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Adjunct Quiz*


Reading time – 3:49  .  .  .

WARNING: SNARK AHEAD

Question 1:

What do you get when you combine the bottomless need for attention of Donald Trump and Alan Dershowitz with the boundary-less conceit and snark of Jay Sekulow, the arrogance and disingenuousness of Pam Bondi, the fanatical, hypocritical self-righteousness of Ken Starr and all of that is paraded on television and before the Senate of the United States of America, where all the senator-jurors have already made up their minds whether they will both recognize and accept Earth-based reality? Important note: Answers containing biologically impossible acts are not allowed.

Question 2:

Where is (the thankfully former) Congressman Joe Wilson (R-SC) now that we need him in the Senate gallery during the impeachment trial to blurt repeatedly at Trump’s defense team, “YOU LIE!“?

Question 3:

Richard Nixon claimed that, “Well, when the president does it, that means that it is not illegal.” Compare and contrast that with Trump claiming, “The law is on my side, the President can’t have a conflict of interest,” and also that the Constitution gives him, “the right to do anything I want.” Factor into your answer that the Constitution specifically contradicts these statements, that Nixon was forced out of office in disgrace – by Republicans – and that those claims are really stupid. Citing Article II of the Constitution in your answer is mandatory. Extra credit will be given for answers that rhyme.

Question 4:

What is the commonality among these things:

    1. The foreshortened arguments of Donald Trump’s impeachment trial, roughly half of which will occur after most Americans are asleep
    2. The pledge under oath of the Majority Leader to be impartial in the impeachment trial, yet he has declared he would be in “total coordination” with the White House?
    3. The refusal of the Senate to have given Merrick Garland a hearing as a nominee to become a justice of the Supreme Court
    4. Hundreds of bills that have passed the house and are now in sloppy stacks on the floor of the Senate Majority Leader’s office.

Earn an extra 5 points each for the use of “turtle,” “Moscow,” and “grim reaper” in your answer.

Question 5:

1. Taking into consideration all federal, state and local courts, in what percentage of trials in the United States are witnesses and/or documentary evidence explicitly and unconditionally prohibited?

2. Taking into consideration all federal, state and local courts, in what percentage of trials in the United States are witnesses and/or documentary evidence produced after prosecution and defense arguments are completed?

Use a No. 2 pencil for both sections of this question and show your work. Winking face and googly eye emojis are allowed.

Question 6:

Of the eight primary Founding Fathers (George Washington, Alexander Hamilton, Benjamin Franklin, John Adams, Samuel Adams, Thomas Jefferson, James Madison and John Jay), which of them would be most horrified by what Donald Trump has done to this nation and most shocked by the cowardice of the members of Congress who have steadfastly refused to hold Trump accountable? Include in your answer appropriate reference to the Founders’ abominable experience with King George III and their justified abhorrence of rule by despot. References in your answer to The Federalist Papers is both allowed and, if appropriately cited, that will be really impressive and cool.

Answer hint: Choose “All of the above.”

Question 7:

What is the date of the general election in 2020? Use of a Google search is permitted for this question.

Question 8:

Extra credit opportunities:

Five points for each criminal offense you can list which Donald Trump has committed since starting his campaign for the presidency

Ten points for each Constitutional violation you can name that Trump has committed

Fifteen points for each purple state senator you can name who is up for reelection this November and right now is scared out of his/her skin because they are facing the possibility of having to get a real job in 2021

If you do an excellent job with this question it is possible to achieve a score greater than 100%. Pat yourself on the back.

The first person to answer all questions correctly will have a gold sticker of his/her likeness placed on the title page of all copies of the Constitution to be printed in the future. Further, following Trump’s eviction from the White House, the winner will be given a seat in the gallery at Trump’s first money laundering and fraud trial, plus a Whoopee Cushion imprinted with the words “BIG SUCK” to put on Mitch McConnell’s chair.

All persons who are at least 18 years of age and a citizen of the United States are required to take and pass this adjunct quiz and vote on Election Day, November 3, 2020. Oops – I gave away the answer to Question 7. All participants will receive a red, white and blue “I voted” sticker and the thanks of a grateful nation.

