Alt-Right

Good-Bye, America


STATUS ALERT!

This is a proud JaxPolitix moment, as we have officially received our first vile, disgusting and politically inane troll message.

To the troll:  We wish you a full recovery from the multiple head traumas you obviously have sustained.

It started decades ago, but that was just laying the ground work for what has now happened. We pick up the story in the recent past.

When President Obama and his Justice Department decided not to prosecute for the torturing of prisoners done by the CIA or pursue the higher-ups who okayed and directed torture during the Bush II wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, something profound happened.

Obama avoided dispiriting and alienating the CIA. He avoided giving the far right lunatics an easy launch point for an all out assault on him. He prevented the law and order muscleheads from using their self-certain, righteous indignation to attack his administration. All that and more was true and accurate and it completely misses the most important and self-destructive point.

In refusing to prosecute obvious criminal behavior, Obama and his Justice Department became complicit in those crimes. Their hands were as dirty as those of the torturers and George W. Bush, his Attorney General Alberto Gonzalez and his law twisting accomplice, John Yoo, he of the “Torture Memo.” That memo gave cover for the U.S. to violate all the Geneva Conventions against torture of enemy combatants, the U.S. Constitution and our own Military Code of Conduct. That was a dozen years ago, but don’t imagine that kind of complicity is all in the past, because it’s happening right now.

Trump’s wrongdoing has been on public display for over four years and the list of his corruptions is so long that you may be forgiven for having forgotten most of it.

He started with various versions of his Muslim ban. Then he ripped babies from their mothers’ arms at our southern border. The Mueller Report lists at least 10 prosecutable instances of Trump’s obstruction of justice (see Section 2). He orchestrated his people to refuse subpoenas to testify at the impeachment hearings. He attempted bribery of the President of Ukraine. He led a conspiracy to defraud the United States in Post Office-gate. And there are all those campaign finance violations, multiple violations of the Hatch Act, federal tax fraud, violations of the Voting Rights Act and more. For a more comprehensive documentation of Trump’s horribles, click here.

And President Biden and his Justice Department are doing nothing about any of it. They are even defending Trump against the defamation lawsuit filed against him by E. Jean Carroll.

When we look to the Democrats to restore norms, to play by the written rules and the spirit of those rules we are fooling ourselves, because their refusal to hold Republicans’ feet to the fire makes them complicit in their crimes. They’re colluding with the perps because they don’t have the political courage to do what needs to be done. What is even more frightening is that today’s Republican crimes are focused on destroying our democracy. And this is set up to get worse.

Trump is a buffoon, a carnival sideshow barker who’s good at fooling the rubes. That’s us. That his blatantly phony “stop the steal” campaign still has breath only means that those who want to be angry and vent their rage with violence feel justified. “Trump sent me,” is what they told us on January 6. But Trump will at last go away. What will not go away are those who would continue the attack on our democracy, the dismantling of what we say we hold dear.

The next megalomaniac won’t be a buffoon. The next guy – it won’t be a woman because these people are all about white male supremacy – will be smart and smooth and won’t make Trump’s stupid mistakes. The next guy will end our democracy because we will have refused to hold people accountable. We will have failed to protect and defend the Constitution against all enemies, both foreign and domestic. The Republicans will end our republic. Read Dahlia Lithwick’s piece in Slate, The Price of No Consequences for Trump.

There’s another chapter to this story.

We fought the Korean War in the same way we fought WW II, which made sense, in that we fought against a nation state backed by another nation state, both with standing armies. It was our uniforms versus theirs. But then Viet Nam came along, a guerilla civil war, peasant-versus-peasant, and our WW II tactics were all wrong. We intervened completely unprepared to fight such a war and the result was a disaster. We fought the last war instead of the present war.

And that is what Democrats are doing in Congress.

The Republicans are fighting a guerilla war, ignoring precedent, norms, the intent of the Constitution and even basic morality in order to gain power. The Democrats are using quaint, gentlemanly tactics, singing paeans to bipartisanship and are somehow surprised when they get steamrolled yet again.

That’s going to continue to happen (thanks, JN for the link), as we experience what President Biden has called “Jim Crow on steroids” and Republicans – Americans, mind you – eliminate majority rule, wipe out free, fair elections and they disempower the electorate. They’re conspiring to determine election results by fiat – their fiat –  instead of by the will of the people. That’s subversion. And they continue their anti-democratic march without being held to account and with just a limp-wristed fight by Democrats.

As Charles Blow put it, I’m, “not consumed by romantic, hagiographic* illusions of yesteryear,” nor should any of us be. There are literally millions of Americans who would crush our democracy right now and that’s what we must deal with.

In a recent Pew Research Center survey, “Two-thirds of Republicans and Republican leaners say voting is a privilege that can be limited .  .  .  compared with about half as many (32%) who say it is a fundamental right.” Even 21% of Democrats think voting isn’t a right. That’s neither liberal nor conservative ideology. It’s fascist. Pay no attention to the words of the Constitution. Nothing to see there. Move along.

So, good-bye, America. We loved you dearly and believed in you for a long time, but it’s almost over now because we let it be over.

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* hagiographic – to idealize the subject

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The Fine Print:

  1. Writings quoted or linked from my posts reflect a point I want to make, at least in part. That does not mean that I endorse or agree with everything in such writings, so don’t bug me about it.
  2. Errors in fact, grammar, spelling and punctuation are all embarrassingly mine. Glad to have your corrections.
  3. Responsibility for the content of these posts is unequivocally, totally, unavoidably mine.
  4. Book links to Amazon are provided for reference only. Please purchase your books through your local mom & pop bookstore. Keep them and your town vibrant.

JA


Copyright 2024 by Jack Altschuler
Reproduction and sharing are encouraged, providing proper attribution is given.

What We Need From the House Select Committee


Ed. note: Read through to the end and click the link for a stunning piece you must read.

The House Select Committee has a tough job. They are tasked with getting to the bottom of the traitorous terrorist insurrection that has come to be known simply as January 6. Notable is that this committee is operating in the presence of a well coordinated campaign of denial, obfuscation, fraud and attempts to discredit the committee itself and everything it does, and that’s just from elected members of Congress. In addition are the blabbers, bloggers and blowhards in the hot air media bubble hoping to defeat democracy.

Did you hear the gut wrenching testimony of the four police officers who presented to the committee on the 27th? Their testimony stands as both declaration of their own experience and as a placeholder for the horrific ordeals of so many Capitol and DC Metro Police officers that day. Here’s the thing to bear in mind:

These cops were protecting the Capitol Building and all those within it. As they were being beaten, maimed, tortured, race-hated and killed, there were insurrectionists proudly and hypocritically parading both inside and outside the Capitol Building with Blue Lives Matter flags.

That, of course, pairs perfectly with the hypocrites who carried various versions of American flags as they broke American laws, disrupted the proceedings of The Congress of the United States and attempted to kill Nancy Pelosi, Mike Pence and any other members of Congress they could get their hands on. These people smeared excrement in the Capitol Building and vandalized whatever they got their hands on. They declared they were the true patriots, as they attempted to destroy democracy, but these people are today’s Nazis.

The Washington Post had this take on questions the House Select Committee should answer:

Top of the list is precisely what then-President Donald Trump did before, during and after the attack. How did he prepare his speech preceding the insurrection, in which he told the crowd to fight? What did he anticipate his audience’s reaction would be? When did he know the pro-Trump mob was threatening the Capitol? Why did he offer only mild statements long after the danger was clear? Did Trump-affiliated rally organizers coordinate with extremist groups?

Investigators should hear from extremist-group leaders at the center of the violence. How did they prepare? What was their goal? The committee should hear also from Justice Department and Capitol Police officials who failed to anticipate the riot. Why did intelligence officials across the government seem unaware of warnings that were all over social media? To what extent did law enforcement discount or ignore warning signs about right-wing extremists because federal and local officers did not want to cross Mr. Trump and other Republicans? Why did the National Guard take so long to arrive?

