How Am I Doing Folks?

 There are some people, that no matter how bad the news is for Donald Trump they will not desert him.  Just this past week three books have come out detailing how really inept and dangerous to America this president truly is.  The reply from the faithful is; 'Well I may not always like what he does but look at what he has done for the country since he has become president.'  So lets look at what Donald promised back when he was running for president and what he has actually got done.

      1) Trump promised to build a wall. A beautiful wall, to keep out the criminals, rapists and murderers who are crossing the border daily.  It will be a two-thousand-mile wall.

As of today, exactly five miles of new wall have been built, approximately three hundred mile of wall have been refurbished.  I guess that counts.

      2) Mexico is going to pay for the wall.

To date not one peso has crossed over into to the US Treasury from Mexico.  In fact, the Mexican president has said, "We are not paying for any fucking wall."  I think that about says it all

      3) Trump said he would round up all the illegal immigrants and send them home to the shithole countries they came from.

In fact, Trump has stopped many asylum seekers from entering the country, and not allowing them to stay while there case is being decided.  He also separates them from their children and places the children in wire cages.  All this in hope of discouraging new refugees.  But the illegals who were here before, they're still here, picking your farm produce.

      4)  Trump promised to be the 'Law and Order' president.

So far, there have been riots and lawlessness increasing in many large and small cities.  Crime and gun violence has increased in the major cities.  But Trump is blaming all this on the incoming administration.  What will happen if it is him, god forbid, incoming then who will he blame?

      5) Trump vowed to always protect American lives.

So far over 190,000 people have died from a pandemic that he deliberately lied to the American people about.  He knew the severity but played it down for months, and he did it to keep the Stock Market from crashing.  The economy was the lynch pin to his reelection.

       6)  Trump promised to do away with the Affordable Care Act -ACA - know as Obama Care.

So far, the ACA is still protecting Americans with affordable insurance, though the Trump administration is in court suing to have it thrown out.  This in the middle of a pandemic.  Thank you John Mc Cain.  

       7)  Trump promised a cheaper and better medical plan to replace Obama Care.

To date there has been no new plan from the Trump administration, though he is still making that promise.  Maybe in the next four years?

       8) Trump had promised the greatest job creation ever.

This promise falls way short, Obama created more jobs in his last three years than did Trump  in his last three years and now there are 13-million people out of work and 8.5% unemployment, OK that's only partly his fault.  But had he acted sooner the figures would look a lot better.

       9)Trump promised to clean up Washington DC, he would 'Drain the Swamp' of the career politicians.

Well someone did because there have been eight people associated with the Trump campaign or his administration that have been charged or convicted of felony criminal offenses.  We're still counting.  

     10)Trump promised to nominate only conservative candidates to fill the judicial vacancies.

This has been a promise made and a promise kept.  But only with the help of the Senate Majority Leader, Mitch McConnel. This court will not be know as Trumps court but as the McConnel court.

     11) This is the biggest farcical promise yet.  Donald Trump promised to always tell the truth to the American people.  

This one is no contest, and it's not even close.  As of this writing, Trump has told more than 20,000    lies.  

     12) Trump had promised to rebuild the county's infrastructure by building and/or repairing roads highways, and bridges.

Just another empty promise, not one dollar has been budgeted for infrastructure in the three years of Trumps presidency, despite it having  bi-partisan approval.

     13) Trump promised to cut taxes for the middle class.

Only if the middle class are those with incomes of $200 million or greater, but then again, maybe to Donald that is the middle class.

    14) Trump promised to reduce the $19-trillion debt.

In his first year, he added to the debt. And now this may not be all his fault, because of the pandemic the deficit is expected to be $35 trillion, equal to the nation's GDP by the end of the year if not sooner.

     15)  Trumps biggest boast was that he would end our trade deficits with other countries

Here he failed big time.  To Trump trade is a zero-sum game, and to that end he placed tariffs on friends, allies, and frenemies alike.  The result was disastrous to the nation's farmers and auto manufacturers. The treasury attempted to assuage the farmers at a cost to the taxpayers, just as they were being saddled with the tariffs from the other countries.  The result of all this trade manipulation, an increase in the trade deficit greater than the ones under the Obama administration.   

    16) Trump had promised to rebuild the military.

But instead of money going to the military that had already been allocated in the budget, Trump took the money from the military to build his beautiful wall.

     17)  And least but not anywhere last, was Trump promised that there would be peace between Israel and Palestine.

