p14, v10.18 — Opinion … Left/Right

Opinion … Left/Right

Mountain Views News Saturday, April 30, 2016

MVNews this week: Page 14

ILL

OPINION

Mountain Views News Saturday, April 30, 2016

RAGING MODERATE by WILL Durst

Mountain
Views

News

PUBLISHER/ EDITOR

Susan Henderson

CITY EDITOR

Dean Lee

EAST VALLEY EDITOR

Joan Schmidt

BUSINESS EDITOR

LaQuetta Shamblee

PRODUCTION

Richard Garcia

SALES

Patricia Colonello

626-355-2737

626-818-2698

WEBMASTER

John Aveny

CONTRIBUTORS

Chris Leclerc

Bob Eklund

Howard Hays

Paul Carpenter

Kim Clymer-Kelley

Christopher Nyerges

Peter Dills

Dr. Tina Paul

Rich Johnson

Merri Jill Finstrom

Lori Koop

Rev. James Snyder

Tina Paul

Mary Carney

Katie Hopkins

Deanne Davis

Despina Arouzman

Greg Welborn

Renee Quenell

Ben Show

Sean Kayden

Marc Garlett

Pat Birdsall (retired)

DICK Polman

TURNS OUT TRUMP

IS RIGHT A LOT

HILLARY CAN SHOW BERNIE
HOW TO LOSE WITH GRACE

As evidenced by
his hair, Donald
J. Trump is pretty
much wrong all
the time. Every
time. About
everything. Except when he isn’t. One
example is, should he become president,
Mexico indeed will build a wall - to
control our immigration. “Get me the
hell out of here. Por favor?” Hell, Canada
might have to build one as well. “Hey, let
me in dere, ya hoser. S’il vous plait, eh?”

Trump is also right about America
becoming more religious under his reign,
because upon his election, people are
going to start praying, “like you wouldn’t
believe.” All over the world. The seismic
shock caused by millions dropping to
their knees on January 21st might crack
open a chasm in the planet deep enough
to swallow a few of the Seven Seas.

After being aced out by Ted Cruz for
all the Colorado and Wyoming delegates,
Trump flailed like a boat- bound goose
trying to fly south with its feet nailed to
the deck, screaming all the while about
the system being rigged.

You know what? He’s right about that
one, too.

It’s finally sinking in - this isn’t
about democracy. This is much more
important: this is party politics. In an
effort to keep their voices preeminent,
the bigwigs have rigged and rerigged
the system like a 30-year-old trailer park
sound system.

On the other side of the aisle,
Bernie Sanders is hearing similar ugly
distortions. He’s finding the Dems have
rules more shady, murky and malleable
than a catfish trap in the Mississippi
Delta made out of cellophane. Perhaps
this helps to explain why the Vermont
senator eschewed becoming a Democrat
until recently.

The Donald also occasionally stumbles
into the lobby of the Correctomundo
Hotel by embracing such a variety of
stances that it wouldn’t be surprising to
find Trump University offers a course
that teaches the Art of the Blind Squirrel/
Nut Finding Deal.

First he supported an assault weapons
ban and background checks, then turned
against them. He told Larry King he
was a fan of universal health care, and
now, not so much. The man has adopted
more positions than a ballet dancer on a
cruise ship, sometimes during the same
interview.

He calls his 180-degree head snapping
turns “evolving.” Ever since Ronald
Reagan characterized his conversion
from Hollywood liberal as an “evolution,”
that’s the go-to, buzz-word for politicos.
People don’t change their minds
anymore. They evolve. Over time. Even
people who don’t believe in evolution,
evolve.

Since 1999 Trump has gone from
Republican to Independent to Democrat
to Independent to Republican again. He’s
the centrifugal candidate. Started out
pro-choice, became anti-choice and now
seems to be multiple-choice. And why
do his supporters love him? Because he
tells it like it is.

No matter what side of an issue you’re
on, Trump has been there, done that.
Less of a Man for all Seasons than a
Man for all Reasons. A businessman too
comfortable with the lesions of treasons.
Whoa. Too much?

And now Paul Manafort, the shiny new
senior advisor, told GOP insiders Trump
is simply playing a role and will tone it
down for the general election. Trump
must be praying that we the voters will
totally forget to play our roles of people
who can’t stand him.

——-

Will Durst is an award-winning,
nationally acclaimed columnist,
comedian and former Pizza Hut
assistant manager. For sample videos
and a calendar of personal appearances
including his new one- man show,
Elect to Laugh: 2016, appearing every
Tuesday at the San Francisco Marsh, go
to willdurst.com.

