Today the House Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the U.S. Capitol issued subpoenas to 14 individuals who were either chairs or secretaries of the groups signing the false electoral documents in Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, New Mexico, Nevada, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin, on December 14, 2020.
As a physician I am enraged when politics undermine science and medicine. It has been a decades long pattern, as described in Chris Mooney’s book “The Republican War on Science” published 17 years ago. Republican stances on masking, lax vaccination, and disposable health care workers/teachers/service industry workers have certainly killed hundreds of thousands.
In terms of kids wearing masks while we are in the peak of the worst wave yet, and seeing Omicron cases (some mild, others not) spread even among vaccinated and boosted teachers and families, it is unethical and savage really to capitulate to parents who think masking their kids causes some greater harm.
My masked kid has had an opportunity to learn about community sacrifices, the greater good, deferred gratification, and mutual respect for the safety of other people. She has worn an N95 with grit, and has not spread Covid nor received an unnecessary lungful of coronavirus that could imperil her own and her parents’ short and long term health, and her grandparents’ very lives.
We need to instill a sense of duty and purpose in our children, and not make them feel like they are too fragile to put up with a mask for as long as it takes. Republican governors and politicians who undermine scientific truths, meddle with specific monoclonal treatment guidelines when variants render them obsolete, undermine basic public health measures that could limit deaths which are back up towards 4K/day- are they not practicing medicine without a license, and malpracticing it at that?
I now live in snowy PA, but I was fortunately raised in Fairfax County, VA. As a retired teacher and daughter of a 32 year retired teacher, I am happy to report that Youngkin's call lines are blocked and filled with parents calling in to report that their child's teacher is guilty of teaching their child. Youngkin is being constipated by the truth.
How long has the USA been trying to balance on the head of pin? How many times has America been in such bad shape? Was it bred in the bone? How many times did we think it would finally be over for Donald J. Trump? Was he bred in our bones, too!
The following are excerpts from 'How America Changed During Donald Trump’s Presidency' a report by the Pew Research Center.
'Donald Trump stunned the political world in 2016 when he became the first person without government or military experience ever to be elected president of the United States. His four-year tenure in the White House revealed extraordinary fissures in American society but left little doubt that he is a figure unlike any other in the nation’s history.'
'Other presidents tried to unify the nation after turning from the campaign trail to the White House. From his first days in Washington to his last, Trump seemed to revel in the political fight. He used his presidential megaphone to criticize a long list of perceived adversaries, from the news media to members of his own administration, elected officials in both political parties and foreign heads of state. The more than 26,000 tweets he sent as president provided an unvarnished, real-time account of his thinking on a broad spectrum of issues …'
'He achieved a string of long-sought conservative victories domestically, including the biggest corporate tax cuts on record, the elimination of scores of environmental regulations and a reshaping of the federal judiciary. In the international arena, he imposed tough new immigration restrictions, withdrew from several multilateral agreements, forged closer ties with Israel and launched a tit-for-tat trade dispute with China as part of a wider effort to address what he saw as glaring imbalances in America’s economic relationship with other countries'.
Deeply partisan and personal divides
'Even before he took office, Trump divided Republicans and Democrats more than any incoming chief executive in the prior three decades.1 The gap only grew more pronounced after he became president. An average of 86% of Republicans approved of Trump’s handling of the job over the course of his tenure, compared with an average of just 6% of Democrats – the widest partisan gap in approval for any president in the modern era of polling.'
'In a 2019 survey, at least three-quarters of Republicans said the president’s words sometimes or often made them feel hopeful, entertained, informed, happy and proud. Even larger shares of Democrats said his words sometimes or often made them feel concerned, exhausted, angry, insulted and confused.'
'On some issues, there were bigger changes in thinking among Democrats than among Republicans during Trump’s presidency. That was especially the case on topics such as race and gender, which gained new attention amid the Black Lives Matter and #MeToo movements. In a 2020 survey that followed months of racial justice protests in the U.S., for instance, 70% of Democrats said it is “a lot more difficult” to be a Black person than to be a White person in the U.S. today, up from 53% who said the same thing just four years earlier.'
