Many news pundits believe that Stephen Miller is the guy who drives the anti-immigrant policies in the Trump administration.  He maybe responsible for Kirstjen Nielsen and others who are out at the DHS.  It is remarkable how this 33 year old has that much power.  But to me, what is remarkable is how much hatred this man has for immigrants and refugees given that his family history includes escape from Jewish persecution from the Russian Empire.

Of course many descendants of undocumented immigrants and refugees are vehemently against those fleeing persecution or economic disasters today.  Recently, Trump was cheered at a Jewish group meeting for his anti-immigrant stand.  I am sure there are descendants of holocaust survivors and victims in that crowd.  They should understand that if  their ancestors had a choice of coming here as undocumented immigrants or suffered their fate, the choice would be obvious.  And we as a country should have taken them in.

The same with the descendants of those who escaped Vietnam, the Irish famine, and Mao's China.  How can those people be against undocumented immigrants and refugees?  Even if their ancestors came by the legal route, they should realize that if the legal route took too long, given the  circumstances, their ancestors would be doing the same thing as those at our border today.

Turned out my prediction of Virginia for the NCAA basketball championship was correct.  But I can't claim any skill as I said it without much conviction.  I just thought that Virginia had the easiest regional and most likely to get to the Final Four.  Turned out, they were remarkably lucky to win at least three of the games.  I had no idea that Texas Tech, who were much more convincing than Virginia in getting to the finals, would be that good.  Parity has come to college basketball.

Now for the NBA.  I am taking the Bucks and the Greek Freak to win it all.  I think GS will have a much harder time getting out of the West.  I think they will be tired out by the time they get to the Finals.

Just came back from a trip to Sequoia National Park on the way to SF.  Not my cup of tea to trek through the snow.  But it is a magnificent to see these great trees.  A reminder of the wonderful things in this country.  Hopefully these remain for generations to come.

Back to reality.  I understand that Trump had come up with a great healthcare plan to replace Obamacare while I was away.  But he won't reveal it until after the 2020 election.  If the plan is so good for Americans,  wouldn't it be hurting Americans by delaying its implementation?  Come on!  Tell us what you got, Mr. President.  Or is it just more BS?

The President also threatens to shut off the border.  Wait until the agricultural businesses lose tons of money when their produce perish at the border.  Wait till the automakers had to shut down plants because parts cannot come from Mexico.  Maybe this is the plan that Trump will implement after 2020, when he has one more month in office as a lame duck.

I did not know that Trump's father was born in Germany!  I would think that we would have known that.  Well, at least Donald would know, right?  I can understand someone wants to lie to gain an advantage.  But I don't see how lying about your father was born a German is beneficial to Trump.  But I guess if someone lies frequently, he just can't help it.

If Donald's father was born in Germany, maybe we should ask to see the President's birth certificate.  Then ask again after seeing it and repeat the process.  After all, anyone who has a father born in another country must not have been born in the U.S. himself!  I don't think Trump was born in Germany even though he claims his father was from there.  But Moscow, maybe?

The long awaited Mueller report is out and we got a summary from AG Barr today.  There was not much surprise in Barr's summary and it opened more questions.  Most of these questions may be answered by a full disclosure of Mueller's report.  Whether we get to read the whole thing is unknown at this time.  I will give my take on this and what it means to Trump.

1.  There is no collusion between Trump and the Russians according to the Mueller report summarized by Barr.  I don't doubt that finding and is not a surprise.  I am not sure Trump initially wanted to win the presidency that badly that he would commit treason to get that job.  So this finding is a vindication for Trump for saying no collusion all along.  The question I want answered from the Mueller report is if there was no collusion, why Trump always defended Putin.  Was there something else that Trump owed Putin.  Did Mueller looked closely at his finances?  If so, will that be made public?

2.  Mueller did not decide whether Trump should be tried for obstruction of justice.  He left that up to Barr and Rosenstein.  According to Barr, both he and Rosenstein decided that there was not enough evidence to go forward to charge Trump.  But Barr also noted that Mueller did not exonerate Trump.  If there was no evidence of obstruction of justice, Mueller would have say so and exonerated Trump.  The fact that he did not, it means that to most people, Trump was trying to obstruct justice.  It is just that the man he appointed as AG feels that there is not enough evidence to convict him.  If this occur in another country, would anyone believe that the leader of that country was not trying to obstruct an investigation on himself?

