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Jack is a graduate of Rutgers University where he majored in history. His career in the life and health insurance industry involved medical risk selection and brokerage management. Retired in Florida for over two decades after many years in NJ and NY, he occasionally writes, paints, plays poker, participates in play readings and is catching up on Shakespeare, Melville and Joyce, etc.

Saturday, March 16, 2019

Lies, Why Lies are Tolerated, Words, I.C.E., Technology Unleashed and My Safe





Lies, Lies, Lies … Sort of


We all know that Donald Trump lies.  Some media outlets keep a running count of them.  We also know that he is clever enough to avoid having his lies being specific enough to justify his being called a criminal.  For years, as is the case with many in his field, real estate development, he has had lawyers protecting him on that flank.  

Charitably, let's assume he had some loose M&Ms in his back pocket

Personally, his strange use of the English language as President (example: “people tell me that … “) filled with imprecision, keeps him from being “on the hook” for what he says.  He’s like a fish that breaks from the line just as you are about to pull him in. 
He jumps between “wall,” “barrier” or “fence” depending on his audience and its length varies from “where necessary” to “from the Gulf of Mexico to the Pacific.” That’s why the Mueller investigation, I feel, will not directly implicate the President, while it will (and already has) catch many around him, possibly including family members.  But their stink will rub off onto him. 

The President will continue to cloud the picture with vague misrepresentation just as Paul Manafort’s lawyer, after both recent sentencings, lied on the courthouse steps about both judges’ “clearing the President of collusion” when both quite specifically stated that the question of collusion was not dealt with in their courtrooms.   Not addressing the question is not the same as saying the court’s not doing so amounts to “clearing the President of charges of collusion.”  Manafort’s lawyer should be disbarred.  Period.  His behavior is why many humorists refer to lawyers as “liars.” Defending a client with outrageous arguments, as defense lawyers sometimes properly do, is not the same as stating outrageous lies for purely political purposes.  But he will not be disbarred any more than the President will be impeached.
Jack Lippman



The Real Problem Behind Trump – Why the Lies are Tolerated




The nation’s problem, as I have oft stated, is not with the President.  It is with (1) the people who elected him and (2) the Republicans in Congress who, while knowing better, recognize that those people are the ones that put them, and can keep them, in office. 

 McConnell - Chief Enabler
  If I were to write a book (I won’t), this is the direction the book would take in trying to explain why these voters are that way.  (As you will shortly see, someone has just done that.)

I have used words like “gullibility” and “ignorance” in this blog to explain their behavior, but it is deeper than that.  It involves:

(1) bigotry,
(2) the disappearance of old-style employment and its replacement by new kinds of jobs,
(3) the absence of unions,
(4) the presence of immigrants in our country,
(5) the deterioration of public education,
(6) the great disparity in wealth among Americans,
(7) the necessity of our having a government-run economic “safety net,”
(8) the confused shifting of the control of health care from the private sector to both the insurance industry and the government and
(9) the actual geographic separation of supporters with differing political agendas.  

A recent book, by Ben Bradlee (son of the late editor of the Washington Post who led the exposure of the Watergate scandal and who himself led the Boston Globe’s exposure of certain misbehaving priests in the Catholic Church) attempts to analyze this problem by dissecting it in Luzerne County, Pennsylvania, in his book “The Forgotten.”  It is on my already cluttered reading list. 

JL 



Words Matter


Evildoers throughout the world usually hide under rocks until they receive some signal that it is alright for them to crawl out and perform evil deeds.  Today, such signals are given through the language and words Donald Trump uses to maintain the loyalty of his base, specifically those expressions directed toward the fear of immigrants coming to take what these misguided people believe is historically and exclusively theirs through some kind of birthright.   

It signals to these evil people that it’s okay to perpetrate murders such as those carried out this week in Christchurch, New Zealand and recently in Pittsburgh.  It is not unlike those atrocities carried out by ISIS in the Middle East by those who believed the misguided Muslim clerics who provided pseudo-religious justification for their evil acts.   


