Why I voted for Trump and still would.
I believe Trump had/has better ideas which he might not be able to get legislated and passed.
I believe Hillary had/has wrong ideas and most likely she could have gotten them passed.
I no longer am amazed by much but I do, on occasion, become discouraged when I hear about how munificent liberals are with our tax dollars because they favor welfare and anxiously support dependency. Granted there are those who need and deserve a hand but the number receiving such has grown like Topsy.
Supporting dependency is not an act of kindness. It is demeaning, it cripples the human spirit. When Dr. Carson made his recent comment about poverty of the spirit he was jumped on but he was right.
The best thing we can wish for and should work towards for anyone is they have the opportunity to live in a loving and secure home, be raised by a caring,involved two parent family, be challenged by a solid education and not be ensnared by addiction.
Liberal programs have done everything to break up the family, encourage reliance, denigrate faith in a higher being and/or cause and destroy a solid educational opportunity. Lately we have been witnessing a large segment of college youth protesting free speech, the exchange of ideas and administrators cowering before their radical demands and actions.
PC'ism has gone wild. It is choking American character and independence.
If you want more of something just fund it and now we have more receiving food stamps, more on welfare, more seeking disability payments and the list of demands and entitlements is becoming endless.
Anyone seeking to curtail these unhealthy trends, who wishes to break this dependency chain is attacked as non-caring, heartless and racially insensitive.
A minimum wage concept was establish to encourage young people to seek employment and gain skills that would prepare them for life. The concept has been stretched beyond its original intent and now we hear no one can support a family on a minimum wage and thus the minimum wage must be raised as if this is a worthy idea. If so why stop at $15/hour? The founder of Facebook, Mark Zuckerberg, argued recently, upon receiving an Honorary Degree from Harvard, which he left before graduating, that the government should pay citizens a living wage. I guess he assumes we will obtain the funds from China or maybe Cuba.
Bernie Sanders and Pocahontas Warren preach Socialism as if empirical evidence suggests it has proven more successful than capitalism. I assume they never read Hayek's "The Road To Serfdom."
The cumulative cost of social programs in America is why government deficits are mounting and will prove unsustainable. Trump's budget proposal was attacked recently as being genocidal by a black minister. Granted parts of his proposals are questionable but there does come a time when deficits, like proverbial straw, will break the camel's back.
We are raising entire generations who will remain unemployable because they lack skills , a family structure that is supportive and a basic education. I dare liberals to pat themselves on the back if this is what are the results of their policies.
This is not generosity. This is akin to abject contempt for one's fellow man.
I am not suggesting this is truthful/accurate but it makes the point. (See 1 below.)
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Oh by the way:https://www.armstrongeconomics
and do not forget about Israel.
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Mexicans were asked what they thought of Trump's proposed wall.They replied, "We are very upset .....but we'll get over it."]
Is it possible Trump got something right? You would never know from reading and/or listening to the mass media. They are simply out to destroy Trump. (See 2 below.)++++++++++++++
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I have posted one of the finest explanations regarding Trump and The Middle East Peace Process between Israel and the PLO. Former Amb. Oren agrees that Trump should recognize Jerusalem as Israel's s capital now for reasons that are similar to mine. A must read. (See 3 below.)
What makes this article more poignant for me is that before I read it I had literally just finished reading: "Distilled" an autobiography of Charles Bronfman written with Howard Green.
Except for his enormous wealth and stature, because of being the youngest son of Sam Bronfman of Seagram fame, Charles' life, in a very few ways related to Israel, parallels my own. I too had a father who cast a large shadow but I had no siblings, Charles was one of four.
Charles had competitive sibling issues, obviously I had none. My father was a Zionist as is Charles and our feelings for Israel are the same. Charles and a former client of mine, Michael Steinhardt, , began "Birthright Israel," one of the world's most successful charities which sends young people to Israel for 10 days, all expenses paid for and some members of my own family have benefited from their generosity.
Lynn and I set up a "tiny" foundation, while living in Atlanta, for the purpose of sending kids to Israel as well but it is oh so tiny and has not yet been fully funded.
My cousin, who is The Israeli Consul General in Los Angeles, worked with Edgar Bronfman, Charles' brother, prior to being appointed to his ambassadorial post.
Lynn's side of the family includes a great uncle who was in the Irgun, his closest friend was Prime MInister Begin. Uncle Avram was one of the founders of The Likud Party and he helped groom Netanyahu for government.
