Doug Jones is one of the few public figures who can talk about “dignity” and “rule of law” without it sounding like some slogan because he’s been in a courtroom with dead children on the record and still came back to do the work. And you’re right to drag the “Western identity” script into the light: it’s not new, it’s old fear dressed up as policy, and it always ends with somebody’s rights getting called optional.
If Alabama can remember that 2017 “earthquake,” it can do it again because “hard work,” “fairness,” “tell the truth even when we don’t want to hear it,” and “look out for your neighbor” aren’t partisan. They’re a moral spine. And that’s what this moment is begging for: a spine. www.xplisset.com
Doug Jones is the man who *should* have been President Biden’s Attorney General! Had he been, I am confident that the USA would have emulated Brazil’s good example – and that prosecutions of the insurrectionists and coup makers, their financiers and backers, and of Trump himself, would have happened in a far more timely manner!
Had Doug Jones been Attorney General, instead of Merrick Garland, I strongly believe that Trump would have been sitting in a prison cell rather than in the Oval Office.
It’s lamentable. When distant memories of the bombing are read, as a 10 year old, I am reminded of an event in my life around that time when a neighborhood chum described the new neighbors using the “N” word. I asked Marty to not use that word. My mother had taught me that it was a bad word. Instead Marty began screaming it repeatedly at me until I lunged at him and we commenced a terrible fight until I let go of him before serious injury had occurred. As I walked home Marty continued to shout that word and 60 plus years later I can still hear him shouting that ugly word.
“In his speech tonight, Jones noted that Alabama politicians ‘love to say they are running to protect our values’ and encouraged voters to make it clear to elected officials what those values are.”
To be clear, everyone needs believe that “we” are the most important people on the planet, bar none. Mature people know that “we” are tied for first place with roughly eight billion other people. Immature people need to grow up (especially when “we” happens to include a pathetically immature 79-year-old POTUS).
A country whose elected president imagines that a handful of undocumented immigrants could destroy its values is by definition NOT "the greatest on Earth"... :-)
My point is that either some people are more — and others are less — important, and then we're on the Road to Perdition, or we're all equal irrespective of the negative impact of one individual's unconstrained power and ignorance, and then civilization's survival is possible.
You seem to suggest that that's different from what I wrote?
My point was that, as soon as a country's leader claims that his country is "the greatest" AND that it could be easily "erased" by a handful of poor undocumented people, he's proving that it's definitely NOT the greatest, since most countries perfectly survive (and even thrive) with substantial numbers of undocumented people.
James. I totally agree. This is the point HCR had been preaching for years. Let’s hope more folks hear it and grasp its positive implications “FOR ALL”.
Except EU, that it wasn’t a handful of immigrants. I’m not against immigration at all. I was against the massive influx that has occurred and in my opinion, it opened the door to the monster we now have in office. You weaken your argument when you characterize it as a handful. It was massive.
In Africa, the accelerating climate crisis drives herders off disappearing grasslands into dwindling agricultural regions.
People fight in an attempt to maintain old lifestyles that are rapidly becoming unsustainable., Then, exhausted by war and famine, they are forced to leave for parts unknown.
This pattern, and others like it (eg. island nations, coastal cities)will expand. This and coming generations, a billion or more people, will be forced to leave the dwindling, inhabitable regions of Earth during the next few decades..
During 10 years on a small boat in France, mostly in the countryside, I had a front seat to climate change and saw US as “the bad teenagers on the block” in relation to what I was learning in the country in France. Hoping we can get through the current horror and continue to move toward the Founding Fathers’ Enlightenment Dream. Back to history and civics in America’s public schools!
I ask Mr Carey and Ms/Mrs Witmer how many years you have spent teaching in American classrooms? I began teaching in 1981 and will (try, for the second time) to retire this May . I never could have imagined the joy that would enter my life when I began teaching. Most proclamations I read about students, teachers and teaching are fear based inaccuracies rooted in disinformation and heinous conspiracy theories. And like all career paths in the Universe, there are noble teachers and awful teachers.
I could and should write a book extolling the joy, benefit and responsibilities of teaching, but I have been too busy participating in all the facets of living and learning with American teenagers.
Tuberville, who is widely regarded as the stupidist US Senator (and perhaps the stupidist Senator in history, though that is s tall order), is the living personification of the the values held by the vast majority of white Alabamans for 200 years.
I wish I could believe it even remotely possible that a majority, even a slim majority, of white Alabamans would turn away from williful ignorance and bigotry as religious values now, or anytime in the next two hundred years. But I can’t.
It could be Marty was a jerk kid with jerk parents and no one ever let them in on their jerkitude. Too bad about the fight Bill, glad you found the strength to refrain from hurting the kid. A guy on a construction job I was working at used the term gook once. Another guy looked at him and said "We don't use words like that". Of all the lines in all the world I wish I had said that was the one.
Well I almost killed him that day. I got him in a chokehold or headlock as we used to call it. I looked down at his face having turned red as tears streamed down his cheeks. He continued screaming that word. At that moment, I let him up.
I had to think about your post - always a good thing - I think it is a yes and.... you are right but it is more than fear, it is also about power, the need by some to have dominance - whether wrapped around race, religion, gender, wealth, etc, - fear (and insecurities), but also power structures.
My mother was racist, complete opposite of my father, who wondered aloud why black people had to go 15 miles to “their” public school when white children went to school 3 miles away. He and our “cleaning lady” laughed and joked together. Result: years later, when she died, my husband and I were the only attendees from the neighborhood she had served for so many years, while getting her children through college.
Thanks for sharing what seems was a life defining moment for you. I wonder if Marty ever evolved beyond the hate he had been taught at a young age? I will not give up on my belief that our country and society can, and will, move beyond these times of hate and fear. Our survival must be based on a belief in our shared humanity..."Of... For... and... By the People".
People can evolve, especially if there is a respected role model nearby. I’m currently reading MARK TWAIN by Ron Chernow. Twain made his evolutionary leap from a racist upbringing after marrying into an abolitionist family. Clearly his wife and her family provided Twain a chance to grow. In addition to evolving from racist beginnings he also became a committed supporter of female equality and suffrage. He even advocated the formation of a new political party to be created by and for women; the existing two party system having failed, in his view, to address the aspirations of our Declaration of Independence in 1776.
Thanks for adding to the conversation. I've added the book to my reading list. Connecting with Heather and others here, has increased my historical perspective in a positive way. I'm fortunate to be surrounded by a wife, daughter, and granddaughters that are smart, free thinking, and courageous women. No doubt in my mind that the way out of this mess, will likely be lead by women.
So would I but I can’t find him anywhere online. Nor his brother. They just disappeared. But I have thought about it often. The neighborhood was demolished under redevelopment agency that defined the neighborhood as being substandard, partially in a flood zone. The interstate highway we being built nearby. Underwood Typewriter Co was threatening to leave nearby. But it was the place were earliest memories reside complete with a polluted river where we frequently hung out and built tree houses on the side. The neighborhood was soon condemned and the city took land under eminent domain. My father sued in court lost and lost on appeal and we were the last house remaining now on a deserted stretch of land. He refused to move until we were served by a sheriff with a 2 week vacate notice. That was my experience in early life.
But all too often there are no saints. Later on in life I began dating a Black woman and she couldn’t understand nor accept it based on her own prejudices.
Oh what a tangled web we weave when first we practice to overcome centuries of abuse and outright criminality. Don't be too hard on yourself or her Bill. Saints are indeed rare.
another interpretation, along with racism and what goes on psychologically with regard to that-- if a 10 year old knows that deeply or is taught-- is that this is defiance. Kids are like that and maybe never leave it as they grow older: wanting to get back, to defy what is forbidden or what everyone is against. Some are like that. If you deem something is bad, they will oppose. This now has it's own psychological category: Oppositional Defiant Disorder. Look it up.
He was definitely defiant. And maybe I was defiant against his defiance. At be I should have just walked away from him. But instead it became confrontational.
When someone is like that they want attention and even a fight-- to get their aggressiveness out on someone. Parents who are too strict or even mean can help make their kids like this. I had similar experiences around that age with neighborhood kids, one in particular. A fight was wanted and could not be avoided... the adrenalin flows too.
I've chocked an awful lot of that behavior to long standing emotional immaturity. With clear objective eyes and understanding I've observed far more of that condition than I'd even speculate to count. And I am speaking of amongst supposed adults of any age.
I think Bill’s story encapsulates centuries of cruelty that, for the those embracing compassion, is a call for justice. On the other hand, plants a seed of hatred that resists forgiveness.
I think all of us of a certain age had similar experiences growing up. I began school in 1949 and came up in the 50's. We were always taught we were at the top of the heap. We played "War" with our cap guns and on one side were "the Japs" or "The Germans."
Even in (so-called) liberal San Francisco, the divide between the races was almost absolute. At some point in my own younger years, I know I used the "N" word with thinking of what was behind that word. My own hyper-Catholic godmother cautioned me not to put coins in my mouth "because some n***** may have touched it. My 6th grade teacher, an old Catholic nun, talked of teaching her "pickaninnies" in a school in the black neighborhoods of San Francisco.
I think it took me well into high school before I realized how segregated we all were. We were unconcious to the hurt we caused other people.
These are not memories I cherish. Decades later, I'm ashamed yet, in a sense, they helped me to instruct my children to be better than I—and Marty—was instructed. I would include Trump amongst the incorrigibles but he is truly a mentally sick, and evil, man. (And just three years my junior!)
I'm remembering that as a child, we said, "Eeny meeny miny mo, catch a tiger by the toe." We didn't use the n-word. I don't know why. I don't know who taught that to whom. But I'm very glad.
Wait a minute. There was a wallen or wallon family down the street. They had many children. Larry was a friend. There was also Whitey, Donny, Linda. Maybe Morgan was the estranged father who I never met. Ironically, that family lives around the corner from me. I recall Larry telling me his grandpa drank up the corner at the bar and staggered home to Willow street on the weekends. I recall an old man drunk out of his mind. Maybe that was Morgan. Sound familiar?
I like to think that he moved to the good side of human thought and behavior. He had a twisted foot and walked with difficulty. And had an uncle with the same malformed foot.
First of all, the only reason, apparently, why you see Garland as not a good AG is because of ONE decision. Why would we disregard his entire term like that?
Secondly, that Trump wasn't in jail yet by the end of 2024 isn't ONE person's "fault". The situation was (and is) extremely complicated.
The goal was clear for everyone, including Garland: making sure that another Jan. 6 never happens again and that the people who spread lies about it aren't empowered. In other words, the goal was nothing less than saving democracy from a fascist movement in the making.
The question then was: HOW to achieve this?
By quickly prosecuting Trump, knowing that no other AG has prosecuted a former president? It would obviously allow the GOP to build a huge case against Democrats, making people believe that "Biden weaponized the DOJ".
So what was a much better option, at the time? That the GOP itself would do the necessary work to get rid of the neofascists in their ranks. Was that a REAL option?
It was. None less than the GOP VP had strongly condemned the insurrection, and at first, the entire GOP Congress did so too. They all turned against Trump, and in the most explicit way.
Then, a battle for the soul of the GOP began. Again, during this time, having pro-democracy Republicans defeat the pro-fascism ones was by far the most effective way to save democracy.
Only once it became clear that the pro-democracy Republicans would definitively lose was prosecuting Trump the next best option.
None of this has anything to do with this or that person individually. It was a complicated situation, with no good options available anyhow.
While I agree with many of your points about Merrick Garland, I still contend he was far too slow, scholarly, yes (he would have made a fine addition to the Supreme Court which is likely the reason he was given the job of Attorney General - as a consolation prize after he was denied that opportunity) for the urgency of the moment in regards to Trump, public opinion and the attention span of our citizens. It took two years after January 6th for him to appoint Jack Smith as Special Council to investigate the matter. Too late by any measure and time became the enemy of the disclosure of truth which the the entire country needed to hear. Garland is a good intelligent man, but entirely the wrong man for the job for the times in which he was appointed.
Actually, my point was precisely that this is NOT about Merrick Garland.
Since you argue that it is, because you take over the common idea on the left that IF he had prosecuted Trump faster, democracy would have been saved, you need to explain HOW jailing him would have defeated the neofascist movement inside the GOP rather than empowering it massively.
It may have been a common idea on the left, but not mine. Jailing Trump was never something I thought would be a good idea and I hoped that whoever adjudicated his case would realize the smarter and far more effective plan would be to sentence him to incarceration then offer a plea deal of a financial penalty and the edict that he never again run for public office.
And I stand by my previous sentiment that it was in good part about the sluggish inaction of Merrick Garland that put us where we are today.
Imho, what happened in Brazil is the best counterexample. Their judicial system acted with appropriate haste and thoroughness. Bolsonaro is jailed – and is likely to remain so the rest of his days.
If that's what you believe, you'd have to show that the situation was similar, namely that Bolsonaro was merely the puppet in a system built up over decades, with at least one third of the population firmly enrolled and brainwashed by its propaganda machine.
Such a system didn't exist in Brazil... . And it didn't exist because, contrary to the US, it wasn't necessary to create it for someone like Bolsonaro to win elections. Brazil is a young democracy, with still a lot of corruption. That's enough to have fascists win elections again, once in a while.
The US is an old democracy, so it's much more difficult to install fascism.
I believe Garland wanted to believe that trump would fade from political life so there was no need to pursue legal action.
Maybe the ruling class would rather keep themselves above being held responsible for crimes that might lead to restricting their power.
It is possible that had Garland moved quickly to bring trump to justice, he may have been convicted. I suspect that the Supreme Court still would have given trump immunity and Jack Smith would continue with the prosecution but the defense would continue to slow walk the trial and bring more aspects of the case to the Supreme Court who no doubt continue to rule that trump had every right to commit any crime in the name of Presidential power. If we don't elect super majoritys to the house and Senate, we may never have a country we all can be proud to be part of.
Mitch McConnell deserves a huge amount of credit for the orange blight's second term. If Mitch McConnell had allowed the vote in the Senate, for the orange blight's second impeachment, the orange blight would be golfing fulltime at Mar a Lago.
Why are we allowing our legal system to obey in advance? France did not care that Sarkozy was their president. Brazil showed everyone they would not tolerate a criminal and dictator like Bolsonaro. Why is the United States comfortable showing the world that we do NOT believe everyone is equal before the law? I don’t care that somebody was president of the United States. He puts his pants on one leg at a time just like I do. I give two figs that somebody was able to finagle their way into getting elected president. Who cares? President is not God. If anything, the president should be held to an even higher standard than the average Joe because he supposedly the most informed on defending the constitution. I thought we were supposed to be the country that led the way for justice. I thought we were the country everyone wanted to do business with because we had lower corruption and we respected the rule of law. NOT pursuing Trump out the gate with the Mueller report IS massively political. Then slowly approaching J6 crimes because in some unknown future election people might think Biden was going after political rivals. Avoidance IS wildly political. Who knows if the Supreme Court would have given him immunity. Garland should have opened up an investigation into Clarence Thomas for bribery. What we did instead was destroy our standing in the world as any authority of justice. We should’ve learned with Nixon’s pardon. We did not. Now we are trash. Admit it.
Because all the conditions needed for the US to have a political party, supported by one third of the population, have been installed decade after decade now, contrary to France or Brazil.
France and Brazil don't have Fox Entertainment. They don't have so many fundamentalist (= hollowed-out forms of) Christians.
The causes are multiple and run deep.
As long as we blame DEMOCRATS (the only ones fighting back) for the RESULTS of what the GOP did, we will remain part of the problem rather than the solution...
While I am in complete agreement regarding Doug Jones, I firmly believe both you and Heater Cox Richardson have picked up a grating habit of Trump’s use of the adverb "strongly".
You're not alone. I've seen and heard it elsewhere.
Trump is limited in his vocabulary. I strongly urge everyone not to limit their own.
I think Garland was a sympathy appointment because of the runaround when Obama wanted to put him on the Supreme Court. He really could have moved with more speed around the Trump issues and if he had it’s likely we’d have a different president today.
Thank you for your kind comment! I am so glad to see HCR, Simon and the Hopium community, and so many others doing their utmost to defend democracy. Challenging times – and millions of Americans rising to the challenge!
Anybody else should have been Biden's AG. Even Kamala. She would have been a better AG, that was her strength in CA. Wonder if there was some kind of agreement between Obama and Biden since Garland didn't make it to the Supreme Court.
As Isabel Wilkerson laid out in her brilliant book Caste, these beliefs of racial superiority are deeply seated in our society and deeply wrong. Race is a false construct. People from different parts of the world adapted to their environment, but we are inherently one race. The current struggle is a grab for money and power. One again Dr Richardson has strung together elements of history and current events to crystalize the current battle. This gives me hope.
I loved following the path of influence from an honorable uncle in 1860’s, Justice Brandeis and Justice Douglas’s influence, author Madison Grant influence, Prosecutor Bill Baxley, and writer Wilkerson today…yes, hope lives on as long as we keep following the better angels that are leading us…
thanks, HCR…you always lay the path out clearly in front of us.
Thank you for your comments. I dug up my copy of Caste for a reread. “The hierarchy of caste is ….. about power-which groups have it and which do not. “
It was when reading Caste that I learned that the Nazis used the Jim Crow laws as a basis for their laws for the Jews and other groups of German citizens.
KMD, of course they did. They did not leave any stone unturned to make the Aryan race superior. I would also add that Europe had a very long history of antipathy towards Jews who among other things, were bankers, at a time when the Church considered usury a sin. They made convenient scapegoats for any number of adversities.
