December 20, 2024

Category: News and Commentary

History / News and Commentary

Happy 76th VE Day

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Victory in Europe Began a New World

Nazi German Formally Surrender on May 8, 1945

Lest we forget, millions upon millions lost their lives the world over because Fascism was allowed to take over the governments of multiple nations and then was not stopped before it was too late. While many people remember how and why Nazi German and Fascist Italy were ultimately confronted and defeated, it is often forgotten hat authoritarian governments continue to this day.

Netherlands-American-Cemetery_onemanz
One of countless WWII cemeteries the world over

The man credited with inventing the term Fascism was an early intellectual architect of what ultimately led to the rise of Mussolini in Italy. He defined Fascism as the marriage of the Corporation and the State. And the hallmarks of Fascism include the government protecting corporate power while eliminating protections for labor and individual citizen, a fervent nationalism and squelching of political decent, a zealous investment in the industrial-military complex bolstered by overblown rhetoric of “national security” against undefined foreign threats, along with a militarized police force and expanded powers of the security services to spy on the citizenry.

Human evils like racism and antisemitism are not necessarily facets of  Fascism, but the extremist nationalism that is at the heart of Fascism always seems to include an elitist us vs. them strategy on its way to taking root and then taking over a society. And it attracts those who require someone else to look down on to feel worthwhile or powerful, and gives them moral permission to exercise their bigotry, while distracting them from the fact those they support politically are actually reducing their personal power and freedoms.

Therefore,  Nazism is not the same thing as Fascism. Rather, Nazism can be viewed as a form of Fascism. This is an important point; as assuming one must be a “nazi” to be a fascist has allowed genuine fascist elements to legitimize themselves in the eyes of their countrymen, including right here in the so-called Bastian of Democracy, the USA. This was never more clear than over the previous six years and in the continued efforts of those trying to disenfranchise the will of the majority of the people by the lies spread to sow distrust in the electoral process that endangers their grip on political and economic power.

This blog rarely deals with political thought or opinion. But on this day, VE Day, when fewer and fewer people are around to bare witness to the atrocious misery inflicted on so many innocent people by Fascism and the great loss of life and treasure required to defeat it in the 1940s, it is important to speak up and out about the fact that Democracy is once again under assault. And this time it is under assault in America, by those who would cripple the democratic process because the last thing they want is for the will of all Americans to have an equal voice in deciding who is running their government, and that those who are sent to Washington D.C. and to statehouses across the USA are elected to be the SERVANTS of the people, not their “leaders” or their dictators.

And so, we have posted below the recent public statement made by a sitting member of Congress, who we do not in anyway endorse politically, but who is herself currently under a propaganda assault by those in her own party who continue to undermine the will of the American people.

 

 

 

News and Commentary

Principals Over Politics, Nation Over Party

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Liz Cheney’s Address to the Nation

Strange bedfellows indeed when we can agree with or support someone remotely related to Dick Cheney

“In public statements again this week, former president Donald Trump has repeated his claims that the 2020 election was a fraud and was stolen. His message: I am still the rightful president, and President Biden is illegitimate. Trump repeats these words now with full knowledge that exactly this type of language provoked violence on Jan. 6. And, as the Justice Department and multiple federal judges have suggested, there is good reason to believe that Trump’s language can provoke violence again. Trump is seeking to unravel critical elements of our constitutional structure that make democracy work — confidence in the result of elections and the rule of law. No other American president has ever done this.

The Republican Party is at a turning point, and Republicans must decide whether we are going to choose truth and fidelity to the Constitution. In the immediate wake of the violence of Jan. 6, almost all of us knew the gravity and the cause of what had just happened — we had witnessed it firsthand.

History is watching. Our children are watching.

House Republican leader Kevin McCarthy (Calif.) left no doubt in his public remarks. On the floor of the House on Jan. 13, McCarthy said: “The president bears responsibility for Wednesday’s attack on Congress by mob rioters. He should have immediately denounced the mob when he saw what was unfolding.” Now, McCarthy has changed his story.

