Morning Thanks

Garrison Keillor once said we'd all be better off if we all started the day by giving thanks for just one thing. I'll try.

Friday, September 09, 2016

The Savior

I am not putting up another picture of Donald Trump

His is not a rags-to-riches story. Anything but. He was 25 when he was given prominence in his father's real estate company, where he made money by selling properties--except not to African-Americans. Yeah, well, so did everyone else at the time, his people say. 

For several years he directed beauty pageants, was accused by one contestant of groping, and made it very clear--all of this is documented--that the contestants would not include African-American women. Well, sure, but there was a ton of racism back then.

When he built the Trump Tower, he imported Polish workers, illegally, and paid them less than $5 an hour, then threatened them with deportation if they said anything. Hey, he was just making great deals, all right? He's a mover and a shaker, and that's the American way.

Trump casinos do not have the kind of balance sheets that would make anyone think their owner was some brilliant financial wizard. Far from it. No pain, no gain, right? At least he's not squirreling his money away. It's out there. Besides, the casino business is cutthroat. Lots of people go under. Try it yourself.

The last time Donald Trump released his tax returns, he'd paid no taxes at all. Zero. Now, he won't, claiming he's being audited, but the IRS shrugs its shoulders. So who doesn't try to get by as cheap as he can, right? If the guy's got the bucks for high-cost lawyers, then what the hell? It's the way things operate in the good old U. S. of A. Besides, you know he forks out big bucks to politicians, right? That's legal.

He's had three wives and that two of them were left behind when he rather publicly carried on tabloid affairs with the curvier young things who subsequently replaced the losers. Yeah, well, there's something rattling around in everyone's closet if you just look around.

I'm plagiarizing a bit here, following the outline of an op-ed by Nicholas Kristof in yesterday's NY Times. Kristof often writes about otherwise nameless people in faraway places where there's far too much suffering, people who are somehow persistently making a difference. Or trying.

Yesterday not. Yesterday for Nicholas Kristof, it was Donald Trump.

"Whether in his youth, in his business career or in his personal life," Kristof says, "Trump’s story is that of a shallow egoist who uses those around him."

And then he ends the piece this way:  

"His life is a vacuum of principle, and he never seems to have stood up for anything larger than himself. Over seven decades, there’s one continuous theme to his life story: This is a narcissist who has no core. The lights are on, but no one’s home."

That's how it ends, but none of it will lay a glove on the Donald. Nada. Nothing. To his disciples, he's the savior.


21 comments:

Anonymous said...

The people have spoken--he won the nomination. Why are you stating what has been known for decades? If the people didn't have a problem with it the past year, they don't have one now. The NeverTrump crowd is a sad bunch. He won. Move on. Was your guy the one who got 4% nationwide? Reflect on that number instead of calling those you disagree with "disciples"---"What am I [you] missing?"

ron said...

Anonymous, you are missing the sad moral implications of voting for such a man.

Anonymous said...

Ron,
The other men are no different--DJT's proclivities are just public, not closeted like so many of the others.
Face it, politics today is a racket. The public is wising up.
We're voting for a Commander-in-Chief, not a Minister of the Word! A Kuyperian doesn't see this; however, a Calvinist would.
Calvinists believe all men are entirely sinful.
Calvinists believe power is given to rulers by the people via elections.
Calvinists obey the government.
Calvinists are submissive to the government.
DJT won the Republican vote, and might win the election--are some of you prepared to -really- be Calvinists?

Anonymous said...

This JCS post reminds me of a quote by Yogi Berra, “It's like déjà vu all over again."

Back in my early days in the 60’s as a liberal arts student on a state college campus in the Mid-west, I would often listen to some glib left-wing professor spewing out liberal pap much like this post.

If I were in the student union and not a psychology class, he would be puffing on his pipe adorned in his corduroy jacket and brushing his shoulder length hair out of his eyes. Often his speech would be mumbled and slurred showing deep thought indicating that his mind was on other important matters such as some atrocity committed by our military in Vietnam or some injustice directed toward some minority group. Just to complete the image this trendy professor had his rusted Volvo [with 300,000 miles plus on the odometer] parked in the faculty parking lot. If he were really sheik he would have to leave in a rush because he was late for his sitar lessons.

