Liberals Did Not Bring Down Bill O'Reilly

OKAY ALL you “pin heads” out there!  Stop crying over Bill O’Reilly’s job loss!  He’ll be fine with his $25 million buy-out and all his book deals.  I’m sure his next book will be about how the left-wing liberals conspired to destroy him with unfounded claims. I wish that were true. I always thought I would be jumping for joy if O’Reilly got his just desserts.  Instead, I find it sad that millions of people continued to watch and enrich this sexual predator even after woman after woman told of his behavior. Mothers, fathers, people with daughters, and even working women who have experienced harassment, continued to hang on his every word.  Make no mistake about it!  Liberals did not bring him down.  It took the advertisers, translated $$$, that prompted FOX News to dump him at last.  If the advertisers had not intervened, O’Reilly, the chief spokesperson for the rightwing, would still be on the air spewing his white nationalism, race based ideology by night and victimizing women by day. 

ONE WOULD think that after the first sexual harassment settlement, O’Reilly would have changed his behavior.  Friends, sexual predators cannot and will not change their behavior.  They are just like the egg-sucking dogs I told you about in an earlier column. 

FOR THAT reason, it came as no surprise to me that one person—Donald J. Trump defended O’Reilly.  Multiple women accused both O’Reilly and Trump. “Bill is a good man.  I don’t think he did anything wrong.”  Of course he doesn’t think he did anything wrong!  If he did, that would be admitting HE (Trump) did something wrong.  After all, egg-sucking dogs don’t think they are doing anything wrong, they just want the egg. 

KEEPING UP with the lunacy in the Trump presidency is harder than herding chickens.  Actually, I think he and his administration is so incompetent, they just look crazy.  My impression is they are poking bears all over the world with no plan for when they wake them up.  The argument Trump supporters use is the best national security staff in the universe surrounds him.  So how did these great military minds lose an aircraft carrier?  The entire world heard National Security Advisor McMasters and General Mattis say on April 8th that the USS Carl Vinson was steaming toward North Korea.  Further, President Trump said he was sending an armada. They even tricked me into writing fake news in my column! Seven days later, it was uncovered the Carl Vinson was 8,000 miles away in Australia, then, it was going to “steam” to Korean Peninsula.  Huh?

AFTER THE disclosure, when asked about this conflicting information, all the great generals and Trump’s spokesperson, Sean Spicer, sounded like they were speaking pig Latin-- No clear answers, lots of double-speak and parsing of words.  Our allies and the entire world are scratching their heads.  Incompetent is the first word that comes to my mind.  All you people who don’t trust Trump, but were comforted by thinking his Senior National Security Advisors would save us; perhaps you should re-visit that mind-set.

THE GHOST of General Michael Flynn is still present in the Trump administration.  Flynn worked in Trump’s campaign and was paid $500,000 by Erdogan, the President of Turkey, to represent his government in Trump’s campaign.  After a referendum passed in Turkey essentially destroying their quasi-democracy and giving Erdogan complete ruling power, President Trump called and congratulated Erdogan on his “great win.”  Erdogan wasted no time exercising his new powers.  Those protesting the outcome of the referendum vote were promptly jailed and raids executed. 

TRUMP’S congratulatory call to this newly elected dictator should give you “cause for pause.”  Trump has been rude and insulting to our foreign allies.  He refused to shake hands with German Chancellor Merkle.  He insulted Australian Prime Minister Turnbull and a contentious phone call was held.  Trump wasted no time telling Canadian Justin Trudeau he would not honor an agreement made by President Obama to re-settle 1,200 Syrian refugees.  Last week, he waged war over Canadian trade policies. 

THESE ARE the same countries that join with USA troops, shoulder to shoulder, fighting wars led by America; recently, Iraq, Afghanistan, and ISIS in Syria.  They have our back and suffer casualties, just like we do.  If Trump keeps up his current pace of alienating allies, it’s going to be very lonely on the battlefields as it appears Trump is ready to take on North Korea, Iran, ISIS in Syria, Afghanistan, and Iraq. So many wars, so few troops. Can you say “DRAFT?”

Trump Furious With Tax Day Protesters

MONROE COUNTY was on the map!  MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow’s map, that is.  In preparation for the upcoming Tax Day marches set for Saturday, April 15, Maddow showed a map of each state with a red pin-point identifying where a Tax Day March was scheduled.  Georgia contained two red pins, one for Atlanta, and one for our very own Monroe County!  Actually, there were many more cities in Georgia that held Tax Day rallies, but they didn’t make it on Rachel’s map!  Finally, Monroe County is running with the big dogs!  And as they say on Facebook, LOL! 

YES, IT’S TRUE.  A Tax Day Rally was held in Forsyth this past Saturday in conjunction with rallies in nearly 200 cities across this nation calling for President Trump to release his tax returns.  Indivisible Monroe sponsored this local event with eighteen participants. While Indivisible Monroe cannot compete with the big cities in crowd size, the passion and message is the same.

TAX DAY rallies were held in our country throughout the 1990’s, consisting of anti-tax protests mostly by Libertarians and Republicans.  On April 15, 2009, a group called Taxed Enough Already (TEA) a/k/a The Tea Party, held a national protest across this country and the organization subsequently grew to every nook and cranny in the nation.  In fact, the Tea Party was very active here in Monroe County.  Nationally and locally, these are largely Trump supporters now.

THE TEA Party was allowed to express their right to freedom of speech and their right to assemble as provided in our Constitution. That’s why I was taken aback on Sunday morning when the President of the United States, Donald Trump, unleashed a Twitter storm against the Tax Day protesters.  He was “madder than a settin’ hen.”  He even said the protesters should be investigated!  What crime did the protesters possibly commit to require an investigation?  Trump’s outburst against releasing his tax returns confirms for me he is hiding something that surely would be devastating to his presidency.  It also confirms for me that Trump and his sympathizers think they have a monopoly on the First Amendment of the Constitution and it does not apply to liberals, progressives, or Democrats. 

ON TAX Day I supported Indivisible Monroe in their event and found the experience gratifying for two main reasons:  First, I was part of a national effort for a common cause.  Second, I was part of something that infuriated Trump.  The fact that we may be on the verge of World War III and Trump’s thoughts are of investigating people such as myself and other Monroe Countians, should tell a reasonable person that Trump’s only priority is himself.

TECHNOLOGY is grand but it can be damnation, too.  The past month has been a nightmare and I have been chasing my tail.  First, my debit card was compromised.  Since I was being issued a new card, I changed all my on-line payments and recurring payments to George’s card.  Not an easy task!  Two weeks later, George’s card was compromised.  Changed everything back to my new card number.  Then the unthinkable happened!  Last week, my cell phone had a “failure” and I had to do a hard reset on it. I have spent nearly every waking moment attempting to recover data, applications, contact numbers, and pictures.  My SD card was not installed as I mistakenly thought.  Plus, never trust Google Drive for storage.  I may never get my phone back like it was.  I have friends who don’t do technology and I envy their stress-free life.  Writing checks again and using a dial phone suddenly doesn’t seem so antiquated since the “technology devil” has it in for me.  I will leave you with this advice:  If this happens to your cell phone, find a ten-year old to assist you.