The Kind-Hearted Smart Aleck

August 17, 2024 Trump: “Energy is going to bring us back. That means we’re going down and getting gasoline below $2 a gallon, bring down the price of everything from electricity rates to groceries, airfares, and housing costs.” https://doggett.house.gov/issues/trumps-economic-promises-timeline November 6, 2024 Trump: "We had no wars. They said, he will start a war. I'm not going to start a war. I'm going to stop wars." https://www.northcountrypublicradio.org/news/npr/nx-s1-5732601/trump-promised-the-maga-base-no-new-wars-then-he-went-to-war-with-iran February 28, 2026 Trump starts war with Iran. https://www.cnn.com/interactive/2026/05/politics/iran-war-key-moments-vis/ Gas prices Regular 1/20/2025: $3.11 9/16/2026: $4.37 Diesel 1/20/2025: $3.72 9/16/2026: $6.30 Donald Trump promised no new wars and lower gas prices, so he, of course, started a new war, which ended up raising gas prices. https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/GASREGW

When out last night, I was invited to sit with a group of people at a bar patio. They had always been nice to me, but I didn't know them a great deal. The banter was light for a few minutes, but then the topic of vaccines arose, and my, oh, my, that was something. Apparently, they're all anti-vaxxers. Here's how that portion of the conversation went. MAGA #1: "Did any of you get the flu vaccine? It's so useless. I'm proud to say I never got any COVID vaccine." MAGA #2: "Same here. I don't trust the government. Did you get one?" MAGA #3: "Oh, heavens, no. Nuh uh. Did you?" Me: "Heck yes!" MAGA #1: "I just read that there's a link between the COVID vaccine and ADHD." Me: "That's false. :: shows him a study, debunking his claim ::" MAGA #1: "That's your opinion. I feel differently." Me: "No, it's been debunked. Your opinion is wrong." MAGA #1: "Whatever, dude. I kno...

I just read an article from USA Today conservative columnist Nicole Russell, which I felt deserved the fact-check treatment. It's titled, "GDP soars and Trump's economy roars. Liberals still won't give him credit." Let's see what she has to say. https://www.usatoday.com/story/opinion/columnist/2025/07/30/trump-gdp-us-economy-rebound-tariffs/85406642007/    "Thanks to President Donald Trump's bold policies, it appears that the United States will avoid a recession this year - one that so many liberals were predicting only months ago." Okay, I hate to be hard on her, but Ms. Russell's argument is off to a slow start. The fact of the matter is Donald Trump inherited a strong economy. The ONLY reason there was ever fear of a recession this year was BECAUSE of Donald Trump's policies. That's it. The man has changed his mind on tariffs more times than a mother of octuplets changes diapers. Here's how things went. There were no fears of a...

1) "We had the greatest economy in the history of our country. We had never done so well. Every – everybody was amazed by it. Other countries were copying us." 2) "But the thing we never got the credit for, and we should have, is getting us out of that COVID mess." 3) "The only jobs he created are for illegal immigrants and bounceback jobs; they’re bounced back from the COVID." 4) "Not going to drive them higher. It’s just going to cause countries that have been ripping us off for years, like China and many others, in all fairness to China – it’s going to just force them to pay us a lot of money, reduce our deficit tremendously, and give us a lot of power for other things." (tariffs) 5) "He also said he inherited 9 percent inflation." 6) "No, he inherited almost no inflation and it stayed that way for 14 months. And then it blew up under his leadership, because they spent money like a bunch of people that didn’t know what t...

“Thank you. Wow. It’s not too hot out here, right? It’s not bad. I heard it was going to be terrible. I heard it was going to be so hot. Did you see we put out a notice saying, Don’t come? So only 20,000 people showed up. It’s never been anything like this, but it’s great to be back in the beautiful, beautiful state. You know the state; we love it. And you always have to say it correctly, Nevada. You aren’t going to call it Nevada. With thousands of proud, hard-working American patriots. And that’s what you are. With your help, we’re going to win Nevada. We’re going to defeat your Biden-loving, radical-left senator, Jacky Rosen, who’s terrible. By the way, she’s a terrible senator. We’re going to knock off the Biden crime family. It’s a Biden family of crime, including the fact that they’ve weaponized the Department of Justice like it has never happened in this country. We’re going to end the weak and failed regime of Crooked Joe Biden, the worst president in the history of our count...