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JIMMY HOFFA RETURNS–ON NETFLIX: PART THREE (END)

In Entertainment, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Politics, Social commentary on September 18, 2019 at 12:20 am

The 1983 TV mini-series, Blood Feud, chronicles the decade-long struggle between Robert F. Kennedy (Cotter Smith) and James R. Hoffa (Robert Blake), president of the International Brotherhood of Teamsters Union.

With Kennedy as Attorney General and facing relentless pressure from the Justice Department, the Mafia despairs of a solution. At a swanky restaurant, several high-ranking Mafiosi agree that “something” must be done.

On November 22, 1963, President John F. Kennedy is assassinated in Dallas, Texas.

Blood Feud clearly implies that the Mafia was responsible.

[The House Assassinations Committee investigated this possibility in 1978, and determined that Carlos Marcello, the Mafia boss of New Orleans, had the means, motive and opportunity to kill JFK. But it could not find any conclusive evidence of his involvement.]

Even with the President dead, RFK’s Justice Department continues to pursue Hoffa. In 1964, he is finally convicted of jury tampering and sentenced to 13 years’ imprisonment.

U.S. Department of Justice

Hoping to avoid prison, Hoffa phones Robert Kennedy, offering future Teamsters support if RFK runs for President. To prove he can deliver, he tells Kennedy that the Teamsters have even penetrated the FBI.

[In March, 1964, Kennedy met with Hoffa on an airfield at Dulles International Airport in Washington, D.C. He was accompanied by two Secret Service agents from the detail assigned to ex-First Lady Jacqueline Kennedy.

[FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover, no longer afraid to cross RFK, had withdrawn the agents previously assigned to guard Kennedy.

[Accompanying Hoffa were two muscular bodyguards—at least one of whom was packing two pistols in shoulder holsters.

[While the Secret Service agents watched from a respectful distance, Kennedy spoke quietly with Hoffa. The Attorney General showed a document to Hoffa, and the Teamsters leader at times nodded or shook his head.

[The agents drove Kennedy back to Washington. During the ride, he said nothing about the reason for the meeting.

[Gus Russo—author of Live By the Sword: The Secret War Against Castro and the Death of JFK—writes that the reason might have been Dallas.

[Perhaps, he speculates, RFK had wanted to look into Hoffa’s eyes while asking him: Did you have anything to do with the assassination? RFK had, in fact, done this with CIA Director John McCone almost immediately after his brother’s death.]

In Blood Feud, Kennedy confronts J. Edgar Hoover (Ernest Borgnine) and accuses him of illegally planting wiretaps in Mob hangouts all over the country.

J. Edgar Hoover and Robert F. Kennedy

Hoover retorts that this had been the only way to obtain the prosecution-worthy intelligence Kennedy had demanded: “You loved that flow of information. You didn’t want it to stop.”

Kennedy: Why did you keep the FBI out of the fight against the Mob for decades?

Hoover: “Every agency that came to grips with them got corrupted by their money.”

[So far as is known, Hoover never made any such confession. Historians continue to guess his reason for leaving the Mob alone for decades.]

The Horn Section: Film Review: BLOOD FEUD (1983)

Ernest Borgnine as J. Edgar Hoover

RFK then mentions the CIA’s plots to employ the Mob to assassinate Cuban dictator Fidel Castro.

[The agency had wanted to please President Kennedy, and the Mafia had wanted to regain its casinos lost to the Cuban Revolution. The role the Kennedy brothers played in the CIA’s assassination plots remains murky, and has been the subject of endless speculation.]

“The CIA, doing business with the Mob,” says Kennedy. “The FBI, leaking information to its enemies [the Teamsters].” Then, sadly: “I guess it’s true—everyone does business with everyone.”

[So far as is known, the FBI did not pass on secrets to the Teamsters. But during the 1970s, the Mafia penetrated the Cleveland FBI office through bribes to a secretary. Several FBI Mob informants were “clipped” as a result.]

In 1967, Hoffa goes to prison. He stays there until, in 1971, President Richard Nixon commutes his sentence in hopes of gaining Teamsters’ support for his 1972 re-election.

Kennedy leaves the Justice Department in 1964 and is elected U.S. Senator from New York. In 1968 he runs for President. On June 5, after winning the California primary, he’s assassinated.

In Blood Feud, just before his assassination, RFK asks: “How will I ever really know if the Mob killed Jack because of my anti-Mob crusade?”

Hoffa schemes to return to the presidency of the Teamsters—a post now held by his successor, Frank Fitzsimmons. He runs the union in a more relaxed style than Hoffa, thus giving the Mob greater control over its pension fund.

And the Mafia likes it that way.

On July 30, 1975, Hoffa disappears from the parking lot of the Machus Red Fox Restaurant near Detroit. He had gone there to meet with two Mafia leaders.

Forty-four years after the death of James R. Hoffa, and 51 years after that of Robert F. Kennedy:

Labor unions are a shadow of their former power.
The threat they once represented to national prosperity has been replaced by that of predatory corporations like Enron and AIG.
The war RFK began on the Mafia has continued, sending countless mobsters to prison.
Millions of Americans who once expected the Federal Government to protect them from crime now believe the Government is their biggest threat.
The idealism that fueled RFK’s life has virtually disappeared from politics.

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JIMMY HOFFA RETURNS–ON NETFLIX: PART TWO (OF THREE)

In Entertainment, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Politics, Social commentary on September 17, 2019 at 12:23 am

The 1983 TV mini-series, Blood Feud, chronicles the decade-long struggle between Robert F. Kennedy and James R. Hoffa.

Having “helped” Kennedy (Cotter Smith) to oust corrupt Teamsters President Dave Beck, Hoffa (Robert Blake) believes that Kennedy should now be satisfied: “He’s got his scalp. Now he can move on to other things while I run the union.”

But Hoffa has guessed wrong—with fatal results. Realizing that he’s been “played” by Hoffa, a furious Kennedy strikes back.

Robert Blake as James R Hoffa

He orders increased surveillance of Hoffa and his topmost associates. He subpoenas union records and members of both the Teamsters and the Mafia to appear before his committee in public hearings.

