Category Archives: Politics

No One Knows

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Macbeth Act 1 Scene 3

If you can look into the seeds of time,

And say which grain will grow and which will not,

Speak then to me, who neither beg nor fear

Your favors, nor your hate.

We have no untrustworthy witches with which to foretell the destiny of our nation. All we have are untrustworthy polls and badly fitted historical analogies as we confront a crucial presidential election like no other.

The Republican Party is now shorn of all principle, devoting itself to a charlatan, a felon, a misogynist, and an insurrectionist all melded together like some horrid Voltron in the orange hued body of Trump. Never has a major party candidate mused about setting aside the Constitution, suggested that the military fire upon those protesting him, or been so enamored with strong men that murder and repress their own populations. And yet every measurable metric indicates a strong possibility of his electoral victory in November.

The Democratic party meanwhile is led by an aging pol form whom the signs of time’s inevitable decline seeming grow by the hour. It is an unavoidable truth that in appearance Biden’s looks weaker and more frail than he ever has. A terrible truth of elections is that appearance matters far more than reality. Did you know that there are studies that show a population of test subjects, utterly unfamiliar with any election or candidate can predict the outcome of a two-person election based solely on photographs of the candidates? Elections are not about policy and positions but vibes and narratives and the narrative is bad for Biden.

The Trump’s campaign is to attack Biden as ‘weak’ and Trump as ‘strong’ a battle plan that works more and more as Biden appears frailer and more aged.

Does that mean Biden should step aside?

I don’t know. In the modern era no party that has dumped its incumbent has gone on to victory.

A new candidate would throw the Trump’s campaign plans into chaos, but no one know what narrative would emerge.

Trump is the most dangerous candidate to ever try for the office and should he win reelection the nature of our democracy is changed. Even if he leaves at the end of his second term, either by walking out or being carried out, the changes he and his people plan to do lay the groundwork for further changes. Project 2025 envisions sweeping changes to the Federal government amplifying the powers of the presidency. This prospect thrills those on the right but they should quake at the thought that that those newly found powers will not always reside in hand that they control.

Never craft a political power you aren’t willing to hand to your opponents.

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An Idiotic Theory

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I will grant you that Trump has a feral innate cunning when it comes to publicity. A nature endpoint for this celebrity obsessed culture.

However, the assassination attempt on Saturday was not some staged master-plan plot to sway the election. Ford had two assassination attempts and still failed at reelection. Such a thing does not generate sympathy for an already unpopular candidate.

And tell just how does this plot actually work?

There’s no way Trump stood there and let someone shoot withing inches of his head. Even Trump isn’t That stupid. So that would mean the shooter was just a decoy, a distraction.

Did they persuade the shooter to get up on that roof as an act of suicide?

Shots were fired and people were injured and killed. So that would have to have two or more shooters. Who are they? Where were they? Why take extra shots and kill people if the whole idea was to injure Trump and promote sympathy? You could do that with one shot.

How are the people remaining silent? The fatal flaw in nearly every ‘vast conspiracy’ is that it requires numerous people to maintain a perfect wall of silence. People just don’t do that.

No.

We have a young male shooter, acting in all likelihood irrationally, and whose exact motivation may never be known.

That’s it.

The world is often chaotic and unreasonable and this is just another example.

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Thoughts of the Attempted Assassination of Donald Trump

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Yesterday, July 13th, while delivering his usual lies, threats, and promises of vengeance Presidential candidate Trump was nearly assassinated by a gunman.

I have nothing but contempt and antipathy for Trump, the man who has more to damage our political system than anyone else. Should an artery in his diseased and putrid brain burst tonight causing him to assume room temperature I would not only not lose a moment’s sleep over it I would consider it a stroke of good fortune.

That said, and as I have said before, there is no room in our system of government for political violence. Full stop. What transpired yesterday is terrible for our nation, terrible for our culture, and terrible for our future. Here, in no particular order, are some thoughts on the matter.

