‘World’s Greatest Healthcare Plan of 2017’ stinks

While millions risk losing their health insurance, perhaps dying as a result, Rep. Pete Sessions (R-TX), chairman of the powerful Rules Committee, thinks he has the perfect replacement for Obamacare in his POS ‘World’s Greatest Healthcare Plan of 2017.’ Sessions thought he would slip his legislation in as a model for what Speaker Paul Ryan  and the rest of the House plan to do. "Instead, Speaker Paul Ryan and his team modeled their initial bill on legislation authored by former
Rep. Tom Price." This is what Price had to say...

"...that that bill as currently written is a “work in progress,” and that future legislative and regulatory fixes will be necessary to address all of the health-care policies that Republicans hope to implement."

But the health care industry doesn't want anything to do with any of it. Seven groups speaking for hospitals, health systems and medical colleges collectively added their “significant concerns,..."

"...to the growing opposition, focusing on the prospect of sharply lower numbers of insured Americans if the GOP plan becomes law. Separately, the American Medical Association, a powerful lobbying group for physicians, rejected the bill for the same reason."

Based on health care specialists who have analyzed the Republican House bill, millions will lose coverage with Americans in their 50s and 60s as the most likely to not be able to afford the coverage. By 2020 the premium subsidies based on income would be gone, according to the New York Times. The current system would be replaced by tax credits of $2,000 to $4,000 per year, based on age. But this would leave a significant deficit from current coverage plans under Affordable Care Act requirements. Meaning, many would have to give up their health insurance.

Here's a statement from a major health care provider...

The central issue is the tax credits are not going to be sufficient, admits Dr. J. Mario Molina, chief executive of Molina Healthcare who offers coverage through Obamacare marketplaces in California, Florida and several other states. 

One unhappy Trump voter says she thought he would make her health insurance more affordable not more expensive. Under the House Plan, she would get $5,188 less each year than she did under the Affordable Care Act. "I'm scared," she says. Although there are no official figures yet, a report from Standard & Poor's claims that somewhere from 2 million to 4 million people will leave the insurance because, in their 50s and 60s, aren't old enough for Medicare but can't afford the new Republican House Plan. Brookings Institution estimates even higher losses.

With this new round of opposition nationwide, the GOP is finding new resistance at every corner. The health care groups also challenged the proposed changes to Medicaid...

"...warning that they would mean lost coverage and funding cuts for a program charged with caring for vulnerable children, elderly and disabled Americans."

"AMA chief executive James L. Madara, a doctor, wrote a letter to congressional leaders released Wednesday expressing the same sentiment: 'We cannot support the AHCA as drafted because of the expected decline in health insurance coverage and the potential harm it would cause to vulnerable patient populations.'”

How many more of you get the feeling, and this dates back for years, that Republicans don't give a shit about those in need of assistance from others? I'm betting plenty. Yes, there are those who take care of the welfare system but that is limited based on expenditures by welfare recipients. And here are 7 lies about welfare that many people believe are fact. AARP has come out against the GOP bill, and even some conservative advocacy groups like Heritage Action for America, FreedomWorks and the Club for Growth have also rejected it. It's proving a bummer, hands down.

Let's talk the Republican Healthcare Plan...

The Republican Plan will have a huge effect on Alan Lipsky of Arden, N.C. Lipsky is 60, his wife in her 50s, and they would lose $13,664 annually under the new plan. He thinks that Obamacare could be improved on, as do most of the Act's supporters, but at least it's baseline. And the GOP bill is taking this away from him with what's left unaffordable, he says. Bu the healthcare wrecking crew are determined to do it their way...

"House Speaker Paul D. Ryan (R-Wis.) expressed confidence the bill would eventually pass, even though some conservative House GOP members have railed against it, complaining it does not undo the ACA aggressively enough."

Also on the chopping block, he financial assistance available to low income people with out-of-pocket costs like deductibles and co-payments. There are some large deductibles under the Affordable Care Act but the cost-sharing reductions that are available are a big protection for low income people that end up with huge medical bills that would otherwise cause financial disaster. The insurance market itself could be in harm's way by the elimination of the individual mandate, hated from the beginning of the ACA, but evntually found to be practical.