Trust me, image mattered… you had to appear left wing. No one in a professor’s position in the 60’s could be a right-winger and exist on a state college campus. Often these guys carried "the look" right into retirement...

Thus, this post from JCS, completely biased and completely unfair and unbalanced. Hillary is a sweetie...

Anonymous said...


King David was a "man after God's own heart", coveted his neighbor's wife, and had her husband killed.

By the way, I hear he was a pretty good shot with a sling-shot!

Lighten-up...



Anonymous said...


Remember this... Hillary is able to remember all the things she has forgotten! Just ask the FBI.

Hence, she needs reminders, she wears an ear device to jog her memory. She needs reminders on all the Saul Alinsky precepts she once had on her finger-tips...

Anonymous said...

I think anonymous better study some history of Calvinism...and doctrine.

ron
p.s. Several of my colleagues in a state college were (still are) right wingers. At least the ones who still alive.

Anonymous said...

Ron,
I have studied Calvin and Calvin's Geneva extensively. Where am I wrong?
I must then inform the club that there are actually ~FIVE~ points to Calvinism--it's odd that "Three-Point Calvinists" consider themselves Calvinists. Just silly. It's sad how far away one strain of the faith has taken Calvinism.
Sigh.
P.S. - I'm not the Anonymous who wrote the state college post if you were confused.

Anonymous said...

Hey You Calvinists:

Stop fighting about your Calvinism purity... drill past the Reformation and anchor your thinking in the early church of Acts... all the Reformation did was define Christians as to how they were different from the Catholics... dig a little deeper! Scripture is with-out error and sufficient skip the Institutes...

ron said...

Whichever anonymous:
Calvinists often have been revolutionaries: Ambois Conpiracy in France, approved by Calvin; England, Holland.
Calvin had confidence in humans to arrive at truths, later termed common grace.

ron

Anonymous said...

@Hey You -- Contrary to what you might think by what I've typed, I really like your comment!
@Ron -- Calvin developing Common Grace, now that's HILARIOUS! WOW.

Signed,
Original Anonymous

ronvdm said...

Read Calvin

ron

Anonymous said...

Not a good rebuttal, Ron!

Anonymous said...

At B'nai B'rith celebrations held in Paris, France, in 1936 Cohen, Cauvin, or Calvin, whatever his name may have been, was enthusiastically acclaimed to have been of Jewish descent (The Catholic Gazette, February, 1936)... ' (1)

It is important to make a distiction between the foreign entity that occupies our land --ZOG Zionist Occupation Government -- and the States united which lies dormant.

thanks,
Jerry

Anonymous said...

"You know, to just be grossly generalistic, you could put half of Trump’s supporters into what I call the basket of deplorables. Right? The racist, sexist, homophobic, xenophobic, Islamaphobic — you name it. And unfortunately there are people like that. And he has lifted them up. He has given voice to their websites that used to only have 11,000 people — now have 11 million. He tweets and retweets their offensive hateful mean-spirited rhetoric.

Now, some of those folks — they are irredeemable, but thankfully they are not America. But the other basket — and I know this because I see friends from all over America here — I see friends from Florida and Georgia and South Carolina and Texas — as well as, you know, New York and California — but that other basket of people are people who feel that the government has let them down, the economy has let them down, nobody cares about them, nobody worries about what happens to their lives and their futures, and they’re just desperate for change. It doesn’t really even matter where it comes from."

It sound like Hillary agrees with you...

Anonymous said...

"but that other basket of people are people who feel that the government has let them down, the economy has let them down, nobody cares about them, nobody worries about what happens to their lives and their futures, and they’re just desperate for change."

Apparently these disenfranchised people who feel left down were did not have their needs meet by Obama. Hillary wants to continue his policies... She screwed up... just like the 47% referenced by Romney...

Barb said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Anonymous said...

I am bewildered by Trump followers who excuse everything he says and does with "but so does everyone else" or "but what about Hillary?". Why do people who feel let down by the government think he will do anything to help anyone but himself? He will only do what benefits himself. This post says exactly what is happening. Nothing will lay a glove on him! (I am not a Hillary fan either.)

Anonymous said...

Trump is a sinner too... he is the lesser of two evils... who knows, God may not allow Hillary to continue her campaign due to failing health.

Anonymous said...

Boy, after reading these posts, I sure am glad I live in Canada.

Anonymous said...

Sounds like Canada needs a population infusion??????