'A dearth of shared facts and information'
'One of the few things that Republicans and Democrats could agree on during Trump’s tenure is that they didn’t share the same set of facts. In a 2019 survey, around three-quarters of Americans (73%) said most Republican and Democratic voters disagreed not just over political plans and policies, but over “basic facts.”
'Much of the disconnect between the parties involved the news media, which Trump routinely disparaged as “fake news” and the “enemy of the people.” Republicans, in particular, expressed widespread and growing distrust of the press. In a 2019 survey, Republicans voiced more distrust than trust in 20 of the 30 specific news outlets they were asked about, even as Democrats expressed more trust than distrust in 22 of those same outlets. Republicans overwhelmingly turned to and trusted one outlet included in the study – Fox News – even as Democrats used and expressed trust in a wider range of sources. The study concluded that the two sides placed their trust in “two nearly inverse media environments.”
'Conspiracy theories were an especially salient form of misinformation during Trump’s tenure, in many cases amplified by the president himself. For example, nearly half of Americans (47%) said in September 2020 that they had heard or read a lot or a little about the collection of conspiracy theories known as QAnon, up from 23% earlier in the year.4 Most of those aware of QAnon said Trump seemed to support the theory’s promoters.'
'Trump frequently made disproven or questionable claims as president. News and fact-checking organizations documented thousands of his false statements over four years, on subjects ranging from the coronavirus to the economy. Perhaps none were more consequential than his repeated assertion of widespread fraud in the 2020 election he lost to Democrat Joe Biden. Even after courts around the country had rejected the claim and all 50 states had certified their results, Trump continued to say he had won a “landslide” victory. The false claim gained widespread currency among his voters: In a January 2021 survey, three-quarters of Trump supporters incorrectly said he was definitely or probably the rightful winner of the election.' (PewResearchCenter) See link and the end of the comment.
Surviving and creating a true democracy is the hope and determination of the Joseph R. Biden, his administration and all Americans who know what the alternative would be. Consider who we elected to the presidency in 2016; know the depth of division among our citizens, recognize the major reforms that need to be made and that Donald J. Trump has escaped from punishment for his dishonest, cruel, racist, misogynistic....and treasonous acts, so far. I won't ask the bettors to come forward to provide the odds on his survival in or out of the slammer. What do they know?
We are each finding our way toward tipping the scales in favor of democracy and a new day in America.
As always, thank you Heather. I am hoping these investigations actually hold Trump accountable. Also, I live in Florida. I stay here to vote against Death Santis. He is horrific and I am embarrassed he is my governor.
What makes me hopeful is watching TFG’s cash position being exposed as so much less than he boasts, but far more plausible to those members of the press who have watched him pretend to be part of the business class he so wishes he could join. Those old white guys never wanted to let him join that club. When he stopped funding the attorneys who were representing the operatives you did the grunt work of orchestrating the behind the scenes coup attempt, and those grunts realized that they were on their own with the members of the 1/6 committee asking them pointed questions about who did what and when, the wheels began to fall off the clown car of the conspiracy. The committee will be handing the DOJ and the state prosecutors a road map for indictments by their grand juries. I’m looking forward to the carefully reality produced televised public hearings of the findings of the 1/6 committee. Rick Scott, Marco Rubio and Ronnie DeSantis will not be able to hide from their very public support of the Trump coup plotting. It’s doubtful that any amount of public rebuke will sway the MAGA supporters but it is time for NPR and the rest of our public media organizations to stop reporting about the perceived Democratic failures and start talking about how the Biden team is doing the hard work that is slowly improving people’s daily lives. HCR does this daily with LFAA and the rest of the public media needs to follow her lead. They need to stop worrying about keeping their paychecks flowing and return to reporting the actual news and not responding to the FOX news whining from Rupert’s advisors. Roger Ailes is dead!
"His suitability as a political leader might well take an irreparable hit." Sorry Heather, color me doubtful. The word is SHOULD. But if there's one thing I've learned form the Malodorous Misadventures of Misogynist OCP is that all the rules, traditions and incidents of history--not to mention, common sense or even physical science--ever seem to matter with this guy or the increasingly circus-like cast of characters who support him. If there were 4K video showing him filling out the false ballots himself, winking at the camera and bragging about it, I'm STILL doubtful half of these sycophants (or his mindless followers) could find it in their pathetic little things they call hearts to do the right thing here. I'm not convinced that ANYTHING, short of his incarceration will greatly diminish his influence anymore. Jail it must be.
