Hypocrisy

Now Yer Talkin’


Republicans have done a truly excellent job of demonization. They call anything proposed by Democrats “socialism,” making clear that Democrats want to change America into a socialist state. That’s heavy stuff in this country, where most Americans think socialism is the same as communism, which, they are certain, is the political embodiment of evil. It’s even more potent than that when it comes to getting the votes of independent voters. Imagine how the socialism label plays for Cuban Americans in Florida, whose parents and grandparents fled Castro’s brutal communist regime.

The good news is that the Democrats have snappy labels and taunts for Republicans, too.

“Republicans hate your children and don’t care if they starve.”

“Republicans want you working with infected co-workers so that you get sick and die of COVID-19.”

“Republicans want you to have to work 3 jobs just to get by.”

Yes, it’s thrilling to see those billboards and see those TV commercials, too. Gotta love the over-dub of Trump’s “shit hole countries” speech, where the Democrats made it clear how much Trump and the Republicans hate all Hispanics, right?

No, not right. You didn’t see that video and you have not heard those slogans or seen them on billboards, because the Democrats are the worst political fighters in the history of history. They haven’t an attack element in their entire wimpy Party. And that is why the minority Republicans spanked them and got 50% of the Latino vote in 2020.

Have you heard any push back to the Republican and QAnon claim that Democrats are part of an international sex trafficking, child blood drinking cabal, even just to call them liars? Neither have I. Note, too, how that horrid characterization plays nicely with the ages old, idiotic and cruel anti-Semitic claim that matzos is made with the blood of Christian children. I’m looking for push back from Democrats against that hatred, against that blatant appeal to White Christian supremacy, and have yet to hear even a whimper of opposition. I haven’t heard any attack on Republican dishonesty.

John Kerry refused to confront the fictions of the Swift Boat liars, not wanting to dignify their lies. He waited way too long to speak up, giving the lies time to gain a strong footing and then he lost the 2004 presidential election. Triple amputee war hero Max Cleland (D-GA) lost his senate seat the same way. He waited too long to counter the slime and the lies of his opponent, Saxby Chambliss, and lost his Senate seat.

Survival means we must speak up and attack – or our democracy will die. Quod erat demonstrandum.

If the Democrats play their cards just right, if they stay the course with their eunuch communication and attack-free attacks on Republicans, they will continue to look like buffoons and will give away the government to the democracy-hating Republicans.

Just get this: If we lose our democracy to the authoritarians, there will be no getting it back. Not in the next election, if there is one, and not in any election after that. All will be permanently lost.

But it doesn’t have to be that way. Here are nine quick stick ’em lines for Dems to use:

“Republicans hate your democracy.”

“Republicans oppose every plan to support working families.”

“How do you like being lied to by Republicans?”

“If something helps your family, Republicans are against it.”

“If Republicans win it will be like you being sent back to Cuba (or El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, the Soviet Union, the Philippines, etc.).”

“Republicans will steal your vote – if they haven’t done that already.”

“Republicans don’t care if the sea swallows your house or your children are killed by a hurricane or tornado.”

“Republicans don’t care that there are rats in your kid’s school.”

“Whatever is dear to you, Republicans are against it.”

There now, that wasn’t so hard, was it?

It matters what Democrats are saying – and what they’re not saying. And they better speak up, or the authoritarian Republican cheats will be the only ones talking, the only ones voters hear.

This post is focused on hitting and on hitting back. Democrats also have to be the party of what is good and right in America and of making things better. That’s for another post. Here’s a tickle of that from the November 17 post:

No, not just the President. Every elected official with a “D” after their name, every pundit, and every cabinet officer has to sell the benefits and call out Republican hypocrisy and lies.

Winning in Three Simple Steps
    1. Call out Republican cheating, lying, hypocrisy, anti-democracy and anti-We-The-People words and actions. Just tell the truth. Forcefully.
    2. Sell Democratic successes and benefits for We The People. No more public hand wringing or endless talk about cost.  Put President Biden’s name in BIG letters on every infrastructure project so that Americans connect the dots from the President to their own well-being. When the Build Back Better bill passes, label those projects “Courtesy of President Biden and your Congressional Democrats.”
    3. Do what’s required to produce massive voter turnout.

