Highlights and Results From That Debacle of a Debate

Donald Trump was, once again, childish, immature, rude and, as ever, bullying last evening in what was the first and possibly last "presidential" debate with Joe Biden. I use the word presidential here very, very loosely as this President was anything but presidential. Herewith, some results and takeaways from it all.

Unfortunately for most of us, it either scared or insulted so many of us.

Presidential debate didn't help Trump catch Biden, but horror show scared America

Usually always, it's a presidential debate between 2 mature adults and both have manners. In this case, one, Trump, is neither, of course--not a mature adult and certainly without manners. Or decency.

How do you keep up with a 74 year old man child that incessantly interrupts?

Who would have thought this is where we would be with an American President?

Trump blows up the debate — and himself

Then this was stunning.

Trump was asked to denounce white supremacy. 

He wouldn’t.

A President of the United States was asked, publicly and on camera, to denounce white supremacy and he would not and did not. Stunning.

At least Joe got this in last evening.

Joe Biden Tells Donald Trump 'You're the Worst President America Has Ever Had' During Debate

And he's right, of course. Harding, Buchanan, Nixon, they're all pikers compared to this divisive, ignorant, reckless, dangerous, colluding fool of a President.

Joe also got this in. Thank goodness.

It was fair. It was certainly fair in this one regard, Joe getting that in.

I think it seems extremely clear to most of the voting, adult population of our nation that the time has long since come for the moderator of these debates to have a mute button, capable of cutting off a speaker if they go over their time or are rude and/or interrupting. That much seems clear. That time is now. It's overdue. Long overdue.

Face it, ladies and gentlemen. We need to face the truth, the facts. Donald Trump is dangerous. Surprisingly, frighteningly, legitimately dangerous. No exaggeration or overstatement. Read this next article.

At the debate, Trump made it clear he's already decided the election doesn't count

Then check out some of the results. This is where and what really counts. This is one of the most important results of last night's debacle.

Undecided voters describe Trump as a 'crackhead,' 'arrogant' in post-debate focus group

And this.

BREAKING: CNN instant poll gives it to Biden by 32 points!

The first post-debate polls say Biden won

Oliver Darcy  @oliverdarcy -- CNN instant poll of debate watcher: 60% say Biden won, 28% say Trump won.

As this article above points out, sure, things could still change but this is, of course, a great short term result from last evening. That is a pretty huge margin of win for Joe Biden right there, folks.

One thing seems to be coming clear, too. That is, Donald Trump looks as though he is going to also be the one who gets this Donald Trump presidency defeated.

That 'debate' was bad for America. 

But it was even worse for Trump

Then check out Joe's other great, great result from last night. Another of the most important things that can or could or even should take place in this insanity called a presidential election campaign.

Joe Biden smashed his single-hour fundraising record after the first presidential debate

Ultimately, of course, this, this is what we need.

David Frum: "Trump yelled, threatened, interrupted--and changed nothing. He's Losing."

So there's some hope, folks. Some big things and they went and are going our way, certainly. We can take nothing, nothing for granted, however. 

We must VOTE. 

And we must VOTE BLUE come November 3.

#BLUEWAVE2020

More:

Even America's CEOs are dumping Trump like bad rubbish

Star Op/ed Piece Says Andrew Jackson Sculpture Should Stay

The Kansas City Star had an op/ed piece in the paper Sunday by a woman who is "...of Olathe ..." and "...works in art conservation with a professional background in analytical chemistry, studio art and art history", wrote that we should keep the statue of Andrew Jackson downtown at the courthouse.

 

Don’t ditch artistic Andrew Jackson 

courthouse statue

Which would be fine, sure, if our only emphasis or guide on this issue were art, sure. If it were only about sculpture, it would be great. Leave the statue there.

But it's not, no way, only about that. This is not about art.

It's also very much about history. It's about history and justice and fairness and racial equality and it's about not honoring, no longer honoring someone who was directly responsible for torturing and killing, yes killing, our own American citizens.  And that is Andrew Jackson.

Andrew Jackson was a slaver, 

ethnic cleanser, and tyrant

Andrew Jackson: 

America’s Most Violent President

The Slave-Owning, 

Indian-Killing History Of The Man

These statues famously, famously went up in the early 1900s because African-Americans had been freed, had been no longer slaves in our nation. Our white citizens, we now know, wanted to "honor" these men of the South. They wanted to make sure they kept these African-American citizens "down" and "in their place." We know this. It's extremely well known. This, this is why these statues were made and installed.

How the US Got So Many Confederate Monuments

Confederate Statues Were Built To Further A 'White Supremacist Future'

Most Confederate Monuments Weren't Built Until the Rise of Jim Crow

Worse, Andrew Jackson not only owned fellow Americans, not only did he own slaves and support slavery of African-American in our nation, but he was also responsible for the torture and killing of an entirely additional race of Americans and that would be Native Americans, of course.

