World leaders can kiss our collective ass …

The news out of Obama’s latest apology tour is that world leaders are “rattled” by Trump’s “ignorance” of world affairs. 

I guess these are the same type of world leaders that feared the election of Reagan or G.W. Bush, and who would have preferred a second term for Carter or the election of President Kerry.

I suppose they are worried about Trump’s ignorance of how they think the world should work. They’ve enjoyed pushing around Obama and his representatives. Perhaps there’s great concern that Trump won’t be satisfied to be “just another nation” desperate for their approval.   

Someone should remind them that they don’t get a vote here.  Nor do most Americans much care what they think about us.  Sure, the European wannabes in the media are all a twitter about what European, Canadian and Mexican leaders think about the possibility of a Trump Presidency. 

Me, I don’t care what they think. 

The Europeans ought to pay more attention to their own problems – there’s the possibility of Brexit; the takeover of major cities by refugees with no intention of assimilating; terror attacks; and the rise of ultra-right-wing nationalist parties as a result of wimpy politicians, overreaching bureaucrats and out-of-control social programs.  The Canadians should be more concerned about the possibility that Trudeau Deux will reignite the unsupported spending policies that drove Canada into a hole a few years back.  And Mexico should worry more about solving institutional corruption and building more home-grown jobs so its own people don’t want to leave.

I don’t agree with Trump about much – except that his wife is hot – but I think he’s right about how other countries routinely take advantage of us and our stupid trade deals. 

For all the poofs and poseurs in Europe who routinely chastise us for spending so much on our military instead of on bigger and more inclusive social programs like them, there’s this:  if we weren’t spending so much of our own money to protect their whiney asses they’d be in big trouble. If they had to fend for themselves – without our military backing – paid paternity leave and what qualifies as "Parmesan cheese" wouldn’t be among their top concerns. 

I personally like the Canadians – who in the world doesn’t? However, the vast majority of Canadians live practically on our northern border with Canada for good reason. Their economy largely depends on trade with the U.S. – we are their largest trading partner by far.  The Canadians also depend on us to protect them, not necessarily because they want to, but simply because with a population roughly a tenth the size of ours, they can’t afford not to. 

Then there’s Mexico.  This is a country that often imprisons people who illegally cross its southern borders but thinks we’re monsters for trying to secure our own southern border. I certainly don’t believe Trump’s claim that Mexico will pay for his wall, but I think Mexico is sorely mistaken if it believes our legal residents don’t overwhelmingly support building that wall. 

Notice I said legal residents.  I’m sure all the illegals and other Mexican-flag-wavers are opposed to a wall. I don’t blame them.  I’m sure burglars are opposed to locks, too. 

Years ago some Mexican president said we could either send Mexico our jobs or it would send us its people. Right now both are happening.  I don’t fault U.S. companies for sending jobs to Mexico.  Nor do I fault Mexicans trying to get here for better jobs.  I do, however, fault our politicians for making it so attractive for both to continue.

I’m also pretty sure the Chinese don’t want Trump to win, but I’ll bet they secretly don’t worry about it as much as the Europeans. They’d rather deal with someone who makes a regular business deal than some wishy-washy panty-waist like Obama who can’t make a decision, much less stick to one. 

I’m guessing the Saudis will welcome an old-school guy like Trump – especially after Obama.  The Iranians and North Korea not so much; Trump seems easier to piss off and respond impulsively than the diplomats and politicians they are accustomed to bullying.   

Finally, the Russians.  I tend to believe Trump when he says he can deal with Putin.  He won’t trust Putin and Putin won’t trust him.  But they’ll respect each other, far more than Putin respects Obama, who he sees as indecisive and weak. 

There are lots of reasons for Americans not to want Trump as President.  However, whether he gets there or not is entirely up to Americans. 

Not the media.  And certainly not world leaders. 

Screw 'em.  

Bob’s Bullshit Top Ten …

It’s hard to narrow this down to just 10 – there’s just so much bullshit to work with – but I have to start somewhere. In no particular order …

Obama will go down as one of our greatest Presidents. 

