As the year 2018 mercifully ends, we stand at a crossroads.  Since his election in 2016, President Trump has demonstrated a remarkable resilience.  The pundits have been predicting his demise since he came down the elevator at Trump Tower in June 2015.  Practically every act and utterance from Trump has provoked a prediction that, “He’s finally gone too far, and now he’s done for.”  The pundits have been wrong every time.  Every time Trump defied the prophets of doom, he came back stronger, and the Left looked smaller.  That part hasn’t stopped.  The Left continues to dredge up, or make up, vague, petty and stupid issues to damage the President.  As this is written, the New York Times no less, and there is no less, has published a story, based on the totally unsubstantiated (dare I say, undocumented?), story from the daughters of a dead doctor, claiming that in 1968, that’s more than 50 years ago, the now dead Queens podiatrist falsely diagnosed Trump with bone spurs to help him avoid the draft.  Really? With all that’s going on, that’s the best they can do?  First of all, don’t these morons understand that Trump already won the election?  The bone spur story is the kind of crap Democrats use to keep a Republican from being elected.  They tried the same crap against George W. Bush, claiming he fraudulently got into the national guard to avoid Vietnam.  But I digress.  To reiterate, we are at a crossroads.  The Dems have taken the House in the mid-term elections, and they are promising two things, votes on all the crap on the loony Leftist wish list, like Medicare for all, and 100% renewable energy, and constant investigations of Trump.  The votes won’t make any of the Leftist policies law.  Keep in mind that the Republican House voted 54 times to repeal Obamacare, and that abomination lives on.  The House votes will serve a purpose, to keep the money coming in from the Bolshevik billionaires like Soros and Tom Steyer.  The Medicare for All bill is $34 trillion.  Financial guru Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez says that’s not a problem, since we’ll actually be saving money, we’ll just pay it.  Uh, huh, and I hope Santa Claus was good to Alexandria.  Hey, maybe she can get Santa to run the Federal Reserve.  The nutty plan to change over the entire electrical grid from oil and natural gas to renewable energy sources would cost trillions more.  But scientific geniuses like Bernie Sanders think it’s a good idea.  Putting aside the fact that we already have greatly reduced pollution by changing from coal to oil and gas, and the fact that we now have more oil and natural gas available in the U.S. than exists in the Middle East, can you imagine any of us living through such a changeover of the electrical grid?  Every time it rains, snows, and the wind blows, we are warned about impending power outages.  Our power goes out for a few seconds every week or so, on sunny days, for no apparent reason at all, and usually just after I have reset the timer for the outside light, for the umpteenth time.  At what is renewable energy anyway?  Windmills and solar panels, that chop up or fry any passing birds?  Windmills are noisy, and the wind is unreliable.  Her in New Jersey, when we actually see the sun at all in winter, we’re so surprised we think something’s wrong.  Maybe the Left hasn’t noticed that, even with billions of federal subsidies, solar companies have gone bankrupt.  Without the $7,500 federal subsidy, nobody would buy electric cars, and anyhow, even though you just plug them in, the power coming out of the plug comes from oil and gas, you idiots.  The only thing renewable energy would mean for us now is unaffordable energy and deprivation.  I’m sorry, but as Americans we should want for nothing.  We’ve worked harder than all the rest and achieved more than all the rest, so we deserve to have what we want, unlike all the rest.  And keep in mind, all the rest aren’t in favor of Leftist energy policy either.  Germany has raised $181 billion in carbon taxes to reduce carbon emissions, with no effect.  In America, CO2 emissions are down more than in any other country without a tax.  Energy is more expensive in Europe than over here.  They have dimmer light bulbs, they restrict the use of air conditioning, and gasoline is very expensive.  Maybe the Left also has failed to notice the Macron fuel tax, geared to lower carbon emissions.  They practically had a second French revolution.  If even a Frenchman won’t surrender to that nutty policy, it has no chance here.  But Donald Trump is at the crossroads.  He’s bounced back every time so far, but there are now lots of balls in the air.  The Democrat House, the stock market woes, rising interest rates, and the current government shutdown.  If Trump can weather all those storms, he, and we, will have a successful 2019.  If not, hold on, it’s going to be a bumpy ride.

A Visit from the Donald
With apologies to Clement Clarke Moore

‘Twas the night before Christmas, and in the White House,
Not a creature was whining, like Schumer, that louse,
The stockings were hung by the chimney with care,
In hopes that the Donald soon would be there,
The children were nestled all snug in their beds,
While visions of tax cuts danced in their heads;
Melania in her Hermes scarf, and Barron in his red cap,
Had just settled their brains for a two hour nap,
When on the South lawn there arose such a clatter,
We stopped in mid-tweet to see what was the matter.
