Deborah what organizations are you partnering with? I have skills and talent I can develop in this area as well. (I'm an attorney who some would say have few talents but I am willing to use the few I have for good)
May I keep you in mind just in case I come across people or situations where your help could be essential in helping some of those people who might find themselves in the cross hairs of the newly elected tyrant in chief?
"MEASURE TWICE CUT ONCE"* is emblazoned on the newest city library. *It's hundreds of years old but I envisioned a new interpretation based on the following recent experiment on the experimental subjects ( American surgeon MDs ) by a Biden appointee:
Atul forced (narcissistic? elitest?) surgeons to keep a checklist (see THE CHECKLIST MANIFESTO by Atul Gawande)
Beschloss:"When I fly on an airplane, I expect the airline employs pilots who are... " not so (MAGA?) gullible as this pilot who overheard symptoms and immediately began manifesting each one:
The selections for Cabinet positions were made by a developmentally challenged person incapable of higher reasoning, without morals or empathy, who has a long history of business failures and who is a convicted felon and rapist. No surprise on his Cabinet selections!
Trump is filling the government with loons, traitors, slackers, fools, blunderers and corrupt plutocrats.
This is his plan: make every pick crazier than the previous pick so we forget the previous crazy pick.
Next up, Marjorie Taylor Greene and Lauren Boebert. 🤦
You look at Trump and his cabinet and then reflect on all the people that voted for him that “THINK” they are Christian. They are not of course. It is impossible for them to be a Christian and support such as that. Good thing for them that Christianity is just a mythology. The road is narrow indeed and you know the tree by its fruit.
I will be wearing this Totally Unhinged Radical Liberal shirt 👇
Someone pretty smart (Sheldon Whitehouse maybe?) characterized this set of appointments as the "crawl test." He is going to nominate the most objectively abhorrent & destructive person for every role in his cabinet & dare the other Republicans in Congress and the Senate to either capitulate to his worst impulses straight out of the gate, or raise opposition & put marks on their own backs going forward.
The composition of these bodies hasn't changed that much from when these same cowards claimed to be too afraid for themselves & their families to hold Trump accountable via either impeachment, so I for one, hold out little hope that they will find their spines when he has the entire apparatus of the government at his disposal for the next four years to indefinitely, & clearly intends to strip away any remaining guardrails against abusing his power.
I openly invite them to prove me wrong. I'd love to be wrong about Republicans for once in my life.
All that you quoted and wrote has been the source of my angst as the nominations began. I saw a quote from Cornyn saying he wants Gaetz’s report on the record. He’s not yet said if he’ll agree to hearings or recess appointments.
I live in DC so
I have no one with a vote to contact; those who represent others aren’t interested in my opinion. All those who live elsewhere where they have those who vote must call and write. Too optimistic that spines will be strengthened? Perhaps. Try we must.
When I think of his supporters I am always reminded of the weak-minded crowd dancing around the golden idol in The Ten Commandments. Same difference. Ignore decency, kindness and morality ... Go for the gold.
Don't forget SCOTUS. I'm sure Alito and Thomas will retire very quickly, giving 5 SCOTUS picks to the president least qualified in history to most picks - I think. has any previous one had 5? Oh, and look for Aileen Cannon to be on the short list,.
It is worth listing Pvt. Bone Spurs’ failures: Trump Airlines. Trump University. Trump Steaks. “The Apprentice”. Trump’s football team. Saving the best for last: PBS managed to screw up a casino in Atlantic City! The organization was, I believe, relieved of its contract to manage (not build and manage) a hotel in Panama. Recall the photo of Ivanka in hard hat in Kazakhstan (I think) “supervising” the building of…something, likely a hotel…that was placed among the flying on/off ramps of a freeway. I don’t which surprised me less: the existence of a “freeway” or the location of the proposed building.
I am a lawyer and I am much more qualified to be AG than Matt Gaetz and I am not qualified at all. But I am qualified to donate my money and time to organizations that will fight the trump government of incompetence.
In my earlier life, I taught at American universities, worked in banking deposit operations, in a plumbing and heating outfit, in construction contract administration, in local government, and in procurement management at an oil refinery.
In all of these roles, I observed that the “general public” has very little understanding about how many people must work hard and effectively in order to keep the modern operations required for civilized ways of living functionally effective and merely operational.
