the loss of appreciation of the arts and a tantrum

Last Sunday morning while we were waiting for someone, anyone, to come in, Chin (he has a longer name that is hard to pronounce and so he just goes by Chin), the classically trained in Japan ceramicist who makes beautiful elegant forms, and I were talking about the dearth of the arts in our culture. Most the people who buy his work are older, same for us. He also did the Saturday show in which the jeweler basically sold out but didn't do well, maybe sold two pieces. Our experience seems to be that anyone younger than 50 or so is not interested in art or even quality. They have been raised in the Mass Production of Cheap Goods from China Age with art mostly missing from school curriculum and museums no longer free and a government that doesn't really support the arts as important to our culture (as opposed to Japan, for instance, where artists are considered national treasures). Chin recounted a looker asking why his work was so expensive when you could buy the same thing from Walmart to which Chin replied that the guy should go get it at Walmart. There is no appreciation for handmade or quality. One of the reason galleries are dying...the older folk have all they need or want and the younger folk aren't buying. And it's not that they aren't spending bundles of money, they do, but they spend it on $1,000 phones that they'll replace in a year or hundreds for a pair of shoes with a name that will wear out in about a year but a piece of art that will grace their home with beauty forever they aren't interested in. And art isn't the only fatality of this lack of appreciation for quality. I have read that many household goods manufacturers have stopped making their top of the line quality products because no one buys them anymore. For instance, washing machines that are worn out beyond repair after about 7 years now as opposed to the 30 year old machine that came with the house that we still use. We, as a nation, have fully embraced the throw-away culture.

And speaking of expensive shoes, did you see the bit about Payless Shoes opening a pop-up store in a mall, Palessi, charging hundreds of dollars for the same shoes that normally cost about $50, and people bought them! Many people.

Well, once again I remind myself that I make this stuff because I enjoy making it and so I've made some progress in playing with this new technique, several line drawing of various feathers and 7 balls of modeling glass with two more colors, a lighter gray and opaque white (the white in the picture is white opal, also opaque but not as bright as opaque white) to mix up before I start rolling out some of this stuff to make the bases for a coupe of feathers and some squares to experiment with color mixtures and transparent powders over opaque colors.

yes, this is glass powder mixed with a binder and a liquid medium

We've been on a warming trend since the cold wet rainy weekend. I checked the rain gauge Monday and we got 5 1/2” between Friday afternoon and Saturday afternoon. After two days of sun, it's overcast again and while it's supposed to get up to 70˚ today, tomorrow another cold front blows in. The weekend should be nice though, sunny and not too cold.

my peas are sprouting!

And did you see the Toddler in Chief threw a tantrum yesterday live on camera and in color, constantly interrupting the adults in the room and then stomped out after declaring he would be proud! to shut down the government if he doesn't get his way and then reportedly went into an adjacent room and threw a folder full of papers scattering them everywhere in his pique. It's going to be a bumpy two years, if he lasts that long. Here's some advice for Donald...you want a wall, you promised a wall, you also promised Mexico would pay for it. You want the wall? Then keep the other part of your promise and get Mexico to pay for it. Other toddler news, he has decimated the Clean Water Act after boasting that our air (whose anti-pollution regulations have also been slashed) and water has never been cleaner. Perhaps so, but now not for long. More MAGA!

So as not to leave you with a bad taste in your mouth, here's a picture of my silly dog trying to stand on her head.

sleepytime for nature and the further degradation of America

I finally got the long daylily flower bed and the round flower bed completely weeded and the lettuce in. Still have two more flower beds to go, one in the back where the poppies grow every spring and they are already starting to sprout and the big one in the front yard with the roses and yellow bells both of which are full of evening primrose which I do love, but not in my flower beds which, it seems, is where they want to grow this year.

Saturday and Sunday afternoon I worked on setting up my display. First I had to remember how it went together, thought maybe about flipping the arrangement which had its own problems but changed my mind. I'm still deciding what to put where and I'm fetching my sister's fold up table, which I won't actually use as there is one in the glass blowing studio at my disposal, this morning to work on that part of the display. I ordered new business cards, sans the etched glass!, from my daughter who works at a print shop and I'm trying to locate a display easel I can borrow to prop my poster on with the explanation of the technique.