In 2016, The Washington Post called Paul Ryan's health care plan, "flimsy." Here's their commentary...

"IT HAS been more than six years since the Affordable Care Act passed and nearly three years since its major provisions began phasing in. During that time, the rate of uninsured Americans has plummeted to a historic low. Also during that time, Republicans have blamed the law for practically every problem with the health-care system, the economy and more. But they have infamously not united behind a credible alternative."

Then Paul Ryan, who should just go back to Wisconsin and stick to making cheese, came out with his version which has ended up, along with Tom Price's version, as what Republicans are going with. But listen to this, two weak points that are pointed out by WP in the 2016 rendition...

The proposal does not say how valuable the credit would be, nor the rate at which it would increase.

The document also does not predict how many people it would cover, nor how much the plan would cost.

Whether these weaknesses were addressed in the latest bill that just cleared the first hurdle in the House and is now being debated in Committee, hasn't been revealed. Ryan, who is beginning to mirror Donald Trump in misinformation, stated "Because of Obamacare, Medicare is going broke." NPR says, "In fact, the opposite appears to be true — Obamacare may actually have extended the life of Medicare."

This year's Medicare Trustees Report says the program would now be able to pay all its bills through 2028, a full 11 years longer than a 2009 forecast — an improvement Medicare's trustees attribute, in part, to changes in Medicare called for in the Affordable Care Act and other economic factors.

What is occurring here, from the top down, is the use of lies and deception from the Republicans to

sell their programs, with healthcare just the latest issue. It rose to popularity in the days of George W. Bush and Karl Rove when prevarication was the norm. It hasn't changed. But apparently Paul Ryan hasn't differed as much as he thought in his bill with Obamacare. Here is what the experts are saying...

"And the irony of the Ryan Medicare plan, say some health policy analysts, is that it would turn the government program into something that looks very much like the structure created for insurance plans sold under the ACA."

"'The way it works is comparable to Obamacare,' says physician and conservative policy analyst Avik Roy, founder of the Foundation for Research on Equal Opportunity." 

There is no way to predict just where and how far the Republicans will take their drive to get rid of the Affordable Care Act, or what they will come up with as a replacement, if they are successful. What we do know is that the American public will not be the beneficiary. It will be the wealthy and big business.

Kellyanne Conway to star with Anderson Cooper New Year's Eve

Rumor has it that when the producers of the Anderson Cooper/Kathy Griffin CNN New Year's Eve show saw the video below, they decided to replace Kathy Griffin with Kellyanne Conway, because Conway could make Anderson laugh tons more than his current co-host. Kathy Griffin even agreed and said she might even decide to apply for a job with the Trump administration.. You have to see this video...

Did George Orwell predict Donald Trump in 1984?

Donald Trump-George Orwell

I am an ardent fan of George Orwell's work including, Animal Farm and 1984. Animal Farm is political satire at its best, depicting the unrest of the animals at the Manor farm because they are treated poorly. Mr. Jones, the farmer, was a mean and drunken man who exploited them, leading to a rebellion by the animals that eventually gets out of hand. It's a short read that will illustrate the kind of uprising that is imminent when people, or animals, are unhappy with their situation. Or their government. It's an issue I'll cover later using the book to draw similarities with the U.S.

But 1984 offers a multitude of possibilities for comparison with the new Donald Trump admin., even as it completes just over a month of tenure. The timing only emphasizes the number of conspiracy theories Donald John has been able to concoct in such a short amount of time. They are numerous and at times so bizarre that they defy the reality that the man that has just been elected to the presidency of the United States is the one who spawned them. It is more likely that we would expect such disjointed discourse from Jack Nicholson in One flew Over the cuckoo's Nest. Examples...

1. Trump's phones in Trump Tower were tapped
2. Said there was Rampant voter fraud in 2016
3. Anti-Trump protesters are paid
4. Obama is coordinating the [Trump] protests
5. There were 1.5 million people who attended his inauguration

In none of these cases has Donald John come up with any corroboration for the statements he made, with the most blatant number five. This was where Trump cried to the heavens how much larger his inauguration crowd was than Barack Obama's in 2008, when independent photos proved him wrong. But the freakish behavior of Donald Trump isn't the basis for this post, rather just some background and sidebars to explain the aberrant nature of the man who has risen from mediocrity to the President of the most powerful nation n the world. And how Orwell's 1984 has its parallels.

