Are you satisfied with President Obama?

Before I begin, let me say that I voted for Barack Obama for both of his terms.  I believed his message of hope and change.  And he started off really well, with the Lily Ledbetter Fair Pay Act, the initial pullout of our troops from Afghanistan and Iraq, and the bailout of the automobile industry with the requirement of fiull payback before the executives could get their bonuses. 

The Affordable Care Act was at first a good start, but came to represent a sellout to the insurance industry rather than a real reform of American health care. Yes, it has it's good points, like the end of pre-existing condition clauses in insurance policies for example, and the millions more people who can get insurance.  But it's not enough, and will never be enough as long as corporate interests are served before the needs of We the People.  He missed the boat on this, which should have been single payer like the rest of the civilized world.  But that can be written off as the need to compromise with the Republicans in Congress in order to get anything passed on that issue.

In all honesty, I bagan wondering about his commitment to that hope and change when, after his first year in office he kept seeking compromise in spite of the fact that Congress kept refusing.  And of course there was his turnaround of the commitment to get our troops out of the Middle East as well as the expansion of actions that have proven counterproductive to peace and stability in the region, like Syria and Libya, pushed by then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.  That expansion has had the effect of increasing the role and influence of ISIS/ISIL by creating power vacuums that the terrorist organisation has been only too willing to fill:

Hillary Clinton, ‘Smart Power’ and a Dictator’s Fall

How ISIS Spread in the Middle East

  Yet I still supported him through most of his two terms.

What started the change in my thinking was when, against all legal precedent, he ordered the assassination of an American citizen by drone a couple years ago.  No arrest, no filing of charges, no conviction or sentence in any court of law.  Then I began looking back at his record, but in spite of his courting corporate support over the people in general, I still supported him. 

That support was enhanced a bit by his rejection of the Keystone XL pipeline for the reasons he stated:
Citing Climate Change, Obama Rejects Construction of Keystone XL Oil Pipeline

Then came his relative silence on DAPL.  He said next to nothing about the peaceful protesters of that pipeline being abused by law enforcement and private (corporate) security forces, and did absolutely nothing.  True, the Army Corps of Engineers rescinded (temporarily!) consent for the construction, but it's unclear whether this was at President Obama's direction or if the Corps did this on their own in response to the validity of the reasons for the protest.
And nothing is being done about Energy Transfer Partners' refusal to accept changes in the pipeline's route in order to protect the environment from catastrophic damage.  In fact they have a record of causing such damage:

Iowa's pipeline safety record spotty

And let's not forget the lackluster economic "improvements" which, although generally better than the depression we were headed for, is still in a rececssion, with many people who used to earn a decent, even upper middle class level, paycheck, who are now stuck in lower-wage, and even minimum wage, jobs, and more low=paying jobs being created to replace the higher-paying ones that have been lost:

Recovery Has Created Far More Low-Wage Jobs Than Better-Paid Ones

All of that being said, if we were to do it all over again, I would still have supported Obama's candidacies, but I would also have urged people to hold his feet to the fire on his campaign promises.  He was, in fact, the best person for the job in comparison to his campaign opponents in both 2008 and 2012.

© 2016 by Don Rice Jr.

Think Critically

"The Washington Post published a report that cites officials who say they have identified individuals connected to the Russian government..."

Let's break this down, shall we?

Un-named "officials".  Suspicious right form the outset.

"... who say they have identified..."  But only on their say-so?

"... connected to the Russian government..." Connected in what way?  Career bureaucrats? Aides? Spies?  Again, no indication of how they're connected.

Let's look further, shalL we?

"By acknowledging and digging into the increasing evidence..." What evidence?  None has been released, at least not to the general public, that I'm aware of.

And the statement that those unknown Russian government people "...gave WikiLeaks emails..." is nothing more than allegation and innuendo until, if and when, it's proven to be true.  At present there is no reason to take the word of government officials or mainstream media that gave every appearance of being in the bag for Hillary Clinton even prior to her securing the Democratic nomination.

It must also be noted that nobody has released the original emails to verify that the tampering or changing alleged to have been done by the Russians actually happened.  If they were tampered with or changed in any way, the originals would prove it.  But they haven't been released.  Why might that be?

I really don't care who leaked the emails. If the only thing up for dispute is who leaked them, and nobody is addressing whether their accurate copies of the originals, then that's really all that matters. And if they are, in fact, accurate representations, then something is very wrong within the DNC.

Critical thinking isn't really all that difficult.

