The Zeitgeist

Donald Trump: Bombaster-in-Chief: Can the nation and the GOP be saved from this man?

Anyone but Trump Real Winner in New Hampshire and Iowa

In New Hampshire 64 percent of Republicans voted against Donald Trump. In Iowa 76 percent of Republican voters told Trump that “he’s fired.”

The big story out of Iowa and New Hampshire isn’t that Trump came in first or second, it’s that the overwhelming majority of GOP voters are rejecting him. Trump has failed to approach or surpass the 50 percent threshold to claim any kind of majority whatsoever, yet the media keep proclaiming and anointing him. The real winner was “not Trump.”

Similarly but for very different reasons, the Democratic voters in the aforementioned states also clearly decided that most of their votes would go to “not Hillary.” Unlike Trump however, Bernie Sanders did pull down a whopping 60 percent of the Democratic vote in New Hampshire, which is way more than a simple majority. Again, Trump has been nowhere near that figure.

The Trump phenomenon is partly the Republicans’ own fault and partly the fault of the media, particularly broadcast but also web to a lesser degree.

The Party

The Republican Party in scheduling a bazillion nationally televised debates many months before Iowa and allowing practically anyone with a pulse to participate based on pre-balloting popularity polls of as few as 450 people (how truly representative can even 1,200 be when there are 153 million registered voters?) essentially created a two-ring circus by giving legitimacy and exposure to bloviating dilettantes and amateurs such as Trump and also nice soft-spoken amateurs such as Dr. Ben Carson. While anyone can run for President of these United States, the party should be a way better gatekeeper.

There should have been fewer debates and they should have stared just six weeks before Iowa, not six months. Criteria for admission should have been a mix of polls, funds raised from the American people prior to the first debate (to demonstrate concrete popular support) along with the prospective candidates’ having either held public office, been a serious candidate for national office (i.e., Congress) or have significant military experience (officer). The minimum threshold in the polls should have been at least 10 percent, not one percent. This would not have precluded Trump or Carson or anyone else from running but it would have denied them the Republican Party’s communion until after balloting had actually begun. This would have kept the forums serious and not turned them into a reality TV show.

The party should also have been policing and disqualifying anyone from appearing on the ballot or in debates who espouses racist, misogynist or pejoratively uncivil comments directed against other candidates (no matter how popular these inflammatory comments might be in the ratings) because the party has to have a standard of baseline decency and professionalism to be taken seriously by the American people. The party has to stand for our country’s best values and for professionalism in governance. Let racists, bigots and malicious slanderers run as independents without the party’s imprimatur.

The Media

Trump is serious “vid-bait” and “click-bait,” which is why he’s been irresistible to broadcast producers and many webmasters. It’s no wonder why: Trump has been a successful reality TV star and he knows how to say outlandish things to generate coverage and exposure. There’s a reason why WWE Raw gets such high ratings (and Trump has appeared on professional wrestling shows) – its chock full of trash talk, insults, put-downs and endless smack-downs. The inner id is unleased around the ring and often it’s not about the physical action.

The problem with all this is that broadcasters in particular (and I don’t care if it’s on cable, they use the public spectrum to beam satellite signals all day long) should have a sense of being custodians of the public trust and welfare. Empowering incivility and even outright racism in the pursuit of ratings is an abuse of the public airwaves while enriching themselves in the arena, potentially jeopardizing the nation by providing 24/7 platforms for whatever lunatics might help sell more commercial spots. Serious candidates with real platforms and experience are ignored and the smack-down mashup is what’s offered the American people as serious political discourse. That the country could be made to suffer for many years for this by electing unqualified candidates is somehow not taken into consideration at all.

How to Save the Party

As indicated by the election results, most Republicans thankfully aren’t buying the bullying and the insulting braying spewed by Mr. Trump. The problem is that there are still a whole scrum of

wannabee presidents vying for the GOP nomination and they’re divvying-up that 64 to 76 percent of non-Trump voters so that Trump gets to sit atop the herd along with all the attendant media hoopla that that entails.

The remaining serious Republican candidates and the party need to go back to the 80s for inspiration – the 1880s. The party poohbahs need to push any marginal candidates) to drop out of the race post haste then they need to lock Ted Cruz, Marco Rubio, John Kasich and Jeb Bush in a back room somewhere far from the media’s prying eyes. These four guys need to be told to temper their hubris, their overwhelming lust for power and the messianic sense that only in them can the nation find true salvation. They need to hammer out a deal whereby one of them becomes the opposing candidate to Trump, one will become the vice presidential candidate and join forces and the other two will either just go home and wait for next time or be promised cabinet positions or prestigious ambassadorial posts if the Republicans win in November in exchange for their endorsement of a unified ticket. Jeb Bush would make a fine Secretary of State.