Rep. Adam Kinzinger (R-IL) sits on the House Select Committee and did so with tears in his eyes listening to the words of the four cops who gave testimony. Here’s what he wants the committee to answer:

“How did this happen? Why? Who spurred this effort? Was it organized? When did our government leaders know of the impending attacks and what were their responses? What level of preparation or warnings did our law enforcement have? Was there coordination between the rioters and any members of Congress, or with staff?

“We need answers and we need accountability, and the only way to get that is a full investigation and understanding of what happened to ensure nothing like this ever happens again. Such an investigation should include a serious look at the misinformation campaigns and their origins, the lies being perpetuated by leaders — including by former President Donald Trump — and what impact such false narratives had on the events leading up to and following Jan. 6. We need to be fearless about understanding the motivations of our fellow Americans, even if it makes us uncomfortable about the truth of who they are and the truth of who played what role in inspiring them.”

There are many people to be held to account; however, people at the top commonly get away with their wrongdoing. Think: Ronald Reagan and his Iran-Contra crimes, even as some of his underlings went to prison; and Richard Nixon and his Watergate cover up, even as his underlings went to prison. The underlings must be held to account, to be sure, and it’s imperative that we hold accountable everyone at the top, too. If we fail to do that we will be inviting the next insurrection fueled by lies and an atmosphere of impunity.

Here’s what Liz Cheney (R-WY) had to say to start the committee’s work:

“Until January 6th, we were proof positive for the world that a nation conceived in liberty could long endure. But now, January 6th threatens our most sacred legacy. The question for every one of us who serves in Congress, for every elected official across this great nation, indeed, for every American is this: Will we adhere to the rule of law? Will we respect the rulings of our courts? Will we preserve the peaceful transition of power? Or will we be so blinded by partisanship that we throw away the miracle of America? Do we hate our political adversaries more than we love our country and revere our Constitution?”

This committee is about identifying whether we will adhere to the rule of law and whether “we hate our political adversaries more than we love our country and revere our Constitution.” That’s why we must have answers to our questions, especially in the face of the maddening, lying opposition to truth and to democracy.

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Notable and Quotable

Rep. Mo Brooks (R-AL) spoke to the mob at the Ellipse shortly before the terrorists headed up Constitution Avenue to ransack the Capitol Building and kill whomever they found there, saying,

“[W]e are not going to let the Socialists rip the heart out of our country. We are not going to let them continue to corrupt our elections, and steal from us our God-given right to control our nation’s destiny.”

“Today Republican Senators and Congressmen will either vote to turn America into a godless, amoral, dictatorial, oppressed, and socialist nation on the decline or they will join us and they will fight and vote against voter fraud and election theft, and vote for keeping America great.”

“[T]oday is the day American patriots start taking down names and kicking ass!” He asked if they were willing to give their lives to preserve “an America that is the greatest nation in world history.”

“Will you fight for America?”

That’s the quotable part. Here’s the notable part.

First & second paragraphs: Absolutely everything he said or implied is false. A lie. All of it. That’s been the through line of Republican speech for decades. They hurl such a flood of fecal matter that it’s next to impossible to refute it. Plus, this is incitement to riot.

Third & fourth paragraphs: This is both an incitement to riot and a direct, blatant call to mob violence. Can’t wait to see the dance Brooks does before the House Select Committee and also when he attempts to defend himself in the lawsuit brought by Rep. Eric Swalwell (D-CA).

What are we to do about such people? In the words of Aaron Sorkin from the movie The American President:

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It’s time to speak up.

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Congratulations to the 55,373 new cases and 266 deaths from Covid on Thursday, nearly all of whom were NOT VACCINATED.

Click me – and read the comments

Be sure to watch the walk of the defiantly maskless Congressional representatives who had just been instructed to mask up because of the horrifically increasing number of cases of Delta variant Covid. They were on their way to infect the Senate. Click the pic to the right.

I long held the belief that as people became older they matured and stopped acting like playground brats. I was wrong.

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Late Addition

Attorney Joseph Welch put the first nail into the coffin of Sen. Joseph McCarthy’s reign of cruelty and abuse. Perhaps the siblings of a cruel and dishonest member of Congress can do the same. This is a must read. Many thanks to MZ for the pointer.

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And add your comments below to help us all to be better informed.

Thanks!

The Fine Print:

  1. Writings quoted or linked from my posts reflect a point I want to make, at least in part. That does not mean that I endorse or agree with everything in such writings, so don’t bug me about it.
  2. Errors in fact, grammar, spelling and punctuation are all embarrassingly mine. Glad to have your corrections.
  3. Responsibility for the content of these posts is unequivocally, totally, unavoidably mine.
  4. Book links to Amazon are provided for reference only. Please purchase your books through your local mom & pop bookstore. Keep them and your town vibrant.

JA

Copyright 2024 by Jack Altschuler
Reproduction and sharing are encouraged, providing proper attribution is given.

Golden Calf


Trump’s endless string of lies at the July 2021 CPAC convention was not just boring; it was old news boring. New day, same old lies.

On the other hand, his supplicants applauded and made the proper guttural noises for him in response to his calls for adulation. They did the same for the rest of the lying and outraged victim presenters. All of that, though, was secondary to the February CPAC supplication.

Golden Trump at CPAC, February 2021

That’s when the circle became complete, with people literally bowing down to an actual golden image of Trump. It is the ultimate Golden Calf of our time, today’s version of the biblical tale, this time focusing on our very own political debauchery and wilful human debasement.

The Evangelicals sold out for a promise of ending Roe, seating extreme conservative judges and having marriage strictly defined as between one man and one woman. They slimed their souls by tolerating the lying, cheating and moral degradation they actually got, and they did it with their eyes wide open. The irony for Evangelicals is just too crazy.

The White supremacists and hate groups sold out our country in the hope of moving their hate show to the main stage. They got that, and now everyone is clear that the haters are the real victims, poor babies, that it’s good and right to suppress the lowly “others” and that the haters are the meanest badasses in the country. In support of their sell out of our country and their beating of cops as they waved Blue Lives Matter flags is a human hot air balloon encouraging their wreaking national carnage.

The rest sold out for flimsier reasons, like, “I’ve always voted Republican and could never vote for a Democrat.”

And now all the sellouts have their very own golden idol to worship. Millions voted for him and continue to chant, “Stop the steal!”

Many thanks to JN for this graphic.

So do the Republicans in Congress, even the ones who at first finger-shamed and blamed Trump for his January 6 treachery. But then they chickened out. Back pedaled. Re-instituted their sucking up. Revved up their inner jelly fish and puckered their lips to match Trump’s ass.

They lie about everything that isn’t self-serving and, most awful, are trying to whitewash the insurrection against our country, even as they know that doing so is the path to the destruction of our democracy. That’s what passes for the Republican Party today.

The Tiananmen Square student protests of 2001 in Beijing were an illustration of the constant human struggle for freedom, this time played out on the world stage. It was also a demonstration of the unbridled lengths to which those in power will go to crush opposition.

That’s what autocracies do.

As those bloody events unfolded, one student summoned the courage to stand in front of army tanks and speak truth to power. He would not be silenced by the brutality of leadership. He would not allow the lies and cruelty to go unnamed.

We’re still looking for Republicans with that same kind of courage. Okay, I’ll give you Liz Cheney and Adam Kinzinger. That’s two Republicans out of 263. Name another.

Strangely, we humans love to keep doing the same thing and then expect different results, but there are consequences to Einsteinian insanity. It’s time for Democrats to figure out that their opponents have been playing by different and draconian rules for decades, which is why Democrats have been overpowered in most state houses and governorships and manipulated into insignificance in Congress.

From The NKC Occasional Update of July 23, 2021:

Progressive think tank Future Majority is out with solid research that shows Dems are not getting credit for their achievements #ForThePeople. Their advice? Play offense on legislation, focus on message discipline about “Delivering” Democratic solutions for American families, and employ similar discipline in defining R’s as “For Q and Not for You!”

