Crossing the Streams.

In the movie “Ghostbusters”, Spengler famously told Venkman, “Don’t cross the streams…it would be bad”.   Americans who are placing themselves in the far left of our political spectrum should heed this advice.  Adopting and embracing any stance or action that is anti-Trump without considering the logic and wisdom behind it is equivalent to crossing the streams.  Following some idiot over a cliff simply because a small part of their shtick aligns with your agenda is not particularly smart.   The leadership of the Democratic Party, totally devoted to their resistance philosophy, has made this mistake repeatedly since our President assumed office; but the NFL kneeling protest controversy has really put a point on it.   Confusing a protest against the President and his policies with a protest against our flag and anthem are two entirely different issues; it is a classic case of crossing the streams.   We must not allow anti-Trump to become synonymous with anti-America.

I think one of the better comments I have read regarding this specific issue was from an individual who drew an analogy of an industrial line worker with a kneeling NFL player.  What would happen if the line worker at GE or Ford/GM walked away from their station on the line and simply knelt in the middle of the floor?  The line would come to a screeching halt and you have to believe the kneeling individual’s job would be in jeopardy.  Just as that individual has a job to do, on their employer’s plant floor and on their employer’s dime; so does an NFL player have a job to do on their employer’s field, on their employer’s dime, and in their employer’s uniform.  This is not an issue about freedom of speech; this is an issue of crossing the streams and mixing business with pleasure. 

A few questions, if you please.  If the reported numbers are accurate, there are approximately 1,700 active NFL players.  It is said that approximately 200 of them participated in kneeling and/or locking arms in protest this last weekend.  Now the locking of arms is clearly distinct and apart from the kneeling protest and demonstrates a message of unity that is apart from the kneeling protest.  Therefore, if we assume that about 50 percent of the protesters were locking arms, that would leave around 100 players who knelt during the national anthem.  That would be 100 out of 1,700.  Is this a massive protest or a misguided sliver?    If a poll were taken, how many of the kneelers actually took the time to vote last November?  What is the average salary of kneeling protesters, who by the way are being well-paid to play a game for a living thanks to the blood left in foreign soil by fallen soldiers who died literally  holding that flag they are protesting above the ground?  How many of the kneelers went to college on a student athlete scholarship and never paid a dime in tuition?  How many of the kneelers have ever held a real, honest to goodness 40-hour-per-week job and have instead spent their entire lives playing a game?  How can we accept such a protest as sincere when some of these kneelers travel to a foreign country (the recent London NFL game) and kneel for the American anthem while they stand for the foreign nation’s anthem, God Save the Queen?  Let me think, now…what country colonized Africa and commandeered a good portion of it during the genesis of the slave trade?

Whatever your politics are, left or right, do you really want Jimmy Kimmel making American health care policy?  Do you want ESPN and its personalities defining political correctness for the entire range of sports, from youth to professional?  Do you want George Clooney and Sean Penn making foreign policy decisions about the fat boy in North Korea?  Do you want the movie moguls and celebrities in Hollywood establishing the moral standards for your families, neighborhoods, towns, cities, states, and country?  Do you want Glenn Beck to define what domestic policies should look like?  Will you allow the talking heads on CNN or FOX to define how you think and which policies you support or oppose?  Make no mistake about it; the rich and powerful people who reside in the extremes of the political spectrum are in a war over YOU.  Some have decided that they can do quite well in their capitalist enterprises alienating half of the population while catering to the other half.  But the ultimate victory will go to the folks who can hold their partisan base while convincing the majority of the folks in the middle to come along with them. 

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Most of us in the center have a very small sphere of influence and control in our lives.  But those small portions combined will ultimately determine who wins the cultural war in which we are engaged.  The powerful weapon that each of us holds is sufficient to tilt the scales.  That weapon is freedom.  The freedom represented by our flag and our national anthem.  The freedom to switch channels when what we are viewing is not consistent with what we believe.  The freedom to decide which concert, movie, or event tickets we choose to buy.  The freedom to purchase the product of corporations that operate in what we consider to be a moral and ethical fashion.  The freedom to vote for candidates that we believe in and trust.  All of these weapons, these freedoms, were purchased by the loss of precious lives and treasure in past military conflicts.  It is wrong to disrespect our flag and our national anthem which represents not our President, but those brave souls and the ideals they fought for. 

