Today, as MAGA Republicans attack the rule of law and promise to prosecute their political enemies if they get back into power, it’s easy to forget that once upon a time, certain Republican politicians championed reason and compromise and took a stand against MAGAs’ predecessors.
Now, just getting more and more hilarious watching the MAGA goonies.
Most comedic: how all fall after themselves in mindless repetitions. Not just the ridge runners, stump savages, and white trash such as Lauren Boebert, Paul Gosar, James Comer, Chip Roy, Tommy Tuberville, Louisiana’s John Kennedy, Josh Hawley, Jim Jordan, Lindsey Graham, Anna Luna, Andrew Clyde, Tim Scott, Marjorie Taylor Gazpacho.
Also the putative “leaders” such as the eminently corrupt Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito, the pious hypocrite House Speaker Howdy Doody, and cultists J. D. Vance, Susan Collins, Elise Stefanik, Ted Cruz, Marco Rubio, Steve Scalise, Nancy Mace, Nikki Haley.
I mention so many for one point: our “me, too,” “me, too,” “me, too” all black hole spiral because not a one has access to or awareness of any of the humanities that can keep us humanly decent.
The stupidity replicates. Behold our dictators, nationalists, autocrats, and murderers. Modi in India. Orban in Hungary. Erdogan in Turkey. Putin in Russia. Saudi royals. Netanyahu in Israel. Assad in Syria. Sisi in Egypt. The North Korean haircut king. The Chinese cadres. The ayatollahs in Iran. Their foot soldiers in Hamas, Hezbollah, and Houthi Yemen.
Guaranteed. Helplessly inevitable. Those with no humanities contort themselves into clichés, slogans, stereotypes, and repetitious conformities.
This parade of dunces, hilarious.
Their insurrections against democracies. Their murders of journalists and democratic opponents. Their forcing of women, gays, and others to Taliban molds. Their setting schools worldwide to one abstracted standardized testing death trip of the linear, binary, categorical, chronological. Not so funny.
"Hilarious," even in jest, does not apply to the MAGA folks who would like to turn our country in an autocratic cult. We must take seriously the folks who have been writing threatening e-mails and texts about the judge and the jury and the witnesses in Trump's trial. One or more of them will go too far and commit violence. Fear is not the answer, but continuing to speak out against lies and threats is our job. Being neither a Republican or a Catholic, I'm still happy to take not only Margaret Chase Smith as a role model, but also the Benedictine nuns who have been speaking out against Harrison Butker's claim that he spoke for all Catholics in his bigoted remarks.
I need to say on the outset that my politics are neither left nor right. They are very center-focused. This may be a big disappointment to many democrats and many of you. It doesn’t prevent me from recognizing that Donald Trump is the culmination of everything politically pernicious in the country as he has cultivated worshipers like no other in modern times. I know that all life experience is a continuum and I wonder if a fully unbalanced, truly narcissistic (I know this word has been overused but it aptly describes him) begins as a spoiled brat who was emotionally pummeled by paternal influences (who isn’t) which gradually morphed into control, greed, a desire to constantly need to be in the center circle and with a dabble of political urges, finding support among his like-minded herd and reaching a pinnacle of pretension that veers on the ridiculous and dangerous; a coming of age of a Hitler-like persona. He is a dictator-in-waiting and he must be stopped, if I may use a line from Malcolm X, by whatever means necessary.
Since the New York State courts found Donald J. Trump guilty of all 34 counts, it comes as no great surprise that his cult following is calling for everything from civil and legal vengeance to open hostilities. There will be violence. That is already being written on the pending tombstone of American Democracy.
How could we have come to such madness and social/political dysfunctionalism? I firmly believe that democracy is a fragile system of government that requires at minimum, both sides to eventually reach consensus. The high court asserted that corporations couldn’t be denied of first amendment rights to dump as much money into political campaigns as they wish. This single act by a conservative court has seeded the monied class to buy Congress. This is nothing new but the voracity of uncompromising hate is.
On the left, the modern Democratic Party has sold itself to the idea of inclusion in word and deed with one exception; lower class working white communities. We are fed a continuous diet of diversity as if this nation were a caste system with untouchable classes at the bottom. No such thing exists today but we are almost force-fed this continual diet and the ultra right has taken this as a battle cry. This does not bid well for society as a whole.
This is my complaint with my democrats. An example; I have applied to be a vendor at the democratic national convention in Chicago. In the application, I have had to answer 1. If I am a minority-owned company, 2. If I am woman-owned, 3. If I am unionized, 4. If my company is LBGTQ owned. Not once did the application ask me if I was a single proprietor small business which I am. I’m really flabbergasted over this kind of questionnaire. I presume that those identifications will receive priority. And we wonder why our ever-so conservative MAGA pre-Nazi movement is gaining in popularity. It would normally be relegated to a fringe element in the body politic. This is one of the reasons. In my opinion, we have gone over the diversity cliff.
Keep in mind my opening remarks. My politics are center focused, neither extreme left nor extreme right.
When LBJ lost the Dixiecrats and the northern hangers-on after his long needed progressive civil rights legislation in the 1960s, Nixon took full advantage with his ‘Southern Strategy’ of white working class and won the White House. There was always a racial or racist undertow to this “Southern Strategy” movement. And in hindsight, Nixon was so much better at guiding the ship of state than our current choice on the right. Nixon created the Environmental Protection Agency on December 2, 1970 — dig that. But he also ruined LBJ’s Paris Peace Talks in order to get elected just like OrangeFatso commanded his MAGA lawmakers to kill border legislation.
If we can’t somehow move our politics back to the center, there is no hope to save our form of representative democracy as we have known it. I assert that both sides are at fault.
I too wear a badge of moderation when it comes to my politics. But as a woman, one of the so-called “protected” classes, I find that the need for those questions is greater now than when they first started showing up. While you have been able all of your life to start your own business, I was not given permission to own my own bank account without my husband’s name on it before the early 1980’s. I couldn’t get a house loan with my own money until the bank was satisfied my ex would promise, in writing, to keep up child support payments (1994). While I was married I couldn’t have been the only signatory then either -married or divorced, my husband owned my financial security. It was the mid-1980’s before a woman could even get financing for her own business without a man’s signature. I won’t even go into what was done to people of color to control their ability to compete in America’s “free market” before laws enforcing diversity fairness were enacted.
So as you might imagine, those of us hobbled at the beginning have a bit of catching up to do. And now, at this late juncture in my life, when I’m ready to start my own business to supplement my retirement, I hear of a bunch of aggrieved white men of power who want to remove my equality again because allowing women into the national conversation was “the beginning of all the trouble”. They actually plan to remove my right to vote! Of course they will remove diversity questions and take away my financial independence.
Acceding to DEI policies in these times may seem like a bit of an inconvenience to a white male entrepreneur who is already having to compete against the bigger, better-funded fish out there. But for those of us who were really beginning to feel accepted as equals, the policies, rules, and questions on applications are more necessary now than they have been since their inception. They are helping to keep us equal and competitive.
You hit one nail absolutely on the head, though. The people who have never had to ask another man to co-sign a business loan because their gender made them inherently less responsible, less worthy, are absolutely threatened and hacked off about diversity questions on applications. Which is exactly why right wing politicians are attacking protected classes with all the political power at their disposal. Feeding that resentment helps them stay elected. Pushing me out of the business world and back to the kitchen satisfies voting white male businessmen that they won’t ever have to worry about someone maybe less “qualified” doing a job a white guy could do “better”.
Sandy - as someone who after a divorce, had to ask my ex to co-sign a bank loan for a tractor (in order to mow grass). This was in the early 90s! I had NO credit whatsoever at that point.
So I agree - people who never had to ask because they were female and therefore less responsibly?
Yeah - I have NO problem with diversity questions. Its about dam time.....
Maggie, maybe it will take women and non-white males standing together to really make a difference. White men have been in charge for so long, they don't know how to be just a human being; they need to be controlling everything around them even when they have no clue and should never be in charge. When we look at women's history or the history of Black Americans, it is clear that so much of it has been framed by white men creating and setting obstacles, letting one or two into the "inner circle" at a time so the men can still control everything. They wanted to seem decent human beings, you know, letting those inferior girls or boys in for a time until they don't bow and scrape properly to the white guys in charge. We will continue to do better no matter what the ruling white guys say.
I can tell you, a real quick antidote to this male "blindness" is to surround them with females who are much brighter. I got put into my place at about six years of age. I had a very bright mom and four sisters. The very sad fact is that I went further than they did professionally and academically because I was a white male. All along the way I kept encountering these absolutely brilliant females. They were white, too, but had the handicap of having two X chromosomes while I had a Y.
Sandy--this and this this. All. Day. Long.. Thank you: white men who are feeling aggrieved have absolutely no idea how eye-rollingly dumb they sound to women, because even white women of privilege live on a knife edge of anxiety as a result of the original systemic bias--the one against vaginas by the ones with penises. I recently purchased a key chain fob from a fun little company called Get Bullish that says "After all human history men should be glad we only want equality and not payback." I'm getting to the point where I am rooting for payback. Those who claim some kind of "superiority" by virtue of the color of their skin and their dangly bits have no right to run anything, let alone seek world domination. Look at what they did to the rest of the world when they decided to interfere in it.
Linda, part of the problem is that males are raised to think that by being male, they are somehow superior. So often they are favored over their sisters, perpetuated not only by fathers, but also mothers. And they are really threatened by successful intelligent women. Just recently I had a chorus of mansplainers thinking they were too clever by half on a thread on Facebook. I ended blocking the one who had to have the last word and thought that rage and f bombs make for a convincing argument. My other observation is that some men are "liberated" intellectually, but not emotionally and frequently do and say dumb things.
Michele, as a white male born in the 50s, I firmly believe that I wasn't raised to be superior -- both parents instilled in me the duty to be good, to do good, and to treat others, particularly females, with respect and kindness, and to use my "power" to protect others when needed.
However, I certainly recognize the patriarchical power -- implicit or otherwise -- that society has given me, and I see it more and more each day.
I'll also own up to occasionally (especially in the past) fitting in with your last sentence, because males frequently do and say dumb things. My wife of nearly 48 years will attest to that.
Yep. And the "Not all white men" mansplaining also needs to stop. A good book about the ways in which this whole thing developed is by Donna Zuckerberg (yep--the dumbass FB founder's smarter sister), Not All Dead White Men: Classics and Misogyny in the Digital Age. I recommend it.
I had the great fortune as an only child (male) to be raised in the 1950s by a woman who broke all the glass ceilings, retiring as the highest “ranking” female executive in Macy’s history at the time. Although I’m not without “male flaws”, one flaw I don’t have is any sense that women aren’t as capable (and often more capable) as men. I see the progress made by women as a virtuous cycle, sucessful fulfilled women instilling in their male children a more egalitarian world view. It will take time—but the end state is inevitable.
Michele--and Doug who claims not to understand. Here is something that showcases to a T what I am talking about--and it could be repeated at EVERY university, in EVERY era (including now, a s I have a friend dealing with this subtle micro aggression by men who will with their dying breath claim to be feminists). Dolores Frese, “Individually, And On Behalf Of All Others Similarly Situated” Medieval Feminist Forum, 45.1 (2009): 93-113. Dolores was an internationally renowned author, literary historian, and critic whose husband is a judge. She recently died and, as the final indignity, the obit the University of Notre Dame, where she taught for decades, published MISSPELLED her name.
Here's the issue: if you don't publicly rebuke guys who are misbehaving in front of women or who speak about women with contempt in private. If you don't speak real truth to power. If your white male privilege is something you totally take for granted and you don't even think about the fact that you are a TINY minority in the world, with outsized levels of privilege, wealth, and access. If the fact that your bodily autonomy is something you take for granted and you don't think about the ways in which women's bodies are invaded and subjugated EVERY DAMN DAY. Then you're part of the problem not its solution. And yes: I have no patience left and no more f***s to give. I am old, tired, and pissed off. Happy Pride Month.
What you say is true, that the males are favored by their mothers over their sisters. At least that was the case for me, born in 1940. This is why DEI today is so important. We must break out of those values imbued by implicit bias. I had a sister two years younger than me: bright, beautiful, athletic. When I was in the army I sent a letter to my mom offering to send money to my sister for college. My mother never told my sister who married and had two children before ultimately getting her degree. When I found out about it and confronted my mother, she got frustrated and said that I didn't want my sister to marry the man she did. That was a lie. I simply wanted my sister to go to college.
Thank you Sandy. I was the plaintiff in a sexual harassment suit in the mid ‘80’s. While I prevailed in the settlement I was discouraged to go full bore by the threat of destruction of my reputation and livelihood. My harasser boss was demoted but continued to teach his Sunday school class and remained a deacon in his church. Yes, I too have little empathy with moans from the “poor white man” having to compete from his implicit position of power.
Sometimes the religious men are the worst when it comes to harassment and abuse. I don’t believe all or even most men are like that, but some of them engage in the very activities they condemn.
Kathy, I have noticed that about "religious" guys too. Hypocrisy can be a major factor in the lives of people in power, particularly when we can be convinced there is nothing behind the curtain.
A single proprietor small business can be owned by Charles Koch or any member of the Walton Family.
And one does not have to expect that historically DIS-enfranchised people would be now more privileged in their applications. But one could count whether or not they were being given a fair chance by whether they showed up in the list of those that succeeded.
Yeah, I know. It’s not perfect. But as a woman who was told many times in my youth that I didn’t need a fair wage because a man would support me, that I should shut up and let my husband keep me in line, whose mother struggled to care for her four children after she was widowed in the 1950s and SHE couldn’t get a decent-paying job or child care for her kids {and needed another male in the family to sign for her financial activities}, oh, the list goes on ….
I also agree that the lower-economic strata struggles, too.
Mmmmmmm, maybe that’s why we farther-Left types believe in a fair wage…for EVERYBODY. And NO gouging from the energy sector, driving up costs for people whose incomes barely cover roof and food. And a decent health care system that doesn’t exploit Americans with outrageous prices and insurance that controls doctors’ treatments ….
We all need a seat at the table, healthy food to eat, and good camaraderie to enjoy. We all have challenges to overcome to get there, but let’s help each other along the way.
Sandy, very nicely put as to what women have been up against since nearly forever. As I read, I was reminded of a religious tale (Buddhist?) of spirits running around having great time and then they awoke to genders and sex and all hell broke loose....sorta another Adam and Eve. In ancient Athens, women were never adults and always had to be controlled by some male. My mother-in-law was the first woman in Oregon to have a credit card in her own name at the local big department store in 1974 if I am remembering the date accurately. She worked and managed a toy store, so she was not exactly unused to handling money. We have put my name on some of our bills so I have a credit rating. The real corker for me was when I made a donation in my father's name to the local Elks scholarship as he had requested at his death. So, my name was first on the check, i signed it, and he was my father. When the thank you letter came, it was to my husband like i didn't exist. I had intended to make a yearly donation, but after that, no way. This was in the late 90s.
Michele, I believe I would have written back to those guys and told them what I thought about their ignorance and that I would not be contributing anything since to them, I was invisible. I don't take insults like that well and have at times made such letters of response. As a blind woman, I often get people talking to anyone who is near me, asking what I want. They don't know that it is I who am paying the bill. I don't get that as much say in the past decade or so but it is still there. Women, disabled people, and non-white males are often dismissed but we need to point it out every single time no matter how bad the people who do it feel. We are made to feel that often and maybe it will help them to see the pain they are inflicting even if they don't realize it. We should also mention their feelings related to our response, so they know they are not the only ones to feel that and that they are doing it to people often if they are not conscious of it.
I thought about writing back to them, but then decided as they were brother Elks in Indiana, that it wasn't worth my time. I would guess they were beyond help. I am sure your experience as a blind person has been illuminating as to how people behave and if I read your correctly, things have improved in the last decade, for which I am glad.
May I just add that I'm tired of people who are lucky, that is, advantaged far and above the rest of us by having been born to a family that was "comfortable", by having parents invested in our upbringing and schooling because they weren't working three jobs, by having family financial and emotional support to go to college and (in my case) law school, and yet claim what they actually believe, that they did it themselves. I'm lucky, but I'll never claim I did it on my own - we all use the roads, the utility grids, fire and police services, etc., etc., etc.
And we all have a duty to "give back" - it really takes a village, not solely to rear all the children, but to build and be that village.
On another note, what is your new business? I'm "retired" (hah!), but I was fortunate enough to buy the small apartment building I live in when I sold my business (it had been ours, but my husband died). Lucky, lucky, lucky.
I’m using my long career experience in software administration to write training docs and consult with customers on deployments, data integrity and user training. Low overhead, low startup costs, high hopes! Thanks for asking.
Well said, Sandy. (And for the record, I'm a white older male who, as I've said before, fully supports the notion that women should lead. While I had nothing to do with what form I took at conception, I can at least acknowledge the role people who look like me have caused in the world.
True, our individual existences are all matters of chance. I could just as easily have been born a raccoon, a tiger or a bear (three animals that I admire.) We share a whole lot of the same DNA. But, in human society in America, there is no question but that white males had/have the advantage over everyone else.
Sandy McClanahan, thanks for answering --- the why ---- those questions appear on the application. Your detailing of the injustices reminded those who know and taught those who didn't experience them, why we press the bounds of change.
Is is possible in any way to actually overcome discrimination of "oppressed classes" without getting a backlash from the "privileged"? Is it possible to "right wrongs" in such a way that most people say "okay, this needed doing". How to end a history of discrimination and not produce "reverse discrimination" fear and loathing?
I strongly suspect it's not possible. People want an outsized percentage of the pie, not a fair portion of pie.
This whole conversation is so good and respectful. How DO we move forward? Stirring up the hate and vengeance is newsy. The other is tedious, slow, hard work - not eye catching until it becomes clear the tension has eased and we begin to care that we all get a fair shake- the women & plenty of others who have trudged thro the muck and those more fortunate whose blinders have been removed. (I know that is too kindly stated lest I repeat all that has been said here …) it will take time & patience and courage. Let’s keep the respectful dialogue going. And acknowledge when you/we can do better for others and this world.
Yes-it’s so important that we talk about it with respect and resolve so we truly can “perfect our union” and demonstrate to the world that humanity can thrive on our “better angels”.
I hadn’t realized how much response I would receive. It’s been educational for me as well as I’ve read all the responses. I do though understand that an irrational poison has seeped into those who feel left out and that is the political enemy that we have created. Where it all ends is anyone’s guess.
And in my defense, I maintain that discrimination against women has largely diminished or ended. How far do we punch folks into the MAGA camp? I once couldn’t compete with a Black woman friend of mine because I’m neither Black or female. If I were more unbalanced than I already am,I would join the MAGAs in a heartbeat. I’m angry and I’m sorry that some of you think I’m a why-not-meism just like you are saying the same.
People who have been born into privilege grow up thinking “This is the way the world is.” As little kids, that’s what they learned, and they think it is somehow ordained to be that way. You make it a little more fair, and they DO feel like they’ve had something that “belonged” to them taken away.
It’s tough to get them to recognize, let alone accept, that they never had an unassailable right to their privilege —AT THE EXPENSE OF OTHER PEOPLE — in the first place.
It’s understandable that people might feel that way at first, but not defensible if they don’t realize they are demanding the continuation of someone else’s victimization to enable their own unfair privilege.
It’s actually NOT like we are asking the once-privileged to see the tables turned — we are NOT asking to discriminate against White Christian Males, or any other previously privileged class {white people in general, for instance.} Just a fair shake for everybody, and a bit of help catching up for those who have been hobbled for so long.
Eminently just. And possibly completely impossible as people scramble to be on top of the pile, come up wth rationalizations of why they should be there, and continually cry "Foul".
Sad! Hoping to change that. We are not equal in our needs, and there is enough to meet needs all around. It’s the ‘I wants’ that make it hard if not impossible.
Katherine, because it has not happened in the past may not be a reason it can't be different in the future. In order to bring about positive change without stirring the new 4 Horsemen of the apocalypse: anger, fear, resentment, and hatred on the part of the oppressors, we will need to work together toward the change we need. Working to stop global warming could be a good way to do that since it is a critical issue that impacts everyone. We need everyone to contribute ideas, research, findings, cooperation, etc. for us to achieve the goal. White men may see that working with others can work for them and everyone else too. Trump and his followers will have a lot of trouble with this because they never even saw their privilege but are fighting its loss. It is pretty pathetic, but I understand that is how many white people, particularly men see the world. The challenge is getting started and getting people on board.
Well said, Sandy. It’s complicated and that’s for sure. Conservatives have already terminated your right to choose abortion. And we stand a chance of losing a whole lot more. I only have tried to illuminate why large segments of the population have irrationally joined the MAGA movement.
At present I am refused any kind of telephone customer service until my husband of 50 years gives his verbal permission. This includes all the online accounts set up by me. This truly gobsmacked me
Anna, alas, we women have permitted men and some women to think they can control our lives, and they have run with it, doing as much harm as they can to us and our kids. I keep wondering what we are going to do about it, but I have heard little except making suits which are often dismissed as in Texas and our rights trickle away with an appallingly partisan Supreme Court who think they are living in the 1800s when no one but rich white men had any rights despite our Constitution, when sick white men like Anthony Comstock could make up national rules just because of his personal misogyny. So, I ask again, what are we going to do. We need to act before we are stuck barefoot and pregnant, the young ones, and used and abused by rich white men and some other men of color who want to get in on the action, ala Clarence Thomas.
Sandy, the problem, every time women, disabled persons, people of color, make advances to try to equalize with white men, something happens or someone arises to try to make sure that does not happen. The anti-woman crap about abortions is not really about fetuses or embryos at all; it is about power and who has it. White men are not afraid of people not as qualified as they are taking their job. They are afraid they are not as well qualified as a whole lot of people they have been putting down and keeping down forever. The non-white-male folks are finding ways to get educated, to quietly push in where only white men feared to tread. We are finding ways to get around all the obstacles being placed in our way. They put crazies on the Supreme Court and other courts knowing they will try to stop all advancement but that of rich white men and corporations, but they forget we non-white-male persons are the majority and are working on saying "we're not going to take it anymore." As a disabled woman, I have learned that every time I get technology that will let me compete with the sighted folks, something new comes along that makes it harder for me to do my job. I do figure it out though, and wait for the next innovation that does not take the needs of disabled persons in mind. We women and disabled persons do figure it out, though and we are coming for equality. We will figure out how to deal with abortions that will not require male supervision or involvement at all. Hopefully we sisters will take care of each other and leave white men, and maybe all men out of the issue altogether, the same with birth control and any other obstacle they put in our way. We do have to be careful though because white men in power are scared (some non-white men too) and scared men can do enormous damage to everyone around them. Check out Putin, Xi, Netanyahu, Mudhi, the nuts in Sudan, and more. Maybe research on a drug that can be administered in the air could help calm the scared men down for the sake of alll of us, and our planet.
I like to think that white, center-minded folk, of which I consider myself one, understand inclusion as necessarily embracing historically (and presently) maligned "minorities" by speech and policy. Such actions are progressive only in the sense they acknowledge we are one People, all entitled to political equality, and not entitled to exercise bigotry toward others.
We can’t leave out those whom justice demands participate. The Republicans want absolute power and want only theocrats and white males to be heard, and we won’t allow Jim Crow Part II.
True, as well as misogynoir. These days it seems like some men feel they have license to say the nastiest things they can about women and their abilities. My father is not a misogynist and he raised my brothers to respect women, and encouraged all of us to get educations.
Tom, you are one of the gems. The shining beacon for men who think all belong. Unfortunately, your compratiots are few and far between or too afraid to speak up. Please keep speaking for those who a voice.
Bill....I understand your dismay with the application questions. I would like to suggest that society has favored the white, male, business owner (actually the white male anything) for so long that it is trying to rectify a historical inequity. Is this the right way to do it? If I were a white male who was simply trying to make a living....whose existence didn't result in those inequities, I'd say no. If I am a minority who has suffered those inequities, which I am (female) I'd say...it's our turn for awhile. (In 1979 as a college educated white female with full time employment, I was still unable to secure a credit card without a man on the application)
Taking a deep dive and perhaps an inaccurate understanding of this tactic....I would say that it's intension is to simply help society ingrain the idea that women, people of color, people who are different from white men have something of value to offer and should be afforded the preference that white males have been given since the beginning of our nation.
I would also venture to say, when the dust settles and there truly is equality/equity in our nation, those application questions will be unnecessary.
My career in sales, which perfectly suited me, combining a high level understanding of complex chemistry without the requirement to be a bench drone, would have been impossible without a big financial change.
You see, to do the job I needed a credit card. And before 1980 I couldn't get one.
Susan, in my world everywhere and in my thinking and my approach, we are existing in a new day almost free of the inequities of the past. But I think you missed my bigger point and that is, a backlash has brought an evil to the fore. And all that we have achieved is in danger of going down the toilet. Yes I’m well off enough to pack up and return to Europe where more civilized people live. But I’d like to stay. I don’t have all the answers. I’m just reacting to a terrible disease permeating this land.