Democrats, the traditionally tongue-tied, slogan challenged, inept communicators, better figure out a smarter, more effective way fast, because terrible Republican stuff is afoot.

I don’t anticipate divine intervention to halt Republican Golden Calf prostration and the killing of democracy it can cause, but there was that one time at the foot of Mt. Sinai  .  .  .

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I’ve written many times to and about our vaccine refuseniks. I’ve answered their reasonable concerns, offered doses of truth to counter the disinformation and propaganda they’ve been fed, used patriotic duty persuasion, offered snarky comments and ridicule and I’ve also washed my hands of them. Still, they insist upon endangering themselves and others, especially our first responders who have to risk their own lives to treat them in hospitals. Many still proudly declare their right to be stupid and die, which they are doing at the rate of about 260 per day.

(Darwin Awards alert: We have some solid contenders in this bunch.)

I’ve come to the point where it’s clear that Emmanuel Macron, President of France, has it right. Read his comments that start this edition of The Markin Report. Then read the rest of the report. It’s time for plain talk, setting limits and accountability. The reason it’s time is because this is an immediate life and death issue that is on the way to becoming far more threatening.

Click the graph

Tennessee Update

As reported here, the Great State of Tennessee proudly announced its cancellation of all outreach to promote all vaccines for kids. Not just Covid; all vaccines. As reported by The Tennessean, after receiving pressure from national condemnation of that decision, Gov. Lee announced a reversal, with the exception of continuing to refuse to use social media to reach teens, where they might actually be able to connect with them and encourage them to be protected. Apparently, they’ve also decided not to eliminate the Tennessee Department of Health, which they had threatened to do.

The Covid vaccination rate in Tennessee is just 39% and new cases of Covid have quintupled in the past month. There is no word on whether they will attempt to rehire Michelle Fiscus, the state’s former top vaccine official, whom they fired when they caved to GOP pressure and had their health damning fit of insanity on July 13.

Bear in mind that Tennessee is the state that proudly attacked and denied science in the Scopes Monkey Trial in 1925.

Plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose. – Jean-Baptiste Alphonse Karr

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“The blameless became the victims of the feckless.” *

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  • * feckless – adjective
  • lacking initiative or strength of character; irresponsible. In this usage, Republicans.

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And add your comments below to help us all to be better informed.

Thanks!

The Fine Print:

  1. Writings quoted or linked from my posts reflect a point I want to make, at least in part. That does not mean that I endorse or agree with everything in such writings, so don’t bug me about it.
  2. Errors in fact, grammar, spelling and punctuation are all embarrassingly mine. Glad to have your corrections.
  3. Responsibility for the content of these posts is unequivocally, totally, unavoidably mine.
  4. Book links to Amazon are provided for reference only. Please purchase your books through your local mom & pop bookstore. Keep them and your town vibrant.

JA


Copyright 2024 by Jack Altschuler
Reproduction and sharing are encouraged, providing proper attribution is given.

Willful Ignorance


Rep. Jim Jordan (R-OH) in a congressional hearing as he berates and attempts to humiliate Dr. Anthony Fauci.

Dear Mrs. Jordan,

It is with regret that I write to tell you about your son, Jim.

He lies so very often, like repeating Donald Trump’s Big Lie. He lies about the attack on our Capitol Building. He lies by promoting conspiracy craziness. He says mean things about Democrats and liberals with almost every breath. His behavior is so bad that now Nancy Pelosi has had to shoo him from the committee investigating the insurrection because of his pugnacious attitude toward democracy. He just doesn’t play well with others.

I told him that if he kept on being so mean and dishonest that I’d tell his mom on him, but he said he didn’t care (sorry if that’s hurtful). Then he said some really horrible things about Dr. Fauci in a committee hearing. That’s the kind of thing he does all the time and it’s why I’m writing to you now.

It appears Jim knows the difference between right and wrong, so his bad behavior isn’t caused by accidental ignorance. Still, he chooses to do wrong. Is that how he behaved when he was a wrestler and a wrestling coach?

I’m sorry to send him back to you, Mrs. Jordan, but it seems he hasn’t grown up at all and needs discipline from his mom and dad. Surely, you didn’t raise him to be so mean and dishonest and I’m guessing he’ll be in loads of trouble now that you know about his bad behavior.

If there is ever anything I can do to help you to administer his punishments, please let me know. Actually, there are a lot of us who will be glad to help.

Sincerely,

Jack

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From the New York Times – On Politics newsletter of July 17, 2021:

After Sherri Tenpenny, a Cleveland-area doctor, falsely suggested during a hearing last month in the Ohio House of Representatives that Covid vaccines leave people “magnetized” and can “interface” with 5G cellular towers, Republican lawmakers thanked her for her “enlightening” testimony.

During her testimony Dr. Tenpenny told Ohio lawmakers that vaccinated people, ” .  .  .  can put a key on their foreheads. It sticks.” Download a PDF of a recent report on the FaceBook Dirty Dozen spreading anti-vaxx propaganda and self-serving lies here – there’s something in it for Dr. Tenpenny to spout this idiocy. And read The Markin Report here.

People magnetized?

Do you remember your 5th grade science class when you were taught that only iron and some of its alloys respond to magnets? Apparently, this doctor doesn’t remember her science class. She says – with a very serious look on her face – that a few cc’s of vaccine can produce strong magnetism in iron-free humans.

Nope. Not on this planet Earth. Maybe on hers. Plus, most keys are made of some version of brass and are non-magnetic under any circumstances. So, if there are any keys sticking to the forehead of Dr. Tenpenny or others, I suggest they make a date with some soap and warm water.

And interfacing with 5G cellular towers?

Can we vaccinated ones really listen to YouTube videos via the fillings in our molars? Will Bill Gates make us update Windows? Will we be able to use our noses as divining rods to find water in the desert? Puleeze!

Here is a critical alarm we should be ringing: That nut bag, Dr. Tenpenny – quite a few pennies short of a dollar – is providing medical care to Clevelanders. Woe be unto them because of her disdain for science and her willful ignorance.

Far worse than that, Republicans are taking her seriously and enthusiastically embracing yet more ignorance. That’s what passes for a political party representing Ohioans and Republicans across the nation.

Please, please DO NOT give me false equivalences or “both sides” blabbering. There are no Democrats or Independents saying such idiotic things. They are instead trying to ensure voting rights for all Americans, beat this pandemic, rebuild our infrastructure and – who knows? – maybe do something to stop the insanity of unchecked global warming.

The old saying is that there is no cure for stupid. I think that remains true. More important now, though, is a question about a variation on that sentiment: Is there a cure for willful ignorance? Because we have an epidemic of willful ignorance in our country and it is destroying lives, driving people to take up arms against fellow citizens, to attack our democracy itself and even more.

There is a virus going around that lodges in lungs. It has killed over 626,000 of us, yet people willfully deny its existence. Instead of taking the proven protection against the pandemic, they refuse it, claiming that the disease is a hoax. 99.5% of such people make up our current dead victims list, which is increasing by over 260 per day. There is a price for willful ignorance and sometimes it’s the ultimate price.

The willfully ignorant are also denying the crisis that is destroying this planet. In the face of the obvious reality of massive storms, droughts, fires and hurricanes they say things like, “Global warming is a hoax.” As far as I know, Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL) is still doing a dance about the reality of global warming, even as the ocean level rises to engulf his state.

But you can ask anyone in our incinerating west or anybody in the devastating floods in Germany or in coastal and even central China right now if, unlike magnetizing vaccines, global warming is a real thing. They’re quite clear that it is, but the willfully ignorant still deny it. For some crazy reason, our willfully ignorant don’t seem willing to connect the dots, even as they see that both the sun and the moon are now red all across the nation due to smoke from our western fires. Once again, there is a price for willful ignorance and sometimes it’s the ultimate price.

