Pardon Me
I, personally, don’t think Trump should have pardoned a sleazebag named Charles Kushner.
Although I approve of the idea that a president can, all on his own, pardon or offer clemency to people in prison who have been the innocent victims of corrupt judges, incompetent juries or their political enemies, in practice it often leaves something to be desired.
Just in the past 20-odd years, we’ve seen a financial philandering fugitive, Marc Rich, granted a stay-out-of-jail card because he had contributed a handsome sum to Bill Clinton’s re-election campaign. We saw Barack Obama pardon domestic terrorists because he recognized fellow community organizers when he saw them.
And now we’ve seen President Trump do both the right thing and the wrong. It was appropriate for him to grant pardons to Roger Stone, Michael Flynn and Michael Papadopoulos, who were the innocent victims of Robert Mueller’s witch hunt.
On the other hand, by granting clemency to the likes of Steve Stockman, Duncan Hunter and Chris Collins, three former members of Congress who had been found guilty of misusing campaign funds, and Paul Manafort, a tax cheat, Trump was showing he wasn’t above playing politics as usual.
I, personally, don’t think Trump should have pardoned a sleazebag named Charles Kushner, who was found guilty of 18 counts of tax evasion, witness tampering and making illegal campaign donations, and served two years in jail. But the donations go back to 2004, so at least they weren’t given to Donald Trump.
Besides, Trump was caught in a bind because this particular sleazebag is the father of his son-in-law Jared Kushner and is a fellow grandfather to Jared and Ivanka’s three children.
When it’s not blacks and Latinos who are being granted liberties not available to the rest of us, it’s Native Americans. Someone who’s running things during the national lockdown should at least take a moment to explain why casinos and restaurants on so-called tribal land are allowed to stay open.
Congress isn’t doing anything to help the folks who own gyms, diners, hair salons, bars or movie theaters, but in the 5000-odd page omnibus bill they cobbled together, they’re sending hundreds of millions of tax dollars to places like Lebanon, Oman, Egypt, Pakistan and Burma.
I think they misnamed the gargantuan piece of pork-filled legislation.
It should be called the ominous bill.
I wasn’t shocked, not even mildly surprised, to hear that Deborah Brix, one of the members of the White House advisory board when it comes to the Chinese virus, was caught traveling during Thanksgiving to spend time with her family at one of her vacation homes.
I mean, why on earth would anyone think she would abide by any of the draconian rules our glorious leaders have set down for the rest of us?
It’s not as if any of them are shot or arrested or even just lose their jobs. When caught, they say they’re embarrassed. Big deal. I’m sure bank robbers and burglars are embarrassed when they wind up in front of a judge. And they haven’t even endangered someone’s life, as hypocrites like Brix, Fauci, Pritzker, Whitmer, Lightfoot, Pelosi and Newsom, insist we’re doing if we don’t wear masks 24/7 and remain six feet away from other people.
I recently broke down and bought a new pair of tennis shoes. When I got home and went to put them on, I discovered that the shoelaces didn’t fit. Because it had been so long since I was able to play tennis and would go through a pair in six or eight months, I had forgotten about this practical joke by the manufacturers.
Because I assume most of our tennis shoes come from China, I figured it was their way of screwing with us.
But I believe the ones I buy – New Balance – are actually made in the USA. So it made me wonder if the shoes are loss leaders and the real profit comes in their selling us shoelaces that aren’t either a foot too long or a foot too short.
After I mentioned the attempt to recall Gavin Newsom, Howard Last reminded me that in 2003, California recalled Governor Gray Davis and we replaced him with an incompetent RINO named Arnold Schwarzenegger.
I explained to Mr. Last that recalling Newsom would mainly serve as a shot across the bow. I had no hope that Californians would replace the current governor with someone who would be an improvement on Nancy Pelosi’s nephew.
American voters don’t tend to replace rotten officeholders would good ones, merely new ones who are younger, dumber and equally corrupt.
But if we could unseat Newsom, it might serve as a signal to the other mayors and governors who are destroying this nation with their unconstitutional edicts that they could be next.
Even during a shutdown, you never know where you’re going to get your laughs. The other day, I was shopping at the supermarket. I was in the produce department, picking out a red pepper, when I noticed they were on sale. Normally, I only buy one at a time because they start to get mushy after a few days. But if they were on sale, I just might add more red pepper to my salads. But then I checked the price and broke out laughing.
I found the produce man and broke the news that the sale consisted of charging $1.50 for a pepper, $3.00 for two.
He reacted like a cartoon character. As the truth registered on him, his jaw dropped and he did the best double-take since Edgar Kennedy departed this vale of red peppers. The grocer then trotted off to see if I was telling him the truth.
When a friend let me know in an email that Christmas shopping had taken so much out of her that she was going to sleep early on Christmas Eve, I told her I hoped she’d wake up wide-eyed and bushy-tailed so she could enjoy Christmas Day.
As soon as I sent the message, I realized I had never before spoken or written that cliché. It occurred to me that if I were the sort to have a bucket list, using “wide-eyed-and-bushy-tailed” is the sort of thing that would be on it.
Other people want a shot at skydiving, whale-watching or visiting Paris or Rome, whereas I want to work my way through all the hackneyed expressions I have tried to avoid my entire adult life. It would be like indulging in forbidden fruit.
Speaking of language, there is only one member of the Senate who invariably gets my attention when he speaks. That would be Louisiana’s homespun senator, John Kennedy.
John Lewis has passed along a bunch of Sen. Kennedy’s one-liners:
“It’s like a frog calling you ugly.”
“These Senate elections in Georgia will be the most important in history, but you have nothing to worry about unless you are a tax payer, a parent, a gun owner, a cop, a person of faith or an unborn baby.”
“You can only be young once, but you can always be immature.”
“Americans are thinking there are some good members of Congress but can’t figure out what they’re good for. Others are thinking, how did these morons make it through the birth canal.” “It’s as dead as four o'clock.”
“Always follow your heart but take your brains with you.”
“The short answer is ‘No.’ The long answer is ‘Hell No.’”
“It must suck to be that dumb.”
“When the Portland mayor’s IQ gets to 75, he oughta sell.”
“I keep trying to see Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer’s point of view, but I can’t get my head that far up my ass.”
“You can get a goat to climb a tree, but you’d be better off hiring a squirrel.”
“Nancy Pelosi can strut while sitting down.”
“With the exception of Israel, I trust Middle Eastern countries as much as I trust gas station sushi.”
“It appears he might do the right thing, but only when supervised and cornered like a rat.”
“Chuck Schumer just moo’s and follows Nancy Pelosi into the cow chute.”
“He’s dumb enough for twins.”
Because Democrats, especially those residing on one of our coasts, are dumb and bigoted, the brie-and-white-wine set would naturally write Kennedy off as a rube, unaware that he is a graduate of Vanderbilt and the University of Virginia Law School, capping off his Phi Beta Kappa academic career with a degree from Oxford.
As the junior senator from Louisiana, Kennedy has fought for animal rights, the rights of gun owners and the rights of the unborn.
And lest there be any confusion, this Kennedy is not related to the Kennedys of Massachusetts.
This particular John Kennedy I would actually vote for.
