Don't Believe Everything Trump Promises

 

The naivety of some of my fellow Louisiana friends never ceases to amaze me especially when it comes to the myth that the election of Donald Trump is somehow going to magically reduce the cost of living as it relates to the purchasing power of everyday products. Part of his plan to do this involves the proposal of a 60% or more across the board tariff on all Chinese made goods.  In reality, this approach will increase the cost of almost everything one purchases. I challenge you to formulate a list of non-food items that don’t contain Chinese parts.  One such example of this Chinese infiltration is the automobile and appliance industry.  GM, Ford, and Volvo already sell Chinese made vehicles in the U.S., while the others made in the U.S., with the exception of Tesla, all contain major Chinese parts.  Still others are manufactured in Mexico, another country touted as needing tariffs by Trump. The same can also be said for appliances.  And, sadly, the list of other classes of products with Chinese parts is too voluminous to list.

Additionally, many of the name brand and generic medications that millions of Americans rely on every day, from antibiotics and blood pressure medicines, to cancer drugs and blood thinners, are being manufactured in China, or rely on materials that come from China.

With Trump’s plan, the cost of all goods intertwined with Chinese manufacturing will dramatically increase and, contrary to what Trump would have his supporters believe, take more money from one’s paycheck, not reduce it.  Additionally, retaliatory tariffs will be imposed on American made goods sold in China, thus impacting U. S. corporations’ bottom line profits, which in turn could lead to further price increases of their U.S. sold products to maintain their profits.

In closing, one of my favorite inflationary subjects, ‘shrinkflation,’ which we all have experienced, and which Trump also proposes to solve, is the downsizing of packaged goods, still being sold at previous prices. Are you naïve enough to think that when Trump is elected, companies like Pepsi Cola, which owns Fritos, Cheetos, Doritos, Quaker Oats, Starbucks, and Lays, are now suddenly going to increase the size of their chip bags to previous levels, or roll back their prices to make less profit? When in the history of this country have corporations ever benevolently-assumed that approach?  Those prices and sizes are here to stay no matter who is elected President.

If you choose to vote for Trump, have at it, but don’t be naïve and expect prices to magically return to the prices that they were during his first term, including the price of gasoline. He has no solution or magic wand to make that happen, as evidenced by his present tariffs approach.

As the famous Bob Dylan song title puts it, “The Times They Are A-Changin.”  We are now past the point of no return on many economic fronts.

 

Landry not supportive of educational reform

In a recent story in the Advocate about Governor Landry hiring a new education policy advisor, and the Louisiana Board of Elementary and Secondary Education appointing a new executive director, the following statement appeared, “Education has been a top priority for Landry since taking office.”  I find that statement somewhat farcical since Landry’s ‘Dream Package’ of education reform just passed in the most recent legislative session entailed allowing school boards to hire chaplains, requiring public schools to post a copy of the Ten Commandments in each classroom, clarifying how parents can avoid getting their children vaccinated for school, setting up Educational Saving Accounts to financially bail out private schools with taxpayers’ money, allowing home schooled students to participate in public school’s extra-curriculum activities, specifying the pronoun a child can be referred to in school,  and the lowering of teacher requirements.

Initially, he had no problems with our legislators completely eliminating pre-k education funding, which due to public outcries, at the last minute, was eventually restored to last year’s funding level to service a paltry 2000 students.

Governor Landry made no push to allocate funds for K-3 tutorial programs, the grades which are the crucial ones where Louisiana students begin to fall behind national peers in their educational skills.  And he proposed no other legislation that directly impacted learning. Additionally, he has told higher education leaders to plan for a $250 million cut in their funding next fiscal year.

So basically our esteemed governor has done very little to address the actual educational needs of our children by focusing on classroom skills learning, but instead chose to laser in on the ‘hot topics’ of the day that have little or no impact.  Hardly a governor with education as a top priority, so please stop saying so.

When will the political lies stop?

