JOHN MCCAIN - RIP!

John McCain was a complex person.  One thing I didn't like about him was that he seemingly never saw a war he didn't like.  Still, he occasionally was a beacon of light in the Republican Party,.  He did try to do something about money in politics with the McCain-Finegold Law.  Alas, the Supreme Court then legislated that companies are people and blew the lid off of campaign financing.

It is a pity that God does not allow us to have an instant replay of alternative election outcomes.  For example, in the 2000 election, I thought that it wouldn't be too bad if McCain won the election for President.  You remember the election ended up with George W. Bush narrowly beating Al Gore (my favorite) in an election decided by the Supreme Court.  Of course, it wasn't to be that McCain would get the Republican nomination.

But let's pretend that McCain won.  How different would things have turned out?  He voted to go to war in Iraq so that might have been the same, but would he have avoided another financial collapse known as the Great Recession brought on by George W. Bush (Bush-43).  He opposed the Bush-43 tax cut in 2001, but, then in 2008, he favored making the tax cuts permanent.  In 2013, Warren, McCain, Cantwell, and Angus King proposed to rein in "too big to fail banks" with the 21st Century Glass Steagall Act.*  But then he voted against the Dodd-Frank Act.

I find McCain's actions regarding financial institutions to be confusing.**  Therefore, I'm not sure he would have avoided the Great Recession.  So maybe it is just as well he didn't become president as he avoided my tag that George W. Bush is the worst president ever.

By the 2008 election where McCain did win the Republican Presidential primary, he seemed to have lost a step or two and show some signs of senility.  On at least two occasions he complained about Shiite Iran training Sunni insurgents in Iraq whereas the Shiites and Sunni's are dread enemies.

McCain considered himself to be an Episcopalian until 2008 after which he said he was a Baptist.

Though I conclude that it is just as well that McCain didn't become President, I do feel he was a superb Senator.  I will miss him dearly.

* https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2013/07/12/elizabeth-warren-and-john-mccain-want-glass-steagall-back-should-you/?noredirect=on https://www.cnn.com/2014/07/17/opinion/warren-mccain-big-banks/index.html

** https://search.myway.com/search/GGmain.jhtml

DONALD TRUMP'S BIGGEST CON

There is nothing quite like trying to con the public into voting for you for president when you have no qualifications.  Even Obama had a few.  What is the old saying: You can fool all of the people some of the time., you can fool some of the people all of the time, but you can't fool all of the people all of the time.  Well Donald Trump is trying.

Just last night he generically "regretted" saying certain hurtful things.*  What things and to whom?  After he made his statements about the Khans, he was asked if he had any regrets and he said no.  He was also asked after his statements about McCain whether he regretted his comments, and he said no (Though Trump eventually endorsed McCain.).  Just what did he regret?  What he has been saying is carefully constructed to appeal to a certain group of people, mainly in the Republican Party.  So finally he appears to be making a pivot to being more reasonable, but the bar is set so low that his unreasonable statements are now endorsed as reasonable.   He is really saying the same things but in a more pleasant fashion. He said that he would never lie to you which is maybe his biggest lie.

He added: "But one thing I can promise you is this: I will always tell you the truth."

Perhaps he is regretting his showing an unflattering picture of Heidi Cruz as he has said that he wouldn't have sent it if he had it to do things over, but earlier he always has said that he has no regrets on everything else.

 Soon after saying this he said he was financing his own campaign.  Just last July (2016), he was bragging about how he had raised $80 million for his campaign in just a few days.

My opponent on the other hand wants a 550% increase in Syrian refugees. Her plan would bring in roughly 620,000 refugees from all refugee-sending nations in her first term, on top of all other immigration. Hillary Clinton is running to be America’s Angela Merkel, and we’ve seen how much crime and how many problems that’s caused the German people.**


It is really something for the Great Liar to call Hillary Clinton a liar, this from a man who is said to make a misstatement (lie) very 5 min.***

I am unable to confirm that Hillary Clinton plans to bring in 620,000 refugees from "all refugee-sending  nations in her first term."  This is certainly a lie.  First of all, the figure is totally unrealistic to do in four years or even eight years because of our immigration policies.  It might be possible for her to bring in 65,000 Syrian refugees  (the 550% increase from 10,000) in her first term, but it is most unlikely as Obama has been unable to get close to his goal of 10,000 Syrian refugees by the end of this year.

