To mute or not to mute a loud leader

           Of course it's news.

Not that my wife wants any part of it. Ever since the electoral victory of Donald Trump, whatever he has to say, she will hear nothing of it.

The mere fact that I just used his name means she will decline to review this commentary.

In our house, any televised mention of His Loudness brings silence, thanks to a 20^th century invention even greater than Trump believes himself to be: the mute.

As exercised by Republicans for the last eight years, muting the president is every American's prerogative.

On the other side of the spectrum, however, are the nation's news gatherers. As news media they feel an obligation to report what a president says. This is a problem in the Time of Trump.

The New York Times recently ruminated on the newsroom dilemma of whether or not every tweet from Trump is news.

"How to cover a president's pronouncements when they are both provocative and maddeningly vague?" ask media writers Michael Grynbaum and Sydney Ember.

"Does an early-morning tweet amount to a planned shift in American policy? Should news outlets, as some readers argue, ignore clearly untrue tweets, rather than amplify falsehoods further?"

A really good question -- to which no good answer exists.

One can understand where the Times is coming from. But my wife has a great point as well. Why pay attention to him at all? For one thing, when can we know that the man actually means what he emotes, or knows anything at all about what he's emoting about?

This is a man who, in the phrasing of Sen. Jeff Merkley, D-Ore., "has the maturity of a 5-year-old."

That's harsh. More appropriate is that Trump on Twitter is Uncle Mort when he gets in the schnapps.

Take Trump's tweet that the United States "must greatly strengthen and expand its nuclear capability." That's news, duly reported by the nation's press, dutifully then quoting nuclear experts' words of disbelief. Since Reagan, U.S. policy has been to tamp down nuclear ambitions while maintaining a sufficient deterrent.

Six-thousand nuclear-tipped missiles, give or take 70: That's what we have at the ready to destroy living things. President after president has agreed that's a sufficient deterrent to any threat ever conceived by man.

And, no, Trump wasn't tweeting about modernization. He was tweeting about more nukes, a trillion dollars' worth.

So, no, we cannot ignore this. Then again, are we to jerk to attention every time the man flexes wrist cartilage?

A deeper, more serious problem is inherent in Trump thus far as relates to a free press and consumers of information.

Last week he canceled what was to be his first press conference since the election. His handlers say stay tuned: maybe January. Already, Trump has taken longer to hold a press conference than any president-elect in half a century.

This is curious (a word quickly losing utility). Trump, a man with so much to say to us with his dandy digits, criticized Hillary Clinton for going so long on the campaign trail without having a press conference.

And now? As he enters the presidency, Trump is job-shadowing Richard Nixon, whose "Rose Garden strategy" kept the press at arm's length as he used televised events to speak directly to the public. Trump's means of circumventing inquiry: to have all pronouncements Twittervised.

Interestingly, a key adviser behind Nixon's approach was an obscure TV news producer who would rise to run Fox News: Roger Ailes.

(Yes, that's the same Roger Ailes who recently lost his job at Fox because of sexual harassment. Who knew Rupert Murdoch held employees to higher standards than the American electorate?)

Back to the matter of whether or not to react to every tweet and twitch of a man whose Android should be registered with the local sheriff:

One could ignore -- until one could ignore no more.

Longtime newspaperman John Young lives in Colorado. Email: jyoungcolumn@gmail.com.

Taking office without a clue, and defiantly so

Let's say you are president.

Make that president-elect. Let's say you've had many grueling months of a brutal and bitter campaign, racking up time zones on your personal plane, putting your global business empire on the back burner -- a must-do to make the country your empire. What to do in preparation?

This president-elect thing is good duty. Let's say you entertain a whole bunch of mightys and powerfuls – Mitt Romney! Kanye West! Before all that inauguration stuff happens, it's a great opportunity to decide if you want the job.

One of the amazing things about being president-elect: You get a chance to find out how things work – governing stuff.

Pentagon stuff. National security stuff.

