On the Fox News Channel’s The Five yesterday, the panel of Fox personalities expressed outrage that federal judge James Boasberg had ordered the Trump administration to stop its deportation of migrants based on the 1798 Alien Enemies Act.
That the absence of a criminal record proves criminality is virtually identical to the tests used to determine whether a woman was a witch. This is the mentality of a large number of people in government now.
Sounds like true-speak or double-think from '1984' and grabbing an innocent to slake the blood-lust sounds like 'Fahrenheit-451'. 🤢 Double-whammy dystopia. 😱 One simply can not make this scheiße up. 💔 These yahoos just wing it with reasons; they do not care about truthfulness. 🤬
Yes, 1984 has come to America. At this point I think it is important to recognize that our President is openly claiming to now have dictatorial power. As he said to Governor Mills of Maine, the law is whatever he says, regardless of what is in the Constitution and regardless of what the courts say. All Americans need to decide whether or not they find this is acceptable and act accordingly.
Move On.org stated some facts....Aprox 3.5% of the popluation must stand against a dictator to defeat him.........the Womens March reaached aprox 1%......there MUST be millions of people in the streets or Orange Hitler and his room full of Orange psyco goons will win.
What about the women that have died in washrooms....back seats of cars......emergencey rooms.......due to nazis taking away a womens right to make her own choices.........they have names!!!
How dare you protect the "pro life" animals.....that now preach "measles parties"......what about the names of millions of innocents around the world now without help and aid.....left to die!!!
Dude! Did you read the part where they skipped due process? If they are truly gang members involved in criminal activity, then sure, deport their asses. But do you have any idea where El Salvador is keeping these people -- yes PEOPLE, not animals? It is a prison worse than any prison in the US. CECOT isn’t just a prison—it’s a tool of state control designed to crush gangs and send a message of fear. While the U.S. has supermax prisons, inmates there still have legal protections, medical care, and basic human rights, whereas in CECOT, prisoners are effectively erased from society with no rights or path to redemption.
It’s closer to a political internment camp than a traditional prison.
AND many detainees have not been convicted but were arrested under emergency powers, leading to thousands of arbitrary detentions -- much like this mass deportation that occurred with no opportunity for defense or to determine whether they were even gang members. Tom Homan basically said "it doesn't matter".
If your kid happened to look a little bit Hispanic and got caught up in such a sweep, I suspect you'd go apeshit on this administration in a heartbeat. Those people may not even see sunshine again. Don't believe me? Ask the president of El Salvador -- those are his words.
Self righteous Animals have murdered women, too by limiting their right to proper medical treatment. Your Kennedy quack is murdering people and young children with suggesting Vitamin A will keep them from measles. The children are the ones who end up in the hospital very sick.
We do not know -- you do not care -- whether those bread-&-circus deportees were really gang members. 😳
No one defends the murders of these young women by undocumented migrants. You imply a distinction between murders by undocumented immigrants vs documented immigrants vs citizens. Any murder is equally heinous. 💔
What troubles me sharply about your thinking is that you seem to think that it is perfectly okay to exploit the pain these families must feel to justify extra-legal and extra-judicial actions against people. 🤢
Thoughtful patriotic American citizens believe in our Constitution and the law. In fact, in the United States, a person is innocent until proven guilty. There are countries that operate on the idea that you are guilty until you can prove your innocence. So, undocumented people need to have their day in court. Gang members need to have their day in court. Perhaps there is nobility in the law, in the Constitution. Donald Trump is a scofflaw. He has always been a scofflaw.
You are an imbecile. You use your righteous indignation about a few tragedies to paint an entire people with a broad stroke. You are misguided in your anger. It is the job of congress to pass immigration law but both parties have failed to do that. The wealthy who employ the immigrants at substandard wages are the same ones that cry foul when a criminal alien commits a crime, but will also cry foul when you deport their staff. I am sorry those women lost their lives to criminals. Where is your indignation for the women losing their lives by lack of access to care caused by the ignorant laws passed to protect a cluster of cells that is not yet a fetus, where is your indignation when unwanted children are bounced from home to home and exploited for the money attached to their fostering? I hope you daughter or wife or girlfriend never has to suffer the criminal denial of autonomy to make their own medical decisions.
Massive national strikes, for at least a week, possibly longer. The only thing that matters to these criminals is money, so don't spend any, don't go to work, don't pay taxes...
I'm all in r/t protests and buying only what's needed to exist, but I can't boycott work...I'm a nurse at an abortion clinic. I think continuing to do my job is in itself an act of protest against the right wing takeover. I would LOVE not to pay any taxes to this government, since they're using it to enrich themselves.
celeste, thank you for your work. It is tough and now dangerous. I think we can acknowledge that some just can't do what many people can. I think doing your work is doing something very important in this fight. I would love not to pay taxes now, and at this point, keep wishing that a couple of them would just depart this earth.
Schumer’s thinking was that y keeping the government open Democrats could have some control. I’m still waiting for the attempts at control because i’ve seen nothing except more chaos and destruction.
What a great idea! Imagine if 100,000,000 of us stopped paying taxes! Even better, what if on April 15, we not only stopped paying taxes we took to the streets to tell the "Orange psyco goons" why we aren't paying taxes.
Time for the blue states to break the bank-transfer links from employers to D.C.; to collect the taxes in their capitals; and, withhold tax funds. Release to D.C. AT MOST the receipts from D.C. in the previous year (to eliminate the overage that blue states send to D.C. to subsidize red states). 🛑
Additionally, when Trump tries to drumpf a blue state of disaster relief funds, for example, then that state applies withheld tax funds to fund said relief. and forwards the net balance to Washington. Many people, will undoubtedly blow a gasket. (Like the Trumpanzee fake news about water released in California.) ⚖️
They may not understand human nature and conflict. They fail to account for stated Trumpian behavior and to anticipate where that authoritarianism is headed. 😵
The hearing for the nominee to direct the O.M.B. revealed open talk within the M.A.G.A. brain-drain, if not yet practice, of impoundment (e.g., suspending or ending F.E.M.A. operations). 😲
Now, with his diktat from the O.M.B., that practice has started the Trumpian attempt to shred the Constitution in favor of divine-right insanity. Where will funds for grants and agencies relegated to formaldehyde go? 🤢
Theorizing about what might cause a civil war over a wire transfer mechanism, when such civil disorder has likely started, is as brilliant as trying to bail out the Titanic with a tea-spoon. The Great Civil War of the nineteenth century did not start at Fort Sumter or even with secession; its started five years earlier with Bleeding Kansas. 😰
Now, this particular idea may not work. But some form of it can at least support initiatives. We need ideas to break down and re-assemble or refine in muscular non-violent responses if we are to avoid civil war. Or, maybe John Brown was right, after all. 😱
Attacking someone's proposed response right now is about as helpful as Florence Nightingale handing out LSD for a head cold. 💔
The first action is easy. Support Susan Crawford in Wisconsin. If we can show that we can beat Musk’s money and a MAGA candidate it will rally people to the cause. Maybe we can win a Congressional seat.
In Turkey, Erdogan just had his political rival arrested. We are only two steps away from Trump proclaiming the Democratic Party a terrorist group. Keep speaking out, writing and calling your friends and politicians. America is crumbling into a second rate country. We have already lost all the respect we gained over the last 80 years. Every aspect of our lives is being diminished while we fill out our brackets.
Old....Yes, we should help candidates where and if we can. Yesterday a a French scientist coming to a conference was denied entry by the jackboots who looked at his phone. He, horrors, had expressed dismay at what death star was doing to science. Well then, he might be a terrorist. I have always found custom agents to be pretty bad, so this was an easy step for them to take. I would say we are headed to lower than second rate and deserve to lose the respect of the world. Yes, it is March Madness and I have not filled out a bracket. I do enjoy basketball and will watch the games where Oregon is playing. Frankly, money has destroyed the main college sports too, but for me it is a break from the news. I am also reading The Overstory which I recommend.
How about on some dark night, when he is there, the real Americans (us) put up a fence around Mar a Lago that is impenetrable? Then, try him in absentia for crimes against the people and have him incarcerated for life right where he remains. Meanwhile, deport Musk.
Celeste, first I would say that we speak out against an American dictatorship as often as possible - just as we are doing here on Heather's website. I like WJB's 3.5% needed to defeat a dictator. In fact I think the majority would, if pressed to answer, object to a dictatorship. But most of them need a little push to act. They need to see that they have ample company. They need to pay attention to the fact that being dictator is Trump's explicitly stated intention. My other suggestion is to contact our representatives in the House and Senate, particularly if they are Republicans. But, even if they are Democrats, our voices can help to empower them to take a stronger stand.
There are many plans for demonstrations and other actions being planned. The group Indivisible that got started in the first trump presidency has grown. There are groups planning actions right now. Do a search. They had a Zoom mtg today and will have weekly mtgs from now on.
Of course you can search for a group in your town too!
That’s such a stock answer from MAGAs, designed to shut the conversation down. Picture if you will, a middle ground, where folks get actual justice, first by determining whether they are in fact gang members and then investigating whether they have committed any crimes. Pre-emptive deportation based on skin art is not the American Way. And take note: just because the regime is doing this to people you don’t like right now, does NOT mean they won’t widen the net.
I feel sorry for folks like you, so fearful and paranoid. Always looking at others as your enemy. It's no way to live. My children were taught not to refer to other human beings as animals.
I need to update what I thought I knew about obeisance to rules, laws and the constitution!! We are descending and disappearing into a deep, deep sinkhole. I cross my fingers that we can depend on the Supreme Court to save our system with reason, principle and conscience???
I'm not sure it will be reason that moves the Supreme Court to stand against the onslaught of authoritarianism. It will probably be out of self preservation, since the current 'administration' has no use for courts or judges. They will only survive if they get the U.S. Marshals to do their jobs and detain those who are flouting the courts' rulings. They need to ENFORCE their power as an equal branch of government. Getting rid of the ruling that states a president can't be charged with crimes committed for acts while in office should be immediate.
Supreme Court Justices, I think, are appointed and then can serve their lifetimes out on the court. Maybe Roberts is wondering what the history books will say if Trump manages to create a lawless police state, hence the warning that the law must be respected. We shall see...
The history books will say that Roberts was one of the chief architects that caused the destruction of American democracy. His culpability started with the Citizens United decision, continued with the gutting of the Civil Rights act, and was finalized with the Presidential Immunity decision. Chief Justice Roberts is not a smart man.
In an authoritarian state, none of the rules apply. And a lifetime can be cut short, with no one there to subject them to the' rule of law'. They better keep all that in mind.
Yes. The way I put it immediately after SCOTUS gave Trump the Get-Out-of-Jail-Free card is that they had signed their own "pink slips."
We have plenty of examples in history where dictators and monarchs eliminated high courts, claiming that the law was whatever the autocrats said it was. The result: Numerous individuals beheaded without due process because they offended the fragile ego of the ruling tyrant.
It just occurred to me re-reading Justice Roberts post that he could be telling Trump to be patient, let the appellate process play out, and when the cases get to the Supreme Court they will back him.
I posted several comments to this effect yesterday. To my mind, Roberts' comment was lawyer-speak intentionally crafted to be read and rebroadcast as a "rebuke" but the between-the-lines meaning is, "Cool your jets, Donnie, and let this come to MY court, where we've got your back."
The energy wasted on AI, cat videos, porn, could be better used to reduce our climate impact…there needs to a life to storage and cloud services. Buy a hard drive.
We swap our hard drive backup weekly at an offsite location. AI is a waste of computing power. People post lies on the internet and AI spreads them like wildfire. Then you have to scroll past all the AI in the search results to find an actual website with the facts.
What cracks me up is the Google AI search choice is often Wikipedia..humans, mostly, writing...AI is neither! It's just code written by people and is stealing the work of others, yes much of it garbage and racist!
Brown, first I would say that we speak out against an American dictatorship as often as possible - just as we are doing here on Heather's website. I like WJB's 3.5% needed to defeat a dictator. In fact I think the majority would, if pressed to answer, object to a dictatorship. But most of them need a little push to act. They need to see that they have ample company. They need to pay attention to the fact that being dictator is Trump's explicitly stated intention. My other suggestion is to contact our representatives in the House and Senate, particularly if they are Republicans. But, even if they are Democrats, our voices can help to empower them to take a stronger stand.
You have a point. In the 'Lord of the Flies' unsupervised kids become psychopathic, Trump has stated that he has not changed since the second grade or he has not needed to grow after second grade.
All animals are equal but some are more equal than others. I first read Animal Farm as a pre- teen (because I thought it was about animals, lol), and by the time I finished it I was radicalized to recognize creeping authoritarianism.
And we’re paying to keep them there out of our tax dollars when we could just send them to their home country. After all, aren’t they telling us that Trump is so good no one is getting in. We shouldn’t have to worry about them coming back.
I 100% agree on your opinion. It’s where I first went in trumps first term as potus. And I knew it was only going to get worse. Bradbury and Orwell were very intelligent and observed the world from a firm understanding of human nature. Not a surprise that an illiterate charlatan like trump and his policies play out like these brilliant authors predicted. The moral and ethical decline of our leaders was bound to happen. With the onset of video games and scrolling social media we have voided the benefits of the development of our most important invention, human language. We no longer value the development of honest and well researched ideas and opinion. Our society values instant gratification and scapegoating to justify its obvious decay.
A lot to respond to, good man. Orwell was not that far off in his timing, though coincidental. Years ago, I read an article that stated the he had titled, and set his novel in, '1984' because he transposed the last two digits of the year during which he penned the book (i.e., 1948). The difference in years is thirty-six, just a 'wee-bit' long than the length of time since the cold war ended.
