Presidency a sociopath's delight for soulless Trump

The bloated, scowling hulk Trump's only antidote for a failed presidency is the relief he appears to get from escalating the civilian body count in the Middle East. Within hours of getting his license to kill from the war party, Trump authorized a drone strike in Yemen that killed ten civilians. Within a week he authorized a botched special ops raid that killed 30 civilians; but Trump ignored that carnage to only glorify the US soldier he sacrificed in the senseless raid. Trump dramatically increased drone and bomber strikes from his predecessor, no shrinking violet in the Middle East murder game, causing over a thousand civilian deaths in March. Some examples? Trump demolished a mosque in Aleppo, Syria, killing 47; homes, school and hospital in Tabqah, Syria, killing 20; temporary refugee housing in Raqqa, Syria, killing 33; and Trump's mother of all war crimes, an entire neighborhood in Mosul, Iraq, killing nearly 300.

Now the sociopath's poll numbers rise and severe Trump critics like Senators McCain and Graham grow quiet as Trump rained 60 Tomahawk missiles on the Syrian government, killing more innocents and ratcheting up tensions that will surely inflame an already volatile region. Trump claims he tomahawked the Syrian airbase to stop future Syrian government gas attacks from killing civilians. Trump couldn't wait for an impartial investigation into the incident which might prove the gas was unleashed either purposely or accidentally by the rebels. This is precisely what happened after the 2013 Syrian gas attack when CIA informed a cautious Obama that Assad likely didn't do it; averting a needless descent into war. But sociopaths like Trump don't hesitate; they kill for the sake of killing and the residual personal benefits.

And by keeping silent, we are all the sociopath Trump's enablers.

LGBT community, all of us, served by rejection of anti transgender agreement clique in Palatine

Congrats to Anna Kimkowitz, Bob Lefevre Jr. and Ed Jung who defeated Kath David, Ralph Bonatz and Jean Forest in Palatine High School District 211 race Tuesday. The winners are committed to continued progress in opening Palatine's school potties to transgenders, as achieved in the 2015 consent agreement with Uncle Sam against furious opposition from the fearful, ignorant and yes, hateful people seeking to keep them in the shadows. This four year long battle for decency and dignity may go on for years as fanatical religious groups and their minority cadre of parents are suing to overturn any accommodation to transgenders in Palatine schools, regardless of the harm it does to transgenders in preventing crimes that simply don't exist. But it least they will continue to confront a board united to preserve the inevitable march of progress, not only for transgenders...but for all of us.

Is Trump readying a 'Remember the Maine' incident to attack Syria?

I'm not buying the rush to judgement of the US war party that Syria launched a chemical attack in Idlib Provence that killed and injured hundreds. Assad has essentially won the civil war against Al Queda backed rebels and gave up his chemical weapons years ago. That negates both motive and means. It defies credulity President Assad, a smart, cunning leader with amazing staying power, would seal his doom on such a needless and reckless act. And guess who hasn't given up their chemical weapons in Syria. The rebels, of course.

In contrast to Assad, the US is headed by an ignorant, bomb happy rookie leader who might jump at the opportunity to launch a military venture to push his possible treason with Russia off the front pages, smothering the investigating committees. He's an easy mark for neocon propagandists in government, the military and the media who couldn't get an easier target for their war plans than was possible to imagine. Trump has set the stage for taking their bait with his withering criticism of Obama for not following through on his 'crossing the red line' promise over the August 21, 2013 Syrian gas attack, also immediately blamed on Assad. What US media hawks like the NY Times, Washington Post and Chicago Tribune never told its readers was that Obama flinched because the CIA quietly told him it was the rebels, not Assad, that likely gassed Syrian civilians. Now the Times, Post and Trib have all convicted Assad in Neocon Court, again disgracing the Fourth Estate. Nothing spikes dwindling paper sales like a hot war.

Uncle Sam still champ at killing innocents

The world is rightly shocked at the 78 killed in Syrian gas attack likely initiated by the Syrian government, but still under investigation. It's Story One in every US media, fueling calls for action, including military, to punish and prevent recurrence. But when US warplanes bombed Mosul, Iraq killing 300 civilians in our totally futile and needless involvement in the Iraq civil war, the atrocity was Story Zero for US media. Only those concerned about our rampaging militarism in the Middle East got the news. Average Joe still doesn't know it occurred. Is there really a difference between being gassed to death in Syria and being blown to smithereens or crushed under tons of collapsed buildings in Iraq? The difference that matters is the US atrocity killed 222 more innocents than the Syrian atrocity. Let's fully investigate the gas attack and work with the UN and regional players to end the Syrian civil war. But first we should investigate the US atrocity and bring those responsible to justice to prevent Uncle Sam's next slaughter of innocents to keep US munitions makers building replacement WCD - Weapons of Civilian destruction.

Palatine transgender war grinds on

Parents in Palatine High School District looked south to North Carolina, saw the state toss $3.6 billion of business out the window with an bizarre law barring transgender students from using the bathroom of their assumed sex, and decided 'That crazyness is for us.' Just as North Carolina moved to repeal its law that protected no victims against no crimes and let the cash registers start ringing again, fifty fearful Palatine district families have signed onto a lawsuit filed by the Alliance Defending Freedom, an Evangelical advocacy group, to bar any new transgenders from using the bathroom that doesn't correspond to their hidden genitals. And three more, 2 trans boys and a trans girl, are stepping up to the potty of their pleasure there. This comes as the district's agreement with the lone transgender student, allowed under a 2015 agreement with Uncle Sam to use the girls bathroom, expires upon her graduation. The argument, a reprise actually over how many angels can dance on the head of a pin, has cost the district thousands of dollars and hours since erupting in 2013 that could have been better used for real education. Instead, this teachable moment of equality and inclusiveness is becoming a 'teachable decade'. The local Evangelical New Hope Community Church as been dogging the school board on behalf of the suing families with this bit of simplistic religious wisdom: "God created two distinct and complete sexes in the biology of the human race. A biological male is never a female and vice versa." In their worldview God don't make no mistakes. It's beyond their powers of comprehension that sometimes He makes a whopper.

Rauner should dump phony 'Bruce Sixpack' duct tape shtick

By day Governor Rauner relentlessly degrades Illinois' education, social welfare, infrastructure, and state supplier networks with refusal to do Job One as governor: provide a budget. By night he barrages us with insulting commercials that appear aimed at clueless ten year olds. Foregoing his thousand dollar suits, Rauner dons earthy flannel shirts of a 'gee whiz' good ol' boy. Then he uses the infantile prop of duct tape on the camera as a metaphor for his specious claim he's in charge to remove the temporary solutions of the 'politicians' who have ruined Illinois. But Bruce Sixpack conveniently omits that by every measure he's ripped apart the sensible start his predecessor made to improve education, improve social welfare, improve infrastructure, improve state vendor networks and begin paying pension obligations again.

Rauner wore out his phony down home outsider shtick before his 2014 election but not before conning a gullible electorate to give him a narrow victory. Now entrenched in an unprecedented campaign to diminish Illinois as an educational and investment state to extract his anti worker, pro rich man's agenda, he's stuck with the flannel shirts and duct tape to mask the utter failure of his administration. Rauner still hasn't recognized even a billion dollars worth of flannel shirts and duct tape can't save his exit from office next year.