It’s December 4, 2015 and time for Friday Yes or No. I ask myself questions that I answer with one of two one-word answers. This week, I have a lot of questions swirling through my head. I imagine you do, too.

Q1: Has the week just ended been about the worst week ever?

A1: No

Q2: But is it pretty damn close?

A2: Yes

Q3: Can you imagine how it must feel to be the loved one of someone who died at Planned Parenthood in Colorado Springs or the Inland Regional Center in San Bernardino?

A3: No

Q4: Or Umpqua Community College in Roseburg or Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Charleston or Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown?

A4: No

Q5: Should I go on with the listings?

A5: No

Q6: But I could, couldn’t I?

A6: Yes

Q7: As the details of the San Bernardino incident come out, does it seem plausible that one motive of the terrorists in this case was to exacerbate the already rampant anti-Moslem sentiment stinking up the U.S.?

A7: Yes

Q8: If that’s the case, mission accomplished?

A8: Yes

Q9: Is there a possibility the United States Senate, with the bubbly Mitch McConnell as ringmaster, is completely oblivious to reality?

A9: Yes

Q10: Were yesterday’s votes against increased background checks to purchase weapons and defunding Planned Parenthood akin to a giant middle finger to the majority of people in this country?

A10: Yes

Q11: Are the words “thoughts and prayers” – as in, “My thoughts and prayers are with the victims of this tragedy” – on the verge of making some perfectly sane people want to vomit?

A11: Yes

Q12: Is there any goddamn reason why anyone who isn’t a police officer or soldier should have a weapon that fires bullets in rapid succession?

A12: No

Q13: Is there any goddamn reason why anyone needs thousands of rounds of ammunition in their home?

A13: No

Q14: Should your and my right to live supersede someone’s right to have a massive weapon arsenal?

A14: Yes

Q15: Is that the case in the United States at this moment?

A15: No

Q16: Does the National Rifle Association support terrorism?

A16: Yes

Q17: Is there blood on the hands of the people who sold the weapons to the murderers in San Bernardino, Colorado Springs, Roseburg, Charleston, Aurora, Newtown and the hundreds of places in between?

A17: Yes

Q18: Is this an embarrassing time to be an American?

A18: Yes

Q19: Are we better than this?

A19:

1. It’s Wednesday, December 2, 2015.

2. Max Zuckerberg is only a few days old. But she might already be rolling her eyes at her parents.

Sure, there’s something noble about the fact that Mark Zuckerberg and Priscilla Chan are giving 99% of their $45 billion in Facebook stock to causes that better the world (although some of my financial reporter friends are more than a little skeptical).

But a 2,200-word letter seems a bit much. (My former colleague, Emily Jane Fox, has a terrific – and much shorter – letter to Max on vf.com)

I’m betting this girl gets a lot of long-winded lectures — from a guy in a hoodie! — over the next 18 years. After that letter, I’m thinking Max will help the world by becoming an editor.

3. Frank Bruni’s New York Times column on Ted Cruz is impressive. Bruni is not nearly as liberal as fellow columnist Paul Krugman. His columns are usually even tempered and often see both sides of an issue.

Not this one. He doesn’t pull punches about he feels about Cruz. “…it’s the fruit of a combative style and consuming solipsism that would make him an insufferable, unendurable president. And if there’s any sense left in this election and mercy in this world, it will undo him soon enough.”

I can’t gauge how much of a chance this 21st century Joe McCarthy has of being the GOP nominee. Like Bruni, I don’t want to find out.

4. Because of the shock factor in the Republican campaign, the Democrats are getting vastly overshadowed. That’s in large part because Democrats are reacting to the shock factor in the Republican campaign.

I’m not sure 60% of Democrats, as measured by this morning’s Quinnipiac poll, love Hillary Clinton; many of her supporters sympathize more with the views expressed by Bernie Sanders.

I think that percentage reaches 60% because Democrats believe the fate of the nation sorely depends on someone other than what the Republicans are throwing up (meant any way you want to think about it) succeeding President Obama in 2017.

Practicality is guiding the Democrats. Practicality says Clinton has the best chance to win.

That is the biggest factor in the race, and will remain so long as we see the names Trump, Carson and Cruz at the top of the GOP polls.

