Voting Rights

U-Turn


POST 1130

From Wikipedia:

A kakistocracy (/kækɪˈstɒkrəsi/, /kækɪsˈtɒ-/) is a government run by the worst, least qualified, or most unscrupulous citizens.[1]: 54 [2][3] The word was coined as early as the seventeenth century.[4] [emphasis JA]

That term was coined then, but we’re reviving that dreadful threat right now.

Paul Newman

Paul Newman

With obviously predictive value, here are two variations of Paul Newman’s Second Law:

Just when things look darkest, they go black.

– or –

It’s always darkest before it turns absolutely pitch black. (Might be from John McCain or Mao Zedong.)

CLICK AND READ THIS. Many thanks to JHA for the link.

This is going to be really bad. We are about to have a government run by the worst, least qualified, hateful, rule-of-law destroying, most unscrupulous citizens. That’s baked into this bitter cake, unless .  .  .

.  .  .  we ditch the hand-wringing, the hopelessness and the rest. Because it will be far worse unless we get to work to stop our headlong plunge into self-destruction. Here are two actions for you to take.

1. Drown Your Republican Senator in Snail Mail, Email and Phone Calls

Demand that s/he VOTE NO on every one of Trump’s anti-competent, anti-qualified, anti-democracy nominees. Look up when your senator’s term ends and tell them that you vow on your children’s lives that if they vote to approve even a single one one of Trump’s democracy destroying picks that you will do everything you can to defeat them next election because your children’s lives would be imperiled by those nominees.

Extend your influence by recruiting your family and friends, neighbors and people you meet when you fill your gas tank and the granny who you help by reaching something on the top shelf for her at the supermarket. Post on whatever social media you use. Do it all repeatedly. Put up a yard sign that reads, “Friends don’t let friends ruin our children’s future.” Tell them all to drown your senator with promises of firing him/her.

Got a connection to someone with a podcast, a pundit with a broadcast email following, someone with connections? Get them to promote the downfall of Trump’s attempt to be führer of the Fourth Reich by directing their audience to pressure their Republican senators to reach around back where their spine is supposed to be an VOTE NO on all those hateful, un-American candidates.

2. Focus on Your State

Focus on the states to kick out the gerrymandering perps, the voter registration cancelling manipulators, the operatives who closed so many polling places and eliminated ballot drop boxes making it harder for many people to vote. How ’bout we encourage everything we can to re-invigorate voting rights. All we have to do is campaign to send Republican state officials packing.

Plus, you need to send a check to The States Project, because they are all about getting all 50 states to actually practice democracy. Wouldn’t that be refreshing?

Need Motivation?

From Heather Cox Richardson:

If Trump has now abandoned the performance he used to win the election, Trump’s planned appointments to office reveal that the actual pillars of his presidency will be personal revenge, the destruction of American institutions, and the use of political office for gain, also known as graft.

We’ll be upside down and without brakes if we don’t start the U-Turn now.*

REBEL!

_________________________________________

* Newman’s First Law: “It is useless to put on your brakes when you’re upside down.”

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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.
  2. There are lots of smart, well-informed people. Sometimes we agree; sometimes we don’t. Search for others’ views and decide for yourself.
  3. Errors in fact, grammar, spelling and punctuation are all embarrassingly mine. Glad to have your corrections.
  4. Responsibility for the content of these posts is unequivocally, totally, unavoidably mine.
  5. Book links to Amazon are provided for reference only. Please purchase your books through your local mom & pop bookstore. Keep them and your town or neighborhood vibrant.
  6. Clicking on most pics in these posts will take you to the source information.

Click me

JA


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

Facing the ‘mare-ca In America


We Billy-Bobs are Right and We Know It

Let’s drop the pretending for a minute and honestly say that while George Floyd’s murder was not okay, it really wasn’t a big deal because, hey, he was just a Black guy. Plus, we stand by our police, except the ones at the Capitol Building and you know why. And we heard that Floyd’s past was sketchy, although me and my posse don’t know what that was about.

And those kids snatched from their mothers at the southern border – I mean, boo-hoo. Gimme a break. Those kids would have grown up to be Brown adults and not so cute anymore and they’d probably be on welfare with me payin’ for them. Glad they’re gone. And their crying moms? Too bad. Nobody invited you. Besides, you’re Brown. Just go away.

Let’s get serious about all those homos demanding rights like they’re so important. Hey, you want a website for your homo wedding, go do it yourself. Don’t try to make a God-fearing, straight, White Christian woman do anything for you. And get that damned rainbow flag out of my face.

And Affirmative Action? Everybody knows that’s just a way to discriminate against White guys, to keep us down. You other races can do that bootstrap thing like we did. Otherwise, just shut up and stay in your place.

We don’t go for no Department of Education. That’s gub-mint telling us what our kids should learn and turning over their future to a bunch of elite coastal bozos and sketchy teachers. We got parents rights, you know. It’s right there in the Constitution. I forget where.

Anyway, don’t go shoveling no lib-ral, anti-‘mer-can crap at us or our kids. We’ll home school ’em and make sure they learn the right stuff, not the lies in your history books. You can’t chop our freedom.

You know this is true: the Founders of this country were all White men – every one of ’em – and they set up this country to be run and owned by White men. That’s a fact. Deal with it, socialist.

The Constitution allowed for slavery, which is why we want to keep those Confederate statues and have our military bases and schools in the South named after Confederate generals. They were great heroes, especially Robert E. Lee. It’s why we honor the Confederate battle flag and do everything we can to make sure only White people can vote and have their votes mean something. It’s the right thing to do because we’re patriotic ‘mare-cans.

You bleeding heart lib-rals make me sick. That lib-ral crap is an insult to the spirit and meaning of our country, so you can take your woke and stick it. If you don’t like that, go someplace else. Maybe back to where your people came from. They sure didn’t come from here like we White people did.

Until then, just remember that most of us are doing concealed carry. Best if you stay in your lane. It would be a shame if something were to happen to you, you know?

We’re right and we know it.

Take a Breath

The above is satire, of course. It’s a caricature of the closed-minded and the willfully ignorant, those intolerant of everything that isn’t just like themselves.

Even as things are exaggerated here to make a point, we as a country rarely care enough about Black, Brown or LGBTQ people. New laws and extremist Supreme Court decisions are ensuring that we care even less. Harm to these people makes the news only because it’s spectacular and brings eyeballs to advertisers. We don’t do much to right the wrongs, so the hits just keep on coming.*

I’m sure it’s comforting to some to deny that there is systemic racism in this country. It’s a relief to some that service can be denied to LGBTQ people on the basis of an impromptu claim of religious beliefs designed to be inflicted on others. All that takes are just a few key words, like God, Jesus, Christian, freedom, liberty and ‘mare-ca. But what you know is that it’s just performative, faux patriotism.

Land of the free, home of the brave? Where’s the bravery that makes sure that all of us are free?

All men are created equal? How equal are we now?

I’m just wondering what it is we really stand for. It’s a terrible shame that we as a nation have lost our ability to feel shame. Maybe we can bring it back. That would help.

