A "YUGE" Victory still creates the Biggest Looser - Now will he hear "You're Fired!"

President Trump likes to talk about his immense win - he even did so in an exclusive interview with ABC. Problem is the numbers don't add up.

There are around 200,081,377 registered voters in the US. The best statistics available show that  138,884,643 actually voted.  the vote totals for the Presidential race broke  65,844,610 for Clinton and 62,979,636 for Trump. Which means that 69% of registered voters went to the polls.  Of course, if you look at people eligible to vote, regardless of registration status, the number of total voters drops to 60%.

But lets stick with the 69% number - of that number, Clinton voter make up 47.4% of those who went to the polls, or 33% of registered voters.  Trump won slightly less, or 31.4%.  But if you add the Clinton votes, the third party candidates, and those who did not vote, Trump LOST bigly, since 69.6% of registered voters either supported someone else or no one at all.

So, friends and neighbors, the next time the President talks about all his support, just remember that roughly 70% of the people who could legally walk into a voting booth on election day didn't want him in the White House. That's no mandate, and anyone who tells you otherwise, including the principal resident of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue - is lying.  YUGELY.

An Open Letter to Donald Trump Supporters

I get it.  You have been lied to so long, ignored so long, and watched too many people who said they were in your corner fail to come to your defense.  You look around your towns and see people who don't look like you doing jobs your neighbors used to do; you see those same neighbors addicted to drugs, living in despair, and devoid of hope.  You see an array of cultural and economic forces you don't understand driving changes you can't control toward a future you fear.  And you see pointy headed "elites" like me whom you believe have never lived your life telling you what to believe, even when their "facts" fly in the face of your "common sense."

And so you threw both the biggest Hail Mary pass and upraised middle finger you could at the political system.  Enough of you voted in enough of the right places for Donald Trump that he now sits in the White House.  Some of you feel vindicated because he made it.  Many of you want him to succeed even if you took him "seriously but not literally," and a few of you are now asking if the campaign promises he seems to want to fulfill are really going to come back to hurt you.

I know you won't let me debate this with you on "facts." Both because you don't trust me to tell you the truth because of my politics and my employment as a public servant, and because your support of him wasn't really about facts anyway. As one West Virginia coal miner recently put it - its about the look of the man and what he might make people think.

So since we don't yet trust each other on facts, lets take a leap of faith.  Many (though certainly not all) of you identify as Christians - I do too.  And as such we have accepted a call to follow Christ's teachings.  All of them - no matter how hard, how unorthodox, or how much they fly in the face of our common sense.  And Scripture has two powerful teachings that should be our guides right now.  First, there is the parable of the Good Samaritan in Luke 10:25-37:

25 On one occasion an expert in the law stood up to test Jesus. “Teacher,” he asked, “what must I do to inherit eternal life?”

26 “What is written in the Law?” he replied. “How do you read it?”

27 He answered, “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind’[a]; and, ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’[b]”

28 “You have answered correctly,” Jesus replied. “Do this and you will live.”

29 But he wanted to justify himself, so he asked Jesus, “And who is my neighbor?”

30 In reply Jesus said: “A man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho, when he was attacked by robbers. They stripped him of his clothes, beat him and went away, leaving him half dead. 31 A priest happened to be going down the same road, and when he saw the man, he passed by on the other side. 32 So too, a Levite, when he came to the place and saw him, passed by on the other side. 33 But a Samaritan, as he traveled, came where the man was; and when he saw him, he took pity on him. 34 He went to him and bandaged his wounds, pouring on oil and wine. Then he put the man on his own donkey, brought him to an inn and took care of him. 35 The next day he took out two denarii[c] and gave them to the innkeeper. ‘Look after him,’ he said, ‘and when I return, I will reimburse you for any extra expense you may have.’

36 “Which of these three do you think was a neighbor to the man who fell into the hands of robbers?”

37 The expert in the law replied, “The one who had mercy on him.”

Jesus told him, “Go and do likewise.”

Now it should not require repeating, but Christ was telling us that the Samaritan - the non believer - acted with the most mercy and compassion, and that we who follow Jesus should "go and do likewise."  Its probably no coincidence that the Samaria of ancient times is in the West Bank, an area now controlled (at least in name) by the Palestinian Authority.  But more to the point, if Christ is telling us a non-believer can be more compassionate then we are - if indeed that non believer's example is for us to follow - then what does it say that today we wish to keep out, kick out, denigrate and discriminate against the "non-believers" of the Islamic faith?  How can we as Christians possibly square support for President Trump with  Christ's teaching that others besides ourselves can show us greater compassion and love then we ourselves show?  And why in the world would we seek to keep out such people, and thus break from what Our Lord has shown us so clearly?

But, you will counter, Islamic terrorists have attacked the US.  They have fought us on the battle fields.  We will not be "safe" if we let them in.  My blunt reply is this - did not Christ also command us in Matthew 5:39 "But I tell you, do not resist an evil person. If anyone slaps you on the right cheek, turn to them the other cheek also."  Here's where those pesky facts have to be considered as well - you are as likely to die crushed under your own TV or dresser as you are to be killed by a terrorist.