So, you're president-elect, and CIA experts have prepared intricate daily briefings for you. Heck, they'll come right to your Manhattan office tower if you want and tell you everything they know.

Would you say, "Heck, yes. Bring that on. This should be juicy."

Or would you say, "I'm, like very smart, and I don't need that stuff."

Which would you say?

Let's just say you said, "Heck, yes, tell me everything" and the CIA told you everything it knew, or at least suspected. It is designed to be the nation's eyes and ears overseas, after all.

What would you like to know about, with the national security mechanism of the world's mightiest nation at your beck and call?

What about this weird-sounding place in Syria, this Aleppo thing? Bad things coming down there, says Twitter.

Let's say you've always admired Syria's Bashar al-Assad, as he's pals with another guy you think "es muy macho," Vlad Putin. Would you like to know how efficiently Assad's troops are tamping down dissatisfaction in Aleppo? Hugely efficient, Twitter says.

Whatever. It would be fascinating to know what the CIA knows about how efficient Assad's being.

Then there's this hacking thing, this thing about Russia trying to influence the election you just won -- not only about hacking into your opponent's communications but actually trying to hack into state elections systems.

It's just an allegation. Putin would never do it, you know. But it would be fascinating to know what the CIA suspects. Wouldn't you'd think?

Let's say you were too busy running for president than to read what Time magazine reported in September, that the Arizona secretary of state went so far as to shut down the state's entire voter base to install security measures after an attempted hack by a Russian group called Fancy Bear.

Even if you thought Putin was a great guy, would you want to hear from these CIA dudes why they think Putin participated directly in hacking attempts to benefit your campaign?

It's one thing to hear it from the corrupt, scum-sucking media. Wouldn't you want to hear it from the people with some authority? Heck, the CIA might say this has been misreported. Then you could tweet some more about the lying New York Times and Washington Post.

Really, get all the good stuff and then reveal all those media lies.

Even if you didn't want to do that, wouldn't you want to have the available skinny?

I know: As some in your family have been telling you, in a lot of ways the presidency would be a step down from what you've been doing. The White House is squat and old. Its only views are of glowering Lincoln and that obstructive Washington Monument. Plus, Washington is a traffic nightmare.

But just from an information standpoint, from a knowing standpoint, what a trip. This presidency thing is fascinating, it you decide to take it.

Longtime newspaperman John Young lives in Colorado. Email: jyoungcolumn@gmail.com.

From Obama's EPA to Trump's PPA (redux)

(Dear johnyoungcolumn readers: A change is required to the most recent submission, as the pick it mentioned for Trump's Interior secretary was premature. Rest assured -- or rest uneasily, as it were -- the actual choice "fits" the theme of the original column. Read on.)

Kathleen Stama sounded like the cat that had just dined on filet de canary.

She told the Denver Post that Oklahoma Attorney General Scott Pruitt is a great choice to run the EPA, as he understands that "centralized government is not the best way to protect the environment."

Stama is all about protecting the environment. Except when she is spokesperson for the Western Energy Alliance, which is all about drilling for oil and mining coal.

In office, Scott Pruitt has been just as willing a servant of industry, and just as concerned about the environment. He's fought the EPA at every turn, in fact.

Sure, local control is the best way to protect the environment. After all, every state is apportioned its own air, right? When every state does what's best for the air, then all states will have clean air, right?

Right.

In other words, rename the agency Stama, and President-elect Trump, envision. What once was the EPA would be the PPA – Polluter Protection Administration.

This is what Americans have been clamoring for. Just see the numbers in the Pew Research Center's poll about environmental protection: 74 percent say that industry should get cart blanche in the face of an oppressive federal government.

Oh, wait; like President-elect Trump is prone to do, I misread those numbers.

Actually, Pew found that 74 percent of Americans say "the country should do whatever it takes to protect the environment," while 23 percent say "the government has gone too far in its effort to protect the environment."

Maybe the energy industry mouthpiece is genuine in saying the Trump-Pruitt approach is about protecting the environment better. But Jason McFarland is all about drilling.