3.  Lot more questions.  As mentioned above, why all the coziness toward Putin?  Why did Trump disagree with the intelligence community about the Russian meddling?  Who did Putin want to win with all the meddling?  How do we prevent this from happening again?  Did Trump violated campaign finance laws by paying off Stormy Daniels?

The GOP and Trump will gloat with what was disclosed today.  The Democrats will keeping digging.  I don't think it changed many minds about Trump.  Maybe he picks up a few percent of the Independents after today.  He may have more problems coming out of Southern District of New York.  I would say that unless the full Mueller report contained some real damage, this was a good day for Trump.

But Friday was a bad day for Trump.  Not because anything with investigation but with the stock market.  It is not just the 460 points loss but because the loss was based on an indicator called yield inversion.  This is where a long term bond yield drops below that of a short term counterpart.  As usually the case, this involves long and short term Treasury investments.  This yield inverse is usually an indication of a coming recession in about a year.  This last occurred in 2007 and we know what happened in 2008.  If this holds true again, then before the 2020 election we will have a recession.  Trump has been exaggerating the success of the economy under him.  If the recession comes, it will be a disaster for him and his backers.

All over the news the last few days was the college admission cheating scandal.  It is big news because rich and famous people are involved.  I am appalled by the revelations but I am not that surprised.  I would bet that some of the people who paid to get their kids admitted to elite schools are at the same time against affirmative action.

I am against affirmative action by race.  But I am for affirmative action based on economic status.  That is the least colleges can do to try to even the playing field.  As you can see, rich folks already have affirmative action for themselves.  They have had back doors and side doors to get in.  Poor folks should have a door somewhere open for them.

It has always been known that at elite colleges there is a back door where rich alums can get their kids in if they are not qualified to go in thru the front door.  This door is known as legacy admits.  There is also a back door for athletes in non revenue generating sports which mostly rich people can participate in.  Golf and tennis are the old examples among others.  Now you can add rowing which has teams in inland schools that are nowhere near water.  You think any inner city kids can play these sports growing up?  So by giving scholarships and lowering  admission standards for people who play in these sports, you are essentially giving affirmative action to rich people and maybe those of upper middle class.

So while white conservatives questioned whether Obama got into Harvard Law School by affirmative action, I will say with 100% certainty that George Bush and Trump got into their schools by white affirmative action or the backdoor.  Trump wanted to see Obama's grades.  At the same time he had Cohen threaten his high school and college not to release his grades.  He also threatened the College Board not to release his SAT scores.  You can't get decent SAT scores after going to elite private schools?  You still need to get in thru the backdoor?  You are so hypocritical that you complain about minority affirmative action?

Many years ago when my future wife was a student at a east LA junior college, a counselor offered to drive a few minority students to UC Santa Barbara so they can experience what a four year college was like.  It opened my wife's eye to an institution that was almost all white at the time.  After the scandal came out the LA Times published an article about some of the minority students at that same junior college are in a club so that they can learn how to transfer to four year colleges.  This club seemed to be the descendant of that trip from many years ago.  The interviews in the article point out that it is still an uphill battle for the students of this college.  They were disheartened but not surprised about the admission scandal.

It seems interesting to me that in many of the cases, the mother of the student is indicted but not their equally famous husband.   See Huffman and Laughlin.  It seems to be similar to cases where the mother is blamed in pushing the kids too hard.  Asian mothers are called tiger moms.  But no name for the dads even though I am sure the fathers are pushing the kids hard as well.  In case of cheating, wouldn't the father be just as guilty?  But since women are blamed here, I suggest that they be called kangaroo moms since they keep their young in their pouches and not let them be independent.  If they don't get what they want, they get "hopping" mad!

News:  Treasury figures show a 77% increase in the deficit over the first four months of the budget year.  (I think they start the budget year in Oct. 2018)  This is due to a combination of decreased revenue due to the tax cut and spending increases.  Trump talks big, but is silent on the issue.

