This author and blogger will be taking a hiatus and will return in early June.
Certainly, a lot of “news” is likely to occur, but commentary will have to wait until the week of June 3!
I wish all my readers and followers a great Memorial Day holiday!
The display this week of a host of Republican officeholders acting as apologists for and sycophants to Donald Trump, by showing up en masse to his New York trial, is a total outrage!
Many of these characters showed up because they are hoping they will be selected to be Trump’s Vice Presidential runningmate, which in itself is an example of total lack of principle, an indication they would do anything Donald Trump wanted!
This is a danger to American democracy and the rule of law, and yet there is no embarrassment or concern as to how it appears to the general public.
The thought that one of these apologists for or sycophants to Trump could be a heartbeat away from the Presidency is obscene, and their willingness to refuse to accept election results if Trump loses, is a major character flaw in the vast membership of the Republican Party.
So the likelihood is that January 6, 2025 might be even worse of a constitutional crisis than what occurred on that date in 2021!
The US Supreme Court is facing a backlash, due to two of its members, Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito, being engaged in their actions and statements, and by their wives’ interactions, with promoting the conspiracy theory that the Presidential Election Of 2020 was “stolen” from Donald Trump by Joe Biden.
Ginni Thomas, wife of Clarence Thomas, actively promoted the January 6 2021 US Capitol Insurrection, but Thomas has refused to recuse himself from cases related to Donald Trump and the horrible events of that day.
And the wife of Samuel Alito displayed the American flag upside down in reaction to neighbors who displayed signs against Donald Trump in the days after the US Capitol attack.
Both Justices have made clear they will do what they can to undermine the federal case against Donald Trump, and this presents a danger that Donald Trump will escape prosecution, and might be given immunity from accountability.
This could lead to a Presidential dictatorship and the emergence of Fascism in the federal government, and with the threats of Donald Trump to destroy American democracy and the rule of law.
Public opinion on the image of the Supreme Court has reached an all time low, and Chief Justice John Roberts needs to intervene to insist that these two Justices must not be engaged in decisions involving the controversies of Janury 6!
The single most significant Supreme Court decision of the 20th century occurred exactly 70 years ago on May 17, 1954, when the Supreme Court, in an unanimous 9-0 decision, declared segregation in public education was unconstitutional, reversing the segregation decision in Plessy V Ferguson of 1896 after 58 years.
The fact that Chief Justice Earl Warren (1953-1969) was able to gain unanimous support on this case, including Southern members of the Court who were comfortable with segregation, is what made Earl Warren the greatest Chief Justice after John Marshall (1801-1835).
It also makes one very downcast and depressed at what has happened at the Supreme Court in recent decades, particularly since Donald Trump made three right wing appointments to be Supreme Court Justices, adding on to the two Presidents Bush who gave the nation the horrendous Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito.
Chief Justice John Roberts, also chosen by President George W. Bush, has been a great disappointment, unable to keep the Court balanced, and now containing two Justices totally out of control, arrogant, nasty, abusive, and not concerned about ethics and common decency.
This, along with the attack on DEI (Diversity, Equity, Inclusion), and a reversal of Affirmative Action, has been not only promoted by this right wing dominated Supreme Court, but also by actions of Republican Governors Ron DeSantis of Florida, Greg Abbott of Texas, and a whole slew of other Republican governors nationwide.
This includes working to deemphazize African American history in educational curriculums, working to wipe out all of the advancements of the Civil Rights Movement after World War II for the next few decades.
Action must be taken to reverse this bigoted, right wing extremist agenda, and it begins by insuring Joe Biden wins a second term, and that, somehow, Democrats win the House of Representatives, and retain control of the US Senate.
This is a massive challenge that anyone who believes in fairness, and common decency, must engage in for the future of America as a shining beacon of change and tolerance.
President Joe Biden took the offensive and proposed two debates with Donald Trump, outside of the Commission on Presidential Debates, which has set the standard since 1988.
The first debate will be on Thursday June 27, sponsored by CNN; and the second debate will be on Tuesday September 10, sponsored by ABC News.
The debates will have no audiences, and will be two hours long, with the plan to shut off microphones to prevent either candidate from interfering with the other candidate speaking.
And there will be, according to the plan, no third party candidate, such as Robert F. Kennedy Jr. participating in the debate, as only a true lunatic would think that RFK Jr. is a serious contender for the Presidency!
The setup for the debates will be similar to those of John F. Kennedy and Richard Nixon in the first such televised debates in 1960.
Retiring Republican Senator Mitt Romney is totally wrong on his idea that President Joe Biden should have pardoned Donald Trump at the time of the four indictments against the former President.
Romney has opposed Trump, refusing to vote for or support him, and he was one of the Republican Senators voting to convict Trump twice on impeachment charges in 2019 and again after the January 6, 2021 US Capitol Insurrection.