About Your Rights and Our Democracy

For a must read satire about the state of our nation that should wake up your blood, read Diane Roberts’ commentary, We’re the Mommies for Liberty and the future belongs to us. It’s focused on the outrageous rights violations going on in Florida today. With that model in mind you’ll see what could be coming to all of America if we don’t set things right. It will give you the shakes, because Roberts’ satire feels frighteningly close to reality.

Another take on democracy and the pummeling of our rights comes from an essay by Anthony Swofford, author of Jarhead, his best-selling 2003 memoir about being a Marine in the first Gulf War, later made into a movie starring Jake Gyllenhaal. His essay in Daily Beast is about book banning, which the vocal extremists in Ottawa County, Michigan did to his book. He ends his post this way:

Make no mistake, they are banning books, but really they are restricting access to ideas. And when one small group of people ban[s] a larger group of people access to ideas, we are in for a closing of the American mind. What begins with banning books ends with a firescape of constitutional rights ablaze. But the fire is already here on your block. [emphasis mine]
 

That stunning image is the threat that faces us, which is why you and I are going to do something about that, like get elected to office people who believe in democracy and who will stop the ones torching the Constitution.

Quotes of the Week

From David Corn of Mother Jones:

So when the pundits scratch their heads about DeSantis’ attempt to out-flank Trump on the right, they miss the point. He is trying to out-hate Trump. That tells you a lot about the guy and what he thinks of Republican voters.

You could say much the same for Republican politicians who tacitly condone extremism by refusing to speak up.

Thinking more about the not-extreme Republicans who have refused to speak out against the vile lies for these terrible years of political venom, read this, paraphrased from Harlen Coben’s 2023 novel I Will Find You:

Morality is subjective. They could have done the right thing, but they only do the right thing when it doesn’t cost them.

Liz Cheney and Adam Kinzinger excepted, of course.

Just Sayin’

Monday, July 3 was Earth’s hottest day in the last 125,000 years. Tuesday was hotter.

It’s possible the climate science nerds have been right all along about looming climate catastrophe, even as know-nothing elected officials have denied both the science and what’s right in front of their own noses. Maybe it’s time we elect officials who can see past their noses.

______________________________

* Watch Jon Stewart’s explainer here.

Today is a good day to be the light.

______________________________

  • Our governance and electoral corruption and dysfunction and our ongoing mass murders are all of a piece, all the same problem with the same solution:
  • Fire the bastards!
  • The days are dwindling for us to take action. Get up! Do something to make things better.

    Did someone forward this post to you? Welcome! Please subscribe – use the simple form above on the right. And pass this along to three others, encouraging them to subscribe, too. (IT’S A FREEBIE!) It’s going to take a lot of us to get the job done.

    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.
    2. There are lots of smart, well-informed people. Sometimes we agree; sometimes we don’t. Search for others’ views and decide for yourself.
    3. Errors in fact, grammar, spelling and punctuation are all embarrassingly mine. Glad to have your corrections.
    4. Responsibility for the content of these posts is unequivocally, totally, unavoidably mine.
    5. Book links to Amazon are provided for reference only. Please purchase your books through your local mom & pop bookstore. Keep them and your town or neighborhood vibrant.

    Click me

    JA


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

Headlines


This Headline Gave Me Hope

.I wrote here about the terribly dangerous Moore v. Harper case from North Carolina. That law threatened to take the votes of We The People, throw them into a dumpster, set them on fire and allow a hyper-partisan legislature to hijack elections – a classic case of theft of our rights and the destruction of our democracy. The good news is that this law was rejected by a 6-3 decision of the Supreme Court.

That ugly North Carolina law was a threat to democracy everywhere. It was promulgated by the autocrat wannabes in the NC legislature, those little minds that covet their very own fiefdom. Had the despotic “independent state legislature theory” law been upheld by the Court, all the Republican controlled states would have followed suit and crafted their own version of this democracy crushing stinker. The legal contest worked out right this time, but another attempt at election theft, the end to your voting rights and our democracy, will surely come along.

The bad news is that the usual suspects, Alito, Thomas and Gorsuch, voted for the autocracy and despotism promised by that anti-Constitution North Carolina legislation. Do bear in mind that if Mitch McConnell had not stonewalled for 341 days President Obama’s nominee to replace Ruth Bader Ginsburg on the bench, Gorsuch wouldn’t be there and Merrick Garland would. McConnell has said that he is very proud of his anti-Constitution larceny.

If the Senate Judiciary Committee had believed Anita Hill’s claims about Clarence Thomas and not fallen for Thomas’ lame “high-tech lynching” victimhood rant, we would have been spared his massive ethics violations and his extremist votes. I say we set that right by removing him and putting Anita Hill on the Supreme Court.

Click the headline above for the Times story and read Prof. Heather Cox Richardson’s explainer. For more insight into this, read Diana Dobrovolny Hefter‘s comment below my post last Sunday. She gets it and is a fine explainer.  Betcha you’ll have something to say, too.

With this vote to smack down the democracy killing “independent state legislature” theory, it looks like it’s possible that the Republican-packed, stolen, extremist Court might not be entirely reprehensible about rights and democracy. Just mostly.

This Oughta Have a Headline

We’ve always had liars, thieves, cheats and scoundrels in our politics. We’ve always had injustice in our justice system. And we’ve always had poverty, disease and avoidable death. What’s most interesting is how red states seem to excel at all of that and how the people in those states don’t seem to see how they are being manipulated and abused. They’re even dying younger due to Republican policies, but they’re allowing that to happen, too. Your required reading is Thom Hartmann’s report of June 28, where he writes:

“It’s undeniably true (and documented with each hotlink below) that Republican-controlled “Red” states, almost across the board, have higher rates of:”

and he goes on to document a Pandora’s box of awful stuff. Why do otherwise common sense Americans not have the sense to refuse to tolerate that?

If you’re in a blue state, don’t imagine you get a free pass. Read this. You’re getting ripped off, too, by being forced to subsidize red states.

This Headline Made Me Laugh Out Loud

This is for real. Click the headline to read the article to meet your minimum daily requirement of eye rolling.

Here’s Another “Oughta Have a Headline”

Let’s be clear about our military veterans. These people volunteered to put their lives on the line for us, even when they knew that the reasons for doing so were stupid, dishonest or hypocritical. They still kept their word to follow orders and to protect and defend. They did that while we went about our regular lives with nobody shooting at us. And some of our vets have lost their way.

A large number of them are homeless. For them, life is far more than hard. A crazy number of them live in a PTSD despair that drives many to commit suicide. It’s the same for teens who are in a mental health crisis of pain and hopelessness.

So, here are a couple of phone numbers to keep handy:

Veterans Crisis Hotline:    800-273-8255
Suicide Hotline:                    988
.

It turns out that the biblical question, “Am I my brother’s keeper?” doesn’t apply only to male siblings. It’s about “brother” in a much broader sense. It’s about a moral obligation to help our fellow human beings when we can.*

The answer to the question is a resounding “YES!” And sometimes your help, our help, is desperately needed. Opportunities to reach out to someone who needs a hand are all around. And as Neil Diamond told us decades ago, that’s what your hand is for. Click the audio below and listen to the words for a reminder.