5. It’s my father’s 85th birthday. He’s afflicted with dementia, so there’s no way he knows that it’s his birthday or that I’m sending him love. But it is, and I am. A lot of it. I’ll see him tomorrow.

.

1. It’s Tuesday, December 1, 2015. How strange is that to see?

2. It’s going to be a few years until President Obama writes his memoir about this eight-year job he’s been elected twice to do. If he does, in fact, write about it.

One of the things I would love to know is what exactly transpires when he meets Vladimir Putin. I do not get the sense that the Obamas, Putin and whoever he’s shacking up with at the moment will ever get together to watch the White Sox on the South Side or go for rainbow ice on Oahu.

The two met yesterday at the Climate Change summit in Paris. But the topic appears to have been the messes in Syria and Ukraine, some of which are messier thanks to Putin. It’s hard to imagine that they exchanged pleasantries, but you do have to wonder how icy things are in the room when the two of them are together.

You always get the sense Putin is jealous of Obama. People around the world look up to Obama. Who the hell looks up to Putin except maybe other Russians afraid not to? I think he needs to get over his Obama envy and realize that the U.S. is his best hope for the security Russia historically craves.

The President, before leaving Paris this morning, said he told Putin that the Russians really don’t want another debacle like Afghanistan in the 1980s. That invasion was a disaster for everyone involved except, perhaps, the terrorist groups it spawned.

Syria and the Iraq mess Putin’s old soulmate, George W. Bush, created are spawning their fair share of deranged killers. It would be nice if these guys could get together and solve something. Syria. Iraq. Ukraine. Bad vodka. Anything.

I’m hoping to read Obama’s memoirs in a world they finally got together and helped fix.

1. It’s Monday, November 30, 2015.

2. It’s supposed to be Cyber Monday, a big online shopping day for those who either didn’t get what they wanted on Black Friday or didn’t even bother. Happy shopping, and thanks for doing your part to boost the global economy.

3. Hopefully your Thanksgiving was a good one. I enjoyed it, in large part because my wife and I have two adult children who are our biggest reasons to be thankful, and we spent the holiday with them.  I hope you were able to spend time with the people you care about, either in person or via the magic of our connected age,

It’s hard to get back to the grind after the four days, but Christmas and New Year’s aren’t so far away.

4. The problem for the rational among us is how to focus your anger in the wake of the Colorado Springs tragedy.

Is it on the fact that a guy whose sanity has been questioned for a long time can easily get his hands on weapons whose only purpose is killing lots of people?

Or is it the fact that he was all riled up to shoot at women who he perceived, through tricked-up videos, as monsters because they were tending to their bodies as they saw fit?

It’s hard to sort out which makes me angrier this morning.

We should be infuriated by both. We should be ashamed that we have allowed the proliferation of weapons and the demonization of women seeking the best for themselves.

But I’m skeptical, even after a day like Friday, even after hearing about the worthwhile lives wasted in a barrage of bullets, even after recognizing that there is no real difference between the terrorist who did this and the terrorists who attacked Paris and a Nairobi mall and a Connecticut elementary school, that any goddamn thing will move this country toward sanity. On controlling guns or on allowing women to make their own decisions about their bodies.

That’s what makes the most angry.

5. The collective head of cauliflower known as the Republican presidential candidates are going to have a field day with President Obama’s speech at the Climate Change conference in Paris. The President said the United States bears some responsibility for the problem, but also relishes the opportunity to take a lead role in solving it.

Oh my God! He’s apologizing for America again! You can hear them on the stump from now until there’s some other thing that makes them chase their collective tails.

In fact, Donny Trump didn’t need to wait until the president actually gave his speech. He said that the President calling climate change the world’s biggest problem is one of the dumbest things ever said. What about terrorism, wails Donny, failing to see the connection that a thinking person – that would be President Obama in this case – already understands.

Of course, President Obama is not apologizing for America. Recognizing that this country’s reliance on fossil fuels contributed to a global problem is not a sign of weakness. It’s a sign of our strength. Our willingness to see a problem and face it, using the talent and ingenuity that makes us great.

Climate change will, despite attempts by conservatives to ignore or deny it, be a determining factor in the security of ourselves and our heirs. The President understands that. Let’s see if he and the rest of the world can come together to offer hope for the future.

