November 3rd: A Day of Infamy? / A Repeat Corona Crisis in NY?.

November 3rd: A Day of Infamy?... Just a few years ago, American Presidents behaved publicly, for the most part, in a dignified manner: in a word, ‘Presidential.’  In their well-tailored Brooks Brothers suits, Presidents spoke in intelligent [to a degree] and complete sentences, and dealt with their peers around the world in a respectful, civil and judicious manner, as their positions warranted. Oh sure, we’ve had Presidents who were not particularly suitable for the job, i.e., Ford, Carter, but they did fulfill their Presidential duties as guardians of the nation as best they could.

Our fragile democracy was not threatened by demagogic and deranged individuals. 

Not anymore.  The current President is dismissive of the principles of our democracy, including a cruel disrespect for our basic humanity, no belief in oppositional fair play, and absolutely no regard for our constitutional-mandated freedoms. He’s only interested in amassing as much money as he can, regardless of legality, along with promises to obliteraate his enemies: he comports himself like one of those  marauding Russian soldiers entering Berlin at the end of World War II: he’s essentially out of control.

Mr. Gripes’ long-held belief that this the stable political culture of this country, at the very least, would keep us safe from all the turmoil  and kleptocracy of the rest of the world no longer is viable.

The reason? Trump may take us all down.

It’s obvious, I think, to anyone paying attention for the past year that there’s a Republican plan to keep Mr. Trump in office, whatever the result of the November election may be.  Let’s start about a year ago when President Trump ‘kidded’ that if he loses the 2020 election, he’s not leaving office. At first, I think, Americans thought the idea was just another of Trump’s ‘throw-away’ lines, meant to be chatted among the media for a few days, but nothing for us to be worried about.

Donald Trump repeatedly has asserted it’s going to be a ‘rigged’ election, if he loses. ‘Rigged’ is Trumpian code for what exactly? That no matter if Mr. Trump gets trounced and beaten badly in the election, popular-vote-wise or electorally, he’s going to mount a no-holds-barred, exhausting campaign through the courts and God-knows-where-else to overthrow the verdict. ‘Rigged’, to Trump, means the election results coming up will change nothing – Mr. Trump is staying. And, even if he ‘loses’ in the courts, he’ll still resist: He’ll have to be carried out of the White House.

There’s a recent precedent for a disruptive election process. Mr. Gripes, who sadly possesses an elephantine memory when it comes to political chicanery, recalls an incident during the 2000 Florida ‘hanging chad’ recount imbroglio: in a county-government office in Broward County, a few days after the voting, ballot-counting inspectors, maybe a dozen seated around a large table, were beginning to take on the task of assessing the validity of some of those questionable ‘chad’ ballots. 

Suddenly, there was a pounding on the glass doors and windows surrounding the room. Screaming Republican operatives, just outside the room, and certainly under a directive of the Bush campaign, made such a racket and created such consternation and fear that the task at hand was suspended, never to be resumed. That insurrectional action was the initial phase of Republican state officials’ push to award Florida’s electoral votes to George Bush weeks later. Intimidation worked to perfection. Dare I say it? ‘Anarchy’ won the day.

Is it possible the election coming up will be ‘fair ‘, according to the President? No way. Donald Trump has a foolproof strategy that’s worked so many times for him in the past: undermine the legitimate processes, throw a million charges at his opponents, denigrate them, confuse the public, and, above all, create a lot of chaos. And if that doesn’t work, create even more chaos. 

Just imagine what the Republicans have in store for us the day after the election: a demand for recounts in every state that’s close; a demand to validate every ballot one-by-one; a rush to the courts for rulings, whether justified or not; a million accusations of a rigged election, further gumming up and delaying the process, even replacing state electors of the Electoral College with new ones who will then back Trump;  and at the end of this insanity, as Trump gets legal backing from his sycophantic, boot-licking Attorney General Bill Barr, calling in the military to deny a Biden victory, citing ‘a national emergency.’

