Patriotism

A Hard Time to be a Republican


FBI Director James Comey

FBI Director James Comey

Reading time – 2:02; Viewing time – 3:27  .  .  .

Confirmation bias is the standard issue human foible of looking at something and finding whatever supports our biases and ignoring or being blind to what contradicts our notions.

Most Democrats, supporters of Hillary and haters of Trump and anything right wing will find that all is well because Hillary won’t be indicted, per the recommendation of FBI Director James Comey.

Most Republicans, supporters of Trump and haters of Hillary and anything left wing will find that she was criminally careless and potentially compromised US national security, which confirms for them that she is untrustworthy and unfit to be President.

Before this news, Rep. Trey Gowdy (R-SC) released the House Select Committee on Benghazi Report, the seventh (or was it the eighth?) Republican investigation into the terrible events in Libya. Almost immediately after release of the report much of the center and lefty press declared that there was no new information flowing from the $7 million investigation and that the entire investigation wasn’t a serious affair, but rather, a political stunt. Looking at that same report, righties found seven key pieces of “new” information. We humans manipulate to our liking and see what we want to see: confirmation bias at work.

We are in the midst of a presidential contest that is, by any calculation, a race to the bottom, an exercise in which each candidate is working to define the other as the worst in the slime bucket – e.g. “S/He says I’m awful and not qualified but, oh yeah? S/He is far worse.” The Founders would surely be very proud. Just to be clear, that last is sarcasm.

Even if you find Hillary to be disreputable, untrustworthy, manipulative, a tool of the establishment and icky, nobody questions her intelligence, international experience and understanding of the presidency. It is impossible to see Donald the Sociopath that way or as qualified for the job. Mark Salter, the former chief of staff to Sen. John McCain, makes that point eloquently in his Real Clear Politics essay. You need to read it. And you need to send this blog to all your Republican friends and relatives because they need to read Salter’s words, too.

It’s a hard time to be a Republican. That isn’t meant as sarcasm; it’s true empathy – and it’s accurate.

NOTE: This blog was crafted just moments after FBI Director James Comey made his announcement on the FBI investigation into Secretary Clinton’s use of a private email server. The post went live immediately, but you didn’t receive the email announcement until early Wednesday morning. By that time anything may have happened, including that the Democratic presumptive nominee may now be unelectable. Just imagine, a presidential race that hands the presidency to a known sociopath, cheat and swindler. it is as insane as the 1979 mayoral race in Chicago that was won by Jane Byrne because Mayor Michael Bilandic didn’t get a heavy snowfall removed fast enough.

This is a hard time to love American politics.

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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: Please offer your comments below and pass this along to three people, encouraging them to subscribe.  Thanks!  JA


Copyright 2025 by Jack Altschuler
Reproduction and sharing are encouraged, providing proper attribution is given.

The Challenge of 1776


Continental Congress

Second Continental Congress

Reading time – 1:33; Viewing time – 2:39  .  .  .

Actually, they tiptoed up to the Declaration of Independence. There wasn’t a mad rush to shove parchment in King George’s face and everyone was aware of the self-imposed threat to life and property, should they, ”  .  .  .  assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them,” and , ”  .  .  .  declare the causes which impel them to the separation.”

Yet they did that, even with only tepid support of some of the states. We are left to deal with that separate and equal station, this collection of individual states – and deal with leaders who now seem destined to continuously knock heads against one another.

Our present lunacy is not without precedent, yet that is scarce comfort, as our politicians frantically race to the bottom of human disgust. Those debating independence during that blisteringly hot summer of 1776 in Philadelphia argued with passion, but they did not pour their energies into rank personal attack devoid of meaning, nor could they have contemplated our politics as snake oil salesmanship.

And here we are, 240 years later, a divided United States.

We all value loyalty, personal independence, toughness, honor, safety, collective pride, respect, fairness, caring, inclusion and more. The sociologists explain that our problem is that we individual humans place different emphasis on those things and that leads to very different behaviors. And each of us is certain that we got it right and cannot fathom how anyone would disagree with us and we are annoyed by and intolerant of the idiots who foolishly don’t see it our way.

Surprise: The Founders had to deal with those same human dynamics. Yet, somehow they managed to create a new and united country.

If they could do that, exactly what is our problem right now?

