Month: September 2017

Incompetent v. Indifferent

Heart

As we approach 10 days after Hurricane Maria made landfall in Puerto Rico as a major Category 4 storm, the federal response to the suffering of 3.5 million American citizens has been woefully inadequate.

The devastation is almost unimaginable, with the electrical grid gone across the whole island with no prospect of repairs for months to years, and nearly 2 million people without drinking water. During these 10 days, President Trump has spent two weekends at his golf resorts. The Washington Post reports the first weekend, a Lost Weekend, hampered efforts to provide relief for Puerto Rico.

This past week, Trump then blamed relief efforts on the fact that Puerto Rico is an island. “This is an island, surrounded by water. Big water. Ocean water,” Trump said.

This weekend, again from his golf course in New Jersey, Trump lashed out at Puerto Rican officials, particularly the mayor of San Juan, in a series of early morning tweets. Apparently her desperate pleas for help did not come with enough Hail to the Chief.

While some have called Maria Trump’s Katrina, CNN said it is much worse. I am not a fan of trying to refurbish the image of George W. Bush. However, Katrina showed the Bush Administration to not be very good at handling a crisis, but their incompetence did not suggest the level of uncaring we see today.

While the “big water” comment proves Trump is in search of a brain as much as Bush was, it would certainly help now if he at least had a heart. Since the wizard isn’t likely to bestow one on Trump any time soon, in the meantime we can drink a Have A Heart cocktail.

This classic from Dr. Cocktail Ted Haigh’s Vintage Spirits and Forgotten Cocktails book is:

1.5 oz gin

.75 oz Swedish Punsch

.75 oz lime juice

.25 oz grenadine

Cheers!

Flying Too Close to the Sun

Plane

Another of Trump’s best people has resigned from the Administration. This time it was HHS Secretary Tom Price after revelations that he chartered private flights costing taxpayers hundreds of thousands of dollars.

As Rep. Adam Schiff snarked on Twitter, “Tom Price committed the one unpardonable sin in Trump’s world: Being rich, but not rich enough to own his own private jet.”

Actually, Trump had threatened Price’s job in July during the overly political speech to the Boy Scouts, saying that if Price couldn’t get the Obamacare repeal bill passed he’d fire him. This past week saw the latest repeal bill fail. Shot down in flames if you will.

Price’s excessive private plane charters has also brought a great deal of scrutiny to the travel habits of others in the Administration as well, with new discoveries making headlines frequently the past few days. The latest case of misuse of taxpayer dollars being attributed to the Veterans Affairs Secretary earlier today.

Of course, Trump is yet again spending the weekend at one of his golf courses, raising the already astronomical security costs and stretching the Secret Service to dangerously thin levels. The cost of Trump versus Price is like comparing an Air Force One 747 versus a paper airplane, but it just proves Trump remains King of the Grifters.

Since the rest of us won’t even be left with a paper airplane at this rate when Trump is done, may as well have a Paper Plane cocktail as we send Tom Price into the wild blue yonder.

Via Kara Newman’s excellent book Shake. Stir. Sip. the Paper Plane is:

.75 oz Bourbon

.75 oz Aperol

.75 oz Amaro Nonino

.75 oz lemon juice

Shake over ice, strain into a chilled coupe glass.

Cheers!