Lame Duck

Within only a few nano-moments of Justice Antonin Scalia being pronounced dead, the august Republican Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell of the great state of Kentucky announced that he would not allow the President’s nomination to fill the vacancy on the Supreme Court to come to the Senate floor for advise and consent.  Putting aside his obvious-to-nearly-everyone-in-the-country political reason that the sitting President is a black Democrat whom he has battled from the gitgo, he asserted that President Obama was a Lame Duck President, and that it was therefore the President’s job to wait for his (Republican) successor to nominate the next (conservative Republican) Associate Justice, some eleven months and change from now. 

Unprecedented?  Yup.

But let’s spend a few words talking about his reason for delay: President Obama is a "lame duck" President.  But he is not a lame duck President.  He will become a lame duck when his successor is in place (look it up!), the morning after Election Day, Wednesday, November 9^th, 2016, more than eight months from this writing.  (Lame duck Presidents use this two and a half months’ time to help transition the President-Elect into office.)  Allowing for definitions to change (because Mitch McConnell is a powerful man), we might choose to see the lame duck period as the time that a sitting President in his second term has to contend with a Senate and a House of the other party, that is since January of 2015 – more than a year ago – or, worse, since the day after Election Day in 2014.  Is McConnell really saying that?  That President Obama has been a lame duck for the entire last half of his second term, that he should sit on his hands for two years, or go on extended vacation in Hawaii, with full pay?

Sample #4

Democracy

Democracy – rule by the people – do we really live in a democracy?

Sample #3

Liberals and Conservatives

The word "liberal" means free-thinking, generous, tolerant, open-minded, innovative, progressive.  The word "conservative" means restrained, cautious, moderate, conventional, respectful, traditional.  The younger mind tends to be more liberal, reckless, open to adventure; and the older mind tends to be more conservative, cautious and safety-minded.  Heaven forbid that we had a political system that honored one stage of life and slighted the other.

Sample #2

Preface

I will piss you off, I guarantee it.  But I do not want to lose you, on that account, before we even begin our journey together.  No matter if you are conservative or liberal, Republican or Democratic, Libertarian or Green, Independent or moderate or undecided – something I say will strike you the wrong way.  Nonetheless, I beg your indulgence, as the message of this book is too important to be left to those who agree with me 100% (not even my own family).  Whether you admire President Reagan or not, I will ask you to consider his words and for the rest of this book to give me the benefit of the doubt that I am not a “traitor,” that I am a patriot – one who truly loves his country – every bit as much as you are.

Sample #1

How to Read This Book

This book was written for Americans who are too busy to read 50 books a year.  It was written in a conversational style, an informal chat between me and you.  It was written to be digested any way that you like.  You want to begin at the beginning and read it straight through?  OK, but don’t expect to get the plot any better than if you read it wherever you happen to put your thumb.  Read it from the middle out?  OK.  You can read most of the book’s short essays in less time than you can hold your breath (“on your mark, get set, inhale.”).  You can read one while you’re taking a coffee break, while you’re grabbing a bite, or even while you’re sitting on your throne.  I have provided a check box (⎕) following each essay’s title for you to mark (√) an essay as “read.”  Or you could pencil a number in the check box for the number of times you have read that essay.  Or a number for how well you liked it.  Or a “Y” or “N” for whether you agree.  Or “*” for “I want to read this one again and tell all my friends about it.”