The argument from the GOP has always been that a tax cut will pay for itself by stimulating the economy which will increase tax revenue.  I like paying less tax myself but I doubt that the effects of tax cuts are always positive for the country.  The last tax cut during the Bush year led to one of the worst recession in history.  So why do we buy into this tax cut concept?

To me it is obvious that if you decrease revenue coming in, then you must decrease what you are paying out.  Otherwise the deficit increases.  The criticism of the Democrats have always been that they like to spend more and more and so need to keep raising taxes.  But when the GOP cuts taxes, they still spend more and more.  It doesn't take a genius to see that neither way is sustainable but the GOP strategy is worse for the country.

It is, of course, no upside in cutting any benefits.   For example, seniors who are the most conservative among the electorates, would go crazy if you cut Medicare.  So the GOP, who needs their support, would never cut Medicare.  The most liberal Democrats are advocating Medicare for all.  This will mean much bigger deficits unless there is a big tax raise.  That is not realistic at this time.  So both sides are just trying to please their supporters and not really doing anything logical.

As I always said, we need pragmatic centrist to get elected.  But is that really possible?  It certainly is not possible on the GOP side as long as Trump is the president.

Michael Cohen described to the nation in the Congressional hearing today what most people in this country already knew:  Trump is a racist, a cheat and a con man.  Deep down, even Trump supporters know this even if they won't admit it.  This man has no regard for this country.  He is all about himself.  I would think even those GOP Congressmen at the hearing know this.  That is why they never defended Trump, only attacked Cohen's credibility.

Since Cohen has admitted lying, the GOP points out why we should believe him.  I think the conservatives have no problem believing a mobster's top assistant when he flips for the prosecution.  The mobster boss will not be the one who actually pulls the trigger.  He only orders the hit.  So of course you need his foot soldiers to flip on him.  These "witnesses" are never your clean cut model citizens.  But I bet the law and order conservatives see no problem of convicting the boss based on the crooks who flipped him.  But in this case, instead believing a person who was very close to Trump, they chose to attack him. 

I think Trump may try to distract from Cohen's testimony by making a deal with Kim.  I think he will declare the official end of the Korean War, which had only been suspended all these years.  I won't make much of the difference in reality for now except Trump can say that he got peace.  He hopes that will detract from all these hearings and legal problems.  I doubt that Kim will get rid of his nukes after that.  For now, nothing changes.  But if the war is officially over, how long before Kim demands that the U.S. troops leave Korea?   I think he sees this opportunity to play Trump again.  Noticed he had a sly smile when reporter asked Trump about Cohen.  By the way, Trump touts that he has great relationship with Kim.  Well, so does Dennis Rodman!

I was not surprised that Trump declared a national emergency so that he can manipulate money to fund his wall.  Since he lost big in the shutdown and he showed his inability to get deals done, he had to do something to show what a tough guy he is.  After all, conservatives like Ann Coulter were calling him a wimp, one even weaker than Bush.  So it was inevitable that he declares emergency to show that he has the power.  Hopefully law and history will prove him wrong.

The thing that surprised and irritated me was the announcement that McConnell supported the declaration of emergency.  It shows what a weakling he is.  He was against the declaration and stated as such before.  But faced with Trump not signing the bill to avoid the shutdown again, he caved.  The truth is Trump had no leverage.  The bill had bipartisan support, Trump would have been on an island by himself with his extreme conservative supporters.  But I guess McConnell was too afraid of a fractured GOP senate trying to decide if they want to override Trump's veto.  By supporting the declaration of emergency, there is little chance of the Senate overriding Trump's declaration.

I am not even going to bother to put up arguments why the declaration is wrong.  If you think putting a wall is an emergency and more urgent than various problems in this country, there is no argument that will persuade you.  After all, you would have believed that Mexico will paid for the wall.  I will say that with this declaration, Trump has cemented his reputation as a dictator wannabe.  Although that should have been obvious before with his firing of the man who was investigating him and his fondness for Putin and other dictators.  The question is, will the Congress and the Supreme Court have the spines to stop him.

