The Union

The Core Issue


From STAT, August 21, 2023:

More children are dying from guns, and disparities are deepening
.

In 2020 guns caused the most deaths among U.S. children and adolescents, for the first time surpassing motor vehicle deaths. In 2021, it got worse. A new analysis of CDC data in Pediatrics shows that from 2018 to 2021, the death rate climbed by 41.6%. “With the unexpected sharp uptick of pediatric firearm deaths noted in 2020, rates did not return to prepandemic levels in 2021, but rather continued to increase and surpassed initial pandemic levels,” the authors write.

The breakdown of children who died:

– In 2021, 84.8% were male, 49.9% were Black, 82.6% were 15 to 19 years-old, and 64.3% died by homicide.

– Black children accounted for 67.3% of firearm homicides and white children for 78.4% of firearm suicides.

– From 2020-2021, the suicide rate increased among Black and white children but decreased among American Indian or Alaskan Native children.

– Higher poverty correlated with higher gun-related deaths.

Our obsessive craziness and lethality over guns is a core issue of mine. With over 27,000 gun deaths already this year, it should be a core issue for all of us. The sad truth is that we will never confront and stop this travesty if we continue down the path of ceding our rights to those who fight against what should be common sense. Indeed, we will never tackle any of the issues that the majority of us care about if we cede our rights to those who fight against what we want. That leads us to an uncomfortable reality. Steve Sheffey nails it in his post of August 20:

Democracy must be our new litmus test. We all have non-negotiable issues but democracy must come first and foremost because only in a democracy can we advocate for the other issues we care about and only in a democracy are our other freedoms protected. Under the old paradigm, we could take for granted that both parties shared a fundamental commitment to democracy and the rule of law.

But it’s different now. Here’s the necessary action piece, also from Sheffey:

Only the Democratic Party respects democratic norms today, which means that only the Democratic Party deserves our support. That’s not what we want to hear because it deprives us of agency. But if we support democracy then that means the GOP fails our litmus test and if we believe what we are saying, we have to vote Democratic. That’s not easy to accept but it is reality.

Steve Schmidt weighed in on the core issue of democracy in his post of August 20,

Democracy dies in the plain light of day
.

The masthead of The Washington Post has read “Democracy Dies in Darkness” for the last six years. It stands as a daily monument of naïveté, smug self-seriousness and delusion that will be a beacon to our descendants in the task of unraveling how the country became so lost in this moment. What will be most obvious is that democracy dies at noon, in the plain light of day, slowly and painfully over many long tedious years.

Never one to mince words, in another post Schmidt offered,

There is no fringe in the MAGA majority. It is an undulating blob of layered imbecility, cowardice, vice, extremism, ignorance, ambition, incompetence and scheming, bubbling and gurgling together in a ceaseless assault against democracy. The fringe and its middle are identical. MAGA is round and without edges.

The proposition at hand for the country is whether a majority will tolerate the lies, corruption, malice and cruelty offered by the MAGA GOP because of the imperfections of the Democratic Party. There is no comparison between the two in terms of comportment, ethics and political morality. MAGA tried to overthrow the government, and is running on a scorched earth platform of revenge and retribution. Alongside the confederacy, Jim Crow and McCarthyism, MAGA is amongst the most odious concoctions ever created from the fumes of American nativism and know- nothingness. It is a pestilence.

We are seeing the alt-right assault on democracy happening every day in ways that are far larger than they might seem at first and it’s only coming from what used to be called conservatives.

But they are not conservative.

Today’s alt-righties are promoting a scheme to grab all of your power, your voice and your money. They have been actively working to steal from you and to destroy our democracy for decades and have gained enormous traction in today’s pugilistic, fantasy-driven politics.

Their power grab is what makes protecting and defending democracy the core issue of our time. It overrides everything.

That is why I’ve become active in The Union, the only issue of which is to protect and defend our democracy. Check it out.

Just For Fun

The Behr Paint Company has announced its color of the year for 2024. It’s

CRACKED PEPPER!
.

From the official Behr color palette

The Behr marketing folks would have you know that,

“Cracked Pepper is a versatile soft black that elevates any room and the way you feel in it.”

Huh?

“As we look into 2024, creating a sense of comfort and belonging will continue to drive design decisions—but now, as life returns to its more familiar rhythms, it’s time to allow our senses to come alive,” says Erika Woelfel, Vice President of Color and Creative Services at Behr Paint Company. “From heightening the aromas of a dining room to feeling the softness of a living area, Cracked Pepper enhances the natural expression in any space.”

What does an “elevated room” look like and how does paint do that? How does their product “allow our senses to come alive” and “height[en] the aromas of a dining room?”

C’mon, man. It’s just paint that’s almost black. Seriously, who comes up with descriptions like this for paint? And what are they smoking?

  • 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 ALL 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.

A Critical Recommendation


There’s no more whispering or hinting. No more sneaky attacks. No more need to interpret Steve Bannon’s insane “Tear it all down,” rants. It’s all out in the open now.

In an enormously chilling piece in the New York Times, Trump and Allies Forge Plans to Increase Presidential Power in 2025, subtitled “The former president and his backers aim to strengthen the power of the White House and limit the independence of federal agencies” your worst fears for our country are laid bare.

