Either way, this is not what this post is about. Those two groups are the people, the voters, his constituents.

I want to talk about the politicians, lobbyists and corporations who love him. It’s obvious why they love him. He has done more in a year to deregulate and destroy everything that we have been repairing from the Iraq war fiasco as well as everything is country has worked for going on 250 years now.

People who are in the middle, not ultra liberal and not ultra conservative, like me don’t understand why politicians don’t stand up to him more and even more so, why they are going to extremes to defend him. We all know that politicians are somewhat shady, but even so they usually wont go too far to defend someone they know is doing wrong. Well, here is my take on what is really going on.

Trump was never a politician. He became the most powerful man in the world and the most powerful politician without ever being a politician. There is no further for him to go, he has no political capital to lose. He can do the things that no other politician can. He can do things that corporations and the morbidly wealthy want without the consequences. He can violate the law, he can tell the American people to go to hell, and nothing will happen. We all know there is no way he will ever be indicted. There are too many legal opinions that it can’t be done and the supreme court is on his side. It is extremely likely that even if Mueller gets really good evidence against him, that he wont be impeached and in the event that he is, Pence will pardon any criminal offenses.

I would even bet that if it gets close to impeachment, he will make up some crazy rationale to resign so that he can keep his pension. $217,000 per year isn’t much, but it would be guaranteed income that I bet he wouldn’t give up.

My point is some of the things he has done like Tariffs, getting out of the Paris Climate accord, the Iran deal and meeting with Kim Jong Un are taboo even in the republican party. There are fringe elements and lobbyists who would like them to happen, but most actual politicians would never use the political capital to make them happen. With Trump as president it gives them cover. They can support the president and if things go wrong, they can just back off and say it was all Trump.

If he goes down in flames they all have enough political cover that they will come out unharmed.

Then there is how much he has not only taken our institutions to the right (rather than being neutral) but so many of them he has done lasting damage to. No other Republican could have done all this without serious backlash.

He has made it normal for huge lies to come out of the White House. We no longer even get upset about it. We just expect it. PolitiFact reports that only 17% of the statements he makes are true.

ATTENTION EDITORS – PICTURE CONTAINS OBSCENE GESTURE A supporter gestures at the media as Republican Presidential nominee Donald Trump addresses supporters during a campaign rally for Republican Presidential Donald Trump in Cincinnati, Ohio, U.S., October 13, 2016. REUTERS/Bryan Woolston TEMPLATE OUT

He has attacked our news media. The free press was once thought of as the third honorary branch of government, put in place to keep the other three honest. Trump doesn’t want to be honest, and doesn’t want to be called out on it, so what does he do? He declares that the media is the enemy of the people. This would be unheard of in any other administration.

He bragged about sexually assaulting women.

He admitted that if things don’t go well with North Korea (after he said he had made us safe again) that he would simply make up an excuse.

He has had his press secretaries lie to the American People.

He openly makes racist comments.

He calls for locking people up that are political opponents or those who just don’t agree with him.

He refuses to admit that Russia meddled in our election, and constantly tells the American people that he believes Putin when he says he had nothing to do with it. His own campaign is under investigation for possibly colluding in this matter which would be the biggest crime in American history if true.

He has put so many of his family in white house positions. After John F. Kennedy made his brother attorney general, Congress passed an anti-nepotism law in 1967. Based on a questionable legal interpretation, however, the administration claims the statute doesn’t apply to White House staff. Trump is giving his daughter Ivanka a security clearance and a West Wing office without forcing her to give up ownership of her clothing company, while making her husband, Jared Kushner, “lead adviser” on relations with China, Mexico, Canada and the Middle East, all subjects on which he has no background.

He has so many financial conflicts of interest I can’t even list them all. Any other president would be impeached based solely on these items alone. Trump is profiting off the Presidency to the tune of MILLIONS of dollars.

Lets not forget that he said he would hire the best people. 5 of them have been charged with crimes. This administration has had more departures at this time than any other administration in history. The list at this point in time is approaching 100. This list includes both people fired and those who have left because they just can’t in good conscience stay in this administration.

Another personnel matter this white house is struggling with is leaks. This White House has more leaks than we have seen in, well maybe forever. There seem to be those in this administration who disagree with it, but remain because they feel it is their duty to keep an eye on things and report to the public.

He has left so many executive branch jobs vacant. Of 553 key positions, Trump has failed to fill 488 of them — 88%. At the departments of State and Defense, the only confirmed appointees are the Cabinet members.

He is the first president to have such low approval ratings so soon after taking office. According to Gallup, just 38% of those surveyed approve of Trump’s job performance. The lowest previous tally for any president about two months after taking office was 53%; that was Bill Clinton’s mark in 1993. As Trump would say, we live in “unpresidented” times.

The quote republicans like to add to this one is “A democracy is nothing more than mob rule, where 51 percent of the people may take away the rights of the other 49”. They claim that Thomas Jefferson said this. This is a lie. Jefferson never said this, nor would it be in line with any of the beliefs he shared with us.
While I love to point out the hypocrisy of the republicans, and that is exactly what this is when it comes to the filibuster rule, that is not my point with this post. I will point out though that they love the filibuster when it works for them and rail against it when it doesn’t. The point of this is to help some explain our type of government and why Corporate America loves it and hates democracy. What is worse, they not only control the republican party but they convince others to join and to vote against their own interest.

Let’s jump back for a minute. There are a few reasons why the founding fathers chose a republic style as opposed to a pure democracy. Many say it is because they thought the average citizen wasn’t educated enough to vote on issues directly. There is not only good evidence to support this, as we can see from citizens in our own time it is likely very true. The more realistic reason though is logistics. Think of the time it would take in the 1700s if every person voted on every issue. Tallying the numbers and getting them to Washington would be nearly impossible. The logical solution was to have communities elect from the people they know and trust a representative to go to Washington and vote on behalf of them all.

