Donald Trump didn't beat the establishment.
He joined it.
The election of Donald Trump was in no small part, a referendum on Barack Obama.
And Trump's victory was interpreted as a sound rebuke to eight years of:
-Open ended warfare
-Out-of-control taxes and spending
-Unchecked executive power
-Disregard for the Constitution
-A vast and growing police state
-Arrogance and hypocrisy
-Amateur administration
-Disregard for human rights
-Lies and broken promises
-A lack of transparency
-Fever-pitch fearmongering
-Rampant corruption
But what have we gotten instead?
More of the same.
A LOT more of the same.
But worse.
No wonder his approval rating has dropped by double digits nationwide, even among his supporters, and dropped in every single state, including the ones that elected him.
Everything the American people detested so much about Barack Obama has not only characterized the presidency of his successor, it's arguably gotten much worse.
The partisan liberal media narrative that Trump is undoing what Obama did is as fake as fake news can get.
Don't believe me?
The following is a list of 100 ways Donald Trump is just like Barack Obama.
We might as well consider Donald Trump a third Obama term on steroids.
Donald Trump is Barack Obama 2.0
If you honestly didn't like Obama...
You can't possibly justify liking Trump, not unless you ignore the facts...
Thanks for visiting my libertarian website. Hope you find this read eye-opening...
Open Ended Warfare
A major reason Trump was elected in 2016 was the perception that Hillary Clinton would continue the Bush-Obama era foreign policy of open ended warfare overseas.
By 2011 most Americans wanted the U.S. military out of Afghanistan within a year.
One study even found that:
"Donald Trump won more votes from communities with high military casualties than from similar communities which suffered fewer casualties."
In his America First foreign policy speech in April 2016, Donald Trump promised peace:
"It’s time to shake the rust off America’s foreign policy...
We’re getting out of the nation-building business and instead focusing on creating stability in the world. Our moments of greatest strength came when politics ended at the water’s edge. We need a new rational American foreign policy, informed by the best minds and supported by both parties, and it will be by both parties — Democrats, Republicans, independents, everybody, as well as by our close allies...
Our goal is peace and prosperity, not war and destruction. The best way to achieve those goals is through a disciplined, deliberate and consistent foreign policy. With President Obama and Secretary Clinton we’ve had the exact opposite — a reckless, rudderless and aimless foreign policy, one that has blazed the path of destruction in its wake...
After losing thousands of lives and spending trillions of dollars, we are in far worst shape in the Middle East than ever, ever before. I challenge anyone to explain the strategic foreign policy vision of Obama/Clinton. It has been a complete and total disaster...
However, unlike other candidates for the presidency, war and aggression will not be my first instinct. You cannot have a foreign policy without diplomacy. A superpower understands that caution and restraint are really truly signs of strength. Although not in government service, I was totally against the war in Iraq, very proudly, saying for many years that it would destabilize the Middle East...
Instead of trying to spread universal values that not everybody shares or wants, we should understand that strengthening and promoting Western civilization and its accomplishments will do more to inspire positive reforms around the world than military interventions...
The world must know that we do not go abroad in search of enemies, that we are always happy when old enemies become friends and when old friends become allies, that’s what we want...
We want the world to be — we want to bring peace to the world. Too much destruction out there, too many destructive weapons. The power of weaponry is the single biggest problem that we have today in the world."
Trump used the same talking points Obama and Bush used to get elected.
A nation weary of foreign entanglements, like it was when it elected Obama and Bush on promises of no regime change or nation building, elected Trump, hoping for peace.
But here's what we got instead:
1. Overseas Contingency Operation - The Obama era, Orwellian rebranding name change for the Global War on Terror.
Nah, it's not a global war or anything...
Just a little, tiny overseas contingency operation. Nothing to see here!
Far from scaling it back like Trump gave us the impression he would, he's keeping it going, and ramping it up, just like Obama:
"Despite Trump’s promise of a 'tremendous difference' between his military strategy and Obama’s... military analysts familiar with current U.S. strategies say Trump has shown little to no variance from Obama when it comes to broader counterterrorism efforts.
'[Trump] has basically done what President Obama has done, maybe just a little bit more forcefully,' said Bill Roggio, editor of Long War Journal, a website dedicated to covering the U.S. war on terror. Forcefully is the key word."
2. ISIS - Foreign Policy noted in May that Trump's ISIS policy is just like Obama's... a never-ending commitment of American blood and resources to fighting other countries' wars instead of Making America Great Again.
3. Bombing - Obama loved bombing foreign countries, but not as much as Trump:
"In just the past few months under Trump, U.S. forces have launched 75 strikes on Yemen (more than in any entire year under Obama); launched 59 Tomahawk missiles on Syrian President Bashar Assad’s forces; dropped more bombs in Syria and Iraq in each of the last three months than in any of the prior 32 months of war against ISIS; and dropped a MOAB, the largest non-nuclear bomb in the U.S. arsenal, on Afghanistan."
