IN SEARCH OF MARTIAN ORGANICS .

The magnificent Viking 2  lander panorama.
This is one the first images
that I remember seeing on TV .  

Way back in 1976 . I was just 8 years old . The biggest news was that Viking 1&2 landed on Mars , where the first robotic probes ever to land , conduct experiments on another world . It was as big as the Apollo moon landings . I remember reading the National Geographic cover : VIKING 1 ON MARS, (1)>>Getting to Mars still isn’t easy. In the 40 years since the successful Nasa mission, there have been 18 attempts to reach the planet (excluding a joint European Space Agency (ESA)/Russian mission, which is currently en route). US launched the two-part Viking programme in August 1975. Viking 1’s orbiter reached its position on 19 June 1976, and a month later the lander was deployed, successfully reaching the western slope of Chryse Planitia on 20 July. The orbiter operated until 17 August 1980, while the lander operated for over six years. Viking 2 achieved orbit on 7 August 1976, and its lander was deployed on 3 September, reaching Utopia Planitia, on the opposite side of the planet to the Viking 1 lander’s position. The Viking orbiters mapped 97% of the planet’s surface, and its landers and orbiters returned more than 50,000 images. The surface of Mars is currently inhospitable to life as we know it, but there is evidence that the Red Planet once had a climate that could have supported life billions of years ago. For example, features resembling dry riverbeds and minerals that only form in the presence of liquid water have been discovered on the Martian surface.  (2)>>The NASA Viking landers took samples of soil on Mars and tested them for signs of organic carbon. A reinterpretation of the results now suggests the samples did contain organic compounds, but the results were not understood because of the strong oxidation effects of perchlorate, a salt now known to be found in Martian soils. [During their missions, the two Viking landers vaporized Martian dirt and scrutinized the samples for signs of organic - or carbon-based - molecules that could serve as the raw ingredients for life. At the time, all they found were chlorine compounds attributed to contamination, but the new research suggests the Viking probes' heat-treatment may have generated these chlorine compounds from naturally occurring Martian organics, destroying them in the process.?]

Curiosity finds Organics!

Gale Crater as seen by the Curiosity Rover.
An ancient "mud flats" long ago dried up
maybe leaving clues to past
Life.

These are exciting findings, published as twin papers in the journal Science today (June 7). But they aren't proof of life on Mars, or even necessarily strong evidence that there's anything living, or anything that used to be alive, out there. The organic compounds aren't even the first molecules of their kind found on Mars, though they are the oldest.While  NASA always down played [ that they found life]  with any of these Mars announcements , there are certain factors that have  indicate the presense of water on Mars , that something biologic is going on . You have to remember how NASA makes always a  cautious announcement.  The discovery of organic molecules suggests that ancient conditions on Mars may have supported life. We have heard that since the Viking lander days , many "claim" today that Mars had life , was destroyed  in some cataclysmic event . Scientists reported that NASA’s Curiosity rover found large amounts of (3)>>organic molecules in 3.5 billion-year-old rock in an area called Gale Crater. The area on Mars is believed to have once contained a large lake. Now in fact a lake existed in the crater is exciting , that would mean that some residuals could still be there . Back in the 1970s during the Viking landers era , Mars was thought to be a "dead planet" . Things are getting a bit " curious" no pun on the name sake rover that NASA announced that Curiosity also discovered sharp seasonal increases in methane gas in the Martian atmosphere. This could also support the case for life. Ninety-five percent of the methane gas found in Earth’s atmosphere is produced by biological activity. Methane can come from animal and plant life, as well as the environment. So this may not prove "life" , but I must suspect that some kind of "chemistry" is at work on the red planet . So what is mixed up in this soup that produces these results ?  The biologic reaction in the soil chemistry has been inconclusive since Viking , the lated Phoenix lander discovery of  perchlorate chemicals, Perchlorates are reactive chemicals first detected in arctic Martian soil by NASA's Phoenix lander that plopped down on Mars over five years ago in May 2008.It is likely both of NASA's Viking Mars landers in 1976 measured signatures of perchlorates, in the form of chlorinated hydrocarbons. Other U.S. Mars robots — the Sojourner, Spirit and Opportunity — detected elemental chlorine. Moreover, orbital measurements taken by the Mars Odyssey spacecraft show that chlorine is globally distributed.And more recently, NASA's Curiosity rover found perchlorates within Gale Crater, where it landed in August 2012.  If there is water on Mars today it not drinkable for humans , or animal life as we know it , however certain bacteria can thrive in perchlorates .
Remembering Wolf Vishniac--April 22, 1922 – December 10, 1973.

