So, with that as background, this past Tuesday, TV coverage provided a couple if interesting insights into the current political climate here in "These United States". The first insight was that the Democrats STILL have not come to grips with the fact that they lost the election! Ample evidence of this was provided in the patently partisan rancor which characterized the Democratic Senators' questioning of the nominee during the televised Senate confirmation hearing held to consider Senator Jeff Sessons' qualifications to become the next Attorney General of The United States. But what struck me most, even before all the accusations about Sessions being a racist, anti-poor people, anti-LGBT and a misogynist (would you expect anything less from a Democrat addressing a Trump nominee?) was the opening statement of Senator Dianne Feinstein. The good Senator took it upon herself to describe, in detail, what is expected of an Attorney General as the chief legal assistant to the President, and the cabinet officer charged to help him (POTUS) meet his Constitutional responsibility to "...take care that the laws be faithfully executed...". Senator Feinstein pounded Senator Sessions over and over with the same question. To wit: "Will you ensure that the laws are enforced?". She did not mention if she had posed this same question to either Eric Holder or Loretta Lynch while they were serving as successive Attorneys General to President Obama, both of whom opted not to enforce immigration laws in several southwestern states and who, indeed, took action against the affected state governments for attempting to do so.
Then, not content to stop her instructional lecture, Ms. Feinstein was at pains to let Senator Sessions know that she expected him to say "No" to the new President when necessary and cautioned him not to see himself as an executor of Mr. Trump's policies. In short, she does not want the President and his AG to have too close a relationship. I don't know if she remembers the very close ties between President Jack Kennedy and his Attorney General (who happened to be his brother Bobby)----but that was during "Camelot", and they were Democrats, so it must have been OK!
The second television event which provided insight into the political climate was The President's Farewell Address. Actually, come to think of it, the speech just reinforced the insight cited above about the Democrats not being able to believe they got beat in November. In addition it highlighted, in my view, how out of touch with reality the President became over time. Or, maybe what I saw as "out of touch" was just his compelling need to spin the facts so as to preserve, for his supporters, the illusion of a highly successful presidency. The speech itself was pretty interesting and I recorded it so that I could play portions of it back to be sure I had heard them correctly. Because of this, I found out, to my surprise, that "By almost every measure, America is in a better, stronger place than when we started." This statement was greeted by a standing ovation from the assembled acolytes and the only thing missing was Mr. Obama asking, "Can I get an AMEN?" I had no idea we were in such great shape, but that is a subject for another blog entry.
My favorite part of the address came at the beginning when Mr. Obama was lauding Chicago (his hometown) and saying that it was here (Chicago) where he learned "That things only happen when ordinary people get involved and they get engaged and they come together to demand it." The irony of that statement was, I think, lost on the President, because that is PRECISELY what happened in the last election. Ordinary people came together to demand change. The only thing that made it bad for the President's party and their candidate was that the "ordinary people", in this case, were not from the two coasts and the big cities, but rather from the much maligned "Fly Over States". They were the ordinary people who the press and the political pundits described as "uneducated whites" and whose views were constantly denigrated as backward, laughable and anti-progress by liberal commentators, Hollywood celebs and even some political candidates (as in the "Basket of Deplorables). These ordinary people took this all in. THEN THEY GOT PISSED OFF AND VOTED!