“The Stone Age was once the future,” said my 15-year-old grandson. Our task today is to keep the accuracy of his statement in the past tense. It’s on us to make damn sure we fix global warming because – and I say this without any keys stuck to my forehead – global warming is coming for us unless we take bold action to stop it. It’s the same with the pandemic.

So, here’s my question for your comments: What is it that drives otherwise sensible people to embrace willful ignorance and consequently imperil all of us?

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Did someone forward this to you? Welcome! Please subscribe and pass this along to three others, encouraging them to subscribe. (IT’S A FREEBIE!) Use the simple form above on the right.

And add your comments below to help us all to be better informed.

Thanks!

The Fine Print:

  1. Writings quoted or linked from my posts reflect a point I want to make, at least in part. That does not mean that I endorse or agree with everything in such writings, so don’t bug me about it.
  2. Errors in fact, grammar, spelling and punctuation are all embarrassingly mine. Glad to have your corrections.
  3. Responsibility for the content of these posts is unequivocally, totally, unavoidably mine.
  4. Book links to Amazon are provided for reference only. Please purchase your books through your local mom & pop bookstore. Keep them and your town vibrant.

JA


Copyright 2024 by Jack Altschuler
Reproduction and sharing are encouraged, providing proper attribution is given.

What’s Going On?


First, Something Personal

Parkinson’s Disease is a miserable critter. It strikes famous people like Michael J. Fox, Linda Ronstadt and Neil Diamond and it hits we little folk as well. Nobody knows what causes it, so nobody knows how to prevent it. It’s progressive (it gets worse over time), so all that can be done now for those stricken with Parkinson’s is to manage symptoms. There’s no cure – yet.

There are ongoing medical trials and much research happening, so hope continues, The research and trials take a long time and are very expensive. That’s why son Scott and Wendy and the boys have dedicated their hike of the John Muir Trail this month to raising money for the cause. If you click on their picture you’ll find a donation page for The Michael J. Fox Foundation for Parkinson’s Research. Your joining in this battle in any amount will be greatly appreciated by my family, others who suffer from this disease now and for the millions in the future who will have more hope because of your help. Thanks.

And please pass this along to folks you know. Post on FB, Twitter  .  .  .  you get the idea.

Kudos to all who make the extra effort to raise funds for worthy causes. We’re way proud of this particular extraordinary help-the-cause people. You rock, kids!

Now, On To What’s Going On

I reported last Wednesday about the State of Texas proudly committing itself to denial of facts and reality and ever more firmly embracing Texas myths. The governor himself tweeted proudly that Texas children should be taught that those who died at the Alamo are heroes. No facts need be presented to impressionable minds about the real motivation of these men to fight. We wouldn’t want them to learn that Mexico prohibited slavery, so the actual (not mythical) truth about the battle at the Alamo was that Texas independence from Mexico meant free labor in Texas cotton fields.

And that’s why Texans wanted independence from Mexico. Now I get it!

But Governor Greg Abbott doesn’t want Texas school children to get it, so he’s stifling education. Pay no attention to the fact that those heroes were only heroes to slave owners. Ignore that this is the state that took two extra years to tell its slaves that they were free. Nothing to see here. Move along.

The governor also doesn’t want to allow today’s Texans to be free. He’s promised to arrest all the Democratic state legislators who left Texas to prevent a vote on his draconian voter suppression laws. There is no law that those Democrats have violated by leaving the state, but Abbott wants to arrest them anyway. He intends to incarcerate them in the state Capitol Building until the end of this special session of the legislature.

And he did more.

Abbott dictatorially vetoed funding for the legislature the first time Democrats fled his inquisition to prevent his voter suppression from becoming law. That stiffing of legislators is being challenged in court, but what can’t be challenged is that Abbott is a dictator wannabe. He thinks he’s a candidate for the presidency in 2024. If so, he’s heading the Anti-Democracy ticket.

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This was part of the TN Department Of Health Covid vaccine promotion. It’s gone now.

“The Tennessee Department of Health will halt all adolescent vaccine outreach – not just for coronavirus, but for all diseases – amid pressure from Republican state lawmakers,” reports the Tennessean. The geniuses in the state legislature are also stopping all Covid-19 vaccine events on school property. Plus they’re ending mailed vaccination reminders to teens. All that and only 38% of Tennesseans have been vaccinated. What could possibly go wrong?

Oh, and they also fired Michelle Fiscus, the state’s top vaccination official. The hollow heads in Nashville are even talking about eliminating the state Department of Health altogether. Yes, really.

Vaccine hostility at CPAC, a brain-free hate fest. Click me.

Halting outreach for ALL vaccines means that the State of Tennessee is now allowing – even encouraging – the elimination of vaccines for measles, chicken pox, smallpox, hepatitis, diphtheria, whooping cough, tetanus, polio, HPV  and more. Who cares about epidemics that maim and kill children? Apparently, not the Republicans in the Tennessee state house and in the governor’s mansion.*

Perhaps they think we should revert to the medicine practices of hundreds of years ago, like leeches, blood letting, driving out evil spirits and purification by fire. Remember, this is the state that refused to allow children to be taught evolution. It looks like they’re on the way back there again. Maybe they can burn some witches and thereby Make America Great Again.

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As reported last Wednesday, the new members of the library board in Niles, IL want to cut back hours, programs and pay for librarians by 23%. I guess the Enlightenment is so far back in our rear view mirror that we can now ignore its teachings and proudly go back to mass ignorance. Maybe the new library trustees will burn books and smash printing presses. Then they can cut the library budget by 100%.

As said about Nazis by Dr. Jones, Sr. in Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, “Goose stepping morons.”

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Tying It Together

All of this is being led by Republicans, who seem to be engaged in a frantic race for us to become mentally medieval. They are appealing to our most base animal instincts and would dumb us down to pounding drums in the forest. At the same time, they are scrambling for power in the most dishonest, anti-democracy ways possible. Here’s what happens when we put those two things together.

We get minority rule by autocrats – despots – dictators – leading an ignorant, uniformed public that can be manipulated into anything. We get theocracy and all its vile perversions, cruelties and suppression and a complete elimination of freedom. There has never been a theocracy that did not devolve into that and we have no reason to believe anything different will happen if the bible thumping, chest pounding, democracy smashing Republicans get their way.

Be clear that this isn’t about conservatism. There is nothing that today’s Republicans are doing that is even remotely conservative. They are anti-democracy radicals.

The actions in Texas and Tennessee and Niles, as well as children having been ripped from the arms of their parents at our southern border by the prior administration look cruel because they are, but John Pavlovitz cautions us that cruelty isn’t the point. Power is. And when some are grabbing and hoarding power, others are losing power. Others like us. Read David Frum’s Atlantic essay, There’s a Word for What Trumpism Is becoming.

The Founders didn’t have in mind that We the People should be ignorant peons enslaved by a cruel autocrat. Those conditions are exactly what led to our revolution. I sure as hell know those conditions are not what I have in mind for us and our country.

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* I recently had a nightmare about Nazis. Being an early Boomer I was raised in the aftermath of WW II when Nazi atrocities, the capture of Adolph Eichmann and so much more were commonly discussed. It’s likely I’m not alone in occasional recollections or even nightmares of those things. When I awoke I wondered if people born, say, 20 years after me – the late Boomers and those born after them – have such dreams. It’s probable they have no memories of talk of Nazi terror during their childhoods.

That’s a kid’s head poking out of that machine – an “iron lung”. It’s doing his breathing for him, because he can’t breath on his own. This was a common sight in the 1950s during that awful polio epidemic. I wonder if that kid survived.

Then my head scratching latched onto the Tennessee Republicans and their actions to cripple medical protection for children. I’m guessing that these politicians are young enough to have no memory of children in iron lung machines, measles epidemics, whooping cough ravaging the nation and the rest. Perhaps the same can be said for our Covid-19 vaccination refusers who simply refuse to understand.