Professor Wolf Vishniac , who would
have found Life on Mars . I was
introduced to him on Sagan's show
"Cosmos" 1979 . We would have
never heard of him with out Carl Sagan's
enthusiasm for Mars.

There was a "chance" that NASA would have found life on Mars a long time ago . NASA has long ago scrubbed the “Wolf trap”, was a life-detection instrument designed by American microbiologist Wolf Vishniac.  Nearly 40 years since Wolf Vishniac's death .Viking mission, which landed on Mars in 1976. Due to budget cuts, it was not included on either lander. The principle of the Wolf trap was to bring martian dust into a tube containing nutrients in liquid form. The instrument would then monitor the state of the liquid; if its pH or cloudiness changed after the martian dust was introduced, this would be an indication of life. One of the members of the EASTEX meeting wondered why no one had devised a remote device to gauge the presence of microbes or organic life, and “challenged the biologists to develop such instrumentation as precursors of instruments to be dropped on the planets to search for indigenous microbiology.” Thus the idea for the “Wolf Trap” was born. According to a history accessible on Solarviews.com, “The very first grant NASA made in the area of biological science was [to Wolf] Vishniac for $4485 to develop ‘a prototype instrument for the remote detection of microorganisms on other planets.’” The website went on describe the objective of the Wolf Trap: “At the heart of the instrument was a growth chamber with an acidity [pH] detector and light sensor; the former would sense the changes in acidity that almost inevitably accompany the growth of

microorganisms, while the latter would measure the changes in the amount of light passing through the growth chamber, (4)>>Microorganisms, such as bacteria, turn a clear culture medium cloudy [turbid] as they grow, and the light sensor would detect such changes. The pH measurement would complement the turbidity measurement, providing an independent check on growth and metabolism.” If used by NASA, this would be the first instrument of its kind on any spacecraft. Its aim was to be placed on a future Mars lander. Since NASA's Curiosity rover landed on Mars in 2012, it has sifted samples of soil and ground-up rock for signs of organic molecules—the complex carbon chains that on Earth form the building blocks of life. Past detections have been so faint that they could be just contamination. Now, samples taken from two different drill sites on an ancient lakebed have yielded complex organic macromolecules that look strikingly similar to kerogen, the goopy fossilized building blocks of oil and gas on Earth. At a few dozen parts per million, the detected levels are 100 times higher than previous finds, but scientists still cannot say whether they have origins in biology or geology. The discovery positions scientists to begin searching for direct evidence of past life on Mars and bolsters the case for returning rock samples from the planet, an effort that begins with the Mars 2020 rover. 

NOTES AND COMMENTS:

(1)>>Getting to Mars still isn’t easy.Let me give you an example. On Mars, the atmosphere is thinner than here. As a result, there is a large temperature difference between the surface and the air. What this practically means, is that if we were standing on Mars our feet and our head would experience different "weather". Amazing, isn't it? Would you imagine your feet having 10 degrees Celcius and your head -20! Now, this fact is back-projected on Earth. First of all, we learn something more for our planet, that the temperature homogeneity that we experience is not a tautology but is a distinct feature of our Earth. But, then a scientist may think "ok, we have a thicker atmosphere, but this doesn't mean that there is absolutely no temperature difference". So, they start measuring it and let's say that they find some small difference.(2)>>The NASA Viking landers took samples of soil on Mars and tested them for signs of organic carbon. Here's some detail about the Viking lander missions that deserves a mention. The two Viking landers each carried 4 different biological experiments to detect life. Amazingly, 3 of the 4 life detection experiments produced a positive result. The 4th experiment which tested for actual organic content of the Martian soil was negative and the scientific consensus was that this meant that organic life could not be present in the soil. However, the recent discovery of perchlorate in the soil on Mars has caused a reevaluation of the experiment which shows that there could have been up to several percent of organic matter in the soil but this would have been destroyed by the heating process of the experiment if perchlorate was also present in the Martian soil. In view of this controversy the official scientific consensus is still that the evidence for life on Mars from the Viking experiments is "inconclusive."No other successful missions to Mars since Viking have contained any experiments designed to directly search for life. Which is a pretty incredible omission really when you think about it. A conspiracy theorist might almost imagine that the mission controllers did not want to public ally settle the question once and for all of whether or not there is life on Mars. Perhaps there are other reasons for the lack of follow up missions to analyse Martian soil directly for life given the intriguing results of the Viking experiments. (3)>>organic molecules. Parts of Mars were capable of supporting life as we know it for lengthy stretches in the ancient past—perhaps hundreds of millions of years at a time, new observations by NASA's Mars rover Curiosity suggest. Since it landed inside the Red Planet's Gale Crater in August 2012, Curiosity has studied a number of different rocks over an elevational range of about 650 feet (200 meters), which represents a time span of tens of millions to hundreds of millions of years.The rovers' analyses indicate that the environment within Gale Crater changed considerably during this period, but never in a way that would preclude life from forming or surviving, mission scientists said during a news conference here at the annual fall meeting of the American Geophysical Union . (4)>>Microorganisms, such as bacteria. It is possible that Life from Earth has been transfered to Mars ? While all spacecraft sent to Mars have to be sterile , It MAY NOT BE the Case . [ see : http://cosmology.com/LifeOnMars.html ] Earth microbes can survive on Mars on certain conditions . Fungi are extremophiles that can survive harsh conditions and environments like deserts, caves or nuclear accident sites., scientists recently reported in the journal Astrobiology. A few of them even managed to cap their year in Mars-like space by reproducing.Although Mars-based life may not use DNA genetic material, then again, it just might. It certainly seems to have worked well for us here on Earth.Even though few of the fungi exposed to Mars-like conditions survived well enough to reproduce, in all cases, at least a fraction did.

Goodbye Miss American Pie.

Meet the First Miss America . ( ↑ )Miss Margaret Gorman.  In 1925 won 
the "crown" that started it all . Times have 
changed , and a century later,  innocence is now
lost .