This isn't the first post or article on this issue, there have been several, but, notably, believe mine is the first to use the Orwell Today site in drawing these comparisons and cross-referencing with Jackie Jura's excellent notes and correlations with the future. On March 5, CNN's headline blazed, "The President of the United States traffics in conspiracy theories," then goes on to document Donald Trump's ongoing perpetuation of lies and misinformation. Jackie Jura n Orwell Today has a section on "Conspiracy Goes Mainstream," which chronicles history's most unique conspiracies. 

But time now to look at George Orwell and then Donald trump through the eyes of "Orwell Today." And the only way to begin is to start with Orwell's most imposing creation, Big Brother. It was the Proles who marched through the streets with placards celebrating Big Brother’s ability to 'Make Oceania Great Again.' Fast forward to the 2016 campaign when Trump followers with red hats were marching everywhere with signs that said, 'Make America Great Again.' Now Donald Trump is not Orwell's Big Brother, but he is the epitome of his oligarchs. 

1984's Winston character tries to recall the past when everything had been better but today's world was the remnants of a society that was free and uncomplicated, unlike 1984, and the new world order where the world was broken into three super-states. Steve Bannon has three tenets on which he plans to build the new "Trumpism" and, although they aren't geographical like Orwell's three nations, they do represent the kind of one-nation ideology of a country that is at the current time highly divisive. They are Capitalism, nationalism, and “Judeo-Christian values.”

It was the plan of the 1984 autocrats to "Keep the Masses Down" in order to maintain a hierarchical society that could only be possible through the proletariat's poverty and ignorance. Although not directly related to Donald Trump, it is the policy of the Republican Party to amass the wealth in only a few (1% of the population) and keep the rest in the dark over what the Party is really doing, in order to maintain the blind votes of their followers. Like Orwell's world, Donald John and the GOP feel their complete survival depend on collectivism.

1984's "Ministry of Truth" must have been the prototype for Donald Trump's communications dept. with Sean Spicer playing the part of the book's character, Winston, whose job it was at the Ministry to take news items he received and turn them around to mean what the higher-ups in the Party wanted said. To be certain, the Ministry of Truth was only the front for a persisting procession of lies to the citizens of Oceania, tied in a neat bundle that, when exxhibited, was meant to be bona fide. Well, in 2017, as in 1984, there is nothing truthful about Donald John's Ministry of Truth.

Orwell's "Falsification of the Past" follows closely to the Ministry of Truth in the fabrication of any information that is granted to the public. If Trump doesn't like what has already been said, he will change it to fit what he wants. Like right after the inauguration when he removed the term "climate change" from the official White House website. In Oceania there was Oldspeak and "Newspeak," when translated corresponds to the civil tone coming from the White House during Barack Obama and earlier presidents, compared to Donald John's crude and sometimes lewd rhetoric.

PoliticoMagazine talks of the multitude of contradictions of Donald Trump: "Has anyone ever disagreed with Donald Trump more than Donald Trump?" The Inner Party in 1984 was governed by adherence to a common doctrine of "Doublethink," which means "the power of holding two contradictory beliefs in one's mind simultaneously, and accepting both of them." Here are Politico's examples...

“I have no intention of running for president.” (Time, September 14, 1987)
“I am officially running for president.” (New York, June 16, 2015)

 “I don’t want it for myself. I don’t need it for myself.” (ABC News, November 20, 2015)
“I wanted to do this for myself. … I had to do it for myself.” (Time, August 18, 2015)

“Politicians are all talk and no action.” (Twitter, May 27, 2015)
“I’m not a politician.” (CNN, August 11, 2015)
“I’m no different than a politician running for office.” (New York Times, July 28, 2015)

Orwell's "Ministry of Love" is like other of his poetic symbols that mean the opposite of what they
say. This one is actually a torture chamber for people who have been picked up by the Thought Police for thinking bad things against Big Brother. Now Donald John has no thought police per se, except for his minions who try to unsuccessfully control the media, but he does have a lot of love he spews on a regular basis, like how much he loves women. How much he loves immigrants. How much he loves blacks. And then he degrades each with a vehemence not found when expressing the love.