At best he’ll go down as America’s first black President. More likely years from now he’ll be remembered primarily as a divisive figure who accelerated the polarization between races, between political parties, and between economic classes.  His abuse of Executive powers – and his famous “pen and a phone” line – and his public scolding of the sitting Justices of the Supreme Court at a State of the Union Address will put him up there with FDR as Presidents who tried to run roughshod over the Constitution to get their way.

Obama deserves credit for pulling us out of the Great Recession.   

His supporters often cite this as proof of Obama’s greatness.  The truth is the economy would have recovered faster – entirely on its own – if he hadn’t interfered. It’s also true he inherited an economic crisis from G.W. Bush, but also from the Democrat-controlled Congress that fostered the growth in subprime lending that ultimately led to the economic collapse.  However, by not allowing GM, Chrysler and the major investment-banking firms to go into structured bankruptcy immediately and letting market forces fix the problems permanently, the Obama Administration intervened with stop-gap measures that papered over – at the cost of billions of shareholder and taxpayer dollars – much deeper issues that still remain. And by forcing “too big to fail” banking firms to consolidate he created even larger “too big to fail” entities. Finally, his almost trillion-dollar “shovel-ready” infrastructure spending was squandered by states on public employees rather than fixing and improving roads, bridge and other infrastructure.  If anything, he prolonged the Great Recession and fixed nothing. 

The rising national debt is not a big problem.

It’s a huge problem.  Interest alone on the existing debt is in the hundreds of billions – a year.  For FY 2015 interest alone was $228 billion. By 2025 the annual interest is estimated to be $808 billion. To put this in perspective, the total Federal budget for FY 2015 was about $3.3 trillion; revenue was projected to be $438 billion less than the budget.  How do we cover that deficit?  Borrowing. Adding more to the national debt, which at present stands at somewhere in the range of $19 trillion.  You don’t have to be a genius to understand that if annual GDP is $17.8 trillion and the national debt is $19 trillion, we’re in serious trouble.  Even the dumbest consumer knows that the worse your credit the higher the interest you have to pay.  So the interest rates on our national debt will continue to go higher the deeper in debt we go. 

Democrats and Obama are responsible for out-of-control spending. 

Republicans talk about the need to reduce the national debt but they are equally responsible for out-of-control spending as the Democrats. The absolute fact is that regardless of who is President or which party controls Congress, spending goes up.  Some of that happens automatically to pay our ever-growing Federal bureaucracy; some of it is simply squandered by politicians of both parties to curry favor with big campaign contributors or provide jobs in their area.  Some is to pay interest on our growing debt.  Then there are “crises” to fix.  G.W. Bush spent trillions on the Iraq and Afghanistan wars with the support of both Republicans and Democrats in Congress.  Obama spent a few trillion on failed economic recovery and green energy programs, as well as on ObamaCare. But he’s not alone: the Republican-controlled House just approved over $600 million to fight the Zika virus, and a couple of hundred billion more than requested by the Pentagon for Defense spending – mainly for weapons and personnel the military doesn’t want.  It all adds up, no matter who is controlling the purse.

Cutting Federal spending will hurt the poor.

There’s enormous fraud and waste in government spending.  Forget “teaching shrimp to run on a treadmill” grants. Those are nothing compared to the rampant fraud in government contracts (see above), entitlements, Medicare, Medicaid, food stamps, earned income tax credits, and disability claims alone. There’s fraud in government operations as well. The IRS alone admits it has hundreds of employees who owe back taxes but refuses to take action. Overall, the waste and fraud runs into the hundreds and hundreds of billions every year. The problem is that no one wants to address this. Helping the truly poor, disabled, and elderly wouldn’t suffer one bit if the government kicked illegals and the ineligible off the benefits rolls, fired bad and corrupt Federal employees, closed down agencies and programs that don’t accomplish anything, and better managed defense contracts. The only people hurt by all this would be politicians, Federal bureaucrats, grant vampires, scam artists, and defense contractors.  And trust me, these folks aren’t poor.

Obama got us out of Iraq and Afghanistan. 

