Obamaville May 24 - The Election - Trump's Greatest Reality Show - America's Greatest Test

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In one corner - The most experienced candidate ever to run for President Hillary Clinton

In the other corner - The most outrageous inexperienced candidate ever to run for President Donald Trump

For those of you who take the 2016 presidential campaign so seriously that you are blinded by hate, overwhelmed by fear, and terrified by the thought of losing, well, I really do not know the antidote to help you make it through the long, dark night.

Had President Obama been successful in legalizing marijuana perhaps there might have been a joint strong enough to help but such was not the case.  You might consider an extended vacation in Colorado where you could remain on a Rocky Mountain high until after November.  Then again, you might consider securing an option on a nice home in Nova Scotia to settle in if you lose.

How long ago it seems this campaign for the ages started with a line up of highly qualified Republicans in the shape of governors, senators, former senate candidates, males, and a female, quite an all-star line up.  Many thought it was the best and most qualified field of candidates ever assembled. Of course, the GOP had two former presidents ready to come to the aid of the heir-apparent of the GOP dynasty, the Bush family.

On the Democratic side was the pre-emptive favorite to win it all, a former White House First Lady, senator, secretary of state, and career politician who just happened to also be a multi-millionaire.  Waiting in the wings was another former popular president known for his wit and charisma who expected to whisk his wife back into the White House, Bill Clinton.

The Democratic field was "fixed" for Hillary but the Republican field was expected to be a blood bath between the conservatives, the more conservatives, the radical right-wing conservatives, and those who wore both suspenders and belts, along with a quiet little voice from a libertarian in the wilderness named Rand Paul for diversity.

The odds on favorites to square off in the fall election were Hillary Clinton and Jeb Bush, the legacy candidates with the blue blood and access to a couple of billion dollars for the campaign.

Then someone opened the gates of Hell, most likely an innocent bureaucrat who was tired and pulled the wrong lever.

The Outcasts Emerge

One should expect the unexpected when two certain losers in the eyes of the news media and politicians materialize on the scene.  One was wrapped in gold and stepped out of an escalator from heaven while the other suddenly appeared through a fog of socialism and appeared older than Moses.

The news media laughed and immediately condemned them to the scrap heap of presidential trivia mocking their intent and ridiculing their credentials.

I mean, Trump, the Republican candidate, never ran for political office before.  Fact is he was a Democrat before he filed and a long time contributor to left wing causes including previous campaigns of Hillary Clinton.

His claim to fame, he build VERY big buildings and was more or less a billionaire.  Most knew him as a reality talk show host who gave bombastic a new definition, knew almost nothing about what a president does, and considers his best advisor to be the person facing him in the mirror.

On the Democratic side came a candidate who was not even a Democrat but a registered Independent riding his own wave of socialism for the masses, and standing for about everything America hated.  A socialist might be a Stalin, Hitler, Castro, or some figment of our imagination but not a real person in the citadel of Democracy.

We had a history of destroying socialism in wars and elections since 1776.  As if not being a Democrat and being a rabid socialist were not enough to get the Democratic nomination, add to that the fact Bernie Sanders was also as old as Moses and Jewish to boot.  If elected, he would be the oldest person ever elected to the presidency.

America prides itself in being modern and the last three presidents were all part of the Baby Boomer generation, meaning they were born after the Great War.  We think young and spend a fortune trying to act young so the prospects for someone old enough to be our grandfather, well not quite, winning the election was outrageous.  Our national slogan seemed to be "Young is fun and old sucks."

Enter the time machine and come to the present.

The pre-emptive president Hillary Clinton is coming upon the last primary elections of the presidential year and lo and behold, pesky old Bernie Sanders is still around drawing tens of thousands of young people disenfranchised by Hillary to campaign rallies and causing a rather significant number of worry lines in the already battle tested face of Clinton.

As for the Republican challenger to the Clinton machine, perhaps even more remarkable than Bernie, is the brash and brazen golden boy from Queens who virtually destroyed the entire field of highly qualified Republicans on the way to the nomination.

The impact of Bernie Sanders on the election is rather historic while the impact of Trump on the election just might be cataclysmic.