The overall strategy is real simple:  Legally, illegally, justified or unjustified, just keep the plates spinning until the other side gives in, and gives up.

Batten down the hatches, Americans: we’re in for one hell of a ride.

A Repeat Corona Crisis in NY?.....New York, regrettably, appears to be descending into another perilous corona-virus crisis akin to the grim days of March and April in which, you remember, shortages of hospital beds, personal protection equipment, and ventilators were the most urgent issues, and the threat of hospitals being overwhelmed very real.

Somehow, through a confluence of missteps by politicians’ timidity and religious leadership, blind ignorance, pig-headed stupidity, or authoritarian willfulness, we’re heading down that road again. And, this time, the winter and flu seasons will be here soon.

Dissecting this developing calamity, the largest fault, despite their vehement denials, lies with a particular segment of the population: the ultra-Orthodox who are concentrated in some areas of New York, and comprise a very significant percentage of citizens who live there. In those zones, during the last month or so, the positivity rates for contracting the virus have jumped [from a little over 1% to as high as 16% in some areas]. 

The conclusion as to the direct cause of the startling rise has to be the ultra-Orthodox citizenry and the disregard for basic virus safeguards and rules.  As they say, ‘Just look at the data.’ It’s impossible, looking at that data, that it could be anything else.

But the inhabitants of the areas with rising infection rates are not solely to blame. In fact, I think it’s the political and religious leadership, who know better, that are especially at fault.  But in the affected communities that’s not the prevalent sentiment. In fact, the rabbinate in areas like Williamsburg, Borough Park and in mid-Hudson Valley asserts that the ultra-Orthodox groups, among all the putative culprits, are being ‘singled-out’. Come on, man.  Don’t BS me. You know what that statement represents? Denial. 

The most vexing problem in these communities is the leadership: it has been pitiful. Instead of acknowledging that face-covering mandates are being ignored, despite warnings from doctors and medical authorities, and that large congregants of adults attending religious services or weddings are probably ‘superspreaders’ of the virus, these elderly religious leaders, whose numbers incidentally have been decimated in this corona period, encouraged the dissemination of the misinformation, which accelerated the virus spread.

But blame for this impending disaster is not only limited to religious leadership.  Timid politicians here in New York State and the city are at fault, too.

After all, it’s a fact that the rabbinical hierarchy can deliver virtually a 100% bloc of votes for a candidate they favor in an election; their congregations look to them to make that decision for them. 

Breaking that down, that means if we posit a rabbi supports a particular candidate, and there are, let’s suppose, 2,000 members in his synagogue, that’s 2,000-to-zero votes in the bag for that candidate. You can imagine what a mother lode that represents for avaricious politicians like Cuomo and de Blasio [any politician, probably.] That’s got to be the reason why during the past few weeks, there’s been no police enforcement of a mask policy or a crowd-limitations mandate. We can’t offend anyone, is the calculus of de Blasio and Cuomo; those unanimous voting blocs are too precious. 

Oh, yes, the cops tell people to put on masks, maybe, but no arrests or fines. Warnings and slaps on the wrist, that’s it. There’s only one policy that would work: fat fines of $500 per individual, $25,000 for institutions. Only a few days ago, Mr. Big Shot, Andrew Cuomo, very late in the game, made the point that enforcement with fines and even imprisonment will now occur. That’s like shutting the barn door after the horses have run out. The move is much too late. Corona virus now runs amok in neighborhoods. It’s the same story once again, isn’t it? The politicians always disappoint, don’t they?

Mr. Gripes
October 14, 2020 
By Jim Israel

Trump’s Secret?/ Clown Car ’18 Version / You Blew It, Blue States / The Colossus of Sports Betting

Trump’s Big Worry – Donald Trump’s modus operandi now, if readers examine it, is identical to his methods prior to his Presidency. He obfuscates, he prevaricates, he confuses, he bullies, he cheats, he denigrates, and he doesn’t hold fixed positions on anything. Plus, he’s ruthless. 

