Dave Richards for May 9th…………
--This week we check the newswire. There’s plenty here to comment on.
We used to laugh at the “tweets” and other quoted quips of President Trump. What I can’t believe is some of these presidential comments are starting to make sense. I won’t say that I agree with them, but they do seem to make sense.
Like when President Trump exclaimed in frustration that perhaps what the country needed was a complete government shut down this fall. Of course, Trump opponents jumped upon him for what they called a totally irresponsible and dangerous comment. But there is logic and reason in his words, even though I would agree they are completely ‘non-‘presidential’.
Folks, I can tell you from personal knowledge that the only thing more destructive to the federal government than a total shut down is the repeated threats of a shut down. I have seen it first hand on four occasions. It takes a full week to shut the government down and another week to put it back on course. In the process, good people who work for the government are distracted from their regular tasks for half a month and suffer needlessly from the stress of possibly not being able to pay their bills on time. All because some rich and selfish members of congress decide to play a power game of financial ‘chicken’ against each other with reckless disregard for the consequences, which are paid by others.
The way I take President Trump’s comment is that he knows what we all know. So long as there are no consequences for the perpetrators, these threatened shutdowns will continue to be used to bully and cajole political adversaries all the while weakening the federal government. Mr. Trump knows that once the bluff has been called and the shutdown takes place, the perpetrators will be unmasked and dealt with, similar to when a blackmail victim does not give in to the blackmailer, but calls the blackmailer’s bluff. The blackmailer then has no further power. There is real logic to this line of thinking.
And then there is the president’s comments regarding Australian healthcare. In a ‘tweet’ over the weekend, Mr. Trump said, “Of course Australia’s healthcare system is better than ours……….Everybody’s is.”
And “of course” detractors have jumped all over him for saying this. “How dare he?!” But let’s think about this for a moment. Without agreeing or disagreeing that Obamacare, which is still in place mind you, is the best or the worst of systems, you have to first understand that Mr. Trump thinks it is the worst. Accepting this, what else would you expect him to think? Now, you may agree with me that even if he thinks it, we wouldn’t expect our president to actually say those words in public, but……….that’s our president. And he did tell us during the campaign that he would not go along with the games played in Washington. Again, I’m not agreeing or disagreeing, I’m just saying it makes sense.
--A new Lundberg survey indicates retail gas prices are going down. This, just before they traditionally go up for the summer months. Does this make sense? I think it does. People still haven’t made plans for their summer trips because of the economy which still is not a good as we are being told it is. Lowering the prices now may spur more consumption in the months ahead when prices will be higher than they are now. I hate sounding suspicious, but when you’re dealing with this many dollars, honest people are hard to find. The thing to keep in mind is that gas costs 14 cents per gallon more this year than it did last year at this time.
--Here’s a curious story, and I’m wondering why I haven’t seen it before. The DeKalb County, Georgia sheriff, Jeffrey Mann, was arrested and booked into the Atlanta City Jail. Last year, Mann was elected to a full term after finishing the unexpired term of Thomas Brown, who left office under criminal charges. Coincidence? I don’t think so. According to what I’m reading on the wire, every DeKalb County Sheriff elected to a full term since 1965 has faced criminal charges. Unbelievable! Seems to me they should be having a lot of trouble finding applicants for a job that for the past 50 years has destroyed the lives of everyone who has taken it. Totally unbelievable!
--Pope Francis has a problem with calling the bomb dubbed the “Mother of All Bombs” by that name. He thinks it is at the very least ‘inappropriate’ to name a bomb, a taker of life, after a mother, a giver of life. Makes sense to me. And, by the way, Happy Mother’s Day this Sunday. If she’s around, remember to at least phone mom and tell her you love her. If she has passed on, do it in your prayers. I think she’ll hear you.
--Lastly, if my mom read the next story I would get a lecture about how irresponsible it is for anyone to drop any bomb. On October 9, 1943, Allied Bombers dropped more than 260,000 bombs on the city of Hanover, Germany during World War Two. This past weekend, after more than 50 years, the 50,000 residents of that now peaceful city were evacuated because 13 of those bombs have been discovered, unexploded. They are calling it the second largest bomb cleanup since the end of hostilities, slightly less than the cleanup required last Christmas Day in the German town of Augsburg. Unbelievable.
--That’s what I think. What do you think? Comments to: dave@onworldwide.com or postal mail to Dave Richards, WOON Radio, 985 Park Avenue, Woonsocket, RI 02895-6332.
Thanks for reading!
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