People do not willingly give up the feeling of being superior and having the power to enforce their view as we are seeing now. Death star, et al tout white male nationalist Christian power. They are still unhappy that a black man became president and that women, black people, immigrants, and the queer community had made some strides. Not only are they undoing any laws and programs that help those groups, they are also trying to erase them from our history.
I would respectfully point out that most human cultures the world has known have been racist. The cultural vilification of “the other” is deeply seated in cultural constructs, and is difficult to ameliorate. We need to work hard to change people’s perceptions. While the Republicans talk only to themselves, it will be very hard to get in there and nibble away at this. But obviously it is necessary to have early role models who don’t permit this. I had a Quaker aunt who heard my 4 year old self say the N word one day, having innocently learned it from my neighbor. Shocked, she confronted my little self and said, “You must never say that.” I learned tolerance from her clearly stated concern. But many people don’t have such clear guidance, and slip into bad habits of thought if they are supported by their cultural surroundings.
It's interesting the Gandhi was an ardent supporter of the Hindu Caste system.
Are you sure race is a 'false' construct? How do you account for differences in say susceptibility to certain medical differences in different peoples? Didn't geography create differences in physical characteristics?
Agreed, we are one human species, but one race?
This is not to say one is better than another, or that people shouldn't be judged as individuals.
I'm curious as to whether denial of race is really the best way to handle racism. Would it be better to recognize the reality of race, it mutability and celebrate diversity than deny its existence?
You bring specificity to an issue the previous commenter did not.
“Nosotros somos una especia” reads the entrance sign to the Smithsonian Museum of Natural History's Hall of Human Origins. Then, in a blizzard of many languages: “we are all one species.” From the viewpoint of biology, we are really quite boring. There is greater genetic diversity among Lowland Gorillas than in the entire human species.
But race? I don’t know. It accounts for about 0.2% of DNA variance. It means something, but the marker barely registers. All the differences in skin pigment, hair, head shape, eyes — in only that 0.2%. It may be more accurate to state that diversity is a false construct, though I dread how the “racial” dimwits out there would try to screw up that statement.
And several legitimate news outlets have finally picked up on Archaeology Magazine's story that Europeans were dark skinned, not at all "white" until about 3,000 years ago. So the whole nonsense that is perpetuated about pigmentation being a determiner of race is patently false. The problem is that "race" is a social construct, one invented by Europeans to justify oppression and genocide. Started in the Middle Ages with the so-called Crusades, which targeted non-Christians, especially Jews in Europe, but also Muslims in the Middle East, as not only "infidels" (a term invented by Europeans) but also as "racially" different. https://archaeologymag.com/2025/03/most-ancient-europeans-had-dark-skin/
Ally, I wrote a very long paper on antisemitism from Roman times to the First Crusade once. Early on Jews fared better under Islam than Christianity. I am currently reading about the Cathars in southern France and parts of Spain and Italy. The Church totally stamped them out. One of the things that the Church objected to was that some nobles of this area had Jews in their governments and the Church demanded, among other things, that those they not have Jews in their governments. In Spain for a while Muslims had Jews and Christians as part of their governance. This, of course, was gradually destroyed by rabid Christianity culminating in Ferdinand and Isabella and Christianity prevailing.
lots of truth in what you right, except that racism is world-wide and was not invented by Europeans. Europeans did not tell Japan how to treat Koreans in the 1930s and 40s. Iranians do not dislike Arabs because of European teaching. It's a built-in thing, mainly dislike/fear of "the other", whoever that is and for whatever reason. And if not race, religion ... but you often can't see a religious difference. So how can you know who to hate? Race makes it easy... alas.
I agree: hatred of the Other is a human failing. But as an historian I define "racism" specifically. Also: Persians historically were conquerors of the region whence semitic populations derived and competed with the Greeks and then the Romans for dominance in the region. That's the reason for the enmity, not really religion. The history of the Abrahamic religions is a history of adopting the kind of exclusionary policies that lead to religious wars. The Zoroastrians were monotheists of a different stamp: although largely specific to the Persian Empire, Zoroastrianism was nonetheless not monolithic. There is also a difference between imperial conquest and genocide, although the latter almost inevitably is tangled up in the former. The demonizing of the conquered population usually comes after the conquest. That is not the case with the medieval AND early modern wars of religion: the justifications for them were deliberately Othering even if the motives and outcomes were largely political. And another fun fact: in ALL of the 17th-century wars between Catholic and protestant states and polities the former received crusade-style remission of sin because killing non-Catholics was considered a holy act. Yes: empires are brutal. And the men responsible for creating them designed them that way.
"Gandhi was an ardent supporter of the Hindu Caste system."
AI
The statement that Gandhi was an ardent supporter of the Hindu caste system is complex and debated, as his views evolved significantly over his lifetime. While he initially supported an idealized concept of the ancient varna system, he vehemently opposed the rigid, hierarchical, and discriminatory caste system as it was practiced.
Evolution of Gandhi's Views
Early Views (e.g., in the 1920s): In his earlier writings, Gandhi defended the fourfold varna system as an ideal, non-hierarchical division of labor based on inherited duties, which he saw as a natural and essential blueprint for social harmony. At this stage, he focused on integrating the "untouchables" (whom he called Harijans, or "Children of God") into the existing Hindu fold, primarily by eradicating untouchability, which he called a "sin" and "a blot on Hinduism".
Later Views (e.g., in the 1940s): Over time, influenced by various social reformers and his ongoing "experiments with truth," his position radicalized. By the 1940s, he declared that the caste system must "go" and became an open advocate for inter-caste dining and inter-caste marriages, a position that was revolutionary for a caste Hindu at the time. He even stated that he would only bless marriages where one of the parties was a Harijan.
Core Distinctions
Varna vs. Caste: Gandhi distinguished between the scriptural varna (ideal occupational classification without hierarchy) and the actual caste system (rigid social hierarchy based on birth, with associated discrimination and untouchability). He consistently argued that the latter was a "hideous travesty" of the original ideal and had no place in true Hinduism.
Untouchability: Throughout his life, Gandhi was unwavering in his opposition to untouchability, campaigning tirelessly to ensure the oppressed were granted access to public wells, roads, and temples. He considered its removal a prerequisite for Indian independence (Swaraj).
Criticism from Ambedkar: Dr. B.R. Ambedkar, a leader from a Dalit (untouchable) community, was a prominent critic of Gandhi. Ambedkar argued that Gandhi's distinction between varna and caste was a political tactic to appease orthodox Hindus and that the varna system was fundamentally the parent of caste inequality and an obstacle to true democracy.
In practice, Gandhi himself consistently broke caste restrictions, dining with people of all faiths and castes, performing "unclean" labor, and encouraging his family and ashram members to do the same.
For more details on this complex topic, you can read more about Gandhi's evolving position on caste in the Janata Weekly or explore Dr. Ambedkar's seminal work, Annihilation of Caste.
It supports my contention, oh wait AI never read Ambedkar's work did it?
Wait, wait, did it assume supported Gandhi? That explains it, AI implies because the title of the work is "The Annihilation of Caste" that Gandhi desired the annihilation of caste. Wow, altogether backwards. The book is a criticism of Gandhi's support of Varna, a caste system. You knew there are more than one caste systems, Apparently AI doesn't?
I can't imagine why educators have their knickers in a knot over AI. It's saves so much time; reading, especially skeptics, is such a drag.
Hurray for non-violence when necessary; boo for racism, misogyny, pedophilia, and religious caste systems.
There are more differences than just skin color, there are clearly other genetic differences. That shouldn't be denied; doing so is as detrimental as assigning those differences social value.
That someone would say they don't see race, sex, or age is just a denial of science and fact. That's not any more helpful than denying the value of vaccines, the nature of the cosmos, or believing in ghosts.
Gary Pudup, not sure the whole argument matters because if we don’t quit arguing and get to work solving energy problems (scientifically), we’re dead. Climate change, everybody!
WTF? Gandhi was a supporter of caste system?????? He fought for the untouchables. Against the caste system of India. He asked and offended his wife Kasthurba to clean the toilet of the Dalits. Where on the earth you got this amazing misinformation?????
Because he advocated for the untouchables doesn't mean he didn't support a caste system. Those are different things.
Sure he promoted Varna rather than the Jati, but they a distinctions with little difference, they both place people into a caste system of social hierarchy.
I know it surprises a lot of people, he was known for his racism, and pedophila also. In his 70's he like to sleep with young girls. He had something in common with you-know-who.
Imperfect he was, but we like his non-violence thing.
Yes he understood that the best way to rid India of British rule was through non-violence, yet his racism and misogyny were well known at the time. Recall his complaint when jailed in South Africa, was that he was house with Black people, "kaffirs"; and that women were beneath men.
This isn't news, it's just not talked about in certain company.
Oh I got the information from such crazy sources as the BBC and legal scholars...
Really? You're right, law journals and the BBC are just silly. Those academics at Cornell? Well, you know how they are; probably some stoned liberal 'women's studies' crackpot trying to dis Gandhi.
I should have watched the movie or just checked in with AI.
Reading biographies, law journals, scholarly sources, and BBC articles is such a drag.
What was I thinking?
Next thing is someone will think Mother Teresa was a ghoul...
Posts like these two only muddy up HRC's standards and contributions to enlightened discourse. I pursued the citations, did my best to understand them, given that they contained terms new to me as well as verbal constructions and apparent misspellings that did not give me confidence in the exposition and/or that I grasped fully what was being said. Plus, when claims are being made that counter understandings I've carried for a lifetime longer than Gandhi's, I offer my own thoughts with some trepidation.
No human is perfect. In the face of imperfection, to be human is to strive to be circumspect, as well as caring. TBFTGOGGI. Respect HCR, respect ourselves. My own conviction is that the world is a better place if we would act out of a shared conviction that race is a social construct. What I know of it leads me to believe that caste is as well.
Indeed, that's my point. It's long and complicated.
There are variations of caste systems in Hinduism. as there are different sects in Christianity; yet a caste system is a social hierarchy that Gandhi believed in.
Sorry to burst your bubble, its deeper than him just wanting untouchables to be recognized for their contribution to society, he still believed in social hierarchy.
I know you didn't;'t think Hindus were monolithic, that they actually have different opinions, that they don't all believe in the same caste system.
Hey, did you know there are different variations of Taoism? Buddhism? Christianity?
Who woulda guessed?
I'm sure you're open minded enough to know that a man doesn't always live up to the myth. None of this diminishes Gandhi's accomplishment in gaining independence from Britain, any more than the fact that Washington owned slaves diminishes his accomplishments in doing the same.
Why is this so hard to accept? He was only a man after all, like all men.
As Ecclesiastes reminds us, men are men, all to the same end, all else is vanity.
Race is a social construction; that is, we give it a reality, it is not a causative or material object of any sort, except when the human mind uses it to do something else. Having a genetic propensity for a particular outcome is not a cause; it is a probable outcome subject to an infinite number of other factors. We see associations between all sorts of factors, but often they are illusory, and after much work, we find they are not causes or even probabilities, but false associations that can be explained by something else entirely. Keep thinking and learning together, while it may not be clear and understandable today, with effort, we can forge a better understanding of how things actually work.
For the sake of conversation, the argument is how we view race is a social construct, race itself is not a social construct.
While it's destructive to believe one race is superior to another; It's not helpful to deny the reality of race. To understand how anything works we need to understand what constitutes the thing. If I want to know how a gasoline engine works compared to a diesel engine I need to know what parts constitutes each. That one uses spark plugs and another doesn't; doesn't mean one is more socially better than another.
Doctors need to consider race when treating certain conditions, to deny race would be unscientific, and indeed harmful.
ICTT's point that racial differences make up only a small portion of our total DNA is important; yet to deny the difference is to be blind to it.
The key is not to deny race but understand it. Placing social values on race is counterproductive, but so is denial of reality.
As our ancestors evolved to live in groups that gave more security to survive, there has been tribalism. After thousands of years tribalism became ingrained in what is known as our lizard brain. The people who learned how to use tribalism to manipulate others beliefs have been the most successful at obtaining power in society.
I use that comparison sometimes, but some are offended to think we may just be another mammal with different qualities and not god's favorite creation.
I had a class back in college, taught by an eminent physical anthropologist, C. Loring Brace, on the concept of race. That was where I first learned that if you line up everyone in the world, based on sets of specific characteristics, it is a continuous line between the peaks where those characteristics are concentrated, and everyone else. What you end up with is a continuous line with peaks and valleys. I was raised by parents who were not racially prejudiced, but this was still a lesson never to be forgotten. It has shaped how I view and relate to people when I've traveled the world.
Cameron: That book & the movie Origin are profound. Thank you for mentioning it. Every human being should read & see to understand the basis of needing a sense of superiority.
It certainly sounds like he could be a winner for Alabama. All of the issues mentioned are certainly bread and butter and more than that, they are the truth. Let truth win the election.
I’m from Alabama and a huge Doug Jones supporter. I fear the football idolization as well. Katie Britt will back Tuberville as well. There have been rumors that Auburn’s retired basketball coach Bruce Pearl might run for Tuberville’s senate seat. And… former AL quarterback AJ McClellan is running for stor et general of AL. Hence, AL could have 2 former coaches and a former quarterback representing us Alabamians. It’s really frightening … and sad.
I was a freshman at UGA when someone tapped a phone conversation between the Bama coach Bear Bryant and the Georgia coach Wally Butts to fix a Saturday game. The Alabama fans backed Bryant while the Butts fans kept quiet. And neither man was fired.
If you ask fans from Texas Tech or Cincinnati about Tuberville, who was a failure for those programs, you get an opposite reaction.
Tuberville forgot to tell them he was also under a preocupying stock fraud investigation at the time.
The last Democratic governor of Alabama was Don Siegelman, who served from January 18, 1999, to January 20, 2003.
Siegelman is the only person in Alabama's history to be elected to serve in all four of the top statewide elected offices: Secretary of State, Attorney General, Lieutenant Governor, and Governor. He served in Alabama politics for 26 years. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Don_Siegelman
In 2006, Siegelman was convicted on federal felony corruption charges and sentenced to seven years in federal prison. Following the trial, however, many questions were raised by both Democrats and Republicans about allegations of prosecutorial misconduct in his case. On March 6, 2009, the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upheld key bribery, conspiracy, and obstruction counts against Siegelman and refused his request for a new trial.
In October 2015, more than 100 former attorneys general and officials, both Democratic and Republican, contended that his prosecution was marred by prosecutorial misconduct; they have petitioned the United States Supreme Court to review the case. Siegelman was released from prison on February 8, 2017, and was on supervised probation until June 2019.
You people who do not live within the SEC do not know how Southerners REVERE football coaches, especially winning ones, and standout players. When they run for office, even if they are, shall we say, not brightly burning intellectual bulbs, they have a big leg up.
I agree, Arnold. I hope Jones wins, but I must quibble with his assertion that Alabama ever had values that made it great.
As I have often opined that America has had brief, shining moments of greatness, it is simply inaccurate to claim that America was ever great as if it were a longstanding characteristic.
Likewise, Alabama has a history that could never be described as great, with perpetually poor educational standards and equally poor educational achievement resulting in one of the lowest living standards in the U.S. Not to mention deep-rooted racism, misogyny and homophobia.
As MLMinET points out, Tuberville enjoys the halo of admiration afforded by a previous career in sports. While I acknowledge the many, many exceptions, it is not inaccurate to state that as a population, U.S. Southerners are not very well educated. Lacking that, they turn to sports as a way to "belong" and affirm each other.
As a longtime resident of Arkansas, I've observed that the way to achieve success in business, society and politics here is to associate oneself with the University of Arkansas Razorbacks. Fandom of the Razorbacks has achieved cult status. A significant number of businesses have "Razorback" in their names, even though they have nothing to do with sports or UA.
William Douglas was one of the few jurists in our history to speak convincingly of labor and human rights because he got his hands dirty in a field somewhere, watching real people get shot for simply trying to defend the rights of others.
It’s all the difference between a real person and the husband of Justice Vergogna, with her fetish for flying the flag upside down because the rule of law actually got upheld.
He's never had the satisfaction of having dirty calloused hands after a day of hard labor. As my uncle told me, "Be careful trusting anyone who has no scars."
When “Protect Our Values” Meets a Prosecutor Who Locked Up the Klan
White Supremacy Discovers That History Still Exists
Doug Jones is back in Alabama politics, and the white grievance crowd is already spiraling. When a movement built on myth runs into a man who prosecuted the Klan, panic follows. This satire skewers “Western values,” race hysteria, and the terror of accountability...
“The contrast [between Jones and Tuberville] could not be clearer. On one side, a candidate whose moral arc includes standing in a courtroom and saying, “These men murdered children, and they will answer for it.” On the other, a candidate who believes “Western civilization” is under attack by people who pray differently and order unfamiliar food”
Thank you for taking the time to comment. I should have mentioned this in the essay: historically, the leadership of racist movements like Nazism or the KKK has not been driven by a sincere belief in a biologically “superior” race. At the top, racism functions primarily as a political technology. It is a tool for mobilizing fear, resentment, and identity anxiety in order to seize power, consolidate loyalty, and justify hierarchy.
The ideology works because it offers a simple story. It explains social or economic pain by blaming an out group, while elevating followers with a sense of stolen greatness. That emotional payoff creates obedience. Leaders benefit materially and politically, even while the promised supremacy never materializes.
This does not mean every follower consciously understands the manipulation. Many truly internalize the myth. But the persistence of these movements shows that racism is less about belief and more about control. If the goal were truth, racism would collapse under scrutiny. If the goal is power, it works disturbingly well.
In short, racism is not a misunderstanding of biology. It is a strategy for domination.
Frank was originally a Republican -- appointed by Eisenhower.