And he tries to enlist the aid of legendary FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover (Ernest Borgnine). But Hoover wants no part of a war against organized crime, whose existence he refuses to admit.

Meanwhile, Kennedy’s confrontations with Hoffa grow increasingly fierce. In open hearings, Kennedy accuses Hoffa of receiving kickbacks in the name of his wife. Hoffa damns him for “dirtying my wife’s name.”

Kennedy secures an indictment against Hoffa for hiring a spy to infiltrate the Senate Labor Rackets Committee. He’s so certain of a conviction that he tells the press he’ll “jump off the Capitol building” if Hoffa beats the rap.

But Hoffa’s lawyer, Edward Bennett Williams (Jose Ferrer) puts Kennedy himself on the witness stand. There he portrays Kennedy as a spoiled rich man who’s waging a vendetta against Hoffa.

Hoffa beats the rap, and offers to send Kennedy a parachute. But he jokingly warns reporters: “Hey, Bobby, you better have it checked. I don’t trust myself!”

By 1959, Robert Kennedy’s work as chief counsel for the Senate Labor Rackets Committee is over. But not his determination to send Teamsters President James Hoffa to prison.

Cotter Smith as Robert Kennedy

Throughout 1960, he manages the Presidential campaign for his brother, John F. Kennedy (Sam Groom). By a margin of only 112,000 votes, JFK wins the election.

Hoffa thinks that his troubles are over, that “Bobby” will move on to other pursuits and forget about the Teamsters.

Hoffa is partly right: Kennedy moves on to another job. But it’s the office of United States Attorney General.

JFK, needing someone in the Cabinet he can trust completely, browbeats Robert into becoming the nation’s top cop.

For Hoffa, it’s a nightmare come true.

As Attorney General, Kennedy no longer has to beg J. Edgar Hoover to attack organized crime. He can—and does—order him to do so.

Throughout the country, the Mafia feels a new heat as FBI agents plant illegal electronic microphones (“bugs”) in their innermost sanctums. Agents openly tail mobsters—and send them to prison in large numbers.

And Kennedy sets up a special unit, composed of topflight prosecutors and investigators, to go after just one man: James Riddle Hoffa. The press comes to call it the “Get Hoffa” squad.

Hoffa continues to beat federal prosecutors in court. But he believes he’s under constant surveillance by the FBI, and his nerves are starting to crack.

Convinced that the FBI has bugged his office, he literally tears apart the room, hoping to find the bug. But he fails to do so.

What he doesn’t know is he’s facing a more personal danger—from one of his closest associates.

He tells a trusted colleague, Edward Grady Partin (Brian Dennehy) how easy it would be to assassinate Kennedy with a rifle or bomb.

Later, Partin gets into a legal jam—and is abandoned by the Teamsters. Hoping to cut a deal, he relays word to the Justice Department of Hoffa’s threats against the Attorney General.

Now working for the Justice Department, Partin sends in reports on Hoffa’s juror-bribing efforts in yet another trial. Hoffa again beats the rap—but now Kennedy has the insider’s proof he needs to put him away for years.

Meanwhile, the Mafia despairs of the increasing pressure of the Justice Department. At a swanky restaurant, several high-ranking members agree that “something” must be done.

[Although this scene is fictional, it’s clearly based on an infamous outburst of Carlos Marcello, the longtime Mafia boss of New Orleans.

Carlos Marcello

[In 1961, Marcello was deported to his native Guatemala on orders by RFK. After illegally re-entering the country, he swore vengeance against the Attorney General.

[In September, 1962, during a meeting with several mob colleagues, he flew into a rage when someone mentioned Kennedy.

“Take the stone out of my shoe!” he shouted, echoing a Sicilian curse. “Don’t you worry about that little Bobby sonofabitch. He’s going to be taken care of!”

[When one of his colleagues warned that murdering RFK would trigger the wrath of his brother, President John F. Kennedy, Marcello replied: “In Sicily they say if you want to kill a dog you don’t cut off the tail. You go for the head.”

[Marcello believed that the death of President Kennedy would render the Attorney General powerless. And he added that he planned to use a “nut” to do the job.]

On November 22, 1963, President John F. Kennedy is assassinated in Dallas, Texas.

Blood Feud clearly implies that the Mafia was responsible.

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JIMMY HOFFA RETURNS–ON NETFLIX: PART ONE (OF THREE)

In Entertainment, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Politics, Social commentary on September 16, 2019 at 12:10 am

James Riddle Hoffa, the onetime president of the International Brotherhood of Teamsters (IBT) Union, vanished 44 years ago—on July 30, 1975.

Elected President of the Teamsters in 1957, Hoffa was convicted of jury tampering in 1964 and began serving an eight-year prison sentence in 1967. Before doing so, he named Frank Fitzsimmons, whom he thought a totally loyal ally, to serve as a caretaker president.

Pardoned by President Richard M. Nixon in December, 1971, Hoffa immediately began campaigning to regain the presidency of the union in 1976. But Fitzsommons had come to enjoy the IBT presidency—and wanted to keep it.

More importantly, the Mafia wanted him to keep it. Under Hoffa, the Teamsters had bankrolled various Mafia real estate schemes—such as building casinos in Las Vegas.

But Hoffa had kept a tight hold on Teamster monies. Fitzsimmons, by contrast, had allowed the Mafia a free hand—at the expense of the Teamster pension fund meant for retiring members.

Warned by his onetime Mafia allies to drop his campaign for re-election, Hoffa charged ahead anyway.

On July 30, 1975, he expected to meet with three major Mafia bosses at a restaurant in Detroit: Anthony Giacalone, Russell Buffalino and Anthony Provenzano. With their backing, he expected a guaranteed victory.

Instead, he disappeared.

The FBI assigned 200 agents to investigate his disappearance. But Hoffa’s body was never found, and even the way he died remained a mystery.