4. Drone Warfare - In a dangerous step toward weaponizing automatons and making Terminator come true (fun for everyone!)...
Part of Obama's legacy was embracing and vastly expanding drone warfare.
And setting off a militarized drone arms race with the world, most notably China. Great.
What Obama took from Bush and made worse, Trump has taken from Obama and made worser. Much worser.
5. Awlaki - Obama set a particularly troubling precedent by ordering the summary execution- without charges or a trial- of Anwar al-Awlaki, a U.S. citizen, by drone strike.
Two weeks later, a U.S. drone strike killed his 16-year-old son, also a U.S. citizen born in Denver, Colorado. Obama's press secretary brushed it off, saying his father should have been more responsible.
So as president Obama claimed the rightful power to execute a U.S. citizen without charges or a trial, because of something a family member of theirs did.
Nothing has changed under Trump, whose first order as Commander in Chief was a Navy SEAL raid that killed 10 women and children, including al-Awlaki's 8-year-old daughter.
6. Troops in Afghanistan - When Trump considered running for president in 2012, he posted a series of tweets calling for a withdrawal from Afghanistan.
Here's one from 2013: "Let’s get out of Afghanistan. Our troops are being killed by the Afghanis we train and we waste billions there. Nonsense! Rebuild the USA."
As president he has bowed to pressure from the military industrial complex, and instead of bringing American soldiers home to MAGA, he has sent even more Americans to Afghanistan to fight in foreign civil wars.
7. Air War in Afghanistan - Trump has also ramped up the air war in Afghanistan, significantly increasing the number of air strikes in this foreign civil war:
"In September, the military dropped 751 airstrikes in Afghanistan, the highest total for any month in seven years of military action in the country.
It represented a 50 percent increase from August when Trump announced the new strategy. The most bombs dropped during one month prior was 589 in August 2012."
8. Syria - From 2013 - 2014, Donald Trump repeatedly warned Obama against bombing Syria and made some great arguments.
He also said Congress had to approve it first.
He wasn't even president for 3 months before ordering 59 Tomahawk Cruise Missiles launched at a military base in Syria.
Without approval from Congress.
9. Bombing in Yemen - Bush bombed people in Yemen. Then Obama, elected on the pretense of peace, bombed more.
Then Trump, an outsider, who funded his own campaign, someone who might actually change things... bombed Yemen even more than Obama. Much more.
10. Bombing in Somalia - Same story in Somalia. Bush bombed. Obama bombed more. And Trump has bombed even more.
11. Bombing in Pakistan - Same story in Pakistan, where Obama stepped up drone strikes with a callous disregard for civilian deaths. After nearly a year of no strikes however, Trump started it up again.
Pakistanis hate the U.S. for doing this.
12. Bombing in Libya - Obama took America to war in Libya in 2011 to support Islamic extremists in overthrowing a stable, secular government that had been a U.S. ally in fighting Islamic terrorists right up until 2011.
The war was undertaken without Congressional approval and it severely destabilized the region.
It resulted in American deaths that Hillary Clinton, a major supporter of the air war in Libya had to answer to Congress for.
Trump commenced new hostilities from the air in Libya in his eighth month in office.
13. Iraq - After flogging his opposition to the Iraq War on the campaign trail, Donald Trump did a 180 in office and sent more troops to Iraq, positioned them closer to the front lines, and lifted White House restrictions on DOD troop levels in the country.
14. Niger - Obama quietly committed over a hundred U.S. soldiers and special forces to Niger in 2013.
Instead of withdrawing from Niger in the spirit of his campaign promises to clean up Obama's mess, Trump continued to authorize the U.S. military presence there.
When four American soldiers died there in October 2017, most Americans were shocked to learn the U.S. was even in Niger.
15. Korea - On the campaign trail Donald Trump proposed a major shift in U.S. relations toward North Korea, advocating a diplomatic approach in contrast to the Obama era policy of pressure and sanctions.
So far the Trump Administration has not distinguished its North Korea policy from Obama's, other than to intensify the policy Obama was already pursuing, and display an extremely negligent lack of understanding of the history and latest news on North Korea.
Trump even recently escalated tensions by adding North Korea back to a list of state sponsors of terrorism. So we're back to Bush's "Axis of Evil." Because that worked out so well for us the first time.
So much for withdrawing the massive commitment of American resources to the region and letting South Korea, Japan, and China handle their own problems.
16. Iran - Obama on Iran: Sanctions. Trump on Iran: Sanctions. Common sense on Iran: Peace through commerce.
17. Civilian Casualty Levels - Obama drew sharp condemnation from much of the world over his callous disregard for civilian casualties as he expanded U.S. airstrikes.