David, It is your observation about the pollution then dilution language that captures my attention urgently. I just re-read '1984' and this quote comes immediately to mind: "[Syme, editor of the up-dated dictionary, says,] 'Don't you see that the whole aim of Newspeak is to narrow the range of thought. In the end, we shall make thoughtcrime literaIIy impossible, because there will be no words in which to express it."
The dummying down of language -- combined with the stupefaction attendant to video games, etc. as you observe -- has rendered many adults incapable of writing a paper embodying critical thinking.
Now onto specific points of connection. We have our bread circuses with video games and non-stop television on ever larger screens.
We have planned anxiety with endless wars.
We have book bannings instead of Guy Montag's book burnings; though those may come as the engineered hysteria of the M.A.G.A. base rises in pitch.
We now have our bread and fracases of engineered hysteria with our M.A.G.A. politics.
Our culture has become innured to violence.
I have read that even students in more selective universities struggle with reading full-length books.
We see the deliberate re-writing of history.
Scape-goating has risen to the point that innocents are faulted and branded by an intolerant voting base.
Sex seems to have little to do with intimacy.
Big Brother may not exist (at least Trump be lights on, nobody home).
The level of civil discourse seems like it is straight out of 'Lord of the Flies'.
Excellent research into the relevance of Orwell having the prescience to foresee our devolution into grunting and knuckling at each other as our means of communication. And Bradbury was all too correct as well, everything only gets faster and faster so that we don’t have the opportunity to actually see life and nature for the beautiful gift we never should be destroying. I want to think that, at the least, we won’t get there for a long time. Buuuuuuuut…… I wince that I could be wrong to think that.
Now we have some idea of what Winston Smith and Guy Montag went through. Perhaps I should read F-451 again. Had read it three times in grade school and high school. Though I remembered off-by-heart. . .Nope.
I’m currently reading Palo Alto by Malcolm Harris. Having been raised in SoCal, I am enjoying learning the truth to the Sunshine State’s success. Nothing we would have ever came close to being taught in California history. Funny though, we only had California history in grade school. I guess there was just way too much nasty reality to California history that they felt it wise to pass it off to us when we too young for the cold hard truth and could thus justify the white washing and dilution of the real story.
Why, Nathan, why this "mentality"? Why no patience with due process regarding others?
I’m using this term, “regarding others,” because David Cay Johnston used it specifically this week in his conversation with Mark Thompson.
Why do so many rely on grouping others instead?
Back in 1987 I went to Hungary, as its poets seemed to me to offer some clues as to how we might regard others more properly as individuals, as well as in the contexts of nature, history, parallel arts.
Hungary then was still part of Moscow’s red star empire, where Marxism-Leninism packaged all life by slogans, clichés, and other go-team-go inanities such as the Beach Boys made fun of in their great pop parody, “Be True to Your School.”
I spent 11 years in Hungary, Slovakia, and the Czech Republic. All most beautiful countries. Especially countrysides and villages. But the red-star-imposed legacies of packaged thinking left all prey to eventually ensuing nationalisms.
I could shuck off the group captivities, as throughout central Europe I found great poets, novelists, and film makers. So many. So many nuances in seeing, “regarding others.”
But when I returned to the U.S., the far-right and billionaire packaging of U.S. schools stared me in the face. Testing and its impersonal, logical categories there now ruled – precursor to Trump, Musk, Vance, and all the hapless MAGA (Dems, too, impotent -- totally without humanities to see what the offshoring had done to millions of American working classes).
Testing doesn't allow for seeing "others" -- only for the competition to get top numbers, thereby rise above, be above -- by numbers only -- everyone else in mass group below.
Mentality, Nathan. You use the correct word. And U.S. schools produced, manufacture it.
And let us thank George W Bush for ushering in that age of testing and data as if children were so many widgets. I was teaching English and American studies in a high school at the time, and I thought it was all nonsense. We lost a month of curriculum because of this meaningless testing. I survived by closing my classroom door and taught what I knew best. I taught my students to think.
I’m glad you taught them how to think, as so much of education is directed by Republicans to tell people what to think. Killing off the Department of Education will only make it harder for kids to learn how to think, and also shortchange students with special educational needs.
"Data does not equal information; information does not equal knowledge; and, most importantly of all, knowledge does not equal wisdom. We have oceans of data, rivers of information, small puddles of knowledge, and the odd drop of wisdom." <https://www.premraj.me/data-science-quotes/>.
While probably accurate as a general matter, this thought vastly overstates the quantum of knowledge and wisdom in the government of the Trump Reich: no puddles, no drops, just a vacuum.
There are also many different forms of knowledge that testing doesn’t catch. That poor student who is a mechanical genius. One of my fellow teenage classmates could take apart an automobile engine and put it back together. He didn’t test well. Others are high on the empathy scale, picking up sensitive cues from others, thus anticipating needs. This is what you want in a caregiver, a nurse. Where’s the test for that? Some learn by doing, some by watching, some by reading. I know several folks who make complex repairs by watching YouTube videos. Data spits out numbers; skilled, creative teachers spit out skilled, creative citizens.
Jan, I appreciate what you were trying to accomplish with your "spitting" comparison, but with respect, it doesn't work.
Thanks to nothing but pure luck, I had the privilege to be taught by some of the best teachers ever to stand in front of a chalkboard. After more than half a century, I can still name the standouts among those excellent educators: Edward Martin, Sybill O'Dell, Shirley Harrison and Thomas Crane.
The brilliance of the educational experiences they provided me wasn't that they imparted a wealth of knowledge to me and my classmates. Rather, they kindled sparks of curiosity, inspired us to explore the subjects they specialized in, and unleashed our potential to become passionate experts in those fields.
It was quick to keep the same words—sounded good. But surely you got the point. I come from a long line of teachers. Good teaching, like good parenting, nurtures children's curiosity. Take them to the library to pick out books. Give them crayons and paper for artwork, share music with them, go outside and explore nature. Schools have resources for this exploration. But teachers need support. And different neighborhoods get different schools and supplies. It's not a level playing field. Dang, this country is making some wrong turns. What a sad state of affairs. I mourn for what my kids and grandkids will have to endure.
I can't stress enough, Carol -- it's all far worse than mere waste of time.
In a world where we can learn to see and regard others, or do the opposite -- learn to worship only categories, groups, and logical packaging -- the testing whets appetites of all only for scores, numbers. Get enough and posture oneself atop -- just generally, abstractly atop.
At the top of what? A satrapy? A mass of others all reduced to just lemming mass?
Given that Trump wants to kill the law, and due process, and any role for truth and evidence, the testing will keep him, Musk, and Vance well-supplied with True Believers ready for social media algorithms to group further, foot soldiers such as the Jan. 6 criminals ready to jump to Trump's word, no matter how based only on the vile poisons stewing in him.
I agree-it was and is a meaninless substitue for learning-in my state it all started when the state legislature became a majority of Republican- I had taught social studies for about 20 years doing and finding as many creative things to teach students as I could to keep them engaged-then came the tests. It was a bad scene-no more critical thinking exercises just facts, No more exploration of different trains of thought about an historical event. In essence teach the tests though we had guidelines but not questions on the tests. I retired as fast as I could to get full retirement as like the students I was bored. It is much worse today I know and have heard from teacher friends.
I am not a fan of testing being the ‘decider/divider’. However, when I went to school, before any testing, the one’s who ‘excelled’ were the
‘Teacher’s Pets’ not the ones who asked questions, or came up with a different way to do things.
When they came thru with the first IQ tests, as limited as they were, many teachers were angry at the ones who scored highest. Because they weren’t the ‘good’ students’ they were often the ones who challenged the teacher.
Soon came the required memorization tests, and then the teacher to the tests.
Nothing wrong with tests, or even memorization at times. Just mix it with universal sports and creative arts. And make at least some of it interesting and fun.
Have a place for everyone in the school and value them all. Admin, teachers, maintenance, students and all others who are in the building.
Sorry for the long escapism of an old lady. It seems so few people were cared for in school and in this world, that they crave control and destruction.
We need the folk singers to bring us together again.
Thank you for that, Carol. We taught that to our kids when they were in school in the 80s. The schools were better back then, of course. This all reminds me of the proverb that in the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king.
You can lay some of this at the feet of schooling, but not all of it.
The core problem I see is there is too much constant data thrown at people (not information, just unprocessed data).
Some people can manage that, but some people can’t. They go into a shell to hide from all the noise.
We have lost connection to individuals. We group and prejudge everyone in masses and we pay a dear price for this.
I have heard this type of environment described as VUCA (volatile/uncertain/complex/ambiguous). I believe complexity is the element that kills us. People want their information in 10 second sound bites or 5 word headlines. This complexity makes that impossible.
I should clarify my data comment. I am not talking about social media, that is a whole different issue, I am talking about just the sheer volume of constant information that comes at people.
In the 70’s you had 3 networks with 90 minutes of news a night. In the 80’s we saw CNN start the first channel with 24 hour news coverage. Now with the internet there are so many different newsfeeds it’s hard to keep track of them all. As a marketing move every single story is heralded as breaking news even if it has already run throughout the day.
It’s become background noise, but that much noise makes some people duck and cover.
Has the News of the forcible Raid on the US-Peace-Institute yesterday been lost in the torrent of Actions that this Regime subjects Us to everyday already?...
Their mass of attacks on democracy just that more elevate (further degenerate?) their convicted criminal in the White House -- elevate criminality itself, heighten white racist nationalism, and solidify alliance with genocidal mass murderers Putin, Netanyahu, and others soulless, intransigently, disgustingly also above, beyond, immune to the law.
Robert Hubbell said the security guards at that building were threatened with loss of its gov contracts if they didn’t switch sides, so they joined with the gov goons to let them in with their keys.
Really good discussion, Phil and Moving. And I would add another element, addiction or dependency. I think people become addicted to or dependent on input, whether it be TV in the 60s or smartphones now. People know, deep down, that spending so much time with screens is not healthy. I don't think it is much different from, say, alcoholism. This is not to blame. I think we all have dependencies that are not healthy, and it takes a little willingness to start the journey away from dependencies and towards community and wisdom. The great adventure!
Your thoughts about addiction are absolutely on point. Research has shown that social media IS addictive. Just like meth produces artificially high endorphin levels SM can do the same thing.
I see everywhere people walking with their eyes planted on their phones. Most people don't look up as you pass by. People are too absorbed with constant 'engagement' and don't notice anything around them. I have never used a cell phone. I am happy not to be constantly programmed into a rat race that has turned people into robots.
Celeste, I am not criticizing you specifically, but I observe a widespread tendency to blame objects of attention rather than the lack of discipline that causes the objects to be detrimental.
We live in a society populated by an overwhelming majority of youth and adults who have no self-discipline. This lack of self-discipline has led to a variety of modern personality disorders, such as "FOMO" (fear of missing out). How did this happen?
One explanation might be that parents of the 1950s and 60s were too distracted with pursuing the American Dream to pay attention to their families. Having more money than time, they bought toys to amuse and distract their children. When the kids "bothered" them, they bought something else to shut them up. Nobody ever told the kids, "No, you don't need that. Let's just sit and talk."
A couple generations have grown up without any sense of self-restraint regarding distractions. In fact, we live in a society where people are uncomfortable if they aren't being entertained in some way. (I submit that part of Trump's appeal is that he's "entertaining.")
Mobile phones are pocket-sized miracles that can keep us informed and safe ... as long as they spend most of their time in our pockets.
It seems to me that in my lifetime, technology that I saw (and loved) was primarily a means of empowering our society (though TV was criticized early on as a manipulative tool). Now a novel sphere of technology seems to be exclusively accessible to the aims of the very rich and powerful, which impacts our lives in way we that seem to afford us far less control. In ways that are anti-democratic.
THAT is certainly one of the larger elephants in the room. Well established protections against unjustified intrusions into personal privacy, wire-tapping and search and seizure seemed to go out the window in the rapid transition to electronic media and the corporatist bent of government. I believe that earlier generations would be shocked to see how much this is so, and it appears to largely be working against our collective and individual interests. I think that the absence of reasonable public protections helped elect Trump.
If you think about it, literally everything emerges from the unfolding of the Big Bang, and is uniformly the same stuff; important since we can generalize and begin to grasp what we see wherever we look. The building blocks of our existence are can be repellent as well as sticky, and allow objects to self organize into the features of what we call "nature", of which we are a part. In such a place connections and distinctions are everywhere, and chains of connection are often complex and very long. The maps we create to navigate this world will always be incomplete, but worse than incomplete, inadequate without recognition of long and multidimensional chains of connection (in an ecosystem for example) and detection of fine, yet often crucial differences. Mass electronic media certainly has its virtues, but it role in comprehension is limited, as least in the ways it is commonly used. It's sort of the Newspeak of society become real.
It was a fictional state-imposed truncated version of English designed to make complex, articulate thoughts (that would impair the mission of "The Party") more difficult to express. The word was indeed coined in "1984".
Not to be flip about it, one of the things I ma learning as I age is that often the hardest discussions are the most important. That does not seem to make them easier. When someone close to me dies, there always seem to be the presence of things I wish I had discussed.
VUCA! Yes! and all of those are the hardest for most people to find a way to integrate into their busy daily lives.
I remember when Sesame Street was being criticized for jumping around in sound bites and songs that didn't allow time for contemplation. And then we had a generation that had learned to make decisions based on the information they had at the time, right or wrong. They were being supervised by people who were taught to look at all the possible effects. The clash was inevitable.
Jacques Cousteau once spoke of "three infinities", the infinitely large, the infinitely small, and the infinitely complex. I'm not sure that the first two technically exist, nor for that matter, the third, except as abstractions, but they may as well as far as we humans are likely to get with them.
Climate? It's complicated. Ecosystems, also complicated. The human organism, yup, also. Our poor powers can only track so far, but it seems as if we're on to something when we put some effort into it.