1) When you normalize and excuse political violence you get more it and you will not be in control of it. Be it street level violence ‘punching nazis,’ mocking and inventing fantastical conspiracies following a brutal attack on political spouse, or an entire political party proclaiming violence insurrectionist as martyrs and hostages, the result is more violence and the degradation of our political life.

2) Grand conspiracies are fantasies no more real that the armies of Barad-dur. It is a deeply human thing to believe that order and reason move the world but love gunman are the rule and not the exception. Overly complex plots to employ ‘false flag’ are the stuff of bad thrillers not reality.

3) Early reports have a terrible error rate and rushing to judgment on them is an act of foolishness.

4) Today people are dead who were not dead Friday. Have some considerations for those killed and injured before you go

5) No one know how this will move the electorate or if it will at all. This election is so ahistorical we have no comparable past to judge it against by which we can make any reasonable assumptions for the future.

6) The elected officials and parties are revealing who they are. Some are coming out with sentiments of consolations and wishes for speedy recoveries while other are quick to deploy attacks and manipulated the event for their partisan advantage. Take note who is doing which.

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248 Birthdays

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It has been 248 years since the Continental Congress adopted the Declaration of Independence. That nation born nearly two and a half centuries ago has never been far from perfect. It labor under the Absolute Evil of slavery and that has cast a long and terrible shadow across time. On the other hand, the aspirational ideals presented in that document has not only given fire to the fight against slavery and tyranny here and abroad but has severed as beacon to be our better selves.

Over the centuries we have explanted the notion about who matters and whose voices can be heard in the public square. What was once unthinkable in terms of human liberty are now enjoyed but there are more to unchain.

Recently the Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) enacted a new test to determine in something was constitutional or not, the ‘history and tradition’ test. If something did not have an analog in the nation’s history or its tradition, a very slippery concept to applied fairly without biases of the head or heart, then it was in conflict with the supreme law of the land.

This is not only an invitation for personal preference to direct outcomes it is directly and thematically in opposition to our founding. A founding that proclaims that the traditions of the past do not fence in our present or future liberties. That because we have always had a king who should therefore always have a king. This nation is a bold experiment in new thinking not traditional customs.

For citizen of the United States of America this year is vitally important year. This election transcends petty policies and speaks to the very nature of the American system.

We can elect a corrupt, venal, criminal of a man who has no wish beyond his own greedy vices and appetites, throwing away two and half centuries of democratic self-governance, or we can accept that policy is less important that principal and keep him and his ilk out.

Like Klaatu said at the end of The Day the Earth Stood Still “The choice is yours.”

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There Are No Norms

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I have not written on the American Political disaster that unfolds about us recently not because it is unimportant or that I do not care but because in my heart I knew such writing to be futile. There are very very few my words may sway in even the smallest of measures. For the most part people are cemented into their camps and only November thru January will let us know if this ship of democracy founders or survives this tempest.

After yesterday’s SCOUTUS corrupt ruling I have to at least make some attempt, I have to speak the truth as I see it.

This heavily politized courts finds that people have no right to bodily autonomy because the words are not in the document but amazingly finds full and partial immunity to commit crimes for the nation’s highest ranking law enforcement officer. If Trump is returned to the Oval Office this petty, ignorant, vengeful man will turn the full power of the Federal government upon his enemies. He will order the IRS to audit, investigate, and harass the wealthy who spoke out against him. The FBI and the DOJ stripped of independence will be hounds sicked on political and personal enemies. The Office of the President will be for sale to those who enrich Trum personally. Hey, you want that carried interest loophole expanded? Well, he won’t sign the bill, the very definition of an ‘official act’ until you make the requisite deposit to his bank account. This vile greedy and hateful man has no loyalty, no patriotism and this country’s enemies around the globe know this fact.

Make no mistake in reading the decision neutrally. This partisan court which has already decided that stare decisis is for sucker and that have twisted and invented new interpretations to achieve their desired outcome will in no manner apply such reasoning for any democratic politician. This immunity is for one Republican at that solely.

We have but one path forward to save our Republic. We must vote Democratic at every level. We must give the majorities in both houses to the Democratic Party and ensure that a Democratic person holds the Oval Office. The ‘norms’ are gone and with that power the Democrats must jettison the filibuster and reform the court. If that is not done this election this cycle we may very well be doomed.