McFarland, president of the International Association of Drilling Contractors, told the Post that the Pruitt choice shows the "clear focus" of the Trump administration would be oil and gas development.

But what about environmental protection? At least one of those words will be expunged from Pruitt's agency, apparently.

Let's acknowledge that one toady for industry (Pruitt) running the what has been our environmental watchdog cannot single-handedly turn around an industry that has been so flush with success that this year the United States became an exporter of oil for the first time in decades.

(As voracious and well-heeled as the oil industry is, this is a little like the NBA changing the rules so that the Golden State Warriors can hit a few more threes.)

Again, Pruitt cannot do it alone. So Trump has chosen Montana Congressman Ryan Zinke, another who has called climate change "a hoax," to be interior secretary. Trust him to support increased drilling and mining on federal lands.

We can be certain that a subtext of such management of public lands will be the inclination, not just to drill it, but to sell it to Trump wannabes.

They can make their purchases, lay scenic natural assets to waste, declare bankruptcy and run for president someday.

Now, this sounds really bad for the environment – not just here and there – but everywhere.

Trump is bent on making a bum's rush past the science of climate change so that moneyed interests that don't need any help can get it anyway.

Pruitt's Oklahoma, by the way, was having two fracking-related earthquakes per day until the state eased off on the accelerator in the deep disposal of waste water. That may seem prudent, but it took seven years for Oklahoma to do anything about this trend.

Rest assured, under a Trump administration, the PPA will wait at least that long to do anything that will slow industry's roll.

Elections have consequences. To all you '"Vote for nobody" types who thought this was a game, Trump agrees with you. He intends to have a high time at it.

Longtime newspaperman John Young lives in Colorado. Email: jyoungcolumn@gmail.com.

From Obama's EPA to Trump's PPA

Kathleen Stama sounded like the cat that had just dined on filet de canary.

She told the Denver Post that Oklahoma Attorney General Scott Pruitt is a great choice to run the EPA, as he understands that "centralized government is not the best way to protect the environment."

Stama is all about protecting the environment. Except when she is spokesperson for the Western Energy Alliance, which is all about drilling for oil and mining coal.

In office, Scott Pruitt has been just as willing a servant of industry, and just as concerned about the environment. He's fought the EPA at every turn, in fact.

Sure, local control is the best way to protect the environment. After all, every state is apportioned its own air, right? When every state does what's best for the air, then all states will have clean air, right?

Right.

In other words, rename the agency Stama, and President-elect Trump, envision. What once was the EPA would be the PPA – Polluter Protection Administration.

This is what Americans have been clamoring for. Just see the numbers in the Pew Research Center's poll about environmental protection: 74 percent say that industry should get cart blanche in the face of an oppressive federal government.

Oh, wait; like President-elect Trump is prone to do, I misread those numbers.

Actually, Pew found that 74 percent of Americans say "the country should do whatever it takes to protect the environment," while 23 percent say "the government has gone too far in its effort to protect the environment."

Maybe the energy industry mouthpiece is genuine in saying the Trump-Pruitt approach is about protecting the environment better. But Jason McFarland is all about drilling.

McFarland, president of the International Association of Drilling Contractors, told the Post that the Pruitt choice shows the "clear focus" of the Trump administration would be oil and gas development.

But what about environmental protection? At least one of those words will be expunged from Pruitt's agency, apparently.

Let's acknowledge that one toady for industry (Pruitt) running the what has been our environmental watchdog cannot single-handedly turn around an industry that has been so flush with success that this year the United States became an exporter of oil for the first time in decades.

(As voracious and well-heeled as the oil industry is, this is a little like the NBA changing the rules so that the Golden State Warriors can hit a few more threes.)

Again, Pruitt cannot do it alone. So Trump has chosen Montana Congressman Ryan Zinke, another who has called climate change “a hoax,” to be interior secretary. Trust him to support increased drilling and mining on federal lands.

We can be certain that a subtext of such management of public lands will be the inclination, not just to drill it, but to sell it to Trump wannabes.

