“If you tell the same lie enough times, people will believe it; and the bigger the lie, the better.”—Josef Goebbels, Adolf Hitler’s minister of propaganda

Donald Trump’s agenda in very large part is devoted to things involving money and/or his personal image. But I believe there’s also a hidden purpose in his obsession with the contention that he lost the popular vote by 2,900,000 only because of “3 to 5,000,000 illegal votes.” 

It seemed insane when he announced that an investigation would be launched on that alleged-vote matter, an issue concocted in his own mind. But the whole thing turned even more bizarre when (as reported by Politico) “On Thursday [Feb. 9 in New Hampshire] during a meeting with 10 senators that was billed as a listening session about Supreme Court nominee Neil Gorsuch, the president went off on a familiar tangent, suggesting again that he was a victim of widespread voter fraud, despite the fact that he won the presidential election. As soon as the door closed and the reporters allowed to observe for a few minutes had been ushered out, Trump began to talk about the election, participants said, triggered by the presence of former New Hampshire Sen. Kelly Ayotte, who lost her re-election bid in November and is now working for Trump as a Capitol Hill liaison, or ‘Sherpa,’ on the Supreme Court nomination of Judge Neil Gorsuch. The president claimed that he and Ayotte both would have been victorious in the Granite State if not for the ‘thousands’ of people who were ‘brought in on buses’ from neighboring Massachusetts to ‘illegally’ vote in New Hampshire.”

According to one participant who described the meeting, “an uncomfortable silence” momentarily overtook the room.

Hillary Clinton narrowly won New Hampshire’s relatively insignificant 4 electoral votes over Trump by nearly 3,000 votes. Ayotte’s margin of defeat was by a slimmer 743 votes. The 3,000+ voters would involve quite a bus fleet. You’t think someone would have noticed 75 or 100 busses. And who on earth rounded up those 3,000+ illegal voters, found the drivers, leased the busses and coordinated such an election-day event? All in quest of a meager 4 electoral votes?

As Trump continues to shock without evoking awe on numerous fronts, I suspect he has an underlying motivation where this particular subject is concerned. He is not merely creating suspicion and paranoia, along with attempting to create the image of a political “mandate”where none exists, and salving his own ego. He also is encouraging and empowering the institution of further voter-suppression laws in various states as Democrats attempt to regain a measure of power in both the House and Senate during the 2018 mid-term elections.

Back to money. The president says he has turned control of the Trump conglomerate over to his sons to avoid possible financial conflict of interest. What does that mean? Not a damned thing! Never has there been such an awesome opportunity for insider trading. You think he won’t be asking his kids what they’ve been doing or have planned . . . or telling them what he’s thinking of doing or planning at home and abroad? Let’s keep an eye on the Trump group’s financial transactions and the president’s actions.

Most of us also would like to see Donald’s income tax return—and an independent investigation of just what investment ties he has in Russia. None he claims. But perhaps we might also look elsewhere beyond today’s Russia, like under the umbrella also including other portions of the former USSR.

Also, the president already is accommodating the Trump professional pattern with his appointment of biggies from the same Wall Street that effected the Bush-administration recession and housing debacle, all of which wiped out $11,000,000,000,000 in U. S. household wealth. He was a big avowed critic of the same people during his campaign. But even those with half a brain here in the common herd are now becoming aware that anything he says isn’t worth spit.

During his campaign, he referred to: “A global power structure that is responsible for the economic decisions that have robbed the working class, stripped our economy of its wealth and put that money into the pockets of a handful of large corporations.” What colossal gall! Yes, Donald; the perspicacious among us recognized you and your power-structure class and didn’t vote for you. But now you’re all getting together more powerful than ever. The working class that did so well under Obama now is being herded back to be on the outside looking in—and the worst is yet to come.

Donald already is working on wiping out banking restrictions  protecting individual investors, etc., for instance portions of the Dodd-Frank Act. Look it up, e.g.: https://www.nytimes.com/2017/01/30/us/politics/trump-dodd-frank-regulations.html  He commented recently: “We expect to be cutting a lot out of Dodd-Frank because frankly, I have so many people, friends of mine that had nice businesses, they can’t borrow money. They just can’t get any money because the banks just won’t let them borrow it because of the rules and regulations in Dodd-Frank.” Oh, the humanity!

There’s a lot of GOP talk about making Obamacare “more affordable.” That translates to “divesting government of healthcare responsibility and throwing it to the wolves.”

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BETWEEN THE LINES--While Trump is spouting off about “revitalizing the labor force,” did you happen to read that in Missouri, New Hampshire and Kentucky, emboldened Republican state legislators have moved forward with union-busting “right to work” legislation? I was a paper-mill union member (Local 175, IBPS&PMW) 71+ years ago, at age 16. It sure beat the hell out of minimum wage with no benefits. I moved from a 40-cents-an-hour part-time job to one that paid 90 cents and hour with time and a half ($1.35) for anything over 40 hours. On a good week I managed 72 hours of work.

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