FranklinGo to your community parade tomorrow and, as the fire trucks, clowns and floats, Boy Scout and Girl Scout troops and the politicians vying for your vote pass by, recognize that we’re all feeling our way forward, just as they did in Philadelphia all those years ago. As Benjamin Franklin said to the signers, “We must all hang together, or assuredly we shall all hang separately.”

We have big challenges right now, so it’s time for us to hang together.

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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: Please offer your comments below and pass this along to three people, encouraging them to subscribe.  Thanks!  JA


Copyright 2025 by Jack Altschuler
Reproduction and sharing are encouraged, providing proper attribution is given.

Magic Beans


BrexitReading time – 2:41; Viewing time – 3:48  .  .  .

The people of the United Kingdom have spoken and, while the final count was very tight (51.9% to 48.1%), the slim majority has decided the future of the UK and it is not with the European Union. World financial markets, governments around the world and a global army of pundits are trying to sort out the meaning and ramifications of the decision. Everyone wants to know how this works, what’s next and how it affects themselves. All good questions, but the far more important question is why apparently sensible people would do such a thing. What are the drivers for this out-sized behavior? Try this.

We’ve been told since the 1960s that the world is changing and that the pace of change will continue to accelerate. Indeed, it seems that the crystal ball gazers back then were right and the world now looks in many ways as it was predicted to be by outlandish science fiction stories of the past. And be clear that there are unintended consequences to all that change, one of which is job displacement.

One of the key drivers of the Brexit impetus was a reaction to immigrants. The EU mandate is to accept immigrants, many of whom come from Eastern Europe with not much in the way of marketable skills. The belief of the UK public is that these immigrants have been stealing jobs from the “natural” residents of the British Isles and, in consequence, depressing all wages. Regardless of the accuracy of that belief, Britons have reacted in a protectionist way, wanting life to return to a time when they had a steady job with good, livable wages. All they have to do, they apparently believe, is to raise an Anglo-Saxon finger eastward and prevent all that immigration. That feels ever-so-powerful.

Another way to say that is that the world has changed, they don’t like it and they want to revert to a time before the change, when things were understandable, life was steady and predictable and they felt in control of their own lives, when “others” weren’t upsetting their equilibrium. They imagine that they felt powerful then.

And that sounds a lot like the Donald Trump “Make America Great Again” message to American voters.

Millions of Americans are angry. Their jobs went somewhere to someone who would work for 1/30th of the wages they worked for. All they can find are jobs that pay poorly and have no benefits, so they can’t support their families, even as their well educated kids are living in their basements. They’ve been promised over and over that their leaders will make things better, but those same leaders have betrayed them for selfish reasons. They’re angry and they’re raising an American middle finger in just about every direction, especially at the establishment.

We, like the UK, are living in a state of change and some of it hits us hard. Worse, we don’t know what tomorrow will bring and human beings have an existential fear of the unknown that hates unpredictability.

Circus sideshow barker Trump is doing what the Brexit leaders did: he is promising a return to a predictable world, some imagined golden yesterday. That message sells well to people desperate for some sense of control and power in their lives, but it is nothing more than the illusion of vapor, something that nobody can deliver.

No one knows how this rapidly globalizing world will work; we humans are making it up as we go along. So, beware the charlatan who tries to sell us magic beans, lest we make a mess for ourselves the way they just did in the UK.

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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: Please offer your comments below and pass this along to three people, encouraging them to subscribe.  Thanks!  JA


Copyright 2025 by Jack Altschuler
Reproduction and sharing are encouraged, providing proper attribution is given.

Does the Constitution Mean Anything to You?


Service to others is the rent you pay for your room here on earth. — Mohammed Ali

“Service to others is the rent you pay for your room here on Earth.” — Mohammed Ali

Reading time – 51 seconds; Viewing time – 1:55  .  .  .

There are lots of Americans, each with our own understanding, so what do you suppose the Constitution means?

Donald Trump wants to prevent any Muslims from entering the United States. I thought there was something, somewhere in the Constitution that bans religious tests for anything. Oh yeah, it’s the First Amendment. I guess the Constitution doesn’t mean much to Trump.