 ©2016 by Don Rice Jr.

Just stop it!

Reportedly the Dakota Access Pipe Line is being rerouted around, not through, Souix lands.  This is a good start, but doesn't really address the issue of polution form broken pipelines, which are all too common, especially with the company running the show.  But important an issue as that is, it's not what I'm writing about today.

You may or may not know that this would be the second change in the pipeline route.  It was originally routed through a wealthier area before it was moved over to the tribal lands.

Bismark, North Dakota residents protested the pipeline coming through their town out of fear of damage to their water supply.  It didn't take months and months of protests during which they were arrested by the scores and by the hundreds and locked in kennel-like cages.  There were no dogs sicked on them.  They didn't have water cannons turned on them.  They weren't turned away from buying supplies in local stores.  They weren't shot in the heads with hard rubber bullets or gassed or assaulted by militarized police and private security forces.  And they didn't need lawyers or retired military veterans to come to their defense.

None of that happened to the residents of Bismark, N.D.  All they had to do was register their concerns, and the pipeline was re-routed away from them.  And the residents of Bismark have the nerve to complain about the Native American people who have been protesting for months the very same issue for their lands and water supplies?   GTFOOHWTBS.

To the people of Bismark who are doing that complaining: Take your white racist crocodile tears somewhere else.  We the People of these supposedly United States, who come in all races, ethnic backgrounds, religions and whatever else, don't need your fake patriotism or your bigoted attitudes.  Those things won't help our country.

 ©2016 by Don Rice Jr.

Stop The Blame Game

What caused Hillary to lose was a combination of a variety of things. Lack of enthusiasm, yes. Voter suppression, yes, in both the general and the primaries. But I think the biggest factor is the mood of the electorate, i.e., We the People, to turn against business as usual, to reject the status quo.

The Democratic party, by whatever means, shady or legitimate, rejected the only primary candidate who is not part of the establishment forces supporting the status quo. Hillary talked a good fight, but only after being pressured by Bernie Sanders’ rapidly rising polling and vote numbers. 

This left the field wide open for Trump to come in as an anti-establishment candidate, even though many of his statements during the campaign were and are repugnant, and win the general election.

Who is to blame for all this? I would say all of us who call ourselves either Democrat or progressive. Those who supported Sanders but switched to Hillary, those who didn’t switch, those who supported Hillary no matter what and denigrated anyone and everyone who disagreed with them are at fault.

 
But now the time for blame is over. We must reach out to our opponents on both the left and the right, and form working coalitions to get more progressive candidates into office on all levels of government, to pass progressive initiatives in every state, and to groom a true progressive to challenge Trump in 2020.

To accomplish that, we must find common ground on which to to build this progressive movement, Our Revolution, into a force to be reckoned with. If we don’t do the work, we will have nobody else to blame.

Namaste',
Don

 ©2016 by Don Rice Jr.

Moving Forward

Over the past several days since Election day, there has been a great deal of vitriol being hurled on social media.  Everyone wants to blame everyone else for Hillary Clinton's loss, too many are refusing to look at the reasons for that loss, especially from people who did not vote for her.

We've all seen the video clips and news reports of people being taunted, insulted, beat down, told to leave the country, et cetera.  And the anger is clearly on both sides.  Real winners don't rub people's faces in their loss a some of the Trump supporters have been doing.  And real progressives don't attack other progressives out of anger at a differing perspective.  Yet those are the things that are happening.

Many of the people expressing anger because others didn't vote the way the Clinton supporters thought they should have lost sight of the basic truth that we are all human and we all err at times. 

The troubling part is that many people on both sides of the situation claim to be Christian, yet their actions show that they are Christian in name only.

Perhaps even more to the point of what's happening lately in reference to the Bible, especially for those who call themselves Christian, is the neglect for living by trhe teachings of the man  called Jesus the Christ. 

I do not call myself Christian.  Yet I have studied the Bible for many years, seeking the larger truths within the teachings of the Bible.  I herewith offer what I consider to be perhaps the most profound of those teachings:

"For if ye love them which love you, what thank have ye? for sinners also love those that love them." (Luke 6:32)

"For if ye love them which love you, what reward have ye? do not even the publicans the same?  47 And if ye salute your brethren only, what do ye more than others? do not even the publicans so?" (Mat. 5:46, 47)

"Therefore all things whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them..." (Mat 7:12)

"If a man say, I love God, and hateth his brother, he is a liar: for he that loveth not his brother whom he hath seen, how can he love God whom he hath not seen?" (1 John 4:20)

Since Christianity is an outgrowth of Judaism, let's take a look at that too.