I am a conservative Republican, and the most conservative of conservative values is reverence for the rule of law. Each of us swears an oath before God to uphold our Constitution. The electoral college has spoken. More than 60 state and federal courts, including multiple Trump-appointed judges, have rejected the former president’s arguments, and refused to overturn election results. That is the rule of law; that is our constitutional system for resolving claims of election fraud.

The question before us now is whether we will join Trump’s crusade to delegitimize and undo the legal outcome of the 2020 election, with all the consequences that might have. I have worked overseas in nations where changes in leadership come only with violence, where democracy takes hold only until the next violent upheaval. America is exceptional because our constitutional system guards against that. At the heart of our republic is a commitment to the peaceful transfer of power among political rivals in accordance with law. President Ronald Reagan described this as our American “miracle.”

While embracing or ignoring Trump’s statements might seem attractive to some for fundraising and political purposes, that approach will do profound long-term damage to our party and our country. Trump has never expressed remorse or regret for the attack of Jan. 6 and now suggests that our elections, and our legal and constitutional system, cannot be trusted to do the will of the people. This is immensely harmful, especially as we now compete on the world stage against Communist China and its claims that democracy is a failed system.

For Republicans, the path forward is clear.

First, support the ongoing Justice Department criminal investigations of the Jan. 6 attack. Those investigations must be comprehensive and objective; neither the White House nor any member of Congress should interfere.

Second, we must support a parallel bipartisan review by a commission with subpoena power to seek and find facts; it will describe for all Americans what happened. This is critical to defeat the misinformation and nonsense circulating in the press and on social media. No currently serving member of Congress — with an eye to the upcoming election cycle — should participate. We should appoint former officials, members of the judiciary and other prominent Americans who can be objective, just as we did after the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001. The commission should be focused on the Jan. 6 attacks. The Black Lives Matter and antifa violence of last summer was illegal and reprehensible, but it is a different problem with a different solution.

Finally, we Republicans need to stand for genuinely conservative principles, and steer away from the dangerous and anti-democratic Trump cult of personality. In our hearts, we are devoted to the American miracle. We believe in the rule of law, in limited government, in a strong national defense, and in prosperity and opportunity brought by low taxes and fiscally conservative policies.

There is much at stake now, including the ridiculous wokeness of our political rivals, the irrational policies at the border and runaway spending that threatens a return to the catastrophic inflation of the 1970s. Reagan formed a broad coalition from across the political spectrum to return America to sanity, and we need to do the same now. We know how. But this will not happen if Republicans choose to abandon the rule of law and join Trump’s crusade to undermine the foundation of our democracy and reverse the legal outcome of the last election.

History is watching. Our children are watching. We must be brave enough to defend the basic principles that underpin and protect our freedom and our democratic process. I am committed to doing that, no matter what the short-term political consequences might be.”

– Rep. Lynn Cheney in the Washington Post

News and Commentary

A New Day, a New President

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A guitarist pen pal in Germany wrote to offer congratulations to me and America

And he asked how I was doing. My reply finally put into words how I felt.

For four years, I and those like me have been sickened to our soul that the America we always wanted to believe existed could have elected that odious villainous criminal. And it looked as if it were to happen AGAIN.

But in the end, American citizens came out in record numbers to reject Trumpism as a political movement in the USA.

Now, not everyone who voted for Trump is an awful human being. Many would vote Republican no matter who was on the ticket. Even here in my progressive area there were many who voted for Trump, because they are wealthy and care for little more than their tax bill.

That is not the same thing as Trumpism.

Then again, maybe it is. Donald Trump doesn’t “love America” and he isn’t a born again Christian. Like all great con men, he tells people what they want to hear.

Actually, Donald Trump only loves Donald Trump, and cares only about himself.

