Category: Donald Trump

Politicians Could Learn From the National Football League  

One of the remarkable parts of watching NFL games on television is at the end when the coaches and players who just “fought like hell” against each other converge on the playing field to shake each other’s hands and even hug each other, exchanging congratulations and best wishes to the players who just beat them.

And one of my favorite penalties is for taunting. Wouldn’t it be nice if there were a penalty for taunting off the field, including in politics? Nowadays we not only see politicians taunting, insulting and ridiculing each other, but even refusing to concede that they were defeated.

Wikipedia defines taunting as “a battle cry, sarcastic remark, gesture, or insult intended to demoralize the recipient, or to anger them and encourage reactionary behaviors without thinking. Taunting can exist as a form of social competition to gain control of the target’s cultural capital.” Sounds like today’s political discourse, doesn’t it?

In football, a coach can challenge a referee’s call, but the final call after review is accepted without question (except by fans), and the players proceed undaunted, accepting every call and moving quickly to avoid a delay-of-game penalty.

Why Wouldn’t the Russians Want Trump Re-Elected? Look at His Accomplishments.

By JIM SMITH

This article represents the author’s personal analysis and opinion. It has not been shared with or endorsed by any of our broker associates.

No world leader has done more to advance the interests of Vladimir Putin and Russia than President Trump. I write this as a former student of the Russian language (in which I am still semi-fluent) and thus as a student of the Soviet Union and now Russia. I traveled to Moscow and Leningrad in 1978 as part of an MIT alumni trip, and again in 1986, 1987 and 1988 on “citizen diplomacy” trips under the auspices of the Center for Soviet-American Dialogue in Bellingham, Washington. My last trip was to Vladivostok, the Pacific port and terminus of the Trans-Siberian railroad, in 1995, on a tour of China, Korea, Russia and Japan.

First, let’s consider Putin’s interests. As a former KGB officer for the Soviet Union, Putin watched helplessly as the Soviet empire disintegrated under Gorbachev. When Boris Yeltsin resigned as Russian President and appointed Putin acting president on December 31, 1999, Putin made it his goal (after pardoning Yeltsin) to return his country to its former glory as a super-power and to bring as many of the former Soviet republics as possible, including Ukraine, back into Moscow’s orbit.

Key to strengthening Russia was the weakening of NATO and the European Union, and annexing strategically important Crimea. Although that annexation occurred before Trump took office, he helped Putin succeed in weakening NATO and the EU. As a candidate, Trump called NATO “obsolete” and, as president, he hesitated to endorse Article 5, which states that an attack on one member of NATO is an attack on all members. The only time Article 5 has been invoked was in connection with the Sept. 11th attack on the United States. Trump’s reluctance to support it must have made Putin very happy. He was made even happier when Trump enthusiastically supported the Brexit campaign to leave the European Union, and encouraged other European countries to follow Britain’s example.

Withdrawing the United States from the Trans-Pacific Partnership and from the Paris Accord on climate change, combined with other international actions, have contributed to a reduction in America’s standing on the global stage, allowing for a bigger role by Russia.

Trump’s criticism of Russia’s annexation of Crimea and its ongoing aggression against Ukraine can be described as half-hearted at best. The entire theory of Ukraine interfering in the 2016 U.S. election, as recounted under oath by Fiona Hill, was a Russian narrative adopted hook, line and sinker by President Trump. It is fair to say that Trump has been duped by the Kremlin in this and other ways. Why wouldn’t Putin want to keep him in the White House for another term?

Forget about collusion — it wasn’t necessary for Trump to collude in 2016, and it’s not necessary for him to collude now. Putin saw in Trump the perfect man to become President when he was the Republican nominee, and is happy to join the chant, “Four More Years!”

What, you might ask, about Russia helping the Sanders’ campaign?  I suspect that is also in support of Trump, since Sanders would be easier for Trump to defeat as a “socialist.”

The lingering question is why Trump wants to advance Putin’s interests. 

This article is also posted on my personal blog at www.JimSmithBlog.com, where you can like, share or comment on it.

Reflections on the State of Journalism & Saving Local Newspapers

Regular readers may recall that my first career was that of a professional journalist, trained on the city desk of the Washington Post. Committed as I am to sound journalism, I am concerned with both the loss of newspapers around the country and the unrelenting assault on the media by the President.

Free and healthy newspapers are essential to a democratic society, which is why the free press is embedded in the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.  They’re our watchdogs.

We can all be proud of how the media have kept us informed and, frankly, kept their cool in the hostile “enemy of the people” environment fostered by the current occupant of the White House, who labels any coverage that doesn’t flatter him “fake news” without providing a specific response to the subject at hand. Most upsetting is the portrayal of straight news reporting as biased.