Despite repeated pummelings - four more
losses Tuesday night, including a blowout
in Pennsylvania - Bernie Sanders still
can’t find the high road on his mental
GPS. He’s still steamed that Democrats
have the temerity to run Democrats-only
primaries (he’s not even a Democrat), says
he’s gonna win in irrelevant West Virginia
on May 10 and continue to battle at the
convention to the bitter end.

Perhaps, if Bernie is at all interested
in losing with grace and class, in uniting
with his victorious foe for the most
existential crusade of our era - preventing
an unhinged racist demagogue from
owning the nuclear codes - he will take a
moment to read what Hillary Clinton said
to her disappointed followers on June 7,
2008.

The primary season had ended four
days earlier. She had virtually split the
nationwide popular vote with Barack
Obama, but she fatally trailed in the
delegate count. Her delegate deficit was
actually far smaller than Bernie’s current
deficit, but did she whine about “rigged”
primaries? Nope. Did she have the gall
to insist, as Bernie did on Monday, that
her victorious foe surrender to her issue
agenda? Nope. Here’s a small sampling of
what she said:

“The way to continue our fight now,
to accomplish the goals for which we
stand, is to take our energy, our passion,
our strength, and do all we can to help
elect Barack Obama, the next president
of the United States. Today, as I suspend
my campaign, I congratulate him on the
victory he has won and the extraordinary
race he has run. I endorse him and throw
my full support behind him. And I ask all
of you to join me in working as hard for
Barack Obama as you have for me.”

That’s the way to do it. You face reality,
and eat humble pie for the greater good.

The big question is not whether Bernie
is toast - that’s been obvious for weeks (he’s
losing the national popular vote by 57 to
43 percent, which in electoral parlance is
known as a landslide). The real question
is whether Bernie will stand down in a
graceful manner. We’re still six weeks
away from the final contest, so there’s
time.

Right now, however, we’re getting
mixed signals. Tad Devine, a strategist in
the Bernie camp, signaled the press early
Tuesday that his candidate is prepared to
“reassess.” But on the same day the Bernie
camp sought
new donations
by emailing a
photo of the
Clintons at
Trump’s wedding.

The candidate himself said Tuesday
night he’s proud of winning minuscule
Rhode Island, “the one state with an
open primary.” He’s stoked for “the 14
contests to come” and is vowing to fight
at the July convention for the issue agenda
that’s losing decisively at the ballot box.
(Here’s what I mean by decisive: In the
Pennsylvania exit polls, 52 percent said
the nominee should “continue Obama’s
policies.” Only 32 percent said the
nominee should “change to more liberal
policies.”)

So we’ll see which way Bernie plays
it. As an outsider, a western European-
style socialist who merely caucuses with
the Democrats, he’s comfortable with
defiance. On TV the other night, he
insisted that it’s “incumbent” upon Hillary
to make the first move toward winning
over his fans. Which is quite cheeky, given
the fact that she’s the winner and he’s the
loser.

On the other hand, Bernie has been an
inside-the Beltway politician for the past
quarter century. If the Democrats win
back the Senate this fall, presumably he
would very much like to chair the Senate
Budget Committee next year. Despite all
his self-righteous thunder, he knows how
to do deals. He hinted as much the other
night, on MSNBC, when he said, “I will
do everything in my power to make sure
that no Republican gets into the White
House in this election cycle.”

If he wants to stay in the race through
California, fine. And if he stops trashing
Clinton on the stump, and hoses down
Tim Robbins and his other celebrity
dilettantes - that’s when we’ll truly begin
to know whether he’s doing everything in
his power to kill the Trump poison before
it fatally infects this country.

——-

Dick Polman is the national political
columnist at NewsWorks/WHYY in
Philadelphia (newsworks.org/polman)
and a “Writer in Residence” at the
University of Pennsylvania. Email him at
dickpolman7@gmail.com.

Mountain Views News
has been adjudicated as
a newspaper of General
Circulation for the County
of Los Angeles in Court
Case number GS004724:
for the City of Sierra
Madre; in Court Case
GS005940 and for the
City of Monrovia in Court
Case No. GS006989 and
is published every Saturday
at 80 W. Sierra Madre
Blvd., No. 327, Sierra
Madre, California, 91024.
All contents are copyrighted
and may not be
reproduced without the
express written consent of
the publisher. All rights
reserved. All submissions
to this newspaper become
the property of the Mountain
Views News and may
be published in part or
whole.

Opinions and views
expressed by the writers
printed in this paper do
not necessarily express
the views and opinions
of the publisher or staff
of the Mountain Views
News.

