Instead of rebuking him, President* Donald Trump on Thursday thanked Russian President Vladimir Putin for expelling American diplomats from Russia on the grounds that “we’re going to save a lot of money.”And this:
“I want to thank him because we’re trying to cut down our payroll, and as far as I’m concerned I’m very thankful that he let go of a large number of people because now we have a smaller payroll,” Trump told reporters at his golf club in Bedminster, New Jersey, according to a pool report.
President* Donald Trump escalated a stunning feud against his top Senate partner Thursday, suggesting Majority Leader Mitch McConnell might have to think about stepping aside if he doesn't deliver on the president's agenda of health care, taxes and infrastructure.Does he not realize that the Congress of the United States is a separate branch of government and that they don't answer to him? McConnell is right about Trump not seeming to understand how the fucking government is set up, according to the Constitution. Which, I'm pretty confident in saying, is a document that Trump has never read, nor does he understand. It's too long and it's written at well above a third-grade level.
And this:
President* Donald Trump said Thursday that his administration plans to declare the opioid crisis a national emergency, a designation that would offer states and federal agencies more resources and power to combat the epidemic.He sure does love saying "the likes of which we have never..."
"The opioid crisis is an emergency, and I am saying, officially, right now, it is an emergency. It's a national emergency," Trump said at his golf club in Bedminster, New Jersey. "We're going to spend a lot of time, a lot of effort and a lot of money on the opioid crisis.
"We are going to draw it up, and we are going to make it a national emergency. It is a serious problem the likes of which we have never had."
So, what does Preznit Four-Year Old plan to do that is no different than what has been done for the last 48 years of the War on Drugs, or, for that matter, was tried during Prohibition?
- More cops on the street? Tried that.
- Harsher sentences? Tried that.
- Sending the military to support interdiction efforts? Tried that.
- Cutting deeper into the 4th Amendment? Tried that.
- Setting up special drug task forces? Tried that.
I ask again: What good has it all done?
We need fresh ideas, not the Old Stale Ideas from the DEA-LEO Industrial Complex.
It probably doesn't matter, though. Trump has the attention span of a toddler; he'll be off on some other fixation in a week or less.
In the corporate world if my project was a failure for 48 weeks I was out of a job. 48 years??? You’re fired!!!
ReplyDeleteWell, the state of emergency declaration frees up resources to use in fixing it, but as you note, we don't know what the actual plan is, and won't until next month.
ReplyDeleteA quick perusal of what they did release yields some good sounding ideas, like freeing up Medicaid funds for addiction treatment in all 50 states, specific training for doctors who prescribe opiates, working with pharmaceutical companies to encourage the development of non-opiate painkillers, and having all law enforcement officers carry naloxone, which can treat overdoses.
Some of the ideas sound a bit questionable (read that intrusive) to me, like data sharing between federal and state agencies to track patients' use of opiates, which might help, but might also end up in the hands of law enforcement instead of healthcare workers, so I don't know what I think about it just yet.
But, yeah, today there is a lot of open speculation about the president's mental health by people who usually stick up for him, so perhaps his "hey, let's play nuclear chicken with North Korea" bit isn't going over as well as he expected.
-Doug in Oakland
"Sending the military to support interdiction efforts? "
ReplyDeleteFor sure that one won't work. The opioid epidemic comes straight off the doctors' prescription pads and out of the drug stores. What's the military going to do — station a PFC with an AR15 to shoot any doctor who prescribes the stuff? Arrest Walgreen's?
And if you outlaw opioids, what happens to patients who really, really need it. For example, if they have bone cancer? Or they're just coming out of hip surgery?
Yours very crankily,
The New York Crank
It should not be too hard to track the production and distribution including point of legal sale (drug store). With this the pill pushers, doctors who should know the amounts that treat pain / feed addition, can be identified. Next step identify the patients who doctor shop to acquire oversupply of pain killers.
ReplyDeleteJust a thought
AC2usn
And if you outlaw opioids, what happens to patients who really, really need it. For example, if they have bone cancer? Or they're just coming out of hip surgery?
ReplyDeleteThey can buy opiods on the street. Which, after all, is just what heroin is.