Americans at large are about to discover how many ways the federal government and its bureaucracy contribute to the peaceful and secure lives we have enjoyed for decades, without appreciating them very much at all.
One way or another, American voters — those who voted and those who failed to vote — have imposed on Americans hard times that are very near at hand and likely to endure long after the present crisis has passed, however it is resolved.
Pause to reflect. Had your thinking been swayed toward socialism before your university teaching career or did you embrace it only after you realized as an educator that all the other smart people thought traditional American values were flawed?
Well, how do you define “socialism?” I believed in the rule of law from an early age. I believed that all humans were created equal. I believed in fair play and equal opportunity. I believed that honesty is the best policy in both private and public life. I believed in the liberal tradition that led to the Idea of America and the American Experiment.
If all that qualifies as “socialism” for you, I did not learn it at universities. I learned it in grade school, beginning in kindergarten.
Well said and you sound rational and open minded, though you described conservatism and the Trump America First points of view in your response. Not sure you intended that, but as time goes on I think you and I will wind up on the same page. Good luck and God bless.
DJT is a lawless criminal, and those who surround him are neo-Fascist ideologues, bent on destroying American democratic institutions and replacing them with a Christian Nationalism that easily fits the historical mold of totalitarian statism.
In my own career I’ve done everything from operating a glass tempering oven to sales. The person whose skills I admire most, however, are those of my oldest daughter. She works in auto parts, traditionally a man’s job. She has been in the business for 35 years, and can find any part for any vehicle if it still exists. The customers who come into the store where she works will wait for her if she’s busy, even if some of the men are free to help them. The store owner works alongside her, and knows what a valuable employee she is. As a mom, I am so very proud of her and her dedication to her customers.
I recently had to have body work on my truck after a large tree branch fell on it, and the body shop manager was a woman. She was wonderful- extremely competent, and I was
so glad to see her there. This is a VERY male oriented area, (Mormon, Republican, rural) so it was a wonderful surprise. :)
Teaching and listening. I love connecting with kids with musicking, especially the kids who need extra (neurodivergent, special needs, foster kids). I love to give my heart to the marginalized, probably because I despise bullying, since I experienced it so much as a kid.
Another educator here: I've had degrees and certifications in elementary education, special education, psychology, and counseling. Like the person above me, I love kids, all kinds of kids. Alas- I'm 80 now, and health is compromised, but if the call goes out...I'll be there.
Maybe you can help find ways to grow & spread those talents. Something like ‘train the trainer’ sessions or knowledge of how to find competent appropriate information & resources.
I think it important to look at these nominations through the lens of “what motivates a sociopathic narcissist”?
A narcissist is in constant need of creating “narcissistic supply” to support their self-worth which, by definition, is zero. This means they have to feed off of others to feel whole. A sociopath derives pleasure by pitting people against each other. In this context his nominations make complete sense. Elevating an incompetent will make them loyal which provides the narcissist with a constant “supply”. Nominating an incompetent like Gaetz or Gabbard is predictable. Why? Their nominations will cause an uproar and conflict. The ensuing conflict is the goal. Doing the job or being responsible to something like the Constitution is irrelevant.
Trying to rationalize with someone like trump is like taking a knife to a gunfight. What’s more trump will not stop until there is no longer supply he can devour.
If we fail to understand our opponent’s motivations prevailing with any sort of normalcy is doubtful.
I pray we will survive. At this point there are no guarantees.
Right you are. My point is those are his goals. But back in the world of sanity, we need to remember the difference between right and wrong, competence and tragically unqualified.
Agreed. My thoughts hopefully provided context and thus create a baseline for future engagement. Strong voices like yours are desperately needed to remind us of the values that have been obscured in these confusing times.
Carry on with fervor. You are much appreciated by many.
I remember during his first term when he had all his cabinet members go around and say how they felt serving (working for him). I remember Pence’s answer was vomit worthy! Trump totally needs to feel like all those people will kiss his ass! Maybe some of them will grow weary of not having a spine. I wonder who will be the first to be fired?
Another point this discussion is showing is within any relatively modest-sized group, the basic skills for living are there. If the society breaks down under the chaos, there is still hope.