Secret Service jumped up and were out like a flash,
With weapons all pointing, about to kick ass.
The search lights had melted the new-fallen snow,
And garishly lighted the objects below,
But what to my wondering eyes did I spy,
A sleigh, and a man in a MAGA hat, suit and red tie,
His chin was out-thrust, and his testicles large,
I knew in a moment he must be in charge.
More rapid than eagles his orders they came,
And he whistled, and shouted, and called them by name:
“Now, Conway! now Sanders! now Miller and Gourka!
On, Kelly! on Bolton, on Jared!, Ivanka!
To the top of the door in the new border wall!
Now tweet away! Tweet away! Tweet away all!”
So up to the housetop the staffers they flew
With a sleigh full of gifts, and the Donald too—
It was then that the media entered this mess,
The prancing and pawing slobs of the Press.
As I drew in my head, and was turning around,
Down the East Room chimney he came with a bound.
He wore a red tie, from his neck to his foot,
Yet his clothes were not tarnished with ashes or soot;
A bundle of gifts he had flung on his back,
Like a Honduran migrant toting his pack.
His eyes—how they twinkled! His mullet so plush!
His cheeks were well tanned, but his eyes not so much!
His droll little mouth was drawn up in a scowl,
And the rude correspondents started to howl;
What’s in that bag? Jim Acosta beseeched,
If they’re emoluments, you’ll be impeached;
The Donald turns round and Acosta he views,
“I have gifts for the good kids, but not for fake news.”                  Acosta just sputtered, and his eyes gave a roll,
As his stocking was filled by the Donald with coal;
A wink of his eye had caused me to muse,
I had nothing to dread, cause I’m from Fox News;
He spoke not a word, but went straight to his work,
He filled all the stockings; then turned to the jerk,
He assured Jim Acosta that CNN blows,
Then nodding his head, up the chimney he rose;
He sprang to his sleigh in just a few bounds,
To Mar a Lago he flew, to play a few rounds;
But I heard him exclaim, speeding by in his luge,
“Happy Christmas to all, and it will be HUGE!”

When it was published in 1949, George Orwell’s 1984 was about a future dystopian world in which the government changes history, represses free thought and individualism,  subjects its citizens to constant surveillance, and punishes all dissent.  Unfortunately, we have seen the future, and we are living the dystopian nightmare envisioned by Orwell, thanks to the so-called progressive Democrats.  I’m not exaggerating.  In 1984,  the government motto was “Freedom Is Slavery” because, according to the Party, the man who is independent is doomed to fail.  It takes a village.  Sound familiar?  By the same token, “Slavery Is Freedom,” because the man subjected to the collective will is free from danger and want.  Medicare for all.  Sound familiar?  “Ignorance Is Strength” because the inability of the people to recognize these contradictions cements the power of the authoritarian regime.  Did you think the Left’s take over of the educational system was a coincidence?  One of the early progressives, John Dewey, supported kindergarten for American kids, not to begin their education at an earlier age, but as a convenient means of removing kids from their families early to prevent their picking up any non-progressive values at home.  In Orwell’s world, the government’s Ministry of Truth was in charge of lying to the public.  The Ministry changed history, by rewriting what actually happened, in favor of the convenient narrative of the moment.  You think the schools stopped teaching history because the subject wasn’t interesting?  And when they do pretend to teach history, many schools rely on Howard Zinn’s, A People’s History of the United States, which pretends to teach history from the Marxist viewpoint.  No, I’m not making that up.  Zinn rejects the notion that the telling of history should be an objective exposition of the facts, but instead, sees is as a means of serving progress.  Thus, in Zinn’s “history,” Maoist China, site of history’s bloodiest state-sponsored killings, becomes “the closest thing, in the long history of that ancient country, to a people’s government, independent of outside control.”  I’m sure that, had they lived, the 30 to 50 million Chinese who were killed by Mao’s policies, would be so proud.  Zinn also dispels that misconception that the Castro regime in Cuba has a bloody record of suppression.  I’m sure that the thousands of Cubans languishing in the filthy prison on the Isle of Pines, the ones the Castros didn’t simply shoot, will be glad to know that they’re not being suppressed.  But changing history?  Is that possible?  In Orwell’s world, the keeping of written records was criminalized, and government records were falsified, to show that the government was responsible only for improving human life and not for oppression.  But that couldn’t happen here, right?  Wrong!  If NBC doesn’t report it, it didn’t happen.  