THE LAW

          Is the law an ass as one playwright said? In a family rife with lawyers I hope not, but at times the law needs to be judged itself. Legal does not make it necessarily moral, nor does it confer unlimited powers on any one being or party. That law needs to be ignored or changed. But no one, NO ONE, is above the law. When that happens, we have lost all democracy and descended into the dark waters of dictatorship.
     All people must be held accountable for the job they do - or do not do. They must judge where and when a line can be drawn - I will do that or I will not do the other. Fear and arrogance and dictatorial desires have no place in a democracy and in fact, democracies demand a huge degree of moral courage and backbone. Lose that and once again, we drift ever downwards into the depths of water we should not plumb.
     Henry VIII said, upon his marriage to Jane Seymour, wife number three who gave him  a son, Edward, to succeed him, that he had gone from Hell to Paradise. Well, we have gone the other way, lost in  a world of bizarre statements and actions, of new rules which have no basis in our Constitution and a desire to tear the country down rather than build it up.
     We have a President who is avoiding the law, avoiding doing what he must. He must answer a subpoena, must account for his actions or lack of them. He must realize that our Constitution does not give him the "unfettered" powers he claims. Yes, he is attempting to run the country that way, now claiming to have the power to order - order - companies to buy from other companies that he names. What happened to free enterprise, which he so publicly claims he supports? What has happened to America.
     Trump continues to use the same old lies and the same shouts and the same denials and the same tweets and the same obfuscation of his health, his taxes, his life, and his actions. He thinks that he can fool all the people all the time, but we already know that is not so. He has given the dictators of the world the murderous right to go ahead and kill and maim, as in Duterte telling the human rights people to "go to hell!"
     Giuliani claims they will fight the subpoena, fight Mueller's request and need and right to question Trump. Other presidents have been subpoenaed and he is no exception to the rule of law - our law - not his. He outspends everything on his wasteful trips to Mar a Lago and then claims he works there all day! He does not even work all day in the White House, so whom does he think he is fooling? He claims Mueller has overspent, yet his Mar a Lago trips cost lots more!
     And now he trumpets about the San Diego border wall and I cry for the loss of America, the loss of its soul, for the arrogant presumption of one being the law itself. We have allowed our country to stray far from its inner heart and soul.
     Is the law an ass? Yes, when it has no soul, when it has no heart, when it has no justice and no morality. But we need to return to the pride we once had in being a country which has a good system of justice and a good set of laws, always willing to improve upon it. Now? Damn it!!!!!!