His charisma and message is all about selfishness. And he legitimized the selfishness of not just the rich who vote for anyone who will cut their taxes, but the selfishness of the smallest, meanest bigots and anyone longing to have their selfishness validated by no one less than the President of the frickin’ United States.

But we were shown there were far more people who wanted Trump’s America than we ever allowed ourselves to believe. And that heartbreak was reinforced when 60 million voted for him this time too.

And yet, as a result of Trump’s ascendancy, so many of the worst of us have been exposed for what they are, so that white supremacists are being ejected from the military and the police, etc. for the first time ever. There are silver linings in this.

Genuine fascism was smoldering at his rallies and was reflected in the cold eyes of his primary advisors. His reckless disregard for the reality of the Virus and his disregard for common decency and the strong man rhetoric inciting his followers to armed violence were endangering the very fabric of our society.

And America – enough of America – came forth to say Trump did not deserve and would not be tolerated in a second term in office. It is our turn to be emboldened, and we are now aware of the serious threats to our democracy residing withing our democracy.

Many who typically vote Republican joined us to vote for Biden. That says a great deal.

As for today, I was not prepared for the outpouring of emotion. From me or from anyone else. There were more people filling the large park near me than had ever been in my 32 years in Brooklyn – not even half that number had gathered there.

And I was told Central Park was “like Woodstock.” And then told it is happening across America. And then I realized it was happening the world over. Church bells were being rung across Europe and elsewhere at the news.

Faith has been restored in me about the better angels of America’s nature. Time will tell if it will be enough.

Trumpism is defeated in an official sense. Its horrid realities are still roaming at large. I remain grateful that I live on an island off the coast of America.

News and Commentary / Science and Nature

COVID-19 Avoidance Advice

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Advice for avoiding the COVID-19 virus that is causing the world-wide shutdown

Transcription of audio message passed via Facebook Messenger

This comes from a letter sent by a medical professional working at Doctor Negrin University Hospital in the Canary Islands, to colleagues. One of them translated it from Spanish and produced the audio message, which I received via Facebook Messenger and cannot download.

Most of the contents are already known. But it is good to be reminded and take such things seriously. There is no way of knowing if the source is correct, but most of the contents have been mentioned by other credible outlets.

I am leaving out some of the intro and adding some of my own comments [in brackets like this.]

MESSAGE FOLLOWS

The Chinese now understand the behavior of the COVID-19 virus, thanks to autopsies they have carried out. This virus is characterized by obstructing respiratory pathways with thick mucus that solidifies and blocks the airways and lungs.

So, they have discovered that in order to administer and apply medicine they must open and unblock these airways so that the treatment can be used to take effect.

However, all of this takes a number of days.

Their recommendations for what you can do to safeguard against contracting the disease yourself are:

1. Drink lots of hot liquids – coffee, tea, soup, warm water. In addition, take sips of warm water every twenty minutes. This keeps your mouth moist and warm and washes any of the virus that’s entered your mouth into your stomach where the gastric juices neutralizes the virus before it can get to the lungs.

2. Gargle with antiseptic in warm water every day if possible – vinegar, lemon juice, salt, etc. [Listerine and similar antiseptic mouthwash probably too.]

3. The virus attaches itself to hair and clothes. Any detergent or soap destroys it. But you must take a bath or shower when you get in from the street. Avoid sitting down anywhere and go straight to the bathroom or shower.

If you cannot wash your clothes daily, hang them in direct sunlight which [it is believed] will also neutralize the virus.

[Viruses have delicate structures, and coronaviruses especially so. They survive best in cold conditions (That is why they like our sinus and lungs, the coldest parts of the human body.) The hotter the conditions the more likely viruses will fall apart into simple components before they can invade host cells.]

4. Wash metallic surfaces very carefully, because the virus can remain viable for up to nine days. Take note and be vigilant about touching handrails and door handles, etc. Within your own home, regularly wipe down and if possible disinfect doors and oven handles, stove tops, refrigerator doors, etc.