Then, in 2004, former prosecutor-turned-author Charles Brandt published a non-fiction book: I Heard You Paint Houses. Based on tape recorded interviews with former Mafia hitman Frank “The Irishman” Sheeran, it revealed the events that led up to Hoffa’s execution.

And it was none other than Sheeran—to whom Hoffa had presented a gold, diamond-encrusted watch in October, 1974—who carried out the execution.

This November, Sheeran’s life will be depicted in a new movie: The Irishman, directed by Martin Scorsese. Sheeran will be portrayed by Robert De Niro, Joe Pesci will portray Mafia boss Russell Buffalino and Al Pacino will play Hoffa.

The Irishman will receive a limited theatrical release on November 1, 2019, followed by digital streaming on November 27 by Netflix.

This is not the first movie made about the life and death of Jimmy Hoffa. Sylvester Stallone played Johnny Kovak, a Hoffa-like labor leader, in 1978’s F.I.S.T. And Jack Nicholson played Hoffa in a 1992 movie.

But the most lengthy and detailed portrayal of Hoffa’s stormy life came 36 years ago on TV.

In 1983, Blood Feud, a two-part TV mini-series, depicted the 11-year animosity between Robert F. Kennedy and Hoffa. Although it took some dramatic liberties, its portrayal of the major events of that period remains essentially accurate.

In 1957, as a young, idealistic attorney, Kennedy had declared war on Hoffa, the president of the Mafia-dominated International Brotherhood of Teamsters Union.

As chief counsel for the Senate Labor Rackets Committee, Kennedy was appalled at the corruption he discovered among high-ranking Teamster officials. As he saw it, under Hoffa’s leadership, the union was nothing less than “a conspiracy of evil.”

Robert Francis Kennedy as Chief Counsel, Senate Labor Rackets Committee

Hoffa, in turn, held an equally unflattering view of Kennedy. “A rich punk,” said Hoffa, who didn’t know or care about “the average workingman.”

Today, labor unions are a rapidly-vanishing species, commanding far less political influence than they did 50 years ago. As a result, young viewers of this series may find it hard to believe that labor ever held such sway, or that the Teamsters posed such a threat.

And in an age when millions see “Big Government” as the enemy, they may feel strong reservations about the all-out war that Robert F. Kennedy waged against Hoffa.

James Riddle Hoffa testifying before the Senate Labor Rackets Committee

Blood Feud opens in 1957, when Hoffa (Robert Blake) is a rising figure within the Teamsters. Kennedy (Cotter Smith) is chief counsel for the Senate Labor Rackets Committee.

At first, Hoffa tries to ingratiate himself with Kennedy, telling him: “I know everybody who can help me and anybody who can hurt me.”

A wily Hoffa decides to parley Kennedy’s anti-corruption zeal into a path to power for himself. Via his attorney, Eddie Cheyfitz, he feeds Kennedy incriminating evidence against Dave Beck, president of the Teamsters.

Confronted with a Senate subpoena, Beck flees the country—paving the way for Hoffa to assume the top position in the union. Hoffa believes he has solved two problems at once.

Having “helped” Kennedy to oust Beck, Hoffa believes that Kennedy should now be satisfied: “He’s got his scalp. Now he can move on to other things while I run the union.”

But Hoffa has guessed wrong—with fatal results. Realizing that he’s been “played.” a furious Kennedy strikes back.

He orders increased surveillance of Hoffa and his topmost associates. He subpoenas union records and members of both the Teamsters and the Mafia to appear before his committee in public hearings.

And he tries to enlist the aid of legendary FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover (Ernest Borgnine). But Hoover wants no part of a war against organized crime, whose existence he refuses to admit.

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TRUMP’S INSANITY IS AMERICA’S REALITY: PART FOUR (END)

In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Military, Politics, Social commentary on August 30, 2019 at 12:08 am

“Drawing Present-Day Lessons: Is Donald Trump the Modern Caligula?”

That’s the question raised in the last chapter of the new biography: Caligula: The Mad Emperor of Rome, by Stephen Dando-Collins

Dando-Collins is the award-winning author of 43 books—nine of which focus on ancient Rome. Among these: Mark Antony’s Heroes and The Ides: Caesar’s Murder and the War for Rome.

Among the similarities he finds between Caligula and Trump:

Caligula ruled the largest military and economic power of his age.
Trump rules the largest military/economic power of the 21st century.
Caligula emptied the Roman treasury through extravagant spending.
Trump’s combination of massive tax cuts for the rich and equally massive Federal spending has ballooned the national debt to $22.5 trillion.
Neither Caligula nor Trump served in the military.
Neither Caligula nor Trump had governing experience before ascending to power.
Both had multiple wives—Caligula had four; Trump has three.
Once in power, Caligula rid himself of advisers who tried to restrain his worst impulses or refused to act on them.
So has Trump.

Gaius Caligula

After an unsuccessful attempt to conquer Britain, Caligula declared war on Neptune, the god of the sea. He ordered his soldiers to whip the waves and gather seashells to bring home as “spoils.” He then sent messengers to Rome claiming victory.
Trump has multiple times seriously suggested using nuclear bombs to stop hurricanes from hitting the United States,
Caligula boasted: “Bear in mind that I can treat anyone exactly as I please.”
Trump has similarly boasted that he could shoot someone on Fifth Avenue and get away with it.
Caligula thought himself a military genius—stealing the breastplate from the corpse of Alexander the Great and wearing it.
Trump has boasted: “I know more about ISIS than the generals do, believe me.”
Caligula delighted in humiliating adversaries. According to his biographer, Gaius Suetonius Tranquillus: “He forced parents to attend the executions of their sons, sending a litter for one man who pleaded ill health, and inviting another to dinner immediately after witnessing the death, and trying to rouse him to gaiety and jesting by a great show of affability.”
Trump similarly relishes humiliating both adversaries and former allies in press conferences and on Twitter, giving them derogatory nicknames such as “Crooked Hillary” Clinton, “Little Adam Schitt” (Schiff), “Little Marco” Rubio, “Rocket Man” Kim Jong-Un.