For clarity about the danger we face, read this Twitter thread – all of it.

Brought To You Today by the Number Seven

From Common Cause:

“MOST FRIGHTENING OF ALL: if just seven more states sign on, the Koch network, the Mercers, corporate funders, and their extremist allies will reach the two-thirds supermajority required to convene the [Constitutional] convention they need to tear apart the U.S. Constitution.”

Learn more here.

Time

No, not that kind. I’m talking about Time Magazine and their poor choice for their 2021 Person of the Year. Read Eugene Robinson’s clear, compelling case that Eugene Goodman is the real deal and should have been on that magazine cover.

That Manchin Thing

There is lots of room for indignation, wailing about betrayal and more, but rather than having tantrums, let’s stay focused on what’s important. We have millions suffering economically, medically, educationally and more and we have the plan to cure huge swaths of that suffering, so let’s stay zeroed in on getting the cure for what ails us. To that end, read Paul Krugman’s clear explainer of why Build Back Better really is better in, What We Lose If We Don’t Build Back Better.

Finally

We’re on the bright side of the road now. We just passed the winter solstice and we will be gaining about 2 minutes of daylight every day until June 21, when we will have 6 more hours of daylight than today. Flowers will bloom. Children will play in the park. Neighbors will rediscover one another. And we, you and I, will be doing our part to make for a joyous November 9, the day after Election Day.

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The days are dwindling for us to take action. Get up! Do something to make things better.

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The Fine Print:

  1. Writings quoted or linked from my posts reflect a point I want to make, at least in part. That does not mean that I endorse or agree with everything in such writings, so don’t bug me about it.
  2. 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 vibrant.

JA


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

Liberty


Samuel Johnson

Just before the American Revolution the English poet and literary critic Samuel Johnson asked,

“How is it that we hear the loudest yelps for liberty among the drivers of Negroes?”

In a singular way, his insightful question puts a perspective to our founding hypocrisy. What was the contortion of mind and soul that allowed our Founders, men of great intellect and profound moral clarity, to live with such duplicity? One might reasonably think that, surely, that inconsistency must have vanished long ago, at least as far back as the abolishing of slavery, but I don’t think so.

Jim Crow didn’t end when southern governors were forced by National Guard or 101st Airborne troops to step aside and allow Blacks (or, really, any non-Whites) to attend public school with Whites. It didn’t end at the Woolworth’s lunch counter in Greensboro, NC, nor did it end with the passage of the 1964 Civil Rights Act. And it didn’t end when Trayvon Martin fell to the ground dead with a bag of Skittles in his pocket.  On one side of each of these incidents and so many more were Whites yelping loudly about their liberty and demanding it to the detriment of others.

It’s no different with our flagrant White supremacists today. Some adorn their pickup trucks with Trump flags and intimidate innocent people. Others intimidate with a vote or with their signature, often on letterhead from the House or Senate, state legislatures or governors’ mansions. These are people of power and stature, the heirs to the mantle handed down from the Founders.

They don’t own slaves or chase people from lunch counters or schoolhouse doors any more, but they work every day to keep non-Whites from voting, to keep them down and powerless. And as these people in power steal from non-Whites – and they’ve expanded their domination to suppress the poor and our young people, too – they are all the while yelping loudly about their liberty.

Ralph Waldo Emerson

Have we learned nothing in these hundreds of years since Samuel Johnson asked his painful question?

Now add this from Ralph Waldo Emerson:

“A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds, adored by little statesmen and philosophers and divines.”

Quite obviously millions covet their duplicitous, foolish consistency. It is much adored by our little statesmen and those who cheer them and harbor that self-same hypocrisy. Our duplicity hasn’t gone away. It’s just mutated and metastasized into today’s cruel, selfish liberty for some, but not for others.

Edward M. Kennedy, 1980

So, it falls to us to honor the pledge of Sen. Edward Kennedy, speaking at the 1980 Democratic National Convention:

“The work goes on, the cause endures, the hope still lives and the dream shall never die.”

Our challenge, as ever, is to make that dream of liberty live.