Donald Trump says that he plans to end American Nation building of other countries.  Well, George W. Bush (Bush-43) said that and Obama said that .  I think both were sincere when they said it, but when it comes down to it, we can't seem to resist.

And now Donald Trump is trying to con African Americans into voting for him while speaking to totally white audiences (or close thereto).  Lots of luck with that, Donald.

Working people should keep in mind that Donald Trump has said that the American worker is overpaid.  For example:****
"Taxes too high, wages too high," he later added. "We're not going to be able to compete against the world. I hate to say it, but we have to leave it the way it is. People have to go out, they have to work really hard and they have to get into that upper stratum. But we cannot do this if we are going to compete with the rest of the world. We just can't do it."

The one thing I am sure of the Donald Trump wants to do is build the Great Wall of Trump on our Southern border to compete with the Great Wall Of China.

But will the Great Con work and yield him the presidency?

* http://www.cnn.com/2016/08/18/politics/trump-i-regret-sometimes-saying-wrong-thing/
** http://www.politico.com/story/2016/08/donald-trump-never-lie-227183
*** http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2016/03/trump-fact-check-errors-exaggerations-falsehoods-213730 (We chronicled 4.6 hours of stump speeches and press conferences, from a rally in Concord, N.C., on Monday to a rally on Friday in St. Louis.  The result: more than five dozen statements deemed mischaracterizations, exaggerations, or simply false – the kind of stuff that would have been stripped from one of our stories, or made the whole thing worthy of the spike. It equates to roughly one misstatement every five minutes on average.)
**** http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/donald-trump-wages-too-high

WHAT IS A NATURAL BORN U.S. CITIZEN?

I think a way should be found to litigate what "natural born American" means.  You couldn't do it for Papa Romney who was born in Mexico because he didn't get the Republican nomination.  You have to have "standing" i.e. you have to be injured. Because he didn't win the nomination, no one was injured. Democrats decided not to try McCain who was born in the Panama Canal zone, but he was born in a U.S. military hospital on an American military base to two American parents; however he didn't win the presidency either so it was mute.  At any rate, I would accept McCain as a natural born American.  Goldwater was born in Arizona, but before it became a state, his credentials are suspect also, but he didn't win the presidency either so Democrats had no "standing."   If anyone was injured in these three cases it was the candidates Republican opponents in the nomination process but none have tried to take out a lawsuit over it.

Obama was born in the U.S. to an American mother and an immigrant father* (He is a natural born citizen on two counts and many Republicans (including Trump) refuse to recognize him as a legitimate American born.  Snopes has an interesting discussion as to whether Obma is a legitimate president. The minimum qualifications for the presidency of the United States specified in Article II of the Constitution are few and seemingly straightforward: In order to be President, a person must be a natural-born citizen of the United States, must be at least thirty-five years old, and must have been a resident of the United States for fourteen years.**  Mitt Romney may have claimed he was injured by Obama's victory, but he too didn't take out a suit.  At any rate, I doubt he would have won.
.........................................................................
A few facets of this claim [of being a natural born American] immediately jump out as being far-fetched: first, that a sitting U.S. Senator who has already spent a good deal of time and money securing his party's nomination for the presidency would suddenly be discovered as ineligible due to an obscure provision of U.S. law; and second, that U.S. law would essentially penalize someone who would otherwise qualify for natural-born citizenship status simply because his mother was too young. The fact is, the qualifications listed in the example quoted above are moot because they refer to someone who was born outside the United States. Since Barack Obama was born in Hawaii, they do not apply to him.

The Fourteenth Amendment states that "all persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States." Since Hawaii is part of the United States, even if Barack Obama's parents were both non-U.S. citizens who hadn't even set foot in the country until just before he was born, he'd still qualify as a natural-born citizen.

