Hello, everyone. Reposting this from a few days ago for those who may not have seen it. Now shorter, clearer, and with a short sample letter at the end that will fit on a post card!
A Call to Action: American democracy is in an unprecedented emergency. If we do not pass the Freedom to Vote Act and the John Lewis Voting Act, our democracy will die with the 2022 elections. I am asking all Americans who care to write or call the seven Republican senators who voted to convict former President Trump of incitement of insurrection, asking them to form a coalition for the sole purpose of saving our republic by voting these bills into law now.
Not the time to argue who is sincere, who has integrity. These Republican leaders are who we've got. For an expert take on why this is our best bet, read Robert Kagan's recent piece in the Washington Post: https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2021/09/23/robert-kagan-constitutional-crisis/. Below is a list of their Washington addresses and phone numbers. (No email, please. It's not effective.)
Please remember that each of these seven have suffered violent threats for their vote to convict in the impeachment proceedings. My suggestion is to appeal to their love of country, to tell them their nation needs them to prevent radical Trumpians from destroying us, that we need them to step up now as the 2022 elections will otherwise mark our descent into autocracy.
Thank you.
Richard Burr, NC (retiring)
217 Russell Senate Office Bldg
Washington, DC 20510
202-224-3153
Bill Cassidy, LA
520 Hart Senate Office Bldg
Washington, DC 20510
202-224-5824
Lisa Murkowski, AK
522 Hart Senate Office Bldg
Washington, DC 20510
202-224-6665
Mitt Romney, UT
354 Russell Senate Office Bldg
Washington, DC 20510
202-228-0836
Ben Sasse, NE
139 Russell Senate Office Bldg
Washington, DC 20510
202-224-4224
Patrick J. Toomey, PA (retiring)
248 Russell Senate Office Bldg
Washington, DC 20510
202-224-4254
Susan Collins, ME
413 Dirksen Bldg
Washington, DC 20510
202-622-8414
An example of short letter:
Dear Senator __________,
Our democracy is in grave and immediate danger. I am writing to you today because you showed courage in voting to convict former President Trump. Please form a coalition with other courageous Republicans and vote for the Freedom to Vote Act and the John Lewis Voting Rights Act. The future of American democracy is in your hands. Thank you.
Thank you, Nomi, for highlighting the necessity for us to walk our talk, and making this action as effective and easy as possible.
However skeptical we may be about "courageous Republicans," this list does represent Republicans who need to be pushed--and that means by us--to walk their talk of upholding democractic process, and voting rights in particular, over self-serving loyalty to preserve their wealth and power.
Call them and what we also need is fax numbers. Flooding fax machines has a real visible effect on staff. Bogging down their operations is the key...it gets the staffs attention the most and makes them yell Uncle.
My daughter tells me that many of their fax machines are "EQ" (?) Meaning digital, no more paper to shoot out onto the floor. The system is programmed to respond to people they need to know about. But we don't know how many offices have them, especially if our machines don't ping the right codes in the 'handshake.' She also said that stand-alone fax machines are the new eight track and VCR dinosaurs. Oh well, something less to buy....
Nomi, your previous post the other day prompted me to write these senators, even though I knew that getting them read was a long-shot. I decided I had to get some skin in the game. On Saturday, I mailed 9 hand-written thank-you notes (including Manchin & Sinema). I emphasized the priority of passing the voting rights legislation ASAP. Today, I'll continue Fair Fight's Fall initiative to call my Senators every day (833-465-7142) with the demand to pass the Freedom to Vote Act and the John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act. I appreciate and will follow up on the practical suggestions readers in this forum are offering about how to take ACTION (such as today's FAX post). Many thanks to all! You have been a huge support this past year.
Jacquie, wonderful. And, yes, as others are saying, staff does tally letters and calls. I did not know about Fair Fight's calling initiative, but now I do! Thank you.
This is excellent, Nomi. Many thanks. HCR and your comment made me have this strange thought in my la magdrugadic brain this morning. I suddenly wondered, what would happen if all dems, progressives and independents suddenly joined the Republican party and inoculated it by dissolving or at least diluting its' dark energy with Truth and Light? What would happen? Poof?! Their voting power would suddenly shift? There are more of us than them...aren't there? . Just an early dawn can-we-use-the-light thought. If you cannot beat them, join them...and destroy them? There was a quote when I was much younger, "Dress Republican, Think Democrat." Those of you who understand politics better than I, can set me straight. But once upon a time Dems were the current Repubs, and Repubs were the Dems. How did they shift? And in the middle of that shift, was there balance first? Like the center line between Yin/Yang? Radical repubs infiltrated everywhere in our systems. We infiltrate theirs with sanity?
You know, when you are in a brainstorming session, ANY idea is allowed to percolate up...
Consider this a perk-up from my overworked, primordial ooze of Being this morning.
I was born into a Lincoln-TR-Ike Republican family. Nixon really changed things a lot in his desire to not lose and to help his "friends". Reagan pushed it a lot further, the first Bush had some heart and at least was a "professional". His son was controlled more by Cheney, Rove and others around him. Iraq was never about WMD. That's when I changed my registration. Trump is his own animal. People can see the light, but it's hard to give up something you've grown up with. Our R Gov Hogan never embraced Trump and it's worked for him. Light and truth always prevail. It can take a long time...but keep at it.
Oh Penelope. I surround both parties with white light every morning with an extra boost of light sent to the recalcitrant brat adults…on all sided. Surrounding darkness with white light allows it to get in the cracks. And, yes, most effective when done in la magdrugada….early morning.
I like to go out in the early morning...at last dark, first light and honor the 4 directions...commune with the Universe...now I have a word for the time. Perfect.
1) The next step up from voting is joining your local party. That’s where being outed as a RINO would take big courage, like what’s required more and more at school board meetings. Not that a requirement for courage should be a barrier.
2) Republican politicians no longer care about winning more than 50% of votes. Hence the legislation to suppress and override votes.
Pros:
1) A bunch of progressive votes would sweetly mess with Republican gerrymandered districts.
2) A bunch of progressive votes would sweetly dismantle legislation to suppress and override votes.
3) Impression management and polls: Significant numbers of registered Republicans tallied as supporting progressive issues and candidates catches media attention and builds that momentum.
Miscellaneous thoughts:
Some sort of critical mass is needed to transform individual party switches into an effective movement. But it starts with individuals and needs cohesive direction.
For awhile it looked like the more Lincolnian Rs would reject the seditious Rs and either reclaim the party or split the party. But neither has happened.
How much of the big switch was an artifact of unique historical circumstances,
We need to re-read and re-listen to all that HCR has written and said about the history of the Republican Party and that switch of affiliation by big business. And of course, follow the money, which takes us back to the matter of how to influence big business. Which is all the more daunting in light of a new round of expose of dark money machinations as illuminated by the Pandora Papers. But why should “daunting” be a barrier. Other than wisely marshalling resources to maximize effectiveness.
Here’s a brief refresher on the big switch:
“How did this switch happen?
Eric Rauchway, professor of American history at the University of California, Davis, pins the transition to the turn of the 20th century, when a highly influential Democrat named William Jennings Bryan blurred party lines by emphasizing the government's role in ensuring social justice through expansions of federal power — traditionally, a Republican stance.
But Republicans didn't immediately adopt the opposite position of favoring limited government.
"Instead, for a couple of decades, both parties are promising an augmented federal government devoted in various ways to the cause of social justice," Rauchway wrote in an archived 2010 blog post for the Chronicles of Higher Education. Only gradually did Republican rhetoric drift to the counterarguments. The party's small-government platform cemented in the 1930s with its heated opposition to the New Deal.
But why did Bryan and other turn-of-the-century Democrats start advocating for big government?
According to Rauchway, they, like Republicans, were trying to win the West. The admission of new western states to the union in the post-Civil War era created a new voting bloc, and both parties were vying for its attention.
… From a business perspective, Rauchway pointed out, the loyalties of the parties did not really switch. "Although the rhetoric and to a degree the policies of the parties do switch places," he wrote, "their core supporters don't — which is to say, the Republicans remain, throughout, the party of bigger businesses; it's just that in the earlier era bigger businesses want bigger government and in the later era they don't."
In other words, earlier on, businesses needed things that only a bigger government could provide, such as infrastructure development, a currency and tariffs. Once these things were in place, a small, hands-off government became better for business.”
I actually did this once when I was young. Registered R for the primary to vote against Nixon. If enough people do it, you can sway an election in the primaries. In this case today try and get R's who will be reasonable, or loose to the Dem. It would take a lot of organizing and it would have to be in districts where the Dem is a sure thing or un-opposed in the primary. TX, GA & KY would be very interesting case studies.
The big shift occurred when LBJ supported & signed Civil Rights legislation. He did the moral thing, knowing many southern Dems would be upset and possibly leave the party. Nixon used that opportunity to court white racists in the southern states. That's when the south started to change from solid D to solid R. There's other factors and other things happened, but that really created the electoral map we see today. It's interesting that 2 of the Dems elected President since then have come out of the south, Carter & Clinton while Bush II is the only R from the south....and R's have elected 2 celebrities, Reagan & Trump. Bush I and Biden have been the political "professionals" and Obama came from the outside...and many of the elections have been very close...and now are electorally decided in about 8 states.
Thank you, Nomi, for reposting. When I wrote to these senators last week I asked them to vote for the Freedom to Vote Act but did not mention the John Lewis Voting Rights Act. I think a postcard this time (as opposed to a letter) could be very effective...with all due respect to envelopes!
Yes, I'm glad I got it down to postcard length. Postcards are good. Glad you're doing it again. I want them to get bags of mails. I posted on Twitter, and have gotten a lot of retweets, so that is encouraging.
A LOT of postcards is good...especially from their districts. We must find like minded people in their states...that makes the most difference....and calls...flood the phone lines...and we need fax numbers...nothing gets staffs attention like a pile of Fax paper on the floor. They can feel and see the "attack".
Lynell I would assume that Dem organizations in these states are doing these things, but one never knows. I'm extremely busy with my video work right now and don't have the time to do the "grass roots" organizing and motivating stuff. My suggestion is find the key Dem organizations in these states, communicate with them...get them into this forum and motivate them to call, fax and send post cards to these R senators in mass....and the truth is 100 calls, faxes and/or post cards feels like a barrage if they happen quickly in a day or 2. A "friendly" protest that gets TV coverage outside their local office with more than 20 people is really effective stuff...especially if it gets repeated on social media.
Lynell here's an example of how local groups can pressure their elected reps with video on social media. I just posted this to my "Camera Person Reflections" page https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GvgNv1F7gLQ
Thank you. I will start sending faxes to my representative.
You can also use Resistbot to send messages. It works from Twitter, Messenger and other media. It’s free but you can donate to support. We donate. My husband is much better about using it than I am.
Thank you again! I wrote my senator (Toomey) sending it snail mail but also email. Received a reply which details the current Rep. rhetoric on voting. Very discouraging.
These senators' individual responses are not to be expected to deviate from their party line. The value of these letters, emails, and postcards is adding to the numbers tallied on the issue by their office staff. Power in numbers!
This is absolutely true and essential. Flood them, make them feel it. This was a big part of the process we used to ban fracking in Maryland. We made sure the elected reps who were on the fence and whose votes we needed felt the heat constantly and in volume.
A few years ago when the goal was to send Trump pink postcards as a pink slip notification that he was fired we bought a stack that could be fed through the printer. Very nice not to have to hand address a hundred cards. Then we put a variety of messages on them. I think I have some left.
I rarely hand write anything because of my vision problems. I am thankful for a 12” iPad that I can make the print large!
Yes Anne, I too am a pajama person. Occasionally even in the car to drop my grandson off at college. Mostly to the mailbox and neighbors.
Several years ago when my husband had surgery for prostate cancer I made him about 8 pairs of pajama bottoms out of batik. Unless he has to go out of the house it’s all he wears. They’ve gotten great use during Covid and are lightweight for the heat. He also has flannel for the winter.
12 post cards (had to go to 2 POs) addressed, text composed, written, and in mailbox in plenty of time for 11am pick up. Of course with Mr DeVice's new slo-mo, they may not get to DC in time...
you're right. Any time a minority in power attempts to control the agenda like the Southern Planter aristocracy by secession and now this law, it just leads to bad results for the minority trying to impose their will. And it's all going to be painful in the process for a lot of people.
I just realized after reading your insights w the Southern Planter aristocracy, that states rights have a tendency to insure inequality. But not always. For instance, ME and AZ allow for government supported funding for state elections, including for governor. ME also allows for Ranked Choice Voting. However, the states rights inclusion in our democracy allows for suppression, because it challenges the federal role in assuring civil liberties.
You are certainly correct...and the "majority" opinion sometimes needs help getting to the right place. Southern secession is our "most extreme" states rights battle to date. We need to be teaching that the Civil War was fought because the CSA was an attempt to create a nation trying to preserve slavery.
Mike, Ashley, thank you so much. And, yes, I know Postcards to Voters is working on the Virginia House campaign. My mom and I have written thousands of postcards through them these past couple of years. They have made a huge impact in many close elections.
And thanks a mil, too, Ashley, for your Virginia voters stack! I voted over a week ago but sent my husband this morning to vote. I told him to just vote wherever he saw a "D" next to a name. He came back carrying the VirginiaDems pamphlet he was given down at the polls.
Will be starting on postcards tomorrow. Thanks, again.
Regarding the international network of offshore financial schemes . . . it has been going on for a very long time. Rachel Maddow has been talking about the oligarchs of Russia for years and offshore accounts are nothing new! Obviously, the grotesque financial inequity that has grown to 100's of billionaires has fed this situation to a global insanity. From the perspective of U.S. government policy there should to be a huge "reset button" regarding financial aid to countries where leaders and individuals hoard $billions and leave their own people in poverty.
And, in this country, it is totally nuts we do the same thing . . . we go begging for and compromising on infrastructure funds (including social infrastructure) while the self-centered uber rich take multi-minute rocket rides to the edge of space as a pure joy ride. Because of the vast financial and social inequities, the masses end up with no control over their lives (for women it gets right down to their own bodies!) There certainly is no easy way out . . .
Hands up for everyone who knew a major location for “offshore hidden assets” was South Dakota? Read the reports on South Dakota trust assets. South Dakota Republican Governor Kristi Noem needs to be asked about this every time she appears in public. And, where are U.S. regulators on this? WTF???
I have wondered many times about her rise in popularity. She has always appeared to me as disingenuous. Hmmm. Who would’ve thought South Dakota as such a piggy bank.
South Dakota has for many decades had an extremely relaxed attitude about the regulation of the financial services companies located and chartered within their state. For many years the credit card industry and many other consumer lenders located operations and chartered themselves there to take advantage of their ability to charge higher rates by virtue of that. South Dakota's excuse was that it provided employment and jobs within what was otherwise a largely rural and agricultural state. Many of these operations were for the financial services industry giants who otherwise were located in coastal states.
She needs to be asked but won't. They'd never pose that question on right wing outlets and you won't be seeing her on 60 Minutes anytime soon I'm guessing.
Thanks Herb. He's probably busy trolling other liberal forums. I was going to ask him to "prove it" but you did a nice job. And as Fern says, "Don't feed it!"
Ummm. The SD angle is in the International Consortium of Independent journalism exposé, guys. And of course, all over WaPo. (WashPost) Let’s be expanding our go-to reliable news sources. (AND subscribing to them, if we want to keep this democratic republic of ours.)
There is a news headline in what you assert, J Boone..."Liberal Democrats in NY and CA hide their millions in South Dakota". Wonder if the locals agree ??
At the core of the problem are all the politicians from both parties that conspire with the wealthy in the high-stakes game of politics. It is quid pro quo on steroids.
It's on full display with every piece of legislation. It's why Biden's $6-trillion Build Back Better proposal has been quickly cut down to as low as $1.5 trillion by the corporate centrist branch of the Democratic Party. It doesn't help when supporters are so willing to compromise on widely lauded and supported legislation just to make a deal.
The other piece of it, as Heather mentioned, is how politicians constantly divert attention from their larcenous ways by distracting most of us with issues that divide and alienate voters. Republicans are masters at this and Democrats participate by default!
As Janet W. noted this has been going on for a very long time. Does anyone believe that politicians will come together, grow a spine, and stand up to the wealthy? I don't.
I was working in the institutional investment management business in the mid-1970's when the industry was solidly under the control of privileged white men (young and old) and offshore accounts (specifically Bermuda) were a financial haven for the affluent of the time! While the wealth factor definitely was there, it wasn't even a blip on the charts compared to today. It has all grown to monsterous levels. For the most part those with wealth and/or privilege have been enabled to accumulate concentrations of riches and influence unheard of in any other time period. They were and are the gatekeepers!
I used to work for Fireman’s Fund Insurance. Their stock is White Mountains. Warren Buffett is an investor. In the latter part of tge 80’s, they moved their operations to Bermuda. I figured it out after I left the company. Took my stock and reinvested elsewhere.