To be clear the attempted assassination of former President Trump is a tragedy that puts us in the same category as some third world country. However, it clearly illustrates the reason why both major political parties need to get a grip on what they are doing to our society. Immediately after the incident House Republicans Mike Collins of Georgia and Colorado Rep. Lauren Boebert claimed in the press that President Biden should be arrested and prosecuted for inciting the assassination attempt, because he referred to Donald Trump in a recent speech that "he was a threat to democracy and we need to put him in the bulls eye and defeat him." They lifted the phrase, “Put him in the bull’s eye” as justification for their claim.  Sadly, these individuals are so ignorant that they don’t even realize that their rhetoric based on an out of context lie further contributes to the divisive hatred that now exists in this country regarding our presidential candidates, and the subsequent rise in threatened violence towards them.

Additionally, these two individuals seem to forget how 9 months ago Trump mocked Paul Pelosi, the 82 year old husband of House member Nancy Pelosi, who was violently assaulted with a hammer, and how he told jokes about the incident at a political rally to the laughter of his supporters. Trump’s son even posted on social media that the incident occurred because of a sexual encounter gone awry.  Joking about violent acts? Or Trump’s speech who some used as a battle cry to storm the Capital over displeasure with the 2020 election, accompanied with the subsequent threatening of Vice President Mike Pence and Rep. Nancy Pelosi.  Trump still refers to them as ‘patriotic heroes’ and hints at a possible pardon for some who were convicted of crimes over it.  Consequently, everyone in both parties needs to drop the blame game agenda.

However, the extent to which this lie-inspired divisiveness has exploded is most recently illustrated by left-leaning The New Republic Magazine which had as its cover an altered picture of Donald Trump resembling Hitler, accompanied by a featured story comparing Donald Trump to Hitler and Fascism.

I am reminded of the old biblical saying, “You reap what you sow.” The press continues to relish and perpetuate the lies spread by each political party about the other presidential candidate. We, as a society, now relish in these lies, use them as battle cries, and internalize them to do whatever we deem necessary to accomplish each party’s desires.

Obviously, we are at a critical point in the societal history of our country. Do we still believe in the democratic process to accomplish goals for the betterment of our society through the voting process, or do we do as third world countries do, take matters into our own hands through violent, destructive acts as we have just witnessed?

And what makes this decision even more overbearing is the continual lies, distortions, and blame games we are fed by our legislators, social media, the press and the present presidential candidates.  But, then again maybe what we are witnessing is a genuine desire to elevate political agendas over everything else, including human life.  If that is true, I truly feel sorry for my kids and grandkids.

Trump's Ten Commandments Hypocrisy

 Warning:  The following is a review questioning a prominent personality’s morality.

Let me begin with the statement that I have no love for either candidate presently running for the office of President, for both have deficiencies that make them unsuitable for the highest office of the most powerful nation in the free world. It is really a choice between which candidate will inflict the least harm on our nation for four years, sadly, a rather pathetic decision to have to make.

Politicians always amaze me about how stupid they think the general public is, and how they feel they can say anything because they will not be held accountable for those statements. However, recent statements by one such presidential candidate, to further solidify support from the Evangelical community, caught my attention because of its religious hypocrisy.

Last week, Donald Trump posted on his social media page that “I LOVE THE TEN COMMANDMENTS IN PUBLIC SCHOOLS, PRIVATE SCHOOLS, AND MANY OTHER PLACES, FOR THAT MATTER. READ IT — HOW CAN WE, AS A NATION, GO WRONG???,” in response to our governor’s signing into law that a copy of the Ten Commandments must be posted in every public school classroom.  Louisiana is the first state to make this a law, and it was hyped by our governor as part of an education reform package.

If memory serves me correctly, The Seventh Commandment states, “Thou shall not commit adultery,” Trump’s alleged affair during his marriage to Melania Trump was recently aired in court. Trump has repeatedly denied that he ever met the young woman, Ms. Daniels. However, documented photographic evidence proves otherwise. Additionally, Stormy Daniels’ detailed court testimony, bordering at times on lewd descriptions of her sexual encounter with Mr. Trump, pretty much confirms to most unbiased individuals that such an adulterous interaction took place.