Just like Obama, Trump has shown a total disregard for the lives of innocent people killed by the U.S. military. But worse.
By July, Trump's DOD had already murdered 2,200 innocent people, on track to double the civilian death rate under Obama.
18. U.S. Soldier Casualties - Obama faced intense criticism for losing American lives in Afghanistan and Iraq after taking office, especially from 2009 - 2012.
Military casualties are back up under Trump, with as many American soldiers dead by August as died the entire year of 2016.
How many more Americans have to die fighting foreign civil wars?
19. Defense Spending Levels - With the Cold War far behind us and no credible threat to American lives from foreign powers other than terrorist blowback from Washington's activities overseas, defense budgets remained massive under Obama.
And he faced major criticism for sinking $1.5 trillion into the failed F-35 fighter jet program, stealing money from American families and businesses, and handing it to Lockheed Martin for absolutely nothing.
All that wasteful defense spending has continued to balloon under Trump.
20. God and War Rhetoric - Many Americans were unsettled and offended by both Bush and Obama's invocation of God to justify U.S. militarism.
Even Jon Stewart marveled at how similar Obama's war rhetoric was to Bush's...
To point of invoking God in the fight against other countries, and "refusing to apologize" for our way of life (which apparently includes drone bombing civilians).
Trump is no different than Obama in this regard, and like Obama, blasphemes God by stamping His Name on senseless violence.
Out of Control
Taxes and Spending
Real patriots who love this country, are critical of Washington, and were paying attention during the Bush years were alarmed by the rapid increase in federal spending.
By the time Obama was elected and Washington started stealing even more money than it did under Bush...
People had had enough and the Tea Party tax protests ensued. I was there for the first round of protests in February, the second in April, and the third in July of 2009.
We got laughed at by Democrats for "Tea Bagging" Obama and Pelosi, even though the joke was clearly on them.
We even got called racist by Obama and by the NAACP for supporting less federal spending and balanced budgets.
And we actually got called terrorists by not a small number of people in high posts in government and the press.
It's amazing the level of entitlement the ruling class exhibit toward other people's money.
But it's not amazing that Washington mismanages its funds so badly. You would too if all you had to do was steal some more.
Well if liberal means "big government spender" and conservative means "fiscally conservative," then Trump is already more liberal than Obama and actually the least conservative president in U.S. history.
If you can swallow hard pills here's another dose of reality for you:
21. Debt Ceiling - Pictured above: Trump doing his best Obama impression by meeting with Democrats to raise the debt ceiling.
22. Middle Class Tax Increase - When Rand Paul warned Trump's tax plan would raise taxes on a lot of middle class taxpayers, McConnell and Ryan said he was wrong. Then admitted it a month later. Trump is raising taxes on the middle class.
Before scrolling to the next item on the list, just stop and let that sink in for a minute.
What the fuck, right? Yeah.
23. 2018 Budget - Obama spent $3.65 trillion dollars his last fiscal year in office. Trump's budget will spend over $4 trillion.
That will not MAGA.
24. Kabuki Theater - The "budget cuts" that have Democrats acting like the sky is falling are part of a time honored tradition of U.S. presidents playing budget cut kabuki theater and never actually cutting federal spending.
This is all a scripted dance folks. They've been doing this forever, and Trump's playing right along. He's not any different.
25. Fuzzy Numbers - Just like Obama, Bush, and every other mother fucking one of them, Donald Trump's budget proposal is full of deceptive projections and accounting tricks.
He's gone full establishment
26. Corporate Welfare - Just like Obama, the corporate welfare is strong with this one.
It's not the free market when government picks winners and losers.
Even when a guy with an elephant lapel pin is giving the SOTU addresses.
It's just government stealing from some people and giving to others (and to itself).
27. Biggest Medicaid Increase in History - Trump is increasing the welfare state to levels beyond what any president before him ever has. Bigger than Obama, Bush, or Clinton.
Bigger than LBJ or FDR.
He's just like Obama. Only worse.
28. Deficit Spending - Washington's record of massive deficit spending under Bush and Obama will continue to drag down the economy under Trump's budget.
29. Military Aid to Egypt - Donald, what are you doing?
30. Federal Reserve Chair - After hammering the Fed as a candidate, Donald Trump's pick for Janet Yellen's replacement as Federal Reserve Chair signals continuity with Obama and Bush era Federal Reserve policy in a big win for the swamp.
31. Alternative Energy Subsidies - He supports them! You know "green energy" company subsidies? That shit Republicans relentlessly criticized Obama, and Pelosi, and Waxman and all those people for?
Take off that stupid red hat and burn it.
32. Coal Bailouts - The government has no constitutional business or moral legitimacy to forcibly take money from us to dole it out to welfare recipients of any kind, especially not the corporate kind.