.
Taking This “Hand Thing” One Step Further

On the night of the 4th we went to the concert in Highland Park, IL to see Highland Park native Gary Senise and the Lt. Dan Band. It was a stunning display of generosity, caring and real deal patriotism. Plus, that’s a most wonderful and entertaining band.

The key point is about what those folks do for our military people. The put their lives where their hearts are and give to our active duty and retired vets. They’ve done over 550 concerts and countless visits to our wounded and they’ve donated gobs of money to benefit and honor the people who keep us safe from bad guys.

They were in town for the Highland Park concert, so the day before that they went to the Great Lakes Naval Training Base in North Chicago and did a gig for our new recruits. Those men and women volunteered to go into harms way for us and many will soon be there. Senise and his band showed up to honor them.

There were police from 27 towns around Highland Park to secure the morning dedication and memorial walk, as well as the concert in the evening. There were Secret Service folks, too, and sniffer dogs. They all gave up their day off, their 4th of July with their families, to be of service to all in the community. All stood in the heat and humidity guarding us. All served and protected.

Think about 9/11 and all of our horrific shootings, like in Highland Park last year. These first responders show up in places where you wouldn’t go and they do the dangerous and grisly things that must be done. So, Gary Senise and the Lt Dan Band remember and honor our first responders, too.

Here’s an NBC report about what Senise and the band members do. Because you’d like to support the people who support our troops, here’s a link for that. It’s a good way to say “Thank You” to the people who say “Thank You” as their mission in life. Through Senise and the band, your hand will reach all the way to our brothers and sisters in need.

One Last Fourth of July Follow Up

From Heather Cox Richardson’s July 5 Letters From an American:

Josh Hawley fist saluting insurrectionists – seditionists – trying to destroy America. January 6, 2020

“Yesterday the official account of the Republican National Committee tweeted Independence Day greetings with a graphic of the Liberian flag, which has one star, rather than that of the United States, which has fifty.

“Even more troubling was the tweet from Senator Josh Hawley (R-MO) attributing to founder Patrick Henry a false quotation saying that “this great nation was founded, not by religionists, but by Christians; not on religions, but on the Gospel of Jesus Christ.” Historian Seth Cotlar noted that the quotation actually came from the April 1956 issue of a virulently antisemitic white nationalist magazine, The Virginian.”

Ignoring the impressive Josh Hawley ignorance factor for the moment, his is not the United States of America envisioned by the Founders, who bristled at the notion of being controlled by any religion. Neither is the America that today’s White supremacists demand.

So, Josh the Sloppy Opportunist, you can take your phony patriotism and religiosity and .  .  .

________________________________

* From Rabbi Hillel:

If I am not for me, then who will be for me?

And if I am for myself alone, what am I?

And if not now, then when?


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

The Canary plus The Good Old Days


This Is a Get Smarter Opportunity

We are sometimes given a gift – a chance to see into the future, if only we will look at what is before us. That’s what we have right now.

You’ve heard of the many democracy, freedom and rights abuses Ron DeSantis and his rubber stamp Republican Florida legislature have inflicted on the citizens of Florida. He has sucked up to as many White supremacist grievances, fears and hatreds as he could in order to get extremists to support his bid to become an authoritarian president.

His assaults represent far worse than oppression of Floridians: DeSantis and his extremists are normalizing fascism.

DeSantis’ actions leave us with an obvious clarity about what he would do to our entire country were he to get his hands on the reins of power. That is why I believe that

Florida is the canary in the fascist infested coal mine.
.

If you’re skeptical about this, read Thom Hartmann’s take. You won’t be skeptical anymore.

You don’t have to be a Floridian to be worried about this, because we see similar things happening elsewhere. That’s why I’m encouraging you to get smart about this, wherever you are.

My friends Jim and Karen Nathan have co-founded Floridians For Democracy, a group dedicated to protecting democracy in Florida and, by extension, where you live. It is to that end that they are inviting you to two informative Zoom sessions:

    • “White Supremacist Activities in Florida: A brave sheriff and a state representative“
    • Jun 7, 2023, 7:00PM EDT. Co-Sponsored by SWFL Voices for Racial Justice
    • and Concerned Citizens of Lower Lee County
    • “Saving Democracy” with Author David Pepper
    •                                                          June 15, 2023, 5:30PM EDT. Co-Sponsored by Floridians for Democracy and SWFL Voices for Racial Justice

Here’s a link to full program descriptions and the Zoom link to each session. Note that these sessions come to you without cost and they are not fundraisers. They are education that is offered because you need to know.

Make no mistake: this is not just about DeSantis attacking minorities or even just about Florida. This is about all the anti-democracy bullies all over America stealing education from our children, cheating Americans of their voting rights, reducing women to second class citizens, refusing gun safety and all the rest.

This matters to you because one day DeSantis and the bullies will be coming for you and you’re going to hate it when they crash through your door.

The Good Old Days

As the default/budget bill was being readied for a vote in the House last Wednesday, Ron DeSantis was pontifi-whining about it, stupidly saying that we’re going to go bankrupt. Other idiot extremist Republicans were saying similarly stupid, apocalyptic things.

They all long so dearly for the good old days when fiscally responsible Republicans were in charge and they never added to our national debt. That made me wonder which days those were, so I dug around and the chart below is the product of that digging.

The numbers represent the total each president added to our national debt over the course of their administrations. Harding and Coolidge delivered surpluses. All the rest gave us more debt.

Most notably, each administration added billions of dollars of debt until Reagan came along and ratcheted that up to trillions. He put six times more debt on the U.S. than his Democratic predecessor did. In fact, he added just shy of twice the debt of all preceding presidents combined!

You can blame his supply side economics for much of that. He truly was Saint Ronny the Reverse Robin Hood, patron saint of giveaways to the rich. Republicans still genuflect at the sound of his fiscally larcenous name.

Simple fact: In large measure our national debt is a function of both low and lowered taxes matched with increased spending. Somehow such debt, while a big DUH! to the rest of us, is not easily understood by supply-siders, who believe Tooth-Fairy-like that we will have increased revenue by means of decreased revenue.
.

George W. Bush dramatically lowered taxes while starting two “off balance sheet” wars. I still don’t know what that term means. He doubled our national debt over all previous presidents combined, including Reagan! Oddly, that failed to impress voters.

The debt Dubya left for us is hardly a surprise, given his wars and his tax cuts. What is surprising is how Trump managed to increase our national debt in one term even more than Dubya did in two terms.

The Dubya and Trump tax cuts for the rich cost the U.S. nearly $10 trillion and included tax breaks for yachts and private jets.* We’re left with the glow of enhancing the lives of rich people and with the bill they left for us.

Someone please tell me which are the Republicans’ good old days when they were in charge, were fiscally responsible and didn’t add to our national debt.