We’re still there. Our service people are still engaged in combat there. They are also still dying there. But now they are far more vulnerable.  The only thing Obama did was pull out the troops needed to keep those areas relatively stable – and I use “relatively” loosely.  In his haste to fulfill a campaign promise to “end the wars” he also created a vacuum that encouraged the rise of ISIS and a resurgence of the Taliban.  His “lead from behind” strategy there and in Libya threw under the bus the few Middle East allies we still had.  With his continued lack of leadership, reluctance to use sufficient force, and the Iran nuke deal, he’s managed to make everyone in the region, especially Israel, feel betrayed.  We may not have large forces in the field, but make no mistake:  we’re still there, albeit in dangerously small numbers. 

There are “good” taxes that encourage better and healthier habits.

Politicians tax products like cigarettes, alcohol, and now sugary drinks because they want the money – plain and simple.  Claims that they are fighting against smoking, pollution, or obesity are pure crap. When states and cities jacked cigarette taxes so high – to “protect people from the hazards of smoking” – cigarettes sales went down as people switched to other tobacco products, and safer alternatives like e-cigarettes.  So did the tax revenues from cigarette taxes.  Now politicians want to put taxes on e-cigarettes, not because these are evil or unhealthy or pollute the air, but because cigarette tax revenue is down. Philly’s mayor wants a tax on sugary drinks “to fight childhood obesity”; the reality is he wants the money for a Pre-K program.  Most new taxes are about bringing in additional revenue for politicians to squander, nothing else. 

We can change the world through diplomacy and sanctions.

The most dangerous bullshit of all. In reality, as Al Capone was supposed to have said: Kind words and a gun will get you further than kind words alone. When you are the most powerful, most feared country in the world diplomacy works like a charm. Thanks to Obama’s indecisiveness and timidity – and desire to be “just another nation” – we aren’t that anymore.  Diplomatic success on the world stage today rests on the belief that one side is willing and able to exact terrible consequences if diplomacy fails.  Obama’s attitude is that diplomatic success is only about getting a deal, no matter how bad, useless, or unenforceable that is.  After his “red line” fiasco in Syria, and the Iran nuke deal, nobody he negotiates with takes him seriously. In this day and age, if you are unwilling to back up your threats with military force – and use that force – nobody will. That’s why the Chinese and Russians can buzz our warships, and Iran can seize our sailors, without fear of reprisals – they know Obama won’t do a damn thing except send a strongly worded objection. Sanctions won’t work either as long as other countries know there are really no consequences from us for ignoring any sanctions we place on another country. 

Hillary’s track record makes her more qualified to be President.    

She was kicked off the House Judiciary Committee staff investigating Watergate for submitting a fraudulent brief and removing and hiding files so she could argue they never existed. She faced possible disbarment for that. She lied about her role in the Whitewater / Rose Law firm scandal and could never find any of the requested documents until they magically reappeared in her room at the White House.  In 1993 she headed up a healthcare reform task force she was appointed to by her husband. After secret meetings – in violation of several laws – and withering attacks from fellow Democrats, her plans were shelved.  When Bill was confronted by numerous claims by women of sexual assault and harassment, she worked aggressively to destroy those women. After proof emerged about Bill’s sexual predation, including sex with a White House intern, she went on 60 Minutes to dismiss these as lies from a “vast right wing conspiracy.” When leaving the White House after Bill’s term in office, she tried to make off with the White House china. But right before then she engineered Presidential pardons brokered for money by her brother.  As a NY Senator, she accomplished absolutely nothing; in fact, most of the legislation she introduced couldn’t attract a single co-sponsor.  As Secretary of State she muffed a “reset” with the Russians, did nothing except fly around a lot, and let 4 Americans dies in Benghazi. Oh yeah, and after those deaths she lied to the families of the dead about the cause.

Trump is not qualified to be President. 

Who is?  The only President in my lifetime who actually had the rock-solid credentials for the job was George H.W. Bush, and he only got one term. It’s true that Trump has no legislative experience, but that hasn’t stopped anybody else from becoming President. Look at Obama.  Does Trump lack the temperament to be President? Is there an example of some other kind of temperament that’s a hallmark of a successful President?  Is he too crude for the job?  Crudeness never stopped LBJ – famous for calling his penis “Jumbo” and showing it off; or for that matter, Bill Clinton – famous for putting his in a variety of places other than Hillary. Trump is certainly not perfect yet he’s had the good fortune and business sense to grow a multi-billion-dollar empire.  Does that alone qualify him to be President?  Of course not, but it doesn’t disqualify him either. 