5. Don’t smoke.

[I would suggest wearing a dust mask when doing any activities that might lead to irritating or inflaming the sinus, throat, and bronchial passages, like sweeping and vacuuming, cleaning cat litter, any DYI things around the home that stir up dust.

Might as well avoid triggering allergic reactions that could make you think you are coming down with something. If you have no N95 masks, pulling your tee shirt up over your nose is better than nothing.]

6. Wash your hands every twenty minutes, using any kind of soap that foams. Do this for 20 seconds, and wash your hands thoroughly.

[Some say sing Happy Birthday twice through, without rushing it. At the bottom is a link to an excellent article about the why traditional soap is especially good for defending yourself against viruses of all kinds.]

7. Eat fruits and vegetables. Try to elevate your zinc level as well as your vitamin C levels.

[You can take too much zinc. Do not ingest more than 40mg per day. Zinc toxicity can produce gastrointestinal issues similar to “a stomach flu without the fever.”

Also, the chemical zincum gluconicum found in zinc throat lozenges (like Cold Eeze) can coat the throat so viruses like the common cold cannot take hold. So, if you can get the lozenges, take them at the first sign of symptoms, don’t waste them if you don’t think you have a cold coming on.]

8. Animals do not spread the virus to people. It is person to person transmission.

9. Try to avoid getting the common flu, which weakens your system in general. Try to avoid eating and drinking cold things.

10. If you feel a sore throat coming on, attack it immediately using the above methods. The virus enters the system this way, where it remains for three or four days before it passes into the lungs.

Good luck, everyone! Take care of yourselves, and pass this information along if you wish.

And that is the end of the transmission.

 

*****

Here is a recipe for homemade hand sanitizer

Ingredients:

2/3 Cup 99% rubbing alcohol (isopropyl or ethanol.)

1/3 Cup aloe vera gel (to counter the drying effect of the alcohol)

8 to 10 Drops of essential oil optional for fragrance and skin soothing (lavender, peppermint, vanilla)

1 to 2 Drops of one antimicrobial essential oil optional for added antimicrobial protection (tea tree, arborvitae, cinnamon, clove, thyme.) But such oils can be harsh on skin, so go easy on this.

Directions:

Mix ingredients in a bowl with spoon or spatula, pour into glass bottles. Spritz away!

IMPORTANT: Do not use other types of alcohol (e.g., methanol, butanol), as they are toxic.

The alcohol must be 60% of the mixture to be effective. If you only have alcohol solution under 91% then it needs to be a greater percentage of the mixture.

After all that, do not forget about good old-fashion soap! Traditional soap is abnormally good at getting viruses off your skin, clothes, etc. According to a renowned chemist, it is actually better than alcohol and other sanitizers at destroying the structure of a virus.

 

*****

Here is the article about using traditional soap to combat viruses.

https://www.marketwatch.com/story/deadly-viruses-are-no-match-for-plain-old-soap-heres-the-science-behind-it-2020-03-08

 

News and Commentary

Get the Flu Shot!

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Anyone who thinks they can just go to work or about their business with the flu have never had it.

The flu is a devastating illness.

It can last weeks and require many weeks of recovery. I used to get the flu every year until I started getting the shot. Recent strains have been quite deadly. The last time I got the flu it was because I waited too long to get the shot. I slept sitting upright for a week because I felt I would suffocate if I slept lying down, which is exactly what happened to a friend’s son who died of the same virus within weeks of my illness. He was fit and in his early 30s, and a father of young children.

Get the shot. That is less about you than those you could infect if you don’t.

Here is piece from NPR you should read and share:

Think You Don’t Need A Flu Shot? Here Are 5 Reasons To Change Your Mind

flu shot NPR piece
Alex Schwartzman, a law student at George Washington University in Washington, D.C., is one of only 8 to 39 percent of college students who get the flu shot in a given year.
 Mary Mathis/NPR

 

News and Commentary

The Harvey Weinstein Phenomenon

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A friend from overseas wrote to ask for my take on the Harvey Weinstein business. And I hadn’t actually made much effort toward such a proposition.

