Trump can't be banned from Twitter, but then he shouldn't be able to block me, either.

As you may know, the President has blocked me on Twitter. 

Shortly after I fired off three successive tweets at him this summer about his failure to produce his promised tax returns, Trump tweeted some inane nonsense to the world and then blocked three people (likely the three at the top of his feed), including me. 

I was outraged. I remain outraged. Yes, I can still see his tweets via an alternate account or a variety of browser settings, but I am no longer able access his Twitter feed via my primary Twitter feed, and this means I can no longer tweet at him or respond to him as me.

More egregious, in 2017, then Presidential spokesperson Sean Spicer said that Trump's tweets amount to "official statements from the President." Therefore, I am also being denied access to the President's official statements because he is a thin-skinned, ignorant coward who cannot handle criticism of any kind. 

When you don't clap at his speech, he calls you a traitor, for example.  

In January of 2018, after Trump seemed to be goading North Korea into a nuclear clash via Twitter, an argument was made that Twitter bans users all the time for making similarly threatening and endangering remarks. 

Why not Trump? 

Twitter responded to these inquiries as it has with similar calls to ban Trump from the platform for similarly egregious tweets:

“Blocking a world leader from Twitter or removing their controversial Tweets would hide important information people should be able to see and debate.”

Fine, but then this:

If Twitter is concerned about the dissemination of the important information from world leaders and therefore exempts them from any possible ban, then Twitter should also be concerned about the hundreds and perhaps thousands of Americans who Trump has blocked, including me, who have also been denied this "important information."

If you want to argue that world leaders cannot be banned from Twitter because the information they provide is too important to hide, then world leaders should be prevented from blocking citizens from this same important information. 

This would be a fair, logical, and sensible policy that would afford world leaders the benefits that Twitter believes is necessary while also providing some basic rights for the citizenry of the world as well.

Why Twitter has not taken this step baffles me. Are they afraid of our vindictive, man-child President? Do they worry that he might abandon the Twitter platform for Snapchat? Or is the company run by hypocrites who don't give a damn about the dissemination of important information? 

I would really like to know. 

$1.50 and a deleted tweet says everything you need to know.

This is a real tweet, posted and then quickly deleted by Paul Ryan after an enormous backlash from the internet.

This is what Republican lawmakers actually think:

An extra $1.50 per paycheck is a meaningful increase. Something worth bragging about. 

Meanwhile, estimates

What Ryan doesn't want you to know is five things:

1. More than 80% of the tax cut benefits went to the top 1% (which is why this secretary is only seeing an increase of $1.50 per paycheck).
2. Trump will save an estimated $15 million dollars thanks to the tax cut, and his son-in-law, Jared Kushner, will save an estimated $12 million dollars. 
3. The U.S. government is set to borrow nearly $1 trillion this year, an 84 percent jump from last year, thanks to the tax cut. 
4. The rising national debt has already triggered a rise in interest rates, which were partly responsible for the Dow's 666 point selloff on Friday. 
5. Ryan received a $500.000 donation from the Koch family immediately after the tax bill was signed. 

This is truly the fleecing of America. Enormous sums of money are now running directly into the coffers of the wealthiest Americans, while high school secretaries are left with $1.50 extra per week. 

It's not wrong. It's not irresponsible. It's just plain evil. 

The offer of a golden toilet seems just right

If you're looking to make a charitable donation to a worthy organization, might I suggest you consider the Guggenheim Museum in New York?

Thanks to a recently leaked email, when the White House emailed the Guggenheim in September and asked to borrow Vincent Van Gogh's 1888 painting "Landscape with Snow," the curator made a counteroffer:

A fully functional 18-karat gold toilet.

The toilet is an interactive work titled “America” that critics have described as pointed satire aimed at the excess of wealth in this country.

It might not seem like much, but institutions like the Guggenheim art can play a role in refusing to normalize this Presidency, which is important.