I  think I  know why Miss America Beauty Pageant  finally ditched the swimsuit  . Its more of a political statement  .The news comes as part of a larger change in the pageant’s standards, explained former FOX News anchor (1.1)>>Gretchen Carlson, who chairs the Miss America Organization’s board of trustees and was herself crowned Miss America in 1989. “We will no longer judge our candidates on their outward physical appearance,” she said. “It’s going to be what comes out of their mouth that we’re interested in.” If it took a long time , if anyone has paid into watching the long (1.2)>>American tradition of judging beauty , poise . Harking back in the old days ... watching the Miss America pageant was part of the prime time family hour , if you lived through the 70s and 80s growing up , the swimsuits were not so "scantly clad" as they are being described now. (2)>>The "revealing" suits appeared right around the 1997 when contestants were allowed  two piece suits , but nearly two decades pass , now the swimsuits slowly stared to resemble beachwear that looked like something out of a "spring break beauty pageant " for revelers . The last time I saw Miss America contest that was my impression .Was it about ratings ???  I think it was .The Atlantic City pageant may have been around for 96 years, but it's weathered some serious lows in the ratings over the years. In 2007, after Miss America had been jettisoned from ABC and only aired on cable, the show managed just 2.4 million viewers. Though the first pageant broadcast, in 1954, aired at a time when Americans only had a handful of networks to choose from, 27 million people tuned in to watch Lee Meriwether become Miss America. This decision is an emotional one for the long-term volunteers and participants in the Miss America Organization. After all, Miss America started in 1921 as a “bathing beauties” contest on the boardwalk of Atlantic City, and letting go of tradition can be difficult for some. But over the past decade, the relevance of Miss America’s swimsuit portion has been hotly debated among those in the pageant industry.   Like all other beauty contests : Miss USA , Miss Universe , etc all for one  these models to be crowned to market products . (3)>>Has any of this advanced women ? It just did not seem that we should watch the show , watch as much as what the women look like play things , but to see how "educated" they are  ? Carlson Tuesday morning, now  the chairwoman of the trustees for the Miss America organization, revealed that the pageant will do away with its notorious swimsuit competition. An outspoken supporter of the #MeToo movement and advocate for victims of sexual assault, Carlson, crowned Miss America in 1989, made her announcement on Good Morning America. “We are no longer a pageant, we are a competition,” Carlson said. “We will no longer judge our candidates on their outward physical appearance. That’s huge, and that means that we will no longer have a swimsuit competition and that is official as of Sept. 9, when we have our competition in Atlantic City.”
The Miss America Trump "factor"?
President Donald Trump seemed to have a rebutting effect on social causes . Donald Trump owned the Miss USA pageant—part of the Miss Universe organization, not to be confused with the aforementioned Miss America competition—from 1996 to 2015. His time as owner of the pageant was plagued with scandals, ranging from the disturbing to downright cruel  He even implemented something called “The Trump Rule,” where he oversaw pre-screenings of Miss USA contestants in revealing outfits and divided them into groups according to which ones he found most attractive. Then, he’d demand that each contestant name another contestant they considered beautiful, and would separate the women accordingly.  Beauty contests can be a bit crude if you follow the Trump rule . Accusations of sexism had followed Trump long before he came back into the spotlight for the 2012 election. As Erin O'Brien wrote in a 2005 article on "The Apprentice," saying that "Donald Trump might be sexist is like saying the sky might be blue."
More "Brains" , more "Braun" , less beauty ?
Since the onset of the # Me Too movement a lot has come under scrutiny in anything that comes out of Hollywood . So all this may have "killed" the "beauty" out of the contest . They want Miss America’s crown to be based on liberal ideas such as “diversity, inclusion, social causes and social impact initiatives.” The Miss America contest isn't bringing in big ratings because contestants aren't dumb bimbos. After the women's movement took hold, there was a whole lot of soul searching (in between waterproof mascara dabbing). Contestants not only had to be lookers. Meanwhile, the corporate sponsors who foot the bill for the scholarships get to use this altruistic pursuit as a tax write-off. It's hardly fair to the bow-legged, knock-kneed, snaggle-toothed, cross-eyed chick who has to flip hamburgers to finance her own education.They had to have smarts now .  No more bathing suits, no more evening gowns. So now we might see "plus size " women ? take center stage ? After all you would think in this day and age of inclusiveness we'd see more bronze than beauty? It remains to be seen . As we say "Goodbye Miss American Pie ....................."

Bye, bye Miss American Pie

Drove my Chevy to the levee but the levee was dry

And them good ole boys were drinking whiskey and rye

Singin' this'll be the day that I die

This'll be the day that I die

Did you write the book of love

And do you have faith in God above

If the Bible tells you so?

Do you believe in rock and roll?

