Trump Speech to Congress

So what did you think of Trump's speech?  I give him a B...

CNN Trump Speech Transcript
CNN Fact Check

I think he had better get some Democrats on board because I don't think the hard core fiscal Conservatives are going support his spending ways.

CNN Conservatives Balk at Cost of GOP Health Proposal

Trump's Incredible Ability

So given all of the information in the latest NBC / WSJ poll, what detail does Trump decide to tweet about?

And somehow he avoids noting all the other really interesting stuff.  Well at least he acknowledged the validity of the poll... :-)  Here is an interesting piece regarding egocentric "abilities".  Life must be much simpler for them...  If you don't like it - Just create an alternate version.

Why Attend Someone Else's Townhalls?

So continuing on from MP With or Without Erik and G2A Erik P: Wise or Chicken. Kelly, one of the organizers, noted that the meeting was advertised and that everyone was welcome.  So I posed some of our questions over at MP, unfortunately I have no answers yet

"Everyone was invited and welcome. There were Republicans, Democrats, and independents there. There was no screening. The invitation was on an open Facebook page, in the Sun Sailor--twice--and I believe was in church announcements." Kelly

"Question: So did you ever have any indication that Erik would come?

Or is this really just a way to rally the Liberals and gain additional supporters?

I mean it does seem like a brilliant method. Get everyone there and if Erik no shows, people may tend to think he is ignoring them. And if Erik shows and people share their sad stories and he has no immediate answers, he is shown to be unwilling to help.

My question is why would any rational person show up to these events? There seems to be no upside for them..." G2A

After thinking about it some, I guess it makes some sense for Erik not to show up.  I mean he ran as a Conservative, he got elected as a Conservative and therefore he is representing us as a Conservative.  What exactly is the value of attending a meeting where most of the people are the ones who did not vote for him???


And did the organizers think he should start acting like a Liberal after the election?  The whole thing is puzzling...

The Democrats are in Trouble

Now the GOP may have problems, but I think the Democrats are really in trouble.
CNN Progressives Unhappy
CNN Sanders Not Impressed


If they are pushed to go even further Left than Hillary proposed, I am thinking they are going to be relegated to holding offices in the highly urban areas only. How do you think the Democrats can change to improve their standing and influence around the country?

How to Help People

I think this is an interesting exchange from here.  I always find it interesting when a Liberal seems to think they are more caring and generous because they want to outsource solving a problem to strangers with someone else's money.

"Left leaning, liberal, progressive and socialist seem to be the favorite labels for people who want to exercise concerted actions in support of bettering the lives of the people. Individual responsibility does not preclude participating in cooperative efforts for social betterment. If these attempts to provide conditions which will allow society to help its members gain comfort and security are denigrated by calling it socialism then look at our current situation and ask how is that antisocial approach working." Reino 

"Actually I think this applies to both Liberals and Conservatives.  "people who want to exercise concerted actions in support of bettering the lives of the people"  The big difference is that the first group wants to delegate the effort to bureaucrats with funds taken from successful people.  The other groups wants to encourage all private citizens to freely give and help their less fortunate neighbors.

Please remember that the first group fought a war on poverty for 50+ years with trillions and trillions of dollars. Now poverty is still with us, the number of single family households is at an all time high and the academic achievement gap is still a big problem. Maybe it is time to try something else." G2A

White House Block Mainstream Press

Let the law suits begin, our foolish President chose to escalate his war with our Free Press even further, and anger the majority of Americans even further. CNN WH Blocks Press  In an SNL skit they guessed that Trump would only last 2 months before Pence took over...  Maybe they will be correct.

"CNN and other news organizations were blocked Friday from a White House press briefing. There was no immediate explanation from the White House. The New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, and Politico were also excluded from the meeting, known as a gaggle. The Associated Press and Time magazine boycotted the briefing because of how it was handled. The White House Correspondents Association is protesting. The conservative media organizations Breitbart News, The Washington Times and One America News Network were allowed in. Hours earlier, at the Conservative Political Action Conference outside Washington, President Trump mocked and disparaged the news media. He said that much of the press represents "the enemy of the people." "They are the enemy of the people because they have no sources," Trump said. "They just make them up when there are none." He also said reporters "shouldn't be allowed" to use unnamed sources. "

Latest Poll. NPR People trust media more?
CNN WH Says They Did Not Try to Manipulate FBI

Erik Paulsen: Wise or Chicken

MP Scenes from with or without 
ST Erik Skips Meeting
CNN TownHall Meetings

So one of our more Liberal church members setup a Townhall at our Church and asked Erik to attend. Given the number of cars and traffic that I endured dropping my daughter off at an unrelated church event, I think there were more than the reported 600 people there...