The ginkgoes are bright yellow now and leaves are starting to drift down in the wind of the cold front blowing in today. Supposed to get down in the low 30s˚ tonight.

The pecans are nearly naked.

The farmer finally got the rest of his cotton crop harvested and now the field is mowed and fallow for winter.

Meanwhile, while we've all been distracted by the Thanksgiving holiday, Trump dismissed a dire report by scientists on global warming that it will adversely affect crop production if greenhouse gases aren't curtailed greatly and immediately because baby it's cold outside, E Coli broke out as a result of rescinding Obama's agriculture inspection rules, GM and Ford are preparing to lay off thousands of workers and closing factories while China has found permanent replacements for the crops and products they bought from us as a result of Trump's trade war, and that most despicable man ordered our ports of entry at San Diego and San Ysidro closed and border patrol is firing tear gas at hungry and exhausted women and children on the Mexican side of the border in blatant violation of US and international law while the Republican congress turns a blind eye, a test to see what kind of backlash he gets. Next step, bullets.

And of course, Democrats are bickering over who gets to be House leader instead of uniting against Trump's policies. I don't think this country will survive much more of his 'greatness'.

wherein I ramble but actually do say something unlike the idiot in the White House

Last Friday was a nice day, mostly clear sky and warm, especially if you were working out in the yard which I was. I cleared the supposed to be bee and butterfly garden just outside the fence of the little backyard of all the black and blue salvia which I do like but it just takes over with a dense root system that won't let anything else grow. It, like the wild mexican petunias I'm also trying to get rid of for the same reason, need an area where they can spread out. I also dug out the evening primrose that has colonized it and the large clump of montbretia (crocosmia) because they also multiply but did not bloom this year and barely last year and just want to lay all over everything else. I have a smaller clump elsewhere that gets more sun that did bloom. I still have not gotten the oxblood lily bulbs planted that I dug up out of the ditch along a pasture but they are sleeping in a shallow pan of dirt right now. Saturday I filled the wheelbarrow with rich dirt from the compost pile and turned that in and finally! got the pansies and violas in. Well, most of them, still have three little violas but had to do the fire ant treatment first where I want to plant them. I plan to fill this bed with zinnias next spring.

But didn't get around to cutting back the cosmos yet that now look like this

after our two nights of below freezing temps because Sunday a cold front came in and it rained lightly most all day and today calls for the same. Which is fine as the last two castings came out of the kiln yesterday and I'm going to get the finish work done on them. The leaf didn't cast all the way which I thought was a possibility and should have sprued the tips of the leaves but didn't because it's a pain in the ass and I'm really over this particular design and I decided I would use it no matter how it came out so I just need to round one leaf tip for it to be more uniform and I'm happy with the color density of the yellow. I don't usually use yellow as it is such a strong color, a little bit goes a long way. I have a lot of grinding to do on the bottoms though as I piled too much glass into the molds figuring too much was better than too little but really too much is too much.

straight out of the mold, not even washed off

And speaking of sleeping in a shallow pan of dirt, this is what the cat does in the shallow pan of dirt I brought in for her to use when our days and nights are too cold to go out (the dog just has to pull up her big girl panties and do her business outside regardless) (and no, she hasn't used it yet for more serious business).

And speaking of rambling and NOT saying anything, did you hear any of Trump's babbling in California about the fires there and needing to rake the leaves in the (33 million acres of) forest and they were going to do something and it would be wonderful because you gotta take care of the floors and that's what they do in Finland and they don't have the fires California has and on and on while standing near someone's cinder of a home. He doesn't have even a clue about the causes of the fires or that that forest is a federal forest and under the responsibility of the federal forest service whose budget he cut or that climate change (he likes good climate and we're going to have good climate) had anything to do with it. The self control of those men standing next to him is amazing in that they were not staring at him in open mouthed disbelief. And still people support this ignorant buffoon.