The sad fact is that the general public lacks journalistic literacy. Specifically, readers (and non-readers) conflate news articles with columns and editorials. Because the New York Times and the Washington Post, for example, criticize the President editorially, readers too readily attribute that bias to the news pages, which is simply wrong.

A core principle of news reporting is “no unattributed facts or opinions.” Of course, a reporter uses his or her discretion as to which facts and opinions are included, but if, for example, an impeachment witness states facts or opinions derogatory of the President, reporting the testimony is straight news, and a good reporter will seek a response from the President.  But labeling such an article “fake news” or “a lie” is not a denial, it is a refusal to refute the testimony. 

I know that some Trump supporters will say “hogwash” to me asserting that straight news articles are unbiased, but that only proves the point I have made above. America’s newspapers would do us all a favor if they eliminated columns and editorials and printed only straight news articles and letters to the editor. Attacks on the media by the President are made more believable because of the inability of too many readers to distinguish news articles from columns and editorials.

TV networks also contribute to this conflating of news and opinion. Fox News, CNN and MSNBC all have daytime news programs, but they devote evening hours to personal opinion. You don’t see that on the three broadcast networks.

Financial health is another serious problem. While the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, USA Today and Washington Post are all thriving, too many local newspapers are downsizing and going out of business. We need some billionaires committed to journalistic standards to rescue them from owners interested only in profit.

These “Never Trumpers” Will Be Jurors in the President’s Senate Trial

Here’s the list of sitting U.S. Senators, according to Wikipedia, who described themselves as “Never Trumpers” before Trump became the Republican nominee and President. What changed?

President Trump has not changed. His behavior and policies are completely consistent with the candidate these Senators found so abhorrent. If their opposition to candidate Trump could be described as “principled,” how should we describe their support of the president who has done what he said he would do?

Whether President Trump abused his power as President is a judgment call, but it is a matter of fact that he obstructed Congress, so how can these Senators in particular stand up and say he’s not guilty of that article? It should be an interesting trial!

My Cable News Viewing Recommendations

As a follow-up to last week’s item about our “Post-Factual Era” coming to an end, I have two cable viewing recommendations for readers wanting to understand current political events.

1)   Fox News Sunday with Chris Wallace.  Although CNN is my weekday viewing choice, I record this show for viewing on Sunday. I’m impressed with Chris’s fair questioning of guests from both parties and his choice of panelists for political discussions.

2)  Reliable Sources. This Sunday morning program on CNN is all about the media and is essential viewing in this error of “fake news” claims from both sides of the political divide. I recommend subscribing to this program’s daily email newsletter, which you can do at www.ReliableSources.com

The Crackdown on Hispanic Immigration Is Hurting the Construction Trades

Like any homeowner who has lived in Colorado for a long time, I have experienced roof replacements due to a hail storm more than once, and have observed that the roofing industry, like many construction trades, is particularly dependent on Mexicans and other Hispanics for their work force.

So I’ve been wondering how the President’s unrelenting (and increasing) crackdown on immigration from Central American countries has been affecting construction trades, including roofing.

Fortunately, my last big hail storm requiring roof replacement was in May 2017, before the crackdown on such immigrants had matured into what we are seeing today.

Googling the topic and surveying the many roofing companies with which I’ve dealt over the years, I find that what I suspected is indeed the case.  Roughly 20% of that industry’s work force has been lost directly or indirectly. It makes me wonder how we will fare in the event of another widespread hail disaster.

The problem is that few non-immigrants jump at the offer of earning minimum or higher wages climbing on roofs in the hot sun and doing the back-breaking work of removing and replacing a roof.  The same is true in the farming industry where migrant labor has been essential to getting seasonal work done.

I remember Elliot Eisenberg, the “Bowtie Economist,” telling Realtors at a 2017 event that immigration is essential to growing the economy, and that we need at least 1 million immigrants every year to achieve the kind of growth which President Trump was promising. (He also pointed out that cutting taxes while the economy is doing as well as it was in 2017 was not smart and could only have a short-lived effect, which is now evident.)

I was reminded of all this on Sunday night, watching a 60 Minutes segment on the Japanese economy hurting because of its historic limitation on immigration in addition to its declining birth rate.

Immigration is good, and it’s necessary to maintain and grow our economy.  The effect of restricting immigration and terrorizing immigrants by raiding businesses with immigrant work forces ends up hurting us all.

According to one website I Googled,

> A U.S. Department of Labor study prepared by the Bush Administration noted that the perception that immigrants take jobs away from American workers is “the most persistent fallacy about immigration in popular thought” because it is based on the mistaken assumption that there is only a fixed number of jobs in the economy.    

