Donald Trump and his Congressional Republicans, as well as every blatherer on Fox News, are all over Robert Mueller and his team, as well as the FBI and the Justice Department. They have impugned Mueller’s integrity. attacked the FBI saying it’s in tatters (somebody please tell me what an FBI in tatters would look like) and have generally done whatever they could to undermine public confidence in the folks who enforce our laws. Okay, we get the political leverage they’re after. We also get the cynical, anti-American nature of dragging down a bedrock of our republic solely for political advantage. I’m sure it’s making Vladimir Putin smile.
But here’s the thing. I want somebody to give me one – just one – example of compromised integrity of Mueller or the FBI. I don’t mean wild, awful sounding accusations without substance. I mean facts. If your views are in line with those of Trump, please offer your solid evidence of malfeasance of our top law enforcement agency or the special counsel or his team in the Comments section below. And, no, his team members expressing political views is not evidence of malfeasance or compromised integrity.
Here’s my view: This whole exercise is another chapter in the Trump-Bannon quest to tear everything apart, to bring it “crashing down“. Ripping apart the Justice Department would be a potent step for that. Doing so would also affirm that Trump is a poor but brave victim of his awful enemies like the judiciary, the press and free elections. This is what fascism looks like. If you’re a conservative, how does tearing down the Justice Department play for you?
Next point.
Nikki Haley was given the honor of representing the United States of America in the United Nations, which was more than a little weird, since she had absolutely no experience in either foreign affairs or diplomacy. Her ineptitude was made manifest on December 21, the winter solstice, as her dim light matched the longest darkness of the year when she addressed the United Nations. She spoke in opposition to a nonbinding UN resolution calling for the U.S. to rescind its decree formally recognizing Jerusalem as the capitol of Israel and pledging to move our embassy there.
Haley’s infantile temper tantrum makes for yet another day of embarrassment for the United States on the world stage and is as shameful and as crass as it can be. This is putting the unending search for world peace onto a return on investment, pro-forma spreadsheet and threatening to end our investment because we didn’t get treated well by meanies in the UN. This is blatantly declaring that the United States will bull its way through the world with no concern for others, just because we can. This is idiotically declaring that a challenge to Trump, after his having thrown gasoline onto the fires of the middle east, is somehow a threat to our sovereignty, so we’re having a hissy fit at the United Nations.
Somebody please tell me how being a bully in the world advances our interests or that of our allies. Somebody please tell me how sticking a finger in the eyes of every other nation of the world makes Americans or our allies safer. Somebody please tell me what is conservative about dissing the United Nations.
Sleep well, knowing that your government is doing all it can to tear apart our own foundations and, at the same time, undermining our safety and security in the world. If that’s okay with you, you might want to recheck your conservative credentials, because you used to be a bedrock law and order supporter, a believer in the Constitution and the rule of law. You used to believe in America.
Ed. note: There is much in America that needs fixing and we’re on a path to continually fail to make things better. It’s my goal to make a difference – perhaps to be a catalyst for things to get better. That’s the reason for these posts. To accomplish the goal requires reaching many thousands of people and a robust dialogue.
YOUR ACTION STEPS: Offer your comments below and pass this along to three people, encouraging them to subscribe (IT’S A FREEBIE!) and engage.Thanks!
Copyright 2024 by Jack Altschuler Reproduction and sharing are encouraged, providing proper attribution is given.
Nobody is above the law, right? Are you sure? Because there is a mountain of evidence that President Trump and his band of outlaws have done some nefarious things, so Robert Mueller is investigating them, but so far our Republican Congress is mostly mute about Trump’s apparent lawbreaking, his incompetence and the various ways he has failed his oath of office. As he does so, your President and loud Republican voices on the Hill are attacking our FBI, the Justice Department, Robert Mueller and those on his staff. That is to say, they are doing their best to assault and disempower the very people we count on to enforce our laws and to ensure that we have justice in our land.
Of course you know that Trump implored former FBI Director James Comey to back off the FBI investigation into felon Michael Flynn. That investigation was about possible collusion and conspiracy with the Russians by the Trump campaign and possibly Trump himself to hack our 2016 election in favor of Trump. The day after Trump leaned on Comey to back off and Comey refused to cave in, Trump fired Comey. Then he went on national television and announced publicly that he had fired Comey to stop the investigation into him and his campaign staff. That’s obstruction of justice and it’s a crime. A high crime. The same crime that drove Richard Nixon from office so that he wouldn’t have to face impeachment.