By putting the needs of the country and the party first above their own needs for power and glory, some of the candidates will really be saviors by dropping out and allowing someone to defeat Trump and save the soul of the Republican Party for generations to come.

The Zeitgeist

       

Cartoon characters Elmer J. Fudd and Cruella de Vil.

Do Americans Really Want Elmer J. Fudd or Cruella de Vil as President?

Are Donald and Hillary the Best 153 Million Registered Voters Can Produce?

In the award winning musical Fiddler on the Roof the main character is “Tevya The Milkman.” In today’s socio-economic terms you’d probably call him a struggling small businessman. One of his biggest wishes is to “be a wealthy man,” so much so that one of the show’s main songs is entitled “If I Were a Rich Man.” (A riff on this song was done in 2004 by Gwen Stefani called “Rich Girl.”)

One of the key aspects of Tevya’s song is that if he were in fact a rich man, he would secure prime seating at his local house of worship and in addition everyone would besiege him with questions and for his advice, “problems that would cross a rabbi’s eyes” because “when you’re rich they think you really know.”

Not much has changed in human nature since the lyrics of that song were written in 1964 because so many people in this country are in thrall in this presidential election cycle to rich people who think they really know.

Democratic presidential candidate Senator Bernie Sanders fulminates against the “billionaires who’ve rigged the system” and how the rich control our economy, the electoral process and the country. He’s calling for a “revolution” on behalf of the Average Joe which can sound pretty radical. Even though I disagree with most of Sanders’ policies and positions, he’s really not far off the mark about the affluent (which can also mean business or special interests) often controlling politics, especially on the national level. Interestingly, most Americans don’t see this as any kind of a problem.

Many of the very top candidates (and some not doing well in the polls) do in fact come from either the Patrician or Oligarch class. A reason for that is when you don’t have to worry about putting bread on the table or sweating out a monthly mortgage you have a lot of free time to pursue politics. Someone punching a clock every day where their presence would be missed at their desk or on the loading dock? Not so possible.

On the Republican side, the man leading all the polls is an actual billionaire who professes no end of braggadocio about it and uses it as his main qualification to lead the county despite not an hour of experience in elective office or the military. Millions of Americans flock to him because he has nothing whatsoever to lose by saying the most outlandish things that can be highly entertaining and is a vicarious release of voters’ powerlessness, anger and frustration. Because he has “F.U. Money” he’s insulated from the ramifications of his words and because even if he loses he’ll still be Donald Trump why not drop malicious gossip bombs hither and yon? What can anyone do to him?

The Wall Street Journal on January 15^th reported on the sale of a penthouse Mr. Trump owns personally in his Trump Park Avenue condo building in Manhattan for $21 million the week prior. He sold another unit recently for $14 million and he’s got another apartment on the market for $35 million. Mr. Trump’s daughter Ivanka in replying to a question whether Mr. Trump’s increased visibility because of the presidential campaign has had any effect on these sales said “the [Trump] brand has never been stronger.” Nothing to lose. Meanwhile, more worthy and more qualified candidates languish at the bottom of the polls while Mr. Trump entertains himself, the media and the country.

On the Democratic side, the woman leading all the polls has earned vast sums of money from accepting huge speaking and consulting fees from giant corporations and from enormous book advances. She and her husband have pulled in nearly $230 million since 2001. Talk about profiting from public service. (http://www.forbes.com/sites/danalexander/2015/10/13/how-the-clintons-made-more-than-230-million-after-leaving-the-white-house/#55ae31f6791e) Having been Secretary of State bolstered the Clinton, Inc. brand and now being a top candidate hasn’t slowed down the flow of cash to her and her husband. If she wins the presidency the money will literally be Mount Gushmore. Mrs. Clinton because of her wealth, fame and privilege also is quite insulated from reality which is why she doesn’t see it as any kind of problem whatsoever that she had her own private hackable email server while working at Foggy Bottom in total violation of the laws for public officials handling sensitive and national security matters.

Like Mr. Trump, Mrs. Clinton hasn’t driven herself to work or to the market in years. They both have retinues of aides and staffers to fill their every need and cater to their every whim. How can either of these two people ever hope to really understand the needs, thoughts and hopes of John and Jane Q. Public? Remember when George Bush the Elder didn’t know what a supermarket checkout scanner was? The American people rightly intuited that he hadn’t a clue about their daily lives. Why then are Americans flocking to these same out of touch flush types now?

Rumored to be mulling an independent entry into the presidential race is former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg – another billionaire – which would give American voters the choice between rich, richer and richest.