It’s hard to get a ‘fix’ on exactly what his strategy is regarding Robert Mueller’s investigation. We only know that he’s dead set on closing it down.

One of the obvious questions I would pose to Mr. Trump is if he, as he claims, did not collude with the Russians during the 2016 race, why doesn’t he just let the investigation run its course to the end, at which point he’d be exonerated of any Russian collusion, and be judged innocent?  He’s much too vehement about stopping it for Mr. Gripes to believe that there’s ‘nothing there’, as Mr. Trump asserts. 

CNNMoney.com

Mr. Gripes has a different take on Trump’s strenuous opposition to the investigation. Collusion will be very difficult to prove: unless there are ‘smoking guns’ out there – on paper or on e-mails – criminality will be virtually impossible to prove. Witnesses asserting his guilt will be countered by witnesses saying he’s innocent, and the whole matter will devolve into a ‘he-said-she-said’ situation, and produce nothing but a muddled confusion.  Without hard evidence, nothing will stick.

So, it’s not collusion that is the principal focus of Mr. Trump these days; he’s most worried about something else: those tax returns. The further Mr. Mueller’s investigations delve into Mr. Trump’s rather spotty and sordid past, the more likely the concealed – and probably criminal – business deals come into play. I’d bet that what keeps our President up at night.

Let’s not forget that Trump thought right up to Election Day he had no chance to be elected; he figured he’d lose to Hillary, and then no one would care enough to pick through his earlier business deals. So, he probably didn’t cover his tracks particularly well. Whatever it was, Mr. Trump acts like he’s guilty of some very bad behavior, actions that could send him to jail.

therealdeal.com

I’ll leave my readers with a hunch guess as to what he was involved in: financial entanglements   in selling arms to enemies of the United States [perhaps laundering tons of cash]. The arms business, which can involve very rich sovereign countries and some murderous rivals of ours, i.e., Syria, Iran, China, Russia, might have proven just too alluring for a money-grubbing monster like Mr. Trump.

* * *

Clown Car, Revisited….Remember the Republican candidates’ ‘Clown Car’ of 2016? Sure you do…Hucklebee, Perry, Carson, Cain, Jeb Bush, etc., as well as the driver of the bus, Donald J. Trump. We laughed at the spectacle, but couldn’t take our eyes off of them. Well, the Democratic Party, not to be undone, now possesses its own clown car, 2018 version; alas, there’s nothing remotely interesting about this crew -- they’re just ancient, like the barnacles Mr. Gripes, in his young summers, used to chisel off the bottoms of imperious rich guys’ boats at the end of Long Island. 

Just look at some of them: that perennial race horse Joe Biden, who incidentally would be a shoo-in in any gleaming-white-teeth competition, reminds Mr. Gripes of the pet hamster who scurries feverishly around his wheel, going nowhere; Joe never stops running as he bides his time for another election; the annoying Nancy Pelosi [not running, but part of the menagerie], who’s seemingly been around DC since the James Polk Administration --  I have a single piece of advice, Ms. Pelosi:  do an Amelia Earhart and disappear; Elizabeth Warren, no longer Pocahontas, but now the female Sitting Bull of the Senate; Bernie Sanders is in the hunt again, although he’ll be 100 before we know it. He thinks the country is moving in his direction – Bernie, don’t delude yourself; you really have no shot. [He’ll be tarred and feathered as a Communist stooge, and the Republicans will find all kinds of lethal Commie dirt on him, most likely with Russian assistance.] 

And, in a stunning development, the vehicle just took on another passenger: John Kerry announced last week he’s considering a run in 2020. Is he kidding? John, your campaign in 2004 was a complete fiasco, and I’ll bet there’s not one Democrat out there who’d vote for you again. Please take a personal inventory, and stop embarrassing yourself – a plush Nantucket retirement with Mrs. Heinz57 awaits you.