And...while the ultra rich of this country continue to build their empires, We The People (most of us being NOT wealthy) are asked to subsidize our fellow Americans' grief, loss, operations, etc. through GoFundMe requests. We are told that religious institutions should take up the slack created by gutted social programs (think food pantries), but who will fund the religious organizations?...wait, I know...the poor and middle class (if there is any middle class left). We (retired on a fixed income and praying that our 401(k)s don't tank) are besieged by requests from all manner of charitable organizations, hoping beyond hope that we can make a "small monthly donation." At last count, I have 18 requests on my desk. At a minimal $5/month, that's $90 a month...and it doesn't begin to include the e-mail and social media requests. But it's OK to send the rich to space. (no, it's not OK...that was a snarky comment)
Fred, I can certainly relate, at about 30 mail requests for money each month. I've drawn the line at $20/year for about 8 different organizations...other than my church.
In the same shape as you guys. Waiting for the stock market to reflect what hit Brazil this year and devastated their coffee trees, in addition to their severe ongoing drought. Their orange trees are down as well, and corn for cattle and egg laying chickens. We will feel this! Starbucks and Dunkin are already scrambling for alternative sources for next year. Brazil is one of the two major exporters of Arabica coffee; the other is Vietnam, then Africa, I think.
For me, dear Professor Richardson, this is the finest letter you've ever written. I believe Texas Republican elected officials have made a huge error with the Abortion Ban law and its vigilante injustice. It is not only alienating Texas women and women across the entire US and beyond, it alienated by brother, a Tea Party conservative. On abortion we are in complete agreement. He even said Governor Abbott was showing his true colors. My brother, an originalist, has written a book on the Constitution and I think he understood how this law defied and defiled the Constitution. That was unacceptable to him.
Here are the written comments I made this evening to the Texas House Redistricting Committee who is holding a hearing this morning (Monday, Oct 4) on the intentionally discriminatory maps they have released taking away six districts from people of color and adding three for whites. I used every character of the 3000 allowed by adding 3 exclamations points on NOW!!! I've been thinking that it is not just white nationalist that want a revolution. I think it is time for a women's revolution!
To the Texas House Redistricting Committee Public Hearing:
Redistricting gives the incumbent party a significant advantage for a full ten years. The maps as presented show intentional discrimination against people of color who made up a super majority portion of the population growth in the past decade. This unfair advantage in the maps mean that the incumbent party will have a six to eight point advantage in all districts which will mean minority rule of that party for the next ten years. Given that that party is truly representing only a minority of the population of Texas this becomes intolerable when they are putting into effect laws which blatantly take away US Constitutional Rights from a majority of citizens - women and people of color -- with the Abortion Ban and the Voter "Integrity" laws. The first is in intentional violation of the U.S. Constitution and fifty years of precedent. A party that believes in the individual freedom to wear a mask or not which protect the right to life of other citizens is taking away my freedom with begins with my body! I will not tolerate vigilante injustice nor do I feel a majority male legislature has any standing to make laws over my body. The second is in violation of the Voting Rights Act Section 2 as intentionally discriminatory. I am not going to tolerate this and will do everything I can to non-violently resist it and to bring about a huge u-turn to a better, more legal direction for our beautiful state one that works for all the people this time. Our representatives no longer represent us because they have been bought by the elite 5% of the population. It is now an oligarchic kleptocracy hollowing out the middle class and weakening capitalism by weakening the consumers. This will destroy capitalism altogether and is has already destroyed democracy in our republic. While I believe minority voices must be heard, I do not believe in minority rule. Having an elite minority lording over everyone else is what we fought the American Revolution over. There are a great many ways to draw fairer maps and I strongly encourage to redraw the current maps and start acting like you still believe in democracy -- by the People -- not your Donors. I plan to work toward an independent commission to draw the 2030 maps. And, note that I said independent -- not bipartisan. The two party system is as John Adams said now becoming the worst evil to befall the Constitution. My idea of fair and just is maps that make all the districts competitive for its constituents so that we have real choices in who represents us. The current gerrymandering is actually a two-edge sword. The incumbent finds himself (and I'm going to make herself the majority!) locked into the extremes of their select constituency and scared of being primaried. These incumbents can no longer negotiate for the good of all because they are locked into keeping the extremes of their party stirred up. This is all intolerable. Redraw these maps into fair and just districts! it is your oath! NOW!!!
... for those with ears to hear ... real men - good men - do not lie, cheat and manipulate to achieve their goals ... good men - real men - behave with integrity, believe in playing fair - and act accordingly.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cuzl_QTBlWI The People, United, Shall NEVER Be Defeated! This is one of my favorite songs! A pianist composer used this theme on a set of 36 variations in groups of six. The first five of the group represent the open hand. The sixth of each group brings the first five together in a fist. Raise your fists! It's time to Unite! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xiWwYsWWVSk
Dear Professor HCR -I really can’t express how important and helpful your analysis has been for me, a relatively uneducated but life-long progressive, in understanding the historical and political influences that give me the perspective to see things with a longer view and less emotional upset. Thank you so much!
Maybe there's even more to Mueller's Iron Triangle. The professor doesn't seem to mention terrorism or the vast financial networks that underlie this form of criminality... with which the United States is supposed to have been at war for so long.
Prof HCR. Most excellent analysis. Yes, the issues are connected and I suspect issue 1 is about to blow up issue 2. I think someone just stepped on a rake.
I simply cannot see the connection, and while informative, Professor Richardson’s post was tendentious.
I do not see this as a connection. I see it as a correlation. ‘Connection’ presupposes that a causative relationship. Other issues are protected in this cynical vein.
Tax credits for the wealthy has long been an article of faith (and action) among Republican ideologues, using the trickle-down theory to buttress their stance.
Could we not just as easily insert this economic policy in place of the Pandora Papers story and say that it too is not unrelated to the marches against the Texas abortion law?
To take the comparison at its face, one would have to suppose that the Republicans only ever get elected by playing some sort of shell game. That’s a first premise and I agree with it in general terms. But the back half of it presupposes that dazzle the electorate with the villainy of those who would seek abortions so as to hide their *real* design to protect what the wealthy do with their money.
The Texas law is abominable and clever - one can only hope it is too clever by half and has pride of place among a vast array of good reasons to remove Abbott far from politics.
It has a host of fathers however. The Pandora Papers is just not one of them. That discovery is simply correlative. The fact that trillions of dollars of wealth is hidden to protect it from taxation is both opaque and silent. We who are not wealthy rail against wealth inequity. But it is fed mostly by constant pounding on the issue of income inequality - the corporate payouts of tens of millions annually to chief officers, the staggering wealth of Bezos, the Waltons et al vs the absurdly low minimum wage, the demonization of those who receive entitlements, the need for millions of workers to scrabble together a living from two and sometimes three jobs.
If anything, the Republicans use social issues like abortion, gun rights and woke culture to distract potential voters from the gross inequality of modern life and thereby win elections and protect the oligarchy.
Obviously wealth-sheltering contributes to this inequality but it has never ranked in the top five of voter concerns.
The comparison further doesn’t hold water in that the Pandora Papers, like its predecessor the Panama Papers, is hugely international in scope. On its list are powerful wealthy people from countries which protect abortion and do not seek to chip away at it.
Did the Panama Papers bring the masses into the street screaming for retribution? Nope. It’s too opaque, too dark, too silent, and often, too legal.
Eric O'Donnel. What entitlements? Social Security/Medicare? We let the government hold our money for retirement, paid taxes on it and are now taxed again (thanks to Reagan) as it gets doled out each month at an amount no one can live on. Are there other programs of which i am not aware? Has everyone been so co-opted by Republican rebranding that even in this forum we are made to look like we always have our hands out for government aid which strengthens the Republican 'welfare state' demonization, even of citizens who played by the rules their whole lives. I may be overlooking other programs, please enlighten me about 'entitlements'.
Bravo, CJ!! I too bristle at calling SS and Medicare an entitlements. Until, (within the past 10 years or so)...when the government raised the SS payroll limit above $103,000 to its present $120,000?? limit, the wealthy did not pay SS taxes above that ceiling limit...but they sure got SS benefits well above those making $50,000/ year. And, in addition, until fairly recently the uber wealthy now have to pay a 3+% (?) Medicare Surtax on their higher income, something that they never had to pay before Omama's presidency !
My comment about ‘entitlements’ referred to the Republican trope developed from Reagan’s “Cadillac Queen”. This spawned a Republican industry of demonizing those who receive welfare benefits, food stamps etc. From the demonizing came periodic and crushing reductions in those entitlements.
This series of attacks, like those on abortion, generate anger deflect America’s attention from the predatory oligarchic class and enable populist Republicans go to squeak out election wins time and time again.
They hit on the supposed laziness and lack of initiative to conceal what should be obvious. The middle class is being hollowed out. Those at the bottom economically have little to no chance of rising.
The Pandora Papers are way, way in the background.
I can assure you that I do not bash those who benefit from the financial expectations involved in a fair society.
And plans that are paid into for years like Social Security and Medicare are a matter of simple fairness.
Eric O'Donnell, have you noticed that whenever anyone tries to make the connection between economics and politics, they're called a socialist? This has been going on since before the Civil War. It's how the powers-that-be shut down the discussion and marginalize anyone who brings up the subject. Could this possibly be why you don't see the connection and think it's only "correlative"?
Well first of all, and this mayn’t answer your point, I am quite comfortable with democratic socialism, as practiced, say, in the Scandinavian countries.
I fully believe your point is sincere, but I am really not catching it as you mean it.
I do agree that the socialism chestnut has been used as the term of art to uphold the manic, pedal to the medal capitalism in America. If one is not all in, one is Socialist. And that usually forestalls further argument.
But my point remains I think - *how* the extremely rich protect and enhance their gains, as seen in the Pandora Papers, is not a hot button issue. It is not something the Republicans are uncomfortable with, as in that it could impair their re-election prospects and sleazy connections to the oligarchic class. Thus the Pandora Papers are correlative.
More worrisome to them is being exposed by a mass movement against income inequality. That beast is not silent. It is visible to anyone with eyes. It angers people. Those people in turn could punish Republican politicians who belong to or aspire to belong to the oligarchic class. Reflexively they then turn to hot button social issues to distract the attention of their electorate. That is truly connective.
We should care deeply about the revelations in the Pandora Papers. But the stories are long, complex, and not always illegal (strictly speaking). So that makes this specific issue correlative.
Who transfers the wealth of the people to the super-rich? Who hides the money that has been taken/stolen and pays very little to no taxes? Who attempts to control the memory of the people and in many ways is successful at it? Who defrauds the people and also distracts them from the facts? Is there no connection between taking the peoples’ wealth, spreading lies to control them and then literally passing laws to cement that control?
Is there no logical connection between accumulating wealth, hiding it in shell games, buying the system, (controlling state legislatures, passing national and state bills/policies and controlling the courts) to protect you from exposure and increase your wealth, while advancing your power and control?
I understand the connection between The Pandora Papers, ‘a vast trove of documents that expose a secretive financial universe that benefits the wealthy and powerful’ and the anti-abortion laws passed by the state legislature in Texas. The analogy illustrates the dangerous imbalance of our country’s system. Eric, unfortunately, I was lost in the logic of your comment and baffled by you calling Heather ‘tendentious’ by connecting the two. Perhaps, your will be equally confounded by this reply.
Definition of tendentious
disapproving
: marked by a tendency in favor of a particular point of view : BIASED (Merriam-Webster)
To further clarify my argument, the 600 marches, comprising of tens of thousands of people across the country, were protesting against Texas' anti-abortion -- the money/power/governmental/forces or Dark Money, which restricted their freedom. They protested against America's version of Pandora's Dark Money.
"So why do they support and advocate for voter suppression, restrictive voting rights "
They do not. This is a lie or an indication that the person repeating it is brainwashed from their media feed. Republicans want free and fair election and want the system to be trusted. It is not trusted today. 85% of OECD countries reject mail-in ballots for a reason.
"tax cuts for high earners and the wealthy,"
That is also political hogwash. Republicans support lower taxes and smaller government. The party is as consistent on this as are Democrats to increase taxes and the size of government.
"unpopular stances on women’s healthcare and reproductive rights,"
There is no unpopular stance on women's health. Just stop with the rhetorical political crap. In terms of reproductive rights, the Democrats position on zero restrictions on abortion is as unpopular as it illegal abortion.
"no support for affordable housing,"
BS. It is in all the liberal-run places where housing is un-affordable and homelessness is rampant. That is because liberals make it more restrictive and more expensive to build new housing. Republicans have an easy solution they advocate... BUILD MORE HOUSING
"and less support for reducing child poverty and income inequality."
Again... bull shit. Republicans want people back to work to earn their own living instead of the fake and broken ideology of government assistance where we eventually run out of other people's money.
In regard to the term "heartbeat bill," the OB/GYNs among us can attest to their expertise of clarifying that at about 6 weeks of human embryo gestation, the amalgamation of cells that eventually will become a heart are NOT yet a functioning heart with a beat. The "heartbeat" reference is a deliberately emotionalizing misnomer, and in our messaging, we need to not perpetuate this tactic of the far right.
As for the Women's March of 10/02/2021, men were out there aplenty in support--yay and thank you! The depth and breadth were impressive. Women's Marches were held in all 50 states.
But I respectfully disagree that the Women's March was limited to people marching "for women’s lives and their constitutional right to abortion." Plenty of people's signs and T-shirts addressed the larger issues of patriarchal capitalism, feminism, women's health, gender rights, citizenship, and constitutional overreach. Here are some examples:
"We are Ruthless! Now act accordingly."
"RBG sent me. I dissent."
"Bans off our bodies"
"Republicans hate women, children, refugees, clean air, voting rights"
"Women's rights are human rights."
"Yes to citizenship now"
"Men of quality are not afraid of equality"
"Real men are feminists"
"The system is sexist. Fight for socialism."
"Pro-choice. Pro-vax. Pro-equality."
"Derechos reproductivos son temas LGBTQ!"
"Address institutional racism in reproductive healthcare"
"Regulate guns, not uteruses"
"Authoritarian reproductive control is fueled by misogyny and racism"
"Viagra is govt. funded ($41.6 million / yr), If Pregnancy is God's Will, So Is Limp Dick"
"Texas: where a virus has reproductive rights but a woman doesn't"
"If I wanted the government in my uterus, I would f**k a politician!"
Morning Ellie. In conversations yesterday, I expressed to people that the MARCH I attended far surpassed the numbers expected and that the voices raised and speeches were about many issues, especially relating to women and children. People were very united and talking amongst groups was riveting. One sign stopped me in my tracks and we took a few minutes to talk.
The speeches given at our march in Ft Worth, reiterated that this ban on abortions is not about pro life, it’s about controlling women. If it were about helping babies and children, then support young women, access to birth control, schools, foster care children, rape victims, abused women, etc. When social services increase, abortions decrease.
A young girl interviewed me for a school project. She asked me why this opposition to the abortion ban is important to me. She got an earful! She didn’t seem to make a connection between controlling women with other issues such as voter suppression, poverty, safety of women. I thanked her mom who brought her out to do the project. I urged them to vote, when the girl is old enough.
Right on, Denise! There’s a ripple effect, when we educate these younger, future voters, as you know well. Thank YOU, for your impactful, ongoing, teaching efforts💙!
This is so well said, Denise. The Los Angeles Times buried the story of the Women's March in the second section page 10, literally behind the obituaries, and used a photo of a sign with a sad misspelling. So Letters to the Editor, here I come! Armed with great phrases from your comment!
I agree Ellie. This is bigger than reproductive rights. It is women's rights. It is People's rights. And we're ready to fight! I liked the sign that said: What would Ruth do?
I was amazed at the Atlanta March how many men were there. There was a wide variety of people. This is what democracy looks like.
My senators and Congresswoman are all progressive Democrats in Georgia! They hear from me all the time, anyway, because they need those numbers of constituents supporting the causes. This is, also, what democracy looks like.
Grateful to Professor Richardson keeping me informed so I can intelligently contact my Congress people.
Ellie, thank you for this list and especially for "If I wanted the government in my uterus, I would f**k a politician!" Made me laugh out loud...a lot!
Dems have a bigger problem than gerrymandering. They don't know how to win elections. Rep. Pramila Jayapal has had a national audience for the past week, and not once have I heard her rebut the charge of socialism and creating a dependent welfare state. Perhaps she thinks Americans are intelligent, rational beings who would not believe such bunk. The yard signs are already up in my town.
The message is simple: This is not socialism. That's a bunch of malarkey. We're repairing the social safety net because too many people are falling through the cracks.
Bonus points if you add the creation of Social Security and unemployment compensation, for context.
I wouldn't criticize the more progressive politicians who advocate for "the people" for not framing their messages more effectively.
I cringe at the headlines, punchlines, phrases and language used by the media (print, TV, cable, radio). NPR can drive my blood pressure up. Their programs are quite informative, providing the education and comparative analysis that people need to make better decisions. BUT they use titles and phrases that can be easily used by Republicans to justify their conspiracy theories and claims of "socialism", etc. The media sets a stage that favors Republicans and puts Democrats in a hole deeper than any Democratic politician can dig their way out of.
Look at covid19. Almost 2 years of overwhelming public health, medical science, reports on where and why covid19 spreads, watching your unvaccinated friends, family and neighbors across the nation get sick, deathly sick and die, can be throttled by some politicians, a few media talking heads and an ex president into remaining unvaccinated. It's many times easier to fool yourself than to inform yourself.
The Hidden Brain podcast has addressed the issues behind this.
Excellent!! ❤️❤️🙏🙏 Thank you David. We also need to intensely began to push back on the demonizing of the word “socialism”. Republicans have tried to force their very limited definition on us for decades, maybe longer, trying to suggest what?