The Eighth Commandment states, “Thou shall not steal,” which seems to be yet another commandment that has eluded Donald Trump, and is well documented.

In 1988, Donald Trump established a non-profit organization called The Donald J. Trump Foundation. Its purpose was to direct funds from his book, The Art of the Deal to nine different charities across the U.S. These included such big names as Meals on Wheels, The United Negro College Fund, The United Way, and The U.S. Holocaust Memorial, among others. In December, 2019, Donald Trump was ordered to pay more than $2 million in court-ordered damages to eight for personal misuse (stealing?) of the funds. He was basically using (stealing from?) the charity money to pay his personal political bills.  This foundation was shut down by Trump after agreeing to 19 admissions, acknowledging the misuse of the funds.

In 2005, Trump established Trump University. Five years later, in 2010, a court case determined it was a sham resulting in monetary defrauding (stealing from?) thousands of attendees, which culminated in Trump paying over $25 million to settle the case and reimburse those duped. It was also shut down.

Donald Trump may love the Ten Commandments, but his adherence to them seems to have been a difficult journey so far, so maybe he ought to cool some of his political gamesmanship regarding that topic.

Louisiana Kids Lose Out Again

In full disclosure, I am a retired educational administrator, so my passion is focused on education reform.  Consequently, I was excited to read the local media story entitled, “Governor signs slew of education bills-Measures promise ‘drastic change’ for schools.”  Governor Landry nicknamed these bills the “Dream Package” for education in Louisiana, and stated, “Today, we fulfill our promise to bring back drastic reform to our education system and bring common sense back to our classroom.”

Since Louisiana ranks in the bottom 3 in almost every educational category surveyed, I could hardly contain myself when I set out to read this article.  Finally, the academic deficiencies of our kids were addressed. Sixteen bills were signed into law.

However, my enthusiasm plunged when I saw that only 3 even remotely addressed actual attempts at academic improvement in the classroom. The others ranged from mandating that the Ten Commandments be displayed in every classroom, the establishment of Education Savings Accounts, which is tax-payer funded financial bailout for private schools, the clarification of how parents can avoid getting their children vaccinated, the pronoun a child can be referred to in school, the lowering of teacher training requirements, to allowing school boards to appoint chaplains to serve in public schools.

Repeatedly, studies have shown the benefits of Pre-School and the successful performance in grades K-3 as the crucial determining factors for higher grades’ success. Yet, Pre-School funding, after initially being completely eliminated, was hastily restored to last year’s level, serving a paltry 2,000 children.   And, you can forget about a state-wide after school K-3 tutorial program being funded, for it wasn’t even proposed as part of Landry’s educational “Dream Package.” Also, Landry didn’t forget about our colleges and universities, which are still operating under draconian budget cuts from the Jindal years, for they were told to plan for up to a $250 million cut next year.

But I am sure Landry, and some parents are happy because they got their ways about LGBTQ+ restrictions, allowing home schooled students to participate in public school extracurricular activities, and other 'educational reform' issues having nothing to do with helping kids achieve academically.

So, congratulations to Governor Landry, our legislators, and vocal, extremist parents who have ensured once again that Louisiana will continue to rank the lowest nation-wide in academic success.  You owe all your kids and grandkids a shameful apology for failing them yet again.

Thank God for the Super Bowl

In a joint news conference this week the Mayor of New Orleans and Governor Landry talked about how they were going to “make the city shine” by tackling blighted buildings, infrastructure problems, safety issues, the homeless problem, etc. Governor Landry even made the prediction that by the time they are finished "New Orleans will be one of the safest cities in the country," a lofty prediction that I find unattainable given its present societal problems. 

What struck me as sad about all these promised improvements was that they clearly demonstrate how New Orleans leaders continual to use a ‘reactive approach’ in management of the city, rather than a ‘proactive’ one.

Apparently making the city better just for the sake of those that live there isn’t a good enough reason to tackle its pervasive problems; for the sole reason for all this laser focus attention is because of the city’s hosting of the Super Bowl. During the news event hundreds of projects were rattled off that were to be addressed. These included over 150 road, curb and sidewalk repairs, 75 upgrades to city lighting, 40 drainage problems, the removal of blighted properties, and plans to remove the homeless from downtown streets. 