"in the past several weeks, it has become clear that the submission of false electoral votes from seven states was part of a larger scheme to throw the election to then-president Donald Trump. This raises the question of who organized the process of writing false documents and getting a group together to sign them. In a press release announcing the subpoenas, committee chair Bennie Thompson (D-MS) said the committee thinks the individuals it is subpoenaing 'have information about how these so-called alternate electors met and who was behind that scheme.'"
It looks as though anti-tRump winds are picking up speed. I can't wait for the DOJ to pick up speed and gallop towards the arrest and conviction of tfg, his family and all his lackeys!
After watching their kids leave home for the city, their jobs leave for China, and their hope for a better future get left behind, I can see why rural Americans feel resentful towards Democrats, and “outsiders” in general. Republican politicians and antagonists, like Glenn Youngkin and Tucker Carlson, who can often be seen wearing the same white polo shirt and red sweater ensemble, see it too. That’s why Carlson spouts off about the “great replacement theory”, playing on those unjustified, but very real fears of his viewers, night after night.
Rural Republicans have a simple, but very consequential choice in the next election, to follow Republicans down “the trail of fears”, or to follow Joe Biden down the path to prosperity that he has laid out for them in the American Rescue Plan (ARP) and Build Back Better (BBB) bill. The ARP is already making significant investments in rural and native American communities by expanding their internet connectivity and providing homeowners with needed assistance programs. Additionally, the BBB bill will fund and assist those very same communities to create, locally-led, sustainable economic programs that will enrich their communities, keep their families together, and aligning their interests with Democrats. That’s both peace and prosperity. These are the kind of initiatives and infrastructure plans that both rural and urban America needs right now.
Your Letters fill me - sometimes with dread and other times with hope. Thank you. I also daily thank the Democrats in office who are fighting for the rights of all of us. It is Saturday morning here in Europe. I wish you beautiful sunrises and rest.
I think we must assume that Trump or a TrumpLight/TrumpRabid will command the GOP. At best, someone who will give the appearance of playing by the rules, while letting Mitch McConnell et al continue hollowing out the foundations and institutions of government, and creating opportunities for the Roberts Court decimate civil rights. (When Sen. Susan Collins says to go slow on confirming Justice Breyer's replacement, she means to gum up the works, in hopes of a 2022 GOP takeover of the Senate. Collins is in on Mitch McConnell denying a Democratic president a vote on a Supreme Court nominee, again.)
In 2016, I unshakably knew Trump would win. I'd been doing outreach for local Dems for 6 months leading up to Election Day. I've just spent two days trying to collect signatures to get Maine's Democratic Gov. Janet Mills and Maine CD2 Democratic Rep. Jared Golden on the 2022 ballot. I am in a blue dot, in a small purplish circle, in a vast red wasteland.
Republicans are what they are, and the party is out for blood. Sadly, left leaning independents are what they are. The siren song of 'person not party' is still strong. The delusion, that if you vote for 'a candidate' then you are not involved 'in politics' is in play, still. These voters are as unmovable and irrational as the GOP base. And as self righteous.
Somehow, the idea of voting as a personal gesture and an expression of your personal feelings, has gotten confused with taking an ethical stance. In the context of politics, the phrase 'vote your conscience' is a sleight of hand and conceit of sophistry, which turns words on their head and inverts meanings. Conscience - judgements of right and wrong - operates in a social context, with knowledge of and respect for a world outside ourselves.
Appropriating the word 'conscience' to mean prioritizing the feelings in your heart or the rumblings of your gut, over thinking rationally and strategically about your social responsibility, is dishonest. It is an exercise in aesthetics, not ethics. It romanticizes politics. In Germany, such romancing lead to the gas chambers. In America it lead to January 6.
And, I haven't even got to those who won't vote because they believe sitting on their hands means they will never have blood on them.