In 1956, Johnson ruled in favor of Rosa Parks, striking down the "blacks in the back of the bus" law of the city of Montgomery Alabama, as unconstitutional. In orders issued in 1961 and 1962, he ordered the desegregation of bus depots (such as the Montgomery Greyhound station) and the Montgomery Regional Airport in Alabama's Middle judicial district. In 1961 he ordered the Ku Klux Klan and Montgomery police to stop the beating and harassment of Freedom Riders attempting to integrate interstate bus travel.
In March 1965, Johnson ruled that activists had the right to undertake the Selma to Montgomery march as a means to petition the government, overturning Governor George Wallace's prohibition of the march as contrary to public safety. Thousands of sympathizers traveled to Selma to join the march, which had 25,000 participants by its last leg into Montgomery on March 25, 1965. It was considered integral to gaining passage by Congress of the Voting Rights Act of 1965.
Johnson received death threats and ostracism for his role in advancing civil rights, and was protected by federal marshals for nearly two decades. A burning cross was placed on his lawn in 1956 following the Rosa Parks decision, and his mother's house was bombed in 1967, although she was not hurt.
Johnson was nominated by President Carter on April 2, 1979, to the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit, and was later part of the 11th Circuit.
As I was reading the section of this post about Madison Grant and his”Passing of the Great Race” about how superior the Nordic “race” was I kept wondering if he knew any history at all. What contributions did they make to civilization? Anything like Galileo’s theory about the planets circling the sun or Einstein’s theory of relativity, etc? People in Europe were terrified of the Norsemen who came killing, burning, and pillaging. So many lies in defense of greed.
I am so grateful for your comments. Your eyes and heart and mind "see" and experience reality in a personal light. We need you. You are a better mirror than we, white skinned persons who can be cruel and disrespectful of others OF ALL COLORS OF SKIN OR SOCIAL STATUS...ETC. EVEN AS SOME OF US MAY HOPE NOT TO EMBODY RACIAL OR OTHER PREJUDICES....WE DO!
If we truly care to be genuine in our relationships with all, we must think before we speak or act. What if we were "that person" being treated as if we were no one at all.
This is a serious human problem....we have choices. Our actions are a reflection of our hearts and minds. We need to examine ourselves and decide....how do we want to be treated?
Doug Jones made a choice. His example is one I respect and want to emulate.
Emily I thank you. I don’t take that kind of trust lightly, because I’m not above the sickness I’m naming; I’ve just had to look at it longer, and it left marks.
As to what you said about “be that person” is the whole test, especially when no one is watching. Doug Jones chose law over tribe, truth over applause, and in this moment that’s a form of love. I’m grateful you’re trying to practice it too. www.xplisset.com
Sarge, what you've said rings true about his character. I hope that common sense will defeat the "old ball coach" because we need statesmen, not name recognition.
Which is why it was gratifying to see Raphael Warnock, a Black man with a doctorate in divinity, beat Hershel Walker, Georgia's first Black football player, to maintain his Senate seat. The Confederacy left its mark on Alabama and Georgia, but it's more pronounced in Alabama. I can remember ridiing down the highway with my parents from North Georgia to South Alabama past signs that proclaimed Impeach Earl Warren and Get the US out of the UN. No such signs going the other way.
Being confronted by trump's cabinet--the worst of the worst--on a daily basis, it is almost anachronistic to learn about someone like Doug Jones and his impeccable integrity....
I turned eight years old in 1963 and remember being shocked at the news about the young girls killed in the bombing. They were close to my age, and that may be why I started paying closer attention to the news from then on. It is crazy that people in this day and age still cling to petty bigotry and bias, and that they can seriously use religion to help justify their inhumanity. My theory is that the powerful elite have always used religion to keep their flock in line in order to retain their power and discourage the people from critical thinking. I'm constantly gobsmacked that so many voters either pay no attention politicaly or are just so backward that they actually think trump is trustworthy after experiencing his first term, his traitorous actions leading up to the J6 insurrection, not to mention his continueas life long stream of of lies.
I hope that people will comprehend how important it is to always stay politically informed and we can work together to make America better for everyone not only for the most wealthy.
Thank you, Xplisset. Doug Jones is part of our moral spine. Wonderful that his candidacy is announced simultaneously with DT’s saying to a cheering crowd that Representative Ilhan Omar must be “sent back.” There is hope for US.
Michele, I’m with you. On a day like this it’s good to know a fellow human. Having walked the ramparts of his hometown in honor of Diderot (not far from the Canal du Midi), I feel free to be part of the Enlightenment. In writing that, I understand pilgrimage as never before.
Jones could win easily if he includes among his campaign issues that he will help U of Alabama hire a great football coach to win the national championship.
Alabama is still a state that struggles with racial issues. It's going to be a tough road for Jones, but God bless his effort. He is one magnificent human being.
Yes, re:Alabama. Having grown up in the northeast, I used to look at southern states like Alabama as uniquely still struggling with racial issues. Now that I’m older, have lived in different parts of the U.S. and studied and lived with people of different races, I realize, as HCR’s post reminds me, how baked-in to the American psyche racism is and if we don’t think it’s there it’s because it’s deeper under the surface. A good friend of mine, Black, who also had lived all over the U.S., served in the military, once told me he actually preferred the south because “ you know exactly where you stand with someone”. We were living in a “more enlightened” part of the country and he felt that here he could not tell who was racist and would ultimately stand in his way or turn their backs. At the time I thought he was being a tad paranoid, but now I know he was not.
WOW, Hummingbird, you have opened up a new avenue of thinking for me - the Dunning-Kruger effect. I will be spending some time thinking about this. I guess my first response would be are people a.) overestimating or b.) underestimating or c.) willfully disregarding the truth, the facts…. ??Your post came in conjunction with a gift that I just received from my wife: A wonderful collection of early Woody Guthrie songs, one of which grabbed my attention: “Plane Wreck at Los Gatos (Deportee).” (Link below - as sung by Woody’s son, Arlo and Pete Seeger.)
Woody was writing the lyrics in 1948 and Arlo was singing it in 1975. I was 3 years old when Woody came up with the main questions of the song:
“Is this the best way we can grow our big orchards? Is this the best way we can grow our good fruit?”
Woody was asking these questions nearly 80 years ago. I ask: Are we Americans willfully disregarding the truth, the facts about corporations who “encourage” cheap labor in order to enhance their pocketbooks or ….what?
Doug Jones is a beacon of sanity but let's be objective: Tubberville and the MAGA folks have a very appealing argument: preserving Western culture and values against the Middle Eastern horde "invading" Europe and the Americas. The fact is, Islam doesn't mix with anything else. And as we now know, neither does white Christian racist nationalism. It has been my thinking that if human life on earth comes to a sudden end, it will be the result of a nuclear Armageddon launched by rival religious factions controlling the governments. "It'll be OK. Everyone will be 'called home' to meet his/her Maker." Their beliefs are pure amathia [Intelligent stupidity; Willful ignorance. We need to start teaching critical thinking skills in our schools, starting as early as the 6th grade. Check out Melanie Trecek-King's website thinkingispower.com
Doug Jones was considered for Attorney General instead of Garland, and we would have been better for it. Jones had been an extremely successful prosecutor and would likely have been much more aggressive in prosecuting the Trump offenses.
HCR: Jones’s support for charges against church bombers Thomas Edwin Blanton Jr. and Bobby Frank Cherry brought a jury to a guilty verdict ...".
"Stay calm when tyranny arrives" Timothy Snyder. Fight back like Doug Jones.
********
UPDATE:
DOUG JONES launched his campaign for Alabama Governor last night in Birmingham.
Jones was interviewed on Velshi's Segment 1 this Saturday morning at the 28 minutes & 45 seconds marker. Many independents, not only Dems, are enthusiastic as their "is a lot to build for" up & down the Alabama ticket.
I always felt his appointment as Attorney General was Garland's consolation prize for having been cheated of his appointment to the Supreme Court. His caution and thoughtfulness would have served the nation well as a justice: unfortunately, those same qualities did not work well for him as AG.
An insightful and fair observation, thank you. I’ve been disgusted, furious and angry about Garland given where we are now. But he was a decent and smart man, inadvertently put in the wrong job at the wrong time.
That to me was one of Biden’s biggest fumble and the most damaging one: Merrick Garland. He was such a disappointment and not what the country needed at the time. When he was chosen, I had a sinning feeling that Trump was going to get away with everything. And here we sit. Jones would have been a much better choice. My money was on Sally Yates, and I truly believe we would not be where we are today if she, or someone likeminded and tenacious had been picked. Sigh.
You are both right about Garland. I had previously hung the whole lack of prosecution of Trump on him, and he is definitely responsible. However, I was surprised to read how reluctant the FBI, for example, was to pursue him. Some who served in Trump’s first administration (and had voted for him) were very reluctant to pursue the classified docs case, especially a search of his place. Some still wanted to honor the office of President (though Trump himself defiled it then and now).
So true about attempting to honor the office of the President, but that ship has, unfortunately, sailed right out to sea with Trump. He has soiled everything.
This will probably get a few rocks thrown my way, but what the dictator has gotten away with has me thinking we’ve put way too much reverence and deference on to the office. We say we don’t want a king, but in many ways we treat the holder of the office as if he were one. I’d like that to be knocked down a peg or two. We act like the president doesn’t put his pants on in the morning the same way the rest of us do. Bur he does, as well as everything else we do.
Years ago a man rose in Quaker meeting and said, "We don't need leaders!" What he probably meant was, We don't need the officially designated leaders. When leaders are needed they will appear.
He was wrong.
We're a herd species. We do need leaders. If we don't get good ones, we'll follow bad ones.
The reference and huge deference given a president who is no more than a man at best, and much less than one as now, is a flaw in human nature, really. We want heroes so badly we'll ignore severe character flaws to find it.
Excuse me for putting something ahead of the good news for Doug Jones.
We're saddled with worse about Donald now, who's openly railing about “shithouse countries” – in public, fulsomely. He’s projecting.
Projecting his own excrement-filled mouth.
He must do that, and pathetically helplessly so because, at every level, he’s a totally evil human being. Laughing, boasting of grabbing women by their private parts. Raping many. Palling around with the worst traffickers of underage girls in U. S. history. Murdering people in small boats on the Caribbean. Demolishing a key part of the White House. Smearing gold glitz all over what for all other presidents had largely been a dignified oval office. Grossly violating the emoluments clause. Committing fraud, lying, and grifting forever in his bankruptcy-ridden business life. Hiring the worst scum to head U.S. federal agencies. Rousing his followers to stochastic terrorism. Siding with the genocidal murderer Putin. Siding with the genocidal murderer Netanyahu. Siding with the hacksaw murderer Mohammed bin Salman.
Unable to respect anything or anyone. Raging hatred for any and all decent qualities.
The excrement stays prominent in his mouth because it exemplifies how there’s nothing but evil, emptiness, and scatology throughout his sick, sick carapace.
I expect we will see a giant outpouring from Trump over the big news in Ukraine today.
Russia attacked 3 Turkish-owned cargo ships berthed in Ukrainian ports. Turkey is a member of NATO. This is a major provocation and test of the NATO alliance.
I just saw that on feedly. In humanitarian terms, as a war crime, it is.
But Russia’s attacks on the Turkish ships could change the whole course of the war. It is the first attack on a NATO member. The bombing of the medical warehouses are attacks on an enemy. So is the Ukrainian attacks on the Russian oil infrastructure. An attack on an enemy. This could drag NATO into the war.
At this point it is Russia testing NATO. Erdogan has already met with Putin, so things are moving fast. Turkey can cut off exit from the Black Sea for both Ukraine and Russia and has already jet up a joint naval force with Bulgaria and Romainia to ensure protection for shipping in the Black Sea. So maybe Putin feels cutting off the strait will be worse for Ukraine, and having Turkey do it has a good look. Russia is now getting more direct arms support by China in return for what appears to be mineral rights in Russia.
Both Russia and Ukraine are getting critically low on cash.
THE ONLY thing Putin respects and will back down from is power. Perhaps this is the bridge too far. Perhaps NATO (that would be Europe) can flip the script and this could do it.
At a minimum it is time to give Ukraine the long range weapons to inflict serious pain on Russian infrastructure and bases.
Putin and Erdogan were fortuitously in Turkmenistan, attending a conference together, when the Turkish cargo ships were attacked.
They talked.
Erdogan is OK with it if there is a limited ceasefire for shipping and energy infrastructure (read Russian oil rigs and shadow fleet oil tankers.)
Erdogan is so OK with it that he is willing to act as the mediator between Kyiv and Moscow.
Somehow, Potemkin villages passed through my mind.
My take on what might be happening: Putin is tying Zelenskyy's hands on attacks on Russian oil. He wants to ditch DJT as a mediator because Donnie hasn't delivered him his "peace deal" and is becoming too erratic, weak, and unreliable.
Erdogan wants to be the pivotal leader in the balance of power between Russia and Europe.
Putin got a chance to put more pressure on the NATO alliance, showing up some more stress fractures.
All of this from the first attack to as I write this took just over 14 hours...
I'm not sure that it is not by design that Erdogan has stepped in. trump is busy, and getting busier, elsewhere. By design. putin needs to finalize his takeover of Ukraine and trump needs to finalize his takeover of South America before Democrats take over the House and the Senate in January '27.
I’m no expert on things military or Services. But, you can watch the US aircraft carrier “strike groups” (CSGs) coming and going on the weekly basis here, on the US Navy’s own site. You can see here the move of the (rather new) Ford carrier from the NE Atlantic and Oslo (September), then the Mediteranian (October), then to the Caribbean. It paints a picture. I have to guess moving a CSG halfway across the globe is not a small endeavor. Lines up with the new ‘spheres of influence’ doctrine.
Makes the European conflict zone look kinda lacking of US presence - just how Poo-teen would love to see it.
“ trump is busy, and getting busier, elsewhere. ” indeed: rump national security pivot to ‘spheres of influence’ with ‘western hemisphere’ being primary (south america); and all else… dropped on the floor. In a heartbeat - though official policy has probably been cooked up over time (with who’s input, eh?).
Keep in mind that David Jolly is running for governor as a Democrat in FL in 2026. The Democrats could really gain some influence if they can pick up 4-6 governorships next year without losing any -- especially across the South.
Abigail Spanberger has the chops to be our first female president. After these next 4 years as governor she will a formidable candidate for the office.
Many are saying that Putin only stays in power as long as he can keep the war going. He has set things up to be like that. However, he is resilient in his creepy spy trained way. His is an evil empire as these sorts of attacks prove.
And he revels in the fact that he can get away with it. He is the champion of no consequences…. as are his devotees. That’s the sick attraction that should keep us awake at night. So say I at 2am
It's the Epstein problem; the special treatment our society actively and passively accords to those with more than average money. At a certain point it can create monsters. Trump positively glories in his ability to break the rules and get away with it. He always has. Somehow that it central to his crowd appeal, his status as an "overlord". Yet it's anti-constitutional. And yet the current $COTUS majority serves money over justice. Many years ago I recall mailing a brief note to William O Douglas thanking him "for taking care of the Constitution". I was pretty naive in those days, but I was grateful for voices elevating justice, and saw that, as ever, justice was under attack.
It’s simple. Trump is a racist, misogynistic, spiteful, money-grabbing, pathologically narcissistic asshole. And his followers voted for him because they want to be racist, misogynistic, spiteful, money-grabbing, pathologically narcissistic assholes, too.
Although I hold more sympathy and more hope for people who are on the short end of the stick when acting out their anger than for those with every possible advantage. Trump, Epstein, Musk, etc. dispense evil wholesale, and glory in it. How many wars and other horrors have been unleashed to satisfy the rapacious egos of autocrats and oligarchs? In the civil war, whose interests were at stake and who died? Although slavery obviously stands in the utter repudiation of the tenets of the Declaration of Independence, 12 US presidents owned slaves; until it dawned on enough people that it was just not OK.
Should public sentiment shift sufficiently to drive this outburst of vainglorious predatory behavior back under it's rock, there will be a lot in need of fixing. Like everybody else I just want live my life and don't know how to change the illness I have watched infecting this society for about half a century; not that there has been no progress of social justice over the last 50 years, but like ongoing climate damage, forms of societal corruption that were far less tolerated when the tide turned on Nixon, have spread and since been normalized. Follow the money.
To exit from this highway to hell I think we have to spotlight and battle blatant corruption and the deliberate big liars; and also find a path to healing.
You're absolutely right. And I still think the root of the problem is malignant narcissism. All of the people who are so adamant to dispense hate, evil and suffering are all pathological narcissists: Trump, Epstein, Musk, Thiel, Putin, Netanyahu - all of them. The REAL trouble is that too many people listen to these raving lunatics, and obey them. We should ignore them and let them rot in the emptiness that is really inside of them...
"At a certain point it can create monsters," you say, J L.
The "it," of course, goes on display here in Heather's when she describes Tommy Tuberville mouthing his piety pabulum regarding his "protecting" "western culture."
The only thing vacuities such as he protect, we know, sink to nothing more than comforting the comfortable -- the rich -- and seeing "western culture" through the blindness of the deeper white supremacy in racists and fascist such as Donald and Putin.
Guarantee: those who mouth slogans such as "western culture" have none. Will never reference any novel, memoir, history book, or any other humanities. They have none. They've an obscene tilt to money. Lying for big money, dark money. And being full of hatred for the diversity, equity, and inclusion values William O. Douglas lived for, and which all our democratic allies also defend as Putin and Donald carry on their mad aggressions against democracies.
I choose to think of his unimaginable behaviors and proclamations as our ultimate meal ticket to victory. It won’t be the economy that brings him down, it’ll be the overt, repugnant and terrifying cruelty and slobbery that gathers us all together to defeat MAGA. Let him act out. Only he can lose from that horror.