For weeks Trump has been denigrating Robert Mueller and talk of Trump firing Mueller is rampant. If he were to do that, do you suppose that might impede the investigation into the Russians invading one of our most cherished rights and Trumpian complicity, that firing Mueller might obstruct justice? Given that you believe that justice is a good thing and that nobody is above the law, if Trump fires Mueller, what are you going to do about it?
Click me
Yes, there is something you can do about it. CLICK HERE and review the MoveOn.org registration page, find a rapid response demonstration in your area. By registering you’ll be set up to receive the GO notice if and when Trump decides to break the law by firing Mueller.
This is not a partisan issue, nor is it a lefty-righty issue. This is not about pro- or anti-Trump. It’s not about coastal elites versus citizens living between the mountain ranges. This has nothing to do with race or religion or gender or preference or guns or immigration or taxes or international treaties or pipelines or clean water or the location of our embassies. This is about whether anyone is above the law. This is about justice. This is about the America you believe in.
So, do it now – CLICK HERE and provide just a few pieces of information and you’ll be ready. Did I mention to CLICK HERE? Did I also mention to do it now? Right. Do it now. CLICK HERE.
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Ed. note: There is much in America that needs fixing and we’re on a path to continually fail to make things better. It’s my goal to make a difference – perhaps to be a catalyst for things to get better. That’s the reason for these posts. To accomplish the goal requires reaching many thousands of people and a robust dialogue.
YOUR ACTION STEPS: Offer your comments below and pass this along to three people, encouraging them to subscribe (IT’S A FREEBIE!) and engage.Thanks!
Copyright 2024 by Jack Altschuler Reproduction and sharing are encouraged, providing proper attribution is given.
Hooray Alabama! Hooray America! Ding, dong, the wicked witch is dead!
Yes, in deep red Alabama the voters told Roy Moore to go home. On his horse, in a car, on foot, whatever. “Just go home, Roy.” And that surely is a victory for sanity and decency.
Click me
I’m pretty much an optimist, but have a look at the final results in this chart. 650,436 Alabamians – 48.4% of voters – voted for the homophobe, the twice-bounced judge who doesn’t obey the law, the alleged, well documented child sexual predator, the Islamophobe, the xenophobe, the nostalgic-for-slavery candidate. Without the disgusting sexual predator accusations, this hate-filled thug likely would have won.
While Alabama is not fully representative of any other state, it does provide instruction as to the ability of Americans to rationalize and compartmentalize shameful, hateful attitudes and behaviors, and there is a lot of shameful, hateful stuff in this country. Proof: a self-aggrandizing, self-obsessed, continuously offensive congenital liar became President of the United States by spewing vitriol.
So, immerse yourself in the glow of victory in Alabama, a win for decency in America, for as long as you like – say, 45 minutes. Then get back to the reality that we need to deal with the root causes of our national disaffection from one another, our intentional dysfunction and our willful embrace of our basest instincts. Alarmingly, that describes 37% of us nationally.
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Ed. note: There is much in America that needs fixing and we’re on a path to continually fail to make things better. It’s my goal to make a difference – perhaps to be a catalyst for things to get better. That’s the reason for these posts. To accomplish the goal requires reaching many thousands of people and a robust dialogue.
YOUR ACTION STEPS: Offer your comments below and pass this along to three people, encouraging them to subscribe (IT’S A FREEBIE!) and engage.Thanks!
Copyright 2024 by Jack Altschuler Reproduction and sharing are encouraged, providing proper attribution is given.
John Pavlovitz is a blogging minister, a posting pastor, who regularly comments on what’s going on. He recently published an open letter “To The 100 Million Americans Who Didn’t Vote;” I highly recommend it to you because he’s nailed a central point of what has driven our circumstances.
In that essay he wrote:
I’ve heard every reason and excuse, every justification and motivation [for not voting] and I honestly don’t disregard them—it’s just that none of them seem to be worth this unequivocal mess we currently find ourselves stuck in.
Angry people vote – they’re motivated, so they show up. When those of us who aren’t angry decide not to vote, we leave the choice of our leaders to those angry people and they choose based upon which candidates have the most prominently extended middle finger. That leaves out of their consideration things like candidates’ capabilities, moral fiber, fitness for office, vision for America and any sense of caring about the people or the country. That’s a really big problem.
Tuesday there is a choice to be made in Alabama. One of the candidates is an accused pedophile and stalker and abuser of women. He has twice been removed from the Alabama Supreme Court for his refusal to obey the law. He glorifies slavery, hates gays and Muslims and worse. The other candidate is pretty much a normal guy, except that in deep red Alabama he’s a Democrat.