We should not cross the streams.  We should not mix our business with pleasure, our vocation with personal politics.  We should revere those who came before us and paid the ultimate price for our freedoms.  We should thank the Lord every day of our lives that we live in America and are truly blessed with the quality of life that we know.  We should embrace our freedom of speech and ideals in a responsible and respectful way, taking public positions based on logic and reason rather than being driven by herd mentalities and political consideration.  If we do not do these things, we will not be deserving of the gifts we have been so fortunate to have received.  What is here today can be gone tomorrow.  Just as ESPN got bloated with its self importance and fell into financial jeopardy, so can the NFL find that many viewers will find other things to do with their Sunday afternoons.  And who knows…a lot of those viewers who explore other non-NFL options on Sunday afternoons may never come back to the game.  Because it is true when you think about it…the NFL is a game and our freedoms are real life.  

The Futility of Porcine Grappling.

I have complained on prior occasions about how politics has intrusively seeped into every aspect of our lives.    I have also written numerous times about how our President’s mouth overloads his better senses sometimes and he speaks when his silence would be preferable.  His recent trip to Alabama where he campaigned for his preferred Senatorial candidate offered up an opportunity for these two unpleasant tendencies to intersect; and they did. 

There is an old saying that you can’t wrestle with a pig without getting down into the slop yourself.  This point is well defined by President Trump’s interactions with many entities and individuals.  Emboldened by a receptive and enthusiastic crowd in a state that he carried with over sixty percent of the vote last November, the Donald reverted back to his old campaign form.  He was throwing caution to the wind, eschewing discretion for hyperbole, and throwing lots of red meat to his adoring supporters.  Among his many colorful comments, he visited the recent controversy surrounding the NFL and the national anthem protests that have occurred at many games.  As is the case with many of Trump’s forays into irresponsible rhetoric, the target of this particular rant in the person of NFL Commissioner Goodell has responded.  And like many prior Trumpian oratorical escapades, Goodell’s response took him down into the slop along with the pig.  Goodell is a clown whose tenure as Commissioner has featured such circus events as the Ray Rice abuse incident, the Tom Brady inflategate farce, and the ongoing drama surrounding Zeke Elliott in Dallas.  As a typical NFL sports fan, I have often marveled at how such a person of obvious professional ineptitude managed to keep a job as NFL Commissioner; that particular mystery remains open.   His willingness to serve as a dunce errand boy for the rich and pampered NFL owners, doing whatever and however they want, is apparently enough to keep him in his current position.  Suffice it to say that a man in Goodell’s position is not well served by an ongoing social media war with the President.

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And to expand that point, there is just as clearly no point to be served by the President engaging in a tweet storm with the NFL Commissioner.  Amid clear evidence that the majority of the public is sick and tired of having politics mixed in with their sports viewing (note declining NFL ratings and ESPN loss of viewership), it is equally clear that most folks would prefer that the President focus on his job description a bit more religiously and forget these little side incursions into “flavor of the month” episodes.  Just as there is no place in sports entertainment for politics; there is no room in politics for sports.  Nary should the twain meet. 

I suppose that none of us should be surprised that a man who was born with a silver spoon in his mouth, climbed the ladder of celebrity status to his high station in life, and then parlayed his status as a reality TV star into the Presidency of the United States should continue to exhibit the same type of personal behavior that led him to his most recent conquest.  The sad, sad truth is that when President Trump allows his lesser angels to influence his public behavior, he not only does an injustice to himself and his office, but he tends to draw his opposition down to the same level.  This pathetic truth has been evidenced by the professional and ethical bankruptcy being exhibited by the mainstream media in all things Trump, by the Democratic Party and their idiotic resistance movement, and by any number of reasonable individuals who have been driven to unreasonable fits of reaction by their total frustration with the Donald and his unique brand of schizophrenic behavior.  