I am glad he is doing what he is doing for the simple reason that far more people are becoming aware of the depths of his evilness. He could have done all of his machinations under the cover of smiles and millions of people would still think he is kindness and light. The only way for people to become aware of just how evil he can be is for him to show them!
This column gives powerful testimony of two of your mantras, Professor:
1. That our situation today has long roots in our history--not just the blindness of theories of white supremacy, but also the influence of good Constitutionalists, passed down by example and hard work.
2. That the most important thing we can do, whether we are Justices or just ordinary people, is to talk with each other and share our information. A chance meeting and encouraging suggestion from a Justice to a simple student led Jones to a breath of hope in one of our poorest states.
That last sentence is a zinger! Can we rekindle the "urgency of hope" from 2017 so that the flame is even stronger now? The kindling to fan the flame of hope is action. So please, let's make the phone calls, send the e-mails, write the postcards, knock on doors, run for office, and protect the vote. We don't all need to do each of those things. We need to understand where our skills and talents lie, and we need to develop them in concert with our friends who possess complementary skills and talents. Some nights I'm pessimistic. Tonight, Doug Jones and Heather have made me hopeful.
Hey Betsy, what do you think about this? Reaching out to the Doug Jones campaign with an idea about using language that includes: "Doug Jones for Alabama, Urgency for Hope Campaign."
(It appears that "Doug for Alabama" has already been established. Still wonder if something of this can be incorporated since they're just launching the campaign.)
On reading tonight's hopeful letter, I made my first humble contribution to the campaign: https://www.dougjones.com/
And of course, the arguments of these racists are demonstrably false by pointing to just a couple of historical incidents that made the European climb out of the early medieval period possible. The first was the Battle of Talas River in 751 when the Chinese art of papermaking fell into the hands of the Abbasid Caliphate. It would take until 1279 before that finally arrived in Europe outside of Moorish Spain. That was in Fabriano, Italy. Then the real shock came in 807 when Harun al Rashid included in his second load of gifts to Charlemagne a clock that might as well have been a space ship, it was so far beyond anything the Europeans were capable of producing. Even the basic shop tools needed to do that kind of precision work were unknown west of the Levant. It would take over five centuries, a lot of determined work by people in several locations, and the introduction of Arabic math and numerals, including the concept of zero, by Levi ben Gershon to finally enable real progress in the efforts to build the first European clock. Even the Maya had the concept of zero long before the Europeans. Critical breakthroughs in technology and learning have happened in many cultures around the planet.
The idea of honor killing or justification of killing people who don't share your religious beliefs (infidels) seems like the hight of irrationally to me.
This is an important question, and any dogmatic tradition can be substituted for your point about conservative Islam. It points to two realities, one is about the nature of scientific thinking and the other is about the deep history of the human condition.
On the science part, a critical requirement of scientific thinking is humility. One has to have even one's most dearly held beliefs on the table at all times and subject to revision based on new insights. Those who cling to dogma have a very difficult time with that concept. There are even a lot of people who work in the sciences who have a hard time with this humility requirement.
The deep history thing I think starts with the emergence of the first proto hominins in Europe around 14 million YBP. There were a ferocious lot who managed to thrive despite the presence some truly formidable Miocene predators. As climate changed and everyone moved south into Africa and spread out across the continent, we diverged and adapted to a great many different niches, with our predecessors managing to somehow survive the highly capable predators of the Pliocene and Pleistocene. That's around 12 million years of kill or be killed evolutionary pressure. Then in the Holocene we gradually eliminated all other hominins except the great apes, chimps, bonobos, and orangs. That left us to face the most fearsome predator of all - us.
40% of humanity now speaks a derivative of proto-Indo European. Except for the movement of that language family south into modern India and Pakistan, the genetic story is one of killing the men and taking the women. Gene flow was very uniform in this regard. This is stunning. As the peoples of the Pontic Steppes moved into Europe, virtually the entire male population of Europe had its genetic markers disappear. Arguably, although spread across a couple thousand years, this is the single largest genocide in our history.
In many ways, the story of the 20th century on is the battle to come to grips with this and turn the page. The MAGA folks and other totalitarian minded folks around the world are resisting turning that page. I think we have a situation where they deserve some empathy, but not our sympathy.
I took a learning course on the Maya several years ago. The explanation of mathematical calculations (in the very specific case of measuring area) is the first time any math made sense to me, and so much of it is astronomy based. One satellite tour we took was to a structure on Cozumel that was set up as a light house; it had spots where four large conch shells were placed on the corners (and unlike other buildings, this was not oriented directly on solstice/equinox axis, but rotated to reflect the "cross quarter" of each axis). Our guide did not know why that was, and theorized that it was related to planting and harvest times; I suspect it was also for weather warnings (the conch shells would note directional wind changes.)
I'm going to go way way way out on limb and hazard a guess about the role of the conch shells in a caracol. While virtually nothing is known of Maya boatbuilding and navigation technologies, there is plenty of evidence that they traded with people as far away as Florida. The Caribbean and Gulf are famous for very rapid weather changes. Lighthouse keepers would need some sort of alert system to let them know what sort of signals to provide in their structures that would be visible to mariners. We know that the shells were positioned to generate sound if the wind was just right. If the shells' orientation and sizes could be accurately determined and tested, it is possible that even small shifts in the wind would cause a change in the sound being generated. This would have been invaluable information to the light keepers.
They proudly explain how they are getting away with the depravity. I can do anything, to which the SC says you sure can…. Mitch enabled his clown thinking that he could be controlled. The joke is on you Mitch. But we aren’t laughing.
It’s amazing *how much help they get* in doing it.
In years to come, if not already, this will be what future historians will redouble their efforts to understand. Our Founders expected that sooner or later, a true demagogic scuzzbag (probably not an 18th century term) would arrive on the scene. They anticipated that our new institutional checks and balances would counteract his perversions of power. As has been said by others many times before, they did not foresee whole branches of power accommodating his smallest, silliest, pettiest, pissiest of wishes.
I’m not sure they anticipated Tommy Tuberville, either. Among his many awards for bootlicking, Tommy is literally the dumbest man God ever blew breath into. No doubt his intellectual “gifts” got Trump’s notice and endorsement. I do so look forward to Doug Jones wiping the floor with him….
They also did not anticipate that we would favor direct democracy over democratic-republicanism.
For better or worse our focus on direct democracy undercut the protections the Framers put into the Constitution. They also believed in the Enlightenment, not the religious dogma of today's MAGA adherents.
The hope that men of virtue would protect us from ideologues and populists the ilk of Trump is now in danger. They counted on Congress leading the way, not a unitary executive. Is that perhaps is the 'originalism' we need to return to?
Alabama - You would do WELL to ELECT DOUG JONES as your GOVERNOR.
Stand up for Alabama values. Stand up for ALL of your people.
Tuberville may have been a fine football coach, but he is NOT following the U.S. Constitution and will NOT help your state.
Doug Jones, as a Senator, began the bipartisan tradition of reading the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.'s Letter From The Birmingham Jail aloud in Congress. One hundred years after the end of the U.S. Civil War, and Black Americans were still waiting - and fighting - for their human rights in 1963. The 1964 Civil Rights Act and 1965 Voting Rights Act came about because of incidents that happened in Alabama.
Come on, Alabama. This is it. Choose democracy and government of the PEOPLE. Defeat fascism - AGAIN. The world is watching.
The corrupt six right-wing Supreme Court Justices are soon going to end what's left of the Voting Rights Act. That will result in the loss of several Democratic Congressional seats in the southern States.
Unfortunately, the only way for Democrats to stay competitive nation wide, is for blue States to gerrymander for more Democratic representation. It is a shame that we have to resort to underhanded right-wing tactics in an effort to save democracy.
Instead, Jones called for reinforcing Alabama values of “hard work,” “fairness,” “looking out for your neighbor, even when you don’t agree on everything,” “telling the truth—even when we don’t want to hear it,” and believing “that every person deserves dignity, respect, opportunity, and a voice.” “Those aren’t Democratic or Republican values,” he said. “They’re Alabama values.”
They are in fact, civilized human values. The "decency" yardstick Joseph Welch held up to Joe McCarthy. In many ways "The McCarthy Era" foreshadowed the Trump Regime, but with more safeguards against its advance.
Brown vs Board of Education was a unanimous decision by the Supreme Court of the United States of America.
And that decision was based on the work of Saint Pauli Murray, who compiled all of the laws in each state into a book that Thurgood Marshall and the team of lawyers that won the case based their arguments.
Separate can never be equal.
To learn more about Pauli Murray, AN AMERICAN HERO, watch the documentary "My Name Is Pauli Murray."
You can also reach out to The Pauli Murray Center for History and Social Justice in Durham, North Carolina, her childhood home. paulimurraycenter.com
“Controlling the media and controlling the message are critical aspects of autocratic takeovers. A slew of headline stories show Trump is accelerating efforts to criminalize dissent and build a police and surveillance state. But recent Democratic election victories show resistance is winning.” ~Anne-Christine D’Adesky / RESISTING PROJECT 2025
We are at our best when we invest in each other. This ‘manifesto’ is how we return to the common good. If anything in the manifesto resonates with you, take it. Use it. Add to it. Share it…
✅ We are encouraging you to write letters with bullet points using Heather Cox Richardson’s ‘American Conversations’ on YouTube (example https://youtu.be/LojhZENpRHw) or from a vetted story contributed from substack author (Anne-Christine D’Adesky) and modify it to speak to our Congress, the SCOTUS or the legacy Media. Email one note each day, it will make you feel productive - you might not think your note/letter will be read, but they will matter. Please do share. Speak up. Speak loudly. Speak together, shift the conversation.
✅ Because when enough people start imagining a better world in unison, that’s when the world actually changes.
comment from ~Reading Off Unto The Sunset posted under RESISTING PROJECT 2025
It seems rather odd that Trump is unaware of the Army of people around the world that turn to Substack for their news.
Substack has had some growing pains when it comes to free speech, etc. but the integrity of most of the contributors and the fact that it is ad-free (except for self-promotion of the contributors) makes it incorruptible compared to almost all other media platforms.
That has been my experience, as well, Gary. In fact, Substack is essentially my "Social Media". I have more excellent Substack subscriptions than any human can read. But I try.
And the lack of ads is essential to my involvement. But there is a little trouble in paradise:
I'm not scared away yet, but if ads start popping up frequently, that will send me packing just like Cable TV did. I guess the first step would be to shun anyone who includes ads - the platform is still too valuable to abandon.
We shouldn't be surprised when the originators of such things go for the money.
My mother was from Birmingham ham and in the 1950’s and 60’s I saw first hand segregation. I saw prejudice unimaginable in rochester NY. As it turned out my mother and her sister my aunt Maine were to say the least liberal by southern terms. I was in mountain Brook with my aunt and mother the Sunday morning of the bombing. Horror was our reaction while some of my cousins thought oh my great! It was a real eye opener of my generation of Alabama relatives. Doug Jones is a true hero. If he wins it will be a true blessing. Good luck Doug
I'm in my 70's, when I was boy growing up in Rochester there were still "Whites Only" water fountains. [For young people, water fountains were ubiquitous stations, usually metal, where you could push a button and get a free drink of water. They were everywhere, usually near a phone booth,(/s), until someone figured out people would pay for water; especially if it was 'spring water from a glacier'. It's like paying more for 'sea salt'.]
Yet Rochester is also the home of Susan B Anthony, and to the North Star publication of Frederick Douglass; both of whom are buried there.
Doug Jones is one of the few public figures who can talk about “dignity” and “rule of law” without it sounding like some slogan because he’s been in a courtroom with dead children on the record and still came back to do the work. And you’re right to drag the “Western identity” script into the light: it’s not new, it’s old fear dressed up as policy, and it always ends with somebody’s rights getting called optional.
If Alabama can remember that 2017 “earthquake,” it can do it again because “hard work,” “fairness,” “tell the truth even when we don’t want to hear it,” and “look out for your neighbor” aren’t partisan. They’re a moral spine. And that’s what this moment is begging for: a spine. www.xplisset.com
Doug Jones is the man who *should* have been President Biden’s Attorney General! Had he been, I am confident that the USA would have emulated Brazil’s good example – and that prosecutions of the insurrectionists and coup makers, their financiers and backers, and of Trump himself, would have happened in a far more timely manner!
Had Doug Jones been Attorney General, instead of Merrick Garland, I strongly believe that Trump would have been sitting in a prison cell rather than in the Oval Office.
It’s lamentable. When distant memories of the bombing are read, as a 10 year old, I am reminded of an event in my life around that time when a neighborhood chum described the new neighbors using the “N” word. I asked Marty to not use that word. My mother had taught me that it was a bad word. Instead Marty began screaming it repeatedly at me until I lunged at him and we commenced a terrible fight until I let go of him before serious injury had occurred. As I walked home Marty continued to shout that word and 60 plus years later I can still hear him shouting that ugly word.
“In his speech tonight, Jones noted that Alabama politicians ‘love to say they are running to protect our values’ and encouraged voters to make it clear to elected officials what those values are.”
To be clear, everyone needs believe that “we” are the most important people on the planet, bar none. Mature people know that “we” are tied for first place with roughly eight billion other people. Immature people need to grow up (especially when “we” happens to include a pathetically immature 79-year-old POTUS).
A country whose elected president imagines that a handful of undocumented immigrants could destroy its values is by definition NOT "the greatest on Earth"... :-)
My point is that either some people are more — and others are less — important, and then we're on the Road to Perdition, or we're all equal irrespective of the negative impact of one individual's unconstrained power and ignorance, and then civilization's survival is possible.
You seem to suggest that that's different from what I wrote?
My point was that, as soon as a country's leader claims that his country is "the greatest" AND that it could be easily "erased" by a handful of poor undocumented people, he's proving that it's definitely NOT the greatest, since most countries perfectly survive (and even thrive) with substantial numbers of undocumented people.
James. I totally agree. This is the point HCR had been preaching for years. Let’s hope more folks hear it and grasp its positive implications “FOR ALL”.
Except EU, that it wasn’t a handful of immigrants. I’m not against immigration at all. I was against the massive influx that has occurred and in my opinion, it opened the door to the monster we now have in office. You weaken your argument when you characterize it as a handful. It was massive.
In Africa, the accelerating climate crisis drives herders off disappearing grasslands into dwindling agricultural regions.
People fight in an attempt to maintain old lifestyles that are rapidly becoming unsustainable., Then, exhausted by war and famine, they are forced to leave for parts unknown.
This pattern, and others like it (eg. island nations, coastal cities)will expand. This and coming generations, a billion or more people, will be forced to leave the dwindling, inhabitable regions of Earth during the next few decades..
During 10 years on a small boat in France, mostly in the countryside, I had a front seat to climate change and saw US as “the bad teenagers on the block” in relation to what I was learning in the country in France. Hoping we can get through the current horror and continue to move toward the Founding Fathers’ Enlightenment Dream. Back to history and civics in America’s public schools!
Step 1: The teacher teaches as the learner learns.
Step 2: The student becomes the teacher.
Step 3: Return to Step 1 and repeat.
It's an old and ancient saying, but a true and honest thought:
If you become a teacher, by your pupils you'll be taught.
-- intro to "Getting to Know You," from "The King and I"
I ask Mr Carey and Ms/Mrs Witmer how many years you have spent teaching in American classrooms? I began teaching in 1981 and will (try, for the second time) to retire this May . I never could have imagined the joy that would enter my life when I began teaching. Most proclamations I read about students, teachers and teaching are fear based inaccuracies rooted in disinformation and heinous conspiracy theories. And like all career paths in the Universe, there are noble teachers and awful teachers.
I could and should write a book extolling the joy, benefit and responsibilities of teaching, but I have been too busy participating in all the facets of living and learning with American teenagers.
Brava Ginny ~
Tuberville, who is widely regarded as the stupidist US Senator (and perhaps the stupidist Senator in history, though that is s tall order), is the living personification of the the values held by the vast majority of white Alabamans for 200 years.
Well then, the best time for that to change was 200 years ago, and the second best time is now.
A widely regarded idea isn't always correct, but IMHO, Tuberville is capable of leaping that tall order in a single bound.
I wish I could believe it even remotely possible that a majority, even a slim majority, of white Alabamans would turn away from williful ignorance and bigotry as religious values now, or anytime in the next two hundred years. But I can’t.
You mean cheating at Football? go ‘Bama!
That’s what racism is. Marty = racism.
It could be Marty was a jerk kid with jerk parents and no one ever let them in on their jerkitude. Too bad about the fight Bill, glad you found the strength to refrain from hurting the kid. A guy on a construction job I was working at used the term gook once. Another guy looked at him and said "We don't use words like that". Of all the lines in all the world I wish I had said that was the one.
“Jerkitude”. Nicely done. May need to be the Merriam Webster word of 2026!
Not bad for someone who couldn't spot a gerund in a herd of gerbils.
Enshitifcation…although this is more about institutions, like churches and WWJD?
Well I almost killed him that day. I got him in a chokehold or headlock as we used to call it. I looked down at his face having turned red as tears streamed down his cheeks. He continued screaming that word. At that moment, I let him up.
Fear and ignorance. Ignorance and fear. Unfounded fear.
I had to think about your post - always a good thing - I think it is a yes and.... you are right but it is more than fear, it is also about power, the need by some to have dominance - whether wrapped around race, religion, gender, wealth, etc, - fear (and insecurities), but also power structures.
I am more referring to the fear and ignorance of the dominated which the dominator uses to his/her advantage.