Andrew Jackson, Indian Removal, 

and the Trail of Tears

The author of this opinion piece clearly hasn't studied our national history. They clearly need to study Reconstruction after the Civil War, the Black Code laws, Jim Crow laws and even segregation from its inception to today.  This author seems to have clearly never seen but needs to see this piece from PBS.

Reconstruction: America After the Civil War

So sure, let's enjoy art. Let's enjoy artworks. Let's go to the Nelson and the Bloch Center for Contemporary Art and all the other places. Heck, the Country Club Plaza, wherever.

But let's make it clear.

This Andrew Jackson sculpture, which was put there to honor him, should come down.

Let there be no doubt.

And then, when we're done there, let's rename the county.

Truman County sounds good.

Americans Need to Know What Just Happened In and To Our Justice System

Yes, every adult American needs to know and be fully aware just what, exactly, took place in and to our justice system yesterday. It starts here.

The Justice Department has dropped Michael Flynn’s case

It seems Attorney General William Barr had up to now guilty Michael Flynn freed from his guilty convictions.

Michael Flynn was formally found guilty in our courts, in our justice system and this administration just overturned that finding.

Everyone needs to know, remember, keep in mind that Michael Flynn plead guilty---twice---formally, officially, in a court of law to lying to the FBI. Perjury. One of the worst offenses, short of murder, one can be found guilty.

Now this.

Pardoning Flynn would have looked bad. Dropping the charges is far worse.

The Trump administration’s Justice Department is undermining the rule of law.

For months, President Trump has suggested that he might pardon retired Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn, his former national security adviser, who pleaded guilty to lying to the FBI. But now Trump won’t have to worry about it: Attorney General William P. Barr filed a motion Thursday asking the federal court overseeing Flynn’s case to dismiss the charges.

If he is successful, Barr will save Trump from the political fallout of pardoning a former close aide, while still clearing Flynn. A pardon might have seemed to be the ultimate perversion of justice — but Barr’s maneuver is actually much, much worse.

Flynn lied to the FBI in early 2017 about a conversation he had with Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak when Flynn was a member of the Trump transition team. Flynn’s conversation involved mollifying Russia immediately after the Obama administration expelled 35 Russian spies and imposed sanctions as punishment for its interference in the 2016 election. When interviewed by the FBI about his conversation with Kislyak, Flynn lied, despite knowing — as he undoubtedly would, as the former head of the Defense Intelligence Agency — that doing so was a crime.

The fact that he would lie to the FBI, which is charged with protecting the country’s national security, raised the concern that he might be compromised by a foreign power — a concern that Barr’s current motion to the court claims that the FBI should have ignored. In fact, Barr’s motion to the court echoes the request Trump made to the bureau’s then-director, James B. Comey, in February 2017, when he asked Comey to “see [his] way clear to letting Flynn go” — a request that landed Trump in the middle of an investigation into obstruction of justice...

William Barr's Dropping of Michael Flynn Case Is Corrupt

'Transparently Corrupt': Barr Lets Flynn Off Scot-Free 

'My God,' Says US Senator After William Barr Deploys 'History Is Written by the Winners' Trope

"The head of the American justice system now saying publicly that there is no good or bad except what the strongest want," said another critic. "The definition of autocracy."

And today, now, it seems this President Trump is even honestly making things worse for himself by---wait for it---shooting off his mouth. Further. Check this out.

Trump: 'I learned a lot from Richard Nixon'

Trump says he 'learned a lot from Richard Nixon,' including not to tape his conversations and 'don't fire people'

During a Friday morning phone interview on Fox News' morning show, "Fox and Friends," President Donald Trump said he's studied history and "learned a lot from Richard Nixon," while reflecting on the federal investigation into his 2016 campaign's ties to Russia.

The president said one of his key lessons came from Nixon, who resigned in 1974 while facing almost-certain impeachment after directing the criminal Watergate break-in. Taped conversations illustrating Nixon's involvement in the criminal conspiracy and his attempts to cover up the wrongdoing by firing top aides helped seal his fate. 

"I learned a lot from Richard Nixon. Don't fire people," Trump said.

"Only the best people..."

Remember that?

Thanks, Republicans.

God help us all.

God forgive and help us all.

Additional link:

Bill Barr Tests Negative for Integrity

Jack Cashill Comes Out Against Mass Transit?? Say It Isn't So!

BREAKING NEWS TODAY!! (last week?)

None other than very Right Wing, conservative JACK CASHILL has come out SQUARELY AGAINST MASS TRANSIT here in the Kansas City area!

Shocking!

Imagine that!!