Jumping forward to today…
The reason that corporations and the wealthy like this form of government is it gives them more control. A representative can be bought off to vote the way the wealthy person or corporation wants. If the people vote, each vote matters and there is no way you could pay off that many people. The number of poor people outnumber the number of rich and therefore they would lose influence. This fact has been known for hundreds of years. “An imbalance between rich and poor is the oldest and most fatal ailment of all republics.” – Plutarch (45AD-127AD)

It becomes obvious at this point where our two major parties draw their names from. One party is in favor of every person’s opinion mattering. It favors everyone being taken care of equally and basic rights for all. The other party is in favor of every person for himself, if you fail then you fail, if you succeed or have a golden parachute it is for you to keep all to yourself and the government should protect that for you at all costs. The basic principles in both are okay, but the truth is one is certainly more on the side of honor and civic responsibility.

I am a man who loves tradition and is at times very old fashioned. However, I believe in being who I am. I have liberal, conservative, and moderate views. I consider myself for the most part moderate. I don’t ever decide on an issue before I know what it is and therefore can’t say I am any of these things. I am my own person. I think that political parties are interesting and in some ways are great parts of our society. They allow people to unite under one banner and for the causes they believe in. The problem is most political parties decide to take everything personal and resort to “mud-slinging” simply because the other party doesn’t agree with them. This is where that tolerance and accepting others for their differences comes in.

I consider myself an independent because I genuinely will not vote for a party, usually I don’t even vote for a man (or woman), I vote for the issues I believe in, as well all should. That can easily cut across party lines. If you say you are one or the other and you are strictly just that, then you have decided on issues before they have even become issues. For example, let’s say in the future we are going to start lunar colonies. The Republicans are completely for this and say it will generate revenue and assist with the growing population. The Democrats say that this is a bad idea because of the costs associated and the damage we could do to the moon’s orbit and everything it affects here on Earth. If I am a hardcore Republican I must be in favor, even if I am not. I have decided on an issue before it is even an issue because right now I have decided on a party.

I feel the same about religion. You can’t just pick a religion because they all have a set of beliefs you would have to agree with. You can’t have pre-marital sex using condoms as birth control and be Catholic or eat non-kosher meat if you are Jewish. It all just seems silly to me. The Free Masons aren’t even a religion, they are a fraternity of men, yet they have the right idea. If you believe in one true God, which they generically call the “Grand Architect of the Universe” then you satisfy their only requirement with religion. That should be enough. This is a good philosophy to have.

I was raised Southern Baptist and was very serious about it for many years. I had a talent for speaking with people, even in groups and making them see things my way. I quickly decided with the help of a preacher of mine that I wanted to become a Southern Baptist Minister some day. In high school I quickly decided against this profession for personal reasons the developed after my first girlfriend. I held on to my faith very firmly but learned that I couldn’t hold on to a religion because of my ever changing beliefs and the need to question everything.

In recent years I have labeled myself as agnostic. I am open to the idea of a God, but don’t consciously believe in him. I have learned too much over the years about how humans think to believe in religion. People must have reasons, we have to have a higher purpose in life, someone to appease. To believe there is something more, some set of rules and guidelines, some after-life we began creating religions. Humans do not want to accept that it is all just random. I pray and always have like anyone else. My praying has just evolved. I no longer pray to some deity. Now, it’s more of an inner monologue of hope. I have no problem with faith; please do not confuse faith and religion. I have faith, I have faith in people and I have faith in good over evil. To me, that is enough at this point in my life. I love people. People are my life’s work. I love understanding what makes them do the things they do. The human mind fascinates me to no end.  Unfortunately, religion has so many flaws. The biggest in my eyes is the fact that not only does religion not bread tolerance it does the opposite in most religions and breads hatred. It is not the intention of most religions to do this, but it happens none-the-less. Nearly every war that has ever been fought since the beginning of time involved religion. This is the opposite of what Christian religions should be doing.

Jesus is my other favorite topic in this arena. Jesus was one of the greatest men who ever lived. I am not going to argue his divinity beyond saying I don’t believe in it. However, I think for so many reasons he was a great man. Now, as with most intelligent men throughout history I think he must have been a bit crazy to do some of the things he did. On a serious note, he was a teacher. We credit him with being a carpenter, which he was, but he was so much more. Jesus was the first hippy. He was a diplomat, a teacher, a humanitarian (possibly the first), a social worker and all around good guy. He taught people the value of themselves as well as other people. He taught us to love each other, to rely on each other, to take care of each other, and how to provide for ourselves. He taught forgiveness and tolerance. The world could use more teachings like these things today.

Now if you are religious and I didn’t lose you on my views on Jesus, hold on to your seats, we are going to talk about the Bible next. The Bible is a great story. In my views and in a growing number of people’s view it’s only that. Historians have not only proven that much of it is ridiculous or impossible, even stories which seem possible, the history of the book itself proves how inaccurate it is. The bible like any other book is a book which was created by man, and therefore must be flawed. It is a collection of books which over the years some books have been decided (by men) to be true and others not so true. What is to say any man can be an authority on what “GOD” has “said”. If someone came up to you and said God talked to me last night and I wrote it down, you would think he was completely crazy. Enough said. All that and I didn’t even cover they Bible’s hypocrisy, bigotry, or overall hate in the old testament. The one thing I have to say though for all you who think it is to be read as 100% true and literal, do you really believe your god destroyed everyone on Earth just because they pissed him off by living their lives? AND if you do believe that, why hasn’t her totally destroyed us all now???