She said people in her country remain puzzled by the way we are making such a big deal out of Weinstein while ignoring the behavior of Donald Trump.

Frankly, when I heard about Weinstein I assumed it was just par for the course where the casting couch was concerned, and didn’t read any details, until later when it was all over the news.

And now I have read about some of it, I remain skeptical.

I fear that, just like in Washington politics, this will be marginalized as if Weinstein is some monstrous aberration, when he is only one of countless men, and the occasional woman, in positions of power who have done this sort of thing forever, if not always in such a reportedly depraved manner.

I wonder how many people remember when Bill Clinton was being persecuted by the “Family Values” Republicans over the Monica Lewinski affair, and the head of the House Ethics Committee that was leading the persecution had to resign suddenly from Congress, when it came out that he too was having a sexual affair with a young intern.

Isolating and attacking the one whose private behavior ended up in the papers seems to part of the creed of such hypocrites.

So, I was surprised by the number of women and some men who were emboldened to come out with their un-provable claims of Weinstein-style piggishness and villainy about other well-known figures. I am sure the belief that any such claims would result in their being bankrupted by an indefensible lawsuit kept many quiet for years.

Others feared the stigma or suffered trauma they did not want to go public with, but feel braver by joining those who already came forward.

Many others probably felt it a calculated choice to keep mum, and one that was necessary to get ahead in their profession, like something bad happened to them but they weren’t going to allow it to ruin their lives or stop them from moving forward.

It has long been rumored that Tom Cruz was Gay, despite his famous wives and girlfriends, while some who might have real inside info put it more like he did what he felt he had to do as an up and coming actor to further his career.

As the saying goes, “Who do you have to blow to get a drink/job/audition in this place?”

Sadly, there is nothing new or unusual about that. According to the legend, shortly after Marilyn Monroe became a made superstar she phoned her friend, the columnist Hedda Hopper, to say off the record, “I’ve given my last blow job.”

In modern times I have known a successful actor who is straight, but who could have been a much bigger figure in Hollywood had he acted upon the invitation from a now dead super-agent to call the man’s private line during extracurricular hours. But he chose not to go that route and has had a good if not stellar career anyway.

It really has been Hollywood’s open secret since the silent movie days. It remains a much less open secret in places like Congress, on Wall St. and the business world in general.

I find it rather amazing, really, that we have gone from the Bill Cosby revelations to Harvey Weinstein to George Bush, and how it is turning into a phenomenal shift in society.

Or at least I hope it is a shift and not just the latest tabloid tempest that plays out before such people get back to their usual way of doing business.

For all the cries of “they all do it” or “that’s just the way the world works” or “that’s just locker room talk,” I hope people remember that there are many in positions of power who aren’t that way at all, and would never impose themselves on others who are vulnerable to such abuse.

But far from par for the course in American politics, I sure wish a lot more people would have paid more attention to the dishonorable piggery of Donald Trump rather than choosing to either ignore it or disbelieve the overwhelming evidence of it, when they went ahead and voted for him anyway.

I feel it sadly safe to say we have a very long way to go before the Harvey Weinsteins and Donald Trumps of the world are no longer tolerated by civilized society.

And that is one man’s word on…

The Harvey Weinstein Phenomenon

News and Commentary

Fearless Girl statue firm pay $5M over non-equal pay for equal work

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The US Department of Labor accused State Street Global Advisors (SSGA), which paid for the Fearless Girl, of not paying hundreds of female executives on par with male executives.

While there’s nothing new about that sort of thing in the white collar world, this time it is the company that crowed about their support for women in the workplace, when they commissioned and installed the statue of the Fearless Girl facing off the famous bronze Wall Street Bull on lower Broadway in New York City.