Therein lies the issue, Bill. We are not, on any level, free of inequities. In fact, they are rising up with the MAGA movement.
Please tell me how, losing my bodily autonomy and being told I can not make decisions regarding reproductive health is equitable. And then we can talk about unequal wages, glass ceilings, intimidation, rape, domestic violence, etc. And I don't even suffer the inequities that my neighbors of color and newly immigrated suffer.
Bill-you’re so right about the backlash. Civil rights legislation and Obama’s election caused panic that we’re living with today. The Cons want to preserve what was-not deal with what is or what can be a better nation if we live up to our stated ideals.
Sadly, there’s resistance to creating a more equitable social fabric, and those who have the means to do it are making a BIG NOISE to cloud the minds of those who don’t have the big picture in mind. It’s always been the way that very-very-privileged will pit the less privileged against each other, to keep them from seeing WHO is really eating their lunch.
That is who we are struggling against in this time — The Oligarchs, who have attached themselves to and taken over the Republican Party.
These days, it’s like saying that David and Goliath were evenly matched. Dems understand one thing better than Repubs. The “others” that you mention in your application are almost without exception knee-capped before they get to the starting gate. Poor, lower-class whites (of which I was one) are not. Those who do make it to the starting gate, still have institutional obstacles that are baked in to the system. I’ve seen it while making my way to a decent life. I can see why some think it is reverse discrimination. But I say, it’s way past time. Hope you get your application approved.
I’m not even sure I want to at this point. The bigger frustration is them not telling us if in fact there will be booths for lease. They are simply not communicating. It’s terrible.
I’m sure they are overwhelmed but if so, they should state this an assure those who applied that answers would be forthcoming. And I spent a lot f money having a web site designed exclusively for my book at the application demanded. You win some you lose some this is probably a loss. My good ole faithful Democratic Party.
They say history is prologue. They also say that that to ignore history is doomed to repeat it. What we are witnessing are the two. The ghost of Senator Smith is no doubt visiting us, her words are haunting. I wonder what today’s so called republicans would say if her words were reprinted without her name. I’m willing to bet they would assail the words as that of some Democrat socialist communist.
Senator Smith’s message is for all of us who want to resist the creeping fascism. If the Republicans weren’t the Trump Party, Trump’s felony conviction would cause the GQP to dump him like a hot potato, but they refuse to accept reality.
Yes, Kathy, Republican's should look at the lesson from Senator Smith. Undoubtedly her 1950 speech contributed to the success of the Republicans in getting Dwight Eisenhower elected two years later. He was a man of integrity who believed in the American consensus and temporarily saved the Republican party from their less honorable elements. It may not be too late for today's Republicans to find a similar alternative to their fascist felon nominee.
In 1989 a young woman decided to be a land surveyor and wanted to own her own business as the decidedly male profession wanted no part of “her” in “their” business. Fast forward 32 years. Her company has employed more than 200 individuals- raising families, paying mortgages, paying for school, contributing to the economy of our state/country.
Had this female surveyor not found support from our government with her MWBE classification she (in her words) “would never have grown to provide jobs for 200+ individuals.”
As importantly, she and her staff contributed to the creation/growth of the transportation and water and sanitation infrastructures you and I depend on pretty much every day of our lives.
The survey profession now has business owners from many minorities who contribute to our economy - due to the inclusive programs created by our government.
That woman was my boss for 16 of her 32 years. When she was ready to retire and pass the torch she found a buyer for her business that promised to continue on with jobs for us and contracts that keep us contributing to the success of our new firm.
PS. She left the MWBE program when her personal wealth, accumulated through her company, exceeded the program limits. After that she competed, and won, contracts based on her reputation.
I suspect the issue here is history and experience. I agree with Mr. Katz that the identity politics that infuse so much of the Democratic Party platform (I'm an Independent myself, and have been for all my voting life - a half century) can often seem overdone, and that at the fringes it is often either comically or almost insanely so. But I am also a WASP (if that term has any meaning anymore) and an ancient and American history teacher of 40 plus years. I know that as a white male of a certain religious persuasion, neither I nor anyone like me has any real historical and present experience with the kind of marginalization, disregard, disdain, and all too often legal, moral, and social persecution which has been inflicted on those who are not white males of a certain religious persuasion. If we had, I suspect that more of us might be more willing to understand why such groups, which together have included well more than half of our population might feel that they needed to be heard. If they are often loud and demanding, they have reasons to be which are essentially unknown to us. Mr. Katz wishes us more centered politically, and I agree with him. But as a historian, I also know that ancient and storied city on the Tiber was not constructed in one 24 hour period.
Is identity politics sometimes a gift to the Right? Yes, undoubtedly so. But even a white male of ancient years should understand that a strong lean toward exclusion is a far worse idea and far more dangerous to a democracy. Mr. Katz recognizes that as I do.
I suspect that there are a more than a few white males of ‘other’ religious persuasions who, at various points in our history might have disagreed with you at least in part. But I would concur in the general case.
I'm also aware that Plato was reacting to a series of catastrophes including the Spartan defeat of Athens, a result of what he believed to be an excess of democracy and its takeover by a series of demagogues - which led to the catastrophic Syracuse expedition, the Spartan victory, the tyranny of The Thirty, the democratic counterrevolution which followed, and finally the judicial murder of his mentor by those who didn't like to be reminded of their confusions and contradictions.
Athens did not have anything like our Constitution, so there were no safeguards built into their political or social structure to help prevent their takeover of the Delian Treasury for their own purposes, and their subsequent decent into empire building of a sorts themselves, which was the catalyst for the Peloponnesian League's assault and eventual victory.
There are parallels which we shouldn't ignore, but remember that the Athenian democracy was very different from ours. Theirs was the result of a series of experimentations leading to something like a pure democracy, which we are not, nor could practically ever be.
For so many years and many more cocooned in the white quiet interior of suburbia where I knew some of the outlines of a world fraught and miserable, then realized suburbia was definitely fraught and miserable as well, and why. You, Heather Cox Richardson, to my mind are
The great purveyor of truths and history, often unseen and if we are lucky, uncovered later by historians, the piece that has been carefully tucked away and dismissed. In this case Margaret Chase Smith, long before any man stepped up so boldly, spoke to the simple truth of manufactured hatred for the amoral class of profits above all, unrestricted siege, a war that obliterates all but rapacious grovelling towards power and money, a trampling of all values and peoples underneath its monstrous intentions. McCarthyism, the greasy oil slick of history.
Thank you so much Heather for that missing piece of all puzzles.
A good example of the "mistakes of Democrats" is NAFTA - enacted with little understanding of what would come after. Jobs gone. One company communities destroyed.
But that was the result of a president who was attempting to govern from the "center". If he had been a champion of the average working class American, he would have protected those jobs and walked a union picket line (like my favorite president did).
Is it "left wing" and radical to fight for the rights of all American families to have jobs, healthcare, equal education, housing even...??? All to include those who have been disenfranchised due to color, sexual preference...or just being a woman? The list in your application is an attempt to rectify centuries of bigotry and oppression. That's not extreme. That's an effort to re-center.
I think sometimes when we label ourselves and others, we immediately alienate. When you speak of the "center" I hear a myth. But when we dig into the facts and feelings of an issue, looking for fairness, I suspect we might heartily agree. We should all be treated equally.
I love moderation. I love compromise. I love when people work together to achieve a betterment of all. That sounds sort of "centerist", doesn't it? But the truth is that is what most lefty Democrats have been trying to do of late.
There is no longer a center in American politics. Republicans who try to tack that way are eliminated at the starting gate. Hutchinson, Hogan, etc. But Haley and McConnell want political survival - so they kiss the ring of a wannabe dictator.
So Bill, in principle, I admire your "centerism". That should be where the vast majority of Americans could live. But it is impossible now. The threat from the radical (fake) religious right is so overwhelmingly obvious, there is only one way for America to survive. Vote Blue, vote blue, vote blue. No matter who. Eliminate the fascist threat and the center we both love might re-emerge.
The center is retrievable when the "right" returns to some basic principles of honesty, integrity and respect for others. Until then, it is WAR.
Bill Astrom, just wanted to add something about our shared disdain for NAFTA. It didn’t start as Bill Clinton’s or the Democratic party’s bill. It was a long term Republican project that Clinton happened to sign onto at the end.
According to Wikipedia:
The impetus for a North American free trade zone began with U.S. president Ronald Reagan, who made the idea part of his 1980 presidential campaign. After the signing of the Canada–United States Free Trade Agreement in 1988, the administrations of U.S. president George H. W. Bush, Mexican President Carlos Salinas de Gortari, and Canadian prime minister Brian Mulroney agreed to negotiate what became NAFTA. Each submitted the agreement for ratification in their respective capitals in December 1992, but NAFTA faced significant opposition in both the United States and Canada. All three countries ratified NAFTA in 1993 after the addition of two side agreements, the North American Agreement on Labor Cooperation (NAALC) and the North American Agreement on Environmental Cooperation (NAAEC).
Bill, thank you for putting into words that which I could not. So many issues of today don't have a "center". How does one "somewhat" care about fairness, honesty & the welfare of others? One party (at least the elected representatives) is not interested in working together for the betterment of all.
Excellent commentary and you are 100% correct! Makes one wonder why people like Liz Cheney and Adam Kinzinger are now politically homeless? I also don’t give my party a pass either. We, the rank and file, should be more vocal and let the extremists who are trying to take over the party know, in no uncertain terms, that most Americans are in the center, and that while their actions may be well intentioned, the road to hell is paved with good intentions!
If only Mark Twain (Samuel Langhorne Clemens) were around, he’d see not much has changed, only the names and faces. He had some very pithy and scathing comments about policy and politics in his own era.
Bill…lots of food for thought here. My personal approach to many things is moderation. Perhaps some would call that “center.” Perhaps I lean center left, which I think speaks of moderation with a little progressive thought thrown in. I say that because I believe in progress and moving forward, not backwards. It’s complicated, eh?
I must say when you listed the questions on the application you seek, it was an eye opener for me. Not an exercise I have ever experienced. However, your point is valid and has left me wondering and full of questions. Have we indeed gone too far in our goals for fairness and equality for all? For certain, I believe in fair and equitable treatment but is it intrusive now? Why does the pharmacist need to list his pronouns under his name on his name tag? Is it anyone’s business? Is it necessary to know his pronouns are him and his in order to conduct a business transaction?
Like I said, your perspective has caused me pause and I don’t know how I feel about that right now. Something to think about…
Christine, that pharmacist’s pronouns aren’t listed for you, if you’re heteronormative. They’re listed to reassure non-heteronormative folks that that pharmacy is a safe place for them to obtain prescriptions. If we pause for a moment and consider how much our pharmacists know about our intimate lives, that tiny name tag is a powerful tool. Even I, a heteronormative woman, would take comfort from it.
KR (OH), thanks, I didn't know it was a signal of safety! Makes me think of all the good people who put symbols of safety around their homes or buildings to signal to slaves escaping north that they would be welcomed and could safely rest or eat there.
I’m mom to a trans kid, and it makes me more aware of and sensitive to these signals. I love your analogy to the Underground Railroad. Thank you for that!
Christine (Happy Valley, PA), I appreciate your humble and honest questioning as a way to process and arrive at your opinion. You wonder, "Have we indeed gone too far in our goals for fairness and equality for all?" May I add to your wondering, that perhaps the goal isn't the problem? Is it possible that the inevitable messiness, of finding the sweet spot (of the most respectful and devoid of anger or fear) strategy to get there, is the problem? When forging new frontiers, we humans make mistakes, even Star Trek's Captain Kirk did many times. Thanks for your openess, Christine. It's a quality much needed, particularly now.
Christine, there is a "thing" going on in the world of music and music programming from the biggest symphony orchestras to middle school band concerts (and all of us in between those two ends): Programming music by "marginalized" composers based on race and gender mostly, but also in programming more "modern" music (i.e. written in the 21st century). There is a LOT of backlash from a lot of people who (rightfully) list important "standards" of music written by exclusively white men are being "replaced" by music that is not standard, mostly because, other than one or two that I can name off hand because they were women or non-white, and had NO exposure at all until at least the mid 1930's. (Caveat: I have NO training or education in classical music, and my level as a performer is of the last chair tuba in an auditioned community band that I did not have to audition for because they needed a tuba player.)
It strikes me as very similar to what Mr. Katz postulates as "going off the diversity cliff." Are "underrepresented composers" worthy of programming, or do we default to what we've always done because it is what is familiar?
I am the virtual Mr. Katz not the real one as he seems to be disinclined to communicate with you at this point. But he says that you are entitled to your beliefs.
I appreciate your thoughtful writing here. History does seem to repeat itself and it seems even more dangerous now that the ugly insults and threats by T***p and his cult are magnified by far-and-not-so-far social media and news sites.
Bill, I, too, like to consider myself in the center, and in an ideal world, more of us perhaps would be.
But I view political and social progress as a pendulum -- each swing left or right ultimately, inevitably, moves us forward. The political Left is trying to move us to equality in the social space, workplace and judicial system; democracy where voters are unencumbered and even encouraged to vote for a candidate of their choice; freedom of and from religion, from gun violence and to be and to love whom they want to; economic fairness; access to basic health care, etc. -- in other words, basic human rights, while the political Right is moving us to anti-democracy, social stratification, a disregard for science leading to further climate catastrophe and reemergences of once-controlled disease: in essence, a repudiation of those human rights.
It's hard to be in the middle when one side believes the only way to succeed is to quash the rights of the other.
Or, to put a finer point on it, the the Right seeks to stop the pendulum and thus the clock at its extreme righthand position; the values the Left hold are those the majority of US citizens favor. Isn't that, then, the center?
Good response and I don’t refute this. Again I brought up the titanic shift that occurred from the 1960s and realignment of political parties. To suggest that poor white working class were and are privileged and therefore have had no legitimate complaint is naive at best. I was vending at a local park fair today mostly hyping my book critical of Trump. A older white woman expressed support for him in light of my repeated attempts to dissuade her. Multiply her by 80 million and we possibly have the end of American democracy. She obviously feels left out even as a member of the privileged class, that’s a mighty strange place to be. You don’t want to leave people out and expect them to be supportive.
I’m just trying to explain what has happened and to try and propose remedies. It’s evident that the worst political monster could become their hero which is something to behold.
There is some truth in what you say. But I'm not sure you represent Democrats fairly. It IS the moderate party with some notable (and legitimate) exceptions.
Democrats demonstrated this once again in voting for border legislation, which was torpedoed by the very people who demanded it! Both-sidism ain't gonna cut it these days.
You give Nixon too much credit. The movement to protect the environment started in 1959 and created several agencies to address protection. Nixon did consolidate parts in USDA and other agencies, he was a good bureaucrat.
I agree that the emphasis on minority rights, like gender issues, has too great an emphasis in the modern Democratic agenda. This often happens when an abused minority finally gets recognition. I think it needs to fade, and it will as it loses novelty.
But no one can be "middle of the road" when one party embraces Christian nationalism, fascism and the relegation of women to handmaids.
The hilarity, Betsy, comes from the evident insanity in repetition.
Remember, too, these are all "educated" people. Yes, they are dangerous. Mortally so.
It is, as in my last line, a "death trip of the linear, binary, categorical, chronological." That is, these vulgar, trapped in their repetitions, exhibit all of the conceits baked into today's, modern education -- as measured by the standardized testing which only enshrines "the linear, binary, categorical, chronological."
Those four adjectives cover not just the values such as they are now in U.S. education, but in most countries of the world where the avatars of commerce have excluded, killed off, scorned, cheapened, demeaned, trivialized all our humanities.
It's deadly. Pathetic as in having Netanyahu on one side, Hamas on the other. Not funny.
But really, Betsy, isn't there something insanely hilarious in having so many, many, many putatively educated people so stuck in repetition? Something black humor mad in all our schools so totally in thrall to the dehumanized?
Please also see Diane Ravitch's "The Language Police." And then tell me, honestly, if I err, or she errs, in seeing and stating the deliberate limits and purposes of all the world's standardized testing.
Alright Phil, do not forget how our educational system was dumbed down, expressly to prevent educated quetions and resistance to the Republican business/ "Defense" machine.
This is a comment I made to a friend on Robert Reich's post last night, dealing with this subject :
Well .........., you know Ronnie was a face, cultvated by the largest "defence" contractor in the world, G.E. to be the calming voice that could sell the masses their program of Supply Side and the wisdom of the Arms Race. He hosted General Electric Theater and was trusted with the lies of the MIC to get elected as California Governor who railed against the Free Speach Movement and the anti war movement. He appointed Max Raferty as the Superintendent of Public instruction expressly to dumb down the finest educational sysytem in the world to stop producing graduates who would question the wisdom of right wing and defence authority. That carried him to the White House, from which he introduced us all to Roger Ailes and Rupert Murdoch. The propaganda machine was born and guess what? The population coming up was so ignorant that they accepted it all and did not ask questions. And everybody loved him. Adored that lovable old man . Gee whiz. They stuck it up our collective keester, sho nuff. The Orange blob is their new face and the masses of those who need to follow are riled up enough this time to maybe pull it off, if we let them. Dumbing down education was a very effective weapon.
We should not have needed Michael Cohen to tell us on MSNBC that his former boss is not just capable of selling the entire security of the United States to the highest bidder but likely to do so. If he hasn't already sold plenty. Apart from what was left lying around for all comers to find... That's self-service for you...
And, regardless of their intentions, those who serve DT and MAGA, including judges and Justices, risk serving interests no sane American would wish to be seen dead with.
This gross failure on the part of the country's security services to vet candidates for the highest offices in the country is more than a hole in the bucket.
There's no bucket.
No security left.
And there's good cause to think DT was primed by Vladimir Putin both before he launched his bid to become President of the United States... and after. If only because the pair have so much in common...
But isn’t it interesting that tfg exposed himself with his consuming lust for attention and power? He could have remained in his golden castle and continued to crime. But that wasn’t sufficient for him. By going public, he opened the door for his life to be examined. And here he is. He did it to himself.
People need to see the lifelong pattern of impunity, in its entirety.
And as for the many who admire a bandit for his chutzpah, they need to understand that they too will be his victims. Only a matter of time.
I still insist, very straightforward documentaries—newsreel material—showing the irresistible rise of Mussolini and Hitler will impress and delight the MAGA mob... until they reach the final chapter.
There are so few effective ways of showing people the truth they'd rather not see.
This is why self-education is key. I know much of what I learned was not in school, including the more distasteful and evil aspects of our history. I do not hate my country, but wish to rectify our wrongs to the fullest extent possible. I also don’t want us to become a fascist, plutocratic and theocratic hellhole. I myself am a religious believer, but I’m also a firm believer in separation of religion and state.
This saga has so many chapters, so many nefarious actors, so many naive clueless.
But the game plan was steady, from the Powell memo in 1971 through the growths of the Heritage Foundation, ALEC, the expansion of the Hoover Institution, and many more far-right foundations, all integrated with each other.
Maybe the saddest part: our best writers on American ed, for over four decades -- none saw any of this happening as it happened.
America didn't just dumb down. It coarsened. Cheapened. Deliberately damaged and abandoned the tens of millions whose jobs got offshored. All as part of the plan to neuter, silo, marginalize, group-set, limit schools to commercial logic only: all to put the rich on steroids, and in alliance with the world's worst dictatorial regimes.
American edumacation dumbed itself down in the name of "progress." Remember "Word Recognition" that created people unable to read when they came across a word they'd never seen? And "Whole Language" that said stick a kid next to a Great Book and he'll learn it by osmosis? The people who invented all the tools to destroy education all identified themselves as "liberal" and "progressive" and "inclusive." And in the 75 years since they wheeled out "Word Recognition," they created a country of dumbed-down illiterate morons.
It hurts, TCinLA., for me, further, for the analogies to our "best and brightest" pushing Nam.
They had all the same uber-rationalized charts, system-supply, weaponry, scientific exfoliants, personnel turnover, mechanized logistics, abstracted slogans, excellent delivery of body bags, nicely surrounding layers of concertina wire for logical clustering of U.S. troops and civilian "New Life Centers."
Nothing human about any of it.
Reminds me sadly, too, of why biology turned to molecular models primarily: life could be reduced to the logic of aggregation, accumulation -- so that illness could be isolated as events needing pills.
Great for Big Pharma -- as similar logic drove every corporate vulgarity.
yours, Phil B., U.S. Army Spec. 5 Viet translator-interpreter, Sept 2, 1969 -- 4 Apr '72.
I’m old but I missed that. I went to a country school and got a better education than I should have. No blacks or disabled but I knew they existed, but on the periphery. Abbott wants that back. I say piss on him and the army he commands.
I agree with you insofar as I think phonics is the best way to teach literacy, but even in my childhood I read books that exposed me to communities different from my own. There are also people with dyslexia who do need special help with learning.
Texas has gone one better. Abbott has a number one goal of destroying public education. His voucher goal is now assured after the recent primary. My very smart junior granddaughter hates school. Her teachers are quitting, the principal is quitting. No one wants to work for public schools here. The district has a good rep, but the evil has not only seeped in, it has crashed the gates. If this has happened in a good district, I hate to think of the others. Of course, in Fl, religious nuts are providing materials for teachers, and they are learning how to present these as we post.
My state of Ohio isn’t much better. The GQP gerrymandered the state, and much of the education money intended to fund public education goes to vouchers for private school. The public schools are still strapped, they put levies on the ballot and hard pressed taxpayers often vote them down. The Supreme Court of the United State didn’t do us any favors by making vouchers legal. Most voters don’t see the connection between funding vouchers and shortages of money for public schools.
A perfect recap of how Ronnie managed it. As a Californian who lived through his governorship in horror only to see the entire country elect him, it was frightening. I kept thinking have you learned nothing from our mess? Mental hospitals closed as the patients would surely just show up every day at clinics he never funded to get their meds (and we wonder why we have roaming homeless who talk to the sky?) As you said, the finest public education system in the country of which I was a very grateful product now a mess of "teach to the test." Going from Gov. Pat Brown to Ronnie was like going from FDR to Trump in terms of philosophy and accomplishments for our state.
My brother, sister in law and their children lived in a nice Orange County community, but due to Prop. 13, the schools had large class sizes. When my brother and his family moved to New Jersey, they found much smaller class sizes.
Phil, it would seem your four "conceits baked into today's, modern education...as measured by the standardized testing which only enshrines "the linear, binary, categorical, chronological" would be an apt description for what humans have struggled to unite with a broader perception of the world for millennia as described in exhaustive and remarkably literate detail by Ian McGilchrist in his monumental work "The Master And His Emissary" wherein he describes the battle between the left and right hemispheres of everyone's brains. Obviously, some are better at it than others...and a thorough-going and broad education likely makes a substantial contribution to better balancing those two viewpoints. Those are viewpoints which I would posit are not simply the products of that kind of education but rather products of the two halves of our brains. Both viewpoints are necessary for the best understanding of our world, balanced with and against each other with neither one in sole possession of "the truth."
What a sorry select those Deplorables . The List of Losers . The sorriest bunch of millionaires lauding over starving puppets who just want food on their table….SAD!
Billionaires too. Their greed is overwhelming and there is no end to it. They feel themselves entitled to buy our government, and all Citizens United did was to enable them to do it. The whole effort started with Buckley v. Valeo (the Buckley here was William F.’s elder brother James) and continued with First National Bank v. Bellotti. These decisions removed limits on campaign finance spending and allowed corporations broader rights to contribute to political campaigns, hence we saw the proliferation of political action committees in the early 1980s.
Thank you Kathy, how many knew this? I have to tell truths, this lesson insidiously crept up and slapped me as well as many with the obvious fact . Complacentcy. We average America people had taken the peace and tranquility hard fought for, for granted , along with expectations , and stopped paying attention.
So here we are.
A lot of ruckus ( more to come!) as desperation continues
/whispered might be failing ..and all stops pulled out. Then GUILTY, Oh my, double down tactics next step, deny, delay, destroy. Many HAVE ‘woke’ up cleverly given bad connotation ahead ..they’re cunning, clever, and caustic.
These formats provide people with the foundation laid, Project 2025 in the making revealed…oh they’ll not stop guaranteed . Divide,Conquer ,Comtrol. The playbook were written long ago.
We squelch it again 11/5/24 with a BLUE TSUNAMI VOTE💙 or within a VERY short period have to fight for the worlds freedom all over again. Knowledge is an advantage. Writers and these comments ( thanks to ALL the ‘Kathys’ ) info we’ve forgotten, perhaps never knew, but definitely need to get up to speed on. After we win there’s the next round , the next elections to get those complicit OUT, and bring others to trial for accessories to the crime …to accountability all the while cleaning up the sly/covert decimation of our rules of law, trust, the corruption, and plans to further control -such as the 2025 a manifesto in itself.