This is probably the most egregious lie of all.  Trump sent his idiot of a son-in-law to work a deal in the middle-east.  The result of which is greater tension between the two countries and the region in general.

This is by no means the only failures of the Trump administration but I am too depressed to continue.  So, let's see how Trump has done with his major promises.  Seventeen promises made and how many were kept?  Well we counted ONE.  that's it folks, one promise kept.    Still think he's working for you?

                                                                        I'm just sayin'    

This. Is. Not. Normal.

 In a normal election, we would be rubbing our hands gleefully and anticipating the harm to Trump among his patriotic base.  But this is not a normal election, his base is dismissing his disparaging words about the military as just so much 'fake news'.  And they are sticking with him as he tramples everything they claim to hold dear.  And the military brass stands beside him, closed mouth.

But I am angry, I am sad, and I am thoroughly disgusted.  And I am tired of feeling this way.  I am so very tired of this knot in the pit of my stomach.  Tired of waking every morning to some other vile and foul utterance from this man.  Just when you think he cannot possibly stoop any lower, he surprises everyone with something even worse.  

The report in The Atlantic of Trumps attack on the military had hit too close to home for me.  My husband served in the Marine Corp in WWII.  He was not a loser and he was not a sucker.  He chose to enlist in the waning days of the war, when the number of eligible men had been exhausted, and no more able men could be found.  His mother reluctantly signed for him, and he spent his 18th birthday on Guadalcanal.  But because of his sacrifice, men like my father, much older, could stay home with his family.  And work for the war effort building military vehicles.

My husband never talked about his two years in the Marines, he had signed up for the duration and six months, all of it served in the Pacific.  There was a box, that I gave our son after my husband died.  It contained his medals and commendations.  As far as I know, my husband never looked at them. 

When the war in Viet Nam was raging, my brother, inspired by his brother-in-law, also joined the Marines.  He was in college and he had a deferment.  But three of his high school buddies enlisted, and so for what ever reason that boys go off to war, my brother felt he must go. He is not a loser; he is not a sucker. Of the four boys who went off together, two never came home.  Their names are on the Memorial Wall.  A third boy came home with one leg and one arm.  And my brother?  Well to look at him he survived just fine.  But if you look closely, you can see something is gone from his eyes.

My brother was a sweet, shy, innocent kid who never even had a date until I fixed him up for his senior prom.  He excelled in math and science, and the Marines sent him to electronics school, and trained him to repair the Hueys and fighter jets.  He was assigned to an air base inside the DMZ.  He worked all day, and paced the barracks floor all night praying that the constant shelling that rained down on the base, would not level his barracks as it had the barracks around him.  While he was in Nam, our mother died and he could not get home until weeks after the service.  With the exception of those two weeks,  He spent 46 months in that hellhole.  He mustered out, alone, in San Diego.  The Marines gave him his medals and put him on a train home to Chicago.

For months, he awoke screaming, in a cold sweat, every night.  In the fall he returned to college but his demons only got worse, and he turned to drugs.  Finally he joined a VA group and they helped him.  He managed to finish his BS and went on to get a MS and a PHD in plant genetics.  But Viet Nam never left him.  It destroyed his first marriage.  To this day, loud noises make his heart race, and the fourth of July festivities fill him with dread.  He suffers with intestinal problems associated with the chemicals used in the war zones.  Yes, he came home in one piece physically, but the sweet boy who went to war never returned.  In his place is a broken human being, who was finally declared 95% disabled five years ago.  It allows the VA to treat him for his depression and myriad of physical problems.  But if you ask him, he will tell you he is not a loser. 

I cannot imagine how the families feel whose sons, brothers, and fathers never came home.  To have them called losers and suckers must be like losing them all over again.  And yet there are some who still defend this monster of a human being.  Those who chose not to believe what they hear with their own ears.  His denigration of John McCain, his berating of the military men who served in his cabinet and were unceremoniously dismissed.  His hounding of Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman - a decorated veteran who served valiantly - the man who testified to what he heard the president say on the phone.  And most egregious of all, using the US military like toy soldiers, as though they are his personal army, to play with.   

This is a man who is bent on destroying our democracy to retain his hold on the presidency.  He is sowing the seeds of doubt in our election process that has served us since the founding of the country.  There have been printed ballots since 1888, Trump has voted by mail in the last four election cycles at least.  And if Trump can convince enough people that the election is fraudulent, he can send it into the courts.  But the Constitution says if there is no elected President and Vice-president, by noon on January 20th, the Speaker of the House becomes President.  Can you say Madam President Pelosi?

                                                              I'm just sayin'