And what do you think the monopolistic search engines and social media sites are up to.  They push any progressive ideas to the front of the list, and either bury or delete conservative thought.  You think it’s a coincidence that Google directed online inquiries about the California Republican Party to a site that equated Republicans with Nazis?  When you don’t teach history, and when young people don’t read books, and when “the truth” is whatever Google and Facebook say it is, then Big Brother is alive and well, and he’s a Democrat.  The Dems like to call Republicans fascists and dictators, but progressives have cornered the market for tyranny.  Progressives are entitled to run our lives from the cradle to the grave, you see.  Because they are afflicted with delusions of rectitude, the unshakable belief that they are always right, they know best what’s good for us.  The individual voter is too ignorant to make his or her own decisions, don’t you know.  And while it’s true that Democrats are having trouble connecting with the voters (which will remain important only until the progressives abolish elections), it’s not their fault.  It’s your fault.  You’re simply too dumb to understand how smart the Democrats/Progressives really are.  Don’t take my word for it.  Just listen to that noted legal scholar, Senator Maisie Hirono, who you will recall was willing to convict Brett Kavanaugh without evidence explaining, “Look, we are not in a court of law, we are in a court of credibility at this point.”  Maisie’s advice to men of, “Shut up and step up” neatly sums up progressive orthodoxy.  Last week, at the Bend Towards Justice conference (as in “Bend Over, Here It Comes Again”), Maisie explained, “We, Democrats, have a really hard time in connecting to people’s hearts instead of [their heads].  We’re really good at shoving out all the information that touch people here [pointing to her head] but not here [pointing to her heart].”Democrats cannot connect with people because we Democrats know so much.  That is true.  We have to … tell everybody how smart we are.”  Wow!  Without realizing it, Maisie Hirono just proved that Ronald Reagan was right again, when he said “It isn’t so much that liberals are ignorant.  It’s just that they know so many things that aren’t so.”  And, of course, Maisie’s right, after all, she’s a liberal.  The proof that Democrats are so smart is all around us.  Joe Biden is a leading contender for the 2020 presidential nomination.  Who’s smarter than good old Joe?  Joe famously taught us that “the No. 1 job facing the middle class is a three-letter word: jobs.  J-O-B-S, jobs.”  Man, that’s deep, no wonder we can’t understand it.  And talk about changing history?  Joe Biden was ahead of his time.  “When the stock market crashed, Franklin D. Roosevelt got on the television and didn’t just talk about … the princes of greed.  He said, ‘Look, here’s what happened.’” Uh, two things.  First, the stock market crashed in 1929, and F.D.R. wasn’t president until 1933, and then again, he never appeared on television until the 1939 World’s Fair, but no matter.  And who could be smarter that the new darling of the Left, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, who taught us that, “Unemployment is low because everyone has two jobs.”  Alexandria, how would we pay the additional $34 trillion for the programs you want?  Answer, “We just pay it, because it’s more affordable.”  Brilliant.  So good is bad, bad is good, more is less, and freedom is slavery.  Yes, Big Brother is alive and well, and we’re in big F—-ing trouble.

The holidays are fast approaching, so it was time for the Leftist imbeciles to take yet another shot at our Christmas traditions.  They’ve already made a number of attacks on Christmas.  They say Christmas is too Christian to be good for America, and of course, only these left-wing, self-hating A-holes know what’s good for America.  We can’t have creches on public property,  or Christmas trees in schools, and we shouldn’t sing Christmas carols in the public schools either.  It’s threatening to non-Christians, you see.  They might be uncomfortable.  To which I must reply, “Bullshit!”  At the risk of sounding like an old fart, things were simpler when I was a kid.  By which I don’t mean things were easier back then.  I grew up in the 1960’s, hardly an uncomplicated time.  Our town was about half Christian and half Jewish.  Come the holidays, the Christians sang the Hanukah songs and the Jewish kids sang the Christmas carols, and to my knowledge, nobody ever felt pressured to convert.  That’s not good enough anymore.  Merely saying “Merry Christmas” can be considered Islamophobic in Britain.  Yet another example of the Left’s mindless obsession for exhibiting unquestioning tolerance to the least tolerant people on the face of the Earth.  But that wasn’t enough.  Now the Left has set it’s out-of-focus sights on one of the most popular Christmas figures, Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer.  