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Many thanks to JN for the chuckle

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Serving The Dream

We need to reach voters in cities where they’ve been repeatedly slammed by so-called “100 year storms.” They at last believe the climate crisis is real and that it truly is a crisis, but believing in this reality isn’t enough; we have to do something about it – like VOTE FOR THOSE WHO WILL ACT TO COOL THE CLIMATE AND PROTECT US! 

You can help to motivate people to vote for candidates who are serious about combating the climate crisis by sending postcards that remind voters to take action. This has been made easy to do by the Postcards for Climate folks. You don’t have to be a wordsmith to do this because they’ll give you the script.

LINK HERE to get your postcards. And be sure to get your kids involved, because they’ll want to be able to breathe and eat when they’re adults. Plus, democracy is a participation sport, so sending postcards is good citizenship training for them.

We have to do democracy in order to have democracy.

– Kelly Ward Burton, President, National Democratic Redistricting Committee

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The days are dwindling for us to take action. Get up! Do something to make things better.

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

Thanks!

The Fine Print:

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

JA


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

RepublicanLand


This is not just another rant about anti-democracy, anti-fact, anti-truth, anti-progress Republicans. Sure, this is a rant and it’s fun to bash the bullies, but what Republicans are doing is amplifying their ingrained dishonesty to the point of imperiling our national bedrock. So, this is a semaphore signal or perhaps the ride of a descendant of Paul Revere. The turncoats are coming! The turncoats are coming! No, wait, it’s worse than that: they’re already here.

Let’s see what’s going on in RepublicanLand.

  1. Republican legislatures in at least 43 states have passed or are in process of passing at least 360 laws to make voting more difficult specifically for people of color, poor people and anyone else likely to vote for Democrats. Read Heather Cox Richardson’s take on this here.
  2. The House passed the For the People Act (the Voting-Rights bill) with zero Republican votes. This law would negate most of the pernicious state anti-voting laws. The Senate has promised similar opposition. Are you seeing a pattern yet?
  3. Republicans voted unanimously against the American Rescue Act, the bill that allows us to dramatically crank up the fight against Covid-19 and to help Americans who have been hit hard economically by the pandemic. This is a bill that has a 70% approval rating by Republican voters and even greater approval numbers from Democrats and independents. And all Republicans voted against it. They are trying to keep Democrats from having any wins to brag about and it’s painfully clear that they don’t care who – perhaps you – gets hurt by their scorched earth actions.
  4. They have vowed to vote in lock step against the American Jobs Plan, the infrastructure building/rebuilding initiative that is already supported by 52% of the electorate and that number is growing. Same reason as #3 above.
  5. The proposed funding for the American Jobs Plan is an increase in taxes on corporations from 21% to 28% (it was 35% prior to the Trump tax giveaway) and on people making over $400,000 per year. This is an overwhelmingly popular idea, but Republicans in Congress oppose it. Same reason as #3 above.
  6. Gun safety has once again come to the front burner and Republicans oppose any form of legislation to curb our ongoing massacre. They continue to do that even as 90% of Americans want universal background checks on the transfer of all firearms and that number has been a constant since Sandy Hook in 2012. Think: campaign contributions and yet again, #3 above.

What all of these and even more Republican manipulations have in common is that they are efforts by a minority of Americans to hold on to power, control, money and a frail, fragile self-image. They either refuse to or are unable to create policies to attract more voters in order to win elections, so,

their sole efforts are to protect themselves at the peril of our nation through obstruction in Congress and obstruction at the ballot box.

.

I bash Republicans regularly because they offer virtually nothing that is praise-worthy. The party has been taken over by a rage-filled mob and traditional Republicans, unable to deal with the craziness, are exiting. Would that this were not so, but this is what passes for the Grand Old Party today. Perhaps that acronym should keep its letters but now mean Grand Obstruction Party.

And that is exactly why we must be vigilant and active. Absent our involvement, this underhanded minority will steal our entire country.

The April “The Lady Doth Protest Too Much, Methinks” Award

This month the awarding of this most sarcastic honor is (so far) nearly a toss up.