George W. Bush was a master of silencing protest, as he got special “federal protection zones” for his appearances where there would be protesters. They were called “free speech zones” and the protesters were made invisible to both Bush and to television cameras. In contrast, people carrying signs of support for Bush were allowed to stand close in so that they could be seen and heard. Didn’t we used to have free speech zones that ran border-to-border? Oh yeah, that was in the First Amendment, too. Looks like the Constitution didn’t mean much to Bush, either.

Donald Trump wants our military to torture prisoners and kill the families of terrorists. Both actions are war crimes. Isn’t there something, somewhere in the Constitution that says that it isn’t okay to do those things? Oh, yeah, it’s that cruel and unusual punishment thing in the Eighth Amendment. And murder – I’m pretty sure that isn’t okay. Apparently, Trump sees the Constitution – shall we say – differently.

Inherent in the Constitution are obligations that rest on the shoulders of all of us. They tell us what it means to be a responsible citizen and they carry duties of service. Some understand that, as did Mohammed Ali. He said, “Service to others is the rent you pay for your room here on Earth.”

What does the Constitution mean to you? And what will you do – what action will you take – to make sure that it continues to mean that?

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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: Please offer your comments below and pass this along to three people, encouraging them to subscribe.  Thanks!  JA


Copyright 2025 by Jack Altschuler
Reproduction and sharing are encouraged, providing proper attribution is given.

Tony Soprano in the Cabinet Room


Reading time – 54 seconds; Viewing time – 1:53  .  .  .

May 24, 2016
Chicago, IL
WLS Radio, 890 AM

Local radio talk show host Jonathon Brandmeier interviewed a caller today who identified as a truck driver. He poo-poohed criticism of Donald Trump for having connections to the mob. He said that if you want concrete for your construction project, as Donald Trump does for each of his buildings, then you have to do business with the mob. No big deal.

Brandmeier asked the caller how he would feel if Trump were elected president and brought in mobsters for every cabinet post. The caller said that he couldn’t care less. Besides, he said, those guys know how to get things done.

Brandmeier then ridiculed those who think ties to the mob is a worrisome thing, as though it’s a given that such people are fools.

And that is the attitude of dismissal of ethics and good judgment that pervades our political world right now. It’s a friendly elbow in the ribs of understanding among like-minded people who don’t care about anything they don’t feel threatened by at the moment. Hey, whatever works.

We live in an era of great political emotion. Dangerously, the emotion of 35% of Americans is destructive of learning, reason and democracy.

Talking reason to an emotionally charged person is an exercise in futility. So, our job between now and November 8 is to stop whining about the lack of sense of Trump supporters and instead speak to the 65% with both our reason and our emotion. You can begin your part right now by passing this piece to 3 people you know who aren’t politically attentive.

All that hangs in the balance is the future of America.

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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: Please offer your comments below and pass this along to three people, encouraging them to subscribe.  Thanks!  JA


Copyright 2025 by Jack Altschuler
Reproduction and sharing are encouraged, providing proper attribution is given.

A Reality Check for Trump Voters


Reading time – 67 seconds; Viewing time – 2:34  .  .  .

You’re flashing the bird at the “establishment” – the authority figures, the big money kids, the guys in the expensive suits and power ties. They have been screwing you for so long that you can’t even remember when you weren’t being screwed. You have no recollection of the last time anyone from any establishment said something that didn’t ring phony. You’re mad as hell and you’re not going to take it anymore.

Got it. You’re right – you are being screwed.

And you’re being screwed in ways you might not realize.

Because the crazies with the megaphones have been tweaking your nose over immigration, God, guns and gays. They’ve been fanning your flames with absolutist junk, like, “You’re either with us or you’re not an American” and they have made your blood boil. And all the time they were doing their misdirection trickery they were picking your pocket.

It started with Reagan’s “supply-side economics,” which was supposed to “trickle down” wealth to you from the fat cats. How’s that been working for you? The answer is that it’s not working at all, because the fat cats kept it all for themselves. And they’re still keeping it and protecting their rights to keep their claws deeply embedded into your wallet, thanks to the laws your legislators enacted that created tax breaks only for already wealthy people. You didn’t catch even a little break.

They told you that it was all about jobs, jobs, jobs. That sounded good. Then they defeated every attempt at job-creating legislation except the one for vets. And the Republicans had to be shamed into passing that.

That’s right: They distracted you with tweaky social issues while they ate your lunch. And they’re still eating your lunch.