Mountain Views News is
wholly owned by Grace
Lorraine Publications,
Inc. and reserves the right
to refuse publication of
advertisements and other
materials submitted for
publication.

Letters to the editor and
correspondence should
be sent to:

Mountain Views News

80 W. Sierra Madre Bl.
#327

Sierra Madre, Ca.
91024

Phone: 626-355-2737

Fax: 626-609-3285

email:

mtnviewsnews@aol.com

LEFT TURN/RIGHT TURN

HOWARD Hays As I See It

CHRISTINE Flowers

TED CRUZ,

THE DESPERATE MAGICIAN

Imagine if I toured Pennsylvania wearing a crown, going
from every diner to gas station announcing myself as
Miss Pennsylvania, even though I never participated in
the pageant or won anything.

The point I inartfully am trying to make is that one
does not put the cart before the horse, especially if one’s
horse is three steps away from the glue factory.

Which brings me to Ted Cruz. The Republican presidential candidate, who
is trailing Donald Trump in both delegates and the popular vote, is not only
not throwing in the towel, he is wrapping it around his head like a turban and
pretending to be a magician who will - poof! - extract a convention victory out of
Carly Fiorina’s mouth.

On Wednesday afternoon, Cruz announced that Fiorina would be his vice
presidential running mate in the general election, which he has apparently
convinced himself he will compete against either Hillary Clinton or the person
who hires a member of the Salvadoran drug gang mS-18 to kidnap the former
secretary of state and keep her incommunicado until November. Because,
essentially, that is the only way Hillary “Make Sure You Don’t Forget the Rodham”
Clinton will be AWOL come autumn. She is inevitable.

Cruz, on the other hand, is far from inevitable. His numbers, while better than
Ohio Gov. John Kasich’s, are nothing compared with Trump’s juggernaut. And
while the political honchos are still weaving scenarios in which there could be a
contested convention and Cruz could snatch the nomination from Trump, those
of us who are not hitting our heads against the Looking Glass have sadly come
to realize it will be a Trump-Clinton contest. This is sort of like the “Rumble
in the Jungle” between Muhammad Ali and George Foreman, only with more
testosterone.

When I watched the senator from Texas announce his VP choice, I was
perplexed. Don’t get me wrong. I think Fiorina is magnificent. During the early
debates, she wiped the floor with whoever else was on stage with her, and she held
her own with Trump when he went on one of his misogynistic rants about her
face.

And yet, that is an irrelevancy, which everyone except Trump seems to
understand. The way a woman looks should have no bearing on the way she is
perceived by voters, and I say this as a person frequently told she needs a drastic
makeover (so you could only imagine what I’d get if I ran for public office.) Many
people have also attacked Fiorina’s business record, continually pointing to the
massive job losses suffered at Hewlett-Packard on her watch.

But most of those who have examined her history both at H-P and in the
business world in general have a strong and positive opinion of her abilities.
Furthermore, her intelligence is awesome, and she easily dwarfs 90 percent of the
people still in the election (her new running mate being the possible exception)
when it comes to brain power.

And yet, it is strange and premature to be talking about what a great vice
president Fiorina would be - and I think she’d be a great one - when the person at
the top of her purported ticket has little to no chance of becoming the presidential
nominee in July.

This does not mean that I don’t want him to be the nominee. I’d take anyone
over Trump, at this point, including the barista at my local Starbucks who finally
figured out my name is spelled with a “Ch” and not a “K.” The kid clearly has a
steep learning curve, but he’s learning. I can’t say the same for Trump.

With Cruz, I know I’ll be getting smart, and, with Fiorina, I know I’ll be getting
tough. They would make a formidable team. But the premature announcement
looks like a Hail Mary pass made by a kid in the Pop Warner league to his mother.
It looks juvenile, amateur and desperate.

Or, it could just be that magical thinking I was talking about, where you steal
a crown and start parading around as the winner, despite all the evidence to the
contrary. And that just makes you look crazy.

Which doesn’t usually win elections. At least, not up till now.

“Always leave the
campsite in better shape
than it was when you
found it.”

- Something I remember
from the Boy Scouts

On a progressive
website, an older-but-
wiser Democrat gave
youngsters feeling the
Bern some sage advice. He wrote how he
sat out the 1980 election after his favorite,
Ted Kennedy, failed to take the nomination
from Jimmy Carter, while a friend voted for
John Anderson. Knowing he can’t turn back
the clock and undo the damage, he now
implores Sanders supporters not to make the
same mistake he made once the Democratic
nominee is chosen in Pittsburgh this July.