Einstein is sometimes credited as saying:
"Everything should be made as simple as possible, but not simpler."
That origin is doubtful, but it might have been popularized by an author who was paraphrasing Einstein. In any case, I think there is wisdom in it.
Moving joy. IMHO all data can be manipulated to favor almost anyone’s point. And without challenges to that data we are left with garbage. It has been the Rights position to dumb down America since, in my lifetime, Newt Gingrich. And it is now showing the results of that process from which I hope we can recover as we all have the power of critical thinking, we must just dig in and use it.
My old country school taught me literature that I use every day. Poems that have guided me. I’m educated but no scholar, but I’m sad for those who have missed a link in the human chain that links us all.
I'd be sad for them, too, JDinTX, except for what Orwell said of them.
They are guaranteed to do evil. All are who, as you nicely put it, "have missed a link in the human chain that links us all."
Missing this, Orwell spelled out in "Politics and the English Language," numbs them, blinds them, anesthetizes them so they will do evil -- massive evil -- yet remain numbed, blinded, anesthetized to the real damages ensuing from them.
Guaranteed the damages. Guaranteed the stupidity, as we see, along with the venom, daily in the criminal-in-chief.
Long ago I read an article by Bruno Bettelheim claiming that European students excelled in some area of language arts in part because they learned to read from real literature while American students (in this, the early 1970s) used text based on exercises emphasizing vocabulary and mechanics, rather than the goal of lucid communication. I don't remember the details very well, but it made sense to me as much of my school work seemed (at least at the time) pointless and lacking an anchoring context.
Testing was modeled after a best-practice business maxim. If it isn't measured it is not valued or attended to. Seemed like such a harmless act, immulating business approaches in education and government. So came the entire accountability movement pressed by American Enterprise and the Kochs until the conservative movement gave up on data-driven decision-making (good data revealed logical errors and failures to meet proposed outcome criteria) and adopted narrative, stories of individuals as the medium for proving the real, lived truth. And, so, I think, began the spread of distrust in the scientific model upon which science and medicine are fundamentally tied and how real knowledge gets advanced and refined over time, experiments, and validation.
The problem is you have to do both where appropriate.
We must value what makes individuals unique because those are the assets that will distinguish them throughout their lives. We should encourage them to explore those interests.
We also need to teach data based decision making. It is sorely lacking in our world and we suffer because of it. We need to teach the methods of scientific inquiry.
It’s not an either/or type thing. We need to do both.
It would seem that human diversity vastly enriches the choices and capabilities of our species, especially if we look at interests and talents. Butcher, baker, candlestick maker. some choreograph ballets or TV specials, some design elaborate microprocessors, some install roofs, others herd sheep. Nobody can do all those things, but we can benefit from a lot of them. Yet for administrative purposes there is a tendency to want to treat people as standardized machine parts; but that's not a realistic model.
Yes, there is a kit of common skills that enable us to communicate and interoperate effectively in a society, and yes, there are certain responsibilities that everyone in a civilized society needs to know and display, including what not to do, such as rape and murder. It isn't practical to completely customize each student's approach to education, but I think far more could be manged to accommodate and cultivate diversity, and evaluate performance in more imaginative and higher resolution ways.
All well said. I often wonder how we’ve come to this point. I grew up in a small resort town on the Jersey shore in the 40s and 50s. At the time it idyllic at least to those of us who were comfortably middle class. I don’t recall thinking there was anything odd about the fact that the “colored” as Black people were then called lived in a separate and definitely not equal part of town. This is background to trying to answer my own question. My public school education was superb in terms of the basics but celebrated the myth of American purity. The reactionary forces now running our country are resisting the move towards making real Jefferson’s declaration “that all men are created equal” and doing everything possible to maintain their unearned privilege. And the fact that the Dear Leader is an ignorant deranged lying racist narcissistic buffoon makes this easier for those our education system has not prepared to think critically (as you point out, intentionally) to revel in this madness.
Exactly JL. Lost deeply in the Red Queen's dark tunnels described by Lewis Carroll.
Putting aside that association is not causation in any court of law, Judge Boasberg calls balls & strikes fearlessly & was confirmed by the Senate 96-0.
It was W's excuse for invading Iraq. My impression is that police shootings of people who were presumed to be a threat, but were not, increased significantly after that precedent, but that only my impression, with no hard evidence. Certainly the "GOP" has seemed less constrained about applying coercion with little or no demonstrable probable cause. The news is full of it.
It's all so they can start using it against citizens here. This is how they are testing which laws they can break and how obedient and supportive the MAGA movement is. It is a litmus test and too many of our fellow citizens are failing it.
Is this the "due process of law"= I do not think so! And a propaganda network commentator is not qualified to make that decision and neither is Steve Bannon. We are in dangerous times!
With his reference to the absence of criminal records in the United States Cerna has only confirmed that the deportees did not come out of jails in the US. So where did the Trump regime find them? And how did they establish that they were members of a Venezuelan gang?
There is another aspect to the rant by Greg Gutfeld (Thank you, Heather, for providing the link to the FOX News bradcast, which I would not have seen otherwise.): While Gutfeld was raging on about Venezuelan murderers and rapists (where did we hear that before ?), they kept showing the deportees, with their shaved heads and shackled in a way that they could not walk upright, being herded unto the planes. It looks like FOX News derived a sadistic pleasure from doing this. They certainly played to the lowest insticts of their audience. This invoked the memory of footage I saw from show trials in the Third Reich, particularly Roland Freisler's "Volksgerichtshof" ("People's Court") where the accused had to appear in shabby clothes, without belts or suspenders, which forced them to stand before the court, holding their pants so that they would not fall down (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/People%27s_Court_(Germany)).
The footage shown by FOX was meant to be even more humiliating. It had a chilling effect on me.
I tried to send a message to Trump through the official White House web page. Nothing works. Can't send message. Can anyone get through or is this another hack at democracy? https://trumpwhitehouse.archives.gov/contact/
"American citizens elect lawmakers who write, debate, and pass the laws under which we live. Under this system, our laws represent the will of the American people." Professor states here the most significant governing principle of democracy. Trump's signature statement is that he is following the mandates of American voters. Trump does not realize that when he breaks a law, he is acting against the will of American voters. When he let Musk destroy government agencies, he is acting against the will of his voters. In America the power lies in the voters, not in the presidency. DEMs should start campainging on this platform for 2026, and 2028 NOW.
Trump tells a lot of lies. It's his modus operandi. Born on a mountain of money, he learned he could get away with it, and he has built a mythology of utter crap. If I was hired for a job as a mechanic, claiming mastery of the craft, and then couldn't tell a socket wench from a garlic press, or took a job as an accountant, but was unable to count, I would expect to be fired. If I promised to replace a person's roof, but took the down payment and delivered nothing, I would be sued or arrested.
So why do we vote for what a politician that promises one thing and delivers another? Does what we DON'T want, or dismisses what they previously claimed because it's no longer their priority? Journalists use the word "campaign rhetoric" as if to say it's an established sham. but isn't a political campaign a job application? For performance of very critical duties? "Representatives" with so little accountability to the public? Representing whom? Why do we tolerate it?
It's all about scapegoating, finding someone to blame and distracting his supporters from the real problems of our country. This is exemplified by the billionaire techno-AI crypto gang under the guidance of Peter Thiel and clearly spelled out by his mentor Rene Girard (worth checking him out if you want to understand the basis of what is going on in America.)
And by the same kind of people and the same kind of moral frame…’we are correct, we know we are correct, truths are an inconvenient barrier to be overcome.’ So evidence, reality, past practice, factual testimony with no fear of persecution. Blow it out there ….!
Puritanical political power knows no bounds, “it is the correct reality because of our felony/fealty to a demigod.”
Malignantly narcissistic political power knows no bounds. Scratch just about any form of abuse, and find narcissism underneath. From Despotism, to racism, to terrorism.
Yes one side of the coin, self-centered to an extreme, and he does spin around in orbit of his own ass for sure, but the other side in belonging and who are your people, the real people, maybe the best example is who he picked for the show, assuming he did, seemed like it because he picked very 'needy' people who too wanted to be part of something greater...in this case him and rather rotund, fat ass. The fact that this has devolved to just 'an asshole' doesn't change that! The GOP Congress certainly has rather colored, an orange-ish brown.! It's all over their faces these days. Look at his administration, they try to wash it off but it just smudges! Bleach keeps Musky all white...RFK rolls in it!
When I was a kid I learned that it was better that X guilty people went unpunished than Y innocent people were punished. I’ve forgotten what the proportions were.
I don't think there is a ratio for justice, but a rate of proven error can point to where improvement is needed. The duty of those we as a society hire to protect us is to minimize harm. If harm is unavoidable, there should be a demonstrable explanation. Where future harm is preventable, there should be substantive moves toward prevention (as we would in an aircraft crash). Negligence and/or malice on the part of entrusted officials can be more damaging to human rights and rule of law than private citizen screw-ups. Toleration beyond minimized public sector misfeasance and malfeasance would be like retaining doctors whose preventable carelessness and/or maliciousness, is killing their patients.
“It is more important that innocence be protected than it is that guilt be punished, for guilt and crimes are so frequent in this world that they cannot all be punished. But if innocence itself is brought to the bar and condemned, perhaps to die, then the citizen will say, “whether I do good or whether I do evil is immaterial, for innocence itself is no protection,” and if such an idea as that were to take hold in the mind of the citizen that would be the end of security whatsoever.”
Like a number of the founders, Adams did not always follow through with their eloquent prescriptions for social justice, but much of their thinking has proved sound, to the degree that we the living pursue such goals in good faith. We all share the responsibility of providing universal liberty and justice, as well as it's benefits. That's what makes for democracy.
I can't believe what I just read either, or what is happening to our nation right now...
Steve Bannon replied: “ Big deal…. Maybe some people got caught up in it. Who knows?... I think they got everybody who was a bad guy, but guess what? If there's some innocent gardeners in there? Hey, tough break for a swell guy. That's where we stand.”
Bannon's complete lack of concern for due process of law or that innocent people can just be apprehended off the street and deported to some faraway prison/detention site in El Salvador is appalling, unconstitutional, and UnAmerican.
It enrages and disgusts me to hear this but it also affects me personally and professionally since I am a gardener by trade.
I am a gardener. I grow food - most of which I share.
Bannon's statement was sick minded. Evil. But millions of "Christians" will agree with him. Maybe when they are blocked from collecting Social Security their selfish, bigoted minds will feel something close to human empathy?
Bannons dismissal of a gardener as just collateral damage made me boil.
I grow a lot of our own fruit and vegetables too, as well as keeping chickens for nearly 20 years. So besides being a lifelong gardener, I’m also a small scale farmer.
I prefer a mattock over a pitchfork and generally keep one in my truck. Never thought I might really need to use it for protection but now I’m not so sure.
I'm a gardener in more ways than one. Gardeners read systems and time and are participatory. Bannon's statement struck me, too -- I'm facing the cold-blooded nature of inner pain turning into dissociated dominance. And THIS. after I saw "Planetwalker" last night, a movie about John Francis, an environmental activist who walked (no gas-driven engines) and spent 17 years not speaking. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gfxST7YMrsg It was shown at Woodwell Climate Research Center and the Q&A was remotely arranged with John Francis, a joyous and practical man who also gardens.
Yes, I read that too. The speaker is a hateful person but like Trump is pushing the falsehood that the US was "invaded" and that harm to innocent people is simply an unavoidable result of effective action. Extraordinary that this notion is pushed by a whiny baby like Trump who is outraged to be prosecuted and sentenced for crimes he committed or admitted to in public.
The Republican regime persecutions - of all from our most vulnerable neighbors to our high officials - has one primary goal, to paralyze each of us with fear. "Who's Next?" is the rallying cry of domestic terrorism.
That comment struck me cold. Shockingly similar to Musks words about Polands Minister of Foreign Affairs when he made a statement that Musk did not like ….”Be quiet, small man”.
To the contrary I can easily believe it. The Republican reaction to the acts of insurrection on January 6, 2021 should have taught all of us what they stand for and what we are up against. Yet 46% of their the electorate couldn't be bothered to: vote in 2024, and more than half of the remaining 54% voted in favor of autocracy. So by my reckoning more than 70% are accepting of autocracy, or are exceptionally stupid.
I tried to send a message to Trump through the official White House web page. Nothing works. Can't send message. Can anyone get through or is this another hack at democracy? https://trumpwhitehouse.archives.gov/contact/
Send the word resist to Resistbot on Apple Messages, Messenger, Instagram, Telegram, or by text to 50409 and answer the questions texted back. In minutes, you’ll have contacted Congress or your other elected officials. Make your letter open for maximum effect."
ICE Cerna actually made these statements in a sworn declaration?? That is absolutely astonishing in its idiocy. But then again, increasingly it appears that idiocy is a job requirement for this administration, as long as it is accompanied by an equal level of malice.
And thanks to Dr. Richardson for the information concerning the Cincinnati riots of 1884. I had never heard of them before.
I mean, these sneaky terrorists coming into the country and going around not committing crimes - whatever next?!!! Someone's got to put a stop to this!
Thanks. Seriously though, Trump has told everyone that the administration would be deporting "the worst of the worst" yet ICE statistics show that 50% of those being detained have committed no criminal offence in the US. In recent weeks, ICE has detained a Welsh cartoonist, German tourists and a Canadian movie star. It's completely bonkers.
According to Karoline Leavitt, the press secretary, the administration is employing a new definition of illegality to encompass any undocumented person. And where illegal behaviour cannot be evinced then some other reason will be found i.e. the victims are part of an invasion, as with alleged members of the Tren De Aragua recently deported to El Salvador; or if one's presence is deemed to have "potentially serious adverse foreign policy consequences for the United States”, as in the case of Mahmoud Khalil.
bio of Trump shows how our country is in a sickened state occupied by a tyrant who is obsessed with revenge and we are standing by and watching him turn the US into suckers for his enjoyment.