January 1^st can't get here fast enough.

a litany of three days

Monday I hung the giant tarp enclosing the plumerias and other tropicals in the garage to help protect them from the coming two nights of below freezing temps (it will come down after it warms up a little more today), 

covered the ponytail palm and the pink angel trumpet (the one I had just planted in the ground the week before), opted not to cover the yellow angel trumpets because they always freeze to the ground anyway, took another bucket of pecans to be cracked, and started on the finish work on the two recent finished castings while Marc made the molds for the leaf and flower, went to yoga, and shelled pecans.

Tuesday my only accomplishment was completing the finish work on the two castings while bundled up in four shirts, long underwear, and my polartek pants 

6" x 5" x 1 3/4"

5 1/4" x 5 1/4" x 3/4" excluding frame

and then spent the rest of the day trying to convince the dog and the cat that I have no control over the weather. And shelled pecans

Yesterday I replaced the catches on two lower cabinet doors in the kitchen because the old ones no longer functioned which involved laying on my back and struggling to get the damn things screwed into the underside of the shelf because, of curse course, the new catches didn't use the same holes. Then I drove out to Glen Flora where Chuck the metal artist lives to pick up the stands for the tiles, 

took the dog for a long walk because even though it was still cold the sky looked like this

and filled the leaf mold. And shelled pecans. I now have 13 pounds of shelled pecans and one more box to go.

On the national scene I am heartened by the election and while we may not get the Florida senatorship or governorship or the Georgia governorship, we have picked up a few more Democratic wins and the Republicans are freaking out to the point that they are furious that the law has required recounts in Georgia and Florida and that all the ballots, including the ones they tried to ignore and the ones they are trying to disqualify, are being counted. I tweet at them 'All votes count and all votes should be counted. Don't like democracy? Move to Russia. Problem solved.'

And Trump is in a tailspin of despondency (not sure if this is good or bad) and lashing out like the spoiled toddler he is by our wins and control of the House, accusing Dems of voting and then changing clothes and going in and voting again, really, the man has no idea how voting works, and the coming scrutinizing and the looming report from Mueller and his ostracization by other world leaders (except Putin of course and did you see the picture of that shit eating grin Trump gave Putin in France?) and being called out by Macron and social media for his refusal to honor our WWI dead in France because, as a WH insider tells us, there would be no tent for him to stand under and he didn't want to get his hair wet (all the other reasons given were spin) and his refusal to travel even the mile and a half on Monday to Arlington National Cemetery to honor our war dead on Veteran's Day while leaving over 5,000 of our troops on the border with nothing to do, missing the holidays with their families, and eating MREs.

And now McConnell, the poster boy for putting party over country and obstruction and hypocrisy pens an op-ed piece wondering if Dems will work for bipartisanship or put party over country and then two days later refuses to bring a bill protecting Mueller and his investigation to the floor for a vote. Apparently he doesn't understand that compromise take two willing sides.

So all in all, I'm feeling pretty optimistic. It's nice to be back in that place. And today I plan to get the last mold filled, the flower, in preparation for the open house.

and don't let the door hit you in the ass on the way out

I am anole. I am turtle at the bottom of the tank. I am cold and not inclined to motion, at least until the dog starts bouncing off my chest wanting her walk. 

Properly bundled and outside it's not so bad, as long as the wind doesn't blow. We walk briskly, the short walk, and even she is ready to be back inside by the time we return. Cold or not, these are the days of laying low as the last week of the year ticks by.

But it is cold...overcast, drier than the past two or three days, temperatures hovering in the low 40s, the high varying only a few degrees from the low. When it changes it will get both warmer and colder, cold enough that plants will have to come in again and others covered.

2017 has worn out its welcome and it's leaving in a wintry snit dumping feet of snow on much of the country. Good riddance I say.