I mention this because the interview I have posted of former Amb. Oren deals with why Obama,Secretary's Clinton and Kerry failed and why Trump may not succeed either but has a better chance if peace is possible, which I do not believe it is at this time. It also covers what I have always maintained when it comes to why Israel has failed to gain the respect and gratitude of the world I believe it deserves.
Oren points out Israelis have resorted to facts as a way of countering anti- Israel emotions and feelings. Israeli's are tough, thick skinned and necked and have fought anti-Semitism's emotional roots with logic and reasoning. I have maintained a consistent victor eventually is turned against because, over time, the world generally falls in love with and supports the victim.
It is happening on American Campuses today. Screaming fascistic tactics and radicals defend Palestinians as they attack our constitution, capitalism and America's successes while ignoring what this country has meant for the world and done in response to evil. Yes, America has made mistakes but where would the world be without American involvement? Well the Syrians and Europeans are finding out because of Obama's failed policies, because Obama gutted America's image and sought to weaken America and wanted America to retreat with its tail between its legs.
Finally, I found Oren's comments about Netanyahu's attitude towards peace with The Palestinians also parallels by own. Netanyahu will not preside over the destruction of his people and realizes the thorny issues he confronts because a Palestinian State, at this time, cannot survive. Sharon proved that when he turned over Gaza to Hamas
Until the PLO leadership is ready to recognize Israel's right to exist, is capable of defending against Hamas and other radical Islamist groups, peace is a pipe dream. Until Abbas and his cronies are forced to face reality and America, encouraged by State Department Arabists, stops feeding bullies and the U.N peace will remain a pipe dream.
Ironically, one can argue, ISIS and other radical Islamist groups are Israel's best allies because of the co-ordinated threat they pose to Egypt, The Saudis, Jordan etc. The Saudi's financed and supported the Wahhabi element within their ranks and now their very existence is threatened by the Islamic Frankenstein they created. Perversely, these Arab nations now need a strong Israel and are being driven towards Israel. Trump understands this, the leaders of these Arab nations understand this and Netanyahu understands this but nothing will come of this unique opportunity until hatred towards Israel subsides and that will take eons, if it ever happens. Territorial and religious issues are not easily resolved and this is more the case when dealing with tribal societies.
This is why hatred towards Israel on American College Campuses is driven by insanity and the stupidity of left wing youth whose minds are poisoned and whose ability to reason and understand history has been wrecked by PC'ism etc. They have been duped by the cry of victim hood! It is this same irrational zeal that forms the basis for explaining why Ringling closed, why climate change is going to destroy our world before N Korea and Iran launches nuclear missiles, and why Trump should be impeached for winning over Saint Hillary, etc.
As I always say - save me from the do gooders!
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Dick
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1)The New Family Breadwinners....Black Lives Matter
The new breadwinner in the family.
An emergency room physician told me that a woman in her late 20's came to the ER today with her 8th pregnancy.
She told the first doctor she saw: "My Mama told me that
I am the breadwinner for the family."
He asked her to explain She said that she can make babies, and babies get money from the State for the family. It goes like this:
The Grandma calls the Department of Child & Family Services, and states that the unemployed daughter is not capable of caring for all of her kids.
DCFS agrees, and tells her the children will need to go into foster care.
The Grandma then volunteers to be the foster parent, and receives a check for $1500 per child each month in Illinois .
Total yearly income: $144,000 tax-free and nobody has to go to work!
In fact, they get more if there is no husband/father/man in the home!
Not to mention free healthcare (Medicaid), plus a monthly card entitling them to free groceries and a voucher for 250 free Obamaphone minutes each month. This does not include WIC and other welfare benefits...that they are "entitled" to.
Indeed, Grandma was correct that her fertile daughter is the "breadwinner" for the family.
Worse, the Muslims have been paying attention, and by mandating that each Muslim family have eleven children, they will soon replace the voting bloc above and can be running this country within 25 years. Read the above again, until it sinks in, and then ask yourself if your Children, Grandchildren, and Great Grandchildren will survive these severe changes to America!!!
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2) This Time, Trump Is Right About Trade
German and Chinese current account surpluses are symptoms of damaging imbalances.
President Donald Trump took his bellicose economic agenda abroad last week, blasting Germany for its “very bad” trade surplus—or “evil” as one German newspaper translated it.