Why did these problems have to wait for the Super Bowl hosting to be addressed? Certainly addressing them would have made the quality of life better for its residents and why wasn’t that a good enough reason to deal with them?  Again, it’s called ‘proactive’ city management.

And you know what the real heart-breaking part about all this excitement is? Once the Super Bowl is over, unless city leaders change their ways, the city will once again return to the where it was before the Super Bowl came to town. This has been clearly borne out by historical evidence.

Almost every time New Orleans received grant money to fund projects, as soon as that money was spent and the city had the responsibility of taking over the funding of these projects, they fell into disarray and neglect. Armstrong Park is a perfect example. How many monetary grants has the city received to continually improve it after repeatedly falling back into dilapidation?

Maybe someday the city of New Orleans will value its residents enough to proactively make their quality of life better for their sake alone, but I seriously doubt it.

Popular Vote Useless?

It’s about time the news media stops misleading folks with their relentless bombarding of National Presidential Voting Polls. They are a waste of time and really don’t estimate how the 2024 election might turn out. The reason for this is that they are based on the total voting population in the U.S., and that is not how the winner of the Presidential Election is determined. If that were the case we would have had Al Gore and Hilary Clinton as past presidents, for Gore received more total votes than Bush and Clinton more than Trump.

The President of the United States is determined by the Electoral College votes.  According to the National Archives website, “The Electoral College consists of 538 electors. A majority of 270 electoral votes is required to elect the President. Your state has the same number of electors as it does members in its Congressional delegation: one for each member in the House of Representatives plus two Senators.  Almost all states have a 'winner-take-all' system that awards all its electors to the Presidential candidate who wins that state's popular vote."

In an extreme example of just how this system renders current national presidential polls somewhat useless, suppose a candidate wins the popular vote in a particular state by a single vote. The entire number of electors in that state cast their vote for the candidate.  Below appears the electoral votes each state is allocated:

So, as you can see any national poll of voters’ choice for U. S. President is rather pointless unless it is conducted on a state by state basis.

An additional negative side effect of the present Electoral College System for electing our president is that it may actually suppress the popular vote.  In Louisiana, if you decide to vote for the Democratic presidential candidate, your vote just fades away into the sunset because historically the majority of Louisiana voters favor Republican presidential candidates. So all the electoral votes go to the Republican.

This notion might discourage some from voting, but for me it doesn’t because I always like the fact that the previous Republican President of the United States will go down in history as never being elected by the majority of the voters; kind of like our present governor who continually preaches how he is “advocating for the will of the people of this state”, and who, in fact, was elected by just slightly over 18% of the registered voters in this state.

"Pro Life" Hypocrisy

It is becoming more and more apparent that Pro-Life legislators in our state, and in many others, have  adopted a myopic definition of "Pro Life" as encompassing the time span of “conception to birth.”  While they loudly advocate for the protection of the unborn, spending millions to foster this agenda, once the child is born their passionate rhetoric rapidly vaporizes, doing little to pass legislation for resources to ensure the health and well being of the newly born child.  Nowhere is this more evident than are in our own state.  It is a fact, that the Pro Life legislators in Louisiana do little to ensure good maternal care during the entire pregnancy process, which they so vigorously claim to protect.

Louisiana presently exceeds the national average in maternal mortality rates, ranking 47 out of 48, and ranks 5^th in infant mortality rates.  Additionally, 65% of the infants born in our state are more likely to die from being born too early or too small as compared to the rest of the country.

And while our legislators and governor prioritize taking public tax dollars to establish ‘educational savings accounts’ which are basically a welfare hand out to private school parents, and is projected to impact our state budget by over $250 million in three years, and approve ‘step backwards’ criminal justice bills with the cost of $32 million, one has to wonder where is the Pro Life priority for legislative funding assistance for the newly conceived child and postpartum medical care for the mom.  Instead, Louisiana Pro Life legislators have repeatedly voted down attempts to adequately fund the state’s Medicaid program, the program that funds 6 out of 10 births; the highest rate in the nation.  So, while the Pro Life movement in Louisiana may take great comfort in the recent passage of the anti-abortion law, the reality is the Pro Life movement has still failed the unborn and expectant mother.