In truth worker’s owning their own businesses is a great model. We are social beings. In an overpopulated world with diminishing resources the more prosocial we are the better we will prosper. Love the reference to the Hidden Brain. The latest research proves what we know.
We’re all in this together. Religious pomp has hijacked that “God is love for each other.” From Albert Einstein:
"If we want our species to survive, if we are to find meaning in life, if we want to save the world and every sentient being that inhabits it, love is the one and only answer.” Today’s Republicans are antisocial. Let’s give voice to being prosocial and the real meaning of socialism.
Yes. My definition of socialism is when we all share a problem, it just makes sense to all share in the solution. We are already very socialistic: fire departments, police departments, water districts, public schools, public roads, public health (universal healthcare would be a great addition), the list goes on. But probably the most socialistic institution in our society is our military.
Politicians who are attempting to demonize socialism depend on Americans not being able to think very deeply. The decision is where to draw the line between social solutions and individual solutions. Those are issues about which reasonable people can disagree and conversations should be had.
Is it feasible to add room in your description for a robust capitalism alongside these socialistic community goals to to prevent market economy heads from exploding?
I agree that media is a necessary focus. Popular media over-simplifies, excites and lies. It is a drug for so many people and alters the collective minds of many Americans. Even NPR and PBS are Republican-lite. It is better to seek sources like this letter, some PodCasts, and Democracy Now (tho it is sometimes grating, it has some worthy guest speakers.) I would go so far as to include video games as inciting an increase in general callousness and violence toward women. But, so far we cannot touch the sacred cows of freedom of speech and the right to bad taste and ignorance.
David, I feel language is everything. Only conservatives have understood, and mastered this. Progressives debate personal positions, and DO NOT unify. We are a grab bag of special interests, and my special interests are framing and the environment, but I also stand for gender equality and blah blah blah 😂 🙏
TFG studied Hitler’s speeches. They are masters of the con and how to brainwash. Democrats have a better message that they just need to get it out there more and the majority of the media work against that.
I feel the media is principally an echo chamber (like NPR), and they would echo our strong and vibrant vision if we had one. Such as a Democratic Capitalism, where everyone had opportunity for success.
No, David, I would criticize progressive politicians for not messaging better. People, even "rational" people, respond more strongly to emotional motivations. Repubes get their power by repeating emotionally charged outrageous lies ad nauseum. We could learn something from this. Liberals would get much more traction with voters if they repeated emotionally charged outrageous truths ad nauseum instead of (yawn) heady rational messages.
We also need to call the Press on the carpet. By giving Trump so much coverage for his outrageous lies, they gave our country to him. And now they are undercutting Biden. We need to insist that they correct their cranio-rectal inversion, even if it requires surgery.
Corporate ownership of the press is a problem. Historically Dems have not been good at messaging as most of us believed that doing well by each other was not a message that needed doctoring. Now with Republicans having been taught the art of fascist language to deceive and indoctrinate it looks like Dems are waking up to the fact they have to repeat their messages of how their bills support we the people to build better. There were a few on MSNBC who had were interviewing the lawmakers themselves this week instead of interpreting their words. Perhaps it matters to voice support for those doing it right?
Steven, you said a million with your post, about liberals ignorance simple communications that will actually attract others. Have you read Lakoff re: his study of political languaging, something he calls ‘framing?'
Totally agree Dem's believe people are intelligent and rational and that is the biggest downfall of the D's. KISS - keep it simple, stupid! Talk like everyone's a 4th grader!
4th grade level. Hum. Think you are right. Intellectual development stalled sometime about then if you were to listen to the verbal battles taking place in school board meetings. About the age when kids start to memorize clever phrases and arithmetic tables and before comprehension is being formed in reading skill. About the age when reading the words and pronouncing them correctly is more important than explaining what was meant by the writer of Dick and Jane.
Maybe the Progressives need a new public face instead of Jayapal, Omar, Bush and AOC. After a while some names just become associated with the ‘radical, extremist, socialist agenda’. The same policies just a different messenger.
I see this time differently. I don't like how the media has treated it. What is happening now is what negotiations between democrats and republicans (even though this time it is the same party) would look like in normal times. I have been paying a lot of attention to how Jayapal expresses herself and I find her absolutely reasonable and very persuasive. She has to walk a fine line between standing up for what she believes in and staying out of idiotic war zones - she is in the middle of a very important negotiation right now. She is not throwing bombs at anyone and she is trying to get more of what she wants. I think it is interesting that that whole group is acting differently right now than it has in the past. AOC has been strangely restrained for the most part and the others have been silent. All of this leads me to believe that they get the feeling that the electorate is on their side and that the Manchins, Sinemas and republicans are already in the rearview mirror. They definitely have more traction in this negotiation than they would have in the past. This is progress. And, in the end, they might be right. It is still stressful to watch because there is so much at stake for all involved.
Good morning Robert. I agree with you and thank you for the pushback. I’m dismayed at the criticism against Rep Pramila Jayapal. I thought her messaging extremely effective last week.
Robert, I to have been paying attention to Pramila Jayapal. Rather than fill this space with my impression of her, I thought it would be useful for some doubters and those, perhaps, a bit too frightened of shopworn attacks by Republicans, to hear from Pramila Jayapal, in her own words:
‘Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-WA), leader of the House progressives, pushed back on one of centrist West Virginia Sen. Joe Manchin’s demands for Democrats’ massive reconciliation spending package, saying Sunday morning that she will not support the bill if it includes the Hyde Amendment.’
‘With the progressive and moderate wings of the Democratic Party continuing to negotiate President Joe Bidens’s agenda-setting $3.5 trillion social policy bill, Manchin—who describes himself as “pro-life”— made it clear last week that he would only vote for the bill if the Hyde Amendment is part of it. (The amendment prevents federal programs from covering abortion expenses.)
‘Appearing on CNN’s State of the Union on Sunday, Jayapal first discussed the ongoing negotiations about the price tag of the spending package and what may need to be cut or trimmed down in order for it to pass. She was then asked about Manchin’s remarks about the anti-abortion provision’
“You shared your experience with abortion in congressional testimony this past week,” anchor Dana Bash noted. “Can you vote for a bill that has the Hyde Amendment in it?”
“No,” Jayapal flatly declared.’
“So what happens?” Bash countered.’
‘The Washington congresswoman replied that “this is a negotiation” before claiming that the Hyde Amendment is something “the majority of the country does not support.” She also said that one in four American women have had an abortion and are in need of reproductive care during a time “when those protections are being rolled back,” referencing the plethora of anti-abortion laws that have recently been passed.’
“That is nobody’s business,” Jayapal added. “It is our business as people that carry the babies. And we have to be able to make the choices during our pregnancy.” (Daily Beast)
‘She said on Friday she had been in almost constant contact with the White House and Democratic congressional leaders.'
“We are making sure we’re holding up the women who need childcare, the families who need childcare, unpaid leave, the folks who need climate change addressed, housing, immigration,” she told reporters.'
“There’s sometimes frustration, but we’re all part of the Democratic party, this is the Democratic agenda, it’s the president’s agenda and we’re excited to be fighting for the same thing. I’ve been here four and a half years. I still find it strange, but things only happen here when there’s urgency and some reason for people to be at the table. We’ve seen more progress in the last 48 hours than we have seen in a long time.”
“Pramila has turned the CPC into a strong political force by keeping everyone informed, having people talk through the issues and then make real commitments,” the Massachusetts senator and fellow progressive Elizabeth Warren told the New Republic.’ (Guardian)
‘As Joe Biden laid out a grand vision for his Presidency, in a speech before Congress late last month, cameras caught Representative Pramila Jayapal standing and applauding. Behind her face mask, she later told an aide, she was smiling. This was not the Joe Biden whom progressives like Jayapal expected to see when he meandered out of the Democratic pack and vanquished their champions, Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren, in last year’s primaries. That was the avuncular centrist who persuaded enough voters that he was the safe choice to beat Donald Trump in November.
'But this Joe Biden is going much, much bigger. As Jayapal said, “President Biden has risen to the moment, and I really do give him an ‘A’ in what he’s done so far. It’s been bold, it’s been progressive, it’s been what the country needs.”
‘But she really perked up when she heard Biden say, “The biggest risk is not going too big. . . . It’s if we go too small.” Jayapal called across the room to her husband, “That’s our line! He used our line!”
I live in Washington state. And while I have been impressed with Representative Jayapal, especially when she spoke out after the insurrection, I did not know these details yet as you outlined here. Thank you for sharing. I support Lincoln Project, who a few of us have mentioned in these comments, and when sent a survey not too long ago asking for names of individuals to throw their positive support behind, I sent them hers.
❤️❤️❤️ Thank you for putting her words out here for all of us Fern!
Many folks are criticizing what they aren’t even a witness to it appears.
There is too much to know, I get it. I am also too often guilty of criticizing what I have not invested the time to learn of but I am grateful for your work of sharing such important information.
Thank you, Christy The data pinpointing the transfer of wealth from the people to the super-rich is available. Most of us are the victims of government in the US, which has not worked for regular folks, the poor, the minorities, families, children and the elderly since the Reagan administration - more than 40 years ago. Millions of the bamboozled among us are now worshippers of the ConDon. Progressives in the Democratic Party are not wild radicals. They want the people to have their share of the economic pie. Too many Americans have been conditioned to be angry - racists - white supremacists - scapegoating 'others' for their sense of loss - The Grievance Party - comprised of citizens diverted from reality and the facts, which would inform them about what they need and recognize the politicians committed to working on their behalf.
I have been especially grateful for MSNBC for interviewing Congresswoman Jayapal, Chair of the Progressive Caucus, frequently during these negotiations. I have always supported compromise but not with the current Fascists of the Right. Holding a line in the sand on the Hyde Amendment is the right thing to do. I’m impressed that she has been firm and calm and smiles confidently through the entire interviews knowing that she is working for we the people. I hope that Manchin hollers out again to “elect more liberals” if we want the right to make our own healthcare decisions, if we want our votes to count, if we want to support the working people of our country with affordable healthcare, childcare and education. Those are the things the majority of us want!! Who better to tell us to vote for more liberals like Jayapal than Joe Manchin!!!
This is an important dialogue here about the Democrat's negotiations. I am, admittedly fearful of losing the whole basket and that our clock could be running out. Japapal and AOC and the other progressives are doing what I hoped a congress should do; negotiate around the ideas to address the needs of my grandchildren's generation, which by definition has to be progressive. Manchin and many other moderates, though socially conscious, are still trying to do the incrementalism that was the hallmark of bi-partisanship in my working years. As I think back, that could have been our false version of trickle-down economics when right-sizing, real funding, adaptability, and inclusion might have caused the social and economic changes we hoped for in our policies in the 1970s and 1990s to have come about. With Mr Biden putting himself clearly now on the side of a progressive agenda perhaps we will now see movement in negotiations. I'm glad to hear more about why there are differences among their ideas about what must be included and less about the trustworthiness of individuals.
Fred, I just remembered there was NOTHING incremental about the trump tax giveaway to the wealthiest 15% of some $1.7T. Or the Bush ll tax giveaway in 2001-02.
True. My point about incremental was in reference to liberal progressive policies. To your point, well taken, Republicans go big to make cuts to federal recent/government size outside military spending.
OMG, do I agree with you! I'm liberal, somewhat progressive and seeing any of those three now is like finger nails on a calk board! They don't understand you can't get everything you want all at one time. Start slow, show people how the programs will work for normal Americans a little at a time. We want it now and we want it all attitude is going to get them and us nothing in the end. And definitely keep pounding the message that social programs like Social Security, Medicare, unemployment etc. are considered socialism by republicans!
I don’t think slow is the way. You need everyone to see the changes and how they benefit. If you only do a small potion it won’t be seen and nothing will progress.
Look at the minimum wage. It should be $15 now but must be gradual. By time it hits $15 it will need to be $20.
What healthcare do you decide to fade in?
What education do you decide to give first? College or pre-school?
Jayapal was far from fingers on a chalkboard this past week. Her words were measured and on target as being for we the people. What is fingers on a chalkboard are the continuous screams and lies from the fascist right. Are you in support of putting the Hyde amendment in the build back better bill? That’s a line in the sand for me and I’m grateful for the Progressive Caucus.
I believe that if they can get some of it done, just for now, so that people can see what a difference these items make, they will vote out the people voting against it and vote in those who will support everything else.
Maybe we highlight Democracy and the “liberty and justice for all” component of our ‘moral pledge’ - which is the Pledge of Allegiance. Aside Democracy and our system of governance is our economic system. They are different!
This Democracy MUST challenge the inherent, systemic problems of an unfair economic system.
Capitalism is simply our way for personal profit to be made. BUT this economic system threatens “liberty and justice for all” because of the poverty, violence (to nature), unfair distribution, inherent addictions to growth and accumulation, etc and etc.
America needs to break our addiction to a problematic economics and highlight the rights and liberties assured by our founding predecessors
That same thought has crossed my mind but they ARE the new face. The old face was Bernie Sanders who couldn't be taken seriously because it felt as though he was always yelling.
Plenty of them have been and are Repubs. I know someone personally right before TFG came on the scene that was complaining that it was going to take a week to get her Foodstamps. Another that told me “ If I get a real job they will take my Medicaid away and I’ll have to pay for my Insurance”. When you know What hits the fan you know who they go running to.Oh ! Only Dem. Voters have parents on Social Security and Medicare. LOL ! I know one of them who benefits really well on a Military pension and S.S. from a parent. They aren’t fooling anyone.
Since I'm on Medicare, I'm paying around $10,000 less for health insurance than before. I'm waiting until 70 to take social security, but that will be another big boost.
Michael Caruso, why should Rep. Jayapal have to rebut the so-called "charge of socialism"? In U.S. politics since before the Civil War "socialism" has been handy smear word for the monied classes to squelch anyone who opposes them. Remember Patrick Henry's famous words, when accused of "treason" against the Crown? "If this be treason, make the most of it." That works for me: "If this be socialism, make the most of it." It's not like we're tools of the USSR -- which, as you may have noticed, doesn't exist anymore.
I'm thinking the Texas "Heartbeat Law" was, finally, a step too far for the Republicans. Given the poll numbers quoted by HCR, it is a distinct possibility. I'm hoping that enough people who generally vote Republican see that it isn't just about former president whatsisname anymore. In fact, it isn't about him at all. It's about a naked stab at the heart of American democracy. We know that, and maybe Greg Abbott and his cohorts in the Texas leg, (pronounced "lej", God I so miss Molly Ivins!) have gone a long way toward making a huge block of Republican voters to see the writing on the wall at last, and become former Republican voters.
It sure crossed a red line for me. Protest signs include: Abort Abbott, I hope a girl has more rights than a gun when she grows up, let's talk about the elephant in the womb, We will fight for the reproductive rights our mothers won! My freedom begins with my body!
I do not understood why men should have the right to tell women what they can do with their bodies. Some women, including the latest appointee to the Supreme Court, and men in positions of political power, have sought to set rules and punishment for those women who, for whatever reason, choose to abort a fetus. I find the religious ‘validation’ unconvincing. In one of the two versions of Genesis, Eve is castigated for eating the apple. Subsequently in the Old Testament (as opposed to the New Testament) man’s superiority over women is writ large.
Without a man, a woman can not get pregnant. Why is it, in the ‘moral’ argument against abortion, that the woman, rather than the man, is the culprit? I am appalled by the term ‘pro life.’ Even more so when the ‘pro lifers’ seek to legislate when a fetus becomes human. Were these ‘pro lifers’ true to their slogan, shouldn’t they be in the forefront of adopting unwanted babies? I am unaware of any ‘pro life’ organization that has its members in the forefront of adopting and caring for unwanted babies. At the same time, some of these purported ‘pro lifers’ have engaged in attacks on abortion clinics and doctors resulting in deaths.
I am appalled by the recent Texas law that empowers citizens to be abortion vigilantes with the inducement of up-to-$10,000 reward for identifying ‘violators. I am equally appalled by the politicalization that could result in our current Supreme Court sharply limiting or even overruling Roe vs. Wade. I believe that there are a diversity of reasons why a woman, with or without a man’s approval, chooses to have an abortion. Indeed, I am certain that the wives or incidental gift friends of some of the ‘pro lifers’ have had abortions. What gives males the right to determine what should occur when they impregnate women? If women are held legally responsible for the aftermath of a sex act, why wouldn’t it be fair to consider castration or some other penalty for the man? Horrors, many people would say. My riposte: then cease applying a double standard in the false ‘morality’ of the ‘pro lifers.’
Thank you. The term Pro life is used to criminalize women who are facing an unwanted pregnancy. To tell a woman she does not have the right to make a decision about her body and her life is criminal. Akin to slavery.
The term is deliberately misleading. In my experience, those most loudly claiming to be pro-life reject the (cost of) assisting the mother in: obtaining or maintaining health care, education, affordable housing, day care so the mother can work (all women “belong in the home” but then services require work), etc., etc.
If they were truly pro-life, they would oppose the death penalty. But they don’t. It’s not about being pro-life, it’s about control. The Catholic Church opposes both abortion and the death penalty (at least being consistent) and yet there is no discussion of withholding Communion from politicians who support the death penalty as there is for those who support women’s reproductive rights. I wonder how all our right wing Catholic Supreme Court justices can sleep, given their hypocrisy. (I am a lifelong Catholic, but I can no longer practice. The list of injustices perpetrated but the Church is just too long.)