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Guilty on Every Count

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Yesterday after just 11 hours of deliberation on 34 felony county a New York City Jury found former president Donald Trump guilty of every charge. Not one count did they find him acquitted nor did they hang on any of the charges. They looked at the evidence presented by document and testimony and found that there was no room for reasonable doubt as to his guilt.

Of course, conservative partisans rushed to prostrate themselves before their Orange God-King protesting the trail, the verdict, the jurors, and every political opponent that could muster to mind. It has been decades since the GOP or the conservative movement possessed any fragment of principle or integrity. Terrified at the potential political fallout they huddle together and mutter their threats and plans of vengeance. Deep in their souls they know that this is a trap entirely of their own making.

The GOP has several opportunities to avoid this fate. They could have refused Trump entry to the party’s debates in 2016. They could have mustered the conventions against him. They could have impeached him when he corruptly used the office against a friendly nation for his person political benefit. They could have impeached him when he attempted to overthrow a fair and free election. They could have stood with due process as the justice system brought him to task for his crimes.

They did none of these things.

From their own selfish wants for lower taxes, more liberty to pollute, the puritanical need to impose their sexual mores on everyone else, and the need to have utterly unrestricted access to any firearm of that their little hearts desire, they have sold their souls, and betrayed the core concept of this great nation: No Person is Above the Law.

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It Wasn’t a Riot It Wasn’t a Protest; It Was an Assault

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There are those who partisanship exceeds their patriotism and insist that the assault on the Capitol Jan 6, 2021, was really a protest or a riot. They are wrong and nothing they say in the matter of the nation’s governance should be given any weight.

A protest is a collective action to bring attention to a cause or event. Protests can and often do involve illegal actions, blocking freeways and the like. Illegality in protests should be dealt with in the courts, not overly harshly nor overly leniently but the illegal actions do not transform or alter the intent of the protest, to draw attention to a subject.

A riot is an emotional outburst that is shared by multiple individuals and is often contagious. Riots have no direct goals. While an event such as an unjustified death at the hands of authorities can ignite a riot the riot itself burns like an uncontrolled fire. They often spread beyond the inciting cause, causing property damage and too often person injury and death to individuals unassociated with the perceived injustice.

An assault is violence with a goal, a purpose, something to be achieved. An assault can be highly coordinated and planned such as the invasion of fortress Europe on D-Day or as disorganized and spontaneous as impulse mugging for cash. What is central is that there is a goal to be achieved and not a message to be conveyed or uncontrolled emotional burst.

The attack on the U.S. Capital Jan 6, 2021, was an assault with the purpose, the goal, of preventing the certification of the Presidential election and thereby preventing the peaceful transfer of power from the Former President to President-elect Biden. Placing quotations around insurrection is a lie.

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The Word ‘Enemy’ is Dangerous

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A friend retweeted a Twitter posting where a conservative supposedly defined ‘woke.’ The tweet contained nothing that any linguist would consider a ‘definition’ but rather a word-salad screed about what they considered the dangerous aspects of ‘woke’ including unsupported assertions of ‘death cult’ and the like. My friend commented in his retweeting that it is was important to know ‘the enemy.’

Now, I am not going to get into the futile and unproductive argument over what is ‘woke.’ In my opinion that term is used as carelessly as ‘fascist’ was deployed by many for decades prior to our current social political crisis.

What I am fascinated with is the term ‘enemy.’ An enemy is someone or faction that you cannot reasonably work with without degrading or corrupting your own standards. The overuse of ‘enemy’ in domestic political terms leads to a breakdown of governance.

If you want to tax high income people at a greater rate than others, that doesn’t make you an enemy. Policy, in general, isn’t the basis for enmity but rather disagreement. It is possible to have serious, vigorous, and even heated debates and arguments over policy without being enemies.

However, when you describe your political opponents as wanting to ‘destroy civilization’ and ‘end the nation’ then you make it impossible to work with them. Your very language has placed them beyond the pale of acceptability and that chains your own actions.