Let the free market decide if a company should stay in business or not. True patriots opposed Bush bailouts. They opposed Obama bailouts. And they oppose Trump's $11 billion annual bailout for coal.
33. Hurricane Pork - Obama chief of staff Rahm Emmanuel said in government you never let a good crisis go to waste.
That's why Obama appallingly seized on American concern and compassion for Hurricane Sandy victims to pass a multi-billion dollar "relief bill" with money that was mostly stolen from actual victims to lard up federal and local government budgets.
Guess what Trump did with the Hurricane Harvey relief bill? Yeah. He stole more money for the federal government.
Disregard for the Constitution
Unchecked Executive Power
Presidents Bush and Obama will be forever remembered by historians for the "imperial presidency," their usurpation of power from the other branches of government in violation of the Constitution.
Instead of a nation guided by laws, our country descended even further into the lawlessness of executive tyranny, unchecked by the other branches of government and unrestrained by the Constitution.
An autocrat, Obama did as he pleased, whether the law permitted it or not.
Trump has been no different:
34. Executive Orders - Donald Trump criticized Obama for the number of executive orders he signed as president.
But now that Trump is president, he's on pace to sign more executive orders than any president in the last 50 years.
35. Immigration - Republican Sen. Jeff Sessions said Obama was acting like an "emperor" in 2014 when he issued an executive order on immigration.
Sessions, now Trump's most vocal immigration proponent as his attorney general, has praised the President for acting on immigration through executive order.
36. Signing Statements - On the campaign trail, Barack Obama called presidential "signing statements" (letters of interpretation and recommendations attached to Congressional legislation) unconstitutional and promised not to use them.
As president, he continued the Bush Era policy of presidential signing statements. If you want to know why this is a dangerous usurpation of power by the executive, click that first link above and Obama will explain.
Just like Obama, Trump is not letting go of this unconstitutional executive overreach.
37. Czars - An un-American word for an un-American political phenomenon that started with Nixon and was radically expanded by Obama on an unprecedented scale...
The unconstitutional appointment of "czars" as "principle officers" of policy who answer solely to the president without the advice and consent of Congress.
Obama appointed over 40 of these "czars" to high level posts within his administration. As soon as he was elected, Donald Trump started appointing czars too.
38. Census - Obama raised the ire of Republicans for his unconstitutional politicization of the U.S. Census.
Trump will continue to overreach his powers and politicize the U.S. Census.
39. Gun Free Zones - Trump promised to get rid of gun-free zones in schools and military bases on day one.
"I will get rid of gun-free zones in schools and you have to, and on military bases. My first day it gets signed. My first day it gets signed. My first day. There’s no more gun-free zones. Think of it."
These gun free zones encroach upon the 2nd Amendment guarantee that the right to bear arms will not be infringed.
Trump has not signed any order or legislation eliminating gun-free zones anywhere. Which is a broken campaign promise.
The Vast and Growing
Police State
Bush and Obama critics consider their presidencies to have inaugurated an era unprecedented in U.S. history.
For violations of civil liberties, privacy, and the constitutional amendments that protect Americans from unwarranted police actions by the government.
The creation of a vast, "national security" state has alarmed critics as something more akin to fascist dictatorship than American constitutionalism.
Yet all of Obama's most tyrannical abuses have not only been continued by Trump, they've been taken to a whole new level:
40. The Patriot Act - You can be pretty much certain that any bill passed by Congress is the opposite of whatever the title says it is.
Passed and renewed over and over again with little debate or deliberation, this gargantuan bill gave the federal government sweeping new powers to police its citizenry.
The Patriot Act violates the 1st, 4th, and 5th amendments of the Constitution.
Obama renewed the Patriot Act (from across the Atlantic Ocean by autopen) as president and voted for its renewal as a senator.
Big surprise: Trump likes the Patriot Act too. In fact he loves it.
41. The NSA - The NSA's illegal and unconstitutional activities spying on all of the American people like we're the enemy is another sordid legacy of Obama.
Just like Obama, Donald Trump supports the vast, unchecked, and illegal powers of the NSA, and bashed Edward Snowden for blowing the whistle to the American people.
42. The TSA - Created by an act of Congress under Bush, and organized within the Department of Homeland Security, the TSA has been annoying and harassing passengers at airports for over a decade now.
But under President Obama, it became more aggressive and oppressive than it ever was under Bush, with the installment of dozens of radiation-emitting "naked body scanners" throughout the country.
And directives from the Dept of Homeland Security to use "enhanced" pat downs that many critics say amount to sexual assault.
Under Bush, the TSA was merely annoying. Under Obama, it was horrifyingly out of control. On the campaign trail, Donald Trump called the TSA a "total disaster," but as president, the TSA has announced more "comprehensive" and intrusive pat downs.