The Rudolph animated TV show, a holiday staple, has been declared by the Huffington Post no less, and there is no less, get ready for this, “problematic.”  The show is now unsuitable for children because in it Rudolph’s father verbally abuses him, it’s also “problematic” that Rudolph’s classmates bully him.  According to these left-wing wing nuts, “In the end, Rudolph & friends learn the bitter truth”… that “deviation from the norm will be punished unless it is exploitable.”  You see, Rudolph isn’t accepted until he proves himself useful to the fat guy driving the sled.  Once again, let me proclaim, “Bullshit!”  For the Left, you see, there are no victors, only victims.  A comment to the Huff Post from Lisa Boothe succinctly sums up this nonsense, “Why does the Left try to ruin everything?  Leave Rudolph alone you nut jobs.  I think your kids have more to worry about with you as parents than watching this movie.”  Amen Lisa.  Then again, maybe the leftists are on to something.  Perhaps all the reindeer need to be reexamined, to make sure they are sufficiently progressive for modern times.  We have Dasher, Dancer, Prancer, Vixen, Comet, Cupid, Donner, and Blitzen.  Dancer and Prancer are probably alright, but if Prancer is gay, isn’t it about time he/she comes out of the closet, or is it the stable?   Cupid was the son of Venus, who shoots people with arrows to make them fall in love.  First of all, it’s not politically correct to have a reindeer named for a heterosexual dating website.  Also, the idea of a male shooting arrows into females to make them fall in love with males is repugnant.  So Cupid is out.  How about a new reindeer – Grindr.  Vixen apparently is female, but we must keep up with the times.  We need a transgender reindeer, how about Vince?  Blitzen is fast as a bolt and can electrify others.  Not acceptable in the age of alternative energy.  We need a green reindeer – how about Windmill or Tesla?  Dasher is derived from the German Dascher, which means purse maker.  He’s good at sewing, and that reminds us of third world sweatshops.  Maybe we need a more stylish purse maker, how about Hermes or Fendi?  Comet is reputed to love the attention of little children.  That could be problematic nowadays.  He bears watching.  Donner means Thunder in German.  Thunder is frightening, so that’s not good.  Also, he has a deep baritone voice which denotes toxic masculinity.  We need a non-threatening male soprano reindeer, so how about Castrato?  And why stop with the reindeer?  The traditional Christmas songs are equally “problematic.”  Baby, It’s Cold Outside has been dropped from some radio station play lists because the lyrics encourage sexual harassment, non-consensual sex and date rape.  No, I’m not making this up.   It got me thinking.  Most of our traditional songs are “problematic.”  Dreaming of a White Christmas?  You better not, Hallmark Channel Christmas movies have been denounced as being “too white.”  So, let’s take the racism out of Christmas – White Christmas is out.  God rest ye merry gentlemen?  Don’t women get any rest?  Out.  Come oh ye faithful?  What about the atheists?  “Come let us adore Him?”  What about his poor mother, who had to give birth in a stable?  So much for the Roman healthcare system.   I saw Mommy kissing Santa Claus?  Why a heterosexual song.  How about, I saw Daddy kissing Santa Claus?  All I want for Christmas is my two front teeth?  If government healthcare included dental coverage, the poor kid could look forward to something better for Christmas than oral surgery.  Santa Baby?   A woman begs a man for a sable coat, money, jewelry and a car.  Fur is offensive to PETA.  She shouldn’t have to beg.  She should just sue the prick and take what she wants.  Grandma got run over by a reindeer?  What was Grandma doing out in the snow, while Grandpa was sitting on his fat ass watching football?  Jingle bells?  Some of the lyrics foster ageism and misogyny. “Now the ground is white, Go it while you’re young, Take the girls tonight, And sing this sleighing song.” Out.  Santa Claus is coming to town?  “He sees you when you’re sleeping, He knows when you’re awake, He knows if you’ve been bad or good, So be good for goodness sake!”  This encourages home invasion, peeping toms, and is way too judgmental.  Out.  Winter wonderland? “Walking in a winter wonderland.”  What about poor Hondurans.  They can’t enjoy a winter wonderland.  Another reason not to have borders.  Feliz Navidad and Donde esta Santa Claus are OK for now.  Get the picture?  The only thing left for us may be Silent Night.  Not the song, mind you, it’s just too religious.  Just stay silent for Christmas, so as not to offend those with superior faiths, or a lack thereof.  Sit around your wasteful, ecology destroying tree with your mouth shut, and have a Merry Christmas, sorry, I mean Happy Holidays, or as happy as the intolerant, left-wing imbeciles think is good for you.