Well it turns out that Erik was a NO SHOW... However it seems the attendees still had a good time airing their thoughts, questions and/or concerns. So was Erik's avoidance of the mob wise or was he just being a big chicken who was hiding from his constituents? Rationale?

Cutting Healthcare Costs is Easy, Just Cut Benefits

Just ball parking based on my family, good insurance costs between $4,000 and $5,000 per year per person.  That would be for a good normal employer plan that covers the 10 Essential Elements with low out of pocket yearly expenses. 


In my case the insurance for my family of 5 runs ~$20,000 / yr.  Thankfully ~70% of that is picked up by my company as part of my annual compensation.  Now the puzzle is since the median household income in the US is in the mid $50,000 range.  How do all of those families on the left side of the curve afford good coverage?


Apparently the GOP's proposal is to allow for less complete plans and smaller subsidies.  I am not sure that is a good answer.  Thoughts?


Please remember that I think ACA was an okay law that just needs tweaking:

• Put real teeth in mandate penalties so everyone buys and stays insured. (ie no more "I'll sign up until they install my new hip")
• Open up insurance competition across State lines.
• Eliminate State Exchanges and provide one functional National Exchange. (ie cut mgmt and mktg costs)
• Maybe set rates by State, not region within State. (ie reduce rural peaks)
• Other?

NPR GOP May Trim 10 Essential Benefits
NPR Less Help for the Low Income
PBS GOP Document Plan
G2A Healthcare Cost Drivers
G2A Pre-Existing Condition Fraud

Hey There Big Spender

I am simply amazed at how much Trump has promised to spend going forward... Are you sure he isn't a Democrat? Now with the GOP in charge of the money, how is he going to accomplish this?

And if he does not achieve these spending goals will he accept responsibility for failing? Or will he blame his failure on someone else? Will the buck EVER stop at his desk? I am guessing not since I know people who are very much like him.

FOX Expand the Military
TP Keep SS & Medicare
CNBC $1 Trillion Infrastructure
CNN Healthcare for All
CNN Wall on Southern Border
Politifact Trump Promise Tracker (rated)
Politifact Trump Promise Tracker (not rated yet)

Then there are the costs that he is incurring just through his personal choices and behaviors. From what I read here it seems he has spent ~11 of his first ~33 days in Florida. Plus we are paying for Melania's security at Trump Tower... Did the Trump voters sign up for his maintaining 3 homes, visiting them often and spending literally $10 million /month? What happened to the first family moving to the White House ASAP and focusing on the country?

NPR Frequent Visits Disrupt Life and Cost Businesses
WLOS Trump Visits Expensive: Want Reimbursement
CBS Trump Trips $10 Mil so far
Independent Trump Family More In One Month
Natl Memo 100's of Millions more than Obama
CNN Aides Hesitant to Say Trump is Playing Golf
Guardian Cost Vex NY and Florida Officials

I love this one...  

"President Donald Trump has made visiting his Florida golf courses a near every-weekend habit in the first month of his administration, and his aides are trying to obscure whether Trump is actually golfing during the visits. One possible reason: Trump was a frequent and vocal critic of President Barack Obama's golf habit, regularly slamming the former president for playing golf with many pressing issues before the country. Trump even suggested during a 2016 event in Virginia, in a knock on Obama, that if elected he was "not going to have time to go play golf." "I'm going to be working for you, I'm not going to have time to go play golf," Trump said at the time. Trump has visited his two golf courses near his Mar-a-Lago estate -- Trump International Golf Course in West Palm Beach and Trump National Golf Course in Jupiter -- six times in his first month in office.