Other examples:

Obama's inaugural concert featured Beyoncé, Mary J. Blige, Jon Bon Jovi, Garth Brooks, Sheryl Crow, Josh Groban, John Legend, John Mellencamp, Bruce Springsteen, James Taylor, U2, and Stevie Wonder, with speeches and readings by Jack Black, Steve Carell, Rosario Dawson, Jamie Foxx, Tom Hanks, Samuel L. Jackson, Ashley Judd, Martin Luther King III, Queen Latifah, Laura Linney, George Lopez, Marisa Tomei, Denzel Washington, Forest Whitaker and Tiger Woods.

Trump's inaugural concert featured Lee Greenwood, Three Doors Down, and a speech by Jon Voight.  

Trump also declined the traditional Presidential invitation to the Kennedy Center Honors for fear of backlash, and he refused to attend his own White House Correspondence Dinner, becoming the first President since Reagan to weasel out of this annual event. 

He has also declined to be interviewed prior to this year's Super Bowl, making him the first President in 17 years to skip this tradition.

Add to this his historically low rating for his recent State of the Union address, his historcally low approval rating, and the enormous number of Republican Senators and Congressmen who have announced their retirements prior to the 2018 midterm election, and it's clear that as much as Trump wants to claim victory at every turn, this is not a normal Presidency, and America and its institutions are working hard not to normalize it.

Including offering him a golden toilet instead of a Van Gogh.

These things also make Trump look stupid and sad, which ain't a bad outcome, either.   

My kind of protest

My favorite things in the world are those that make me joyous while making the people who I despise sad or angry. 

This protest by multimedia artist Robin Bell, projected onto the facade of Trump Tower in Washington, DC on Saturday night, manages to hit this sweet spot perfectly.  

Added to my joy is the suddenly plunge in Yelp scores at Trump hotels across the world as scores of protesters are leaving one and two star reviews with hilarious comments. 

Yelp has begun removing these fictitious reviews, but for a while, Trump hotels were rated at the bottom of the barrel, which must've made the petulant man-child very angry. 

Oddly, it's also been pointed out that the word "shithole" is an anagram for "His hotel."

It would seem that even the universe is fight back in subtle and amusing ways.  

One tweet. Four deliberate, purposeful lies.

This tweet got a little loss in the political firestorm of the last couple days, which is understandable. Not only did Trump disparage Haiti and refer to African countries as "shitholes," but he managed this act of indecency on the eight year anniversary of the Haitian earthquake and on the cusp of Martin Luther King, Jr. weekend. 

Timing is everything, I guess.

Still take a look at this tweet:

The real reason that Trump has cancelled his London trip is out of fear of massive protests (a fact the White House reported before Trump attempted to change the narrative) , but in addition to this lie, the tweet contains three other lies. 

1. President Bush sold the former embassy and initiated the move. NOT Barack Obama.  
2. The sale of the former embassy paid for the new embassy, so the price of the new embassy is irrelevant. It didn't cost American taxpayers a dime. 
3. The move was made for security reasons. The former embassy was not deemed safe and secure enough for our diplomats, so a change was necessary.

His tweet was so inaccurate and disparaging that the US embassy in the United Kingdom put out a press release correcting his lies. 

With any other President, a statement containing three deliberate lies in order to support a fourth lie would be an scandal of enormous proportions, but Trump lies so often and with such impunity from his party or supporters that this tweet is all but forgotten amidst the hundreds of other lies and racist remarks. 

These are not normal times, even though a small but still astounding 36% of Americans continue to support this racist, coward, and serial liar.  

It's hard to understand. 

These are the kinds of words that Americans yearn to hear

I'm a harsh critic when it comes to speeches and monologues. I often hear that a speech is "amazing" or "remarkable" or "inspiring," only to be let down by something that fails to reach the level of the shouted superlatives. 

This is not the case.

Anderson Cooper's brief monologue in response to Trump's disgusting, indecent, and un-American comments on Haiti and other countries is moving, captivating, and brilliant. 

Take two minutes and watch. Please. 