Michael Wolff has written four books about Donald Trump on YouTube NEW
Nothing says ‘law and order’ like ignoring court orders, criminalizing innocence, and turning justice into a loyalty test. At this rate, due process will be whatever the leader’s gut—and his TV ratings—demand.
I tried to send a message to Trump through the official White House web page. Nothing works. Can't send message. Can anyone get through or is this another hack at democracy? https://trumpwhitehouse.archives.gov/contact/
Bannon just said clearly what everyone who voted for the current president thought: bad things will happen to other people, and I'm fine with that because it won't happen to me. Until it does.
I wish you and others would stop speaking simply of “deportation” without due process. The “deported” were not sent back to the land from which they came. They were thrown without any process into a foreign prison—one of the world’s worst—to be degraded and held indefinitely in crowded conditions without access to visitors. Your tax dollars will pay for it. Can’t go much lower than that.
At worst they are status offenders not convicted criminals like Trump. Theoretically they can be detained or deported but not imprisoned. Have to convict them of a specific crime to be even close to legal.
Another sad day of outrage for those of us brought up believing in the Constitution, the Declaration of Independence, law and order and a government providing a safety net for the People, by the People and of the People, we who’ve invested in that government with our taxes, our sweat and sometimes, with our blood.
And if you are a Medal of Honor recipient and also a person of color or a female, the story of your blood shed for this country will be erased from the DOD website and from Arlington Cemetery in a completely petty and unnecessary action by this "administration."
Here are some of the indictments in the Declaration of Independence. Our Constitution seeks to remedy most of these. And Trump/Musk is violating many of those ancient indictments below and then some. I am not clever enough to rewrite the indictments of Trump/Musk but it would be interesting if someone would.
Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.
"He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.
"He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.
"He has refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of Representation in the Legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.
"He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their Public Records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.
"He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness of his invasions on the rights of the people.
"He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected, whereby the Legislative Powers, incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining in the meantime exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within.
"He has endeavoured to prevent the population of these States; for that purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migrations hither, and raising the conditions of new Appropriations of Lands.
"He has obstructed the Administration of Justice by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary Powers.
"He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.
"He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harass our people and eat out their substance.
"He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies without the Consent of our legislatures.
"He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil Power.
"He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:
"For quartering large bodies of armed troops among us:
"For protecting them, by a mock Trial from punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States:
I made a comment to my wife this morning about your post, then started reading it to her. Since she was, as usual, not listening carefully before I started the reading, she said "wow, that much is certain. Who wrote that?" I told her it was the Declaration of Independence. She told me my assignment today was to put it in modern terms and issues. Hmmmm
I tried to send a message to Trump through the official White House web page. Nothing works. Can't send message. Can anyone get through or is this another hack at democracy? https://trumpwhitehouse.archives.gov/contact/
Head-shaved and hog-tied on the concrete floor of a prison in El Salvador after being arbitrarily rounded up, chained and deported sound like justice to you Steve? Greg? Stephen? Marco? Traitors making a buck – feeding on what’s left of the body of our Democracy. Your day will come, I may not live to see it, but it will come.
Sociopaths tend to lack shame, but I think shame can still be a weapon against them if enough of us condemn such behavior. It might not change the sociopath, but may weaken their following.
As pleased as I am about this positive development in one case, how can anyone casually allow for the possibility that upstanding, hardworking "gardeners" may get swept up in a raid without having anybody to go to bat for them? Our system of justice may be even more unfair for those who are undocumented, or whose documentation may be revoked capriciously and illegally, but how much better is our system of justice when those who can afford expensive representation have an overwhelming advantage over most of us?
Well, Betsy, you are clearly ignoring the fact that ‘gardeners’ are all brown people, so picking them up and deporting them is just getting ahead of the problem.
It is ironic that Trump and his cronies evaded conviction or imprisonment by using every sophistic trick in the books to postpone and even escape justice. Now his paid sophists are using lies and ever more tricks to hasten false arrest, conviction, and Gulag punishments. Like the old guard Soviets, Trump’s legals use the semblance of law to further their own lawlessness. Will they next poison their political opponents, as Putin does?
In my fantasy version of how the Second Reich of Herr Trump comes apart (hopefully sooner than later), there will be a Nuremberg-style trial, during which not only the usual suspects will be tried, convicted and sentenced to long, harsh prison terms, so will the entire Fox News organization. I'll watch it on C-Span.
That's one of the ways I am trying to get through this Reign of Terror.
These people are no longer redeemable. they cannot be talked to, they do not deserve to be "understood," they cannot be "negotiated with." The Gutmans and the Ingrahams and all thes rest of the scum need t o be seen for what they are: The Enemies of America. And when the Trump War Crimes Trials are held after the Restoration, they need to stand in the dock too. And all of them, once pronounced guilty, need to be hanged. With slipknots so they experience a bit of the pain and agony they inflict by their existence. No more of this BS that they're our "fellow Americans." They have demonstrated and continue to do so that they are not.
I'm getting scared. They aren't slowing down and the courts don't seem to have braking power, and the hints are there every day that trump, cheered on by frothing fanatics, will feel empowered to call on American troops to fire on non- violent protesters, of whom I will be one. Open warfare.
TC, I had an exchange with a former city cop sergeant yesterday; he had written one of the most condescending, mansplaining, insulting replies to a post I’d made. I told him that I owed him nothing of the sort; he viewed my sources as suspect as I view NewsMax and Faux News, and I did not want to further engage in “dialogue”. He sees nothing wrong with what ffpotus is doing.
When did “deportation” become incarceration in a foreign contract prison beyond the reach of habeas corpus or any legal defense?
Lack of evidence is evidence? If absence of criminal records is proof of criminality, then all us law-abiding citizens are potential terrorists. Let the implications of that precedent sink in.
Chief Justice Roberts showed the beginnings of a spine. It’s time to grow the whole backbone.
I tried to send a message to Trump through the official White House web page. Nothing works. Can't send message. Can anyone get through or is this another hack at democracy? https://trumpwhitehouse.archives.gov/contact/
We have crossed a bright red line that is clear for anyone to see unless - as in the case of Senator Chuck Schumer - they are determined not to see it. Schumer was recently interviewed by Chris Hayes and I invite everyone to watch the Democrat who “leads” the Senate Democrats offer his willful blindness for all to see. He needs to resign his position while there is still time to stop Trump!
Saw it when it was happening... you could tell Chris had a very hard time controlling his reaction to the blatant cowardice and stupidity that Schumer was showing. It was one of those 'Elvis Presley shooting at the TV' moments. Infuriating. No wonder this shite is happening: without an effective opposition, the MAGAts are going to continue to run amok.
Thanks for the link. We had recorded TRMS and she alluded to Hayes’s interview, but I hadn’t searched it out.
I saw that a fellow I used to know and like (he’s created for himself a kind of video info world; Rick Dancer, if you want to look him up. Former local newscaster who ran for Oregon SecState some years back) who posted a meme saying, basically, that an unelected judge had no business telling the president what to do.
Schumer needs to be replaced with someone with a spine. I would say replacing everyone in the senate over 65 with someone younger would be good, but I don’t want to throw Bernie out with the bath water.
That the absence of a criminal record proves criminality is virtually identical to the tests used to determine whether a woman was a witch. This is the mentality of a large number of people in government now.
Sounds like true-speak or double-think from '1984' and grabbing an innocent to slake the blood-lust sounds like 'Fahrenheit-451'. 🤢 Double-whammy dystopia. 😱 One simply can not make this scheiße up. 💔 These yahoos just wing it with reasons; they do not care about truthfulness. 🤬
Yes, 1984 has come to America. At this point I think it is important to recognize that our President is openly claiming to now have dictatorial power. As he said to Governor Mills of Maine, the law is whatever he says, regardless of what is in the Constitution and regardless of what the courts say. All Americans need to decide whether or not they find this is acceptable and act accordingly.
I find it totally unacceptable. How does one act? What is to be done to stop this?
Move On.org stated some facts....Aprox 3.5% of the popluation must stand against a dictator to defeat him.........the Womens March reaached aprox 1%......there MUST be millions of people in the streets or Orange Hitler and his room full of Orange psyco goons will win.
The technical term is "to lynch."
Or stuffed into a drainage pipe like Gaddafi
At 21% approval rating for Democrats, its obvious why.
Democrats believe defending illegal GANG members against AMERICAN citizens is NOBLE.
Its digusting that you invoke the name of Hitler. Especially after animals have MURDERED woman and girls.
THEY HAVE NAMES: Laken Reilly, Jocelyn Nungaray, Rachel Morin.
How dare you protect these animals in the NAME of WOMAN.
What about the women that have died in washrooms....back seats of cars......emergencey rooms.......due to nazis taking away a womens right to make her own choices.........they have names!!!
How dare you protect the "pro life" animals.....that now preach "measles parties"......what about the names of millions of innocents around the world now without help and aid.....left to die!!!
Dude! Did you read the part where they skipped due process? If they are truly gang members involved in criminal activity, then sure, deport their asses. But do you have any idea where El Salvador is keeping these people -- yes PEOPLE, not animals? It is a prison worse than any prison in the US. CECOT isn’t just a prison—it’s a tool of state control designed to crush gangs and send a message of fear. While the U.S. has supermax prisons, inmates there still have legal protections, medical care, and basic human rights, whereas in CECOT, prisoners are effectively erased from society with no rights or path to redemption.
It’s closer to a political internment camp than a traditional prison.
AND many detainees have not been convicted but were arrested under emergency powers, leading to thousands of arbitrary detentions -- much like this mass deportation that occurred with no opportunity for defense or to determine whether they were even gang members. Tom Homan basically said "it doesn't matter".
If your kid happened to look a little bit Hispanic and got caught up in such a sweep, I suspect you'd go apeshit on this administration in a heartbeat. Those people may not even see sunshine again. Don't believe me? Ask the president of El Salvador -- those are his words.
Aye, and next "they" will come after you! We need the laws to apply to "all". Everyone! Always!
Self righteous Animals have murdered women, too by limiting their right to proper medical treatment. Your Kennedy quack is murdering people and young children with suggesting Vitamin A will keep them from measles. The children are the ones who end up in the hospital very sick.
Take a lap, son, and go out for junior varsity. 🪞
We do not know -- you do not care -- whether those bread-&-circus deportees were really gang members. 😳
No one defends the murders of these young women by undocumented migrants. You imply a distinction between murders by undocumented immigrants vs documented immigrants vs citizens. Any murder is equally heinous. 💔
What troubles me sharply about your thinking is that you seem to think that it is perfectly okay to exploit the pain these families must feel to justify extra-legal and extra-judicial actions against people. 🤢
Democrats want to be sure thay are criminals! Would you like to be that 2 innocent person caught up in this?
Thoughtful patriotic American citizens believe in our Constitution and the law. In fact, in the United States, a person is innocent until proven guilty. There are countries that operate on the idea that you are guilty until you can prove your innocence. So, undocumented people need to have their day in court. Gang members need to have their day in court. Perhaps there is nobility in the law, in the Constitution. Donald Trump is a scofflaw. He has always been a scofflaw.
You are an imbecile. You use your righteous indignation about a few tragedies to paint an entire people with a broad stroke. You are misguided in your anger. It is the job of congress to pass immigration law but both parties have failed to do that. The wealthy who employ the immigrants at substandard wages are the same ones that cry foul when a criminal alien commits a crime, but will also cry foul when you deport their staff. I am sorry those women lost their lives to criminals. Where is your indignation for the women losing their lives by lack of access to care caused by the ignorant laws passed to protect a cluster of cells that is not yet a fetus, where is your indignation when unwanted children are bounced from home to home and exploited for the money attached to their fostering? I hope you daughter or wife or girlfriend never has to suffer the criminal denial of autonomy to make their own medical decisions.
But Putin's gang of miscreants is all right cause they are all white...GTWFOH
Massive national strikes, for at least a week, possibly longer. The only thing that matters to these criminals is money, so don't spend any, don't go to work, don't pay taxes...
I'm all in r/t protests and buying only what's needed to exist, but I can't boycott work...I'm a nurse at an abortion clinic. I think continuing to do my job is in itself an act of protest against the right wing takeover. I would LOVE not to pay any taxes to this government, since they're using it to enrich themselves.
Thank you for what you do. Be well.
Thank you for your work. A woman like you saved my life 50 years ago. I never forget.
Thank you for your work, each and every day. Thank you.
THAT YOU GO TO WORK EVERY DAY IS A COURAGEOUS ACT OF PROTEST!
Thank you, Terry.
celeste, thank you for your work. It is tough and now dangerous. I think we can acknowledge that some just can't do what many people can. I think doing your work is doing something very important in this fight. I would love not to pay taxes now, and at this point, keep wishing that a couple of them would just depart this earth.
You do fine work, Celeste; keep at it. we need you.
Yes--your work is indeed a protest! Thank you for your work and your courage.
What a difficult position you are in. Hold your head high Celeste.
Schumer was wrong. We already have a non functioning government.
Schumer’s thinking was that y keeping the government open Democrats could have some control. I’m still waiting for the attempts at control because i’ve seen nothing except more chaos and destruction.
24/7/365 round the clock protests and boycotts.......NYTImes....WPost boycott....Amazon boycott.
Many of us simply can’t to stop going to work. Especially now that we’re not sure about our SSA checks.
What a great idea! Imagine if 100,000,000 of us stopped paying taxes! Even better, what if on April 15, we not only stopped paying taxes we took to the streets to tell the "Orange psyco goons" why we aren't paying taxes.