I could go on for some time but it will be much more interesting for you to browse Jackie Jura's Orwell Today site and come up with your own conclusions of how George Orwell's book, 1984, corresponds with the idiocy of the Donald Trump administration. Check the 45 topics she has documented on the left-hand side of the site. and when you go to something like "Big Brother" be sure and take advantage of the notes and analogies she has referenced as they will often point directly to current events. Good Reading!

Stephen King's latest horror story: Donald Trump

Donald Trump is in deep doo doo the Russian interference in the 2016 election and whether or not his election campaign staff was involved, while at the same time he must defend the lowlife Jeff Sessions he nominated for Attorney and a gutless Republican approved. So, does he do what any self-respecting individual would do--especially the President of the United States--build a palatable defense for each with facts? And since the world knows there is no defense for what has been done, what's left. Simple, we go on the offense with more lies and misinformation. Trump's tweet 3/4...

“How low has President Obama gone to tapp [sic] my phones during the very sacred election process. This is Nixon/Watergate. Bad (or sick) guy!”

First of all, the man is illiterate when it comes to spelling, and second, as has been the case with past accusations, he gives absolutely no proof. Here's what the master of handed-over misinformation, Sean Spicer, had to say 3/5...

“Reports concerning potentially politically motivated investigations ahead of the 2016 election are very troubling.”

What the hell are these people talking about? Fact checker asked for evidence of this "dramatic claim" but received nothing. The Washington Post reports that possibly Spicer's "reports" refer to news stories and not concrete information. But, "The Washington Post for months has sought to confirm this report of a FISA warrant related to the Trump campaign but has been unable to do so." More so, WP assumes other major news media have done the same and also come up empty. The gist of the matter is that month of FISA for information on Russian hacking have been denied.

McClatchy reported in January...

"The FBI and five other law enforcement and intelligence agencies have collaborated for months in an investigation into Russian attempts to influence the November election, including whether money from the Kremlin covertly aided President-elect Donald Trump, two people familiar with the matter said."

"The agencies involved in the inquiry are the FBI, the CIA, the National Security Agency, the Justice Department, the Treasury Department’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network and representatives of the director of national intelligence."

 FISA court (Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act), has been approached from about every direction including the former White House, for the purpose of uncovering Donald John's connection to the Russians in the 2016 campaign, not for the purpose of wiretapping Trump Tower. There is more investigation into how money transferred from the Kremlin "may have been used to pay some email hackers in the United States or to supply money to intermediaries who would then pay the hackers. More from McClatchy...

"On Jan. 6, the director of national intelligence released a declassified report that concluded Russian President Vladimir Putin had ordered an influence campaign to “undermine faith in the U.S. democratic process,” damage Hillary Clinton’s election prospects and bolster Trump’s. The campaign included the hacking of top Democrats’ emails and fake news distributed by Russian sources."

But the real story here is horror writer Stephen King's assessment of Donald John... 

“A Trump presidency scares me more than anything else. I’m terrified that he’ll become president.”

This, of course, was pre-election, and sounds like he may be comparing the then coming election of Donald Trump with books of his like Carrie, It, and Misery. If you lump all of King's chillers together, they wouldn't equal the repugnance of the Trump administration. Stephen King likens the Trump presidency with his 37-year-old book, Dead Zone, about a salesman who fights the establishment to run for president. He doesn't make it but King has some interesting tweets mocking Donald John's charges over Obama's wiretapping of Trump Tower...

"Not only did Obama tap Trump's phones, he stole the strawberry ice cream out of the mess locker."

"Populist demagogues like He Who Must Not Be Named aren't a new thing; see THE DEAD ZONE, published 37 years ago."

"Obama tapped Trump's phones IN PERSON! Went in wearing a Con Ed coverall. Michelle stood guard while O spliced the lines. SAD!"

It is pretty pathetic when one of the greatest writers of all time spends part of his valuable time to poke fun at the new president of the United states, not in a playful way, but to point out the absurdities and lunacies of this new administration. Avi Selk, in the Washington Post story once again reiterates...