You see, Bernie was a conventional politician, even a sitting Senator, an indentured member of The Establishment, who used the system to poke holes in the Clinton mystic.  I suspect because he was from Vermont, and the first socialist mayor of a big town, few people ever heard of him.

Trump, well he had other ideas on how to win.  Having never run for office before, he had no loyalty to conventional rules, experience, or consultants.  In fact, he had no clue what they might be.

What he did have was a sixth sense of the mood of the public and he tapped right into a sense of frustration and disgust with the political establishment and the news media establishment by the people.  Whether by design or accident, he knew people were not interested in experience or flowing promises and policy platforms.

People were mad as Hell, and there was no better person to lead them in their anger and frustration than Donald Trump, the outsider from politics, the man who got things done.  He may not have the answers, he may twist facts and exaggerate, but they could count on him to fight for the little people against the ironclad political establishment running and wrecking our nation.

The result, the election rules, and decorum went out the window along with every rule of survival in politics.  Even our vaunted fourth estate, the press, was steamrolled by Trump because of his free wheeling style and most unusual approach.

Bernie calls for a revolution, Trump already shoved it down the throats of The Establishment, and we have not even reached the conventions to nominate the party candidates.

Nearly a month before the end of the primary elections and two months before the convention Trump finished demolishing the entire sixteen-person field running against him.

Already he has turned his machine gun barrage of charges against Hillary and at times it has resembled the Valentine's Day massacre in Chicago.

No one has a clue as to what will happen the last six months until the election.  Trump has already surged into a tie with Hillary.  Leaders of foreign nations have condemned Trump, and still he climbs in the polls.

America is in for one of the most entertaining presidential campaigns in history as Donald Trump finally gets his wish, to be part of the greatest reality show in history.  If he wins, he most likely faces even bigger hurdles winning over the people and then the leaders of the world.

Nothing will ever be the same in politics and maybe not even in life, as we know it.  Some people have long held the belief that people grow into the responsibilities of the presidency.  Students of history can point to many examples and even our most recent president, Barack Obama, has overcome many issues with inexperience to grow into the job.

The survivor of this raucous campaign, whether Hillary Clinton or Donald Trump, face many challenges if elected president, and will most certainly be tested by our friends and enemies around the world.  Healing America after the election will be the greatest challenge.  For our part, we must help America heal.

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Obama - A Leader Unable to Lead - An American Tragedy

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America has had it share of presidents who, once elected, have failed to inspire and lead the nation through tough years. With the collapse of his popularity polls, his failure to make corrections to his operation, his lack of plans and policy and his aloof attitude toward the very people who elected him President Obama stands on the threshold of throwing away a presidency of promise and change.



I come from the old American view that everyone should want our president to succeed, no matter what political party he may subscribe to in getting elected. Long ago the political parties dominating the American landscape lost their control over their own candidates because once elected their candidates chose to serve the people, not their party platform.

In fact the whole concept of a political party with a rigid agenda that is good for all Americans has long been accepted as nonsense which is why more voters now see themselves as independents, not Democrats or Republicans. That is how it should be in a Republic such as ours. Once elected the president must accept responsibility for all Americans, not just those who voted for them.



When a president learns that lesson they start to become effective. John Kennedy became popular when he moved to the center and stop adhering to a social, spend free liberal platform advocated by his own party and he started doing what was best for all Americans.

Ronald Reagan overcame a disastrous economy and slammed through his Reaganomics agenda with tax cuts and reduced federal government interference his first term, then turned his attention to stopping the Cold War and foreign affairs his second term. His success swept him to a landside re-election.



Bill Clinton had to take a few defeats before he saw the light and moved to the center embracing the dreaded business community over the social activists. It seems he didn't realize it was Ross Perot and his independent movement who got him elected and not the Democratic platform. But once he made the change he was able to survive many personal difficulties and gain popularity.

Even George Bush was able to serve out two terms because his agenda was what the people wanted, even if he was not the most popular president. Like him or not the Bush administration fought and won battle after battle with the Congress, Democratically control for much of his tenure, by demonstrating that the will of the people was not represented in the will of Congress.