Heck our Pro Life governor does not even want to accept already allocated federal monies to provide a summer lunch program for our school kids, at minimal cost to the state.  I term that Pro Life hypocrisy.  

Sadly, even if our legislators do finally understand what Pro Life actually encompasses, it’s too late because there is no more money left in in the state budget for this session due to our Pro Life governor’s other priorities.

Thus far, Governor Landry and our legislators have done little to nothing Pro Life for the prenatal/post-natal health of babies or expectant mothers.  It is so much more than simply “conception to birth protection.”  Hopefully the hypocrisy surrounding Pro Life will end soon among our state's governing leaders, and nationally, among others, but so far there is little factual evidence of that.

U.S. Is Losing its Morals

 

As our daily media headlines continue to bombard us with stories about the our border crisis, sexual assaults by Catholic priests, mob-style  slash-and- grabs, car-jackings, shootings, and murders, one has to wonder what has become of the morals in our society.  One of today’s headline stories even further defines America’s moral dilemma.   Dollar General announced that they will begin removing all self-checkout devices from their stores, due to item theft.  Walmart and Target also announce they will now limit the number of items you can check out in their self-checkout lines.

And to top things off we have two men running for president that have serious ethical and moral deficiencies.  In fact, one is presently defending himself from 91 charges in four criminal cases.  However, no one seems to really care anymore when one’s moral character is suspect.

I think my friend best summed up the present day moral sentiment in our country when I questioned him about the moral insufficiencies of these two candidates and he replied, “Well no one is perfect, and to find someone morally fit is not possible today, and should not be expected.”  Please pause and think about what he said.  Do you also buy into this belief?

If so, I wonder if we even internalize what we hear every time we attend church or synagogue.  And while we may simply wish to ignore what we as a society are willing to morally tolerate, one best review the long term plans of two of our top adversaries, namely, Russia and China.

Neither of these adversary’s plans involve going to war with the U.S. for world dominance. Their plan is simply to foster self- destruction of our society from within. Pit us against each other by destroying our moral fiber.  And if you think this is some sort of looney belief on my part, you need only to review the recent report released by our intelligent agencies about all the disinformation that is being disseminated by both these countries on social media to foster not only divisiveness, but to influence our elections. They are striking at the very core of our democracy.

Just look at how successful these two countries have been with their plans in creating a climate of ineffectiveness due to polarization and divisiveness at our Congressional House and Senate levels, and at the many state legislative branches.  Presently, these entities spend most of their time in power struggles rather than focusing on improving the quality of life in our society.  Many simply have sunk so low as to resort to name calling and personal attacks like preschoolers on a school yard.  And, we condone and reinforce this by our cheers and laughter when the folks running for the highest office in the land do it.   

Our political leaders no longer intellectually debate each other on issues important to us. They just personally demean each other.  But then again, maybe they lack the intellect to do otherwise.  However, whatever the reason all are contributing to implementing the perfect Russia/China plan.

Just how low will we morally and ethically go before we come to the realization that Russia and China are succeeding, and we decide to stop it?   It’s time to take your head out of the sand and notice what‘s going on.

What is LSU's Legacy?

As LSU continues to bask in the media surrounding its football team’s, men’s and women's baseball teams’, women’s gymnastics team’s and now the women's basketball team's elite successes, one ranking that is sorely missing from all this excitement is LSU’s academic successes.

According to the LSU website its mission and vision statement reads as follows:

“As the Flagship institution of the state, the vision of LSU is to be a leading research-extensive university, challenging undergraduate and graduate students to achieve the highest levels of intellectual and personal development. Designated as a Land, Sea and Space Grant institution, the mission of LSU is the generation, preservation, dissemination and application of knowledge and cultivation of the arts.