The harm done by statements like Trump’s saying (in regard to Charlottesville) that “there are good people on both sides” and his constant mischaracterization of those unfortunates seeking asylum in the United States is no longer immeasurable.  It can be calculated by counting up the bodies of those murdered by those whom such statements encourage. Trump’s guilt must be shared by those Republicans, mentioned in the first paragraph of the preceding article, who continue to support him. Their complicity is beyond shame.  It is inexcusable. 

 JL



 

Defining I.C.E. 


A frequent mantra of this blog has been “I.C.E.” referring to the Impeachment, Conviction and Exile of the President.  The time has come to be more specific.  The impeachment proceedings, or the resignation which their imminence might bring about, should take place only when there is strong support for it among the American people and both Houses of Congress.  House Speaker Pelosi is aware of this and is acting accordingly.  An impeachment effort, impeded by the Republicans in the Senate and Trump’s ever-loyal base, would do more harm than good.   

Once he is out of office, steps to indict and eventually convict the former President of criminal activity through our court system should take place, and if he is found guilty, the humanitarian thing to do would be to offer him exile in lieu of incarceration.   I have suggested Russia, Saudi Arabia or the island of St. Helena as possible places where he might go.  


Another possibility is the attractive beach area at the far eastern tip of the island of Cuba, a spot which the United States controls.


 JL




The March of Technology


The two tragic plane crashes involving Boeing 737 Max8 aircraft, from what I have been reading, very well may be the results of actions taken by the plane’s systems automatically, without specific direction by the pilots, or possibly action on the part of the pilots which conflicted with that automatic action, the pilots being unaware of what the systems were trying to do automatically.  We will eventually find out if that is the case. 

Which brings me to the new automobile I leased a few months ago.  I was surprised to find out that if were driving down a dark road at night, the lights automatically switched to “high” beams and resumed a normal setting when I turned onto a better lighted thoroughfare.  Now, I have always been smart enough to do that kind of thing myself, but I appreciate it having been built into my new car. 


Today, I received an Email from the dealership reminding me of the check-up which they say will be due at the 5,000 mile or six-month mark, whichever came sooner.  What really astounded me though was that the Email included the exact mileage I had put on the car as of the date of the Email and also commented that the installation of the floor mat on the driver’s side had to be checked!  Apparently, they knew I had removed and replaced it when I last vacuumed the floor of the car.  How closely are they watching me?  Apparently, they have the ability to keep track of me.  Do they know the addresses I’ve programmed into the navigation system as well?  Maybe I don’t want anyone to know where I go. That’s my business!   
Perhaps just as the pilots of those two planes that crashed might not have been, I am not fully unaware of where technology has taken charge of my life, taking decisions I am accustomed to making out of my hands.   And for those addresses programmed into the navigation system, I hope the fine print on the paperwork I signed when I leased the car didn’t take away any right to privacy.   
 JL



How My Safe Made My Day



Years ago, we installed a safe in a closet in my home.  It can be opened digitally by pushing a combination of numbers.  At one time, we kept some jewelry and papers in the safe but no longer do.  In fact, it is empty, but removing it would be a much bigger task than it is worth because of the way it is bolted to the floor.  Anyhow, the other day, I checked out the safe and it would not open.  A red light flashed indicating the old batteries operating the locking mechanism needed replacement.   Aware that there was a “secret” place on the safe where it could be opened with a key even after the batteries had died, I opened it in order to install new batteries in the battery chamber behind the safe’s door.  In doing so, unfortunately, one of the two springs which were supposed to hold the batteries in place snapped, a victim of old age.  After unsuccessfully seeking a replacement spring on the internet and checking in a couple of local hardware stores, I ended up calling the safe’s manufacturer. After waiting twenty minutes on hold on their customer service line I hung up and sent them an Email, explaining my problem.  After doing that, I noticed a metal paper clip on the floor.  Hmm, I thought.  Picking it up and returning to the safe, I bent it until it was small enough to be squeezed in where the spring had come out, creating a makeshift spring.  Voila!  Contact made!  It worked!  Problem solved!  But more importantly, this whole episode left me with a feeling of real accomplishment.  It made my day!  It was almost like winning the Lottery (which I have never done). That’s why I’m including this on this posting.
 JL



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