An Obama spokesman and a former intelligence director said there was no wiretap. Some speculated that Trump was referring to claims on talk radio and the conservative website Breitbart that Obama used “police state” tactics against him. Others accused Trump of trying to distract from reports that his staff covered up conversations with Russian officials during the campaign.

On the legal side, FBI Director James Comey feels there is no credibility in Trump's claims that Barack Obama wiretapped Trump Tower phones and told the Justice Department to refute the charges. Donald John fired back refusing to "acknowledge" Comey's judgment, probably leading to some kind of confrontation with the head of the nation's leading law enforcement agency. The New York Times is leery of the fact that Trump would fire Comey because that could very well backfire into a cover-up over his campaign connections with the Russians.

Although Sean Spicer has made several comments stating Donald Trump's conclusion that former President Barack Obama did in fact wiretap trump Tower during the 2016 presidential campaign. He offered no evidence at the time, nor has Donald John since his accusations. Yet the two of them are adamant it happened. But not so sure are others in the White House, including Sarah Huckabee Sanders who pretty much hedges on most of Spicer's and Trump's allegations. This is why Spicer didn't really want to talk about this...

"During an at-times-painful interview with ABC's Martha Raddatz, Huckabee Sanders repeatedly suggested that Trump's allegation was worth looking into but declined to vouch for it. Raddatz pointed this out repeatedly, and Huckabee Sanders responded by saying 'if this happened,' 'if this took place,' 'if it did' and 'let's find out.'”

Martha Raddatz is one of those reporters that gives no quarter when it comes to getting the truth and

Martha Raddatz-Sarah Huckabee Sanders

didn't relent with Huckabee Sanders continued use of the preposition "if" when Raddatz finally exclaimed, “If,” “if,” “if,” “if.” Huckabee Sanders reply, ""I agree." Raddatz added...

"Let me just say one more time. The president said, “I bet a good lawyer could make a great case out of the fact that President Obama was tapping my phones in October.” So the president believes it is true?"

HUCKABEE SANDERS: I would say that his tweet speaks for itself there.

In a nutshell, Donald Trump "trumped" up this conspiracy theory of Barack Obama wiretapping Trump Tower during the 2016 campaign, solely for the purpose of diverting attention away from the issues that he and his staff were in cahoots with Putin and the Russians in 2016 to aide his election chances and damage Hillary Clinton's, And the other issue, the skaggy lowlife he nominated for AG, Jeff Sessions lying about his contact with the Russians during the election. With a lack of support from his FBI Director, now some of his staff, where does the American public draw the line?

Is it possible Jeff Sessions is a bigger liar than Trump?

In the Senate hearings to confirm Jeff Sessions for Attorney general under the new Donald Trump administration, Sen. Al Franken (D-Minn) asked him a simple question of had he had contacts with the Russians. Sessions reply...

“I have been called a surrogate at a time or two in that campaign and I didn't have — did not have communications with the Russians, and I'm unable to comment on it."

Not only was he in contact with a Russian, he met with the Russian ambassador. And more than once. Nancy Pelosi, the House's minority leader, says that Sessions lied to Congress and must resign. Chuck Schumer, the Senate Democratic leader also called for Sessions to resign. When Sessions did everything he could think of to change his story and rearrange the facts, all of which still didn't work, he recused himself...

"...from any and all investigations into the 2016 campaign by the Justice Department, a clear attempt to throw a bone to the howling pack in hopes that the controversy would die down."

It didn't, has only gotten worse, and Donald John was reportedly furious for his action, enough to start the maniac on another tirade accusing Barack Obama of ordering the wiretapping of the Trump Tower during the 2016 campaign. Completely unsubstantiated...nada...zip to back it up. But then, that's Donald Trump, a part of his formula to spread misinformation about anyone who crosses him or disagrees with him. The other part of his formula is outright lies, a technique he has employed from the first day of his presidential campaign, perhaps all his business life.

One can understand why Trump would be frantic over Jeff Sessions recusing himself since it is no doubt his Attorney General would have overseen an investigation of the Russian impact on Donald Trump's winning the election. And we all know from experience that Sessions is simply another of Donald John's yes men, ready to do his bidding no matter what. So, what's next? According to CNN...

"Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said Thursday that Sessions' acting deputy attorney general, Dana Boente, should appoint a special prosecutor to oversee the investigation."

If they drag their feet...

"We will then urge (Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell) and (House Speaker Paul Ryan) to work with Democrats and create a new and improved version of the independent counsel law, which would give a three-judge panel the authority to appoint an independent counsel," Schumer said.

Yeah, lots of luck on that. Here's what PoliticusUSA had to say about a McConnell reaction...

"Given his support for Trump, expect Majority Leader McConnell to resist calls for an investigation, but when even he has to admit that there are unanswered questions, the President has big problems."

With trump's luck so far, his star will rise even higher because his numb nuts followers will scream their fried President is being persecuted. So, if Congress isn't going to do anything and his supporters will only glory in their man's "maltreatment," what's left? Well, it comes down to an anemic left that has been so disjointed in the past that they can't even help themselves, much less try to bring charges against the President. I want you to understand that I do not take pleasure in the fact that, the dozing Democrats under Debbie Wasserman Schultz were grossly outsmarted by the Republicans. Pathetic!

Chuck Schumer and Nancy Pelosi calls for Jeff Sessions to resign have fallen on deaf ears in the Republican Congress and in the White House. The Washington Post's take on this says that, even as the democrats mount their opposition against Sessions, his own Party is faltering with some trying to dump him altogether, and others avoiding him in the cloak room. In politics, everyone knows the laws of survival and when you lie, especially in front of a Senate committee, your supporters have a tendency to shun any relationship with you. WP comments...

"If Sessions's response on Thursday morning was the best that he can offer to defend himself, you can expect that the few people sticking up for him right now will dwindle to his immediate family sometime very soon. And when you lose your friends while under heavy fire from your opponents in political Washington, it's almost always curtains."

Jeff Sessions and his spokeswoman have repeatedly tried to explain the whole thing away as a routine act of the Senator as a member of the Armed Services Committee. Sarah Isgur Flores, Sessions’s spokeswoman, said...

"Sessions last year had more than 25 conversations with foreign ambassadors as a senior member of the Armed Services Committee, including the British, Korean, Japanese, Polish, Indian, Chinese, Canadian, Australian and German ambassadors, in addition to Kislyak [the Russian ambassador]."

Neither the Russian ambassador, nor his spokesperson were available for comment but...

"The Washington Post contacted all 26 members of the 2016 Senate Armed Services Committee to see whether any lawmakers besides Sessions met with Kislyak in 2016. Of the 20 lawmakers who responded, every senator, including Chairman John McCain (R-Ariz.), said they did not meet with the Russian ambassador last year."

Chuck Schumer said in the Daily Beast...

"...Sessions had tried to 'dramatically mislead' Congress. He stopped an inch or two short of calling his former Senate colleague a liar, but made it clear he thought Sessions had concealed the full truth from the Judiciary Committee at his confirmation hearing. “If there was nothing wrong” with meeting Ambassador Kislyak, Schumer asked, why didn’t he just come clean and tell the truth?'”

Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak with Jeff Sessions

Schumer talks about a special counsel to investigate Jeff Sessions and the Beast thinks that idea willIn 1999 he was a key proponent of prosecuting then-President Bill Clinton for allegedly lying under oath when Clinton was accused of perjury over statements he made regarding his relationship with Monica Lewinsky. Shoe on the other foot.
"avalanche" now, even with Senators that aren't in deep Red states. The downside of all this starts with Donald Trump who nominated this second-rate politician who is an avowed racist, and who has a past that should haunt him in this issue.

Lindsay Graham said in a tweet, "If Jeff Sessions spoke with Russian diplomat, then for sure you need a special prosecutor." Another republican Senator, Rob Portman, from Ohio joined in the call for a prosecutor. Here's a kick. Some thirty years ago, Sessions was too much of a racist to be a federal judge but now all of a sudden he has become Attorney General of the United States, which is on a higher level than the judgeship he wasn't qualified for. Just what happened in those thirty years to better  certify him for this job? I think nothing.

Have we been conditioned to accept T-rump's stupidity?