In implementing its mission, LSU is committed to:

• Offering a broad array of undergraduate degree programs and extensive graduate research opportunities designed to attract and educate highly qualified undergraduate and graduate students;
• Employing faculty who are excellent teacher-scholars, nationally competitive in research and creative activities and who contribute to a world-class knowledge base that is transferable to educational, professional, cultural and economic enterprises; and
• Using its extensive resources to solve economic, environmental and social challenges.”

Sadly, when it comes to addressing its academic mission LSU seems to be unable to repeat it sports’ successes. In the 2024 college and university rankings published by U.S. News and World Report, LSU ranks 185 in national universities, which is a 32 point drop since 2021 where it scored 153, and a 9 point drop over last year’s ranking.  Understandably, the media glossed over this stat, reported it in the back pages of the local papers, and never did any in-depth follow up investigative reporting as to why this continual drop is occurring.

Why would you expect any different coverage since LSU is promoted as the “Flagship institution” of the state?

However, I bet if this year’s women's basketball team had suddenly started losing games, that would have been front page news, and all the sports writers would have done in-depth stories as to what was going on.

So as our new governor embarks on focusing his energy and monies on the hot topic of combating crime in our state, just maybe he ought to put as much excitement and resources into combating the educational problem in our state which has now even reached the doorsteps of the state’s premier university. But as of now, he seems to have decided to grant raises to state agency heads as yet another priority.

It’s time for LSU and the governor to decide not only what's the Flagship institution’s legacy is to be, but the state's as a whole regarding educating its youth.

Thank God for Mardi Gras

As Mardi Gras approaches and the city breaks into revelry there is a particular group of individuals that surely is thankful for these celebratory days, namely, the homeless.  In order to make the city as attractive as possible, the homeless gathering in Treme under the Claiborne Avenue bridge is once again being disbanded by city workers and these individuals placed in subsidized apartments.  How long they will be permitted to remain there is anybody’s guess, but at least they are out of view to the tourists.

Sadly, this appears to be the only solution the Cantrell administration has to deal with this chronic problem, and after Carnival ends this population will once again grow on full display for all residents.

When the city will enact a realistic and sustainable plan to deal with the homeless in New Orleans is an unknown, but thank God for Mardi Gras to give these folks some temporary relief.

Just maybe some of that city income from Mardi Gras could be dedicated towards dealing with this problem permanently, instead of using the yearly band-aide solution.

Lazy Parents

Several months ago, I penned an opinion on the public outcry to ban certain books from libraries that were deemed inappropriate or offensive for children by certain individuals.  These regulations even went so far as to allow only a one individual to raise a complaint in order to have a book reviewed for banning.  At the time I raised the issue of where the role of the parent fit into all this regulation, and how parents now days would rather have government regulation of their children’s behavior rather than assume the role of good parenting.

Today, the news media reported that a federal judge in Ohio has halted the implementation of a new law that would require children to get parental consent to use social media apps such as FaceBook, TikTok, SnapChat, Meta, X, etc.  In his ruling the judge claimed the law was an infringement on free speech and overly vague.

For me this law was more than that. It was yet another example of lazy parents who feel they have no responsibility in regulating their children’s behavior; an attitude that is clearly borne out by the rise in teenage crimes.

Additionally, there really is no need for such a law.  There is already a function on all smart devices that allows online sites to be blocked from the device.  It’s called “Parental Controls.”  And there is another function called “Delete” which allows the complete removal of an app from the smart device.   However, it is obvious that many parents today don’t want to be perceived as the ‘bad guys’ by their children and simply want to use the scapegoat of government regulation to enforce their online behaviors. 

Well, I can tell what parents should be doing irrespective of any law.  They should assume the ‘bad guy’ role, monitored their kid’s search history, review what apps he/she are using, and if you feel they are inappropriate or being used abusively (bullying), deleted them.  If your children defy you and put them back on their smart device, take the device away.  Simple isn’t it?

News flash for parents, you don’t have to be your kid’s friend or buddy.  Instead love them, nurture them, and for God’s sake take responsibility in monitoring their behavior.  It's called parenting!