43. The War on Drugs - Obama let the 40-years-old, destructive, unconstitutional, and failed War on Drugs rage on uselessly for eight years under his watch.
On the campaign trail Donald Trump repeatedly promised as president he would not let the federal government interfere with states that legalize marijuana.
This is a massive, multi-billion dollar, peaceful industry that supplies a highly valued product to consumers who want it, and legalization efforts have taken those profits away from the violent drug cartel and put them in the hands of peaceful American entrepreneurs.
This business has continued to grow despite the attempts of Trump's Justice Department to advance the unconstitutional federal enforcement of these catastrophically failed prohibition laws from the 1970s.
44. CIA Black Sites - The CIA's "extraordinary rendition" program consists of seizing "terror suspects," detaining them without warrant or trial, and sending them offshore to outsource their "interrogation" to third world countries where they are tortured for information and confessions. Seriously.
Torture in CIA black sites was one of the big criticisms faced by the Bush Administration, and in February 2009, the Obama Administration wasted no time in quietly retaining the practice of rendition.
On the campaign trail and as president, Trump has been quite bullish on torture and rendition. Just like Obama.
45. Guantanamo Bay - Obama talked passionately about closing Guantanamo Bay on the campaign trail, but it was apparently not a political priority for him, and he never shut it down as promised.
Trump wants to send more people to Guantanamo bay, to be held indefinitely, without charges or trial, and the treatment of inmates there has gotten worse since he became president.
46. Defendants' Rights - Obama displayed an unseemly disregard for defendants' rights.
For example, the Obama Administration actually had the gall to ask the Supreme Court to overrule the long-standing law that stops police from initiating questions unless a defendant's lawyer is present.
In the same spirit, Trump drew sharp rebukes from the International Association of Chiefs of Police for telling police in a speech to purposefully injure detained suspects.
He brushed it off as a joke, but now's not a good time for the POTUS to be making jokes about police brutality...
47. Militarization of Police - A major concern under Obama was the increasing use of military weapons and tactics by local and state police, often against unarmed, non-violent suspects, such as in no-knock raids by SWAT teams to serve drug warrants.
As president, Trump is putting this terrifying Obama era police state trend into overdrive.
48. Prison Population - Obama's eight years in office hardly made a dent in the U.S. federal prison population of Soviet Gulag proportions. Trump policies will continue to keep a staggering number of Americans in prison. Welcome to the USSA.
49. ICE - A big government guy through and through, Obama actually deported more people than any president before him in U.S. history. The Hill reports Trump is no different:
"Increased action by the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) has been an explicit goal of the Trump administrations and deportations and arrests have increased. Stories of the impact on communities of having valued members removed have become common."
50. Civil Asset Forfeiture - Civil asset forfeiture skyrocketed under Obama. It is unconstitutional and amounts to government theft of billions of dollars annually.
The Trump Administration is going to keep this institutionalized mass theft by the police state going for years to come.
51. Carpenter vs. United States - The Trump Administration is arguing for the government to seize your cell phone records without a signed warrant from a judge.
I guess Donald Trump uses the Fourth Amendment for toilet paper or something.
52. Joe Arpaio - If you needed any more assurances that Donald Trump is just another police state president like Obama, read this.
Arrogance and Hypocrisy
Obama's critics bristled at his unbridled arrogance. On top of his work to increase government power and corruption, he was just so damnably smug and narcissistic.
Amazing any of them can stand Trump:
53. Celebrity - One of the biggest criticisms of Obama in 2008 was that he was nothing more substantive than "a celebrity."
Go figure that so many of his critics would go on to support an actual, literal television celebrity for president in 2016!
54. No depth - Obama's critics slammed him for being all frosting, no cake. More about appearances, logos, slogans, and branding than substantive policy proposals.
Just a big, stupid O logo, vague platitudes, and simple, ambiguous NLP slogans like "Hope" and "Change."
Well Donald Trump was notoriously short on substantive policy proposals, and legendary for how unclear and inconsistent his policy platform was as a candidate.
This policy vagueness was even rationalized away as the use of unpredictability to cut better deals for the nation. Lol
In the end voters just elected a red hat with the words "Make America Great Again."
55. Hubris - Oh the unabashed hubris of Barack Obama, who cast himself as a world transformational figure.
Who accepted the DNC's nomination on that stage resembling a classical Greek temple like he was some kind of divine demi-god.
Amazing those who found his hubris so objectionable found someone even more full of themselves, grandiose, and self-obsessed than Obama to support.
56. Golf - After roundly criticizing Obama on the campaign trail for taking vacations and playing golf, Trump has played more golf, and had three times the number of vacation days as Obama by this time in his presidency.
57. Wasteful Ostentation - Obama, the man who said: "There is no doubt that we’ve been living beyond our means and we’re going to have to make some adjustments," blew $170 million for his big inauguration party.