A bunch of old, white men are determining the course of our nation

You'll be pleased to know that Trump and the Republican leadership met at Camp David this weekend to set their 2018 legislative agenda, and once again, the GOP made sure that a diversity of voices were heard.

Nine old, white, male Republican leaders, including Trump and Pence, were joined by Paul Ryan, who is also male and white but only middle aged.

He's only 47 years old.  

Republican diversity at work, my friends. And they were once again dumb enough to emphasize this point by posing behind Trump at the conclusion of the weekend. 

This Trump tweet is 50 words long but says so much more.

I don't think it's wise to parse the words of someone as erratic and incompetent as Donald Trump, but this recent tweet is a real doozy and demands a little scrutiny. 

Take a look. 

Let's dig in.

First, we have the President claiming that the book is boring. But the only way to determine if a book is boring is to actually read the book, which we know Trump did not do because:

• Trump doesn't read.
• Trump tweeted this less than 24 hours after the book was published. Even if he did read books (and he doesn't), he didn't have time to read a book of this length over the course of a day, especially while serving as President.  

It's both strange and disconcerting that Trump would not see the transparency of this obvious lie.

Second, we have the President claiming that Wolff "made up stories" to sell this "untruthful" book. But Trump knows that Wolff, who reputation for the truth is admittedly not pristine, has recordings of many of the conversations used to write this book.

Is he hoping Wolff won't release these recordings or allow a third party to listen for verification?

Even worse, we know most of these stories to be true already. They are consistent with reporting emerging from the West Wing all year. Sources have been leaking this kind of information about Trump and his staff ever since Trump took office. While the book is a bombshell, it's not exactly entirely new information.   

Also, why doesn't Trump realize that every time he criticizes this book or attacks the author, Wolff sells more books? This should be exceptionally obvious, and yet Trump continues to attack. First, he ineffectually sued to prevent the book's publication (which only results in the publisher releasing the book four days earlier), and since then, he has criticized it verbally and on Twitter again and again.

It's going to be a New York Times #1 bestseller, thanks in large part to Trump. 

I can only pray that Trump would attack one of my books with equal ferocity. 

Now we get to the most interesting and incomprehensible aspect of this tweet. Trump says:

"He used Sloppy Steve Bannon, who cried when he got fired and begged for his job."

There is so much here. 

1. If Wolff "used Steve Bannon," who had unfettered access to the West Wing as Trump's chief strategist for most of 2017, then Wolff had at least one very significant source for this book, and Trump just acknowledged it.  
2. When Bannon left the White House in late August, Sarah Huckabee Sanders stated that it was a "mutual decision." Trump had nothing but praise for Bannon at the time. So was Sanders lying about this mutual decision? Was Trump lying about his effusive praise? Does Trump not see that reversing a story four months later makes him and his spokesperson a liar back then or a liar now? 
3. How does telling the world that someone cried as you terminated their employment make you look like anything other than a despicable, reprehensible, untrustworthy human being? How does anyone ever work for a man who would do this kind of thing? When has any employer in the history of the world revealed that an employee cried in response to being fired? Does Trump not realize that revealing that Bannon cried only serves to make Bannon seem more human and Trump appear even more rotten than before?
4. Does anyone really believe that Bannon cried? Anyone? 

Then Trump says that Bannon has been "dumped like a dog" by almost everyone. 

Who dumps dogs? 

Dumped like a bag of steaming garbage? Sure. 
Dumped like a bad habit? Fine.
But who dumps man's best friend? Apparently Trump does. 

Then Trump closes with "Too bad!" 

What does this mean?

• Is Trump reflecting back upon his and Steve's previously joyous moments in the Oval Office?
• Is he expressing regret for the deterioration of their relationship?
• Is he worried about the future financial viability of his one time friend? 
• Or is it the "Too bad!" of a sarcastic, middle school bully who is purposefully deflecting emotional attachment and feelings while trying to hurt another?