A middle-aged (senior?), very white, middle- to upper-class, again, Right Wing, conservative--Republican? Libertarian?---coming out against MASS TRANSIT!!

Naturally, I first read of this shocking, shocking development over at some local blog.

KANSAS CITY URBAN PLANNER FACT CHECK: CONSERVATIVE JACK CASHILL EXAMINES DENSITY & PUBLIC TRANSIT ROLE IN DEADLY CORONAVIRUS!!!

Thank goodness I checked that out! (Thanks for the heads up, Ton...)

You just can't get any more controversial or daring than that!

Be able to take light rail from, say, the airport to downtown? Or out in the city??

Have the city bisected by light rail with East/West and North/South routes??

This daring Right Winger is having nothing of it!

And Mr. Cashill so rightly makes a DIRECT CONNECTION between this MASS TRANSIT NONSENSE and the current CORONAVIRUS PANDEMIC!!

We knew there was one, right??

So what if light rail is successful in St. Louis and Denver and, oh, I don't know, Chicago and New York and EVERY OTHER CITY it's in ACROSS THE ENTIRE WORLD!!

Next thing you know, people will want to---oh, I don't know--SAVE MONEY and SAVE TIME and have it be CONVENIENT and POLLUTE LESS??

I say again---GET AROUND THE ENTIRE METROPOLITAN AREA EASIER AND FASTER AND MORE CONVENIENT AND LESS EXPENSIVE AND POLLUTE LESS??

We'll have none of that!

We'll be gripping our steering wheels UNTIL WE DIE, right Jack??!!

Thank God someone, someone is taking on these tough, tough, controversial issues in this day and age and area!

God bless you, Jack Cashill!

Keep up that great, ground-breaking, courageous work, sir!!  We're right with you!!

Back here in the 1890s.

(I'm dyin' ovah heyah).

Links:

Mass Transit System - Advantages of Mass Transit System

Mass Transit and Smart Growth Save Time, $ and the Environment

Take Public Transportation - Save Money, Save The World

The Environmental Benefits of Riding Public Transit

Can We Please Stop Pretending Cars Are Greener Than Transit?

Cars, Mass Transit and the Efforts to Reduce Emissions

Quote of the Day -- On This President

"Fox has degenerated from providing a legitimate and much-needed outlet for conservative voices to a mere propaganda machine for a destructive and ethically ruinous administration. When prime-time hosts — who have never served our country in any capacity — dismiss facts and empirical reality to launch profoundly dishonest assaults on the FBI, the Justice Department, the courts, the intelligence community (in which I served) and, not least, a model public servant and genuine war hero such as Robert Mueller — all the while scaremongering with lurid warnings of “deep-state” machinations — I cannot be part of the same organization, even at a remove. To me, Fox News is now wittingly harming our system of government for profit."

--Retired Lt. Col. Ralph Peters

From the article:

Fox News contributor quits, 

slams network as 'propaganda machine 

How the Rest of the World Sees Our Nation and Our Guns

"Sunday with Lubach, which is sort of like the Dutch version of Last Week Tonight with John Oliver, looked at guns — specifically, the US’s love of firearms."

From the article:

This European comedy sketch explains how the world sees America's

 gun problem

Defend Gun Control With Facts

It's gotten so tiresome over the years, trying to discuss weapons in our nation and the damage they do to us all. The Right Wing and Republican Party and NRA and all their supporters insist nothing will work, nothing will help and, gosh, we have to support our Constitution and the oh so precious Second Amendment.

The fact is, the facts are, the facts need to be looked at and accepted.

So herewith, some of those facts.

America's unique gun violence problem, 

explained in 17 maps

--America has six times as many firearm homicides as Canada, and nearly 16 times as many as Germany

--America has 4.4 percent of the world’s population, but almost half of the civilian-owned guns around the world

--On average, there is more than one mass shooting for each day in America

--There have been more than 1,500 mass shootings since Sandy Hook

--States with more guns have more gun deaths

--It’s not just the US: Developed countries with more guns also have more gun deaths

--States with tighter gun control laws have fewer gun-related deaths

--Where there are more guns there is more homicide

--Across high-income nations, more guns = more homicide

--Across states, more guns = more homicide

--More guns = more homicides of police

More:


We have to get over the emotionalism and empty opinions with facts.

Links, sources:

Harvard Injury Control Research Center 

New President and Congress Show For Whom They're Actually Working, Already

Check out what the Republicans in Congress have done and are doing for the already-wealthy and corporations--and against the people, ultimately, against the nation and the nation’s best interests since they took over the White House and got back in Congress only two weeks ago.

--Scrapping Dodd-Frank so the big banks can be yet more unregulated and take us ever-closer to one more economic, national and possibly, if not likely, international melt-down

--Scrapping rules against coal companies dumping coal ash into streams

--Scrapping required background checks for the officially mentally unstable

--Scrapping rules that require financial advisers to act on their clients best interests. Those clients would be you and me.