The population of the US is approximately 318 million according to the US Census Bureau. Roughly 153 million Americans are registered to vote (although 215 million are eligible). Of that figure 32 percent are registered Democrats, 23 percent as Republicans and 39 percent are Independents. Out of 153 million American voters the best people we can produce from that vast polity to lead this country are Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton? What does this say about the sad state of public life in this country? Why do we want to be led by Elmer J. Fudd or Cruella de Vil?

I may disagree with Bernie Sanders about healthcare, taxation and foreign policy but he’s right that the people need to take back the political process so that candidates of greater quality from both parties will have a serious shot at leadership.

The Zeitgeist

A Nazi Crematorium

Baking Jews with Mike Huckabee:

When is an Oven an Oven?

Last weekend former Arkansas Governor and GOP presidential candidate Mike Huckabee opened the oven door on President Obama’s Iran Nuclear deal and let out a big blast of heat and blowback.

On Sunday, July 26^th in an interview with Breitbart News, Huckabee said “this president's foreign policy is the most feckless in American history. It is so naive that he would trust the Iranians. By doing so, he will take the Israelis and march them to the door of the oven." The metaphor used by Huckabee is that of the Nazi crematoria of World War II which were employed in the extermination of six million Jews.

The next day Huckabee was all over broadcast and cable TV defending his criticism of the Iran deal in those terms and saw his poll numbers rise appreciably against the 17-candidate GOP pack.

No end of vituperative criticism and righteous indignant invective was inveighed against Huckabee by President Obama, others within his administration, prominent Democrats, prominent American Jewish Liberals and the gaggle of cable talking heads. “How could you and how dare you compare the Iran nuclear deal to the Holocaust” was the general refrain. Somehow Huckabee had sacrilegiously besmirched the hallowed memory of the Nazis’ victims. But did he really?

It begs the question, what is an oven exactly? We’re all familiar with coal and wood fired ovens, which often make the best pizza. There are electric ovens and convection ovens, toaster ovens, gas-fired ovens and microwave ovens all employing differing levels of technology to achieve the desired result of cooking whatever dish might be placed within and sometimes you can burn a roast or casserole if the oven is too hot. The Nazis burned people in really big ovens. The main target of Nazi burning were Europe’s Jews who they killed with industrial efficiency with an eye towards genocide, at which they were nearly completely successful.

Hitler and his minions were unabashed and unapologetic about their stated goal of eradicating Europe’s (and even the world’s) Jews. At great cost to their war effort they pursued this goal practically until the bitter end. It was really kind of a rabid hate.

The Ayatollahs along with the political and military leaders of Iran have made no bones about their admiration for the Nazis’ effort (which paradoxically they deny ever happened) and their oft publicly stated desire to complete Hitler’s work by eradicating the State of Israel and all of the six million Jews in it. This is no secret, it’s shouted in the streets of Iran, in their press, tweets and broadcasts. They provide extensive monetary and strategic backing to various heavily armed proxy terrorist groups encircling Israel with the aim of enabling them to murder as many Israelis as possible and as an advance guard for the big, final push somewhere down the road.

This is why there is a wall to wall consensus in Israel from the far left to the far right against President Obama’s Iran nuke deal. After the experience of World War II and decades of ethno-religious hatred against them in the Middle East, Israelis take threats of genocide seriously and don’t pooh-pooh them as fantastical.

By allowing Iran to keep their nuclear program and permitting any pretense of inspections to expire in a decade along with the repeal of economic sanctions, the return of $150 billion in frozen assets, the lifting of prohibitions against selling Iran arms and intercontinental missiles, isn’t the deal in fact enabling Iran to burn more Jews in the short term and possibly realize their stated goal of genocide against the Jewish people perhaps 10 years on?

In the only two instances where atomic weapons were used against civilian populations (Hiroshima and Nagasaki) we saw the power of the atom to burn and incinerate. While the Nazis had to turn one body at a time into powder and ash, atomic weapons can do that to tens and hundreds of thousands in an instant and cause delayed death from radiation shortly after for the survivors of such a blast. If you incinerate thousands of bodies a day manually or perhaps a million instantaneously is not the end result the same?

The real desecration of the Holocaust victims’ memory is allowing such a thing to happen again, enabling would-be genocide by caving into the demands of dictatorial bullies who are fueled by religious and racial hatred. Holocaust survivors and most Jews generally ascribe to the philosophy of “Never Again” to a Holocaust against them.

Mike Huckabee used some very blunt language to disparage a deal that puts millions of Jews in harm’s way and Israel between a rock and a very hard place defensively.  When it comes to saving millions of lives perhaps diplomatic politesse is precisely the wrong tack to take and some plain speaking will both clear the air and shed more light.

For the diplomats in the White House and at Foggy Bottom this is all one big process and they’ll move on to the next treaty. For Israel and the Jewish people this is about life and death. Jews are very familiar with ovens of every caliber and would prefer not to be exposed to the heat in the Iranians’ kitchen.