Why use such a small desk *see explanation
below
*Note on “small desk” photo: When a president signs a
measure in another room (not the Oval Office), or outside of Washington,
alternate accommodations must be made – hence, the portable “kiddie’ size desk
he used in the photo above).
Trump Motorcade heading to Mar-a-Lago
(On one of his
many golfing visits)
This post today is rather long, but I felt now is a
good time to post at Trump’s first full year in office to speak to the kind of
man and president he has been and continues to be.
Several stories and examples are
listed here
and here
– They tend to shore up and emphasize my points – and they are the most-important
ones I wanted to underscore following these two headline examples:
1. Trump has tweeted from his @realDonaldTrump
account mentioning Obama 1,464 times — the vast majority have been
negative.
2. Trump in one single word is
a giant hypocrite: Seven actions Trump blasted Obama for and then Trump did them
himself.
This one
tweet pretty much sets the scene:
On
Travel: Trump
often vents on Twitter about Obama's taxpayer-funded travel saying “worse ever,
etc.”
The
Truth:
Obama's travel cost an estimated $97 million over his eight years in office.
Trump has spent $21 million on travel in about three months.
A lot more
follows below:
Trump promised that we
were going to “… win
so much, we’ll be sick and tired of winning.”
But it is not the
public at large who has been “winning.” It has been Wall Street, private
prisons, the gas and oil industry, and Trump’s own family.
A Gallup
poll found that a majority of Americans believe that President Trump
does not keep his promises and is unable to effectively manage the government.
HIS FIRST 100
DAYS – HERE IS THE LIST OF THE TOP 100 (A condensed month-by-month
synopsis):
January 20, 2017
- Takes
the oath of office from Chief Justice John Roberts during an inauguration
ceremony at the Capitol, then delivers an inaugural address which
focuses on the populist themes that fueled his run for the presidency.
January 27, 2017
- Trump
signs an executive order halting all refugee arrivals for 120 days and banning
travel to the United States from seven Muslim-majority countries for 90
days. Additionally, refugees from Syria are barred indefinitely from
entering the US. The order is challenged in court.
February 9, 2017
- A
panel of three judges in the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals rules against the
Trump administration, which sought to lift the block on the executive
order.
February 28, 2017
- Trump nominates Neil Gorsuch to replace late Supreme
Court Justice Antonin Scalia.
March 4, 2017 - Alleges
on Twitter, without offering evidence, that his predecessor, Barack Obama,
wiretapped his phones at Trump Tower ahead of the 2016 election. “Terrible!
Just found out that Obama had my 'wires tapped' in Trump Tower just before the
victory. Nothing found. This is McCarthyism!”
March 6, 2017 - Trump
signs a new version of the EO banning immigration from six
Muslim-majority countries. Iraq is
no longer on the list of banned countries and the provision blocking Syrian
refugees indefinitely is removed. One day after the order is signed, Hawaii
files a federal lawsuit challenging the ban.
March 15, 2017 - A
federal judge in Hawaii issues a restraining
order which blocks the new travel ban and the suspension of the refugee program
nationwide hours before it is scheduled to take effect. Calling it
"fundamentally flawed," US District Court Judge Derrick Watson
writes, "It is undisputed, using the primary source upon which the Government
itself relies, that these six countries have overwhelmingly Muslim populations
that range from 90.7% to 99.8%...It would therefore be no paradigmatic leap to
conclude that targeting these countries likewise targets Islam." Two days
after the ruling is issued, the Justice Department files a motion to narrow the
scope of the Hawaii's temporary restraining order, allowing the government to
suspend the refugee program while other components of the ban are litigated.
March 16, 2017 - A
federal judge in Maryland issues a similar ruling. US District Judge Theodore
D. Chuang blocks the travel ban, saying that it is unconstitutional. Also on
March 16, the
Trump administration releases its budget blueprint, with increases in
funding for the military and cuts for agencies including the State Department,
the Environmental Protection Agency and the Department of Agriculture.
May 19, 2017 - Leaves
for his first foreign trip as President, a nine-day, five-country trip
that includes stops in Saudi Arabia, Israel, the Vatican, a NATO summit in
Brussels and a G-7 summit in Sicily.