WARNING: If you fail to participate in this adjunct quiz and, most important, its associated election, there may not be another election.

*Adjunct quiz:
  1. a test added to the main and most important event
  2. an examination intended as an orienting supplement
  3. a “Hey, wake up!” message
  4. having a little fun with dopes and babies

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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!

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.

Home


Reading time – 2:13  .  .  .

You’re out and about and tell a friend,”I’m going back to my house.” Your house is defined by a street address, information that identifies a place on a map. If instead you had said,”I’m going home,” the geographic destination would be the same, but the meaning would be quite distinct.

“Home” is a place in the heart, a well of meaning that transcends GPS coordinates. If you pay attention and allow it to surface, just saying, “I’m going home” has a personal power and depth of meaning. I’ve always felt the same about “America.”

The “United States” is just that: 50 states that are united. It’s a geographical and a political identity and a statement of our sometimes difficult but enduring union. All of that is good. But “America” is home. “America” is what my ancestors saw in the 1890s, as they sailed past the Statue of Liberty and registered at Ellis Island. They didn’t see a collection of states. They saw America and all its promise. They saw a new home. To understand more fully, read Emma Lazarus’ poem The New Colossus, which is inscribed on the base of the Statue.

But now I despair over what we’re doing to our home. I’ll be writing soon about a wonderful victory for a woman named Maria and her 6-year-old daughter, yet I can’t help but shake my head in frustration over why it was so difficult for us to simply do the right thing here in our home. Watch for that story.

It’s the same reluctance to do the right thing that we see every day in the national insanity and embarrassment that is today’s Congressional GOP. They consistently deny realities that are right in front of them and violate the very values that make this America. The same is true of the 25 (or more) Republican controlled state houses that institutionalize voter suppression, the new Jim Crow. It’s the same way with our president who lies over 32 times per day, for whom the only things that are sacred are those that benefit himself and who endangers our home by bumbling through foreign affairs and inciting division.

These are disheartening times for our failing to do the right things, but if we are to protect our home we must not stay in this low place. We must take up the arms of our voices and our votes and restore what we hold to be sacred and dear. We must come home.

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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!

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.

Hitting Back


Reading time – 3:12  .  .  .

From the Wall Street Journal:

The U.S. carried out airstrikes against an Iranian-backed Shiite militia group in Iraq and Syria. The Pentagon said the strikes targeted three of the Kataib Hezbollah militia’s locations in Iraq and two in Syria, and were in response to an attack on Friday in which more than 30 rockets were fired at an Iraqi military base near Kirkuk. That incident killed a U.S. contractor and wounded four U.S. troops.

We all get that: they hit us, so we hit back. We’ve known that dynamic and that it’s okay since we were little kids. It’s Human Being 101. Everybody thinks themselves an innocent victim and therefore justified in”hitting back.” But when I read that piece I couldn’t help but wonder about the predictability of the consequences and whether there might be better ways.

History consistently shows us that “hit back” behavior frequently leads to escalated “hit back” from the other side. After all, in their eyes their initial hitting wasn’t the beginning, but, rather, a “hit back” for some slight or wrong they believe was visited upon them. We’ve seen this movie before and we know how it ends. And we know that it always starts again.

Diplomacy has been our primary tool to avoid violent conflict and it has worked quite well countless times. However, right now we’re a bit limited in what we can do in this realm, as our State Department has been gutted of many of its most senior and capable people by the present administration. That’s compounded by a president who is incapable of thinking strategically and who dismisses anything that isn’t some international version of children fighting on the playground. He’s even played “I dare you” over nuclear weapons. That doesn’t sound like a good way to resolve conflict.

So, we’re hamstrung by the human desire to hit back, the lack of alternative critical resources and a leader whose tool bag contains only the knee-jerk reaction to punch others in the nose harder.