It is beyond outrageous that the President of the United States and the Republican National Committee have endorsed the pedophile, the stalker and hater who doesn’t obey the law. That’s because the official Republican view is that this hateful man is better than an unblemished Democrat.
And that’s what America has come to, in part because of 100 million eligible voters who refused to show up on election Day. This isn’t about laying guilt; it’s about declaring fact.
Let’s be fair and admit that the gut level baseness represented by our abhorrent current reality is the BIG deal. It just wouldn’t have been made manifest so horribly without the passive approval of those who didn’t show up to vote and instead allowed power to go to this amoral Congress and administration. That has permitted them to make enormous strides in destroying all that we hold dear.
Surely, we have to deal with the real issues. Meanwhile, we have to stop the drivers of our destruction.
So, citizens of Alabama, your number has been called and you’re up. Your country and the world are counting on you to make the right choice for the America we believe in. Show up on Tuesday.
And another thing – This may not be popular to say, but . . .
We have decades of reacting to women accusing men of stalking, rape, abuse, molesting, groping, grabbing and all manor of predatory behavior and not believing them. We’ve allowed law enforcement that should have been protecting women to instead make it SOP to blame the victims. He said – She said has mostly been settled with humiliation for women and in favor of He.
Now we’re convicting men in the court of public opinion solely on the basis of accusation and the outfall is enormous. Separating out of this discussion the cases where there’s clear evidence of wrongdoing, as in Roy Moore, Donald Trump, Harvey Weinstein and perhaps Al Franken, is just an accusation enough to derail a life?
Let me poke at this a bit. What if some of those anonymous accusers are really political operatives for the other side? What if some of the Me-Too folks are pissy at all men and act out of a perceived opportunity to do some men-bashing? I had an experience of that from a woman I barely knew, whom I had not wronged in any way – she later agreed to that – but who tried to beat me up anyway.
This is not to diminish in any way the importance of this issue, nor the legitimate grievances of women who have been abused. But whatever happened to innocent until proven guilty?
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Ed. note: There is much in America that needs fixing and we’re on a path to continually fail to make things better. It’s my goal to make a difference – perhaps to be a catalyst for things to get better. That’s the reason for these posts. To accomplish the goal requires reaching many thousands of people and a robust dialogue.
YOUR ACTION STEPS: Offer your comments below and pass this along to three people, encouraging them to subscribe (IT’S A FREEBIE!) and engage.Thanks!
Copyright 2024 by Jack Altschuler Reproduction and sharing are encouraged, providing proper attribution is given.
Maureen Dowd gave her Sunday column to her conservative brother Kevin on November 26 and we learned that he isn’t tired of winning. I’m sure that’s true, as Trump hasn’t won anything, but Kevin Dowd’s remarks deserve comment, so this is a letter to him.
You begin, Kevin, by telling us, “Every time I hear Neil Gorsuch’s name, I smile.” Hold that grin, Kevin, because you would never so much as know Gorsuch’s name were it not for Mitch McConnell’s bedrock dishonesty. We keep hearing that elections have consequences, and so they do. Barack Obama was elected President twice, which means that he had dibbies on who to send to the Supreme Court. Does your smile fade just a bit because you know that Merrick Garland, however you may dislike his views, rightly should be there? Is getting your way more important than following the rules?
You admire Trump for his resilience against “an unrelenting and unfair press” – really? The press is supposed to be unrelenting – you remember: the Fourth Estate holding politicians’ feet to the fire – and it has been unrelenting with every President you can remember, so get over that. And tell me about the unfair reporting from the mainstream press. Not the wacko stuff from the publications telling us about the woman with three breasts and the guy who was abducted by aliens who probed his navel. You’ll easily find reports that condemn Trump for his malfeasance or a stupid tweet or his more than five lies per day, but none of that is unfair. C’mon, name just one unfair report.
Until this week Kim’s rockets could only hit the west coast, so you wrote, “we’re probably alright until he can hit a red state.” Did you actually write that? Is that some kind of comfort for people in red states, willing to sacrifice the people of Washington, Oregon and California – any blue state – as long as it doesn’t nuke the red-staters?
You claimed that Trump is undoing Obama’s executive orders, and so he is. The problem is that he’s doing it just to spite Obama and there is no strategy or even any logic that goes deeper than that. He’s getting his federal judge nominations through because McConnell blocked more of Obama’s nominations than any Senate leader in history.
Thank you for your admission that, “The N.F.L. players were disrespecting the American Flag . . .” because you reveal your bias for refusing to see what is right in front of you.