> Experts note that immigrants are blamed for unemployment because Americans can see the jobs immigrants fill but not the jobs they create through productivity, capital formation and demand for goods and services.  

> Immigrants pay more than $90 billion in taxes every year and receive only $5 billion in welfare. Without their contributions to the public treasury, the economy would suffer enormous losses. 

Personally, I think we should welcome, not shun, immigrants.

‘Preferential Voting’ Is a Great Method for Dealing With Primary Elections With a Dozen or More Candidates

With over a dozen candidates now vying for the Democratic presidential nomination, I have a modest proposal. Let those states holding primaries do what Australia does for most of its elections and employ a preferential voting system.

Under such a system, voters rank the candidates in their order of preference. If no candidate receives at least 50% of the votes, the candidate with the lowest number of votes is eliminated and the second choice of that candidate’s voters are counted. If that doesn’t produce 50% or more votes for any candidate, the candidate with the now lowest vote count is eliminated and those voters’ next favorite candidates receive their votes. And so it continues until one candidate receives at least 50% of the votes.

In 2016, there were 17 Republican primary candidates. If a preferenttial voting system had been utilized, Donald Trump probably would have won far fewer primaries and not won the Republican presidential nomination.

If done for the general election, this could encourage third-party candidates. Such a candidate couldn’t function as a spoiler, because if the top candidate does not get at least 50% of the votes, the third-party candidate is eliminated and his/her voters’ second choices are counted.

The State of Maine used this system, which they call “Ranked Choice Voting,” in the 2018 mid-term election and it caused the Republican incumbent, who got the most votes but not 50%, to lose to the Democratic candidate after a third candidate with the lowest number of votes was eliminated and his votes redistributed to his voters’ second choice. Not surprisingly, the Republicans in Maine’s legislature are now pressing to have the law repealed. Here’s a link to a TV news report on the controversy:

https://wgme.com/news/local/ranked-choice-voting-up-for-debate-at-state-house

I Love to Write About Real Estate, But This Week It’s Personal

By JIM SMITH, Citizen

I’m writing this week’s column from the woods near Kalispell, Montana, where we are visiting Rita’s sister and her husband. Although I usually write about real estate, that topic is not top of mind for me this week. Instead, I’m going to write about what’s really top of mind for me these days — Donald Trump and the decline and fall of the America in which Rita and I grew up.

I’m paying for this ad space personally. That’s why I removed all branding in the printed versions.  The opinions I express herein are not those of the brokerage I own and manage.  None of my broker associates were consulted about its content and I know that at least one would disagree with what I write below.

What’s really on my mind as Rita and I take this 10-day road trip to Boise, Seattle and now Kalispell, listening to the national news and conversing with friends and relatives, is the sad state of our republic.

Since I am also writing this on Father’s Day, I’m also thinking about my late father, Abbott Smith, an old-school proper New Englander to whom integrity was everything. I can still hear Dad saying, “Just because other people steal apples doesn’t make it right for you to steal apples.”  I got my values from him.

Dad would be appalled that we have a president who, under the tutelage of his one-time lawyer, Roy Cohn, practices the principle that if you tell a lie long enough people will believe it. Also, that you should never admit you’re wrong. (Google the two names together or click here to learn about Cohn’s influence on Trump.)

Rita and I left on our vacation about the time that President Trump negotiated with his “new friend” Kim Jung Un after insulting his fellow G-7 leaders, including the prime minister of our country’s strongest ally and trading partner, Canada.

It was clear to me years ago that Donald Trump is a narcissist and bully, whose only interest is self aggrandizement and self promotion, even when it violates the emoluments provision of our Constitution. My lifelong Republican father would be turning over in his grave if he knew not only what Donald Trump is doing and saying but, worse, how the elected members of the “Grand Old Party” — most of whom at one time proclaimed “Never Trump!” (Google that phrase or click here to read the very long list) — have snapped into line with Trump because they think that’s how they can maintain what’s most important to them — their re-election.

How much further down this road must America go? The President, who says that military exercises with South Korea were “costing us a fortune,” ordered a military parade that will cost millions of taxpayer dollars that would be better spent on almost anything else. He was inspired by a parade in France, but such parades are really the trademark of Russia, China, North Korea and other dictatorships.  What’s next?  Oversized wall-mounted portraits of him in Washington DC?

Rotary’s “4-Way Test”

Every Tuesday we begin our breakfast meeting at the Rotary Club of Golden by reciting the Pledge of Allegiance, followed by Rotary’s 4-Way Test. I can’t picture this president beginning cabinet meetings with this declaration of “the things we think, say or do”:

  • First, Is It the Truth?
  • Second, Is It Fair to All Concerned?
  • Third, Will It Build Goodwill and Better Friendships?
  • Fourth, Will It Be Beneficial to All Concerned?

