Encore of Revival: America, June 29, 2020

And then, the TV numbers came in.

Trump’s low-turnout rally in Tulsa melted down the media. 8 million viewers on Fox News eclipsed some 2 million on rival networks CNN and MSNBC. It was the highest-rated Saturday night for Fox News ever and, with advertisers, it was the most valued. Numbers don’t lie.

This supposed “White power” retirement rally in Florida is a rouse. The man’s words were sarcastic, as a provocative, comical comeback against some venomous parade trolls. At the pro-Trump golf cart procession, the anti-Trump crowd hawked and jeered. One lady jumped in front of an oncoming golf cart to force a collision, then demanded to see “the officer”, who never showed, until her own peers pulled her back and let the man pass. He stuck out his tongue at her. What evil!

Adding to last week’s list of reasons Trump will be reelected—mainly that he has neither defied campaign promises nor shown gross incompetence nor negligence—the opponent is boring. Joe Biden stirs the suspense of a sloth, much like Romney and McCain, whose lack of anything tellable successfully reelected Obama.

More than that, the anti-Trumpists seem histrionic. They don’t show the overly-dramatized performance of a group that is not losing. There’s more to proving a lack of minority support than someone convincingly saying, “Where are the minorities!?” But, anti-Trumpists don’t think so. If, indeed, minorities didn’t support Trump, those emphatic, emotional, convincing performances wouldn’t be necessary. Over-done theater from the Left isn’t the strongest cause for a Trump re-election, but it is the most convincing evidence this week.

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Encore of Revival: America, March 11, 2019

The nation is polarizing. Conservatives are becoming more conservative; Liberals are becoming more liberal. The veil of mediocrity has been lifted and people are being forced to fly their true colors.

Democratic Congresswoman Omar from Minnesota called out Obama for being a “pretty face” more “polished” than Trump, while denouncing Obama’s policies. Freshman Congresswoman Cortez and veteran Senator Sanders decried capitalism while unemployment is at a record low and jobs are returning to America—jobs which Obama said would not come back. That only adds to the lists of failed Obama promises. Yet, Democrats still think it was the Obama ideological opposition that failed, not their own—except for Omar who thinks everyone failed, kind of.

It’s one thing to not know when one lost, it’s another thing to not know when one will lose again. What better place to discuss a campaign for the anti-enterprise 2020 ticket than in the Caribbean!

Socialist cities across America are in a battle against rural American sheriffs and prosecutors.

Don’t attack people with your posts on social media—but if you’re CNN, that’s common practice, though still defamation—at least according to the lawyer for the Covington High School student who was treated by CNN and the Washington Post the way Facebook doesn’t want you to treat real bad guys who actually did something wrong—maybe. It all depends on opinion, but there is one solution: utilities.

Facebook and Google are in the fast lane on the highway to “Utilityhood”. Irritating as it is, a free market can’t force Facebook to cooperate with Vine when there is neither profit nor loss in our “free-and-open” Internet. By allowing Facebook to make market decisions in its own interests, it will be easier to sway public opinion toward government crushing the Facebook and Google empires by making them public utilities.

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Cadence of Conflict: Asia, February 25, 2019

Nations and peoples of the free world are reaching toward each other. The EU reached out to Taiwan and Taiwan was grateful. Taiwan reached out to CNN and CNN did an interview. Kim Jong Un is likely on a train headed through China to Vietnam to meet President Trump. President Trump met with the Vice Premier of China in the Oval Office to discuss trade. And, China “rightly” oppresses an estimated two million Muslims in internment camps, who inhabit the hope-to-breakaway province of Xinjiang, through which China’s “Silk Road” passes to reach other nations with trillions of dollars in trade.

Taiwan’s position in the world only stepped up. In tech, it’s the multinational victim of China. The EU’s unanimous statement of support for Taiwan and condemnation of China’s military activity in the Taiwan Strait is anything but positive PR for China. Taiwan has the support of Europe; that doesn’t count for nothing.

China’s latest shenanigans include Hong Kong taking a serious look at redefining extradition laws so that Taiwanese in Hong Kong would be “extradited” to China. This does far more damage for Hong Kong’s popularity with its electorate at home than it does for Taiwan, raising international sympathy for both. Remember, meddling in Hong Kong’s government is a “must not” as the condition of Hong Kong not remaining under Britain. Nothing would indicate Chinese meddling in Hong Kong’s government more than such a sure-to-backfire anti-PR move like Hong Kong is making by even entertaining such a revision.