Thank you, too, for pointing out that while we haven’t seen a direct connection between Trump and Russia, Mueller’s investigation has found collusion with Hillary and the D.N.C. on the dossier. You also snarkily claim that she has several donors on Mueller’s staff, “ready to offer legal advice.” The public evidence continues to mount of nefarious Trump connections with Russia and your comment is about how crooked Hillary is? Classic switch and attack, but your comments have nothing to do with Trump’s likely illegal and treasonous activity. Nice job, too, of urging the prosecution of Loretta Lynch and James Comey. Got nuthin’ to do with crooked Donald, but it’s a fine distraction from what’s important.
The real value of your essay, Kevin, is the way you have displayed the Trump supporter mindset – the deflections from core issues, the conscious enthusiasm to ignore outrageous wrongs, the blissful attitude that if it doesn’t hurt you directly it’s okay and your impenetrable blinders for harm to others.
But here’s the thing, Kevin: there are others out here beyond your skin who are affected by his behavior and do have a problem with things like encouraging hatred, cancelling DACA, multiple vacuums where strategies should be, taunting a murderous nuclear dictator, trying to trash the only thing standing between us and a nuclear Iran, pulling out of the Paris Climate Accord as though we aren’t on our way to frying the planet, his trying to refuse healthcare to tens of millions of Americans, his letting the people of Puerto Rico suffer because Trump’s pals on Wall Street want money and his trying to pass a tax bill that primarily enriches wealthy people and does so on the backs of poor and working class Americans and leaves us with a $1.5 TRILLION debt.
Ah, Kevin, it must be nice and comfy to ignore the harm this President is doing and just bask in the glow of the raised middle finger that is Trump nation.
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Ed. note: There is much in America that needs fixing and we’re on a path to continually fail to make things better. It’s my goal to make a difference – perhaps to be a catalyst for things to get better. That’s the reason for these posts. To accomplish the goal requires reaching many thousands of people and a robust dialogue.
YOUR ACTION STEPS: Offer your comments below and pass this along to three people, encouraging them to subscribe and engage.Thanks!
Copyright 2024 by Jack Altschuler Reproduction and sharing are encouraged, providing proper attribution is given.
Chris Matthews’ new book about Bobby Kennedy ends with the words of John Glenn, former astronaut and senator from Ohio, relating his taking Kennedy’s children to their home following the assassination of their father and staying the night with them. He found himself in Kennedy’s study and saw on his desk a collection of poems and essays by Ralph Waldo Emerson, a couple of which Kennedy had marked in the margin. Emerson wrote,
“If there is any period one would desire to be born in, is it not the age of Revolution; when the old and the new stand side by side and admit of being compared; when the energies of all men are searched by fear and by hope; when the historic glories of the old can be compensated by the rich possibilities of the new era? This time, like all times, is a very good one if we but know what to do with it [emphasis added].”
Surely, ours is a time of revolution, a time of massive upheaval in our country and the voices of change are loud and intractable. Oddly, the voices resisting the din of the revolutionaries aren’t embedded in the status quo, but instead are calling for their own change. Returning to the way we were seems to be dissatisfying to all.
That, then, focuses us on Emerson’s final sentence: “This time, like all times, is a very good one if we but know what to do with it.” Who, indeed, has what it takes to declare, “THIS is what we will do with it”? I don’t think a hate-filled, exclusionary specter will do, nor do I believe that just being against things is adequate. Our times call for wisdom in the face of our daily cacophony. We need a visionary who can see both the forest and all the trees, who can make sense of our reality and show us the better tomorrow we’ll build together. Then, in Emerson’s words, we’ll know what to do with it.
The other passage Kennedy had marked in his copy of Emerson’s poems and essays is critical to our time and will remain so:
“Always do what you are afraid to do.”
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Ed. note: There is much in America that needs fixing and we’re on a path to continually fail to make things better. It’s my goal to make a difference – perhaps to be a catalyst for things to get better. That’s the reason for these posts. To accomplish the goal requires reaching many thousands of people and a robust dialogue.
YOUR ACTION STEPS: Offer your comments below and pass this along to three people, encouraging them to subscribe and engage.Thanks!
Copyright 2024 by Jack Altschuler Reproduction and sharing are encouraged, providing proper attribution is given.
First, a heads-up for the impatient: The lede is buried at the end of this post.
A Really Tough Time for Republicans
Judge Roy Moore was removed from the bench twice for flaunting our laws in favor of his absolutist religious beliefs. Yes, he was an Alabama Supreme Court judge who disrespected the rule of law – that’s why he was removed from the bench – did I mention “twice”? Apparently, in Alabama that’s not a disqualifier for becoming a United States Senator. As you know, though, the story gets far worse.