We could hope for Congressional action to limit the administration’s war powers, but that’s unlikely in our present political environment. We can just wait for the election in November and then vote cooler heads to both the White House and to Congress, but they won’t have any power for over a year. That’s a lot of time for a tantrum prone president to cause a lot of violence, this as he’s spurred Iran to crank up its atomic bomb manufacturing and North Korea is set to test its intercontinental ballistic missiles to show the world what tough guys they are.

I don’t think escalating war technology will allow us both to continue “hit back” behavior and to survive. We need some better answers right now.

Finally,

Have a look at what contributing opinion writer Kent Greenfield, writing for the Louisville Courier Journal, has to say about Sen. Mitch McConnell and the upcoming impeachment trial in the Senate. Give consideration to how McConnell’s declarations about that process might impact his re-election and overall control of the Senate in 2021. Bear in mind that McConnell is the manipulator who blocked the nomination of Merrick Garland to the Supreme Court in order to spite President Obama and to bend the court further to the right. That and his present promise to violate his oaths and much more are what has powered McConnell past Ted Cruz to be the country’s most disliked senator. That’s quite an accomplishment.

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

YOUR ACTION STEPS:

  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!

NOTES:

  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 or punctuation are all embarrassingly mine. Glad to have your corrections.
  3. Responsibility for the content of these posts is unequivocally, totally, unavoidably mine.

 


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

What’s the Proper Word For That?


Reading time – 3:02; Viewing time – 4:40  .  .  .

Some folks find the sport of curling exciting to watch. On the other hand, the subtlety and beauty of the game are pretty well lost on me. That gives credence to what Sly Stone told us in his song Everyday People, declaring,

 

Or as Henry David Thoreau so elegantly explained it:

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.

Yet as different as we Americans are, there are some things on which there is universal agreement and we are in lock-step about them. Alarmingly, we’re very late in getting serious about one of them. Here are the facts:

    • The Russians hacked Clinton, DNC and Podesta emails and used them to attack our 2016 election for the sole benefit of candidate Donald Trump. And Trump welcomed the help.
    • The Russians sent its troll farm into our social media, infesting it with false and distorted propaganda. They reached 126 million Americans. That’s almost as many of us as turned out for the 2016 election. They did it to ensure the election of Donald Trump. And Trump welcomed the help.
    • The Russians attempted to hack into the voting machines of all 50 states and lifted complete voter registration databases from at least two of them. Trump was good with that, too.

All of that happened and Trump still refuses to take action against the Russians either to penalize them for what they’ve done or to prevent them from further manipulation of our democracy.

What’s the proper word for that?

We Americans are in complete agreement that it isn’t okay for foreign powers to attack us. We think that one part of patriotism is to be dedicated to protecting and defending the Constitution and our nation. The oath of office that every federal employee takes requires them to do that protecting and defending. That includes our legislators and the President, yet that isn’t what is happening.

The President overtly declares – falsely – that there was no Russian meddling in our 2016 election. His absurd assertion flies in the face of the Special Counsel investigation findings and all 17 agencies of our intelligence community, which declare unequivocally that not only did the Russians cyber-invade, but that Trump willfully accepted illegal help from them. And Trump has invited yet more attacks by the Russians for his 2020 campaign.

What’s the proper word for that?

That is compounded by the “Grim Reaper” – his own label – Mitch McConnell, or “Moscow Mitch,” as Joe Scarborough has called him. There are bills ready for a vote in the Senate that would create action to protect and defend our country, but McConnell refuses to allow any such legislation to come to the floor of the Senate for a vote. *

Millions of Americans have put their lives on the line to protect and defend what Trump and McConnell are giving away.

Those men whom we trusted with so much power to do the right things for our nation are easing the path for a hostile foreign power to attack our nation and crush our democracy. What they’re doing is a little like the sweepers in a curling match making a path of least resistance. Only, in curling, it’s just a game. In our democracy, it’s our entire way of life that’s at risk and these men are refusing to protect our country.

They are violating their oath of office and our trust. They are co-conspirators in the willful disarming of the United States as an enemy attacks.

And arguably, Trump and McConnell are al Qaeda’s best friends, too, because they are aiding in the destruction of the core of western democracy, exactly what Osama bin Laden attempted to do.