Time for the blue states to break the bank-transfer links from employers to D.C.; to collect the taxes in their capitals; and, withhold tax funds. Release to D.C. AT MOST the receipts from D.C. in the previous year (to eliminate the overage that blue states send to D.C. to subsidize red states). 🛑
Additionally, when Trump tries to drumpf a blue state of disaster relief funds, for example, then that state applies withheld tax funds to fund said relief. and forwards the net balance to Washington. Many people, will undoubtedly blow a gasket. (Like the Trumpanzee fake news about water released in California.) ⚖️
They may not understand human nature and conflict. They fail to account for stated Trumpian behavior and to anticipate where that authoritarianism is headed. 😵
The hearing for the nominee to direct the O.M.B. revealed open talk within the M.A.G.A. brain-drain, if not yet practice, of impoundment (e.g., suspending or ending F.E.M.A. operations). 😲
Now, with his diktat from the O.M.B., that practice has started the Trumpian attempt to shred the Constitution in favor of divine-right insanity. Where will funds for grants and agencies relegated to formaldehyde go? 🤢
Theorizing about what might cause a civil war over a wire transfer mechanism, when such civil disorder has likely started, is as brilliant as trying to bail out the Titanic with a tea-spoon. The Great Civil War of the nineteenth century did not start at Fort Sumter or even with secession; its started five years earlier with Bleeding Kansas. 😰
Now, this particular idea may not work. But some form of it can at least support initiatives. We need ideas to break down and re-assemble or refine in muscular non-violent responses if we are to avoid civil war. Or, maybe John Brown was right, after all. 😱
Attacking someone's proposed response right now is about as helpful as Florence Nightingale handing out LSD for a head cold. 💔
We filed our taxes asap so we could get our refund before Musk got his dirty little paws more deeply into the IRS.
The first action is easy. Support Susan Crawford in Wisconsin. If we can show that we can beat Musk’s money and a MAGA candidate it will rally people to the cause. Maybe we can win a Congressional seat.
In Turkey, Erdogan just had his political rival arrested. We are only two steps away from Trump proclaiming the Democratic Party a terrorist group. Keep speaking out, writing and calling your friends and politicians. America is crumbling into a second rate country. We have already lost all the respect we gained over the last 80 years. Every aspect of our lives is being diminished while we fill out our brackets.
Old....Yes, we should help candidates where and if we can. Yesterday a a French scientist coming to a conference was denied entry by the jackboots who looked at his phone. He, horrors, had expressed dismay at what death star was doing to science. Well then, he might be a terrorist. I have always found custom agents to be pretty bad, so this was an easy step for them to take. I would say we are headed to lower than second rate and deserve to lose the respect of the world. Yes, it is March Madness and I have not filled out a bracket. I do enjoy basketball and will watch the games where Oregon is playing. Frankly, money has destroyed the main college sports too, but for me it is a break from the news. I am also reading The Overstory which I recommend.
Love your name, *oldandintheway. Sure beats what I used to say thirty years ago, "I am a curmudgeon before my time." Now I am simply a curmudgeon.
How about on some dark night, when he is there, the real Americans (us) put up a fence around Mar a Lago that is impenetrable? Then, try him in absentia for crimes against the people and have him incarcerated for life right where he remains. Meanwhile, deport Musk.
Celeste, first I would say that we speak out against an American dictatorship as often as possible - just as we are doing here on Heather's website. I like WJB's 3.5% needed to defeat a dictator. In fact I think the majority would, if pressed to answer, object to a dictatorship. But most of them need a little push to act. They need to see that they have ample company. They need to pay attention to the fact that being dictator is Trump's explicitly stated intention. My other suggestion is to contact our representatives in the House and Senate, particularly if they are Republicans. But, even if they are Democrats, our voices can help to empower them to take a stronger stand.
The people have to take to the streets. In massive numbers! April 5!!!
There are many plans for demonstrations and other actions being planned. The group Indivisible that got started in the first trump presidency has grown. There are groups planning actions right now. Do a search. They had a Zoom mtg today and will have weekly mtgs from now on.
Of course you can search for a group in your town too!
Why don't YOU volunteer to HOUSE these ANIMALS? Do you have children?
I'm sure they would LOVE playing with GANG members. I'm sure your neighbors would love it too.
Of course not. You are all phonies.
That’s such a stock answer from MAGAs, designed to shut the conversation down. Picture if you will, a middle ground, where folks get actual justice, first by determining whether they are in fact gang members and then investigating whether they have committed any crimes. Pre-emptive deportation based on skin art is not the American Way. And take note: just because the regime is doing this to people you don’t like right now, does NOT mean they won’t widen the net.
Would love it if "they" deported all the MAGAts!
It’s called due process
I feel sorry for folks like you, so fearful and paranoid. Always looking at others as your enemy. It's no way to live. My children were taught not to refer to other human beings as animals.
“Eternal vigilance is the price of liberty.”
I need to update what I thought I knew about obeisance to rules, laws and the constitution!! We are descending and disappearing into a deep, deep sinkhole. I cross my fingers that we can depend on the Supreme Court to save our system with reason, principle and conscience???
I'm not sure it will be reason that moves the Supreme Court to stand against the onslaught of authoritarianism. It will probably be out of self preservation, since the current 'administration' has no use for courts or judges. They will only survive if they get the U.S. Marshals to do their jobs and detain those who are flouting the courts' rulings. They need to ENFORCE their power as an equal branch of government. Getting rid of the ruling that states a president can't be charged with crimes committed for acts while in office should be immediate.
Supreme Court Justices, I think, are appointed and then can serve their lifetimes out on the court. Maybe Roberts is wondering what the history books will say if Trump manages to create a lawless police state, hence the warning that the law must be respected. We shall see...
The history books will say that Roberts was one of the chief architects that caused the destruction of American democracy. His culpability started with the Citizens United decision, continued with the gutting of the Civil Rights act, and was finalized with the Presidential Immunity decision. Chief Justice Roberts is not a smart man.
In an authoritarian state, none of the rules apply. And a lifetime can be cut short, with no one there to subject them to the' rule of law'. They better keep all that in mind.
That little video of Roberts and His Heinous having a moment at SOTU might have embarrassed him a tiny bit.
Yes. The way I put it immediately after SCOTUS gave Trump the Get-Out-of-Jail-Free card is that they had signed their own "pink slips."
We have plenty of examples in history where dictators and monarchs eliminated high courts, claiming that the law was whatever the autocrats said it was. The result: Numerous individuals beheaded without due process because they offended the fragile ego of the ruling tyrant.
Except that bimbo Bondi is in charge of the Marshals. Big problem there.
Keen insight there, Celeste. Many thanks.
It just occurred to me re-reading Justice Roberts post that he could be telling Trump to be patient, let the appellate process play out, and when the cases get to the Supreme Court they will back him.
I posted several comments to this effect yesterday. To my mind, Roberts' comment was lawyer-speak intentionally crafted to be read and rebroadcast as a "rebuke" but the between-the-lines meaning is, "Cool your jets, Donnie, and let this come to MY court, where we've got your back."
Trump is too old and impatient to wait.
Trump will simply tell them to buzz off.
An people tuning out with porn or cat videos is like SOMA from Brave New World
The energy wasted on AI, cat videos, porn, could be better used to reduce our climate impact…there needs to a life to storage and cloud services. Buy a hard drive.
We swap our hard drive backup weekly at an offsite location. AI is a waste of computing power. People post lies on the internet and AI spreads them like wildfire. Then you have to scroll past all the AI in the search results to find an actual website with the facts.
What cracks me up is the Google AI search choice is often Wikipedia..humans, mostly, writing...AI is neither! It's just code written by people and is stealing the work of others, yes much of it garbage and racist!
Beautifully said, David. I may be sixty-eight but I will fight.
Right behind you, Ned. 67 in 7 days.
Happy birthday, sister! 🎂
Ha! My son is 68; I’m 86. Still resisting!!!
Now living in my 7th decade & my mouth is moving more than ever. Just try to shut me up. Oh for the likes of RBG.
All Americans must have the information presented to them ; then decide and have their votes count.
Sadly- ain't gonna happen
I am pessimistic, too. But, hey, it ain't over 'til it's over.
David. What more do we need to do??
Brown, first I would say that we speak out against an American dictatorship as often as possible - just as we are doing here on Heather's website. I like WJB's 3.5% needed to defeat a dictator. In fact I think the majority would, if pressed to answer, object to a dictatorship. But most of them need a little push to act. They need to see that they have ample company. They need to pay attention to the fact that being dictator is Trump's explicitly stated intention. My other suggestion is to contact our representatives in the House and Senate, particularly if they are Republicans. But, even if they are Democrats, our voices can help to empower them to take a stronger stand.
I can't wait for Trump, Putin and Xi begin to divide up the world into their spheres of influence. We'll be ninety percent of the way to '1984'.
Seriously, somebody needs to stop him. This man is not fit for the presidency.
It’s a 1984 meets Fahrenheit 451 meets Brave New World dystopian horror trifecta wrapped in an Animal Farm blanket.
You forgot one - Lord of the Flies! Bet your ass that school boards across the south are banning literature with a dystopian vibe.
With Trump, it's more like Lord of the Fleas.
You have a point. In the 'Lord of the Flies' unsupervised kids become psychopathic, Trump has stated that he has not changed since the second grade or he has not needed to grow after second grade.
Quick! Everyone get a flea collar!
Yes, yes. We see that now with puerile politics of the anti-D.E.I. scape-goating and bullying.
All animals are equal but some are more equal than others. I first read Animal Farm as a pre- teen (because I thought it was about animals, lol), and by the time I finished it I was radicalized to recognize creeping authoritarianism.
Good for you, Valerie.
Well, we do have a figurative pig in the 0val 0fiice proclaiming, as Dr Richardson implies, that some pigs are more equal than others.
And don’t forget the “Minority Report”. Now we’re sending people to hell hole prisons because they will or might commit a crime?
Diane and yet the felon escapes the law
And paying El Salvador 6 million to take them!
My question is why didn’t they send them to Guantanamo ?
Philip K Dick was a prophet.
And we’re paying to keep them there out of our tax dollars when we could just send them to their home country. After all, aren’t they telling us that Trump is so good no one is getting in. We shouldn’t have to worry about them coming back.
Well said,Mr McDoodle.
Thank you, Bill! From you that makes my a.m.!
I 100% agree on your opinion. It’s where I first went in trumps first term as potus. And I knew it was only going to get worse. Bradbury and Orwell were very intelligent and observed the world from a firm understanding of human nature. Not a surprise that an illiterate charlatan like trump and his policies play out like these brilliant authors predicted. The moral and ethical decline of our leaders was bound to happen. With the onset of video games and scrolling social media we have voided the benefits of the development of our most important invention, human language. We no longer value the development of honest and well researched ideas and opinion. Our society values instant gratification and scapegoating to justify its obvious decay.
A lot to respond to, good man. Orwell was not that far off in his timing, though coincidental. Years ago, I read an article that stated the he had titled, and set his novel in, '1984' because he transposed the last two digits of the year during which he penned the book (i.e., 1948). The difference in years is thirty-six, just a 'wee-bit' long than the length of time since the cold war ended.
David, It is your observation about the pollution then dilution language that captures my attention urgently. I just re-read '1984' and this quote comes immediately to mind: "[Syme, editor of the up-dated dictionary, says,] 'Don't you see that the whole aim of Newspeak is to narrow the range of thought. In the end, we shall make thoughtcrime literaIIy impossible, because there will be no words in which to express it."
The dummying down of language -- combined with the stupefaction attendant to video games, etc. as you observe -- has rendered many adults incapable of writing a paper embodying critical thinking.
Now onto specific points of connection. We have our bread circuses with video games and non-stop television on ever larger screens.
We have planned anxiety with endless wars.
We have book bannings instead of Guy Montag's book burnings; though those may come as the engineered hysteria of the M.A.G.A. base rises in pitch.
We now have our bread and fracases of engineered hysteria with our M.A.G.A. politics.
Our culture has become innured to violence.
I have read that even students in more selective universities struggle with reading full-length books.
We see the deliberate re-writing of history.
Scape-goating has risen to the point that innocents are faulted and branded by an intolerant voting base.
Sex seems to have little to do with intimacy.
Big Brother may not exist (at least Trump be lights on, nobody home).
The level of civil discourse seems like it is straight out of 'Lord of the Flies'.
Excellent research into the relevance of Orwell having the prescience to foresee our devolution into grunting and knuckling at each other as our means of communication. And Bradbury was all too correct as well, everything only gets faster and faster so that we don’t have the opportunity to actually see life and nature for the beautiful gift we never should be destroying. I want to think that, at the least, we won’t get there for a long time. Buuuuuuuut…… I wince that I could be wrong to think that.
Now we have some idea of what Winston Smith and Guy Montag went through. Perhaps I should read F-451 again. Had read it three times in grade school and high school. Though I remembered off-by-heart. . .Nope.
I’m currently reading Palo Alto by Malcolm Harris. Having been raised in SoCal, I am enjoying learning the truth to the Sunshine State’s success. Nothing we would have ever came close to being taught in California history. Funny though, we only had California history in grade school. I guess there was just way too much nasty reality to California history that they felt it wise to pass it off to us when we too young for the cold hard truth and could thus justify the white washing and dilution of the real story.
Strange that both of those books are on the banned (damned) book list. I think they don't want people who read relate the books to what is going on.
BINGO, Karen!
Why, Nathan, why this "mentality"? Why no patience with due process regarding others?
I’m using this term, “regarding others,” because David Cay Johnston used it specifically this week in his conversation with Mark Thompson.
Why do so many rely on grouping others instead?