Without even having read Radley Balko's opinion in the Washington Post, I have hinted at the fact in my blog posts that the American public has become accustomed to the rantings of a psychopathic liar that has somehow taken over the White House. Here's what Balko had to say...

"...Tuesday night’s fit of demagoguery masquerading as a presidential address is a frightening demonstration of how his first month in office has left those of who are supposed to hold him accountable timid and shell-shocked."

Demagoguery, let's examine it historically along with the prevailing example. Salon was profiling Donald Trump as a modern-day demagogue back in June of 2016, five months before the election that made history and put America on a track to a sure eventual collapse. In an elaborate use of adjectives and adverbs, the website talked of the "virus infecting our politics," which had its contemporary kickoff during the George W. Bush/Karl Rove era. There are other bad actors and the whole conglomeration worked tediously together to give us what's known today as President Donald Trump.

Here's how Salon describes it...

"There have been stretches of history when this virus lay dormant. Sometimes it would flare up here and there, then fade away after a brief but fierce burst of fever. At other moments, it has spread with the speed of a firestorm, a pandemic consuming everything in its path, sucking away the oxygen of democracy and freedom."

 There were others early-on who developed a formula and format for those to use in later years. Men like ...

“'Pitchfork Ben' Tillman, the South Carolina governor and senator who led vigilante terror attacks with a gang called the Red Shirts and praised the efficiency of lynch mobs."

"Mississippi’s Theodore Bilbo, a member of the Ku Klux Klan who vilified ethnic minorities and deplored the 'mongrelization' of the white race."

"Louisiana’s corrupt and dictatorial Huey Long, who promised to make 'Every Man a King.'"

"George Wallace, the governor of Alabama and four-time presidential candidate who vowed, 'Segregation now, segregation tomorrow, segregation forever.'"

The demagogue that stands out in U.S. history is Joseph McCarthy, US senator from Wisconsin, that Salon describes, "...until now perhaps our most destructive demagogue." Until now. McCarthyism was another psychopathic lunatic's way of drawing attention to himself by terrorizing the country into believing there was a Communist under every rock. There weren't, and several lives were ruined in the process. I had a close friend in Los Angeles who was a movie screenwriter who knew a few fellow writers whose lives were affected. And tailgunner Joe didn't even have a bully pulpit.

Remember Roy Cohn, he was chief counsel to McCarthy’s Senate Permanent Subcommittee and wouldn't you know it, the bad seed is back. As Salon put it, "Cohn was McCarthy’s henchman, a master of dark deeds and dirty tricks. "Cohn didn't go down with McCarthy when Edward R. Murrow exposed him on his CBS show, "See it Now." But not Cohn, who continued his operations in New York where he ended up working for mob bosses and, yes, Donald Trump's father, Fred, until later years when he made his McCarthy-like methods of strong-arm manipulation available to Donald.

Bernie Sanders on what Donald Trump did not say in his speech to Congress:

Cohn also introduced Trump to the man who was his campaign chair, Paul Manafort, someone who made a fortune representing dictators. Salon has an interesting analogy between Joseph McCarthy and Donald Trump...

"So the ghost of Joseph McCarthy lives on in Donald Trump as he accuses President Obama of treason, slanders women, mocks people with disabilities and impugns every politician or journalist who dares call him out for the liar and bamboozler he is. The ghosts of all the past American demagogues live on in him as well, although none of them have ever been so dangerous."

Returning to the present and Balko's charge that Donald John has conditioned us to just accept him the way he is and go on with our business, letting him run the country in the ground. Balko says, "We need to be better than that." And we should. The writer comments...

"We’ve been conditioned to accept behavior from the leader of the most powerful nation on Earth that we’d never have accepted from his predecessors (and I have pretty low expectations of presidents) — that we’d never accept from a friend, relative, pastor or community leader — as long as he spares us and our group from his attacks."

Trump's speech to Congress included the same lies that we have heard over and over, except that this time he delivered them in a toned-down rhetoric that is as much like the normal Trump as Scotch is like bourbon. Where it came from I do not know, but I suspect it is another of his underhanded tactics to appease a few concerned Republicans along the way who get their skivvies in a dither when he's too much the bad boy. Balko is really up in arms over the bi-partisan praise when this wasn't the man talking who has been ranting and raving such absurdities for his first month in office.

