Author: A.T.

MERRY CHRISTMAS!

Donald Trump flanked by Christmas trees: “When I started 18 months ago I told my first crowd that we’re going to come back here someday and we are going to say ‘Merry Christmas’ again. Merry Christmas. Merry Christmas.”

Chris Lewandowski, former Trump campaign manager: “You can say Merry Christmas again because Donald Trump is now the president. You can say it again. It’s OK to say. It’s not a pejorative word anymore.”

For those who actually believe President Obama had some kind of war on Christmas — just as they doubt his place of birth and the science of climate change  — please bathe in these must-watch, heartfelt Christmas wishes from the President of the United States.

But I second the President Elect: Merry Christmas.

HAPPY CHANUKAH!

A Hamilton Chanukah at the White House.  So good.  Oy!

Want more?  Another, on stage. Oy! Oy! Oy!

Wonder who got the biggest Christmas gift from this past election — at least so far?  The answer is not “the workers at Carrier,” as you might expect; nor the Trumps themselves, though their fortunes seem to be rising fast.  No, it’s Goldman Sachs, whose stock closed at $182 on Election Day and $240 Thursday — a $32 billion gift.

Now, more than ever:

Peace On Earth, Good Will To Man.

And (says the aggressive atheist):

God bless us . . . everyone.

Click that link: an hour twenty-seven in black and white, as it was meant to be seen.  (Colorized?  Humbug!)

I ask you: is there anything more wonderful than the spirit of Christmas?

One of the things you would want to do, if you were a strongman, ala Vladimir Putin or so many others throughout history, is delegitimize and intimidate the press.  Click here for a taste of that if you missed Rachel Maddow Tuesday night. And if you agree this is a danger to our democracy, perhaps subscribe to the New York Times and the Washington Post, among others, to help keep them strong.

Could one of these credit cards be worth switching to, if you have good credit and never run a balance?

I was pleased to see SMBC — first suggested here at $11 five years ago — touch $36 yesterday. (Thanks, Chris Brown!)  It may go higher, of course, but especially in a tax-free account, this could be a good time to take your triple and park it on the sidelines while you look for something else.

Not to go all . . . “money” . . . on you.  But there was a time that was my main focus.  If you enjoy reading about money, two of my books have just been posted as e-books: Getting By On $100,000 A Year (And Other Sad Tales) and Money Angles.  Ancient history, of course, but what do you want for $5.95?

And less, just generally.

Six minutes.

No words.

(It’s from My Science Academy. Which has videos like this, too — “crazy bike balancing.” Please tell me he’s tethered to a guy, out of frame, running alongside.)

And, yes: Donald Trump will be our next president. The dignity, intellect, temperament, and thoughtfulness of President Obama — a rescued economy, rescued housing market, rescued Detroit now booming, tripled stock market, 80 consecutive months’ private-sector job growth, energy independence, rising household incomes (finally!), a deficit slashed by two-thirds with the Debt once again (finally!) shrinking relative to the economy as a whole, Bin Laden dead, ISIS on its heels, the American body count zero most weeks, a world brought together to combat climate change — to be succeeded by . . . what?

What caught my eye about Ivanka Trump’s boots, in brown, grey, and black, suede or leather, size six, offered here, on Amazon, were the comments below. Gabriela: “BUYER BEWARE! These boots are some sort of port key or wrinkle in the space time continuum.. I put them on and I was transported back to Berlin in 1933.” AR wrote that both boots came for right feet – extremely right and alt-right – with care instructions in Russian though made in China. The one plus? “They look really well together with either a brown shirt or a white hood.”

Etc.

Disrespectful; but isn’t that what Crooked Donald Trump has led us to accept? Demeaning – and outright lying about – political adversaries in his new order?

No, I think. Thoughtful people should not accept that.

But satire is okay. Did you watch SNL Saturday night? Virtually every segment hit it out of the park.

