February 19, 2019--Master of Distraction

Being the master of distraction can cut two ways. With Trump, adept at this dubious art, it does and then some.

Take the National Emergency.

Trump was on the ropes. The Democrats in Congress (read Nancy Pelosi) were dug in. They were not going to give him even "one dollar" for his Wall. If he didn't agree to compromise (read "fold") the government would come to a halt and as with the December shutdown, Trump would lose politically and again see his poll numbers tank. They were heading then to the low 30s, pretty much for him a potential 2020 electoral disaster. 

The media covered this wall-to-wall. Even Trump's enablers on Fox News and talk radio (read Laura Ingraham and Rush Limbaugh) were restive and cranky, with Ann Coulter, hitting him literally below the belt, when she called him a "weenie."

So Trump rolled out his thus far most ambitious distraction--he made up and then declared a national emergency, knowing, but not really caring, that it will take forever to get through the courts and ultimately wind up with the Supremes who will likely declare it unconstitutional. Even Clarence Thomas might see things that way. Actually, ignore that--there is no way that he will. But expect Roberts to assure that minimally it will be a 5-4 decision.

In truth, for Trump, the more time it takes to work its way through the judicial system, the more we will be taking about nothing but,  which is his hope. It's about distraction and that's the definition of distraction--talking about something else.

As we saw on Friday the media immediately switched from obsessing about the battle Trump was having with Congress and began talking about only the emergency. To help them and to fill time they rolled out professors of constitutional law, former federal prosecutors, and Pulitzer Prize winning columnists. 

I said to Rona, if this keeps up for another two weeks I'm going to learn so much about the law that I'll be prepared to take the Bar Exam.

But there were a couple of sub-headlines buried on page 16 that ground on relentlessly. Stories that were not about the constitutional crisis but rather about Robert Mueller's investigation. 

At about the same time Trump was holding his rambling, sing-song news conference in the Rose Garden where all the questions were about the "emergency," Mueller prosecutors were in court calling for the presiding judge to sentence Trump's former campaign manager, Paul Manafort, to 24 years in prison. Effectively a life sentence for the 69 year-old Manafort. 

So expect that we will soon be back to paying 24/7 attention to Trump's legal troubles. Troubles exacerbated ironically by his use of the national emergency distraction because even some Republicans feel Trump by declaring it abused his power. Which is an impeachable offense. It was one of the charges against Nixon.

Thus, the default on all of this is the Mueller investigation. It is not going away. It is ultimately distraction proof.

For example, it is reported that Manafort is already singing like a canary and Roger Stone may be the next to flip.

January 29, 2019--The Wimp Factor

I'm sure you remember that during the campaign Trump frequently said it's all about "winning." 

He got in trouble when draft-avoider Trump said he didn't respect war hero John McCain because being shot down and held prisoner for years was evidence that he was a loser.

He told us if he was elected there would be so much winning that we'd get tired of winning.

Thus far, considering Trump's short list of accomplishments, I am managing to avoid winning fatigue.

He set this dialectic in motion so it is only fair that he is now being brought down because these days he seems to be doing a lot more losing than winning. And to be perversely consistent, he is looking tired of so much losing.

Catching myself enjoying his evolving fate I thought a bit more about this winning and losing business. Employing it as a prism through which to sum up how he is doing, vis-à-vis, say, Nancy Pelosi may not be the best rubric to be using.

During the 35-day government shutdown most of the stories in the media were about who was up (Nancy) and who was down (Trump). Most of the polling cited in the coverage focused on who was to blame (mainly Trump and the Republicans) and how Trump's approval ratings were faring (badly).

A special focus of much of this reporting was how Trump was being regarded by his Fox News followers, principally how he was being treated by conservative columnists and radio talk-show hosts such as Rush Limbaugh and Ann Coulter.

Coulter especially got under his skin. This could be because among other taunts she called his (fragile) manhood into question.

On one occasion she said we thought we were electing Trump but instead "got Jeb."

In a weekend tweet, after Trump gave in to Pelosi, Coulter wrote--

"Good news for George Herbert Walker Bush: As of today, he is no longer the biggest wimp ever to serve as President of the United States."

Trump was being savaged by his old friends who said that while seeking to build a wall he wound up with a cave. As in "he caved" to Nancy and the Dems.

One obvious common denominator--it has been primarily strong women who have made him crazy.