Donald Trump

Caligula never forgot a slight and relished exacting vengeance, even years afterward. His infamous order for torturing victims: “Strike so that he may feel that he is dying.”
Trump has famously said: “Get even with people. If they screw you, screw them back 10 times as hard. I really believe it.”
Caligula reveled in self-worship, calling himself: “Pious,” “Child of the Camp,” “Father of the Armies,” and “Greatest and Best of Caesars.”
Trump has similarly declared himself “so great looking and smart, a true Stable Genius!”
Flattered by sycophants, Caligula began to believe himself a god. He appeared at the temple of Castor and Pollux to be worshiped as Jupiter Latiaris. He also set up a special temple to his own godhead.
Similarly, during a press conference, Trump reached heavenward for legitimacy. Defending his potentially disastrous trade war with China, he proclaimed: “Somebody had to do it. I am the Chosen One.”
He also quoted Right-wing conspiracist Wayne Allyn Root as saying: “The Jewish people in Israel love him [Trump] like he’s the King of Israel. They love him like he is the second coming of God.”
Caligula lived in incest with his three sisters. He violated Drusilla when he was still a minor.
Trump has boasted: “I’ve said if Ivanka weren’t my daughter, perhaps I’d be dating her.”

The trait that finally destroyed Caligula was his joy in humiliating others.

His fatally taunted Cassius Chaerea, a member of his own bodyguard. Caligula considered Chaerea effeminate because of a weak voice and mocked him with nicknames like “Priapus” and “Venus.”

On January 22 41 A.D. Chaerea and several other bodyguards hacked Caligula to death with swords before other guards could save him.

Trump has repeatedly outraged members of the American Intelligence community—such as the FBI, CIA and National Security Agency—by siding with Vladimir Putin against them. He has in effect accused them of lying about Russian subversion of the 2016 Presidential election.

On December 22, 2018, Trump shut down the Federal Government, forcing Secret Service agents to work for more than a month without pay because Democrats refused to fund his senseless “wall” against Mexico.

Now Trump—through the US Citizenship and Immigration Services—has decreed that children born to American military members outside the United States will no longer be automatically considered citizens.

Many members of all of these agencies—FBI, CIA, National Security Agency, Secret Service, Army, Navy, Air Force, Marines—come in contact with him almost daily. And many of them are armed. (Secret Service agents are always armed.)

As Niccolo Machiavelli warns in The Discourses: “When a prince becomes universally hated, it is likely that he’s harmed some individuals—who thus seek revenge. This desire is increased by seeing that the prince is widely loathed.”

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TRUMP’S INSANITY IS AMERICA’S REALITY: PART THREE (OF FOUR)

In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Military, Politics, Social commentary on August 29, 2019 at 12:37 am

Donald Trump’s appearance at the Conservative Political Action Conference (C-PAC) on March 2, 2019, was an occasion for rejoicing among his supporters.

But for those who prize rationality and decency in a President, it was a dismaying and frightening experience.

For two hours, Trump gave free reign to his anger and egomania.

Among his unhinged commentaries:

“He called me up. He said, ‘You’re a great President. You’re doing a great job.’ He said, ‘I just want to tell you you’re a great President and you’re one of the smartest people I’ve ever met.'”

Trump attributed these remarks to California’s liberal governor, Gavin Newsom. On February 11, 2019, Newsom announced the withdrawal of several hundred National Guardsmen from the state’s southern border with Mexico—defying Trump’s request for support from border states.

Donald Trump at CPAC

“You know if you remember my first major speech—you know the dishonest media they’ll say, ‘He didn’t get a standing ovation.’ You know why? Because everybody stood and nobody sat. They are the worst. They leave that out.”

Once again, he’s the persecuted victim of an unfair and totally unappreciative news media.

“And I love the First Amendment; nobody loves it better than me. Nobody. I mean, who use its more than I do? But the First Amendment gives all of us—it gives it to me, it gives it to you, it gives it to all Americans, the right to speak our minds freely. It gives you the right and me the right to criticize fake news and criticize it strongly.”

Trump has repeatedly called the nation’s free press “the enemy of the people”—a slander popularized by Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin. And while Trump brags about his usage of the First Amendment, he’s used Non-Disclosure Agreements and threats of lawsuits to deny that right to others.

“For too long, we’ve traded away our jobs to other countries. So terrible.”

While this remark—like virtually every remark Trump made at CPAC—got rousing applause, he failed to mention that his own products are made overseas:

Ties: Made in China
Suits: Made in Indonesia
Trump Vodka: Made in the Netherlands, and later in Germany
Crystal glasses, decanters: Made in Slovenia
And the clothing and accessories line of his daughter, Ivanka, is produced entirely in factories in Bangladesh, Indonesia and China.

“By the way, you folks are in here—this place is packed, there are lines that go back six blocks and I tell you that because you won’t read about it, OK.”

He’s obsessed with fear that the media won’t make him look popular.

“So we’re all part of this very historic movement, a movement the likes of which, actually, the world has never seen before. There’s never been anything like this. There’s been some movements, but there’s never been anything like this.”

Actually, the world has seen a movement like this—in Fascist Italy and Nazi Germany. Trump sees himself as the single greatest figure in history. So anything he’s involved with must be unprecedented.

“But I always say, Obamacare doesn’t work. And these same people two years ago and a year ago were complaining about Obamacare.”

In 2010, 48 million Americans lacked health insurance. By 2016, that number had been reduced to 28.6 million. So 20 million Americans now have access to medical care they previously couldn’t get.

“But we’re taking a firm, bold and decisive measure, we have to, to turn things around. The era of empty talk is over, it’s over.”

Trump has boasted that he and North Korean dictator Kim Jong-Un “fell in love.” Then he met with Kim in Vietnam—and got stiffed on a deal for North Korea to give up its nuclear weapons.

On July 16, 2018, Trump attended a press conference in Helsinki, Finland, with Russian President Vladimir Putin. There he blamed American Intelligence agencies—such as the FBI, CIA and National Security Agency—instead of Putin for Russia’s subversion of the 2016 Presidential election.