They can “OK, Boomer” all they want, but there is so much being done in our country that suggests that we’ve lost individual and collective memory of enormous suffering and death. It seems that all that is left is a knee-jerk reaction to any public policy that contacts rugged individual freedom. And it seems they now want to force their automatic rejections onto helpless others – children.

Very strange. And very dangerous.

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The Fine Print:

  1. Writings quoted or linked from my posts reflect a point I want to make, at least in part. That does not mean that I endorse or agree with everything in such writings, so don’t bug me about it.
  2. Errors in fact, grammar, spelling and punctuation are all embarrassingly mine. Glad to have your corrections.
  3. Responsibility for the content of these posts is unequivocally, totally, unavoidably mine.
  4. Book links to Amazon are provided for reference only. Please purchase your books through your local mom & pop bookstore. Keep them and your town vibrant.

JA


Copyright 2024 by Jack Altschuler
Reproduction and sharing are encouraged, providing proper attribution is given.

Potpourri – v13.0


Curmudgeon Corner

Richard Branson has successfully staged his self-promotional space spectacular and it is most disappointing.

Don’t get me wrong – I’m as geeky as most science geeks and a space shot, even a barely sub-orbital one, is pretty cool. But the science and engineering and cool factors aren’t the real story.

The real deal is the acquiescence of the national press to publicize Branson’s space tourism private business launch. They have followed this present day P.T. Barnum and faithfully done his marketing for him. What do you suppose 3 hours of cable coverage is worth? Multiply your figure by the number of stations covering the event. Now yet more rich guys will pony up a quarter of a million dollars to ride his roller coaster. Well done, Sir Richard.

That’s a perfect parallel to the non-stop free press coverage that Donald Trump got for 5 years, especially during each of his campaigns. We blame Russian hacking and Trump’s horrendous cheating for his temporarily living at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. But just as culpable is the press having slavishly done his marketing for him with all that free publicity. I mean, was it really legitimate news to air in full every promotional event and thousands of his inane tweets and every other outrageous thing he said and did?

All news outlets censor, in the sense that they cannot cover everything that happens. They pick and choose every day. Where was their sense of discretion for five years? Where is it today?

Re-education

If you visit the Alamo in San Antonio, TX you’ll see various artifacts of the men who defended it against General Santa Anna’s army in February 1836. Among the items is a brick from the chimney of Davy Crockett’s home in Tennessee. No clue what that has to do with the battle at the Alamo, any more than the tableware that is on display there from the far away homes of others.

The story of the battle and the men who defended the Alamo has been glorified on television, in movies and primarily in proud Texas lore. Some of that lore is accurate. Much is fictionalized to suit Texas pride and there is great Lone Star chest thumping about it going on right now.

There was to be a book tour event at the Bullock Texas State History Museum in Austin to highlight “Forget the Alamo: The Rise and Fall of an American Myth.” It was cancelled by the museum hours before the event because of political pressure from the state’s Republican lieutenant governor Dan Patrick, who proudly killed the session. (Is that cancel culture? If so, should righties oppose the cancellation?) As one of the book’s authors, Jason Staffords, writes, “Apparently, the state history museum was no place to discuss state history.”

Not to be outdone by his lieutenant governor, Governor Greg Abbott, he of anti-mask and voter suppression infamy, tweeted “Stop political correctness in our schools.” “Of course Texas schoolchildren should be taught that Alamo defenders were ‘Heroic’!”

In other words, pay no attention to facts and reality if they disturb Texans’ comfort in self-serving fantasy. It’s yet another effort of the far right to control the minds of Americans, to educate or re-educate them to manipulative “alternative facts.” We don’ need no stinking truth or learning here in Texas.

Separately, Ira Leavitt wrote about his home town library, saying, “Four new Niles-Maine District Library trustees, stealthy victors in a sparsely-voted election, want to carve deeply into the budget, resulting in staff and program cuts and a 23% reduction of hours.” He called them, “The small-minded people attacking the source of knowledge of their community” No stinking truth or learning needed in Niles, either.

Citizens for Renewing America wants to re-educate our teachers so that our young Americans are properly indoctrinated. For example, Critical Race Theory (CRT), a relatively obscure legal concept, is now a favorite boogeyman used by the far right to demonize any adjustment to its favorite narratives, facts notwithstanding, and they are staunchly against any word of it leaking out. You can download a PDF of the organization’s manifesto, Model School Board Language to Prohibit Critical Race Theory here.

Don’t be fooled by its apparent shield against discrimination, because it’s anything but that. Scroll down to the extensive list of concepts that it proudly declares are prohibited and read its proscribed penalties for violation of its Big Brother doctrine.

These people are focused on prohibiting critical thinking of any kind. They are about muzzling teachers and controlling the minds of our kids. It seems we don’ need no stinking truth or learning in our schools, either. These people and their tyranny are a harbinger of the Thought Police.

All these episodes are part of today’s version of the Scopes Monkey Trial. It’s a battle for knowledge, truth, reality and critical thinking against an entrenched, pre-frontal lobe mob. We lost the Scopes battle (only to “win” later on a bizarre, wimpy technicality). Today’s fight is a battle every bit as important and we better win this one clean. Evolution is real and so is the true story – not the heroic Texas fantasy one – of the Alamo. Our need for knowledge and learning in all things is real. So is our need for librarians.

A Credible Revolution

President Trump told us that his health plan would be incredible – so good you won’t believe it – better coverage, lower cost and all the rest. Of course, it turned out that he was right. His plan was incredible – it lacked credibility because there never was a plan.

Now President Biden has signed An Executive Order Promoting Competition in the American Economy. In presenting it he said, “[W]e know we’ve got a problem—a major problem. But we also have an incredible opportunity.”

I don’t know how sensible his plan is, although Reagan effectively stopped our anti-trust (anti-monopoly) actions and it’s been competition elimination ever since. If Biden can reverse that, it should be a good thing for nearly all of us. Meanwhile, he started by labeling the opportunity as “incredible.”

Our language has evolved to the point where up is down and incredible means credible and spectacular. That’s not okay. I’m calling for a credible revolution, where “incredible” means “not credible, not believable” just the way we applied it to Lyndon Johnson. He had his “credibility gap,” which is what people said in the 60s when the president lied. And he lied a lot.

So, let’s stop using “incredible” when we mean wonderful or better than you might imagine or spectacular or really good. Let “incredible” go where it should, to describe those who lack credibility.

Can you think of anyone or any group that fits that description, boys and girls? I knew you could.

Short Reads in Reality

Dahlia Lithwick explains The Price of No Consequences for Trump.

Republicans, those stalwart “law and order” pounders of fists on desks, seem to have forgotten themselves. Jennifer Rubin explains in Republicans Now Stand for Lawlessness and Disorder.

There’s been enough pretending that there are honest brokers in the Republican caucus. Thom Hartmann makes his persuasive case in Dear Democrats: Don’t Negotiate With Terrorist-Lovers.

Maybe you want to know why Democrats aren’t running the table. Jeff Greenfield explains Why America’s Most Popular Party Isn’t Getting More Done.

Tucker Carlson is on a pseudo-patriotic crusade against “civilization ending poison.” It’s another of his fabricated hate fests, this one attacking teachers. Read a letter to him from an actual teacher, Dear Tucker Carlson.

Are you seeing the Delta variant trend?
236 deaths every day is equivalent to a Boeing 737-MAX crash every day.
GET VACCINATED!

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The Fine Print:

  1. Writings quoted or linked from my posts reflect a point I want to make, at least in part. That does not mean that I endorse or agree with everything in such writings, so don’t bug me about it.
  2. Errors in fact, grammar, spelling and punctuation are all embarrassingly mine. Glad to have your corrections.
  3. Responsibility for the content of these posts is unequivocally, totally, unavoidably mine.
  4. Book links to Amazon are provided for reference only. Please purchase your books through your local mom & pop bookstore. Keep them and your town vibrant.

JA


Copyright 2024 by Jack Altschuler
Reproduction and sharing are encouraged, providing proper attribution is given.