When you think about the why of rascism and anti____, it is so illogical, it is impossible to sight anything that makes sense.
My mother was racist, complete opposite of my father, who wondered aloud why black people had to go 15 miles to “their” public school when white children went to school 3 miles away. He and our “cleaning lady” laughed and joked together. Result: years later, when she died, my husband and I were the only attendees from the neighborhood she had served for so many years, while getting her children through college.
Thanks for sharing what seems was a life defining moment for you. I wonder if Marty ever evolved beyond the hate he had been taught at a young age? I will not give up on my belief that our country and society can, and will, move beyond these times of hate and fear. Our survival must be based on a belief in our shared humanity..."Of... For... and... By the People".
People can evolve, especially if there is a respected role model nearby. I’m currently reading MARK TWAIN by Ron Chernow. Twain made his evolutionary leap from a racist upbringing after marrying into an abolitionist family. Clearly his wife and her family provided Twain a chance to grow. In addition to evolving from racist beginnings he also became a committed supporter of female equality and suffrage. He even advocated the formation of a new political party to be created by and for women; the existing two party system having failed, in his view, to address the aspirations of our Declaration of Independence in 1776.
Thanks for adding to the conversation. I've added the book to my reading list. Connecting with Heather and others here, has increased my historical perspective in a positive way. I'm fortunate to be surrounded by a wife, daughter, and granddaughters that are smart, free thinking, and courageous women. No doubt in my mind that the way out of this mess, will likely be lead by women.
I too will look it up thank you. Sam Clemons is one of my mentors.
I would enjoy knowing how Marty feels about that now.
So would I but I can’t find him anywhere online. Nor his brother. They just disappeared. But I have thought about it often. The neighborhood was demolished under redevelopment agency that defined the neighborhood as being substandard, partially in a flood zone. The interstate highway we being built nearby. Underwood Typewriter Co was threatening to leave nearby. But it was the place were earliest memories reside complete with a polluted river where we frequently hung out and built tree houses on the side. The neighborhood was soon condemned and the city took land under eminent domain. My father sued in court lost and lost on appeal and we were the last house remaining now on a deserted stretch of land. He refused to move until we were served by a sheriff with a 2 week vacate notice. That was my experience in early life.
YIKES! I'm so sorry to hear that. Makes me feel privileged in comparison.
Marty is probably dead from a bar fight or his alcoholism…
How sad that you have that burden on you. Your mother was a wise woman. Marty should have had a mother like yours.
But all too often there are no saints. Later on in life I began dating a Black woman and she couldn’t understand nor accept it based on her own prejudices.
Oh what a tangled web we weave when first we practice to overcome centuries of abuse and outright criminality. Don't be too hard on yourself or her Bill. Saints are indeed rare.
I'm sad for both of you.
another interpretation, along with racism and what goes on psychologically with regard to that-- if a 10 year old knows that deeply or is taught-- is that this is defiance. Kids are like that and maybe never leave it as they grow older: wanting to get back, to defy what is forbidden or what everyone is against. Some are like that. If you deem something is bad, they will oppose. This now has it's own psychological category: Oppositional Defiant Disorder. Look it up.
He was definitely defiant. And maybe I was defiant against his defiance. At be I should have just walked away from him. But instead it became confrontational.
When someone is like that they want attention and even a fight-- to get their aggressiveness out on someone. Parents who are too strict or even mean can help make their kids like this. I had similar experiences around that age with neighborhood kids, one in particular. A fight was wanted and could not be avoided... the adrenalin flows too.
I've chocked an awful lot of that behavior to long standing emotional immaturity. With clear objective eyes and understanding I've observed far more of that condition than I'd even speculate to count. And I am speaking of amongst supposed adults of any age.
I am so sorry you had to endure that horrific experience. Hopefully, Marty has reflected back with some regret…
I recall this exact same story from you from before, Bill.
I think Bill’s story encapsulates centuries of cruelty that, for the those embracing compassion, is a call for justice. On the other hand, plants a seed of hatred that resists forgiveness.
I think all of us of a certain age had similar experiences growing up. I began school in 1949 and came up in the 50's. We were always taught we were at the top of the heap. We played "War" with our cap guns and on one side were "the Japs" or "The Germans."
Even in (so-called) liberal San Francisco, the divide between the races was almost absolute. At some point in my own younger years, I know I used the "N" word with thinking of what was behind that word. My own hyper-Catholic godmother cautioned me not to put coins in my mouth "because some n***** may have touched it. My 6th grade teacher, an old Catholic nun, talked of teaching her "pickaninnies" in a school in the black neighborhoods of San Francisco.
I think it took me well into high school before I realized how segregated we all were. We were unconcious to the hurt we caused other people.
These are not memories I cherish. Decades later, I'm ashamed yet, in a sense, they helped me to instruct my children to be better than I—and Marty—was instructed. I would include Trump amongst the incorrigibles but he is truly a mentally sick, and evil, man. (And just three years my junior!)
I'm remembering that as a child, we said, "Eeny meeny miny mo, catch a tiger by the toe." We didn't use the n-word. I don't know why. I don't know who taught that to whom. But I'm very glad.
Perhaps it's time to ask ourselves whether fighting against words is the most effective way to defeat racism?
Were you neighbors with Morgan Wallen?
Oops not likely just looked him up.
Wait a minute. There was a wallen or wallon family down the street. They had many children. Larry was a friend. There was also Whitey, Donny, Linda. Maybe Morgan was the estranged father who I never met. Ironically, that family lives around the corner from me. I recall Larry telling me his grandpa drank up the corner at the bar and staggered home to Willow street on the weekends. I recall an old man drunk out of his mind. Maybe that was Morgan. Sound familiar?
No familiarity. Who was he and where did he live.
Well, at least you tried, and you knew it was wrong.
He's probably a proud boy, oathkeeper, or other supremist-group member.
I like to think that he moved to the good side of human thought and behavior. He had a twisted foot and walked with difficulty. And had an uncle with the same malformed foot.
Too easy.
First of all, the only reason, apparently, why you see Garland as not a good AG is because of ONE decision. Why would we disregard his entire term like that?
Secondly, that Trump wasn't in jail yet by the end of 2024 isn't ONE person's "fault". The situation was (and is) extremely complicated.
The goal was clear for everyone, including Garland: making sure that another Jan. 6 never happens again and that the people who spread lies about it aren't empowered. In other words, the goal was nothing less than saving democracy from a fascist movement in the making.
The question then was: HOW to achieve this?
By quickly prosecuting Trump, knowing that no other AG has prosecuted a former president? It would obviously allow the GOP to build a huge case against Democrats, making people believe that "Biden weaponized the DOJ".
So what was a much better option, at the time? That the GOP itself would do the necessary work to get rid of the neofascists in their ranks. Was that a REAL option?
It was. None less than the GOP VP had strongly condemned the insurrection, and at first, the entire GOP Congress did so too. They all turned against Trump, and in the most explicit way.
Then, a battle for the soul of the GOP began. Again, during this time, having pro-democracy Republicans defeat the pro-fascism ones was by far the most effective way to save democracy.
Only once it became clear that the pro-democracy Republicans would definitively lose was prosecuting Trump the next best option.
None of this has anything to do with this or that person individually. It was a complicated situation, with no good options available anyhow.
While I agree with many of your points about Merrick Garland, I still contend he was far too slow, scholarly, yes (he would have made a fine addition to the Supreme Court which is likely the reason he was given the job of Attorney General - as a consolation prize after he was denied that opportunity) for the urgency of the moment in regards to Trump, public opinion and the attention span of our citizens. It took two years after January 6th for him to appoint Jack Smith as Special Council to investigate the matter. Too late by any measure and time became the enemy of the disclosure of truth which the the entire country needed to hear. Garland is a good intelligent man, but entirely the wrong man for the job for the times in which he was appointed.
Actually, my point was precisely that this is NOT about Merrick Garland.
Since you argue that it is, because you take over the common idea on the left that IF he had prosecuted Trump faster, democracy would have been saved, you need to explain HOW jailing him would have defeated the neofascist movement inside the GOP rather than empowering it massively.
Any idea?
Had Trump been prosecuted it might have won a battle but as you note it wouldn’t have won the greater war.
Still it would have helped.
It may have been a common idea on the left, but not mine. Jailing Trump was never something I thought would be a good idea and I hoped that whoever adjudicated his case would realize the smarter and far more effective plan would be to sentence him to incarceration then offer a plea deal of a financial penalty and the edict that he never again run for public office.
And I stand by my previous sentiment that it was in good part about the sluggish inaction of Merrick Garland that put us where we are today.
Upvote for your thoughtful rebuttal.
Imho, what happened in Brazil is the best counterexample. Their judicial system acted with appropriate haste and thoroughness. Bolsonaro is jailed – and is likely to remain so the rest of his days.
If that's what you believe, you'd have to show that the situation was similar, namely that Bolsonaro was merely the puppet in a system built up over decades, with at least one third of the population firmly enrolled and brainwashed by its propaganda machine.
Such a system didn't exist in Brazil... . And it didn't exist because, contrary to the US, it wasn't necessary to create it for someone like Bolsonaro to win elections. Brazil is a young democracy, with still a lot of corruption. That's enough to have fascists win elections again, once in a while.
The US is an old democracy, so it's much more difficult to install fascism.
I believe Garland wanted to believe that trump would fade from political life so there was no need to pursue legal action.
Maybe the ruling class would rather keep themselves above being held responsible for crimes that might lead to restricting their power.
It is possible that had Garland moved quickly to bring trump to justice, he may have been convicted. I suspect that the Supreme Court still would have given trump immunity and Jack Smith would continue with the prosecution but the defense would continue to slow walk the trial and bring more aspects of the case to the Supreme Court who no doubt continue to rule that trump had every right to commit any crime in the name of Presidential power. If we don't elect super majoritys to the house and Senate, we may never have a country we all can be proud to be part of.
Too easy.
You assume that the internal battle inside the GOP was over BEFORE it was fought.
That's irrational.
Mitch McConnell deserves a huge amount of credit for the orange blight's second term. If Mitch McConnell had allowed the vote in the Senate, for the orange blight's second impeachment, the orange blight would be golfing fulltime at Mar a Lago.
Why are we allowing our legal system to obey in advance? France did not care that Sarkozy was their president. Brazil showed everyone they would not tolerate a criminal and dictator like Bolsonaro. Why is the United States comfortable showing the world that we do NOT believe everyone is equal before the law? I don’t care that somebody was president of the United States. He puts his pants on one leg at a time just like I do. I give two figs that somebody was able to finagle their way into getting elected president. Who cares? President is not God. If anything, the president should be held to an even higher standard than the average Joe because he supposedly the most informed on defending the constitution. I thought we were supposed to be the country that led the way for justice. I thought we were the country everyone wanted to do business with because we had lower corruption and we respected the rule of law. NOT pursuing Trump out the gate with the Mueller report IS massively political. Then slowly approaching J6 crimes because in some unknown future election people might think Biden was going after political rivals. Avoidance IS wildly political. Who knows if the Supreme Court would have given him immunity. Garland should have opened up an investigation into Clarence Thomas for bribery. What we did instead was destroy our standing in the world as any authority of justice. We should’ve learned with Nixon’s pardon. We did not. Now we are trash. Admit it.
Because all the conditions needed for the US to have a political party, supported by one third of the population, have been installed decade after decade now, contrary to France or Brazil.
France and Brazil don't have Fox Entertainment. They don't have so many fundamentalist (= hollowed-out forms of) Christians.
The causes are multiple and run deep.
As long as we blame DEMOCRATS (the only ones fighting back) for the RESULTS of what the GOP did, we will remain part of the problem rather than the solution...
From your belief to God's ears!
If only….
That's a small town in Ida ho:-)
While I am in complete agreement regarding Doug Jones, I firmly believe both you and Heater Cox Richardson have picked up a grating habit of Trump’s use of the adverb "strongly".
You're not alone. I've seen and heard it elsewhere.
Trump is limited in his vocabulary. I strongly urge everyone not to limit their own.
You’re right. My only excuse is that I’m not always sufficiently mindful of the nuances of English, given that it is my second language.
(Spelling: Heather)
Et Tu Willelmus?
Are you sure that he often uses the word "strongly"... ?
I think Garland was a sympathy appointment because of the runaround when Obama wanted to put him on the Supreme Court. He really could have moved with more speed around the Trump issues and if he had it’s likely we’d have a different president today.
ArticStones- Great to hear from you. I always scanned for your comments when I was following Rosenberg in 2024. Glad to see you’re still out there.
Thank you for your kind comment! I am so glad to see HCR, Simon and the Hopium community, and so many others doing their utmost to defend democracy. Challenging times – and millions of Americans rising to the challenge!
Yes. I came to say just this.
Anybody else should have been Biden's AG. Even Kamala. She would have been a better AG, that was her strength in CA. Wonder if there was some kind of agreement between Obama and Biden since Garland didn't make it to the Supreme Court.
As Isabel Wilkerson laid out in her brilliant book Caste, these beliefs of racial superiority are deeply seated in our society and deeply wrong. Race is a false construct. People from different parts of the world adapted to their environment, but we are inherently one race. The current struggle is a grab for money and power. One again Dr Richardson has strung together elements of history and current events to crystalize the current battle. This gives me hope.
I loved following the path of influence from an honorable uncle in 1860’s, Justice Brandeis and Justice Douglas’s influence, author Madison Grant influence, Prosecutor Bill Baxley, and writer Wilkerson today…yes, hope lives on as long as we keep following the better angels that are leading us…
thanks, HCR…you always lay the path out clearly in front of us.
Thank you for your comments. I dug up my copy of Caste for a reread. “The hierarchy of caste is ….. about power-which groups have it and which do not. “
It was when reading Caste that I learned that the Nazis used the Jim Crow laws as a basis for their laws for the Jews and other groups of German citizens.
KMD: That really hits one in the soul, doesn’t it?
KMD, of course they did. They did not leave any stone unturned to make the Aryan race superior. I would also add that Europe had a very long history of antipathy towards Jews who among other things, were bankers, at a time when the Church considered usury a sin. They made convenient scapegoats for any number of adversities.
People do not willingly give up the feeling of being superior and having the power to enforce their view as we are seeing now. Death star, et al tout white male nationalist Christian power. They are still unhappy that a black man became president and that women, black people, immigrants, and the queer community had made some strides. Not only are they undoing any laws and programs that help those groups, they are also trying to erase them from our history.
I would respectfully point out that most human cultures the world has known have been racist. The cultural vilification of “the other” is deeply seated in cultural constructs, and is difficult to ameliorate. We need to work hard to change people’s perceptions. While the Republicans talk only to themselves, it will be very hard to get in there and nibble away at this. But obviously it is necessary to have early role models who don’t permit this. I had a Quaker aunt who heard my 4 year old self say the N word one day, having innocently learned it from my neighbor. Shocked, she confronted my little self and said, “You must never say that.” I learned tolerance from her clearly stated concern. But many people don’t have such clear guidance, and slip into bad habits of thought if they are supported by their cultural surroundings.
It's interesting the Gandhi was an ardent supporter of the Hindu Caste system.
Are you sure race is a 'false' construct? How do you account for differences in say susceptibility to certain medical differences in different peoples? Didn't geography create differences in physical characteristics?
Agreed, we are one human species, but one race?
This is not to say one is better than another, or that people shouldn't be judged as individuals.
I'm curious as to whether denial of race is really the best way to handle racism. Would it be better to recognize the reality of race, it mutability and celebrate diversity than deny its existence?
You bring specificity to an issue the previous commenter did not.
“Nosotros somos una especia” reads the entrance sign to the Smithsonian Museum of Natural History's Hall of Human Origins. Then, in a blizzard of many languages: “we are all one species.” From the viewpoint of biology, we are really quite boring. There is greater genetic diversity among Lowland Gorillas than in the entire human species.
But race? I don’t know. It accounts for about 0.2% of DNA variance. It means something, but the marker barely registers. All the differences in skin pigment, hair, head shape, eyes — in only that 0.2%. It may be more accurate to state that diversity is a false construct, though I dread how the “racial” dimwits out there would try to screw up that statement.
And several legitimate news outlets have finally picked up on Archaeology Magazine's story that Europeans were dark skinned, not at all "white" until about 3,000 years ago. So the whole nonsense that is perpetuated about pigmentation being a determiner of race is patently false. The problem is that "race" is a social construct, one invented by Europeans to justify oppression and genocide. Started in the Middle Ages with the so-called Crusades, which targeted non-Christians, especially Jews in Europe, but also Muslims in the Middle East, as not only "infidels" (a term invented by Europeans) but also as "racially" different. https://archaeologymag.com/2025/03/most-ancient-europeans-had-dark-skin/
Thanks for the reminder from the BCE history department, Linda!
Ally, I wrote a very long paper on antisemitism from Roman times to the First Crusade once. Early on Jews fared better under Islam than Christianity. I am currently reading about the Cathars in southern France and parts of Spain and Italy. The Church totally stamped them out. One of the things that the Church objected to was that some nobles of this area had Jews in their governments and the Church demanded, among other things, that those they not have Jews in their governments. In Spain for a while Muslims had Jews and Christians as part of their governance. This, of course, was gradually destroyed by rabid Christianity culminating in Ferdinand and Isabella and Christianity prevailing.
lots of truth in what you right, except that racism is world-wide and was not invented by Europeans. Europeans did not tell Japan how to treat Koreans in the 1930s and 40s. Iranians do not dislike Arabs because of European teaching. It's a built-in thing, mainly dislike/fear of "the other", whoever that is and for whatever reason. And if not race, religion ... but you often can't see a religious difference. So how can you know who to hate? Race makes it easy... alas.
