I find it absurd that the media spend so much time on Trump's extramarital affairs.  The porn star and the Playboy playmate are being interviewed all over.  Unlike victims of sexual abuse, who should be given time, these two had consensual sex with Trump.  By having sex with a married man, they are not moral people themselves.  So they shouldn't be given so much time.  If having extramarital affairs disqualify someone from political office, then we probably need to replace over half of our politicians.  (Which maybe not be so bad!)  Trump voters have already made it known that they don't care if he is a moral man, so why are we wasting our time?

There was at least sometime given over the weekend in the news about the march against guns.  Maybe when all these young people can vote, we can defeat the NRA and have real effective gun laws.  In the meanwhile, we have to listen to stupid people like Rick Santorum who said that instead of marching, the young people should learn to do CPR!  Does he know what the success rate of CPR is if someone had been shot and the heart is not beating.  Less than 10%.  The young people are asking the politician to help them.  But Santorum thinks that people should help themselves.  It is like saying doctors should not develop vaccine but patients should learn how to treat themselves after getting the infection.  What kind of nonsense is that?

While the news is all about sex:  See 60 Minutes tonight.  We have greater problems that the media is spending way too little time.  The trade war has started and the stock market is tanking.  Trump has appointed John Bolton to be the national security advisor.  Bolton helped Bush lied about the WMD that let to the Iraq war.  He has been the advocate of regime change in Iran and North Korea.  By having him working with Trump, chances of an unnecessary war has increased several folds.  Basically, Trump has created a financial crisis with his tariffs and a military crisis by bringing in Bolton.  These are the things about Trump we should be focused on, not extramarital affairs.

Facebook lost 7% of stock value today because of revelation about user's data was used illegally after being sold by Facebook.  Supposedly data collected by a Russian professor at Cambridge was not supposed to be sold to a third party.  But it was sold to Cambridge Analytica which in turn was paid by the Trump campaign.  It is all very complicated.  It is not clear to me that Facebook could have prevented all this.  But if this prevents or restricts Facebook or other media companies from selling data, it will have a chilling effect on tech companies.  I think selling data is a very significant source of revenue for Facebook and losing it would be devastating.

It is amazing to me that we worry about our privacy when it comes to government snooping around but we let private companies look into our everyday life and even our thoughts.  Every time we go online, we are monitored by companies.  Yet we seldom complain.  I guess there is no way to keep ourselves private unless we don't ever use computers, smart phones, subscribe to Netflix etc.  But at least in this case, I did not help Trump since I am not on Facebook!  In fact I am not on any social media.  As Betty White once said when she found out what social media were:  "I think it is a big waste of time!."

I was flying to Vancouver last weekend and was elated that my boarding pass said that I have fast TSA check in.  This means I get to go through a faster line at security and do not have to take off my shoes and belt.  This shaves at least 10 minutes and rid of lot of hassle at a crazy airport like LAX.  The security line was as smooth as promised.  I put my bags on the conveyor belt and waked thru the metal check with my shoes on expecting I will be done in another 10 seconds or so.

The conveyor belt stopped!  The young lady TSA agent checking the x-rays of the bags picked up one of my bag and shouted to the young guy standing behind me: "Is this your bag, sir?"  The young man looked puzzled and said no.  I raised my hand and said this is my bag.  The agent looks at me with a relief look and asked:  "Oh, do you have an old style phone?"  I said yes, I do.  She took my flip phone out of the bag and the short line and all the TSA agents broke out in hearty laughter.  I said to the young agent and the young man:  "Yeah, my kids laugh at me all the time."  He then asked if I can text on that phone since he is not familiar with it.  Again laughter all around.

Besides the mild humiliation, I found it interesting that a flip phone would look suspiciously like some kind of dangerous device.  I guess young people don't even know what a flip phone is!  Also, if the agent look at the order of the people in line and the order of the bags, it would be most likely that the bag belonged to me.  Yet, she barked at the young man behind me in the line.  Well, not surprisingly, he is brown skin with a beard.  So there was obvious profiling here.  Once she realized that the bag belonged to me, the tension was gone, the young man was relieved, and everybody had a good laugh.  I am glad that I, as an old Asian man, am not of the demographic that is deemed dangerous.  But what of the young brown men? 

