Who’s not happy Trump is gone?

This was first posted on Facebook on 21st January 2021, with support from my Ko-Fi network.

In conversation with a friend on the phone the other night, I noted that even though 70 million Americans voted for Trump, this doesn’t mean he has 70 million supporters. (It’s still a dreadful number, but, even so.)

Donald Trump left the White House just after dawn yesterday for a big military send-off as he and Melanie boarded the plane for Florida (Palm Beach is likely to issue an eviction notice next month reminding the former President no one is allowed to live at his golf club – guests can stay there for a maximum of 21 days a year).

Thus the US tradition of the previous President attending the new President’s inauguration ceremony was broken. The only two Republican representatives of previous administrations to attend were Mike Pence and George W. Bush. (Barack & Michelle Obama, Bill & Hillary Clinton, and Jimmy Carter, all attended Trump’s tiny inauguration in 2016). This is the first time since 1869 a US President has refused to attend his successor’s inauguration: Andrew Johnson, who opposed giving civil rights to former slaves, stayed in the White House during Ulysses S. Grant’s inauguration ceremony (Grant was the Commanding General of the US Army 1864–1869).

Cummings Goings

This was first posted on Facebook on 14th November 2020, with support from my Ko-Fi network.

A few facts.

Trump has stopped dyeing his hair. (No, it is not a toupee, he has a massive combover with tons of product, but it came loose in a good Scottish breeze once when he was here to buy a golf course.) The Ivanka Trump version is that he dyes it himself from a DIY-box, and the reason the colour is so weird is that he’s never had the patience to leave it on the right amount of time.

Pence and Pompeo: Coup or corruption?

This was first posted on Facebook on 10th November 2020, with support from my Ko-Fi network.

Mike Pompeo, Secretary of State, and Mike Pence, soon-to-be-ex Vice President, have both declared that as far as they are concerned, the election is not over and they could yet be having a seamless transition to Trump’s second term in office.

Okay. This is freaky. But consider these facts.

Bi Den

This was first posted on Facebook on 7th November 2020, with support from my Ko-Fi network.

Mid-afternoon UK time, so morning EST, Donald Trump announced by tweet that his fixer Rudy Giuilani would be holding a press conference at Four Seasons in Philadelphia at 11:30am EST.

It seems Trump tweeted the announcement before his team had got the agreement of the Four Seasons Hotel Philadelphia at the Comcast Center, because shortly afterwards, he deleted that tweet and tweeted that the press conference would be happening at Four Seasons Total Landscaping, which is a small garden centre in Philadelphia. Next to an adult bookstore. With a crematorium across the street. I am not kidding you about any of this.

Writing About Breaking International Law

This was first posted on Facebook on 11th September 2020, with support from my Ko-Fi network.

Let us consider where we are.

Boris Johnson is the Prime Minister and holds a 79-seat/bullet-proof majority in the House of Commons. He has made clear to his MPs that neither rebellion nor dissent are tolerated and he will remove the Whip – that is, make a Tory MP an Independent MP without a party – from any of his MPs who act in any way contrary to his instructions.

Boris Johnson has instructed his government to insert clauses into the Internal Market Bill which break international law. This has been publicly admitted to by several of his Cabinet ministers – not that Boris Johnson gave the instructions (it may have been Dominic Cummings, who knows) but that certain clauses in the Internal Market Bill do break international law, Ministers of the Crown know this, and they want this bill enacted even though it breaks international law.