Just get this: Donald J. Trump has been and is an integral part of the establishment misdirection scheme that got your pocket picked. His claws are holding your cash and he’s proposed cutting taxes even more for the rich kids – but not for you. Trump won’t be trickling any money down to you.

You know a phony when you see one, even if he sounds like a really good circus sideshow barker. So, when November comes around, put your hand on your wallet and keep it there as you vote.

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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: Please offer your comments below and pass this along to three people, encouraging them to subscribe.  Thanks!  JA


Copyright 2025 by Jack Altschuler
Reproduction and sharing are encouraged, providing proper attribution is given.

National Courage


Source: http://www.worldometers.info/world-population/

World Population – Source: http://www.worldometers.info/world-population/

Reading time – 2:10 – Viewing time – 5:29  .  .  . 

When there were just one billion people (about 1804), this planet was able to tolerate a lot of abuse in various forms of pollution, including fouling of lakes and rivers, putting toxic gasses into the air and dumping nasty materials into the ground. The ratio of humans to planet was just too great for us to have lasting, significant impact.

As we now approach eight billion people, the ratio is vastly different and human impact on the Earth is both obvious and threatening. That leaves us just two options for actions to save ourselves from substantial danger.

First, we can take steps to reduce the pollution that we create and perhaps even reverse some of it. That will take a united and sustained global effort if we are to avert wars over fresh water and food. It is hoped that such an effort has been started with the accords developed at the Paris Climate Conference in December, 2015, attended by 195 nations. The fundamental agreement is that each nation is to devise its own plan. What is needed, of course, is for all to follow through both with plans and with actions.

The second thing we can do is to cause world population to stabilize and then decrease, because obviously, with fewer people we will have a reduced impact on the planet. Accomplishing that is the trick.

Jonathan Swift offered us direction on that with his 1729 offering to ease the burden of the poor in Ireland by selling their children as food, this in his powerful work, A Modest Proposal. What could be simpler and have the twofer advantage of both decreasing the population and helping with food shortages?

With that clear and compelling logic in mind, I suggest that we are already on a similar journey and offer these examples:

Let’s face the facts.

We stubbornly refuse to change our lifestyle habits and that’s good, because that helps to solve our population problem.

Interestingly, there are now more homicides by firearms each year than deaths due to car crashes. Part of that is due to the safety systems now built into our cars, like seat belts, air bags, ABS brakes, traction control and newer features like frontal crash protection. There is even some braniac’s invention of a system to keep your car in its lane, even when you’re distracted by texting something that’s so important that it can’t wait for you to stop the car.

Unfortunately, all of those automobile safety features run counter to our desired reduction of the population, so some serious consideration should be given to abandoning all of them and bringing back the days when holiday weekends were marked by tallying the hundreds of fatal car crashes across the nation.

For the gun part of this issue, it’s time to stop pretending that background checks, fingerprint ID and trigger locks are good things. It’s time for a national return to both open and concealed carry, with all adult citizens being required to carry a loaded gun. That will bring us back to the days of the Old West and we will be able to settle our differences quickly and help to reduce over-population and pollution all at the same time.

As for the suicides of military veterans, we may have to become better at this, as there are roughly 21.8 million vets in America, so the 22 suicides per day probably won’t have sufficient impact to make a dent on our over-population problem. Perhaps we can entirely eliminate PTSD treatment for returning vets and also string out medical attention for war-related injuries even longer.

Source: “NIH Research Funding Rebounds in President’s FY 2016 Budget”, by, Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology

Finally, and perhaps obviously, it’s time to end our mania over disease treatment and prevention. Infectious diseases have the same potential today to solve a great many of our population challenges as they did during the bubonic plague in medieval Europe and the influenza epidemic in the early 20th century. Sadly, we have recently taken a step in a counterproductive direction.

As you can see from the dashed light blue line on the chart on the right, we have wisely been reducing funding  for the National Institutes of Health for 13 years. Just this year, though, in a wrong-headed move, the President increased funding just slightly. That will have the long term effect of increasing our population and pollution problems. What could he have been thinking?

Clearly, there are things we can do to increase our death rate and achieve our goals. All we need is our national gift for innovation and the courage to rededicate ourselves to continue on our path.