Politically, it started out bad with Trump's inauguration and continued downhill from there. In one short year Trump has destroyed our standing in the world, ruined our relationships with our allies, sold off our national lands, admired our enemies, insulted our free press and intelligence agencies, rescinded decades of protective regulations for workers and the environment, gave the very rich a trillion dollar ta x cut...basically, if Obama did it then he is undoing it...and cost the taxpayers $100 million for him to play golf every weekend, Nazis actually paraded through the streets of America and Trump called them good guys.

Personally, I spent far too much time in doctor's offices and endured far too many tests. An exploration of my weird choking and throat spasms which was a colossal waste of time and money with an ENT who ignored the reason I was there and just wanted to fix my broken nose and then a stress induced 2 week period of episodes of rapid heartbeat sent me to a cardiologist who never addressed the episodes of rapid heartbeat but otherwise gave me a clean bill of health, no sign of any blockage. So, yay that!

The planet continued to produce extreme weather with a tornado that peeled off the roof of the antique store so no more Saturday job, a long hot dry summer here, drought in California, direct hits on the country from three major hurricanes in a row the first of which caused half our house to flood with us being rescued by airboat, 

record breaking wildfires in the Northwest and California, and this last month we woke up to 2” of snow one morning while the Northeast, in these last few days, is being buried by the stuff.

It wasn't all bad though. We spent a week in Hawaii with our twin granddaughters Jade and Autumn, their reward for hard work, graduating with honors and scholarships, before their first year of college. 

We had no commission work this year and with Marc's birthday this past Wednesday, he will start getting SS which will boost our income enough that we have decided to retire from the etched glass purposefully. The Wren Box and the Peach Box sold. I got my studio room remodeled from ceiling to floor.

And our spring garden produced an abundance of tomatoes and potatoes which I put up in the freezer and then lost it all when the electricity went out due to the flood. 

Three more days and I'd ask what else can possibly happen except that I know better than to invoke the gods.

cashing out

I read where the rich have never before in history been this rich and that corporations have never before in history made as high profits as they make now and yet our Republican government found it necessary to lower their taxes.

Yale University conducted a survey of 110 Fortune 500 and Fortune 50 business leaders and only 14% were planning to make immediate capital investments in the US like building plants or upgrading equipment, which would lead to jobs, because they already have plenty of cash on hand to do that if they were so inclined and at the Wall Street Journal's CEO council last November only a few hands went up when asked if they planned to use this tax cut for capital investment in the US and yet the Republicans call this a tax cut and jobs bill. Wall Street expects these tax cuts to go directly to investors and buy backs of stock which is why the stock market is so high. Historically, this does not lead to higher wages but it does result in richer shareholders. The CEOs do seem to be concerned about the over a trillion dollars added to the deficit and only 55% of business leaders surveyed by Yale thought the tax cuts should be enacted. link 

I was listening to an interview with the CEO of Home Depot on NPR on my way home from yoga last night. One of the questions asked was what do you plan to do with the money you will receive from the new corporate tax cut. The answer was invest in the business, buy back their stock. What he did not say was hire more workers or give our employees a raise. So much for trickle down. And while AT&T announced they plan to give their employees a $1,000 bonus as a result of the tax cut, in truth it was an already agreed upon retroactive pay raise as part of a union negotiation. link 

Another corporation, Wells Fargo, has announced a PR minimum wage pay hike to $15.00 due to the tax cut although their minimum pay range is already $13.50 - $17.00. With 25,000 employees in that range only the ones making $13.50 - $14.99 will see an increase and if you average that range it amounts to a 25¢ raise. link 

So what is this tax reform bill that gives massive tax cuts to the rich and corporations which are permanent and paltry tax cuts to the rest of us which are temporary (and will in fact increase our taxes) and adds over a trillion dollars to the deficit and will cause tens of thousands of people to lose their health care by rescinding the ACA mandate (sneaky this as it essentially kills the ACA) that over 75% of Americans are opposed to? Why is it that our elected representatives can and do ignore the will of the people who elected them and who they are supposed to represent and who they continually throw under the bus? The reason is money because campaigns are no longer funded by the people but by the very rich and corporations who want to see return on their investments in these politicians. I can't find the bit that I read yesterday either on Twitter or FB but a behind the scenes republican when asked why the Republican party is so intent on this devastating tax reform responded that the Republicans were 'cashing out'. Those were the words he used, 'cashing out', because they know the Republican party is done, that Trump and a decade of obstruction by the Republicans has ruined this country, that they expect to lose the majority and their seats in 2018 and 2020 and that this is the pay back to their donors and themselves.