What if the voice threatening the jury and court officials is Fox News and their evil sisters? Fox is a propaganda machine for the irresponsible far right. Is Free Speech the right to lie?.
"Is Free Speech the right to lie?" Indeed. A good question. I believe America needs to look elsewhere to other democracies around the world and see how that issue is handled. I do not think we can look within - we have proven that we are not the shining light on a hill that we once were, or thought we were. Whatever the answer, a Fox News leading half the nation astray day after day, month after month, year after year even after absorbing multi-million dollar defamation lawsuits, is unsustainable. Gotta stop.
Free Speech is simply a Right to speak without the Government employing prior constraint. The exception being when harm may befall others such as crying Fire in a crowded theater. Or, in Trump’s case a “gag” order to preclude inducing harm to others.
As for lying, I offer the laws regarding slander and libel remain true. E. Jean Carroll’s successful defamation lawsuit against Trump are case in point. The Dominion lawsuit against Fox News are another. No law prevented either from their lies. However, law most certainly held them accountable.
What is unacceptable is the GOP’s effort to dismiss those laws when it is inconvenient to their arcane purpose.
Exactly! The lies have to be written up in leaflets and distributed via air drop, mail, social media...Truth can be agreed upon! The biggest lie is that "everybody lies".
Yes it is free speech. IMHO lying should have its legal limit, but where and/ or how, by what metric is that line drawn, that legal limit established? How do we bring to bear the lies, the rhetoric of violence cloaked in falsity’s without inflaming those who have come to believe them to be true? Perhaps Faux News having to publicly admit guilt in the Dominion civil lawsuit could have been one step.
As we saw in that settlement there was no requirement to admit guilt by faux news. Is it a requirement when found guilty by a jury? I’m not sure but consider a judge stating it a requirement at sentencing of someone found guilty.
Considering our current situation, I abhor the lying of tfg and that of his cronies in Congress. While I find all that extremely difficult to swallow a defendant cannot and should not be forced to (or have to) admit guilt. Why? Think of those found guilty, even serving time in jail, who later were found to be innocent and had their verdicts overturned. Should they have been forced to admit guilt (at sentencing?) for something they know they didn’t do? Forced to incriminate themselves?
We walk a fine line, a very fine line, when it comes to free speech. Is lying allowed? Yes it is, but where do we draw the line? It’s scary these days to see the impact incessant lying has had. It undoubtedly has exposed its peril on our Democracy, but limiting free speech could expose our Democracy to peril as well….. just look at any authoritarian dictatorship where free speech is not allowed.
I cringe every time I hear the lies coming out of the mouths of the GOP in support of tfg and in support of their desire for absolute power, in their pursuit to impose their “Christian values” on all of us. Do we persecute them now like Trump plans to persecute us if elected? If we did would we not be guilty of the same thing? Yes fight them tooth and nail, but in the process be careful we do not fall prey to that which they do. We are more than in between a rock and a hard place….
"As an American, I condemn a Republican Fascist just as much as I condemn a Democrat Communist. They are equally dangerous to you and me and to our country. As an American, I want to see our nation recapture the strength and unity it once had when we fought the enemy instead of ourselves."
- Margaret Chase Smith
Chase Smith was as staunchly antiCommunist as McCarthy (she urged that the US use nuclear weapons against the Soviet Union.) She disapproved McCarthy's tactics.
Senator Smith may have pushed back at the extremes of Senator Joe McCarthy after he replaced her on his committee with Richard Nixon, but she was front and center in the purging of homosexuals from government employment, joining the Senate committee investigation ‘’Employment of Homosexuals and Other Sex Perverts in Government’’ - the so-called, ‘’Hoey Committee’’. It was an era of fear.
A fascinating account of the era is contained in this lengthy interview with Ruth Young Watt, Chief Clerk of the US Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, 1948-1979. She was born in Brooks, Maine.
It is. Just take a look at the introduction to Mrs. Watt’s interview for a sense of the scope of this oral history. Some may find it tedious, but to me it is very engaging first-person history.
McCarthy wasn't "anti-communist" till he saw the reaction he got in Wheeling. He was desperately looking for something to run for re-election on in 1952 (he got into the Senate as a defender of the Nazi Waffen-SS scum who killed Americans in the Malmedy Massacre, that they had been subject to "kangaroo justice" in their war crimes trials that gave them death sentences.) McCarthy's other idea of a cause to run on was to come out for a massive increase in construction of "affordable housing" - yes! That's true!
"McCarthy's other idea of a cause to run on was to come out for a massive increase in construction of "affordable housing" - yes! That's true!"
After WW2, as with after WW1, there was a certain amount of How Ya Gonna Keep 'em Down on the Farm (After They've Seen Paree?)* But added to the fear of the cosmopolitan was a fear of Communism - of GI's getting ideas. (As GI Joe sez: Knowing is half the battle.) So real estate developers came running to Uncle Sam: give us government funding to build suburbs - and the commute and home ownership will keep Vets too busy to become politically engaged. Actually the developers double dipped. They got government benefits for building and got GI Bill funds when they sold to Vets. These suburbs were planned as lily-white. Black Vets were denied GI Bill benefits for housing (and education, the cornerstones of intergenerational wealth.) And the suburbs were red lined.
Those federal real estate subsidies and benefits all quite deliberately excluded any funding for inner city renovation.
Add to this the post-1956 fact of federal subsidies for construction of freeways, whose planners again quite deliberately mapped out the literal cutting-up and destruction of inner-city ethnic communities -- always beginning with destroying black communities first.
Also, lin -- thank you for the two links to two different covers of a great song.
The placement of freeways and finally trying to deal with that in restoring communities is a major part of the transportation revisions and urban development revisions that the Biden Administration is doing - the first time ever by the federal government.
YES! I was so heartened to read that the nuns said, “This is NOT the attitude we championed when we created our school!” Good for them! Ten times over.
Thank you, Betsy. That needed to be said, because what has happened in the past eight years has not a sliver off hilarity. The current threat to our country is real, and while most of the perpetrators are buffoons, they still threaten our country and all of us. With all of our warts still visible from our past, we must work to make our country a better, more inclusive place, and refuse to tolerate the Trumps, MAGA Republicans, Alitos, Thomases and others who threaten what we hold dear. We must work diligently to eradicate intolerance and the folly that surrounds all of us, or we can expect that the end result will resemble Putin's Russia or the more refined, but no less dangerous, Viktor Orban's Hungary.
It’s not ‘hilarious’ watching the MAGA ‘’goonies ‘ - they are a dangerous & haphazard group - not to be laughed at. These people are nuts & not to be taken lightly.
Your prose is all nicely put, yet the nuttiness is out here -
Phil, you can add Mike Johnson to that list as he is a disgrace! They all might end up like Michael Cohen in jail if they aren't careful. Fortunately, he took responsibility and learned a lot! I wish him peace now as he stated on MSNBC recently!
His name comes immediately after "the eminently corrupt Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito."
I call the speaker of the House Howdy Doody, out of contempt for his pious posturing combined with his version of "Christianity" happy with pussy grabbing, raping women, a fraud university, support for the world's worst dictators, mocking the disabled, inciting violence, leading an insurrection, multiple instances of racism, thousands of blatant lies, and many, many more frauds, grifts, cons.
I've known people, Lisa, genuinely trying to be decent. This speaker of the House supports behavior far, far from what I know from the Gospels.
Or Christianists, or christians [lower case], or so-called Christians. Someone here or “there” online calls them Fundamentalists: the same destructive effect on any religion.
I wonder if anyone born after 1990 knows who or what Howdy Doody is? The name applied to Mike Johnston in apt. It's actually comical.(https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Howdy_Doody)
It’s gone WAAAY past ‘being careful’ their dies were cast in cement long ago.
I’d underscore their time is short before indictment, the list is long (and well known) as their sentences before the judges should be too. This is no ‘witch hunt’ it’s criminal behavior and breaking law called ACCESSORY TO THE FACTS ( ie COMPLICIT).
How many BLUE BALLOTS will it take to say that loudly ..enough for warrants and end in guilty verdicts?
Let’s get to it folks…we made that mistake before with Nixon..this time best be leaving no doubt.
Also add to it. For instance, another commenter here corrected me when originally I'd written Comey, but meant Comer. Checking that error, I also saw that I'd neglected to mention J. D. Vance as the eminent moneyed filth and dehumanized suck-up he is also.
Thanks. We are privileged to have these facts to utilize , to gain knowledge of who the culprits are. And doubly noted when people ADMIT their errors and correct them , shows how good leadership is defined. Thanks again Phil.
We are hopeful piece by post by commentary to see the BIG PICTURE even more clearly . We are in the mess because ..WE DIDNT.
I am so grateful to Heather , the long list of eloquent writers I subscribe to and read for free. While many are swimming as hard as they can to keep their heads above water we have to work a little harder to assist them and make bold fact rise above their DIN!
Phil, While I deeply appreciate you powerfully and elegantly detailing the widespread moral and cultural decay that threatens to engulf and destroy all of us, I noted a missing piece from your comment: the huge number of people in this country (and I expect elsewhere) who pretty much have given up on a promise and think that the easy promises of a dictator will solve most everything. Further down in today’s comments, I discuss in some detail this perhaps greatest of threats.
Only further testament to the BLUE TSUNAMI needed, but an excellent point needing boldly stated thru the next 6-8 elections.
Thanks Barbara!
And I emphasize -we NEED to hold OUR future elected to high levels of accountability..No. Impropriety. Allowed.
Anyone being chosen or voted into these highly esteemed positions NO ONE off the hook . Truth and Accountability is paramount. That includes their spouses!
There are a huge number of people who have missed the bus when it comes to prosperity, there are a lot of reasons for this, some of us are born lucky, many not so, some of us grabbed whatever education offered us, others chose to reject education or at least stop it at a certain point. Work ethics have always played a part in a path to success, while your ethics don’t guarantee success, if you don’t have any their lack will certainly diminish your odds for success. Change is a constant, and the ability to adapt to change increases a person’s chance for success. Willfully choosing to limit one’s opportunities is a handicap that the maggot crowd seems to have in common, so now they are angry that the prosperity bus has left without them, that bus has moved on with the winds of change and is not coming back. So I get their anger, what I don’t get is their antipathy to Joe Biden, and his desire to improve the lot of all working men and women, including those without college degrees.
Ok Phil, can’t argue with one well chosen word. I would add that they are soulless. Look into the dead eyes of chump and they are all the same bottomless pits of evil and I don’t say that lightly. And, I would wager that the damage was done before they ever hit a school yard and were drilled on “teaching to the test.” And some, like Clarence Thomas, just had his nose pressed to the glass, wanting in by any means possible. Maybe “humanities” could have softened a few, but they, and many more in this country and the world, lack something that emanates from within, empathy for others and generosity of soul.
I see how Hitler had his propagandist's, chiefly Goebbels, who not only took dictation of Hilter's Mein Kampf, but also spun whatever Hitler did into lies to placate the German people. That is what the MAGAs are doing now. They are trying to make up lies that make the unpalatable acceptable. We have a candidate who is a convicted criminal running for office, and none of them can say The Emperor is wearing no clothing. We have a Supreme court prized to hand the election to Trump, and they are establishing that they will not follow the law because we did not have a real solution for them going rogue.
In fact, the entire Fox entertainment cohort is all-in for Trump. Consequently, and almost by definition, it means that both truth and an interest in the survival of America's democracy have been sacrificed for the very short term goals of money, influence, and power. Trump is not in love with the truth either. They're made for each other.
But only one is in public office now -- the one from the state with the giant Noah's Arc for the gawking, slack-jawed crowd (the one whose name Kathy nicely noted I'd gotten wrong on my first try).
Correct, Phil, but the ramifications of Comey's late-October "revelation" may end up costing us our democracy, for which there is a special place in Hell waiting for him.
I realized I'd left out the name of the investment predator and Trump sycophant, J. D. Vance. So have also used edit function to correct that lapse also on my part.
Unfortunately, Vance is one of my senators, and I can only pray and vote once for Sherrod Brown. I don’t want to see Bernie Moreno joining Vance in the senate.
Phil, while I wholeheartedly agree with your advocacy of recentering the humanities in education, I think your analysis lets the people you name (at least the Americans), and others of their ilk you don’t name, off the hook. As if they are helpless to stop acting as they do, just because they aren’t sufficiently schooled in humanities. There are plenty of people who are products of that same educational system who do not behave so. We in this forum are mostly products of that system, and I find for the most part that we are a fine, well-educated group. The difference isn’t that they (and we) were taught humanities while those on the right were not, the difference is integrity, morality, and compassion, and their lack.
I love, KR, your expression, "The difference isn't . . . the difference is . . .."
So many differences, KR. My program for schools around the world to explore these differences, to learn better to see others as individuals in complicated, fraught, nuanced contexts, is called "Essaying Differences."
Senator Margaret Chase Smith was the commencement speaker at my graduation from Whittier College on June 12, 1965. Also there were Richard Nixon and Bob Hope. Among several admonitions that Senator Smith gave us students was the following: " It is far more important for you and me to understand each other--'than for us to agree with each other. For really we cannot truly agree or disagree unless we accurately understand each other-and unless we know what each believes and feels on a particular matter."
Senator Smith went on to say: "I think most of us think of the word "Christian" in perhaps a wider, even if erroneous, meaning than in its very specific meaning as the doctrine of Jesus Christ. I believe most of us think of the word "Christian" as denoting kindness, as living by the Golden Rule of doing unto others as you would have them do unto you, and as being civilized human beings dedicated to the dignity of man."
Thank you….. thank you, you have put my feelings on paper for me to see and to digest. It seems so simple to have learned from our history. And yet, here again we find ourselves drowning in the vomit of the wildly corrupt.
Even after Smith talked so eloquently, McCarthy rambled on for 4 years. Please please America, use that sacred time on this planet to bring sanity back to our National conscience.
Phil, an excellent post to start my am read, coffee, and chocolate cookie. i had forgotten you call little Johnson Howdy Dowdy as he is most certainly a puppet. Unfortunately, we don't find one Margaret Chase Smith among them.....just so many bobbleheads.
Good morning, Michele. I am enjoying a bit of a "double dip" here today; I read the first couple hours of comments last night, and have come back with coffee (but sadly, no cookie and now I want one) to catch up on the comments!
Good morning, Ally. Sorry about the cookie. Yesterday was Saturday Market and we always visit our fav bakery first and have pecan rolls after we get home. Then the next day he has a scone and I have a cookie. They had small pies (raspberry?) which were the result of some mistake, so they made lemonade so to speak. Will try that tomorrow. I have smoked black cardamon and cocoa and spice (Burlap and Barrel spices) in my coffee. Hope you are enjoying maybe more than one cup.
As we fear the fall of the democracy of the United States let us remember that most of the countries you listed were either faux democracies, never democries, or were only democracies for a few years or decades. We are looking at 250 yrs of democracy that has become a better democracy since it's founding but today still struggles with the idea of equality and freedom, tested every few years and weakened most prominently by the actions of McCarthy, McConnell, Goldwater, and Trump, we have not crumbled. The autocrats and facists and christionists will crawl back under their rocks only to emerge when we are most complacent. They will do so again, and again, and again and they will be sent packing again, and again, and again. We are not a new democracy like the Russians, Indians, Turks, or Israels have. Our democracy will not be so easily snuffed out.
Yes! Susan Collins wrapping herself in the mantle of Margaret Chase Smith is like Donald Trump wrapping himself in the American flag.
Collins has made some brave votes But mostly, McConnell has let Collins make some independent votes - when they were not going to change the outcome. Unlike Chase Smith who voted for every Civil Rights bill, Collins has caved to the GOP's embrace of States Rights rhetoric to oppose civil rights protections, especially for voters.
In my campaigning, I've found that many Maine voters are on autopilot when it comes to Collins. McConnell helps her roll in the pork barrels at election time and they don't pay attention to her votes.
Lin, to me I will forever associate her with the phrase “I am very concerned”….and then crickets….kinda like Shakespeare: “Life's but a walking shadow; a poor player, that struts and frets his hour upon the stage, and then is heard no more: it is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.”
Barbara, I liked your comment so much. I hardly ever read Shakespeare, but your quote, which I found out was written for a disconsolate Macbeth, was so appropriate as a metaphor for the career of Sen. Collins. Her own actions have rendered it meaningless. The same can be said for many other Republican politicians. I liked, too, the unpretentious, casual way in which you introduced the quote while knowing well, I suspect, that it is so profound it was likely to set off an explosion of reflections in your reader’s minds. It did, even in my unimaginative one. Thanks!
Collins seems to have forgotten the promise she made in her first Senate campaign, that she believed two terms in the Senate were good for everyone and she wouldn't run for a third term. She's like all "moderates" - full of shit. She talks her bullshit talk, and then votes for every shit bill Republicans propose.
Well that is a sweeping and unsupported condemnation.
Maine CD2's Rep. Jared Golden is probably the most centrist Democrat in the House. As a progressive he continuously tests my Vote Blue No Matter Who. But - he contributes to the number of Democrats in the House and when we have a majority he amplifies more progressive voices. Also there are issues on which he is in line with the Democratic agenda. And - Golden represents a district which went for Trump twice (despite our best efforts) and by a larger percentage than any other district which went for Trump but elected a Democratic representative.
I feel the same way about Jared Golden. I wish he were more progressive, but as you've said, ME District 2 is very tricky. The area where we live on the coast is pretty liberal, but inland, if you drive on Route 2 through the towns from Newport to Skowhegan, you'll see lots of Trump signs.
TC, I disagree. I view too many "progressives" as dangerously willing to take destructive points of view in order to adhere to some ideological purity. It's harder yet more generally effective for a wider range of people and politicians to stay in the middle and compromise. Ideologically pure arguments are enticing and more entertaining, but they can be dangerous if implemented without compromise.
Susan Collins is a fraud and a hypocrite, genuflecting at the alter of Don the Con like all the other sycophants. I am shocked that a state that elects an Angus King continues to support her.
lin- You are so right. People remember the Susan Collins before McCarth,er, McConnell was speaker and how she used to collaborate and compromise with the Democrats.
She seems to actually admire McConnell and follows lockstep with him except when her vote doesn't make a difference.
And yes, Susan Collins's hero is Margaret Chase Smith and wants to be remembered as standing up for Americanism, but by making an ass out of herself defending Kavanaugh and her comments about the 2017 tax cut she has muddied her reputation to many Mainers and all Americans.
Perhaps you received the email from her, asking her to vote for Nikki Haley in the primary this year. And now Nikki turned on her supporters by giving her support to TFFG.
On numerous occasions, I have urged Senator Collins to become an Independent like our other Senator. -- Angus King. She has NEVER once responded to these emails even though she has responded to other emails on other topics.
She is a snake in the woods and hopefully Mainers will finally realize this.
February 2020: “I believe that the president has learned from this case,” she (Collins) told Norah O’Donnell of CBS News. “The president has been impeached. That’s a pretty big lesson.”
Sen. Collins is a fool, who was fooled and wants her constituents to be just like her.
Anyone with a ringside seat to Trump’s behavior, a member of Congress, who would claim that they were “fooled”, is one! (I’ll let the ambiguity of English grammar decide whether “one” refers to “ a fool” or “a member of Congress” or perhaps they’re equal.)
Colline did a lot of talking about how she cared about protecting Roe but ended up voting otherwise. Calling out Kavanaugh for lying was simply a piece of performative theater. She knew any Federalist Society approved nominee was doing away with Roe at the first opportunity. To be fair, the next nominee wouldn't have been any better, but she still tried to have it both ways.
If Mainers thought Susan was the reincarnation of Margaret, they sure must be disappointed, or else those who were alive then are all gone, so no one remembers.
Senator Flake (R-AZ) tried to do it in 2017. When he stood up to Trump, I suspect that other Senators -- like Messrs Sasse, Corker, Lankford et al. -- would gain the heart necessary to rally next his call for honor. Nope. Representatives Cheney and Kinzinger knew their fates by sitting and participating vigorously on the 06jan21 Committee.
Representative Cheney got primaried by the macho-mouthed epigone and Representative Kinzinger called it quits but continues fighting with his 'Country First' Movement. In the era of social media, I wonder how Senator Smith would have fared. Likely much the same as Mr Kinzinger and Ms Cheney. Democrats have already started showing their appreciation.
Yes....people have spoken up. But the MAGA crowd has no sense of decency and instead drag everyone down with them. Their voters CHOOSE to be represented by deplorables. They choose the circus as long as the media keeps devoting the majority of their coverage to awaiting Trump's next pronouncement the same way the press covered Joe McCarthy. Whoever speaks up and/or fact checks gets subsumed by the next "news" (entertainment) cycle. The public is clicking thru for their next dopamine hit. The media turned Trump from sideshow to center ring.
Actually, the RINOs are all that is left. Party of Lincoln? Give me a break. Advocates and protectors of a republic? Hell no. Almost everything they ever say is fake, except for their desire for total domination.
No. I was never part of that tribe. I'm what used to be called a centrist, which means I'm now a firm Democrat. (Because Independents are Republicans trying to disavow MAGA but still believing in trickle down economics and oligarchic control...as long as they are the oligarchs. ) And I'm a nobody with no clout.
At this point they would laugh and make fun of someone who would say something similar. They are a danger to all Americans. This is not going to end well. I'm old and tired and I'd like to see things start to change for the better.
I woke up this morning thinking about Joe McCarthy, decency, and American democracy. This may be the biggest assault on our form of government since that dark time. And yet, McCarthy was brought down, seemingly in an instant. Perhaps we can do the same in 2024.
I have the hope (and vision), Annabel, that like that jury of 12 who saw the evidence and rendered their verdict - in a New York minute - our country will do the same on Roevember 5, 2024.
Thanks, Lynell! Usually I have to wait until morning (and coffee) in order to get some sleep. After my day yesterday, I needed this. I'll post more on my day when I get done perusing the new comments this morning.
Corruption has spread much wider and deeper in ways that are without precedent. "Tailgunner Joe" got smacked down relatively early. The lies of Nixon/Reagan et al have festered for over four decades and being called with conviction (no pun intended) only in the 11th hour. Were gonna need a bigger soapbox.
But there have been so many lines crossed that most of us said would be his downfall, and they weren’t. We kept thinking even his peers would do something, and then they fell in line. What kind of Svengali hold is present here? I wish some investigative organization could discover his little black book if one exists. The flipping makes me also question a person’s ethics and wonder what kind of hold or promises are being made that are worse than their credibility or sense of honor.
One wonders how Margaret Chase Smith would fare in the current Republican party. Not well, I'd guess. Nor, I suppose, would Jacob Javits, or even John McCain. We only have to look at Liz Cheney's and Adam Kinzinger's fates to understand how far from honor and decency today's Republican party has strayed.
Not the one the Bible recorded. What would Jesus do? Not vote for Trump, that's for sure. Jesus was hard to rile, but I think greedy self-serving, and cruel Republicans would face some memorable reproval.
Agree that she would fare like Liz Cheney. In contrast to the era of McCarthyism, today's Gangster Operating Politicos lack both Snow white and a single dwarf.
Liz Cheney and Adam Kinzinger and their GOP supporters were voted out or declined to run. The red tsunami predicted against Dems has instead “primaried” all the McCain Republicans out of office.
If you listen to Decoding Fox News on Substack, you’ll see why. The Right Wing’s Trumpet drowns out all sanity and heaps praise on today’s nefarious “McCarthys” whose fire and brimstone belligerence makes better television.
And it’s not JUST right wing news. I wear a Biden Shirt on every Grocery Run in Florida and have been blown away by the response: zero negative comments. I talked with a CBS News producer about my experience. She kept probing for conflicts or threats from shoppers in MAGA gear. None! I chimed. And that was the end of her interest in the story.
Consider the phrase that turned the tide on McCarthy
“Have you no sense of decency…?”
A sense of decency… THAT should be the bar for anyone who runs for office.
If the skewed news coverage inspires you, join me Grocery Shopping in Biden Gear on every grocery run til 11/5. Union Made t-shirts available at DemsMakeLifeBetter.Org and BeantownStrong.Org
Agreed that decency is part of what makes life worth living. Predatory autocracies make life hell. Strange that so many over so many centuries, have been beguiled by it. When enough people have had quite enough, the tyrant falls, with bloodshed or without.
We have a right to demand decency of one another to a responsibility to practice it ourselves.
That's a bittersweet letter. That such a woman should have, in the end, gone to waste because of the same mindset that we're now seeing. “I do not want to see the Republican party ride to political victory on the Four Horsemen of Calumny—Fear, Ignorance, Bigotry, and Smear.” That spells FIBS, by the way.
And promptly, too. Whiny little raised-eyebrows voice, on the BBC Radio news this morning: "Well, I don't think the American people will stand for it. I don't think they will." It's 'Stand back and stand ready" in other words.
Eric Prince’s BLACKWATER was used by Putin as a model for Russia’s Wagner (Mercenary/Paramilitary) Expeditionary Army.