Several women have gone public, accusing Moore of sexually violating them and most were minors when the accused sexual predator allegedly violated them. We’re talking pedophilia. Here are some peculiars about this:
There are only allegations of Moore’s wrongdoing – nine as of this writing – there have been no legal proceedings. If we still believe in innocent until proven guilty (and that’s questionable, given the Trump hysteria of “lock her up”) why are so many calling for Moore’s political lynching?
We all know he’s a slime ball, with a history of his absolutist views being the only ones he deems of value, and his taking a million dollars from his charity for his personal use. He’s hurt both the Constitution and a lot of people and has that self-righteous stink of a hypocrite. That makes it easy to leap to a public opinion conviction of this guy.
Donald Trump has slithered his tweets about how awful are the two wrongdoings of Sen. Al Franken (D-MN). Oddly, even with the multiple accusations of Moore’s pedophilia, Trump hasn’t said a thing about him. That’s a mistake. I believe that the best thing that can happen is for Trump to weigh in on Moore’s alleged sexual predatory behavior. After all, other than Harvey Weinstein, Trump is the guy with the most experience in this field. Okay, that was snark.
Why aren’t all Republicans leaping at the opportunity to fry Roy Moore? This is a political no-brainer.
This is a really tough time to be a Republican with a spine, with a moral compass, with a drive to do what’s right for others and for our country. If such folks stand up for what’s right, the extremists will fire them from from their jobs in Congress and the state houses. That’s because about half of us – most of the reasonable, centrist Americans – don’t bother to vote, leaving to the extremists the decisions about who goes to Congress and our state houses. The solution to this is obvious. So, help a good-guy Republican by showing up and voting for the reasonable folks in every election.
Education
George W. Bush created the No Child Left Behind plan, which forced teachers to instruct students how to take standardized tests, rather than teaching them what they need in order to succeed in life. The name of that plan is something we all support and encourage, so the spinmeisters did their job. The only problem is that No Child Left Behind left millions of children behind.
Speaking of our children being successful, it seems we don’t actually want that to happen. We continue to provide the majority of funding for our schools through property taxes, which is a great plan if the properties are in a wealthy area. It doesn’t work quite as well if the area is poor, because that results in low tax revenue for schools and inadequate resources for turning out well educated kids. That’s how we systematically condemn poor kids to poverty and our country to less than our best possible future.
Leadership
Being clear about what’s going on and about what needs to be done is hard work. Someone needs to stand up and declare, “THAT WAY!” and it isn’t at all obvious who’s up to the challenge. The call has to be inspirational and it must be clean and crisp and memorable so that we maintain focus and continue putting one foot in front of the other and in the right direction. But that call seems as yet uncrafted. In the face of challenges all around us, which way should we go? And who will you follow?
Monopoly (not the board game)
The Justice Department case against Microsoft 17 years ago for anti-competitive practices is the most recent enforcement of the Sherman Anti-Trust Act, legislation designed to prevent monopoly. The purpose of that act was to keep excessive economic power from being concentrated in too few hands, because otherwise society – that’s the rest of us – would be harmed. Ronald Reagan essentially terminated the Sherman Anti-trust Act through non-enforcement and not much has been done to prevent anti-competitiveness since then, even as large corporations buy competitors and consolidate power for themselves and largely at the expense of you and me. Think: airlines; investment companies; accounting firms; pharmaceutical companies; and banks.
Taxes
You already know that the basic fact of the proposed Republican tax plan is primarily a cash giveaway to the rich. That’s accomplished by taking benefits from poor and working class Americans. The Republicans are claiming that this corporate and rich people’s mattress-stuffer bill will deliver the wondrous magic of driving economic growth, new and better jobs for Americans and rising income for all. Plus, everybody gets their own pony in the back yard. But what if all the goodies (other than the cash gift to the wealthy) are really just a phantom that was dreamed up years ago in order to sell trickle-down?
Bruce Bartlett was a key guy in creating the trickle-down myth in the 1980s, so he knows something about this. Read his piece in the Washington Post, where he ‘fesses up to having been a true believer in trickle-down and now unmasks the fraud that it is. He pulls back the curtain about the claim that reducing taxes primarily on the wealthy will result in rising income for working Americans. Be sure to pass along his piece to your fiscally conservative brother-in-law and be sure to remind him of the $1.5 trillion debt the Republicans’ plan will create. That should make for a spirited Thanksgiving discussion.