Back in 1987 I went to Hungary, as its poets seemed to me to offer some clues as to how we might regard others more properly as individuals, as well as in the contexts of nature, history, parallel arts.
Hungary then was still part of Moscow’s red star empire, where Marxism-Leninism packaged all life by slogans, clichés, and other go-team-go inanities such as the Beach Boys made fun of in their great pop parody, “Be True to Your School.”
I spent 11 years in Hungary, Slovakia, and the Czech Republic. All most beautiful countries. Especially countrysides and villages. But the red-star-imposed legacies of packaged thinking left all prey to eventually ensuing nationalisms.
I could shuck off the group captivities, as throughout central Europe I found great poets, novelists, and film makers. So many. So many nuances in seeing, “regarding others.”
But when I returned to the U.S., the far-right and billionaire packaging of U.S. schools stared me in the face. Testing and its impersonal, logical categories there now ruled – precursor to Trump, Musk, Vance, and all the hapless MAGA (Dems, too, impotent -- totally without humanities to see what the offshoring had done to millions of American working classes).
Testing doesn't allow for seeing "others" -- only for the competition to get top numbers, thereby rise above, be above -- by numbers only -- everyone else in mass group below.
Mentality, Nathan. You use the correct word. And U.S. schools produced, manufacture it.
And let us thank George W Bush for ushering in that age of testing and data as if children were so many widgets. I was teaching English and American studies in a high school at the time, and I thought it was all nonsense. We lost a month of curriculum because of this meaningless testing. I survived by closing my classroom door and taught what I knew best. I taught my students to think.
I’m glad you taught them how to think, as so much of education is directed by Republicans to tell people what to think. Killing off the Department of Education will only make it harder for kids to learn how to think, and also shortchange students with special educational needs.
Exactly, Kathy. Thinking is evil today!
"Data does not equal information; information does not equal knowledge; and, most importantly of all, knowledge does not equal wisdom. We have oceans of data, rivers of information, small puddles of knowledge, and the odd drop of wisdom." <https://www.premraj.me/data-science-quotes/>.
While probably accurate as a general matter, this thought vastly overstates the quantum of knowledge and wisdom in the government of the Trump Reich: no puddles, no drops, just a vacuum.
There are also many different forms of knowledge that testing doesn’t catch. That poor student who is a mechanical genius. One of my fellow teenage classmates could take apart an automobile engine and put it back together. He didn’t test well. Others are high on the empathy scale, picking up sensitive cues from others, thus anticipating needs. This is what you want in a caregiver, a nurse. Where’s the test for that? Some learn by doing, some by watching, some by reading. I know several folks who make complex repairs by watching YouTube videos. Data spits out numbers; skilled, creative teachers spit out skilled, creative citizens.
Rather, maybe, Jan -- "creative teachers nurture skilled, creative citizens."
Jan, I appreciate what you were trying to accomplish with your "spitting" comparison, but with respect, it doesn't work.
Thanks to nothing but pure luck, I had the privilege to be taught by some of the best teachers ever to stand in front of a chalkboard. After more than half a century, I can still name the standouts among those excellent educators: Edward Martin, Sybill O'Dell, Shirley Harrison and Thomas Crane.
The brilliance of the educational experiences they provided me wasn't that they imparted a wealth of knowledge to me and my classmates. Rather, they kindled sparks of curiosity, inspired us to explore the subjects they specialized in, and unleashed our potential to become passionate experts in those fields.
It was quick to keep the same words—sounded good. But surely you got the point. I come from a long line of teachers. Good teaching, like good parenting, nurtures children's curiosity. Take them to the library to pick out books. Give them crayons and paper for artwork, share music with them, go outside and explore nature. Schools have resources for this exploration. But teachers need support. And different neighborhoods get different schools and supplies. It's not a level playing field. Dang, this country is making some wrong turns. What a sad state of affairs. I mourn for what my kids and grandkids will have to endure.
A poem whose author I don’t recall said “Where is the knowledge we have lost in information, where is the wisdom we have lost in knowledge”,
I can't stress enough, Carol -- it's all far worse than mere waste of time.
In a world where we can learn to see and regard others, or do the opposite -- learn to worship only categories, groups, and logical packaging -- the testing whets appetites of all only for scores, numbers. Get enough and posture oneself atop -- just generally, abstractly atop.
At the top of what? A satrapy? A mass of others all reduced to just lemming mass?
Given that Trump wants to kill the law, and due process, and any role for truth and evidence, the testing will keep him, Musk, and Vance well-supplied with True Believers ready for social media algorithms to group further, foot soldiers such as the Jan. 6 criminals ready to jump to Trump's word, no matter how based only on the vile poisons stewing in him.
Amen to the proposition that all childrens' creativity and intelligence cannot be recognized and appreciated by a multiple-chouce test.
I agree-it was and is a meaninless substitue for learning-in my state it all started when the state legislature became a majority of Republican- I had taught social studies for about 20 years doing and finding as many creative things to teach students as I could to keep them engaged-then came the tests. It was a bad scene-no more critical thinking exercises just facts, No more exploration of different trains of thought about an historical event. In essence teach the tests though we had guidelines but not questions on the tests. I retired as fast as I could to get full retirement as like the students I was bored. It is much worse today I know and have heard from teacher friends.
I am not a fan of testing being the ‘decider/divider’. However, when I went to school, before any testing, the one’s who ‘excelled’ were the
‘Teacher’s Pets’ not the ones who asked questions, or came up with a different way to do things.
When they came thru with the first IQ tests, as limited as they were, many teachers were angry at the ones who scored highest. Because they weren’t the ‘good’ students’ they were often the ones who challenged the teacher.
Soon came the required memorization tests, and then the teacher to the tests.
Nothing wrong with tests, or even memorization at times. Just mix it with universal sports and creative arts. And make at least some of it interesting and fun.
Have a place for everyone in the school and value them all. Admin, teachers, maintenance, students and all others who are in the building.
Sorry for the long escapism of an old lady. It seems so few people were cared for in school and in this world, that they crave control and destruction.
We need the folk singers to bring us together again.
Thank you for that, Carol. We taught that to our kids when they were in school in the 80s. The schools were better back then, of course. This all reminds me of the proverb that in the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king.
And Teddy K signed on to that. Still pissed.
You can lay some of this at the feet of schooling, but not all of it.
The core problem I see is there is too much constant data thrown at people (not information, just unprocessed data).
Some people can manage that, but some people can’t. They go into a shell to hide from all the noise.
We have lost connection to individuals. We group and prejudge everyone in masses and we pay a dear price for this.
I have heard this type of environment described as VUCA (volatile/uncertain/complex/ambiguous). I believe complexity is the element that kills us. People want their information in 10 second sound bites or 5 word headlines. This complexity makes that impossible.
Of course, Moving Joy Around, the data doesn't move around haphazardly.
The social media billionaires employ super-smart techies to construe algorithms to find those most avid for particular hatreds.
And we don't even know if it's Putin and his techies, or the nihilist U.S. billionaires and theirs.
I should clarify my data comment. I am not talking about social media, that is a whole different issue, I am talking about just the sheer volume of constant information that comes at people.
In the 70’s you had 3 networks with 90 minutes of news a night. In the 80’s we saw CNN start the first channel with 24 hour news coverage. Now with the internet there are so many different newsfeeds it’s hard to keep track of them all. As a marketing move every single story is heralded as breaking news even if it has already run throughout the day.
It’s become background noise, but that much noise makes some people duck and cover.
Has the News of the forcible Raid on the US-Peace-Institute yesterday been lost in the torrent of Actions that this Regime subjects Us to everyday already?...
The far right is exulting now, Apache.
Their mass of attacks on democracy just that more elevate (further degenerate?) their convicted criminal in the White House -- elevate criminality itself, heighten white racist nationalism, and solidify alliance with genocidal mass murderers Putin, Netanyahu, and others soulless, intransigently, disgustingly also above, beyond, immune to the law.
Robert Hubbell said the security guards at that building were threatened with loss of its gov contracts if they didn’t switch sides, so they joined with the gov goons to let them in with their keys.
MSNBC showed this.
I missed it.
Really good discussion, Phil and Moving. And I would add another element, addiction or dependency. I think people become addicted to or dependent on input, whether it be TV in the 60s or smartphones now. People know, deep down, that spending so much time with screens is not healthy. I don't think it is much different from, say, alcoholism. This is not to blame. I think we all have dependencies that are not healthy, and it takes a little willingness to start the journey away from dependencies and towards community and wisdom. The great adventure!
Your thoughts about addiction are absolutely on point. Research has shown that social media IS addictive. Just like meth produces artificially high endorphin levels SM can do the same thing.
I see everywhere people walking with their eyes planted on their phones. Most people don't look up as you pass by. People are too absorbed with constant 'engagement' and don't notice anything around them. I have never used a cell phone. I am happy not to be constantly programmed into a rat race that has turned people into robots.
Celeste, I am not criticizing you specifically, but I observe a widespread tendency to blame objects of attention rather than the lack of discipline that causes the objects to be detrimental.
We live in a society populated by an overwhelming majority of youth and adults who have no self-discipline. This lack of self-discipline has led to a variety of modern personality disorders, such as "FOMO" (fear of missing out). How did this happen?
One explanation might be that parents of the 1950s and 60s were too distracted with pursuing the American Dream to pay attention to their families. Having more money than time, they bought toys to amuse and distract their children. When the kids "bothered" them, they bought something else to shut them up. Nobody ever told the kids, "No, you don't need that. Let's just sit and talk."
A couple generations have grown up without any sense of self-restraint regarding distractions. In fact, we live in a society where people are uncomfortable if they aren't being entertained in some way. (I submit that part of Trump's appeal is that he's "entertaining.")
Mobile phones are pocket-sized miracles that can keep us informed and safe ... as long as they spend most of their time in our pockets.
I thought I was the Lone Wolf, with no cell phone!
Plus there are a lot more decoys out there.
It seems to me that in my lifetime, technology that I saw (and loved) was primarily a means of empowering our society (though TV was criticized early on as a manipulative tool). Now a novel sphere of technology seems to be exclusively accessible to the aims of the very rich and powerful, which impacts our lives in way we that seem to afford us far less control. In ways that are anti-democratic.
Tech reporter Kara Swisher makes the point that there has never been an industry so shielded from regulation as tech.
And thus, the firing of the 2 Democratic commissioners at the FTC.
THAT is certainly one of the larger elephants in the room. Well established protections against unjustified intrusions into personal privacy, wire-tapping and search and seizure seemed to go out the window in the rapid transition to electronic media and the corporatist bent of government. I believe that earlier generations would be shocked to see how much this is so, and it appears to largely be working against our collective and individual interests. I think that the absence of reasonable public protections helped elect Trump.
If you think about it, literally everything emerges from the unfolding of the Big Bang, and is uniformly the same stuff; important since we can generalize and begin to grasp what we see wherever we look. The building blocks of our existence are can be repellent as well as sticky, and allow objects to self organize into the features of what we call "nature", of which we are a part. In such a place connections and distinctions are everywhere, and chains of connection are often complex and very long. The maps we create to navigate this world will always be incomplete, but worse than incomplete, inadequate without recognition of long and multidimensional chains of connection (in an ecosystem for example) and detection of fine, yet often crucial differences. Mass electronic media certainly has its virtues, but it role in comprehension is limited, as least in the ways it is commonly used. It's sort of the Newspeak of society become real.
JL, your comment makes sense to me until the word "Newpeak." What does it mean?
Maybe it’s a reference to Orwell’s concept of Newspeak, as in his novel “1984.”
It was a fictional state-imposed truncated version of English designed to make complex, articulate thoughts (that would impair the mission of "The Party") more difficult to express. The word was indeed coined in "1984".
I have a couple of friends and family that don’t/wont talk about it. We need to unite more even when it’s hard.
Not to be flip about it, one of the things I ma learning as I age is that often the hardest discussions are the most important. That does not seem to make them easier. When someone close to me dies, there always seem to be the presence of things I wish I had discussed.
VUCA! Yes! and all of those are the hardest for most people to find a way to integrate into their busy daily lives.
I remember when Sesame Street was being criticized for jumping around in sound bites and songs that didn't allow time for contemplation. And then we had a generation that had learned to make decisions based on the information they had at the time, right or wrong. They were being supervised by people who were taught to look at all the possible effects. The clash was inevitable.
Yes, complexity is the spanner in the works.
Jacques Cousteau once spoke of "three infinities", the infinitely large, the infinitely small, and the infinitely complex. I'm not sure that the first two technically exist, nor for that matter, the third, except as abstractions, but they may as well as far as we humans are likely to get with them.
Climate? It's complicated. Ecosystems, also complicated. The human organism, yup, also. Our poor powers can only track so far, but it seems as if we're on to something when we put some effort into it.
Einstein is sometimes credited as saying:
"Everything should be made as simple as possible, but not simpler."
That origin is doubtful, but it might have been popularized by an author who was paraphrasing Einstein. In any case, I think there is wisdom in it.
This is a video I made during the pandemic. There are strategies for leading through a VUCA world, https://youtu.be/R82oQ8ELc6w
Moving joy. IMHO all data can be manipulated to favor almost anyone’s point. And without challenges to that data we are left with garbage. It has been the Rights position to dumb down America since, in my lifetime, Newt Gingrich. And it is now showing the results of that process from which I hope we can recover as we all have the power of critical thinking, we must just dig in and use it.
My old country school taught me literature that I use every day. Poems that have guided me. I’m educated but no scholar, but I’m sad for those who have missed a link in the human chain that links us all.
I'd be sad for them, too, JDinTX, except for what Orwell said of them.
They are guaranteed to do evil. All are who, as you nicely put it, "have missed a link in the human chain that links us all."