The American ISIS – Part Two


This is Part Two of The American ISIS. Part One was published on Wednesday, July 7, 2021. You can find it here.

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Kurt Andersen’s 2017 book Fantasyland is a remarkable journey through our 5 century endeavor to perfect our ability to believe almost anything. It’s about how we blind ourselves to obvious reality and embrace outrageous explanations and fantasies to fill our gaping ignorance and feed our passions. We may be reaching perfection in that right now and could achieve escape velocity.

I recommend Andersen’s book to you but caution that you may find some of his views objectionable. Should that happen, simply focus on the basic American manias of belief in whatever puffs our bubble and our need to be wowed by ever more spectacular wow. There are hard consequences to those vulnerabilities. Our enthusiasm to believe the otherwise unbelievable is especially true when we live in fear of the ground shifting farther away from what feels solidly familiar. We clutch after vaporous memories of an imagined better time that never happened and we demand that it return.

He concludes his book quoting Hannah Arendt, who escaped Germany in 1933, came to America and became a leading political philosopher. In her 1951 book The Origins of Totalitarianism she wrote, “The essential conviction shared by all ranks [in a totalitarian movement], from fellow-traveler to leader, is that politics is a game of cheating.” Consider that in the context of our fellow-traveler mobs chanting “Stop the steal!” and their dear leader having whined, accused and lied incessantly since 2015 about rigged elections and who now donkey brays about how the 2020 election was “stolen” from him and his mobs.

Back to Arendt:

“A mix of gullibility and cynicism have been an outstanding characteristic of mob mentality before it became an everyday phenomenon of masses. In an ever-changing, incomprehensible world the masses had reached the point where they would, at the same time, believe everything and nothing, think that everything was possible and nothing was true  .  .  .  Mass propaganda discovered that its audience was ready at all times to believe the worst, no matter how absurd, and did not object to being deceived because it held every statement to be a lie anyhow. The totalitarian leaders based their propaganda on the correct psychological assumption that, under such conditions, one could make people believe the most fantastic statements one day, and trust that if the next day they were given irrefutable truth of their falsehood, they would take refuge in cynicism; instead of deserting the leaders who had lied to them, they would protest that they had known all along that the statement was a lie and would admire the leaders for their superior tactical cleverness.”

Her references were to Stalin and Hitler but she could as well have been writing about 21st century America and Donald Trump. We’re not a different species from any other people at any other time and this story is a recurring one. The difference is that it is being played out on us today and it is our democracy that is in danger.

The Nazi Brown Shirts and Stalin’s Death Squads and Pol Pot’s Kymer Rouge were each absolute followers of an absolute, tyrannical leader. They were constantly infused with propaganda. So, too, were and are the al Qaeda and ISIS vengeful mobs.

Right here at home our American ISIS is propagandized by Trump. He is yet another megalomaniac who will get his way or he will burn it all down. His followers have promised death to whomever he points a stubby finger at, including the Vice President of the United States. There are over 300 million guns in private hands in America and most are owned by a relative few, meaning that we have propagandized militias with over-stocked arsenals and barely contained rage. Even some of our military and police are fully propagandized.

These American ISIS members have promised ongoing violence fueled by their self-righteous certainties of patriotism and their imagined unity with 18th century revolutionaries. They have demonstrated their eagerness to inflict their violence on others. In fact far right extremists are the biggest perpetrators of domestic terrorism in America – by far. Now consider what will happen when their tyrannical leader, their Caligula, is indicted and convicted of his crimes.

Consider, too, how critical it will be to pass S.4263, the John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act and H.R.1, the For The People Act to stop a Republican steal of our upcoming elections and of our democracy.

The facts are before us, so expecting the American ISIS to make good on their threats is an exercise in reality. Believe your eyes.

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Good News!

On Friday President Biden fired the Trump appointed head of the Social Security Administration, Andrew Saul, and solicited and received the resignation of his chief deputy, David Black. Saul spent the past years doing everything he could to deny benefits to seniors, our disabled and others for whom the system is supposed to work. He tried to bust the employee union and more.

Saul’s firing is a fine start to removing all the Trump toadies who have their jobs due to campaign donations and blatant conflicts of interest with the agencies they lead, like Postmaster General Louis DeJoy, who spends his days hobbling the post office system and slowing your mail.

Well done, President Biden. Keep purging!

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Said John Maynard Keynes, “When the facts change, I change my mind. What do you do, sir?” So, add your comments below to help us all to be better informed.

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The Fine Print:

  1. Writings quoted or linked from my posts reflect a point I want to make, at least in part. That does not mean that I endorse or agree with everything in such writings, so don’t bug me about it.
  2. Errors in fact, grammar, spelling and punctuation are all embarrassingly mine. Glad to have your corrections.
  3. Responsibility for the content of these posts is unequivocally, totally, unavoidably mine.

JA


Copyright 2024 by Jack Altschuler
Reproduction and sharing are encouraged, providing proper attribution is given.

A Love Letter . . .


.  .  .  To Our Vaccine Refusers

The rest of the world is hoping for, scrambling for, begging for vaccines, while in the good ol’ US of A we’re bribing people to get vaccinated and still they’re refusing.

Question: Why is it possible for me to write that sentence and know it’s accurate?

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Okay, anti-vaxxers, we know you have your reasons – ten are listed in red below. Be sure to let me know if I’ve missed any biggies.

1. The vaccines aren’t fully vetted. I’ll wait until they are so I know they’re safe.

The FDA has done everything but the last bit of paper review. Besides, 67% of all eligible Americans have taken at least one dose, and 58% are fully vaccinated. There have been no deaths from vaccines, next to no deaths from Covid among the vaccinated and almost no hospitalizations among them, either.

Right now 99.5% of Covid deaths are of un-vaccinated people. That means the vaccines are working. Efficacy and safety, baby. You want proof? You got it. Go get vaccinated.

2. The government damn well can’t tell me what to do. This is a free country and I’m free. Plus, I like that my refusing the vaccine pisses off the libs.

Got it, cowboy. But this isn’t all about you. You want to get sick and die, go ahead. But the thing is that once you’re infected you won’t have any symptoms at first and you’ll still be hanging out with your family, your BFF, your co-workers and whoever is sitting next to you at the movies or the ball game and you’ll be infecting every one of them. Get past yourself and do something for others. Get vaccinated so that you don’t spread the disease and kill people.

Plus, the government of We The People can tell you what to do. We tell you to stop at stop signs. We tell you that you can’t murder people or steal their stuff. We tell you that your kids have to be immunized against measles before they can enter public school and there is a lot more do/don’t stuff. There are good reasons for all of those things. So, we really can tell you and all of us what to do and we have to do it. Get over your obstinance. You’ll still be free. And vaccinated.

I can’t do anything to help you about your mania to “piss off the libs.” You might want to try an anger management program.

3. I’m young and unlikely to get sick. Besides, even if I do catch Covid the case will be mild.

Okay, young ‘un. Re-read the first paragraph of #2 above – the one to the cowboys. Then give a thought to your grandmother who, being old, is far more likely to die if she gets Covid from you. So is your obese Uncle Fred and your little sister who has diabetes. This Covid thing isn’t just about you.

So, same deal: Get past yourself and do something for others. Get vaccinated so that you don’t spread the disease and kill the people you love. Get vaccinated because your case of Covid might not be mild. It might kill you.

4. Covid is a hoax. Everybody knows it, so there’s no point in me getting vaccinated.

This is too stupid for me to waste time on, so just go to the ER of your local hospital and ask a few questions. Maybe they’ll shove a ventilator tube down your throat so you can experience what their dying Covid patients endure. You could even ask one of those patients about that, but they won’t be able to answer. You know why.

5. Fauci lied and so did the CDC. We can’t trust anything they say.

Fauci changed his narrative and his recommendations as new information was available and clear. What do you do when you get better information?