If true, maybe we should back off from some of the winning and losing talk. Especially if there are significant gender aspects connected to it. As there are. Do we want a hyper-riled-up Trump, worrying about his manhood, as we move though more and more perilous times?

War could be looming in Venezuela, Israel, and North Korea. And of course Syria, with us unwisely withdrawing, is in danger of further unravelment. All places where in wag-the-dog terms Trump might be tempted to have us intervene.

I'm not suggesting that Nancy and her supporters back off but just that we should continue to look for opportunities to weaken him politically (to "win") but not make too big a deal of the personal contest that is at the heart of the matter.

I have always felt that in many hotly contested situations winning without gloating is the preferred way to go. This is a glaring and frightening example.

January 8, 2019--Trump's Emergency

With the Mueller report likely to surface soon, Trump is experiencing his own private emergency and now he appears to want to drag the rest of us into a much larger, generalized one. A national emergency.

His is real, the one he has in store for us concocted.

At first, hearing about the possibility that Trump was finally trumped, with some Democratic friends I was gleeful.

"This only shows Trump's desperation," one said. Another, that "He's finally painted himself into a corner from which there is no way out."

But then I thought more about this. Yes, there may be no easy exit from the trap he clumsily set for himself, with Nancy Pelosi playing him subtly like a well-tuned piano. And on the other side, to his base, there is more trouble represented by Rush Limbaugh and Ann Coulter, both of whom warned that they would call his manhood into question if he caved in to the Dems by agreeing to reopen the government as part of a deal that would get him a pittance more for his cement, steel, tissue paper wall, fence, barrier, curtain, whatever. Call it anything you like. He just wanted out of the trap.

For the man whose ghostwriter wrote the book on the art of the deals it was looking bleak. No deal in sight. Just plunging poll numbers.

But then there is the potential game-changing idea for Trump to declare a national emergency--he would claim, as he did last night in an Oval Office speech, that the country is threatened by caravans of murderers, rapists, gang members, and drug dealers, augmented by tens of thousands of terrorists sneaking annually across the border. And, oh yes, there is a humanitarian crisis.

Never mind that there were just six (6) potential terrorists who were intercepted by the border patrol during the first half of 2018. Compounding this lie, Trump went on, claiming most of the opioids threatening our young people are coming though the same way--strapped to Mexican MS-13 gang members, while in fact they are hidden in and smuggled across the border by otherwise legitimate big-rig truckers.

If Trump declares a national emergency (and he has the power to do so), he will no longer need Congress (read Democrats in the House of Representatives) to pass a Homeland Security Department budget with $5.0 million allocated for the wall because he will just redeploy those and many more billions from the Pentagon budget (in an official emergency he likely has the power to do that as well as deploy soldiers to take the lead in building the wall).

By this scenario Nancy and Chuck will become irrelevant, Trump will look extra macho to Ann Coulter, Rush will be re-smitten, and too much of the public will think that Trump did the bold and right thing to protect us from all those dangerous brown people heading north on moonless nights.

And then the final irony--since it will cost $50 to $100 billion to build a 500-mile wall, because the money will have come from the Pentagon budget, Trump will demagog Chuck and Nancy into coming up with enough to replace it. The last thing Dems want is to appear wimpy when it comes to military spending. You know--"support our troops."

This strategy is so perversely brilliant that it could have come from only one source. Trump's current senior staff and advisors are incapable of thinking about how to get themselves out of a paper bag and so a play this multi-layered and intricate is beyond their devious capacities.

Therefore this has to be the idea of only one possible person. One evil genius--

Steve Bannon. Remember him?

The only problem--it won't work. 

Trump's favorables will continue to hover in the 35 percent range. His act is becoming boring to all except his relatively few dead-ender followers. Even Steve Bannon will not be able to think his way out of that.

December 24, 2016--Merry Christmas At the White House

It is Christmas Eve day and I am sure you are feeling cozy that our nation's First Love Birds are huddled together roasting chestnuts on the White House Yule Log's open fire.

This in spite of the fact that our president painted himself into a political corner only to get rolled by Rush Limbaugh and Ann Coulter who once called Trump a "god" but late last week referred to him as a "gutless douchebag." This because he was willing to trade away his Wall to the Dems so they could strike a budget deal and everyone could slip out of town.