If this meager bunch is representative of what the Democrats will be offering in 2020, Mr. Trump must be grinning from ear to ear.

* * *

A headline from ‘Slate’ a few weeks back: ‘The official who ordered 147 trees cut down so a well-heeled contributor would have a ‘better view out his front window’ is named National Parks Commissioner by the Trump Administration.’ Just beautiful. Three, maybe seven, long, long years of this car wreck to go, folks.

* * *

The real life stories are so heartless, so cruel. Just recently, a man who’s lived in this country for 39 years, and who has four daughters, is deported back to Mexico. Why? No reason that makes sense.  Pure vindictiveness.  And, let’s face it, as the Trump people place more and more of their supporters into positions of authority, these tragedies will occur more and more frequently.

Mr. Gripes’ suspicion is that during the Obama years, immigration officials and police were foaming at the bit, infuriated by Barack Obama’s benevolent approach to essentially harmless [and tax-paying] immigrants. Now that Trump and Sessions have given carte blanche permission to arrest and deport, the law is out for blood.  Immigration enforcement increasingly isn’t differentiating between criminals and perfectly honest, law-abiding individuals – they’re arresting anyone without the proper documentation. This is just so stupid:  besides, the courts and jails are currently completely overwhelmed.  It’s a bureaucratic morass. Why at this time, with so many critical problems this country faces, create one more enormous, unnecessary headache, and heartache? These Trump operatives show no mercy.

* * *

 

‘A Day Late, A Dollar Short’ – Blue State Governors and Mayors, you blew it: you had eight years of a supportive Democratic President in the White House sympathetic to your burdens: he’d at least listen to your concerns about the crumbling urban areas: he was your hope and opportunity to obtain the financing you desperately need to repair transit systems, railroads, buildings, bridges, schools, roads, basically the entire crumbling infrastructure of this country. That’s right: you had two terms of a benevolent White House. But virtually nothing was accomplished, as you did nothing but fall into petty, divisive, inter-party and intra-party disputes, and  the inevitable happened: A Republican President came into office, and you’re today staring at the implacable countenance of an undeniably hostile Republican President and Congress. You’ll end up getting crumbs.
 
If it were all up to Donald Trump, he wouldn’t fork over a nickel. ‘Sh_t,’ he roars, ‘Those a__holes didn’t vote for me, and now they come begging? That ain’t happening’. The slashing of funding for urban areas is only just beginning. So what if De Blasio in New York City needs billions for transit repair and upgrade?   Trump will stump him on his progressive throat. All of you fat-cat urban politicians who never have to contend with any real opposition in your elections:  you dawdled, you bitched, you whined, you got nothing done, and now you’re in real big trouble. The Republicans play very hard ball – it’s all ‘vote for me or face the harsh consequences‘. 

And here’s a double whammy: have you noticed that interest rates are going up, after a long period of dormancy? For years, we had low interest rates attached to municipal bonds, lessening the debt obligations – from now on, with the deficit exploding, the new debt service is going to be much more expensive. Shame on all of you for wasting a golden opportunity. From here on you’re going to pay dearly for your interminable turf wars.

* * * 

Soon to be Legal: Sports Bets…The National Football League, as a lot of you know, has suffered some setbacks in the last couple of years: its TV ratings, which allowed the league to grow exponentially over the past 60 years, have faltered a bit lately: a drop of 16%, which is significant. Why? There was a national anthem kerfuffle; severe player injuries on the field, which sidelined many of its stars; recognition by the public that life-altering concussions occur all too frequently, and attendant to that, a prohibition by many mothers in allowing their sons to play football. All these factors at least chipped away at the NFL’s massive popularity.

Well, Mr. Gripes has a solution, and it’s staring right in the face of the sport’s grandees: betting on games. And this goes for every other sport out there.