More to the point however, when we give in to our fears of those who do not look like us, or sound like us or act like us, we are breaking Christ's second greatest commandment found in Matthew 22:36-40:

36 “Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the Law?”37 Jesus replied: “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’[a] 38 This is the first and greatest commandment. 39 And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’[b] 40 All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.”

We cannot demonstrate love for our neighbors if we throw them out of our bakeries for the simple act of wanting to marry their partners.  We can not love our neighbors if the color of their skin makes them "inferior" to us. We can not love our neighbors if we allow our "leaders" to persist in lying to use about everything in the world around us just because their egos are fragile and they fear the people they have been elected to lead. 

You want hope.  You want respect.  You deserve dignity.  I get it.  And my Christian pledge to you is that you and I can and will seek those things for you together.  But not with this man. His rise will not lift you, and if you push me away, then I can not carry you when you stumble, as the Samaritan did for the man accosted by robbers.

The State of Republican Affairs

What does it say about the Republican Party that the Cato Institute - which leans hard right and libertarian - is calling out the Reoublican nominee for lying about the connection between illegal immigrants and crime? And here's the spoiler - Cato says immigrants of all stripes make us safer as a nation.

What does it say about rank and file Republicans backing that nominee that they don't or won't care about being lied to again?

And when will Republican leaders finally acknowledge that the lack of caring about this lie, about all the lies, is a direct result of 4 plus decades of xenophobic, white makes centric, racist oligarchical dog whistle politics?

Read the Cato reports here:

http://www.cato.org/publications/commentary/donald-trump-wrong-immigrants-can-help-reduce-crime?utm_term=0_395878584c-2fc7bc39b7-142013162&goal=0_395878584c-2fc7bc39b7-142013162&mc_cid=2fc7bc39b7&mc_eid=9f06a24e5d&utm_content=buffer023db&utm_medium=social&utm_source=facebook.com&utm_campaign=buffer

Hillary makes history - but is it enough?

Bernie Sanders graciously bowed out. Hillary Clinton becomes the first woman nominated by a major political party to be President. Debbie Wasserman-Schultz is out (finally). But with so many Americans so upset about so much - and feeling so disconnected - will it be enough? Time will tell, but democrats inability (or unwillingness) to connect to voters emotionally is still Hillary's Achilles heel.

Really Martha Raditz? The MSM shills for the military industrial complex again.

In tonight's State of Union speech, President Obama rightly noted that while ISIL certainly represents a threat to American citizens but not an existential threat to the US. While it seems to many to be a wildly inaccurate statement, the reality is that ISIL can not destroy the US unless we as a nation cower before them.

Yet ABC's Martha Raditz picked up the banner of war and dismissed the President's assertions as everything but fiction.

And that is the core of the problem - Anerica has the ability to defeat ISIL and yet our media is told to fear them as if the  very Constitution itself would be torn asunder if we don't completely destroy ISIL right now.

Frankly, if we look to history we see that quiet, consistent ignoring of such ignorant apostates usually forces them to go away. We would also know that a failed state - be it Syria, Iraq, Sudan, Lybis, or Russia - is not always the job of the US to fix.

Too bad the MSM isn't sophisticated enough to lead us there. For Shame.

Are gas prices going to sabotage COP21?

Driving home tonight I needed to get gas in my wife's car. Our preferred purveyor had an excellent price:

From a pocketbook perspective this price is great - in fact it's been several years since we've seen prices this low in the National Capitol Region.

Problem is, lower gas prices severely underprice the environmental impact  of their associated carbon emissions. So while many educated and well meaning people are trying to reach an agreement in Paris to address our growing Climate Crisis, they are being undermined by the local economics of cheap gas. Unless we can change the economic incentives, all the Paris's and Kyoto's in the world won't save us from our own hubris.

A Truly Compassionate and Christian Response to Kim Davis "fear" of Issuing Marriage Licenses to Gay and Lesbian Couples

Much of what drives modern American Politics is fear - fear of people who do not look like you; fear of people who do not sound like you; fear of people who do not love like you. And fear has been used to control Americans since America was "founded" - afterall, how many runaway slaves were turned over to slave hunters by poor whites out of fear they would see their own farms burned? 

Yet I would argue politely that part of the loving and compassionate response to Kentucky Clerk of Court Kim Davis’ fear that issuing marriage licenses to gay couples is a "heaven or hell" decision, is that Christ - whom she said she must follow since she is a "Christian" - was very clear that we should both render unto Caesar that which is Caesar's, and turn the other cheek to those who would smite us. Like it or not that means she has a choice - a choice to do her public duty as an elected official, or to leave her job. 

What she cannot do is commit the second biggest sin Christians are called to avoid, for when Christ was asked what where God's greatest Commandments, He responded that 1) you should love God with all your heart, mind, and strength and 2) love your neighbor as yourself. These gay couples are her neighbors, seeking to render unto Caesar that which is Caesar's (i.e. obtain a secular marriage license from a secular state office).  If indeed Christian Scripture is right, she will be judged more harshly by Christ for refusing to love them as she does herself by denying them the secular state license to which they are legally entitled, then she will be for following that same law as written in this matter – since Christ’s teaching are absolutely silent on whom God will consider married.