So sure was Trump that things would work out that his wife and a few of his sons hopped on the First Lady's plane (why, by the way, do First Ladies have their own taxpayer-paid-for plane?) and lit out for 16 days (16!) of baking in the sun at their gaudy Palm Beach chateau, Mar-a-Lago.

Trump had to stay behind for politically cosmetic reasons--he couldn't be seen in shorts teeing off at one of his golf courses while nearly a million federal workers would not be getting paychecks.

Rush and Ann, these two Grinches spoiled his Christmas. Poor thing. 

So much so that Trump unleashed a series of tweets that suggested he was becoming even more unhinged. Saturday night, for example, he referred to himself as "the most popular hero in America" for withdrawing all our troops from Syria and "your favorite president." He does need to check the most recent polls.

But a funny thing happened on the way to that deal--after Limbaugh and Coulter slammed him for being weak, calling his manhood into question, he had no recourse but to pull the plug on the budget deal and cancel his golfing getaway.

Then, most interesting, a day after arriving, Melania had them gas up her plane and she flew back to Washington so she could spend Christmas with her beleaguered husband.

Unusual loving behavior for a couple where the wife won't hold hands with her husband in public and for a husband and wife who famously do not exchange Christmas gifts, unless Melania's renegotiating their prenup when Trump was exposed, in a manner of speaking, for having affairs with a porn star and a Playboy Playmate might be considered a gift that keeps on giving.

I suspect that daughter Ivanka and son-in-law Jared were so shaken by Trump's railing after Defense secretary Mattis summarily quit, refusing to endorse Trump's precipitous and dangerous decision to pull all U.S. forces out of Syria and effectively turn the country over to Putin, Iran, Hezbollah, and ISIS that they were so shaken that he was about to completely lose it if he couldn't make a deal to fund his Wall and shut down the encroaching Mueller investigation, that the children thought the situation was approaching 25th Amendment territory and that Melania better get back in DC and try to calm him down.


And so there they are, Donald and Melania snug in the White House which is full of Melania's blood red Christmas trees. 

Perhaps, to get away from reruns of White Christmas Trump can practice his putting on the White House green. The weather is forecast to cooperate.

March 9, 2018--My 3,333rd Blog Posting: Suicide Is Painless

The one thing thus far missing from the Trump Show is a murder or suicide. 

In regard to that he's not keeping up with the Clintons who, according to the conspiracy-minded, as early as their first year in the White House, already had a few.

Vince Foster comes to mind.

He was a colleague of Hillary's in the Rose law firm in Little Rock and her suspected lover. He followed the Clintons to Washington and during the first six months of Bill's presidency served in the administration as deputy White House counsel.

One day, after not showing up for work, Foster was found dead in Fort Marcy Park, shot in the head. 

Many on the lunatic fringe claimed that the Clintons murdered him, though five separate investigations found that Foster, unhappy in Washington, had grown despondent and killed himself. 

For years afterward, Clinton haters did not accept that verdict, including Jerry Falwell, who, through the Arkansas Project, alleged that there were two witnesses who had incontrovertible evidence that Foster was murdered by Bill and Hillary. However, before they could testify, Falwell claimed they were killed in two separate plane crashes.

On late-night talk radio, along with a continuing drumbeat of accusation about Hillary's role in the death of our embassy workers in Benghazi, one can still hear ranting about the murder of Vince Foster.

Thus far with Trump, we hear about Playboy centerfolds and porn stars, but nothing yet about suicides or murders. 

Give them time. He's been in office only 14 months.

As things close in tighter and tighter on Trump and his inner circles, I anticipate there will be a few. 

Would one be surprised if Trump's so-called "outside" lawyer, Michael Cohen, who has created a fiasco out of attempting to obscure and silence talk about Trump's longterm extra-marital affair with porn star Stormy Daniels, took a handful of pills? 

He is clearly one of those Trump enablers who has been with him for years, cleaning up his messes, who feels as if he would take a bullet for Trump. Barring that, killing himself would serve. 

And, of course, this would have the additional benefit of Sean Hannity blaming it on Hillary. 

Then there is the strange case of Sam Nunberg, another Trump hanger-on, who until recently was also available to take a bullet for the big guy and who became a household name earlier this week among cable news devotees as he made the rounds of talk shows, muttering semi-coherently about being subpoenaed by one of Robert Mueller's grand juries. On the Ari Melber show, for example, he was so agitated that Melber and his panelists suspended normal interviewing and tried to talk him down from the ledge. 