It’s November 27, 2015 and time for the Black Friday edition of Friday Yes or No. I’ve had a fine Thanksgiving meal, what time stores open is no longer my professional concern and I’ve started my month-long non-stop holiday music listenthon. I’m psyched.

Q1: Is it any surprise that the retail industry is worried about this holiday season?

A1: No

Q2: Is it because the way people shop has changed dramatically in the last 15 years, with more people going online and more buying things when they want them, no matter what time of year?

A2: Yes

Q3: Is Adele the best new singer of this century?

A3: Yes

Q4: Would an Adele holiday album be awesome?

A4: Yes

Q5: So everyone who thought Donny Trump’s presidential circus would fold up its tent by Thanksgiving is wrong?

A5: Yes

Q6: Is there much chance Trump will get bored or self-immolate by Christmas?

A6: No

Q7: Was there anyone who thought the Middle East situation would get better if there was a new conflict between Russia and Turkey?

A7: No

Q8: Is anyone really convinced that France is about to become a more pushy player in the Syria/ISIS/Iraq mess?

A8: No

Q9: Is the 8.1% rise in traffic deaths in the first half of this year due in large part to distractions such as smartphones?

A9: Yes

Q10: But is it also a reflection of the angry times we live in, as also manifest by the success so far of Donny Trump?

A10: Yes

Q11: So the message to drivers for the rest of this holiday weekend is get off the phone and slow the hell down?

A11: Yes

1. It’s Wednesday, November 25, 2015.

2. It’s a day early, but I’m thankful for the fact that I don’t have to drive anywhere the day before Thanksgiving.

3. The release of the video of the Laquan McDonald shooting in Chicago is a reminder of something I’ve been saying: The quality of day-to-day police work is declining and leading to these horrible abuses of power.

There is no professionalism, much less regard for human life, on display in that video. The extraneous gunshots after McDonald was already paralyzed by bullets show a callous disregard for life and an inability to do what a policeman is supposed to do – keep the peace.

There certainly is a racial component to all this, and that unfortunately is going to play out in the days and weeks ahead. We should all be thankful that protests, while tense, have been peaceful so far. The protesters have a case, and I’m certain they’ll be watching closely as prosecutors make theirs against the officer under arrest.

The nation’s police departments really need to rethink what they’re doing in academies. Why are these incidents occurring with such frequency? Communities and peace officers should all be on the same page. In a lot of places, they’re not. That needs to be fixed. Fast.

4. The best hour I’ve spent watching TV this month came yesterday afternoon when President Obama awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom to 17 deserving Americans.

My interest in this was heightened by the fact that I was one of the more than 100,000 people who signed one of the White House’s We the People petitions to get the medal for Yogi Berra.  I’m not sure who started the campaign, but it ultimately succeeded – Yogi’s son accepted the medal for the Hall of Fame catcher, who passed away in September.

Seeing Yogi honored with so many other great Americans of varied backgrounds was a reminder of how great this country can be. These people are its very best, and that really has to make you smile.

1. It’s Tuesday, November 24, 2015.

2. I used to call this National Clothespin Day. It really isn’t. One year, there was a drug store calendar distributed by Plough Inc. that was selling a cold remedy, and there was a picture of someone with a clothespin on their nose (they’re congested, get it) on the Tuesday before Thanksgiving. I was seven at the time and thought it was hysterical. So I celebrated Clothespin Day until my mid-20s.

3. The reason I would want to put a clothespin on my nose on the Tuesday before Thanksgiving, 2015 is to block the stench from the Republican presidential candidates.

It is, frankly, becoming a little too much to stand. Particularly from the mass of odor known as Donny Trump. It seems as though he’s doing a social experiment to see how outrageous he can be before people start boiling tar and plucking feathers.

Alas, he continues to find new lows for some of our populace. His comments that there were American Muslims cheering as the World Trade Center collapsed are despicable. They reek of a man so enamored with the sound of his own voice and a sense that there are people who would actually vote for him that he will say or do anything.

It’s not unlike what kids do when they’re three and first discover that when they say something adults will laugh. So they’ll say something more and more silly until Mom or Dad says “OK, let’s stop now.”