The Jewish Rabbinical teaching in the B'reshith Rabba (Genesis Rabba) teaching reads: "If thou despisest any man, thou despisest God who made man in His image."

I had a discussion with someone on Facebook who insisted that my vote for Jill Stein was actually a vote for Trump.  No matter how I explained that this wasn't so, she refused to budge.  I don't despise her or hate her because she stubbornly refuses to see someone else's perspective.  It's the action and attitude that saddens me, and I sincerely hope that people will wake up and realize the harm they're doing by being hateful and vindictive.

What it comes down to is that we should treat others the way we want to be treated, not the way they treat us, or to despise them because we disagree with them.  If we did that, then there would be no chance of harmony, simply because nobody agrees totally with anyone else all the time.

Instead, we must seek to understand each other better and not stick with our prejudices and one-sided perspectives.  And we must seek the common ground between us, for only there will we be able to find a way out of this quagmire.  Then, and only then, will we be able to move forward as a nation.

Namaste,
Don

©2016

Democrat Paul Penzone unseats Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio | Cronkite News

Democrat Paul Penzone unseats Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio | Cronkite News: After holding the position of Maricopa County Sheriff for more than two decades, Joe Arpaio has lost his seat to Democrat Paul Penzone.

Election 2016: The Bigger Picture

So Donald John Trump will be the next President of the United States.  What does this mean for the country?

The truth is that we won't really know until after he takes office.  But the more important question is this:

How did we get here? 

There is a traceable line of cause and effect that goes back at the very least 50 years or so.  It really goes back long before that, but for the purpose of this writing, 50 years is sufficient as a starting point.

What happened then that led to this?  And how did it lead to our current condition?

The 1954 Supreme Court decision in Brown v. Topeka Board of Education was perhaps the starting point, but it wasn't the cause of today's difficulty.  No, the cause was the reaction to that decision. 

A program of massive resistance was begun in Virginia by political movers and shakers.  This led directly to the creation of "segregation academies".  And the concept spread throughout the country.  Not only in the realm of education, but also in businesses.

This program was designed specifically to circumvent the Brown decision, and to continue the segregation of every institution in the nation, both public and private, including commercial enterprises.  And the program expanded on Jim Crow laws as well as northern de facto segregation most if not all of the other states that make up what we call America.

Segregation academies are still around, and educational segregation is growing via charter schools, though it must be noted that not all charter schools are segregation academies.  Segregation in education, especially in charter and religion-based schools, is not only racial.  It is also based on disability, gender identity/sexual orientation, and economic status.  There are, of course, variations between and within these types of schools, based largely on the ruling principles each school and type of school is founded upon.

Academic achievement has gradually decreased in many, if not most, parts of the country, based largely on the same factors endemic to segregation, although certain segments of the population have shown marked improvement.  Black women, for example, are the fastest growing group of college graduates.  And the lowest scholastic achievers are mostly in the southern states.

Added to all of this is something the establishments of both the Democratic and Republican Parties failed to take note of.  That factor is the rapidly growing dissatisfaction of the people in all parts of the country with the status quo.  People are sick and tired of empty promises and eager for real progress rather than going backwards.  And that includes the ever-increasing gap between rich and poor as well as the perception that our so-called leaders are bought and paid for by the corporate elite.

As a result, more, many more, people in America are ready for a change in leadership.  The two major parties put forth the most disliked candidates for President in our nation's history.  And only one of them was not part of the political establishment that people are tired of.  Too many people saw this election as a choice of the lesser evil, which candidate would do the least damage.
  
But the problem is even deeper.  The Democratic National Convention, through the state conventions, chose a candidate who was not only viewed as deeply flawed, but also shown in every major poll to be incapable of beating most of the Republican candidates, and might... MIGHT... beat Donald Trump.  That turned out, obviously, to not be the case.  The candidate whom polls showed could easily beat Trump was turned away. 

Setting aside the belief by many, including me, that Bernie Sanders was cheated out of the nomination, the fact is that he could have and probably would have beaten Trump, while Hillary Clinton stood a very slim chance of doing so.  As can be easily seen in hindsight, the polls didn't lie.

The Democratic establishment has only itself to blame for this mess.

© 2016 by Don Rice Jr.

The Lesser Evil

Many people have said that we MUST vote for Hillary, or... Trump!  On the other side, people have said we should vote for Trump because... Hillary!