Up to now, the various professional sports leagues have pushed mightily to not allow the public to bet on games of any kind [only one sport, horse racing, is generally permitted to take wagering in a public setting, and has been for centuries. Why is that sport exempted from the ban? Maybe because it’s forever been a pastime of rich and powerful men, but that’s just a guess.]

Why has virtually every professional sports league fought so vehemently against betting on competitive games across the board? Perhaps because gambling is considered a ‘sin’ in many quarters, including organized religion, and the politicians, who hold the hammer on this issue, don’t want to have to tangle with opposition generated by their more devout constituents? Or, the unproven fear that as gambling takes hold in a community, the moral fabric of that community will start to fray? 

In any event, the leagues now are beginning to change their tunes. Finally, it’s dawning on these rather slow-on-the-draw officials that the revenues the leagues could generate from legalized gambling would be absolutely huge. If they’re worried about television ratings, gambling will insure a much bigger audience, and consequently, much larger fees for the rights to televise these games.

And, they’d be entitled on some level to a percentage of the revenues generated by the betting.  Ten percent, let’s say, of the ‘take’ would mean a ‘gusher’ of cash for teams.

Its appeal to the public is assured. Here’s why: suppose the football New York Jets are playing the Indianapolis Colts. Mr. Gripes, who roots for the Jets, would like nothing more than to walk over to a betting establishment, lay $20 on the Jets to cover the point spread, and then settle down in front of an enormous TV to enjoy the game, over a huge hoagie, fries and pint of beer –ah, heaven on earth. And he’d probably make another bet on the second televised game as well.  A game is so much more interesting when there’s a wager involved. It’s a captive audience. Ask any sports fan.

Think of that $20 bet multiplied by a portion of the average 14,000,000 football viewers who watch a game on any given Sunday. If half of them bet $20, we’re talking revenues of $140,000,000!  And that’s just for that one Sunday afternoon.

If the politicians can get out of the way, this is a guaranteed bonanza. No need to brand, or expend millions on advertising. We all know how to bet. If it were permitted, many, many fans would love to gamble a little on games. When it’s legal, it can’t miss. And everyone wins: the states, cities and municipalities, which are desperate for cash, get a piece of the action [without raising taxes]; the leagues make a fortune as television ratings skyrocket…..and the public will love it.

It’s coming….in a decade, legalized sports gambling will be entrenched in this country.

Count on it.

Jim Israel, aka Mr Gripes
February 12, 2018

Hasta la Vista, Fidel/ Scranton Joe Is Running Again/ Christmas Plot?

Straight to Hell, Fidel --Mr. Gripes was handed an early Christmas present on November 25th: he woke up to discover that Fidel Castro had died. My immediate reaction: ‘The SOB is finally dead -- this morning there’s one less bastard on this earth.’

And, indeed, what a ruthless, cruel, heartless monster he was. And crazy, too: when Nikita Khrushchev and John Kennedy were attempting delicately to extricate their countries from initiating a nuclear war during the Cuban missile crisis in 1962, Fidel Castro’s persistent advice to Mr. Khrushchev was : ‘Go, go for it. Use the missiles to launch those nuclear weapons on the U.S. if America threatens Cuba.’  Castro was advocating the destruction of the planet, which would surely have followed any attack on the United States mainland. When I read this recently, I was immediately convinced: Fidel Castro was a demonic and murderous psychopath.

Mr. Castro did, miraculously, manage to survive 57 years in power, since 1959. That is astonishing.  But, readers, don’t be misled by the fools who still support the Castro reign. Don’t believe for a second it’s because there was a groundswell of love and devotion to Fidel. No, the Castros have maintained power through the very same means that all cruel despots use: a huge secret police apparatus that penetrates every aspect of Cuban society, eliminating any political opposition through intimidation and imprisonment, prohibiting a free press or free assembly, or simply through the barrel end of a gun, or the noose at the end of a piece of rope.