Not to be outdone, Trump, who campaigned on "vigorously eliminating waste... in the federal government," blew through $200 million to throw his inauguration.
That's almost a quarter billion dollars. On a single, self-aggrandizing party. These people are not for us. They are for themselves.
58. CurtsyGate - Trump mocked Obama for bowing to a Saudi King, then accepted a medal from a Saudi royal, and when he did, if you watch the video, Trump unmistakably gives the Saudi monarch a little curtsy. Baaahahahahahaha!
59. Lesser of Two Evils - For all the self-serving delusions of grandeur that Obama had, he wasn't elected because he was great.
He was elected for the same reason every president gets elected. He just wasn't as bad as John McCain or Mitt Romney.
Which is setting the bar awfully high right? Well maybe it is if all you have to do to win is beat Hillary Clinton.
Just like Obama, all Trump was in 2016, was the lesser of two evils. That doesn't make him good. And it won't make America great.
Amateur Administration
One of the enduring criticisms of Obama through his administration was his mismanagement of the federal government through sheer lack of experience.
He was an amateur.
Trump is no different:
60. Just Trust Me - Long on platitudes, short on specifics, Obama's main selling point for himself as a candidate was that he would personally be a good negotiator because of his charm and even temperament. He wasn't a rigorous policy wonk, just a political amateur. Donald Trump was no different as a candidate and no different as a POTUS.
61. Travel Ban - Trump's travel ban went down in flames almost instantly in the U.S. judiciary because of how poorly written it was. Then again and again. The weak legal language of the executive orders, the clear lack of inter-agency cooperation on putting it together-- it bore all the marks of amateur executive policy making.
62. Attacks on Private Citizens - Because of the great power and import of their position, it is very unusual and unpresidential for a POTUS to call out and get into fights with private citizens.
Obama did anyway like a petty amateur.
Trump is legendary for his petty, unpresidential penchant for getting into protracted Twitter flame wars with private citizens. He'll fight anybody.
College students. NFL players.
Dude you've got all the nukes. Pissing contests with students and entertainers makes you seem weak and like someone we should be scared has all the nukes.
63. Half-baked Budget - Amazing how lightweight of a policy president Trump is even with number crunching GOP wunderkind Paul Ryan helping him craft his bills. Even if he was sincerely trying to MAGA, Trump is like Obama: He doesn't have what it takes.
64. Tweeting Public Policy - Amateur move.
Disregard for Human Rights
The picture of Obama, the Nobel Peace Prize laureate, as a figure of transformational enlightenment, humanity, and compassion is a completely delusional fairy tale. Actually it's propaganda that even a modest commitment to the truth and a brief review of the publicly available information can easily disprove.
Human rights groups and even liberal media reports have had to admit this sad reality of the Obama era, and call his legacy on human rights "shaky," "weak," and a "failure."
Trump is already shaping up to be just as bad:
65. Armenian Genocide - Obama wouldn't call the Armenian Genocide of 1.5 million Armenians by the Turkish government a genocide. And Trump has refused to as well. Trump the blunt, straight talker.
Except when it counts.
66. Sins of The Father - As pointed out in item #5 on this list, Obama's Administration was cool with killing people, even American citizens, simply for being related to someone guilty of a crime or engaged in terrorism. Trump is the same. So if your cousin who you don't even talk to commits a mass shooting, Trump thinks it's okay to murder you.
67. Philippines - Rodrigo Duterte, the Philippines president is literally a homicidal maniac and one of the most brutal and repressive dictators in the world today.
In his first year as president, he has led a reign of terror and had thousands of people rounded up and summarily executed in extra judicial killings by national police and local vigilante groups. He has actually claimed his goal is to be a modern Hitler and he has also publicly encouraged his soldiers to rape.
Four months in office, Donald Trump talked to Duterte over the phone and warmly praised him for his mass extra-judicial killings. When he traveled to Asia in November, Trump embraced Duterte as a friend.
68. Egypt - Trump's good friends with Egypt's repressive dictator too. Just like Obama.
69. Vietnam - Vietnam's too. Just like Obama.
70. Saudi Arabia - Just like Obama before him, Donald Trump has maintained warm relations between Washington and Saudi Arabia, a brutal autocratic regime and prolific state-sponsor of terrorism.
You just know these guys are laughing at us and the continuing weakness and timidity of U.S. "leadership" under Donald Trump.
Lies and Broken Promises
Lies, lies, lies. The Bush Administration was marred by lies and broken campaign promises. His administration looked nothing like the promises he made during the 2000 presidential campaign. The Obama Administration was no different.
I'm not a data scientist or anything, but I'm starting to notice a trend here:
71. Foreign Policy 180 - Insert the entire first section of this list here. Obama promised America would start acting like a constitutional republic again instead of a bankrupt global empire. He lied and broke his promises.