Banking
The Glass-Steagall Act was passed following the Great Depression as a preventative against some reckless banking practices that helped lay waste to our economy and devastate millions of Americans. In 1999 that law was repealed, allowing investment banks, commercial banks and insurance companies to merge and invent heretofore unimaginable products that put the entire world on the precipice of economic disaster. There have been many calls for the big banks to be broken up since then, precisely because they enjoy de facto monopoly of our financial world and can pose an existential threat to our country. Those break ups haven’t happened and the banking instruments that put our economy in peril in 2008 are vastly larger today. What do you suppose might happen?
Freedom
It’s time to pay attention to what’s going on and make sense of it all. Here’s a sampling of what some very wise people had to say about that.
Our government . . . teaches the whole people by its example. If the government becomes the lawbreaker, it breeds contempt for law; it invites every man to become a law unto himself; it invites anarchy.Justice Louis Brandeis
He Screwibus Union
The people never give up their liberties but under some delusion.Edmund Burke
The people of every country are the only safe guardians of their own rights, and are the only instruments which can be used for their destruction. And certainly they would never consent to be so used were they not deceived. Thomas Jefferson
If a nation values anything more than freedom, it will lose its freedom; and the irony of it is that if it is comfort or money that it values more, it will lose that too. W. Somerset Maugham
We need clear, rational thinking and action in order to protect what we hold dear. Who would have thought that doing so would require courage on the part of those in Congress?
What we’ve seen so far are extensive connections to Russia and fatuous lies told about those connections by nearly everyone high in the Trump administration. What has been confirmed by 17 intelligence agencies of the U.S. is that Russia hacked of our election and tried to influence the votes of millions of Americans. Instead of believing our own experts, Trump believes Putin when all he offers is, “nuh-uh.” Trump maintains a submissive, lapdog posture toward Putin and his manipulation of and access to information makes it look like there’s been a bloodless coup, a Russian theft of America.
You are incrementally being put at greater risk by powerful people concerned solely with their own wealth and power and apparently without the slightest concern for our country. I assure you that staying quiet about this, doing an ostrich, will allow more harm to be done to you and to America. Robert Mueller is doing his job, but that may not be enough. Perhaps it’s time for you to stand up and speak up.
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Ed. note: There is much in America that needs fixing and we’re on a path to continually fail to make things better. It’s my goal to make a difference – perhaps to be a catalyst for things to get better. That’s the reason for these posts. To accomplish the goal requires reaching many thousands of people and a robust dialogue.
YOUR ACTION STEPS: Offer your comments below and pass this along to three people, encouraging them to subscribe and engage.Thanks!
Copyright 2024 by Jack Altschuler Reproduction and sharing are encouraged, providing proper attribution is given.
You’re 12 years old and you’re playing Monopoly with a few friends. One of them is “that guy” – the one who nearly always wins. You’ve played your best, but you’re watching your pile of cash disappear, as you land on yet another of his hotel properties. Your frustration grows and you find you have an urge to wipe everything from the board with both hands, sending houses and hotels, tokens and the Chance cards flying. Been there, done that. And we have a national case of that same frustration.
Many of us watched in horror last November when a thoroughly unqualified narcissist won the election to be President of the United States, commander of the nuclear codes. It took a while for the reality of events to fully register and the press has been chock-a-block with attempts to explain how this could have happened ever since that most fateful of days. How, indeed, could Americans have elected a schoolyard bully, a misogynist, a liar, an adulterer, a know-nothing, a destroyer of things? Last week I found a likely explanation.
I’ve written several times about the enormous impact of globalization and the profound upset it’s causing people in the industrialized world. We haven’t come close to figuring out what to do about this and not long ago it led to Brexit, a knee-jerk reaction by millions of displaced and angry Brits who responded to the uninformed, visceral calls of a braying bully. Just wipe the board. Smash what is. Vent the frustration. There’s a connection of that to what happened here last November.
Jill Filipovic provided insight in her recent essay in the New York Times. Here’s the Monopoly and Brexit connecting paragraph:
Resentful of the changing order of things, some men have simply leaned in to chaos. If the system no longer serves them, it will at least be fun to blow it all up. Which is exactly why the old rules of political engagement don’t work with Mr. Trump or his base.
There are millions of frustrated, angry Americans for whom the American Dream, the bubble idea of the way things work and will be, has burst. It’s a bit like teens who rebel when they at last learn that the world doesn’t remotely correspond to the fairy tales they were told to believe in. There is a mountainous, “IT”S NOT FAIR!” resentment and the echoes of that primal scream get reinforced every day.
There is no question whether the system is equitable; it’s not. For example, you already know about the great productivity gains of the past few decades and how nearly all of the wealth from those gains has gone to the rich, while workers have stagnated or moved downward on the economic ladder. All those globally displaced workers know it, too, and they’re living with the consequences of both globalization and economic unfairness. Little wonder they want to “wipe everything from the board with both hands, sending houses and hotels, tokens and the Chance cards flying.”