I agree: hatred of the Other is a human failing. But as an historian I define "racism" specifically. Also: Persians historically were conquerors of the region whence semitic populations derived and competed with the Greeks and then the Romans for dominance in the region. That's the reason for the enmity, not really religion. The history of the Abrahamic religions is a history of adopting the kind of exclusionary policies that lead to religious wars. The Zoroastrians were monotheists of a different stamp: although largely specific to the Persian Empire, Zoroastrianism was nonetheless not monolithic. There is also a difference between imperial conquest and genocide, although the latter almost inevitably is tangled up in the former. The demonizing of the conquered population usually comes after the conquest. That is not the case with the medieval AND early modern wars of religion: the justifications for them were deliberately Othering even if the motives and outcomes were largely political. And another fun fact: in ALL of the 17th-century wars between Catholic and protestant states and polities the former received crusade-style remission of sin because killing non-Catholics was considered a holy act. Yes: empires are brutal. And the men responsible for creating them designed them that way.
You are correct, placing social value on race is what dimwitted people do.
Yet it's not a false construct, but the social construct assigned to it by the dimwitted that's harmful.
It's nonsensical when the far right places value on race, it's equally nonsensical when the far left "doesn't see race."
@ Gary. Before you post, check your sources.
"Gandhi was an ardent supporter of the Hindu Caste system."
AI
The statement that Gandhi was an ardent supporter of the Hindu caste system is complex and debated, as his views evolved significantly over his lifetime. While he initially supported an idealized concept of the ancient varna system, he vehemently opposed the rigid, hierarchical, and discriminatory caste system as it was practiced.
Evolution of Gandhi's Views
Early Views (e.g., in the 1920s): In his earlier writings, Gandhi defended the fourfold varna system as an ideal, non-hierarchical division of labor based on inherited duties, which he saw as a natural and essential blueprint for social harmony. At this stage, he focused on integrating the "untouchables" (whom he called Harijans, or "Children of God") into the existing Hindu fold, primarily by eradicating untouchability, which he called a "sin" and "a blot on Hinduism".
Later Views (e.g., in the 1940s): Over time, influenced by various social reformers and his ongoing "experiments with truth," his position radicalized. By the 1940s, he declared that the caste system must "go" and became an open advocate for inter-caste dining and inter-caste marriages, a position that was revolutionary for a caste Hindu at the time. He even stated that he would only bless marriages where one of the parties was a Harijan.
Core Distinctions
Varna vs. Caste: Gandhi distinguished between the scriptural varna (ideal occupational classification without hierarchy) and the actual caste system (rigid social hierarchy based on birth, with associated discrimination and untouchability). He consistently argued that the latter was a "hideous travesty" of the original ideal and had no place in true Hinduism.
Untouchability: Throughout his life, Gandhi was unwavering in his opposition to untouchability, campaigning tirelessly to ensure the oppressed were granted access to public wells, roads, and temples. He considered its removal a prerequisite for Indian independence (Swaraj).
Criticism from Ambedkar: Dr. B.R. Ambedkar, a leader from a Dalit (untouchable) community, was a prominent critic of Gandhi. Ambedkar argued that Gandhi's distinction between varna and caste was a political tactic to appease orthodox Hindus and that the varna system was fundamentally the parent of caste inequality and an obstacle to true democracy.
In practice, Gandhi himself consistently broke caste restrictions, dining with people of all faiths and castes, performing "unclean" labor, and encouraging his family and ashram members to do the same.
For more details on this complex topic, you can read more about Gandhi's evolving position on caste in the Janata Weekly or explore Dr. Ambedkar's seminal work, Annihilation of Caste.
Welcome back!
Did you read the AI generated piece you sent?
It supports my contention, oh wait AI never read Ambedkar's work did it?
Wait, wait, did it assume supported Gandhi? That explains it, AI implies because the title of the work is "The Annihilation of Caste" that Gandhi desired the annihilation of caste. Wow, altogether backwards. The book is a criticism of Gandhi's support of Varna, a caste system. You knew there are more than one caste systems, Apparently AI doesn't?
I can't imagine why educators have their knickers in a knot over AI. It's saves so much time; reading, especially skeptics, is such a drag.
Hurray for non-violence when necessary; boo for racism, misogyny, pedophilia, and religious caste systems.
Gary, I’m not sure we “see race,” more likely “different skin color.”
There are more differences than just skin color, there are clearly other genetic differences. That shouldn't be denied; doing so is as detrimental as assigning those differences social value.
That someone would say they don't see race, sex, or age is just a denial of science and fact. That's not any more helpful than denying the value of vaccines, the nature of the cosmos, or believing in ghosts.
"Race" is a social construct, for sure...not a genetic reality.
Penny, are you arguing there are no genetic difference between the races? None?
White, Blacks, and Asians are all the same genetically?
So if two Asians mate they can have a Black child?
Of course not. If we're going to argue facts matter in science, like global warming, shouldn't we argue facts matter in other fields of science.
I always say We are one race-HUMAN and many ethnicities.
Well intentioned, good heart. Sounds nice but really?
Ethnicity and race are different. Think Bosnian and Serb, Hutu and Tutsi, and on and on. Different ethnicities, same races, and all the same species.
Definitions matter. How does denial of reality move us forward?
Gary Pudup, not sure the whole argument matters because if we don’t quit arguing and get to work solving energy problems (scientifically), we’re dead. Climate change, everybody!
Argument is the driver of fact, without argument we might a swell be watching FOX or MSNBC.
Socrates knew this. Although he probably didn't watch much TV.
WTF? Gandhi was a supporter of caste system?????? He fought for the untouchables. Against the caste system of India. He asked and offended his wife Kasthurba to clean the toilet of the Dalits. Where on the earth you got this amazing misinformation?????
Because he advocated for the untouchables doesn't mean he didn't support a caste system. Those are different things.
Sure he promoted Varna rather than the Jati, but they a distinctions with little difference, they both place people into a caste system of social hierarchy.
I know it surprises a lot of people, he was known for his racism, and pedophila also. In his 70's he like to sleep with young girls. He had something in common with you-know-who.
Imperfect he was, but we like his non-violence thing.
Yes he understood that the best way to rid India of British rule was through non-violence, yet his racism and misogyny were well known at the time. Recall his complaint when jailed in South Africa, was that he was house with Black people, "kaffirs"; and that women were beneath men.
This isn't news, it's just not talked about in certain company.
Oh I got the information from such crazy sources as the BBC and legal scholars...
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-india-34265882
https://www.lawctopus.com/academike/mahatma-gandhi-on-caste-gender/
You got your information from an intern and a law student’s term paper, and a book review, neither being stellar sources.
Really? You're right, law journals and the BBC are just silly. Those academics at Cornell? Well, you know how they are; probably some stoned liberal 'women's studies' crackpot trying to dis Gandhi.
I should have watched the movie or just checked in with AI.
Reading biographies, law journals, scholarly sources, and BBC articles is such a drag.
What was I thinking?
Next thing is someone will think Mother Teresa was a ghoul...
https://blogs.cornell.edu/issues/looking-at-dc/the-great-soul-gandhi-the-father-of-india-gandhi-the-misogynist-and-gandhi-the-racist/
You are simply full of it. I am not wasting my time arguing with you.
Posts like these two only muddy up HRC's standards and contributions to enlightened discourse. I pursued the citations, did my best to understand them, given that they contained terms new to me as well as verbal constructions and apparent misspellings that did not give me confidence in the exposition and/or that I grasped fully what was being said. Plus, when claims are being made that counter understandings I've carried for a lifetime longer than Gandhi's, I offer my own thoughts with some trepidation.
No human is perfect. In the face of imperfection, to be human is to strive to be circumspect, as well as caring. TBFTGOGGI. Respect HCR, respect ourselves. My own conviction is that the world is a better place if we would act out of a shared conviction that race is a social construct. What I know of it leads me to believe that caste is as well.
Yeah. Make the wife clean toilets.
It is more than that. He himself did it too. The story is a long one.
Indeed, that's my point. It's long and complicated.
There are variations of caste systems in Hinduism. as there are different sects in Christianity; yet a caste system is a social hierarchy that Gandhi believed in.
Sorry to burst your bubble, its deeper than him just wanting untouchables to be recognized for their contribution to society, he still believed in social hierarchy.
I know you didn't;'t think Hindus were monolithic, that they actually have different opinions, that they don't all believe in the same caste system.
Hey, did you know there are different variations of Taoism? Buddhism? Christianity?
Who woulda guessed?
I'm sure you're open minded enough to know that a man doesn't always live up to the myth. None of this diminishes Gandhi's accomplishment in gaining independence from Britain, any more than the fact that Washington owned slaves diminishes his accomplishments in doing the same.
Why is this so hard to accept? He was only a man after all, like all men.
As Ecclesiastes reminds us, men are men, all to the same end, all else is vanity.
Race is a social construction; that is, we give it a reality, it is not a causative or material object of any sort, except when the human mind uses it to do something else. Having a genetic propensity for a particular outcome is not a cause; it is a probable outcome subject to an infinite number of other factors. We see associations between all sorts of factors, but often they are illusory, and after much work, we find they are not causes or even probabilities, but false associations that can be explained by something else entirely. Keep thinking and learning together, while it may not be clear and understandable today, with effort, we can forge a better understanding of how things actually work.
For the sake of conversation, the argument is how we view race is a social construct, race itself is not a social construct.
While it's destructive to believe one race is superior to another; It's not helpful to deny the reality of race. To understand how anything works we need to understand what constitutes the thing. If I want to know how a gasoline engine works compared to a diesel engine I need to know what parts constitutes each. That one uses spark plugs and another doesn't; doesn't mean one is more socially better than another.
Doctors need to consider race when treating certain conditions, to deny race would be unscientific, and indeed harmful.
ICTT's point that racial differences make up only a small portion of our total DNA is important; yet to deny the difference is to be blind to it.
The key is not to deny race but understand it. Placing social values on race is counterproductive, but so is denial of reality.
Could we say race is a categorical way to sort people? (Ps I’m far from an anthropologist.)
I was sitting here thinking, imagine if, at the very first flicker of prejudice, the thought wasn’t fear or judgment, but curiosity.
Who is this interesting human being in front of me?
They don’t look like me. Their skin, their story, their way of moving through the world is different.
What might I learn here? What richness, humor, wisdom, or beauty might exist in this difference?
Instead of pulling back, we’d lean in.
Instead of labeling, we’d listen.
Instead of defending what we know, we’d explore what we don’t.
Difference wouldn’t feel like a threat. It would feel like an invitation.
Imagine.
Yes, yes, yes, agreed 100%.
What a better world if we celebrated our differences rather than denied them.
As our ancestors evolved to live in groups that gave more security to survive, there has been tribalism. After thousands of years tribalism became ingrained in what is known as our lizard brain. The people who learned how to use tribalism to manipulate others beliefs have been the most successful at obtaining power in society.
The people who learned how to use tribalism to manipulate others beliefs have been the most successful at obtaining power in society.
Sounds familiar, I heard there's a whole country going through that.
Kind of like dog and cat breeds.
I use that comparison sometimes, but some are offended to think we may just be another mammal with different qualities and not god's favorite creation.
I had a class back in college, taught by an eminent physical anthropologist, C. Loring Brace, on the concept of race. That was where I first learned that if you line up everyone in the world, based on sets of specific characteristics, it is a continuous line between the peaks where those characteristics are concentrated, and everyone else. What you end up with is a continuous line with peaks and valleys. I was raised by parents who were not racially prejudiced, but this was still a lesson never to be forgotten. It has shaped how I view and relate to people when I've traveled the world.
Cameron: That book & the movie Origin are profound. Thank you for mentioning it. Every human being should read & see to understand the basis of needing a sense of superiority.
..the forever battle…as from the get-go… it’s always the first move in one-up-man-ship , making ‘the lessers’ classic losers
..and IMHO the first sign of an inferiority complex
"They’re a moral spine. And that’s what this moment is begging for: a spine."
You hit the nail on the head.
It certainly sounds like he could be a winner for Alabama. All of the issues mentioned are certainly bread and butter and more than that, they are the truth. Let truth win the election.
About a handful of Alabaman read HRC's article. The rest will vote for the Dumberville. I will be over the moon to be wrong.
It's hard to imagine a state that elects and re-elects Tuberville turning so far around as to elect Jones
I’m from Alabama and a huge Doug Jones supporter. I fear the football idolization as well. Katie Britt will back Tuberville as well. There have been rumors that Auburn’s retired basketball coach Bruce Pearl might run for Tuberville’s senate seat. And… former AL quarterback AJ McClellan is running for stor et general of AL. Hence, AL could have 2 former coaches and a former quarterback representing us Alabamians. It’s really frightening … and sad.
I was a freshman at UGA when someone tapped a phone conversation between the Bama coach Bear Bryant and the Georgia coach Wally Butts to fix a Saturday game. The Alabama fans backed Bryant while the Butts fans kept quiet. And neither man was fired.
If you ask fans from Texas Tech or Cincinnati about Tuberville, who was a failure for those programs, you get an opposite reaction.
Tuberville forgot to tell them he was also under a preocupying stock fraud investigation at the time.
The last Democratic governor of Alabama was Don Siegelman, who served from January 18, 1999, to January 20, 2003.
Siegelman is the only person in Alabama's history to be elected to serve in all four of the top statewide elected offices: Secretary of State, Attorney General, Lieutenant Governor, and Governor. He served in Alabama politics for 26 years. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Don_Siegelman
In 2006, Siegelman was convicted on federal felony corruption charges and sentenced to seven years in federal prison. Following the trial, however, many questions were raised by both Democrats and Republicans about allegations of prosecutorial misconduct in his case. On March 6, 2009, the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upheld key bribery, conspiracy, and obstruction counts against Siegelman and refused his request for a new trial.
In October 2015, more than 100 former attorneys general and officials, both Democratic and Republican, contended that his prosecution was marred by prosecutorial misconduct; they have petitioned the United States Supreme Court to review the case. Siegelman was released from prison on February 8, 2017, and was on supervised probation until June 2019.
Never knew this about Siegelman. Having moved from the South in the mid-sixties, it's a relief not to think about its politics or football.
You people who do not live within the SEC do not know how Southerners REVERE football coaches, especially winning ones, and standout players. When they run for office, even if they are, shall we say, not brightly burning intellectual bulbs, they have a big leg up.
Oh, I do. That is why Herschel Walker came as close to winning in Georgia as he did. I dunno what sealed his fate, his conduct or his color...
Football is a religion. That's not an exaggeration.
I agree, Arnold. I hope Jones wins, but I must quibble with his assertion that Alabama ever had values that made it great.
As I have often opined that America has had brief, shining moments of greatness, it is simply inaccurate to claim that America was ever great as if it were a longstanding characteristic.
Likewise, Alabama has a history that could never be described as great, with perpetually poor educational standards and equally poor educational achievement resulting in one of the lowest living standards in the U.S. Not to mention deep-rooted racism, misogyny and homophobia.
As MLMinET points out, Tuberville enjoys the halo of admiration afforded by a previous career in sports. While I acknowledge the many, many exceptions, it is not inaccurate to state that as a population, U.S. Southerners are not very well educated. Lacking that, they turn to sports as a way to "belong" and affirm each other.
As a longtime resident of Arkansas, I've observed that the way to achieve success in business, society and politics here is to associate oneself with the University of Arkansas Razorbacks. Fandom of the Razorbacks has achieved cult status. A significant number of businesses have "Razorback" in their names, even though they have nothing to do with sports or UA.
Unfortunate, but probably true.
William Douglas was one of the few jurists in our history to speak convincingly of labor and human rights because he got his hands dirty in a field somewhere, watching real people get shot for simply trying to defend the rights of others.
It’s all the difference between a real person and the husband of Justice Vergogna, with her fetish for flying the flag upside down because the rule of law actually got upheld.
Does the same applies to our president?
He's never had the satisfaction of having dirty calloused hands after a day of hard labor. As my uncle told me, "Be careful trusting anyone who has no scars."
No dirty hands, but a filthy brain…
Xplisset, you are right! We the People need to work hard to GOTV! Postcards, donations….this LFAA is one of Heather’s most important of our time.
MADA: MAKE AMERICA DIGNIFIED AGAIN an acronym for the restofus.
Or perhaps MADA: Make America Decent Again.
When “Protect Our Values” Meets a Prosecutor Who Locked Up the Klan
White Supremacy Discovers That History Still Exists
Doug Jones is back in Alabama politics, and the white grievance crowd is already spiraling. When a movement built on myth runs into a man who prosecuted the Klan, panic follows. This satire skewers “Western values,” race hysteria, and the terror of accountability...
https://essayx.substack.com/p/when-protect-our-values-meets-a-prosecutor
Truly chilling photos of KKK. Shudder!
I love this line from your essay:
“The contrast [between Jones and Tuberville] could not be clearer. On one side, a candidate whose moral arc includes standing in a courtroom and saying, “These men murdered children, and they will answer for it.” On the other, a candidate who believes “Western civilization” is under attack by people who pray differently and order unfamiliar food”
Thank you for taking the time to comment. I should have mentioned this in the essay: historically, the leadership of racist movements like Nazism or the KKK has not been driven by a sincere belief in a biologically “superior” race. At the top, racism functions primarily as a political technology. It is a tool for mobilizing fear, resentment, and identity anxiety in order to seize power, consolidate loyalty, and justify hierarchy.
The ideology works because it offers a simple story. It explains social or economic pain by blaming an out group, while elevating followers with a sense of stolen greatness. That emotional payoff creates obedience. Leaders benefit materially and politically, even while the promised supremacy never materializes.