The CDC was under enormous pressure to downplay the disease, this from the prior occupant of the White House. They could have and should have pushed back harder against hydroxychloroquine, injecting Lysol, Clorox and UV lights, mask refusal and the rest. Gotta give you partial credit for that one.

Regardless, what we know now is that vaccines save lives, like yours, and that getting infected without having been vaccinated is extremely hazardous to your ability to continue to breathe.

Are you seeing the pattern? 80% of new cases and 99.5% of the deaths now are due to the Delta variant. It’s way more contagious than anything we’ve seen so far. And the vaccines are very effective at preventing Delta infection.

6. Bill Gates has infused the vaccines with nanobots that will enable our tyrannical government to monitor and control me. I’ll never be free again.

Nice detective work, Sherlock, but there’s a flaw in your investigation.

Said Sherlock Holmes, “When you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth.” For you what remains is this: There are no nanobots in vaccines. READ THIS AND WATCH THE VIDEOS. You’ll see that people you trusted lied to you over and over.

Even if Gates or the government wanted to implant nanobots in you, they couldn’t get them through the vaccination needle. You can doubt that, but it does not change the accuracy of the statement. It’s a measurement thing. End of mystery. Go get vaccinated.

If it makes you feel better, drink a toast to Bill Gates and flip him off at the same time, but get vaccinated. In contrast, if you want to be chipped like your dog, see your vet.

7. It’s a Democrat conspiracy to enslave us. They’re already running child sex rings and drinking children’s blood. No way I trust them.

This is way above my pay grade. Seek professional help immediately.

8. Donald Trump said it isn’t manly to wear a mask, so it isn’t manly to get a vaccine, either. Besides, Trump never got vaccinated.

All the Trumps got vaccinated quietly in the White House after he recovered from nearly dying from the disease. And he would have died had he not been administered expensive, heroic medical treatment that probably isn’t available to you unless you’re the president – and you’re not! So if you get Covid, especially the Delta Variant that accounts for nearly all new cases, you’re going to die from it.

As for Trump having said that wearing a mask isn’t manly, true enough. He did say that. But a ventilator hose down your throat as you wear a hospital gown with your ass hanging out isn’t real manly, either. Get vaccinated so that you can continue to be manly.

9. I’m Black, Brown or Hispanic and I know about the Tuskegee syphilis betrayals and others, the con jobs that ruined lives and ended them terribly. I don’t trust the government or the medical blabbers.

Got it. Or at least I get it as much as anyone not on the screwee list might. Let’s fairly say that I appreciate and care.

AND let’s consider that this time might be different. After all, people of all races, religions, ancestry and all the rest of the ways we foolishly divide ourselves are getting vaccinated and suffering no ill effects. And they aren’t getting sick and dying, nor are they infecting the people they love. This is the perfect time to take a chance: go get vaccinated. Live. Breathe. Love.

10. I’m a patriot and I don’t do sissy crap that blue state elites blab on and on about.

Okay, you want to play the red, white and blue card? You better be ready for this:

The most patriotic thing you can do, by far, is to sacrifice a little of your defiance in order to protect your fellow citizens.

Protect yourself so that nurses, doctors, techs and the brave people who clean up whatever mess you’ll leave in your hospital bed, instead won’t have to encounter you.

Do it for the selfless EMTs so that they won’t have to haul your miserable, sorry ass to the hospital. Act as though their lives matter every bit as much as your own. They’re heroes defying death every day for others while you’re out infecting people. Grab your fierce independence and get fiercely, independently vaccinated for them. Do it for your country. Be a patriot.

Aw, hell, I’m sick of trying to talk sense into you. If you want to get infected and die, knock yourself out. Hack, wheeze, gasp and croak.

But until you do, just keep the hell away from the rest of us who don’t want to die because of your defiant attitude, like those few still alive in Springfield, MO. And stop waving all your chest thumper flags – they won’t protect you from the Delta variant. Better yet, take your flags off your vehicle and give it to me. I’m due for new wheels and you won’t be needing yours anymore.

————————————

Did someone forward this to you? Welcome! Please subscribe and pass this along to three others, encouraging them to subscribe, too. (IT’S A FREEBIE!) Use the simple form above on the right.

Said John Maynard Keynes, “When the facts change, I change my mind. What do you do, sir?” So, add your comments below to help us all to be better informed.

Thanks!

The Fine Print:

  1. Writings quoted or linked from my posts reflect a point I want to make, at least in part. That does not mean that I endorse or agree with everything in such writings, so don’t bug me about it.
  2. Errors in fact, grammar, spelling and punctuation are all embarrassingly mine. Glad to have your corrections.
  3. Responsibility for the content of these posts is unequivocally, totally, unavoidably mine.

JA


Copyright 2024 by Jack Altschuler
Reproduction and sharing are encouraged, providing proper attribution is given.

The American ISIS – Part One


When al Qaeda bombed the World Trade Center in 1993 they thought they were doing God’s work. When they upped their game on September 11, 2001 they thought they were doing God’s work. When ISIS beheaded American journalist Danny Pearl they thought they were doing God’s work. When ISIS murdered the staff of Charlie Hebdo they thought they were doing God’s work.

And when rioters stormed and desecrated the Capitol Building on January 6, 2021 they thought they were the true patriots and that they were doing God’s work. They even paused their befouling to profanely rage out a prayer in the Senate chamber.

The New York Times has published a narrative and a 40-minute video chronicling what happened on that awful day of self-righteous rage. I urge you to read and watch, because it’s highly likely that you don’t know the extent of the carnage to people, to physical structures and to our democracy that were visited upon us that day. I promise you that you’ll be left with new questions about how this happened,

The starting point occurred long ago when it was determined that power, fame and money could be gained by lying, cheating, stealing and peddling outrageous and cruel fantasies to angry Americans. This obscene manipulation has been refined to an art form, with people so overwhelmed by false claims that no charge is too fantastic for millions to believe.

These fantasies have led to violence, like mass shootings. One led a North Carolina fool to drive to Virginia and fire his gun into what he thought was the basement of a pizza parlor. He believed the outrageous conspiracy claim that there was a child sex ring run by Hillary Clinton operating there. Luckily, the building has no basement or he likely would have killed someone.

These fantasies and lies have led to millions believing that the 2020 election was stolen by Democrats committing fraud on a national scale. Thousands felt they were more than justified in attacking government.

That’s the starting point, but there’s far more to identify, like,

– why repeated warnings of a violent confrontation coming to DC weren’t heeded by the Capitol Police, DC law enforcement and the federal government

– who gave reconnaissance tours of the Capitol Building to insurrectionists on January 5

– why it took hours for reinforcements to arrive – then hours more for additional help to show up

– who dragged feet in quelling the insurrection

– why there weren’t hundreds of tear gas canisters deployed into the crowd and fire hoses at the ready to disperse the mob

– why law enforcement was so woefully under-resourced and why they showed so much restraint in their actions as they were being beaten and maimed and the building was being desecrated

– why Republicans in Congress opposed and killed an independent commission to investigate this most reprehensible attack on our country. Who and what are they protecting from daylight?

There is conjecture that the goal of the rioters was to prevent the Electoral College votes from being counted. The insurrectionists screamed that they were taking back “their” country. They chanted their intent to hang Vice President Mike Pence and that they were coming for Nancy Pelosi and even Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts (Note: Roberts doesn’t work in that building). They failed at all those goals and more, yet they proudly declared their insurrection to have been a victory. Do you suppose that means they’re done with wreaking havoc and violence on America?

There were perhaps as many as 10,000 anti-democracy, authoritarianism loving* rioters assaulting the Capitol and every one of them broke at least one law. The FBI is pursuing violators, but so far they’ve grabbed and charged only about 535 of them. The vast majority will get away with their criminality. They’ve gone home with the personal satisfaction of knowing that they have destroyed property, injured hundreds, killed 5 and temporarily disrupted the machinery of government.

