This is the only forum I participate in, so please indulge me for a lengthy note.
As a former debating teacher and so-called expert, I want to put out my general rules of debate in the hope that one of you will be able to pass this on to JB's advisers within the next two weeks.
The first debate is crucial, for it sets the tone; remember Kennedy vs Nixon. Here is my advice:
1. To be on the Defensive means you are losing the debate. To be on the Offensive means you are winning. It's like football; you can only score points when you are on the offense. Don't waste time defending; respond and counter attack. Always try to dictate the topic and direction of discussion. Mohammed Ali won many of his fights by learning his opponent's vulnerabilities and going for them; make a checklist of the most important ones which will score points.
2. Get the audience on your side; remember Ronald Reagan and "There you go again". Your opponent will try to score points by attacking you, twisting facts, making spurious accusations, denying failures, claiming untrue successes, etc. Don't simply deny; that is a mug's game. Laugh and say "There you go again, there's lie number 2,760" or similar. Puncture his balloon.
3. The best precedent you can call upon is Joseph Welch, during the McCarthy hearings. His quote, "Have you no sense of decency, sir?" made nationwide headlines and brought McCarthyism to an abrupt end. When confronted by an outrageous lie or false accusation, simply reply "You know that is totally untrue and it is an insult. Have you no sense of decency, sir?" (I can guarantee it will be the headline of every newspaper the next morning.)
4. If he does not treat you with respect, respond accordingly. Do not call him "Mr President" if possible. If he calls you "Sleepy Joe", use a similar appellation in response; the terms "Conman", "Devious" and "Dopey" come to mind. Remember that he has a very thin skin and is easily riled. He cannot stand confrontation.
5. The final rule of debating is "He who loses his temper loses the argument."
Once again, apologies for this lengthy treatise, but I felt I must somehow make my thoughts public.
An excellent post. THANK you! There is some excellent advice here. However, reading it I kept asking myself several things...
While I agree about the thrust of all 5 points above, I wonder if maybe the times have changed to the point that such things as "There you go again...", or "Have you no decency, sir?", or coming up with some witty rejoinder to a Trump epithet would actually make the "outrage meter" budge at all. This is a different playing field now, certainly from the '50s McCarthy era or '60s Nixon/Kennedy era, and even from the 1980s of Carter/Reagan era. After nearly 4 years of a constant, daily barrage of outrageous, unethical, even unlawful behaviour from Trump & Co., we have become completely inured to anything anyone could say or do anymore. That was then, this is now. Reality has been altered, and not for the better. Actually, I don't see the debates REALLY making much of an impact as in past years. (I tend to think the VP debate could be much more interesting.) I just don't see anything either candidate might do or say anymore that will garner much publicity. Okay, it might generate a headline for a day or two, but then how soon would that be forgotten and added to the huge pile of old news events? Things are coming and going so quickly nowadays, the news cycle changes at such an alarming speed, I don't see "gotcha" moments in debates having that much of an impact now. I do agree that disarming Trump and making him appear even more insane and unstable SHOULD be an easy task, and might further affect him adversely with some swing voters, but overall I think most people already know who they're going to vote for. (I doubt I will watch as I dislike what these "debates" have turned into...but that's a topic for another discussion.) Neither Trump nor Biden impresses me as being successful debaters, and "winning" or "losing" will probably come down to who makes fewer mistakes. Again, thanks for your post!
Thanks for your thoughts. While I may be antedeluvian in my thinking about Reagan or Welch, the one important thing is to keep the debate focused on the topics YOU think will win points and not on those which benefit your opponent. And.....attack, don't defend.
Actually I don't think this is so different. DT has a strong connection with the '50s McCarthy era in Roy Cohn who was sitting right next to Senator McCarthy during those hearings. Roy Cohn was DTs lawyer and the one who taught him to double down no matter what. He was also Rupert Murdoch's lawyer; worked with Roger Stone on the Reagan campaign, and was finally disbarred in 1986 and died of complications of AIDS shortly after.