That’s it for now.      

Raising wages and benefits, and losing jobs …

It may come as a surprise to many, especially liberals in Washington like Obama and Biden, but businesses in America don’t work for the government. 

Liberal politicians and would-be socialists may be thrilled by government mandates that require businesses to pick up the tab for higher wages and employee costs.  That is, until smart businesses find alternatives to keep their costs in line.

And that’s precisely what has happened, and what’s going to happen. 

ObamaCare required employers above a certain size to provide benefits to employees working more than 30 hours a week.  Why not 40, which most consider a normal work week? 

Well, Obama and the liberals wanted to force employers to cover more people, so they deliberately set the threshold lower. Sneaky, huh? 

In a classic case of too-clever-by-half, it backfired. 

Employers cut the hours of their existing hourly employees to avoid providing healthcare or paying the penalty. Joe and Molly Sixpack went from making an okay living at 40 hours a week to making 25% less. To get the same amount of work done, employers hired more part-time employees and kept them below 30 hours. Nobody got benefits; the company paid no penalty. 

Big-city liberal politicians like raising the minimum wage because it makes low-income minimum-wage workers happy.  Seattle has done it.  San Francisco and other cities are following. 

What do you think is going to happen?  Let me enlighten you. 

McDonalds and other fast-food joints that employ a lot of minimum-wage people will employ fewer of them. In fact, some are experimenting with self-service kiosks for ordering to cut the number of workers required at each restaurant. And that’s just the beginning.  When it’s cheaper to use automation to prep and serve your Big Mac and fries than to pay some slacker in a paper hat with a bad attitude $15 an hour guess what fast-food operators will do. 

Years ago I had a summer job working for a relative who owned a small radio station outside Atlanta. On my first day he showed me an elaborate automated system he’d bought for his modern-country FM station.  It played preprogrammed music from a service called IGM and had slots to insert our recorded commercials and breakers. To the listening public, it sounded like live local broadcasting.

As he lovingly patted this machine he said what he loved the most about it was it never asked for a raise, never called in sick, and never took a day off.  He could focus on selling spots, making money, and running a business without all the employee hassles. 

Was he a monster? Nope. He was just trying to make a living and keep costs down. 

Listeners got a first-class product. Advertisers got their money’s worth. 

His AM station – run out of the same building – was completely live. But it was only on a sundown/sunrise license.  Not much labor required there. Three part-time DJs and me.  I think he operated that station more as a hobby than anything else and to fulfill the “community-service” requirement to maintain his licenses.

Just today I read that Obama has issued an order that requires businesses to pay overtime – at time and a half for every hour over 40 – to regular full-time workers making up to $47,500 a year. Liberals are gushing over this as a way to overcome wage stagnation and give millions of workers an automatic raise.  They are particularly thrilled that this will most likely impact fast-food managers and retail workers who routinely work 50 or more hours a week. 

Now, the theory is that businesses won’t be able to automate their way out of this one; we’re talking about clerical, office workers and managers who can’t be easily replaced by machines.  Once again, Obama and the liberals simply don’t understand what’s really going to happen. 

I’ll take a shot at this. First, companies will require those same employees to get the same amount of work done in less time – under the 40 hours.  And that’s the best-case scenario. 

More probable is that they’ll turn many of those same jobs into “contract” jobs”; those employees will become independent contractors.  As independent contractors they’ll be just another vendor, on a fee for services basis, off the company’s payroll and responsible for their own benefits. They’ll also no longer be eligible for overtime whether they work 40, 50 or more hours.   

That’s what’s really going to happen. Count on it.

Obama and the liberals created this bad economy. True, they inherited a financial mess.  But that was seven years ago, plenty of time for the economy to recover entirely on its own.

Had it been left alone.

The Obama Administration – through sheer ignorance of how business and the economy work – has made things much worse than need be.

Average household income has plummeted. Fewer Americans are working full time. 

