Whose woods are these? I do not know. Certainly none around these parts. The Japanese maple outside my front door still has all its beautiful leaves. Winter doesn’t seem to be right around the corner.
So what kind of winter will we have? I have heard all sorts of predictions. Cold, no snow. Very snowy. Warmer than usual.
What do the woolly caterpillars tell us? I don’t know. I never saw a one of them this year. Nor were the fruit trees laden with fruit. My holly tree doesn’t have a single berry. Last year it was full.
Trump is putting together what will be the wealthiest administration in modern American history. His announced nominees for top positions include several multimillionaires, an heir to a family mega-fortune and two Forbes-certified billionaires, one of whose family is worth as much as industrial tycoon Andrew Mellon was when he served as treasury secretary nearly a century ago. Rumored candidates for other positions suggest Trump could add more ultra-rich appointees soon.
Many of the Trump appointees were born wealthy, attended elite schools and went on to amass even larger fortunes as adults. As a group, they have much more experience funding political candidates than they do running government agencies.
Their collective wealth in many ways defies Trump’s populist campaign promises. Their business ties, particularly to Wall Street, have drawn rebukes from Democrats. But the group also amplifies Trump’s own campaign pitch: that Washington outsiders who know how to navigate and exploit a “rigged” system are best able to fix that system for the working class.
“It fits into Trump’s message that he’s trying to do business in an unusual way, by bringing in these outsiders,” said Nicole Hemmer, an assistant professor in presidential studies at the University of Virginia’s Miller Center. But Trump and his team, she added, won’t be able to draw on the same sort of life struggles that President Obama did, in crafting policy to lift poor and middle-class Americans.
“They’re just not going to have any access to that” life experience, she said. “I guess it will be a test — does empathy actually matter? If you’re able to echo back what people are telling you, is that enough?”
Does this situation not scare the rest of us earthlings? There is something sinister about the 1% having power over us all. Some Orwellian sc-fi plan that I just can’t put my finger on is lingering in the back of my mind.
What were the American people thinking? [shaking head!!]
In the newest example of “Jesus Kellyanne can you PLEASE take his phone away?” President-elect Donald J. Trump — who will soon be sworn in as our nation’s 45th Commander-in-Chief — took to Twitter this morning for one of his more stunning admissions in quite some time.
On the table is the issue of burning the American flag, perhaps in reaction to the news that a handful of college students in Massachusetts burned a flag this week in protest to the election results. Burning the American flag is a Constitutionally protected right under the First Amendment stemming from the SCOTUS 1989 case Texas v. Johnson. The landmark case under Chief Justice William Rehnquist argued that any statute or law that criminalizes the desecration of a venerated object like the American Flag violates a person’s First Amendment privileges as outlined by the Bill of Rights.
Despite the law, our President-elect seems to have different ideas for the future of our country:
“Nobody should be allowed to burn the American flag,” Trump wrote. “[I]f they do, there must be consequences – perhaps loss of citizenship or year in jail!” The Tweet is at least the first one in a while not to take bizarre aim at CNN, his favorite target as of late.
Someone absolutely needs to tell Trump to put away his Twitter account. He is acting like a petulant adolescent, not the president of the greatest nation in the world.
Trump has little knowledge of the law and plays to the dumbest person in the room. We might all want to punch someone in the face for flag burning or we might say we want to deport them or some other dire threat. We know we can’t but it feels good to say it. The difference is that WE are not the president, or soon-to-be president. Donald Trump is and he needs to stop acting like a teenager who is getting off on mouth-flashing.
Many people, both Democrats and Republicans want Donald Trump to select Mitt Romney as Secretary of State. Romney is known as being dignified, knowledgeable, and a cool head, unlike some of the other suggestions.
Some Trump loyalists disavow Romney because of his harsh words before the election about Trump’s suitability to hold the office he will soon hold.
Romney also would have an easy time being confirmed by the senate.
Should Trump nominate Romney because of his statesmanship or should he stick with his loyal supporters like Giuliani or Gingrich?
In the modern era of presidential politics, no candidate has ever won the popular vote by more than Hillary Clinton did this year, yet still managed to lose the electoral college. In that sense, 2016 was a historic split: Donald Trump won the presidency by as much as 74 electoral votes (depending on how Michigan ends up) while losing the nationwide vote to Clinton by 1.7 million votes and counting.
But there’s another divide exposed by the election, which researchers at the Brookings Institution recently discovered as they sifted the election returns. It has no bearing on the election outcome, but it tells us something important about the state of the country and its politics moving forward.
