Big Numbers:
34 days until Election Day
206,888 US COVID-19 deaths
7,229,693 US confirmed COVID cases
$750.00 Number of dollars Trump paid in Federal Income Tax in two of the past five years.
Another week of Donald Trump chaos is underway and like clockwork, Trump threw out some spaghetti for one wall, poop for two other walls and the only wall left standing was the one for us to bang our heads against.
The first presidential debate was described as:
“A brutal slugfest,” read the New York Post
Reuters described it as “Chaos Reigning”
And even the Drudge Report, the far-right website called it a “circus.”
The problem is those descriptions are exactly what Trump wanted. He wants us to all throw our collective hands into the air and declare it as Dana Bash did on CNN, a Shit-Show. By doing so, many people express a level of frustration that poisons the entire democratic process, and in some instances, might dissuade people from participating at all in the very thing that makes this a democracy: elective representation.
While it was that very response that Trump was clearly hoping for, we cannot lose sight of the bigger picture. We have an election in 33 days and at that time we have to make a couple of determinations. 1) Do we want to continue with democracy as the basis of our government?; and 2) Do we want Donald Trump to continue to lead our nation or would we prefer to replace him with Joe Biden?
Last night’s debate, was indeed a hot mess, filled with shouting, evasion, lying and generally “unpresidential” behavior, most of which came from only one side: Donald Trump. He was roundly criticized for interrupting and talking over both Joe Biden and the moderator Chris Wallace of the Fox News Channel. Yes, there were moments when Joe Biden made snide comments and quips, like “shut up,” but those were generally made in response to Trump talking over him or just outright insults such as when Trump repeatedly went after Biden’s son Hunter Biden, a man who is not running for president nor has he been found guilty of, or even charged with any crime, despite the Right Wing’s insistence that he should be “locked up.”
As a matter of fact, the specter of Hunter Biden’s having had done something wrong was a significant part of why Trump was impeached earlier this year. There are conspiracy theories about the younger Biden’s involvement with both Ukraine and China that Trump supporters, led by Rudy Giuliani, have used to suggest that Joe Biden was corrupt in his dealings with foreign governments while Vice President. Those theories have been repeatedly debunked and even Trump’s own intelligence agencies have moved on. But not so, for Trump’s enablers and co-conspirators.
Nevertheless, Trump continues to egg on his followers with these unfounded rumors and innuendo. Last night’s debate did show us two things, however, that I hope people do not overlook. Joe Biden showed up prepared and ready to debate issues. He answered questions using specific facts, stats and examples to describe what he would do as president and provided details that illustrated his understanding of the job ahead. Yes, Joe has a stutter, and yes, Joe is getting up there in age, but unlike all the rantings from the right in the lead up to the debate, there was nothing to indicate a cognitive decline or drug use. That is, unless you are speaking about Trump’s side of the stage.
But while everyone called it all kinds of things, I called it illuminating.
The other thing I want to make sure we don’t ignore is Trump’s deflection. I watched the debate, the pre-debate, and the post-debate coverage on MSNBC, CNN, and I even tuned in to Fox News (for as long as I could tolerate them ignoring what my eyes and ears had just encountered). I also watched the early morning coverage when surrogates from both sides started making the rounds and I read news stories chronicling the response across the country and the globe. Universally, literally, the talk was about the spectacle of the debate. About Trump doing all but setting himself on fire mid-stage. The most focus was on an exchange between the three men that culminated in Trump refusing to denounce “White Supremacists.” Duh. Of course, he didn’t denounce them. He needs them. Who else is gonna vote for him at this point? Trump either feeds your racism or he feeds your bank account or maybe both. But few of his likely voters are in the neither category. His audience isn’t growing and in fact he’s been tanking in the polls for months, since the coronavirus started. He did not show up to win over undecided voters.
In spite of what we did hear, there is the matter of what we did not hear. Trump did not talk at any length about his plans to mitigate COVID-19, beyond lying about a vaccine that was weeks away and how the military is on standby to get doses to everyone. Reports have been out that explain how that simply is not logistically possible given the length of human trials, the number of doses and other challenges that cannot be overcome on a timeline that predates the election.
Trump also didn’t talk about healthcare, other than to state that he delivered pre-existing conditions, which Obamacare did 10 years ago; and he got rid of the individual mandate, which he described as unpopular. It may be, but it is necessary to have the mandate in order make the pool of insured large enough to offset the costs of healthcare for those with the most risk. He has been president for nearly four years and has no plan. Yet he continues to insist one is coming in two weeks.