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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: Please offer your comments below and pass this along to three people, encouraging them to subscribe.  Thanks!  JA


Copyright 2025 by Jack Altschuler
Reproduction and sharing are encouraged, providing proper attribution is given.

Coca-Cola


Reading time – 82 seconds; Viewing time – 2:16  .  .  .

It is such a relief – relief, I tell you – that our beloved country is at last post-racial. Yes, the stain of slavery and racism is at last behind us, as we walk white-hand-in-black-hand-in-brown-hand through the golden meadow, singing the 1971 Coca Cola hilltop theme,

I'd like to build the world a home and furnish it with love,
Grow apple trees and honey bees and snow white turtle doves.
I'd like to teach the world to sing in perfect harmony,

I’d like to buy the world a Coke and keep it company.

Now, the trick is that we have to get the Maricopa County Arizona residents who stood in line for over 5 hours to vote in the primary last week to buy into that message. My guess? They’ll gag on it.

And so should we. We should gag, too, on all the voting restrictions visited mostly on poor people and people of any color darker than beige. These are laws that have snuffed out the rights of tens of thousands of people in Arizona, North Carolina, Texas and many other states since the astonishingly blind and moronically simple-minded Supreme Court decision to gut the 1965 Voting Rights Act. That act contained specific prohibitions on states with a history of discrimination, restrictions which would have prevented the Arizona subversion of America and people’s rights of citizenship. But the Voting Rights Act no longer protects Americans, thanks to 5 Supreme Court Justices.

Now, some economically middle class, white Americans recognize that the country is continuing its color shift to darker shades.  It’s possible that they like the disenfranchisement going on in Arizona. They may like that those discriminatory actions take rights from others, because those others are people who want to take from them what is their lawful and God-given right to be superior.

In fact, there are lots of Constitution thumpers who are like that and they are, just like the Big Bucks Boys who buy our laws and regulations and elections, stealing America from Americans.

You gonna let that happen?

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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: Please offer your comments below and pass this along to three people, encouraging them to subscribe.  Thanks!  JA


Copyright 2025 by Jack Altschuler
Reproduction and sharing are encouraged, providing proper attribution is given.

Potpourri v1.0


Reading time – 2:07; Viewing time – 5:21  .  .  .

A while back Paul Ryan offered an updated version of his budget plan that would at last make our national economy whole, solid and debt free. The only problem with his plan is that it will not make our national economy whole, solid or debt free. In fact, it would create an additional $1.8 trillion of debt, while making wealthy people far wealthier and  middle class and poor people even poorer. It is based on outright fraud, the wishful thinking of fairy dust sprinkled upon us (“I can fly!”) and it is the plan that Ryan continues to promote today. Have a look at Paul Krugman’s analysis in his essay, The Flimflam Man.

Gary Klaben is one of those guys who manages to be sensible in a world that – let’s face it – usually doesn’t seem too sensible. Watch his most recent video, where he compares how we believe certain things, even in the face of a very different reality. It isn’t always easy to see reality, as our news media only brings us the sensational. Example: CNN’s month-long, non-stop coverage of the Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 disappearance, even as there was never any new information. That very sensationalism causes our understanding of reality to be skewed in the direction of fear and danger. Pay special attention to that part as you watch Gary.

Wonderful news!

We no longer have to enforce sanctions against North Korea or Iran, nor do we have to worry about cutting off funding for terrorist groups.

We no longer need civilian leadership to set the priorities or address the needs of the U.S. army, which has been at war since 2001.

We no longer have to deal with our southern border security or the influx of Central American immigrants, nor do we have to concern ourselves with counter-narcotics efforts.

All of those things must be true, since the Republicans in the Senate continue to block appointments of people who would be charged with leading our efforts to deal with these issues. Have a look at this article from the New York Times editorial board and you’ll see that partisan politics is far more important to Republicans than having our nation safe and operating well, notwithstanding their chest thumping and promises to carpet bomb and torture. And, lest you believe that we should be apportioning responsibility for this insanity equally between the political parties, have a look at Ezra Klein’s explanation here.