IS OUR DEMOCRACY IN PERIL?
Well, duh. Thoughtfully articulated here.

A MESSAGE FROM THE MAYOR OF SOUTH BEND
But there is a way forward. This, from a rust-belt Afghanistan war veteran is well worth your time.

What caught my eye about Ivanka Trump’s boots, in brown, grey, and black, suede or leather, size six, offered here, on Amazon, were the comments below. Gabriela: “BUYER BEWARE! These boots are some sort of port key or wrinkle in the space time continuum.. I put them on and I was transported back to Berlin in 1933.” AR wrote that both boots came for right feet – extremely right and alt-right – with care instructions in Russian though made in China. The one plus? “They look really well together with either a brown shirt or a white hood.”

Etc.

Disrespectful; but isn’t that what Crooked Donald Trump has led us to accept? Demeaning – and outright lying about – political adversaries in his new order?

No, I think. Thoughtful people should not accept that.

But satire is okay. Did you watch SNL Saturday night? Virtually every segment hit it out of the park.

IS OUR DEMOCRACY IN PERIL?
Well, duh. Thoughtfully articulated here.

A MESSAGE FROM THE MAYOR OF SOUTH BEND
But there is a way forward. This, from a rust-belt Afghanistan war veteran is well worth your time.

OK.  Finally free of Verio, which was simply not up to the task of hosting websites reliably.  (Wikipedia: “In early 2000 Verio was sold to NTT at . . . a total cost slightly exceeding $5 billion. . . .  In late May 2015, Verio . . . was sold to The Endurance International Group, Inc., a low-confidence provider of web solutions who generally tanks new acquisitions, for around $13 million.”)

Now when there’s no column, the explanation is likely to be nothing more than my own sloth; or, should I someday acquire a dog, that he ate my homework.

From the Washington Post:

As Alexander Hamilton explained, the electoral college provides a backstop in the event voters select a dangerously unfit candidate. “The process of election,” Hamilton wrote, “affords a moral certainty that the office of President will never fall to the lot of any man who is not in an eminent degree endowed with the requisite qualifications.” Electors would use their judgment to prevent the “tumult and disorder” that would result from “this mischief” of presidential candidates exploiting “talents for low intrigue, and the little arts of popularity.”

It is important not to take a step like this lightly.  The ideas of the late 1700s are not the same as the norms that have developed since — we all should respect the role of the Electoral College to be a “rubber stamp” in all but the most extraordinary of circumstances.  But arguably, when our major geopolitical adversary of the last 80 years has conducted a major military cyber operation to subvert our election, designed to install a president friendly to that adversary’s policies (the only thing the Trump team changed in the GOP platform this summer was its position on Ukraine) . . .

. . . and when that candidate has been called “a national disgrace” by Colin Powell, a “pathological liar” by Ted Cruz, a “dangerous con man” by Marco Rubio, a “race-baiting, xenophobic, religious bigot, empowering radical Islam [and] undercutting everything we stand for” by Lindsay Graham (and more) . . .

. . . and when not a single newspaper editorial board other than the National Enquirer and the Ku Klux Klan’s Crusader endorsed him . . .

. . . and when he got millions fewer votes than his opponent even before allowing for the yet many millions more she would have received if people hadn’t been assured by every media outlet in the country it was safe to cast protest votes because he had absolutely “no path to 270” . . .

. . . arguably, when all this is true, it IS the most extraordinary circumstances, of just the sort the Founders, in their wisdom, imagined might arise.

If that’s how YOU feel, here‘s how to write — or FedEx for Saturday delivery — a deeply respectful note to Trump-state electors.

My own note would ask them to consider casting their vote for Mitt Romney, who got a higher percentage of the vote when he ran in 2012 than Donald Trump got in 2016; who sees Russia as an adversary; and who might represent a sensible compromise in this most unusual circumstance.