On the one hand we have Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-Hypocrisy) wailing his objections to corporations that are weighing into politics, like voting rights. He says that’s “stupid.” How awful and inappropriate, he tells us, that MLB took the All Star Game from Georgia and Coca-Cola, Home Depot and more big corporations have offered public criticism of Republican voting suppression laws. McConnell waves his political purity for all to see, even as he gleefully solicits and accepts corporate campaign contributions. He doth, indeed, protest too much.

On the other hand we have Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Pluto) and his alleged sex scandals and whatever else the Feds are investigating about him. He’s a purist, a Trumpian blowhard of Olympian caliber who apparently engages in the same or similar practices as Trump himself, including howling his integrity and his victimhood in incoherent rants. His only two supporters are Rep. Marjory Taylor Green (R-QAnon) and Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Wrestling Scandal). I guess the congressmen to whom he showed pictures of his female conquests in the nude couldn’t speak up on his behalf. Perhaps they liked the pictures and maybe their giggles echo yet in the House cloakroom, but they’re kinda busy just now, it seems. Still, Gaetz caterwauls his abusive indignation to anyone who will stand still long enough to hear about his untaintedness. He doth protest too much, too.

Whom to choose  .  .  . ?

I can’t help but recall televangelist Jim Bakker, who was a fire and brimstone preacher against dishonesty of any kind, right until he was indicted and convicted of fraud and conspiracy. Same for all preachers who extolled purity, then were caught in sex scandals, like Jerry Fallwell, Jr., Ted Haggard, Jimmy Swaggart and more.

And all the Catholic priests preaching against sin while sexually violating children.

Really, it’s all the holier-than-thou types whom we at last learn have feet of clay.

Like today’s Republicans in Congress and state houses, protecting the sanctity of voting by preventing citizens from voting. And it’s all happening in the land of minority rule, RepublicanLand.

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The Fine Print:

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

JA


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

Straight Talk For Wednesday Morning


Reading time – 5:10  .  .  .

The win for Joe Biden and Kamala Harris was more than a citizen endorsement of the future promised by Biden; it was a repudiation of Trump’s attempt to make a toxic waste dump of our democracy, as well as a visceral rejection of his cruelty.

For four years Trump was aided and abetted by Republicans in Congress who know right from wrong, yet refused to stand up against Trump’s wrongs. They deserved to be made available for employment elsewhere, which is why a Blue Wave election was expected.

It didn’t happen.

Most of the spineless Republicans were re-elected and the Rs even picked up a bunch of seats in the House. It is left to us is to determine how that happened concurrently with the Biden win. A divided government likely will result in Biden being encumbered by four years of the champion obstructionist, the Great Hypocrite, Mitch McConnell or, at best, a 50-50 Senate split. That split would leave blue dog Democrats always a potential threat to the progress of the Biden agenda.

How did that happen?

The saying in the TV news business has long been, “If it bleeds, it leads.” In other words, whatever is sensational gets the first and the most news coverage. In the political arena, we’ve had gobs of sensationalism for decades. The problem is that when that’s what we’re shown, we tend to imagine that extremism is mainstreamism.

For example, when Newt Gingrich was going googly-eye self-righteous against Bill Clinton in the 90s it was easy to imagine that all of America was Puritanical crazy. Surely, a lot of people figured that most of us were that way, but it was mostly just Newt and his nitwits making a lot of noise through mass media megaphones. Nevertheless, it took years and an ethics investigation to get Newt to shut up. His baseless claim, though, that America is center-right continues to be believed by millions.

The Tea Party Caucus arrived in 2009. These were the right-wing extremists who seemed to magically convince themselves they were somehow akin to the courageous tea protesters in Boston in 1773. And wasn’t it an odd coincidence that these bile spewing Tea Partiers announced themselves just after a Black man became president?

They stimulated self-deluded citizens to wear tricorn hats and carry “Don’t Tread On Me” flags. These are the same people who carried signs saying, “Keep your government out of my Medicare” and “Keep Government out of Medicade.”[sic] Yes, really. Righties aren’t all that way, of course, although you couldn’t divine that from the sensationalist news.

The Tea Party spawn of the devil, the Freedom Caucus, has been and is full of self-righteous accusations, proclamations and demonizations. We hear a lot of their blather, lies and distortions for reasons similar to Gingrich’s: it’s sensational. Remember: if it bleeds, it leads. It would be easy to imagine that all Rs are as extreme as Mark Meadows and as hate-mouthed as Jim Jordan.