This does not mean every follower consciously understands the manipulation. Many truly internalize the myth. But the persistence of these movements shows that racism is less about belief and more about control. If the goal were truth, racism would collapse under scrutiny. If the goal is power, it works disturbingly well.
In short, racism is not a misunderstanding of biology. It is a strategy for domination.
Remember Frank Johnson, Alabama patriot. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frank_Minis_Johnson
Frank was originally a Republican -- appointed by Eisenhower.
In 1956, Johnson ruled in favor of Rosa Parks, striking down the "blacks in the back of the bus" law of the city of Montgomery Alabama, as unconstitutional. In orders issued in 1961 and 1962, he ordered the desegregation of bus depots (such as the Montgomery Greyhound station) and the Montgomery Regional Airport in Alabama's Middle judicial district. In 1961 he ordered the Ku Klux Klan and Montgomery police to stop the beating and harassment of Freedom Riders attempting to integrate interstate bus travel.
In March 1965, Johnson ruled that activists had the right to undertake the Selma to Montgomery march as a means to petition the government, overturning Governor George Wallace's prohibition of the march as contrary to public safety. Thousands of sympathizers traveled to Selma to join the march, which had 25,000 participants by its last leg into Montgomery on March 25, 1965. It was considered integral to gaining passage by Congress of the Voting Rights Act of 1965.
Johnson received death threats and ostracism for his role in advancing civil rights, and was protected by federal marshals for nearly two decades. A burning cross was placed on his lawn in 1956 following the Rosa Parks decision, and his mother's house was bombed in 1967, although she was not hurt.
Johnson was nominated by President Carter on April 2, 1979, to the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit, and was later part of the 11th Circuit.
As I was reading the section of this post about Madison Grant and his”Passing of the Great Race” about how superior the Nordic “race” was I kept wondering if he knew any history at all. What contributions did they make to civilization? Anything like Galileo’s theory about the planets circling the sun or Einstein’s theory of relativity, etc? People in Europe were terrified of the Norsemen who came killing, burning, and pillaging. So many lies in defense of greed.
Xplisset,
I am so grateful for your comments. Your eyes and heart and mind "see" and experience reality in a personal light. We need you. You are a better mirror than we, white skinned persons who can be cruel and disrespectful of others OF ALL COLORS OF SKIN OR SOCIAL STATUS...ETC. EVEN AS SOME OF US MAY HOPE NOT TO EMBODY RACIAL OR OTHER PREJUDICES....WE DO!
If we truly care to be genuine in our relationships with all, we must think before we speak or act. What if we were "that person" being treated as if we were no one at all.
This is a serious human problem....we have choices. Our actions are a reflection of our hearts and minds. We need to examine ourselves and decide....how do we want to be treated?
Doug Jones made a choice. His example is one I respect and want to emulate.
Emily I thank you. I don’t take that kind of trust lightly, because I’m not above the sickness I’m naming; I’ve just had to look at it longer, and it left marks.
As to what you said about “be that person” is the whole test, especially when no one is watching. Doug Jones chose law over tribe, truth over applause, and in this moment that’s a form of love. I’m grateful you’re trying to practice it too. www.xplisset.com
Sarge, what you've said rings true about his character. I hope that common sense will defeat the "old ball coach" because we need statesmen, not name recognition.
Which is why it was gratifying to see Raphael Warnock, a Black man with a doctorate in divinity, beat Hershel Walker, Georgia's first Black football player, to maintain his Senate seat. The Confederacy left its mark on Alabama and Georgia, but it's more pronounced in Alabama. I can remember ridiing down the highway with my parents from North Georgia to South Alabama past signs that proclaimed Impeach Earl Warren and Get the US out of the UN. No such signs going the other way.
Being confronted by trump's cabinet--the worst of the worst--on a daily basis, it is almost anachronistic to learn about someone like Doug Jones and his impeccable integrity....
I turned eight years old in 1963 and remember being shocked at the news about the young girls killed in the bombing. They were close to my age, and that may be why I started paying closer attention to the news from then on. It is crazy that people in this day and age still cling to petty bigotry and bias, and that they can seriously use religion to help justify their inhumanity. My theory is that the powerful elite have always used religion to keep their flock in line in order to retain their power and discourage the people from critical thinking. I'm constantly gobsmacked that so many voters either pay no attention politicaly or are just so backward that they actually think trump is trustworthy after experiencing his first term, his traitorous actions leading up to the J6 insurrection, not to mention his continueas life long stream of of lies.
I hope that people will comprehend how important it is to always stay politically informed and we can work together to make America better for everyone not only for the most wealthy.
Thank you, Xplisset. Doug Jones is part of our moral spine. Wonderful that his candidacy is announced simultaneously with DT’s saying to a cheering crowd that Representative Ilhan Omar must be “sent back.” There is hope for US.
Michele, I’m with you. On a day like this it’s good to know a fellow human. Having walked the ramparts of his hometown in honor of Diderot (not far from the Canal du Midi), I feel free to be part of the Enlightenment. In writing that, I understand pilgrimage as never before.
Jones could win easily if he includes among his campaign issues that he will help U of Alabama hire a great football coach to win the national championship.
What an incredible message of hope and sanity Doug Jones brings.
Alabama is still a state that struggles with racial issues. It's going to be a tough road for Jones, but God bless his effort. He is one magnificent human being.
Yes, re:Alabama. Having grown up in the northeast, I used to look at southern states like Alabama as uniquely still struggling with racial issues. Now that I’m older, have lived in different parts of the U.S. and studied and lived with people of different races, I realize, as HCR’s post reminds me, how baked-in to the American psyche racism is and if we don’t think it’s there it’s because it’s deeper under the surface. A good friend of mine, Black, who also had lived all over the U.S., served in the military, once told me he actually preferred the south because “ you know exactly where you stand with someone”. We were living in a “more enlightened” part of the country and he felt that here he could not tell who was racist and would ultimately stand in his way or turn their backs. At the time I thought he was being a tad paranoid, but now I know he was not.
Joyce Vance once worked for him.
Yes, Georgia - Interesting and important comments by Doug Jones. Who doesn’t believe in -
- hard work?
- fairness?
- looking out for your neighbor?
- dignity and respect for all?
- the truth?
- freedom of speech?
- due process?
- love?
- equality?
- and more….?
I mean, if the list above isn’t “your” list, then the following must be your list, right?
- laziness
- cheating
- shunning your neighbor
- dishonor and disrespect
- lies
- muzzling
- lawlessness
- hate
- superiority/inequality
- and more….
I agree. However I’m always amazed when I encounter the level of cognitive bias in some people, like the Dunning-Kruger effect.
WOW, Hummingbird, you have opened up a new avenue of thinking for me - the Dunning-Kruger effect. I will be spending some time thinking about this. I guess my first response would be are people a.) overestimating or b.) underestimating or c.) willfully disregarding the truth, the facts…. ??Your post came in conjunction with a gift that I just received from my wife: A wonderful collection of early Woody Guthrie songs, one of which grabbed my attention: “Plane Wreck at Los Gatos (Deportee).” (Link below - as sung by Woody’s son, Arlo and Pete Seeger.)
Woody was writing the lyrics in 1948 and Arlo was singing it in 1975. I was 3 years old when Woody came up with the main questions of the song:
“Is this the best way we can grow our big orchards? Is this the best way we can grow our good fruit?”
Woody was asking these questions nearly 80 years ago. I ask: Are we Americans willfully disregarding the truth, the facts about corporations who “encourage” cheap labor in order to enhance their pocketbooks or ….what?
“And all they will call you will be Deportee.”
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Xfi0IUh4y8A
Another thought: Our orchards of today are not any different than our cotton fields two CENTURIES ago.
Just askin’
Doug Jones is a beacon of sanity but let's be objective: Tubberville and the MAGA folks have a very appealing argument: preserving Western culture and values against the Middle Eastern horde "invading" Europe and the Americas. The fact is, Islam doesn't mix with anything else. And as we now know, neither does white Christian racist nationalism. It has been my thinking that if human life on earth comes to a sudden end, it will be the result of a nuclear Armageddon launched by rival religious factions controlling the governments. "It'll be OK. Everyone will be 'called home' to meet his/her Maker." Their beliefs are pure amathia [Intelligent stupidity; Willful ignorance. We need to start teaching critical thinking skills in our schools, starting as early as the 6th grade. Check out Melanie Trecek-King's website thinkingispower.com
I would love to live in Alabama so I could vote for him
Doug Jones was considered for Attorney General instead of Garland, and we would have been better for it. Jones had been an extremely successful prosecutor and would likely have been much more aggressive in prosecuting the Trump offenses.
HCR: Jones’s support for charges against church bombers Thomas Edwin Blanton Jr. and Bobby Frank Cherry brought a jury to a guilty verdict ...".
"Stay calm when tyranny arrives" Timothy Snyder. Fight back like Doug Jones.
********
UPDATE:
DOUG JONES launched his campaign for Alabama Governor last night in Birmingham.
Jones was interviewed on Velshi's Segment 1 this Saturday morning at the 28 minutes & 45 seconds marker. Many independents, not only Dems, are enthusiastic as their "is a lot to build for" up & down the Alabama ticket.
Go Doug & Jones' Supporters!
I always felt his appointment as Attorney General was Garland's consolation prize for having been cheated of his appointment to the Supreme Court. His caution and thoughtfulness would have served the nation well as a justice: unfortunately, those same qualities did not work well for him as AG.
That is the argument I made. We needed prosecutorial fire. We got judicial restraint.
I think you’re right Kasey
An insightful and fair observation, thank you. I’ve been disgusted, furious and angry about Garland given where we are now. But he was a decent and smart man, inadvertently put in the wrong job at the wrong time.
That to me was one of Biden’s biggest fumble and the most damaging one: Merrick Garland. He was such a disappointment and not what the country needed at the time. When he was chosen, I had a sinning feeling that Trump was going to get away with everything. And here we sit. Jones would have been a much better choice. My money was on Sally Yates, and I truly believe we would not be where we are today if she, or someone likeminded and tenacious had been picked. Sigh.
You are both right about Garland. I had previously hung the whole lack of prosecution of Trump on him, and he is definitely responsible. However, I was surprised to read how reluctant the FBI, for example, was to pursue him. Some who served in Trump’s first administration (and had voted for him) were very reluctant to pursue the classified docs case, especially a search of his place. Some still wanted to honor the office of President (though Trump himself defiled it then and now).
So true about attempting to honor the office of the President, but that ship has, unfortunately, sailed right out to sea with Trump. He has soiled everything.
This will probably get a few rocks thrown my way, but what the dictator has gotten away with has me thinking we’ve put way too much reverence and deference on to the office. We say we don’t want a king, but in many ways we treat the holder of the office as if he were one. I’d like that to be knocked down a peg or two. We act like the president doesn’t put his pants on in the morning the same way the rest of us do. Bur he does, as well as everything else we do.
No rocks here. I'm old enough to remember "Camelot".
Years ago a man rose in Quaker meeting and said, "We don't need leaders!" What he probably meant was, We don't need the officially designated leaders. When leaders are needed they will appear.
He was wrong.
We're a herd species. We do need leaders. If we don't get good ones, we'll follow bad ones.
Completely agree!!
The reference and huge deference given a president who is no more than a man at best, and much less than one as now, is a flaw in human nature, really. We want heroes so badly we'll ignore severe character flaws to find it.
Look no further than "influencer" culture.
He has soiled everything. "Everything Trump Touches Dies." Rick Wilson
Excuse me for putting something ahead of the good news for Doug Jones.
We're saddled with worse about Donald now, who's openly railing about “shithouse countries” – in public, fulsomely. He’s projecting.
Projecting his own excrement-filled mouth.
He must do that, and pathetically helplessly so because, at every level, he’s a totally evil human being. Laughing, boasting of grabbing women by their private parts. Raping many. Palling around with the worst traffickers of underage girls in U. S. history. Murdering people in small boats on the Caribbean. Demolishing a key part of the White House. Smearing gold glitz all over what for all other presidents had largely been a dignified oval office. Grossly violating the emoluments clause. Committing fraud, lying, and grifting forever in his bankruptcy-ridden business life. Hiring the worst scum to head U.S. federal agencies. Rousing his followers to stochastic terrorism. Siding with the genocidal murderer Putin. Siding with the genocidal murderer Netanyahu. Siding with the hacksaw murderer Mohammed bin Salman.
Unable to respect anything or anyone. Raging hatred for any and all decent qualities.
The excrement stays prominent in his mouth because it exemplifies how there’s nothing but evil, emptiness, and scatology throughout his sick, sick carapace.
I expect we will see a giant outpouring from Trump over the big news in Ukraine today.
Russia attacked 3 Turkish-owned cargo ships berthed in Ukrainian ports. Turkey is a member of NATO. This is a major provocation and test of the NATO alliance.
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2025/12/13/russia-damages-turkish-owned-vessels-in-attack-on-ukrainian-ports
Wow.
America - We MUST replace this regime with competent leadership.
It is not an understatement to say the planet is at stake.
The bigger news from Ukraine is that Putin has been systematically bombing the medical warehouses that supply the country’s pharmacies and hospitals.
I just saw that on feedly. In humanitarian terms, as a war crime, it is.
But Russia’s attacks on the Turkish ships could change the whole course of the war. It is the first attack on a NATO member. The bombing of the medical warehouses are attacks on an enemy. So is the Ukrainian attacks on the Russian oil infrastructure. An attack on an enemy. This could drag NATO into the war.
At this point it is Russia testing NATO. Erdogan has already met with Putin, so things are moving fast. Turkey can cut off exit from the Black Sea for both Ukraine and Russia and has already jet up a joint naval force with Bulgaria and Romainia to ensure protection for shipping in the Black Sea. So maybe Putin feels cutting off the strait will be worse for Ukraine, and having Turkey do it has a good look. Russia is now getting more direct arms support by China in return for what appears to be mineral rights in Russia.
Both Russia and Ukraine are getting critically low on cash.
THE ONLY thing Putin respects and will back down from is power. Perhaps this is the bridge too far. Perhaps NATO (that would be Europe) can flip the script and this could do it.
At a minimum it is time to give Ukraine the long range weapons to inflict serious pain on Russian infrastructure and bases.
A quick update to engender calm.
Putin and Erdogan were fortuitously in Turkmenistan, attending a conference together, when the Turkish cargo ships were attacked.
They talked.
Erdogan is OK with it if there is a limited ceasefire for shipping and energy infrastructure (read Russian oil rigs and shadow fleet oil tankers.)
Erdogan is so OK with it that he is willing to act as the mediator between Kyiv and Moscow.
Somehow, Potemkin villages passed through my mind.
My take on what might be happening: Putin is tying Zelenskyy's hands on attacks on Russian oil. He wants to ditch DJT as a mediator because Donnie hasn't delivered him his "peace deal" and is becoming too erratic, weak, and unreliable.
Erdogan wants to be the pivotal leader in the balance of power between Russia and Europe.
Putin got a chance to put more pressure on the NATO alliance, showing up some more stress fractures.
All of this from the first attack to as I write this took just over 14 hours...
I'm not sure that it is not by design that Erdogan has stepped in. trump is busy, and getting busier, elsewhere. By design. putin needs to finalize his takeover of Ukraine and trump needs to finalize his takeover of South America before Democrats take over the House and the Senate in January '27.
I’m no expert on things military or Services. But, you can watch the US aircraft carrier “strike groups” (CSGs) coming and going on the weekly basis here, on the US Navy’s own site. You can see here the move of the (rather new) Ford carrier from the NE Atlantic and Oslo (September), then the Mediteranian (October), then to the Caribbean. It paints a picture. I have to guess moving a CSG halfway across the globe is not a small endeavor. Lines up with the new ‘spheres of influence’ doctrine.
Makes the European conflict zone look kinda lacking of US presence - just how Poo-teen would love to see it.
https://news.usni.org/category/fleet-tracker
I’m having some difficulty in summonimg up ‘calm’, but thanks anyways Georgia for your effort to make a pathway there.
“ trump is busy, and getting busier, elsewhere. ” indeed: rump national security pivot to ‘spheres of influence’ with ‘western hemisphere’ being primary (south america); and all else… dropped on the floor. In a heartbeat - though official policy has probably been cooked up over time (with who’s input, eh?).
I read late yesterday that the EU is about to remedy that for Ukraine, with the release of billions in Russian cash to Ukraine.
Action will speak louder than words. And weapons availability will allow Ukraine to persevere: not just cash, but hardware deployed.
They hadn’t done it yet. There are pro-Putin countries in the EU such as Hungary.
His blather will be what Vlad wants it to be.
It's blather that can have major consequences.
I really don't want to introduce a thread on this here.
The Doug Jones announcement is too important to our mental health today.
Just wanting people to have a heads up on major Ukraine news.
If anybody wants Ukraine updates you can go to my stack or check Al Jazeera.
Keep in mind that David Jolly is running for governor as a Democrat in FL in 2026. The Democrats could really gain some influence if they can pick up 4-6 governorships next year without losing any -- especially across the South.
There's hope. We had a Democratic sweep in Virginia. We have our first female governor and she is brilliant.
Abigail Spanberger has the chops to be our first female president. After these next 4 years as governor she will a formidable candidate for the office.
I forgot that. He seems quite level-headed. A former Republican US Rep.
Many are saying that Putin only stays in power as long as he can keep the war going. He has set things up to be like that. However, he is resilient in his creepy spy trained way. His is an evil empire as these sorts of attacks prove.
putin and trump. Mutt and Jeff.
I'd not heard. So thank you for the heads-up, Georgia.
Russia has been re-energized by Trump, that vile excuse for a man.