There are real consequences to bad economic policies, no matter how popular they are with some segments of the population.

We’ll see how popular these remain when people start losing the very jobs they thought would be paying them even more.  And the benefits they now have. 

Black is the new Teflon …

When you’re black you can get away with all kinds of crap. 

You can be openly hateful toward women, gays, cops, society in general and get a pass. You can be rude, obnoxious, racist, and violent and it’s okay. Go ahead and thumb your nose at the same people trying to protect you, help you, enrich you, and yes, support you and think nothing of it.

The world exists to serve you. All because you’re black. 

Sure, the black community suffers from overwhelmingly black on black crime, and the leading cause of death among black youth is murder – by another black – but because you’re black nobody is allowed to discuss that. Not even other blacks. Nor is it okay to report that more than 70% or all births in the black community are to unwed mothers. Or that blacks only make up 13% of the U.S. population but account for 40% of all prisoners. Or that now 1 in 3 black males are projected to end up in the system.

Nope. When you’re black you have a built-in excuse for whatever you’ve done; that excuse being that you’re black. The reason you failed in school?  Because you’re black.  The reason you’re in prison?  Because you’re black. The reason you didn’t get that job promotion?  Because you’re black. The reason you have multiple children from multiple fathers before you’re 18?  Because you’re black.  The reason you’re poor? Because you’re black. 

And the reason why we all need to forgive whatever you do and give you whatever you want? Again, because you’re black. 

If white entertainers made songs glorifying robbery, rape, abusing women, murdering police, dealing dangerous drugs and running whores, most people would be aghast. However, black rappers can go on at length about women as hos, jacking cars, killing rivals, and murdering cops, and that’s just expressing themselves as blacks.

Can you imagine the reaction of the black community if a halftime show at the Super Bowl celebrated the founder of the Ku Klux Klan by marching out hooded figures who then formed a giant burning cross mid-field?  All that while images of lynchings played on the Jumbotron?    

Yet Beyoncé can do a half-time show honoring the Black Panthers – who assassinated cops – and Malcolm X, a former drug dealer and pimp who preached bigotry and hatred, while performing songs about cops killing unarmed blacks, and it’s just her honoring her black heritage. Meanwhile images of unarmed blacks being confronted by police played in the background. 

This from the same Beyoncé who demanded a police escort to the show.

But hey, she’s black. Okay then …

There was a time when it was understandable that blacks would feel like victims. That’s because in many ways they were, especially when racist whites kept them from eating in the same restaurants, sleeping in the same hotels, riding in the same part of the bus as whites, and even drinking from the same water fountains as whites.

Yet that time is over, and has been for decades. 

America has elected a black President twice. If it were still mired in racism, as many black leaders maintain still exists today, that would have never happened.  Again, blacks only make up 13% of the population; that’s not a large enough group to elect a President on its own – there had to be a lot of whites, Hispanics, Asians and others voting for him as well.

Even though racism against blacks in this country has diminished dramatically over the years, racism by blacks against whites seems to have grown.

Are all blacks racist?  Of course not, any more than all whites are racist.

But I’d bet a higher percentage of blacks are than whites. If you use my definition of a racist as someone who views everything through the prism of race, I’d put money on it.

This was driven home to me recently when a black acquaintance came to our house and went on a rant about how Republicans hated blacks because they were opposed to affirmative action. She maintained that she only got her job at a major corporation because she was black, but was later passed over for a promotion – which went to a white coworker she had trained – only because she was black.  She went to HR to complain and she got the next promotion.

Forget for a moment that there are other reasons why someone gets passed over for a promotion – not the least of which is often personality and how well someone gets along with others – yet in her view it was all about race. So she openly played the race card to get the next promotion. 

According to her white people are by their nature racist toward blacks. When my wife said surely she didn’t think we were racist, her response was “If you say so.”

That’s the attitude. I suppose I should have expected that.       

Back when OJ was acquitted of murdering his wife this same woman said she and her black coworkers broke out in cheers and applause. Even though most believed he committed the murder, according to her they cheered because a black man had been able to “beat the system.”

Is that any different than a hundred years ago when all-white juries acquitted whites who murdered blacks? I don’t think so. It was injustice then as the OJ verdict was now. 

