On January 23, 1968, the USS Pueblo was attacked by vessels from North Korea in international waters.  The ship was captured and the crew was detained for 11 months.  The ship itself was never returned and is currently moored on the Taedong River in Pyongyang, where it is used as a museum.  The capture of this ship was an important intelligence coup because it provided North Korea, China and the Soviet Union with the most valuable intelligence information in the world.  It let them gain firsthand information on what we knew about them.  Everyone knew that we were spying on North Korean, China and the Soviet Union.  We also knew they were spying on us.  But what they didn’t know was how effective we were.  All of that changed with the capture of the USS Pueblo, and it took years for the U.S. intelligence community to recover.

This brings me to my point.  Donald Trump has challenged Obama with regard to his birth certificate when no one else, including Rush Limbaugh, was willing to do that.  I had to ask myself, why?  I finally figured it out.  Donald Trump is a very wealthy businessman who has his own business intelligence operatives.  I suspect that Donald Trump already knows exactly what is and is not on record in Hawaii.  Unlike people like Sean Hannity, Glenn Beck, Bill O’Reilly, Rush Limbaugh and Sarah Palin, Donald Trump actually has the resources necessary to find out.  The main stream media is pathetic at conducting really effective investigations.  They tend to go for the quick and dirty ambush stuff, but don’t really have serious people who are skilled at really verifying information.   Businessmen, like Trump, have their own intelligence operations.  Trump is dropping strong hints that he has a lot more.  He brought up the subject of Obama’s college transcripts and other records.  At one point, during the View appearance, Trump said that he was from New York and that made him aware of the potential for fraud.  Why would he say that?  I doubt that this was an innocent remark.

The bottom line is that Trump knows enough that he is willing to risk challenging Obama.  The problem for Obama is that he does not know what else Trump has up his sleeve.  That is the challenge with managing a cover-up.  Eventually, someone forgets which lie was told and when.  Trump is not going to back down, and he is too big to ignore.  In addition, Trump has already figured out that the next President is very likely to be the one who is most willing to take on Obama.  Perhaps the most important lesson to learn from this situation is that Trump thinks Obama is toast.  Otherwise he would never risk challenging someone who is likely to be re-elected President of the United States.  Trump knows he has a lot of baggage, and that he is a long-shot candidate.  But, if he manages to expose Obama, he will soar to the top of the leader board.  The American people will tolerate a lot from someone they respect as a leader.   By taking on Obama’s birth certificate, Donald Trump will deliver real change.  Trump change.

TDM