What’s the proper word for that?

Please pass this along to both your Trump supporting friends, as well as your “I could never vote for a Democrat” friends so they can double-check how they are being double-crossed.


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Ed. Note: I don’t want money or your signature on a petition. I want you to spread the word so that we make a critical difference. So,

YOUR ACTION STEPS:

  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!

NOTES:

  1. Writings quoted or linked to 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 or 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.

Vision


Reading time – 3:42; Viewing time – 4:39  .  .  .

The second round of over-populated candidate debates will occur this week. Instead of hearing them snipe at one another, jockey for position or clutch desperately for air time, here’s what I want from the candidates.

Vision is the “THAT way” clarity that guides us in both the best of times and the worst. We have a national vacuum where that direction should be and that leads to proposals that are foolish and often self-defeating and which leave us adrift in the hot air that is today’s sound bite politics. Our leaders, whose task it is to name it and keep us focused, are vision-challenged in our hyper-partisan, post-reality swamp, so we wander about without direction.

We are a fractious and largely confused people, often acting only on impulses borne of the amygdala, the “reptile brain,” which is acutely tuned to fear. That leaves us vulnerable to the demagogue’s exploitation, as we mindlessly react to the most recent fear mongering. That causes us to lose our ability to stay true to our values. It turns out that Darth Vader was right when he said:

Jamelle Bouie makes that clear in his essay The Joy of Hatred, wherein he speaks of, “our history of communal, celebratory racism.” Communal and celebratory, indeed. We’ve seen that in Donald Trump’s chanting crowds, with their nearly all white faces smiling and reveling in the dark side of rejecting “others.” That isn’t the least bit helpful to our American condition or to our possibilities and it is utterly without hope for the future.

Trump speaks and acts as though he is a disciple of Darth Vader and he is leading us backward into authoritarianism. That is the very thing that motivated the Founding Fathers to say to King George III, “No more.” While they didn’t utter those words, their actions and the Declaration of Independence made clear that was their message.

To find our way to that more perfect union and our true potential we need to regain our aspirational nature. We have to abandon our impoverishment of ourselves and stop looking through the rear view mirror. We have to restore our vision ahead. We’ve done that before, as we did under the leadership of President Kennedy, which resulted in our Apollo program successes.

During that period of our history we were in perpetual danger of civilization-ending conflict. Gaining preeminence in space was our way of saying to the world and to ourselves that we are America. Might it be possible to regain that forward looking, can-do spirit? Might we be able to articulate the inspiration of creating that shining city on the hill?

I have two essays for you that speak to that.

Lori Garver, former deputy administrator of NASA, wrote an exceptional vision for a new and critical mission for NASA and it doesn’t include sending anyone to the moon or to Mars. It is rooted in real world need that is incrementally manifesting itself in unmistakable ways.

The other essay is from David Brooks. He speaks to who we really are and who we can be. Do yourself a favor and click his link to a Langston Hughes poem.

Back to the Apollo program.

Gene Kranz was flight director for the Apollo 13 mission. A catastrophic failure of their spacecraft put the lives of the men aboard in peril. Kranz’ engineers and scientists were working to cobble together the life-sustaining measures needed to save our astronauts when Kranz is reputed to have said, “Failure is not an option.” That is still true.

Who has what it takes to inspire this nation? Who will call upon what Lincoln termed our better angels and lead us in the direction of our greatness?

What I want is for our politicians and candidates to stop the silly, often self-destructive stuff and focus on who we can be. I want them to awaken our sleeping capabilities and to light a beacon to shine on that hill and guide us all. Rarely has the need been so great.

As I watch the debates I’ll be looking for the candidate who will do that.

President Trump is obsessed with attacking opponents by using the word “infested.” His vision for America seems to be constant attack, constant degrading of others. That’s exactly the kind of future where there is no hope. That’s the kind of future that rips us apart. Click here to see what CNN’s Victor Blackwell had to say about that. Decide for yourself which vision moves your spirit.