Obama tapped into the unrest of the people with government but lost his compass on the way to the Inaugural address when the union and social activists on the one hand and his silent and well concealed backers from Wall Street on the other took control of his agenda and set him on a path in direct opposition with the people who elected him.



It was not the unions, social activists or Wall Street executives who elected him, they have never elected anyone to the presidency. It was middle America with their distain for big government and independence from political parties and tactics who put him in office. Sadly, as he did offer hope to an electorate tired of business as usual, he settled into the role of business as usual.

A year into office he has accomplished nothing for the people although he did a number of things to reward the small group of Wall Street, union and social activists who felt they elected him. How he fell into the trap is what is makes his fall from grace so unusual. His problems are only compounded by his arrogant refusal to hear the people.



Obama seems to come from the laissez-faire approach to big business, (let them do whatever they want), his consensus building approach to policy, (don't be responsible for what happens), his seemingly professorial aloofness to communicating with the public, (if you only knew what I know you'd know I knew best), and his penchant for blaming everything wrong all the time on everyone else, (I didn't get us into this mess).

If you were a tenured professor from Harvard with a Nobel prize for excellence and accomplishment you might be able to get away with such an approach but even the Harvard professors would probably have a plan or policy to follow. Now Obama is a professor from Harvard but his Nobel prize was not for excellence or achievement but for empty promises. And he is not a professor at Harvard but the President of the United States.



We elect presidents to lead, not pontificate. We elect them to be responsible, not point fingers. We elect them to represent all the people, not just his campaign contributors. And we elect them to tell the truth, not proclaim transparency while making more secret deals with contributors than Huey Long in his prime in Louisiana where he was known for his flamboyant style and brazen deeds.



For some reason it seems that the only people concerned about controlling big deficit spending, bigger national debt, eliminating special interest influence and restoring honesty and integrity to government are the people, not the politicians and the special interests who own them who rape and pillage our national government in Washington.

Today, the first anniversary of the Obama stimulus, we should all ask if we are better off now than when he was elected? Did he shut down the bad guys on Wall Street? Did he throw out the lobbyists and special interests prowling our nation's capitol? Did he fix health care or is he trying to take over health care for the unions and special interests? Did he move us toward energy independence or did he just make a few liberals rich with cap and trade and alternative energy projects while the gas, oil and coal needed to be independent remain in the ground?



I could go on and on but you all know the truth. The question is how is our president reacting? Today he again blamed the Bush Administration for his failures and the Republicans for stopping his agenda. We have no idea what that agenda might be since he seems to have no long term policy or plan to fix our nation.

As for the Republicans, Obama has had total control of the House and Senate with enough votes to shove legislation down our throats with no Republican votes. If his agenda was good for the people don't you think he might have done it? But if his agenda is littered with special deals, secret payoffs and hidden agendas then he might want to stay out of it and let Congress look like the fools, because the ultra liberal hidden agenda will in time be exposed and fail.



His White House staff today is continuing to spin all the benefits from his first year in office, how the millions that became unemployed under Obama were not his fault either, and how the Republicans in Congress are to blame for no action by Congress. If the big government, big spending, big deficit and big national debt are all that was proposed by the Democrats in Congress and the mouthpiece for the Democrats in the White House then maybe we owe the do nothing Republicans a great deal for saving us from a socialist takeover and national bankruptcy.



Yet the defenders of our Democratically controlled Congress are also in the news today proclaiming all the good Congress has done this past year. House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer says Congress had a great year and things would have been much worse without their leadership. What tea leaves is he reading? What in the world are the pharmaceutical companies protected by Congress putting into the water in Washington, Prozac?



If Obama and our Congressional leaders say things are well on the way to recovery then the best thing that can happen is for Congress to do nothing while the people systematically vote them out of office. We deserve better than that. Yes "We", those people our forefathers proclaimed as the heart and soul of our Republic. Maybe Congress should read again our Declaration of Independence and remember it is not our declaration of partisan or special interest dependence.

To quote just a little of our Declaration:

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. — That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, — That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.

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