Frank's Musings

C’mon folks. We all give President Trump credit for bearing down on stubborn international adversaries to get them to temper their conflicts. We must also concede, for some of us begrudgingly, that federal programs beneficial to the public at large will sometimes be better administered by state or municipal bureaucracies.

But the shameless indignities displayed by the Trump administration and outlined by Michelle Goldberg in the 10/20/2025 New York Times (https://www.nytimes.com/2025/10/20/opinion/trump-degredations-maga.html?searchResultPosition=1) are insulting to all of us Americans. Not only does the president himself engage arrogantly in scurrilously demeaning his political enemies, but he also blithely expects his supporters to accept his self-serving manner of running our government’s affairs. 

There must be a reason his yes-men and women acolytes, with whom he has loaded his cabinet and other senior administrations positions, are sacrificing their future credibility by participating in Trump’s megalomaniacal fantasy.   Maybe they anticipate joining a subsequent fascistic U.S. regime.  They may have been promised a guaranteed (even escrowed) financial bounty that assures them a comfortable retreat when a semblance of liberal democracy is restored to America.

Democrats’ main problem, as implied by Chris Hayes in the 10/19/2025 NYT, is that they continue to focus on the content of political messages rather than on getting the attention of enough voters to win in the electoral college. Only if the federal electoral system is constitutionally changed will the substance of issues matter in national elections as much as the style in which they are presented.

Indeed, the turnout of the 2025 No Kings rally was impressive. Presumably, that makes the critical next step easier. Now a sustained movement equivalent to the suffragette or equal rights campaigns has to be formed to change the direction of our government.

Recent violent abductions of suspected illegal immigrants in Chicago, Los Angeles, and other U.S. cities by Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents have employed tactics that violate the peaceful ambience of those communities. Local state and municipal police forces are responsible for maintaining civil order on behalf of their residents. However, local law enforcement has, so far, been notably absent from preventing ICE’s harassment and brutality, which have been captured on social media, not to mention reported by broadcast and cable news reports.

The initial result of President Trump’s autonomous imposition of an average 18.6 percent tariff on imported products has been a surge in U.S. government revenues without expected inflationary consequences, surprising most economists. What this really means is that America can afford to pay more for goods manufactured abroad because they get additional value from allowing its workforce to concentrate on higher technology production.

Rather than producing Halloween costumes, for example, the U.S. designs and integrates sophisticated spooky year-round diversions. Rather than manufacture standard speed boats, the U.S. engineers and builds water transportation systems that combine high efficiency, advanced materials, luxury features, and wide mission diversity. These sorts of accomplishments take time and expertise to achieve. On the other hand, the everyday consumer goods that can easily be made, particularly in less developed foreign countries, are an important part of America’s international imports, which generates much of the recently ballooning tariff receipts.

The low inflationary impact of the tariffs will not last long. The executives of foreign suppliers realize that in the long run products like theirs (e.g.,  the Model T, the VCR, and others) will disappear from use. So, to preserve their share of the market for as long as it lasts, they are absorbing much of the cost of the tariffs. All of those who stay in business in the future, however, will incorporate the cost of import taxes on new products into their respective prices, making tariffs just another ingredient in the final price that American consumers will end up paying for.  As imported goods get more consumer-friendly, their prices will go up, along with the anount of tariffs on them.

Until that time and afterwards, tariffs will have paid for a large share of government expenses but only by shifting more of that burden towards the lower income segments of society, for whom the tariffs are a more significant drain on their budgets. That strategy will have rewarded the financial backers of Trump's authoritarian regime by reducing pressure to increase their income taxes.  It won't improve the  general welfare.  A coalition of concerned activists from a wide spectrum of classes and occupations needs to be mobilized by a charismatic leader to resurrect the country’s liberal democracy that favors the common people.

The President and Secretary of Defense made fools of themselves on 9/30/2025 by gratuitously assembling the experienced leaders of the country’s military and purporting to lecture them on how better to perform their jobs. It had to be embarrassing for the politely listening brass to have to sit through this demonstration of hubris by two symbols of Washington’s incompetence.

President Trump has repeatedly claimed that his recent tariffs have enriched the federal budget and, therefore, reduced the deficit. However, (1) that is only their temporary effect, because tariffs raise import prices and ultimately reduce their volume, and (2) the tariffs are really additional taxes on U.S. consumers. Those taxes are not paid by foreign suppliers; and even more unfairly, most of them are already being, and will be, paid by low and middle-income domestic purchasers of imported goods.

Early blame for  the assassination of Charlie Kirk was placed on  a transgender perpetrator because of Kirk’s mention of that lifestyle during a speech on a college campus.

In fact, it turned out that the suspected killer, Tyler Robinson,  a in a romantic relationship with a transgender man.

Ironically, the victim was a deeply religious conservative who sponsored dialogue instead of violent opposition of views.

The killer seems to have had an unconventional social orientation--one that usually would have reduced his tendency to use violence to resolve disputes.  

The killer also had an extremely conservative upbringing.

Trump’s initial publicized reaction was surprisingly correct; but it had undemocratic undertones.

This assassination may be an additional consequence of Trump’s pugnacious, incendiary rhetoric (cf. Jamelle Bouie in 9/20/2025 NYT)

Kirk ironically advocated acceptance of a few gun deaths as the price of relying on the 2nd Amendment to justify loose regulation of firearms (cf. Stephen Cody controversy in Palmetto, FLA).

Politically disaffected people often search for otherworldly solutions to their problems.  This invites exploitation by quasi-demagogues, especially by appealing to evangelical Christians.  Some of these rabble-rousers  are sincerely responding to sociological discomfort; but others are merely megalomaniacs. 

As a result, the Kirk memorial on 21 September 2025 was ripe for exploitation by speakers like Stephen Miller and Donald Trump as a political rally.  The event was an assembly of listeners who were sympathetic to right-wing propaganda.  It couldn’t have been better organized by a campaign advance man.