Can music…

NOTES AND COMMENTS:

 (↑ )Miss Margaret Gorman.Miss America started in 1921 as a way to improve tourism on the New Jersey coast in Atlantic City. According to the historical Encyclopedia of New Jersey, 100,000 people turned out on the local boardwalk to witness Margaret Gorman, a 16-year-old from Washington, DC, named the “Most Beautiful Bathing Girl in America”. She won the Golden Mermaid trophy and $100 in prize money, and when she returned in 1922 she was “draped in an American flag and called ‘Miss America’ ”. The pageant was born. (1.1)>>Gretchen Carlson. Now that Gretchen Carlson took over &As chairwoman of the organization, Carlson led the move to eliminate the much-maligned bikini-and-stiletto parade beamed from the glossy Atlantic City, N.J., stage to the world.For years, Carlson said the pageant had been pushed to defend the bikini contest as a celebration of discipline and fitness. Now that it’s gone, Carlson said she’s being questioned for eliminating the showcase of supremely shaped physiques — and the work entailed in getting to that shape.(1)>>American tradition of judging beauty , poise. The 2017 Judges’ Manual lists the qualities and attributes required of titleholders, in this order: “beautiful, well-spoken, intelligent, talented, able to relate to young people, reflective of women her age (she should not be a 35-year-old trapped inside a 20-year-old body), charismatic, dynamic/energetic — that ‘IT’ quality that is so hard to define, mature enough to handle the job and all of its responsibilities, comfortable ‘in her own skin,’ manageable, punctual and flexible.” (2)>>The "revealing" suits. Part of the problem was that Miss America's ratings were tanking . If you had to compare with other "pageants" , Miss Universe , Miss Teen USA , they looked  scantier and scantier , so was this an executive rating pitch for a two piece suit ? Could be . (3)>>Has any of this advanced women ? The biggest question , in our day and age , there is a lot of mental conditioning of young girls to beauty products . Its so far gone from when 16 year old Miss Gorman took the crown in 1925 . Advancement of women has been too slow , women won the right to vote just around the time of the first Miss America . Long before feminists began protesting the Miss America pageant in the late 1960s, Christian groups had signaled their disapproval. When the Miss America pageant began in 1921, Baptists, Quakers and Methodists alike called for Christians to steer clear of Atlantic City, N.J., and other bathing revues. Southern Baptists passed a “Resolution on Beauty Contests” in 1926 that stated, in part, that “‘Whereas, ‘Beauty contests’ and so-called ‘bathing revues’… tend to lower true and genuine respect for womanhood … We, the Southern Baptist Convention do deplore and condemn all such contests and revues.” As innocent as it began the beauty pageant fell pray to the New Morality of the 1960s onward , perhaps under the spell of Hugh Hefner's "philosophy" giving women , contests a back seat to a vary slow ride to progress.

Russia's "Art of the Deal".

Russia's "Art of the Deal".

France's Macron and Putin
met to cut "deals" ,
trade agreements
regardless of American
foreign policy .