Balko disparages Trump's speech grammar, saying it was "terribly written," and "full of his typical doom-and-gloom pronouncements about America," quoting one of his most egregious passages...

"Recent threats targeting Jewish community centers and vandalism of Jewish cemeteries, as well as last week’s shooting in Kansas City, remind us that while we may be a nation divided on policies, we are a country that stands united in condemning hate and evil in all its forms."

Just hours before the speech Donald John had indicated that some of the attacks, above, had been perpetrated by Jews themselves. More extreme exaggeration almost to the point of lying...

"We’ve defended the borders of other nations, while leaving our own borders wide open, for anyone to cross — and for drugs to pour in at a now unprecedented rate."

At best, this statement is borderline bogus. More on drugs...

"I have further ordered the Departments of Homeland Security and Justice, along with the Department of State and the Director of National Intelligence, to coordinate an aggressive strategy to dismantle the criminal cartels that have spread across our nation."

Balko documents that when George W. Bush attempted the same thing, by coercing the Mexican

Mexican drug casualties

government into militarizing its drug war, the country’s homicide rate jumped by nearly 250 percent. Regarding Trump's "banned" list...

"It is not compassionate, but reckless, to allow uncontrolled entry from places where proper vetting cannot occur. Those given the high honor of admission to the United States should support this country and love its people and its values. We cannot allow a beachhead of terrorism to form inside America — we cannot allow our nation to become a sanctuary for extremists."

Now here's a refuting fact, "The odds of your average American being killed by a terrorist attack committed by a refugee are astronomical, about one in 3.6 billion."

There is more and Radley Balko's opinion is chock full of solid facts and a good reasoning where the United States stands after only a month of the reign of Donald Trump you can read here. It's up to us where we go from there.

Trump Congress speech doesn't fact check-What's new?

Donald Trump at his best

Donald Trump in a more presidential mode talked to Congress last Tuesday and while Presidents in the past have realized the importance of such a speech and refrained from "stretching the truth," as The Washington Post put it, Donald John performed his usual feat of slaughtering it. Here they are...

Harking back to boasting of forcing Ford's hand on Mexico, T-rump takes responsibility for Fiat Chrysler, General Motors, Sprint, SoftBank, Lockheed, Intel, Walmart and many others have announced that they will invest billions of dollars in the United States and will create tens of thousands of new American jobs.”

Turns out all these plans had been made long before his election. 

T-rump takes credit for the lowered cost of the F-35 program.

The Pentagon had earlier announced budget cuts for this very same project which covered what he was taking credit for, but at times in his rantings Donald John not even sure if "he" saved $600 or $700 million.

T-rump makes the statement, “Ninety-four million Americans are out of the labor force.”

The Washington Post gives this 4 Pinocchios for absurdity. There are only 7.6 million people actively looking for a job that cannot find one, an unemployment rate of 4.8%, inherited from Barack Obama.

Claims we spent $6 trillion in the Middle-East, when we should be spending it at home. 

The truth is we spent $1.6 trillion. 

There's much more that deserves more serious reading to understand just how the President of the United States can stand before a group of people, the U.S. Congress, no less, and lie to them and the American public. Read it here.

At least there was an upside; however, for Republicans only. Politico reports the GOP was "...relieved there were no embarrassing moments." How does it look before the entire world for the American party in power in both Houses of Congress, and also in control of the White House, to feign relief just because their President didn't embarrass them and the rest of the country? And I question whether anyone is in control at the White House. The general consensus is among Democrats and Republicans that the speech was less vitriolic but full of the same generalities that is T-rump' boilerplate message.

But suck up Newt Gingrich had to put in his two cents, worth not anywhere near that, saying, “It would have been very ineffective had you been involved in some kind of long, detailed step-by-step laundry list.” Interpreted: Donald Trump hasn't the slightest idea what he is doing, which translates into the fact that he has no plan where to lead this country. And there was yet even more comfort taken by a senior Republican aide, “He didn’t alienate anybody." We have already seen the damage this man can do offending the heads of Mexico and Australia. Who is next?