Take a look at the chart and see if the “tax and spend” label that Republicans like to staple to the chests of Democrats makes sense to you. Or the Republican claims of fiscal responsibility. Or the moronic belief in supply-side economics. If any of that makes sense to you, you will immediately be sent to a 3rd grade remedial math class to see if you can keep up with 8-year-olds doing flash cards.

Source: The Balance

________________________________

* It’s heartwarming to know that the new budget just squeezed out of the Congress cuts $21 billion in funding from the IRS. That was a critical thing for Republicans. Two points about that:

  1. The non-partisan Congressional Budget Office (CBO) projects that hobbling the ability to go after tax cheats will result in $40 billion in lost revenue, resulting in an increase to the debt of $19 billion.
  2. Gotta answer this question: Why was it so important for the Republicans to inhibit the IRS from chasing down rich tax crooks? Hint: Can you say “donors” boys and girls?
  • Today is a good day to be the light.

    ______________________________

  • Our governance and electoral corruption and dysfunction and our ongoing mass murders are all of a piece, all the same problem with the same solution:
  • Fire the bastards!
  • The days are dwindling for us to take action. Get up! Do something to make things better.

    Did someone forward this post to you? Welcome! Please subscribe – use the simple form above on the right. And pass this along to three others, encouraging them to subscribe, too. (IT’S A FREEBIE!) It’s going to take a lot of us to get the job done.

    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.
    2. There are lots of smart, well-informed people. Sometimes we agree; sometimes we don’t. Search for others’ views and decide for yourself.
    3. Errors in fact, grammar, spelling and punctuation are all embarrassingly mine. Glad to have your corrections.
    4. Responsibility for the content of these posts is unequivocally, totally, unavoidably mine.
    5. Book links to Amazon are provided for reference only. Please purchase your books through your local mom & pop bookstore. Keep them and your town or neighborhood vibrant.

    Click me

    JA


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

What It’s Really About – Part One


The Diabolical Debt Ceiling

Everyone knows that if the U.S. defaults on its debt obligations that the sky will fall all over the world. We will sink into a recession that lays off over 8 million American workers, leaving them without a way to support their families. Interest rates will soar, making everything way more expensive and we will lose our place of leadership in the world.

All of that and far more is waiting for us right around the corner due entirely to the threatened Republican catastrophe scheme. Why would Republicans be taking us there? They want the same things for our country as you want, right?

Wrong!
.

As Jaemlle Bouie wrote, they don’t hate big government, at least not big government that benefits themselves. I’ll add that they really hate big government that they don’t control dictatorially.

Democracy is all that’s stands guard between us and a dictatorship.

And the Republicans prove to us every day that what they and what their cruel minority wants is absolute control. Dictatorship. They don’t want you to have a voice or power of any kind.

They worship at the feet of dictator Viktor Orbán in Hungary, holding their conferences there, and some of them even cheer Putin. Yes, Republicans are championing Russians who attack the freedom of others.

They gerrymander our voting districts to benefit themselves and to eliminate Democrats from legislative bodies, all the while taking power from those they don’t like.

They attack our press, our schools, teachers and knowledge itself.

They take rights from you time after time, including taking away your right to safety, to not be gunned down in a mass shooting.

They attack our justice system and call for impeachment of our pubic officials for no reason other than to undermine your faith and confidence in our institutions.

They manipulate the system to put ever more guns into private hands, including people who have known mental health issues.

And they work every day to dis-empower women. See the last quote in this post.

What all of that tells us is that what this terrorist minority of haters is working toward is to

bring down our government!
.

They tried and failed (barely) on January 6. But what do you suppose will happen if our economy and our place of world leadership are in tatters because we decided to stiff our creditors?

The thugs will shout from the rooftops that democracy – our government – has failed us and that only they can save us. Then all will be lost. Our delicate experiment in self-rule will be over and we will descend into a hundred years of darkness.

Kevin McCarthy isn’t bluffing when he threatens you, our country or our world. He and the crazies want a very different America than the one you want and they don’t care what rights and freedoms you lose, who gets oppressed or even killed or what injustices torment us, all in their pursuit of all the power and all the money. They want to subjugate We The People. They want Nazi Germany in America. Marjorie Taylor Greene, AR-15 in hand, will be the head of the American SS.

It is all about grabing and hoarding
all the power and all the money for themselves.
.

And that is what it’s really about.

Special note for skeptics: If this seems hyperbolic to you, I urge you not to take my word for any of this. Just look at the easily found historical models and compare them with what is happening in plain sight right now.

On-Point Must Reads

Thom Hartmann lays out with great clarity what the GOP really is, what it is doing to America and what it’s doing to you. His essay is subtitled, “It’s time to call a fascist a fascist.” Hartmann references FDR’s Vice President Henry Wallace and his article about fascism published in the New York Times in 1944. It could have been written today. You can read it here.

Dana Milbank’s Washington Post essay, The Day Free-market Republicans Became Soviet Economic Planners is a fine exposé of Republican efforts to subvert our nation.

Quotes of the Week

From David Corn of Mother Jones:

“These days, Republicans have intensified their efforts to rig the system to help them gain and retain power, even when they attract the support of only a minority of voters. In Missouri, they are trying to pass a measure that would require a 57 percent majority to approve a ballot initiative [same in Ohio, except theirs would require a 60% majority] .  .  . a condition that favors the GOP. Republicans throughout the country are scheming to make it harder for college students to vote. In Texas, Republican state lawmakers are pushing legislation that would allow an appointee of the governor to overturn elections in Houston. And there are many other ways the GOP is striving to stack the deck in its autocratic [read: dictatorial] favor.”

  • – Our Land Newsletter, May 9, 2023

In reaction to the recent spate of mass shootings (we have 2 every 3 days), Sheila Markin writes,

“Wanna Stay Alive? Don’t Vote For Republicans”

“Mother’s Day isn’t dying—mothers are.” – click here and here

  • Watch for What It’s Really About – Part Two this Sunday, May 21.
Today is a good day to be the light.

______________________________

  • Our governance and electoral corruption and dysfunction and our ongoing mass murders are all of a piece, all the same problem with the same solution:
  • Fire the bastards!
  • The days are dwindling for us to take action. Get up! Do something to make things better.

    Did someone forward this post to you? Welcome! Please subscribe – use the simple form above on the right. And pass this along to three others, encouraging them to subscribe, too. (IT’S A FREEBIE!) It’s going to take a lot of us to get the job done.

    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.
    2. There are lots of smart, well-informed people. Sometimes we agree; sometimes we don’t. Search for others’ views and decide for yourself.
    3. Errors in fact, grammar, spelling and punctuation are all embarrassingly mine. Glad to have your corrections.
    4. Responsibility for the content of these posts is unequivocally, totally, unavoidably mine.
    5. Book links to Amazon are provided for reference only. Please purchase your books through your local mom & pop bookstore. Keep them and your town or neighborhood vibrant.