Or, the very different case of, those who don't vote because being an effective part of representative government is outside their education, experience, and imagination.
Raskin is right about what they are learning, but I am not going to hold my breath that Moron America will drop its love affair with Fatso Fatass. But I do look forward to the day someone at the DoJ grows a set and decides to take all this evidence and indict the worthless damned traitor. (Looking at YOU, AG Garland)
Off topic but important. It concerns Spotify support of Joe Rogan's ongoing dissemination of misinformation/disinformation around Covid. I've been absent from this platform so if this has been covered, I apologize in advance.
This is a letter I sent a few minutes ago to Heather's Herd members. I will be posting it on my Facebook account as well.
Hello friends,
There is another way we can show our strength right now against disinformation is to cancel our Spotify accounts in protest against their choice to continue to allow Joe Rogan to spread Covid disinformation, (among other things). So far, Neil Young and Joni Mitchell have left Spotify in protest. We closed our Spotify account yesterday morning.
Mitchell posted a short note a on her website that "... was accompanied by a link to the open letter published earlier this month by a group of 270 doctors, scientists, professors and other medical professionals expressing concern over Rogan’s platforming of misinformation around COVID-19. In the letter, the signees asked Spotify to implement a misinformation policy as a means of combatting claims made by Rogan and his guests. Among other comments, they noted that Rogan has discouraged young people from receiving the vaccine, incorrectly claimed that mRNA vaccines are “gene therapy” and promoted the use of ivermectin to treat COVID-19, contrary to FDA warnings against using the drug to treat the virus."
Like any other boycott or protest there is strength in numbers. If you are a Spotify account folder, please consider dropping your account until Spotify does the right thing regarding the dangerous misinformation around Covid being broadcast by Rogin and his guests.
Hold on! High alert. The coming days and weeks may be more and more dangerous. Beings like this do not go out quietly, if they can they'll bring the world down with them.
A Samson act, a Twilight of False Gods. A Syrian scenario.
May what I have just written be wrong! Too much damage has been done already.
As a physician I am enraged when politics undermine science and medicine. It has been a decades long pattern, as described in Chris Mooney’s book “The Republican War on Science” published 17 years ago. Republican stances on masking, lax vaccination, and disposable health care workers/teachers/service industry workers have certainly killed hundreds of thousands.
In terms of kids wearing masks while we are in the peak of the worst wave yet, and seeing Omicron cases (some mild, others not) spread even among vaccinated and boosted teachers and families, it is unethical and savage really to capitulate to parents who think masking their kids causes some greater harm.
My masked kid has had an opportunity to learn about community sacrifices, the greater good, deferred gratification, and mutual respect for the safety of other people. She has worn an N95 with grit, and has not spread Covid nor received an unnecessary lungful of coronavirus that could imperil her own and her parents’ short and long term health, and her grandparents’ very lives.
We need to instill a sense of duty and purpose in our children, and not make them feel like they are too fragile to put up with a mask for as long as it takes. Republican governors and politicians who undermine scientific truths, meddle with specific monoclonal treatment guidelines when variants render them obsolete, undermine basic public health measures that could limit deaths which are back up towards 4K/day- are they not practicing medicine without a license, and malpracticing it at that?
I now live in snowy PA, but I was fortunately raised in Fairfax County, VA. As a retired teacher and daughter of a 32 year retired teacher, I am happy to report that Youngkin's call lines are blocked and filled with parents calling in to report that their child's teacher is guilty of teaching their child. Youngkin is being constipated by the truth.
How long has the USA been trying to balance on the head of pin? How many times has America been in such bad shape? Was it bred in the bone? How many times did we think it would finally be over for Donald J. Trump? Was he bred in our bones, too!
The following are excerpts from 'How America Changed During Donald Trump’s Presidency' a report by the Pew Research Center.
'Donald Trump stunned the political world in 2016 when he became the first person without government or military experience ever to be elected president of the United States. His four-year tenure in the White House revealed extraordinary fissures in American society but left little doubt that he is a figure unlike any other in the nation’s history.'