Eric Princes sister, former Trump’s Education Secretary, is married to Amway Founder Dick Devos. Amway has a billion+ business in Russia. After sanctions placed on Russia, Putin made it illegal to take $ out of Russia. The Devos’s billions are locked inside Russia. FSB last year or so raided the Moscow Amway HQ offices. Just one example of the too cozy relationships with conservative Western billionaires and the Putin regime.
Former Commerce Sec Wilbur Ross owns a shipping company with Russian Oligarghs. Wilbur also was a board member of the Bank of Cyprus, a known vehicle for Russian money laundering.
Pre 2016, Robert Mueller warned us of this and other convoluted relationships infecting the western rule of law based financial system by kleptocrats, authoritarians, gangsters/mafia/paramilitaries.
It is actually 6 posts up from this one if you scroll up just a bit:
"Senator Flake (R-AZ) tried to do it in 2017. When he stood up to Trump, I suspect that other Senators -- like Messrs Sasse, Corker, Lankford et al. -- would gain the heart necessary to rally next his call for honor. Nope. Representatives Cheney and Kinzinger knew their fates by sitting and participating vigorously on the 06jan21 Committee.
Representative Cheney got primaried by the macho-mouthed epigone and Representative Kinzinger called it quits but continues fighting with his 'Country First' Movement. In the era of social media, I wonder how Senator Smith would have fared. Likely much the same as Mr Kinzinger and Ms Cheney. Democrats have already started showing their appreciation."
I can find previous posts by using a search function, but it get annoying when there are many "see more" pages. There is no global search function. I give Substack a C- for usability. It's minimalist and it works, but there are many useful functions it lacks, without cluttering it with bells and whistles. It would help, for example, to label which person is responding to which person with out tracing a spiders web of connecting lines that become extended. It's not rocket science.
We need more people, especially women, now like Margaret Chase Smith. They are all cowards now and better be careful! They are on the wrong side of history (herstory) and we will show them Roevember 5! My birthday is November 7 and I want the present I received in 2020 as they announced that Biden won on this day!
We have such women in the Squad, Katie Porter, Cori Bush, Jasmine Crockett. All Democrats and all have to fight the Dem establishment to hold on to their seats unfortunately as the power brokers in the party don't seem to like outspoken women who are left of themselves. Look how they supported Cuellar (who has voted with Republicans more than any other Dem) over Jessica Cisneros. We have work to do in our party as well if we really want to stand up for people over corporations and big money.
The Democratic Party organization needs to be more democratic in nature than it has in the past. I think that's how so much crap managed to slip by them as the Party of Lincoln., or at least the Party of Eisenhower, morphed into the Party of Trump. Irrespective of whether Humphrey was the ideal candidate, the party's handling of the nomination was diplomatically disastrous. I urged my friends to vote against tricky Dick, but a number of them sat it out out of spite. I saw the same heavy handedness in 2016, and bad feeling that was didn't help at all. I think that under Biden, the party is doing better in that respect.
I was raised in a home where the mention of the N word, meaning Nixon, would send my mother frothing at the mouth. She was once almost strangled by a southern friend arguing politics. My dad had to pull him off. Needless to say, politics was taken seriously at home. Mother wouldn’t have survived the election of T.
Hey Lisa - my birthday is also November 7th and I wish for the same thing- a landslide Blue Vote throughout the country. We citizens must put a stop to this madness.
Paraphrasing renowned historian Ken Burns, we are on the cusp of someplace we’ve never been before in our history in which there are a huge number of people in this country who pretty much have given up on a promise and think that the easy promises of a dictator will solve most everything. As we all know, it will make things worse.
For folks who might think despotism is going to stop with deporting 15 million immigrants or going after political enemies, we know better. We know it doesn’t end anywhere. Hence, it’s our job to wake up those asleep to the reality that there literally is no choice in November—none. We either have the continuation of the United States of America or we don’t. Which do we want?
Ally, Thank you for writing. While I would note, at least in the short-term, I have given up on hardcore MAGA, I still believe, aside from the lists dispensed for postcarding, text- and phone-banking, and the like, we still have a shot with the substantial number who are “soft” on Trump.
Ally, For what it’s worth, I take great effort to drive home what it would mean to lose our democracy and how our way of life would change. Trump already has stated he would enact the Insurrection Act on Day 1 of his presidency. He’s already spoken about rounding up his political enemies. In a word, we can’t relent on prevailing upon people, whatever their concerns about Biden, to imagine what America would look like were the President to start moving the military around to put down our voices, our right to protest policy with which we disagree, perhaps indefinitely detaining us. This is not without precedent. Trump had wanted to criminalize protesters around Black Lives Matter for the murder of George Floyd.
Given the hour EDT, I’ve barely touched upon rights and freedoms that would be ripped away, nor have I mentioned women losing control of their bodies, nor what it would mean were we unable to depend on an independent judiciary (we’re already starting to see what that would look like), or depend on the rule of law, or an independent Justice department, or an independent Federal Communications Commission—all things Trump has said he would do, and I’m just getting started.
Ultimately, we have 5 months to urge so-called persuadable voters before the General to listen to the things Trump says and the people he admires. No one should doubt that whatever freedoms we have in this country, whatever one likes about this country, dramatically would change.
Everything the current "Republican" party says and does contrasts sharply with values we have been taught to admire for decades. It's had to know which examples to prioritize, but the underhandedness that makes them powerful is surely also where they are vulnerable. They prosper on lies so we have to be careful to dispense the truth, so far as we are able, but also move like a skilled prosecutor to "truth" them into a corner, and identify the legitimate issues that pack a gut punch.
Barbara, thank you. I got told yesterday after I made a snarky post on what (retired LCSO command staff) said, which was basically "If you hate one man that much you might be part of the problem." And I replied with "Why do y’all hate him so much then? Oh, my bad. You’re not talking about the current president. You’re talking about the one who calls me vermin and wants to take away my rights. Got it."
Said retired command guy didn't comment, but my former sergeant did. I got mansplained as to how I was wrong, that fpotus was a staunch supporter of LGBT rights, and that he never called us vermin. I replied about white Christian Nationalism being stuffed down my throat and the quote that he had called democrats and Biden supporters as "vermin". I then asked if he had heard of Project 2025, he said he'd read it and that it was unconstitutional.
He then went on a tirade about how unfair and unconstitutional the NYC trial was, because his wife (a lawyer 30+ years ago) pointed out some federal laws that she believes were violated. I asked him for his news and information sources. Crickets at of 0600 PDT today.
It's hard to argue with people who have been convinced to support and never question some proposition at any cost and whose peer group status demands that they do so. That ain't liberty. Maybe video of some of Trumps greatest meltdowns would affect some. What a crybaby!
If it all doesn't go to hell in a handbasket, I think a significant number of of MAGA's may fall out of love with Dear Dictator, even if they don't go Democrat. At least that may be the case if reasonable sanity rules. For the moment I am hoping that some of those who are not paying enough attention to politic will see enough compare and contrast to see the danger, and make the wiser move. I keep saying this, but I think it is important to frame voting as a personal share of responsibility for future outcomes, for ourselves, for others, who may well be affected more than we ourselves, and for generations to come, more so than an expression of personal opinion, which is the pitch I tend to encounter; "Do you want a voice in the people's choice" said an old PSA. It not just about you. Democracy is not just about you, nor is self-governance, decency, and liberty and justice for all.
It didn't really fit with what I said in my original post, so here goes:
Yesterday was the day set for our annual "retiree shoot" whereupon honorably retired cops qualify to prove their marksmanship and receive a "concealed carry" card pursuant to a congressional act. This group was (by definition) all older than 50 years old, most of us over 60, and a fair number over 70. In casual conversation I learned that a number of guys (seriously, I was the only female retiree there, there was one female range officer there, and as I was leaving a retired officer from another agency was arriving) who were usually there but missing today had moved to other states (Arizona, Idaho, and Texas) all stating grandly because of "Oregon's politics). There were a LOT of sidebar conversations regarding the political climate today, ALL of them were MAGAt talking points. I did chat with one guy, of a similar political bent, for about 20 minutes down in the parking lot.
This skewed my attitude for most of the rest of the day, causing me to get irritated with a dear friend who could not understand my directions on how to get to our local community college where we were going so she could test out the electric assist motor she got on her Eliptigo. This set me up for an argument with my wife over stupid things like directions on leaving the parking lot (this is an incredibly rare occurrence, and was exacerbated by her being in a great deal of pain from a back problem that is defying all treatment options).
We managed to get around that, and I offered up two options for dinner, both involving the left over tri tip I smoked the day before. She said she "wasn't really hungry), so I went down to our music studio (spare bedroom) to practice. I was about 30 minutes in when I heard her race upstairs in extreme distress (and with a bad back, "race" is a generous term) and experience the disaster of what was most likely food poisoning from lunch. She does not EVER vomit (3rd time in 40+ years of knowing her) and it was an unpleasant experience (to say the least). I ended up dealing with the aftermath, which included a load of laundry and some other cleanup (I can deal with a lot of stuff; blood, brains, severed limbs, dead people/animals but adult human 💩 is my one trigger).
It was a day, and reading this post and doing some commenting was just what I needed to reset.
Dunno Ally. Your PTSD from that range experience might’ve caused you to attempt to poison your good friend. Glad to hear you were apparently unsuccessful.
" There were a LOT of sidebar conversations regarding the political climate today, ALL of them were MAGAt talking points. "
So few things in life match the ideal, but here we a talking about officers of the law, tasked with enforcing adherence to the law. And here is the Orange Orifice openly showing open contempt for the law in just about every respect. The poster child of lawlessness. And let's be frank, clearly guilty as charged, with the defense crying foul because the prosecution did not call up witnesses for the defense that the defense failed to call ??? Me, oh my, such a miscarriage of justice (snark,snark). What's wrong (really wrong) with this picture???
Thank you so much for this much-needed and greatly appreciated history lesson tonight. Wishing you a peaceful and restorative Sunday with those you love in an environment your cherish.
The conspiracy theorists insist that the convict has been able to blackmail most of his opposition in the GOP. That it seems is the only way to explain the unexplained. It is astonishing to see the same people who were in hiding, in fear on J6, now endorsing him as he awaits sentencing. How will future readers of our current history ever believe it?
I don’t think the conspiracy theorists are barking up the right tree. There is far too much information that the efforts of Leonard Leo and Project 2025 are EXACTLY what they want. That, and their perceived power in that “new order” is the only logical explanation.
Have you read Hitler’s book/speeches? “My New Order”
One would think that an American political party would at least change the words, plans, playbook, and thoughts of Hitler to disguise their goals just a wee bit… but they aren’t even hiding it anymore. The GOP is in full fascist bloom.
According to a 1990 Vanity Fair interview, Ivana Trump once told her lawyer Michael Kennedy that her husband, real-estate mogul Donald Trump, now a leading Republican presidential candidate, kept a book of Hitler's speeches near his bed.
"Last April, perhaps in a surge of Czech nationalism, Ivana Trump told her lawyer Michael Kennedy that from time to time her husband reads a book of Hitler's collected speeches, My New Order, which he keeps in a cabinet by his bed ... Hitler's speeches, from his earliest days up through the Phony War of 1939, reveal his extraordinary ability as a master propagandist," Marie Brenner wrote.
(...)
Trump then recalled, "Actually, it was my friend Marty Davis from Paramount who gave me a copy of 'Mein Kampf,' and he's a Jew."
Brenner added that Davis did acknowledge that he gave Trump a book about Hitler.
"But it was 'My New Order,' Hitler's speeches, not 'Mein Kampf,'" Davis reportedly said. "I thought he would find it interesting. I am his friend, but I'm not Jewish."
Power tends to corrupt and money is power. Monopolies of any form of power threatens liberty and justice. I though we had already learned that. That was at the very least strongly implied in my school books.
If only Trump were a drunk like Joe McCarthy. He would have self-destructed years ago. But this time is different. Republican corruption is staggering. They had the presidency for 4 years and are shooting for another 4. They have won dozens of seats in congress, and six seats on the Supreme Court. The billionaires are financing the takeover of the government, and their only motive is lower taxes and less regulation. They will commit any crime, any dishonesty, destroy any program to get what they want. Steve Bannon is braying like a banchee. People are listening to him. Phil Balla makes jokes about it all. It's not a joke.
Yeah James, McCarthy and 1950s GOPers 'keeping their head down' in silence compared to Trump and MAGAs is like the difference between heartburn and a heart attack.
We shouldn’t expect to win an argument with fascists. Winning a debate with reason is not their goal nor aim. Theirs is a different game. They win hearts and minds through force of will, threats of violence, pure passion void of rational thought. They understand only force. Took us awhile to learn that in the 30’s. And we paid the price in the 40’s. If the rule of law doesn’t put them in prison, if the courts don’t uphold the rule of law, if we don’t win enough of a majority, it will just keep spreading like a malignant cancer.
I think you have to tell the truth, which is what successful social movements do, but you have to keenly focus and and repeat incessantly (it works for big truths as well as big lies). It helps to box them in a corner, as Biden did to get Repub to pledge not to cut Social Security and as Joseph Welch did to outfox McCarthy.
No finish, James -- till a cornered Putin sees he's dying, and can push the button that most of the rest of us die either immediately, or in terrible, terrible post-nuke aftermath.
Possible. More likely he gets assassinated -- IF we and the European powers make it impossible for him to keep his economy and his war running. He is not the only cutthroat in his regime. His people are old hands at revolution, when the time comes, although that outcome is less likely because, unlike our citizens, they are not armed. Either Putin goes, or we do. I don't know which will occur first.
Would that the Big Mac effect had affected the right guy instead of the poor man who was trying to show how deleterious they are to our health. I keep waiting for his arteries to explode between his diet and all the hate.
Once again, some of the Republicans in the Senate are more interested in conspiracy theories than in doing the work that they were sent to do. Their manifesto was signed by Sens. Mike Lee (R-Utah), J.D. Vance (R-Ohio), Tommy Tuberville (R-Ala.), Eric Schmitt (R-Mo.), Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.), Rick Scott (R-Fla.), Roger Marshall (R-Kan.) and Marco Rubio (R-Fla.). If they are unwilling to do the work, we need to elect people who will.
Mary, & Everyone, I attended a digital meeting this Saturday morning organized by "Team Newsom" that is assembling a national effort to organize effectively for the November election using the robust digital Platform Discord which has numerous tools to build very large digital communities, share videos, access to massive storage, personal data safeguards with scaffolding nodes such as "Channels" & "Topics".
The Discord platform is scalable to accommodate bite size communication tasks to very large commitments such as "how to talk to voters" or participate in a focused 6 month effort to Vote Blue "Up & Down the Ballot & across the Country" I contacted one of the organizers today at: haysorganizing@gmail.com & will update the launch through June 2024.
I will continue to comment on LFAA & Civil Discourse & report on SCOTUS published opinions through this Term which are typically released on Thursdays & are available LIVE at SCOTUSblog.com after the "5 minute bell" rings at 9:55 am Eastern.
As Professor Vance says: "We are all in this Together."
After working as a poll worker assigned to an official (in charge of a precinct) who turned out to be a conspiracy nut and who kept asking ME questions, I decided I could perform an official’s job after all. Later I saw him on a current movie, “Bad Faith,” and had my worst impressions confirmed.
Never thought about the people I'll be working WITH! Here in corrupt Ohio, at least there are laws keeping the loonies a realistic distance from the voting locations ( 200 ft. from the entrances, I believe ), but no restrictions on keeping the loonies from being poll workers. Yikes!
There’s a common thread around the country but Ohio demonstrates it clearly. Counties that lost manufacturing jobs to China, never retooled, retrained, re-educated their citizens, lost hope, voted for Obama and hope, fell into opiod addiction, ( thanks Purdue Pharma and pharmaceutical lobby), lost their senses feeling forgotten,left vulnerable both economically and psychologically, fell for a hate and grievance spewing demagogue, & voted for him twice.
Yep. And here in Ohio at least, it began under Clinton, with NAFTA. So all the slack-jawed yokels saw DEM-O-CRATS as the guys that took their jobs, and have never come back, even when they KNOW they're voting against their own best interests. It's maddening!
I think it began as Nixon opened China as a trading partner. Then, under the Regan administration, factories began moving East. Clinton was just cozy with Corporations ( donor $) because to win, he said, “It’s the economy stupid.”
In my union profession, we had a "no strike" clause because we "performed essential community work". I guess without the statement that elected officials should do their jobs, our only recourse is to vote them out. I'm thinking that it is ridiculous (intentionally used here) to run for election on the promise that you'll "do the things" and then decide to fail to do the things you were elected to do.
My nephew is the union rep for his fire department in a red state. Most of his negotiating is done with Republicans he said. I'm not sure if he's been reelected as the rep yet or not.
Gary, if he’s been reelected, he might benefit from reading the book Taking the War Out of Our Words—it’s the best book I’ve found on how to get people to listen to your point of view.
The VP Auditions have begun. Little Marco Rubio exposed his and Florida’s Cuban immigrants vulnerability and fears of Castro’s purge and oppression in a false equivalence of TFG’s Conviction worthy of the history of a “Strongman” like Mussolini and Hitler ( themselves both convicted criminals).
Ted, when all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail. Somehow we need to give them the ability to see that the conviction by 12 ordinary citizens selected by Trump’s lawyers is the exact opposite of Castro’s imprisonment of political rivals.
I don’t think “we” can reach Rubio’s already radicalized Cuban Americans. Marco has chosen demagoguery/manipulation to activate his already traumatized immigrants from Cuba. We can only inoculate those that are undecided. That is where the effort, resources, and messaging should be aimed.
Yes, Margaret Chase Smith was then.
Now, just getting more and more hilarious watching the MAGA goonies.
Most comedic: how all fall after themselves in mindless repetitions. Not just the ridge runners, stump savages, and white trash such as Lauren Boebert, Paul Gosar, James Comer, Chip Roy, Tommy Tuberville, Louisiana’s John Kennedy, Josh Hawley, Jim Jordan, Lindsey Graham, Anna Luna, Andrew Clyde, Tim Scott, Marjorie Taylor Gazpacho.
Also the putative “leaders” such as the eminently corrupt Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito, the pious hypocrite House Speaker Howdy Doody, and cultists J. D. Vance, Susan Collins, Elise Stefanik, Ted Cruz, Marco Rubio, Steve Scalise, Nancy Mace, Nikki Haley.
I mention so many for one point: our “me, too,” “me, too,” “me, too” all black hole spiral because not a one has access to or awareness of any of the humanities that can keep us humanly decent.
The stupidity replicates. Behold our dictators, nationalists, autocrats, and murderers. Modi in India. Orban in Hungary. Erdogan in Turkey. Putin in Russia. Saudi royals. Netanyahu in Israel. Assad in Syria. Sisi in Egypt. The North Korean haircut king. The Chinese cadres. The ayatollahs in Iran. Their foot soldiers in Hamas, Hezbollah, and Houthi Yemen.
Guaranteed. Helplessly inevitable. Those with no humanities contort themselves into clichés, slogans, stereotypes, and repetitious conformities.
This parade of dunces, hilarious.
Their insurrections against democracies. Their murders of journalists and democratic opponents. Their forcing of women, gays, and others to Taliban molds. Their setting schools worldwide to one abstracted standardized testing death trip of the linear, binary, categorical, chronological. Not so funny.
"Hilarious," even in jest, does not apply to the MAGA folks who would like to turn our country in an autocratic cult. We must take seriously the folks who have been writing threatening e-mails and texts about the judge and the jury and the witnesses in Trump's trial. One or more of them will go too far and commit violence. Fear is not the answer, but continuing to speak out against lies and threats is our job. Being neither a Republican or a Catholic, I'm still happy to take not only Margaret Chase Smith as a role model, but also the Benedictine nuns who have been speaking out against Harrison Butker's claim that he spoke for all Catholics in his bigoted remarks.
A Beave New World Awaits
I need to say on the outset that my politics are neither left nor right. They are very center-focused. This may be a big disappointment to many democrats and many of you. It doesn’t prevent me from recognizing that Donald Trump is the culmination of everything politically pernicious in the country as he has cultivated worshipers like no other in modern times. I know that all life experience is a continuum and I wonder if a fully unbalanced, truly narcissistic (I know this word has been overused but it aptly describes him) begins as a spoiled brat who was emotionally pummeled by paternal influences (who isn’t) which gradually morphed into control, greed, a desire to constantly need to be in the center circle and with a dabble of political urges, finding support among his like-minded herd and reaching a pinnacle of pretension that veers on the ridiculous and dangerous; a coming of age of a Hitler-like persona. He is a dictator-in-waiting and he must be stopped, if I may use a line from Malcolm X, by whatever means necessary.
Since the New York State courts found Donald J. Trump guilty of all 34 counts, it comes as no great surprise that his cult following is calling for everything from civil and legal vengeance to open hostilities. There will be violence. That is already being written on the pending tombstone of American Democracy.
How could we have come to such madness and social/political dysfunctionalism? I firmly believe that democracy is a fragile system of government that requires at minimum, both sides to eventually reach consensus. The high court asserted that corporations couldn’t be denied of first amendment rights to dump as much money into political campaigns as they wish. This single act by a conservative court has seeded the monied class to buy Congress. This is nothing new but the voracity of uncompromising hate is.
On the left, the modern Democratic Party has sold itself to the idea of inclusion in word and deed with one exception; lower class working white communities. We are fed a continuous diet of diversity as if this nation were a caste system with untouchable classes at the bottom. No such thing exists today but we are almost force-fed this continual diet and the ultra right has taken this as a battle cry. This does not bid well for society as a whole.
This is my complaint with my democrats. An example; I have applied to be a vendor at the democratic national convention in Chicago. In the application, I have had to answer 1. If I am a minority-owned company, 2. If I am woman-owned, 3. If I am unionized, 4. If my company is LBGTQ owned. Not once did the application ask me if I was a single proprietor small business which I am. I’m really flabbergasted over this kind of questionnaire. I presume that those identifications will receive priority. And we wonder why our ever-so conservative MAGA pre-Nazi movement is gaining in popularity. It would normally be relegated to a fringe element in the body politic. This is one of the reasons. In my opinion, we have gone over the diversity cliff.
Keep in mind my opening remarks. My politics are center focused, neither extreme left nor extreme right.
When LBJ lost the Dixiecrats and the northern hangers-on after his long needed progressive civil rights legislation in the 1960s, Nixon took full advantage with his ‘Southern Strategy’ of white working class and won the White House. There was always a racial or racist undertow to this “Southern Strategy” movement. And in hindsight, Nixon was so much better at guiding the ship of state than our current choice on the right. Nixon created the Environmental Protection Agency on December 2, 1970 — dig that. But he also ruined LBJ’s Paris Peace Talks in order to get elected just like OrangeFatso commanded his MAGA lawmakers to kill border legislation.
If we can’t somehow move our politics back to the center, there is no hope to save our form of representative democracy as we have known it. I assert that both sides are at fault.
I too wear a badge of moderation when it comes to my politics. But as a woman, one of the so-called “protected” classes, I find that the need for those questions is greater now than when they first started showing up. While you have been able all of your life to start your own business, I was not given permission to own my own bank account without my husband’s name on it before the early 1980’s. I couldn’t get a house loan with my own money until the bank was satisfied my ex would promise, in writing, to keep up child support payments (1994). While I was married I couldn’t have been the only signatory then either -married or divorced, my husband owned my financial security. It was the mid-1980’s before a woman could even get financing for her own business without a man’s signature. I won’t even go into what was done to people of color to control their ability to compete in America’s “free market” before laws enforcing diversity fairness were enacted.
So as you might imagine, those of us hobbled at the beginning have a bit of catching up to do. And now, at this late juncture in my life, when I’m ready to start my own business to supplement my retirement, I hear of a bunch of aggrieved white men of power who want to remove my equality again because allowing women into the national conversation was “the beginning of all the trouble”. They actually plan to remove my right to vote! Of course they will remove diversity questions and take away my financial independence.
Acceding to DEI policies in these times may seem like a bit of an inconvenience to a white male entrepreneur who is already having to compete against the bigger, better-funded fish out there. But for those of us who were really beginning to feel accepted as equals, the policies, rules, and questions on applications are more necessary now than they have been since their inception. They are helping to keep us equal and competitive.
You hit one nail absolutely on the head, though. The people who have never had to ask another man to co-sign a business loan because their gender made them inherently less responsible, less worthy, are absolutely threatened and hacked off about diversity questions on applications. Which is exactly why right wing politicians are attacking protected classes with all the political power at their disposal. Feeding that resentment helps them stay elected. Pushing me out of the business world and back to the kitchen satisfies voting white male businessmen that they won’t ever have to worry about someone maybe less “qualified” doing a job a white guy could do “better”.
Sandy - as someone who after a divorce, had to ask my ex to co-sign a bank loan for a tractor (in order to mow grass). This was in the early 90s! I had NO credit whatsoever at that point.