Some have claimed that Barack Obama's Hawaiian birthplace doesn't qualify him as a natural-born citizen because Hawaii was not yet a state when he was born. This claim is wrong: Hawaii was admitted as the 50th state almost two years before Barack Obama's birth there (21 August 1959 for statehood vs. 4 August 1961 for Obama's birthdate).

But Cruz was born in Canada to one American parent (mother) and even carried a Canadian passport and he didn't renounce his Canadian citizenship until he decided to run for president.*  I certainly hope he doesn't win because he scares the H@LL out of me, but his case is questionable.  Constitutional law Prof. Laurence Tribe of Harvard said that as a student, Cruz was an "originalist" who said that the constitution should be interpreted as it was originally intended.***

Here are some other possibilities.  Consider this one, suppose you are born in the U.S. to legal immigrants or even better suppose you are born in the U.S. to illegals.  Technically you are a natural-born American even if your parents are not citizens (see above quote).  Can you imagine Republicans on that one?  Or suppose you are born by C-section.  Is that "natural born?"

I think we ought to get this thing out of the way for good.  It is fine with me if the Supreme Court says born anywhere in the U.S. and/or born to an American citizen.

NOTE ADDED 01-16-2016: Houston attorney Newton Schwartz, who said he isn’t connected to any campaign, filed the lawsuit Thursday in U.S. District Court in Texas. The court is being asked to settle whether Cruz, a Republican senator from Texas, meets the “natural born citizen” requirement in the Constitution. (http://www.marketwatch.com/story/lawsuit-filed-over-whether-ted-cruz-is-a-natural-born-citizen-2016-01-15)

* Until 1934 if your mother was American but the father wasn't, you were not considered a natural born American citizen and had to be naturalized.  In 1934 a law was passed making you a citizen not needing naturalization if it is you mother is an American citizen and your father isn't. So it is only since 1934 that you are considered an American citizen with either parent being an American citizen.
** http://www.snopes.com/politics/obama/citizen.asp
***https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/volokh-conspiracy/wp/2016/01/11/professor-laurence-tribe-questions-whether-ted-cruz-is-a-natural-born-citizen/

ELIZABETH WARREN'S ONLY CHANCE?

Elizabeth Warren, a so-called liberal politician who cares about the consumer, is often mentioned as a 2016 presidential candidate, although she has repeatedly said she is not running.  She was born  June 22, 1949, an early Baby Boomer, and will be 67 years old on election day in 2016.  So if she is going to run for president, she will have to do it in this next presidential election.

Even if whomever is elected in 2016 serves only one term, Elizabeth Warren will be 71 by the 2020 election, probably too old to run.  Democrats in particular tend to think that 70 is too old to run for president.

Republicans, however, are different in that Bob Dole and John McCain, both Republicans, ran for president when older than the age of 70, but neither was elected.  Ronald Reagan ran for president over the age of 70 but that was for a second term.  He was 69 when he took office for his first term.  More likely whomever is elected in 2016 will probably serve two terms because that is what we have been doing lately.  Beginning with Ronald Regan, 4 of the five presidents have been elected for two terms so Elizabeth Warren would be 75 by 2024.

Hillary Clinton is the favorite among Democrats to run for president at this time.  She was born October 26, 1947 and would be 69 on election day in 2016, and, if elected would also be 69, about the same age as Ronald Reagan.  Although Republicans favor older candidates, I presume they will make the argument that she is too old, if she runs.  If for some reason Hillary does not run, my guess is that Elizabeth Warren will.

Jeb Bush seems to be the favorite of the "establishment" Republicans.  He was born February 11, 1953 so will be only 63 at the time of the 2016 election.  Chris Christie was born September 6, 1962 so will be only 54 at the time of the next presidential election.  The oldest of the Republican hopefuls is Mitt Romney who was born March 12, 1947 and is slightly older than Hillary Clinton.  If he is the Republican candidate, it will be hard to say Hillary Clinton is too old.  Other main Republican hopefuls seem to be younger than Jeb Bush.