    JA


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

Scheming


Here’s Some Of What Decades of Far Right Scheming Have Brought You

Voter suppression through:

extreme gerrymandering;

voting rights suppression;

throwing out voter registrations for obscure reasons – especially in poor and minority areas;

eliminating voting places;

restricting ballot drop box access;

School vouchers for private and parochial schools that starve public schools of money and violate the freedom of religion guarantee of the First Amendment;

Attacking and eliminating healthcare rights;

Cheating on Supreme Court confirmation hearings to get a polarized Court;

Cultivating a power base by appealing to racism and hatred – no more need for dog whistles;

Book banning and book burning;

Stoking fear of the “other;”

Promoting supply side “voodoo” economics for over 40 years, which has served only to make the wealthy wealthier and more powerful and make all others poorer and less powerful;

Packing the Supreme Court to engineer the Citizens United decision into a grotesque monster that allows enormous sums of money from hugely wealthy individuals and corporations to control our elections. This was accomplished by expanding the original case into something not in contest – in effect, making up a new case to ensure power for the wealthy;

Denial of truth and embrace of cruel fictions that stick a spoke into the wheels of progress in Congress and state houses, then complaining that government can’t do anything. Example: spouting lies about the safety and efficacy of the coronavirus vaccines and demonizing public health officials, while well over a million people died and our healthcare infrastructure (hospitals) failed, leaving millions without healthcare at all – and at the same time complaining that the government grossly mishandled the pandemic;

A Trump appointed Texas judge overruling the FDA to eliminate Mifepristone, this on a foundation of boundless ignorance and vacuous reasoning. That compliments what appears to be his whitewashing of his extremist views that he hid during his lifetime appointment judgeship confirmation process;

Challenging election results on the basis of absolutely no facts or evidence – but the false claims have accomplished the undermining of citizen confidence in our elections;

Stoking fear and hatred of LGBTQ citizens and inciting violence;

Ignoring the overwhelming public will on issues like gun safety, abortion, healthcare and more. Here is an example in a chart from the April 11 STAT report, based on a Kaiser Family Foundation study.

These are shocking numbers and the story is actually worse than it appears. Read the full Kaiser Family Foundation report. This is what happens when a minority is in control and they ignore what the rest of us want. It’s deadly.

The extremists have been at this for decades, applying billions of dollars and enormous political pressure and their scheming has paid off in their minority control and their fantastic self-enrichment. Decide for yourself if this stuff works for you. If it doesn’t, then perhaps we should be scheming to set things right.

DNC: I don’t hear a thing from you except solicitations for my money. Is that your best shot?

Today is a good day to be the light.

______________________________

  • Our governance and electoral corruption and dysfunction and our ongoing mass murders are all of a piece, all the same problem with the same solution:
  • Fire the bastards!
  • The days are dwindling for us to take action. Get up! Do something to make things better.


    Did someone forward this post to you? Welcome! Please subscribe – use the simple form above on the right. And pass this along to three others, encouraging them to subscribe, too. (IT’S A FREEBIE!) It’s going to take a lot of us to get the job done.

    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.
    2. There are lots of smart, well-informed people. Sometimes we agree; sometimes we don’t. Search for others’ views and decide for yourself.
    3. Errors in fact, grammar, spelling and punctuation are all embarrassingly mine. Glad to have your corrections.
    4. Responsibility for the content of these posts is unequivocally, totally, unavoidably mine.
    5. Book links to Amazon are provided for reference only. Please purchase your books through your local mom & pop bookstore. Keep them and your town or neighborhood vibrant.

    JA

 


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

Riddle Me That, Batman


Join the Disambiguation Gang right over there ⇒ (scroll down just a bit)

_____________________________________

The Riddler, aka E. Nigma

We human beings are walking contradictions. We say we want to be fit and healthy but we forget the New Year’s resolution and drop the gym membership before January 20 (to get the full membership refund) and we eat stuff that tastes good, but we know it’s bad for us.

We know the climate is warming, causing not just more natural disasters, but far more destructive ones. Check with Uncle Phil who lives in the California mountains to hear what he has to say about that right now – if you can get through to him. Or what Aunt Gloria in Ft. Myers, FL said about the hurricane last September. Or check with anybody in the still not fully rebuilt Lower Ninth Ward in New Orleans, these 18 years after Katrina, or any farmer who’s watched his crops wither and die in a massive draught. These disasters really are becoming more frequent and more devastating, but we still go out and buy a 17 mpg SUV or a 13 mpg pickup truck. Riddle me that.

Sometimes we’re contradictions in ways that are devastating in immediate and very personal ways.

For example, pro-life people are staunchly against abortion. They offer various rationales for their views, including calling abortion murder, stating their religious justifications and more. Here’s the riddle me part.

These folks are often in favor of capital punishment. That is decidedly not pro-life. You could ask any of the former death row inmates who were released due to the fine work of The Innocence Project. They know a lot about capital punishment from a perspective you don’t have and they’re quite sure that capital punishment isn’t pro-life.

And what about the pro-lifers who don’t want us to support healthcare for poor people, some of whom die for lack of healthcare? Or those who don’t want to provide supplemental food for poor children. Or those who won’t support a first rate education for kids regardless of their home address? This is starting to look very much like these people aren’t pro-life at all and perhaps aren’t even pro-kids. They’re just pro-fetus and don’t demonstrate much caring for kids following their birth. Riddle me that.

And while we’re on the subject of giving birth, how is it pro-life to refuse an abortion to pregnant women whose lives will clearly be in peril if their pregnancy continues? And how is it pro-life to force a 10-year-old girl in Ohio, a victim of rape and incest, to carry a fetus to term, endangering her life? Riddle me those life-of-the-mother contradictions.

Should you take issue with my indictment of pro-life, read Thom Hartmann’s exquisitely clear unmasking of it.

Our military people were ordered to be vaccinated against the coronavirus, this to ensure our fighting forces would be ready when needed, unlike the sailors and ships the Navy had to sideline in 2021. Some refused the order to be vaccinated. Bear in mind that they were required to receive various vaccines upon entering military service, so their objection surely wasn’t about vaccines.

They took an oath freely and without reservation, they affirmed, both to protect and defend the Constitution and to obey orders. And they kept their word, right until the moment when they didn’t. Riddle me that one, too.

Click me for the story

There was a gang of thugs who were going to kidnap and execute the Governor of Michigan because of her mask mandate and the 2021 lock down. They were conspiring to violate a bucketload of laws, all the while calling themselves patriots. That looks a lot like the January 6 insurrectionists carrying Blue Lives Matter flags, the flagpoles of which they used to beat and stab police officers. They proclaimed that they were true patriots, too. Riddle me those cruelties.

How about the mania for book banning and book burning that’s sweeping states with extremist, self-serving governors and legislatures? It’s always done with some excuse about protecting our delicate children from the truth, always with the patina of some invented notion of parents’ rights. But in the end it’s about what a minority of hair-on-fire types want and the ignoring of the truth that the majority wants taught to their kids. Riddle me that, too.

People exercise their rights by parading outside polling places carrying intimidating assault rifles. They scream insanely at school board meetings and threaten peaceful protesters. They repeatedly lie in Congress and claim the right to abuse asylum seekers and kidnap their children and more. Pay no attention to the constitutional rights they deny others. Riddle me that.

