Trump Sticks It to the Poor Again

Over the past two days information about Trump’s new federal budget have been trickling out.  What we know is that he is boosting the military but cutting budgets for the State Department and foreign aid.  On the domestic front, now you have to wait 600 days to get approved if you are an applicant for Social Security disability.  Medicare and Medic-aid have been slashed.  This whole infrastructure talk is bogus.  Trump has talked about a 1.7 trillion allocation for infrastructure over the next several years but that means only 300 Billion are out of federal money and the other four fifths or more of the money has to be provided by the states, most of which appear to be broke despite a roaring economy.  I don’t know how that happens.  And also other services are being slashed such as energy assistance for heating and such in the cold weather back east, and also public housing and also food stamps.  Apparently they want to choke food stamps to death with countless new restrictions.  Norman Goldman and Bill Press were both talking about this on their programs.  Some say that when the general population is aware of these vast cuts in domestic spending they’ll vote democratic in the fall.  We can only hope but it hasn’t worked so far.  Basically all of these sacrifices of the poor go to the tax cuts we got in December for the millionaires and billionaires.  It doesn’t matter what promises Trump made to the voters in 2016, we all know the truth.  As I have said before, the only promises President Trump has actually kept are the ones he made personally to Shawn Hannity. 

Yesterday it dawned on me that we don't have "Johnny Can't Read" by Don Hendley on any of our rock compilations.  This situation may change soon.  It all depends on Management.  

My mom is fading fast as the following paragraph illustrates. 

Paul called at five to twelve saying he’d be over in ten minutes.  He arrived at twenty after.  The place is off Brookhurst just past the railroad track.  Once again Mom was sleeping and it took time to wake her.  But she seemed unable to say very much and it was disconcerting.  We learn that she has general weakness on her left side perhaps due to a stroke.  Perhaps this is why she fell in the first place.  Her left eye was droopy and a care giver remarked that the whole side of her face was droopy and she had little use in her left arm and hand.  The place was in the eighties when we arrived and the TV was on.  Paul opened the patio door.  We turned the TV off.  I asked Mom whether she watched much TV and she shook her head no.  She complained of pain in her stomach.  Paul did her nails remarking on how dirty they were.  There were two aids in the room and one of them had really big eyes.  Both were fairly young.  UTI stands for urinary tract infection, which they feared Mom might develop.  One of them explained that sometimes it makes more sense to put patients in diapers rather than risk their falling being taken to the bathroom.  The two aids stressed that they are the caring type and will not leave a dying patient to vegetate in isolation.  I hope it hasn’t come to that yet.  The first thing I noticed when I entered the room was that there was an oxygen tank in the room and it was on and making a noise.  The aids believed Mom should be on oxygen all the time and not just when her number dipped really low.  But prior to this day Mom never needed oxygen at all.  Her blood pressure was high at 148 over 110, which is definitely high. The bathroom had a shower but no step so it seems the water would just run all over the floor.  I sometimes sensed I wasn’t phrasing things quite tactfully enough.  We were there a little less than two hours and left at twenty after two.  They took Mom to breakfast but she wasn’t eating but only slumped over her chair.  Paul worries that there is a risk of giving her too much pain medication.  Tim and Wendy had lunch with Mom yesterday and she was doing a lot better then.  The only thing is that Tim said she wasn’t talking much.  Paul called Judy twice while we were there.  The second time was out on the patio just before we left.  Paul asked me about the Time magazines but I didn’t want them because they were a month old and I have my own magazines.  There was an empty bed in the room.  Sometimes you’d hear cries of “Help!” down the hall.  We arrived back here just before two thirty.  (The place isn’t far)  I borrowed a cigarette from Larry and five minutes later I borrowed another cigarette from Ron.  I guess I was having a nicotine shortage.