As a retired licensed mental health professional and social worker, l appreciate your sound explanation of Trump’s narcissistic personality disorder issues and sociopathy. You’re absolutely right. His behavior and decisions reflect the the main goals of all who suffer from his mental health disorders: chaos, disruption, intense non-stop conflict, and denigration of everyone who has self worth, so he can control those who don’t have any. Anything to prop himself, psychologically. Unfortunately, with Congress being controlled now by one party, there won’t be the check and balance system we desperately need to regain sanity amidst the intense chaos Trump will continue to champion for four more years. I spent my entire 40+ year in 3 different levels of government, and to see our system destroyed in Trump’s unique way is truly heartbreaking.
But: remember the movie “The Magnificent Seven”. Bring the knife if you are Charles Coburn. We WILL survive. If you must, watch the episode of Full Frontal titled “Trump in Scotland” (every day if you need to, and see if you can find hints that can become strategies). Find ways to laugh at him as publicly as possible, and always keep a balloon at hand. I have images of cartoons over the years; I’m thinking about compiling them into a pdf document…but sharing it would probably violate about 50,000,000 copyright laws.
I am a retired pediatric surgeon. For the last decade of my career I was an Executive Vice President and Chief Medical Officer of a $4 Billion health network, overseeing two thousand physicians and allied health professionals, safety and quality, research, education and much more. I AM NOT QUALIFIED TO BE SECRETARY OF HHS, and yet , at the same time, I am MUCH more qualified than the present nominee.
I have the talent - which should be commonplace but, based on the outcome of our elections, is evidently not - of being able to recognize ignorance and evil for the existential threats that they represent.
Always been a publisher, even when I was 12 (Did a home newsletter that only my parents and little brother got to see), so naturally I was school newspaper editor (we had co-editors in chief) and then worked as a book editor, managing editor of a national magazine, and now copyeditor. Writing is the skill I love more than editing, but happy to help people refine their communications and think I can do that well into my later years (God willing!)...this is a great prompt for a Saturday!
I was an editor/reporter for my high school newspaper and photographer for the Annual. Gave me insight to a career in journalism, I so wanted to be a radio personality and write for my local daily. Took a major in journalism for my undergraduate degree only to learn that mostly cronies and despots got those jobs in media outlets that were on a downhill slide into obscurity. Teaching English to 7th graders proved to be much rewarding and after a stint as my local rep, got hired as a political operative for a national teachers union.
I am a caregiver to my adult son who has autism and is non verbal.
I have also managed apartments. I have taken classes in both areas in order to understand and keep him and others safe. I provide a safe and peaceful environment for my son and was accused of not caring about him if I didnt vote for the orange terror.
I will be even more diligent now to protect him because my level of fear for his safety now has gone up 120 percent.
I understand your situation better than most people would. My firstborn is Trans and lives with us in FL. I am a retired teacher of students with very special needs. We will need each other even more during the coming years.
I admire the skills of teachers. Wrangling large classes of students who may be disinterested in what they are teaching and turning out the young adults that we will depend on to do the job in the future.
I think what you are getting at is that Donald Trump has no understanding, or even awareness, of competence. He does not appear to have ever held a job that he was competent to perform, and when he picks people for jobs, he does not appear to consider whether they are highly skilled, or even somewhat skilled. As far as I can tell, he does not understand the reason for doing so. Thus, he looks upon complaints about lack of competence as simply the “other side” picking at him.
From what I have read over the years, Trump often picks people based on looks. So-and-so looks perfect for the part of (fill in the bank). Let's hire him/her.
If we had been handed $750M by a parent, lost it all and yet still allowed to constantly fail up with the assistance of (who knows? Russian banks? NBC?) we might also feel persecuted if our every petty whim were not indulged. I suppose some of his cult may envy that, thinking "If I support him, maybe I too can learn how to be a rich criminal and get away with it." (Trump University 2.0 business model?)
Competence overall wasn’t necessary. He had a few people who were. The rest were there to make him look good. Unlike most of us, failure didn’t matter. He would lie and cheat to get his next dollar. (He almost went belly up and got loans by convincing banks a project was already under construction. To do that he told ‘his people’ to go out and rent gobs of construction equipment and move it around the site when the $$$ men came to observe. It worked.)
You base this on …? Competence is “the ability to do something successfully or efficiently” — good or bad.
He doesn’t want competition obstacles that come with competent people.