Apparently, the Trump parents were too busy for that.

4. I, and a lot of other people, thought Trump was a joke last summer. He’s not a joke any more.

Here’s what he really is: ISIS’ top recruiter.

Teenagers are caught in the awful social whirl of those stupid years. Added to the mix for teens in Muslim families is, on occasion, the trauma of being the outsider. Many communities are good about not exacerbating those problems by trying to be inclusive. But some aren’t, and being picked on — having your looks or your clothing or your hijab get derided by the ignorant — leads to alienation.

Now you have this billionaire buffoon who people actually believe should run the country railing. He’s going to put you on some register because someone he thinks you must sympathize with struck terror in Paris, or hallucinates that you and everyone in your family and faith clapped when the planes hit the Trade Center. He’s signaling that it’s OK for the other 300 million Americans to hold you in contempt.

And then the other meatballs running for president with him chime in. One says you have no business even thinking about being president because of your faith. Others want to block anyone fleeing the oppression in Syria from entering the country — unless, of course, they can prove they’re not Muslims like you.

God, why wouldn’t you be interested in hearing out some screaming imam? A guy who’ll say that while you’re loathed in America, you’re cherished on the training grounds of Mesopotamia, that learning to use AK-47s and detonating bombs strapped to your body is nobler than being picked on by some bully in Texas or New Jersey.

Sure as I’m sitting here, Trump and this anti-Islamic crusade launched by the right is luring Muslim kids to ISIS. They’ll go because with all the pressures that teenagers face, this added pressure of being on society’s outs will push some of them over the edge. The ability to resist will be a powerful test for the Muslim parents I know, men and women strong in their faith, in their family and in their love of this country — despite Trump and the other jackasses.

If ISIS somehow wins a state of its own in the Middle East, I wonder if Trump is going to get a condo or golf course contract. He would have earned it.

5. One more thought. I was looking for news stories from sources outside the mainstream and went to the Amsterdam News Web site. For those outside New York, Amsterdam News is the city’s best-known African-American newspaper. This story, about a new New York City firefighter, caught my attention. 

The young man’s family and his mosque celebrated his graduation from the Fire Academy. Here’s a young man willing to put his life on the line for eight million New Yorkers. He’s not exclusive – he had 294 classmates equally as brave. But the fact that he’s willing to go out and protect a city with a prominent resident ready to put him in some alien database makes me hopeful and sad at the same time.

“I could never thank Allah (God) enough for all that he has done for my family,” the new firefighter’s mom said. We can’t thank her enough for raising a son whose bravery and dedication make America proud.

It’s November 20, 2015, and time for Friday Yes or No. I ask the questions. I answer them. Control freak? Sure. But as much fun as a 61-1/2 year-old can have on a Friday afternoon.

Q1: After a week in which the people of the United States had to chance to demonstrate their strength and courage in the wake of the Paris terror attacks, are you profoundly disappointed in the behavior of a large chunk of the American public and in political leaders, most – but, alas, not all – of them Republicans?

A1: Yes

Q2: Does it make any sense at all to bar Syrian refugees from this country?

A2: No

Q3: Would you categorize the bashing of American Moslems – some of whom, by the way, are in the armed forces defending this country – as idiotic?

A3: Yes

Q4: Speaking of “idiots,” should there be a picture of Donny Trump next to that word in the dictionary?

A4: Yes

Q5: Also next to the words “horse’s ass,” “moron” and “miserable bastard”?

A5: Yes

Q6: Is that out of your system yet?

A6: No

Q7: Does it make sense for Princeton to revisit the racism of Woodrow Wilson to the point of possibly taking his name off campus buildings?

A7: No

Q8: Wilson was a racist, right?

A8: Yes

Q9: So is the reason not to take his name off buildings the fact that he’s not honored for his racism, but for his thinking about American foreign policy and education, and that his views on race, while seen as abhorrent in 2015, were in the mainstream of American opinion in the 1910s?

A9: Yes

Q10: Don’t you wish you were in Chicago this weekend?

A10: No

Q11: Is that because of the 6-8 inches of snow expected by tomorrow afternoon?

A11: Yes

Q12: Doesn’t that seem a little soon – or is it that all you have to do is say “Chicago” and you understand?