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Ed. Note: I don’t want money or your signature on a petition. I want you to spread the word so that we make a critical difference. So,

YOUR ACTION STEPS:

  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!

 


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

Guest Essay – The Real Reason


Reading time – 4:35  .  .  .

Reader Dan Wallace has an insightful take on our American condition that is happily devoid of the hystrionics, name calling and partisan posturing of many. He offered it as a comment to my Hoping for Clarity From Sunday Times Readers post, but it was likely missed by many. His views are too important to be missed, so his essay is presented here. Read it and nod affirmatively and enthusiastically. JA

I was not a Trump voter for the reason given below. But it was, and I believe remains, the primary reason not to vote for him.

Simply put, comparing Trump’s publicly visible behavior to the available checklists for psycho/sociopathology, all indications are that he is psychopath, a sociopath, a person experiencing anti-social personality disorder, a malignant narcissist, or something along those lines. The exact term does not matter. That there is something seriously wrong with this guy is obvious and does matter. The right answer for someone like this is to feel sorry for him and to help him if we can, while minimizing the damage he can do. It is not to elect him (or keep him as) President of the United States.

For some reason it is considered unseemly to talk about this. I do not understand why. Choosing not to talk about it is like sitting down to dinner at a table that has a giant moose on it and pretending there’s no moose. There is. Step one in getting rid of the moose is admitting there’s a moose.

The view that there is something seriously wrong with Donald Trump is held by people as diverse as George Conway and Keith Olbermann. Unlike them, I am not a newcomer to it. I was virulently anti-Hillary in 2016. But I argued at the time, and I still do, that given a choice between venal and crazy, the right answer is to put 100 clothespins on your nose and vote for venal because it is at least predictable and is not necessarily oriented toward tyranny. While not all psychopaths become tyrants, all tyrants start as psychopaths.

Every now and then the American people make the mistake of putting into office someone with a severe mental disease or defect. The last time we did that was 1968. It took 6 years, but the institutions ultimately worked and we removed him from office.

We need to do that again, but the stakes are far higher now. We have an enormous division between those who have been left behind by globalization and those who have not. We have not figured out how we as a nation will compete in a truly globalized world. We have enacted policies that have driven the disparity of wealth to the sort of level that provokes insurrection. We have the least efficient healthcare system of any industrialized nation and continue to play the fiddle while it threatens to bankrupt us. In order to avoid dealing with those unpleasant realities, we have given ourselves a false sense of prosperity by fueling our economy with debt, something in which both parties have been equally and joyfully complicit. That accumulated debt is now so large that resolution of it likely will eventually require devaluation of the dollar, which will turn us into something like Greece or Venezuela. Meanwhile, we are experiencing a change in our environment that has the capacity ultimately to threaten the survival of our species (Moose #2).

These are serious issues and we should get about the business of addressing them in a serious way. The solutions will not be simple. There is plenty of demagoguery to go around, on both the left and the right. None of it helps. But one thing we should all be able to agree on: Having a psychopathic buffoon in the White House makes all of this worse, not better.

Addendum

On Wednesday of last week, Trump “met with” a group of about 25 refugees in the Oval Office. Presumably, this was a photo op intended to make him look empathetic. The problem is that it was captured on video, and one thing he clearly is not is empathetic.

The video shows Trump’s interaction with Nadia Murad, a Yazidi refugee who won the 2018 Nobel Peace prize for bringing her horrific story to the world and for fighting to stop the use of sexual violence as a weapon of war. Her story includes ISIS raiding her village, killing her mother and six of her brothers, taking her captive, holding her as a sex slave and subjecting her to rape and torture.

The remarkable thing about this video is not Trump’s abject ignorance, unpreparedness and stupidity (after Murad tells him twice that ISIS killed her family, he asks, “So where are they now?” – Yes, really – watch the video.). Rather, it is that the President of the United States can listen to this story and show absolutely no empathy for the human being standing in front of him and for the appalling suffering and loss she experienced. If that lack of empathy doesn’t make someone a psychopath, then what the hell does?