 Try applying that test to such Trump policies as separating immigrant children from their parents, while falsely claiming the Democrats made him do it.   Or how about denying climate change and removing all use of that phrase from EPA documents on the subject? What about imposing tariffs on our closest trading partners, while claiming falsely that trade wars are “good” and “easy to win”?  It’s hard to think of any Trump policy for which any one of those four questions could be answered in the affirmative.

Well-intended policies often need to be reversed, but Trump, as taught by Roy Cohn, will never admit he’s wrong, so he allows bad policies to stay in place when they shouldn’t, just to avoid admitting a mistake.  That’s why he insists on keeping nonsensical campaign promises he made — such as bringing back coal, quitting the Paris Climate Accords, quitting the Trans-Pacific Partnership, exiting the Iran agreement, or abandoning NAFTA, among others.  (The list is pretty long!)

As offended as we have been by so many of this president’s words and deeds, we’re also saddened by the lack of an articulate opposition by both Democrats and those once-moderate never-Trump Republicans.

Also, as a professional journalist, I am saddened by the attacks on the mainstream media as the “enemy of the people” (a Stalinist term) and by the use of the phrase “fake news” to dismiss honest journalistic coverage. The complicity of Fox News in this process is disappointing to anyone who knows and appreciates real journalism.

So what can be done about this situation?  Below are two “modest proposals” that I’d like to advance.

A Couple Modest Proposals for Saving America

It’s easy to criticize President Trump and where he is leading us, but where are the proposals to remedy this situation? Here are mine.

The first is for the Democratic Party to create what the British Parliament has long had and which I learned about in the 7th and 8th grades — a “Shadow Cabinet.”  

Wikipedia describes this pillar of British government as follows:

The Shadow Cabinet is a feature of the Westminster system of government. It consists of a senior group of opposition spokespeople who, under the leadership of the Leader of the Opposition, form an alternative cabinet to that of the government, and whose members shadow or mirror the positions of each individual member of the Cabinet. It is the Shadow Cabinet’s responsibility to scrutinize the policies and actions of the government, as well to offer an alternative program.

In most countries, a member of the shadow cabinet is referred to as a Shadow Minister. In Canada, however, the term Opposition Critic is more common. In the United Kingdom’s House of Lords and in New Zealand, the term “spokesperson” is used instead of “shadow.”

I propose that the minority party (currently the Democratic Party) designate political leaders to serve as Shadow Secretaries for each Cabinet department.  (How cool would it be if they recited the 4-Way Test when they meet as a group?)  The Shadow EPA administrator could focus his or her attention on the unreported activities and pronouncements of EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt. The Shadow Secretary of Energy could monitor the actions and pronouncements of Secretary Rick Perry, and the Shadow Attorney General could do the same regarding Attorney General Jeff Sessions. And so forth for every other Cabinet member. Their press conferences would be covered, including by Fox News, and provide information which is currently only being provided by investigative reporters who are readily dismissed by the president as “fake news.”  Sen. Chuck Schumer and Rep. Nancy Pelosi simply cannot provide this service or play this role. Good candidates for a current Shadow Cabinet would be former heads or deputies of those cabinet departments.

I wish the Republicans had had a Shadow Cabinet during the Obama administration for the same reasons.  All sides would benefit from the perspective provided by a Shadow Cabinet.  It would serve to keep the “real” Cabinet and the President honest.  The worst part of the current situation is how easily the President can dismiss investigative reporting that is critical of his administration. If, instead, the reporters were covering the informed statements of department experts, it wouldn’t be as convincing when that coverage is labeled “fake news.” 

My second proposal is that some newsworthy opponent of the current president (likely a Democrat) announce his or her candidacy for President now instead of next year. Doing so not only provides a mechanism for fundraising (which is working well for Trump), but it also makes it possible to have full-fledged rallies (also working well for Trump) that would garner coverage by all the media, providing yet another avenue for turning the mainstream media  into reporters covering newsmakers critical of the Trump administration instead of providing the analysis themselves, which has only made them vulnerable to charges of partisanship (aka “fake news”).

Lastly, I want to reiterate that these are my personal remarks and not those of my real estate brokerage or its broker associates. I’m not worried that speaking out on this subject will hurt my brokerage or me financially, but if it does, I am willing to pay that price, and I will understand if an agent wants to disassociate him or herself from what I have written and leave our brokerage. Our democracy, our country, our future as a nation are too important for me to remain silent any longer about this president, his denial of climate change, his assault on the free press, and his total disregard for telling the truth.