And he revels in the fact that he can get away with it. He is the champion of no consequences…. as are his devotees. That’s the sick attraction that should keep us awake at night. So say I at 2am
It's the Epstein problem; the special treatment our society actively and passively accords to those with more than average money. At a certain point it can create monsters. Trump positively glories in his ability to break the rules and get away with it. He always has. Somehow that it central to his crowd appeal, his status as an "overlord". Yet it's anti-constitutional. And yet the current $COTUS majority serves money over justice. Many years ago I recall mailing a brief note to William O Douglas thanking him "for taking care of the Constitution". I was pretty naive in those days, but I was grateful for voices elevating justice, and saw that, as ever, justice was under attack.
It’s simple. Trump is a racist, misogynistic, spiteful, money-grabbing, pathologically narcissistic asshole. And his followers voted for him because they want to be racist, misogynistic, spiteful, money-grabbing, pathologically narcissistic assholes, too.
Dutch, substitute "are" for "want to be" and I agree wholeheartedly.
Although I hold more sympathy and more hope for people who are on the short end of the stick when acting out their anger than for those with every possible advantage. Trump, Epstein, Musk, etc. dispense evil wholesale, and glory in it. How many wars and other horrors have been unleashed to satisfy the rapacious egos of autocrats and oligarchs? In the civil war, whose interests were at stake and who died? Although slavery obviously stands in the utter repudiation of the tenets of the Declaration of Independence, 12 US presidents owned slaves; until it dawned on enough people that it was just not OK.
Should public sentiment shift sufficiently to drive this outburst of vainglorious predatory behavior back under it's rock, there will be a lot in need of fixing. Like everybody else I just want live my life and don't know how to change the illness I have watched infecting this society for about half a century; not that there has been no progress of social justice over the last 50 years, but like ongoing climate damage, forms of societal corruption that were far less tolerated when the tide turned on Nixon, have spread and since been normalized. Follow the money.
To exit from this highway to hell I think we have to spotlight and battle blatant corruption and the deliberate big liars; and also find a path to healing.
Healing will be crucial.
You're absolutely right. And I still think the root of the problem is malignant narcissism. All of the people who are so adamant to dispense hate, evil and suffering are all pathological narcissists: Trump, Epstein, Musk, Thiel, Putin, Netanyahu - all of them. The REAL trouble is that too many people listen to these raving lunatics, and obey them. We should ignore them and let them rot in the emptiness that is really inside of them...
"At a certain point it can create monsters," you say, J L.
The "it," of course, goes on display here in Heather's when she describes Tommy Tuberville mouthing his piety pabulum regarding his "protecting" "western culture."
The only thing vacuities such as he protect, we know, sink to nothing more than comforting the comfortable -- the rich -- and seeing "western culture" through the blindness of the deeper white supremacy in racists and fascist such as Donald and Putin.
Guarantee: those who mouth slogans such as "western culture" have none. Will never reference any novel, memoir, history book, or any other humanities. They have none. They've an obscene tilt to money. Lying for big money, dark money. And being full of hatred for the diversity, equity, and inclusion values William O. Douglas lived for, and which all our democratic allies also defend as Putin and Donald carry on their mad aggressions against democracies.
To be grateful for voices elevating justice, especially when those voices belong to people who are in a position to make a difference, is not naivete.
I was still naive, but not for admiring Douglas.
I choose to think of his unimaginable behaviors and proclamations as our ultimate meal ticket to victory. It won’t be the economy that brings him down, it’ll be the overt, repugnant and terrifying cruelty and slobbery that gathers us all together to defeat MAGA. Let him act out. Only he can lose from that horror.
I see the marked decrease in his self-inhibition as proof his deterioration is accelerating. Could this be right?
Let us know how you really feel, Phil. We're with ya.
I am glad he is doing what he is doing for the simple reason that far more people are becoming aware of the depths of his evilness. He could have done all of his machinations under the cover of smiles and millions of people would still think he is kindness and light. The only way for people to become aware of just how evil he can be is for him to show them!
Some people love his cruelty, sad to say
This column gives powerful testimony of two of your mantras, Professor:
1. That our situation today has long roots in our history--not just the blindness of theories of white supremacy, but also the influence of good Constitutionalists, passed down by example and hard work.
2. That the most important thing we can do, whether we are Justices or just ordinary people, is to talk with each other and share our information. A chance meeting and encouraging suggestion from a Justice to a simple student led Jones to a breath of hope in one of our poorest states.
Thank you.
E Pluribus Unum.
There six Justices today that I can't respect much less trust with our democracy.
True, that's what makes remembering Brandeis et al is so inspiring!
That last sentence is a zinger! Can we rekindle the "urgency of hope" from 2017 so that the flame is even stronger now? The kindling to fan the flame of hope is action. So please, let's make the phone calls, send the e-mails, write the postcards, knock on doors, run for office, and protect the vote. We don't all need to do each of those things. We need to understand where our skills and talents lie, and we need to develop them in concert with our friends who possess complementary skills and talents. Some nights I'm pessimistic. Tonight, Doug Jones and Heather have made me hopeful.
Hey Betsy, what do you think about this? Reaching out to the Doug Jones campaign with an idea about using language that includes: "Doug Jones for Alabama, Urgency for Hope Campaign."
(It appears that "Doug for Alabama" has already been established. Still wonder if something of this can be incorporated since they're just launching the campaign.)
On reading tonight's hopeful letter, I made my first humble contribution to the campaign: https://www.dougjones.com/
I'm all in with you, Betsy.
And of course, the arguments of these racists are demonstrably false by pointing to just a couple of historical incidents that made the European climb out of the early medieval period possible. The first was the Battle of Talas River in 751 when the Chinese art of papermaking fell into the hands of the Abbasid Caliphate. It would take until 1279 before that finally arrived in Europe outside of Moorish Spain. That was in Fabriano, Italy. Then the real shock came in 807 when Harun al Rashid included in his second load of gifts to Charlemagne a clock that might as well have been a space ship, it was so far beyond anything the Europeans were capable of producing. Even the basic shop tools needed to do that kind of precision work were unknown west of the Levant. It would take over five centuries, a lot of determined work by people in several locations, and the introduction of Arabic math and numerals, including the concept of zero, by Levi ben Gershon to finally enable real progress in the efforts to build the first European clock. Even the Maya had the concept of zero long before the Europeans. Critical breakthroughs in technology and learning have happened in many cultures around the planet.
As a older person with an older wife I see a lot more doctors these days. Lots of no-Caucasian faces. Lots of women.
I wonder if the MAGAts would rather die than be treated by such doctors…
Probably.
Now this was an enlightening and fascinating piece of an ancient history. Thank you.
Science and Islam with Jim Al-Khalili on BBC. Great documentary!
Has science continued to advance in Islam?
The idea of honor killing or justification of killing people who don't share your religious beliefs (infidels) seems like the hight of irrationally to me.
This is an important question, and any dogmatic tradition can be substituted for your point about conservative Islam. It points to two realities, one is about the nature of scientific thinking and the other is about the deep history of the human condition.
On the science part, a critical requirement of scientific thinking is humility. One has to have even one's most dearly held beliefs on the table at all times and subject to revision based on new insights. Those who cling to dogma have a very difficult time with that concept. There are even a lot of people who work in the sciences who have a hard time with this humility requirement.
The deep history thing I think starts with the emergence of the first proto hominins in Europe around 14 million YBP. There were a ferocious lot who managed to thrive despite the presence some truly formidable Miocene predators. As climate changed and everyone moved south into Africa and spread out across the continent, we diverged and adapted to a great many different niches, with our predecessors managing to somehow survive the highly capable predators of the Pliocene and Pleistocene. That's around 12 million years of kill or be killed evolutionary pressure. Then in the Holocene we gradually eliminated all other hominins except the great apes, chimps, bonobos, and orangs. That left us to face the most fearsome predator of all - us.
40% of humanity now speaks a derivative of proto-Indo European. Except for the movement of that language family south into modern India and Pakistan, the genetic story is one of killing the men and taking the women. Gene flow was very uniform in this regard. This is stunning. As the peoples of the Pontic Steppes moved into Europe, virtually the entire male population of Europe had its genetic markers disappear. Arguably, although spread across a couple thousand years, this is the single largest genocide in our history.
In many ways, the story of the 20th century on is the battle to come to grips with this and turn the page. The MAGA folks and other totalitarian minded folks around the world are resisting turning that page. I think we have a situation where they deserve some empathy, but not our sympathy.
I took a learning course on the Maya several years ago. The explanation of mathematical calculations (in the very specific case of measuring area) is the first time any math made sense to me, and so much of it is astronomy based. One satellite tour we took was to a structure on Cozumel that was set up as a light house; it had spots where four large conch shells were placed on the corners (and unlike other buildings, this was not oriented directly on solstice/equinox axis, but rotated to reflect the "cross quarter" of each axis). Our guide did not know why that was, and theorized that it was related to planting and harvest times; I suspect it was also for weather warnings (the conch shells would note directional wind changes.)
I'm going to go way way way out on limb and hazard a guess about the role of the conch shells in a caracol. While virtually nothing is known of Maya boatbuilding and navigation technologies, there is plenty of evidence that they traded with people as far away as Florida. The Caribbean and Gulf are famous for very rapid weather changes. Lighthouse keepers would need some sort of alert system to let them know what sort of signals to provide in their structures that would be visible to mariners. We know that the shells were positioned to generate sound if the wind was just right. If the shells' orientation and sizes could be accurately determined and tested, it is possible that even small shifts in the wind would cause a change in the sound being generated. This would have been invaluable information to the light keepers.
That was my theory; there was a room at the top where there was evidence of fire. I thought the conchs would give an early warning.
Wow, what a gift !
It is amazing how far backwards this administration has taken us in such a short time. They are totally unashamed of their racism.
They proudly explain how they are getting away with the depravity. I can do anything, to which the SC says you sure can…. Mitch enabled his clown thinking that he could be controlled. The joke is on you Mitch. But we aren’t laughing.
It’s amazing *how much help they get* in doing it.
In years to come, if not already, this will be what future historians will redouble their efforts to understand. Our Founders expected that sooner or later, a true demagogic scuzzbag (probably not an 18th century term) would arrive on the scene. They anticipated that our new institutional checks and balances would counteract his perversions of power. As has been said by others many times before, they did not foresee whole branches of power accommodating his smallest, silliest, pettiest, pissiest of wishes.
I’m not sure they anticipated Tommy Tuberville, either. Among his many awards for bootlicking, Tommy is literally the dumbest man God ever blew breath into. No doubt his intellectual “gifts” got Trump’s notice and endorsement. I do so look forward to Doug Jones wiping the floor with him….
They also did not anticipate that we would favor direct democracy over democratic-republicanism.
For better or worse our focus on direct democracy undercut the protections the Framers put into the Constitution. They also believed in the Enlightenment, not the religious dogma of today's MAGA adherents.
The hope that men of virtue would protect us from ideologues and populists the ilk of Trump is now in danger. They counted on Congress leading the way, not a unitary executive. Is that perhaps is the 'originalism' we need to return to?
Could be, but we might have gotten here sooner had the Robber Barons of the 18th Century had the reins of governmental power.
Polybius wrote that this is inevitable. The Framers studied Polybius and hoped they had a solution to his conjecture.
"So it goes" ~KV
And sadly I expect he's reproduced.
Darkest before the dawn...
And surely that can even more effectively be turned against them.
Alabama - You would do WELL to ELECT DOUG JONES as your GOVERNOR.
Stand up for Alabama values. Stand up for ALL of your people.
Tuberville may have been a fine football coach, but he is NOT following the U.S. Constitution and will NOT help your state.
Doug Jones, as a Senator, began the bipartisan tradition of reading the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.'s Letter From The Birmingham Jail aloud in Congress. One hundred years after the end of the U.S. Civil War, and Black Americans were still waiting - and fighting - for their human rights in 1963. The 1964 Civil Rights Act and 1965 Voting Rights Act came about because of incidents that happened in Alabama.
Come on, Alabama. This is it. Choose democracy and government of the PEOPLE. Defeat fascism - AGAIN. The world is watching.
The corrupt six right-wing Supreme Court Justices are soon going to end what's left of the Voting Rights Act. That will result in the loss of several Democratic Congressional seats in the southern States.
Unfortunately, the only way for Democrats to stay competitive nation wide, is for blue States to gerrymander for more Democratic representation. It is a shame that we have to resort to underhanded right-wing tactics in an effort to save democracy.
Instead, Jones called for reinforcing Alabama values of “hard work,” “fairness,” “looking out for your neighbor, even when you don’t agree on everything,” “telling the truth—even when we don’t want to hear it,” and believing “that every person deserves dignity, respect, opportunity, and a voice.” “Those aren’t Democratic or Republican values,” he said. “They’re Alabama values.”
They are in fact, civilized human values. The "decency" yardstick Joseph Welch held up to Joe McCarthy. In many ways "The McCarthy Era" foreshadowed the Trump Regime, but with more safeguards against its advance.
Don’t forget W/Dickie in the scheme of things. Practice is important.
Brown vs Board of Education was a unanimous decision by the Supreme Court of the United States of America.
And that decision was based on the work of Saint Pauli Murray, who compiled all of the laws in each state into a book that Thurgood Marshall and the team of lawyers that won the case based their arguments.
Separate can never be equal.
To learn more about Pauli Murray, AN AMERICAN HERO, watch the documentary "My Name Is Pauli Murray."
You can also reach out to The Pauli Murray Center for History and Social Justice in Durham, North Carolina, her childhood home. paulimurraycenter.com
Thank you for this-I had never heard of Pauli Murray!
She was friends with Eleanor Roosevelt too.
It's high time for Tommy Tuberville to get shellacked! Thanks for the summary that drew from historical context.
I can't wait.
Then maybe he’ll go back to FL where he belongs 🤷♂️
This is why I subscribe. Thanks for the historical information reconciled with current political news/events.
Yes. I love the way Heather always ties things together with their historical past.
Same here. Somehow, it is reassuring to me that we've "been here before".
“Controlling the media and controlling the message are critical aspects of autocratic takeovers. A slew of headline stories show Trump is accelerating efforts to criminalize dissent and build a police and surveillance state. But recent Democratic election victories show resistance is winning.” ~Anne-Christine D’Adesky / RESISTING PROJECT 2025
https://open.substack.com/pub/resistingproject2025/p/mccarthyism-20-as-his-popularity-de1?r=kxzps&utm_medium=ios
✅ @Off Unto The Sunset (12/12/25)…
We are at our best when we invest in each other. This ‘manifesto’ is how we return to the common good. If anything in the manifesto resonates with you, take it. Use it. Add to it. Share it…
https://resistingproject2025.substack.com/p/mccarthyism-20-as-his-popularity-de1/comment/187178337?r=kxzps&utm_medium=ios
✅ We are encouraging you to write letters with bullet points using Heather Cox Richardson’s ‘American Conversations’ on YouTube (example https://youtu.be/LojhZENpRHw) or from a vetted story contributed from substack author (Anne-Christine D’Adesky) and modify it to speak to our Congress, the SCOTUS or the legacy Media. Email one note each day, it will make you feel productive - you might not think your note/letter will be read, but they will matter. Please do share. Speak up. Speak loudly. Speak together, shift the conversation.
✅ Because when enough people start imagining a better world in unison, that’s when the world actually changes.
comment from ~Reading Off Unto The Sunset posted under RESISTING PROJECT 2025
ANNE-CHRISTINE D’ADESKY | DEC 12 2025 | Substack
https://open.substack.com/pub/resistingproject2025/p/mccarthyism-20-as-his-popularity-de1?r=kxzps&utm_medium=ios
Support the reporting on the resistance to Project 2025 from Anne-christine d'Adesky
It seems rather odd that Trump is unaware of the Army of people around the world that turn to Substack for their news.
Substack has had some growing pains when it comes to free speech, etc. but the integrity of most of the contributors and the fact that it is ad-free (except for self-promotion of the contributors) makes it incorruptible compared to almost all other media platforms.
That has been my experience, as well, Gary. In fact, Substack is essentially my "Social Media". I have more excellent Substack subscriptions than any human can read. But I try.
And the lack of ads is essential to my involvement. But there is a little trouble in paradise:
https://mediaanddemocracyproject.substack.com/p/substack-has-a-nazi-problem-and-a
and some creators are said to be adding ads...
I'm not scared away yet, but if ads start popping up frequently, that will send me packing just like Cable TV did. I guess the first step would be to shun anyone who includes ads - the platform is still too valuable to abandon.
We shouldn't be surprised when the originators of such things go for the money.
Marc Andreessen‘s $$$ gives me pause.
"Progressivism is as deeply rooted in American history as reaction."
Demonstrably true. Not spoken of enough.
My mother was from Birmingham ham and in the 1950’s and 60’s I saw first hand segregation. I saw prejudice unimaginable in rochester NY. As it turned out my mother and her sister my aunt Maine were to say the least liberal by southern terms. I was in mountain Brook with my aunt and mother the Sunday morning of the bombing. Horror was our reaction while some of my cousins thought oh my great! It was a real eye opener of my generation of Alabama relatives. Doug Jones is a true hero. If he wins it will be a true blessing. Good luck Doug
I'm in my 70's, when I was boy growing up in Rochester there were still "Whites Only" water fountains. [For young people, water fountains were ubiquitous stations, usually metal, where you could push a button and get a free drink of water. They were everywhere, usually near a phone booth,(/s), until someone figured out people would pay for water; especially if it was 'spring water from a glacier'. It's like paying more for 'sea salt'.]
Yet Rochester is also the home of Susan B Anthony, and to the North Star publication of Frederick Douglass; both of whom are buried there.
A mixed history, but one of progress.