On Trump's plan to feed the greed of corporate elites

Howard Lutnick wants to have his cake and eat it, too. Then, he intends to eat your cake. Lutnick is another billionaire corporate huckster who was a campaign bagman for Trump, and now he's to become the commerce secretary. But first, he's been tasked with picking hordes of corporate loyalists to be placed in Trump's government as friendly "regulators" of corporate hucksterism.

Convenient, huh? This is what Trump & Company mean by saying they'll make government "efficient." Instead of corporate powers having to lobby regulators to get special favors, corporate officials will become the regulators. That is so much smoother for Lutnick and his ilk, who look forward to four free-wheeling years of devouring our economy.

In choosing those who are to police corporate price gouging, workplace rules, bank rip-offs and such, Lutnick has been calling Wall Streeters, Silicon Valley tech bosses, corporate giants and billionaires, telling them to send their best operatives to Trump's regime. "Let's get them into government," he exults! Notice that he's not calling any union leaders, consumer protectors or other real public interest watchdogs.

By the way, Lutnick himself is in line to profit from the corporate feeding frenzy he's now staffing. He is invested in everything from health care profiteers to cryptocurrency flimflams, and while he's been doing Trump's work, he's simultaneously been pushing Congress to do favors for his personal holdings. But he insists that there is no conflict of interest in his efforts. After all, he says with a straight face, he holds his government policy meetings in separate rooms from his own business pleadings.

This is Jim Hightower saying ... And that paper-thin wall of separation is Trump's new ethical standard for protecting us from raw corporate greed.

WHEN AND WHERE WAS THE FIRST THANKSGIVING FEAST?

Let's talk Turkey!

No, not the Butterballs in Congress. I'm talking about the real thing, the big gobbler -- 46 million of which we Americans will devour this Thanksgiving.

It was the Aztecs who first domesticated the gallopavo, but the invading Spanish conquerors "fouled up" the bird's origins. They declared it to be related to the peacock -- wrong! They also thought the peacock originated in Turkey -- wrong! And they thought Turkey was located in Africa -- well, you can see the Spanish were pretty confused.

Actually, even the origin of Thanksgiving Day in the U.S. is confused. The popular assumption is that it was first celebrated by the Mayflower immigrants and the Wampanoag natives at Plymouth, Massachusetts, 1621. They feasted on venison, furkees (Wampanoag for gobblers), eels, mussels, corn and beer. But wait, say Virginians, the first Thanksgiving Food-a-Palooza was not in Massachusetts -- the feast originated down here in Jamestown colony, back in 1608.

Whoa there, pilgrims! Folks in El Paso, Texas, say it all began way out there in 1598, when Spanish settlers sat down with people of the Piro and Manso tribes to give thanks, feasting on roasted duck, geese and fish.

"Ha!" says a Florida group, asserting the very, very first Thanksgiving happened in 1565 when the Spanish settlers of St. Augustine and friends from the Timucuan tribe chowed down on "cocido" -- a stew of salt pork, garbanzo beans and garlic -- washing it all down with red wine.

Wherever it began, and whatever the purists claim is "official," Thanksgiving today is as multicultural as America. So, let's enjoy! Kick back, give thanks we're in a country with such ethnic richness, and dive into your turkey rellenos, moo shu turkey, turkey falafel, barbecued turkey ... and so on.

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