--Scrapping methane rules so corporations can pour yet more methane into our atmosphere

Don't believe it? See for yourself.

Trump Team Promises To 'Dismantle' 

Dodd-Frank Bank Regulations

Trump Moves to Roll Back Obama-Era 

Financial Regulations

'banking caucus' ready to rip apart 

Dodd-Frank

Congress just killed a rule restricting coal companies from dumping waste in streams

GOP rolls back gun control rule that limits sales to mentally disabled people

Trump Takes Aim At Dodd-Frank, Investor Protections Rule In Executive Action

Congress ready to roll back federal methane flaring rule

And then this sort of Republican President, Trump, wants to further erode the separation of church and state by letting churches be political. Ironically, he said it at the National Prayer Breakfast a few days ago.

Trump vows to 'totally destroy' restrictions on churches' support of candidates

Want to see a real beauty? Want to see who this new President Trump and his Republican colleagues are really working for? There's nothing any more telling than this little exchange that took place this week, just a few days ago.

Donald Trump breaks Medicare promise after meeting with Big Pharma lobbyists

Finally, here's another. One last, late breaking example of who Mr. Trump and all the Republicans in Congress are actually working for. And it's not you and me, Mr. and Mrs. middle- and/or lower-class America.

G.O.P. Hurries to Slash Oil and Gas Rules, Ending Industries’ 8-Year Wait

During the campaign for the office he now holds, Mr. Trump said we Americans pay too high prices for drugs and pharmaceuticals in the nation. Like he had to tell us, right? Now? Now that he's President and in the White House and has the power to do anything?  Yeah, well, never mind...

Mind you, this is only the first two weeks, ladies and gentlemen. Who can even imagine what they have in store for us even this month, this year, let alone the next four or six years, depending on the length of their respective terms in office?

Day 5 Of This New Administration

What he did most recently.

• Trump will keep James Comey as head of the FBI
• Congressional Budget Office projects $8.6 trillion increase in federal deficit
• Trump clears way for Keystone XL and Dakota Access Pipeline to go forward
• Lawsuit against Trump, filed Monday, alleges Trump's foreign investments are a violation of the Constitution's emoluments clause. 
• EPA ordered to freeze grants, not talk about it
• Multiple federal agencies ordered not to speak to press
• Spicer continues to defend illegal ballot lie and state that it is a long-held belief of the President
• No evidence that Trump has actually sold off his shares in Energy Transfer Partners, which owns the Dakota Access Pipeline
• Nikki Haley confirmed as UN ambassador
• The twitter account for Badlands National Park tweeted facts about climate change. Tweets were deleted and the account has gone silent. 
• House passes bill to bar federal funds for abortion and block tax credits for individuals and businesses buying abortion coverage under health care law. 

Who can say what to expect next? There's nearly no telling.
Links:   Trump Tracker

Trump campaign promise tracker

On That Universal Basic Income??

The futurists and visionaries out in Silicon Valley who see the future coming, seem to agree with me on the need for a universal basic income one day not too far away.

Why a bunch of Silicon Valley investors are suddenly interested in universal basic income

Hint: It's about robots

And keep in mind, this is coming from the very vaulted private sector, too.

A bit from the article:

Basic income is having a moment. First Finland announced it would launch an ambitious experiment to see if it would work to give everyone in a given area is given a set amount of cash every year from the government, no strings attached. Now the Silicon Valley seed investment firm Y Combinator has announced it wants to fund a basic income experiment in the US.

YC's president, Sam Altman, announced on the YC blog that the company wants to hire a researcher to "work full-time on this project for 5 years," and supervise an experiment wherein Y Combinator will "give a basic income to a group of people in the US for a 5 year period, though we’re flexible on that and all aspects of the project."

Y Combinator — a startup incubator that counts Dropbox, Airbnb, and Reddit among its alumni — seems mostly interested in basic income as a response to technological unemployment. In the future, the reasoning goes, enough work will be automated that demand for all but the highest skilled labor will collapse, leaving a small group of programmers and capitalists with all the coconuts and most people with nothing.

I'm skeptical this is ever going to happen (Matt Yglesias makes a good case against the hypothesis here), but basic income is one way to make sure everyone survives structural employment changes in the future.

"I’m fairly confident that at some point in the future, as technology continues to eliminate traditional jobs and massive new wealth gets created, we’re going to see some version of [a basic income] at a national scale," Altman writes.

As for me, I, too am skeptical. I'm skeptical humans would be so smart---or fair and just---to set up such a system.

But there's always hope.

Note:  The article is a fascinating one, telling about different past and current attempts and experiments at what does and does not work with this and the possible ramifications. To me, it's well worth the read.