“I’ll tell you what they [agents of Immigration and Customs Enforcement] do, they came and endorsed me, ICE came and endorsed me. They never endorsed a presidential candidate before, they might not even be allowed to.”

Trump can’t stop boasting about how popular he is.

“These are hard-working, great, great Americans. These are unbelievable people who have not been treated fairly. Hillary called them deplorable. They’re not deplorable.”

On the contrary: “Deplorable” is exactly the word for those who vote their racism, ignorance, superstition and hatred of their fellow citizens.

A FINAL NOTE: Trump held himself up for adoration just three days after Michael Cohen, his longtime fixer:

Damned him as a racist, a conman and a cheat.
Revealed that Trump had cheated on his taxes and bought the silence of a porn “star” to prevent her revealing a 2006 tryst before the 2016 election.
Estimated he had stiffed, on Trump’s behalf, hundreds of workers Trump owed money to.

And, only two days earlier, Trump had returned from a much-ballyhooed meeting in Vietnam with North Korean dictator Kim Jong-Un. Trump hoped to get a Nobel Peace Prize by persuading Kim to give up his nuclear arsenal.

Instead, Trump got stiffed—and returned home empty-handed.

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TRUMP’S INSANITY IS AMERICA’S REALITY: PART TWO (OF FOUR)

In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Military, Politics, Social commentary on August 28, 2019 at 12:14 am

On March 4, 2017, less than two months after taking office as President, Donald Trump—offering absolutely no evidence—accused former President Barack Obama of illegally tapping his Trump Tower phones prior to the election:

“I’d bet a good lawyer could make a great case out of the fact that President Obama was tapping my phones in October, just prior to Election!”

A subsequent investigation by the Justice Department turned up no evidence to substantiate Trump’s foray into Presidential libel.

And during his first two weeks as President, Trump attacked 22 people, places and things on his @realDonaldTrump Twitter account.

Trump’s vindictiveness, his narcissism, his compulsive aggression, his complaints that his “enemies” in government and the press are trying to destroy him, have caused many to ask: Could the President of the United States be suffering from mental illness?

One who has dared to answer this question is John D. Gartner, a practicing psychotherapist.

John D. Gartner

Gartner graduated magna cum laude from Princeton University, received his Ph.D in clinical psychology from the University of Massachusetts, and served as a part-time assistant professor of psychiatry at Johns Hopkins University Medical School for 28 years.

During an interview by U.S. News & World Report (published on January 27, 2017), Gartner said: “Donald Trump is dangerously mentally ill and temperamentally incapable of being president.”

Gartner said that Trump suffers from “malignant narcissism,” whose symptoms include:

anti-social behavior
sadism
aggressiveness
paranoia
and grandiosity.

“We’ve seen enough public behavior by Donald Trump now that we can make this diagnosis indisputably,” said Gartner, who admitted he had not personally examined Trump.

Completely agreeing with that estimate was Bandy X. Lee, an assistant clinical psychiatry professor at the Yale School of Medicine.

She is the editor of The Dangerous Case of Donald Trump: 27 Psychiatrists and Mental Health Experts Assess a President.

“It doesn’t take a psychiatrist to notice that our president is mentally compromised,” she and colleague Judith Lewis Herman asserted in the book’s prologue.

According to Dr. Craig Malkin, a Lecturer in Psychology for Harvard Medical School and a licensed psychologist, Trump is a pathological narcissist:

“Pathological narcissism begins,” Malkin wrote, “when people become so addicted to feeling special that, just like with any drug, they’ll do anything to get their ‘high,’ including lie, steal, cheat, betray and even hurt those closest to them.

“When they can’t let go of their need to be admired or recognized, they have to bend or invent a reality in which they remain special despite all messages to the contrary. In point of fact, they become dangerously psychotic. It’s just not always obvious until it’s too late.”

Lance Dodes, a retired psychiatry professor at Harvard Medical School, believes that Trump is a sociopath: “The failure of normal empathy is central to sociopathy, which is marked by an absence of guilt, intentional manipulation and controlling or even sadistically harming others for personal power or gratification.”

More of that behavior was on full display on March 2, 2019 at the annual Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC), held at the Gaylord National Resort & Convention Center, National Harbor, Maryland.

For more than two hours, Trump delivered the longest speech (so far) of his Presidency to his fanatically Right-wing audience.

Facing a hostile Democratic House of Representatives and a potentially explosive report by Special Counsel Robert Mueller, Trump threw down the gauntlet.

“You know, I’m totally off script right now,” Trump said early on. “This is how I got elected, by being off script.”

And from the moment he embraced an American flag as though he wanted to hump it, it was clear: He was “totally off script.”

“How many times did you hear, for months and months, ‘There is no way to 270?’ You know what that means, right? ‘There is no way to 270.'”

Once again, Trump reveals his obsession with his win in 2016—as if no one else had ever been elected President.

“If you tell a joke, if you’re sarcastic, if you’re having fun with the audience, if you’re on live television with millions of people and 25,000 people in an arena, and if you say something like, ‘Russia, please, if you can, get us Hillary Clinton’s emails. Please, Russia, please.'”

Here he’s trying to “spin” his infamous invitation to hackers in Vladimir Putin’s Russia to intervene in an American Presidential election by obtaining the emails of his campaign rival. Which they did that same day.

“So now we’re waiting for a report, and we’ll find out whether or not, and who we’re dealing with. We’re waiting for a report by people that weren’t elected.”

It doesn’t matter to Trump that America’s foremost enemy—Russia—tried to influence a Presidential election. What matters to him is that the report may end his Presidency.

“Those red hats—and white ones. The key is in the color. The key is what it says. ‘Make America Great Again’ is what it says. Right? Right?”

Color matters. Words, ideas don’t.

“We have people in Congress that hate our country.”

If you don’t agree 100% with Trump on everything, you’re a traitor.

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TRUMP’S INSANITY IS AMERICA’S REALITY: PART ONE (OF FOUR)

In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Politics, Social commentary on August 27, 2019 at 12:15 am

From the beginning of his Presidency, Donald Trump aroused fear—based not only of what he might do, but that he might be mentally unbalanced. Consider:

His egomania is literally stamped on his properties. Of the 515 entities he owns, 268 of them—52%—bear his last name. He often refers to his properties as “the swankiest,” “the most beautiful.”

