Is it worth being a so-called world champion if to gain that honor you cheat? The answer that comes from Boston is “of course.”

Cheating by Bill Belichick and the Patriots is an old story. They were exposed on Sep 13, 2007, ESPN news service wrote: “

“New England Patriots coach Bill Belichick was fined the NFL maximum of $500,000 Thursday and the Patriots were ordered to pay $250,000 for spying on an opponent’s defensive signals. Commissioner Roger Goodell also ordered the team to give up its first-round draft choice next year if it reaches the playoffs this season, or its second- and third-round picks if it misses the postseason.”

The article went on to note that this fine represented about 14% of Belichick’s salary stating: “This episode represents a calculated and deliberate attempt to avoid long-standing rules designed to encourage fair play and promote honest competition on the playing field.”

Belichick apologized and called it “a mistake” adding “We have never used sideline video to obtain a competitive advantage while the game was in progress.”  He didn’t mention how it was used in preparing for the game.

The outlook wasn’t brilliant for the New England eleven that day:

The score stood fourteen  to thirteen, with little time to play.

And then when the enemy used the clock to help their game,

A pall-like silence fell upon the patrons of the game.

A straggling few got up to go in deep despair, and the rest

Clung to the hope which springs eternal in the human breast;

They thought. “If only Brady could but get his hands upon the ball

We’d put up even money now, that the team would stand tall.”

But the Titans had the ball and their coach Mike Vrabel knew the tricks

And all watched in anger as he took penalties letting the clock tick

So upon the stricken multitude grim melancholy set in,

For there seemed but little chance of Brady getting in again.

But New England’s coach Belechick was a master at time-outs,

He’d done it so many times that few had any doubts

He’d manipulate those stoppages in such a clever way

That when he got the ball there’d be plenty of time to play.

A local Boston columnists who makes his money by belittling Hispanics and government workers to his white red-neck audience spends time at the Trump resort in Mar a Largo trying to get a pat on the head from Trump. The irony of the whole matter is this columnist lives large and attacks those who live like he does while his audience lives the lives of begrudging grumblers who believe he is one of them.

It so happened he was there at the time Trump ordered the U.S. military to kill the Iranian General Soleimani. When he first saw Trump about “9 o’clock,” on “a warm idyllic evening in south Florida” he described him as “cool, calm and collected..”

Trump called him over but the columnist said he mentioned that just “to show how uneventful the evening seemed . . . .”  He went on to say: “If the president was anxious or nervous about the strike he’d just ordered, he was surely hiding it well.”

This was written as a paean to Trump with the implication that  after having ordered this killing we should admire him because in effect he seemed to not have the least concern about it.

Happy New Year as we start off with an unprecedented assassination of a  foreign national leader from a country who we are not at war with.  The rationale being that General Soleimani was a bad person,  to quote Trump, “Soleimani was responsible for numerous deaths, including of thousands of Americans, . . .”  He then added” “He was directly and indirectly responsible for the death of millions of people, including the recent large number …. of PROTESTERS killed in Iran itself.”

Plus, as put out by the Defense Department, “General Soleimani was actively developing plans to attack American diplomats and service members in Iraq and throughout the region.”

Logic would suggest that if true General Soleimani had been doing this for a long time. He would probably have been involved as far back as 2003  when Bush invaded Iraq. The question then is why after 17 years it was now time to assassinate him?

It is not that Trump just gained his office and learned this. He sat on it for three years himself without doing anything. Then why did he do it now since what Soleimani was doing was nothing different from he had been doing throughout those three years.

Raise your hands if you agree with Senator Kennedy that it very well might have been Ukraine that interfered with the 2016 presidential election on behalf of Hillary Clinton and not Russia on behalf of Trump.

Raise your hands if you think it was the Deep State the made up the facts the Russia interfered in the 2016 election and by Deep State I mean all our intelligence agencies who agree that it happened.

Raise your hands if you agree with Senator Kennedy that even though there is no evidence that Ukraine interfered in the election there might be some evidence that it did.

Raise your  hands if you believe that even though there is no evidence that the Moon is made of Cheddar cheese there may be evidence that it is.

Raise your hands if you believe the interference by Trump in the military justice system on behalf of a Navy Seal who was turned in by his fellow sailors because of his actions against civilians and who posed with a dead body of a slain man was in the interests of the nation.

It’s clear Trump withheld aid to Ukraine. It was aid in the amount of $400 million that had been appropriated by Congress that had already determined that Ukraine had been meeting its obligations to receive the aid. Part of its obligation was to act against the Soviet legacy corruption that had grabbed Ukraine by the neck and was strangling it.

It’s clear that the Ukraine had a Maidan Revolution. The second revolution in ten years. The first was the Orange Revolution. These were an attempt by the people of Ukraine to root out the corrupt leaders that were working more in line with Russia than the Ukrainian people.

The Maidan Revolution was in 2014 against Victor Yanukovich who had rejected the people’s desire that Ukraine unite more closely with the West and away from Russia. Because Yanukovich was a Putin ally he tried to pull Ukraine into the Russian orbit. During the mostly peaceful revolution Yanukovich stationed snipers on buildings who fired at the unarmed protesters. He was forced to flee the county. He headed for Russia where he was welcome with billions of Ukrainian money.

I saw it early on after Trump announced his candidacy. He never did any public service for the country.  I felt that not having thought of the nation all his life rather than himself, he would be unable to appreciate what it meant to work for the benefit of others.

He easily confirmed my feelings early on. He attacked John McCain because he was a prisoner of war. Trump said McCain was no hero: “I like people that weren’t captured.” This from a man who faked a disability to avoid serving. Who would find comfort knowing that this person Trump did not like those people who fought in combat who ended up  missing or were captured or are dead. He could not like them and had no empathy for  people who wore the uniform because they did what he didn’t do. His MO was to resort to belittling others who had more courage than he did.

It isn’t only the people who wore the uniform but also people who worked in government. That is shown by his shabby treatment of Marie Yavanovich who worked for 33 years in the State Department. This woman whose family fled the Soviets and Nazis to come to America for its freedom, an immigrant so many Trump supporters are conditioned to hate, joined the State Department to show her appreciation for what America did for her.

I received a comment that sets out the full GOP/Trump defense. I examine it

1. Your error in logic is this: Because X occurs AFTER fact Y, does not mean it occurred because of fact Y. After Trump’s phone call with the New Ukrainian President (read the TRANSCRIPT) aid continued to be withheld for several weeks. (Late July to early September.) A better explanation is that Trump temporarily withheld aid until he was assured the New President would spend it well and was sincere about addressing corruption.

Reply: We haven’t seen the full transcript, it has been hidden in a secret place. Trump’s phone call mentioned nothing about corruption. The aid was resumed after the whistleblower came out with the complaint and the news became public. Nothing changed in Ukraine to assure the president of anything other than Russia continuing its aggression.

2. You write that all countries have corruption. Yes, to lesser or greater extents, but I’ve read that Ukraine leads the list (is “one of the top three most corrupt receiving U.S. aid”). Trump ran on a promise not to waste US dollars on corrupt governments.