GUANTONIMO AND FRANZ KAFKA

Franz Kafka is known for his dark novels.  Of particular note here is Der Process or the Trial in which a man is arrested by some remote authority, but he is never told what he did.  It sounds a lot like what has happened to the  prisoners at Guantanamo Bay, some held for more the 12 years without ever being indicted for anything.  Some time in the future, I believe this period will be considered a dark period in American history rivaling the internment of Japanese Americans (and, lesser known, some German Americans) during WW-II.

Within the last few days, five "major" prisoners were released from Guantanamo Bay Prison for "house" arrest for a year in Qatar before being released.  John McCain who seems never to have seen a war he didn't like calls these men "the hardest of the hard core."  We Americans get kind of hysterical about our enemies and attribute to them some super human qualities, able to destroy America by themselves.  We were even afraid to put them into high security U.S. jails for certain they would escape and do much harm.  We didn't even trust them to American civilian courts for fear they wouldn't be convicted.

As has been pointed out, these five have been "out of commission" for a dozen years so are "way out of the loop."  Also they are members of the Taliban and not al Qaeda (though they are rumored to have al Qaeda connections) so it is not clear that their mission is to destroy America so much as rule Afghanistan.*  However, it wouldn't surprise me if they had worked up a great hate for being incarcerated for so long.

If we know so much about them, why haven't they been tried, much less indicted?  One is said to be wanted for war crimes (Mullah Muhammad Fazi) for the murder of thousands of Afghan Shiites in the 1990s, but why wasn't he released for trial?  They have just been held under the lame excuse that since they are not being held within the U.S., they are not protected by the U.S. Constitution.  But they were being held in a U.S. Naval base which for purposes of running for President of the United States is approved (McCain himself was born in the Panama Canal Zone in a U.S. military base and ran for President).

I have little to say about Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl, who was promoted to Sergeant while a prisoner of the Taliban.**  It seems he was a deserter and may well ultimately have exchanged one type of prison for another.  I wonder why he volunteered for the Army?  His father looks like he has become a Muslim with the free form beard and comments.  But I do feel sorry for Susan Rice who has fallen on her sword a second time for the President in describing Bergdahl as captured on the battlefield.  Well, I suppose you can describe the whole of Afghanistan as a battlefield.  Morning Joe Scarborough has said he wonders who in the White House hates her.

* http://www.cnn.com/2014/06/01/us/bergdahl-transferred-guantanamo-detainees
** http://www.cnn.com/2014/06/01/us/bergdahl-deserter-or-hero/index.html

THE BREADBASKET OF EUROPE IS NOW A BASKET CASE

The title of this piece, that regards Ukraine,* is not original with me, but I couldn't resist using it.  But I am getting increasingly upset with certain politicians who insist on undermining our President in foreign relations.  Prominent, of course, is senile John McCain who seemingly never saw a war he didn't like; however, when pressed by Charley Rose as to what should be done over the Soviet, I mean Russian, occupation of the Crimea said that the first thing he would do is to freeze the foreign assets and visas of the Russian oligarchs, something that Secretary John Kerry has mentioned as a possibility.

I'm also disappointed in Lindsey Graham, Senator of South Carolina, for his comments making fun of the President in a serious international incident, as, at times, he has shown some statesmanship.  Supposedly the reason he is doing this is because of his Tea Party challenge in his reelection bid.  Unfortunately, this puts his reelection ahead of his country.  He seems to think that we should have bombarded the leader of Syria even after the promise of getting rid of the poisonous gases.  Unfortunately, there are no good solutions in Syria as if  Assad is overthrown the real civil war will begin with the likelihood that the country will become a conservative Muslim state like Iran.   As awful as the situation is in Syria, perhaps the best state is a status quo.