So I agree - people who never had to ask because they were female and therefore less responsibly?
Yeah - I have NO problem with diversity questions. Its about dam time.....
sorry - less responsible!!
Maggie, you can edit your comment by tapping on the 3 dots and then "edit".
Maggie, maybe it will take women and non-white males standing together to really make a difference. White men have been in charge for so long, they don't know how to be just a human being; they need to be controlling everything around them even when they have no clue and should never be in charge. When we look at women's history or the history of Black Americans, it is clear that so much of it has been framed by white men creating and setting obstacles, letting one or two into the "inner circle" at a time so the men can still control everything. They wanted to seem decent human beings, you know, letting those inferior girls or boys in for a time until they don't bow and scrape properly to the white guys in charge. We will continue to do better no matter what the ruling white guys say.
I can tell you, a real quick antidote to this male "blindness" is to surround them with females who are much brighter. I got put into my place at about six years of age. I had a very bright mom and four sisters. The very sad fact is that I went further than they did professionally and academically because I was a white male. All along the way I kept encountering these absolutely brilliant females. They were white, too, but had the handicap of having two X chromosomes while I had a Y.
All true, Ruth - and we have far too many of those "ruling white guys" in our legislative and judicial branches of government!
Sandy--this and this this. All. Day. Long.. Thank you: white men who are feeling aggrieved have absolutely no idea how eye-rollingly dumb they sound to women, because even white women of privilege live on a knife edge of anxiety as a result of the original systemic bias--the one against vaginas by the ones with penises. I recently purchased a key chain fob from a fun little company called Get Bullish that says "After all human history men should be glad we only want equality and not payback." I'm getting to the point where I am rooting for payback. Those who claim some kind of "superiority" by virtue of the color of their skin and their dangly bits have no right to run anything, let alone seek world domination. Look at what they did to the rest of the world when they decided to interfere in it.
Linda, part of the problem is that males are raised to think that by being male, they are somehow superior. So often they are favored over their sisters, perpetuated not only by fathers, but also mothers. And they are really threatened by successful intelligent women. Just recently I had a chorus of mansplainers thinking they were too clever by half on a thread on Facebook. I ended blocking the one who had to have the last word and thought that rage and f bombs make for a convincing argument. My other observation is that some men are "liberated" intellectually, but not emotionally and frequently do and say dumb things.
Michele, as a white male born in the 50s, I firmly believe that I wasn't raised to be superior -- both parents instilled in me the duty to be good, to do good, and to treat others, particularly females, with respect and kindness, and to use my "power" to protect others when needed.
However, I certainly recognize the patriarchical power -- implicit or otherwise -- that society has given me, and I see it more and more each day.
I'll also own up to occasionally (especially in the past) fitting in with your last sentence, because males frequently do and say dumb things. My wife of nearly 48 years will attest to that.
Yep. And the "Not all white men" mansplaining also needs to stop. A good book about the ways in which this whole thing developed is by Donna Zuckerberg (yep--the dumbass FB founder's smarter sister), Not All Dead White Men: Classics and Misogyny in the Digital Age. I recommend it.
I had the great fortune as an only child (male) to be raised in the 1950s by a woman who broke all the glass ceilings, retiring as the highest “ranking” female executive in Macy’s history at the time. Although I’m not without “male flaws”, one flaw I don’t have is any sense that women aren’t as capable (and often more capable) as men. I see the progress made by women as a virtuous cycle, sucessful fulfilled women instilling in their male children a more egalitarian world view. It will take time—but the end state is inevitable.
Michele--and Doug who claims not to understand. Here is something that showcases to a T what I am talking about--and it could be repeated at EVERY university, in EVERY era (including now, a s I have a friend dealing with this subtle micro aggression by men who will with their dying breath claim to be feminists). Dolores Frese, “Individually, And On Behalf Of All Others Similarly Situated” Medieval Feminist Forum, 45.1 (2009): 93-113. Dolores was an internationally renowned author, literary historian, and critic whose husband is a judge. She recently died and, as the final indignity, the obit the University of Notre Dame, where she taught for decades, published MISSPELLED her name.
Here's the issue: if you don't publicly rebuke guys who are misbehaving in front of women or who speak about women with contempt in private. If you don't speak real truth to power. If your white male privilege is something you totally take for granted and you don't even think about the fact that you are a TINY minority in the world, with outsized levels of privilege, wealth, and access. If the fact that your bodily autonomy is something you take for granted and you don't think about the ways in which women's bodies are invaded and subjugated EVERY DAMN DAY. Then you're part of the problem not its solution. And yes: I have no patience left and no more f***s to give. I am old, tired, and pissed off. Happy Pride Month.
What you say is true, that the males are favored by their mothers over their sisters. At least that was the case for me, born in 1940. This is why DEI today is so important. We must break out of those values imbued by implicit bias. I had a sister two years younger than me: bright, beautiful, athletic. When I was in the army I sent a letter to my mom offering to send money to my sister for college. My mother never told my sister who married and had two children before ultimately getting her degree. When I found out about it and confronted my mother, she got frustrated and said that I didn't want my sister to marry the man she did. That was a lie. I simply wanted my sister to go to college.
Thank you Sandy. I was the plaintiff in a sexual harassment suit in the mid ‘80’s. While I prevailed in the settlement I was discouraged to go full bore by the threat of destruction of my reputation and livelihood. My harasser boss was demoted but continued to teach his Sunday school class and remained a deacon in his church. Yes, I too have little empathy with moans from the “poor white man” having to compete from his implicit position of power.
Sometimes the religious men are the worst when it comes to harassment and abuse. I don’t believe all or even most men are like that, but some of them engage in the very activities they condemn.
Kathy, I have noticed that about "religious" guys too. Hypocrisy can be a major factor in the lives of people in power, particularly when we can be convinced there is nothing behind the curtain.
A single proprietor small business can be owned by Charles Koch or any member of the Walton Family.
And one does not have to expect that historically DIS-enfranchised people would be now more privileged in their applications. But one could count whether or not they were being given a fair chance by whether they showed up in the list of those that succeeded.
Yeah, I know. It’s not perfect. But as a woman who was told many times in my youth that I didn’t need a fair wage because a man would support me, that I should shut up and let my husband keep me in line, whose mother struggled to care for her four children after she was widowed in the 1950s and SHE couldn’t get a decent-paying job or child care for her kids {and needed another male in the family to sign for her financial activities}, oh, the list goes on ….
I also agree that the lower-economic strata struggles, too.
Mmmmmmm, maybe that’s why we farther-Left types believe in a fair wage…for EVERYBODY. And NO gouging from the energy sector, driving up costs for people whose incomes barely cover roof and food. And a decent health care system that doesn’t exploit Americans with outrageous prices and insurance that controls doctors’ treatments ….
Oh, yea, the list goes on …
We all need a seat at the table, healthy food to eat, and good camaraderie to enjoy. We all have challenges to overcome to get there, but let’s help each other along the way.
True, and those who were silenced for so long especially have a right to be heard and their concerns heeded.
Thank you. You said it well.
I am not middle of the road. I am outraged at the white male proviledge.
Sandy, very nicely put as to what women have been up against since nearly forever. As I read, I was reminded of a religious tale (Buddhist?) of spirits running around having great time and then they awoke to genders and sex and all hell broke loose....sorta another Adam and Eve. In ancient Athens, women were never adults and always had to be controlled by some male. My mother-in-law was the first woman in Oregon to have a credit card in her own name at the local big department store in 1974 if I am remembering the date accurately. She worked and managed a toy store, so she was not exactly unused to handling money. We have put my name on some of our bills so I have a credit rating. The real corker for me was when I made a donation in my father's name to the local Elks scholarship as he had requested at his death. So, my name was first on the check, i signed it, and he was my father. When the thank you letter came, it was to my husband like i didn't exist. I had intended to make a yearly donation, but after that, no way. This was in the late 90s.
Michele, I believe I would have written back to those guys and told them what I thought about their ignorance and that I would not be contributing anything since to them, I was invisible. I don't take insults like that well and have at times made such letters of response. As a blind woman, I often get people talking to anyone who is near me, asking what I want. They don't know that it is I who am paying the bill. I don't get that as much say in the past decade or so but it is still there. Women, disabled people, and non-white males are often dismissed but we need to point it out every single time no matter how bad the people who do it feel. We are made to feel that often and maybe it will help them to see the pain they are inflicting even if they don't realize it. We should also mention their feelings related to our response, so they know they are not the only ones to feel that and that they are doing it to people often if they are not conscious of it.
I thought about writing back to them, but then decided as they were brother Elks in Indiana, that it wasn't worth my time. I would guess they were beyond help. I am sure your experience as a blind person has been illuminating as to how people behave and if I read your correctly, things have improved in the last decade, for which I am glad.
Sandy, I applaud your statement.
May I just add that I'm tired of people who are lucky, that is, advantaged far and above the rest of us by having been born to a family that was "comfortable", by having parents invested in our upbringing and schooling because they weren't working three jobs, by having family financial and emotional support to go to college and (in my case) law school, and yet claim what they actually believe, that they did it themselves. I'm lucky, but I'll never claim I did it on my own - we all use the roads, the utility grids, fire and police services, etc., etc., etc.
And we all have a duty to "give back" - it really takes a village, not solely to rear all the children, but to build and be that village.
On another note, what is your new business? I'm "retired" (hah!), but I was fortunate enough to buy the small apartment building I live in when I sold my business (it had been ours, but my husband died). Lucky, lucky, lucky.
I’m using my long career experience in software administration to write training docs and consult with customers on deployments, data integrity and user training. Low overhead, low startup costs, high hopes! Thanks for asking.
Well said, Sandy. (And for the record, I'm a white older male who, as I've said before, fully supports the notion that women should lead. While I had nothing to do with what form I took at conception, I can at least acknowledge the role people who look like me have caused in the world.
More power to you.
True, our individual existences are all matters of chance. I could just as easily have been born a raccoon, a tiger or a bear (three animals that I admire.) We share a whole lot of the same DNA. But, in human society in America, there is no question but that white males had/have the advantage over everyone else.
Agreed, but it's not just here, Richard. And it's males generally, but white males typically.
Sandy McClanahan, thanks for answering --- the why ---- those questions appear on the application. Your detailing of the injustices reminded those who know and taught those who didn't experience them, why we press the bounds of change.
Is is possible in any way to actually overcome discrimination of "oppressed classes" without getting a backlash from the "privileged"? Is it possible to "right wrongs" in such a way that most people say "okay, this needed doing". How to end a history of discrimination and not produce "reverse discrimination" fear and loathing?
I strongly suspect it's not possible. People want an outsized percentage of the pie, not a fair portion of pie.
This whole conversation is so good and respectful. How DO we move forward? Stirring up the hate and vengeance is newsy. The other is tedious, slow, hard work - not eye catching until it becomes clear the tension has eased and we begin to care that we all get a fair shake- the women & plenty of others who have trudged thro the muck and those more fortunate whose blinders have been removed. (I know that is too kindly stated lest I repeat all that has been said here …) it will take time & patience and courage. Let’s keep the respectful dialogue going. And acknowledge when you/we can do better for others and this world.
Yes-it’s so important that we talk about it with respect and resolve so we truly can “perfect our union” and demonstrate to the world that humanity can thrive on our “better angels”.
Yes
I hadn’t realized how much response I would receive. It’s been educational for me as well as I’ve read all the responses. I do though understand that an irrational poison has seeped into those who feel left out and that is the political enemy that we have created. Where it all ends is anyone’s guess.
And in my defense, I maintain that discrimination against women has largely diminished or ended. How far do we punch folks into the MAGA camp? I once couldn’t compete with a Black woman friend of mine because I’m neither Black or female. If I were more unbalanced than I already am,I would join the MAGAs in a heartbeat. I’m angry and I’m sorry that some of you think I’m a why-not-meism just like you are saying the same.
Sadly, agree, Katharine.
People who have been born into privilege grow up thinking “This is the way the world is.” As little kids, that’s what they learned, and they think it is somehow ordained to be that way. You make it a little more fair, and they DO feel like they’ve had something that “belonged” to them taken away.
It’s tough to get them to recognize, let alone accept, that they never had an unassailable right to their privilege —AT THE EXPENSE OF OTHER PEOPLE — in the first place.
It’s understandable that people might feel that way at first, but not defensible if they don’t realize they are demanding the continuation of someone else’s victimization to enable their own unfair privilege.
It’s actually NOT like we are asking the once-privileged to see the tables turned — we are NOT asking to discriminate against White Christian Males, or any other previously privileged class {white people in general, for instance.} Just a fair shake for everybody, and a bit of help catching up for those who have been hobbled for so long.
That is eminently just, I think.
Eminently just. And possibly completely impossible as people scramble to be on top of the pile, come up wth rationalizations of why they should be there, and continually cry "Foul".
Sad! Hoping to change that. We are not equal in our needs, and there is enough to meet needs all around. It’s the ‘I wants’ that make it hard if not impossible.
Katherine, because it has not happened in the past may not be a reason it can't be different in the future. In order to bring about positive change without stirring the new 4 Horsemen of the apocalypse: anger, fear, resentment, and hatred on the part of the oppressors, we will need to work together toward the change we need. Working to stop global warming could be a good way to do that since it is a critical issue that impacts everyone. We need everyone to contribute ideas, research, findings, cooperation, etc. for us to achieve the goal. White men may see that working with others can work for them and everyone else too. Trump and his followers will have a lot of trouble with this because they never even saw their privilege but are fighting its loss. It is pretty pathetic, but I understand that is how many white people, particularly men see the world. The challenge is getting started and getting people on board.
👏👏👏
👏🏻👏🏻✊🏻
Well said, Sandy. It’s complicated and that’s for sure. Conservatives have already terminated your right to choose abortion. And we stand a chance of losing a whole lot more. I only have tried to illuminate why large segments of the population have irrationally joined the MAGA movement.
At present I am refused any kind of telephone customer service until my husband of 50 years gives his verbal permission. This includes all the online accounts set up by me. This truly gobsmacked me
Anna, alas, we women have permitted men and some women to think they can control our lives, and they have run with it, doing as much harm as they can to us and our kids. I keep wondering what we are going to do about it, but I have heard little except making suits which are often dismissed as in Texas and our rights trickle away with an appallingly partisan Supreme Court who think they are living in the 1800s when no one but rich white men had any rights despite our Constitution, when sick white men like Anthony Comstock could make up national rules just because of his personal misogyny. So, I ask again, what are we going to do. We need to act before we are stuck barefoot and pregnant, the young ones, and used and abused by rich white men and some other men of color who want to get in on the action, ala Clarence Thomas.
Sandy, the problem, every time women, disabled persons, people of color, make advances to try to equalize with white men, something happens or someone arises to try to make sure that does not happen. The anti-woman crap about abortions is not really about fetuses or embryos at all; it is about power and who has it. White men are not afraid of people not as qualified as they are taking their job. They are afraid they are not as well qualified as a whole lot of people they have been putting down and keeping down forever. The non-white-male folks are finding ways to get educated, to quietly push in where only white men feared to tread. We are finding ways to get around all the obstacles being placed in our way. They put crazies on the Supreme Court and other courts knowing they will try to stop all advancement but that of rich white men and corporations, but they forget we non-white-male persons are the majority and are working on saying "we're not going to take it anymore." As a disabled woman, I have learned that every time I get technology that will let me compete with the sighted folks, something new comes along that makes it harder for me to do my job. I do figure it out though, and wait for the next innovation that does not take the needs of disabled persons in mind. We women and disabled persons do figure it out, though and we are coming for equality. We will figure out how to deal with abortions that will not require male supervision or involvement at all. Hopefully we sisters will take care of each other and leave white men, and maybe all men out of the issue altogether, the same with birth control and any other obstacle they put in our way. We do have to be careful though because white men in power are scared (some non-white men too) and scared men can do enormous damage to everyone around them. Check out Putin, Xi, Netanyahu, Mudhi, the nuts in Sudan, and more. Maybe research on a drug that can be administered in the air could help calm the scared men down for the sake of alll of us, and our planet.
I like to think that white, center-minded folk, of which I consider myself one, understand inclusion as necessarily embracing historically (and presently) maligned "minorities" by speech and policy. Such actions are progressive only in the sense they acknowledge we are one People, all entitled to political equality, and not entitled to exercise bigotry toward others.
We can’t leave out those whom justice demands participate. The Republicans want absolute power and want only theocrats and white males to be heard, and we won’t allow Jim Crow Part II.
I again bring attention to the persecution of women.
True, as well as misogynoir. These days it seems like some men feel they have license to say the nastiest things they can about women and their abilities. My father is not a misogynist and he raised my brothers to respect women, and encouraged all of us to get educations.
Tom, you are one of the gems. The shining beacon for men who think all belong. Unfortunately, your compratiots are few and far between or too afraid to speak up. Please keep speaking for those who a voice.
Bill....I understand your dismay with the application questions. I would like to suggest that society has favored the white, male, business owner (actually the white male anything) for so long that it is trying to rectify a historical inequity. Is this the right way to do it? If I were a white male who was simply trying to make a living....whose existence didn't result in those inequities, I'd say no. If I am a minority who has suffered those inequities, which I am (female) I'd say...it's our turn for awhile. (In 1979 as a college educated white female with full time employment, I was still unable to secure a credit card without a man on the application)
Taking a deep dive and perhaps an inaccurate understanding of this tactic....I would say that it's intension is to simply help society ingrain the idea that women, people of color, people who are different from white men have something of value to offer and should be afforded the preference that white males have been given since the beginning of our nation.
I would also venture to say, when the dust settles and there truly is equality/equity in our nation, those application questions will be unnecessary.
My career in sales, which perfectly suited me, combining a high level understanding of complex chemistry without the requirement to be a bench drone, would have been impossible without a big financial change.
You see, to do the job I needed a credit card. And before 1980 I couldn't get one.
Susan, in my world everywhere and in my thinking and my approach, we are existing in a new day almost free of the inequities of the past. But I think you missed my bigger point and that is, a backlash has brought an evil to the fore. And all that we have achieved is in danger of going down the toilet. Yes I’m well off enough to pack up and return to Europe where more civilized people live. But I’d like to stay. I don’t have all the answers. I’m just reacting to a terrible disease permeating this land.
Therein lies the issue, Bill. We are not, on any level, free of inequities. In fact, they are rising up with the MAGA movement.
Please tell me how, losing my bodily autonomy and being told I can not make decisions regarding reproductive health is equitable. And then we can talk about unequal wages, glass ceilings, intimidation, rape, domestic violence, etc. And I don't even suffer the inequities that my neighbors of color and newly immigrated suffer.
I’m on your side don’t forget. lol.
Bill-you’re so right about the backlash. Civil rights legislation and Obama’s election caused panic that we’re living with today. The Cons want to preserve what was-not deal with what is or what can be a better nation if we live up to our stated ideals.
Sadly, there’s resistance to creating a more equitable social fabric, and those who have the means to do it are making a BIG NOISE to cloud the minds of those who don’t have the big picture in mind. It’s always been the way that very-very-privileged will pit the less privileged against each other, to keep them from seeing WHO is really eating their lunch.
That is who we are struggling against in this time — The Oligarchs, who have attached themselves to and taken over the Republican Party.
These days, it’s like saying that David and Goliath were evenly matched. Dems understand one thing better than Repubs. The “others” that you mention in your application are almost without exception knee-capped before they get to the starting gate. Poor, lower-class whites (of which I was one) are not. Those who do make it to the starting gate, still have institutional obstacles that are baked in to the system. I’ve seen it while making my way to a decent life. I can see why some think it is reverse discrimination. But I say, it’s way past time. Hope you get your application approved.
The Supreme Court is trying to pretend we all start from the same position, but we know it’s a myth.
Kathy Hughes, they have boundless delusions.
They are religious zealots of the inquisition variety
It would be a hilarious joke if it were funny
Yes, instead of which it’s a tragedy in the making.
I’m not even sure I want to at this point. The bigger frustration is them not telling us if in fact there will be booths for lease. They are simply not communicating. It’s terrible.
Shunning is worse than negative response. No excuse.
I’m sure they are overwhelmed but if so, they should state this an assure those who applied that answers would be forthcoming. And I spent a lot f money having a web site designed exclusively for my book at the application demanded. You win some you lose some this is probably a loss. My good ole faithful Democratic Party.
They say history is prologue. They also say that that to ignore history is doomed to repeat it. What we are witnessing are the two. The ghost of Senator Smith is no doubt visiting us, her words are haunting. I wonder what today’s so called republicans would say if her words were reprinted without her name. I’m willing to bet they would assail the words as that of some Democrat socialist communist.
Senator Smith’s message is for all of us who want to resist the creeping fascism. If the Republicans weren’t the Trump Party, Trump’s felony conviction would cause the GQP to dump him like a hot potato, but they refuse to accept reality.
Yes, Kathy, Republican's should look at the lesson from Senator Smith. Undoubtedly her 1950 speech contributed to the success of the Republicans in getting Dwight Eisenhower elected two years later. He was a man of integrity who believed in the American consensus and temporarily saved the Republican party from their less honorable elements. It may not be too late for today's Republicans to find a similar alternative to their fascist felon nominee.
Too late- only if he is imprisoned or dies. He lacks the dignity to withdraw.
Smith’s words should be emblazoned for Susan Collins.
Ain’t that the truth.
Now THAT would be pretty amusing - mainly for the enlightening to follow!
In 1989 a young woman decided to be a land surveyor and wanted to own her own business as the decidedly male profession wanted no part of “her” in “their” business. Fast forward 32 years. Her company has employed more than 200 individuals- raising families, paying mortgages, paying for school, contributing to the economy of our state/country.
Had this female surveyor not found support from our government with her MWBE classification she (in her words) “would never have grown to provide jobs for 200+ individuals.”
As importantly, she and her staff contributed to the creation/growth of the transportation and water and sanitation infrastructures you and I depend on pretty much every day of our lives.
The survey profession now has business owners from many minorities who contribute to our economy - due to the inclusive programs created by our government.
That woman was my boss for 16 of her 32 years. When she was ready to retire and pass the torch she found a buyer for her business that promised to continue on with jobs for us and contracts that keep us contributing to the success of our new firm.
PS. She left the MWBE program when her personal wealth, accumulated through her company, exceeded the program limits. After that she competed, and won, contracts based on her reputation.
I suspect the issue here is history and experience. I agree with Mr. Katz that the identity politics that infuse so much of the Democratic Party platform (I'm an Independent myself, and have been for all my voting life - a half century) can often seem overdone, and that at the fringes it is often either comically or almost insanely so. But I am also a WASP (if that term has any meaning anymore) and an ancient and American history teacher of 40 plus years. I know that as a white male of a certain religious persuasion, neither I nor anyone like me has any real historical and present experience with the kind of marginalization, disregard, disdain, and all too often legal, moral, and social persecution which has been inflicted on those who are not white males of a certain religious persuasion. If we had, I suspect that more of us might be more willing to understand why such groups, which together have included well more than half of our population might feel that they needed to be heard. If they are often loud and demanding, they have reasons to be which are essentially unknown to us. Mr. Katz wishes us more centered politically, and I agree with him. But as a historian, I also know that ancient and storied city on the Tiber was not constructed in one 24 hour period.
Is identity politics sometimes a gift to the Right? Yes, undoubtedly so. But even a white male of ancient years should understand that a strong lean toward exclusion is a far worse idea and far more dangerous to a democracy. Mr. Katz recognizes that as I do.
You don't even have to have a certain religious persuasion if you're a white male.
I suspect that there are a more than a few white males of ‘other’ religious persuasions who, at various points in our history might have disagreed with you at least in part. But I would concur in the general case.
James, as a person of ancient history, you are likely familiar with Plato’s reckoning that, “Tyranny follows Democracy.”
I'm also aware that Plato was reacting to a series of catastrophes including the Spartan defeat of Athens, a result of what he believed to be an excess of democracy and its takeover by a series of demagogues - which led to the catastrophic Syracuse expedition, the Spartan victory, the tyranny of The Thirty, the democratic counterrevolution which followed, and finally the judicial murder of his mentor by those who didn't like to be reminded of their confusions and contradictions.
Athens did not have anything like our Constitution, so there were no safeguards built into their political or social structure to help prevent their takeover of the Delian Treasury for their own purposes, and their subsequent decent into empire building of a sorts themselves, which was the catalyst for the Peloponnesian League's assault and eventual victory.
There are parallels which we shouldn't ignore, but remember that the Athenian democracy was very different from ours. Theirs was the result of a series of experimentations leading to something like a pure democracy, which we are not, nor could practically ever be.
Would you kindly point me to a well written book on this subject?