'Other presidents tried to unify the nation after turning from the campaign trail to the White House. From his first days in Washington to his last, Trump seemed to revel in the political fight. He used his presidential megaphone to criticize a long list of perceived adversaries, from the news media to members of his own administration, elected officials in both political parties and foreign heads of state. The more than 26,000 tweets he sent as president provided an unvarnished, real-time account of his thinking on a broad spectrum of issues …'
'He achieved a string of long-sought conservative victories domestically, including the biggest corporate tax cuts on record, the elimination of scores of environmental regulations and a reshaping of the federal judiciary. In the international arena, he imposed tough new immigration restrictions, withdrew from several multilateral agreements, forged closer ties with Israel and launched a tit-for-tat trade dispute with China as part of a wider effort to address what he saw as glaring imbalances in America’s economic relationship with other countries'.
Deeply partisan and personal divides
'Even before he took office, Trump divided Republicans and Democrats more than any incoming chief executive in the prior three decades.1 The gap only grew more pronounced after he became president. An average of 86% of Republicans approved of Trump’s handling of the job over the course of his tenure, compared with an average of just 6% of Democrats – the widest partisan gap in approval for any president in the modern era of polling.'
'In a 2019 survey, at least three-quarters of Republicans said the president’s words sometimes or often made them feel hopeful, entertained, informed, happy and proud. Even larger shares of Democrats said his words sometimes or often made them feel concerned, exhausted, angry, insulted and confused.'
'On some issues, there were bigger changes in thinking among Democrats than among Republicans during Trump’s presidency. That was especially the case on topics such as race and gender, which gained new attention amid the Black Lives Matter and #MeToo movements. In a 2020 survey that followed months of racial justice protests in the U.S., for instance, 70% of Democrats said it is “a lot more difficult” to be a Black person than to be a White person in the U.S. today, up from 53% who said the same thing just four years earlier.'
'A dearth of shared facts and information'
'One of the few things that Republicans and Democrats could agree on during Trump’s tenure is that they didn’t share the same set of facts. In a 2019 survey, around three-quarters of Americans (73%) said most Republican and Democratic voters disagreed not just over political plans and policies, but over “basic facts.”
'Much of the disconnect between the parties involved the news media, which Trump routinely disparaged as “fake news” and the “enemy of the people.” Republicans, in particular, expressed widespread and growing distrust of the press. In a 2019 survey, Republicans voiced more distrust than trust in 20 of the 30 specific news outlets they were asked about, even as Democrats expressed more trust than distrust in 22 of those same outlets. Republicans overwhelmingly turned to and trusted one outlet included in the study – Fox News – even as Democrats used and expressed trust in a wider range of sources. The study concluded that the two sides placed their trust in “two nearly inverse media environments.”
'Conspiracy theories were an especially salient form of misinformation during Trump’s tenure, in many cases amplified by the president himself. For example, nearly half of Americans (47%) said in September 2020 that they had heard or read a lot or a little about the collection of conspiracy theories known as QAnon, up from 23% earlier in the year.4 Most of those aware of QAnon said Trump seemed to support the theory’s promoters.'
'Trump frequently made disproven or questionable claims as president. News and fact-checking organizations documented thousands of his false statements over four years, on subjects ranging from the coronavirus to the economy. Perhaps none were more consequential than his repeated assertion of widespread fraud in the 2020 election he lost to Democrat Joe Biden. Even after courts around the country had rejected the claim and all 50 states had certified their results, Trump continued to say he had won a “landslide” victory. The false claim gained widespread currency among his voters: In a January 2021 survey, three-quarters of Trump supporters incorrectly said he was definitely or probably the rightful winner of the election.' (PewResearchCenter) See link and the end of the comment.
Surviving and creating a true democracy is the hope and determination of the Joseph R. Biden, his administration and all Americans who know what the alternative would be. Consider who we elected to the presidency in 2016; know the depth of division among our citizens, recognize the major reforms that need to be made and that Donald J. Trump has escaped from punishment for his dishonest, cruel, racist, misogynistic....and treasonous acts, so far. I won't ask the bettors to come forward to provide the odds on his survival in or out of the slammer. What do they know?