I wrote many times in that our American "sanctions don't work ...".  As in case of Russia. Vladimir Putin very well may be the richest man in the world. He is beating America, its (1)>>President Donald Trump at the (1.2)>>" Art of the Deal". " Deals are my art form” is one of the opening lines of his famous book on the subject. President Donald Trump has emphasized [had hoped] that he intended to pursue cooperation with Russia wherever possible, particularly in combating terrorist groups like the Islamic State. The president had  set  have a telephone conversation with Russian President Vladimir Putin.  WHAT  deal is there to be made with Moscow, and what can the United States get out of it? Putin’s wish list, by contrast, is detailed, long and the items on it, such as getting U.S. sanctions imposed over Moscow’s actions in Ukraine eased, are potentially significant for his own political future. Now with the non-approval of the American Congress . U.S. and Russian relations are estranged to a degree .  Now it seems Russia has the upper hand   (2)>>As a twitter follower of all things Russian news worthy.  I have noticed how aggressively productive Russia has been at diplomacy with other nations , and signing trade deals that are benefiting Russia . My question is where is our American diplomacy  in world ?Where are the trade deals out of Washington D.C. . So far all I have seen is a backward path of economic isolationism . The fact that the US pulled out of the Iran Deal , the rest of the EU sided against the US policy on Iran . It begs the question , why not our nation ? (3)>>Russia is doing photo ops with world leaders, making profitable business deals that are vary much amazing  speed its harder to follow it on twitter . Meanwhile our President Donald Trump is putting tariffs on  imported goods with retaliation coming from our would be allies .And it’s not just that Trump seems to have abandoned the larger geopolitical playing field to America’s principal rivals. He appears to be doing everything in his power to facilitate their advance at the expense of the United States. While Trump is gutting past trade agreements , here comes Russia making gains on capitalism , cutting deals.   Meanwhile America is missing .  This was evident in  last January at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland. There was no senior representative of the soon-to-be installed Trump administration even put in an appearance.  The biggest danger: that China and Russia will feel emboldened by Trump’s narrow-minded views . The (4)>>United States just can't seem to come to grips with a new reality - that most of the world's people live in the 'Old World' on the other side of the planet, that Russia, China and some other nations have decided to assert themselves as regional powers, that China eventually will be a superpower, that nations over there have decided to manage their own affairs without the interference of the US. Least of all Donald Trump should "realize" that his Art of the Deal is being used by Russia , they are building on it creating new  economic ties worth billions of dollars world wide . Something has to change right now . Our nation has to take the first steps to work , create a new alliance with Russia [ a reset with relations] by restoring diplomatic relations  (5)>>as a first step to get back on the global stage by creating partnerships with other nations . This we need to do by looking closely at Russia .

NOTES AND COMMENTS:

(1)>>President Donald Trump .   If there’s a single consistent aspect to Donald Trump’s strategic vision, it’s this: US foreign policy should always be governed by the simple principle of “America First,” with this country’s vital interests placed above those of all others. “We will always put America’s interests first,” he declared in his victory speech in the early hours of November 9. “From this day forward, it’s going to be only America first, America first,” he insisted in his Inaugural Address on January 20. Since then, however, everything he’s done in the international arena has, intentionally or not, placed America’s interests behind those of its arch-rivals, China and Russia. So to be accurate, his guiding policy formula should really be relabeled America Third.  (1.2)>>" Art of the Deal". Donald Trump's best-selling The Art of the Deal came out in 1987, but feels like it could have been written yesterday.It reached number 1 on The New York Times Best Seller list, stayed there for 13 weeks, and altogether held a position on the list for 48 weeks. The 2016 Presidential hopeful hasn't changed much since then. He's still jetting around and making deals -- huge deals -- and talking about them in much the same way he talks about his political campaign today. "I don't do it for the money. I've got enough, much more than I'll ever need. I do it to do it. Deals are my art form," he writes, in the book's opening line. It goes on from there with pages of Trump gems (although, in his case we're probably talking about diamonds). he Art of the Deal, Trump's seminal volume on doing businessman things that's approximately what Sun Tzu would have produced if he was dropped as a child.   (2)>>As a twitter follower of all things Russian news worthy.  Since Donald Trump was elected , the rise of "Russophobia" in the our media . I have taken steps to investigate things myself . Following Russia on the media . I have noted how much of America is in Russia , since the break up of the Soviet Union , there has been a surge of western values in Russia . While the Russian media is state controlled,  a viewer would note how many American ideas have been adopted into Russian media culture . While our nation is going backward on opinion related thought that is dubbed "Fake-news" . The Russians have progressed much further on a verity of intellectual debate . (3)>>Russia is doing photo ops with world leaders. Let us look at  France , Macron, who spoke before Putin at SPIEF, said that France wants to become the largest direct investor in Russia. "The source of motivation is that our French enterprises now employ 170,000 Russian citizens,” he said. The French president added that, in the last 10 years, no French company quit the Russian market despite the troubles in the Russian economy, it is a “strong signal”. Our nation is falling behind Russia and China , far behind  also is the UK.  UK loses out on real investment opportunities in a country that actually has a future, preferring to walk obediently behind their US masters and snatch up any unwanted crumbs they throw at them. Terminally sad and doomed to failure as the US has no allies, only vassal states. The Russian president said France is an old and reliable partner of Russia, as well as Germany. "We very much count on the fact that our French friends, companies will develop in Russia, will receive income and profit..Putin also noted that Russian-French business ties are diversified since the countries work in many spheres from space to pharmaceuticals. But Russia's leading economic partner is now China, not France or Germany, Putin pointed out. “Trade with Europe was worth $450 billion once, now it has fallen by half. With China, trade is going to reach $100 billion soon,” the  Russian president said. (4)>>United States just can't seem to come to grips with a new reality . Most important of all, the abandonment of US leadership in the struggle to slow global warming will mean both the surrender of technological preeminence in the fields most likely to dominate the world economy in the decades to come and a far greater chance of planetary catastrophe. This should be considered a betrayal of all Americans—and especially of those who voted for him in the belief that he would ensure America’s political and economic primacy. (5)>>as a first step to get back on the global stage by creating partnerships with other nations . America should be comitted to restoring a balanced relations with other national powers . Example : There are no reason why there should be any hostilities between our nation and Iran , North Korea , etc . From Bush II , Obama and now Trump,  our national prestige has regressed,  we are suffering world wide as far as the reputation of the United States is concerned .