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Ed. Note: I don’t want money or your signature on a petition. I want you to spread the word so that we make a critical difference. So,

YOUR ACTION STEPS:

  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!

 


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

Blue 2020


O’ Blue, you good dog, you.

Reading time – 1:10; Viewing time – 1:57  .  .  .

We have issues. Challenges, Problems to solve. And most of them not only are not getting solved, but they are being made worse. You need only consider our manufactured humanitarian crisis at our borders for a painful example.

There has been a continuous wringing of hands, including in this column, and the people tasked with dealing with our challenges have accomplished little. It appears that we’re left solely with the imperative that this horrible, likely criminal president must go. But we haven’t had a clarity about The Candidate who can accomplish that imperative and solve our problems. Now we do.

I’m announcing that my dog BLUE is a candidate for President of the United States!

He was born in this country, so he doesn’t have a foreign country to go back to. He isn’t a communist or a socialist and is color blind, so he can’t discriminate by race. BLUE is loyal, caring, steadfast and dedicated to making the lives of others better. He is fiercely protective, so you’ll sleep well at night, knowing that BLUE is standing guard over our country.

Trump shoves Markovic of Montenegro. Click for the video.

BLUE is incapable of inflicting cruelty on refugees and would never promote a tax act that ignored every citizen but the enormously wealthy. Rather than attacking our allies, BLUE will lick their hands. And he would never push a fellow NATO member aside to get in the front row.

It’s obvious that we need a leader who respects the office of the president, is thoughtful and is dedicated to the people instead of to himself. You get it, because this is both clear and compelling.

Really, isn’t it obvious that my dog BLUE will do a much better job of being President of the United States than Donald Trump? So, let’s make this a red, white and

BLUE 2020!


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Ed. Note: I don’t want money or your signature on a petition. I want you to spread the word so that we make a critical difference. So,

YOUR ACTION STEPS:

  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!

 


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

Porky Pig


Reading time – 57 seconds  .  .  .

To quote Porky Pig: “Ah-bi-dee, ah-bi-dee, that’s all, folks!”

The Supreme Court has just handed down its most blatantly political decision in a long time, or at least since the democracy killing Citizens United decision in 2010. Their stupefyingly bone-headed refusal to knock down blatantly obvious discrimination by North Carolina’s legislature will have a destructive impact that will echo across the nation.

This case was about gerrymandering designed to strip voting rights and legislative power from the poor and from minorities. The Supreme Court has opened the door for unending, unearned political control by a diminishing white majority. Its decision will have devastating impact on millions of Americans for years to come and is truly the New Jim Crow.

To the 5 justices who made this happen, I have some snark: Your mothers must be very proud.

I can’t do better than David Leonhardt’s piece in Friday’s New York Times. Click through and read it, and note his comments about the census, too.

BTW, the Times is not failing, as Emperor Trump would have you believe. It’s having some of its best years ever. They’re focused on stuff happening here on planet Earth, a concept of reality that doesn’t seem to penetrate the information-proof walls of the East Wing living quarters, which serve as Trump’s Twitter bunker. #FailingPresident.


————————————

Ed. Note: I don’t want money or your signature on a petition. I want you to spread the word so that we make a critical difference. So,

YOUR ACTION STEPS:

  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!

 


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

How Did We Get Here? and “The Wag”


Reading time – 3:58; Viewing time – 5:40  .  .  .

  • How did we get to the point:

– where ripping babies from their mothers’ arms is tolerated?

– where we refuse those kidnapped kids soap and a toothbrush and there isn’t universal outrage?

– where disrespecting our allies and cozying up to adversaries is thought to be good foreign policy?

– where allowing fossil fuel exploration in Monument Valley is considered a good idea?

– where pulling out of the Paris Climate Agreement is deemed sound policy for our children and grandchildren?

– where there could be a discriminatory citizenship question on the national census? The Constitution calls for no such thing.

– where Russia could invade and disrupt our national election and the president refuses to confront, much less punish the offender?

– where the president refuses to do anything to stop further cyber assault on our country and even invites it – and somehow we aren’t all enraged?