Cubans are a very gifted and beautiful people blessed with hard work-ethics, who reside on a gorgeous island that possesses bountiful natural resources. Fidel Castro essentially took these people and their magnificent country and ground them into the ground. Mr. Gripes laughs when he hears the apologists assert, ‘But Castro gave his people free medical care.’ Yeah, and the doctors, I bet, deal with a lot of malnutrition. The jobless economy is so dire, and has been for so long, that people struggle to eat. It’s an impoverished, tattered country.

Castro, when he came to power, had an opportunity to mold his country into one of the most envied nations on earth: his people, if they were treated differently, and if Castro had chosen a more benevolent path, could easily have achieved whatever they wanted. And let’s not forget that American investment and aid would have poured in. The country had everything it needed. But Castro didn’t hesitate to take another road: his ambition was one-man rule and domination, and if killing enemies and destroying the economy were the methods to get there, so be it. 

His supporters in this country never did accept Fidel Castro as the criminal he was. After all, he was a devoted Marxist, and the leader of a country that was a ‘workers paradise.’ Everyone would be treated the same, the doctor or the peon in the sugar fields. It was going to an egalitarian society. Castro promised this, and a lot of duped people in America and Europe believed him for a long, long time. 

Did you know that Cuban citizens, whose land is surrounded by the spectacular Caribbean Sea, are not allowed to keep their own boats! Why? Fidel Castro, a man of the people, was afraid his people would try to escape the ‘workers’ paradise’ and direct the ships to America, to a free life. Fidel Castro was a horrific, sorrowful catastrophe, who mistreated his own people right up to the end.


Jobless Man from Scranton -- At least he’s honest: Joe Biden, soon to be out of his job as court jester in the Obama royal court, admitted a couple of weeks ago, “I’ve done this [politics] since I was 26 years old; I can’t do anything else.’ Naturally, in the same breath he announces he’s running for President in 2020. Guys like him always are running for office, or getting ready to run. They’re like racehorses – lead them to a race track, and they witlessly run, and run, and run.

Mr. Biden, not a man of introspection, doesn’t realize he’s finished. His time has passed: he’s worked successfully the ‘I’m-from-scrappy-Scranton-and me-and-the-working-man-are-attached-at-the-hip’ crap for a long time. His supporters, however, extensively white, blue-collar, union, urban, and a bit long-in-the-tooth, have just rejected the Democrats and voted for Trump. He’s now a relic of the Franklin Roosevelt era.

When Mr. Biden confesses he can’t do anything else but run for office, he’s not kidding: I bet he couldn’t sell a chocolate bar or a comic book to kids on their lunch break in a candy store. Mr. Gripes, despite Mr. Biden’s jobless plight, sheds no tears for him; some fat-cat, liberal, Democratic tax-dodge foundation will give him a cushy $750,000 no-show sinecure for which Mr. Biden, flying first-class around the country while staying at $800-a-night, big-shot hotels, will attend well-heeled conferences to exhort crestfallen Hillary souls to keep the faith –2020 will be here soon enough.

Why is Joe Biden in such a hurry to announce a run at this ungodly early date? [Also, let’s not forget that challengers like Elizabeth Warren and, yes, Bernie Sanders, are growling about running, too]. Mr. Gripes has a theory. The Democratic Party, I suspect, is convinced that Donald Trump is going to fall on his face, fail miserably as President, and serve just one term, gift-wrapping a Democratic Presidency in 2020.

Beware, once again, my vanquished and wishful-thinking Democratic friends: Mr. Trump may turn out to be quite adroit at retail politics. In the interregnum before he takes office next month, for example, Donald Trump has already made some pronouncements that are broadly appealing to a majority of Americans: his caustic criticism of the ridiculous cost of the new Air Force One [$4 billion!], and his anger at the ongoing price overruns for a new military plane, the F-35 [$400 billion, and counting!!], are very shrewd ploys: no one is for extravagant waste. [Of course, nothing may come of his comments, but Mr. Trump is surely aware that first impressions in this country are usually all that’s remembered.]