While denying they were not in compliance with specific regulations covering government contracts, the Boston firm State Street (SSGA) has agreed to pay out $5 Million dollars in a settlement stipulated in this USDoL Conciliation Agreement.

According to the story at BBC Business, the settlement also covers the underpayment of 15 African-American employees, compared to their white colleagues. This was all the result of a 2012 financial audit. State Street reportedly said they just wanted to put the situation to rest.

Artist Kristen Visba said that her metal sculpture of the child with arms akimbo as she bravely faces the much larger bull statue represented the future.

Many critics of the installation responded by saying the Fearless Girl statue was nothing more than a marketing stunt, since it was paid for by a major investment firm. Those critics included Arturo Di Modica Di Modica, the artist who made the bull statue, which was unveiled in 1989 in tribute to the American economic recovery following the 1987 stock market crash.

fearless girl bull New York Times BBC

 photo: New York Times

History / News and Commentary

A Most Dishonorable Result

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We get the government we deserve

Such quotes give scant comfort in an era when integrity means so little

During the first State of the Union Address given by President Barak Obama, when he stated that health care reform would not cover illegal immigrants, Joe Wilson, Republican Representative from South Carolina, shouted from his seat, “You lie!”

The President stopped his speech long enough to reply, “That’s not true.” But too few Americans could tell the difference between the two statements.

Social media was filled with commentary about the incident, with many saying things like “What’s the big deal? Democrats have booed Republican presidents during their addresses too.”

I knew then that if relatively literate, educated Americans do not understand how partisan booing of a President’s policies differed from a serving member of Congress declaring before the nation and the world that the President of the United States is a dishonest and dishonorable man, we were in serious trouble.

But I completely underestimated just how bad it has become.

Now, seven year later, the minority of Americans who actually vote have elected someone to the Presidency who has repeatedly proven, in absolutely verifiable ways, that he is serially dishonest and egregiously dishonorable, and they voted for him anyway.

Like so many, I failed to heed the dire warnings of Carl Sagan at the end of the last century, as he predicted how the American people might sign away their very liberty, if education in this country so deteriorated that voters were unable to distinguish fear mongering from inconvenient truths, and propaganda from reasonable assertion and argument supported by empirical evidence and verifiable fact.

But even such a brilliant wise man as Dr. Sagan could not have envisioned an American electorate unable to see the difference between the baseless character-smearing of the expert career bureaucrat proven to be the most truthful Presidential candidate in this past election cycle, and the overwhelming documentary evidence proving that the rank amateur who won the Presidency is a truly dishonest and dishonorable man unfit to serve on even a PTA board.

Like many a successful shyster, he convinced them to vote against someone else. I realize that a lot of these voters were simply unaware of what they were actually voting for.

Facts Forgotten

The Trump campaign won in part by using the technique where you accuse someone of something terrible, which cannot be disproved, and then say it louder and louder and over and over until the masses believe it must be true.

Trump’s increasing declaration that no one has ever been more corrupt than Hillary Clinton was nothing more than an outrageous insult to hurl at an opponent. It can’t even be considered an opinion, as it has no basis in fact, and was put forth and repeated without a shred of evidence presented to back up his claims.

This technique is known as “the Big Lie” and it has worked very well for many people like Trump, since Adolf Hitler published the concept in Mein Kampf in 1925.

That is not to say Trump is a Nazi. He isn’t.

Fascism doesn’t mean “Nazis.” It means “the merger between the corporation and the state.”

That is the definition of Fascism according to Giovanni Gentile, the man who invented it.

And that is exactly what the American people voted for; even if most of them didn’t even know it, including Donald Trump.

All they know is they voted for the tough-talking outsider who is going to shake up Washington – by voting into power the very corruption they thought they were voting against.