– where we yawn when yet another Cabinet Secretary resigns in disgrace?

– where birthright citizenship – you know, the 14th Amendment – would be under attack? Note: The 14th Amendment is probably why you are a United States citizen.

– where we tolerate reversing EPA standards, such that fossil fuel extractors no longer have to report or reduce methane emissions? Methane is 84 times more powerful at global warming than carbon dioxide.

– where picking fights with other countries is considered a good negotiating strategy?

– where a continuing presidential attack on freedom of the press is somehow held to be patriotic?

– where defying subpoenas is in any way a debatable thing?

– where arbitrary tariffs slapped on friends is tolerated?

– Where witnesses before Congressional committees can avoid testifying by claiming “absolute immunity,” an immunity that doesn’t exist in law?

This list could be far longer and likely you can add to it.

We’ve always had divided government, with impassioned politicians at times saying stupid stuff.* This isn’t about that. This is about the amazing reality that we got to the point where, for example, ripping babies from their mamas as a tool to discourage immigration is open for debate.

KEY POINT: Not one of the items on this list is a whine about Trump being crude, disrespectful, ignorant and an assault on decency. They aren’t even a complaint about his well over 10,000 lies since taking office. And every one of them has substantive impact on Americans – like you – and on our nation as a whole.

KEY OTHER POINT: It’s so very easy to pin all that on Trump, but he only has the power to do those things because of a supportive – or at least compliant – citizenry and, correspondingly, a meek and cowardly Republican Congress.

KEY QUESTION: In order to get out of this craziness we have to be able to both define it and identify what brought us here. What’s your notion? Post it in the Comments block and we’ll help one another learn.

FUN FACT: Roughly 63 million people voted for Trump (or they voted against Hillary) in 2016. On that same day, over 90 million voting age Americans stayed home.

FUN FACT QUESTION: Can you think of something you can do so there isn’t a repeat of that in 2020? I knew you could.

Late Addition

I’ve warned repeatedly (here and here, for example) that we are at risk of Donald Trump pulling a “wag the dog” scam to ensure he gets reelected. Now it appears that he’s doing it.

He has backed Iran into a corner with enough sanctions to hobble its economy and withdrawn from the JCPOA. Then Trump complained because Iran said that it would restart its uranium enrichment program, the very thing the JCPOA prevented.

So, he sent a carrier group and 2,500 troops to the area. Then on Thursday he ordered military strikes on Iran in response to Iran having downed a U.S. reconnaissance drone. He called off the attack before damage was done, claiming that killing 150 people with his attacks wouldn’t be a proportional response. We don’t know if that cancellation was actually just a stunt to make Trump seem to be a humanitarian, but since Trump is all about the theater of things, it very well could have been just that.

Recognize that Trump is constantly opaque in his dealings, leaving everyone wondering about his motives and goals, and almost certainly he sees the situation with Iran as a pissing contest that he has to win. A lot of his supporters like his kind of brainless muscular response, which drives the danger meter pointer closer to catastrophe.

You better make sure your senators and Congress people stand up to what looks like the newest Gulf of Tonkin fraud, or we’ll get involved in yet another unending middle east war and a lot of people will die.

*Stupid stuff is the blatantly obvious false or misleading statement. It’s the filibustering of a reporter to avoid his/her question. It’s the whataboutism that is designed to avoid having to deal with the truth or to denigrate an opponent. It’s the whole cloth fabrication that comes in a small throwaway line or a sweeping, dramatic denial of reality. Stupid stuff.



————————————

Ed. Note: I don’t want money or your signature on a petition. I want you to spread the word so that we make a critical difference. So,

YOUR ACTION STEPS:

  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!

 


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

Simplistic Solutions From 2,789 Years Ago


Reading time – 4:09; Viewing time – 5:40  .  .  .