Americans have known of outrageous overruns for decades, and nothing is ever done about them. I applaud Mr. Trump for at least announcing that the days of rubber-stamped approvals without real oversight are over. And if Mr. Gripes, who cannot conceive ever voting for Mr. Trump, is muttering, ‘Go get ‘em, Donald, beat on them like a drum,’ there are a hell of a lot of other potential 2020 voters out there, Republican and Democrat, thinking the same thing.


‘The War on Christmas’ – It’s bizarre that right next to the uproar these days about ‘fake’ news on the internet, Americans are simultaneously bombarded with the notion that this country is in the midst of a subversive ‘war on Christmas.’ Talk about a phony and spurious issue….

Mr. Gripes reasons that this is another ‘shot across the bow’ by the radical / evangelical right towards liberals and their media pals. It’s a slippery slope, the neo-Conservatives proclaim, when media and businesses instead of proudly asserting ‘Merry Christmas’, substitute ‘Happy Holidays’ as the greeting. Taking ‘Christ’ out of Christmas will be next, they say, then the elimination of Christ in public discourse and, ultimately, the banning of Christianity itself.

The fear is absurd on its face: Mr. Gripes took a stroll down Fifth Avenue in Manhattan a couple of weeks ago, enjoying immensely the Christmas decorations in department store windows, as well as the festive bonhomie of everyone walking down the avenue. Christmas, on 5th Avenue, is no different now than it was when my family and I took that same stroll 60 years ago.

‘They’re killing Christmas’ is a bold-faced lie. How does an obvious falsehood like this manage to endure for such a long shelf life? For one thing, it’s been promulgated by Bill O’Reilly for years, even though Mr. Gripes is convinced Mr. O’Reilly doesn’t believe a word of it. Let’s keep in mind, though, that Mr. O’Reilly is one terrific publicity engine for his endeavors, especially his books. [He did write one on Jesus Christ, in fact.] He knows that pushing this ‘dead Christmas’ idea, although patently untrue, arouses the conspiratorial tendencies of the Radical right, which always thinks liberals are out to snuff out ‘traditional’ American values and eviscerate our rights. Bill O’Reilly wants to create publicity, and a theory, however outlandish, about the demise of Christmas will have the media eating out of Mr. O’Reilly’s hands. And, voila, his books then fly out of the bookstores.

Let’s get one thing straight, by the way: the American Constitution guarantees religious freedom for all citizens. We’re free to belong to any religious order, whether it’s Catholicism, Buddhism, Hinduism, Judaism, Atheism, Islam, even Paganism. Sure, we’re a predominantly Christian country, but religious freedom is a protected right for everyone, no matter how minuscule the number of believers may be.

What’s especially dismaying to Mr. Gripes is that our President-Elect has taken up the cause. The other day, he made it a point to emphasize the words ‘Merry Christmas’ repeatedly in an impromptu press conference, giving credence to those who think saying ‘Happy Holidays’ is all a conspiracy to delete ‘Christmas’ from our American lexicon. Doesn’t Mr. Trump have many more important matters to deal with, as he’s going to be President in less than a month? Maybe not.

It’s Mr. Gripes’ contention that Donald Trump revels in conspiracy-thinking. It fits him to a tee. First of all, if the theory is dramatic enough, it creates a lot of publicity – and good or bad publicity is all Mr. Trump is after. Second, there’s no need to be truthful: just create a ‘plausible’ fiction, throw it up against the wall, and see what sticks. Verifiable facts are bunk. Mr. Trump, with his Obama-birth fabrications [‘I have investigators over in Honolulu right now and they’ve come up with some real interesting stuff.’], knew it was a total lie, but that issue, I think, actually jump-started his campaign to the White House.

And, last, conspiracy theorists, like Trump, thrive on tumult, disruption – shake up the established order, and create noise. So, of course, Donald Trump is going to play up a Christmas conspiracy – it’s custom-made for him. 

Jim Israel, aka ‘Mr. Gripes’
December 31, 2016