We are each finding our way toward tipping the scales in favor of democracy and a new day in America.
https://www.pewresearch.org/2021/01/29/how-america-changed-during-donald-trumps-presidency/
As always, thank you Heather. I am hoping these investigations actually hold Trump accountable. Also, I live in Florida. I stay here to vote against Death Santis. He is horrific and I am embarrassed he is my governor.
What makes me hopeful is watching TFG’s cash position being exposed as so much less than he boasts, but far more plausible to those members of the press who have watched him pretend to be part of the business class he so wishes he could join. Those old white guys never wanted to let him join that club. When he stopped funding the attorneys who were representing the operatives you did the grunt work of orchestrating the behind the scenes coup attempt, and those grunts realized that they were on their own with the members of the 1/6 committee asking them pointed questions about who did what and when, the wheels began to fall off the clown car of the conspiracy. The committee will be handing the DOJ and the state prosecutors a road map for indictments by their grand juries. I’m looking forward to the carefully reality produced televised public hearings of the findings of the 1/6 committee. Rick Scott, Marco Rubio and Ronnie DeSantis will not be able to hide from their very public support of the Trump coup plotting. It’s doubtful that any amount of public rebuke will sway the MAGA supporters but it is time for NPR and the rest of our public media organizations to stop reporting about the perceived Democratic failures and start talking about how the Biden team is doing the hard work that is slowly improving people’s daily lives. HCR does this daily with LFAA and the rest of the public media needs to follow her lead. They need to stop worrying about keeping their paychecks flowing and return to reporting the actual news and not responding to the FOX news whining from Rupert’s advisors. Roger Ailes is dead!
"His suitability as a political leader might well take an irreparable hit." Sorry Heather, color me doubtful. The word is SHOULD. But if there's one thing I've learned form the Malodorous Misadventures of Misogynist OCP is that all the rules, traditions and incidents of history--not to mention, common sense or even physical science--ever seem to matter with this guy or the increasingly circus-like cast of characters who support him. If there were 4K video showing him filling out the false ballots himself, winking at the camera and bragging about it, I'm STILL doubtful half of these sycophants (or his mindless followers) could find it in their pathetic little things they call hearts to do the right thing here. I'm not convinced that ANYTHING, short of his incarceration will greatly diminish his influence anymore. Jail it must be.
"in the past several weeks, it has become clear that the submission of false electoral votes from seven states was part of a larger scheme to throw the election to then-president Donald Trump. This raises the question of who organized the process of writing false documents and getting a group together to sign them. In a press release announcing the subpoenas, committee chair Bennie Thompson (D-MS) said the committee thinks the individuals it is subpoenaing 'have information about how these so-called alternate electors met and who was behind that scheme.'"
It looks as though anti-tRump winds are picking up speed. I can't wait for the DOJ to pick up speed and gallop towards the arrest and conviction of tfg, his family and all his lackeys!
After watching their kids leave home for the city, their jobs leave for China, and their hope for a better future get left behind, I can see why rural Americans feel resentful towards Democrats, and “outsiders” in general. Republican politicians and antagonists, like Glenn Youngkin and Tucker Carlson, who can often be seen wearing the same white polo shirt and red sweater ensemble, see it too. That’s why Carlson spouts off about the “great replacement theory”, playing on those unjustified, but very real fears of his viewers, night after night.
Rural Republicans have a simple, but very consequential choice in the next election, to follow Republicans down “the trail of fears”, or to follow Joe Biden down the path to prosperity that he has laid out for them in the American Rescue Plan (ARP) and Build Back Better (BBB) bill. The ARP is already making significant investments in rural and native American communities by expanding their internet connectivity and providing homeowners with needed assistance programs. Additionally, the BBB bill will fund and assist those very same communities to create, locally-led, sustainable economic programs that will enrich their communities, keep their families together, and aligning their interests with Democrats. That’s both peace and prosperity. These are the kind of initiatives and infrastructure plans that both rural and urban America needs right now.
It's gonna be a long four years here in Virginia.
Your Letters fill me - sometimes with dread and other times with hope. Thank you. I also daily thank the Democrats in office who are fighting for the rights of all of us. It is Saturday morning here in Europe. I wish you beautiful sunrises and rest.