Kathy, I’ve been reading the comments here today, and not yet responding to any, but yours struck a real chord with me. I have lifelong high school friends (from a small Catholic high school in Staten Island) who have left the Catholic Church and joined other Christian churches, much of their decision driven by the hypocrisy in the church. I, myself, thought of leaving but the sacraments were too important to me so I went back to Mass for that reason. At the Vigil Mass on Saturday evening our new pastor (who I had originally had high hopes for) gave his announcements at the end by addressing if the parish would impose a vaccine mandate. He stammered and stuttered through his talk, giving a tepid endorsement of vaccines, saying the Pope got a vaccine, then stressing that the church would not be mandating anything related to COVID. He spent more time telling why they weren’t being mandating them than telling everyone why they SHOULD get it. No taking care of your neighbors. No looking out for the old and the children. No advising to consult with a doctor. The bitter irony was the recessional hymn “They will know we are Christians by our love”. He will be getting an email from me this morning.
Annette, I can literally hear his wishy-washiness through your description. In contrast, my parish held daily Mass in defiance of our lockdown throughout 2020, and my elderly neighbors both caught Covid. Three weeks in the icu, but they survived. On the plus side, I love that hymn. The music and the sense of community is what I miss most.
“ Were these ‘pro lifers’ true to their slogan, shouldn’t they be in the forefront of adopting unwanted babies”
I assume most of THESE ‘pro lifers’ will/would not adopt. Although some evangelical institutions have made it their” social cause “ to promote adoption which contributes to the majority of US agencies having religious affiliations.
Legalized abortion reduces the amount of adoptable “orphans”. Some, usually from foreign countries with lax laws, are not actually “orphans”.
HHB’s ( Heinous Heartbeat Bills) will increase the number of white adoptees$$$.
Adoption and separating a child from it’s origins/ family has/will never been the answer.
Keith, this pro-choice adoptee always enjoys your comments !
I have to disagree that there will be more white adoptees. White women will do as they have always done. There will, however, be an increase in black, brown and biracial children, who are not being adopted as it is.
Good point,Barbara I agree that there will be a disproportionate number of black,brown and biracial children who will not be adopted as a result of these heinous laws
Although I do believe the HHB’s “will increase the number of white adoptees” $$$ .The history of adoption is not so pretty…
Or as Balzac put it: "The secret of a great success for which you are at a loss to account is a crime that has never been found out, because it was properly executed.”
In a speech to the State Department on February 4, Biden said that he would put “America’s most cherished democratic values” back at the center of American diplomacy, “defending freedom, championing opportunity, upholding universal rights, respecting the rule of law, and treating every person with dignity.” Which is why he sent Jake Sullivan to meet with the murdering barbarian Prince Mohammed Bin Salman. To discuss the mutual commitment to "values."
That is best explained by what Prince Metternich said, explaining the Congress of Vienna to a journalist: "Nations have no permanent friends, or permanent enemies - only permanent interests."
And the whole damn week has demonstrated that Otto von Bismarck was correct when he said: "Laws are like sausages, it is better not to see them being made."
And I'll finish off with the most accurate piece of political cynicism I ever heard, spoken by a guy I consider the best (in terms of skill and ability in the sausage-making) politician I ever met: "If you can't drink their booze and screw their women, and vote against them the next morning with a smile on your face, you have no business in this business." (Jesse Unruh, inventor of the modern state legislature)
It was said 55 years ago and if you look up his record, he was pretty good on that issue, given the times. The world doesn't operate on 2021 wokeness (too bad, but that's a fact).
TC, Why not take a look at USA style colonialism, close to home. It is hardly an example of Biden's “America’s most cherished democratic values” ... “defending freedom, championing opportunity, upholding universal rights, respecting the rule of law, and treating every person with dignity.”
We've been eating Puerto Rico's lunch for decades.
'How the U.S. Dictates What Puerto Rico Eats'
'A series of natural disasters compounded problems here. That same year, Hurricane María pummeled the island, killing some 4,600 people and causing an estimated $95 billion in damage. Earthquakes in early 2020 left many homeless, and the pandemic paralyzed the economy for months.'
'The economic consequences have been staggering. Hundreds of thousands of islanders have moved to the mainland. Puerto Rico has the highest unemployment rate in the United States; 40 percent of the population is experiencing food insecurity. The minimum wage of $7.25 an hour will increase to $8.50 starting in January, but that is unlikely to move the needle on a poverty rate that has hovered at nearly 44 percent since 2019.'
'Scrapping or changing the Jones Act could help turn the tide, but President Biden has reiterated his support for it. Proponents of the act include the U.S. shipping industry and those who owe their livelihoods to it, whether as shipbuilders or merchant mariners.'
“The Jones Act is still a straitjacket on Puerto Rico because it subsidizes the marine shipping companies of the United States,” said Fernando Lloveras San Miguel, president of Para La Naturaleza, a nonprofit that works on reforestation.
'Puerto Rico’s dependence on imports is a boon for shipping companies whose vessels, in a brutal irony, carry names of local symbols like Taíno, after the Indigenous people of the Caribbean, or Coquí, for the island frog with a singsong croak. The enforced use of indirect importation for things like fertilizer and farming equipment in turn drives up local farmers’ costs.'
'It wasn’t always like this. In 1940, agriculture was the cornerstone of Puerto Rico’s economy, employing nearly 45 percent of the work force. But by 2019, it represented less than 1 percent of the commonwealth’s G.D.P. and employed less than 2 percent. Natural disasters, economic crises and mismanagement have contributed to the island’s transformation from agricultural powerhouse to one that relies on imports. But it has been U.S. policies like the 1920 Jones Act and Operation Bootstrap that have strangled local agriculture.'
“Today we have an economic model of consumption,” said Eliezer Molina, a Maricao-based farmer who ran for governor in the last election. “The United States doesn’t want to encourage the growth of production in Puerto Rico, because what we consume is from their producers, and that gives their companies protection.”
'For example, local egg producers have been snuffed out by the “dumping” of lower-priced, lower-quality eggs from off the island, securing the dominance of mainland producers in supermarkets. “Local companies are then driven to bankruptcy, and then there’s no competition,” Mr. Molina said, which means “the American companies raise their prices.” (NY Times) See link to Opinion below:
This column highlights exactly why I find the insidious Republican voter suppression laws and gerrymandering so terrifying. We are being set up for permanent minority rule.
Dear Heather: I love the link you've made between the rallies for reproductive rights and the Pandora Papers. It's a brilliant splice! Thank you!
I attended one of those rallies. It was a cold, wet day in VT, but the crowd couldn't have been more warm and fired up for women's rights. Almost as many men as women were in attendance as was an excellent showing from our legislature, including our Attorney General, who, along with a handful of women representatives spoke to the crowd. It made me proud to be a self-proclaimed Vermonter, even if not a seventh-generational one!
Here, too, the ties between excessive wealth/extreme poverty and women's rights were made blatantly clear not in the exact same way, but visible nonetheless in the sordid imbalances which exist when monetary power reveals its grotesque face.
Great connection--I have only one criticism. Using the term 'elite' instead of something more specific like 'super-rich' or 'oligarchs' plays into the current populist authoritarian trend of discrediting education and expertise in all fields.
I am very glad to know that Biden and Blinken care about the scandal of the financial elite (though I note the WP didn't follow routes that would lead to uncovering the owner of the WaPo or any other unscrupulous American billionaire). The return of efforts to abide by the rule of law is going to reduce my stress enormously! But it's not the case that the president also cares about “defending freedom, championing opportunity, upholding universal rights...and treating every person with dignity.” Not if Haitians are "persons," or Afghan women belong to the universe that has rights, or Saudi women's freedom and opportunity deserves defense.
Mary, sadly one of the Pandora Papers stories had this to say:
"The United States’ wealthiest citizens — including Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, who owns The Washington Post; Tesla founder Elon Musk; Microsoft billionaire Bill Gates; and billionaire investor Warren Buffett — do not appear in the documents." Paragraph 5, under the heading "The US Uber Rich".
Frankly, the lack of findings on the US Uber Rich does not bode well with regards to cleaning up the influence of folks like the Kochs, Mercers, Adelsons, and others. I am not confident that anything will change with regards to big money and it's influence on our politics.
Mary, I, too, am skeptical about Biden's claims to care about “defending freedom, championing opportunity, upholding universal rights...and treating every person with dignity.” Actions speak louder than words. Our government's actions do not reflect the concepts of freedom, opportunity, universal rights, and personal dignity.
Maya Angelou said, “I’ve learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.” When you make people seeking asylum feel unwanted and unwelcome, when you deport them to a country filled with political and civil unrest, corruption, violence and poverty, that is what the will remember of you. You meaning us.
Speaking of Koch (cringeworthy mentioning of name) The Nation had this to report of his devious design of using Critical Race Theory to stoke the unrest towards teachers and public education.
Gates, Buffet and Bezos actually may not use the offshore accounts that are the subject of the Pandora papers. I don’t care to defend all the methods that they used to acquire their assets, but neither do I assume that they were improperly overlooked by the project’s reporters.
Hi daria. I would add to my earlier comment that the people whose use of offshore accounts to hide their wealth and avoid taxes most offends me are heads of state, elected representatives and other government officials with good, steady salaries, all of whom are charged with respecting and enforcing the law. Tony Blair's name jumped off the page yesterday.
It appears the work "enough" does not exist for lots of lucky rich folks.
Jonathan, It occurs to me that when certain folks have accumulated serious wealth -- let's say 1 billion plus -- there are so many legal ways for them to protect it that they do not really need to risk doing something illegal. Between tax loopholes and our legally sanctioned campaign corruption (Citizens United), someone like Bezos can go into space for pure entertainment. Offshore accounts are best for those hiding money they have obtained illegally or immorally, or who live in countries with truly confiscatory tax regimes, surely not the case in the USA.
1. Dr. Richardson, you've done it again, thank you! I would never have linked the two.
2. I believe the March was poorly covered by MSNBC. The Saturday hosts--mostly women--had far less than 10 minute segments and very poor video shots. I fast forwarded through each hour and watched each segment. The marchers deserved better.
3. A hearty "well done" to everyone who marched in body, mind, or spirit! You DID contribute to the increasing awareness by uninformed voters who are just beginning to smell the stench of a rotten political party; and you directly told that fetid mess that we are not going to take it anymore!
Hello, everyone. Reposting this from a few days ago for those who may not have seen it. Now shorter, clearer, and with a short sample letter at the end that will fit on a post card!
A Call to Action: American democracy is in an unprecedented emergency. If we do not pass the Freedom to Vote Act and the John Lewis Voting Act, our democracy will die with the 2022 elections. I am asking all Americans who care to write or call the seven Republican senators who voted to convict former President Trump of incitement of insurrection, asking them to form a coalition for the sole purpose of saving our republic by voting these bills into law now.
Not the time to argue who is sincere, who has integrity. These Republican leaders are who we've got. For an expert take on why this is our best bet, read Robert Kagan's recent piece in the Washington Post: https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2021/09/23/robert-kagan-constitutional-crisis/. Below is a list of their Washington addresses and phone numbers. (No email, please. It's not effective.)
Please remember that each of these seven have suffered violent threats for their vote to convict in the impeachment proceedings. My suggestion is to appeal to their love of country, to tell them their nation needs them to prevent radical Trumpians from destroying us, that we need them to step up now as the 2022 elections will otherwise mark our descent into autocracy.
Thank you.
Richard Burr, NC (retiring)
217 Russell Senate Office Bldg
Washington, DC 20510
202-224-3153
Bill Cassidy, LA
520 Hart Senate Office Bldg
Washington, DC 20510
202-224-5824
Lisa Murkowski, AK
522 Hart Senate Office Bldg
Washington, DC 20510
202-224-6665
Mitt Romney, UT
354 Russell Senate Office Bldg
Washington, DC 20510
202-228-0836
Ben Sasse, NE
139 Russell Senate Office Bldg
Washington, DC 20510
202-224-4224
Patrick J. Toomey, PA (retiring)
248 Russell Senate Office Bldg
Washington, DC 20510
202-224-4254
Susan Collins, ME
413 Dirksen Bldg
Washington, DC 20510
202-622-8414
An example of short letter:
Dear Senator __________,
Our democracy is in grave and immediate danger. I am writing to you today because you showed courage in voting to convict former President Trump. Please form a coalition with other courageous Republicans and vote for the Freedom to Vote Act and the John Lewis Voting Rights Act. The future of American democracy is in your hands. Thank you.
Thank you, Nomi, for highlighting the necessity for us to walk our talk, and making this action as effective and easy as possible.
However skeptical we may be about "courageous Republicans," this list does represent Republicans who need to be pushed--and that means by us--to walk their talk of upholding democractic process, and voting rights in particular, over self-serving loyalty to preserve their wealth and power.
Call them and what we also need is fax numbers. Flooding fax machines has a real visible effect on staff. Bogging down their operations is the key...it gets the staffs attention the most and makes them yell Uncle.
I posted this list elsewhere on your comment, Mike: https://faxzero.com/fax_senate.php
Thank you Lynette! Stuffing their fax machines.
Thx so much!
Lynell, you are golden, many thanks💙!
Shh, Ashley...I'm an Ellie Kona wannabe!
…said the daily “morning, y’all!!” well researched links poster who cheerily inspires Ellie Kona and so many others!
My daughter tells me that many of their fax machines are "EQ" (?) Meaning digital, no more paper to shoot out onto the floor. The system is programmed to respond to people they need to know about. But we don't know how many offices have them, especially if our machines don't ping the right codes in the 'handshake.' She also said that stand-alone fax machines are the new eight track and VCR dinosaurs. Oh well, something less to buy....
Good to know, Gus. Bummer!
Yes, exactly.
Nomi, your previous post the other day prompted me to write these senators, even though I knew that getting them read was a long-shot. I decided I had to get some skin in the game. On Saturday, I mailed 9 hand-written thank-you notes (including Manchin & Sinema). I emphasized the priority of passing the voting rights legislation ASAP. Today, I'll continue Fair Fight's Fall initiative to call my Senators every day (833-465-7142) with the demand to pass the Freedom to Vote Act and the John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act. I appreciate and will follow up on the practical suggestions readers in this forum are offering about how to take ACTION (such as today's FAX post). Many thanks to all! You have been a huge support this past year.
Staff will see them. They tally how many letters or communications they get on either side of an issue for their reps. Numbers matter.
Jacquie, wonderful. And, yes, as others are saying, staff does tally letters and calls. I did not know about Fair Fight's calling initiative, but now I do! Thank you.
Thank you, Jacquie and Good morning. Keep those efforts going. You sound like a warrior.
This is excellent, Nomi. Many thanks. HCR and your comment made me have this strange thought in my la magdrugadic brain this morning. I suddenly wondered, what would happen if all dems, progressives and independents suddenly joined the Republican party and inoculated it by dissolving or at least diluting its' dark energy with Truth and Light? What would happen? Poof?! Their voting power would suddenly shift? There are more of us than them...aren't there? . Just an early dawn can-we-use-the-light thought. If you cannot beat them, join them...and destroy them? There was a quote when I was much younger, "Dress Republican, Think Democrat." Those of you who understand politics better than I, can set me straight. But once upon a time Dems were the current Repubs, and Repubs were the Dems. How did they shift? And in the middle of that shift, was there balance first? Like the center line between Yin/Yang? Radical repubs infiltrated everywhere in our systems. We infiltrate theirs with sanity?
You know, when you are in a brainstorming session, ANY idea is allowed to percolate up...
Consider this a perk-up from my overworked, primordial ooze of Being this morning.
I was born into a Lincoln-TR-Ike Republican family. Nixon really changed things a lot in his desire to not lose and to help his "friends". Reagan pushed it a lot further, the first Bush had some heart and at least was a "professional". His son was controlled more by Cheney, Rove and others around him. Iraq was never about WMD. That's when I changed my registration. Trump is his own animal. People can see the light, but it's hard to give up something you've grown up with. Our R Gov Hogan never embraced Trump and it's worked for him. Light and truth always prevail. It can take a long time...but keep at it.
Oh Penelope. I surround both parties with white light every morning with an extra boost of light sent to the recalcitrant brat adults…on all sided. Surrounding darkness with white light allows it to get in the cracks. And, yes, most effective when done in la magdrugada….early morning.
Can you send some of that light up to Georgia? And beam a little over to Sen. Warnock please....
Let's send it around the globe every madrugada!
Light in the cracks, I like it...magdrugada (didn't know the word till now) is my favorite...
“Madrugada” is classic Daria. Shared last week. Such a beautiful descriptor.
I like to go out in the early morning...at last dark, first light and honor the 4 directions...commune with the Universe...now I have a word for the time. Perfect.
Circle of Light time.
It is my new favorite word, too, from Daria a few days ago.
Continuing the brainstorming with pros and cons…
Cons:
1) The next step up from voting is joining your local party. That’s where being outed as a RINO would take big courage, like what’s required more and more at school board meetings. Not that a requirement for courage should be a barrier.
2) Republican politicians no longer care about winning more than 50% of votes. Hence the legislation to suppress and override votes.
Pros:
1) A bunch of progressive votes would sweetly mess with Republican gerrymandered districts.