At the age of 82, I do remember some things in the lead up to WW-II, and the Russian occupation of the Crimea to "protect" the Ukrainian citizens of Russian heritage reminds me a lot of the Nazi occupation of the Sudetenland** to protect citizens of German heritage at the very beginning of WW-II.  I don't recall any news about threats to the Russian speaking peoples anywhere in Ukraine.  And Putin does seem to be trying to generate an excuse for more occupation of Ukraine by having some of his soldiers shoot over the heads of some Ukrainian troops:
But not every scene was so calm. Video showed more than 100 unarmed Ukrainian troops trying Tuesday morning to return to Belbek air base north of Sevastopol, only to have Russian forces fire warning shots over their heads.***

As the situation in Ukraine is still in flux, I have little more to say at this time.

History of Ukraine:

Crimea has had a long and complex history but more recently for more than 300 yrs it was a part of Turkey, then in 1783 became a part of Russia, more or less, and then of the Soviet Union.  Mysteriously, Kruschov gave the Crimea to Ukraine in 1954.  Speculation is that he was drunk at the time.  Crimea has spent little time as an independent nation though it was called the Autonomous Republic of  Crimea.  It became recognized as a part of Ukraine by Russia in 1997.  (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Crimea).

Eastern Ukraine has been largely Russian since late in the 17th century.  In 1991, 75% of ethnic Russian said they no longer identified themselves as Russian and 55% voted for Ukrainian independence.  Many Russian speaking Ukrainians bemoan the fact that Russian is not an accepted official language of Ukraine. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russians_in_Ukraine)

Western Ukraine likewise has a complicated history and was a part of Poland most of the time for several hundred years which ended in 1939.  After WW-II, Ukraine became the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic with some independence from the Soviet Union.  West Ukraine is largely west looking.  Though the country is largely of the Eastern Orthodox religion, around 4 million Roman Catholics are present, mainly in western Ukraine. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Western_Ukraine; http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Ukraine)

* http://www.infoplease.com/askeds/bread-basket-europe.html
** http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/German_occupation_of_Czechoslovakia
*** http://www.cnn.com/2014/03/04/world/europe/ukraine-russia-tensions/

TED CRUZ FOR PRESIDENT?

Though he is an American citizen, Ted Cruz was born in Canada to an American mother so is he a "natural born citizen" as article II, Section I of the constitution requires?  I seem to recall claims (fraudulent) by so-called "birthers" that President Obama was born in Kenya  so was not eligible to run for president (though he was born to an American mother)?  Well, that was then, this is now.

It may turn out that it doesn't matter after all as "Legal scholars generally agree that Cruz meets that requirement, and Cruz's office agrees.  But it also remains somewhat untested in the courts." http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-fix/wp/2013/03/20/supporters-push-for-ted-cruz-for-president/  I don't recall this being brought up at the time of the arguments over President Obama.

It had been suggested that George Romney was not eligible to be president because he was born in Mexico, but he did not win the Republican nomination for president.

John McCain was born in the Panama Canal Zone to American parents, but the Panama Canal Zone was made an exception (a ruling with which I agree).  In an attempt to make sure, a non-binding resolution declared John McCain was eligible to be president, but that resolution had no legal basis.  Since McCain was born on a U.S. military reservation he possibly should be considered to be born in America.  At any rate, Democrats never contested the issue.

My own thought is that if the issue arises, the conservative Supreme Court would side with the conservative Cruse being a "natural born citizen of the U.S."  And I have no doubt that conservative Republicans can shift gears to accepting Cruse should he choose to run for president even though they verbally contested Obama.  Being consistent is not a requirement of politicians.  Since we have a conservative Supreme Court, I would like to see this settled with a conservative Republican nominee who was not born in America.  After all, it would be a strain if the situation should arise for a Democratic candidate born outside America (but not on an American military station), to one American parent to face a conservative Supreme Court.  In view of what happened to Obama, I would like to see the issue solved once and for all and Cruz would be a good test.

SUSAN RICE & SWEET REVENGE

Susan rice has withdrawn herself from consideration of being Secretary of State.  So John McCain got his revenge for nasty things she is reported to have said about him in the 2008 election process.  Lindsay Graham has gotten revenge for the way John Bolton was treated by Democrats on his appointment as Ambassador to The United Nations.  So now let's hope they are happy and we can go on to more constructive things.