From The Onion, of course – click me

Perhaps far worse, hundreds of senators and congressmen/women are still there, lying about what happened and protecting lawbreakers by obstructing the investigation of that mass criminality and even of justice itself.

The January 6 riot was a battle in a much larger war against reality, order and democracy. Even if all 10,000 are charged, convicted and imprisoned, the war will continue. As I write this, charges have been filed against Trump’s company and his CFO, Alan Weisselberg. Indictments of Trump himself are sure to follow from the State of New York, the State of Georgia and perhaps from the U.S. Justice Department. As we rediscover our long lost national accountability, how do you suppose Trump’s self-righteous, rage-filled followers, the American ISIS, will respond to that?

It is one of the great ironies of life that people who most angrily proclaim their independence are little more than tools of those who control them. – Mardy Grothe

Watch for The American ISIS – Part Two this Sunday, July 11, 2021.

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* Click through to the article and see for yourself. And download the right-wing authoritarian (RWA) scale referenced in the essay. Prepare to be amazed, but not surprised.

To put the critical urgency of this phenomenon into context, read this letter, entitled with enormous reserve, a “Statement of Concern.” It’s signed by 100 scholars of democracy. What they explain is far more than a “concern.”

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Said John Maynard Keynes, “When the facts change, I change my mind. What do you do, sir?” So, add your comments below to help us all to be better informed.

Thanks!

The Fine Print:

  1. Writings quoted or linked from my posts reflect a point I want to make, at least in part. That does not mean that I endorse or agree with everything in such writings, so don’t bug me about it.
  2. Errors in fact, grammar, spelling and punctuation are all embarrassingly mine. Glad to have your corrections.
  3. Responsibility for the content of these posts is unequivocally, totally, unavoidably mine.

JA


Copyright 2024 by Jack Altschuler
Reproduction and sharing are encouraged, providing proper attribution is given.

We’re A Very Entertaining Species & BHB


Here’s a Fourth of July message, because this is how we define ourselves. This is how we do things. This is how we plan for the future. Be advised that we can be a very entertaining species.

Read this from Wikipedia:

The oil depletion allowance in American (US) tax law is an allowance claimable by anyone with an economic interest in a mineral deposit or standing timber.[1] The principle is that the asset is a capital investment that is a wasting asset, and therefore depreciation can reasonably be offset (effectively as a capital loss) against income.

The oil depletion allowance has been subject of interest, because of the relationship of big oil with the US government, and because one method (percentage depletion) of claiming the allowance makes it possible to write off more than the whole capital cost of the asset.[2][emphasis mine]

The oil depletion allowance applies to most extraction commodities – anything pulled from the Earth, like fossil fuels. The allowance is basically a subsidy to those industries and to those who profit from them.

Once we’ve sucked all the oil out of the ground it’s gone. We don’t have another 60 million years to wait for more supply. So we pretzeled our tax code to give the industry billions of dollars in tax reductions so the oil barons would have a soft landing when all the holes are dry a long, long time from now. We surely wouldn’t want to burden them with the awful mental labor of figuring out what’s next. They just want to go on cashing their checks.

It was a simple jump to taxing the profits of the oil companies – income tax – to make governments beholden to the revenues they received from Big Oil, Coal and Gas. That made politicians and the public protective of the fossil fuel industry because of all the services they funded. It also relieved our leaders of that same burden, the terrible entrepreneurial mental labor of figuring out what’s next. They, too, just want to go on cashing their checks.

So, congratulations to all of us for setting ourselves up for sclerotic brain functioning about what comes next. We aren’t in immediate danger of running out of fossil fuels. But we are in danger of running out of a survivable place to live, because we’re cooking ourselves in our own juice, even as we defend the source of what’s cooking us. It’s good for individuals and local, state and federal revenues to protect the status quo. Pay no attention to the people dying of heat in Portland, Seattle and Vancouver, or the water reservoirs going dry and agricultural fields drying up.

This is just another chapter in the Book of Reality Denial. Like most of the other chapters, you can get to the root of the foolishness by following the directive of Deep Throat: Follow the money.

We humans can be bought at such a low price. Every day there’s a blue light special in aisle seven and we stampede to it, heedless of our own coughing and wheezing. And that’s the BHB – Basic Human Behavior* – we have to overcome if we’re to save ourselves, because the Oil Depletion Allowance won’t grow food, provide water, stop mega storms or un-foul our air.

Be sure to wave your flag at your town’s Fourth of July parade (if it isn’t cancelled due to the pandemic). Watch for my traditional red, white and blue flag shirt as you pass by.

And wake up to the reality that a few more bucks in our pockets at both individual and governmental levels will be worth nothing if we’re scratching for existence. It’s time for us to see red, white and blue in a new way so that those colors will still be flying for our children and grandchildren.

Because ready or not, what’s next is coming.

If you’d like to have a look at our century-long subsidizing of and our squishy love affair with Big Oil, have a look at this piece from Mother Jones.

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* BHB – Basic Human Behavior

Be clear that we humans have a nearly infinite capacity for self-delusion. Even today we see Governor Greg Abbott (R-TX) pledging to complete Trump’s border wall, at least in Texas, and he’s pledged $250 million of Texas tax payers’ money to do it. I guess Mexico just isn’t going to pony up any cash for a wall and, clearly, Abbott’s paltry fund won’t buy much wall, so he’s soliciting private donations. Abbott received $459,000 from duped donors in just a week. To learn why they’re duped, take this math test:

Trump’s border “wall” – sometimes it’s just a fence – cost over $22 million per mile. This was accomplished through the magic of Trump’s no-bid contracts awarded to his donor friends.

The Texas-Mexico border is 1,200 miles long.

How much would it cost to construct Gov. Abbott’s border wall?

Hint: $26,400,000,000

.

So, no, Gov. Abbott is not going to build that wall. You can be confident that the money he collects will go to the governor’s favorite campaign fund. And don’t be surprised if all that gets erected along the border is a weather beaten post with a bullet-riddled stop sign.

Politicians will fund raise on anything that tweaks donors. Stoking fear of immigrants has repeatedly proven to be an excellent stimulus for the emptying of citizens’ wallets into politicians’ piggy banks, exactly what Abbott is doing right now. Our BHB – Basic Human Behavior – allows us to be duped in this way over and over. And it gets even crazier than that.

Somehow Republican South Dakota Governor Kristi Noem thinks it makes sense for her to send South Dakota National Guard troops to the Texas-Mexico border. Yes, seriously.

And Tennessee (not South Dakota) billionaire megadonor Willis Johnson has pledged to fund Noem’s spectacle of trying to look patriotic. Yes, seriously.

VSQ (Very Serious Question): What do you suppose megadonor Johnson expects to get back as a return on his investment in Noem? Hint: Noem thinks she’s a 2024 presidential candidate and Johnson might want to be on Noem’s favorite donor list to get whatever it is he wants. He’s just another grifter and we allow ourselves to get duped by the megadonor 2-step nearly every time.

Click me

Like I said, we’re a very entertaining species.

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More BHB

We Americans are making great progress in refusing vaccines. And we’re doing it just in time for the arrival of the Delta variant which is 140 times more contagious than the “that’s so 2020” Covid-19. Here’s a great summary.

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Did someone forward this to you? Welcome! Please subscribe and pass this along to three others, encouraging them to subscribe, too. (IT’S A FREEBIE!) Use the simple form above on the right.

Said John Maynard Keynes, “When the facts change, I change my mind. What do you do, sir?” So, add your comments below to help us all to be better informed.

Thanks!

The Fine Print:

  1. Writings quoted or linked from my posts reflect a point I want to make, at least in part. That does not mean that I endorse or agree with everything in such writings, so don’t bug me about it.
  2. Errors in fact, grammar, spelling and punctuation are all embarrassingly mine. Glad to have your corrections.
  3. Responsibility for the content of these posts is unequivocally, totally, unavoidably mine.

JA


Copyright 2024 by Jack Altschuler
Reproduction and sharing are encouraged, providing proper attribution is given.

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