They care nothing for the citizens of this country. After the tax bill was passed, the protesters attendant were telling their stories of how this would negatively affect them while the jubilant Republican politicians laughed at them.

Let that sink in.

the current list and it's no better than the previous lists, depressing but best to stay informed

This man is pure evil, cares nothing for anyone or anything but his ego. Trump is turning the US into just a bigger and more dangerous N. Korea, aligning us with Russia and would turn us into a totalitarian regime and the Republicans, who are just as complicit, will let him. They care nothing for democracy either, only about staying in power. He loved Saudi Arabia because there were no demonstrations, no protests, and he thinks Americans are disrespectful. I flip back and forth from angry to hopeless. I know there are serious investigations going on and eventually some of these people will be taken down but it's not happening fast enough! The only bright spot is the many governors, mayors, and individuals (CEO Michael Bloomberg has offered to pay the $15 million to the UN operating budget for the Paris Accords that the US was expected to contribute) that are standing up and standing against. If 'make America great again' means abdicating our role as a world leader and a light unto the nations, then he has succeeded...

The Assistant Attorney General, because Sessions had to recuse himself because he's fucking involved, appointed an Independent Counsel at the FBI to continue the investigation, a man that both parties find honorable. True, Trump can fire him as well but it will be much harder thanks to the terms laid out by the Ass't AG when he wrote up the order, not to mention how much worse it will look for Trump to have fired two heads of the same investigation. And of course, Trump responded like he always does whining about how unfair he is being treated.

A transcript, and apparently the tape itself, has surfaced of a conversation between Republican congressmen when it came out that Trump and another Senator were thought to be being paid by the Russians and Paul Ryan stopped that dead in the water and swore everyone to secrecy...what happens in the House, stays in the House.

Democrats have produced proof that Pence was told back in November that Flynn was getting paid by Turkey.

After Trump sang Turkish president Erdogan's praises at the White House, Erdogan ordered his bodyguards to beat up the peaceful protesters outside the Turkish Embassy. Trump's response? Silence.

The White House is trying to keep the Office of Government Ethics from viewing documents detailing which former lobbyists have been hired by the Trump administration for positions in the federal government.

After Comey's testimony before Congress, Trump contacted the Director of National Intelligence, Daniel Coates, and the director of the National Security Agency, Adm. Michael Rogers, in an attempt to pressure them to publicly deny the existence of any evidence of collusion during the 2016 election. The two men refused to comply.

Trump, during his visit to the Middle East told a room full of Israelis in Israel that he had just come from the Middle East.

Wilber Ross, Trump's Commerce Secretary, thinks the lack of protest in Saudi Arabia, which is punishable by death, is a good thing.

Trump, on his trip to Israel, told Netanyahu at the end of a press conference, with the press still present, that he didn't mention Israel to the Russians...“just so you understand — I never mentioned the word or the name Israel in conversation. Never mentioned it.”...totally confirming the source of the intel he bragged about to the Russians.

Trump admits firing Comey over the investigation into Russian contact and then tells the Russians that Comey was a nut job and he fired him and now the pressure of the investigation was off.

Not only did Comey create a memo directly after his dinner with Trump when Trump asked him to drop the Flynn investigation, so did Mike Rogers of the NSA when Trump asked him to lean on Comey to end the investigation.

Trump's AG Jeff Sessions, who perjured himself during his confirmation hearing, also lied via omission about his contacts with the Russians on his security clearance form.

And speaking of omitting information on contacts with Russians on their security clearance forms, so did scumbag Jared Kushner who buys low rent properties and then sues ex-tenets that had already moved out for breaking their leases.