2) A bunch of progressive votes would sweetly dismantle legislation to suppress and override votes.
3) Impression management and polls: Significant numbers of registered Republicans tallied as supporting progressive issues and candidates catches media attention and builds that momentum.
Miscellaneous thoughts:
Some sort of critical mass is needed to transform individual party switches into an effective movement. But it starts with individuals and needs cohesive direction.
For awhile it looked like the more Lincolnian Rs would reject the seditious Rs and either reclaim the party or split the party. But neither has happened.
How much of the big switch was an artifact of unique historical circumstances,
We need to re-read and re-listen to all that HCR has written and said about the history of the Republican Party and that switch of affiliation by big business. And of course, follow the money, which takes us back to the matter of how to influence big business. Which is all the more daunting in light of a new round of expose of dark money machinations as illuminated by the Pandora Papers. But why should “daunting” be a barrier. Other than wisely marshalling resources to maximize effectiveness.
Here’s a brief refresher on the big switch:
“How did this switch happen?
Eric Rauchway, professor of American history at the University of California, Davis, pins the transition to the turn of the 20th century, when a highly influential Democrat named William Jennings Bryan blurred party lines by emphasizing the government's role in ensuring social justice through expansions of federal power — traditionally, a Republican stance.
But Republicans didn't immediately adopt the opposite position of favoring limited government.
"Instead, for a couple of decades, both parties are promising an augmented federal government devoted in various ways to the cause of social justice," Rauchway wrote in an archived 2010 blog post for the Chronicles of Higher Education. Only gradually did Republican rhetoric drift to the counterarguments. The party's small-government platform cemented in the 1930s with its heated opposition to the New Deal.
But why did Bryan and other turn-of-the-century Democrats start advocating for big government?
According to Rauchway, they, like Republicans, were trying to win the West. The admission of new western states to the union in the post-Civil War era created a new voting bloc, and both parties were vying for its attention.
… From a business perspective, Rauchway pointed out, the loyalties of the parties did not really switch. "Although the rhetoric and to a degree the policies of the parties do switch places," he wrote, "their core supporters don't — which is to say, the Republicans remain, throughout, the party of bigger businesses; it's just that in the earlier era bigger businesses want bigger government and in the later era they don't."
In other words, earlier on, businesses needed things that only a bigger government could provide, such as infrastructure development, a currency and tariffs. Once these things were in place, a small, hands-off government became better for business.”
https://www.livescience.com/34241-democratic-republican-parties-switch-platforms.html
Food for thought!
Ellie…I’ll need to think about all this for quite awhile. Lots of nuggets in there…as usual. Thank you.
Great idea, Penelope! Just like the NYT columnist who suggest that Biden could get his money for his programs by minting a trillion dollar coin!
Is that called subversion or sabatage? Either esy i’m for it. Reps do it to the Dems already
I would say it would be a subversive action. And sabotaging their authoritarian coup d'etat would be the goal.
I actually did this once when I was young. Registered R for the primary to vote against Nixon. If enough people do it, you can sway an election in the primaries. In this case today try and get R's who will be reasonable, or loose to the Dem. It would take a lot of organizing and it would have to be in districts where the Dem is a sure thing or un-opposed in the primary. TX, GA & KY would be very interesting case studies.
Good morning Penelope! Very interesting perk-up.
I surprise my Self, sometimes, Gus!
Pay no attention to Randy. Keep on thinking!
Yes, he is adding nothing to the discussion at hand. Thanks, Gus!
The big shift occurred when LBJ supported & signed Civil Rights legislation. He did the moral thing, knowing many southern Dems would be upset and possibly leave the party. Nixon used that opportunity to court white racists in the southern states. That's when the south started to change from solid D to solid R. There's other factors and other things happened, but that really created the electoral map we see today. It's interesting that 2 of the Dems elected President since then have come out of the south, Carter & Clinton while Bush II is the only R from the south....and R's have elected 2 celebrities, Reagan & Trump. Bush I and Biden have been the political "professionals" and Obama came from the outside...and many of the elections have been very close...and now are electorally decided in about 8 states.
Thank you, Nomi, for reposting. When I wrote to these senators last week I asked them to vote for the Freedom to Vote Act but did not mention the John Lewis Voting Rights Act. I think a postcard this time (as opposed to a letter) could be very effective...with all due respect to envelopes!
Will get right on it today.
Yes, I'm glad I got it down to postcard length. Postcards are good. Glad you're doing it again. I want them to get bags of mails. I posted on Twitter, and have gotten a lot of retweets, so that is encouraging.
A LOT of postcards is good...especially from their districts. We must find like minded people in their states...that makes the most difference....and calls...flood the phone lines...and we need fax numbers...nothing gets staffs attention like a pile of Fax paper on the floor. They can feel and see the "attack".
Here's a list by state of senators' fax numbers: https://faxzero.com/fax_senate.php
This same site has the fax numbers of House members as well as governors. You can find those lists at the top of the site.
Lynell I would assume that Dem organizations in these states are doing these things, but one never knows. I'm extremely busy with my video work right now and don't have the time to do the "grass roots" organizing and motivating stuff. My suggestion is find the key Dem organizations in these states, communicate with them...get them into this forum and motivate them to call, fax and send post cards to these R senators in mass....and the truth is 100 calls, faxes and/or post cards feels like a barrage if they happen quickly in a day or 2. A "friendly" protest that gets TV coverage outside their local office with more than 20 people is really effective stuff...especially if it gets repeated on social media.
Lynell here's an example of how local groups can pressure their elected reps with video on social media. I just posted this to my "Camera Person Reflections" page https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GvgNv1F7gLQ
This is an excellent example of the need to follow through! Thanks, Mike
Thank you. I will start sending faxes to my representative.
You can also use Resistbot to send messages. It works from Twitter, Messenger and other media. It’s free but you can donate to support. We donate. My husband is much better about using it than I am.
Thanks, Sharon!
Thank you again! I wrote my senator (Toomey) sending it snail mail but also email. Received a reply which details the current Rep. rhetoric on voting. Very discouraging.
These senators' individual responses are not to be expected to deviate from their party line. The value of these letters, emails, and postcards is adding to the numbers tallied on the issue by their office staff. Power in numbers!
Yes.
This is absolutely true and essential. Flood them, make them feel it. This was a big part of the process we used to ban fracking in Maryland. We made sure the elected reps who were on the fence and whose votes we needed felt the heat constantly and in volume.
Should we add these senators to your list as well?
The Honorable Richard Shelby
304 Russell Senate Office Building
Washington DC 20510
The Honorable Roy Blunt
260 Russell Senate Office Building
Washington DC 20510
The Honorable Rob Portman
448 Russell Senate Office Building
Washington DC 20510
as soon as I am decent (dressed) I'm going to the P O to buy post cards. Thanks for your additions
A few years ago when the goal was to send Trump pink postcards as a pink slip notification that he was fired we bought a stack that could be fed through the printer. Very nice not to have to hand address a hundred cards. Then we put a variety of messages on them. I think I have some left.
I rarely hand write anything because of my vision problems. I am thankful for a 12” iPad that I can make the print large!
Yes Anne, I too am a pajama person. Occasionally even in the car to drop my grandson off at college. Mostly to the mailbox and neighbors.
Sharon, you're my kind of gal! Thanks for the pajama party!
Postcard writing pajama party!!!!!
🤣🤣🤣
Pajamas: Acceptable Covid Attire. Also sweats for ugly old men....
Several years ago when my husband had surgery for prostate cancer I made him about 8 pairs of pajama bottoms out of batik. Unless he has to go out of the house it’s all he wears. They’ve gotten great use during Covid and are lightweight for the heat. He also has flannel for the winter.
Postcard writing pajama party!!!!!
Postcard writing pajama party!!!!!
(pajamas ARE decent, apparently - especially for driving to the post office)
...especially to use the outside drive up mailbox so one doesn't have to go inside. I use the drive up mailbox as I have ambulatory problems
Well Barbara, in that case practically any costume could be appropriate 🤣
Wearing pajamas is definately legal for walking to the mailbox. Amd mine is 1/2 mile away. Except between 3 pm and 6 pm.
Does this provide an insight into your selection of ... pajamas?
I'm still laughing! But nah, it just indicates that "we dress for dinner!"
😅🤣😂
We'll take you, Anne, decent or otherwise!
Pajama pants and slippers are frequently seen in Albuquerque Walmarts, school drop off lines and even occasionally at the malls. 🙄
Nomi thank you. Constant and increasing pressure on the the right elected reps is what gets results.
Mailed seven letters yesterday!
Thank you for giving us something TODO!!
12 post cards (had to go to 2 POs) addressed, text composed, written, and in mailbox in plenty of time for 11am pick up. Of course with Mr DeVice's new slo-mo, they may not get to DC in time...
“States Rights Are Dangerous” as our history has proven, and our current Texas Vigilante Law proves
you're right. Any time a minority in power attempts to control the agenda like the Southern Planter aristocracy by secession and now this law, it just leads to bad results for the minority trying to impose their will. And it's all going to be painful in the process for a lot of people.
I just realized after reading your insights w the Southern Planter aristocracy, that states rights have a tendency to insure inequality. But not always. For instance, ME and AZ allow for government supported funding for state elections, including for governor. ME also allows for Ranked Choice Voting. However, the states rights inclusion in our democracy allows for suppression, because it challenges the federal role in assuring civil liberties.
You are certainly correct...and the "majority" opinion sometimes needs help getting to the right place. Southern secession is our "most extreme" states rights battle to date. We need to be teaching that the Civil War was fought because the CSA was an attempt to create a nation trying to preserve slavery.
Done. Handwritten. Snail mail.
Nomi!
Thanks a mil for making such an impactful action so simple and succinct for us!
I’ll be adding these 7 postcards to my stack going out to VIrginia voters today. 💙
Mike, Ashley, thank you so much. And, yes, I know Postcards to Voters is working on the Virginia House campaign. My mom and I have written thousands of postcards through them these past couple of years. They have made a huge impact in many close elections.
And thanks a mil, too, Ashley, for your Virginia voters stack! I voted over a week ago but sent my husband this morning to vote. I told him to just vote wherever he saw a "D" next to a name. He came back carrying the VirginiaDems pamphlet he was given down at the polls.
Will be starting on postcards tomorrow. Thanks, again.
Done! Thanks so much for providing the info!
Thank YOU, Liz!
De nada. 🥰
Letters are finished and will be mailed today 10/4.
Mine too!
Thank you, Nomi. I will do this.
Regarding the international network of offshore financial schemes . . . it has been going on for a very long time. Rachel Maddow has been talking about the oligarchs of Russia for years and offshore accounts are nothing new! Obviously, the grotesque financial inequity that has grown to 100's of billionaires has fed this situation to a global insanity. From the perspective of U.S. government policy there should to be a huge "reset button" regarding financial aid to countries where leaders and individuals hoard $billions and leave their own people in poverty.
And, in this country, it is totally nuts we do the same thing . . . we go begging for and compromising on infrastructure funds (including social infrastructure) while the self-centered uber rich take multi-minute rocket rides to the edge of space as a pure joy ride. Because of the vast financial and social inequities, the masses end up with no control over their lives (for women it gets right down to their own bodies!) There certainly is no easy way out . . .
Hands up for everyone who knew a major location for “offshore hidden assets” was South Dakota? Read the reports on South Dakota trust assets. South Dakota Republican Governor Kristi Noem needs to be asked about this every time she appears in public. And, where are U.S. regulators on this? WTF???
I have wondered many times about her rise in popularity. She has always appeared to me as disingenuous. Hmmm. Who would’ve thought South Dakota as such a piggy bank.
South Dakota has for many decades had an extremely relaxed attitude about the regulation of the financial services companies located and chartered within their state. For many years the credit card industry and many other consumer lenders located operations and chartered themselves there to take advantage of their ability to charge higher rates by virtue of that. South Dakota's excuse was that it provided employment and jobs within what was otherwise a largely rural and agricultural state. Many of these operations were for the financial services industry giants who otherwise were located in coastal states.
She needs to be asked but won't. They'd never pose that question on right wing outlets and you won't be seeing her on 60 Minutes anytime soon I'm guessing.
Had no idea!
Now I know! Thank you Bruce.
Thanks Herb. He's probably busy trolling other liberal forums. I was going to ask him to "prove it" but you did a nice job. And as Fern says, "Don't feed it!"
Ummm. The SD angle is in the International Consortium of Independent journalism exposé, guys. And of course, all over WaPo. (WashPost) Let’s be expanding our go-to reliable news sources. (AND subscribing to them, if we want to keep this democratic republic of ours.)
And the source of that money is generally owned by liberal Democrats living in New York and California.
I've seen enough of rich "liberal" Democrats to believe you have a point, but do you have any concrete evidence?
THERE’s our troll for today!!!!
Considering the size of this list, I'm amazed that there are so few trolls. OTOH, I believe they have to subscribe to post. That helps!
There is a news headline in what you assert, J Boone..."Liberal Democrats in NY and CA hide their millions in South Dakota". Wonder if the locals agree ??
At the core of the problem are all the politicians from both parties that conspire with the wealthy in the high-stakes game of politics. It is quid pro quo on steroids.
It's on full display with every piece of legislation. It's why Biden's $6-trillion Build Back Better proposal has been quickly cut down to as low as $1.5 trillion by the corporate centrist branch of the Democratic Party. It doesn't help when supporters are so willing to compromise on widely lauded and supported legislation just to make a deal.
The other piece of it, as Heather mentioned, is how politicians constantly divert attention from their larcenous ways by distracting most of us with issues that divide and alienate voters. Republicans are masters at this and Democrats participate by default!
As Janet W. noted this has been going on for a very long time. Does anyone believe that politicians will come together, grow a spine, and stand up to the wealthy? I don't.
Great comments, Janet!
I was working in the institutional investment management business in the mid-1970's when the industry was solidly under the control of privileged white men (young and old) and offshore accounts (specifically Bermuda) were a financial haven for the affluent of the time! While the wealth factor definitely was there, it wasn't even a blip on the charts compared to today. It has all grown to monsterous levels. For the most part those with wealth and/or privilege have been enabled to accumulate concentrations of riches and influence unheard of in any other time period. They were and are the gatekeepers!
I used to work for Fireman’s Fund Insurance. Their stock is White Mountains. Warren Buffett is an investor. In the latter part of tge 80’s, they moved their operations to Bermuda. I figured it out after I left the company. Took my stock and reinvested elsewhere.
And...while the ultra rich of this country continue to build their empires, We The People (most of us being NOT wealthy) are asked to subsidize our fellow Americans' grief, loss, operations, etc. through GoFundMe requests. We are told that religious institutions should take up the slack created by gutted social programs (think food pantries), but who will fund the religious organizations?...wait, I know...the poor and middle class (if there is any middle class left). We (retired on a fixed income and praying that our 401(k)s don't tank) are besieged by requests from all manner of charitable organizations, hoping beyond hope that we can make a "small monthly donation." At last count, I have 18 requests on my desk. At a minimal $5/month, that's $90 a month...and it doesn't begin to include the e-mail and social media requests. But it's OK to send the rich to space. (no, it's not OK...that was a snarky comment)
Fred, I can certainly relate, at about 30 mail requests for money each month. I've drawn the line at $20/year for about 8 different organizations...other than my church.
In the same shape as you guys. Waiting for the stock market to reflect what hit Brazil this year and devastated their coffee trees, in addition to their severe ongoing drought. Their orange trees are down as well, and corn for cattle and egg laying chickens. We will feel this! Starbucks and Dunkin are already scrambling for alternative sources for next year. Brazil is one of the two major exporters of Arabica coffee; the other is Vietnam, then Africa, I think.
For me, dear Professor Richardson, this is the finest letter you've ever written. I believe Texas Republican elected officials have made a huge error with the Abortion Ban law and its vigilante injustice. It is not only alienating Texas women and women across the entire US and beyond, it alienated by brother, a Tea Party conservative. On abortion we are in complete agreement. He even said Governor Abbott was showing his true colors. My brother, an originalist, has written a book on the Constitution and I think he understood how this law defied and defiled the Constitution. That was unacceptable to him.
Here are the written comments I made this evening to the Texas House Redistricting Committee who is holding a hearing this morning (Monday, Oct 4) on the intentionally discriminatory maps they have released taking away six districts from people of color and adding three for whites. I used every character of the 3000 allowed by adding 3 exclamations points on NOW!!! I've been thinking that it is not just white nationalist that want a revolution. I think it is time for a women's revolution!