You already know that Donald Trump couldn’t possibly get any crazier or more dangerous, right? Yet, maybe he’s just warming up and this is the minor league of his xenophobia, his bigotry, his misogyny. Have a look at this MoveOn.org video and decide for yourself what’s coming at future Trump rallies and, if total insanity grips our nation, what will happen if Trump is elected president. It isn’t difficult to imagine storm troopers smashing down your door in the middle of the night and then Trump telling the nation, “It’s a beautiful thing. Believe me.” Maybe staying silent right now isn’t an acceptable option for you.

You’ve heard Bernie Sanders tell us the truth, that no president can reform our nation on his/her own because this is not a dictatorship. Instead, he calls on us for a political revolution, for millions of us to demand the reform we need. Thom Hartmann tells us in his book Unequal Protection that he believes that it will take 10 – 20% of us to stand up and make our voices heard. That is exactly why I offer this platform for our discussion of the truth and encourage you to comment, to make your voice heard. Go ahead – offer your ideas in the What Do You Think? section below.

And that is why I crafted and deliver my program, Money, Politics & Democracy: You’re Not Getting What You Want. I’ve reached hundreds of people from across the political spectrum and not a single person has given me push-back because this is strictly a non-partisan presentation of the truth of what is going on in America. It is also a call to action.

If we are to become the millions of Americans making our voices heard and demanding reform, I’m going to have to bring this clarity to a lot more people. Will you help me to do that?

We need to educate young people who will live for a very long time with the consequences of our actions today. We need to reach poor people who are suffering and don’t understand why life is so hard for them or how to make things better. We have to reach blue collar workers like those at Carrier Corporation in Indianapolis who are all losing their jobs, as their manufacturing plant and all 2,100 of their jobs are being sent to Mexico.

I don’t want money to do my part to educate and motivate Americans. I just want to shove us back to being a democracy. That will make all the difference.

So, make the connection with a group you know who will listen to my message. Tell me when and where and I’ll show up.

Thanks for being part of the solution.

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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: Please offer your comments below and pass this along to three people, encouraging them to subscribe.  Thanks!  JA


Copyright 2025 by Jack Altschuler
Reproduction and sharing are encouraged, providing proper attribution is given.

Edward R. Murrow Was Right


Edward R MurrowReading time – 46 seconds; Viewing time – 2:46  .  .  .

Said Edward R. Murrow, “Just because your voice reaches halfway around the world doesn’t mean you are wiser than when it reached only to the end of the bar.”

Imagine if Donald Trump understood that. Or Ted Cruz. Or Mitch McConnell or Chuck Grassley or Sarah Palin or any of the long list of people whose notion of public service is:

  1. To block any progress on anything other than bulking up the wallets of already rich people, and
  2. Saying ludicrous, flagrantly false things designed to stoke fear and anger in people who are already fearful and angry.

It was during Bill Clinton’s presidency that the Republican party went full bore obstructionist. It became the party of “no” and offered absolutely nothing that would make America better, nothing to “form a more perfect union.” Republicans were solely about clawing for power via public confrontation, even opposing things they had previously championed.

Their philosophy was perfected during the Obama presidency, as Republican lawmakers and a few others gathered at an exclusive DC restaurant on inauguration night, January 20, 2009. The purpose of the meeting was to declare their strategy to defeat Obama in every way, to deny him any victories, regardless of the stupidity of their actions and the cost to our country.

Mitch McConnell went public with that, telling us his number 1 goal was to make President Obama a 1-term president, making clear that anything to make things better for the country or for the American people was secondary. It was all about a Republican power grab. Indeed, they would refuse to do the very jobs they were hired to do and instead would focus solely on partisan warfare. For them, cooperation and compromise meant that everyone else must cave in and agree with them 100%.

None of that strategy would have made sense or been wise had it been heard at the end of the bar. It surely was a clarion call to self-destruction that was heard halfway around the world and that didn’t make it any wiser.

It still isn’t wise and we’re living with that stupidity right now, as McConnell refuses to vet a Supreme Court nominee. He claims that presidents in an election year never make such appointments. That’s absolutely true, except for Anthony Kennedy, who was appointed in Reagan’s last year in office. In fact, one of every three presidents has made a Supreme Court appointment in an election year.

Sadly, Murrow was right.

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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: Please offer your comments below and pass this along to three people, encouraging them to subscribe.  Thanks!  JA


Copyright 2025 by Jack Altschuler
Reproduction and sharing are encouraged, providing proper attribution is given.

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