For myself, it's a matter of every election in recent history being billed as a choice between the lesser of two evils. I've reached the point where that is no longer acceptable as a reason to vote for a particular candidate.

The old saying goes, "The lesser of two evils is still evil." While that is true, it doesn't even begin to cover the extent of the issue when it comes to voting for President or any other office.

At issue is the continued validity, or lack thereof, of the two-party system. Both major parties have proven to be corrupt and eminently corruptible. Yet we are told that we must vote for one or the other, or the Armageddon will come.  Either the end of the world predicted by evangelicals of all persuasions, or the end of America as we know it, or some other end of something or other.

I flatly reject that viewpoint. With both major parties being undesirable and the electoral system needing to change, the only rational option is to vote for a third party candidate. At the same time, we need to educate people on how to change the system into a multi-party one that does not act merely as a spoiler.

Otherwise, we will continue our long slide into oligarchy or theocracy. That would truly be the end of this grand experiment we call the United States of America.

© 2016 Donald C. Rice Jr.

Are you ready for it?

Occupy Wall Street, protesting corruption, the buying off of our political system, and the massive redistribution of wealth from the workers who made wealth possible to the super-wealthy, the big banks, stockbrokers and CEO's.

Arab Spring, the protest expressing deep-seated resentment toward Arab dictatorships, anger at the brutality of the security apparatus, unemployment, rising prices, and corruption that followed the privatization of state assets in some countries.

Black Lives Matter, a response to the racism that is endemic in many aspects of our society, but most especially to the fact that police brutality affects black people more than any other ethnic group in America.

Tiananmen Square, the 1989 protests in China against inflation, limited preparedness of graduates for the new economy, and restrictions on political participation.

What do these have in common? At their heart, they are all a coming together of mostly young people who have decided that it's time for  change toward real progress in human societal evolution.  And the struggle continues. 

The United Kingdom just voted to leave the European Union.

And here in the United States, a huge majority of Republican primary voters has chosen Donald Trump as their presumptive Republican nominee for President of the United States.  And on the Democratic side, 45% of primary votes counted so far have been for Bernie Sanders, a Democratic Socialist whose stands on issues are reminiscent of the liberal policies of the Democratic Party of decades past while the present Party is run by corporatists masquerading as liberals, what have been called Neoliberals and New Democrats.

But that's not all.  Many, many voters were disenfranchised as the Democratic Party adopted and adjusted Republican/Conservative/Tea Party tactics to prevent Sanders supporters from voting.  There are official inquiries and even lawsuits about election fraud springing up, as the Media, allegedly in cahoots with the Democratic National Committee, downplayed at almost every turn the progress being made by the Sanders campaign, which began at a serious disadvantage and pulled within a few points of the Establishment favorite, Hillary Clinton, before the primaries were over, taking 22 states and, when all of the mail-in and provisional ballots are finally counted, perhaps more.  

What does it all mean?  Consider that a majority of Republicans chose an anti-candidate, one who is neither respected nor wanted by the Party elites.  And nearly half of the Democratic voters chose a candidate who has eschewed Party membership while harkening back to a truly liberal and progressive stance that the Party's top echelons have apparently forgotten.  Then consider that this accounts for roughly half of the membership of of both Parties who voted in their respective primaries.  Add to that that about 40% of registered voters in the United States are either independent or support a third party. 

This speaks to that same dissatisfaction that led to the four groups mentioned at the beginning of this  More and more people are openly coming out against business as usual and want to see real progress in human affairs. 

As Cenk Uygur of the Young Turks Network just said tonight, "Buckle up.  Here comes the revolution."

© 2016 Donald C. Rice Jr.

Hillary Clinton's Rape Case

Everyone who knows me and/or follows me, in real life or on social media, knows that I do not like or trust what I see and hear of Hillary Rodham Clinton, the "presumptive" nominee for the Democratic run for the Presidency of the United States.  However, in an effort to be as impartial as possible, allow me to present my analysis of one particular aspect of why I don't trust her.

There is a meme running around the Internet about a rape case she handled as a young attorney on Arkansas:

While the meme grossly misrepresents the facts of the case, what stands out in my awareness is that Hillary laughed about lie detector test:

"I had him take a polygraph, which he passed,
which forever destroyed my faith in polygraphs."

She also laughed about saying to prosecutor,
"Well, this guy's (a well-known and highly respected forensics expert) ready to come from New York to prevent this miscarriage of justice."