New Improved Travel Ban

An example of the Trump stupidity and distraction in action.  This obsession with annoying huge business, universities, states, liberals and moderates etc over the minimal threat (MSN WP New Travel Ban) even as they roll back a logical safety measure.  I will never understand the far Right, let's stop the people without guns from coming here and ensure the mentally impaired can have guns.  Really?

Happy Presidents Day

I thought that was saying because I actually have it off for the first time in my adult working life...  Apparently management needed one more holiday this year !!!

Low Approval Equals Lost Seats

Jerry and I were discussing what Trump's real approval and disapproval ratings are today over here.  My beliefs are depicted in the graphic below. The things I think he is doing that will continue to keep his approval below 50% include:

• His obsession with blocking legal refugees and other travelers from 7 countries even though there is no proven threat.
• His saying he is only deporting violent illegals, while in reality occasionally taking Mothers away from their families.  Separating families and crying children make excellent advertisements for the Democrats against him.
• His continually saying that our Free Press is an enemy of the citizens. (Lugenpresse)
• His continual lying over the stupidest things. (biggest electoral win since Reagan)  I mean hasn't he heard of google search?
• The tendency for him and his staff to make mistakes. (Sweden),  (Bowling Green)

Since he continues to focus on rallying his true believers, fighting against everyone else and focusing on minutia, I really don't see a path to him becoming a President with a high approval rating.  With that in mind, the following article becomes pretty important.  538 Will Trumps Low Approval Ratings Harm GOP  It will be interesting to see what happens in the next 22 months.  Now please remember that I want Trump to succeed, I just don't know how he is going to do it if he:

• does not improve his methods (ie he is NOT a CEO anymore, people do not need to do what he says...  I wonder how long it will take for him to figure that out?)
• continues catering exclusively to his base (ie they are a minority of Americans, he won because the system is thankfully rigged by the electoral college. but that only goes so far.)
• continues speaking/ tweeting before thinking (ie how can any rational person take him serious with all the errors/lies he makes)
• continues picking fights over the dumbest things (ie adults have the self control to know when to fight and when to ignore) (ie number of people at inauguration?  Really?)
• continually gets distracted with the minutia instead of getting focused on the economy and healthcare. 
• continues to try and take credit for everything good and blame others for everything bad. (ie adults know how to share praise and blame)

Trump Misrepresents Polls

Here is what I think is an important diagram, especially since the Trump folks are trying to say they are trusted more than the media.  It is a bit like when the GOP would use polls to say that people did not approve of ACA, and implied that they all thought it went "too far".  When in reality many of those folks really thought it did not go far enough...

Same in this case, the reality is that there are many people on the Far Left who do not trust the Mainstream Media because they think it is controlled by the Conservative Corporate interests. (ie it is too Conservative)  And many on the Far Right who think all those journalists are Liberals...

Where as who trusts Trump is much more one sided, it is his True Believer voters.  And everyone else distrusts him, including myself.

Fox News Poll

Fox News Summary of Results

Slate Reports Regarding Fox Poll

Household Debt: Here We Go Again

Apparently people did not learn from the Great Recession... They are out borrowing and living large again.  It is hard for me to feel bad when the rainy day comes and all these folks have no umbrella.  Oh well.
CNN Money Debt Growing

It is really too bad that Bush and Obama drove up the National Debt to buy our way out of the Great Recession so quickly...  It seems people did not have time to learn valuable lessons, and now our country is deeply in debt if the economy flounders again.  Which it will undoubtedly.
G2A Recession a Bad Thing?
G2A Recession a Bad Thing Revisited?

Trump Inherited a Mess?

Maybe Trump is losing it...

• "As you know, our administration inherited many problems across government and across the economy. To be honest, I inherited a mess. It's a mess. At home and abroad, a mess."
• "We have made incredible progress. I don't think there's ever been a president elected who in this short period of time has done what we've done,"
• "This administration is running like a fine-tuned machine."
• "We had a very smooth roll out of the travel ban. But we had a bad court," Trump said. "We had a bad decision, that is the only thing that is wrong with the travel ban."

I would say that all of these statement are incredibly incorrect.

CNN Trump Unloads on the Media

CNN Opinion Trump Going Off Rails
Fox News Trump Blasts Media
Fox News Trump I did not Divide America
CNN Trump Regarding Leaks: Then and Now