The divide is economic, and it is massive. According to the Brookings analysis, the less-than-500 counties that Clinton won nationwide combined to generate 64 percent of America’s economic activity in 2015. The more-than-2,600 counties that Trump won combined to generate 36 percent of the country’s economic activity last year.
Clinton, in other words, carried nearly two-thirds of the American economy.
So what does this data tell us? What does it tell us moving forward?
According to the WaPo:
In between those elections, U.S. economic activity has grown increasingly concentrated in large, “superstar” metro areas, such as Silicon Valley and New York.
How will Trump keep his promises to return the coal industry and jobs to areas that don’t have the money and aren’t the population centers? He has a tall order before him.
The cast of “Hamilton” was not going to throw away its shot.
After Friday evening’s performance, at which Vice President-elect Mike Pence was in the audience, several dozen of the Broadway musical’s cast members zeroed in on Pence during their curtain call. Brandon Victor Dixon — the actor who played Aaron Burr — stepped forth and cut through the applause.
“You know, we have a guest in the audience this evening,” he said to audience laughter. “And Vice President-elect Pence, I see you walking out, but I hope you will hear us just a few more moments. There’s nothing to boo here, ladies and gentlemen. There’s nothing to boo here. We’re all here sharing a story of love. We have a message for you, sir. We hope that you will hear us out.”
As he pulled a small piece of paper from his pocket, Dixon encouraged people to record and share what he was about to say “because this message needs to be spread far and wide.”
(see above)
Twitter exploded late Friday night with responses that cleaved into two camps: Those who cheered the cast for voicing their concerns so directly and those who found the exchange “rude.” In the latter was President-elect Donald Trump, who tweeted twice Saturday morning about Pence’s musical visit, saying that the cast had “harassed” the vice president-elect with “cameras blazing.”
Charles Murray explains how many of us are insulated from working class America.
I found his bubble quiz to be difficult to answer. I grew up in a pseudo-bubble. My parents were educators but not at the college level. Perhaps the mere fact that I found the bubble quiz difficult to take speaks volumes.
Northern Virginia is unique in itself and probably gives a false negative on bubble-dom.
Virginia looks like a red state from a distance. It’s obvious Virginia would have gone for Trump if Northern Virginia counties had not kicked in late. Prince William, Fairfax and Loudoun saved the day for Clinton.
Do you believe Northern Virginia insulates us from the rest of the country?
Mike Pence said he didn’t understand why Michelle Obama had so passionately condemned his running mate, Donald Trump, for boasting about forcibly grabbing women by their genitals. The First Lady denounced the Republican presidential nominee, although she never dismissively spoke his name, for “speaking freely and openly about sexually predatory behavior” – which she said had “shaken (her) to the core.”
“First and foremost,” Pence argued, “I have no idea why Mrs. Obama, who will be departing the White House shortly, is even commenting on the future President of the United States, God-willing. That’s the first thing I don’t quite get. Secondly, if she’s the First Lady, shouldn’t she be focused on doing whatever it is that First Ladies are supposed to be doing as their duties while their husbands are rescuing the world? What’s she doing commenting on and obviously worrying about her successor? That’s not what she should be doing.”
University of Virginia President Teresa Sullivan is being asked to refrain from quoting Thomas Jefferson because of his racist beliefs, according to The Cavalier Daily.
A letter, signed by 469 faculty members and students, was sent to Sullivan on Nov. 11 protesting the use of a Jefferson quotation in her email calling for unity after the presidential election, the student newspaper reported.
“We would like for our administration to understand that although some members of this community may have come to this university because of Thomas Jefferson’s legacy, others of us came here in spite of it,” the letter read. “For many of us, the inclusion of Jefferson quotations in these e-mails undermines the message of unity, equality and civility that you are attempting to convey.”
In her message after the election, Sullivan said that “Thomas Jefferson wrote to a friend that University of Virginia students ‘are not of ordinary significance only: they are exactly the persons who are to succeed to the government of our country, and to rule its future enmities, its friendships and fortunes.’”
She encouraged “today’s U.Va. students to embrace that responsibility.”
Noelle Hurd, an assistant professor of psychology who drafted the letter, said in a statement that the intention “was to start a conversation with our administration regarding ways to be more inclusive.”
Oh Dear God! Do these youngsters realize they wouldn’t have a college if it weren’t for Jefferson? I am so tired of irrational behavior. Why do students refuse to accept the fact that times change, values change, and what was the status quo then, in Jefferson’s day, was different than today?