But it doesn’t matter. The only thing that does is a black man got off. 

Once again black Teflon works.  Just as it worked when blacks turned punks like Trayvon Martin and Michael Brown into heroes despite all the evidence to the contrary.  Just as it gave rioters and looters in Ferguson and then Baltimore license to destroy local businesses in an orgy of violence and arson.  And just as it conveniently overlooks data that far more cops are killed by blacks than blacks killed by cops every year. 

How durable is black Teflon?  Well, charlatans like Al Sharpton can avoid paying millions in back taxes but still get frequent trips to the White House.  Why?  Because he’s black.       

Obama gets a pass on a lot of crap, too, because he’s black. Whites are afraid to criticize his performance in office for fear of being called racists.

The Democrats claim anyone who opposes Obama’s policies – and even his widespread, breathtaking at times, abuse of Presidential authority – is doing so only because he’s black.

In reality, if Obama were white he would have never won a Nobel Prize before he did anything; in fact, he’d probably have never been elected.  Even now, that he is black has prevented him from being driven from office for his sheer incompetence and laughable work ethic. 

The same goes for Michelle Obama.  She gets a break for saying she was proud to be an American – the first time in her life – because America elected a black man as President.  I guess until then she saw America as a racist empire. 

I’m sure she still does.  Yet no one is allowed to call her out because … you guessed it … she’s black. Instead, Obama’s fans – black and white – jump through hoops to try to show that Michelle’s comments were taken out of context, or somehow justified given America’s history of discrimination.

Bullshit.  He’s a racist.  She’s a racist. 

But that’s okay.  Because they’re black.    

When in doubt, play the race card.  Works every time. 

Potty Politics II …

So, it’s not enough that bozos in North Carolina passed a law that you can only use the bathroom appropriate to your gender at birth.

Now the President of the United States has to get involved. 

In case you missed it, he’s had the Justice Department issue a “guidance” that all public schools must allow transgendered persons to use the bathrooms – and now locker rooms – for the gender they identify with.  Or schools could risk losing Federal funds.   

In essence, Obama has said “I’ll see your stupidity, and raise it.” 

Has this been a real problem to date? Especially among school-age kids? 

Even the most ardent advocates for the transgendered estimate maybe, just maybe, there are 700,000 transgendered people in the U.S. That’s about three-tenths of one percent (0.3%) of the population. And according to that same study, most if not all of these are adults. 

There’s little if any data on how many transgendered people under the age of 18 there are. Part of that is because kids up to a certain age have no idea about “gender identity”; even later they may not feel one way or the other. Or they might feel confused and ashamed. 

In any case, it’s an extraordinarily small number. 

That doesn’t mean I don’t have compassion for a school-age kid in this situation.  I just can’t see how allowing a school-age girl who identifies as a male, or a school-age boy who identifies as a female, to use the restroom or locker room of their “gender identity” helps them. 

If anything, understanding how “Lord of the Flies” kids can be, I think it puts them more at risk. And that risk increases the older those kids are.  

I suppose there are forces in play that want to use these kids to push the need for “tolerance” of other lifestyles and sexual orientations at ever decreasing ages.

There’s nothing wrong with teaching tolerance. I'm all in favor of that. But there’s something really wrong about turning these kids into martyrs to promote some adults’ agendas. 

Martyrs never end well. 

The fact that we have, as a society, sexualized children at such an early age is disturbing. The fact that politicians on both sides are using this for political gain is appalling and reprehensible.  

There’s plenty of time later for children to decide for themselves what and who they want to be. There’s no reason to force their hands now. 

Shame on North Carolina for escalating this.  Shame on Obama for raising the stakes. And shame on the media and special interests for keeping this in the news.  

This is about kids, for God's sake, not an agenda.  

Potty Politics …

Who should be allowed to use which public restroom? 

Was this such a big problem that North Carolina had to pass a law to clarify this?

Welcome to more legislative stupidity. It’s an election year, after all, and we have to expect looney-tune legislation designed to further splinter the electorate.

So some bozos in North Carolina passed a law that you’re only allowed to use the public restroom that corresponds to your gender at birth.