To the Texas House Redistricting Committee Public Hearing:
Redistricting gives the incumbent party a significant advantage for a full ten years. The maps as presented show intentional discrimination against people of color who made up a super majority portion of the population growth in the past decade. This unfair advantage in the maps mean that the incumbent party will have a six to eight point advantage in all districts which will mean minority rule of that party for the next ten years. Given that that party is truly representing only a minority of the population of Texas this becomes intolerable when they are putting into effect laws which blatantly take away US Constitutional Rights from a majority of citizens - women and people of color -- with the Abortion Ban and the Voter "Integrity" laws. The first is in intentional violation of the U.S. Constitution and fifty years of precedent. A party that believes in the individual freedom to wear a mask or not which protect the right to life of other citizens is taking away my freedom with begins with my body! I will not tolerate vigilante injustice nor do I feel a majority male legislature has any standing to make laws over my body. The second is in violation of the Voting Rights Act Section 2 as intentionally discriminatory. I am not going to tolerate this and will do everything I can to non-violently resist it and to bring about a huge u-turn to a better, more legal direction for our beautiful state one that works for all the people this time. Our representatives no longer represent us because they have been bought by the elite 5% of the population. It is now an oligarchic kleptocracy hollowing out the middle class and weakening capitalism by weakening the consumers. This will destroy capitalism altogether and is has already destroyed democracy in our republic. While I believe minority voices must be heard, I do not believe in minority rule. Having an elite minority lording over everyone else is what we fought the American Revolution over. There are a great many ways to draw fairer maps and I strongly encourage to redraw the current maps and start acting like you still believe in democracy -- by the People -- not your Donors. I plan to work toward an independent commission to draw the 2030 maps. And, note that I said independent -- not bipartisan. The two party system is as John Adams said now becoming the worst evil to befall the Constitution. My idea of fair and just is maps that make all the districts competitive for its constituents so that we have real choices in who represents us. The current gerrymandering is actually a two-edge sword. The incumbent finds himself (and I'm going to make herself the majority!) locked into the extremes of their select constituency and scared of being primaried. These incumbents can no longer negotiate for the good of all because they are locked into keeping the extremes of their party stirred up. This is all intolerable. Redraw these maps into fair and just districts! it is your oath! NOW!!!
We the People, all of Us This Time!!!
... for those with ears to hear ... real men - good men - do not lie, cheat and manipulate to achieve their goals ... good men - real men - behave with integrity, believe in playing fair - and act accordingly.
... 'nuff said ...?
I don't think there ARE any "real" men, much less "good" men in the Texas trumplican party.
Absolutely!
El Pueblo, unido, jamas sera vencido! Thanks Cathy.
I just added this to my signature on email so it will go out to everyone I contact. With the upside down Exclamation point at the beginning.
We the People, All of Us this time!
¡El pueblo unido jamás será vencido!
The people united shall not be defeated!
You ROCK!
Just added it to my signature...gratitude, Cathy.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cuzl_QTBlWI The People, United, Shall NEVER Be Defeated! This is one of my favorite songs! A pianist composer used this theme on a set of 36 variations in groups of six. The first five of the group represent the open hand. The sixth of each group brings the first five together in a fist. Raise your fists! It's time to Unite! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xiWwYsWWVSk
Lyrics translated. I love this song. You also shared it some weeks ago. I had it on my phone and played it to a group of people on Saturday.
https://lyricstranslate.com/en/el-pueblo-unido-jam%C3%A1s-ser%C3%A1-vencido-united-people-will-never-be-defeated.html
✊🏻✊🏼✊🏽✊🏾✊🏿
WOW, go purple Texas
Abbott's big mistake is not realizing that abortion rights are strong among Republican women and men. He might just lose their votes.
well stated
BRAVO CATHY!!
Dear Professor HCR -I really can’t express how important and helpful your analysis has been for me, a relatively uneducated but life-long progressive, in understanding the historical and political influences that give me the perspective to see things with a longer view and less emotional upset. Thank you so much!
See, there was a reason not to fall asleep in that history class! :-)
I agree! Thank you Liz for expressing that so well
Yes, thank you Liz. We all get a lot of connections and perspectives from these HCR letters.
Maybe there's even more to Mueller's Iron Triangle. The professor doesn't seem to mention terrorism or the vast financial networks that underlie this form of criminality... with which the United States is supposed to have been at war for so long.
Such strange bedfellows...
"The two stories are not unrelated." Masterful comparison and connection of these two trends in the US. Thank you.
Prof HCR. Most excellent analysis. Yes, the issues are connected and I suspect issue 1 is about to blow up issue 2. I think someone just stepped on a rake.
I simply cannot see the connection, and while informative, Professor Richardson’s post was tendentious.
I do not see this as a connection. I see it as a correlation. ‘Connection’ presupposes that a causative relationship. Other issues are protected in this cynical vein.
Tax credits for the wealthy has long been an article of faith (and action) among Republican ideologues, using the trickle-down theory to buttress their stance.
Could we not just as easily insert this economic policy in place of the Pandora Papers story and say that it too is not unrelated to the marches against the Texas abortion law?
To take the comparison at its face, one would have to suppose that the Republicans only ever get elected by playing some sort of shell game. That’s a first premise and I agree with it in general terms. But the back half of it presupposes that dazzle the electorate with the villainy of those who would seek abortions so as to hide their *real* design to protect what the wealthy do with their money.
The Texas law is abominable and clever - one can only hope it is too clever by half and has pride of place among a vast array of good reasons to remove Abbott far from politics.
It has a host of fathers however. The Pandora Papers is just not one of them. That discovery is simply correlative. The fact that trillions of dollars of wealth is hidden to protect it from taxation is both opaque and silent. We who are not wealthy rail against wealth inequity. But it is fed mostly by constant pounding on the issue of income inequality - the corporate payouts of tens of millions annually to chief officers, the staggering wealth of Bezos, the Waltons et al vs the absurdly low minimum wage, the demonization of those who receive entitlements, the need for millions of workers to scrabble together a living from two and sometimes three jobs.
If anything, the Republicans use social issues like abortion, gun rights and woke culture to distract potential voters from the gross inequality of modern life and thereby win elections and protect the oligarchy.
Obviously wealth-sheltering contributes to this inequality but it has never ranked in the top five of voter concerns.
The comparison further doesn’t hold water in that the Pandora Papers, like its predecessor the Panama Papers, is hugely international in scope. On its list are powerful wealthy people from countries which protect abortion and do not seek to chip away at it.
Did the Panama Papers bring the masses into the street screaming for retribution? Nope. It’s too opaque, too dark, too silent, and often, too legal.
Eric O'Donnel. What entitlements? Social Security/Medicare? We let the government hold our money for retirement, paid taxes on it and are now taxed again (thanks to Reagan) as it gets doled out each month at an amount no one can live on. Are there other programs of which i am not aware? Has everyone been so co-opted by Republican rebranding that even in this forum we are made to look like we always have our hands out for government aid which strengthens the Republican 'welfare state' demonization, even of citizens who played by the rules their whole lives. I may be overlooking other programs, please enlighten me about 'entitlements'.
Bravo, CJ!! I too bristle at calling SS and Medicare an entitlements. Until, (within the past 10 years or so)...when the government raised the SS payroll limit above $103,000 to its present $120,000?? limit, the wealthy did not pay SS taxes above that ceiling limit...but they sure got SS benefits well above those making $50,000/ year. And, in addition, until fairly recently the uber wealthy now have to pay a 3+% (?) Medicare Surtax on their higher income, something that they never had to pay before Omama's presidency !
My comment about ‘entitlements’ referred to the Republican trope developed from Reagan’s “Cadillac Queen”. This spawned a Republican industry of demonizing those who receive welfare benefits, food stamps etc. From the demonizing came periodic and crushing reductions in those entitlements.
This series of attacks, like those on abortion, generate anger deflect America’s attention from the predatory oligarchic class and enable populist Republicans go to squeak out election wins time and time again.
They hit on the supposed laziness and lack of initiative to conceal what should be obvious. The middle class is being hollowed out. Those at the bottom economically have little to no chance of rising.
The Pandora Papers are way, way in the background.
I can assure you that I do not bash those who benefit from the financial expectations involved in a fair society.
And plans that are paid into for years like Social Security and Medicare are a matter of simple fairness.
Thank you Eric O'Donnell, for setting the record straight.
Very well said!
Thank you.
I apologize for my lack of clarity in the original.
Workers pay into those programs. They are not entitlements.
And too complex for sound bites. Nothing that cannot fit into sound bites ever gets a meaningful exploration in our short-attention-span culture.
Eric O'Donnell, have you noticed that whenever anyone tries to make the connection between economics and politics, they're called a socialist? This has been going on since before the Civil War. It's how the powers-that-be shut down the discussion and marginalize anyone who brings up the subject. Could this possibly be why you don't see the connection and think it's only "correlative"?
Well first of all, and this mayn’t answer your point, I am quite comfortable with democratic socialism, as practiced, say, in the Scandinavian countries.
I fully believe your point is sincere, but I am really not catching it as you mean it.
I do agree that the socialism chestnut has been used as the term of art to uphold the manic, pedal to the medal capitalism in America. If one is not all in, one is Socialist. And that usually forestalls further argument.
But my point remains I think - *how* the extremely rich protect and enhance their gains, as seen in the Pandora Papers, is not a hot button issue. It is not something the Republicans are uncomfortable with, as in that it could impair their re-election prospects and sleazy connections to the oligarchic class. Thus the Pandora Papers are correlative.
More worrisome to them is being exposed by a mass movement against income inequality. That beast is not silent. It is visible to anyone with eyes. It angers people. Those people in turn could punish Republican politicians who belong to or aspire to belong to the oligarchic class. Reflexively they then turn to hot button social issues to distract the attention of their electorate. That is truly connective.
We should care deeply about the revelations in the Pandora Papers. But the stories are long, complex, and not always illegal (strictly speaking). So that makes this specific issue correlative.
Perhaps it will change.
Who transfers the wealth of the people to the super-rich? Who hides the money that has been taken/stolen and pays very little to no taxes? Who attempts to control the memory of the people and in many ways is successful at it? Who defrauds the people and also distracts them from the facts? Is there no connection between taking the peoples’ wealth, spreading lies to control them and then literally passing laws to cement that control?
Is there no logical connection between accumulating wealth, hiding it in shell games, buying the system, (controlling state legislatures, passing national and state bills/policies and controlling the courts) to protect you from exposure and increase your wealth, while advancing your power and control?
I understand the connection between The Pandora Papers, ‘a vast trove of documents that expose a secretive financial universe that benefits the wealthy and powerful’ and the anti-abortion laws passed by the state legislature in Texas. The analogy illustrates the dangerous imbalance of our country’s system. Eric, unfortunately, I was lost in the logic of your comment and baffled by you calling Heather ‘tendentious’ by connecting the two. Perhaps, your will be equally confounded by this reply.
Definition of tendentious
disapproving
: marked by a tendency in favor of a particular point of view : BIASED (Merriam-Webster)
https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/interactive/2021/booming-us-tax-haven-industry/
To further clarify my argument, the 600 marches, comprising of tens of thousands of people across the country, were protesting against Texas' anti-abortion -- the money/power/governmental/forces or Dark Money, which restricted their freedom. They protested against America's version of Pandora's Dark Money.
Let's unpack this for the unknowing...
"So why do they support and advocate for voter suppression, restrictive voting rights "
They do not. This is a lie or an indication that the person repeating it is brainwashed from their media feed. Republicans want free and fair election and want the system to be trusted. It is not trusted today. 85% of OECD countries reject mail-in ballots for a reason.
"tax cuts for high earners and the wealthy,"
That is also political hogwash. Republicans support lower taxes and smaller government. The party is as consistent on this as are Democrats to increase taxes and the size of government.
"unpopular stances on women’s healthcare and reproductive rights,"
There is no unpopular stance on women's health. Just stop with the rhetorical political crap. In terms of reproductive rights, the Democrats position on zero restrictions on abortion is as unpopular as it illegal abortion.
"no support for affordable housing,"
BS. It is in all the liberal-run places where housing is un-affordable and homelessness is rampant. That is because liberals make it more restrictive and more expensive to build new housing. Republicans have an easy solution they advocate... BUILD MORE HOUSING
"and less support for reducing child poverty and income inequality."
Again... bull shit. Republicans want people back to work to earn their own living instead of the fake and broken ideology of government assistance where we eventually run out of other people's money.
In regard to the term "heartbeat bill," the OB/GYNs among us can attest to their expertise of clarifying that at about 6 weeks of human embryo gestation, the amalgamation of cells that eventually will become a heart are NOT yet a functioning heart with a beat. The "heartbeat" reference is a deliberately emotionalizing misnomer, and in our messaging, we need to not perpetuate this tactic of the far right.
As for the Women's March of 10/02/2021, men were out there aplenty in support--yay and thank you! The depth and breadth were impressive. Women's Marches were held in all 50 states.
https://act.womensmarch.com/event/oct-2-2021-march/search/?source=plannedparenthood_attend&gclid=Cj0KCQjw18WKBhCUARIsAFiW7Jwy-Rxj5F40MWB_CsotI9KTwGD1WKGfh_ZR5SEnh_Q4VJaEU4kH7XoaApNxEALw_wcB
But I respectfully disagree that the Women's March was limited to people marching "for women’s lives and their constitutional right to abortion." Plenty of people's signs and T-shirts addressed the larger issues of patriarchal capitalism, feminism, women's health, gender rights, citizenship, and constitutional overreach. Here are some examples:
"We are Ruthless! Now act accordingly."
"RBG sent me. I dissent."
"Bans off our bodies"
"Republicans hate women, children, refugees, clean air, voting rights"
"Women's rights are human rights."
"Yes to citizenship now"
"Men of quality are not afraid of equality"
"Real men are feminists"
"The system is sexist. Fight for socialism."
"Pro-choice. Pro-vax. Pro-equality."
"Derechos reproductivos son temas LGBTQ!"
"Address institutional racism in reproductive healthcare"
"Regulate guns, not uteruses"
"Authoritarian reproductive control is fueled by misogyny and racism"
"Viagra is govt. funded ($41.6 million / yr), If Pregnancy is God's Will, So Is Limp Dick"
"Texas: where a virus has reproductive rights but a woman doesn't"
"If I wanted the government in my uterus, I would f**k a politician!"
Morning Ellie. In conversations yesterday, I expressed to people that the MARCH I attended far surpassed the numbers expected and that the voices raised and speeches were about many issues, especially relating to women and children. People were very united and talking amongst groups was riveting. One sign stopped me in my tracks and we took a few minutes to talk.
“The Book of Woman says…
Thou shalt NOT govern my body.
Fallopians 10:2”
It was a memorable, strong, satisfying day.
The speeches given at our march in Ft Worth, reiterated that this ban on abortions is not about pro life, it’s about controlling women. If it were about helping babies and children, then support young women, access to birth control, schools, foster care children, rape victims, abused women, etc. When social services increase, abortions decrease.
A young girl interviewed me for a school project. She asked me why this opposition to the abortion ban is important to me. She got an earful! She didn’t seem to make a connection between controlling women with other issues such as voter suppression, poverty, safety of women. I thanked her mom who brought her out to do the project. I urged them to vote, when the girl is old enough.
It was a really good day! Inspiring!
Right on, Denise! There’s a ripple effect, when we educate these younger, future voters, as you know well. Thank YOU, for your impactful, ongoing, teaching efforts💙!
This is so well said, Denise. The Los Angeles Times buried the story of the Women's March in the second section page 10, literally behind the obituaries, and used a photo of a sign with a sad misspelling. So Letters to the Editor, here I come! Armed with great phrases from your comment!
Lucky little girl who found you to interview!
I agree Ellie. This is bigger than reproductive rights. It is women's rights. It is People's rights. And we're ready to fight! I liked the sign that said: What would Ruth do?
There was a sign with RBG pic that said we’re Ruthless, act like it!
And women are the majority
There were plenty of “Ruth sent us” signs at the March in my city.
Thanks, Ellie! I heard this chant as well: "Hey, Ho, Patriarchy Must Go!"
I was amazed at the Atlanta March how many men were there. There was a wide variety of people. This is what democracy looks like.
My senators and Congresswoman are all progressive Democrats in Georgia! They hear from me all the time, anyway, because they need those numbers of constituents supporting the causes. This is, also, what democracy looks like.
Grateful to Professor Richardson keeping me informed so I can intelligently contact my Congress people.
My husband, who never protests, joined me in the march at Fort Worth, Texas. I saw many men participating.
Of course there was also very loud religious stated anti abortionist protesting against us there. Shake my head at these people
Ellie, thank you for this list and especially for "If I wanted the government in my uterus, I would f**k a politician!" Made me laugh out loud...a lot!
Dems have a bigger problem than gerrymandering. They don't know how to win elections. Rep. Pramila Jayapal has had a national audience for the past week, and not once have I heard her rebut the charge of socialism and creating a dependent welfare state. Perhaps she thinks Americans are intelligent, rational beings who would not believe such bunk. The yard signs are already up in my town.
The message is simple: This is not socialism. That's a bunch of malarkey. We're repairing the social safety net because too many people are falling through the cracks.
Bonus points if you add the creation of Social Security and unemployment compensation, for context.
I wouldn't criticize the more progressive politicians who advocate for "the people" for not framing their messages more effectively.
I cringe at the headlines, punchlines, phrases and language used by the media (print, TV, cable, radio). NPR can drive my blood pressure up. Their programs are quite informative, providing the education and comparative analysis that people need to make better decisions. BUT they use titles and phrases that can be easily used by Republicans to justify their conspiracy theories and claims of "socialism", etc. The media sets a stage that favors Republicans and puts Democrats in a hole deeper than any Democratic politician can dig their way out of.
Look at covid19. Almost 2 years of overwhelming public health, medical science, reports on where and why covid19 spreads, watching your unvaccinated friends, family and neighbors across the nation get sick, deathly sick and die, can be throttled by some politicians, a few media talking heads and an ex president into remaining unvaccinated. It's many times easier to fool yourself than to inform yourself.
The Hidden Brain podcast has addressed the issues behind this.