Watched Henry Louis Gates Jr.'s program "Finding Your Roots" yesterday.  Three politicians:  Congresswoman Tulsi Gabbard, Senator Marco Rubio and former House Speaker Paul Ryan were the guests.  All three came from immigrant families even though they knew little about their immigrant ancestors.  Gabbard, being a Democrat, obviously has been outspoken about anti-immigrant rhetoric from Trump.  The two Republicans have been much quieter on the subject.

At the end of the program, I think both Rubio and Ryan were touched by the stories of their ancestors' hardships in coming to America.  I think it was Rubio who summed it up by saying that people will do anything to get to a place where their family will have a chance for a better life.  He said that we are a country of go-gettors.  Well said, Senator.  I hope they will keep those things they learned in the program in mind next time when they are confronted about a political decision involving immigrants.

I have to say that the Trump administration is doing a good job with the Venezuela situation.  Like many bad situations in the world, there are no good or easy answers.  But unlike most of his foreign policies, Trump is actually trying to do something good.  Since his so called America first agenda, Trump has been pulling away from the world.  America has been losing its leadership in the world.  But in this situation in Venezuela, Trump has been able to get allies around the world to support his policy of demanding that Maduro leave office.  It is not sure that this will work.  But by leading a multiple national effort, it is more likely to succeed and critics can't say anything about American imperialism as a goal here.

The Democrats has been rather silent on this issue except for some left leaning members of Congress who called for the U.S. to stay out of it.  How can we not try to do something about this humanitarian crisis?  By not coming out strongly against Maduro, it also will let the GOP claim that the left is socialist.  At this time, I think centrist Democrats should support what Trump is doing because there isn't any good choices here. 

Russia and China are supporting Maduro.   But there is a difference in their support.  Moscow wants a thorn on the U.S. side close to our shore.  So Russia will support Maduro no matter what.  China has invested a lot of money in Venezuela.  It wants return in oil and money.  But if China can be convinced that a new government will honor all previous contracts, it can change its support.  For Russia, it is a political issue.  For China it is a financial issue.  So if Guaido can convince China that under him Venezuela will be stable and export oil to China, I think the tide may change.

I don't see how Virginia governor Ralph Northam can stay in office.  After revelation of a picture from his medical school yearbook surfaced showing a man in black face and another in KKK outfit.  At first he admitted that he was in the picture, although he didn't say which person was him.  Then he said that it wasn't him and that he had not seen that picture before.  This all sounded like Trump when the Access Hollywood tape came out.  First he apologized, then he said it was just locker room talk.  Then later on he questioned whether that was his voice in the tape at all.   To both Northam and Trump, I ask:  If it wasn't you, why did you admit it at first?  So you thought you did something that you didn't do, only to remember later that you didn't do it?  Yeah, right!

I will admit that I did not know that there was this racist thing called black face until maybe in my thirties or forties.  So if at my medical school someone with black face had stand next to me and someone took a picture of us, maybe I would not react.  But then I would not be wearing a KKK outfit.  So there was no reason for Northam to be in this kind of picture.  Certainly I can't think of any legitimate, non-racist reason to post that picture in your yearbook.  His clumsy defense makes things worse. 

If he refuses to resign.  I think the GOP will call for impeachment.  The GOP may not do this so that they can use this issue in 2020 elections.  But I don't think that would be productive for them because then they would be blasted for condoning racism.  Now they can force the democrats to renounce one of their own.  Once the GOP move for impeachment, the Democrats will go along since this is indefensible for them even if no crime had been committed.  So I think Northam cannot ride out the storm.  If doesn't resign, he will be kicked out of office.

The Democrats have to take the high and right road on this.  They cannot be like the GOP base who gives Trump a bye every time he says something racist or sexist.  So what if this is a victory for the conservative site which reported this.  It also exposes the hypocrite they are when they do not call out Trump.

The Evil Empire wins again.  I rooted for the Rams, not just because they are from LA, but also I don't want Brady and the Patriots win again!  But give them credit, even if they might have cheated in the past, their consistency and excellence are just tremendous.