The Curious "Silence" of Mike Pence.

I believe that Vice President
Mike Pence has ambitions
if the Trump Presidency
turns over .

Vice President Mike Pence is one of the most odd ball figures in ever so dwindling Trump administration cabinet .  Pence is often seen in the background when Trump has his photo ops with the press , (##)>>he always has this strange gaze on his face . (1.1)>>Rumors of Pence's presidential ambitions seem to resurface whenever Trump’s political prospects look weakest. With all the rage that been going on with the Trump administration . Honestly we might be on the brink . Mike Pence seems to be "odd" for a evangelical who stands behind the most controversial  American  President ever . He is nothing but a priest in a political grab . At a appearance before a pastors conference in Washington DC, Vice President Mike Pence outlined how the Trump administration has championed causes important to the evangelical community and implored them to continue to, (1.2)>>"share the good news of Jesus Christ.” While the vice-president’s message had a spiritual tone, his defense of (1.2.2)>>Trump is at odds with his  Christian values . Donald J Trump is the opposite of Pence's "values"  , here is a man who should have rang a bell of warning to the evangelicals like Pence . While the tone of most American  Evangelicals Christians  to somehow found a way to "forgive" (1.3)>>Trump's past , his sordid relationships , business dealings

"Look I want you to act
Presidential at this
press conference !" 

make him less like a "Christian" . Mike Pence has been a silent watch dog on Trump . I would use the word "eerie" silence . While Trump has been outspokenly outrageous using Twitter [being the "leaker" in chief ] But, at this point, with the president re-enacting the Tell-Tale Heart in public and all over the electric Twitter machine, you have to wonder , not a peep of criticism from Pence. In Pence, Trump has found an obedient deputy whose willingness to suffer indignity and humiliation at the pleasure of the president appears boundless. When Trump comes under fire for describing white nationalists as “very fine people,” Pence is there to assure the world that he is actually a man of great decency. When Trump needs someone to fly across the country to an NFL game so he can walk out in protest of national-anthem kneelers, Pence heads for Air Force Two.  Pence in my view is probably the "real" President of the United States . I can't imagine Donald Trump having any poliical experience , never holding public office , yet Pence is the perfect

I wonder  how the left has called
Trump as a puppet of
Putin , but look
behind .