Excellent!! ❤️❤️🙏🙏 Thank you David. We also need to intensely began to push back on the demonizing of the word “socialism”. Republicans have tried to force their very limited definition on us for decades, maybe longer, trying to suggest what?
In truth worker’s owning their own businesses is a great model. We are social beings. In an overpopulated world with diminishing resources the more prosocial we are the better we will prosper. Love the reference to the Hidden Brain. The latest research proves what we know.
https://www.technologynetworks.com/neuroscience/news/touch-helps-mom-and-babys-brains-synchronize-354244?fbclid=IwAR08Y6iMcGAQs-ONxhXQ0oHXh1kj5JvOYPmuaEzdlSJjyVYEdZT9wHQHF2U
https://www.discovermagazine.com/mind/brains-might-sync-as-people-interact-and-that-could-upend-consciousness?utm_source=dscfb&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=dscfb&fbclid=IwAR0Q89flhj7Mxm6q7PfGN-VE69w-81xygG6Wh7FsW30R0NyxIrSLtTB_jKI
We’re all in this together. Religious pomp has hijacked that “God is love for each other.” From Albert Einstein:
"If we want our species to survive, if we are to find meaning in life, if we want to save the world and every sentient being that inhabits it, love is the one and only answer.” Today’s Republicans are antisocial. Let’s give voice to being prosocial and the real meaning of socialism.
Yes. My definition of socialism is when we all share a problem, it just makes sense to all share in the solution. We are already very socialistic: fire departments, police departments, water districts, public schools, public roads, public health (universal healthcare would be a great addition), the list goes on. But probably the most socialistic institution in our society is our military.
Politicians who are attempting to demonize socialism depend on Americans not being able to think very deeply. The decision is where to draw the line between social solutions and individual solutions. Those are issues about which reasonable people can disagree and conversations should be had.
Well, I think the insurrection proves that some people do not “think clearly” and oh, also the pandemic, being that 700,000 have needlessly died.
Is it feasible to add room in your description for a robust capitalism alongside these socialistic community goals to to prevent market economy heads from exploding?
Steven: May I post this sensible statement on my FB? With/without attribution? Yr name or "Response to HCR"?
We ARE social beings, not capitol beings or property. But social beings.
Thank you Christy
I agree that media is a necessary focus. Popular media over-simplifies, excites and lies. It is a drug for so many people and alters the collective minds of many Americans. Even NPR and PBS are Republican-lite. It is better to seek sources like this letter, some PodCasts, and Democracy Now (tho it is sometimes grating, it has some worthy guest speakers.) I would go so far as to include video games as inciting an increase in general callousness and violence toward women. But, so far we cannot touch the sacred cows of freedom of speech and the right to bad taste and ignorance.
David, I feel language is everything. Only conservatives have understood, and mastered this. Progressives debate personal positions, and DO NOT unify. We are a grab bag of special interests, and my special interests are framing and the environment, but I also stand for gender equality and blah blah blah 😂 🙏
TFG studied Hitler’s speeches. They are masters of the con and how to brainwash. Democrats have a better message that they just need to get it out there more and the majority of the media work against that.
I feel the media is principally an echo chamber (like NPR), and they would echo our strong and vibrant vision if we had one. Such as a Democratic Capitalism, where everyone had opportunity for success.
No, David, I would criticize progressive politicians for not messaging better. People, even "rational" people, respond more strongly to emotional motivations. Repubes get their power by repeating emotionally charged outrageous lies ad nauseum. We could learn something from this. Liberals would get much more traction with voters if they repeated emotionally charged outrageous truths ad nauseum instead of (yawn) heady rational messages.
We also need to call the Press on the carpet. By giving Trump so much coverage for his outrageous lies, they gave our country to him. And now they are undercutting Biden. We need to insist that they correct their cranio-rectal inversion, even if it requires surgery.
Corporate ownership of the press is a problem. Historically Dems have not been good at messaging as most of us believed that doing well by each other was not a message that needed doctoring. Now with Republicans having been taught the art of fascist language to deceive and indoctrinate it looks like Dems are waking up to the fact they have to repeat their messages of how their bills support we the people to build better. There were a few on MSNBC who had were interviewing the lawmakers themselves this week instead of interpreting their words. Perhaps it matters to voice support for those doing it right?
Steven, you said a million with your post, about liberals ignorance simple communications that will actually attract others. Have you read Lakoff re: his study of political languaging, something he calls ‘framing?'
I am going to check out "The Hidden Brain". Thanks😊
Check out "Freakonomics".
Hear! Hear!
Totally agree Dem's believe people are intelligent and rational and that is the biggest downfall of the D's. KISS - keep it simple, stupid! Talk like everyone's a 4th grader!
4th grade level. Hum. Think you are right. Intellectual development stalled sometime about then if you were to listen to the verbal battles taking place in school board meetings. About the age when kids start to memorize clever phrases and arithmetic tables and before comprehension is being formed in reading skill. About the age when reading the words and pronouncing them correctly is more important than explaining what was meant by the writer of Dick and Jane.
It’s no wonder development stalled if they’re hollered at when they’re kids like they holler at the rest of us
...and that message needs to be repeated, again, and again, and again.....
“THIS is a socialist road you are driving on”
I’m sorry to say, but Rep Jayapal and progressives know nothing about framing.
Maybe the Progressives need a new public face instead of Jayapal, Omar, Bush and AOC. After a while some names just become associated with the ‘radical, extremist, socialist agenda’. The same policies just a different messenger.
I see this time differently. I don't like how the media has treated it. What is happening now is what negotiations between democrats and republicans (even though this time it is the same party) would look like in normal times. I have been paying a lot of attention to how Jayapal expresses herself and I find her absolutely reasonable and very persuasive. She has to walk a fine line between standing up for what she believes in and staying out of idiotic war zones - she is in the middle of a very important negotiation right now. She is not throwing bombs at anyone and she is trying to get more of what she wants. I think it is interesting that that whole group is acting differently right now than it has in the past. AOC has been strangely restrained for the most part and the others have been silent. All of this leads me to believe that they get the feeling that the electorate is on their side and that the Manchins, Sinemas and republicans are already in the rearview mirror. They definitely have more traction in this negotiation than they would have in the past. This is progress. And, in the end, they might be right. It is still stressful to watch because there is so much at stake for all involved.
Good morning Robert. I agree with you and thank you for the pushback. I’m dismayed at the criticism against Rep Pramila Jayapal. I thought her messaging extremely effective last week.
Robert, I to have been paying attention to Pramila Jayapal. Rather than fill this space with my impression of her, I thought it would be useful for some doubters and those, perhaps, a bit too frightened of shopworn attacks by Republicans, to hear from Pramila Jayapal, in her own words:
‘Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-WA), leader of the House progressives, pushed back on one of centrist West Virginia Sen. Joe Manchin’s demands for Democrats’ massive reconciliation spending package, saying Sunday morning that she will not support the bill if it includes the Hyde Amendment.’
‘With the progressive and moderate wings of the Democratic Party continuing to negotiate President Joe Bidens’s agenda-setting $3.5 trillion social policy bill, Manchin—who describes himself as “pro-life”— made it clear last week that he would only vote for the bill if the Hyde Amendment is part of it. (The amendment prevents federal programs from covering abortion expenses.)
‘Appearing on CNN’s State of the Union on Sunday, Jayapal first discussed the ongoing negotiations about the price tag of the spending package and what may need to be cut or trimmed down in order for it to pass. She was then asked about Manchin’s remarks about the anti-abortion provision’
“You shared your experience with abortion in congressional testimony this past week,” anchor Dana Bash noted. “Can you vote for a bill that has the Hyde Amendment in it?”
“No,” Jayapal flatly declared.’
“So what happens?” Bash countered.’
‘The Washington congresswoman replied that “this is a negotiation” before claiming that the Hyde Amendment is something “the majority of the country does not support.” She also said that one in four American women have had an abortion and are in need of reproductive care during a time “when those protections are being rolled back,” referencing the plethora of anti-abortion laws that have recently been passed.’
“That is nobody’s business,” Jayapal added. “It is our business as people that carry the babies. And we have to be able to make the choices during our pregnancy.” (Daily Beast)
‘She said on Friday she had been in almost constant contact with the White House and Democratic congressional leaders.'
“We are making sure we’re holding up the women who need childcare, the families who need childcare, unpaid leave, the folks who need climate change addressed, housing, immigration,” she told reporters.'
“There’s sometimes frustration, but we’re all part of the Democratic party, this is the Democratic agenda, it’s the president’s agenda and we’re excited to be fighting for the same thing. I’ve been here four and a half years. I still find it strange, but things only happen here when there’s urgency and some reason for people to be at the table. We’ve seen more progress in the last 48 hours than we have seen in a long time.”
“Pramila has turned the CPC into a strong political force by keeping everyone informed, having people talk through the issues and then make real commitments,” the Massachusetts senator and fellow progressive Elizabeth Warren told the New Republic.’ (Guardian)
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/oct/03/pramila-jayapal-washington-state-congresswoman-democrat
‘As Joe Biden laid out a grand vision for his Presidency, in a speech before Congress late last month, cameras caught Representative Pramila Jayapal standing and applauding. Behind her face mask, she later told an aide, she was smiling. This was not the Joe Biden whom progressives like Jayapal expected to see when he meandered out of the Democratic pack and vanquished their champions, Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren, in last year’s primaries. That was the avuncular centrist who persuaded enough voters that he was the safe choice to beat Donald Trump in November.
'But this Joe Biden is going much, much bigger. As Jayapal said, “President Biden has risen to the moment, and I really do give him an ‘A’ in what he’s done so far. It’s been bold, it’s been progressive, it’s been what the country needs.”
‘But she really perked up when she heard Biden say, “The biggest risk is not going too big. . . . It’s if we go too small.” Jayapal called across the room to her husband, “That’s our line! He used our line!”
https://www.newyorker.com/news/the-political-scene
I live in Washington state. And while I have been impressed with Representative Jayapal, especially when she spoke out after the insurrection, I did not know these details yet as you outlined here. Thank you for sharing. I support Lincoln Project, who a few of us have mentioned in these comments, and when sent a survey not too long ago asking for names of individuals to throw their positive support behind, I sent them hers.
❤️❤️❤️ Thank you for putting her words out here for all of us Fern!
Many folks are criticizing what they aren’t even a witness to it appears.
There is too much to know, I get it. I am also too often guilty of criticizing what I have not invested the time to learn of but I am grateful for your work of sharing such important information.
Thank you, Christy The data pinpointing the transfer of wealth from the people to the super-rich is available. Most of us are the victims of government in the US, which has not worked for regular folks, the poor, the minorities, families, children and the elderly since the Reagan administration - more than 40 years ago. Millions of the bamboozled among us are now worshippers of the ConDon. Progressives in the Democratic Party are not wild radicals. They want the people to have their share of the economic pie. Too many Americans have been conditioned to be angry - racists - white supremacists - scapegoating 'others' for their sense of loss - The Grievance Party - comprised of citizens diverted from reality and the facts, which would inform them about what they need and recognize the politicians committed to working on their behalf.
BRILLIANT post FERN. Thank you!
Thank you, Frederick. It was a plea that 'we' Americans know that the 'Progressives' are us.
Yes. All the legislative negotiations must be done within one party now, since the other has been bought and sold to the devil.
I have been especially grateful for MSNBC for interviewing Congresswoman Jayapal, Chair of the Progressive Caucus, frequently during these negotiations. I have always supported compromise but not with the current Fascists of the Right. Holding a line in the sand on the Hyde Amendment is the right thing to do. I’m impressed that she has been firm and calm and smiles confidently through the entire interviews knowing that she is working for we the people. I hope that Manchin hollers out again to “elect more liberals” if we want the right to make our own healthcare decisions, if we want our votes to count, if we want to support the working people of our country with affordable healthcare, childcare and education. Those are the things the majority of us want!! Who better to tell us to vote for more liberals like Jayapal than Joe Manchin!!!
This is an important dialogue here about the Democrat's negotiations. I am, admittedly fearful of losing the whole basket and that our clock could be running out. Japapal and AOC and the other progressives are doing what I hoped a congress should do; negotiate around the ideas to address the needs of my grandchildren's generation, which by definition has to be progressive. Manchin and many other moderates, though socially conscious, are still trying to do the incrementalism that was the hallmark of bi-partisanship in my working years. As I think back, that could have been our false version of trickle-down economics when right-sizing, real funding, adaptability, and inclusion might have caused the social and economic changes we hoped for in our policies in the 1970s and 1990s to have come about. With Mr Biden putting himself clearly now on the side of a progressive agenda perhaps we will now see movement in negotiations. I'm glad to hear more about why there are differences among their ideas about what must be included and less about the trustworthiness of individuals.
Fred, I just remembered there was NOTHING incremental about the trump tax giveaway to the wealthiest 15% of some $1.7T. Or the Bush ll tax giveaway in 2001-02.
True. My point about incremental was in reference to liberal progressive policies. To your point, well taken, Republicans go big to make cuts to federal recent/government size outside military spending.
Robert, I very much appreciate your perspective. Perhaps they re in the position of ... governing. They are no longer a protest movement.
Most often, I feel progressives come from a protest position. Now, progressives have ... power. And, without an overarching vision
OMG, do I agree with you! I'm liberal, somewhat progressive and seeing any of those three now is like finger nails on a calk board! They don't understand you can't get everything you want all at one time. Start slow, show people how the programs will work for normal Americans a little at a time. We want it now and we want it all attitude is going to get them and us nothing in the end. And definitely keep pounding the message that social programs like Social Security, Medicare, unemployment etc. are considered socialism by republicans!
I don’t think slow is the way. You need everyone to see the changes and how they benefit. If you only do a small potion it won’t be seen and nothing will progress.
Look at the minimum wage. It should be $15 now but must be gradual. By time it hits $15 it will need to be $20.
What healthcare do you decide to fade in?
What education do you decide to give first? College or pre-school?
Where do you focus internet for all?
Jayapal was far from fingers on a chalkboard this past week. Her words were measured and on target as being for we the people. What is fingers on a chalkboard are the continuous screams and lies from the fascist right. Are you in support of putting the Hyde amendment in the build back better bill? That’s a line in the sand for me and I’m grateful for the Progressive Caucus.
I believe that if they can get some of it done, just for now, so that people can see what a difference these items make, they will vote out the people voting against it and vote in those who will support everything else.
Pam, I feel like that is what I’m watching them try to do.
Sorry, we cant’t wait. If we don’t act now, we will have an overwhelming disaster no one can solve.
Perhaps our message, needs a message?
Maybe we highlight Democracy and the “liberty and justice for all” component of our ‘moral pledge’ - which is the Pledge of Allegiance. Aside Democracy and our system of governance is our economic system. They are different!
This Democracy MUST challenge the inherent, systemic problems of an unfair economic system.
Capitalism is simply our way for personal profit to be made. BUT this economic system threatens “liberty and justice for all” because of the poverty, violence (to nature), unfair distribution, inherent addictions to growth and accumulation, etc and etc.
America needs to break our addiction to a problematic economics and highlight the rights and liberties assured by our founding predecessors
imho
That same thought has crossed my mind but they ARE the new face. The old face was Bernie Sanders who couldn't be taken seriously because it felt as though he was always yelling.
That’s the idea. Someone who is not constantly screaming in your face.
Bernie Sanders is being listened to by more people now than ever. I believe the Republicans can claim the screamers.
Take a look at Cruz Gaetz master screamers and absolutely no listening skills
And they have a bunch of them!
That's the heart of it. Back to my favorite guy on its George Lakoff. The Dems keep blowing it.
Charlie, I’ll have top keep you posted on conversations I am having, around this framing thing. But later.
Super. I look forward to hearing from you.
Plenty of them have been and are Repubs. I know someone personally right before TFG came on the scene that was complaining that it was going to take a week to get her Foodstamps. Another that told me “ If I get a real job they will take my Medicaid away and I’ll have to pay for my Insurance”. When you know What hits the fan you know who they go running to.Oh ! Only Dem. Voters have parents on Social Security and Medicare. LOL ! I know one of them who benefits really well on a Military pension and S.S. from a parent. They aren’t fooling anyone.
Since I'm on Medicare, I'm paying around $10,000 less for health insurance than before. I'm waiting until 70 to take social security, but that will be another big boost.
Michael Caruso, why should Rep. Jayapal have to rebut the so-called "charge of socialism"? In U.S. politics since before the Civil War "socialism" has been handy smear word for the monied classes to squelch anyone who opposes them. Remember Patrick Henry's famous words, when accused of "treason" against the Crown? "If this be treason, make the most of it." That works for me: "If this be socialism, make the most of it." It's not like we're tools of the USSR -- which, as you may have noticed, doesn't exist anymore.
I'm thinking the Texas "Heartbeat Law" was, finally, a step too far for the Republicans. Given the poll numbers quoted by HCR, it is a distinct possibility. I'm hoping that enough people who generally vote Republican see that it isn't just about former president whatsisname anymore. In fact, it isn't about him at all. It's about a naked stab at the heart of American democracy. We know that, and maybe Greg Abbott and his cohorts in the Texas leg, (pronounced "lej", God I so miss Molly Ivins!) have gone a long way toward making a huge block of Republican voters to see the writing on the wall at last, and become former Republican voters.
