Time to worry

Stanley - Thursday

To me and most of my friends, Donald Trump is a joke – an ignorant, lying, narcissistic joke. We laugh at his inability to speak coherently. We roll our eyes at how quickly he can change feet in his mouth. We slap our heads in disbelief at how he treats the USA’s allies and shake our heads when he holds hands with Putin and Erdogan.

All of his behavior is fodder for the press, against whom he rails incessantly – 'the fake press'.

But amidst our laughter, there is cause for serious concern. Let’s take a brief look at what has happened over the past ten days.

Despite a court order requiring the government to reunite the children who had been separated from their parents at the southern border, about 650 still haven’t. And there is a strong likelihood that some may never be. The only thing worse than the idea that such separations are good policy is that total lack of caring for the kids and of remorse at what has happened.

The Attorney-General of the United States has instituted a religious liberty task force. "Religious Americans are no longer an afterthought," he said. "We will take potential burdens on one's conscience into consideration before we issue regulations or policies." 

Attorney-General Sessions

I am in favour of religious freedom, but what underlies this is government permission to discriminate – if my religious belief tells me not to serve gays or hire blacks, then the government will support me. Sessions also said "This administration is animated by that same American view that has led us for 242 years — that every American has a right to believe and worship and exercise their faith in the public square." From what I have read, at no time did he talk about the constitutional requirement for the separation of church and state.

Trump continued to escalate the trade war, threatening to slap tariffs on all Chinese goods. Many company executives are beginning to pass the added costs along to customers. They shouldn’t worry too much for themselves, however. The Trump administration is mulling a change in how capital gains are calculated for tax purposes. Instead of a gain being calculated by taking the difference between sale and cost price, they are considering making it the difference between sale price and cost price adjusted for inflation. In most cases, particularly for assets held for long period of times, this will result in a markedly lower tax. Estimates are this will save $100 billion in taxes – which sounds good, except that the savings will go to the affluent, who have assets, and will increase the budget hole already worsened by the Trump tax cut. The Trump administration is working to pay for the cuts by cutting programs such as Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security, much of which is paid for by deductions from people’s salaries and comprise the most important safety nets for people in need.

Trump tweeted that he wants Attorney-General Sessions to stop the Mueller witch hunt – which has already indicted thirteen Russians. I think Sessions future is very shaky.

Trump attacks the press the whole time.

Republicans have rejected $250 million for securing the elections in November. I wonder why. Trump also eliminated the top government cyber security job. I wonder why.

Trump’s trade war has hurt farmers badly. He just gave them a $12 billion handout. I am sure they want to farm not receive handouts. The Trump administration wants drug testing for all welfare recipients. One joker wondered whether the farmers were going to have to submit for drug testing.

Supporting his push for voter ID cards with photos, Trump said it was ridiculous that you needed to show photo IDs when buying groceries, but not when voting.

The Trump administration has proposed Brett Kavanaugh to be the next Supreme Court justice. Kavanaugh is on record as saying that sitting presidents shouldn’t be indicted. The Republicans are refusing to provide some records of Kavanaugh’s past to Democrats. What are they hiding?

Trump has threatened to shut down government if he doesn’t get his wall – paid for by the USA!

The Trump administration stopped efforts to prevent plans for making guns out of plastic on 3-D printers from being downloaded on the internet. A judge put a temporary ban on the downloading, but the plans are easily available anyway. Scary! These guns are not detectable by many screening devices.

I think it is time we stop laughing at Trump, stop ridiculing him. We need to work to stop the damage he doing to society, and not only in the USA. If you are an American, get out and vote in November. Join protests. If you are not an American, beware, because Trump’s influence is spreading quickly.