I have no idea whether Susan Rice would have made a good Secretary of State.  From what people say, she would have had to make some personality changes.  Hillary Clinton did it so maybe Susan rice could have done it also.  But for now, looks like she will stay as Ambassador to The Untied Nations.

YOU CAN ACCOMPLISH A LOT IF YOU .....

We have all heard the saying that you can accomplish a lot in this life if you don't care who gets the credit, but we have a new one. You can accomplish a lot in this life if the other side thinks you are CRAZY! We just had a demonstration of this in the debt ceiling debacle where it was hard to tell which world the tea partiers were in. They were just fooling weren't they, weren't they? If so their act got to be so convincing that the more rational Republicans like John McCain and conservative op-ed writers like David Brooks and Ross Douthat began to believe them also.

I admit that I don't know what was in the bill just passed as I hear conflicting accounts, but I believe very little of the bill will apply to FY 2011 or 2012. There is hope that the economy improves by 2013; however, I have my doubts (http://stopcontinentaldrift.blogspot.com/2011/07/our-consumerism-society.html).

VIETNAM AS A POLITICAL ISSUE

During my paid career, I had little time for movies, maybe saw one every other year. Since I have retired, I have been catching up during the last four years. I saw Platoon and Apocalypse a few years ago. Awhile back I got around to seeing Deer Hunter. It occurred to me while watching this movie that Vietnam as a political issue was over. Oh, I'm sure there are those around my age who will carry the hurt of Vietnam the rest of their lives. To them it will be an issue, but to the bulk of the voters, it is no longer one.

During the 2008 election, a lot of effort was made to try to tie Barack Obama to Bill Ayers, a founder of the Weather Underground back in the 1960s, which could be labeled a terrorist organization. It was true that they did know of each other and served on a panel together, but, to say that Barack Obama knew Bill Ayers (who after all is a professor of education now at the University of Illinois at Chicago) and thus was not qualified to be president was a stretch, and voters, in general, rejected it.

Actually, no Vietnam veteran has been able to become president. For reasons I don't understand Vietnam War veterans do not support Vietnam veterans for president. The time for John McCain was in the 2000 election, but perhaps as a result of some dirty campaigning, could not even get the Republican nomination for president. Though McCain was to be accepted as a Vietnam War hero in the 2008 election, that was not the case in the 2000 election. Thus the Vietnam War hero was a two time loser. Admittedly, I probably would not have voted for John McCain in 2000, but I wouldn't have felt badly had he won. Alas, in 2008, he was over the hill and the surprise was how close he came to being elected.

I had several experiences of being in Senate hearings and other meetings with Al Gore and found him most impressive. I thought he couldn't become president, however because of his academic way of speaking. I didn't bother me, but I thought it would with most voters. Actually, he came closer than I ever thought he would. Like McCain, Gore was a Vietnam veteran, but the knock was that he was not involved enough in the battle. As the son of a long-time representative and senator, you can imagine that Gore's commanding officer sweated bullets the whole time Gore was in Vietnam.

And then there was John Kerry who had two tours in Vietnam and was a decorated veteran. Of course, a group was formed that became known as the Swift Boaters (on whom Kerry had served) who did their best to destroy the meaning of military medals in the eyes of the public. I do understand that these veterans were hurt by Kerry eventually turning against the Vietnam war.

Briefly, Bob Kerrey, former senator from Nebraska, and an injured Vietnam War veteran made a run for the presidency, but it turned out he was unacceptable because, well, he was too involved in the Vietnam war.

I suppose it is still possible for a Vietnam veteran to be elected president, but, so far as I know, none of the leading Republican or Democratic hopefuls are. And past history shows that even if one of them were, Vietnam veterans probably would not support them. Perhaps the most attractive Republican candidate who is a veteran is Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, but he is not a Vietnam War veteran, though he has served briefly in both Iraq and Afghanistan in non-combatant roles. One assumes at this time, that President Barack Obama, not a veteran, will run for reelection.