It sure crossed a red line for me. Protest signs include: Abort Abbott, I hope a girl has more rights than a gun when she grows up, let's talk about the elephant in the womb, We will fight for the reproductive rights our mothers won! My freedom begins with my body!
Right on, sister!
Molly Ivins was an absolute rock star.
SO miss Molly Ivins!!!
I agree. They get in their "bubble" and loose sight of the big picture
I do not understood why men should have the right to tell women what they can do with their bodies. Some women, including the latest appointee to the Supreme Court, and men in positions of political power, have sought to set rules and punishment for those women who, for whatever reason, choose to abort a fetus. I find the religious ‘validation’ unconvincing. In one of the two versions of Genesis, Eve is castigated for eating the apple. Subsequently in the Old Testament (as opposed to the New Testament) man’s superiority over women is writ large.
Without a man, a woman can not get pregnant. Why is it, in the ‘moral’ argument against abortion, that the woman, rather than the man, is the culprit? I am appalled by the term ‘pro life.’ Even more so when the ‘pro lifers’ seek to legislate when a fetus becomes human. Were these ‘pro lifers’ true to their slogan, shouldn’t they be in the forefront of adopting unwanted babies? I am unaware of any ‘pro life’ organization that has its members in the forefront of adopting and caring for unwanted babies. At the same time, some of these purported ‘pro lifers’ have engaged in attacks on abortion clinics and doctors resulting in deaths.
I am appalled by the recent Texas law that empowers citizens to be abortion vigilantes with the inducement of up-to-$10,000 reward for identifying ‘violators. I am equally appalled by the politicalization that could result in our current Supreme Court sharply limiting or even overruling Roe vs. Wade. I believe that there are a diversity of reasons why a woman, with or without a man’s approval, chooses to have an abortion. Indeed, I am certain that the wives or incidental gift friends of some of the ‘pro lifers’ have had abortions. What gives males the right to determine what should occur when they impregnate women? If women are held legally responsible for the aftermath of a sex act, why wouldn’t it be fair to consider castration or some other penalty for the man? Horrors, many people would say. My riposte: then cease applying a double standard in the false ‘morality’ of the ‘pro lifers.’
Thank you. The term Pro life is used to criminalize women who are facing an unwanted pregnancy. To tell a woman she does not have the right to make a decision about her body and her life is criminal. Akin to slavery.
The term is deliberately misleading. In my experience, those most loudly claiming to be pro-life reject the (cost of) assisting the mother in: obtaining or maintaining health care, education, affordable housing, day care so the mother can work (all women “belong in the home” but then services require work), etc., etc.
Pro birth is more accurate; pro birth to punish women is even more accurate.
Yes. Very calculated by patriarchal, white men.
Ahhhh. That's It! I forgot - women are slaves of men. Any men.
Chattel slavery, f'sure, because, you know, penis
saw a big sign on an idjt property: Freedom, my choice.
the idiocy of lack of reasoning
Freedom: my body, my choice...
If they were truly pro-life, they would oppose the death penalty. But they don’t. It’s not about being pro-life, it’s about control. The Catholic Church opposes both abortion and the death penalty (at least being consistent) and yet there is no discussion of withholding Communion from politicians who support the death penalty as there is for those who support women’s reproductive rights. I wonder how all our right wing Catholic Supreme Court justices can sleep, given their hypocrisy. (I am a lifelong Catholic, but I can no longer practice. The list of injustices perpetrated but the Church is just too long.)
Kathy, I’ve been reading the comments here today, and not yet responding to any, but yours struck a real chord with me. I have lifelong high school friends (from a small Catholic high school in Staten Island) who have left the Catholic Church and joined other Christian churches, much of their decision driven by the hypocrisy in the church. I, myself, thought of leaving but the sacraments were too important to me so I went back to Mass for that reason. At the Vigil Mass on Saturday evening our new pastor (who I had originally had high hopes for) gave his announcements at the end by addressing if the parish would impose a vaccine mandate. He stammered and stuttered through his talk, giving a tepid endorsement of vaccines, saying the Pope got a vaccine, then stressing that the church would not be mandating anything related to COVID. He spent more time telling why they weren’t being mandating them than telling everyone why they SHOULD get it. No taking care of your neighbors. No looking out for the old and the children. No advising to consult with a doctor. The bitter irony was the recessional hymn “They will know we are Christians by our love”. He will be getting an email from me this morning.
Annette, I can literally hear his wishy-washiness through your description. In contrast, my parish held daily Mass in defiance of our lockdown throughout 2020, and my elderly neighbors both caught Covid. Three weeks in the icu, but they survived. On the plus side, I love that hymn. The music and the sense of community is what I miss most.
Tell that new pastor, Annette!
same
Perpetrated *by* the Church. Sigh.
“ Were these ‘pro lifers’ true to their slogan, shouldn’t they be in the forefront of adopting unwanted babies”
I assume most of THESE ‘pro lifers’ will/would not adopt. Although some evangelical institutions have made it their” social cause “ to promote adoption which contributes to the majority of US agencies having religious affiliations.
Legalized abortion reduces the amount of adoptable “orphans”. Some, usually from foreign countries with lax laws, are not actually “orphans”.
HHB’s ( Heinous Heartbeat Bills) will increase the number of white adoptees$$$.
Adoption and separating a child from it’s origins/ family has/will never been the answer.
Keith, this pro-choice adoptee always enjoys your comments !
I have to disagree that there will be more white adoptees. White women will do as they have always done. There will, however, be an increase in black, brown and biracial children, who are not being adopted as it is.
Good point,Barbara I agree that there will be a disproportionate number of black,brown and biracial children who will not be adopted as a result of these heinous laws
Although I do believe the HHB’s “will increase the number of white adoptees” $$$ .The history of adoption is not so pretty…
#whiteadoptee
Amy Conan Barrett has adopted children which gives her the right to judge, condemn and jeopardize the life of any pregnant woman.
I meant Coney as in
most excellent reasoning
Here’s a link to an overview of the Pandora Papers that’s unobstructed by a paywall:
https://www.theguardian.com/news/2021/oct/03/pandora-papers-biggest-ever-leak-of-offshore-data-exposes-financial-secrets-of-rich-and-powerful
Here’s a link to the BBC’s package of Pandora stories.
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-58780465
Thank you!
Thank you Catherine!
Thank You Catherine.
Or as Balzac put it: "The secret of a great success for which you are at a loss to account is a crime that has never been found out, because it was properly executed.”
In a speech to the State Department on February 4, Biden said that he would put “America’s most cherished democratic values” back at the center of American diplomacy, “defending freedom, championing opportunity, upholding universal rights, respecting the rule of law, and treating every person with dignity.” Which is why he sent Jake Sullivan to meet with the murdering barbarian Prince Mohammed Bin Salman. To discuss the mutual commitment to "values."
That is best explained by what Prince Metternich said, explaining the Congress of Vienna to a journalist: "Nations have no permanent friends, or permanent enemies - only permanent interests."
And the whole damn week has demonstrated that Otto von Bismarck was correct when he said: "Laws are like sausages, it is better not to see them being made."
And I'll finish off with the most accurate piece of political cynicism I ever heard, spoken by a guy I consider the best (in terms of skill and ability in the sausage-making) politician I ever met: "If you can't drink their booze and screw their women, and vote against them the next morning with a smile on your face, you have no business in this business." (Jesse Unruh, inventor of the modern state legislature)
It's been a tough week for idealists.
That Unruh quote is the epitome of toxic patriarchy. Smash Patriarchy!
It was said 55 years ago and if you look up his record, he was pretty good on that issue, given the times. The world doesn't operate on 2021 wokeness (too bad, but that's a fact).
He may have had redeeming features, but really, I would think that quote is indefensible, then as well as now.
TC, Why not take a look at USA style colonialism, close to home. It is hardly an example of Biden's “America’s most cherished democratic values” ... “defending freedom, championing opportunity, upholding universal rights, respecting the rule of law, and treating every person with dignity.”
We've been eating Puerto Rico's lunch for decades.
'How the U.S. Dictates What Puerto Rico Eats'
'A series of natural disasters compounded problems here. That same year, Hurricane María pummeled the island, killing some 4,600 people and causing an estimated $95 billion in damage. Earthquakes in early 2020 left many homeless, and the pandemic paralyzed the economy for months.'
'The economic consequences have been staggering. Hundreds of thousands of islanders have moved to the mainland. Puerto Rico has the highest unemployment rate in the United States; 40 percent of the population is experiencing food insecurity. The minimum wage of $7.25 an hour will increase to $8.50 starting in January, but that is unlikely to move the needle on a poverty rate that has hovered at nearly 44 percent since 2019.'
'Scrapping or changing the Jones Act could help turn the tide, but President Biden has reiterated his support for it. Proponents of the act include the U.S. shipping industry and those who owe their livelihoods to it, whether as shipbuilders or merchant mariners.'
“The Jones Act is still a straitjacket on Puerto Rico because it subsidizes the marine shipping companies of the United States,” said Fernando Lloveras San Miguel, president of Para La Naturaleza, a nonprofit that works on reforestation.
'Puerto Rico’s dependence on imports is a boon for shipping companies whose vessels, in a brutal irony, carry names of local symbols like Taíno, after the Indigenous people of the Caribbean, or Coquí, for the island frog with a singsong croak. The enforced use of indirect importation for things like fertilizer and farming equipment in turn drives up local farmers’ costs.'
'It wasn’t always like this. In 1940, agriculture was the cornerstone of Puerto Rico’s economy, employing nearly 45 percent of the work force. But by 2019, it represented less than 1 percent of the commonwealth’s G.D.P. and employed less than 2 percent. Natural disasters, economic crises and mismanagement have contributed to the island’s transformation from agricultural powerhouse to one that relies on imports. But it has been U.S. policies like the 1920 Jones Act and Operation Bootstrap that have strangled local agriculture.'
“Today we have an economic model of consumption,” said Eliezer Molina, a Maricao-based farmer who ran for governor in the last election. “The United States doesn’t want to encourage the growth of production in Puerto Rico, because what we consume is from their producers, and that gives their companies protection.”
'For example, local egg producers have been snuffed out by the “dumping” of lower-priced, lower-quality eggs from off the island, securing the dominance of mainland producers in supermarkets. “Local companies are then driven to bankruptcy, and then there’s no competition,” Mr. Molina said, which means “the American companies raise their prices.” (NY Times) See link to Opinion below:
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/10/01/opinion/puerto-rico-jones-act.html?searchResultPosition=1
This column highlights exactly why I find the insidious Republican voter suppression laws and gerrymandering so terrifying. We are being set up for permanent minority rule.
Gerrymandering is exactly why Florida has been governed by Republicans for over 20 years. We should all be terrified.
Dear Heather: I love the link you've made between the rallies for reproductive rights and the Pandora Papers. It's a brilliant splice! Thank you!
I attended one of those rallies. It was a cold, wet day in VT, but the crowd couldn't have been more warm and fired up for women's rights. Almost as many men as women were in attendance as was an excellent showing from our legislature, including our Attorney General, who, along with a handful of women representatives spoke to the crowd. It made me proud to be a self-proclaimed Vermonter, even if not a seventh-generational one!
Here, too, the ties between excessive wealth/extreme poverty and women's rights were made blatantly clear not in the exact same way, but visible nonetheless in the sordid imbalances which exist when monetary power reveals its grotesque face.
Great connection--I have only one criticism. Using the term 'elite' instead of something more specific like 'super-rich' or 'oligarchs' plays into the current populist authoritarian trend of discrediting education and expertise in all fields.
That's good and I did hesitate when I typed it... thank you! I will take your suggestion.
I totally agree, Marty; very insightful comment!
I am very glad to know that Biden and Blinken care about the scandal of the financial elite (though I note the WP didn't follow routes that would lead to uncovering the owner of the WaPo or any other unscrupulous American billionaire). The return of efforts to abide by the rule of law is going to reduce my stress enormously! But it's not the case that the president also cares about “defending freedom, championing opportunity, upholding universal rights...and treating every person with dignity.” Not if Haitians are "persons," or Afghan women belong to the universe that has rights, or Saudi women's freedom and opportunity deserves defense.
Mary, sadly one of the Pandora Papers stories had this to say:
"The United States’ wealthiest citizens — including Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, who owns The Washington Post; Tesla founder Elon Musk; Microsoft billionaire Bill Gates; and billionaire investor Warren Buffett — do not appear in the documents." Paragraph 5, under the heading "The US Uber Rich".
Frankly, the lack of findings on the US Uber Rich does not bode well with regards to cleaning up the influence of folks like the Kochs, Mercers, Adelsons, and others. I am not confident that anything will change with regards to big money and it's influence on our politics.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/interactive/2021/pandora-papers-offshore-finance/?itid=lk_inline_manual_3
Mary, I, too, am skeptical about Biden's claims to care about “defending freedom, championing opportunity, upholding universal rights...and treating every person with dignity.” Actions speak louder than words. Our government's actions do not reflect the concepts of freedom, opportunity, universal rights, and personal dignity.
Maya Angelou said, “I’ve learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.” When you make people seeking asylum feel unwanted and unwelcome, when you deport them to a country filled with political and civil unrest, corruption, violence and poverty, that is what the will remember of you. You meaning us.
Speaking of Koch (cringeworthy mentioning of name) The Nation had this to report of his devious design of using Critical Race Theory to stoke the unrest towards teachers and public education.
https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/charles-koch-crt-backlash/
Christine, thanks for reminding us how insidious, manipulative and pervasive the Kochs influence is.
Gates, Buffet and Bezos actually may not use the offshore accounts that are the subject of the Pandora papers. I don’t care to defend all the methods that they used to acquire their assets, but neither do I assume that they were improperly overlooked by the project’s reporters.
I don't necessarily think they were improperly overlooked either.
Hi daria. I would add to my earlier comment that the people whose use of offshore accounts to hide their wealth and avoid taxes most offends me are heads of state, elected representatives and other government officials with good, steady salaries, all of whom are charged with respecting and enforcing the law. Tony Blair's name jumped off the page yesterday.
It appears the work "enough" does not exist for lots of lucky rich folks.
I agree wholeheartedly, David.
I meant "word".
Jonathan, It occurs to me that when certain folks have accumulated serious wealth -- let's say 1 billion plus -- there are so many legal ways for them to protect it that they do not really need to risk doing something illegal. Between tax loopholes and our legally sanctioned campaign corruption (Citizens United), someone like Bezos can go into space for pure entertainment. Offshore accounts are best for those hiding money they have obtained illegally or immorally, or who live in countries with truly confiscatory tax regimes, surely not the case in the USA.
This.
BTW. Did anyone post a link to Greg Olear’s blistering blog on Facebook? If not, here’s the link.
https://email.mg2.substack.com/c/eJxVkt-PoyAQx_-a-qZBsFUefPCu17021WaT3evuk0GZKvUHLuK6-NcvbS-XXMJA-M4MA_OhZBoqqUw8yFE7tynXZoC4h3lsQWtQzjSCygWPw9DHESIOjwPuR-vIEWN-UQAdE22s1QTOMBWtKJkWsr8lYLSha6eOGWU-DYD6YVAGpOC8pFBsgIcFQwWJ_EdZNnEBfQkxfIIysgenjWuth3FFkhXe2VEpe9UWmPLGqRg1KxuvlJ11DNYurIRCysYVo6trcO0DXCU7cGeha7cBJVZkp2UD_YpswRz8Ev8xb7ht9ldJsuWXOW2T5fjzMBckQ391lF6Tr_TaLKmZBTvvkNW-smu6pNsKZUuDbPxQklScxGHm57228fj08iqsvtj9Xb-dd3w7tO_nDLEznfY98l6LhK73UZK-Z9n4_BFliTE7_ePl9PQbh8OaHZenrg7zDf98doTtI_Z9hKwRGlAPe5dLFBFgjHNsW8iQ15aGfUwRXgWoq_B_7XFUPNezaGs5I2L91Q3X3WFp5Xbtpl5ok0PPihb4A6R-fIc72ryCHpT9JjxnOvY3hKAoCGkQUfQAZ0kHGPmYEuLYylzarD7-B-sb4WbOmQ
Shorter link….
https://gregolear.substack.com/p/facebook-is-the-new-rome-with-keri?r=l2aa7&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&utm_source=
Here is the link for the Atlantic piece referenced in Olear's blog. A must read.
https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2021/11/facebook-authoritarian-hostile-foreign-power/620168/
Thanks Christine for the Reader’s Digest link!
Thank you for your post Daria. I see a distinct disconnect between Biden’s fancy speeches and his administration’s actions.
To all who will jump to his defense - yes, he’s better than trump but that doesn’t mean he can do no wrong. Or harm.
I seem to recollect a mention in a report of the "owners of the Wall Street Journal" though being involved. I didn't follow the mention further.
And American women as well!
Yup, exactly right on!
Three points:
1. Dr. Richardson, you've done it again, thank you! I would never have linked the two.
2. I believe the March was poorly covered by MSNBC. The Saturday hosts--mostly women--had far less than 10 minute segments and very poor video shots. I fast forwarded through each hour and watched each segment. The marchers deserved better.
3. A hearty "well done" to everyone who marched in body, mind, or spirit! You DID contribute to the increasing awareness by uninformed voters who are just beginning to smell the stench of a rotten political party; and you directly told that fetid mess that we are not going to take it anymore!