Remember When?

Remember how badly some people in the Tea Party movement, other Romney supporters, and even children, reacted to the reelection of President Obama four years ago?  For example:

Remember when Tea Partiers assaulted a man they thought had voted for Obama and tried to steal his car?

Remember when pro-Romney high school students in Maryland beat up a fellow student who wore a pro-Obama hat?

Remember how a pro-Romney high school student in Florida punched a classmate for holding up a pro-Obama sign?

Remember when pro-Romney students beat up an 11-year-old boy for voting for Obama in a mock election?

Remember when a Tea Partier even had the audacity to carry a sign that said "Rape Michelle"?

And finally, do you remember the teenagers who acted out a mock assassination of Obama?

Do you remember any of that?  Let's just say....

ME NEITHER!

Disclaimer:  Everyone please note that I'm referring to a hypothetical mock assassination, not a real one.  The actual mock assassination was part of a skit, the "victim" not being the current president.

Various And Sundry

Some various and sundry (or sun-dried) things going on out there:

From the Journal Gazette & Times-Courier, six things in the news.

From National Review, if you want know who "normalized" Donald Trump, look left.

From AOL News, the most powerful female on Trump's team is not who you'd think.

From Politico, Trump's designee for Attorney General is already catching flak.

From USA Today, "Who is Michael Flynn" whom Trump has tapped for National Security Adviser?

From the New York Post, Trump has some other unfinished business to take care of.

From Twitchy, the irony of Trump's predecessor's warning about "fake news".

From The Daily Caller, some of the under-reported attacks on Trump supporters.

From CNN, here's someone who didn't vote, but if he had, would have voted for Trump.

From The Jerusalem Post, Benjamin Netanyahu has some advice for Trump.

From FrontpageMag, what not to do if you want whites to vote for you.

From Gatestone Institute, don't call these guys what they are.

From Reuters, 32 well-off Sri Lankans join ISIS.  (So much for terrorism being driven by economic concerns and poverty.)

From the Daily Mail, Britain's first Muslim female Lord Mayor defends herself in court.

From Warrior, some badassery from the U.S. and U.K. military.

From TechCrunch, can the tech industry solve political problems?

From Fox News, a judge is indicted for giving a gun to a felon.

And from Truth Revolt, a Twitter user exposes their double standard.

Music Break

Now that the election is over a week in the past, I can turn my attention back to music for a bit.  The first number, Crossfire, comes from In Step, the fourth and last album by Stevie Ray Vaughan and Double Trouble.  It was written by his band-mates Tommy Shannon (bass), Chris Layton (drums) and Reese Wynans (keyboards), along with Bill Carter and Ruth Ellsworth.  The track includes Joe Sublett on sax and Darrell Leonard on trumpet, the two collectively known as the Texicali Horns.  Sadly, after releasing Family Style with his brother Jimmy, Vaughan would die in a helicopter crash after performing at a show in Wisconsin in 1990.

A New Senator John Kennedy (R-LA)?

This coming January, there might be a new Senator named John Kennedy, who is, even with that name, a Republican.  But first, he must win the runoff election in Louisiana.

Read more at Roll Call, Politico, The Times-Picayune and The Hill.

What I'd Like To See From President Trump

You could say that I've waited four years to write this post.  Back in 2012, I was hoping to congratulate Mitt Romney on being elected president, and then set out what I'd like to see from him when he gets into office.  Those hopes, as we all remember, were dashed by the reelection of Barack Obama.  As a result, my experience in writing this type of post consists only of a post which I wrote in 2010 congratulating the GOP for retaking the House of Representatives, when I was a contributor to AndRightlySo.  So then, here are my suggestions for President-elect Donald Trump:

First of all, as Han Solo once said to Luke Skywalker, "Don't get cocky."  I realize that asking any politician, even one whose experience is mostly outside of politics, to reign in his arrogance is a tall order, but it must be done.  You will soon be the most powerful man in the world (which already scares the [bleep] out of the left), and will have responsibilities more grievous than most people would ever want.  If memory serves me correctly, George Bush the Elder once said that there really is nothing that truly prepares you for the presidency.  For that reason alone, a little bit of humility will go a long way.