Look at the war in Europe. Many people on both the left and the right see the vital importance in assisting a democratic and free nation in defending itself against a brutal, savage war launched by its dictatorial neighbor. And yet that assistance to held captive and withheld because to actually do the work to get it out requires working with the ‘enemy.’

On a less critical issue, keeping an insurrectionist out of the presidency, political aid is coming from those who served with the insurrection in his previous administration. I have no love for Pence. I know that given the chance he would harm those I care about with his deluded sense of morality, but I will not label him an ‘enemy’ making it impossible to work with him.  I will accept his assistance but never forget what it is he is and what he would want to achieve.

The word ‘enemy’ is dangerous and should be applied quite carefully.

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Believe in Something, Do not Simply Oppose

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The title of this post is deceptively simple. Particularly when it comes to politics, everyone believes in something and by believing in that thing they come to opposes those who do not.

But therein lies the trap.

Once you are fixed on those who oppose you, it is so much easier to keep them in your sights than to question yourself or your fellow travelers. This sets you up to follow your fellow travelers down terrible paths because each and every one of you continue to stand firm against those you oppose.

My first election was back in 1980 and I voted Reagan over Carter. I did not believe Carter to be a bad man, but I did believe that he was in over his head. My political path went along with the GOP but even then, I took care to keep my own head. I never supported the more religious aspects of the party and there were times when my votes when to the Democratic politicians over such issues. I have always known that I supported equality, the right to choose, and other programs that set me apart. I cannot be dogmatic.

Knowing what I believed to be right and wrong made it possible for me to see that the GOP had taken a terrible turn when it embraced torture. My conservative friends saw me as a ‘one issue’ voter when I walked away from the GOP over that, but it is not that the ‘one issue’ was torture but rather it was right and wrong. (I had argued passionately against the invasion of Iraq.)

The follow the crowd mentality that continued to support the party after the torture debacle is *in part* what helped the party to fall into line behind Trump.

My conservative friends who have spent their entire political lives opposing the Democratic party have lost their way. If you could travel backwards in time to 1990’s and warn them that as they supported the impeachment of Clinton and the endless investigations of the couple that in the future, they would support an obvious conman and fraud who gave support to Russia as it invaded its neighbors they would steadfastly and with utter confidence tell you that would never happen. That their support of the GOP has limits. But of course, it doesn’t because the GOP continues to oppose the Democratic Party. Fixate on your opponents and you will lose yourself.

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Peer Pressure Isn’t Just Teenagers

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We tend to think of ‘peer pressure’ as something that is a trouble for teenagers. A scene in a badly scripted After School movie where the bad kid Tommy tells the good kid Jimmy that if he wants to be cool Jimmy needs to take a drag on the joint. Of course, it doesn’t work like that in real life at all. It’s not so much as pressure from one or two people as much as it is the Fear of Missing Out. People are doing something, having fun, being social. It’s rare that anyone verbally chastises someone into participating but rather the need to maintain the social life, to be accepted, to be with the group instead of outside it that sweeps people along. It’s far less ‘pressure’ as it is a swift river’s current. it can be fought but it is so much easier to flow with the waters.

This applies to adult as much as it applies to teenagers. It is a major component of why so many rational normal Republicans now move with Trump.

Oh, there are the true Trumpists, authoritarians and neo-fascists for whom the dream of state power is a one that frightens the rest of us, but I do believe that they are the minority. The trouble is that to maintain their social lives, their social contacts, and to avoid being ostracized by their friends and peers far too many simply swim with the current. They have lived their entire adult lives with the concept that the Democrats are not just wrong but evil. It’s beyond their imagination and conception that they are now the anti-Americans. So, despite their criticisms of Bill Clinton for dodging the draft, breaking the law, or unproved accusations of sexual assault and grifty financial dealings, or their charges that Obama was an unready novice with over inflated ego, they have wedded themselves to Trump. The hypocrisy of their support is unseen they are drowned in the swift river of the need to be accepted by their peers and our nation is worse off because of their weakness.

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