What about the far left?

So far I’ve picked on far right extremists, but it works the same way for extremists on the far left, and this is where this stuff intersects our recent election.

AOC and some of her pals did an excellent job of creating an extremist agenda and making a lot of noise about it. They self-promoted like champions, drafting the Green New Deal (download a copy here), a litany of extreme left ideas that they promoted with the fervor of the Spanish Inquisition: convert or die.

And that led to week after week of Democratic presidential candidates brainlessly swearing during the primaries that there should be an end to private insurance, we should have open borders and provide healthcare to all undocumented people. Taxing the rich will pay for everything and butterflies will flit among ever-blooming flowers. Okay, forget the butterflies and flowers bit. The extremist lefty stuff has garnered enormous attention from our news and opinion outlets because it’s sensational. Also, counter-productive.

Do you doubt that? Here’s highly respected opinion writer Peggy Noonan in a Wall Street Journal piece explaining why voters chose divided government:

Lots of things, but one was a year of Democratic presidential debates, in which week after week the party painted itself as deeply progressive. The candidates were down with identity politics, would ban private health insurance, were for essentially open borders. I wrote wonderingly after the first debate that the entire party seemed to have picked itself up and placed itself down outside the mainstream and apart from the center.

Clearly, Noonan is a genius because she agrees with me. So does Ira Leavitt – have a look.

I watched all the debates and cringed visibly and painfully every time the candidates swore obeisance to the far left, knowing they were alienating middle America.

This story got worse.

Following the murder of George Floyd people were and still are in the streets demanding that we “Defund the Police!” Cooler heads are doing the, “What they really mean is . . . ” dance, but however justifiably impassioned people are, the words are clear. And idiotic. And off-putting to voters in the middle.

All of that has provided the manure-fertilized feed stock needed by the radical right. For example, they said that if Biden were to win, the extremist elites will force socialism on your country, your taxes will soar, criminals will pour across our borders to harm you, bloated central government socialism will dictate your children’s future, you’ll dial 9-1-1 and nobody will answer and did I mention socialism? Wait, you’re doubting that claims like these – scare tactics – were made over and over and that they terrified moderates and convinced even some informed people to vote against the Democrats? Look it up and horrify yourself.

That stuff scared the hell out of the 6 – 18% of moderate voters who decide our elections. They are – did I mention? – moderate. They don’t like extremism or extremist ideas. If you want to drive them away, tell them you’re going to turn their world upside down. They will immediately turn to whatever or whoever is familiar, however spineless they know him/her to be, because it feels stable and safe.

Adios Blue Wave.*

Democrats almost never miss an opportunity to miss an opportunity.

Biden won, but absent the abhorrent Trump, he would have lost in a landslide. Now he’ll have to figure out how to govern with one or two hands tied behind his back, thanks to the far left noisy stupiditude that kept the Senate from being blue.

If you’d prefer not to have four more years of Mitch McConnell’s obstructionism and hypocrisy in your news feed, make a contribution to the Democrats in the Georgia Senate run-off elections to be held on January 5. Here’s a link.

That Blue Wave had the potential to sweep over the shore and reshape the land. Then the Ds killed it with their extremism and it turned into just a little swell lapping at the shore. It didn’t have to be that way. So, Democrats, next time try not scaring the hell out of the people in the middle who will decide the election.

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*Read this to understand our national polarization.

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Ed. note: We need to spread the word so that we make a critical difference, so,

  1. Did someone forward this to you? Welcome! Please subscribe and pass this along to three others, encouraging them to subscribe, too. (IT’S A FREEBIE!) Use the simple form above on the right.
  2. Engage in the Comments section 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. Sometimes I change my opinions because I’ve learned more about an issue. So, educate me. That’s what the Comments section is for.
  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.

JA


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

The Arc


Reading time – 4:43; Viewing time – 8:05  .  .  .

“The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice,” said Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., paraphrasing 19th century clergyman Theodore Parker.