For so many years and many more cocooned in the white quiet interior of suburbia where I knew some of the outlines of a world fraught and miserable, then realized suburbia was definitely fraught and miserable as well, and why. You, Heather Cox Richardson, to my mind are
The great purveyor of truths and history, often unseen and if we are lucky, uncovered later by historians, the piece that has been carefully tucked away and dismissed. In this case Margaret Chase Smith, long before any man stepped up so boldly, spoke to the simple truth of manufactured hatred for the amoral class of profits above all, unrestricted siege, a war that obliterates all but rapacious grovelling towards power and money, a trampling of all values and peoples underneath its monstrous intentions. McCarthyism, the greasy oil slick of history.
Thank you so much Heather for that missing piece of all puzzles.
So well said. Thank you.
A good example of the "mistakes of Democrats" is NAFTA - enacted with little understanding of what would come after. Jobs gone. One company communities destroyed.
But that was the result of a president who was attempting to govern from the "center". If he had been a champion of the average working class American, he would have protected those jobs and walked a union picket line (like my favorite president did).
Is it "left wing" and radical to fight for the rights of all American families to have jobs, healthcare, equal education, housing even...??? All to include those who have been disenfranchised due to color, sexual preference...or just being a woman? The list in your application is an attempt to rectify centuries of bigotry and oppression. That's not extreme. That's an effort to re-center.
I think sometimes when we label ourselves and others, we immediately alienate. When you speak of the "center" I hear a myth. But when we dig into the facts and feelings of an issue, looking for fairness, I suspect we might heartily agree. We should all be treated equally.
I love moderation. I love compromise. I love when people work together to achieve a betterment of all. That sounds sort of "centerist", doesn't it? But the truth is that is what most lefty Democrats have been trying to do of late.
There is no longer a center in American politics. Republicans who try to tack that way are eliminated at the starting gate. Hutchinson, Hogan, etc. But Haley and McConnell want political survival - so they kiss the ring of a wannabe dictator.
So Bill, in principle, I admire your "centerism". That should be where the vast majority of Americans could live. But it is impossible now. The threat from the radical (fake) religious right is so overwhelmingly obvious, there is only one way for America to survive. Vote Blue, vote blue, vote blue. No matter who. Eliminate the fascist threat and the center we both love might re-emerge.
The center is retrievable when the "right" returns to some basic principles of honesty, integrity and respect for others. Until then, it is WAR.
Bill Astrom, just wanted to add something about our shared disdain for NAFTA. It didn’t start as Bill Clinton’s or the Democratic party’s bill. It was a long term Republican project that Clinton happened to sign onto at the end.
According to Wikipedia:
The impetus for a North American free trade zone began with U.S. president Ronald Reagan, who made the idea part of his 1980 presidential campaign. After the signing of the Canada–United States Free Trade Agreement in 1988, the administrations of U.S. president George H. W. Bush, Mexican President Carlos Salinas de Gortari, and Canadian prime minister Brian Mulroney agreed to negotiate what became NAFTA. Each submitted the agreement for ratification in their respective capitals in December 1992, but NAFTA faced significant opposition in both the United States and Canada. All three countries ratified NAFTA in 1993 after the addition of two side agreements, the North American Agreement on Labor Cooperation (NAALC) and the North American Agreement on Environmental Cooperation (NAAEC).
Debra NY, thanks for the history reminder. Mulroney was a conservative like Bush, but not sure about de Gortari of Mexico..
Thank you for the info!
Bill, thank you for putting into words that which I could not. So many issues of today don't have a "center". How does one "somewhat" care about fairness, honesty & the welfare of others? One party (at least the elected representatives) is not interested in working together for the betterment of all.
I think you summed up the issue rather nicely.
Bill the very day NAFTA was signed I reminated that it would be a bad day for the American worker
Excellent commentary and you are 100% correct! Makes one wonder why people like Liz Cheney and Adam Kinzinger are now politically homeless? I also don’t give my party a pass either. We, the rank and file, should be more vocal and let the extremists who are trying to take over the party know, in no uncertain terms, that most Americans are in the center, and that while their actions may be well intentioned, the road to hell is paved with good intentions!
I’d argue that one does not necessarily need to BE in the center, but one does need to be willing to GO to the center and compromise.
If only Mark Twain (Samuel Langhorne Clemens) were around, he’d see not much has changed, only the names and faces. He had some very pithy and scathing comments about policy and politics in his own era.
Absolutely!
Excellent comment, MLM.
Did you apply for the repub convention too?
I wonder what they would ask of you?
I'm pretty sure there would be similar questions - opposite, of course, from the Dem's!
With my book , “Donald’s Vanity Tantrums?” Are you kidding? I want to sell my book I don’t want to be lynched.
They would ask who won the 2020 election. If you say Biden, they would not allow you in.
Bill…lots of food for thought here. My personal approach to many things is moderation. Perhaps some would call that “center.” Perhaps I lean center left, which I think speaks of moderation with a little progressive thought thrown in. I say that because I believe in progress and moving forward, not backwards. It’s complicated, eh?
I must say when you listed the questions on the application you seek, it was an eye opener for me. Not an exercise I have ever experienced. However, your point is valid and has left me wondering and full of questions. Have we indeed gone too far in our goals for fairness and equality for all? For certain, I believe in fair and equitable treatment but is it intrusive now? Why does the pharmacist need to list his pronouns under his name on his name tag? Is it anyone’s business? Is it necessary to know his pronouns are him and his in order to conduct a business transaction?
Like I said, your perspective has caused me pause and I don’t know how I feel about that right now. Something to think about…
Christine, that pharmacist’s pronouns aren’t listed for you, if you’re heteronormative. They’re listed to reassure non-heteronormative folks that that pharmacy is a safe place for them to obtain prescriptions. If we pause for a moment and consider how much our pharmacists know about our intimate lives, that tiny name tag is a powerful tool. Even I, a heteronormative woman, would take comfort from it.
KR (OH), thanks, I didn't know it was a signal of safety! Makes me think of all the good people who put symbols of safety around their homes or buildings to signal to slaves escaping north that they would be welcomed and could safely rest or eat there.
I’m mom to a trans kid, and it makes me more aware of and sensitive to these signals. I love your analogy to the Underground Railroad. Thank you for that!
Pronouns don’t bother me, but some people go ballistic over such small issues.
KH, I hope you are not suggesting I went ballistic over this observation I made over the name
Tag. It was not My intent to convey that. Just thinking out loud…
Christine (Happy Valley, PA), I appreciate your humble and honest questioning as a way to process and arrive at your opinion. You wonder, "Have we indeed gone too far in our goals for fairness and equality for all?" May I add to your wondering, that perhaps the goal isn't the problem? Is it possible that the inevitable messiness, of finding the sweet spot (of the most respectful and devoid of anger or fear) strategy to get there, is the problem? When forging new frontiers, we humans make mistakes, even Star Trek's Captain Kirk did many times. Thanks for your openess, Christine. It's a quality much needed, particularly now.
Christine, there is a "thing" going on in the world of music and music programming from the biggest symphony orchestras to middle school band concerts (and all of us in between those two ends): Programming music by "marginalized" composers based on race and gender mostly, but also in programming more "modern" music (i.e. written in the 21st century). There is a LOT of backlash from a lot of people who (rightfully) list important "standards" of music written by exclusively white men are being "replaced" by music that is not standard, mostly because, other than one or two that I can name off hand because they were women or non-white, and had NO exposure at all until at least the mid 1930's. (Caveat: I have NO training or education in classical music, and my level as a performer is of the last chair tuba in an auditioned community band that I did not have to audition for because they needed a tuba player.)
It strikes me as very similar to what Mr. Katz postulates as "going off the diversity cliff." Are "underrepresented composers" worthy of programming, or do we default to what we've always done because it is what is familiar?
I am the virtual Mr. Katz not the real one as he seems to be disinclined to communicate with you at this point. But he says that you are entitled to your beliefs.
I appreciate your thoughtful writing here. History does seem to repeat itself and it seems even more dangerous now that the ugly insults and threats by T***p and his cult are magnified by far-and-not-so-far social media and news sites.
I have heard Dr Richardson quote, “History may not repeat itself. But it rhymes.” This quote is often attributed to Mark Twain.
Yes! Thanks for that. That distinction of rhyme rather than repetition is very real.
Bill, I, too, like to consider myself in the center, and in an ideal world, more of us perhaps would be.
But I view political and social progress as a pendulum -- each swing left or right ultimately, inevitably, moves us forward. The political Left is trying to move us to equality in the social space, workplace and judicial system; democracy where voters are unencumbered and even encouraged to vote for a candidate of their choice; freedom of and from religion, from gun violence and to be and to love whom they want to; economic fairness; access to basic health care, etc. -- in other words, basic human rights, while the political Right is moving us to anti-democracy, social stratification, a disregard for science leading to further climate catastrophe and reemergences of once-controlled disease: in essence, a repudiation of those human rights.
It's hard to be in the middle when one side believes the only way to succeed is to quash the rights of the other.
Or, to put a finer point on it, the the Right seeks to stop the pendulum and thus the clock at its extreme righthand position; the values the Left hold are those the majority of US citizens favor. Isn't that, then, the center?
Doug Gagne, you explained it very well. Thank you.
Good response and I don’t refute this. Again I brought up the titanic shift that occurred from the 1960s and realignment of political parties. To suggest that poor white working class were and are privileged and therefore have had no legitimate complaint is naive at best. I was vending at a local park fair today mostly hyping my book critical of Trump. A older white woman expressed support for him in light of my repeated attempts to dissuade her. Multiply her by 80 million and we possibly have the end of American democracy. She obviously feels left out even as a member of the privileged class, that’s a mighty strange place to be. You don’t want to leave people out and expect them to be supportive.
I’m just trying to explain what has happened and to try and propose remedies. It’s evident that the worst political monster could become their hero which is something to behold.
There is some truth in what you say. But I'm not sure you represent Democrats fairly. It IS the moderate party with some notable (and legitimate) exceptions.
https://yadontknow.blogspot.com/2020/02/moderation.html
Democrats demonstrated this once again in voting for border legislation, which was torpedoed by the very people who demanded it! Both-sidism ain't gonna cut it these days.
You give Nixon too much credit. The movement to protect the environment started in 1959 and created several agencies to address protection. Nixon did consolidate parts in USDA and other agencies, he was a good bureaucrat.
I agree that the emphasis on minority rights, like gender issues, has too great an emphasis in the modern Democratic agenda. This often happens when an abused minority finally gets recognition. I think it needs to fade, and it will as it loses novelty.
But no one can be "middle of the road" when one party embraces Christian nationalism, fascism and the relegation of women to handmaids.
The hilarity, Betsy, comes from the evident insanity in repetition.
Remember, too, these are all "educated" people. Yes, they are dangerous. Mortally so.
It is, as in my last line, a "death trip of the linear, binary, categorical, chronological." That is, these vulgar, trapped in their repetitions, exhibit all of the conceits baked into today's, modern education -- as measured by the standardized testing which only enshrines "the linear, binary, categorical, chronological."
Those four adjectives cover not just the values such as they are now in U.S. education, but in most countries of the world where the avatars of commerce have excluded, killed off, scorned, cheapened, demeaned, trivialized all our humanities.
It's deadly. Pathetic as in having Netanyahu on one side, Hamas on the other. Not funny.
But really, Betsy, isn't there something insanely hilarious in having so many, many, many putatively educated people so stuck in repetition? Something black humor mad in all our schools so totally in thrall to the dehumanized?
Please also see Diane Ravitch's "The Language Police." And then tell me, honestly, if I err, or she errs, in seeing and stating the deliberate limits and purposes of all the world's standardized testing.
Alright Phil, do not forget how our educational system was dumbed down, expressly to prevent educated quetions and resistance to the Republican business/ "Defense" machine.
This is a comment I made to a friend on Robert Reich's post last night, dealing with this subject :
Well .........., you know Ronnie was a face, cultvated by the largest "defence" contractor in the world, G.E. to be the calming voice that could sell the masses their program of Supply Side and the wisdom of the Arms Race. He hosted General Electric Theater and was trusted with the lies of the MIC to get elected as California Governor who railed against the Free Speach Movement and the anti war movement. He appointed Max Raferty as the Superintendent of Public instruction expressly to dumb down the finest educational sysytem in the world to stop producing graduates who would question the wisdom of right wing and defence authority. That carried him to the White House, from which he introduced us all to Roger Ailes and Rupert Murdoch. The propaganda machine was born and guess what? The population coming up was so ignorant that they accepted it all and did not ask questions. And everybody loved him. Adored that lovable old man . Gee whiz. They stuck it up our collective keester, sho nuff. The Orange blob is their new face and the masses of those who need to follow are riled up enough this time to maybe pull it off, if we let them. Dumbing down education was a very effective weapon.
There's been a sea change since Reagan.
We should not have needed Michael Cohen to tell us on MSNBC that his former boss is not just capable of selling the entire security of the United States to the highest bidder but likely to do so. If he hasn't already sold plenty. Apart from what was left lying around for all comers to find... That's self-service for you...
And, regardless of their intentions, those who serve DT and MAGA, including judges and Justices, risk serving interests no sane American would wish to be seen dead with.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_7Ml4k2ik3Q
This gross failure on the part of the country's security services to vet candidates for the highest offices in the country is more than a hole in the bucket.
There's no bucket.
No security left.
And there's good cause to think DT was primed by Vladimir Putin both before he launched his bid to become President of the United States... and after. If only because the pair have so much in common...
So right, I kept thinking that I didn’t need to have what was obvious decided by a jury. But so it goes…
But isn’t it interesting that tfg exposed himself with his consuming lust for attention and power? He could have remained in his golden castle and continued to crime. But that wasn’t sufficient for him. By going public, he opened the door for his life to be examined. And here he is. He did it to himself.
No, but we all needed that... just for starters.
People need to see the lifelong pattern of impunity, in its entirety.
And as for the many who admire a bandit for his chutzpah, they need to understand that they too will be his victims. Only a matter of time.
I still insist, very straightforward documentaries—newsreel material—showing the irresistible rise of Mussolini and Hitler will impress and delight the MAGA mob... until they reach the final chapter.
There are so few effective ways of showing people the truth they'd rather not see.
We must use them.
This is why self-education is key. I know much of what I learned was not in school, including the more distasteful and evil aspects of our history. I do not hate my country, but wish to rectify our wrongs to the fullest extent possible. I also don’t want us to become a fascist, plutocratic and theocratic hellhole. I myself am a religious believer, but I’m also a firm believer in separation of religion and state.
Well-said, Ransom.
This saga has so many chapters, so many nefarious actors, so many naive clueless.
But the game plan was steady, from the Powell memo in 1971 through the growths of the Heritage Foundation, ALEC, the expansion of the Hoover Institution, and many more far-right foundations, all integrated with each other.
Maybe the saddest part: our best writers on American ed, for over four decades -- none saw any of this happening as it happened.
America didn't just dumb down. It coarsened. Cheapened. Deliberately damaged and abandoned the tens of millions whose jobs got offshored. All as part of the plan to neuter, silo, marginalize, group-set, limit schools to commercial logic only: all to put the rich on steroids, and in alliance with the world's worst dictatorial regimes.
American edumacation dumbed itself down in the name of "progress." Remember "Word Recognition" that created people unable to read when they came across a word they'd never seen? And "Whole Language" that said stick a kid next to a Great Book and he'll learn it by osmosis? The people who invented all the tools to destroy education all identified themselves as "liberal" and "progressive" and "inclusive." And in the 75 years since they wheeled out "Word Recognition," they created a country of dumbed-down illiterate morons.
It hurts, TCinLA., for me, further, for the analogies to our "best and brightest" pushing Nam.
They had all the same uber-rationalized charts, system-supply, weaponry, scientific exfoliants, personnel turnover, mechanized logistics, abstracted slogans, excellent delivery of body bags, nicely surrounding layers of concertina wire for logical clustering of U.S. troops and civilian "New Life Centers."
Nothing human about any of it.
Reminds me sadly, too, of why biology turned to molecular models primarily: life could be reduced to the logic of aggregation, accumulation -- so that illness could be isolated as events needing pills.
Great for Big Pharma -- as similar logic drove every corporate vulgarity.
yours, Phil B., U.S. Army Spec. 5 Viet translator-interpreter, Sept 2, 1969 -- 4 Apr '72.
I’m old but I missed that. I went to a country school and got a better education than I should have. No blacks or disabled but I knew they existed, but on the periphery. Abbott wants that back. I say piss on him and the army he commands.
I agree with you insofar as I think phonics is the best way to teach literacy, but even in my childhood I read books that exposed me to communities different from my own. There are also people with dyslexia who do need special help with learning.
Texas has gone one better. Abbott has a number one goal of destroying public education. His voucher goal is now assured after the recent primary. My very smart junior granddaughter hates school. Her teachers are quitting, the principal is quitting. No one wants to work for public schools here. The district has a good rep, but the evil has not only seeped in, it has crashed the gates. If this has happened in a good district, I hate to think of the others. Of course, in Fl, religious nuts are providing materials for teachers, and they are learning how to present these as we post.
My state of Ohio isn’t much better. The GQP gerrymandered the state, and much of the education money intended to fund public education goes to vouchers for private school. The public schools are still strapped, they put levies on the ballot and hard pressed taxpayers often vote them down. The Supreme Court of the United State didn’t do us any favors by making vouchers legal. Most voters don’t see the connection between funding vouchers and shortages of money for public schools.
Jeri Chilcutt, my heart goes out to you and everyone there witnessing the madness up close as you do. May you be well!
A perfect recap of how Ronnie managed it. As a Californian who lived through his governorship in horror only to see the entire country elect him, it was frightening. I kept thinking have you learned nothing from our mess? Mental hospitals closed as the patients would surely just show up every day at clinics he never funded to get their meds (and we wonder why we have roaming homeless who talk to the sky?) As you said, the finest public education system in the country of which I was a very grateful product now a mess of "teach to the test." Going from Gov. Pat Brown to Ronnie was like going from FDR to Trump in terms of philosophy and accomplishments for our state.
And many love it, our national shame.
My brother, sister in law and their children lived in a nice Orange County community, but due to Prop. 13, the schools had large class sizes. When my brother and his family moved to New Jersey, they found much smaller class sizes.
I’m old enough to remember most of that.
Indeed
Phil, it would seem your four "conceits baked into today's, modern education...as measured by the standardized testing which only enshrines "the linear, binary, categorical, chronological" would be an apt description for what humans have struggled to unite with a broader perception of the world for millennia as described in exhaustive and remarkably literate detail by Ian McGilchrist in his monumental work "The Master And His Emissary" wherein he describes the battle between the left and right hemispheres of everyone's brains. Obviously, some are better at it than others...and a thorough-going and broad education likely makes a substantial contribution to better balancing those two viewpoints. Those are viewpoints which I would posit are not simply the products of that kind of education but rather products of the two halves of our brains. Both viewpoints are necessary for the best understanding of our world, balanced with and against each other with neither one in sole possession of "the truth."
Interesting. Thanks I'll think on this.
Yes, John -- thank you for citing.
I have, much respect, and am well indebted to the McGilchrist. I have read it all and taken notes on it.
I celebrate and pair it with Robert Lustig's "The Hacking of the American Mind: The Science Behind the Corporate Takeover of Our Bodies and Brains."
Sounds like an interesting read, John. I'll look into that.
What a sorry select those Deplorables . The List of Losers . The sorriest bunch of millionaires lauding over starving puppets who just want food on their table….SAD!
Billionaires too. Their greed is overwhelming and there is no end to it. They feel themselves entitled to buy our government, and all Citizens United did was to enable them to do it. The whole effort started with Buckley v. Valeo (the Buckley here was William F.’s elder brother James) and continued with First National Bank v. Bellotti. These decisions removed limits on campaign finance spending and allowed corporations broader rights to contribute to political campaigns, hence we saw the proliferation of political action committees in the early 1980s.
Thank you Kathy, how many knew this? I have to tell truths, this lesson insidiously crept up and slapped me as well as many with the obvious fact . Complacentcy. We average America people had taken the peace and tranquility hard fought for, for granted , along with expectations , and stopped paying attention.
So here we are.
A lot of ruckus ( more to come!) as desperation continues
/whispered might be failing ..and all stops pulled out. Then GUILTY, Oh my, double down tactics next step, deny, delay, destroy. Many HAVE ‘woke’ up cleverly given bad connotation ahead ..they’re cunning, clever, and caustic.
These formats provide people with the foundation laid, Project 2025 in the making revealed…oh they’ll not stop guaranteed . Divide,Conquer ,Comtrol. The playbook were written long ago.
We squelch it again 11/5/24 with a BLUE TSUNAMI VOTE💙 or within a VERY short period have to fight for the worlds freedom all over again. Knowledge is an advantage. Writers and these comments ( thanks to ALL the ‘Kathys’ ) info we’ve forgotten, perhaps never knew, but definitely need to get up to speed on. After we win there’s the next round , the next elections to get those complicit OUT, and bring others to trial for accessories to the crime …to accountability all the while cleaning up the sly/covert decimation of our rules of law, trust, the corruption, and plans to further control -such as the 2025 a manifesto in itself.
Such a super comment Kathy !
Agree. We have been far too complacent, and it’s coming back at us.
What if the voice threatening the jury and court officials is Fox News and their evil sisters? Fox is a propaganda machine for the irresponsible far right. Is Free Speech the right to lie?.
"Is Free Speech the right to lie?" Indeed. A good question. I believe America needs to look elsewhere to other democracies around the world and see how that issue is handled. I do not think we can look within - we have proven that we are not the shining light on a hill that we once were, or thought we were. Whatever the answer, a Fox News leading half the nation astray day after day, month after month, year after year even after absorbing multi-million dollar defamation lawsuits, is unsustainable. Gotta stop.
Free Speech is simply a Right to speak without the Government employing prior constraint. The exception being when harm may befall others such as crying Fire in a crowded theater. Or, in Trump’s case a “gag” order to preclude inducing harm to others.
As for lying, I offer the laws regarding slander and libel remain true. E. Jean Carroll’s successful defamation lawsuit against Trump are case in point. The Dominion lawsuit against Fox News are another. No law prevented either from their lies. However, law most certainly held them accountable.
What is unacceptable is the GOP’s effort to dismiss those laws when it is inconvenient to their arcane purpose.
I think that Biden would find it difficult to prove defamation from Trump’s lies about him.
Maybe lawsuits about lies (by Trump or Faux) need to be made asap, so that the repeats are stopped under penalty of being fined.
Exactly! The lies have to be written up in leaflets and distributed via air drop, mail, social media...Truth can be agreed upon! The biggest lie is that "everybody lies".
The crux of our crises
Yes it is free speech. IMHO lying should have its legal limit, but where and/ or how, by what metric is that line drawn, that legal limit established? How do we bring to bear the lies, the rhetoric of violence cloaked in falsity’s without inflaming those who have come to believe them to be true? Perhaps Faux News having to publicly admit guilt in the Dominion civil lawsuit could have been one step.
As we saw in that settlement there was no requirement to admit guilt by faux news. Is it a requirement when found guilty by a jury? I’m not sure but consider a judge stating it a requirement at sentencing of someone found guilty.
Considering our current situation, I abhor the lying of tfg and that of his cronies in Congress. While I find all that extremely difficult to swallow a defendant cannot and should not be forced to (or have to) admit guilt. Why? Think of those found guilty, even serving time in jail, who later were found to be innocent and had their verdicts overturned. Should they have been forced to admit guilt (at sentencing?) for something they know they didn’t do? Forced to incriminate themselves?
We walk a fine line, a very fine line, when it comes to free speech. Is lying allowed? Yes it is, but where do we draw the line? It’s scary these days to see the impact incessant lying has had. It undoubtedly has exposed its peril on our Democracy, but limiting free speech could expose our Democracy to peril as well….. just look at any authoritarian dictatorship where free speech is not allowed.
I cringe every time I hear the lies coming out of the mouths of the GOP in support of tfg and in support of their desire for absolute power, in their pursuit to impose their “Christian values” on all of us. Do we persecute them now like Trump plans to persecute us if elected? If we did would we not be guilty of the same thing? Yes fight them tooth and nail, but in the process be careful we do not fall prey to that which they do. We are more than in between a rock and a hard place….
apparently
It isn’t the only pro-Trump media outlet, but it is the most prominent. Trump seems to have a love-hate relationship with Fox.
"As an American, I condemn a Republican Fascist just as much as I condemn a Democrat Communist. They are equally dangerous to you and me and to our country. As an American, I want to see our nation recapture the strength and unity it once had when we fought the enemy instead of ourselves."
- Margaret Chase Smith
Chase Smith was as staunchly antiCommunist as McCarthy (she urged that the US use nuclear weapons against the Soviet Union.) She disapproved McCarthy's tactics.