For instance in his early career he hired competent women before it was a “thing”. He said 1 good woman will out work 10 men. We know especially in construction competent women were not a threat to men in charge.
Was Roy Cohn incompetent?
Our major problem is he and his minions believe the president is and should be all powerful. He is on a mission of destruction. He can only succeed by being in total control of the people at the top and filling the ranks with loyalists. If he cows the Senate he removes a major obstacle.
Nick Fuentes before his dinner at mar a lago streamed a plan very similar from the role of women to getting donnie in the WH, dissolving Congress, using the military to force compliance & no more elections.
The right has plenty of competent people chomping at the bit to help. Whether they can get along and figure out how to do things without tearing themselves apart in less that 2 yrs Or postpone the inevitable consequences people will face for 2 yrs, until after the midterms. … that is to be determined.
I’m qualified to find an organization helping those targeted for deportation and give my time, my talents, and my treasure to help them.
Deborah what organizations are you partnering with? I have skills and talent I can develop in this area as well. (I'm an attorney who some would say have few talents but I am willing to use the few I have for good)
May I keep you in mind just in case I come across people or situations where your help could be essential in helping some of those people who might find themselves in the cross hairs of the newly elected tyrant in chief?
Good for you, Deborah!
"MEASURE TWICE CUT ONCE"* is emblazoned on the newest city library. *It's hundreds of years old but I envisioned a new interpretation based on the following recent experiment on the experimental subjects ( American surgeon MDs ) by a Biden appointee:
Atul forced (narcissistic? elitest?) surgeons to keep a checklist (see THE CHECKLIST MANIFESTO by Atul Gawande)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atul_Gawande
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Checklist_Manifesto
This resulted in preventing half the deaths? (victims of listless quacks were cut twice to remove items the surgeon forgot to remove😱)
2.
Similarly, thwarting the egos of licensed providers of anxiety depression and habit treatments resulted in speeding up healing by ten times?
https://drive.google.com/file/d/10sB0fqSY4fbyuRvWeSvif6HXW1gDFXru/view?usp=sharing
3.
THE BILL OF RIGHTS was forged over centuries of debates over SCOTUS Rulings and Dissenting Opinions
MY POINT: It can take centuries of debates to approach a More Perfect Union but ego and narcissism and tribalism can sabotage progress
What evidence that "the normal healthy human mind" is a "science denying organ"...?
Journalists called Trump narcissistic thousands of times and never mentioned the metric, Narcissistic Personality Inventory?
All eye doctors recommend looking up from your reading to refocus, but no library has an eye chart to measure how refocused I am?
The (depressing?) history of the world waited until 1965 to measure depression?
....AND THE ENTIRE SPECIES PUT UP WITH THIS SHIT!!!🤔😁🙃🕵😱
May I suggest Lawyers for Good Government? Founded Nov. 2016 because of the GOP goons.
Beschloss:"When I fly on an airplane, I expect the airline employs pilots who are... " not so (MAGA?) gullible as this pilot who overheard symptoms and immediately began manifesting each one:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ir1rzzGugIU
😁🙃
The selections for Cabinet positions were made by a developmentally challenged person incapable of higher reasoning, without morals or empathy, who has a long history of business failures and who is a convicted felon and rapist. No surprise on his Cabinet selections!
Trump is filling the government with loons, traitors, slackers, fools, blunderers and corrupt plutocrats.
This is his plan: make every pick crazier than the previous pick so we forget the previous crazy pick.
Next up, Marjorie Taylor Greene and Lauren Boebert. 🤦
You look at Trump and his cabinet and then reflect on all the people that voted for him that “THINK” they are Christian. They are not of course. It is impossible for them to be a Christian and support such as that. Good thing for them that Christianity is just a mythology. The road is narrow indeed and you know the tree by its fruit.
I will be wearing this Totally Unhinged Radical Liberal shirt 👇
https://libtees-2.creator-spring.com/listing/radlib
Now more than ever!
Someone pretty smart (Sheldon Whitehouse maybe?) characterized this set of appointments as the "crawl test." He is going to nominate the most objectively abhorrent & destructive person for every role in his cabinet & dare the other Republicans in Congress and the Senate to either capitulate to his worst impulses straight out of the gate, or raise opposition & put marks on their own backs going forward.
