Tweeting with the President

We've all seen Trump's relentlessly insipid Tweets. He's tweeted thousands of times since he became an actual political figure. Most of the time he uses Twitter to attack his political foes or to claim credit for the very few things he's accomplished since becoming the de facto leader of the Free World.

I like that he does that. First of all, every Tweet is eventually going to be used as evidence in either an impeachment trial, or in likely dozens of civil and criminal trials that will inevitably happen.

He will probably assist the prosecution in determining his guilt on many issues.

Also, his stream of unedited statements on Twitter gives everyone tremendous insight into his thought process.

And it ain't pretty!

I spent a fair amount of time responding to his tweets early on. It usually starts with him making some outrageous claim or half-baked remark, which I retweeted with with my own comprehensive rebuttal.

After some weeks of this, I realized that this isn't the way to get a response from him.

So I started calling him a dick.

Yes, I know it's silly and juvenile. But it's fun to think that every time I call him a dick and put an "@" mention of his name on the tweet, there's a tiny possibility that he may see it!

Because he does occasionally review his @ mentions, and it makes me feel all warm inside to think that as he scrolls through those mentions, the phrase "You're a dick!" may leap out at him.

As Sun Tzu says, "If your opponent is of choleric temper, seek to irritate him."

Plus, it saves me tons of time by not trying to reason with him. Just saying "You're a dick" is incredibly freeing and satisfying!

I also like to mix it up sometimes, by incorporating some of what he says in a tweet when I reply. Always with the "@realDonaldTrump" tag on it.

And then there's some of this sort of thing.

But mostly, I try to let him know, each and EVERY day, that...

Sunday Night Music Club v.52

In light of yet another tragic school shooting a couple of weeks ago, I decided to post this video of Sir Bob Geldorf and the Boomtown Rats playing their hit "I Don't Like Mondays".

This song explores the reasons, or lack of reasons, for a long-ago school shooting.

It was a time when school shootings were virtually unknown. Since then, it's tragically become an all-too-frequent event.

On Monday, January 29th, 1979, 16-year old Brenda Spencer opened a window in her house that faces the school, and started firing a little 22-calibre semi-automatic rifle at children who were waiting for the school gate to open. Even with a weapon as under-powered as that, in a few minutes she managed to kill 2 adults and wound 8 children.

After firing 30 rounds, she barricaded herself in her home. A reporter called the house during the standoff and asked her why she did it. She famously replied, "I don't like Mondays. This livens up the day."

Bob Geldorf heard the quote soon after, and set about to try and makes sense of what is obviously a senseless act of violence.

Brenda Spencer is still in prison, and probably will be for life. She's next up for parole in 2019.

The two adults she murdered are still dead.

Maryland Working on Presidential Tax Return Law

I just heard about this. Maryland's State Senate just moved a bill forward that will require ALL presidential candidates to release their previous five years of income tax returns to secure a place on the ballot.

Holy shit! What a brilliant idea!

Maryland has a Democratic majority in their Senate and House, but they also have a Republican governor, Larry Hogan. He hasn't said anything about his stance on such a bill.

Here in Connecticut, we have a majority in the House, Senate (very slight but it counts), and a Governor who may be in favor of signing such a law.

We need to make this bill strong, and there's a number of things that need to be included:

- Penalties that make it a SERIOUS state crime to falsify, omit, or hold back ANY of the
information that was filed with the IRS. This will be easy to prove, if my hope that the
IRS will provide tax returns if they are evidence in a criminal trial is realized.

- A deadline far enough in advance of any elections that make it possible to forensically
go over each return with a fine-toothed comb. Since we have a primary in Connecticut,
we should make it 90 days before the polls open.

- If an incumbent decides to skip the primary, which will happen because the Republicans
are a bunch of pussies who are afraid to go against the Cheeto King, there will still
be a 90-day requirement to release them ahead of November. This will hit right around
the time of the Republican National Convention most likely.

This can be huge! We need to call our State reps with this idea, and see if they can get it on the legislative agenda. I'd love to hear what our governor, Dan Malloy, would think about this. And we'll have to make this the model of legislation that many other Blue states can enact.

If we get enough states to do this, we can change the way certain criminal presidents are able to slither into the White House without giving a shit about fiscal transparency.

This can literally change the course of our nation.