According to the many accounts in Wolff's book, it's the latter. The one consistent theme running throughout the book is that Trump acts like a petulant child in need of immediate gratification. As a result, these final two words of this tweet only serve to further support the case for the book and its accuracy.  

This petulant, angry, insulting, defensive, untruthful tweet was written by the President of the United States. This is how he spends his time. This is how he serves the American people.

I'd tell Trump how I feel about his tweet directly, but he blocked me on Twitter earlier this year. 

Damn coward. 

Lest us not forget the real story of Christmas

It's a damn shame how racism, homophobia, xenophobia, and disregard for human life outside our borders keep getting in the way of the those God loving conservatives like Mike Pence and Jeff Sessions and what should be their desire to help those less fortunate. 

If only they knew the true meaning (and origins) of Christmas. 

Trump isn't fit to clean toilets

In response to Trump's tweet earlier this week about Senator Gillibrand:

USA Today's Editorial Board wrote:

“With his latest tweet, clearly implying that a United States senator would trade sexual favors for campaign cash, President Trump has shown he is not fit for office. Rock bottom is no impediment for a president who can always find room for a new low.

A president who would all but call Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand a whore is not fit to clean the toilets in the Barack Obama Presidential Library or to shine the shoes of George W. Bush. ”

USA Today is generally considered to occupy the center in terms of its political leanings, and it does not formally endorse political candidates. 

But these are not normal times, and the editors of USA Today recognize this. 

I thank them for breaking from tradition, responding to this truth, and taking a stand. While I would not characterize my blog as political, I am writing more about politics now than ever before, simply because these are not normal times in America. 

This is not a normal President.

And yes, I would agree. Donald Trump is not fit to clean the toilets in the Barack Obama Presidential Library or to shine the shoes of George W. Bush.

All I want for Christmas is a machine gun

Not really, of course, but damn do I love this sweater.

For those of you who can't quite pick up on the reference, it's Die Hard, the greatest Christmas film of all time.

In the movie, our hero, John McClane, has just managed to kill his first terrorist and acquired a machine gun. He sends the lifeless corpse down to Hans Gruber, the terrorist boss man, in an elevator with this note written in red Sharpie on his sweatshirt.

There's nothing better than a barefoot underdog taunting his well armed enemy.

For the record, while I'm not interested in owning a machine gun, I'm not at all opposed to the second Amendment. I believe in the right of Americans to own firearms. I simply want every gun owner to undergo a thorough background check, restrictions placed on criminals, perpetrators of domestic abuse, individuals on the no-fly list, and the like, and a complete ban on assault weapons. 

You know... reasonable, rationale gun ownership. The kind of gun ownership our founding fathers envisioned with they wrote the Constitution. 

Except for John McClane, of course. He can have as many machine guns as he wants. 

Comeuppance!

Two years ago Kim Davis, the county clerk for Rowan County, Kentucky, denied David Ermold a marriage license because he was gay, despite it being legalized.  

Last week she had to watch as he signed up to run against her in the next election.

Alabama did the right thing last night. Let's hope Rowan Country, Kentucky can do the same. 

If you enjoy a glass floor, don't forget to look down and thank your lucky stars

"But for a couple of bad breaks, especially visited upon vulnerable people, the outcome of life would be so different." 

This is a sentence that Slate's Mike Pesca spoke a couple months ago on his podcast The Gist in the midst of an interview.

I wrote the sentence down immediately, and I've been thinking about it ever since.

Mike is right. As a person who has suffered from a couple of bad breaks while in a vulnerable position, I can assure you that it doesn't take much to send a life reeling into desperate, uncharted, potentially life-changing waters. 

It's so easy to judge the circumstances of others if you enjoy a proverbial glass floor: a familial support system that will prevent you from ever falling too far.

I've seen it more times than a can count. 