The composition of these bodies hasn't changed that much from when these same cowards claimed to be too afraid for themselves & their families to hold Trump accountable via either impeachment, so I for one, hold out little hope that they will find their spines when he has the entire apparatus of the government at his disposal for the next four years to indefinitely, & clearly intends to strip away any remaining guardrails against abusing his power.
I openly invite them to prove me wrong. I'd love to be wrong about Republicans for once in my life.
All that you quoted and wrote has been the source of my angst as the nominations began. I saw a quote from Cornyn saying he wants Gaetz’s report on the record. He’s not yet said if he’ll agree to hearings or recess appointments.
I live in DC so
I have no one with a vote to contact; those who represent others aren’t interested in my opinion. All those who live elsewhere where they have those who vote must call and write. Too optimistic that spines will be strengthened? Perhaps. Try we must.
Despite what the Reps say, there is plenty of precedence for releasing the House Oversight Committee findings on Gaetz. https://www.politico.com/news/2024/11/15/ethics-panel-gaetz-report-00189863
All that and it is the Steve Bannon “deconstruction of the administrative state” plan. Stevie likes to use the word ‘blowtorch.’
When I think of his supporters I am always reminded of the weak-minded crowd dancing around the golden idol in The Ten Commandments. Same difference. Ignore decency, kindness and morality ... Go for the gold.
Don't forget SCOTUS. I'm sure Alito and Thomas will retire very quickly, giving 5 SCOTUS picks to the president least qualified in history to most picks - I think. has any previous one had 5? Oh, and look for Aileen Cannon to be on the short list,.
Marge to manage NOAA and the Weather Control Division!
It is worth listing Pvt. Bone Spurs’ failures: Trump Airlines. Trump University. Trump Steaks. “The Apprentice”. Trump’s football team. Saving the best for last: PBS managed to screw up a casino in Atlantic City! The organization was, I believe, relieved of its contract to manage (not build and manage) a hotel in Panama. Recall the photo of Ivanka in hard hat in Kazakhstan (I think) “supervising” the building of…something, likely a hotel…that was placed among the flying on/off ramps of a freeway. I don’t which surprised me less: the existence of a “freeway” or the location of the proposed building.
i’m qualified to teach folks how to spot disinformation and disrupt the spread.
Plead do...every day.
I am a lawyer and I am much more qualified to be AG than Matt Gaetz and I am not qualified at all. But I am qualified to donate my money and time to organizations that will fight the trump government of incompetence.
Thank you.
This is a great prompt.
In my earlier life, I taught at American universities, worked in banking deposit operations, in a plumbing and heating outfit, in construction contract administration, in local government, and in procurement management at an oil refinery.
In all of these roles, I observed that the “general public” has very little understanding about how many people must work hard and effectively in order to keep the modern operations required for civilized ways of living functionally effective and merely operational.
Americans at large are about to discover how many ways the federal government and its bureaucracy contribute to the peaceful and secure lives we have enjoyed for decades, without appreciating them very much at all.
One way or another, American voters — those who voted and those who failed to vote — have imposed on Americans hard times that are very near at hand and likely to endure long after the present crisis has passed, however it is resolved.
Alas.
Sorry I misjudged you. Appears you are neither rational nor open minded. Didn’t mean to annoy you.
No worries. I got you right away. Good luck to you. May the best idea of America win.
Pause to reflect. Had your thinking been swayed toward socialism before your university teaching career or did you embrace it only after you realized as an educator that all the other smart people thought traditional American values were flawed?
Well, how do you define “socialism?” I believed in the rule of law from an early age. I believed that all humans were created equal. I believed in fair play and equal opportunity. I believed that honesty is the best policy in both private and public life. I believed in the liberal tradition that led to the Idea of America and the American Experiment.
If all that qualifies as “socialism” for you, I did not learn it at universities. I learned it in grade school, beginning in kindergarten.
Well said and you sound rational and open minded, though you described conservatism and the Trump America First points of view in your response. Not sure you intended that, but as time goes on I think you and I will wind up on the same page. Good luck and God bless.
Nonsense. Gaslight someone else.
DJT is a lawless criminal, and those who surround him are neo-Fascist ideologues, bent on destroying American democratic institutions and replacing them with a Christian Nationalism that easily fits the historical mold of totalitarian statism.
I can create a fairly good poem. I can recognize a fascist authoritarian politician (my job as a voter, these days).
We need more people with these qualities.