Among the flattering references he’s made to himself:

“My fingers are long and beautiful, as, it has been well documented, are various other parts of my body.”
“I think the only difference between me and the other candidates is that I’m more honest and my women are more beautiful.”
“My Twitter has become so powerful that I can actually make my enemies tell the truth.”
“My IQ is one of the highest—and you all know it.”

Trump has never been charged with incest, but he’s repeatedly made sexually inappropriate comments about his daughter, Ivanka:

“Yeah, she’s really something, and what a beauty, that one. If I weren’t happily married and, ya know, her father …
”When Trump appeared on the Dr. Oz Show, he was joined on stage by Ivanka. After they kissed, Dr. Oz said: “It’s nice to see a dad kiss his daughter.” Trump: “I kiss her every chance I get.” The remark was edited before the show aired.
When asked how he would react if Ivanka, a former teen model, posed for Playboy, Trump replied: “I don’t think Ivanka would do that, although she does have a very nice figure. I’ve said if Ivanka weren’t my daughter, perhaps I’d be dating her.”
“You know who’s one of the great beauties of the world, according to everybody? And I helped create her. Ivanka. My daughter, Ivanka. She’s six feet tall, she’s got the best body.”

Ivanka Trump

Trump delights in inflicting personal cruelties. From June 15, 2015, when he launched his Presidential campaign, until October 24, 2016, Trump fired almost 4,000 angry, insulting tweets at 281 people and institutions that had somehow offended him.

The New York Times needed two full pages of its print edition to showcase them.

At his campaign rallies, he often encouraged Right-wing thugs to attack dissenters, even claiming he would pay their legal expenses.

As President, Trump has repeatedly used Twitter to attack hundreds of real and imagined enemies in politics, journalism, TV and films.

He has bullied and publicly insulted even White House officials and his own handpicked Cabinet officers:

Trump waged a Twitter-laced feud against Jeff Sessions, his Attorney General. Sessions’ “crime”? Recusing himself from investigations into well-established ties between Russian Intelligence agents and members of Trump’s Presidential campaign. Trump fired him on November 7, 2018, the day after Democrats retook the House of Representatives in the mid-term elections.
Trump repeatedly humiliated Chief of Staff Reince Priebus: “He’s like a little rat. He just scurries around.” At one meeting, Trump ordered him to kill a fly that was buzzing about. On July 28, 2017, six months after taking the job, Priebus resigned.
Trump similarly tongue-lashed Priebus’ replacement, former Marine Corps General John Kelly. Trump was angered by Kelly’s efforts to limit the number of advisers who had unrestricted access to him. Kelly told colleagues he had never been spoken to like that during 35 years of military service—and wouldn’t tolerate it again.
After Trump gave sensitive Israeli intelligence to Russian ambassador Sergey Kislyak, his national security advisor, H.R. McMaster, denied this had happened. Trump then contradicted McMaster in a tweet: “As president, I wanted to share with Russia (at an openly scheduled WH meeting) which I have the absolute right to do, facts pertaining to terrorism and airline flight safety.”

Donald Trump

This bullying has resulted in the highest turnover of White House staff in modern history.

Referencing Trump’s Presidency, Tom McCarthy, national affairs correspondent for the British newspaper, The Guardian, wrote on November 30, 2018:

“The current president has seen crowds where none exist, deployed troops to answer no threat, attacked national institutions—the military, the justice department, the judiciary, the vote, the rule of law, the press—tried to prosecute his political enemies, elevated bigots, oppressed minorities, praised despots while insulting global allies and wreaked diplomatic havoc from North Korea to Canada.

“He stays up half the night watching TV and tweeting about it, then wakes up early to tweet some more, in what must be the most remarkable public diary of insecurity, petty vindictiveness, duplicity and scattershot focus by a major head of state in history.”

On March 4, 2017, less than two months after taking office as President, Trump—offering absolutely no evidence—accused former President Barack Obama of illegally tapping his Trump Tower phones prior to the election:

“Terrible! Just found out that Obama had my ‘wires tapped’ in Trump Tower just before the victory. Nothing found. This is McCarthyism!”

“Is it legal for a sitting President to be ‘wire tapping’ a race for president prior to an election? Turned down by court earlier. A NEW LOW!”

“How low has President Obama gone to tapp my phones during the very sacred election process. This is Nixon/Watergate. Bad (or sick) guy!”

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MORE THAN FETUSES MAY BE ABORTED

In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Politics, Social commentary on May 21, 2019 at 10:36 am

In The Prince, Niccolo Machiavelli, the father of modern political science, raised the question of “whether it is better to be loved than feared, or feared more than loved.”

And he answered it: “The reply is, that one ought to be both feared and loved, but as it is difficult for the two to go together, it is much safer to be feared than loved.”

But Machiavelli warned against relying primarily on fear: “Still, a prince should make himself feared in such a way that if he does not gain love, he at any rate avoids hatred, for fear and the absence of hatred may well go together, and will always be attained by one who abstains from interfering with the property of his citizens….or with their women.”

If the Republicans governing Georgia and Alabama ever read this warning, they have ignored it with a vengeance.

Niccolo Machiavelli

On May 7, Georgia Governor Brian Kemp signed an anti-abortion law that—in defiance of the 1973 Supreme Court decision in Roe v. Wade—re-criminalizes abortion.

The law bans abortions as soon as a fetal heartbeat is detectable. This usually occurs about six weeks into a pregnancy—even before many women know they’re pregnant.

The law permits abortions

Only if the mother’s life is at risk; or
If the fetus cannot survive.

No exceptions are made for cases of rape or incest.

“HB 481 would also have consequences for women who get abortions from doctors or miscarry,” writes Mark Joseph Stern for Slate.