Not only did Trump spill highly secret intelligence to the Russians, he told Phillipine president Duterte the secret location of two of our nuclear submarines.

While we're on the subject of spilling intelligence, information from the investigation of the Manchester bombing made it's way into our news before the Manchester investigators made it public and now they are refusing to share any more information with us.

In another show of vindictiveness, Trump sent Sean Spicer back to the US early depriving him of meeting the Pope, the one thing as a Catholic he truly wanted to do.

After promising in a January press conference that his company would donate all profits from foreign governments, Trump now says it's more trouble than it's worth to determine exactly how much that would be in order to comply with the emoluments clause of the Constitution. Too hard and too much trouble to comply with the Constitution which he calls archaic and not good for the country.

Trump and Pence have both recorded robocalls in support of the Republican candidate in Montana where robocalls are illegal. Their work around was to have an actual person dial the phone and ask whoever answered if they would like to hear a recording.

Because his ego demands that he be front and center of any photo op, Trump rudely pushed other NATO leaders aside and barged his way to the front for the photos of the NATO meeting in Brussels.

Trump's White House put out, and reported by Fox that Trump was the first sitting American president to visit the Western Wall in Jerusalem...well, except for Presidents Obama, Bush, and Clinton.

During a meeting with Netanyahu in Israel, Trump got a blank look on his face, stood up and wandered off and his aides had to bring him back.

Mitch McConnell, Senate majority leader, thought congressional procedure worked just fine for the last 8 years while they obstructed everything President Obama tried to do. Now that Democrats are doing their best to obstruct the cruelties of Republican policies and the shoe is on the other foot, he thinks that congressional procedure doesn't work so well.

Trump, on his first international trip to meet with other world leaders praised the repressive Saudi regime from which most of the 9/11 attackers came from, making a $110 billion arms deal with them allowing our arms and helicopters to be made in Saudi Arabia while in his meeting with European leaders lectured them about not paying their 'fair share' for NATO proving once again that he does not understand how NATO works and declined to re-commit the United States to Article 5 which says an attack on one is an attack on all making it dependent on whether or not the attacked country was spending enough on defense in his opinion.

Trump also refused to commit to honoring the Paris Accords telling them he had to think about it and then days later, out of spite against anyone and everyone who doesn't adore him, announced he was pulling the US out of the agreement putting us on the side with the only two nation in the world who did not sign on, Syria and Nicaragua, because he doesn't believe in global warming. Well, I always said that human beings would be one of Mother Earth's least successful lifeforms because of our arrogance. Too bad we will change her face in our death throes and I never thought it would begin in MY lifetime.

Trump's performance in Europe was so poor that Angela Merkel has stated that Europe can no longer count on the United States.

White nationalism/terrorism has risen dramatically given a big boost by Trump and verbal and physical attacks by whites on non-whites and non-christians have also increased dramatically. In one such recent attack, a white man was verbally attacking two women he took to be muslims and three men came to their defense. The attacker, wielding a knife, murdered two of these heroes, wounded the third, and then called it an act of patriotism. Trump's response? Total silence.

While Trump has had nothing to say about the murder of the two men who stood up to protect American citizens from a white terrorist, he did manage to congratulate a Republican, who physically assaulted a reporter days before his election, on his win in Montana.

Jess Sessions, Trump's AG who is supposed to be tough on crime, accused the NYC police department of being soft on crime while he gave corporate criminal banks a slap on the hand and a small fine. But, hey, if you get caught with little marijuana you can expect to be jailed for life in a for-profit prison.

In his continuing effort to undo everything Obama did, Trump has announced that he will rescind the looser relations with Cuba.

Trump, who always puts his business and bank account before country, admitted that his difficulty in opening golf courses in Europe influenced his EU views.

Russia demanded their diplomatic property in the US back 'or else' that Obama denied them access to for spying and Putin's lapdog Trump will oblige them.

Conservatives and Trump were angry about a comedian's photo of holding a bloody fake Trump head but they have no problem cozying up to Saudi Arabia who regularly beheads people.