Trump is trying to act tough by slapping tariffs on foreign steel and aluminum.  The fact that he did this against his economic advisors and right before a Chinese trade representative was coming to the U.S., seems to make this a stance against Chinese imports.  The only thing is, China is not a big exporter to the U.S. of steel and aluminum.  The biggest exporter of these goods to the U.S.?  Canada.  So are we risking a trade war with Canada or China?  Either way, it is probably not a good idea.

I think China will not react strongly to this.  But if there is a trade war, Trump and whoever agrees with him in Congress will not win.  Xi Jinping is in way more firm control of China than Trump is of the U.S.  There is talk of changing the Chinese constitution so that Xi can be president for life.  So he can go through a downturn in the economy as a result of a trade war.  But that would not be the case with Trump and the GOP.  So if a trade war occurs, the U.S. will blink first.

Speaking of Xi becoming so powerful, this will set China back.  Since Deng Xiaoping, each subsequent Chinese leader has had a decrease in power compare with his predecessor.  Jiang Zemin was less powerful than Deng, Hu Jintao wielded less power behind the scene than Jiang did after his ten year term was over.  Xi, though, has greater ambition for China and himself.  He already sees China as the world's premier power in the future and he wants to have more than 10 years to navigate China into that position.  This will mean less freedom in China and more confrontation with other countries.  Xi is a capable leader.  But the way he is going about to achieve his goals will not be good in the long run for China and the world.

The Democratic memo in response to the Republican memo has finally gone public.  This after two week delay to redact somethings that the FBI and Justice department deem risk to national security.  The two week delay means that very few people care about the response anymore.  This is what Trump wanted.  But I don't think it changed anybody's mind.  I can't tell who is telling the truth based on the excerpts from both sides.  But I think it says something when Trump allowed the GOP memo to be published right away despite the warnings from the FBI and the Justice department but he delayed the Democrat memo for the same reason. 

I had given all hope for any change in gun laws.  But I see a light of hope provided by the high school students after the Florida shooting.  Their outrage and dedication to the cause of gun control is impressive.  Interestingly, some businesses are now backing away from working with the NRA.  I think the new generations, X, Y, and Z are going to be more proactive on this issue.  They are going to outnumber us baby boomers soon, if not already.  They are also the demographic that businesses go after.  So maybe politicians our age are beholden to the NRA, but the younger people will force businesses to back away from the NRA.  Money do talk.  These young people will be tomorrow's voters and politicians.  So there is hope, even if results may not be immediate.

The winter Olympics are finally over.  I thought it was boring.  I think women's gold medal hockey game was the only thing that kept me glue to the set.  They seem to be adding more and more sports each winter Olympics but I find them uninteresting.  I guess most of the new sports are put in to attract young viewers.  But I think even then NBC was running out of things to show.  Yesterday they showed a segment honoring the great diver Sammy Lee.  That is great except that diving is in the summer, not winter, Olympics!  Maybe they need to change basketball and volleyball to the winter games.  Well, not beach (outdoor) volleyball!

It was pointed out by senator Durbin that Chloe Kim's parents would not have been allowed to immigrate to the U.S. under Trump's immigration rules.  While this is politicizing a great moment in U.S. Olympic history, Durbin is right.  In fact, my family would not have been able to come to the U.S. under Trump's rules.  He wants to get rid of family sponsorship.  My family came due to my aunt and uncle sponsoring us.  He wants immigrants who are educated and speak English.  My parents did not meet these requirements.  Obviously we are not from Norway.  But like the Kims, our parents have made a good life in the U.S. and I think my siblings and I have been useful citizens for this country.  Like the Kims, we have lived the American dream which would not be possible if Trump had his way.

Another school shooting today.  I have run out of words to say except for praying for the victims and their families.  The GOP will say again that it is not the time to discuss guns.  They are right.   The time for the discussion should have taken place many years ago.

Happy lunar new year, everybody.  May it be a peaceful and prosperous year.

My take on the memo is that it is much to do about nothing.  It doesn't prove FBI bias against Trump as the GOP claims.  There was also nothing in it that support Democrat claims that it would divulge sensitive national security info.  It is all a political game. I think moderate Republicans see thru what Trump supporters are doing.  John McCain does.  Hopefully it will not have any effect on the Mueller investigation.  I don't think it will.

