our story thus far

I can count on one hand how often I’ve been proud to be an American this millenium.  Barack Obama addressing that massive Chicago crowd the night of his election was the last time.  (Miss you already, B.)  Today will resonate rosily in my soul the rest of my life.

I certainly knew I wasn’t the only one concerned about the Cheeto, but goddamn!  Connecting with a few million more all around the globe was intoxicating.  I don’t know how much of today’s energy we can maintain, but my heart tells me this day will go down as the start of a ground-shaking movement.

Legend has it that as hundreds of thousands demonstrated during one of the 1969 Vietnam War protests, Richard Nixon watched a football game.  Today, as millions marched, some of the Trump family bowled in the White House.  Donnie Junior posted a pic of his wife Vanessa rolling one down the lane.  In high heels.  To her credit, she did knock down eight pins.  But those heels would have to be spiked to punch a hole in their bubble.

Donnie Senior, in the meantime, went to CIA headquarters to tout his nominee for its new director, Mike Pompeo.  Yes, the Mike Pompeo who just told Congress that he’s cool with water boarding.

Standing in front of the Company’s memorial wall that honours the 117 employees who have died in the line of duty, Trump may have set a tone he can never repair.  Did he mention the 117 fallen?  No.  Did he thank the 200 or so current employees who came in on their days off for their service?  Of course not.

Instead, the Screaming Cantaloupe ranted about the Evil Media’s misrepresenting the size of his inauguration crowd based merely on facts.  I’m sure you’ve seen the telling aerial photos of yesterday’s 250,000 or so attendees compared to Obama’s 1.8 million in 2009.

He did, however, credit Fox “News” with a fair and balanced account of his inauguration.  Time magazine was also non-evil to him because it had put him on its cover on “14 or 15” occasions, a record Trump figures will never be broken.  How that’s related is beyond me.

Then, to bottom things off, he declared his love for the CIA and again blamed the media for misconstruing his attack on the agency recently.  You remember.  He idly speculated that the pee stories were leaked (sorry, couldn’t resist) by the agency.  Not a shred of evidence for that, but enough reason for him to justify a tortured Nazi allusion.

When CNN went back to its studio right after Trump’s talk, one of its pundits was sitting there with his jaw actually dropped.  Former CIA Director John Brennan said he was “deeply saddened and angered” by Trump’s “despicable display of self-aggrandizement” in front of the wall.

Not enough excitement for this historic day?  An hour or so ago, Trump’s press secretary Sean Spicer delivered a statement augmenting his boss’s inaccuracies.  Mixing specious stats with outright lies, Spicer briefly babbled, then left without taking questions.

Another CNN pundit just hypothesized that all this whale shit is to distract from the Womens’ March.  Lying in the face of photographic evidence to make us forget about millions peacefully protesting?  Brilliant.