coach giving him advice . You have to compare Obama when he took office , he built his platform by installing his political adversaries in positions [ Hillary & Biden ]  but Pence might be hard pressed to figure out Trump’s “real” feelings on any number of issues he’s spent his political career defending. On abortion, it took Trump several do-overs to settle on an incomprehensible view of an issue Pence has spoken passionately on for years.  The word "puppet" was used to describe Trump. Even since the so-called Russia probe investigation . Well its not exactly been  Putin pulling Trump's strings if you look at the man really behind the Oval Office , a bit more closely . The Republican establishment took control of the election in 2016 , ousting Hillary's chances in a coup that looked as if  outside meddling had occurred. While Trump has not yet voiced the most explicit version of this conspiracy publicly, he has been slowly building the case that the Justice Department investigation is, in fact, a Deep State plot to delegitimize his presidency or even force him out of office. After Trump threatened to “totally destroy” (2.1)>>North Korea, Gail Collins, the Times columnist, praised Vice-President Mike Pence as someone who at least “seems less likely to get the planet blown up.” This summer, an opinion column by Dana Milbank, of the Washington Post, appeared under the headline “ ‘president pence’ is sounding better and better.”  (2.2)>>Pence has other plans. New York Times article in which dozens of Republican sources said influential party actors, including Pence, “have begun what amounts to a shadow campaign for 2020—as if the current occupant of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue weren’t involved.” The “sheer disarray surrounding this presidency,” the report said, has “prompted Republican officeholders to take political steps unheard-of so soon into a new administration.” 

NOTES AND COMMENTS:

(##)>>he always has this strange gaze on his face .  Mustering a devotional gaze always in the background when a photo-op comes .(1.1)>>Rumors of Pence’s presidential ambitions.Pence, who has dutifully stood by the President, mustering a devotional gaze rarely seen since the days of Nancy Reagan, serves as a daily reminder that the Constitution offers an alternative to Trump. The worse the President looks, the more desirable his understudy seems. The more Trump is mired in scandal, the more likely Pence’s elevation to the Oval Office becomes, unless he ends up legally entangled as well.  (1.2)>>"share the good news of Jesus Christ.” Not to take the Lord's name in vain . I find that American politicians , some Democrats , mostly Republicans have taken to the Pulpit to preach politics , policies just to win votes . Con-servaties as they have called themselves have succumbed to the alt-extreme level of the Tea Party movement that emerged during the Obama era .   (1.2.2)>>Trump is at odds with his  Christian values . Pence attempted public repentance by personal essay. His article, “Confessions of a Negative Campaigner,” ran in newspapers across the state. “Christ Jesus came to save sinners,” the essay began, quoting 1 Timothy, “among whom I am foremost of all.”  (1.3)>>Trump's past, his sordid relationships , business dealings make him . Just what is a qualification to be a President ? Trump, and those who see that 80% of evangelicals voted for him,To social conservatives, particularly evangelicals, the Stormy Daniels saga presents an ethical quandary: The president they’ve tasked with defending Christianity against the “secular left” allegedly cheated on his third wife, just months after she gave birth, with an adult film star.Of course, Trump’s spiritual shortcomings (from accusations of rampant marital infidelity to alleged sexual assault to almost daily public insults of perceived enemies on Twitter) have been long known — and largely set aside by the conservative Christians who voted for him because they saw him as a more workable alternative than Hillary Clinton.(2.1)>>North Korea. US Vice President Mike Pence warned North Korea that it could end up like Libya if it fails to make a nuclear deal with Washington."There was some talk about the Libyan model last week, and you know, as the President made clear, this will only end like the Libyan model ended if Kim Jong Un doesn't make a deal," Pence said Monday.When it was noted that the comparison could be interpreted as a threat, Pence told Fox News: "Well, I think it's more of a fact."Previous comments, by President Donald Trump's national security adviser John Bolton, that the administration was looking at Libya as a potential example for North Korea to follow, provoked alarm in Pyongyang.   (2.2)>>Pence has other plans. Assuming Pence isn’t simply readying himself for Trump’s downfall, but taking steps hasten it, we should note that he won’t be well situated to make the most of his coup.