He was right, of course, but that bending isn’t guaranteed and it doesn’t happen accidentally. The moral arc will only bend toward justice if we make it bend that way.

There is nothing pre-destined about justice. Bad guys sometimes win. Despots sometimes create dynasties that oppress people for centuries. Evil has terrorized people throughout recorded history. Justice doesn’t just happen. Ask any person in the U.S. of any color other than white for confirmation of that.

The only way that justice prevails is when good people bear down and do what is necessary, especially in perilous times. It happens when they demand justice. It happens when they refuse to condemn their children and grandchildren and great-grandchildren to the cruel slavery of injustice.

George Floyd memorial, Minneapolis. Notice how many protesters aren’t Black. Across the country this is a people’s protest. Perhaps our young ones will save us from ourselves.

This is the time to demand justice. And I don’t mean only because of what’s happening in our streets now, triggered by the murder of George Floyd. There is an even bigger picture that we must focus on and it bears heavily on the Floyd tragedy. If we don’t do that, all the protesting in the world will fail to make the changes we need and things will become far worse. Besides, we largely know what to do about racial injustice. It’s been studied again and again. It’s the take-action part that we haven’t done.

The President of the United States doesn’t want his job. He wants something far bigger, like the despots he admires, Putin, Xi, Duerte, Kim and Erdoğan. He wants to be an autocrat with absolute power. A dictator. A monarch. A god. He’s told us that plainly.

There is nothing too low for Trump, including holding up a Bible in front of a church for a hypocritical photo-op after having the U.S. military attack peaceful protesters. Here’s why.

We decided in 1775 that such an arrangement just doesn’t work for us. We said that we would be peasants to no one and we threw off the tyrannical rule of King George III and set out on an audacious journey of self-government. To be sure, the road has not always been easy nor has it always been just, but it has become better over time.

Now, though, we are standing face-to-face with that president who wants to be a god. If we don’t stop him now, he will grab absolute power, because grabbing everything for himself is what he always does. We will be peasants once again and that glorious journey of self-government will end. There will no longer be a path toward a more perfect union.

Nameless, badge-less, unidentified cops/military threatened peaceful protesters in Lafayette Square Park. Then they attacked.

Trump has already deployed the U.S. military to DC in a brutal act of martial law and is threatening to do the same in our states. Is that okay with you? It isn’t okay with George Will. It isn’t okay with Gen. James Mattis. It isn’t okay with Gen. John Kelly or with Gen. John Allen. It isn’t okay with Adm. James Stavridis or with Steve Schmidt or with Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-AK) or with Gen. Martin Dempsey or with Gen. Douglas Lute or with Gen. Tony Thomas or with Adm. Mike Mullin or with Adm. William McRaven. And it surely isn’t okay with the peaceful protesters in Lafayette Square Park who were beaten, gassed, shot and flash-banged by anonymous thugs in anonymous police and military uniforms. That injustice stands in perfect perverse harmony with the fact that slaves were once sold in that very park.

Minutes after the picture to the left.

With one moronic, corrupt declaration after another this president is stealing all that you hold dear, all that you believe in and he will get away with it if we are passive toward his thievery. Look up and you’ll see that this isn’t the flag to which you pledged allegiance in elementary school. That flag has been hijacked and the president and his flunkies are wiping their dirty Gucci loafers on it for a power grab and a photo-op. They’re self-justified by a tyrannical tear everything down mantra and they want you to salute their flag of fear, obedience and powerlessness.

We all have our private lives and we ordinarily focus on our own personal issues, but these times aren’t ordinary. These times are ringing an alarm and it is we who must answer the call.

New fence in Lafayette Square Park to isolate demonstrators – not unlike the Berlin Wall. So, we paraphrase Pres. Reagan’s words: “Mr. Trump. tear down this wall.”

The First Amendment tells us that we have the right to petition our government for redress of grievances, which, of course, is exactly what the demonstrators in Lafayette Square Park were doing. You and I better exercise that right while we still have it, because we surely have grievances: our country is being stolen from us. And this president is being aided and abetted by Republican invertebrates in the Cabinet, the Senate and the Justice Department. They don’t have the spine to stop him.