In my own career I’ve done everything from operating a glass tempering oven to sales. The person whose skills I admire most, however, are those of my oldest daughter. She works in auto parts, traditionally a man’s job. She has been in the business for 35 years, and can find any part for any vehicle if it still exists. The customers who come into the store where she works will wait for her if she’s busy, even if some of the men are free to help them. The store owner works alongside her, and knows what a valuable employee she is. As a mom, I am so very proud of her and her dedication to her customers.
Lovely to hear.
I recently had to have body work on my truck after a large tree branch fell on it, and the body shop manager was a woman. She was wonderful- extremely competent, and I was
so glad to see her there. This is a VERY male oriented area, (Mormon, Republican, rural) so it was a wonderful surprise. :)
Teaching and listening. I love connecting with kids with musicking, especially the kids who need extra (neurodivergent, special needs, foster kids). I love to give my heart to the marginalized, probably because I despise bullying, since I experienced it so much as a kid.
Another educator here: I've had degrees and certifications in elementary education, special education, psychology, and counseling. Like the person above me, I love kids, all kinds of kids. Alas- I'm 80 now, and health is compromised, but if the call goes out...I'll be there.
Maybe you can help find ways to grow & spread those talents. Something like ‘train the trainer’ sessions or knowledge of how to find competent appropriate information & resources.
My talent? Being a pianist, sharing my gift and always appreciate GOOD music, whatever the genre
I think it important to look at these nominations through the lens of “what motivates a sociopathic narcissist”?
A narcissist is in constant need of creating “narcissistic supply” to support their self-worth which, by definition, is zero. This means they have to feed off of others to feel whole. A sociopath derives pleasure by pitting people against each other. In this context his nominations make complete sense. Elevating an incompetent will make them loyal which provides the narcissist with a constant “supply”. Nominating an incompetent like Gaetz or Gabbard is predictable. Why? Their nominations will cause an uproar and conflict. The ensuing conflict is the goal. Doing the job or being responsible to something like the Constitution is irrelevant.
Trying to rationalize with someone like trump is like taking a knife to a gunfight. What’s more trump will not stop until there is no longer supply he can devour.
If we fail to understand our opponent’s motivations prevailing with any sort of normalcy is doubtful.
I pray we will survive. At this point there are no guarantees.
Right you are. My point is those are his goals. But back in the world of sanity, we need to remember the difference between right and wrong, competence and tragically unqualified.
Agreed. My thoughts hopefully provided context and thus create a baseline for future engagement. Strong voices like yours are desperately needed to remind us of the values that have been obscured in these confusing times.
Carry on with fervor. You are much appreciated by many.
I remember during his first term when he had all his cabinet members go around and say how they felt serving (working for him). I remember Pence’s answer was vomit worthy! Trump totally needs to feel like all those people will kiss his ass! Maybe some of them will grow weary of not having a spine. I wonder who will be the first to be fired?
For not ass-kissing or even greater incompetence or leaking to the press?
Another point this discussion is showing is within any relatively modest-sized group, the basic skills for living are there. If the society breaks down under the chaos, there is still hope.
As a retired licensed mental health professional and social worker, l appreciate your sound explanation of Trump’s narcissistic personality disorder issues and sociopathy. You’re absolutely right. His behavior and decisions reflect the the main goals of all who suffer from his mental health disorders: chaos, disruption, intense non-stop conflict, and denigration of everyone who has self worth, so he can control those who don’t have any. Anything to prop himself, psychologically. Unfortunately, with Congress being controlled now by one party, there won’t be the check and balance system we desperately need to regain sanity amidst the intense chaos Trump will continue to champion for four more years. I spent my entire 40+ year in 3 different levels of government, and to see our system destroyed in Trump’s unique way is truly heartbreaking.
But: remember the movie “The Magnificent Seven”. Bring the knife if you are Charles Coburn. We WILL survive. If you must, watch the episode of Full Frontal titled “Trump in Scotland” (every day if you need to, and see if you can find hints that can become strategies). Find ways to laugh at him as publicly as possible, and always keep a balloon at hand. I have images of cartoons over the years; I’m thinking about compiling them into a pdf document…but sharing it would probably violate about 50,000,000 copyright laws.