Missing this, Orwell spelled out in "Politics and the English Language," numbs them, blinds them, anesthetizes them so they will do evil -- massive evil -- yet remain numbed, blinded, anesthetized to the real damages ensuing from them.
Guaranteed the damages. Guaranteed the stupidity, as we see, along with the venom, daily in the criminal-in-chief.
My bro seems catatonic and withdrawn. I would worry but he voted chump because of that “black woman.” So appalling
A lot of bros tapped into that, JD.
Dems just out of touch with all of them, at all levels.
I feel the same way about Latin. I really find I use it every day to understand words and language. Thank you to my teachers.
! ! !
Long ago I read an article by Bruno Bettelheim claiming that European students excelled in some area of language arts in part because they learned to read from real literature while American students (in this, the early 1970s) used text based on exercises emphasizing vocabulary and mechanics, rather than the goal of lucid communication. I don't remember the details very well, but it made sense to me as much of my school work seemed (at least at the time) pointless and lacking an anchoring context.
I believe that. Reading is instructive, even for infants
Testing is forced on educators by local school boards. Then there’s the awful No Child Left Behind Act.
Testing was modeled after a best-practice business maxim. If it isn't measured it is not valued or attended to. Seemed like such a harmless act, immulating business approaches in education and government. So came the entire accountability movement pressed by American Enterprise and the Kochs until the conservative movement gave up on data-driven decision-making (good data revealed logical errors and failures to meet proposed outcome criteria) and adopted narrative, stories of individuals as the medium for proving the real, lived truth. And, so, I think, began the spread of distrust in the scientific model upon which science and medicine are fundamentally tied and how real knowledge gets advanced and refined over time, experiments, and validation.
The problem is you have to do both where appropriate.
We must value what makes individuals unique because those are the assets that will distinguish them throughout their lives. We should encourage them to explore those interests.
We also need to teach data based decision making. It is sorely lacking in our world and we suffer because of it. We need to teach the methods of scientific inquiry.
It’s not an either/or type thing. We need to do both.
It would seem that human diversity vastly enriches the choices and capabilities of our species, especially if we look at interests and talents. Butcher, baker, candlestick maker. some choreograph ballets or TV specials, some design elaborate microprocessors, some install roofs, others herd sheep. Nobody can do all those things, but we can benefit from a lot of them. Yet for administrative purposes there is a tendency to want to treat people as standardized machine parts; but that's not a realistic model.
Yes, there is a kit of common skills that enable us to communicate and interoperate effectively in a society, and yes, there are certain responsibilities that everyone in a civilized society needs to know and display, including what not to do, such as rape and murder. It isn't practical to completely customize each student's approach to education, but I think far more could be manged to accommodate and cultivate diversity, and evaluate performance in more imaginative and higher resolution ways.
I am still pissed that Ted Kennedy signed on to that. W was practice for chump…
All well said. I often wonder how we’ve come to this point. I grew up in a small resort town on the Jersey shore in the 40s and 50s. At the time it idyllic at least to those of us who were comfortably middle class. I don’t recall thinking there was anything odd about the fact that the “colored” as Black people were then called lived in a separate and definitely not equal part of town. This is background to trying to answer my own question. My public school education was superb in terms of the basics but celebrated the myth of American purity. The reactionary forces now running our country are resisting the move towards making real Jefferson’s declaration “that all men are created equal” and doing everything possible to maintain their unearned privilege. And the fact that the Dear Leader is an ignorant deranged lying racist narcissistic buffoon makes this easier for those our education system has not prepared to think critically (as you point out, intentionally) to revel in this madness.
Phil😩🤬. SHIT
Off with their heads!
Exactly JL. Lost deeply in the Red Queen's dark tunnels described by Lewis Carroll.
Putting aside that association is not causation in any court of law, Judge Boasberg calls balls & strikes fearlessly & was confirmed by the Senate 96-0.
`No, no!' said the Queen. `Sentence first--verdict afterwards.'
`Stuff and nonsense!' said Alice loudly. `The idea of having the sentence first!'
JL. Agree
Worse, the statement alleges criminality not yet committed; this could be wielded against all of us for their ends, couldn’t it.
It was W's excuse for invading Iraq. My impression is that police shootings of people who were presumed to be a threat, but were not, increased significantly after that precedent, but that only my impression, with no hard evidence. Certainly the "GOP" has seemed less constrained about applying coercion with little or no demonstrable probable cause. The news is full of it.
It's all so they can start using it against citizens here. This is how they are testing which laws they can break and how obedient and supportive the MAGA movement is. It is a litmus test and too many of our fellow citizens are failing it.
Suspected Thoughtcrime.
Is this the "due process of law"= I do not think so! And a propaganda network commentator is not qualified to make that decision and neither is Steve Bannon. We are in dangerous times!
But the FOTUS who *does* have a criminal record is gang leading all of this, making us all unsafe and, in his deteriorated brain, criminals. 🤯
If they wouldn't have that mentality they wouldn't be in this government.
With his reference to the absence of criminal records in the United States Cerna has only confirmed that the deportees did not come out of jails in the US. So where did the Trump regime find them? And how did they establish that they were members of a Venezuelan gang?
There is another aspect to the rant by Greg Gutfeld (Thank you, Heather, for providing the link to the FOX News bradcast, which I would not have seen otherwise.): While Gutfeld was raging on about Venezuelan murderers and rapists (where did we hear that before ?), they kept showing the deportees, with their shaved heads and shackled in a way that they could not walk upright, being herded unto the planes. It looks like FOX News derived a sadistic pleasure from doing this. They certainly played to the lowest insticts of their audience. This invoked the memory of footage I saw from show trials in the Third Reich, particularly Roland Freisler's "Volksgerichtshof" ("People's Court") where the accused had to appear in shabby clothes, without belts or suspenders, which forced them to stand before the court, holding their pants so that they would not fall down (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/People%27s_Court_(Germany)).
The footage shown by FOX was meant to be even more humiliating. It had a chilling effect on me.
😩😭🥴. What the hell. Where are we as a country going to end up. Treason is the cheeto’s game plan without prosecution 🤬
Ignorance rules. How else could we have gotten to this place.
I tried to send a message to Trump through the official White House web page. Nothing works. Can't send message. Can anyone get through or is this another hack at democracy? https://trumpwhitehouse.archives.gov/contact/
Perhaps a large bundle of money?
"American citizens elect lawmakers who write, debate, and pass the laws under which we live. Under this system, our laws represent the will of the American people." Professor states here the most significant governing principle of democracy. Trump's signature statement is that he is following the mandates of American voters. Trump does not realize that when he breaks a law, he is acting against the will of American voters. When he let Musk destroy government agencies, he is acting against the will of his voters. In America the power lies in the voters, not in the presidency. DEMs should start campainging on this platform for 2026, and 2028 NOW.
Trump tells a lot of lies. It's his modus operandi. Born on a mountain of money, he learned he could get away with it, and he has built a mythology of utter crap. If I was hired for a job as a mechanic, claiming mastery of the craft, and then couldn't tell a socket wench from a garlic press, or took a job as an accountant, but was unable to count, I would expect to be fired. If I promised to replace a person's roof, but took the down payment and delivered nothing, I would be sued or arrested.
So why do we vote for what a politician that promises one thing and delivers another? Does what we DON'T want, or dismisses what they previously claimed because it's no longer their priority? Journalists use the word "campaign rhetoric" as if to say it's an established sham. but isn't a political campaign a job application? For performance of very critical duties? "Representatives" with so little accountability to the public? Representing whom? Why do we tolerate it?
It's all about scapegoating, finding someone to blame and distracting his supporters from the real problems of our country. This is exemplified by the billionaire techno-AI crypto gang under the guidance of Peter Thiel and clearly spelled out by his mentor Rene Girard (worth checking him out if you want to understand the basis of what is going on in America.)
And by the same kind of people and the same kind of moral frame…’we are correct, we know we are correct, truths are an inconvenient barrier to be overcome.’ So evidence, reality, past practice, factual testimony with no fear of persecution. Blow it out there ….!
Puritanical political power knows no bounds, “it is the correct reality because of our felony/fealty to a demigod.”
Malignantly narcissistic political power knows no bounds. Scratch just about any form of abuse, and find narcissism underneath. From Despotism, to racism, to terrorism.
Yes one side of the coin, self-centered to an extreme, and he does spin around in orbit of his own ass for sure, but the other side in belonging and who are your people, the real people, maybe the best example is who he picked for the show, assuming he did, seemed like it because he picked very 'needy' people who too wanted to be part of something greater...in this case him and rather rotund, fat ass. The fact that this has devolved to just 'an asshole' doesn't change that! The GOP Congress certainly has rather colored, an orange-ish brown.! It's all over their faces these days. Look at his administration, they try to wash it off but it just smudges! Bleach keeps Musky all white...RFK rolls in it!
When I was a kid I learned that it was better that X guilty people went unpunished than Y innocent people were punished. I’ve forgotten what the proportions were.
"In criminal law, Blackstone's ratio (more recently referred to sometimes as Blackstone's formulation) is the idea that:
It is better that ten guilty persons escape than that one innocent suffer.[1]
as expressed by the English jurist William Blackstone in his seminal work Commentaries on the Laws of England, published in the 1760s."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blackstone%27s_ratio
I don't think there is a ratio for justice, but a rate of proven error can point to where improvement is needed. The duty of those we as a society hire to protect us is to minimize harm. If harm is unavoidable, there should be a demonstrable explanation. Where future harm is preventable, there should be substantive moves toward prevention (as we would in an aircraft crash). Negligence and/or malice on the part of entrusted officials can be more damaging to human rights and rule of law than private citizen screw-ups. Toleration beyond minimized public sector misfeasance and malfeasance would be like retaining doctors whose preventable carelessness and/or maliciousness, is killing their patients.
It would be hard to quantify. John Adams said:
“It is more important that innocence be protected than it is that guilt be punished, for guilt and crimes are so frequent in this world that they cannot all be punished. But if innocence itself is brought to the bar and condemned, perhaps to die, then the citizen will say, “whether I do good or whether I do evil is immaterial, for innocence itself is no protection,” and if such an idea as that were to take hold in the mind of the citizen that would be the end of security whatsoever.”
Like a number of the founders, Adams did not always follow through with their eloquent prescriptions for social justice, but much of their thinking has proved sound, to the degree that we the living pursue such goals in good faith. We all share the responsibility of providing universal liberty and justice, as well as it's benefits. That's what makes for democracy.
I can’t believe what I just read.
So some innocent “gardener” gets taken up and swept into jail and “so what?”
So what is
“he”is every one of us.
Our neighbors, friends, relatives, children, co workers. You. Me.
Look around.
We the People.
Who’s next?
I can't believe what I just read either, or what is happening to our nation right now...
Steve Bannon replied: “ Big deal…. Maybe some people got caught up in it. Who knows?... I think they got everybody who was a bad guy, but guess what? If there's some innocent gardeners in there? Hey, tough break for a swell guy. That's where we stand.”
Bannon's complete lack of concern for due process of law or that innocent people can just be apprehended off the street and deported to some faraway prison/detention site in El Salvador is appalling, unconstitutional, and UnAmerican.
It enrages and disgusts me to hear this but it also affects me personally and professionally since I am a gardener by trade.
from a man that has been afforded due process to the excess.
I think he had a different opinion when it was his ox being gored. Of course, he wasn't "some gardener," was he? Just an arrogant blowhard.
horhai, I honor your profession.
I am a gardener. I grow food - most of which I share.
Bannon's statement was sick minded. Evil. But millions of "Christians" will agree with him. Maybe when they are blocked from collecting Social Security their selfish, bigoted minds will feel something close to human empathy?
Bannons dismissal of a gardener as just collateral damage made me boil.
He is "just a gardener"...?
Come and get us, Steve. We have pitchforks.
And manure.
Thanks Bill Alstrom.
I grow a lot of our own fruit and vegetables too, as well as keeping chickens for nearly 20 years. So besides being a lifelong gardener, I’m also a small scale farmer.
I prefer a mattock over a pitchfork and generally keep one in my truck. Never thought I might really need to use it for protection but now I’m not so sure.
I'm a gardener in more ways than one. Gardeners read systems and time and are participatory. Bannon's statement struck me, too -- I'm facing the cold-blooded nature of inner pain turning into dissociated dominance. And THIS. after I saw "Planetwalker" last night, a movie about John Francis, an environmental activist who walked (no gas-driven engines) and spent 17 years not speaking. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gfxST7YMrsg It was shown at Woodwell Climate Research Center and the Q&A was remotely arranged with John Francis, a joyous and practical man who also gardens.
Hopefully a fat lying fraudster with a podcast who just took a plea in New York to fraud, is next. Love to see this loser deported to Hell.
Satan won’t take him. He doesn’t want any competition.
I think that been scheduled.
Yes, I read that too. The speaker is a hateful person but like Trump is pushing the falsehood that the US was "invaded" and that harm to innocent people is simply an unavoidable result of effective action. Extraordinary that this notion is pushed by a whiny baby like Trump who is outraged to be prosecuted and sentenced for crimes he committed or admitted to in public.
If the US has been "invaded", the proposed "remedy" is worse for our nation than the alleged offense.
"Who's next."
The Republican regime persecutions - of all from our most vulnerable neighbors to our high officials - has one primary goal, to paralyze each of us with fear. "Who's Next?" is the rallying cry of domestic terrorism.
Subjugation.
That comment struck me cold. Shockingly similar to Musks words about Polands Minister of Foreign Affairs when he made a statement that Musk did not like ….”Be quiet, small man”.
THIS ^^^
To the contrary I can easily believe it. The Republican reaction to the acts of insurrection on January 6, 2021 should have taught all of us what they stand for and what we are up against. Yet 46% of their the electorate couldn't be bothered to: vote in 2024, and more than half of the remaining 54% voted in favor of autocracy. So by my reckoning more than 70% are accepting of autocracy, or are exceptionally stupid.