The fingerprints of Beijing damaging Hong Kong where British interests remain, all in order to damage Taiwan, goes against the wisdom of courting favor with the masses across Europe. Then, there’s Huawei.

As if international scandals implicating China weren’t enough, Huawei’s founder made the narcissistic comment that “the world can’t live without Huawei”. In Chinese culture, that might make enough people feel compelled to comply. But, the God-fearing West will take the self-absorbed claim as a challenge, much how God took the challenge when “experts” said He couldn’t sink the Titanic. Huawei just might take its place in the hall of sunken fame. No, the West does not. Not too many years from now, when a finance guru claims that a company is “too big to fail”, the public will respond, “Remember Huawei.”

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Encore of Revival: America, November 19, 2018

John Kelly’s failure to book seats for the first lady on Airforce One, thereby creating security snafus and other logistic problems, was no mere oversight. A military man made White House chief of staff doesn’t make security-logistic mistakes. Getting along with the first lady personally, then giving her a smaller staff than previous first ladies, refusing to promote her staff while promoting his own—all these were indications of something deeper.

Pacific Daily Times’ Symphony suggested on September 10 that the “mole” who wrote the infamous, and since forgotten, “New York Times essay” fit the profile of someone like John Kelly. The clashes leading up to his rumored replacement fit the profile even more. Similarly, is a DHS chief performing poorly—another non-accident—, then Kelly clashing with security adviser John Bolton when Bolton criticized the poor performance. Try this hypothetical scenario: The essay author was in cahoots with other saboteurs; when a fellow saboteur was called-out, the saboteur naturally got defensive. Such a saboteur probably didn’t storm out of the White House on October 18 from mere rage, but to perform apparently-needed damage control since his plans for sabotage were at risk. That scenario may not be true, but it would explain a lot. Does it seem all that strange that Kelly and the DHS chief he was so defensive of would both be on the radar for replacement?

Theories to fit the pieces together, however, are no more than theories. All we know from here is that a theory made Kelly’s departure all too predictable and that, to know the rest, we’ll just have to wait and see. Replacing a cabinet member should be easier with Governor Rick Scott having secured the fifty-second Republican seat in the Senate.

With rules of conduct in place for the White House press, it will be easier for reporters to have fair access to questions and easier for the White House to kick out reporters who want to take mic time from others. For suing the woman who worked at the White House who tried to take away the White House microphone from Jim Acosta—on camera—with no injury—when he wouldn’t yield the floor to his peers—CNN and Acosta should be ashamed.

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Encore of Revival: America, July 10, 2017

Donald Trump Tweeting himself is important. It’s more important that Jame’s Comey writing classified information in his personal memos, more important than cutting the environmental red tape holding back pollution, more important than DeVos re-making 1965 education law, more important than Dodd-Frank regulations being scrapped, even more important than Obamacare about to bite the dust!

In fact, Trump’s Tweet about himself is more important than a young man’s privacy, than his dignity—it’s even more important than CNN’s own credibility with the public.

America’s new president is anything but a fool. He knows exactly where to throw a scrap of meat to the dogs, how big it should be, exactly how long it will take for them to scramble for it. He is the master of the spotlight, whether his own spotlight or shining a spotlight on someone else to blind them from what he is doing.

And, he is doing a lot.

He has made massive rollbacks in Obama-era rules. This is arguably one of Obama’s biggest failings—that Obama left everything he worked for so easy to undo. He made rules with the stroke of a pen, Trump undid them with the stroke of a pen. But under Trump, Betsy DeVos is exploring fundamental legislative changes to education—and that’s just the beginning.

The Trump administration is pushing legislation that rarely gets mentioned in light of top titles—military, tax… Obamacare… While Republicans are fighting amongst each other over the optics of disagreeing with Obamacare, other laws are getting passed without any scrutiny from the media. And, it’s all thanks to pop culture’s obsession with everything that doesn’t matter. Pop culture got Trump elected and pop culture will get his policies passed.

Obama’s legacy is being undone because he didn’t work. He didn’t work with Congress to get laws that would outlast a Republican majority. He spent too much time golfing. He gave too many long-winded speeches and didn’t produce enough hard-earned, well-manufactured product. Compared to Trump, Obama was lazy. That’s why Trump is getting his way: work.

No attack can harm a man who works. No media smear can hurt him. It’s not that all press is good press all the time. Rather, all press is good press for those who work.

Right and wrong, for both better and worse, we are entering an era dominated by people who work.

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