“A woman who seeks out an illegal abortion from a health care provider would be a party to murder, subject to life in prison. And a woman who miscarries because of her own conduct—say, using drugs while pregnant—would be liable for second-degree murder, punishable by 10 to 30 years’ imprisonment.

“Prosecutors may interrogate women who miscarry to determine whether they can be held responsible; if they find evidence of culpability, they may charge, detain, and try these women for the death of their fetuses.” [Emphasis added.]

In addition, a woman could be sentenced to 10 years’ imprisonment if she leaves Georgia to obtain an abortion in another state.

And on May 14, Alabama Governor Kay Ivey signed into law the “Alabama Human Life Protection Act.” The law only allows exceptions “to avoid a serious health risk to the unborn child’s mother,” for ectopic pregnancy and if the “unborn child has a lethal anomaly.”

As in the case of Georgia, no exceptions are made for rape or incest.

Ivey admitted that the new law may be unenforceable owing to Roe v. Wade, which legalized abortion in all 50 states. But the whole point of the law is to challenge that decision, Ivey said.

Republicans constantly claim to be “the party of small government.” But there can be no more intrusive act than dictating to a woman that she must give birth—even if she’s the victim of rape or incest.

At the same time:

Republicans have proven uniformly hostile to providing poor mothers with access to food, clothing and medical care.
Donald Trump has made repealing the Affordable Care Act—which provides medical insurance to more than 20 million Americans—the hallmark of his Presidency.

It’s easy to imagine many of these women fatally cracking under the strain.

On December 6, 2011, Rachelle Grimmer, a 38-year-old resident of San Antonio, pulled a gun in a state welfare office and held off police for seven hours. Then she shot and wounded her two children—ages 10 and 12—before fatally shooting herself.

For months, she had been unable to qualify for food stamps.

Thus, women living in abortion-banning states face Right-wing hypocrisy on one hand and draconian laws punishing the most intimate acts—of sexuality and reproductive freedom—on the other.

It’s easy to imagine some pregnant women—especially the victims of incest and/or rape—desperately seeking redress through violence. And the targets of their wrath could easily be the Republican legislators of their states who have made their lives a living hell.

The President is constantly guarded by the Secret Service. And governors are protected by state police. But state assemblymen and senators aren’t assigned such details—unless there’s a specific threat made against them.

In fact, Right-wing figures have often been the targets of successful—and unsuccessful—assassination attempts.

On September 8, 1935, Louisiana U.S. Senator Huey Long was shot and fatally wounded by Carl Austin Weiss, an idealistic young doctor. Long had intended to run for President in 1936 and unseat Franklin D. Roosevelt.
On May 27, 1942, SS Obergruppenführer (General) Reinhard Heydrich—“The Butcher of Prague”—was killed with a hand grenade by two Czech patriots.
On May 15, 1972, Presidential candidate George C. Wallace was shot and paralyzed by a crazed gunman while mingling with supporters in a Maryland shopping center.
On March 30, 1981, President Ronald Reagan was shot and almost killed by a psychotic gunman while walking to his bulletproof limousine in Washington, D.C.

All of these men, it should be noted, had bodyguards assigned to them at the time they were attacked.

Given the ferocity of laws aimed specifically at them, some women may decide to abort more than fetuses.

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NRA: FEEL FREE TO INSULT DEAD GUN VICTIMS

In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Politics, Social commentary on May 9, 2019 at 12:11 am

“You know the great thing about the state of Iowa is, I’m pretty sure you all define gun control the same way we do in Texas—hitting what you aim at.

“My wife, Heidi, who is a petite, 5’2 California blonde, she was standing at the tripod unloading the full machine gun with a pink baseball cap that said ‘Frmed and Fabulous.’”

Yes, it was United States Senator Rafael “Ted” Cruz (R-Texas) on the prowl for laughs–-and votes—at a town hall meeting in Iowa.

Normally, Cruz would do his vote-hunting in Texas. But now Cruz had a bigger prize on his mind than simply being re-elected a United States Senator. Cruz wanted to be President in 2016.

U.S. Senator Rafael Cruz

And Iowa held its precinct causes on February 1-2, 2016.

Cruz’ jokes about gun control came on June 19, 2015, only two days after Dylann Roof, a white high school dropout, gunned down three unarmed black men and six black women at Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Charleston, South Carolina.

Dylann Roof

Following his remarks, Cruz headed to a shooting range, where he fired off rounds on a semiautomatic .223-caliber Smith and Wesson M&P 15.

Cruz’ remarks no doubt appeared insensitive to those who now mourned for the latest victims of gun violence. But Charles L. Cotton took insulting the dead to a whole new level.

Cotton is a National Rifle Association (NRA) board member who also runs TexasCHLForum.com, an online discussion forum about guns and gun owners’ rights in Texas and beyond.

In a discussion thread on June 18, 2015—one day after the church slaughter—a board member noted that Clementa C. Pinckney, one of the nine people slain, was a pastor and a state legislator in South Carolina.

Cotton responded: “And he voted against concealed-carry. Eight of his church members who might be alive if he had expressly allowed members to carry handguns in church are dead. Innocent people died because of his position on a political issue.”

That discussion thread has since been deleted.

During a subsequent phone interview, Cotton emphasized that he had been speaking as a private citizen—and not as an NRA board member:

“It was a discussion we were having about so called gun-free zones. It’s my opinion that there should not be any gun-free zones in schools or churches or anywhere else. If we look at mass shootings that occur, most happen in gun-free zones.”

If private citizens were allowed to carry guns everywhere, Cotton says, there will be fewer mass shootings because “if armed citizens are in there, they have a chance to defend themselves and other citizens.”

Cotton’s position—“there should not be any gun-free zones”—is exactly that of the NRA itself.

Under such circumstances, America will become a nation where anyplace, anytime, can be turned into the O.K. Corral.

Another point that Cotton didn’t mention: Dylann Roof did believe in concealed-carry–and it cost the lives of nine innocent men and women.

Finally, there is this: Even highly-trained shooters—such as those assigned to the United States Secret Service–don’t always respond as expected.