They just handed the White House and Congress to the Oil Companies whose profits are soaring but pay no taxes, the Insurance Companies that will deny them healthcare or skyrocket their premiums once the ACA is repealed, the Pharmaceutical Companies who will continue to charge them many times more for drugs than what people pay in other countries, and the shadowy firms who make most of the weapons of mass destruction in the world and grow fat by eating up more than half of every tax dollar that should be going to repair our schools, bridges, roads, and affordable healthcare in the only industrialized nation that doesn’t have it.

In case you think such statements are soft on “national defense,” you may have not noticed that the USA’s military is larger and more powerful than THE ENTIRE REST OF THE WORLD COMBINED.

A Safe Place

At 3:30 AM, after drinking more scotch than at any time my life, I posted on social media my sincere disappointment with the results of the most important election in my lifetime, and my disgust for those who would knowingly vote for Institutionalized Intolerance, Bigotry, and Brutality, which Donald Trump embraces and encouraged.

I received a private message in response to my election night reaction, asking “Do you need a blankie and a safe place?”

My impromptu reply included the following:

Oh my.

You could not be more wrong.

I have spent far too many years in a very safe place on an island off the coast of America, in the only cosmopolitan city on the continent.

From here I could feel sorry for working class women in places like Texas, who could not access safe and affordable healthcare, or even a textbook on history or science that presented the world to young minds as it really is, rather than sustaining the precious but false beliefs of those empowered to ban books and even ideas.

But my own life was relatively untouched by such things, and I grew complacent and comfortable and on the sideline far too long.

While I could be tempted to emigrate from America to the civilized world – a place that is, around the globe, horrified at what happened here on the 8th of November – that would be deserting my homeland on the brink of its worst crisis since the Civil War.

Only, this time, the winning forces belong to the bigotry-based aristocracy that grow ever richer on the masses of ignorant laborers, because they vote against their own better interests, if they vote at all.

A little over a decade ago, representatives from around the world, who really know what they are talking about, took part in a poll that named North Korea as the worst threat to world peace and global stability.

The United States of America came in second.

The Obama Administration went a long way toward repairing the severe damage to our credibility brought about by the last Republican administration, as well as overseeing an historic and remarkable domestic economic recovery from the calamity that happened during the Bush Administration, and all despite disgraceful obstructionism on the part of a hostile Congress, the like of which having never before existed in U.S. history.

So yeah, I am distraught to the point of despair that the United States of America is now going to backslide from all of that progress and set the world back decades if not a century, when very real threats like Climate Change cannot wait, rather than leading the world into a brighter future, as it once did.

As a white Anglo-Saxon male with health insurance, most any election result hardly touches my own life.

Yet I grieve for my fellow Americans who will suffer mightily as a result of this election. And that includes those who brought it upon themselves.

Well, some of them anyway.

But I grieve most for those in this once great nation that was built upon principals of enlightenment and justice for all, whose civil rights and human rights are threatened, denied, or abused, now that the Ugly Americanism of ignorance, intolerance, bigotry, brutality, and persecution have been given a green light and the reigns of power, and in many cases will almost certainly be legislated into law.

Tolerance Has Its Limits

I have never been particularly political, except in cases of notable social injustice. My life has been built upon tolerance, even for the most intolerant, who I tended to pity if not as much as their victims, except in cases of overt bigotry. But no longer.

With very few exceptions for the genuinely ignorant or those of misguided religious principals, I simply will never forgive anyone who voted for Donald Trump in knowing opposition to raising the minimum wage so families with two full-time working parents do not live in poverty, protecting Social Security and Medicare, science education standards based on actual science rather than denial or mythology, true environmental protection, truly equal civil rights and protection under the law for all Americans including equal pay for equal work and national healthcare, stopping criminals from buying firearms without a waiting period in some states to use for crimes in other states, and forcing corporations and the extremely wealthy to pay taxes equal to their income.

Those are all things you voted against if you voted for Trump.

And for those who voted thus out of concern only for their own personal greed at the expense of their fellow citizens, just so they can pay fewer taxes in a country with one of the lowest tax rates in the industrialized world, I have lost any respect I might have held for you as a human being – permanently.