It’s the Heritage Foundation in full Nazi dress uniform declaring that they own the true interpretation of our Constitution and it doesn’t involve any of that messy, inconvenient checks and balances bother. There’s neither need for nor room for democracy. They want nothing to impede a megalomaniac.

Their treachery would create a unitary president with monarchic power. Dictatorship. All power in the hands of one pathological ruler.

Go read the report by Jonathan Swan, Charlie Savage and Maggie Haberman. They make clear that what these “extreme unitary executive people” want to do is truly horrifying, anti-American and terminally toxic to rights and freedom. What’s even more upsetting is how many millions of Americans seem to want that.

From an earlier Disambiguation:

It is truly frightening that millions of people are demanding authoritarianism in America. They want an end to our self-rule, our long and noble experiment in democracy. Christopher Ingraham spells out the truth that has been so difficult to define in his Washington Post article, “New Research Explores Authoritarian Mind-set of Trump’s Core Supporters.”

Key takeaway: In the face of this brain-free populist authoritarian self-destruction, we practice apathy at our individual and collective peril.

Apathy and disinterest simply won’t do for those of us who think democracy – that thing you learned about in civics class – is a pretty good thing. Fortunately, there are actions we can take to help us keep it.

If we were all to vote, our popular will would be enough to douse the flames of authoritarianism. Good on you for voting, but it turns out we don’t all vote. That means that you and I have to do a bit more. We have to fight a better fight if we’re to keep our democracy and the things we hold dear.

IMPORTANT NOTE

DO NOT be swayed by claims made by the totalitarians with their chest-thumping calls of patriotism, patriarchy, Christianity, traditional society or any of the other manipulations that autocrat wannabes use. This is simply, clearly and maniacally a grab for all the money and position and power.

They will use any words and any manipulation to get away with their treason, but it will remain treason to all you hold dear. It’s their boundless greed. Their grab for total control. And once your democracy is gone, it will be gone forever. It will be the end of life as you know it.

Don’t believe it? Does that seem hyperbolic to you? Go ask the people of Hungary or Turkey about that. They used to have democracies. Check with survivors of the Third Reich and the Soviet Union. It took wars where tens of millions of people died to end those dictatorships and now the Putin dictatorship has revived the cruelty of the Soviet Union.

This threat is existential to you.

These people don’t give a damn about you or anything that’s important to you. Whether your key issue is guns and gun safety, abortion rights, healthcare, immigration, education, jobs, wealth inequity – THEY DON’T CARE! They want to take the power from you and me and use it for themselves. Here’s what that means to us:

We must get democracy supporters and promoters into all offices and dump the anti-democracy thugs.
.

It’s the only way for us, our children and our grandchildren to remain free.

This is no thought experiment, nor something that is so far away that we can’t see it. We can already feel it, taste it, smell it and touch it. This threat is here right now. The un-American thugs have declared their intent to destroy our country.

Still not convinced? Review the Project 2025 website, but keep your teddy bear close, because it’s going to really scare you. It’s nothing short of lipstick on a rights, freedom and democracy killing pig.

That’s why you’re going to JOIN THE UNION, where they will show you how to make the difference you need to make.

Critical Recommendations

The Union is an organization dedicated to our Union – the U.S.A. It’s an offshoot of The Lincoln Project. Its efforts are focused on exactly one issue: to protect and defend and to strengthen our democracy. They support organizations doing the hard work of protecting our rights and freedoms and advocating for the things you believe in. That’s a good thing. So CLICK HERE and join The Union. I’m a volunteer and I think you should be, too, because:

  1. This is to protect and expand what you believe in.
  2. What you believe in will go away unless you do something to prevent that from happening.

Heavy handed? Sure, but nowhere near as heavy handed as Donald Trump Der Fuhrer. Or any Republican despot wannabe.

More To Do
Paraphrased from Sheila Markin’s post of July 20, here is what you and I need to do:
.
  1. Actively tell everyone you know that Biden is the right guy for the job and stop wringing hands about his age.
  2. Canvas, text, make calls and donate to get Democrats elected, because Republicans are trying to murder our democracy – unless you can find a Republican who is overtly promoting democracy. It’s unlikely you’ll be able to find one.
  3. Explain why all Republicans are too scary to elect even if their name is not Donald Trump. They are all part of the movement to dismantle democracy and, at best, they’ve stood silent as the outrages have continued. The threat to our democracy is much bigger than Donald Trump.
  4. Volunteer to be an election worker so that there is a counter to the MAGA GOP election deniers who are going to volunteer to oversee elections and intimidate voters.
  5. Share this post to help people understand the threat.
Strongly Recommended Reading

1. Professor Heather Cox Richardson’s Letters from an American, July 17. She’ll give you context for the extremist power play for 2025.

2. Writing for The Hill, Alexander Bolton explained that GOP Senators Rattled by Radical Conservative Populism. They might be rattled, but these cowards still refuse to speak out against the crazy and the un-American. That may be the biggest obstacle to preventing autocracy/fascism from taking over our country.

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 ALL 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.

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