A12: Yes

1. It’s Thursday, November 19, 2015.

2. Next Thursday is Thanksgiving.

3. Right now, it doesn’t seem as though Americans believe they have much reason to be thankful. They’re scared after the Paris terror attacks. They fear Syrian refugees and Mexicans. There are people who would actually vote for Donny Trump, who is so big a horse’s ass that he might win the honor as biggest horse’s ass of both the 20th and 21st centuries.

Trump’s latest idea, by the way, is that he would not rule out requiring all Muslims to register themselves for a national database. My guess is that, when Donny saw movies about World War II, he got the wrong idea about who the good guys were.

President Obama, right now, is literally on the other side of the world from the near-hysteria. He’s on a long-scheduled trip to East Asia, visiting the Philippines and Malaysia. There’s no logical reason he should come home early.

But when he gets back this weekend, he needs to channel his energy to putting down the stupidity and reassuring the rational people of the country.

He needs to tell the American people that, yes, this is a scary world but that the administration is doing all it can to ensure their safety.

He needs to remind them who is responsible for terrorism. It is not someone who prays at a mosque in Brooklyn or Detroit, any more than someone who prays at a church in Seattle or Birmingham or a synagogue in Miami or Chicago. Terrorism is the realm of the sick, the warped, those who seek legitimacy for the evil in their minds and hearts. Adam Lanza, who shot up Sandy Hook Elementary School, is as much a terrorist as Abdelhamid Abaaoud. Both should be roommates in Hell.

The president needs to insult Ted Cruz to his face. Actually, there’s a long line of people who would love to insult that rotted cetriolo to his face. Count me as one.

The president needs to remind people that, if anybody’s keeping score on terrorism, he’s the one who has taken the heat for the drone strikes that have killed suspected plotters – as well, unfortunately, of many innocent people. He’s the one who was on the hook when U.S. bombs last week successfully took out the cancer nicknamed Jihadi John who appeared on video delighting in the execution of American journalists. And yes, when Republicans promised to get the man who plotted September 11, it was President Obama who delivered.

The president needs to put his amazing communicative skills to their ultimate test. At a time when stoking fear and distrust is seen as a way to win the Iowa caucus, he needs to tell the American people that it’s time to stop cowering. It’s time to realize that victory in the war on terror is not about exclusion, but inclusion. It isn’t about making Muslims second-class citizens. It isn’t about mindlessly saying that sending U.S. troops to the deserts of the Middle East will solve everyone’s problems.

He needs to reaffirm what’s great about America. Our diversity. Our freedom. Our sense of shared values.

He needs us to know that he’s on it, as he has always been. President Obama has always said his number one job is keeping the American people safe. If we hang in there with him, we will be.

1. It’s Wednesday, November 18, 2015.

2. We can be nothing but grateful if French police thwarted another horrific terrorist attack with today’s raid in St.-Denis. It’s clear that these perverts have had way too much time to plan attacks on innocent people.

What we seem to be finding out about these hoodlums is that most of them were citizens of France. They were not citizens of Syria who snuck in as part of the wave of refugees.

I doubt that this will have much impact on the Republican ignorati that’s either running for the presidential nomination or governs a state. Their reaction to what happened in Paris – calling for an end to accepting Syrian refugees – is pretty much capitulation to the creeps who launched and supported the attacks.

Those creeps want a world where other religions gang up against Islam. And they would just as soon ignore the hundreds of millions of Muslims who practice their faith in peace and seeking peace.

3. Strangely enough, the announcement that David Ortiz of the Boston Red Sox is retiring fits into the appropriate reaction to terror.

Not that Ortiz is retiring. But the announcement harkens back to his comments in the first Red Sox game at Fenway Park after the Boston Marathon bombing in 2013.

He praised the police and then, in front of thousands of people and a live TV audience, said “This is our fucking city, and nobody’s going to take away our freedom.”

We should share Big Papi’s message with Paris. We need defiance, not fear. We need courage, not cowardice. We need to join together and be strong, as Boston did, and not betray our ideals or our principles.

That’s how we’ll take out the trash that killed indiscriminately Friday night, and might have done it again today if police didn’t intervene.

They don’t represent a country or a religion or a race. They represent Hell. We should send them home.