That’s very much like the right of state officials to gerrymander fair representation out of existence, and to wipe people off voting roles for the sneakiest, most manipulative of Jim Crow-like reasons. It’s about the right of states to remove polling places and ballot drop boxes in order to make it far more difficult for a select group of citizens to vote. It’s about the right to bollix up the system such that it takes 20 minutes to vote in White areas and 8 hours to vote in Black areas.

It’s always about the freedom and rights of those in the minority but who are in control, as they deny freedom and rights to others. Effectively, they tell us, “Freedom for me, but not for thee.” Riddle me that, Batman.

Oh, and Florida SB1316 requires bloggers who make comments about the governor, lieutenant governor, attorney general and others to register with the state. This is a blatant attack on freedom of the press.

That control freak power grab of a bill is not without precedent, as Vladimir Putin passed that same law in Russia in 2014.

That raises the question of why some of our Republican elected officials, self-proclaimed patriots, support dictators Putin, Orbán, Erdoğan, Duterte and other authoritarian bullies who strip rights and freedom from their people. Why do our homegrown anti-Americans call for us to abandon Ukraine, as it fights for freedom and democracy? Why do these elected officials call themselves patriots, even as they hate our democracy? Riddle me that, too.

Like I said: we’re walking contradictions.

Except when there isn’t a contradiction, as when all that matters is, “It’s all about me and what I want.”

For a fine explainer of our self-contradictory and often cruel crowd, read Ed Gurowitz’s offering, “Woke Is the New Code for Fascism.”

And if you have struggled to understand decades of dirty tricks and the mind numbing cacophony of cruel and self-contradictory absurdities Republicans spout, you must read Prof. Heather Cox Richardson’s explainer here.

Finally

The International Criminal Court has indicted Vladimir Putin for his war crime of kidnapping thousands of Ukrainian children. That prompted me to wonder what plans he has for them. Try this awful scenario.

We know that he is sending untrained soldiers to die in his war, using political criminals and other Russian undesirables as his canon fodder. He sends many to fight without weapons.

Now imagine him putting uniforms on older Ukrainian children and sending them unarmed to the front lines, forcing the Ukrainian army to kill their own kids. He’s diabolical enough to do that.

Let’s hope I’m wrong.

_____________________________

PS

In my last post I observed that “woke” is commonly used as a pejorative but there’s no definition of what it means. Turns out I was wrong. Here’s an explainer.

Today is a good day to be the light.

______________________________

  • Our governance and electoral corruption and dysfunction and our ongoing mass murders are all of a piece, all the same problem with the same solution:
  • Fire the bastards!
  • The days are dwindling for us to take action. Get up! Do something to make things better.


    Did someone forward this post to you? Welcome! Please subscribe – use the simple form above on the right. And pass this along to three others, encouraging them to subscribe, too. (IT’S A FREEBIE!) It’s going to take a lot of us to get the job done.

    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.
    2. There are lots of smart, well-informed people. Sometimes we agree; sometimes we don’t. Search for others’ views and decide for yourself.
    3. Errors in fact, grammar, spelling and punctuation are all embarrassingly mine. Glad to have your corrections.
    4. Responsibility for the content of these posts is unequivocally, totally, unavoidably mine.
    5. Book links to Amazon are provided for reference only. Please purchase your books through your local mom & pop bookstore. Keep them and your town or neighborhood vibrant.

    JA


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

Hatred, Christian Nationalists & The Supreme Court


An Open Letter to Christian Haters

Did you go to Sunday School when you were a kid? Or at least attend a church service now and then? Here’s what you did with that.

They told you the stories and the lessons from long ago, like to be kind to strangers. They said to be generous to others, especially those less fortunate than you. You remember that stuff, right?

Do you remember the day they told you what Jesus said about hatred? I’m pretty sure they said that Jesus instructed, “Don’t hate,” although they wrapped a lot more words around the message. You sat in your chair and you heard the words.

Then you walked out of the building and said to yourself, “No way, man. I’m gonna do whatever I want, whatever makes me feel good and powerful and in control.” Whatever message or teaching or directive Jesus had for you was cast aside, forgotten, crushed under your heel. In that moment you rejected Jesus completely.

And you’ve been living without Jesus ever since.

Oh, you put up a Christmas tree and you do the other performative stuff and claim you’re a Christian, but you don’t follow the rules. You live under only your own rules and who cares about what those ancient guys said? You like to hate others. It makes you feel good.

This nation has been hating non-Whites for over 400 years. Asians are squarely in the center of the bulls eye again and antisemitism is up 34 percent (seven incidents per day), according to the most recent data a year ago. The count of those acts of hatred is almost certainly higher now. So, with all that hatred infecting people, tell me again how this is a Christian nation.

Bible thumpers, holier than thou types, those wearing beatific masks, please don’t even imagine you’re fooling anyone. There is a universe of issues on which you try to paint your non-Semitic image of Jesus, but it’s just your ongoing dishonesty.

When you invade a prayer meeting at a Black church and shoot the people there, when you blast away the congregants in a synagogue, when you make death threats and distribute hate literature, when you make laws that crush your out-group, you’re refusing, denying and even giving the finger to Jesus.

That’s your truth that you hide from. But know this: we see you for what you are. So, don’t tell us you want this to be a Christian Nationalist country, because you wouldn’t be allowed to live there.

The Constitution

Now that I’ve inflamed a lot of people, let’s take this one step further.

The Articles in The Constitution primarily describe how our government is intended to work. The Amendments primarily define the rights we have as citizens. Here’s a link so that you can review all The Amendments to understand your rights. And everyone else’s, too.

What neither the Articles nor the Amendments offers is an opportunity to check a box next to the parts you like and ignore the rest.

So, if you are an ardent believer that the Second Amendment gives you the unlimited right to own and carry whatever guns or other armament you like, you would surely check the box next to that Amendment. But in calling yourself patriotic, a true American, you also have to check the box next to the First Amendment, which gives everyone, even the people you hate, the right of freedom of religion. That precludes the possibility of this becoming a Christian Nationalist nation. This country was never meant to be that. Get over it.

The First Amendment also gives us the right of freedom of speech. That means that the people you hate can say what they like, just as you can. And they can publish what they want, even if it goes against your rigid principles. There are limits to what anyone can say, but the limits have nothing to do with whether you like what they’re saying.

The First Amendment also gives us freedom of the press, the right of peaceful assembly and the right to petition the government for redress of grievances. These are for everyone, not just for you. Nobody gets to pick and choose those rights or deny them to anyone else.

We have senators and representatives who rail every day against the Bill of Rights, the first ten Amendments. They want to leave some of those imaginary boxes unchecked because it’s inconvenient or annoying that others whom they hate have the same rights as they have. The same goes for millions of ordinary citizens.

Show me the patriotism in that. Show me how demanding that this be a Christian Nationalist country comports with our founding document.

Right. You can’t.

So, Just For You .  .  .
.

Here’s a link to become a card carrying member of the American Civil Liberties Union. Click it and join to protect and defend our Constitution. You’re patriotic and want to protect and defend the Constitution, right?

