Trump's Day of infamy.

My first blog story in 2025 is about Donald Trump. Not a pleasant subject I know but Trump has now admitted on the floor of the Congress that he has been colluding with Russian dictator, Vadimir Putin,  over the fate of battered and besieged Ukraine. 

What happened when President Trump, the  person we all thought was the leader of the free and democratic world, announced that he was in collusion with Russia. All of the Republican representatives in the Congress rose to their feet and gave him an ecstatic, standing ovation. 

Around the world people gasped in horror at what was unfolding on their television screens. A United States President and a Russian dictator colluding to plunder the resource rich, second largest country in Europe.

In February 2024, eight months before the 2024 presidential election, I wrote a blog identifying Donald Trump as Putin,s puppet in the Whitehouse. Meet Donald Trump...Putin's candidate for the presidency Now, 43 days after his inauguration, Donald Trump has admitted it. He has cut off all aid to Ukraine, including vital intelligence information which could warn Ukraine of Russian troop movements near its borders. Given this American act of bastardry against Ukraine, which other country in the free world can ever have any faith in any pledge for protection From US President Trump.

In the dark days following the surprise attack by Japanese aircraft on Pearl Harbour on  December 7th, 1941  another US President stood and spoke in the Congress. Franklin Delano Roosevelt, a great leader of his people, urged Americans to rise up and fight the evil aggressor. He said that December 7, 1941 would forever be a "A day of Infamy."  In years to come  History will judge Trump's admission that he  colluded with Russia to carve up The Ukraine will also be called a day of American infamy.

Western leaders have roundly criticised Trump for his betrayal of Ukraine. No one said it better than the  hero of Polish Solidarity against Communist brutality,  the Former President of Poland, Lech Walesa  who wrote the following letter to Trump

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Your Excellency, Mr. President,

We watched the report of your conversation with the President of Ukraine, Volodymyr Zelensky, with fear and distaste. We find it insulting that you expect Ukraine to show respect and gratitude for the material assistance provided by the United States in its fight against Russia. Gratitude is owed to the heroic Ukrainian soldiers who shed their blood in defense of the values of the free world. They have been dying on the front lines for more than 11 years in the name of these values and the independence of their homeland, which was attacked by Putin’s Russia.

We do not understand how the leader of a country that symbolizes the free world cannot recognize this.

Our alarm was also heightened by the atmosphere in the Oval Office during this conversation, which reminded us of the interrogations we endured at the hands of the Security Services and the debates in Communist courts. Prosecutors and judges, acting on behalf of the all-powerful communist political police, would explain to us that they held all the power while we held none. They demanded that we cease our activities, arguing that thousands of innocent people suffered because of us. They stripped us of our freedoms and civil rights because we refused to cooperate with the government or express gratitude for our oppression. We are shocked that President Volodymyr Zelensky was treated in the same manner.

The history of the 20th century shows that whenever the United States sought to distance itself from democratic values and its European allies, it ultimately became a threat to itself. President Woodrow Wilson understood this when he decided in 1917 that the United States must join World War I. President Franklin Delano Roosevelt understood this when, after the attack on Pearl Harbor in December 1941, he resolved that the war to defend America must be fought not only in the Pacific but also in Europe, in alliance with the nations under attack by the Third Reich.

We remember that without President Ronald Reagan and America’s financial commitment, the collapse of the Soviet empire would not have been possible. President Reagan recognized that millions of enslaved people suffered in Soviet russia and the countries it had subjugated, including thousands of political prisoners who paid for their defense of democratic values with their freedom. His greatness lay, among other things, in his unwavering decision to call the USSR an “Empire of Evil” and to fight it decisively. We won, and today, the statue of President Ronald Reagan stands in Warsaw, facing the U.S. Embassy.

Mr. President, material aid—military and financial—can never be equated with the blood shed in the name of Ukraine’s independence and the freedom of Europe and the entire free world. Human life is priceless; its value cannot be measured in money. Gratitude is due to those who sacrifice their blood and their freedom. This is self-evident to us, the people of Solidarity, former political prisoners of the communist regime under Soviet Russia.

We call on the United States to uphold the guarantees made alongside Great Britain in the 1994 Budapest Memorandum, which established a direct obligation to defend Ukraine’s territorial integrity in exchange for its relinquishment of nuclear weapons. These guarantees are unconditional—there is no mention of treating such assistance as an economic transaction.

Signed,

Lech Wałęsa, former political prisoner, President of Poland.