Here is the report from CNN that includes those excerpts:

What happened in Hillary Clinton's 1975 rape case?

These facts, all by themselves, show clearly what she thought about the case.  She clearly thought the man was guilty.  Did she know he was guilty?  We may never know the answer to that question; it's not one she is ever likely to answer.  But it's clear that she believed he was.  He passed the polygraph, and that destroyed her faith in the test.

In Clinton's defense, she was appointed as the man's lawyer.  That made her responsible for defending him to the best of her ability.  She did that, admirably, within the system as it was at the time.  She didn't get the guy of completely, but plea bargained the case down so that, instead of being sent to prison for life, he spent a year in the county jail for "fondling".

It must also be acknowledged that the prosecution massively bungled their side of the case.  They lost the actual evidence, the piece of the underwear with the blood and semen stains, and offered Clinton the remainder of the garment as what they had for evidence. 

Apparently they also failed to bring forth the witness statement that the man got on top of the girl and a short time later pulled up his pants. 

So what it comes down to is that Hillary's supporters are going to
 ignore her own clearly demonstrated attitude toward this case.  But her detractors err in the opposite direction, failing or refusing to acknowldge that she had a job she was required by law to do, defend the accused to the best of her ability, and she did that job quite thoroughly.  She can't be faulted for that, because if it ever came out that she didn't offer up her best defense, she could have been disbarred, meaning she would not be permitted to practice law again in Arkansas and perhaps in other places as well.

The CNN report on this issue closes by noting that, according to Clinton, the case inspired her to start the first rape hotline in Arkansas.  Was this a political calculation, as some might say?  I doubt it.  She was a new lawyer just getting started at 27 years old.  I don't believe political calculation applied at all at that time in her life.  But again, I don't think we'll ever really know for sure.

It should be noted, however, that she declined to address the question of her smearing of the rape victim when specifically asked about it.  One can only speculate about that while understanding that this was accepted practice across the country in those days.  It's much less common now due to "shield laws", but it still happens, in court and out.  It's called "blaming the victim", it's a despicable practice that needs to end, and Hillary Clinton engaged in it as a defense attorney.

Here is the clip, again from CNN.  Note how the anchors mention that aspect but don't pursue it at all, concluding that Clinton gave a well-thought-out answer:

Clinton stands by defense of child rapist in the 1970s

In conclusion, while she may have done the legally correct thing in this case, it was not the *right* thing.  Yes, she got her client a reduced charge and a greatly reduced sentence resulting from that reduced charge.  Her methods, while perfectly legal, were counter to the concept of seeking the truth in the matter.  When questioned, she deflects blame and responsibility from herself.  This is not someone I would want to trust in the highest office in the land.

© 2016 Donald C. Rice Jr.

Good cops and bad cops

Yesterday the news broke that the second police officer brought to trial in Baltimore, Edward Nero, was found not guilty in the death of Freddy Gray, a black man arrested for possession of a spring-assisted knife.  Such knives are legal by Maryland state law, but Baltimore has it's own law making them illegal.  The first officer brought to trial, Caesar Goodson Jr., had a deadlocked jury and will apparently be re-tried in September.  Four more officers may or may not be taken to trial.

One might ask, "Why did Gray die in police custody?"  It's a valid question.  But it's not the purpose of this blog post.  The arrest was legitimate; the death was not.  Nor is it the purpose of this post to blame the victims, as far too many people are all too willing to do.  Sure, some of those people had criminal records.  But some had no record, yet were still killed.  Cleveland's Tamir Rice, not even a man but a 12-year-old child, comes to mind.  

With Tamir Rice in mind, one might also ask what a cop is supposed to do when someone aims a gun at them.  It's been said that a cop sometimes only has a split second to decide if they are actually in danger.  But this is a result of training, or rather, a lack of appropriate training.  For example, in many European countries, police are trained to de-escalate and disarm, only firing their weapons when absolutely necessary.  And they're trained to be able to tell when it's necessary.  There's no reason we can't train our police officers the same way here in  the U.S.  None whatsoever.

Anyone who has paid the slightest bit of attention knows that Gray is not the only black man to die at the hands of police.  Nor is he the only black person, as several women have also died in police custody or by other police action.  Sandra Bland comes to mind immediately, but she's not the only one.     

No, the purpose of this post is to examine the larger picture of the phenomena of black deaths by police involvement.  And that larger picture is the reason for movements such as Black Lives Matter and Black Matters.