They can make their purchases, lay scenic natural assets to waste, declare bankruptcy and run for president someday.

Now, this sounds really bad for the environment – not just here and there – but everywhere.

Trump is bent on making a bum's rush past the science of climate change so that moneyed interests that don't need any help can get it anyway.

Pruitt's Oklahoma, by the way, was having two fracking-related earthquakes per day until the state eased off on the accelerator in the deep disposal of waste water. That may seem prudent, but it took seven years for Oklahoma to do anything about this trend.

Rest assured, under a Trump administration, the PPA will wait at least that long to do anything that will slow industry's roll.

Elections have consequences. To all you '"Vote for nobody" types who thought this was a game, Trump agrees with you. He intends to have a high time at it.

Longtime newspaperman John Young lives in Colorado. Email: jyoungcolumn@gmail.com.

Flotsam from the Trump thought stream

The early projection: Donald Trump is the end of satire.

Not that as president he would ban it, although in his fantasies he shuts down "Saturday Night Live." It's that based on his early proclivities, Trump is beyond lampooning.

Whatever scene a humorist might conjure, he lives it. He is his own work of fiction.

Presidential? Oh my; with smart phone in hand, he is a running joke. Consider the laughable data he mined from a sophomoric web site to assert that Hillary Clinton's 2.3 million-vote plurality comes from illegal votes.

Granted, the man may turn out to be FDR. Based on his material, however, as of now Trump is Kanye West without rhythm.

So is this what we face: Late at night, when Trump should be doing something constructive on behalf of the republic, he paces his quarters, armpits ablaze, sleeveless like Brando on stage, rat-tat-tatting out dubious mind-blorts into the wee Twitter hours.

With fake news and a never-ending stream of bad information, with fact-checkers hospitalized for exhaustion, President Trump finally may answer the question, "Can anyone break the Internet?

Just another night: Trump tweets his thoughts about flag-burning. Flag-burners should be jailed and their citizenship revoked, he says. 

The Supreme Court ruled in 1989 that flag-burning is protected symbolic speech. (Arson is a crime; inciting a riot is a crime; theft is a crime. Symbolism is not a crime.) Not only that, but the court elevated such an act above free-speech quandaries like obscenity, for one reason alone: Flag desecration is a commentary on the government.

The proposition that a nation based on freedom of thought would dictate how people could comport themselves around a government symbol should repel anyone who embraces American principles.

The type of authoritarian patriotism Trump craves was embraced by India's highest court recently when it ordered movie theaters to play the national anthem before each show, with the audience required to stand. 

More on inconvenient speech: In the campaign, Trump said that as president he would "open up the libel laws" to allow public figures to sue the press. So doing, Trump showed that he didn't have a clue about press law or what his threat would mean.

In the landmark New York Times vs. Sullivan ruling of 1964, the Supreme Court told people like Trump who seek to run the country, or a state, or a city, or a school district, that the bar would be set purposefully high for defamation claims. The low bar that existed before the Sullivan ruling chilled discussions of public policy.

Oh, in case Trump also doesn't know about the court's ruling in Hustler Magazine vs. Falwell (1988), he also can't sue for being spoofed. Opinion is protected speech.

           So much to learn about the Constitution, Mr. President.

The New York Times ruminated the other day on the dilemma of treating every tweet from Trump as news. This is more than a media problem. For a president-elect to use social media as a nightstand scratch pad is childish and dangerous.

How about an Etch-a-Sketch, Mr. Trump? It can be erased.

Here's wishing that at some point the president-elect realizes it's in the interests of the nation to give more than a moment's thought to the sharing whatever notion crosses his mind.

Right now, undoubtedly, seasoned aides offer reassurance about all the legal and ethical vagaries:

"Your elitist, know-it-all critics assert that at every turn you are giving out bad information. No problem, Sir. The nifty thing about this First Amendment is that it protects even that."

Longtime newspaperman John Young lives in Colorado. Email: jyoungcolumn@gmail.com.