As of this morning Nunberg says he will cooperate with Mueller, his is not off the wagon, and though he's still alive, he's on my watch list. 

And, of course, if he does do himself in, Rush Limbaugh can always blame it on Obama.

Would anyone be surprised if Paul Manafort was found dead soon after imbibing some exotic Russian potion? Either administered by the same operative who poisoned the Russian defector and his daughter earlier this week in London (he could have had an open-jaw plane ticket from Moscow to London to Washington to Moscow) or the polonium-210 could have been self-administered by Manafort who at age 68 is looking at 80 years in federal prison. That would make him even older than my 107-year-old mother if he managed to serve his entire sentence.

What with his literal million-dollar custom wardrobe, which he paid for with Ukrainian money, living the rest of his life in a 50 square foot jail in an orange jumpsuit with no belt or shoelaces is not that GQ. 

But again, if Manafort is no more, his demise can be blamed on Huma Abedin or Susan Rice or Eric Holder. 

And, finally, there is Trump himself. From the current look of him it appears as if he is eating himself to death. A few more supersized Big Macs, with his clogged arteries, who knows. 

On the other hand he'll have no one to blame but himself.

December 2, 2015--Lies: The New Facts

Among the many intriguing things about Donald TRUMP's pursuit of the GOP nomination is the fact that he doesn't seem to get hurt in the polls when he lies.

As when he tells big ones like having seen "thousands and thousands" of Muslims in Jersey City celebrating at tailgate parties as the World Trade Center "came tumbling down." And then doubling and tripling down when confronted with the "facts"--that there is no documentable evidence that such a monstrous thing occurred.

Traditional candidacies would have already collapsed under the weight of lies of that magnitude, much less been able to survive after the things he said about illegal immigrant Mexican "rapists," Carly Fiorina's "face," and Fox News' Megyn Kelly's loss of journalistic objectivity because "blood was coming out of her wherever."

If anything, the more outrageous he behaves, the more he lies, the more his supporters love him and the better he does in the polls. (See, for example, today's Quinnipiac national poll where he has a 10 point lead.)

He left Chuck Todd sputtering Sunday morning on Meet the Press when Todd pressed him about the importance of the president telling the truth and TRUMP refused to budge or recant some of his whoppers.

As quoted in This Week, the exasperated Todd said, "Just because somebody repeats something doesn't make it true. You're running for president of the United States. Your words matter. Truthfulness matters. Fact-based stuff matters."

TRUMP continued to hold his ground, refusing to back down, act contrite, or much less show embarrassment. In effect reversing reality by propounding that it's the liberal media that does the lying. It is as if he is saying, "If I believe it to be true, if I say that it's true, it's true and more reliable than anything coming from biased broadcast outlets such as Meet the Press."

For decades now, the right-wing alternate media system of conservative talk shows and Fox News have been peddling lies as truth. And like TRUMP savaging what they see to be the progressive, socialist agenda of the "mainstream media."

This assault on the truth, where lies become the new truth, sets the table for a candidate such as TRUMP who is comfortable living in a world of lies masquerading as facts.

Thus poor Chuck Todd's frustration. He lives and operates in a universe where, as he put it, fact-based stuff matters. He is uncomfortable in a world where this is no longer true, where people make up facts, especially facts fabricated from lies that are so elaborate--like "seeing" thousands of jihadists partying in New Jersey--that to the predisposed can only be true.

The most influential of the new media operatives, Rush Limbaugh, when discussing climate science, said--

If you know what's good for you, if you know they're leftists, you won't believe anything they say any time, anywhere, about anything. . . . So we now have the Four Corners of Deceit, and the two universes in which we live--the Universe of Lies, the Universe of Reality, and the Four Corners of Deceit: government, academia, science, and media. These institutions are now corrupt and exist by virtue of deceit.

So there you have it--the context in which TRUMP is operating. A culture in which the former sources of truth are now fully compromised and untrustworthy.

It may be that because of this delusional strategy he will not be able to defeat Hillary Clinton in the general election where for the majority of the full electorate facts do count, but with so many Republicans living in the world in which embraceable lies abound, lies that confirm their own biases--like jihadists dancing in the streets of America--he to me is still looking like the most likely GOP nominee.

February 25, 2015--Two of a Kind

Appearing on CBS's Sunday show, Face the Nation, Senator John McCain said that he is "ashamed of my country" for allowing Vladimir Putin to annex Crimea and push militarily to overthrow the government of Ukraine.