There is a major discrepancy, that has been demonstrated multiple times, between the treatment of minorities, especially black people, and whites.  Deny it if you will, but consider that black folks are killed for sometimes petty crimes, or no crime at  all, while the racist murderer of black people in a South Carolina church is led away smiling by police.  You know that if it had been a white church and the gunman was black, he would most likely have been dead, quite possibly after being taken into custody.

How many times have you read or heard a news report talking about arrest records of the black people who have been killed by cops?  Like Freddy Gray, that list is extensive.  But what the media generally doesn't tell us is that Freddy Gray's arrest record is not a valid measure.  What is valid is his conviction record.  Most of those arrests did not lead to convictions.  Furthermore, not one of them, arrests or convictions, was for a capital offense anywhere in this country.  Yet Freddy Gray is dead, as are a large number of other black men and women, at the hands or in the custody of police, and without one capital offense among them.

Are we a nation of laws and justice?  Or are we a nation of bigotry and revenge for all and sundry?

Many times I hear or read that the cops who do these things are a small percentage of the total.  This is probably true.  And there are the occasional stories of cops doing good things, like helping poor people desperate for a meal or facing eviction.  But where are the stories about cops crossing that "thin blue line"?  Where are the stories of cops standing up against their fellow officers who are not good cops?  Where are the Frank Serpico's willing to put their lives on the line to see justice being done, when the justice is against another cop?

Frank Serpico was and is a hero.  We need more of them.  And we need to see more of them.

Namaste',
Don Rice Jr.

© 2016 Donald C. Rice Jr.

Which way to go?

History informs us that when a nation or ideal or mass movement begins a downhill slide, it reach a point where it has to bottom out before the people rise up to change it.  This basic premise has been repeated over and over.  The Roman Empire had to reach it's nadir before the Renaissance could begin, for example.  The British Empire had to reach the height of arrogance and abusiveness before the colonies would rise up against it, beginning with the American Revolution. 

Each of those falls took a couple hundred years to fully materialize. The much more recent Filipino "peaceful revolution" that derailed the corrupt regime of President Ferdinand Marcos was something of an anomaly in that it took place, not after centuries, but a couple decades. But now we're in the Information Age, fueled by the Internet and the global economy.  Awareness of events in one part of the world moves quickly to nearly every corner of the Earth.  People everywhere can now see what's happening almost as it occurs. 

And here in the USA, the Industrial Age gave way to the Information Age, not by natural progression, but by political manipulation that saw our manufacturing base moved to other countries as part of a power agenda to break trade unions and dumb down education so that the people would not be aware en masse that they were being shafted by the very people who employed them as well as the ones who were supposed to represent them in the halls of government.

With the rapid movement of knowledge of events now taking place, peaceful revolution becomes more possible in some places.  And with more and more people awakening to progressive possibilities, we might yet avoid the long rebuilding that occurs after mass violent rebellions.  Much depends on how many people wake up and participate in the peaceful revolution, and what positions they assume during the rebuilding. 

But one thing seems inevitable.  That is that before this peaceful revolution can be successful, more people must be forced to accept that change is not only necessary, but inevitable.  The means of that force could very well need to be, here in America, the election of a right-wing megalomaniac such a Donald Trump or Ted Cruz.  It's a frightening, unpalatable concept, I know; but it may and probably will have the effect of convincing people that we must come together in order to create the change necessary to the furtherance of our nation toward the uplifting of human existence instead of the seeking after power and wealth for it's own sake or for our own selfish satisfaction.

Should such a person become President, it is likely that it will be for only one term, or less, should the person be impeached.  And the people will be the force behind that change, as they see the need to progress rather than regress.  

© 2016 Donald C. Rice Jr.

Trump This!

I read a rather humorous rumor today that Donald Trump wants to have some entertainment at the Republican National Convention, where he hopes (probably accurately) to be crowned that Party's nominee for President.  One person commented the idea of a bear riding a bicycle.  Another thought it should be juggling because of Trump's alleged "small hands".  Those are small-time circus acts, and Trump is anything but small time.  At least in his own bloated-ego mind anyway.

I think he'd have a reality-show theme, since he has experience in that realm.  I visualize a couple professional mimicking his rivals for the Presidency.  You know, Rubio, Clinton, Cruz, Sanders and Kasich.

It'll be billed as "Presidential Apprentice".

He's seated at the head of a conference table.  They're all standing before And he looks at each one and yells, "You're fired!"

Yeah, that's what I think The Donnie will do if that rumor is true.

 © 2016 Donald C. Rice Jr.