Question Of The Week

Since we’re talking about hatred, the Supreme Court consistently decides cases in ways that negatively impact Americans. They call themselves conservatives, but I’m wondering what they’re conserving. Think:

Citizens United – gave corporations and rich people the right to distort our elections in their favor and against yours

Dodd v. Jackson Women’s Health – killed abortion rights. And don’t even think of imputing your supposed Christian judgments on that – see the last paragraph below.

Various gun safety laws like Heller and MacDonald – effectively made it easier for haters to kill others

A swamp of voter suppression laws (e.g. closing polling places, eliminating ballot drop boxes, gerrymandering, removing voters’ registrations) and they all seem to be decided in favor of the haters

So, our Question Of The Week is,

Why do the so-called conservatives on the Supreme Court hate Americans?

Supreme Court Fallout

If you’re a woman, they stole your reproductive rights. If you’re a man, they stole those rights from your wife, your sister, your daughter, all the females in your neighborhood, extending from sea to shining sea plus you know where else. Almost as bad, that theft of rights is being imputed into other organizations, driven by far right pressure.

Take Walgreen’s, for instance. They just announced that they will no longer sell Mifepristone, the abortion pill. Not just in states where they’ve been outlawed, but in states where it is still quite legal to sell them. They have allowed themselves to be intimidated by far right big money pressure and they’re caving in.

I’m wondering if enough pressure can be applied the other way by we consumers, who have choices. We can explain to Walgreen’s that those choices include CVS, Rite-Aid and the rest.

Here’s a plea from an activist friend:

We hope you will take five minutes today to contact Walgreen’s headquarters at (800) 925-4733 (press 5 at the prompt) to make clear that those who want to strip away women’s fundamental rights are in the minority.

Women make 85% of all consumer purchases in the US (Forbes), and drive 70-80% of spending among consumers (Entrepreneur, Mar 19, 2021). We demand that our medical decisions be respected. We will not spend our dollars at institutions that do not protect us.

I’ll add that right-to-choose voters poll over the falsely named pro-life voters (the guys who hate abortion but love the death penalty) by 24 percentage points. Seems like we Americans like our rights.

Go call Walgreen’s.

Today is a good day to be the light.

______________________________

  • Our governance and electoral corruption and dysfunction and our ongoing mass murders are all of a piece, all the same problem with the same solution:
  • Fire the bastards!
  • The days are dwindling for us to take action. Get up! Do something to make things better.


    Did someone forward this post to you? Welcome! Please subscribe – use the simple form above on the right. And pass this along to three others, encouraging them to subscribe, too. (IT’S A FREEBIE!) It’s going to take a lot of us to get the job done.

    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. There are lots of smart, well-informed people. Sometimes we agree; sometimes we don’t. Search for others’ views and decide for yourself.
    3. Errors in fact, grammar, spelling and punctuation are all embarrassingly mine. Glad to have your corrections.
    4. Responsibility for the content of these posts is unequivocally, totally, unavoidably mine.
    5. Book links to Amazon are provided for reference only. Please purchase your books through your local mom & pop bookstore. Keep them and your town or neighborhood vibrant.

    JA


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

Maybe We Should Try It


Thanks for this, Jim Nathan

Final Comments of President Biden’s State of the Union Address, February 7, 2023

“And finally, to my Republican partners I say – and this is from the heart – no joke: cut the crap.

“Stop the brinkmanship over the debt ceiling. Not even you are dumb enough to pull that stupid default stunt again. I hope. Besides, Americans are locked and loaded to blame you for the consequences if you dummy this up.

“You want to talk policy? Great. Let’s go. We need to talk about spending and taxes. We need to talk about immigration. We need to talk about education and global warming and national defense. We need to find the best solutions to these issues and more so that we deliver for the American people.

“But if instead of developing policy that will help our nation and our people, all you want to do is to spread hatred, to demonize and to stoke culture wars – you know: the malignancies you grow – you’re no partner at all. In fact, you’re an enemy of the American people.

“But you don’t have to be.

“Choose whose side you’re on. I’ll be pulling for you to choose the side of America and Americans. Here’s a good way to show you’re on the right side.

“The Founders declared this to be a democracy. So, put on your originalist hat and reverse all your voter suppression crap. All of it. Pass laws that make that happen all across this land. And no, we’re not going to negotiate that.

“Oh, and that balloon thing. We couldn’t have learned anything about its capabilities, what it surveilled or how it worked if we had blasted it out of the sky as soon as it crossed into our airspace, making it crash on land. It would have become an unintelligible pile of junk. That’s why we shot it down over water. We want the counter-intelligence. Get it? So, get a grip, join Team National Security and cut the tough guy bombastic crap.

“We have big challenges to tackle and big opportunities to champion. And there is nothing, nothing beyond our capacity if we do it together.

You believe that, right?

“May God bless America and God bless our troops.”

Democracy

There are many zealots on the right, especially the far right, who attack the fundamentals of our democracy. Some openly promote autocracy. They assault our institutions that are designed to protect this experiment in self-rule and, in doing so, they establish themselves as the enemies of democracy. Yet we have to look at this as a system.

Can this be a democracy when in 2010 the Supreme Court, through gross manipulation of the Citizens United case, gave unlimited power to corporations and wealthy people? The Court has allowed and even encouraged them to have dramatic influence on our elections. Those big money spenders have vastly more power than you do. So much for one person, one vote.

Can this be a democracy when state legislatures practice and the Supreme Court encourages gross gerrymandering, such that elections aren’t elections at all? Those gerrymandered districts take the vote right out of your hands. They take away your voice and your power.

Can this be a democracy when before every election more and more citizens are cast off voting roles so that only the voters chosen by those in power are allowed to vote?

Can this be a democracy when polling places and early voting ballot drop boxes are located in such inconvenient locations that some people, chosen by those in power, are physically unable to vote?

Can this be a democracy when formerly incarcerated people are told they can vote, but they can’t exercise that right until they pay fines and fees they can’t afford? Note that the Constitution doesn’t make the right to vote contingent upon one’s state of freedom or the payment of fines or fees. The franchise is wholly independent from such restrictions.

Can this be a democracy when a political party has, at best, made itself subservient to White supremacy and at worst has promoted hatred so as to intimidate our citizens to keep them from voting or working in election related positions?

This list could be longer, but surely you get the point that we have institutionalized the practice of limiting who gets to vote and selecting who gets outsized election influence. We have thereby predetermined who has power and who does not. That’s our system. It’s as heinous as poll taxes or a jelly bean jar at a Jim Crow polling place.

Democracy is a lovely idea. Maybe we should try it.

Quotations

Abba Eban, Israeli statesman and ambassador, addressed the United Nations in June, 1967, saying,

” .  .  .  men and nations do behave wisely once they have exhausted all other alternatives.”

Often attributed to Winston Churchill,

“You can always count on Americans to do the right thing – after they’ve tried everything else.”

Perhaps we have at last tried enough failed paths and can resume the originally intended course.

______________________________

  • Our governance and electoral corruption and dysfunction and our ongoing mass murders are all of a piece, all the same problem with the same solution:
  • Fire the bastards!
  • The days are dwindling for us to take action. Get up! Do something to make things better.