The moon was great tonight. I went to the Battlefield where I usually go for sunset and the sky put on quite a show. There were throngs of people out there.
West SkyRising Moon over the Tree Line in the East
It may rain tomorrow and we simply won’t get to see the mega-moon. I hope that is not the case.
To all our veterans–thank you for your service. Any time someone signs his or her name on the dotted line and joins one of the branches of the US military, he or she puts his or herself in harms way. We should never forget that sacrifice.
We can best honor our veterans by insisting that they receive decent medical services in a timely fashion. Our nation has not always succeeded in this endeavor. We also need to ensure that all our veterans have a place to live and enough food to eat. Our efforts should be directed towards Congress. But….
If we know of a veteran who is having a difficult time, we need to kick in and be resourceful. Local community services and churches provide meals and often temporary shelter. For that matter, if you know of a homeless veteran, how about packing a lunch for him a couple days a week. Every little bit helps. We can all do our part!
Meanwhile, to all our veterans in the moonhowlings.net family–Carpe Diem! Today is your day. Live it up! Again, thank you for your service!
Despite losing Tuesday’s presidential election, Hillary Clinton appears to be on pace to win the popular vote, an ironic twist in an election in which her opponent repeatedly said the system was rigged against him.
Just two days before Election Day, Republican businessman Donald Trump tweeted: “The Electoral College is a disaster for a democracy.”
As it turns out, without the Electoral College, Trump probably wouldn’t be the president-elect.
A day after Election Day, Clinton held a narrow lead in the popular vote, according to unofficial results tallied by The Associated Press. With nearly 125 million votes counted, Clinton had 47.7 percent of the vote and Trump had 47.5 percent.
That’s a lead of about 236,000 votes.
Many states count votes after Election Day, so Clinton isn’t guaranteed to keep her lead. However, most of the outstanding votes appear to be in Democratic-leaning states, making it very likely she will become the second Democratic candidate for president this century to win the popular vote but lose the presidency.
Oh the irony! Perhaps Donald Trump will now have an opportunity to grow up.
This is twice that the electoral college has deprived the real winner of the presidency. Al Gore and Hillary Clinton.
Perhaps it’s time to change the Constitution so there is no electoral college.
The biggest chunk of uncounted votes is in California. Washington State, New York, Oregon and Maryland also have large numbers of uncounted votes. Clinton won all those states, and if the trends continue, she will pad her lead by more than 1 million votes.
I would be remiss not to mention the significance of the woman issue on this blog. Never before has a woman been one of the candidates from a mainstream political party. Yes, it is a big deal.
I can remember when President Obama was first elected. There in that park in Chicago, on election night, one could see famous blacks like Jesse Jackson and Oprah Winfrey standing there listening to the newly elected first black president who addressing the huge crowd. Tears were streaming down their faces. It was then that I realized I would never understand how blacks, rich or poor, felt about seeing the election of a first black American president.
I thought about how I would feel if a woman were elected. I didn’t think it would hit me quite as hard but it would hit me. I guess I am now on the precipice of testing my theory.
This morning I though about my own personal history. My grandmother was 30 years old before she could vote. My mother was born just 4 months after the passage of the 19th amendment. WWII began when women had only had the vote for 21 years. Now on November 8, 2016, some 96 years after getting the right to vote, a woman could be elected president of the United States.
Yes, as a female, I am standing in awe. I don’t think I will cry when it happens. I am not that moved. However, the special social and political significance is not lost on me. It’s about damn time!
Let’s keep this short and to the point. I have been very impressed with the Dream Team comprised of Pam Sebesky, Rex Parr and Mark Wolfe. All three candidates have a long community service record. All three candidates have run a great GOTV campaign. I have been pleased with how they work with each other. That tells me that they will attempt to work as well on the Manassas City Council.
Together they can accomplish great things. Sometimes people’s political parties leave them. I am happy to see my friend Mark Wolfe has found a new home with the Democrats. I know that switching political parties isn’t easy. However, Mark always looks to better the community, regardless of political party. When pushing to buy a new fire truck, political party is just not important.
Good luck to all three candidates. Moonhowlings.net endorses all three, Pam, Rex and Mark! Vote Parr, Sebesky and Wolfe!
Whose woods are these? I do not know. Certainly none around these parts. The Japanese maple outside my front door still has all its beautiful leaves. Winter doesn’t seem to be right around the corner.