Senator Smith may have pushed back at the extremes of Senator Joe McCarthy after he replaced her on his committee with Richard Nixon, but she was front and center in the purging of homosexuals from government employment, joining the Senate committee investigation ‘’Employment of Homosexuals and Other Sex Perverts in Government’’ - the so-called, ‘’Hoey Committee’’. It was an era of fear.
https://stacks.stanford.edu/file/druid:fd720pb8753/employment-homosexuals-serialset.pdf
A fascinating account of the era is contained in this lengthy interview with Ruth Young Watt, Chief Clerk of the US Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, 1948-1979. She was born in Brooks, Maine.
https://www.senate.gov/about/resources/pdf/watt-ruth-young-full-transcript-with-index.pdf
Interesting.
It is. Just take a look at the introduction to Mrs. Watt’s interview for a sense of the scope of this oral history. Some may find it tedious, but to me it is very engaging first-person history.
McCarthy wasn't "anti-communist" till he saw the reaction he got in Wheeling. He was desperately looking for something to run for re-election on in 1952 (he got into the Senate as a defender of the Nazi Waffen-SS scum who killed Americans in the Malmedy Massacre, that they had been subject to "kangaroo justice" in their war crimes trials that gave them death sentences.) McCarthy's other idea of a cause to run on was to come out for a massive increase in construction of "affordable housing" - yes! That's true!
Typical right-wing coward.
"McCarthy's other idea of a cause to run on was to come out for a massive increase in construction of "affordable housing" - yes! That's true!"
After WW2, as with after WW1, there was a certain amount of How Ya Gonna Keep 'em Down on the Farm (After They've Seen Paree?)* But added to the fear of the cosmopolitan was a fear of Communism - of GI's getting ideas. (As GI Joe sez: Knowing is half the battle.) So real estate developers came running to Uncle Sam: give us government funding to build suburbs - and the commute and home ownership will keep Vets too busy to become politically engaged. Actually the developers double dipped. They got government benefits for building and got GI Bill funds when they sold to Vets. These suburbs were planned as lily-white. Black Vets were denied GI Bill benefits for housing (and education, the cornerstones of intergenerational wealth.) And the suburbs were red lined.
*
Judy Garland
https://youtu.be/2URLyxcdpgA?si=SkyPHQnniP2-kOkk
Durante & Cantor
https://youtu.be/kciiIdK9uRo?si=VNbOZpimeaE8h5PC
Something else, too, lin.
Those federal real estate subsidies and benefits all quite deliberately excluded any funding for inner city renovation.
Add to this the post-1956 fact of federal subsidies for construction of freeways, whose planners again quite deliberately mapped out the literal cutting-up and destruction of inner-city ethnic communities -- always beginning with destroying black communities first.
Also, lin -- thank you for the two links to two different covers of a great song.
The placement of freeways and finally trying to deal with that in restoring communities is a major part of the transportation revisions and urban development revisions that the Biden Administration is doing - the first time ever by the federal government.
Oh yes. ThankYou for spotlighting that.
Repub scum are always thinking of a scam
In that, he reminds me of Pat Buchanan, who had a soft spot for Nazi war criminals outed as obtaining citizenship illegally.
(Religious sisters are the hard workers of the church. They know the score. Bishops don’t impress them; quite the opposite.)
I'm right there with you, Betsy.
YES! I was so heartened to read that the nuns said, “This is NOT the attitude we championed when we created our school!” Good for them! Ten times over.
Thank you, Betsy. That needed to be said, because what has happened in the past eight years has not a sliver off hilarity. The current threat to our country is real, and while most of the perpetrators are buffoons, they still threaten our country and all of us. With all of our warts still visible from our past, we must work to make our country a better, more inclusive place, and refuse to tolerate the Trumps, MAGA Republicans, Alitos, Thomases and others who threaten what we hold dear. We must work diligently to eradicate intolerance and the folly that surrounds all of us, or we can expect that the end result will resemble Putin's Russia or the more refined, but no less dangerous, Viktor Orban's Hungary.
It’s not ‘hilarious’ watching the MAGA ‘’goonies ‘ - they are a dangerous & haphazard group - not to be laughed at. These people are nuts & not to be taken lightly.
Your prose is all nicely put, yet the nuttiness is out here -
There are some interesting synonyms for “hysterical” in Websters. They include:
Ludicrous
Ridiculous
Riotous
Laughable
As we’re wont to say sometimes: “Funny strange not funny ha-ha”
Perhaps these could be added:
Unhinged
Demented
Absurd
Amen to that!
I would say dangerous rather than those chosen adjectives.
And don’t forget these Maggots are frequently HEAVILY ARMED!
Better to die free than be cowards and let Republicans just destroy our country without a fight. Besides, many of us are prepared for them.
Agreed.
I agree.
Comedians do a pretty good job of mockery
Jeri, comedians are actually more consequential than many realize—they certainly get under tfg’s skin.
And some, like Stephen Colbert, are willing to call out fakery, which is more consequential that most realize.
I have been a fan of his since The Colbert Report on Comedy Central.
The truth can do that. Wish MSM would tell a few facts
Phil, you can add Mike Johnson to that list as he is a disgrace! They all might end up like Michael Cohen in jail if they aren't careful. Fortunately, he took responsibility and learned a lot! I wish him peace now as he stated on MSNBC recently!
His name comes immediately after "the eminently corrupt Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito."
I call the speaker of the House Howdy Doody, out of contempt for his pious posturing combined with his version of "Christianity" happy with pussy grabbing, raping women, a fraud university, support for the world's worst dictators, mocking the disabled, inciting violence, leading an insurrection, multiple instances of racism, thousands of blatant lies, and many, many more frauds, grifts, cons.
I've known people, Lisa, genuinely trying to be decent. This speaker of the House supports behavior far, far from what I know from the Gospels.
Christian Nationalist is not what we have known as Christian! It’s a political entity which has a goal of undermining democracy!
"Christoid", not Christian...
Or Christianists, or christians [lower case], or so-called Christians. Someone here or “there” online calls them Fundamentalists: the same destructive effect on any religion.
Well said I fully agree. The cowardice and abject hypocrisy of the GQP scum in the house is breathtaking.
If only the mass media would risk committing journalism even for a moment, they might open some eyes.
Love that phrase.
I think he is in the list as "Howdy Doody".
Indeed, Roy.
I wonder if anyone born after 1990 knows who or what Howdy Doody is? The name applied to Mike Johnston in apt. It's actually comical.(https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Howdy_Doody)
🤣, absolutely!
It’s gone WAAAY past ‘being careful’ their dies were cast in cement long ago.
I’d underscore their time is short before indictment, the list is long (and well known) as their sentences before the judges should be too. This is no ‘witch hunt’ it’s criminal behavior and breaking law called ACCESSORY TO THE FACTS ( ie COMPLICIT).
How many BLUE BALLOTS will it take to say that loudly ..enough for warrants and end in guilty verdicts?
Let’s get to it folks…we made that mistake before with Nixon..this time best be leaving no doubt.
💙VOTE ALL THE COMPLICIT OUT💙
Hey Phil , can we use your list?
Please use as you like, Patricia.
Also add to it. For instance, another commenter here corrected me when originally I'd written Comey, but meant Comer. Checking that error, I also saw that I'd neglected to mention J. D. Vance as the eminent moneyed filth and dehumanized suck-up he is also.
Thanks. We are privileged to have these facts to utilize , to gain knowledge of who the culprits are. And doubly noted when people ADMIT their errors and correct them , shows how good leadership is defined. Thanks again Phil.
We are hopeful piece by post by commentary to see the BIG PICTURE even more clearly . We are in the mess because ..WE DIDNT.
I am so grateful to Heather , the long list of eloquent writers I subscribe to and read for free. While many are swimming as hard as they can to keep their heads above water we have to work a little harder to assist them and make bold fact rise above their DIN!
Thanks for the brilliance Phil. Carry on🫶
Phil, While I deeply appreciate you powerfully and elegantly detailing the widespread moral and cultural decay that threatens to engulf and destroy all of us, I noted a missing piece from your comment: the huge number of people in this country (and I expect elsewhere) who pretty much have given up on a promise and think that the easy promises of a dictator will solve most everything. Further down in today’s comments, I discuss in some detail this perhaps greatest of threats.
Only further testament to the BLUE TSUNAMI needed, but an excellent point needing boldly stated thru the next 6-8 elections.
Thanks Barbara!
And I emphasize -we NEED to hold OUR future elected to high levels of accountability..No. Impropriety. Allowed.
Anyone being chosen or voted into these highly esteemed positions NO ONE off the hook . Truth and Accountability is paramount. That includes their spouses!
Indeed would have to agree
There are a huge number of people who have missed the bus when it comes to prosperity, there are a lot of reasons for this, some of us are born lucky, many not so, some of us grabbed whatever education offered us, others chose to reject education or at least stop it at a certain point. Work ethics have always played a part in a path to success, while your ethics don’t guarantee success, if you don’t have any their lack will certainly diminish your odds for success. Change is a constant, and the ability to adapt to change increases a person’s chance for success. Willfully choosing to limit one’s opportunities is a handicap that the maggot crowd seems to have in common, so now they are angry that the prosperity bus has left without them, that bus has moved on with the winds of change and is not coming back. So I get their anger, what I don’t get is their antipathy to Joe Biden, and his desire to improve the lot of all working men and women, including those without college degrees.
At this point the right wing anger has boiled over into rage.
This group doesn't want a solution, they want revenge; they want others to suffer as much as they have.
The goal appears to be tearing down the entire country.
They don't see that the right-wing oligarchs have whipped them up into a raging mob and aimed them at the country they purport to be patriots of.
Ok Phil, can’t argue with one well chosen word. I would add that they are soulless. Look into the dead eyes of chump and they are all the same bottomless pits of evil and I don’t say that lightly. And, I would wager that the damage was done before they ever hit a school yard and were drilled on “teaching to the test.” And some, like Clarence Thomas, just had his nose pressed to the glass, wanting in by any means possible. Maybe “humanities” could have softened a few, but they, and many more in this country and the world, lack something that emanates from within, empathy for others and generosity of soul.
Very good characterization of Clarence.
I see how Hitler had his propagandist's, chiefly Goebbels, who not only took dictation of Hilter's Mein Kampf, but also spun whatever Hitler did into lies to placate the German people. That is what the MAGAs are doing now. They are trying to make up lies that make the unpalatable acceptable. We have a candidate who is a convicted criminal running for office, and none of them can say The Emperor is wearing no clothing. We have a Supreme court prized to hand the election to Trump, and they are establishing that they will not follow the law because we did not have a real solution for them going rogue.
Goebbels was a great role model for Rove, Luntz and the other lying bastards
That's a role that Hannity is filling very nicely
Jesse Watters also does it.
In fact, the entire Fox entertainment cohort is all-in for Trump. Consequently, and almost by definition, it means that both truth and an interest in the survival of America's democracy have been sacrificed for the very short term goals of money, influence, and power. Trump is not in love with the truth either. They're made for each other.
James Murphy translation must be very popular with repubs. Easy reading
the more of these that accumulate, the less amusing it gets.
I think you mean James Comer, not James Comey. Big difference.
Both guilty as hell.
True, Daniel.
But only one is in public office now -- the one from the state with the giant Noah's Arc for the gawking, slack-jawed crowd (the one whose name Kathy nicely noted I'd gotten wrong on my first try).
Correct, Phil, but the ramifications of Comey's late-October "revelation" may end up costing us our democracy, for which there is a special place in Hell waiting for him.
Remember Ghouliani had rogue FBI agents waiting in the wings to go public if Comey did not.
Hell is going to be very crowded in the near future, isn't it?
Thank you, Kathy.
I've gone to the edit function (the three dots on the lower right) and so corrected.
Another thanks, Kathy.
I realized I'd left out the name of the investment predator and Trump sycophant, J. D. Vance. So have also used edit function to correct that lapse also on my part.
Unfortunately, Vance is one of my senators, and I can only pray and vote once for Sherrod Brown. I don’t want to see Bernie Moreno joining Vance in the senate.
Phil, while I wholeheartedly agree with your advocacy of recentering the humanities in education, I think your analysis lets the people you name (at least the Americans), and others of their ilk you don’t name, off the hook. As if they are helpless to stop acting as they do, just because they aren’t sufficiently schooled in humanities. There are plenty of people who are products of that same educational system who do not behave so. We in this forum are mostly products of that system, and I find for the most part that we are a fine, well-educated group. The difference isn’t that they (and we) were taught humanities while those on the right were not, the difference is integrity, morality, and compassion, and their lack.
I love, KR, your expression, "The difference isn't . . . the difference is . . .."
So many differences, KR. My program for schools around the world to explore these differences, to learn better to see others as individuals in complicated, fraught, nuanced contexts, is called "Essaying Differences."
Incredible itemization of Le Deplorables Miserables! WOW…what is your brand of vitamins, please😉
Thank you, Phil yer on a roll!
Brilliant. Thank you.
Speak !
Senator Margaret Chase Smith was the commencement speaker at my graduation from Whittier College on June 12, 1965. Also there were Richard Nixon and Bob Hope. Among several admonitions that Senator Smith gave us students was the following: " It is far more important for you and me to understand each other--'than for us to agree with each other. For really we cannot truly agree or disagree unless we accurately understand each other-and unless we know what each believes and feels on a particular matter."
Senator Smith went on to say: "I think most of us think of the word "Christian" in perhaps a wider, even if erroneous, meaning than in its very specific meaning as the doctrine of Jesus Christ. I believe most of us think of the word "Christian" as denoting kindness, as living by the Golden Rule of doing unto others as you would have them do unto you, and as being civilized human beings dedicated to the dignity of man."
IMO: Not so evangelical MAGA Christians.
Phil,
Thank you….. thank you, you have put my feelings on paper for me to see and to digest. It seems so simple to have learned from our history. And yet, here again we find ourselves drowning in the vomit of the wildly corrupt.
Even after Smith talked so eloquently, McCarthy rambled on for 4 years. Please please America, use that sacred time on this planet to bring sanity back to our National conscience.
Phil, an excellent post to start my am read, coffee, and chocolate cookie. i had forgotten you call little Johnson Howdy Dowdy as he is most certainly a puppet. Unfortunately, we don't find one Margaret Chase Smith among them.....just so many bobbleheads.
Good morning, Michele. I am enjoying a bit of a "double dip" here today; I read the first couple hours of comments last night, and have come back with coffee (but sadly, no cookie and now I want one) to catch up on the comments!
Good morning, Ally. Sorry about the cookie. Yesterday was Saturday Market and we always visit our fav bakery first and have pecan rolls after we get home. Then the next day he has a scone and I have a cookie. They had small pies (raspberry?) which were the result of some mistake, so they made lemonade so to speak. Will try that tomorrow. I have smoked black cardamon and cocoa and spice (Burlap and Barrel spices) in my coffee. Hope you are enjoying maybe more than one cup.
I am! Freshly roasted and ground Cafe Ma'am that I picked up Thursday!!
As we fear the fall of the democracy of the United States let us remember that most of the countries you listed were either faux democracies, never democries, or were only democracies for a few years or decades. We are looking at 250 yrs of democracy that has become a better democracy since it's founding but today still struggles with the idea of equality and freedom, tested every few years and weakened most prominently by the actions of McCarthy, McConnell, Goldwater, and Trump, we have not crumbled. The autocrats and facists and christionists will crawl back under their rocks only to emerge when we are most complacent. They will do so again, and again, and again and they will be sent packing again, and again, and again. We are not a new democracy like the Russians, Indians, Turks, or Israels have. Our democracy will not be so easily snuffed out.
In the morning I want to forward this to our fellow Mainer who obviously does not have the courage of Margaret Chase Smith, aka Susan Collins.
Yes! Susan Collins wrapping herself in the mantle of Margaret Chase Smith is like Donald Trump wrapping himself in the American flag.
Collins has made some brave votes But mostly, McConnell has let Collins make some independent votes - when they were not going to change the outcome. Unlike Chase Smith who voted for every Civil Rights bill, Collins has caved to the GOP's embrace of States Rights rhetoric to oppose civil rights protections, especially for voters.
In my campaigning, I've found that many Maine voters are on autopilot when it comes to Collins. McConnell helps her roll in the pork barrels at election time and they don't pay attention to her votes.
Lin, to me I will forever associate her with the phrase “I am very concerned”….and then crickets….kinda like Shakespeare: “Life's but a walking shadow; a poor player, that struts and frets his hour upon the stage, and then is heard no more: it is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.”
Barbara, I liked your comment so much. I hardly ever read Shakespeare, but your quote, which I found out was written for a disconsolate Macbeth, was so appropriate as a metaphor for the career of Sen. Collins. Her own actions have rendered it meaningless. The same can be said for many other Republican politicians. I liked, too, the unpretentious, casual way in which you introduced the quote while knowing well, I suspect, that it is so profound it was likely to set off an explosion of reflections in your reader’s minds. It did, even in my unimaginative one. Thanks!
Collins seems to have forgotten the promise she made in her first Senate campaign, that she believed two terms in the Senate were good for everyone and she wouldn't run for a third term. She's like all "moderates" - full of shit. She talks her bullshit talk, and then votes for every shit bill Republicans propose.
"She's like all "moderates" - full of shit."
Well that is a sweeping and unsupported condemnation.
Maine CD2's Rep. Jared Golden is probably the most centrist Democrat in the House. As a progressive he continuously tests my Vote Blue No Matter Who. But - he contributes to the number of Democrats in the House and when we have a majority he amplifies more progressive voices. Also there are issues on which he is in line with the Democratic agenda. And - Golden represents a district which went for Trump twice (despite our best efforts) and by a larger percentage than any other district which went for Trump but elected a Democratic representative.
I'm mostly thinking of Republican "moderates" - they declare their independence and then vote the party line.
I feel the same way about Jared Golden. I wish he were more progressive, but as you've said, ME District 2 is very tricky. The area where we live on the coast is pretty liberal, but inland, if you drive on Route 2 through the towns from Newport to Skowhegan, you'll see lots of Trump signs.
Thanks for reminding people of this, TC! As a Mainer, I mention Susan Collins' statement about only serving 2 terms as often as I can.
Here's another fact about Sen. Susan Collins: She only votes against her party when it costs her nothing!
TC, I disagree. I view too many "progressives" as dangerously willing to take destructive points of view in order to adhere to some ideological purity. It's harder yet more generally effective for a wider range of people and politicians to stay in the middle and compromise. Ideologically pure arguments are enticing and more entertaining, but they can be dangerous if implemented without compromise.
I would appreciate understanding what destructive points of view you find in progressives.
Well said.
Susan Collins is a fraud and a hypocrite, genuflecting at the alter of Don the Con like all the other sycophants. I am shocked that a state that elects an Angus King continues to support her.
"I am shocked that a state that elects an Angus King continues to support her."
Well, Wisconsin elects the admirable Democrat Tammy Baldwin, as well as the appalling Republican Ron Johnson.
Just the first example that comes to mind.
Add Ohio, with the wonderful Sherrod Brown, and the brown-shirt jd vance. And NO, I will NEVER capitalize his name, or that of the orange turd.
and those of us in Wisconsin that support Sen Baldwin are completely embarrassed and mortified that other Wisconsin voters support Rojo.
lin- You are so right. People remember the Susan Collins before McCarth,er, McConnell was speaker and how she used to collaborate and compromise with the Democrats.
She seems to actually admire McConnell and follows lockstep with him except when her vote doesn't make a difference.
And yes, Susan Collins's hero is Margaret Chase Smith and wants to be remembered as standing up for Americanism, but by making an ass out of herself defending Kavanaugh and her comments about the 2017 tax cut she has muddied her reputation to many Mainers and all Americans.
Perhaps you received the email from her, asking her to vote for Nikki Haley in the primary this year. And now Nikki turned on her supporters by giving her support to TFFG.
On numerous occasions, I have urged Senator Collins to become an Independent like our other Senator. -- Angus King. She has NEVER once responded to these emails even though she has responded to other emails on other topics.
She is a snake in the woods and hopefully Mainers will finally realize this.
A viper
After Trump's first impeachment:
February 2020: “I believe that the president has learned from this case,” she (Collins) told Norah O’Donnell of CBS News. “The president has been impeached. That’s a pretty big lesson.”
Sen. Collins is a fool, who was fooled and wants her constituents to be just like her.
Anyone with a ringside seat to Trump’s behavior, a member of Congress, who would claim that they were “fooled”, is one! (I’ll let the ambiguity of English grammar decide whether “one” refers to “ a fool” or “a member of Congress” or perhaps they’re equal.)
Well said. Seems to be fooled over and over, and never learn.
I call that "stupid" at the least, if not venal and corrupt.
Some today were admiring her because she condemned the NY verdict! With her record, her opinion can change every day! Flip Flopper!
Please do!
Colline did a lot of talking about how she cared about protecting Roe but ended up voting otherwise. Calling out Kavanaugh for lying was simply a piece of performative theater. She knew any Federalist Society approved nominee was doing away with Roe at the first opportunity. To be fair, the next nominee wouldn't have been any better, but she still tried to have it both ways.
If Mainers thought Susan was the reincarnation of Margaret, they sure must be disappointed, or else those who were alive then are all gone, so no one remembers.
We are still waiting for a the current version of "At long last, have you no sense of decency?" Because we all know that MAGA's answer is "No."
Senator Flake (R-AZ) tried to do it in 2017. When he stood up to Trump, I suspect that other Senators -- like Messrs Sasse, Corker, Lankford et al. -- would gain the heart necessary to rally next his call for honor. Nope. Representatives Cheney and Kinzinger knew their fates by sitting and participating vigorously on the 06jan21 Committee.
https://www.c-span.org/video/?c5022166/user-clip-brav-rep-cheney ⚖️
https://www.c-span.org/video/?c5119478/user-clip-senator-coons-praises-senator-flake 🙏
https://www.c-span.org/video/?c5021441/user-clip-brav-rep-kinzinger ✌️
Representative Cheney got primaried by the macho-mouthed epigone and Representative Kinzinger called it quits but continues fighting with his 'Country First' Movement. In the era of social media, I wonder how Senator Smith would have fared. Likely much the same as Mr Kinzinger and Ms Cheney. Democrats have already started showing their appreciation.
Yes....people have spoken up. But the MAGA crowd has no sense of decency and instead drag everyone down with them. Their voters CHOOSE to be represented by deplorables. They choose the circus as long as the media keeps devoting the majority of their coverage to awaiting Trump's next pronouncement the same way the press covered Joe McCarthy. Whoever speaks up and/or fact checks gets subsumed by the next "news" (entertainment) cycle. The public is clicking thru for their next dopamine hit. The media turned Trump from sideshow to center ring.
Why wait ? Get your voice out there !
It has to come from within the tribe. They’ve been successful at otherising (RINOs) and censoring everyone who has tried.
Actually, the RINOs are all that is left. Party of Lincoln? Give me a break. Advocates and protectors of a republic? Hell no. Almost everything they ever say is fake, except for their desire for total domination.
Are you part of the ‘tribe’ - if so, speak.
No. I was never part of that tribe. I'm what used to be called a centrist, which means I'm now a firm Democrat. (Because Independents are Republicans trying to disavow MAGA but still believing in trickle down economics and oligarchic control...as long as they are the oligarchs. ) And I'm a nobody with no clout.
At this point they would laugh and make fun of someone who would say something similar. They are a danger to all Americans. This is not going to end well. I'm old and tired and I'd like to see things start to change for the better.
https://www.facebook.com/share/r/STY3wFeQZzBLFSmo/?mibextid=xCPwDs
Matthew McConaughey speaking up as a Centrist. We are the real majority.
https://www.facebook.com/share/r/STY3wFeQZzBLFSmo/?mibextid=xCPwDs
I woke up this morning thinking about Joe McCarthy, decency, and American democracy. This may be the biggest assault on our form of government since that dark time. And yet, McCarthy was brought down, seemingly in an instant. Perhaps we can do the same in 2024.
I have the hope (and vision), Annabel, that like that jury of 12 who saw the evidence and rendered their verdict - in a New York minute - our country will do the same on Roevember 5, 2024.
Evening, Lynell! Broke my rule and read LFAA when it showed up. After today, I needed this!
Morning, Ally! (It's 3:05 a.m. here). As you just proved to yourself, anytime is a good time for LFAA!
I invoke my R.C. upbringing and nominate Dr Cox Richardson as the patron saint of insomniacs. 🤭😉🥳
And early risers.
Ahhh. . . the symmetry of saintliness! 😅
Second!
Thanks, Lynell! Usually I have to wait until morning (and coffee) in order to get some sleep. After my day yesterday, I needed this. I'll post more on my day when I get done perusing the new comments this morning.
Looking forward to hearing about your day. No rush!
Corruption has spread much wider and deeper in ways that are without precedent. "Tailgunner Joe" got smacked down relatively early. The lies of Nixon/Reagan et al have festered for over four decades and being called with conviction (no pun intended) only in the 11th hour. Were gonna need a bigger soapbox.
That starts with overturning citizens united.
https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/us-republican-party-gop-whigging-out-you-make-call-ned/
From 6½ years ago.