Steven Bannon may have left the White House staff, but he continues to be one of Trump’s advisors. Frighteningly, Bannon is specifically dedicated to bringing it all crashing down. Just look at what has already happened to our dramatically understaffed State Department and the other agencies of government that make this country function. We don’t have people in place to do what needs to be done.
I don’t know what Steven Bannon’s and Donald Trump’s psychological issues are, but these destroyers are incrementally wiping the board into chaos. Put some thought into what will fill the void. It’s a different game when you can’t even find the houses and hotels, the tokens and Chance cards that went flying and you probably won’t like what happens.
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Ed. note: There is much in America that needs fixing and we’re on a path to continually fail to make things better. It’s my goal to make a difference – perhaps to be a catalyst for things to get better. That’s the reason for these posts. To accomplish the goal requires reaching many thousands of people and a robust dialogue.
YOUR ACTION STEPS: Offer your comments below and pass this along to three people, encouraging them to subscribe and engage.Thanks!
Copyright 2024 by Jack Altschuler Reproduction and sharing are encouraged, providing proper attribution is given.
Get a head start on the weekend: This is Sunday’s Disambiguation on Thursday so you’ll be ready for Saturday.
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Earlier this year the Muslim Student Alliance of Niles West High School in Skokie, IL presented Truths to Combat Hate: Islamophobia Edition. The presentation concluded with the following prompt:
Click the banner – you’ll understand why when you’ve finished reading this Disambiguation
“What is the one thing you wish all non-Muslim members of your community knew or understood?”
The prompt was an opportunity to provide student voice and to broaden the collective understanding of the Muslim community. Here’s what some of the Muslim students had to say (edited lightly):
“I hate ISIS, too.”
“Muslims love Jesus. Also, I love everybody and hate terrorism as much as you guys do.”
“I do not wear my hijab because I am forced to. I wear it because I feel the most comfortable in it. So please stop asking me if I want to take it off.”
“No, I don’t wear my headscarf in the shower.”
“Terrorism is not a religion.”
“We as Muslims experience a lot of hate. And if not direct hate, then side glances, back stabs, and unfair judgments.”
“Jihad doesn’t mean suicide bombing white people. Jihad means the spiritual struggle within oneself against sin.”
“Washing my hands, feet, and face in the bathroom is part of the process for me to be able to pray. It’s not because I don’t own a shower.”
“Muslims are friendly people and you should not be afraid of us. At least to get to know us before you judge us.”
Hmmm . . . maybe Muslims are a lot like you and me. Kudos to the kids for speaking up and for their clarity.
Please pass this along to your intolerant friends and family members and after they’ve read it, ask them what they learned. If they just can’t be comfortable without having an enemy to hate, then tell them to find a different one. How about Vladimir Putin? Or the Koch brothers? Or the obstructionists in Congress?
Many thanks to the Muslim Student Alliance and the administration at Niles West High School for permission to share this with you, because . . .
A fundamental need under authoritarian rule is to have an enemy, someone who is “other” and whom you can blame for any misfortune or suffering you bear – you know, a scapegoat – like the Muslims Trump demonizes. Oh, and those wonderful kids at Niles West High School – they’re the very people he wants you to fear and hate and keep out of America. There’s nothing like an enemy to both inspire passion and get everyone lined up behind the authoritarian. As Darth Vader instructed, “You don’t know the power of the dark side.” Turns out he was right.
And it’s being used to manipulate you every day. It’s what’s behind Trump’s Muslim ban and his declaration that Mexicans are rapists and murderers and his demonization of the press. He’s trained his 38% to respond to those dog whistles and it’s powerful stuff – they’re the power moves of an authoritarian – so powerful that we are incrementally sliding into fascism.
Something that any mental health professional will tell you is that victims always victimize. For example, if someone was victimized as a child, odds are enormous that he will victimize others when he’s an adult. I don’t know what happened to the haters who showed up in Charlottesville or to Dylann Roof or to Donald Trump, but one thing is clear: There is a lot of hate and victimization going on and it is leading this country in a very dark direction.
Trump is just the key actor now, but there are plenty more.* Trump’s thirst for power and his concurrent attacks on others whom he perceives as an enemy is exactly what Kim Jung-un does in North Korea. And in Trump’s infinite neediness for power and approval, he is incrementally dismantling the foundations of our democracy. Exactly what do you think will fill that void?