The debate was notable to me, for what he did not say and plans he did not share, largely so he could run out the clock and avoid talking about the elephant in the room. His taxes and bank account, as outlined in the New York Times story that broke on Sunday.
The NYT reported a comprehensive accounting of his business failures and sketchy, if not outright illegal, business dealings and tax evasion practices. The Times got ahold of 15 years of Trump’s taxes that paint a picture of a man who is deceptive in how he has presented himself to the public and how far from successful he has been as a business man.
Trump is not a real estate developer. He is a banding guy. He has created a persona of a businessman. Literally, a businessman-type character he plays on TV, and in his financial dealings, in order to dupe people into thinking his brand is much more valuable that it is. His brand is actually all based on a façade.
His taxes show how much he has lost in virtually every enterprise he has touched throughout his entire life. Literally. He has squandered the money his father gave while he was alive; he has squandered the money he received as part of his father’s inheritance; he has squandered all the of the money he made by way of The Apprentice and his “charitable donation” of his salary as president, is only a PR move to distract us from the US taxpayers money he squanders as president on such frivolities as golf and hanging out with his cronies.
His tax returns are a complex array of schemes and machinations designed to write off debt, delay payments and ultimately avoid paying US taxes. Some of it is legal or on the border of legal, but most of it is unethical in that he does not participate in paying for the government that he leads, nor does he pay his fair share in keeping our nation afloat. That said, the portions of the taxes that are most in question and that will very likely come back to haunt him are the deductions he takes due clever accounting slight-of-hand and due to his “fame.” The deductions in these aread are questionable at best, and very likely illegal at worst, for things that should not be written off, such as business operating expenses for consulting fees paid to his daughter Ivanka Trump, while she’s simultaneously collecting a paycheck as an employee and officer of many of the Trump Organization’s business entities.
On the fame front, he generally says, ‘my business is my brand and in order to maintain the brand, I have to do certain things like fly private jets, stay in fabulous homes and live high on the hog. Therefore, I can deduct the cost of all of that.’ Uh huh, ask a Kardashian if that is how it works.
So while he’s trying to distract us from understanding this tax crisis he’s facing and the nearly $400 million dollars that will come due, especially if he’s not president, he underscores how important it is for him to remain in office. By staying in office he has more time to change laws in his favor, sometimes retroactively creating a situation where he can revise previous tax filings so that he can get refunds on monies already paid out. He can also continue to do business with foreign governments, who still pay him though his businesses, although he promised to divest himself of his holdings. Furthermore, as a sitting president, most creditors will likely delay calling on the debts due, or not repossess his assets. This would have the added bonus of buying himself more time to find some money in order to pay his debts because he clearly is not a billionaire by any measure. It looks like he is barely a millionaire for that matter.
The only thing Trump can do at this point to win, based on the most recent polling is to find a way to cheat by invalidating the ballots. In the debate last night an entire segment was spent on his hysterical rantings about how millions and millions of ballots are being sent out and sold and the whole thing is a scam, according to him. This is simply not true. However, he was given a platform to advance this strategy, hoping to confuse and frustrate voters into not showing up, as well as to prime the voters for the fights that will take place to toss the ballots in multiple states after election day. By tying up the election results for weeks and weeks, he believes he can run out the clock without a candidate being timely certified as the winner, and then we turn to the House of Representatives to vote.
Many people think by going to the House in early January, somehow that just means Nancy Pelosi will become president. That is not the case. The House would vote. As of today, Republicans control 26 states and each state gets only one vote. This is one reason it is so imperative to DEMs to not seat Amy Coney Barrett who has not recused herself from participating in any legal battles that may reach the Supreme Court should she be confirmed to the high court; and why maintaining the House of Representatives as well as taking control of the Senate is equally important.
In the next, episode of Capital G, I will set aside some time to talk in greater detail about the potential ways Trump and the Republican Party may work to have ballots invalidated and whether or not they could succeed with that in the courts.
Next Wednesday, October 7, Vice President Mike Pence and Senator Kamala Harris face off in the only Vice-Presidential debate. It certainly won’t have as many fireworks as the one last night. And on October 15, Trump and Biden will meet again, with new rules in place according to the Commission on Presidential Debates.
In the meantime, our best bet as a nation, is to review what could be more aptly titled a unpresidential debacle than a presidential debate, and get real about who can take the job seriously and who’s just throwing crap at the wall.
Don’t forget to listen to the Capital G Podcast, a companion to the Capital G Blog.