Their point was … I give up.  I honestly don’t know. More interesting: who is going to check?  Is there going to be an official genitals inspector at the door of every restroom? Will you need to bring your birth certificate every time you need to go?  

Think TSA. If you thought the lines at the women’s restrooms at airports and sporting events were long already, get prepared for an even longer wait. And what about the urinals in men’s restrooms – the real reason the lines in men’s rooms move faster – how’s that going to work?  

I’ve seen women in men’s restrooms, mainly because they can’t wait in their line any longer. I’ve never seen men offended; they seem to understand. I’m not sure how women feel about men in their restrooms – which probably happens with far less frequency – but I suspect most of them wouldn’t care that much either as long as the men used a stall and put the seat down afterward.

This seems to be much ado about nothing. However, by passing an inane law to prohibit something that didn’t seem to be a problem – for God knows what reason – the nitwits in North Carolina invented a crisis that didn’t previously exist.

It also gave the Democrats and the Left ammunition to paint all Republicans in general and Southerners in particular as redneck cracker bastards who hate gays.

Thanks a bunch, North Carolina.    

Of course, this same idiotic law brought out the threat of boycotts by such intellectuals as Bruce Springsteen, the members of Pearl Jam, and Ringo Starr. Companies have threatened to move operations elsewhere, as have sponsors of major sporting events. 

How did this all start?  Well the city of Charlotte passed an ordinance that all public restrooms should be gender neutral. That’s it. The North Carolina legislature was so horrified by this prospect that it passed this piece of legislative insanity to protect its citizens.

And that’s how the fun began. Bible thumpers on one side predicted teenage girls would be forced to shower with adult men as the logical outcome. The Left predictably screamed discrimination against the LGBT community, especially the transgendered, fortunately for Democrats just in time for the next election.

How gender-neutral restrooms leapfrogged to this escapes me. But, as I said, this is an election year and that’s prime time for nutso behavior. 

I for one don’t mind gender-neutral bathrooms one bit. 

I only ask that women – or men who self-identify as women – put the seat up when they’re done as a courtesy to any men who still self-identify as men who may follow. 

Fair’s fair.      

And now it begins …

All signs now point to a showdown between Trump and Hillary in November.

We’ll be treated to two ethically challenged rich people, with more skeletons in their closets than the Grim Reaper, hammering away at each other in what’s likely to be the grittiest, nastiest campaign for President in modern times.

This will make even the most bizarre reality-TV shows seem tame. 

I have to admit I don’t like either Trump or Hillary. I’m not alone. There’s never been a pair of probable nominees running for President with such high negatives. It’s not simply that people don’t agree with their policies; they genuinely dislike or perhaps despise Trump and Hillary. 

That includes a lot of folks in their own respective parties. 

For me it’s a visceral thing. I can’t stand watching either of them.

Trump is an arrogant, narcissistic prick. But most everybody knows that. 

His mannerisms are practically cartoonish, with the flipper-like arm movements coupled with the thumb and index finger pinch and air quotes, and the smug, Il Duce face he makes, he’s an impressionist’s dream come true. He begs to be mocked. 

More seriously, I’m appalled at what he says; not just the misogynist and ethnic slurs, but the sheer stupidity of some of it, especially from someone who wants to be President.

He’s apparently unfamiliar with the U.S. Constitution, which branch of government does what, how laws are made and enforced, and what our military can and cannot do.  He clearly doesn’t understand international trade and the consequences of trade wars. He may have bullied his way to the top of the business world, but his adversaries there never had the resources, or ability to retaliate, that world powers like China and Russia have. 

In short, he sounds and acts more like a banana-republic dictator like Hugo Chavez than the brilliant, worldly international business genius he’s supposed to be. His professors at Fordham and Wharton must be hanging their heads in shame.

He says he’s going to surround himself with “really smart people” to advise him, but in the next breath says he gets his information on world affairs by watching the Sunday news shows. I guess he doesn’t find enough international news in the National Enquirer. 