Our own senators and congressmen are the very ones for us to petition. So go to Senate.gov and House.gov, find the contact information for your legislators and call them. Demand that they stop this mad tyrant wannabee before military boots hit your streets and the tear gas fogs your park and the intimidating Black Hawk helicopters hover low over your town square as they did over Lafayette Square Park. Those actions are what this president has threatened to do to you.

Do those calls to your legislators seem like a futile gesture amid Trump’s crushing avalanche of lies, his calls to hatred and violence and Trump’s vile power grabs? Consider this.

Howard Reich’s book, The Art of Inventing Hope: Intimate Conversations with Elie Wiesel, is a very personal and complex narrative that speaks to us in a way perhaps not intended by the author. Nevertheless, Reich wrote,

“Taking action even when you think it may be futile – especially if you think it will be futile – was not only Wiesel’s definition of active pessimism but also, I believe, his statement of hope amid sorrow. When the quest is failing, he seemed to be saying, we need to work that much harder, not only to try to effect change but also as a statement of who we are.”

“In effect, we create hope by pushing forward in the face of failure.”

If we are to have hope that the arc of the moral universe will bend toward justice, we have to take action especially if we think it will be futile. We must try that much harder and say clearly, unequivocally that this who we are.

Do you need inspiration?

Download this piece that I recently received as an email from the Chicago Urban Prep Academies. Tim King is working miracles there, inventing hope and changing lives for the better every day. Download and read the Urban Prep Creed. These high school students recite it every day and they make every word of it ring true, right there on Chicago’s dangerous south side. Perhaps those kids have something to teach us.

When you question whether you can make a difference, repeat Tim King’s words in his emailed message: Either WE do or WE don’t. It’s up to us. And BTW, feel free to help keep the Urban Prep magic going by kicking in a few bucks.

Finally, inspired by the song Teach Your Children, by Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young:

You, who are on the road, must have a code that you can live by  .  .  .

It’s time to sing your code. It is your own personal guide and this is the time to sing the words out loud and fully live them to bend that long arc of the moral universe toward justice.

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Click me

Ed. note: We need to spread the word so that we make a critical difference, so

  1. Pass this along to three people, encouraging them to subscribe (IT’S A FREEBIE!).
  2. Engage in the Comments section 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. Sometimes I change my opinions because I’ve learned more about an issue. So, educate me. That’s what the Comments section is for.
  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.

JA


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

Republicanistas


Reading time – 37 seconds  .  .  .

I’m reading David McCullough’s biography of Harry Truman and am struck by a comment in a letter from young Harry to his then-intended, Bess Wallace, who would later become the First Lady. In his letter he wrote, “I am by religion like everything else. I think there’s more in acting than in talking.” Perhaps that’s another way to say that actions speak louder than words. Okay, then lets look at some actions and some concurrent words and then consider an appropriate label.

We are blessed with a very loud swarm of Republicanistas, who thump Bibles and tell us that this is a Christian nation, that we should live according to the Bible, all this with the implication that they themselves are good Christians. Those are the words. The actions tell a different story.

Because even as they proclaim their Jesus-ness they are at the same time cutting food aid to poor children and they stand in the way of medical care for all of our poor. They subvert the rights of the poor and our minorities, barring their way to the voting booth. They blockade buses of refugee children and spew their hate at them. They decide categorically that all abortions are wrong and enforce their views by murdering doctors.

Regardless of your religious persuasion and even if you have no religious persuasion at all, call upon whatever your notion of Jesus may be and then answer this question: Do the actions of our Bible-thumpers sound like something Jesus would have promoted or expected? And if your answer is no, then what can we say about these self-righteous Republicanistas?

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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. Please help by offering your comments, as well as by passing this along and encouraging others to subscribe and do the same.  Thanks.  JA

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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. Please help by offering your comments, as well as by passing this along and encouraging others to do the same.  Thanks.  JA

– See more at: https://jaxpolitix.com/father-flannigan-in-texas/#sthash.hwTpyC23.dpuf

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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. Please help by offering your comments, as well as by passing this along and encouraging others to do the same.  Thanks.  JA

– See more at: https://jaxpolitix.com/father-flannigan-in-texas/#sthash.hwTpyC23.dpuf


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

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