Trump's White House has issued 17 ethics waivers for his staff (more than Obama did in 8 years). What does that tell you about the ethical nature of his staff?

And speaking of his staff, people are resigning and he can't find anyone to replace them, he still has many positions left unfilled crippling the government, he would replace many others who he thinks aren't loyal enough but he can't find anyone who wants to work for/under him.

at the risk of running off all my readers...

Trump met with top Russians in the Oval Office, one of whom is generally considered to be a spy and the other the ambassador, excluding the American press from the meeting that the Russian press attended during which, in a fit of braggadocio, Trump passed on some extremely secret intel, code-word intel, that not even all our own people were privy to and not shared with all our allies, jeopardizing not only people and operations in the field but also an important source of intel as they may now think twice before passing on new information to us making this country less safe. You understand this, right? The president of the United States jeopardized the citizens of this country that he swore to protect as well as an important intelligence source and jeopardized the agent in place just so that he could look big and brag in front of the Russians who are NOT our friends. What's worse is that he probably had no idea of the sensitive nature of the information that he was blabbing to the Russians because he thinks national security briefings are boring and he doesn't pay attention.

It is true that a president can choose to declassify information, and that is Trump's indignant reaction to the uproar of passing sensitive intel to the Russians but this was not done after a period of consideration or meeting with security personnel to discuss and decide if it no longer needs be classified. No Trump 'declassified' this intelligence on the spur of the moment to inflate his ego.

Then, the next day after this revelation, Comey reports that Trump had asked him to drop the investigation into Flynn's connections to Russia which Comey rightly refused to do and which eventually got him fired.

And today, while Trump was singing the praises of Turkey's president, Erdogan at the White House, Erdogan's bodyguards were beating up American citizens protesting near the Turkish embassy. Trump's response? Crickets, because that is exactly what he would like to do to protesters.

You would think that in the face of this obvious attempt at obstruction of justice and Trump's casual leak of extremely sensitive information to our national foe that put our intelligence gathering at risk and his blatant disregard for American citizens that Congressional Republicans would finally be moved to put country over party but you would be wrong. Apparently, you have to lie about having sex to garner impeachment proceedings.

I wasn't planning on publishing another one so soon but holy fucking cow!

In another move to undo everything the Obamas did, Trump has moved to rescind the school lunch nutrition guidelines loosening the restrictions and allowing the funding to be cut even though for some kids their school lunch is the only real meal they get every day. But hey, the vendors will be able to make more money serving sugar and fat disguised as food bereft of nutrition.

Trump signed an EO revoking another of Obama's EO, the Northern Bering Sea Climate Resilience, giving local Alaskans and Tribes who use those waters every day a say in how the federal government managed those waters so that private interests can't use and abuse the Bering Sea without input from the people who depend on it for their lives and livelihoods.

Reince Priebus, Trump's chief-of-staff, admitted in an interview with ABC that Trump wants to restrict the freedom of the press (that he considers unfair towards him), wants to restrict the 1^st Amendment and has considered a constitutional amendment as a way to achieve it.

Trump, who swore to uphold the constitution, has been calling it 'archaic. Out of date, and not good for the US' and thinks something needs to be done about it to get rid of the checks and balances to make it easier to get things done ie let him act by decree, as in being an authoritarian as in dictator.

Trump has invited Philippine president Duterte, another authoritarian he admires, a man who has authorized the extra-judicial murders of 4,000 – 8,000 (depending on who you talk to) people in his country under the guise of ridding the country of drug dealers (and anyone who opposes him is labeled a drug dealer), to visit the White House.

Besides being completely unqualified for being president, Trump is also ignorant of our country's history asking in an interview, “people don't ask that question, but why was there the Civil War?” and thought Andrew Jackson, who had died 16 years previous, was “really angry” about it.

In another act of childish revenge, this time against President Jimmy Carter who has been a vocal critic of Trump and who the Argentine government announced they were awarding that country's highest honor, the Order of the Liberator General San Martin for his tireless humanitarian work, Trump's administration contacted the Argentine government directly and pressured them to withhold the award.