On May 15, 1972, Alabama Governor George Wallace was campaigning for President in Laurel, Maryland. He gave a speech behind a bulletproof podium at the Laurel Shopping Center. Then he moved from it to mingle with the crowd.

Since the 1968 assassination of Senator Robert F. Kennedy, all those campaigning for President have been assigned Secret Service bodyguards. And Wallace was surrounded by them as he shook hands with his eager supporters.

Suddenly, Arthur Bremer, a fame-seeking failure in life and romance, pushed his way forward, aimed a .38 revolver at Wallace’s abdomen and opened fire. Before he could be subdued, he hit Wallace four times, leaving him paralyzed for the rest of his life.

Arthur Bremer shoots George Wallace

Nor was he Bremer’s only victim. Three other people present were wounded unintentionally:

Alabama State Trooper Captain E. C. Dothard, Wallace’s personal bodyguard, who was shot in the stomach;
Dora Thompson, a campaign volunteer, who was shot in the leg; and
Nick Zarvos, a Secret Service agent, who was shot in the neck, severely impairing his speech.

None of Wallace’s bodyguards got off a shot at Bremer—before or after he pulled the trigger.

On October 6, 1981, Egyptian President Anwar Sadat was reviewing a military parade in Cairo when a truck apparently broke down directly across from where he was seated.

Anwar Sadat, moments before his assassination

Suddenly, soldiers bolted from the rear of the vehicle, throwing hand grenades and firing assault rifles. They rushed straight at Sadat—who died instantly under a hail of bullets.

Meanwhile, Sadat’s bodyguards—who had been trained by the CIA—panicked and fled.

Sadat had been assassinated by army officers who believed he had betrayed Islam by making peace with Israel in 1977.

The ultimate test of the NRA’s mantra that “there should not be any gun-free zones…anywhere” will come only when one or more heavily-armed gunmen target an NRA convention.

It will then be interesting to see if the surviving NRA members are as quick to blame themselves for being victims as they are to blame the victims of other mass gun-slaughters.

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“SECURITY THEATER” PROMOTES FAKE SECURITY

In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Military, Politics, Social commentary on April 25, 2019 at 12:04 am

So you want to visit the Pentagon and see how America’s military works to protect you? Fine.

Just be prepared to accept the requirements that go with “security theater.”

According to the Pentagon’s webpage: “Tours are available Monday through Thursday from 10:00 A.M. to 4:00 P.M. and Friday from 12:00 P.M. to 4:00 P.M., and normally last approximately 60 minutes.”

Here’s what you’ll need to take the tour:

Ages 12 and under – ID not required.
Ages 13 to 17 – One form of photo ID or a parent/guardian to vouch for them.
Ages 18 and up – At least one form of proper identification, which must be current and contains a photograph.

The Pentagon

Let’s break all this down:

“Ages 12 and under – ID not required.” Strapping bombs to children was a favorite tactic of the Viet Cong. And Al Qaeda has not hesitated to make use of the same weapon. It’s not comforting to learn that our military is still looking at children as “babes of innocence” rather than as possible “bombs of convenience.”

“Ages 13 to 17 – One form of photo ID or a parent/guardian to vouch for them.” Great! So long as an adult says, “Yeah, he’s mine,” any teenager can gain entry to America’s most important military center. This includes those teens who resent the American military’s presence around the world.

“Ages 18 and up – One form of ID, which must be current and contains a photograph, such as a driver’s license or U.S. passport.

Knowing a person’s identity is useful—so long as you have a reliable database system to match it against. An example of this is the FBI’s National Crime Information Center (NCIC).

Since 1967, the NCIC has been America’s central database for tracking crime-related information. It’s linked with such information repositories as:

Federal law enforcement agencies
State law enforcement agencies
Local law enforcement agencies
Federal and state motor vehicle registration/licensing agencies.

The NCIC makes available a variety of personal and property records for law enforcement and security purposes, covering:

Convicted sex offenders
Criminal convictions
Foreign fugitives
Immigration violators
Persons with active protection orders
Parolees
Persons with active arrest warrants
Secret Service protective alerts
Terrorist organizations and membership
Violent gang organizations and membership

Behind this lies a simple but highly effective formula, which was best-expressed in the classic 1973 movie, The Day of the Jackal. An anonymous professional killer has been hired to assassinate French President Charles de Gaulle.

At a government meeting called to thwart the plot, a top security expert says: “The first task is to give this man a name. With a name, we get a face, with a face a passport, with a passport an arrest.”

But if you don’t have a reliable database system to match an ID against, forcing people to “show me your ID” is worthless. What does “John Smith” mean to the average ill-paid security guard?

Even if the person is a wanted criminal, just looking at his ID card is worthless. Unless, of course, the person is so notorious as a criminal that his name is known to almost everyone: “My God, it’s Osama bin Laden!”

That’s presuming that the person is not only notorious but stupid enough to flaunt it. There is, after all, such a thing as a falsified ID. Every teenager who’s ever wanted access to a can of beer knows that.

If it seems impossible that any security official could be so stupid, consider this:

In 2010 a friend of mine decided to rent a P.O. box at his local Postal Service office. He was promptly told he would have to provide two pieces of identification, such as:

A driver’s license or State ID card
A passport
A birth certificate
A bill from a utility company, such as for phone or electric service.

Now, consider:

He lived only a few blocks from the post office where he was applying for a P.O. box.
He had lived at the same apartment building for 22 years.
The Postal Service had been delivering his mail there that entire time—sometimes knocking at his door to do so.
When he came to its counter to retrieve mail that was otherwise un-deliverable, his showing a State ID card had been entirely enough.

But, to rent a P.O. box at that very same post office, he had to prove he wasn’t a terrorist. And one of the ways he was to do this was to show a utility bill.

What does paying money to an electric or gas company prove about anyone?

Mohammed Atta faithfully paid all his utility bills on an apartment in Hamburg, Germany, where he planned the 9/11 attacks. He continued paying his utility bills during his stay in Venice, Florida—right up to the day he flew American Airlines Flight 11 into the North Tower of the World trade Center.

In short: Creating security theater is not the same as providing real security.

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