• Legal troubles eliminated thanks to exceptionally skilled professionals paid for by parents
• College tuition, mortgage downpayment, automobiles, and infusions of cash offered by parents in desperate times
• Family owned businesses, legacy employment, nepotism, and second, third, and fourth chances given to someone thanks to the influence of a parent

If you're fortunate to be blessed with a glass floor, please don't forget how devastating a bad break can be for someone who isn't as blessed, and how incredibly stressful life can be for someone who is living without any safety net whatsoever.  

Think about this: According to a recent New York Fed study, one-third of Americans would not be unable to come up with $2,000 to deal with an emergency like an urgent home repair, medical crisis, or car accident.

This means that not only could they not raise $2,000 themselves, but they have no parent or family member capable of raising the money on their behalf, either. 

For many people, this situation would be unimaginable. But for almost a decade, I lived that reality, not because of bad decisions on my part or an unwillingness to work, but simply because of bad breaks. A cycle of poverty. A lack of support systems of any kind. The victim of a violent crime. An arrest for a crime I didn't commit. Homelessness. 

And I was lucky. I was physically and mentally healthy. Fairly intelligent. Capable of working 80 hours a week when necessary. I lived in a state with a strong social safety net. I had friends who put a roof over my head in a time of need. I wasn't the victim of racial discrimination.   

Still, I almost didn't make it.

Imagine what life could have been had my bad breaks had been coupled by mental illness. A physical disability. Addiction. Imagine if I had been unjustly convicted of that crime. Imagine how my life might be different had I been African American or female or any other marginalized member of society.  

It's so easy to see someone down on their luck, spiraling, and assume that they are to blame, when so many of us suffer similar breaks but are saved by the support systems that many don't enjoy.   

"But for a couple of bad breaks, especially visited upon vulnerable people, the outcome of life would be so different." 

It's so true. 

Americans would never allow someone like Roy Moore to work alongside them. Except for Republican Senators, of course.

Politics is the only arena where a gutless coward like Mitch McConnell can say, "I'm going to let the people of Alabama decide” about whether he should work alongside a pedophile like Roy Moore.

IN EVERY OTHER ARENA, PUBLIC OR PRIVATE, Americans would take a stand.

Can you imagine a dental hygienist or a machinist or a nurse saying: 

"Yes, this man has multiple female accusers claiming that he sexually harassed and/or assaulted them when they were underage, and yes, these women possess an enormous amount of circumstantial evidence supporting their claims, and yes, he was banned from a damn mall for harassing young women, and yes, he once called a girl out of high school math class to ask her on a date when he was a 28 year-old assistant district attorney, but if the boss thinks it's okay for him to work alongside me, I'm fine with that, too."

No, Mitch McConnell. You can have an opinion on Roy Moore regardless of what the voters of Alabama decide. That's called leadership, dumbass. It's called "having a spine." It's what good, decent people do everyday. We make moral choices instead of transactional choices. 

Yesterday Donald Trump offered his full support to Roy Moore for the first time. 

Last night the Republican Party followed suit, restoring their support for Moore after withdrawing it two weeks earlier.   

The party of the religious right has abandoned every shred of decency and goodness in order to guarantee that their massive transfer of wealth from the middle class to the wealthiest Americans can proceed as planned.   

This is a party whose leader has been accused of sexual assault by more than 20 women and who has admitted to sexual assault on tape. He is a man who bragged about going backstage during his beauty pageants in order to see women naked in their dressing rooms. 

Now they are also the party that supports pedophiles for the United States Senate.

They are a party of transactional, gutless, immoral politicians who choose to sit on the sidelines and allow evil men to rise to power when it's convenient for their agenda. 

Things I do #11: I get angry at the other versions of me.

Assuming that the theory of the multiverse is correct, I often find myself angry at the other versions of me that live in alternate timelines where Trump is not President and the world still makes sense.

Not "Ha! Ha!" angry.

Seriously angry. Legitimately angry. 

The wealthy are often playing an entirely different game than the rest of us.

I like this explanation of the difference between the wealthy, the middle class, and the poor a lot: 

"Entrepreneurship is like one of those carnival games where you throw darts or something.