Trump may be ultra-rich, but he’s like Rodney Dangerfield in the movie Caddyshack. He’s got all the toys, beautiful women, private jets, and gobs of money to burn, yet his over-the-top ostentation and crude jokes belie a low-brow attitude about everything.  His ad hominem attacks on the other Republicans who ran against him, and even their wives at times, reached new lows. He openly mocks the disabled, brags about his penis, and calls women pigs and sluts. 

Truly money can’t buy class; Trump’s proof. 

Hillary is a weasel always playing the edges. But again, everybody knows that.

She lies when the truth would do as well; in fact, she’s lied about so much so many times I don’t think she knows what’s real and what isn’t. You can’t believe anything she says. You’re never sure she knows she’s lying, or if in some nutso way she thinks it’s true. 

Pathological liar or delusional – either way it’s a big problem.   

Then there’s the fact that she’s damaged goods with a history of backroom deals, shady financial transactions, skirting the law, and money grubbing. Trump may have bullied his way to the top, but Hillary sleazed her way there.

People want to blame Bill for a lot of the Clintons’ questionable ethos, but while he’s certainly no paragon of virtue and a rapist at worst and sexual predator at best, Hillary’s always been the one driving the bus on enriching herself and her family.

She’s the first-timer who made $100,000 overnight in a commodities bet on an insider-trading tip from a friend. She was the lawyer on the Whitewater fiasco. She’s the one who tried to make off with $200,000 worth of White House china. She’s the one who helped her brother broker pardon deals for money at the end of Bill’s Presidency.  She’s the one who got $675,000 from Goldman-Sachs for three 20-minute speeches. She’s the one who took in millions from foreign countries and companies for the “Clinton Foundation” while she was in a position as Secretary of State to approve trade deals that benefitted those same countries and companies.  

She’s apparently willing to anything for the right amount of money. That’s scary. 

And, of course, she’s willing to lie about it. She had no problem saying she and Bill were “dead broke” when they left the White House, even though they had book deals for millions already. She didn’t stop there, either; she went on to claim they had to “cobble” together the money to buy two – count ‘em, two – houses and pay for Chelsea’s education at Stanford. 

She may be running almost exclusively on becoming the first female President, but she’s got brass balls, nonetheless, to say stuff like that with a straight face.     

I suspect the Hillary camp is secretly pleased the Republicans seem obsessed with Benghazi and her e-mail server. That takes the focus off Hillary’s much larger character issues, her actual Achilles’ Heel, which should frighten anyone thinking of electing her.

Her campaign posters have a big “H” and an arrow. I suppose that’s for Hillary, but for me it’s for “Hypocrisy, this way …” It’s one thing to change positions; it’s another to be a blatant hypocrite, especially when digital media captures everything you say.

Recently, while pandering to a bunch of climate-change activists, Hillary clearly said she planned on putting a lot of coal miners out of work. Later, when confronted by one of those coal miners in West Virginia, she said that was taken out of context. Like I said, brass balls. 

She claims she’s in touch with what real Americans want and how they feel. This from a woman worth millions who admits she hasn’t driven a car in more than 20 years. 

When she starts on about how she’s always been a warrior for women’s rights, I think of the women Bill assaulted or had affairs with and how she tried to portray them all as trailer trash.

I also remember her on camera in 1996 talking about the need to put “super predators” in jail for long terms, which resulted in substantially increased incarceration rates for black males. Now that she’s courting the black vote again she claims she’s in favor of “criminal justice reform” that would reduce sentences disproportionately affecting African Americans. 

Hillary says she’ll crack down on the financial industry – the same industry that’s contributed millions to her campaign and millions more to her “Foundation.” Hillary says she’ll crack down on lobbyists and special interests – the same lobbyists and special interests who’ve also given her and her Foundation millions and sit on her campaign committee. Hillary tries to portray herself as just like the rest of us – but she and Bill managed to get Chelsea a part-time job at one of the networks for $900,000 a year; I don’t know many of “us” who could pull that off.    

Face it: we have two awful choices ahead of us – Trump who can be bought off with flattery; Hillary who can be bought off for money. 

I don’t know which is worse.     

But I can tell you this:  I wouldn’t want to sit next to either of them at a baseball game – an old Ed Rendell test.

I honestly can’t imagine either of them as President.