Host Bob Shieffer was stunned. "I'll say this, senator, I've known you for a long, long time, interviewed you many, many times, and I've never heard you say I'm ashamed of my country."

McCain added, "I'm ashamed of my president and I'm ashamed of myself that I haven't done more to help these people."

Adding himself to the list of who to be ashamed of softened his otherwise outrageous characterization of his president. It is not appropriate for a senior senator to express these divisive and mean-spirited feelings. Yes, disagree, disagree strenuously, disagree fundamentally, disagree profoundly, whatever; but to be ashamed crosses the line and thus stunned veteran journalist Shieffer.

McCain was trumped in mean-spiritedness last week by Rudy Giuliani, formerly known as America's Mayor. Over the weekend at a Scott Walker fundraiser at New York's 21 Club, he said, "I do not believe, and I know this is a horrible thing to say, but I do not believe that the president loves America. He doesn't love you. And he doesn't love me. He wasn't brought up the way you were brought up and I was brought up, through love of this country."

And he didn't walk it back, reiterating later that he was merely expressing his feelings.

Giuliani, and to a lesser extent, John McCain are suffering from Dick Morris Syndrome. Sensing that they are both aging and losing influence and power. For Rudy, who ran disastrous campaigns for the Republican presidential nomination, to see rising empty-suit political stars such as Scott Walker grabbing attention and headlines, it is hard because of his kind of colossal ego. Ditto for McCain who still can't accept the fact that he lost the national election in 2008 and that Barack Obama is president.

In Dick Morris' case, he began his professional political career working for Upper-Westside liberal Manhattan Democrats and then moved into the center of the Bill Clinton reelection campaign until he was forced out when he got into a scandal involving a prostitute. Next stop for him was Fox News and after making a fool of himself there (predicting on air a landslide victory for Mitt Romney), he descended further and is left now pandering to that 20-30 percent of the GOP base that takes Glenn Beck, Russ Limbaugh, and black helicopters seriously. There's money to be made there by writing books about how Obama is seeking to turn America into a totalitarian state with him self-imposed as president-for-life.

These same dead-enders are now the people with whom Giuliani is left to cavort. What a sad fate.

April 24, 2014--The Clinton Grandchild

Last week, at a public event attended by her mother, Chelsea Clinton announced that she is with child. As it played out in the press, she might well have said she is with grandchild.

A member of the media in the room where Chelsea shared the good news asked if it's expected birth date was politically timed.

Chelsea pretending she did not understand, smiled and shrugged. But then added that she looks forward to her daughter or son growing up "in a world with so many strong female leaders."

It was obvious what her smile and wink suggested. At her side, mom glowed.

The fact that that question was raised was telling, as is my snarky tone.

What should have been about a blessed event (there I go again) at the moment of the announcement and subsequently was treated as a political calculation. From the relatively-gossip-free New York Times to Rush Limbaugh to just about everyone on Fox News it was smirkingly assumed that it was yet another example of the Clinton's doing everything they could to advance their personal agenda. In this case, Chelsea arranging the timing of her pregnancy to help Hillary secure the nomination and then, with a grandchild on her hip, be elected president.

Shades of Sarah Palin moving about the country with special-needs grandchild Trig (for trigger--get it) schlepped along to help shape her aw-shucks, soccer-mom image.

And with Hillary still lacking the likeability factor (remember Obama during the 2008 campaign with  shrug of his own saying she was "likable enough") what better way to humanize her?

With politics becoming fully political theater and a form of mass entertainment--who doesn't wish Herman (Ducky-Ducky) Cain will run again next year--it is not beyond reason that timing the birth of a child-grandchild could be as stage managed as adhering to talking points and TV ads produced by friendly PAC groups. With appearances on the Tonight Show, the Daily Show, Colbert Report, and SNL essential.

October 25, 2013--Big Government

One claim about Barack Obama can be put to rest with a few facts.

Most Republicans contend that he is a proponent of big government.  

The facts are these--

Back in 1966 when Lyndon Johnson was in the White House, excluding members of the military (who are also federal employees), there were 2,721,000 government workers.

Last month, before the government shutdown, the federal government had 2,723,000 on the payroll. The lowest figure since 1966.