Pit Bull Elected Mayor

For the fourth time in its history, the small town of Rabbit Hash, Kentucky has elected a dog to be their mayor.  A pit bull named Brynneth Pawltro, or Brynn for short, beat out other dogs, a chicken, a cat, a donkey (a Democrat, maybe?), and a Godzilla figurine.  The previous mayor, a border collie named Lucy Lou who had been in office for eight years, stepped down with all four legs after the election was called.

Read more at The Telegraph, WLWT and The Dodo.

Anti-Trump Prognosticators Fail Miserably

YouTube user Marc Dice has posted a video compilation of politicians and media figures saying either that Donald Trump will not be president, or that he will not be the GOP nominee.  The political people come from both major parties, and include Trump's respective immediate predecessors as president and as GOP nominee.  At the start, however, we get to watch one person who got it right.

The direct link is here.  For those of you on record as predicting that Trump would never be elected president, enjoy eating your crow.

Saturday Links

Here are things going on, as the weekend starts to unfold:

The speculation can now begin.  What kind of administration will President Trump have?

The crybabies are still crying.

An open letter to said crybabies.

I'd call this a good piece of advice to said crybabies.

Our friends to the north can breathe a small sign of relief.
UPDATE:  So can some of our amigos across the Atlantic.

Should we cry this guy a river, or just get out the very small violin?

Trump reiterates his position on Syria.

A college course on Hillary Clinton's life.

Was a hiker's encounter with Clinton staged?

Lego and the Daily Mail will part ways.

Some information on the migration into Europe.

Some of those migrants are drug dealers.

France pays tribute to the victims of the terror attack a year ago.

Introducing the folding electric bike.

A space object's orbit might have been affected by Planet Nine.

And to finish with some historical humor, a special snowflake from the past is very upset that Trump won.

Trump's Letter From Nixon

Several media outlets have recently reported about a letter Donald Trump received in 1987 from former President Richard Nixon.  The letter was posted by the National Archives Foundation and mentioned by author Michael D'Antonio in his new biography of the president-elect, entitled Never Enough.

In late December of 1987, former First Lady Pat Nixon was watching Phil Donahue's TV show, on which Trump was a guest, and apparently was rather impressed with the real estate developer.   Mrs. Nixon thought that Trump could be successful in politics, which sentiments Mr. Nixon conveyed to Trump in the letter.  The body of the letter reads:

I did not see the program, but Mrs. Nixon told me you were great on the Donahue show.

As you can imagine, she is an expert on politics and she predicts that whenever you decide to run for office you will be a winner!  [underline in original]

To be sure, the Nixons did not mention any specific public office, much less the presidency.  While this correspondence is not quite, in my opinion, as interesting as the in-person handshake between President John F. Kennedy and a boy from Arkansas named Bill Clinton, it's certainly worth taking note of the connection between the current president-elect and one of his predecessors.

Read more at The Vindicated (part of New York Mag), AOL News, The New York Times and WPVI-TV.

UPDATE:  Here's another blast from the past, of the comical variety.

Some Takeaways From Trump's Victory

Here are some facts and consequences arising from Donald Trump's victory in this year's election:

As I've previously mentioned, Trump is the oldest man ever to be elected president, and this coming January, will be the oldest man to be sworn into the office.  He is also the first twice-divorced person to be elected president.  Due to his vast wealth, if he decides to accept his presidential salary, he will probably still be taking a very large pay cut (or as he would put it, a yuuuuge pay cut).

Trump will not be the only president to have not previously held any other type of civilian government office such as senator (like Obama and Kennedy) or governor (like Clinton and Bush the Younger).  However, most of the others with this distinction, as far as I know, had been military generals (like Eisenhower and Grant) before becoming president.  Thus, Trump will be one of the few presidents, if not the only one, to have no earlier service in any other government office, either civilian or military.

Mrs. Trump, the former Melania Knauss, will become the first First Lady to be born in mainland Europe, specifically Slovenia, and the second born outside the United States (or the antecedent British colonies), after Louisa Adams, who was born in London.   While her attractiveness is obvious, she also has enough smarts to speak five languages.  She will also be the first Slav that I know of to become FLOTUS, something that a part-Slovak part-Pole like myself can be proud of.