As much as many of us may yearn for President Trump to mature and grow into the office of the Presidency, it becomes increasingly clear on a daily basis that there is little chance of that happening.  For all steps he takes forward like a strong UN speech or a sincere and compelling reaction to natural disasters, there comes an equal and opposite step backwards like the Alabama remarks.  As infuriating as it is to continually be forced to ferret through the President’s words to glean the few kernels of truth and wisdom that reside there, it is even more maddening to acknowledge that we will likely be spending the next three-to seven years doing just that.  Just as Obama lowered the ethical and democratic principles of the Presidency during his two terms in office, Trump is well on his way to lowering the civility of the office in an equal fashion. We are left clinging to the resignation that an imperfect Trump is clearly far superior to the abysmal Obama; that President “all over the board” Trump is absolutely preferable to the corrupt and slimy Hillary Clinton; and that based on his solid administrative appointments and the resiliency of our nation’s government, this nation will likely survive a Trump Presidency the same way it has survived similar presidents in the past.

For Republicans, Has the Proverbial Ship Sailed?

Fed up with our past ridiculous president Obama and his uber-liberal bent, this nation’s voters eschewed “Obama the Sequel, featuring Hillary” for a loudmouth, TV reality personality.  Donald Trump swept into WDC with a Republican majority in the Senate and the House and a jubilant Grand Ole Party full of itself and big ideals. 

Now, after sitting in the big chairs for nearly nine months, the Republican Party has basically disowned Trump, engaged in schizophrenic policy behavior, destroyed any public confidence in its ability to govern effectively, and quite possibly thrown away a golden opportunity to make sweeping and fundamental changes in our government.  Has the door completely shut on Republican chances to reform health care and our tax system? ... Probably not.  However, there can be little doubt that when John McCain openly indulged in excessive self-esteem, personal grandstanding, and naked arrogance by casting his vote against the Republican health care legislation; the Republicans lost their chance to exclusively rewrite this country’s massively flawed health care system.   And now, on the heels of the Donald’s much discussed deal with “Chuck and Nancy”, the breech between the Republican Party Leadership and this Republican President seems wide and widening. 

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I have written many times before that I believe Donald Trump to be much more liberal-at-heart than he is conservative.  Once again, I urge anyone who doubts that statement to review Trump’s public life leading up to his quest for the Republican Presidential nomination.  And as liberal as Trump sounded then, his family members who apparently are maintaining positions of authority and influence in this White House, are even more liberal than he is.  Now the devil’s advocate might argue that based on his judicial nominees and his administration appointments, Trump has exhibited a conservative tilt.  This is true; but a closer examination might reveal a crack or two in that theory.  Trump’s corporate background and raising gives him a natural disposition against overt government intervention into the private sector.  The last thing a CEO wants is a federal judge telling his or her company how they should operate.  It is natural for a capitalist to desire strict constructionists in the courts.  And if you look closely at some of the Trump administration appointments, they have pretty strong liberal leanings in many areas.  Militarily and judicially, his selections show a conservative leaning; but is that a political call or a personal call?  I submit that it has much less to do with politics than it has to do with his personal belief that government should be small, non-intrusive, and predictable while the U.S.A. should be the strongest military presence on the planet and carry a big, big stick.   It might be revealing to note that the overwhelming majority of people leaving this Administration are rightists.  Now some them may be less than desirable to begin with, but the point is that the conservative power base in the White House is not strengthening; it is shrinking.

We shall see how this “Chuck and Nancy” kabuki dance plays out, but it may well prove to be the point where the centrist/liberal Trump came to the front and the conservative Trump mask was dropped to the floor.  For all of their supposed political wizardry, McConnell and Ryan may have frittered away their single best opportunity to influence America.  One thing is beyond debate; the middle point in the conservative versus liberal debate in Congress has been shifted to the left.   If Schumer and Pelosi are smart, they will seize this opportunity to maximize their position as a minority legislative party with a sympathetic President.  It is far from certain that they are that smart; but it will certainly be interesting to watch it play out.