“The history of the Great Wall of China began when fortifications built by various states during the Spring and Autumn [period] (771–476 bc) and Warring States periods (475–221 bc) were connected by the first emperor of China, Qin Shi Huang, to protect his newly founded Qin dynasty (221–206 bc) against incursions by nomads from Inner Asia.“

So begins the Wikipedia narrative about the Great Wall. It was a successful defensive measure against warring neighbors and was military state-of-the-art in the first millennium BC.

That was then and, of course, this is now. We don’t have warring neighbors or incursions by nomads from Inner Asia or anywhere else to worry about. Furthermore, a physical wall simply isn’t a barrier to anyone today, given that those who would enter the U.S. illegally have all heard of ladders, tunnels and boats. Nevertheless, our unimaginative president is attempting to fix his imagined 21st century crisis with a 771 BC solution.

Trump continues to threaten to declare a national emergency over what is plainly not an emergency. He would then steal $5.7 billion from places where Congress had appropriated it and would use that to build his useless wall and starve other needs. While he will attract an immediate court challenge that likely will stop him, he’ll proceed anyway. When he’s stopped he’ll wallow in his victimhood, because that’s what self-centered autocrats do.

Next, from MarketWatch:

“Lawmakers, already in a protectionist mood, responded to the pain of the Great Depression by passing the infamous Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act of 1930, which raised duties on hundreds of imports.

“Meant in part to ease the effects of the Depression by protecting American industry and agriculture from foreign competition, the act instead helped prolong the downturn. Many U.S. trading partners reacted by raising their own tariffs, which contributed significantly to shutting down world trade.”

That is to say, Trump is now using failed tariff policies from nearly 100 years ago to solve a trade problem that doesn’t even exist in the way he naively describes it. His tough guy behavior may feel good to some for a moment, but it eventually becomes self-defeating. Just ask Harley Davidson and our soy bean farmers.

Trump thinks and acts simplistically, regardless of the complexity of an issue. His solutions are always puffery and brute force and they’re entirely lacking even a whiff of insight from higher level cognitive functioning. Sadly, our international opponents are playing three dimensional chess while Trump is smashing checkers with a big hammer.

Whatever may be his mental issues that caused him to lie over 6,000 times during his first two years in office, the real issue is not Trump’s lying. The real issue is Trump’s lack of recognition of the truth. It means nothing to him. He seems to believe that all he has to do is to say something and Voila! – it becomes true. For Trump, reality is just a minor obstacle to walk over. It’s what autocrats always do. For more on this, refer to Putin, Xi, Duerte, Erdoğan, Hitler and Stalin.

The rise of autocracy around the world has been well documented and it represents a clear and present danger because autocracies have a way of creating wars. Millions suffer and die. Everything is made worse.

Not long ago I wrote,

The worst thing, though, is the ongoing drumbeat of how awful our government is, including blatant lies by legislators and by polarized commentators, like Breitbart, Rush Limbaugh and Alex Jones. That has led to a very angry citizenry. And that has led to the election of a president who is incrementally tearing down the very things that make this country work, including our democracy itself. Somehow, his supporters, otherwise good, solid folks, are so angry that they are willing to ignore Trump’s crazy.

I have written (here and here or click Fascism in the Categories list to the right) about the threat of creeping fascism in this country and have seen nothing to indicate that progress has been made to reverse the weakening of our democracy. It continues as predicted by Henry Wallace, Franklin Roosevelt’s next to last vice-president, and we’ve been warned repeatedly by various clear-headed thinkers that, “When fascism comes to America it will be wrapped in the flag and carrying a cross.” That sounds a lot like Trump’s appeals to “his base.”

Have a look at what former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright has to say about this. Then think about whether it’s okay to have a simplistic president solving 21st century challenges with 3-millennia old solutions and all the rest of his crazy, the way autocrats always do. Then think about a wag the dog gambit to keep him in power, like the looming opportunities for war in Argentina and Iran. How are we going to prevent that? If we fail, Trump may have enough time to tear everything down.

                   ————————————

Ed. Note: I don’t want money (DON’T donate) or your signature on a petition. I want you to spread the word so that we make a critical difference. So,

YOUR ACTION STEPS:

  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 be better informed.

Thanks!

 

 


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

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