 

 Why is Donald Trump acting like Putin's puppet in the Whitehouse?                                                Well there are many theories.The most salacious one is concerns Donald Trump and the Miss World Pageant in Moscow. Trump was in hotel with a bevy of beautiful women...well, young girls.  Many believe, but cannot prove, that ex-KBG heavyweight,  Vladimir Putin, bugged  Trump's hotel and harvested a portfolio of eye watering salacious video and audio tapes.

The other theory is that Putin bailed Trump out of bankruptcy in the 1990s. At the time Trump had experienced several bankruptcies and no banks would lend him money. However several Russian oligarchs, rich from the spoils of the collapsed Soviet regime, purchased real estate off trump at quite inflated prices.rubles, offered Trump  a great deal of money at very favourable terms. Deutsche Bank continued to give Trump favourable deals and guarantees.                                                                             Now, although these financial deals are well known, there is absolutely no evidence to tie Vladimir Putin to any of them. Except that Putin is the supreme ruler of Russia and nothing happens in Russia unless Putin is in favour of it. As a KGB man he is skilled in not leaving any trace of himself anywhere near the scene of the crime.

Whatever the truth is, Trump has been publicly friendly with Putin on every occasion that they have appeared at international heads of state meetings. If Putin accepts Trump's invitation to the Whitehouse you can bet your life that he will not be set upon, badgered and harrassed on an intenational TV set-up like Zelensky.

With Trump now batting for Russia,  western democracies need to rethink their international strategies. Obviously, anything they say in private to Trump could be forwarded to Putin. 

Countries that share intelligence with the USA will have to carefully rethink their agreements.Could that intelligence be headed to the Kremlin?

Trump's Day of Infamy has made him an untrustworthy pariah to all of America's former close allies...including Australia!

A Shearer's Tale.

 

ARNIE Y

IE YA A Shearer’s Tale

Arnie scooped up the last of the leaves from the pool. He walked across the yard  and placed the scoop against the small  shed. He was followed by Lambchop, the pet sheep. Arnie had acquired Lambchop about ten years ago, the same time that he and Ella had started acquiring grandchildren.           

The backyard pool was also acquired to entertain his two daughters and their families, which now extended to six grandchildren. Lambchop was a firm favourite with the grandies. Lambchop was also very good at keeping the grass in check around the pool which was in a fenced off area in the end bottom third of the  half acre block.

Arnie was 84 years old. He used to be a shearer. A very good shearer. His father was a shearer as were his three brothers. When Arnie left school, he naturally became a shearer, too. Arnie worked in shearing sheds throughout Western Australia.He even gave demonstration shearing exhibitions at the Perth Royal show. He and his three brothers were almost of legend status in the Western Australian shearing industry.

When he was fifty-nine, Arnie’s back and right wrist told him it was time to give the shearing game away. Within a few weeks he was working for the shire as the groundsman for the local bowling and tennis club. He really  enjoyed that work and was given a big send-off by the bowlers and tennis players, and the local councillors, when he decided fifteen years later that working five full days a week at age 76 was a bit too much.

A few weeks later Arnie and Ella picked up what he called a ‘dream “ job. They worked for the local abattoir, washing the workers blood-stained  clothes in industrial washing and drying machines and then using a pressure hose to clean the entire work area. They used to start at four o’clock in the afternoon and be finished by 6-00PM. Before they headed home, they folded the clean dry clothes laid out clean work clothes to be used the next day.

When he walked into the kitchen, Ella said, “Hello, Love. I’ve just put the kettle on.” Arnie picked up his copy of the morning paper and sat in his lounge chair waiting for the tea to arrive. He was halfway through reading the paper when the telephone rang in the kitchen . Ella called out, “Arnie, it’s Joy, from next door. She wants to talk to you.”

Joy told Arnie that a young fellow was shearing sheep in the next street. In South Guildford quite a few residents had sheep to keep the grass under control in their large blocks.

“Yes, Arne,’ said Joy, “he’s got his utility with shearing gear rigged up. When I saw him about twenty minutes ago, he had three customers lined up. I think he shears the sheep for nothing if he can keep the fleece. I thought you might want to take Lambchop along.”

When Arnie first got Lambchop he used to shear him once a year with hand shears. However, his aching right wrist made that an increasingly painful job. So, Arnie placed a rope around Lambnchops neck and off they set to walk the hundred and fifty meters or so to meet the enterprising young shearer.

As Arnie rounded the corner, he saw the shearer and his ute. He was shearing a sheep while two ladies stood nearby with their woolly pets. Arnie joined the queue. He watched the young fellow as he went about his job and his mind wandered back to his days on the boards and of the thousands and thousands of sheep he had shorn. He even remembered being at the Royal Show doing exhibitions shearing back in the fifties.