Though German Chancellor Angela Merkel did not seem to care for the messenger, she should nonetheless hear the message. While Mr. Trump gets a lot wrong about trade, on this particular point he’s right. Germany’s current account surplus, which combines trade and investment income, is now the world’s largest. Along with China’s, it is a dangerous imbalance that leaves others, including the U.S. and the rest of Europe, worse off.
Mr. Trump does misstate the problem. It’s not, as he frequently claims, that a trade deficit means one country is using protectionist policies to win at another’s expense. Protectionism can change the patterns of a country’s exports and imports, but not the overall balance.It’s not just Mr. Trump who thinks so. “The criticism is right. Germany’s trade surplus is excessive,” says Marcel Fratzscher, president of DIW Berlin, a prominent German think tank. Mervyn King, former governor of the Bank of England, went further, arguing, “President Trump is right when he identifies a problem with current international trading and monetary relationships.”
Rather, deeper economic forces are at work. A trade surplus means a country consumes less than it produces and thus saves a lot. A deficit means the opposite. This can be benign: a country in the upswing of the business cycle, like the U.S., tends to have a deficit. A country in recession, or with an aging population, tends to have a surplus. However, the persistence and magnitude of Chinese and German surpluses and U.S. deficits suggest actual policy decisions are at work.
This comes by interfering with currency markets. As Mr. King notes, a country with a weak economy and a trade deficit would expect its currency to fall to boost exports and restrain imports. That can’t happen if exchange rates can’t move, as is the case with China and Germany, though for different reasons.
China was the largest of a group of countries that from 2003 to 2013 spent more than $5 trillion intervening in foreign exchange markets to hold down their currencies and bolster trade surpluses, according to a new book by Fred Bergsten and Joseph Gagnon of the Peterson Institute for International Economics. That drew production and jobs from deficit countries like the U.S., worsening the 2007-2009 recession and holding back the subsequent recovery. They estimate U.S. employment was depressed by more than one million jobs between 2009 and 2014 as a result.
Messrs. Bergsten and Gagnon suggest a new approach to prevent China from reverting to its old ways: When a country buys dollars to hold down its currency for competitive advantage, the U.S. should respond proportionately by purchasing that country’s currency. They also recommend the U.S. go beyond current law, which requires the U.S. to discourage currency manipulation in new trade pacts, by prohibiting it outright. Mr. Trump may seek just that in a renegotiated North American Free Trade Agreement. Since neither Mexico nor Canada manipulate their currencies, this would serve as a template for future pacts.China’s behavior has changed in recent years. It has allowed its exchange rate to appreciate and since 2014 has intervened to support it, and the trade surplus has shrunk.
Germany is a tougher challenge. Since adopting the euro in 1999, it hasn’t controlled its own currency. However, it did win competitive advantage over its neighbors in the currency union. Labor-market reforms restrained domestic wages. In 2007, a payroll tax cut, which made German labor more competitive, was financed with an increase in the value-added tax, which exempted exports.
In previous eras, those reforms would have pushed the deutsche mark higher, squeezing Germany’s trade surplus. Inside the euro, though, the burden has fallen on Germany’s neighbors, including France, to compete by grinding down domestic wages and prices through high unemployment and fiscal austerity. That has kept the entire region’s economy weak, forcing the European Central Bank to hold down interest rates and thus the euro. That inflates the entire region’s trade surplus with the world.
Mr. Fratzscher says the problem is not, as Mr. Trump claims, that Germany exports too much: “You can’t blame BMW for selling cars to American consumers.” (Indeed, BMW AG, Daimler AG and Volkswagen AG all assemble cars in the U.S.) “The problem is Germany is importing too little.”
In time that can be fixed if tight labor markets drive up German wages, bolstering domestic spending and imports. To hurry rebalancing, outsiders urge the German government to borrow and invest more, reducing domestic saving.
French President Emmanuel Macron is pressing for a “fiscal union” under which Germany in effect finances some of its neighbors’ budgets, loosening the vise of austerity in the rest of Europe.
Neither is appealing to Ms. Merkel or austere Germans. Mr. King says the euro may have to break up into a strong currency area led by Germany and a weak currency area including France.