 

News and Commentary

February 25, while it lasts

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There are banshees fighting yeti outside my bedroom window, as the winds whip around the corners of the 111 year old apartment building I call home, and the driving rains lash against the windows.
 
On the one hand, I am glad the banshees are winning, as this would be one serious mountain of snow, should the temperature drop below freezing.
 
But it is actually 56F on the western tip of Long Island at Midnight – IN FEBRUARY.
 
This is the second time in less than a month that we had such a storm. The last one came less than a week after a blizzard.
 
So I am a bit concerned for the planet that, you know, is our only home in the vast emptiness of what could possibly be a lifeless universe.
 
And even if it isn’t lifeless, it does not do you and me a bit of good. We cannot exactly travel to anywhere else.
 
We cannot even send one human being to the nearest desert planet bombarded by radiation that would fry Earthborn life in hours, and has no breathable air.
 
We certainly cannot send them TRILLIONS of miles, across the generations of human-life-years it would take to get anyone to where it, maybe in a very, very, very, very slight chance, might support human life, with technology we have not developed yet because the wealthiest societies on the planet throw away almost all of their Gross National Product on barbaric machinery of War, when it could have been used to reach out for the stars, or at least figure out how to keep Miami, London, Hong Kong, and New York City from becoming the under-the-sea relics they will almost certainly be before this year’s college graduates enter their retirement homes. That is, unless some things seriously change.
 
But so long as people consider vapid morons like Donald Trump as potential leaders of the Free World, well, we are doomed.
 
It really is that simple.
 
So you might as well stock up on your favorite fatty foods and delicious dainties and dig in. Because the unprecedented change in the planet’s climate is real, regardless of what wishful thinkers and blind deniers say.
 
And no, the fact that what we now take for granted as the global civilization may end up in a heap in no way means some weirdly-Caucasian Jesus is “coming back” from somewhere to save you believers from the pain of death before your natural time runs out. That is not a spot to put all your chips. Centuries of deluded folk have been there and done that, each of them sure that the end is nigh.
 
This in no way means there is no God or that Jesus isn’t all some folks say he was or is. It just means the tidy package trotted out every generation or so to rail against the changes that just cannot possibly mean anything but the impending end of the world, but don’t, is complete hooey.
 
Humans will adapt, and keep adapting long after you and I are not even remembered by name by any breathing entity.
 
But that does not mean humans will make it all that far.
 
Lizards and other things that suck in their food with their tongues while remaining low to the ground with four limbs dedicated to locomotion have a much better chance than we do.
 
And that is why I am going to make sure there aren’t any lights on in the apartment that do not need to be on, and that all the water taps aren’t leaking any drops of precious fluid.
 
And then I will have another drink, since it is my birthday.
 
And someday, no living thing on this planet will know that simple fleeting fact, let alone know the fact that this oddly truncated list of days once called February by less than a majority of the humans who lived on the itsy bitsy thin crust of a molten planet that happened to be in just the right orbit around its mid-size star to allow the stability necessary for advanced life forms like the paramecium to evolve, not to mention the big sex-obsessed apes with guns we call human beings, just by coincidence housed the 24-hour period of time wherein one of the Beatles was born.
 
And that it happened on the same day (a considerable number of years later) as the birth of the composer of this address.
 
And as that cold, unfeeling universe shrugs with a collective, “So what? Big deal,” I bow to those who have read this far and thank you. I know that I was alive when some great stuff happened, and some pretty great people made it happen. And I am happy that you are alive this very moment and may, in some small way, wish me happy birthday. You might as well, what the hell difference will it make in the long run?
 
Not much, really. But it will help another clump of animated carbohydrates, water, and empty space feel a bit less like, well, a clump of carbohydrates, water, and empty space – all of which are becoming endangered commodities, if you haven’t noticed.