When it was Lambchops turn to be shorn Arnie said, “Hey, young fellah. I’ve been watching you shearing these sheep. Could I have a go at shearing my own sheep”

The young bloke looked at Arnie and looked at Lambchop. “ Ah. Erm. I dunno! Do you reckon you can handle it? It’s not as easy as it looks.”

“Well,” said Arnie, “what if I start off. If  I’m no good you can always stop me and take over.”

“Yair, I suppose that’ll be OK,” was his dubious reply.

Arnie took hold of the shears. He quickly pulled Lambchop between his legs and began sweeping long blows that had the fleece peeling off like the skin off a banana. In just under two minutes Lambchop was well and truly fleeced and Arnie was handing the shearing piece back to the young shearer.

“Hey, Mate!”, he exclaimed, “You’re really good. D’yuh wanna a job?”

Arnie placed  the rope over lambchop's neck. As he walked away, he smiled and said, “No, thanks, Mate.  I’ve already got a job.”

 

 

 

Putting on the SIDE.

 

“What’s in a name?

That which we call a rose, by any other name would smell as sweet.”

Well, that was William Shakespeare’s opinion and it is true, a rose would smell as sweet no matter what we called it.

But what if we called roses, “Snottygobbles”?

Would my wife, the love of my life, feel delicious shivers to the core of her being if I sent her one dozen yellow snottygobbles? I think not. They may smell as sweet, but I will not expect her to rush to the phone to brag to her friends about it. So, despite Shakespeare’s poetic observations, names are important.

Big business spends big dollars paying marketing experts to devise catchy names and phrases for their products. Film stars, models and other public figures change their names to give themselves a more acceptable public persona. Let’s face it, nobody cared much for a lanky fellow called Marion Morrison until his name was changed and he became an American film star folk hero known as John Wayne. Bernard Schwartz was just a cheeky kid in the Bronx. He became a sex symbol of the 1950s and 60s as film star, tony Curtis. And Reginald Dwight didn’t get half as much fan male as he does now as Elton John.

Adolf Hitler’s father was an illegitimate child who took his mother’s maiden name, Huttler, which later transformed into Hitler. Adolph's father was actually sired by a man named Schiklegruber. So, if Adolf's  father had not been an illegitimate bastard, young Adolf (who we all know was an absolute bastard) would have been called Schicklegruber, too.

Political scientists are still arguing whether the German people would have marched off to war on a frenzied wave of Nationalism, shouting out, “Heil Schicklegruber” whenever their Fuhrer appeared. Maybe they would have just all fallen about laughing at him and World War 2 would never have happened.

Names are important, which is why it is a shame that whenever the Director-General of Education in Western Australia, or any other Department of Education Directors want to broadcast policy directions and planning initiatives they do so by using a teleconference video link from the School of Isolated and Distance Education. That’s S.I.D.E. for short. So,  official pronouncements from the very top could be said to be a SIDE SHOW!

Now, I am quite proud of education in Western Australia. I think it compares with the best in the world and we do so over a vast area. When our leaders tell us important policies via video link it is a very important event.

 It should not be a side show. What can we do about it? What can we do about S.I.D.E? Well, we could try to form a different acronym and switch the letter around a little bit.

Isolated and Distance Education is I.D.E.S. Considering what happened to a great Roman leader on the Ides of March, I doubt any DoE leaders would want to be associated with I.D.E.S. Distance and Isolated Education is D.I.E.S. Obviously and acronym much too terminal for advanced educational thinkers with dynamic policies.

The only real solution, Shakespeare not withstanding, is to change the name of S.I.D.E. completely. Trust me. It will still smell as sweet.

May I suggest that S.I.D.E. becomes the Technological Educational Regional Resources Institute For Improved Curriculum. That’s T.E.R.R.I.F.I.C for short.

Then, when the Director General of other Directors have a teleconference it won't be a SIDE Show it will be a TERRIFIC show.

Or as Shakespeare once almost said,                                                                                                           "What’s this video link Biz?                                                                                                                    That, which in the D-G shows,                                                                                                                      With a better name, how sweet it is?”

PS. I wrote this story in 2000, nearly a quarter of a century ago. I realise that video links may now be a thing of the distant and isolated past.                                                                                                            The story was published in WORDS, the quarterly magazine of the WA Primary Principal's Association, in  the August 2000 edition.                                                                                                      Recently, I heard that there is now a growing desire within SIDE to change its name.

What a TERRIFIC idea.