On the Republican side, Sen. Ted Cruz (R-
TX) insists his tax plan, costing $8.6 trillion
over ten years with half the benefits going to
the top 1%, would spur growth not seen in
thirty years. Donald Trump makes fun of the
way Gov. John Kasich (R-OH) eats pancakes.
The Koch Brothers have joined a growing
list of Republican luminaries suggesting they
won’t be going anywhere near their party’s
convention in Cleveland.

Watching TV, you’d think election news
was the only news – but meanwhile, the
Obama Administration continues to make
history.

While the president was overseas meeting
with European and Saudi leaders on Earth
Day last Friday, Secretary of State John Kerry
joined representatives of 174 other nations
in signing the accord reached at the U.N.
Conference on Climate Change in Paris last
December to keep global warming below 2
degrees (C) above pre-industrial levels. It was
the largest such signing at a U.N. opening
session ever. Michael Brune, Executive
Director of the Sierra Club, called it a “turning
point for humanity and a permanent shift
toward a 100 percent clean energy economy”.

Republicans, of course, now are trying to block
our contribution to the Green Climate Fund,
part of the deal to help developing countries
with their green technology projects, and
they insist the accord won’t work, anyway.
In refusing to accept science, they remain
at odds with the governments (liberal and
conservative) of all other developed countries,
all the world’s major scientific organizations,
over 97% of its scientists and 90% of
Americans polled on the subject.

As for the tax dodgers I wrote about last
week, with Republicans determined to cripple
the IRS’ ability to go after them, the president
and his administration are taking care of
business themselves. New regulations were
enacted on “corporate tax inversions”, where
an American company partners with one
in a low-or-no tax country overseas as a tax
dodge. Treasury Secretary Jack Lew explained
the new rules would “meaningfully reduce the
economic benefit” of the scam and the related
“earnings stripping”, where profits are shifted
to the overseas partner while corporate debt
is booked over here – where the interest on it
becomes tax deductible. The scams have been
costing us some $30-$90 billion a year in lost
revenue.

Last year, President Obama warned that
“For you to continue to benefit from that
entire architecture that helps you thrive, but
move your technical address simply to avoid
paying taxes, is neither fair, nor is it something
that’s going to be good for the country over
the long term.” Seeing the new rules put in
place, drug giant Pfizer announced earlier
this month it had second thoughts and is now
abandoning plans to hook up with Irish drug
maker Allergan, and will instead be paying
Allergan a $150 million “break-up fee”.

As this was happening, the Department
of Labor was reporting that “companies
have been hiring at a pace not seen before
in this century, and wages are rising faster
than inflation”, and that the “215,000 jump
in payrolls capped the best two-year period
for hiring since the late 1990s”. This report
came about the same time as a new Gallup
poll showing the president’s approval at 53%,
its highest in over three years. Six months
ago, party affiliation was even - with those
identifying as Democrats or Republicans
split at 42% each. Now, it’s shifted with
46% identifying as Democrats and 40% as
Republicans.

With all the non-election news going on,
the president last week found time to answer
the letter of 8-year-old Mari Copeny, who’d
written to ask for “a chance to meet with you
or your wife” when she came to Washington
along with busloads of other residents of
Flint, Michigan to be there for the hearings
on the water crisis – although “my mom
said chances are you will be too busy with
important things”.

The president wrote back, “You’re right
that Presidents are often busy, but the truth
is, in America, there is no more important
title than citizen. And I am so proud of you
for using your voice to speak out on behalf of
the children of Flint.” The president let Mari
know that rather than her having to return
to Washington, he’d be coming to Flint next
month to personally meet with her and other
members of her community.

On Earth Day, I think of the “campsite”
in the opening quote as our planet, and its
admonition as a purpose for whatever length
of time we’re able to camp out on it. Regarding
the consequences of voting, I recall that one
of Ronald Reagan’s first acts as president was
removing the solar panels Jimmy Carter had
installed on top the White House.

The campsite could also be an analogy for
the Oval Office, with the quote describing a
goal for whoever moves in. Whoever it is
that does set up camp there come January,
however, they’re going to have an awfully
tough act to follow.

Mountain Views News

Mission Statement

The traditions of

community news-
papers and the
concerns of our readers
are this newspaper’s
top priorities. We
support a prosperous
community of well-
informed citizens.
We hold in high
regard the values
of the exceptional
quality of life in our
community, including
the magnificence of
our natural resources.
Integrity will be our
guide.

Mountain Views News 80 W Sierra Madre Blvd. No. 327 Sierra Madre, Ca. 91024 Office: 626.355.2737 Fax: 626.609.3285 Email: editor@mtnviewsnews.com Website: www.mtnviewsnews.com