As a percentage of the workforce, the Obama administration is the picture of fiscal rectitude--In 1966, 4.3 percent of all workers were federal employees. Now the government employs only 2 percent of the nation's workers.

If one takes a look at the military, back in 1966 there were 2.6 million on active duty. Today the figure is just 1.4 million.

In contrast, during Ronald Reagan's eight years in office, the number of non-military employees ranged from 2.77 to 3.05 million the year he left office.

I know you won't hear this on Fox News or from Rush Limbaugh and the Tea Party. You won't even hear this from the remaining mainstream Republicans. But these are the facts.

There is a lot of fault to be found with Barack Obama and his administration, but being advocates of big government is not one of them.

October 4, 2013--Rite Aid

On Wednesday, while in Camden in 80 degree weather, we stopped at the Rite Aid pharmacy to buy a bottle of water. Forget for the moment that 18 ounces was $1.95 and Rona couldn't resist making a point about what must be the profit on selling "free" water.

What was most interesting was the chat I had with a Rite Aid staffer who was set up with a computer at a desk near the prescription counter.

He was with a customer but we caught each other's eye and I mouthed, "Obamacare?"

He nodded and when the person with whom he was talking got up--seemingly quite happy--I stepped closer and we chatted about what he was doing and how it was going. Counseling people, he said, about the Obamacare options available to them in Maine and how the public he was encountering was reacting to what they were learning about it from him. Very positively he reported.

He told me that at every Rite Aid around the country, not just in communitarian Maine, there were people like him who had been trained to help uninsured people think about what might be best for them.

I told him I was not waiting to have him describe the options to me, that I am on Medicare and have Aetna in addition, but since there was no one waiting he seemed eager to chat.

"They come in here having gotten most of their information about the Affordable Care Act from listening to fear-mongers such as Glenn Beck, Michael Savage, and Mark Levin on the radio in the middle of the night and, as you might imagine, are very worried about what having to purchase insurance will mean for them and their families and how much it will cost them to sign up."

"I can only imagine," I said, "Though to me it's far from perfect, I support Obamacare; but feel he hasn't done as good a job describing it, selling it, as people such as Rush Limbaugh have done to denigrate it and instill fear in unsuspecting listeners."

"Pretty much everything they tell me that they 'know' about Obamacare is wrong. For example, there is still the belief out there that if you sign up for it you and your family members will be under the control of death panels and if you currently have coverage you will not be able to keep it but will be required to join a plan endorsed personally by Obama."

"What about cost issues? Are people worried about how much it will cost them?"

"Initially, pretty much universally yes. But when I sit them done and run the numbers--based on their family income--considering incomes here are in general not that high, they discover that it will likely cost them a manageable amount to select a health care plan."

"Can you be specific?"

"Sure. For a couple making less than about $62,000 a year (and that would be almost everyone here) with the tax credits available, on average it could cost them about $100 a month. Which almost any working couple can afford. For a family of four, tax credits kick in up to about $94,000 of annual income; and the cost for the plan selected--and there's a range of them--would run from a couple of hundred dollars a month to $1,000 or so for those opting for the low-deductable, so-called 'platinum' one. On the other hand, if a family of four makes less than $32,000 a year, the cost of the basic plan will be about zero. Like for those of you on Medicare. The government subsidies will cover pretty much the entire cost. Which, to say the least, is a good and big deal."

"Do they know about how with Obamacare there are no lifetime caps on how much will be covered and how, no matter one's preexisting conditions, coverage can't be denied?"

"Some have heard about that but most haven't. And when I tell them about that--almost everyone I've spoken with thus far does in fact have a preexisting condition--they think I'm not telling the truth. That I'm a shill for Obama."

"So Mark Levin and company have been ironically successful in spreading misinformation . . ."

"And lies," he said. "That's what this computer's for," he tapped the screen, "I show them the truth in black and white, so to speak."

"How's business? I mean, how many people have you seen?"

"Between yesterday and thus far today maybe a couple dozen. But here's the most interesting part."

"What's that."

"Already today I'm seeing people who had friends or relatives who I spoke with yesterday coming here now based on what their friends learned. It's too early to generalize, but word of mouth seems quite positive."

A couple of middle-aged people had joined the line behind me so I turned to leave.

"They're not positive about me," he laughed, "but about Obamacare."

"I wonder if this will find its way to the media or will they continue to insist on covering the negative?"

"That would be a first," he said, winking and waving as I left.