But now, he says that Biden should have taken action to pardon Trump, comparing it to Gerald Ford doing so with Richard Nixon in 1974.
This is preposterous and ridiculous, and to compare Trump to Nixon is a distortion of history.
Yes, Nixon was corrupt and engaged in criminal action, but NOT on the level of Donald Trump!
There are many who still feel Nixon should have been prosecuted, and that his pardon helped to cause the defeat of Ford in the Presidential Election of 1976.
But the rule of law, despite what Ford did a half century ago, requires that any public official be held accountable.
Most notably, this is a man who committed the incitement of the Insurrection at the US Capitol, which led to deaths and injuries; and took government documents illegally to his private residence; and also interfered in state government and state electors regarding the vote count in the Presidential Election of 2020.
The Presidency needs to be reigned in so that the image of an Imperial Presidency, where the Chief Executive is not subject to the laws everyone else is, is put to rest for eternity.
The Presidency is NOT a dictatorship, but an office responsible to the American people!
America is, unfortunately, saddled with a Speaker of the House, Mike Johnson, who is both a religious hypocrite and an underminer of the rule of law.
This is a man who claims to be a “good Christian”, and he and his son monitor each other on avoidance of pornography online.
But at the same time, he shows up at the trial of Donald Trump, who has been engaged in illicit sex affairs with multiple women, and arranged a payment with two such women to keep the American people from learning about the affairs before the Presidential Election of 2016.
Trump has had three marriages, and cheated on all three wives, including just after his youngest son was born in 2006, and yet, Mike Johnson comes to his defense.
Johnson and all of the other Republicans who have shown up at the trial of Trump are out to defend a person engaged in illicit and criminal activity, and are undermining the rule of law, common decency, and morality and ethics.
The thought that Johnson is two heartbeats away from the Presidency under the Presidential Succession Act of 1947 is horrifying and just another reason to insure that the Democrats win the House of Representatives in the upcoming Presidential Election of 2024.
Imagine if past Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi intervened to defend Democrats facing trial, such as Hunter Biden or Senator Bob Menendez. What an outrageous reaction there would be, but such an event would never occur.
And think back to the Bill Clinton sex scandal, when Republicans were so moral and ethical, but now have switched gears completely!
When Israel was attacked by the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas on October 7, 2023, there was universal horror and shock at the massacre of 1,200 Israelis, the worst single event since the Holocaust of World War II, that killed 6 million Jews!
It was understandable that Israel would mount an offensive to do what could be done to eliminate Hamas.
However, the total eliminination is clearly impossible, as indicated by the reality that in areas that Israel seized in the northern Gaza Strip, already Hamas has returned to be an influence.
With 35,000 Palestinians, including 70 percent estimates of women and children killed, and others facing famine with the incessant Israeli military offensive, now being focused on Southern Gaza and Rafah, it is clear that if anything, the survivors of this brutal war will have resentment and bitterness and want revenge on Israel.
So all out war has failed to accomplish its goals and clearly, never will be successful in the manner that the Israeli government has set as a goal.
Meanwhile, many Israelis want the war ended and the remaining hostages released. The Jewish community in the United States is also divided, with many younger Jews alienated from the extremist government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his extremist Orthodox Jew ministers and supporters, who want all Palestinians dead!
Support for Israel in general is waning, and antisemitism is rampant, so an insoluble situation for future stability and recovery seems unattainable.
This is also affecting political support for Joe Biden as he is against a full scale attack on Rafah, but Donald Trump does not represent a better future.
Donald Trump, in the midst of the stress caused by the criminal trial taking place in New York City, is making speeches at campaign rallies and in comments on Truth Social that clearly show rapid mental deterioration!
He was speaking in New Jersey over the weekend about fictional Hannibal Lecter, who ate his victims.
He has described migrants as animals, and has spewed forth open hatred and putrid language without any filter.
What is most disturbing is that his MAGA followers seem to rejoice in his rhetoric on racism and nativism, and his promotion of hate, and that is very disconcerting, as it indicates major psychological issues for millions of his loyalists.
This is the kind of mentality that allowed the democracy of Weimar Germany a century ago to lead to the mass murder, Holocaust and World War II incited by lunatic Adolf Hitler and Nazi Germany!
This cannot be allowed to happen in the United States, as once democracy is lost, it would be extremely difficult to restore it!
Nikki Haley dropped out of the Presidential campaign two months ago, having only won DC and Vermont, but gaining often one third of the primary vote in the states she lost to Donald Trump.
Since then, amazingly, she has racked up 13-25 percent of the vote in later Republican primaries despite having withdrawn from the race, and in some suburban counties in these states even higher at times.
She did this in crucial states, including Indiana, Pennsylvania, Georgia, Arizona and Wisconsin.
And Donald Trump has made no moves to appeal to Haley or her supporters, while Joe Biden is making every effort to appeal to Haley supporters to “cross the aisle”.
This is an encouraging sign for Democrats.