The weird thing about the GOP memo is that it complains of government abuse of civil liberties and use of the FISA warrants.  This is the type of complaints by liberals or libertarians, not conservatives.  The conservatives usually say that if you are not guilty, you have nothing to worry about.  Well, it looks like Trump is worried.

Great Super Bowl game today.  I guess Brady is not god after all.  I don't root for him anymore, but I still think he is GOAT!

The State of the Union address is going to be in two days.  So something interesting may come out and to be written about.  But I kind of doubt it.  So I will write something now and then see if anything is worthwhile to write about in two days.

Pretty sure Trump is going to brag about the stock market and the economy.  As a stock investor, I hope the market keeps going up even it would help Trump.  But I doubt that it will continue to climb.  The corporate tax decrease and loosening of regulations by Trump and the GOP congress will have a positive effect for a short period.  But there are many factors in the global economy for it to keep going up.  But Trump will milk it for all its worth.

The Democrats will have Joseph Kennedy III, congressman from Mass.  to give the rebuttal.  I hope he has something new and inspiring to say.  I also hope he is not given the role because of his name.  I thought somebody like Tammy Duckworth, senator from Illinois, would have been a better choice.  She has been in politics longer.  She is a female minority.  She is a war heroine.  She just called Trump a draft dodger without getting a rebuttal from Trump.  So to me she would be a perfect candidate to rebut Trump's speech.

Been having trouble with my computer so did not write over the weekend.  I was going to write that the Democrats cannot win by using government shutdown to help the dreamers.  Despite the fact that a majority of the people want to help the dreamers, more people don't want a government shutdown over it.  So finally the Democrats caved today and basically passed the same thing from Friday.  So I think despite Trump was wrong to abandon DACA and was useless in trying to get a budget passed, he came out looking better than the Democratic leadership.

If the Democrats were going to hold out, they should have insisted that there be no money for the wall.  Unlike DACA, the wall is a legitimate budget issue.  They should insist that Trump keeps his promise that Mexico pays for the wall.  The GOP framed the budget debate to Democrats wanting to help illegals while hurting the troops by shutting the government.  The Democrats should frame the debate that Trump refused or unable to get Mexico to pay for the wall as promised and thus deprived the troops money by spending it on the wall.

Notice how politicians always use security issues to justify their spending.  So if the budget is not passed, it is the troops who lose, not welfare queens.  On the liberal side, they always asks for bond money to fund schools, police and firemen.  But of course, those things should be funded by original tax money.  It is because the tax money was not spent wisely that special bonds are needed.  When the government shut down over the weekend, there was talk that the troops oversea would not be able to see the football playoffs.  But the telecasts were then deemed essential and thus was funded.  It makes me feel more secure that the troops were given these essential tools to keep us safe!

I am proud to say that I am one of those foreign born Americans who came from a shithole place.  Hong Kong, of course, is a world class city today.  But back in 1966 it was a poor British colony.  So we felt lucky to have immigrated to the U.S. at that time.  I think that is the story of most Americans, either they or their ancestors came from a terrible place to live.  Let's face it, if your country and you are doing well, why would you want to come to America.  Trump wants more people from Norway and the people of Norway say no way.

The amazing thing is the people who came from shitholes have done extremely well.  I would say that they are the reasons why America continues to lead the world.  Can you imagine what America would be like without the contributions of the Jews, the Irish, the Italians, the Asians, and the Latinos  who came?  All of these groups were at one time thought of as inferior to the WASPS that are the majority of the country.  There is no reason to believe that people who are  from Africa and Haiti that Trump mentioned will not contribute to the country as well.  He is also worried about Muslims coming.  But at one time, people were worried about Catholics coming as well.  Diversity is good and is the only chance that we end up lasting longer than empires of the past.

At this point, nothing coming out of Trump's mouth is shocking anymore.  But what is disturbing is that no matter what he says, there are many people who defend him.  They say that so what if he is politically incorrect?  This is not about political correctness.  It is about human decency.  It is also about lack of the understanding of the history of this country.