    Did someone forward this post to you? Welcome! Please subscribe – use the simple form above on the right. And pass this along to three others, encouraging them to subscribe, too. (IT’S A FREEBIE!) It’s going to take a lot of us to get the job done.

    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. There are lots of smart, well-informed people. Sometimes we agree; sometimes we don’t. Search for others’ views and decide for yourself.
    3. Errors in fact, grammar, spelling and punctuation are all embarrassingly mine. Glad to have your corrections.
    4. Responsibility for the content of these posts is unequivocally, totally, unavoidably mine.
    5. Book links to Amazon are provided for reference only. Please purchase your books through your local mom & pop bookstore. Keep them and your town or neighborhood vibrant.

    JA


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

Theocracy Is Just A Tool


What do you think about the Framers, the guys who hammered out the Constitution in a locked room with windows nailed shut and, obviously, no air conditioning, this over the course of the very hot Philadelphia summer of 1787? Are they the forebears of all national bedrock, the seers with the ability to establish the true way for whatever might come over the course of centuries? Or were they just normal men, each with his own foibles, stumbling along just as you and I do, simply doing the best they could do to conjure the needs of a new nation?

If you think the former, then you’ll surely align in some measure with the so-called “originalists” on the Supreme Court, who imagine they can see into the minds of the Founders and that we should adhere to what these justices see. That isn’t entirely unsupported, as the Federalist Papers contain a wealth of insight into their intentions, as do the the letters and other writings of some of the Founders.

If you think the latter, then you likely believe that the Constitution was intended as a series of guideposts and was intentionally left incomplete and subject to modification. The amendment process supports that view, as does the obvious fact that nobody in 1787 could have envisioned many, perhaps most, of the inventions, world changes and societal needs that have arisen over the course of the intervening 236 years.

Now, though, we are at a terrible crossroads, where many are openly denying reality, some are committing violence and a screeching minority is doing its best every day to eliminate the very democracy envisioned by the Founders. Worse, some of the howlers have their hands on the reigns of power and, worst, some howlers sit on the Supreme Court. That puts us in danger of losing what the vast majority of We the People want and believe in. The demand that this country should adopt Christian nationalism is a prime example of the danger we face, and that’s just a smoke screen for what the howlers really want.

Whatever one’s individual beliefs and practices regarding religion or God, we are intended to be a secular country. The Founders wrote about that and the First Amendment is its legal foundation, as it says,

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion or prohibiting its free exercise thereof; [emphasis mine]

The courts have established that the First Amendment also intends that we have freedom from religion. It’s a right, as in: guaranteed. But we haven’t been completely faithful to refraining from wedging religious beliefs into our public rules.

“Under God” was inserted into the Pledge of Allegiance in 1954. “In God We Trust” has been on every piece of our currency since 1957. We were in the Cold War then and had to differentiate ourselves from the godless commies to show that we were the good guys. Clearly, those insertions meant that God was on our side.

So, since 1957, every time we pay a buck for goods or services we’re confirming that we believe in and trust in God. That’s quite unfair to a lot of our people and is a self-evident violation of the intent of the First Amendment.

We violate the First Amendment every time we give public money to religious organizations. George W. Bush called them “Faith-based institutions” and doled out taxpayer cash to them. Issuing school vouchers to redirect money from public education to private schools, many parochial, is another example. More on that in a minute. There’s something very hinky about those freedom of and from religion violations, but there they stand, wearing the imprimaturs of our laws and of the Supreme Court. The drafters of the First Amendment would be baffled by that. It appears the some justices aren’t the originalists they claim to be. That malleability goes further.

In Jessica Mason Pieklo’s piece, How Conservative Justices Are Driving Us Toward Theocracy, she writes of the Court,

First, they have responded in kind to the Republican Party’s lurch to the far-right and open embrace of anti-democratic principles by issuing more and more substantive decisions on its shadow docket. Second, the Court’s conservatives, led by Justices Samuel Alito and Clarence Thomas, have started actively rewriting decades of legal precedent to help pave the path for even more regressive anti-democratic policies to emerge from states that are held in conservative gerrymandered capture.

She goes on to make the point that efforts to establish this country as a Christian nationalist theocracy are a giant step toward eliminating democracy altogether and to the establishment of autocracy – religious fascism.

Katherine Stewart was quite direct in making this point in her op-ed in the New York Times, posted on the heels of the Supreme Court stomping on our rights in its Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization opinion:

Breaking American democracy isn’t an unintended side effect of Christian nationalism. It is the point of the project. … Its purpose is to hollow out democracy until nothing is left but a thin cover for rule by a supposedly right-thinking elite, bubble-wrapped in sanctimony and insulated from any real democratic check on its power.

The democracy attackers use many means to warp our country. A favorite is the aforementioned de-funding of public education, as by vouchers. They use these to transfer public cash to private schools, including the funding of religious schools. Perversely, they then attack the very pubic education system they have then under-funded, saying it is failing, claiming privatization is the cure. That’s your tax money transferred to religion and to very rich guys.

Postmaster General Louis DeJoy is doing the same thing to the Postal service by having trashed all the high speed sorting machines and hobbled mail delivery. The theocracy thumpers now claim that The Postal Service should be privatized because it doesn’t work properly. I’m guessing that these guys think God is on their side and that a theocracy would deliver the mail on time. Regardless, privatization would deliver the cash to rich guys. Even without full privatization, the logistics (i.e. delivery) company DeJoy used to run has been paid over $286 million by the Postal Service, and he still has a 30% stake in the company.

Snap your brain onto the most important issue: the point of all the sanctimonious Christian nationalism talk isn’t about Jesus. Indeed, the point of killing Roe and threatening to ban contraception isn’t about religion or pro-life.

They’re tools for ending our democracy for the benefit of rich and powerful people and for those who baffle themselves with their own BS, believing they’ll be sitting at the Big Kids’ table.

Back to the opening question about your belief in what the Founders intended.

If you think of yourself as an originalist, you’re forced to believe in democracy and a secular country, because the Framers specifically wrote the framework for democracy and excluded the possibility of Christian nationalism.

If you think of yourself as believing in choice number two, working to conjure the needs of our nation within the Constitutional framework, begin your thinking with the clarity that we Americans don’t like having others’ views jammed down our throats.

Either way, it’s clear that this is supposed to be a secular democracy. We the People really do believe as Thoreau advised,

“If a man does not keep pace with his companions, perhaps it is because he hears a different drummer. Let him step to the music which he hears, however measured or far away.”

That pretty well cautions against destruction of our democracy or establishment of a Christian or any other theocratic nationalism forced on We the People. Indeed, the Framers specifically didn’t want any part of that, having escaped the yoke of King George III and the Anglican Church.

In the acts of primitive rage of our extremists, they make it clear that they want to establish Christian nationalism and destroy democracy. Well, you know,

.  .  .  when you talk about destruction
Don’t you know you can count me out

– Revolution, John Lennon

To sin by silence when we should protest makes cowards out of men.

– Ella Wheeler Wilcox

______________________________

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