Middle class kids can afford one throw. Most miss. A few hit the target and get a small prize. A very few hit the center bullseye and get a bigger prize. Rags to riches! The American Dream lives on.

Rich kids can afford many throws. If they want to, they can try over and over and over again until they hit something and feel good about themselves. Some keep going until they hit the center bullseye, then they give speeches or write blog posts about "meritocracy" and the salutary effects of hard work.

Poor kids aren't visiting the carnival. They're the ones working it."

I'd add to this metaphor the following:

Rich kids also have the additional advantage of enormous safety nets to protect them before and after they play the game. Private schools and tutors to insulate against failure before ever throwing a dart and family businesses and inherited wealth to fall back on if they decide to stop playing the game altogether.   

The Trump family is a perfect example of this.

Donald Trump is not a self-made man but the beneficiary of his father's immense real estate fortune. Incidentally, Fred Trump's real estate career was marked by investigations by the U.S. Senate for wartime profiteering and the Department of Justice for violating the Fair Housing Act for refusing to rent to African American tenants.  

Not exactly a fortune earned through hard work alone. 

The Trump children are all third generation beneficiaries of that fortune as well. They all work in the family business and have benefited from the free capital of the Trump fortune when launching businesses of their own.

No matter how many entrepreneurial darts Trump and his children threw, they would never be without wealth. Their family business served as an enormous safety net to failure, misfortune, or incompetence.  

Even Ivanka Trump's wealthy husband, Jared Kushner, is the product of an enormous family fortune. He, too, works for the family business. 

None of these people are self-made, boot-strapping, rags-to-riches people. They take credit for their wealth at every turn but are merely the stewards of a fortune that was amassed a long time ago. 

In fact, economists have demonstrated that had Donald Trump merely placed his father's fortune in an index fund and done nothing, he'd be more wealthy than he is today.  

Fred Trump went to the carnival in the second half of the twentieth century to try his hand at throwing darts. He probably cheated while playing the game and scored big, and the Trump family has been the beneficiaries ever since.

Are we surprised that the tax cuts currently proposed by Republicans vastly favor the wealthy while increasing middle class taxes?

Are we surprised that Trump and his wealthy supporters are hell bent on eliminating the inheritance tax?

Trump doesn't want to throw darts. He doesn't want to take any entrepreneurial risk. He and his wealthy supporters don't want to go anywhere near the carnival. Those darts were thrown long ago. They simply want to benefit from the risk taking and fortune building of their predecessors.  

Crazy just got crazier (if that was possible)

Trump is always making disturbing, undignified, self-serving statements, but this weekend, he took a decidedly crazy turn (even for him) when he launched a barrage of attacks at the UCLA basketball players who he helped to secure their release, the father of one of these players, and Republican Senator Jeff Flake. 

Included in these tweets were the following:

• A bizarre reference to himself in the third person
• A even more bizarre reference to himself as "your favorite President" despite his historically low approval ratings, his loss of the popular vote by more than 3 million votes, and the commonly held understanding that normal human beings should never to refer to themselves as anyone's favorite anything. 
• A middle school-like reference to Republican Senator Jeff Flake as "Jeff Flake(y)"
• The implication that China's shoplifting penalty of 5-10 years in prison is perfectly appropriate
• An expression of regret for helping to secure these American's release from Chinese custody because one of their fathers failed to acknowledge Trump's role in the process

California Congressman Ted Lieu responded to this last week well:

"As public servants, we help people because it is the right thing to do, not because we want to be praised for it. Also, the US President should never wish for Americans to be locked up in a foreign jail."

Apparently Bob Mueller's team directed the Justice Department to turn over a broad array of documents this weekend related to Trump's firing of FBI director James Comey and Jeff Sessions decision to recuse himself from the inquiry. So perhaps this bizarre tweet storm was the result of the intense pressure being applied on Trump and his White House in relation to the investigation into the Trump campaign's collusion with Russian operatives.

Or perhaps he's even crazier than we thought. 