So Verio, my host provider, decided to move everyone over to a new system. Unfortunately, both the old system (this one) and the new one failed at the same time.  It took five days to get the old one back up, and here I am — though I expect at least one more outage of a day or so duration before it’s all sorted out.  More on all that once it’s truly resolved.

In the meantime, check out last week’s briefly accessible President Romney post (wherein Clinton asks her electors all to vote for him and 37 Trump electors follow suit) or the Facts Don’t Matter post, in case you missed them.  (They’re short!)

So much else I would have inflicted on you these last few days, but here’s at least a smattering.

THE OOZE

If you own any Borealis or follow WheelTug, you might enjoy this presentation CEO Isaiah Cox recently made to a conference called MarketForce.  We inch along.  (I hope.)

ALEXA FINALLY TOLD ME A GOOD JOKE:

“There are two kinds of people in the world.  People who can extrapolate from an incomplete set of facts and …”

OK, you had to be there.  But up until now, all her jokes have been puns.  She’s gaining depth.  (And her parent, Amazon, has topped $760 a share.  How far we’ve come from those first books I ordered when that’s all Amazon sold.)

And speaking of jokes (thanks, Mel!) . . .

“My therapist said that my narcissism causes me to misread social situations. I’m pretty sure she was hitting on me.”

OBAMA’S WAR ON CHRISTMAS

Did you see Chris Hayes debunk it?  Here, in two minutes.  Priceless.

HOW THE MINORITY PARTY TOOK CONTROL

It was carefully thought out in 2010, and boy did it ever work.  If you’re not familiar with operation REDMAP, you’ll find this New Yorker piece someplace between revelatory and depressing.  That is, if you’re a Trump/Cruz gal, you will revel in it.  If you’re me, you’ll want to be sure our side is rising to challenges like these.

Lots more on tap, but want to get this out before Verio crashes again.  Hope to see you soon.

There are so many reasons Trump should not be president, including that he is — per Laurence Tribe on MSNBC, via Salon — “a walking, talking violation of the Constitution.”

It’s called the emoluments clause, and it basically says no officer of the United States can be on the receiving end of any kind of benefit, economic benefit, payment, gift, profit, whatever, from a foreign government or its corporations or agents. . . . In this case Donald Jr. or Ivanka or Eric — then there would be a close relationship that could never be disentangled by the American public.

He’s a constant emolument magnet. He thinks of himself as a babe magnet, but he’s an emoluments magnet. And all around the world everybody wants to go to his hotels and not the competitors, and wants to give him a variance or a special land use permit and there’s simply no way short of absolutely liquidating all of his [assets and placing the proceeds] into a blind trust and not handed over to his kids. No way short of that prevents him from being a walking, talking violation of the Constitution from the moment he takes the oath.

With that in mind, have you seen this idea?  That Hillary urge her electors all to vote for Romney December 19, so Putin doesn’t win, after all.  Just three dozen or so Republican electors would have to switch.

I doubt it will happen or would work.  And it would make Trump voters very mad, understandably.

But both Clinton and Romney got a higher percentage of the popular vote than Trump did, and either poses far less risk to the world; so it’s a thought.

Especially if the forthcoming New York Times revelations on the extent of Russia’s interference in our election prove as sensational as they are rumored to be — and come forth in time.

Have you seen this New Yorker cartoon?  About the quiz show “Facts Don’t Matter” where a wrong answer trumps the right one if it’s shouted louder?

Paul Abrams shares an all too relevant quote:

Since the liar is free to fashion his ‘facts’ to fit the profit and pleasure, or even the mere expectations, of his audience, the chances are that he will be more persuasive than the truth teller. — Hannah Arendt, The Origins of Totalitarianism

“Figuring out how not only to survive this, but to conquer it,” Paul writes, “is the central challenge of our time.”

Fareed Zakaria — the indispensable international commentator I tune to on CNN every Sunday morning — analyzes the kinship some, like Zimbabwe’s Robert Mugabe, feel toward Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump.  Four minutes. Chilling.