I think we must assume that Trump or a TrumpLight/TrumpRabid will command the GOP. At best, someone who will give the appearance of playing by the rules, while letting Mitch McConnell et al continue hollowing out the foundations and institutions of government, and creating opportunities for the Roberts Court decimate civil rights. (When Sen. Susan Collins says to go slow on confirming Justice Breyer's replacement, she means to gum up the works, in hopes of a 2022 GOP takeover of the Senate. Collins is in on Mitch McConnell denying a Democratic president a vote on a Supreme Court nominee, again.)
In 2016, I unshakably knew Trump would win. I'd been doing outreach for local Dems for 6 months leading up to Election Day. I've just spent two days trying to collect signatures to get Maine's Democratic Gov. Janet Mills and Maine CD2 Democratic Rep. Jared Golden on the 2022 ballot. I am in a blue dot, in a small purplish circle, in a vast red wasteland.
Republicans are what they are, and the party is out for blood. Sadly, left leaning independents are what they are. The siren song of 'person not party' is still strong. The delusion, that if you vote for 'a candidate' then you are not involved 'in politics' is in play, still. These voters are as unmovable and irrational as the GOP base. And as self righteous.
Somehow, the idea of voting as a personal gesture and an expression of your personal feelings, has gotten confused with taking an ethical stance. In the context of politics, the phrase 'vote your conscience' is a sleight of hand and conceit of sophistry, which turns words on their head and inverts meanings. Conscience - judgements of right and wrong - operates in a social context, with knowledge of and respect for a world outside ourselves.
Appropriating the word 'conscience' to mean prioritizing the feelings in your heart or the rumblings of your gut, over thinking rationally and strategically about your social responsibility, is dishonest. It is an exercise in aesthetics, not ethics. It romanticizes politics. In Germany, such romancing lead to the gas chambers. In America it lead to January 6.
And, I haven't even got to those who won't vote because they believe sitting on their hands means they will never have blood on them.
Or, the very different case of, those who don't vote because being an effective part of representative government is outside their education, experience, and imagination.
Raskin is right about what they are learning, but I am not going to hold my breath that Moron America will drop its love affair with Fatso Fatass. But I do look forward to the day someone at the DoJ grows a set and decides to take all this evidence and indict the worthless damned traitor. (Looking at YOU, AG Garland)
Off topic but important. It concerns Spotify support of Joe Rogan's ongoing dissemination of misinformation/disinformation around Covid. I've been absent from this platform so if this has been covered, I apologize in advance.
This is a letter I sent a few minutes ago to Heather's Herd members. I will be posting it on my Facebook account as well.
Hello friends,
There is another way we can show our strength right now against disinformation is to cancel our Spotify accounts in protest against their choice to continue to allow Joe Rogan to spread Covid disinformation, (among other things). So far, Neil Young and Joni Mitchell have left Spotify in protest. We closed our Spotify account yesterday morning.
Mitchell posted a short note a on her website that "... was accompanied by a link to the open letter published earlier this month by a group of 270 doctors, scientists, professors and other medical professionals expressing concern over Rogan’s platforming of misinformation around COVID-19. In the letter, the signees asked Spotify to implement a misinformation policy as a means of combatting claims made by Rogan and his guests. Among other comments, they noted that Rogan has discouraged young people from receiving the vaccine, incorrectly claimed that mRNA vaccines are “gene therapy” and promoted the use of ivermectin to treat COVID-19, contrary to FDA warnings against using the drug to treat the virus."
Like any other boycott or protest there is strength in numbers. If you are a Spotify account folder, please consider dropping your account until Spotify does the right thing regarding the dangerous misinformation around Covid being broadcast by Rogin and his guests.
Kind regards,
Daria
“It’s about time we stopped fighting and it’s about time we start working together again,” he said. “We can do an awful lot.”
Amen Mr. Biden, Amen
The long-awaited implosion seems to have begun.
Hold on! High alert. The coming days and weeks may be more and more dangerous. Beings like this do not go out quietly, if they can they'll bring the world down with them.
A Samson act, a Twilight of False Gods. A Syrian scenario.
May what I have just written be wrong! Too much damage has been done already.
Either the law is for everyone or it does not exist.