Donald Trump promised Washington would pull American resources back to our borders and use American money to Make America Great Again instead of bombing and then rebuilding half the rest of the world. He's lied and broke his promises too.
72. Tax Cut within First 100 days - Read my lips, right? It was a big, fat lie. Instead you get a big, fat tax increase, bitches. Eat it.
73. Monetary Policy - Big 180.
74. Hiring Freeze - Trump promised to limit the size of the bloated government through managed attrition by enacting a hiring freeze after becoming president.
It didn't last three months before Trump lifted it. So much for smaller government.
75. Repeal ObamaCare - Both Houses of Congress and the White House under their control, and the GOP has campaigned on this basically since ObamaCare was passed, and now all of the sudden all these tough talkers can't get it up on camera. What gives?
You try to pass a fake repeal bill that just re-arranges the chairs on the Titanic while people's premiums and deductibles are skyrocketing? Rename it something else, but leave it the same and say you repealed it?
Can anyone tell me what good the Republican Party is after all this? Broken promise because weak sauce. If I were a Trump donor, I'd be suing for my money back.
76. "He could still do it" - I hear some unshakeable loyalists saying. Yeah well he promised it would be immediate: "You’re going to end up with great health care for a fraction of the price and that’s gonna take place immediately after we go in. Okay? Immediately. Fast. Quick."
77. Secret Plan to Defeat ISIS - Trump made this big deal about this secret plan he had to defeat ISIS. He couldn't tell us or he'd lose the element of surprise. Turns out it was all just made up to help him win votes.
78. Said He Would "bring down the national debt fairly quickly" - He promised. But his first budget as president shows he sure as hell won't be doing that.
79. Drain The Swamp - Trump promised he would work with Congress to introduce for passage in the first 100 days the Clean Up Corruption in Washington Act:
"Next, I will work with Congress to introduce the following broader legislative measures and fight for their passage within the first 100 days of my administration. Clean Up Corruption in Washington Act. Enacts tough new ethics reforms, to reduce the corrupting influence of special interests, and donors, on our politics."
While some members of Congress have introduced various bills related to ethics reform, Trump has not publicly endorsed any of them. And his White House is already the most corrupt in history.
80. Rarely Leave WH or Take Vacations - Trump promised to rarely leave the White House and not take vacations:
"I would rarely leave the White House because there’s so much work to be done. I would not be a president who took vacations. I would not be a president that takes time off... You don’t have time to take time off."
Trump left the White House for three (sometimes long) weekends in a row to stay at his Mar-a-Lago club in Palm Beach, FL in the first month of his presidency alone. This trend has only continued.
81. Term Limits - Trump promised to propose a constitutional amendment for term limits on day one of his new administration.
"Under my contract with the American voter we are proposing a series of ethics reforms on day one to end government corruption. They include a constitutional amendment to impose term limits on all members of congress."
The White House had not announced such a proposed amendment.
82. No More Tweets - Would you know that Donald Trump said he would stop tweeting after he became president?
Well you couldn't possibly guess it now if you didn't know already, could you?
83. Deregulation - Trump promised to create a requirement that for every new regulation, two existing regulations must be eliminated on day one. Well all the Executive Order he signed to "fulfill" this campaign promise actually does, is require federal agencies to identify two regulations that could be repealed, not actually eliminate them.
84. Marijuana - Total 180.
85. Tax credit children and elders - On the campaign trail, Obama promised a $4000 tax credit for college tuition, but backpedaled when he signed a much smaller $2,500 college tax credit into law.
Supposedly some new kind of politician, Trump pulled the same bait and switch campaign with broken promises of tax credits for the care of children and the elderly.
Lack of Transparency
Despite campaigning heavily on introducing transparency back into an increasingly secretive federal government, Barack Obama's leaves a legacy of unprecedented secrecy and hostility toward the press.
Trump is no better than Obama when it comes to keeping secrets from the American people whom Washington pretends it is working for. Might even be worse:
86. Tax Returns - While criticizing Obama for sealing his college law school records, Trump still refuses to release his tax returns, unlike every president and presidential candidate in recent history. What is he hiding?
87. White House visitor logs - Trump also refuses to release White House visitor logs to the public. Just like Obama (don't let Democrats trick themselves into thinking Obama was transparent w/ WH visitor logs).
It's our money the White House spends. We have a right to know who he's talking about spending it with. Why do they hide this?
88. Bashed Chelsea Manning - Trump has bashed Chelsea Manning, undeniably an American and world hero who revealed to the American people and the world more scoops about government corruption and malfeasance than most journalists could dream of reporting in an entire lifetime.
89. Bashed Edward Snowden - Trump bashed Edward Snowden too, and called for his execution for treason, even though Trump himself has revealed highly classified information to Russian officials (no doubt because he's an amateur POTUS).
