on his hands).

Ah, but those who view Facebook as the font of all truth and knowledge tend to eschew grains of salt.  If a fired employee lambastes his former employer, said employer must be guilty as charged.

In defending his decision to fire Comey, Trump called the former FBI Director a "grandstander."  The left howled its rage.

So what did Comey do after the memo was leaked?  He stated his desire to testify before Congress, not in a closed hearing, as would befit matters of national security, but in a public one.  If that's not grandstanding, what is?  Sounds to me like an attention-starved disgruntled former employee looking to air his grievances in the court of public opinion.  But I have no aversion to salt.

So now Deputy AG Rosenstein, who recommended Comey's termination, has appointed a special counsel, Robert Mueller, to head the Russian investigation.  Mueller preceded Comey as FBI Director, appointed by George W. Bush in 2001 and serving through that President's two terms, and two years into President Obama's tenure.

The left smells blood in the water.  But it just may be that Rosenstein realizes that this matter has to be put to bed once and for all, and the only way to do it satisfactorily is to appoint a special counsel.  (Not prosecutor.  Counsel.  There's a significant distinction, lost on those who lack the capacity for critical thinking.)  No matter; if the special counsel determines that there's no smoking gun, the left will manufacture a conspiracy theory.  As an investor, I'd recommend being long tinfoil.

We'll see how it all plays out.  In the meantime, since this is the Economic Curmudgeon, after all, let's look at the potential market impact, especially since the Dow sold off by some 370 points today.

Everyone has been drawing parallels to Nixon since Comey was fired, probably because they can't conjure up a defensible Hitler reference.

During the Watergate scandal, the market sold off some 10%.  That meets the definition of a correction, nothing more.

If Trump were to be impeached - and I'd place the odds of that at less than 10% at this juncture, notwithstanding the partisan rantings of Chuck Schumer and Maxine Waters - we'd see a similar correction.

But it would be short-lived.  We'd then have President Pence, who is more even-keeled than Trump (the understatement of my lifetime), but shares the same pro-business and pro-market positions regarding taxes, regulation, etc.  Thus a rebound would ensue, and in the long run, the markets would be fine.

In fact, for the investor, that may be a better scenario.  I said a long time ago that a vote for Trump was a vote for Pence, because Trump was likely to do something during his first term to get himself impeached.

Not because he's corrupt - he can't carry Hillary's jockstrap in that regard - but because he's used to functioning as a businessman, where "my way or the highway" rules the day.  That doesn't play so well in the political arena, where there are checks and balances.

Now, I don't believe that what's transpired to date will get Trump impeached.  But here's the thing: the constant distractions surrounding his presidency impede the policy initiatives that have buoyed the economy and the markets since November 8.  (My own portfolio is up well more than the S&P since then.  Granted, I'm a better stock-picker than many fund managers, but you still have to give some credit to the anticipation of a return to pro-business policies, after eight years of the opposite.)

There is some debate - most of it partisan - surrounding whether those distractions are self-inflicted or manufactured.  For economic purposes, it matters not: regardless their genesis, they impede policy progress, and that is enough to disrupt the markets.

Comeygate

Dear Democrats,

You can NOT feign outrage over the firing of former FBI Director James Comey.  He was your villain when, 11 days before the election, he announced that the agency was re-opening its investigation of Hillary Clinton's emails after thousands of them were discovered on Anthony Weiner's laptop.

Der Weiner, as you may recall, is married to top Hillary aide Huma Abedin, who reportedly forwarded said emails to her husband (why would you forward sensitive State Department emails to your spouse?).  He also has an infamous inability to keep his namesake in his pants, and was under investigate for sexting with an underage girl.

The emails discovered on his laptop (computer, that is) included the 3,000 or so that Hillary had "inadvertently" deleted and thus was unable to turn over to the FBI, which closed its investigation of her last July.

Comey's announcement that the investigation was being re-opened presumably, according to Democrats, tanked her chances at the White House.  As the fable - er, story - goes, that swayed enough people who were planning on voting for her to swing the election in Donald Trump's favor.

Never mind that, nine days later and two days before the election, Comey announced that the investigation of the emails found on Weiner's laptop found nothing to warrant prosecution, which presumably would have swayed those voters back in her favor before the polls opened.

Never mind that on election day, Democrats were swooning over what they believed was an easy win, thus it doesn't seem that many of her supporters were swayed.  In fact, her standing in key swing state polls improved in the ten days leading up to the election.

Comey was a pariah among Dems (and Republicans, who believed that back in July he copped out by not recommending prosecution).  So much so, that last week, when Comey testified before Congress, Sen. Dianne Feinstein, one of the Democrats' poster children for Post-Election Denial Syndrome (PEDS), grilled him relentlessly, essentially re-prosecuting the election some six months after the votes had been tallied.

Others piled on, from both sides of the aisle, heaping criticism for his handling of the email scandal.  Let's just say that he didn't come out smelling like a rose.

So now, dear Democrats, you want to express outrage over the firing of a man you've wanted fired since November.  Well, you can't have your cake and eat it, too, no matter how entitled to that you may feel.

So what of this latest round of faux outrage?  Well, the prevailing (lack of) wisdom suggests that President Trump fired Comey just as the latter was closing in on some smoking gun linking the former to Russian hackers, whom the Democrats also blame for Hillary's loss.

Never mind that she was a hopelessly flawed candidate.  Never mind that everything about her that was uncovered by both the (alleged) Russian hackers and the FBI was undisputed, even by the Dems.  (They're just mad she got caught.)  Never mind that her campaign strategy sealed the deal for Trump, as she ignored key swing states that he won.

First, let's examine the timing of Comey's firing.  Then, we'll look at the justification.  After that, we'll consider the apparent reversal from candidate Trump praising Comey to President Trump firing him.  Finally, we'll consider Comey's successor.

There is nothing credible to suggest that Comey's FBI was anywhere close to finding some smoking gun linking the Trump campaign to the Russians.  Probably because that mythical link does not exist.

However, the firing does follow two things: first, the recent appointment of Comey's boss, Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein.  Trump nominated Rosenstein to the role in January.

The Senate finally got around to confirming him on April 25.  By a vote of 94-6.  If he was going to be such a slam-dunk, why did the Dems put off his confirmation for more than three months?  Maybe they were self-medicating for PEDS.  More likely, they were smarting over their loss, and wanted to delay key appointments as long as possible.  If they'd confirmed Rosenstein back in January, James Comey would likely have been gone then.  There goes the timing issue.

So Rosenstein's first order of business was to review the FBI Director's track record.  And what he found was a bipolar pattern of "she did it," "no, she didn't," "yes, she did," "no, she didn't" ...  All of which took place during an election cycle and raised the specter of FBI meddling, however far-fetched the notion may be.  Perception becomes reality, especially in the minds of the delusional.

Rosenstein recommended that Trump fire Comey, and that's exactly what Trump did.

Another thing that immediately preceded Comey's firing was his poor performance in his Congressional testimony last week.  After that, I'd lose confidence in the guy, too.  When Dianne Feinstein scores points on you, you're not up to the game.  That's like Usain Bolt getting smoked by Michael Moore in the 100 meters.

So much for the timing, now for the justification.  There's the mis-handling of the email debacle, and the very public announcements of what should probably have been kept under wraps until a definitive conclusion could be reached.  There's the poor showing in front of Congress.  Again, the cause goes hand-in-hand with the timing.  The firing was clearly justified.

Sure, a conspiracy theorist could engage in sufficient conjecture to come up with a nefarious motive.  But you could also argue that this whole thing started when the Martians landed at Roswell.  No amount of tin-foil speculating can refute the justification for Comey's termination, nor the timing of it.

Next up, Trump's purported reversal of position regarding Comey.  Anderson Cooper did his level best to bait Kelly Anne Conway on that matter, at one point asking whether candidate Trump is some fictitious character who longer exists.  Stay real, Pony Boy.

So a presidential candidate took a different position after being elected?  Pardon me for being jaded by U.S. politics, but that's not exactly ground-breaking.  The revered Barack Obama did it.  So did every one of his predecessors, going back to George Washington.

Why?  Some of it is due to politics, and getting elected.  Some of it is due to getting in office and actually having access to real information that isn't available to those of us in the public - other than the savants who know all and see all, thanks to Facebook and Occupy Democrats memes.

And part of it is due to the fact that no executive shows his cards until it's time to play the hand.  I know this; I spent 15 years as a CEO.  There were people that I knew I was going to have to fire, for good and just cause.  But I never telegraphed that to them months in advance.  "Hey, Mike, just so you know, I'm going to can you in two months."  No, you express confidence in them, all the while documenting the reasons that will justify their termination, which you know is imminent.

Sure, you warn them as their performance deteriorates.  And Trump did criticize Comey.  No, you don't give them an "Exceeds Expectations" performance rating two months before you fire them for poor performance.  That's an invitation for litigation.  But Trump didn't do that with Comey.

So you wait until the appropriate time.  You may need to keep them around for some reason.  You may need to give them one more opportunity to hang themselves - as was the case when Comey testified before Congress last week - before you can say, "See, world?  This guy has got to go."  Then, every rational person (key word: rational) will understand that the move was necessary.  The bottom line is that people who get fired tend to fire themselves, one day at a time.

All of that can be perceived as cruel and dirty.  Okay.  Business - and politics - can get dirty.  But the fact of the matter is, some people need to be fired.  It happens.  Organizations that refuse to fire underperformers don't thrive.  If you don't like it, start your own business.  You're not likely to fire yourself.  Good luck.

Finally, let's consider Comey's successor.  He's a Democrat, and a FOH (Friend of Hillary).  Isn't it more likely that he will aggressively pursue any link between the Trump campaign and the nasty ol' Russians than was James Comey, who swung wildly from appearing to be against Hillary, to for her, to against her, to for her, to ...  You could hardly call Comey a FOH.  Who knows where that man's loyalties lay?

If Trump really removed Comey because Comey was close to finding a smoking gun, wouldn't he have appointed, say, his son-in-law as FBI Director?  Someone who would drop the whole Russian thing?  No, he appointed a FOH.  That speaks volumes - at least to any rational person not suffering from PEDS.

So, dear Democrats, rail if you must.  After all, this is just one more manifestation of your condition.  Be in denial, feign outrage, gnash your teeth and rend your clothing.

But know this:

Hillary lost.  Trump won.  And all the angst you can muster will not change that.