The Republican tax bill is legitimately but expectedly evil. These two tidbits are surprisingly evil.

Two things happened yesterday that make it seem as if the Trump administration is trying hard to appear as evil as possible.

Almost as if they are auditioning for the role of the next Bond villain. 

And no, it's not the Republican's deeply unpopular tax bill that will cut taxes on the ultra wealthy, raise taxes on millions of middle class Americans, and increase the deficit by enormous amounts. That's admittedly evil but almost any standard, including and especially by the standards of Jesus Christ, who the Republicans constantly profess to love.

But we knew this was coming. It's straight out of the Republican playbook. 

And no, it's not the additional tax cuts that Republicans have added to the bill for (no joke) golf course and private jet owners. These cuts are also unbelievably evil, especially when you consider that more than one-quarter of all American children are food insecure on a daily basis.

But Republicans have been doing this kind of thing forever. 

No, yesterday the Trump administration decided to allow hunters to bring trophies of elephants they killed in Zimbabwe and Zambia back to the United States, reversing a ban put in place by the Obama administration in 2014. 

Trump has gone out of his way to take the side of elephant killers.

Can't imagine why they might decide to further threaten this already endangered species...

Meanwhile, Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin and his wife Louise Linton, who is famous for being born into enormous wealth, marrying into enormous wealth, and insulting Americans for not being rich enough, visited the Bureau of Engraving and Printing in order to take one of the most tone deaf photos of all time:

It's takes a special breed of narcissism and/or stupidity to look at this photo (and the photo of Donald Trump Jr.) and think, "Yes. Perfect. That's the one we want America to see."

Stupid, evil narcissists running the country and not even trying to hide it anymore. 

Just last week, ALL THIS happened...

Donald Trump tweeted that Kim Jong Un is short and fat in response Jong Un's claim that Trump was old and crazy. 

Trump also argued that at age 71, he is not old. He did not, however,  defend himself against Jung Un's insanity claim.   

In response to questions from reporters about Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin's brief meeting during the Asian summit, Trump said that he believed Putin's claims that Russia did not interfere with the election, despite the fact that all 17 United States intelligence agencies agree that Russia interfered with out election and attacked our democracy. Putin then denied that Trump even asked him about election interference during their brief meeting. In response, Trump then lashed out at former US intelligence leaders as "political hacks" and did not refute Putin's assertion. 

According to the latest poll, evangelicals in Alabama are now more likely to vote for Roy Moore after the disclosures that Moore had sexual relationships with several teenage girls when he was 32 years old and older, including a 14 year old girl.

One Alabama lawmaker defended Moore by arguing that Mary and Joseph of The Bible had a similar age disparity in their relationship, failing to recall that Mary and Joseph were, at least according to The Bible, were not having sex. Mary was a virgin, at least according to the text. 

A 36-year-old attorney and Trump nominee who has never tried a case and who was unanimously deemed “not qualified” by the American Bar Association was approved for a lifetime federal district judgeship by the Senate Judiciary Committee.

Details from the Republican tax bill emerged last week, including the surprise that 47 million middle class households - especially those with children - will get a tax hike while corporations and millionaires will be guaranteed the vast majority of the proposed tax breaks.

Other details from the tax plan include:

Students lose help paying off their loans. Teachers can no longer deduct the cost of buying classroom supplies. Grad students get taxed on their scholarships. Deductions on large out-of-pocket medical expenses will be eliminated. Massive cuts to Medicaid & Medicare. Massive cuts to the funding for Head Start and Pell Grants, while at the same time private school tuition will become fully deductible. Brand new tax breaks to the owners of (if you can believe it) golf courses.

Energy Secretary Rick Perry, who didn't know the Department of Energy regulated and protected nuclear power plants until he was given the job and actually campaigned on a platform to eliminate the Department of Energy, said that sexual assault could be prevented if we simply use more fossil fuels to keep the lights on.

Trump appointed a man to the Department of Agriculture whose previous job was cabana attendant at Westchester Country Club.