I am a retired pediatric surgeon. For the last decade of my career I was an Executive Vice President and Chief Medical Officer of a $4 Billion health network, overseeing two thousand physicians and allied health professionals, safety and quality, research, education and much more. I AM NOT QUALIFIED TO BE SECRETARY OF HHS, and yet , at the same time, I am MUCH more qualified than the present nominee.
I have the talent - which should be commonplace but, based on the outcome of our elections, is evidently not - of being able to recognize ignorance and evil for the existential threats that they represent.
Always been a publisher, even when I was 12 (Did a home newsletter that only my parents and little brother got to see), so naturally I was school newspaper editor (we had co-editors in chief) and then worked as a book editor, managing editor of a national magazine, and now copyeditor. Writing is the skill I love more than editing, but happy to help people refine their communications and think I can do that well into my later years (God willing!)...this is a great prompt for a Saturday!
Thanks, Michael. I was co-editor-in-chief of my high school newspaper, too!
And I like editing more than writing! A team!
Will have to hit you up for a long-form project! Lol.
I was an editor/reporter for my high school newspaper and photographer for the Annual. Gave me insight to a career in journalism, I so wanted to be a radio personality and write for my local daily. Took a major in journalism for my undergraduate degree only to learn that mostly cronies and despots got those jobs in media outlets that were on a downhill slide into obscurity. Teaching English to 7th graders proved to be much rewarding and after a stint as my local rep, got hired as a political operative for a national teachers union.
I am a caregiver to my adult son who has autism and is non verbal.
I have also managed apartments. I have taken classes in both areas in order to understand and keep him and others safe. I provide a safe and peaceful environment for my son and was accused of not caring about him if I didnt vote for the orange terror.
I will be even more diligent now to protect him because my level of fear for his safety now has gone up 120 percent.
I understand your situation better than most people would. My firstborn is Trans and lives with us in FL. I am a retired teacher of students with very special needs. We will need each other even more during the coming years.
I admire the skills of teachers. Wrangling large classes of students who may be disinterested in what they are teaching and turning out the young adults that we will depend on to do the job in the future.
Me too. So critical.
I sure as hell do my best.
I think what you are getting at is that Donald Trump has no understanding, or even awareness, of competence. He does not appear to have ever held a job that he was competent to perform, and when he picks people for jobs, he does not appear to consider whether they are highly skilled, or even somewhat skilled. As far as I can tell, he does not understand the reason for doing so. Thus, he looks upon complaints about lack of competence as simply the “other side” picking at him.
If I am right, that explains a lot.
From what I have read over the years, Trump often picks people based on looks. So-and-so looks perfect for the part of (fill in the bank). Let's hire him/her.
If we had been handed $750M by a parent, lost it all and yet still allowed to constantly fail up with the assistance of (who knows? Russian banks? NBC?) we might also feel persecuted if our every petty whim were not indulged. I suppose some of his cult may envy that, thinking "If I support him, maybe I too can learn how to be a rich criminal and get away with it." (Trump University 2.0 business model?)
Competence overall wasn’t necessary. He had a few people who were. The rest were there to make him look good. Unlike most of us, failure didn’t matter. He would lie and cheat to get his next dollar. (He almost went belly up and got loans by convincing banks a project was already under construction. To do that he told ‘his people’ to go out and rent gobs of construction equipment and move it around the site when the $$$ men came to observe. It worked.)
Huh? Yes, but he still doesn’t comprehend the existence of competence. I did not know that was possible.
You base this on …? Competence is “the ability to do something successfully or efficiently” — good or bad.
He doesn’t want competition obstacles that come with competent people.
For instance in his early career he hired competent women before it was a “thing”. He said 1 good woman will out work 10 men. We know especially in construction competent women were not a threat to men in charge.
Was Roy Cohn incompetent?
Our major problem is he and his minions believe the president is and should be all powerful. He is on a mission of destruction. He can only succeed by being in total control of the people at the top and filling the ranks with loyalists. If he cows the Senate he removes a major obstacle.
Nick Fuentes before his dinner at mar a lago streamed a plan very similar from the role of women to getting donnie in the WH, dissolving Congress, using the military to force compliance & no more elections.
The right has plenty of competent people chomping at the bit to help. Whether they can get along and figure out how to do things without tearing themselves apart in less that 2 yrs Or postpone the inevitable consequences people will face for 2 yrs, until after the midterms. … that is to be determined.