Mark November 4 on your calendar right now because you’re occupado that day. Click here to access the November 4 It Begins web page. Read it, scan down to Find an event near you, then sign up and show up. That’s how we begin to stop the slide into fascism and start the return to democracy. That’s how we begin to counter the victimization. That’s how we begin to stop the hate.
*BTW – Steve Bannon is on a weight loss program now, looking prettier already. As you watch him spew his hatred, keep and eye open for a presidential run from him in 2020.
Bonus selection
General John Kelly stupided out his views on the Civil War, defending Robert E. Lee and declaring that the war wasn’t about slavery. Instead of listening to him and others attempt to rewrite history with their self-serving snapshots of well treated, happy slaves, treat yourself to some facts by reading the string on Ta-Nehisi Coates’ Twitter feed here. Scroll down to the Oct. 31 entry that begins, “Regarding John Kelly’s creationist theorizing on Lee and the Civil War,” and then read up the string. Be sure to watch the embedded video by Col. Ty Seidule. Many thanks to David Leonhardt of the New York Times for his heads-up to this enlightening string.
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Ed. note: There is much in America that needs fixing and we’re on a path to continually fail to make things better. It’s my goal to make a difference – perhaps to be a catalyst for things to get better. That’s the reason for these posts. To accomplish the goal requires reaching many thousands of people and a robust dialogue.
YOUR ACTION STEPS: Offer your comments below and pass this along to three people, encouraging them to subscribe and engage.Thanks!
Copyright 2024 by Jack Altschuler Reproduction and sharing are encouraged, providing proper attribution is given.
I observed an incremental shift toward authoritarianism during the Bush years. The John’s – Bolton and Ashcroft – scared me as much as Cheney did. I didn’t see that kind of power shift during the Obama years, although I could have been misled by his intelligence and his reasonable manner.
Now, though, we have a Destroyer-in-Chief, who is incrementally doing sociopath Steve Bannon’s work of eliminating anything that smacks of what we used to call “the establishment.” You know, the systems that promote the general welfare and the rest. Many of the Presidential Cabinet heads are dedicated to eliminating their departments (like DeVos, Price, Perry and Pruitt) and many of the rest are headed by diabolical or drone types (like Mnuchin, Carson and Zincke). Most of what I read from progressives and centrists about the actions of these powerful people is in opposition to the things they’re doing, like allowing oil drilling in the arctic refuge, cutting support for public education and food for poor children and eliminating regulations that prevent industrial pollution. While all of that opposition is important, I’m much more interested in what happens after the infrastructure take-down.
That is to say, what does all the trashing of the established order create? What will fill the vacuum? The answer that keeps coming up is fascism, autocracy, dictatorship. Pick a word that is in direct opposition to democracy and it will do.
When I met with some activists against fascism shortly before Trump took office I agreed with them in principle, but their notions seemed a bit wing-nutty extremist to me and I wasn’t ready to sign on. Now, though, the evidence has continued to accumulate and the picture is becoming clearer that we are on the road to the end of our democracy. That has fueled the change in my thinking.
Have a look at this poster about fascism. It was created during the Bush/Cheney years and is frighteningly accurate today.
If you really want to be informed, click through to the links accompanying the poster and read more. Then let us know how you’re feeling about democracy’s chances.
We must continue to protect our fragile experiment in democracy, because the work will never be done. The Founders thought it was pretty well done in 1789 when the Constitution was ratified, but in the 1950s Joe McCarthy got away with trashing the Constitution until some courageous people found their spine and stopped him.
Today Big Money has bought our democracy and the system hasn’t produced leaders with the spine to stop it yet. Reality is telling us every day that very bad things are happening and we need people to step up. It’s our turn now.
” . . . democracies erode not from military intervention or revolutions, but from the expansion and abuse of power by elected leaders.”
“. . . political constraints are the strongest and most consistent predictors of democratic survival.”
“”We find that limiting executive power both lowers the stakes of elections and protects vulnerable minority groups from abuses of power.”
Ed. note: There is much in America that needs fixing and we are on a path to continually fail to make things better. It is my goal to make a difference – perhaps to be a catalyst for things to get better. That is the reason for these posts. To accomplish the goal requires reaching many thousands of people and a robust dialogue.
YOUR ACTION STEPS: Offer your comments below and pass this along to three people, encouraging them to subscribe and engage.Thanks!
Copyright 2024 by Jack Altschuler Reproduction and sharing are encouraged, providing proper attribution is given.
With 25 years of hands-on executive experience as CEO of the commercial and industrial water treatment company I founded, I now use every bit of what I learned there in delivering workshops and keynote speeches on leadership. And it seems our national political leaders need a bit of that training, too. Let's talk about it here.