Until now, U.S. leaders have been too attached to the euro to point this out. By contrast Mr. Trump, unburdened by any commitment to the status quo, can engage in “ruthless truth-telling,” as Mr. King puts it. After this past week, though, it’s doubtful Mr. Macron or Ms. Merkel will be in any mood to listen
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3) Obama treated Israel 'as part of the problem,' says ex-envoy Oren. With Trump, 'it's love, love, love'
By Times of Israel, Raoul Wootliff
As a noted historian, former Israeli ambassador to the United States and current Knesset member, Michael Oren has been grappling with the question of how Israel should be presented to the world for years.
Last year, shortly before being appointed deputy minister for public diplomacy, Oren was invited for a meeting with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to discuss just that.
“Delegitimization, the Boycott, Divest and Sanctions movement… What are we doing wrong? What could we be doing to present Israel better?” Oren, speaking to a crowded auditorium of English-speaking Israelis at a Times of Israel event Sunday night, recalled Netanyahu asking him.
Oren said he told the prime minister that he believed Israel was fighting the war of words with the wrong weapons. While “the other side” has a simple narrative peppered with buzzwords like “occupation,” “colonialism,” “oppression,” and “apartheid,” Israel, according to Oren, had yet to work out how to present a succinct and salient argument to counter its critics. Israel was falling behind in the battle for hearts and minds because it has not succeeded in creating a positive counter-narrative, Oren argued.
Tasked by Netanyahu with forming that narrative, Oren at first approached public relations experts, he recounted, but soon realized that traditional PR methods were the wrong approach to hasbara, or pro-Israel advocacy.
“I realized that we have been fighting feelings with facts. And everybody in a marriage knows that when a fact comes against a feeling, the feeling is going to win,” Oren said. “We can talk all we want about the facts of Israel’s history, but for an 18-year-old in the US, the simple message of ‘oppression’ is going to win out.”
Israel — one of the most emotive stories in history — should evoke feelings, Oren concluded. So he decided to turn to a group of poets. Together they created the following text to sum up the “feeling not facts” of Israel.
Israel is home.
It is open and inviting, creative and compassionate.
It defends freedom and promises its citizens equal rights.
It bridges east and west, ancient traditions and technologies that shape the future.
It has a free press, a globally respected justice system, and state-of-the-art health care for all.
It is a pioneer in women’s and LGBT rights, in conservation and water reclamation, and sustainable sources of energy and food for developing nations.
Israel has given shelter to refugees from seventy countries and humanitarian aid to disaster victims abroad.
It is the improbable story of vision and perseverance in the face of unspeakable hardship.
And it is the native land of the Jewish people for 4,000 years, the fulfillment of their yearning and dreams. Israel is community. It is family. Israel is home.
‘Love, love, love’
In conversation with Times of Israel editor David Horovitz, that same sense of “feeling” seemed to permeate Oren’s worldview on some of Israel’s most pressing current issues.
On US President Donald Trump’s visit to Israel last week, Oren said that above all, the emotion expressed by the billionaire businessman during the trip is what most touched Israelis and has the most potential to influence Israeli policy.
“If there’s one thing during the visit that he hammered down the whole time, it’s love, love, love. And I think that will be very helpful in terms of beginning a process,” Oren said of Trump’s efforts to restart negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians. “If you want us to be flexible, show us love. If you pressure us, we will hunker down.”
At Trump’s main speech in Israel, delivered at the Israel Museum in Jerusalem on May 23, those “feelings” of love for Israel were clear and were reciprocated by the crowd. “Iran’s leaders routinely call for Israel’s destruction,” the US president said, before declaring emphatically, “Not with Donald J. Trump, believe me.” The remark was met with cheers and a standing ovation. “Thank you, thank you, thank you,” said Trump as he waited for the clapping to stop, then added, “I like you too.”
Oren said this love, and the new approach of the US administration, allowed Israel maneuverability.
“Diplomacy is about space, and we have had our space restricted for almost 15 years,” Oren said. “Trump is giving us space, and that’s why I’m hopeful.”
Oren, who as Israel’s ambassador to the US played a significant role in the 2013 visit of then-president Barack Obama, said Trump’s predecessor takes a different approach. “They supported us, but there is genuine love in this administration,” he said.
Obama treated Israel “as being part of the problem, not part of the solution,” according to Oren, who noted the intended cynicism in the title of his book, “Ally: My Journey Across the American-Israeli Divide,” which analyzes the Israel-US relationship under Obama. That approach, he said, pushed Israel into a corner and prevented real negotiations.