But there have been so many lines crossed that most of us said would be his downfall, and they weren’t. We kept thinking even his peers would do something, and then they fell in line. What kind of Svengali hold is present here? I wish some investigative organization could discover his little black book if one exists. The flipping makes me also question a person’s ethics and wonder what kind of hold or promises are being made that are worse than their credibility or sense of honor.
One wonders how Margaret Chase Smith would fare in the current Republican party. Not well, I'd guess. Nor, I suppose, would Jacob Javits, or even John McCain. We only have to look at Liz Cheney's and Adam Kinzinger's fates to understand how far from honor and decency today's Republican party has strayed.
"Strayed" is droll. It's gone without a trace. Not a trace.
How would Abe Lincoln fare? Theodore Roosevelt? Even Ike? Maybe even Nixon.
Or Jesus the Christ for that matter
Not the one the Bible recorded. What would Jesus do? Not vote for Trump, that's for sure. Jesus was hard to rile, but I think greedy self-serving, and cruel Republicans would face some memorable reproval.
Agree that she would fare like Liz Cheney. In contrast to the era of McCarthyism, today's Gangster Operating Politicos lack both Snow white and a single dwarf.
Liz Cheney and Adam Kinzinger and their GOP supporters were voted out or declined to run. The red tsunami predicted against Dems has instead “primaried” all the McCain Republicans out of office.
If you listen to Decoding Fox News on Substack, you’ll see why. The Right Wing’s Trumpet drowns out all sanity and heaps praise on today’s nefarious “McCarthys” whose fire and brimstone belligerence makes better television.
And it’s not JUST right wing news. I wear a Biden Shirt on every Grocery Run in Florida and have been blown away by the response: zero negative comments. I talked with a CBS News producer about my experience. She kept probing for conflicts or threats from shoppers in MAGA gear. None! I chimed. And that was the end of her interest in the story.
Consider the phrase that turned the tide on McCarthy
“Have you no sense of decency…?”
A sense of decency… THAT should be the bar for anyone who runs for office.
If the skewed news coverage inspires you, join me Grocery Shopping in Biden Gear on every grocery run til 11/5. Union Made t-shirts available at DemsMakeLifeBetter.Org and BeantownStrong.Org
Spread the word.
Agreed that decency is part of what makes life worth living. Predatory autocracies make life hell. Strange that so many over so many centuries, have been beguiled by it. When enough people have had quite enough, the tyrant falls, with bloodshed or without.
We have a right to demand decency of one another to a responsibility to practice it ourselves.
That's a bittersweet letter. That such a woman should have, in the end, gone to waste because of the same mindset that we're now seeing. “I do not want to see the Republican party ride to political victory on the Four Horsemen of Calumny—Fear, Ignorance, Bigotry, and Smear.” That spells FIBS, by the way.
The "GOP" tells whoppers, and big lies kill, and have for centuries. We have a duty to expose them for what they are.
And promptly, too. Whiny little raised-eyebrows voice, on the BBC Radio news this morning: "Well, I don't think the American people will stand for it. I don't think they will." It's 'Stand back and stand ready" in other words.
Notes:
Eric Prince’s BLACKWATER was used by Putin as a model for Russia’s Wagner (Mercenary/Paramilitary) Expeditionary Army.
Eric Princes sister, former Trump’s Education Secretary, is married to Amway Founder Dick Devos. Amway has a billion+ business in Russia. After sanctions placed on Russia, Putin made it illegal to take $ out of Russia. The Devos’s billions are locked inside Russia. FSB last year or so raided the Moscow Amway HQ offices. Just one example of the too cozy relationships with conservative Western billionaires and the Putin regime.
Former Commerce Sec Wilbur Ross owns a shipping company with Russian Oligarghs. Wilbur also was a board member of the Bank of Cyprus, a known vehicle for Russian money laundering.
Pre 2016, Robert Mueller warned us of this and other convoluted relationships infecting the western rule of law based financial system by kleptocrats, authoritarians, gangsters/mafia/paramilitaries.
Thank you, Ted.
Betsy DeVos, Wilbur Ross -- two more excellently prominent reminders of our billionaire vermin.
How many trips to Kharkiv did Rudy make pre 2016 for his “terrorism” consulting gigs? ( paid for by Russian backed oligarch’s)
What was Gov Perry of Texas doing in Ukraine? Energy deals?
More than one way to corrupt an American political party. The common thread is greed.
There were courageous Republicans who spoke out against MAGA. They were purged.
Please see my response to Barbara S.; better addressed to you.
There's really no way to find that among the hundreds of comments here without spending a lot of time.
It is actually 6 posts up from this one if you scroll up just a bit:
"Senator Flake (R-AZ) tried to do it in 2017. When he stood up to Trump, I suspect that other Senators -- like Messrs Sasse, Corker, Lankford et al. -- would gain the heart necessary to rally next his call for honor. Nope. Representatives Cheney and Kinzinger knew their fates by sitting and participating vigorously on the 06jan21 Committee.
https://www.c-span.org/video/?c5022166/user-clip-brav-rep-cheney ⚖️
https://www.c-span.org/video/?c5119478/user-clip-senator-coons-praises-senator-flake 🙏
https://www.c-span.org/video/?c5021441/user-clip-brav-rep-kinzinger ✌️
Representative Cheney got primaried by the macho-mouthed epigone and Representative Kinzinger called it quits but continues fighting with his 'Country First' Movement. In the era of social media, I wonder how Senator Smith would have fared. Likely much the same as Mr Kinzinger and Ms Cheney. Democrats have already started showing their appreciation."
Thank you, Ally. That was kind of you to do. 🤝💓✌️
I can find previous posts by using a search function, but it get annoying when there are many "see more" pages. There is no global search function. I give Substack a C- for usability. It's minimalist and it works, but there are many useful functions it lacks, without cluttering it with bells and whistles. It would help, for example, to label which person is responding to which person with out tracing a spiders web of connecting lines that become extended. It's not rocket science.
We need more people, especially women, now like Margaret Chase Smith. They are all cowards now and better be careful! They are on the wrong side of history (herstory) and we will show them Roevember 5! My birthday is November 7 and I want the present I received in 2020 as they announced that Biden won on this day!
Yes, Lisa! May you get your birthday wish!
A gift that will keep on giving.
We have such women in the Squad, Katie Porter, Cori Bush, Jasmine Crockett. All Democrats and all have to fight the Dem establishment to hold on to their seats unfortunately as the power brokers in the party don't seem to like outspoken women who are left of themselves. Look how they supported Cuellar (who has voted with Republicans more than any other Dem) over Jessica Cisneros. We have work to do in our party as well if we really want to stand up for people over corporations and big money.
The Democratic Party organization needs to be more democratic in nature than it has in the past. I think that's how so much crap managed to slip by them as the Party of Lincoln., or at least the Party of Eisenhower, morphed into the Party of Trump. Irrespective of whether Humphrey was the ideal candidate, the party's handling of the nomination was diplomatically disastrous. I urged my friends to vote against tricky Dick, but a number of them sat it out out of spite. I saw the same heavy handedness in 2016, and bad feeling that was didn't help at all. I think that under Biden, the party is doing better in that respect.
https://www.salon.com/2016/02/13/un_democratic_party_dnc_chair_says_superdelegates_ensure_elites_dont_have_to_run_against_grassroots_activists/
I was raised in a home where the mention of the N word, meaning Nixon, would send my mother frothing at the mouth. She was once almost strangled by a southern friend arguing politics. My dad had to pull him off. Needless to say, politics was taken seriously at home. Mother wouldn’t have survived the election of T.
Hey Lisa - my birthday is also November 7th and I wish for the same thing- a landslide Blue Vote throughout the country. We citizens must put a stop to this madness.
Paraphrasing renowned historian Ken Burns, we are on the cusp of someplace we’ve never been before in our history in which there are a huge number of people in this country who pretty much have given up on a promise and think that the easy promises of a dictator will solve most everything. As we all know, it will make things worse.
For folks who might think despotism is going to stop with deporting 15 million immigrants or going after political enemies, we know better. We know it doesn’t end anywhere. Hence, it’s our job to wake up those asleep to the reality that there literally is no choice in November—none. We either have the continuation of the United States of America or we don’t. Which do we want?
Your assessment of that “huge segment” is 100% accurate. I got to hang out with about 50 of them today. They are gonzo.
Ally, Thank you for writing. While I would note, at least in the short-term, I have given up on hardcore MAGA, I still believe, aside from the lists dispensed for postcarding, text- and phone-banking, and the like, we still have a shot with the substantial number who are “soft” on Trump.
I’m hoping for some information that I can use with some of them…
Ally, For what it’s worth, I take great effort to drive home what it would mean to lose our democracy and how our way of life would change. Trump already has stated he would enact the Insurrection Act on Day 1 of his presidency. He’s already spoken about rounding up his political enemies. In a word, we can’t relent on prevailing upon people, whatever their concerns about Biden, to imagine what America would look like were the President to start moving the military around to put down our voices, our right to protest policy with which we disagree, perhaps indefinitely detaining us. This is not without precedent. Trump had wanted to criminalize protesters around Black Lives Matter for the murder of George Floyd.
Given the hour EDT, I’ve barely touched upon rights and freedoms that would be ripped away, nor have I mentioned women losing control of their bodies, nor what it would mean were we unable to depend on an independent judiciary (we’re already starting to see what that would look like), or depend on the rule of law, or an independent Justice department, or an independent Federal Communications Commission—all things Trump has said he would do, and I’m just getting started.
Ultimately, we have 5 months to urge so-called persuadable voters before the General to listen to the things Trump says and the people he admires. No one should doubt that whatever freedoms we have in this country, whatever one likes about this country, dramatically would change.
"Trump hates dogs" works. https://rvat.org/
"Do you support stealing from kids with cancer?" works.
I agree.
And "do you think dogs are a good judge of character?".
Thanks for a useful link.
Everything the current "Republican" party says and does contrasts sharply with values we have been taught to admire for decades. It's had to know which examples to prioritize, but the underhandedness that makes them powerful is surely also where they are vulnerable. They prosper on lies so we have to be careful to dispense the truth, so far as we are able, but also move like a skilled prosecutor to "truth" them into a corner, and identify the legitimate issues that pack a gut punch.
Barbara, thank you. I got told yesterday after I made a snarky post on what (retired LCSO command staff) said, which was basically "If you hate one man that much you might be part of the problem." And I replied with "Why do y’all hate him so much then? Oh, my bad. You’re not talking about the current president. You’re talking about the one who calls me vermin and wants to take away my rights. Got it."
Said retired command guy didn't comment, but my former sergeant did. I got mansplained as to how I was wrong, that fpotus was a staunch supporter of LGBT rights, and that he never called us vermin. I replied about white Christian Nationalism being stuffed down my throat and the quote that he had called democrats and Biden supporters as "vermin". I then asked if he had heard of Project 2025, he said he'd read it and that it was unconstitutional.
He then went on a tirade about how unfair and unconstitutional the NYC trial was, because his wife (a lawyer 30+ years ago) pointed out some federal laws that she believes were violated. I asked him for his news and information sources. Crickets at of 0600 PDT today.
It's hard to argue with people who have been convinced to support and never question some proposition at any cost and whose peer group status demands that they do so. That ain't liberty. Maybe video of some of Trumps greatest meltdowns would affect some. What a crybaby!
If you don't already, Ally, please subscribe to Hopium Chonicles. Simon provides a litany of great talking points. https://www.hopiumchronicles.com/
I do, thank you. I should dig a little deeper there than I do. Thanks for the tip.
If it all doesn't go to hell in a handbasket, I think a significant number of of MAGA's may fall out of love with Dear Dictator, even if they don't go Democrat. At least that may be the case if reasonable sanity rules. For the moment I am hoping that some of those who are not paying enough attention to politic will see enough compare and contrast to see the danger, and make the wiser move. I keep saying this, but I think it is important to frame voting as a personal share of responsibility for future outcomes, for ourselves, for others, who may well be affected more than we ourselves, and for generations to come, more so than an expression of personal opinion, which is the pitch I tend to encounter; "Do you want a voice in the people's choice" said an old PSA. It not just about you. Democracy is not just about you, nor is self-governance, decency, and liberty and justice for all.
Tell us more Ally.
It didn't really fit with what I said in my original post, so here goes:
Yesterday was the day set for our annual "retiree shoot" whereupon honorably retired cops qualify to prove their marksmanship and receive a "concealed carry" card pursuant to a congressional act. This group was (by definition) all older than 50 years old, most of us over 60, and a fair number over 70. In casual conversation I learned that a number of guys (seriously, I was the only female retiree there, there was one female range officer there, and as I was leaving a retired officer from another agency was arriving) who were usually there but missing today had moved to other states (Arizona, Idaho, and Texas) all stating grandly because of "Oregon's politics). There were a LOT of sidebar conversations regarding the political climate today, ALL of them were MAGAt talking points. I did chat with one guy, of a similar political bent, for about 20 minutes down in the parking lot.
This skewed my attitude for most of the rest of the day, causing me to get irritated with a dear friend who could not understand my directions on how to get to our local community college where we were going so she could test out the electric assist motor she got on her Eliptigo. This set me up for an argument with my wife over stupid things like directions on leaving the parking lot (this is an incredibly rare occurrence, and was exacerbated by her being in a great deal of pain from a back problem that is defying all treatment options).
We managed to get around that, and I offered up two options for dinner, both involving the left over tri tip I smoked the day before. She said she "wasn't really hungry), so I went down to our music studio (spare bedroom) to practice. I was about 30 minutes in when I heard her race upstairs in extreme distress (and with a bad back, "race" is a generous term) and experience the disaster of what was most likely food poisoning from lunch. She does not EVER vomit (3rd time in 40+ years of knowing her) and it was an unpleasant experience (to say the least). I ended up dealing with the aftermath, which included a load of laundry and some other cleanup (I can deal with a lot of stuff; blood, brains, severed limbs, dead people/animals but adult human 💩 is my one trigger).
It was a day, and reading this post and doing some commenting was just what I needed to reset.
p.s. she's fine this morning.
Dunno Ally. Your PTSD from that range experience might’ve caused you to attempt to poison your good friend. Glad to hear you were apparently unsuccessful.
LOL!!! I’m glad I failed, if that was my intent.
" There were a LOT of sidebar conversations regarding the political climate today, ALL of them were MAGAt talking points. "
So few things in life match the ideal, but here we a talking about officers of the law, tasked with enforcing adherence to the law. And here is the Orange Orifice openly showing open contempt for the law in just about every respect. The poster child of lawlessness. And let's be frank, clearly guilty as charged, with the defense crying foul because the prosecution did not call up witnesses for the defense that the defense failed to call ??? Me, oh my, such a miscarriage of justice (snark,snark). What's wrong (really wrong) with this picture???
I will when I write my original comment after I read all the new comments that wandered in whilst I slept.
I’m guessing that you made the mistake of going to the grocery store, but I’m hoping there’s a little more to it than that.
😲…wow…you recovered yet?
Yeah, but it took a while.
Poor you.
Well said!
Thank you, Christopher.
Thank you, HCR for this moving story of courage to inspire us to defend the same principles today.
Thank you so much for this much-needed and greatly appreciated history lesson tonight. Wishing you a peaceful and restorative Sunday with those you love in an environment your cherish.
The conspiracy theorists insist that the convict has been able to blackmail most of his opposition in the GOP. That it seems is the only way to explain the unexplained. It is astonishing to see the same people who were in hiding, in fear on J6, now endorsing him as he awaits sentencing. How will future readers of our current history ever believe it?
I don’t think the conspiracy theorists are barking up the right tree. There is far too much information that the efforts of Leonard Leo and Project 2025 are EXACTLY what they want. That, and their perceived power in that “new order” is the only logical explanation.
Have you read Hitler’s book/speeches? “My New Order”
One would think that an American political party would at least change the words, plans, playbook, and thoughts of Hitler to disguise their goals just a wee bit… but they aren’t even hiding it anymore. The GOP is in full fascist bloom.
https://a.co/d/bxfnOwI
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Order_(Nazism)#:~:text=Among%20other%20things%2C%20the%20New,colonization%20by%20German%20settlers%2C%20to
From Business Insider: https://www.businessinsider.com/donald-trumps-ex-wife-once-said-he-kept-a-book-of-hitlers-speeches-by-his-bed-2015-8
According to a 1990 Vanity Fair interview, Ivana Trump once told her lawyer Michael Kennedy that her husband, real-estate mogul Donald Trump, now a leading Republican presidential candidate, kept a book of Hitler's speeches near his bed.
"Last April, perhaps in a surge of Czech nationalism, Ivana Trump told her lawyer Michael Kennedy that from time to time her husband reads a book of Hitler's collected speeches, My New Order, which he keeps in a cabinet by his bed ... Hitler's speeches, from his earliest days up through the Phony War of 1939, reveal his extraordinary ability as a master propagandist," Marie Brenner wrote.
(...)
Trump then recalled, "Actually, it was my friend Marty Davis from Paramount who gave me a copy of 'Mein Kampf,' and he's a Jew."
Brenner added that Davis did acknowledge that he gave Trump a book about Hitler.
"But it was 'My New Order,' Hitler's speeches, not 'Mein Kampf,'" Davis reportedly said. "I thought he would find it interesting. I am his friend, but I'm not Jewish."
Dig in and read those speeches and you will see clearly how that now, it’s the entire GOP running Hitler’s old fascist playbook to power.
Power tends to corrupt and money is power. Monopolies of any form of power threatens liberty and justice. I though we had already learned that. That was at the very least strongly implied in my school books.
Yes, Ally, they are all in to replace our existing system.
https://www.nytimes.com/2024/05/28/magazine/roe-v-wade-christian-network.html?unlocked_article_code=1.wk0.Qe0F.CdZJW1PNyXJa&smid=nytcore-ios-share&referringSource=articleShare&u2g=i
George Ferrick
just now
I've come across this quote, by AOCortez, that seems like it would be helpful
when people bring up Joe Biden's age or other aspects:
"Biden doesn’t stand for all the values I do.
But I would rather fight for those things in a landscape where democracy still works,
than in a landscape of racist, sexist authoritarianism."
This^This^This^This^This^This^
If only Trump were a drunk like Joe McCarthy. He would have self-destructed years ago. But this time is different. Republican corruption is staggering. They had the presidency for 4 years and are shooting for another 4. They have won dozens of seats in congress, and six seats on the Supreme Court. The billionaires are financing the takeover of the government, and their only motive is lower taxes and less regulation. They will commit any crime, any dishonesty, destroy any program to get what they want. Steve Bannon is braying like a banchee. People are listening to him. Phil Balla makes jokes about it all. It's not a joke.
Yeah James, McCarthy and 1950s GOPers 'keeping their head down' in silence compared to Trump and MAGAs is like the difference between heartburn and a heart attack.
They're not giving up. This is a fight to the finish.
We shouldn’t expect to win an argument with fascists. Winning a debate with reason is not their goal nor aim. Theirs is a different game. They win hearts and minds through force of will, threats of violence, pure passion void of rational thought. They understand only force. Took us awhile to learn that in the 30’s. And we paid the price in the 40’s. If the rule of law doesn’t put them in prison, if the courts don’t uphold the rule of law, if we don’t win enough of a majority, it will just keep spreading like a malignant cancer.
Ted, YES! There is no middle ground. Courts must do their job.
Equal protection under law, equal justice under law. WE have to make it happen.
Exactly.
I think you have to tell the truth, which is what successful social movements do, but you have to keenly focus and and repeat incessantly (it works for big truths as well as big lies). It helps to box them in a corner, as Biden did to get Repub to pledge not to cut Social Security and as Joseph Welch did to outfox McCarthy.
No finish, James -- till a cornered Putin sees he's dying, and can push the button that most of the rest of us die either immediately, or in terrible, terrible post-nuke aftermath.
Possible. More likely he gets assassinated -- IF we and the European powers make it impossible for him to keep his economy and his war running. He is not the only cutthroat in his regime. His people are old hands at revolution, when the time comes, although that outcome is less likely because, unlike our citizens, they are not armed. Either Putin goes, or we do. I don't know which will occur first.
Trump and his whole frikkin' party is drunk on power, and that's way, way worse than booze.
Would that the Big Mac effect had affected the right guy instead of the poor man who was trying to show how deleterious they are to our health. I keep waiting for his arteries to explode between his diet and all the hate.
Once again, some of the Republicans in the Senate are more interested in conspiracy theories than in doing the work that they were sent to do. Their manifesto was signed by Sens. Mike Lee (R-Utah), J.D. Vance (R-Ohio), Tommy Tuberville (R-Ala.), Eric Schmitt (R-Mo.), Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.), Rick Scott (R-Fla.), Roger Marshall (R-Kan.) and Marco Rubio (R-Fla.). If they are unwilling to do the work, we need to elect people who will.
Mary, & Everyone, I attended a digital meeting this Saturday morning organized by "Team Newsom" that is assembling a national effort to organize effectively for the November election using the robust digital Platform Discord which has numerous tools to build very large digital communities, share videos, access to massive storage, personal data safeguards with scaffolding nodes such as "Channels" & "Topics".
The Discord platform is scalable to accommodate bite size communication tasks to very large commitments such as "how to talk to voters" or participate in a focused 6 month effort to Vote Blue "Up & Down the Ballot & across the Country" I contacted one of the organizers today at: haysorganizing@gmail.com & will update the launch through June 2024.
I will continue to comment on LFAA & Civil Discourse & report on SCOTUS published opinions through this Term which are typically released on Thursdays & are available LIVE at SCOTUSblog.com after the "5 minute bell" rings at 9:55 am Eastern.
As Professor Vance says: "We are all in this Together."
Thank you, Counselor.
I learned a lot from that 'Back Row View' Officer.
And it's not like there is no work to be done.
Spot on "JL";I will be trained as a November '24 Election worker in August.
Me too, here in Ohio. And Ohio is a scary place these days!
After working as a poll worker assigned to an official (in charge of a precinct) who turned out to be a conspiracy nut and who kept asking ME questions, I decided I could perform an official’s job after all. Later I saw him on a current movie, “Bad Faith,” and had my worst impressions confirmed.
Never thought about the people I'll be working WITH! Here in corrupt Ohio, at least there are laws keeping the loonies a realistic distance from the voting locations ( 200 ft. from the entrances, I believe ), but no restrictions on keeping the loonies from being poll workers. Yikes!
MLMinET launched an Author's Substack 8 days ago. Yeah!
Actually, that's a mistake. I didn't. I'm not sure how it happened, but I've asked for Substack's help deleting it. But thanks.
There’s a common thread around the country but Ohio demonstrates it clearly. Counties that lost manufacturing jobs to China, never retooled, retrained, re-educated their citizens, lost hope, voted for Obama and hope, fell into opiod addiction, ( thanks Purdue Pharma and pharmaceutical lobby), lost their senses feeling forgotten,left vulnerable both economically and psychologically, fell for a hate and grievance spewing demagogue, & voted for him twice.
Yep. And here in Ohio at least, it began under Clinton, with NAFTA. So all the slack-jawed yokels saw DEM-O-CRATS as the guys that took their jobs, and have never come back, even when they KNOW they're voting against their own best interests. It's maddening!
I think it began as Nixon opened China as a trading partner. Then, under the Regan administration, factories began moving East. Clinton was just cozy with Corporations ( donor $) because to win, he said, “It’s the economy stupid.”
Positive see your Substack Daniel.
They have said they won’t do their jobs—actually go on strike. In my profession, if you stood up and said you would not do your job, you were fired.
In my union profession, we had a "no strike" clause because we "performed essential community work". I guess without the statement that elected officials should do their jobs, our only recourse is to vote them out. I'm thinking that it is ridiculous (intentionally used here) to run for election on the promise that you'll "do the things" and then decide to fail to do the things you were elected to do.
Were you the union rep for your department Ally?
My nephew is the union rep for his fire department in a red state. Most of his negotiating is done with Republicans he said. I'm not sure if he's been reelected as the rep yet or not.
No. I had no desire to do that at all.
Gary, if he’s been reelected, he might benefit from reading the book Taking the War Out of Our Words—it’s the best book I’ve found on how to get people to listen to your point of view.
At the very least, to sue them for malpractice.
The VP Auditions have begun. Little Marco Rubio exposed his and Florida’s Cuban immigrants vulnerability and fears of Castro’s purge and oppression in a false equivalence of TFG’s Conviction worthy of the history of a “Strongman” like Mussolini and Hitler ( themselves both convicted criminals).
Ted, when all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail. Somehow we need to give them the ability to see that the conviction by 12 ordinary citizens selected by Trump’s lawyers is the exact opposite of Castro’s imprisonment of political rivals.
I don’t think “we” can reach Rubio’s already radicalized Cuban Americans. Marco has chosen demagoguery/manipulation to activate his already traumatized immigrants from Cuba. We can only inoculate those that are undecided. That is where the effort, resources, and messaging should be aimed.