If only Steve Brannon got swept up, because he's not a swell guy. But then he may feel differently.
I am a gardener, too. I think my garden and my dog are the only two things keeping me sane these days.
You can expect nothing more disgusting than Bannon.
I tried to send a message to Trump through the official White House web page. Nothing works. Can't send message. Can anyone get through or is this another hack at democracy? https://trumpwhitehouse.archives.gov/contact/
I use this app.
Resistbot is a chatbot that turns your texts into faxes, postal mail, or emails to your representatives in minutes.
https://resist.bot/
"The Easiest Way to Be Heard
Send the word resist to Resistbot on Apple Messages, Messenger, Instagram, Telegram, or by text to 50409 and answer the questions texted back. In minutes, you’ll have contacted Congress or your other elected officials. Make your letter open for maximum effect."
First they came for the Communists
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a Communist
Then they came for the Socialists
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a Socialist
Then they came for the trade unionists
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a trade unionist
Then they came for the Jews
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a Jew
Then they came for me
And there was no one left
To speak out for me
https://hmd.org.uk/resource/first-they-came-by-pastor-martin-niemoller/#:~:text=First%20They%20Came%20%E2%80%93%20by%20Pastor%20Martin%20Niem%C3%B6ller
😭👿
Exactly. Call your Reps NOW
ICE Cerna actually made these statements in a sworn declaration?? That is absolutely astonishing in its idiocy. But then again, increasingly it appears that idiocy is a job requirement for this administration, as long as it is accompanied by an equal level of malice.
And thanks to Dr. Richardson for the information concerning the Cincinnati riots of 1884. I had never heard of them before.
I mean, these sneaky terrorists coming into the country and going around not committing crimes - whatever next?!!! Someone's got to put a stop to this!
And having the nerve to take jobs that no one else would dirty their manicured hands doing! Very clever, that subterfuge!
The nerve of those people!
And they had such GRAND landscaping plans for their estates.......
There's at least one person who won't have to worry about the landscaping and grounds maintenance - https://theintercept.com/2025/03/17/trump-national-park-firings-white-house/?utm_medium=email&utm_source=The%20Intercept%20Newsletter
Russell, best comment today. Well put.
Thanks. Seriously though, Trump has told everyone that the administration would be deporting "the worst of the worst" yet ICE statistics show that 50% of those being detained have committed no criminal offence in the US. In recent weeks, ICE has detained a Welsh cartoonist, German tourists and a Canadian movie star. It's completely bonkers.
Look at Homan then at a German Camp Kommandant in any WWII movie! Homan is type cast.
So all congress majority are Sgt. Schultz?
He seems to be right in the part - https://thehill.com/homenews/administration/5198604-border-czar-trump-deportation/
By that "reasoning," every law abiding person in this country without a criminal record is vulnerable.
According to Karoline Leavitt, the press secretary, the administration is employing a new definition of illegality to encompass any undocumented person. And where illegal behaviour cannot be evinced then some other reason will be found i.e. the victims are part of an invasion, as with alleged members of the Tren De Aragua recently deported to El Salvador; or if one's presence is deemed to have "potentially serious adverse foreign policy consequences for the United States”, as in the case of Mahmoud Khalil.
First chuckle of the morning. Thank you.👏🏻😁
Would someone please sweep up Steve Bannon and deport him to El Salvador.
No, he has a criminal record, so clearly he is no threat to America.
bio of Trump shows how our country is in a sickened state occupied by a tyrant who is obsessed with revenge and we are standing by and watching him turn the US into suckers for his enjoyment.
Michael Wolff has written four books about Donald Trump on YouTube NEW
https://youtu.be/fAC8u5GfX0I?si=VsIg9QB865IBUXFJ
By this logic, I'd better commit a crime.
I’m plotting to not file taxes this year…
😳🤣
Has the opposition put a glaring spotlight on this dangerous gibberish? My answer is “no” correct me if I’m wrong.
MALice (malICE)
MALice dreamed up at MAL-a-Lago with Putin (online) and Orban in-house.
Ditto; Nor I.
Nothing says ‘law and order’ like ignoring court orders, criminalizing innocence, and turning justice into a loyalty test. At this rate, due process will be whatever the leader’s gut—and his TV ratings—demand.
I tried to send a message to Trump through the official White House web page. Nothing works. Can't send message. Can anyone get through or is this another hack at democracy? https://trumpwhitehouse.archives.gov/contact/
Bannon just said clearly what everyone who voted for the current president thought: bad things will happen to other people, and I'm fine with that because it won't happen to me. Until it does.
Celia Ludi, you can almost hear an on saying “if a peasant gets rounded up…”
I wish you and others would stop speaking simply of “deportation” without due process. The “deported” were not sent back to the land from which they came. They were thrown without any process into a foreign prison—one of the world’s worst—to be degraded and held indefinitely in crowded conditions without access to visitors. Your tax dollars will pay for it. Can’t go much lower than that.
At worst they are status offenders not convicted criminals like Trump. Theoretically they can be detained or deported but not imprisoned. Have to convict them of a specific crime to be even close to legal.
Good point. Mere deportation might not be so bad. But they’re now in an El Salvador gulag.
Another sad day of outrage for those of us brought up believing in the Constitution, the Declaration of Independence, law and order and a government providing a safety net for the People, by the People and of the People, we who’ve invested in that government with our taxes, our sweat and sometimes, with our blood.
And if you are a Medal of Honor recipient and also a person of color or a female, the story of your blood shed for this country will be erased from the DOD website and from Arlington Cemetery in a completely petty and unnecessary action by this "administration."
Here are some of the indictments in the Declaration of Independence. Our Constitution seeks to remedy most of these. And Trump/Musk is violating many of those ancient indictments below and then some. I am not clever enough to rewrite the indictments of Trump/Musk but it would be interesting if someone would.
Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.
"He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.
"He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.
"He has refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of Representation in the Legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.
"He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their Public Records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.
"He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness of his invasions on the rights of the people.
"He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected, whereby the Legislative Powers, incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining in the meantime exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within.
"He has endeavoured to prevent the population of these States; for that purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migrations hither, and raising the conditions of new Appropriations of Lands.
"He has obstructed the Administration of Justice by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary Powers.
"He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.
"He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harass our people and eat out their substance.
"He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies without the Consent of our legislatures.
"He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil Power.
"He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:
"For quartering large bodies of armed troops among us:
"For protecting them, by a mock Trial from punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States:
and so on.......
I believe many of Trump's supporters have not read the indictment portion of the Declaration of Independence. They stop reading after "We the People".
Marxism. Ick.
I made a comment to my wife this morning about your post, then started reading it to her. Since she was, as usual, not listening carefully before I started the reading, she said "wow, that much is certain. Who wrote that?" I told her it was the Declaration of Independence. She told me my assignment today was to put it in modern terms and issues. Hmmmm
I tried to send a message to Trump through the official White House web page. Nothing works. Can't send message. Can anyone get through or is this another hack at democracy? https://trumpwhitehouse.archives.gov/contact/
In other words, a swept up "gardener" is nothing more than collateral damage in the eyes of MAGA. 😎
I recall Desmond Tutu gave a talk in which he spoke of "that obscenity, 'collateral damage'." Vocal emphasis on the word "obscenity".
Head-shaved and hog-tied on the concrete floor of a prison in El Salvador after being arbitrarily rounded up, chained and deported sound like justice to you Steve? Greg? Stephen? Marco? Traitors making a buck – feeding on what’s left of the body of our Democracy. Your day will come, I may not live to see it, but it will come.
Not just traitors. The government of El Salvador is cleaning up on this operation.
El Salvador is getting paid to be cruel to the imprisoned. Trump's orders
Es una vergüenza. Saying it's shameful seems to have lost power.
Sociopaths tend to lack shame, but I think shame can still be a weapon against them if enough of us condemn such behavior. It might not change the sociopath, but may weaken their following.
Mahoud Khalil is being brought back to NJ from LA where he apparently was in one of the worst deportation sites in the U.S. Jeremy Scahill, from Drop sit News, did an interview with one of Khalil's attorneys. Even though it is long, it is worth watching. https://www.dropsitenews.com/p/mahmoud-khalil-attorney-interview-lawsuit-trump-pam-bondi-linda-mcmahon?utm_source=podcast-email&publication_id=2510348&post_id=159423940&utm_campaign=email-play-on-substack&utm_content=watch_now_button&r=cnsl&triedRedirect=true&utm_medium=email
As pleased as I am about this positive development in one case, how can anyone casually allow for the possibility that upstanding, hardworking "gardeners" may get swept up in a raid without having anybody to go to bat for them? Our system of justice may be even more unfair for those who are undocumented, or whose documentation may be revoked capriciously and illegally, but how much better is our system of justice when those who can afford expensive representation have an overwhelming advantage over most of us?
Well, Betsy, you are clearly ignoring the fact that ‘gardeners’ are all brown people, so picking them up and deporting them is just getting ahead of the problem.
I'm afraid that is too true. If the family separations were happening Caucasians, I think public revulsion would be a lot more evident.
Wow McCarthyism is in full flower. We know that doesn’t turn out well!
It is ironic that Trump and his cronies evaded conviction or imprisonment by using every sophistic trick in the books to postpone and even escape justice. Now his paid sophists are using lies and ever more tricks to hasten false arrest, conviction, and Gulag punishments. Like the old guard Soviets, Trump’s legals use the semblance of law to further their own lawlessness. Will they next poison their political opponents, as Putin does?
Nah, just throw them out a window. It’s cheaper. Muskrat likes that.
In my fantasy version of how the Second Reich of Herr Trump comes apart (hopefully sooner than later), there will be a Nuremberg-style trial, during which not only the usual suspects will be tried, convicted and sentenced to long, harsh prison terms, so will the entire Fox News organization. I'll watch it on C-Span.
That's one of the ways I am trying to get through this Reign of Terror.
We can dream it.
These people are no longer redeemable. they cannot be talked to, they do not deserve to be "understood," they cannot be "negotiated with." The Gutmans and the Ingrahams and all thes rest of the scum need t o be seen for what they are: The Enemies of America. And when the Trump War Crimes Trials are held after the Restoration, they need to stand in the dock too. And all of them, once pronounced guilty, need to be hanged. With slipknots so they experience a bit of the pain and agony they inflict by their existence. No more of this BS that they're our "fellow Americans." They have demonstrated and continue to do so that they are not.
I'm getting scared. They aren't slowing down and the courts don't seem to have braking power, and the hints are there every day that trump, cheered on by frothing fanatics, will feel empowered to call on American troops to fire on non- violent protesters, of whom I will be one. Open warfare.
I’m scared, too.
You can't stop a bullet and keep going Susan. People like you are very much in demand, be careful please.
Courts are slow but typically tenacious. I am hoping to see more braking power from them.
They will do the same to any of us.
TC, I had an exchange with a former city cop sergeant yesterday; he had written one of the most condescending, mansplaining, insulting replies to a post I’d made. I told him that I owed him nothing of the sort; he viewed my sources as suspect as I view NewsMax and Faux News, and I did not want to further engage in “dialogue”. He sees nothing wrong with what ffpotus is doing.
thanks for standing up to me. I think you live in southern oregon. sorry for having said those things to him.
I grew up in Medford, and still have family in the Rogue Valley
Sad.
You know things are bad when Dr. HCR gives us a standalone “Wow.” Yikes.
When did “deportation” become incarceration in a foreign contract prison beyond the reach of habeas corpus or any legal defense?
Lack of evidence is evidence? If absence of criminal records is proof of criminality, then all us law-abiding citizens are potential terrorists. Let the implications of that precedent sink in.
Chief Justice Roberts showed the beginnings of a spine. It’s time to grow the whole backbone.
Before Roberts showed signs of growing a spine, he "legalized" the substitution of a president for a king .
Now we are all paying the consequences. Thanks Roberts but it's a little bit too late for a little spine.
He is liable to be one of the first to feel the result of his decision.
And he is going to keep feeling it for quite a long time. He is not going to like it.
I tried to send a message to Trump through the official White House web page. Nothing works. Can't send message. Can anyone get through or is this another hack at democracy? https://trumpwhitehouse.archives.gov/contact/
We have crossed a bright red line that is clear for anyone to see unless - as in the case of Senator Chuck Schumer - they are determined not to see it. Schumer was recently interviewed by Chris Hayes and I invite everyone to watch the Democrat who “leads” the Senate Democrats offer his willful blindness for all to see. He needs to resign his position while there is still time to stop Trump!
https://youtu.be/QYiaifdIJIk?si=ongFBD5SjO5eJFaJ
Saw it when it was happening... you could tell Chris had a very hard time controlling his reaction to the blatant cowardice and stupidity that Schumer was showing. It was one of those 'Elvis Presley shooting at the TV' moments. Infuriating. No wonder this shite is happening: without an effective opposition, the MAGAts are going to continue to run amok.
Yes. Schumer is a coward!
Yes, Chris has been all in for the last few broadcasts with this Schumer intransigence. He's right.
Thanks for the link. We had recorded TRMS and she alluded to Hayes’s interview, but I hadn’t searched it out.
I saw that a fellow I used to know and like (he’s created for himself a kind of video info world; Rick Dancer, if you want to look him up. Former local newscaster who ran for Oregon SecState some years back) who posted a meme saying, basically, that an unelected judge had no business telling the president what to do.
We are in a constitutional crisis.
You’re welcome. And yes we are!
Schumer needs to be replaced with someone with a spine. I would say replacing everyone in the senate over 65 with someone younger would be good, but I don’t want to throw Bernie out with the bath water.