Managing expectations
But while Oren, a member of the centrist Kulanu party, hopes and believes that Trump’s efforts could succeed in bringing Israel and the Palestinians to the negotiating table, he warned against expectations for an immediate positive outcome.
Israel’s success in building a state nearly 70 years ago came from its investment in public institutions. But the Palestinians, Oren said, with the brief exception of efforts by ousted prime minister Salam Fayyad, have failed to lay the foundations for a state to be built upon.
“If we give them a state tomorrow, it will fail in days or even hours,” he said.
In fact, while espousing negotiations, Oren questioned whether the Palestinians could ever be ready for a state. “I know this may be controversial,” he said, “but not every society organizes itself according to nation-states. We are seeing today the failure of European efforts to impose a nation-state on people who don’t organize themselves like that.”
Oren does, however, think the Palestinians should be given a chance. For now, instead of a two-state solution, Oren presented what he calls a “two-state situation” by which Israel and the Palestinians strengthen the already existing cooperation between the two sides to create the basic tenets of a state, even without full independence.
“We should create a diplomatic horizon so that some day the Palestinians may be ready for statehood,” Oren said, adding that he was hopeful Washington now understood this way of thinking.
Another policy change that Oren hopes Trump will implement is his campaign promise to move the US embassy to Jerusalem.
While the Israeli government was hopeful the move would take place early on in Trump’s presidency, US officials have signaled that he now plans to wait until a later date. If he does intend to wait, Trump will have to sign a waiver on Thursday to prevent the embassy relocation.
According to Oren, moving the embassy would indicate a clear break from his predecessors and show other countries in the region that Trump is serious about fulfilling his commitments. It would even strengthen the US president’s hand in pushing peace talks, he argued.
Oren recommended that if Trump doesn’t immediately move the embassy, he should at least start with some signs to formally recognize Jerusalem as the capital of Israel. One such move, he said, could be allowing “Jerusalem, Israel” to appear on passports of US citizens born in the city, as opposed to the current White House directive ordering they say simply “Jerusalem.”
‘Realistically optimistic’
But what of Netanyahu?
Even with the space given to Israel by the new US administration and potential sweeteners in the form of Jerusalem recognition, did Oren really think that the prime minister was willing to take a step toward Trump’s “ultimate deal”?
Most Israelis do not feel that Netanyahu is pushing for a deal, Horovitz pressed. Does his deputy minister?
“I will tell you unequivocally,” Oren said, “he’s serious. He’s very serious.”To answer, Oren relied less on feelings and more on his experience with the prime minister during “many, many hours spent dealing with this, with John Kerry, Obama and others.” According to Oren, not only is Netanyahu interested, but he is deeply involved in the detailed minutiae of every proposal.
Despite that seriousness, or perhaps because of it, however, Netanyahu has profound reservations about where the process may end, he said.
“I will also tell you equally unequivocally,” Oren added, “that he would not agree to a Palestinian state that will fall apart, that will threaten us militarily, that will be militarized, that is capable of signing treaties with foreign powers, that’s going to involve the withdrawal of Israeli forces or that’s going to involve the uprooting of Israeli citizens.”
Those conditions echo, but go even further than, the limits Netanyahu put forward on Palestinian statehood when he first expressed support for the idea in his seminal 2009 Bar-Ilan University speech.
Oren, however, still feels Netanyahu’s position offers possibility for progress. “For me, the conditions don’t close off a lot of options. There is still a lot of maneuverability,” he insisted.
On a personal level, Oren said that, like the prime minister, he has a deep connection to the entire land of Israel, but still thinks a deal with the Palestinians is necessary. He admitted that when push comes to shove, he may have to choose “painful concessions” over deep-seated feelings.
“I believe that the Jewish people have a right to every millimeter of Judea and Samaria,” Oren said using the biblical phrase for the West Bank. “But to make peace, we may have to make hard and painful concessions. That’s not a denial of our right, it’s a recognition that other people have rights there too. I’m moved by being in our homeland, but ultimately, I want a better future for our children and our grandkids.”
Future Times of Israel Presents events include anti-terror lawyer Nitsana Darshan-Leitner on stage in Jerusalem (June 4), and authors Jessica Steinberg and Shirley Graetz (June 19) and former US ambassador Dan Shapiro (July 2).
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