Long before the mid-term elections, we received news that a group of 5,000, or 10,000, or was it 15,000 Central Americans from Honduras, or was it Guatemala, was headed toward the United States.  The story was that this group of migrants, refugees, or was it marauders, was going to enter the U.S., at some unspecified point, and apply for political asylum, because they were fleeing gang violence, and/or political oppression, and/or they just wanted to find work in the land of the free and the home of the brave, and/or they just wanted to suckle at the teat of America, a/k/a, good old Uncle Sucker.  I say a “group,” because CNN, a/k/a, the Fake News Network, declared that this assemblage of humanity was not to be called a “mob.”  It was a caravan, whatever that is.  “Mob” is such an ugly word after all, and after all, these poor people were just seeking a better life, so we must welcome them.  In October, we were assured that they were not violent, and that, after all, they were hundreds of miles away and no threat to the U.S.A.  Of course, we saw video of these poor benighted souls breaking down the fences on the border separating Guatemala from Mexico.  We saw indisputable evidence that the group,  dare I say “mob,” was comprised largely of young, able-bodied males, and we saw indisputable evidence that, whenever the cameras were on, these mild-mannered, innocuous, would-be philosopher kings, pushed the available women and children to the front of the mob … sorry, group, to portray the notion that this assemblage was the vanguard of a humanitarian crisis.  President Trump was understandably concerned, and he raised the alarm.  Predictably, the mainstream media told us that Trump was delusional.  There was no invasion.  These poor people were hundreds of miles away, and there was no evidence that they would approach the U.S. border.  This in the face of interviews of the migrants, and/or refugees, and/or invaders, who steadfastly professed that entering the U.S. was precisely their intention.  Trump’s crazy, they said.  He’s just trying to make political hay using these poor refugees as pawns.  It’s not a crisis, not even an issue, or so they said.  Election day came and went, but the mob moved relentlessly northward.  The President vowed that they will not be admitted to the U.S.  He called up the military to assist the border patrol people.  The media protested that this was illegal.  It’s not, of course.  The military can’t enforce the law of make arrests, but they certainly can provide support.  When I ran the Essex County, New Jersey Narcotics Task Force, I had a National Guard Sergeant on my staff to provide support, and we had access to military aircraft for overhead surveillance.  The main job of the military is the protection of our homeland, not passing out rations to ingrates in Somalia.  CNN doesn’t accept this fact.  Anyhow, the media assured us that the mob, a/k/a caravan, was a figment of the President’s imagination which was not a threat, and would never approach the border.  Then they were at the border, having been transported to the Tijuana area in buses or trucks.  Despite video of the mob at the border, the media continues to claim it’s not happening.  The President vowed that people entering illegally would not be processed for asylum claims.  He was immediately sued and the federal court in San Francisco, hundreds of mile from the border, broke all records for speed of litigation, and entered a nationwide Order blocking the President’s policy.  Understand what that means.  One piss-ant District Court Judge in a jurisdiction far removed from the scene of the problem decided that people entering in violation of U.S. statutes, criminals, must be admitted to the U.S. to make their phony asylum claims.  The President has detained them on Mexican soil.  The Mexican government agrees that these people are invaders.  On Sunday, the mob, a/k/a/, caravan stormed the border, trying to break down the fences, much as they had at the Guatemala-Mexico border.  Using the tactic of Palestinian terrorists, the pushed women and children ahead of them, while the young, strong males hurled rocks and bricks at border control agents.  President Trump shut down the Tijuana border crossing, and tear gas was used to repel the invaders.  The photograph of one woman with two children was plastered all over the media, and Trump was denounced as an oppressor, on the order of Stalin or Hitler.  The fact that Il Duce Obama used tear gas to repel border invaders 80 times during his tenure was ignored.  We were assured that Trump is despicable, and that, boy how I hate this crap, “these are not American values.”  Exactly what American values have to do with people who seek to destroy America by overwhelming us with foreigners who: (A) don’t know or share our values; (B) are waving Honduran flags and spitting on America; and (C) are just looking for a better deal than they are getting from their shit-hole homelands, is unclear.  The goal is to destroy Trump by any means necessary.  Here’s the truth.  The caravan was sent by rich left-wingers who are probing for advantage.  It may be 5,000 this time, but if they can get this 5,000 in on “catch and release,” next time it may be 100,000, or more, until they break down our system of government, and complete the “fundamental transformation” of America began by Il Duce Obama.  This must be stopped.  Luckily, Donald Trump, and not Hillary Clinton is President.  Fixing this mess is the job of Congress.  I wouldn’t hold my breath waiting for them to act.