Trump appointed a man to the Energy Department whose previous job was manager at Meineke Auto Repair in New Hampshire.

A new appointee to the EPA Scientific Advisory Board stated that the air in the United States is "too clean for optimum health."

Trump's pick to lead a State Department office of female empowerment strongly criticized the movie "Frozen" for not having enough men in it.

All of this is not to make you despondent  or disillusioned. It is simply to remind you that if you oppose Donald Trump and his leadership, you cannot become complacent. You must act and continue to act until honest, ethical, capable leadership is restored for our country. 

Write to or call your Senator or Congressperson regularly. Download the 5 Calls app, which will make the five most strategic phone calls for you every day and tell you exactly what to say to be most effective. I don't use it every day, but I use it three or four times a week and vow here to do better. 

Volunteer for a campaign or cause. Make a monetary donation. Run for office. Ensure that your friends, family, neighbors, and coworkers are registered to vote. 

Stay informed.  

Every week Trump and his supporters in Congress are attacking the very institutions that make our nation great. They are doing so quietly, strategically, and ruthlessly. We must stand as a bulwark to their efforts. We must resist at every turn. We must make it as difficult as possible for them to erode our democracy and damage our foundations until the 2018 and 2020 elections. 

Download that app. Do it right now. 

The 14 women who have accused Trump of sexual harassment or assault

Donald Trump and his Press Secretary, Sarah Huckabee Sanders, claim that all 14 of the women who have accused Trump of sexual harassment and/or assault are lying.

At the same time, Trump admitted to sexual assault while aboard an Access Hollywood bus back in September of 2005, and his description of this assault is strikingly similar to some of these women's accusations.

Trump also famously tweeted this:

In summary:

• According to Donald Trump, 14 women are liars, but he is not, even though both he and the women are speaking  about the same same thing in the same terms. 
• Trump seems to believe that women and men cannot work together without sexual assault taking place.

I have worked almost exclusively in the company of women for 20 years. It is not uncommon for me to be the only man in the room at any number of meetings or professional development. Prior to that, I attended an all women's college and was always the only man in class. 

Despite my proximity to women for almost a quarter century, I am quite confident that no woman would claim that I sexually harassed or assaulted her.

Trump is no different than Harvey Weinstein except that he has a Republican Congress and a Press Secretary standing behind him. History will judge these people poorly. 

The women who have come forward so far include:

Ninni Laaksonen, former Miss Finland.
 “Trump stood right next to me and suddenly he squeezed my butt” in July 2006.

Jessica Drake.
Said Trump grabbed and kissed her without consent, then offered her $10,000 for sex in 2006.

Karena Virginia.
Says she was groped by Trump at the U.S. Open in 1998.

Cathy Heller.
Says Trump grabbed her and attempted to kiss her at Mar-a-lago in 1997.

Summer Zervos.
Apprentice contestant says Trump started kissing her and grabbing her breasts, began "thrusting his genitals" in 2007.

Kristin Anderson.
Said Trump reached under her skirt and grabbed her vagina through her underwear in the early 1990s.

Jessica Leeds.
Said Trump lifted up the armrest, grabbed her breasts and reached his hand up her skirt in the early 1980s.

Rachel Crooks.
Says she was assaulted by Trump in an elevator in Trump Tower in 2005.

Mindy McGillivray.
Says Trump groped her while she was attending a concert at Mar-a-lago in 2003.

Natasha Stoynoff.
Says Trump pushed her against a wall and jammed his tongue down her throat at Mar-a-lago in 2005.

Jennifer Murphy.
Apprentice contestant says Trump kissed her on the lips after a job interview in 2005.

Cassandra Searles.
Says Trump grabbed her ass and invited her to his hotel room in 2013.

Temple Taggart McDowell.
Former Miss Utah says Trump kissed her directly on the lips the first time she met him in 1997.

Jill Harth.
Says Trump repeatedly sexually harassed her and groped her underneath a table in 1993.