Snowden is absolutely an American hero of transparency and accountability to the American people, and more loyal to the U.S. Constitution than any oath taking and breaking liar that has ever held office.
It is revealing that many Washington politicians accuse Snowden of treason for revealing government secrets to the enemy, when what he did was reveal government secrets (the fact that government was breaking the law) to the American people.
Thus Washington admits it views the American people as the enemy.
Which is no surprise, since it's been spying on us like we're the enemy.
90. Did not release all the JFK files - Made a big deal bout releasing the JFK files to the public, but didn't release all of them.
Come on. It's been over half a century. The Deep State's obviously got this POTUS on a leash just like it had Obama.
91. State Secrets Privilege - Obama's Administration continued to invoke the state secrets privilege in cases involving alleged CIA torture during the Bush Administration. Trump has followed suit.
92. Most Anti-Leak White House Ever - The Obama White House proved far more aggressive than the Bush White House in seeking to punish whistle-blowers within the administration. Guess who's three times even more aggressive than that?
Fearmongering
One of the most derided aspects of the Obama Administration (and a complicit media) was its use of fearmongering to scare the American people into accepting its relentless march on our freedoms.
Donald Trump is no less unscrupulous than Obama in using fearmongering to advance sweeping federal powers:
93. Polarized Partisanship - Washington is a massive parasitic organism feeding on its host organism: America and the rest of the world. What keeps the American people from noticing or caring is the constant fear of "the other side" of the "great partisan divide" when the truth is both "sides" are exactly alike.
Although he was practically worshiped as this great unifying figure, Barack Obama continued Washington's long record of corruption unchallenged by using the fear Democrats have been taught to have of Republicans to divide and conquer. Donald Trump plays the exact same game. He uses partisan fear to divide and conquer.
94. Scapegoating - The government's always got a scapegoat to blame and to make you afraid of so you'll tolerate its flagrant abuses, corruption, and tyranny. Trump scapegoats immigrants for America's problems, even though there's no way immigrants could have possibly done more damage to your bank account and economic prospects than fucking Washington DC, and you know that's true.
If you really want to make America great again, we should deport Congress and the entire parasitic ruling class in Washington.
95. Terrorism - It's not hard to understand why shocked Americans gave Bush a pass on violating the fundamental principles of how our society is supposed to be constituted, but it's amazing how far they let Obama take trampling liberty in the vain search for absolute security, and it's inexcusable in 2017 that so many of us still haven't shaken off the daze and finally started demanding freedom, refusing to be afraid of terrorists like they want us to be, and acting like Americans again.
Corruption
The depth of corruption in the Obama Administration was apparent from before he was even inaugurated. The cronyism and deep ties to Wall Street were evident enough to anyone willing to casually scratch the surface by Googling Obama's top campaign contributors for the 2008 election, which included Goldman Sachs, JPMorgan Chase & Co, Citigroup, and Morgan Stanley.
Nothing changed with Trump:
96. Join The Swamp - Trump's White House is already the most corrupt in history.
97. Investigations - And facing widespread cabinet level investigations leading to more than one resignation in under 12 months.
98. Goldman Sachs Alumni Group - And stacked with former Wall Street executives in Trump's inner circle after he spent the campaign beating up on Wall Street.
99. Do I have to sign it? - It's shit like this.
100. Hillary Clinton - Every time Justice Department scrutiny of Trump intensifies, he points the finger at Hillary Clinton and calls for a more scrutinizing investigation of her corruption. But you just know he's never going to appoint a special prosecutor to seriously investigate her like he promised.
They are both openly corrupt, Washington is obviously rotten, and this is how the two parties are in bed together, perpetually fingering each other in an unholy wedlock that obscures and somehow excuses the festering corruption, criminal malfeasance, mass theft, and mass murder they share in common.
Conclusions
It's time for some principled opposition to Donald Trump. Since progressives have clearly relinquished this responsibility.
Or can't uphold it because of everything they let slide under Obama.
So let this libertarian show you how to speak truth to power.
One year in and there's already all this! Amazing isn't it?
The purpose of this post is to wake people up from the delusion that there is any meaningful difference between the two main political parties in America or the candidates they nominate to run for higher offices.
And to provide plenty of well-organized information in one convenient place for people who are already awake to this political reality so they can open more eyes with a thorough knowledge of these details.
As the author/owner of this growing libertarian website, I also wanted to dispel any notions the misinformed libertarian or anti-libertarian may have that Donald Trump is a libertarian.
Nearly all of these things that Donald Trump and Barack Obama have in common involve government trampling on some human being's life, liberty, or property.
I spoke out fervently against eight years of this while Obama was president, and I can not remain silent while people cheer Trump as he presides over more and more of the same.
If you're with me, please share this post:
