Bearing Witness to Trump Week 29

August 6 – 12, 2017

Trump begins his working vacation with a tweet storm blaming Congress, Democrats, and fake news media for the ills of his presidency and the country.  He is acting like such a whiny little child in Republican party that no longer commands respect nor have any moral authority.

White House strategists are reported to be considering private security forces be used in Afghanistan. Yes, since we are a country that is perpetually at war let’s privatize it so business can make profits off of death and destruction. Just like we have done to health care and profiting from ill people in America.  I think we have seen the movie before during the Iraq war where private armies committed war crimes in the name of the American people with few repercussions.

Not happy to just blame Democrats and Congress in general for the failed attempt to repeal Obamacare, Trump is now taunting, haranguing, shaming, and cyber-bullying Republican Majority Leader Mitch McConnell. While on the first week of his working vacation he suggests McConnell should quit if he can’t get things done. Hum, yes that is a good idea for anyone: just leave if they can’t produce results, including Trump. McConnell finally shows some spine and says Trump is an amateur. Trump’s hyenas at Fox News come to his rescue by calling on McConnell to retire. What great civic lessons this administration is teaching the youth of our country.

Trump thanks the Russians for sending hundreds of Americans home packing from Moscow that have been kicked out in a diplomat spat. He says fewer diplomats will save the U.S. much money from a smaller payroll. Of course, this is another Trump lie as these State Dept. employees will be reassigned with the expense of moving them back home or to their next assignment. The Russians respond by sending a spy plane circling over Washington DC.

While on vacation, Trump turns up the rhetoric on North Korea. In a series of ever escalating bombastic militant statements that only add fuel to the fire, Trump says the North Koreans will face “fire and fury” like the world has never seen. Yes, evangelicals who voted for him, this is of course what a good Christian would do. Have we ever heard a U.S. President act and talk so irresponsibly?  Later Trump says perhaps that threat of his was not strong enough. Nothing like marching the country off to war from a golf course. The Koreans respond with threatening to target Guam. The public stays confused when we hear reports of a crazy man threatening to blow up the planet. Is he our crazy or their’s?

And just to help encourage the Chinese with some insults, Trump has the U.S. Navy sail into disputed waters in the South China Sea. Does no one understand history of the human race? This is how nations stumble into accidental wars.

Trump  and Sessions continue on their war against drugs. Duh, does it occur to them Americans are resorting to drugs more because of the frightening dysfunctional leadership? No, they blame the Obama administration instead for not being tough enough. Behind the scenes of course the Trump budget guts money in Medicaid and throw millions of American out of healthcare will only aggravate the opioid drug crisis that is particularly hard on rural poor Americans.

In Ohio the Republican Justice Dept. backs their attempt to throw occasional federal voters off the polls. There’s democracy in action, disenfranchising more voters, in a state that matters in nearly every Presidential election. Thank you patriotic Republicans for sending troops to die abroad protecting our freedoms and rights, then taking them away from us back home.

Over a dozen agencies issue a draft report citing that man-made climate change is impacting us right now. I’m rather sure that Trump will call this a gigantic hoax once again and use his influence to have the report censored.

And never to miss an opportunity to be a world-class anarchist, Trump refuses to rule out military action in Venezuela. Yes, that’s right, let’s enter into another civil war, have our volunteer army injected into a quagmire that has nothing to do with our freedom, just the freedom of oil moving out of South America.

News slips out that twice a day Trump receives a folder full of stories which flatter him and make him look good. It seems all wannabe dictators need their propaganda to prop up their fragile little egos.

The Canadians open up refugee centers to handle more asylum seekers coming across the US border from those immigrants afraid to stay in the U.S. How shameful for our country.

And there is good reason that they leave. The week ends with violence, riots, and death on the streets of Charlottesville, Virginia where white supremacist nationalists gather to make America great and pure again, railing against blacks, liberals, Jews, Hispanics, etc. Counter-protestors refused to abandon their America and street fights broke out overwhelming the police. Trump who has stoked all this calls for everyone to abandon hate and violence, but refuses to condemn the right extremists.

The above news items have been taken from a number of international, national, regional, and local news media sources, both print and digital. Additional editorial opinions and comments about these news items are those of this author.