July 7, 2017 - Meets Russian
President Vladimir Putin for the first time, on the sidelines of the
G20 meeting being held in Hamburg, Germany. Talking for two hours - much longer
than planned - the two discuss allegations
of Russian meddling in US elections and the war in Syria, among other
things.
September 19, 2017
- In a speech
at the United Nations General Assembly, Trump refers to North Korean leader
Kim Jong Un as "Rocket Man" and vows to "totally destroy North
Korea" if the US and its allies are forced defend themselves. He declares
the Iran nuclear deal all but dead and describes some regions of the world as
"going to hell."
December 6, 2017
- Trump
recognizes Jerusalem as Israel's capital and announces plans to
relocate the US Embassy there.
December 11, 2017
- A group of women who have publicly accused Trump of sexual
harassment and assault hold a news conference.
January 11, 2018
- During a White House meeting on immigration reform, Trump
reportedly refers to African nations as “shithole” countries.
Tidbits:
Employers added 863,000 jobs during Trump's first five full months
in office, but as many as the 908,000 jobs added during Obama's last five
months in office.
Of course, Trump's five-month record is far better than
Obama's first five months, when 3 million jobs were lost – why? Obama assumed
office since the economy was hemorrhaging jobs the worse downturn since the
Great Depression.
In fact, Obama handed Trump an economy that was close to what
economists have considered to be full employment. The unemployment rate on
Inauguration Day was 4.8%, and it has fallen since then, to 4.4% in June.
NOTE: At full employment,
businesses have an extremely difficult time finding available, qualified
workers to fill job openings. In fact it wasn't that the economy was too weak –
it was that the labor
market was almost too strong.
Employers would probably be hiring faster if
they weren't having so much trouble finding the workers they need. A Labor
Department report shows there were 6 million unfilled job openings in the
government's most recent reading, the most since it started keeping track in
2000.
The odds have become much better for people looking for work.
Nearly twice as many people are quitting jobs as are being laid off or fired,
also a sign of a strong labor market. That Trump record of 863,000 jobs in five
months is less than the 955,000 added during the same period a year ago. It
also trails the first five months of Obama's second term, when 1 million jobs
were added, and the first five months of Bush's second term (1.2 million jobs
added after losing 400,000 first five months of in 2001 when we were in a
recession).
Here’s
more quickies:
• Withdrew the United States from the
Trans Pacific Partnership, a 12-nation trade deal he had heavily criticized
as a candidate as not protecting American workers enough.
• Greenlit beginning
construction on a wall along the U.S. border with Mexico, which he
said he hoped would begin
within “months.”
• Reinstated
the so-called Mexico City policy, which bars federal money from going to
foreign nonprofits which promote or perform abortions.
• Ordered a freeze on federal hiring other than for military,
public safety, and public health jobs.
• Reversed a
planned cut on mortgage insurance for many first-time homebuyers.
• Ordered executive branch agencies to begin
preparing for the repeal of the Affordable Care Act, so far a mostly
symbolic action that could be used to undermine the law’s enforcement.
• Formally submitted his Cabinet nominations to the U.S.
Senate, which has now confirmed Defense Secretary James Mattis and Homeland Security
Secretary John Kelly, and signed
a waiver for Mattis.
• Moved
forward on the Dakota Access and Keystone XL oil pipelines.
• Ended
a policy known as “catch and release,” under which some immigrants are
released from detention while they await a hearing with an immigration judge.
• Ended
federal funding to sanctuary cities and states, which opt out of reporting
undocumented immigrants.
• Kept FBI Director James Comey, who both he and
Hillary Clinton criticized over his handling of her private email
server, on the job.
• Named net
neutrality critic Ajit Pai to lead the Federal Communications
Commission (Note: Who has since voted to end Net Neutrality and now to cancel the “Lifeline Phone” program).
• Spoke
with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu by phone, signaling that a
promise to move the U.S. embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem won’t be fulfilled
immediately.
• Visited the CIA to mend fences after weeks of acrimony,
and faced criticism after he talked about the media
reporting on the size of his inauguration crowds.
Finally: We have
a long way to go – stay tuned – it’s not pretty not by a long shot.
Thanks for stopping by.
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