Trump has announced he is ending Michelle Obama's girl's education program Let Girls Learn that aimed to increase the educational opportunities for young girls in developing nations because, you know, Obamas.

Once again, because Trump can't immediately get his way, frustrated at the slow pace of the legislative process and the need to compromise, he wants to shut down the government in September because the bi-partisan budget deal did not include any of the cuts he wanted or money for the wall (though he did get his military increase) and change the legislative rules to 51 votes as opposed to the 60 votes the Senate now requires.

And related to that, Trump is threatening, again, to shut down the government if Democrats don't stop being happy about the budget deal and stop hurting his feelings (I kid you not).

Trump walks out of an interview when pressed for proof of his claim of the Obama ordered wiretapping.

A woman who was present during AG Jeff Sessions confirmation hearings who gave an involuntary burst of laughter when a Senator described Sessions as fair to all people regardless of race or orientation, an outright lie which can be proven by looking at his record, was arrested, prosecuted, and convicted for...laughing during the hearing. So, head's up people, laughing at or about Jeff Sessions is a criminal offense.

On order from Trump, all TV monitors will be tuned to Fox News (where before they tuned into a variety of stations). Only Fox News will be allowed on the White Oak Campus of the FDA. The station on the monitors is unable to be changed. Pay attention, this is Trump tightening his control over what people see and hear and if it isn't complimentary, it will be censored.

The Republican House passed their version of a health care bill, TrumpcareII, which will cause millions of people to lose their health insurance, got rid of the pre-existing conditions protection which will cause rate hikes and crappy coverage for millions more (excluding themselves, of course, who would continue to get that protection), slashed funding for Medicaid and gleefully celebrated with high fives all around for doing it. Edit: Due to the uproar, they passed a bill excluding their exclusion.

Trump has added 25 more National Parks and National Monuments to his list to their status reviewed.

The Republican held N Carolina House just voted to let people drive through protestors if they are blocking the road...state sanctioned assault with the intent to harm and possibly murder.

If Trump gets his way there will be no funding for libraries continuing his and the Republican party's effort to uneducate the American public.

In their continuing drive to undermine workers, the Republican House just voted on and passed legislation to end time-and-a-half overtime pay even for union workers, allowing employers to give workers time off instead.

Trump continues to be in the same place at the same time as Russian oligarch Dmitry Rybolovlev, this time in New Jersey where Trump is playing golf this weekend to 'save us money'.

Trump signed a religious liberty EO allowing discrimination based on religious grounds and gave churches the right to politicize without losing their tax free status.

With the noose getting tighter re Trump/Russia, Trump and his White House, who did not vet Flynn before giving him the position of National Security Advisor, continue to blame Obama for Michael Flynn, a man Obama fired in 2014 and, along with then AG Sally Yates, warned Trump against during the transition.

In an attempt to discredit Sally Yates and smear her reputation hours before her testimony to the Senate re Trump's and his administrations ties to Russia, Trump may have broken the law regarding intimidation of witnesses.

Scott Pruitt, Trump's pick to head the EPA, has declined to renew the terms of 5 scientists on the review board and plans to replace them with businessmen whose industries are affected by the EPA regulations.

A reporter was arrested, after receiving zero warnings that he was in danger of arrest, for repeatedly asking HHS Tom Price questions about Trumpcare. Alarmed yet?

Trump fired Sally Yates as AG for refusing to support his unconstitutional Muslim ban and appointed butt-kisser Jeff Sessions. Trump fired US Attorney Preet Bharara for refusing to resign along with 45 other US Attorneys without having any replacements confirmed thereby interrupting ongoing cases and investigations including Bharara's investigation into HHS Secretay Tom Price. Now Trump has fired FBI director James Comey after demanding that Comey end the Trump/Russia ties investigations and grand juries and Comey refused. Are you noticing a pattern here?

The day after Trump fired FBI director Comey, Trump met with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov in a closed door meeting, no American reporters allowed.

Once again, party before country Republicans refuse to appoint a Special Prosecutor to investigate Trump/Russia ties.