This is good advice for those of us having to deal with trumpers. Thank you. Biden did very well when he debated Paul Ryan. He won 51% or 32% for Ryan. His acceptance speech was dynamic. Trumpers will think trump won, you can’t convince them nor could you convince me to vote for trump. We’ll see what independents think.
Trump literally has no sense of decency. He is invulnerable to shame. He doesn’t like to be mocked by people he respects. I don’t know if he respects Joe enough to let anything he says get under his skin.
Steven, I was invited to give my opinion in a focus group for Joe Biden for the upcoming debates. I copied and pasted your advice with attribution to you having shared it on this forum. I sincerely hope you are ok with that because I meant no harm.
I am hopeful it will get to him and be helpful. One must fight fire with fire and ensure that DT (delerium tremens?) doesn't get away with his dirty tricks. Remember he is a seasoned TV presenter and he will try to dominate the stage (as he did with Hillary)
I sent your original posting to a friend, who just emailed this to me: "I just pasted his comment in a FB item from the DNC asking what do you want Joe to talk about in the debate. Fingers crossed it gets to him or his handlers.
That is terrific advice. Finding one or more "names" to hang on "The Don" is crucial. Why has no-one succeeded before now???? And you are right---this is nothing that approaches a "normal" debate; Trump doesn't understand debate---and HE needs to be hit back hard, figuratively speaking. Go Biden!!
Today seems like the perfect day for this. Here is what Cult45 RRALLY thinks about us and about Trump. (Full of fucks, so if you’re easily offended by language you might want to sit this one out. Even though you really shouldn’t)
From a FB friend who escaped the Trump cult:
“You all don’t get it. I live in Trump country, in the Ozarks in southern Missouri, one of the last places where the KKK still has a relatively strong established presence. They don’t give a shit what Trump does. He’s just something to rally around and hate liberals, that’s it, period. He absolutely realizes that, and plays it up. They love it, he knows they love it, and the fact that people act like it’s anything other than that just proves to them that liberals are idiots, all the more reason for high fives all around.
“If you keep getting caught up in why do they not realize blah blah blah and how can they still back him after blah blah blah, you are not understanding what is the underlying motivating factor of his support. It’s fuck liberals, that’s pretty much it.
“Have you noticed he can do pretty much anything imaginable and they’ll explain some way that rationalizes it that makes zero logical sense? Because they’re not even keeping track of any logical narrative, it’s irrelevant, fuck liberals is the only relevant thing, trust me, I know first hand what I’m talking about. That’s why they just laugh at it all, because you all don’t even realize they really, truly, don’t give a fuck about whatever the conversation is about, it’s just a side mission story that doesn’t really matter anyways. That’s all just trivial details- the economy, health care, whatever. Fuck liberals.
“Look at the thing with not wearing the masks. I can tell you what that’s about. It’s about exposing fear. They’re playing chicken with nature and whoever flinches just moved down their internal pecking order, one step closer to being a liberal.
“You gotta understand the one core value that they hold above all others is hatred for weakness, because that’s what they believe strength is, hatred for weakness. And I mean passionate, sadistic hatred. And I’m not exaggerating. Believe me. Sadistic, passionate hatred, and that’s what proves they’re strong, their passionate hatred for weakness. Sometimes they lump in vulnerability, a compromised circumstance, or an overwhelming circumstance in there with weakness, too, because people tend to start humbling themselves when they’re in those circumstances and that’s an obvious sign of weakness.
“Kindness=weakness. Honesty=weakness. Compromise=weakness. They consider their very existence to be superior in every way to anyone who doesn’t hate weakness as much as they do. They consider liberals to be weak people who are inferior, almost a difference species, and the fact that liberals are so weak is why they have to unite in large numbers. Disgust is a true expression of their natural superiority.
“Go ahead and try to have a logical, rational conversation with them though. Just keep in mind what I said here, and think about it.”
The below is by another author regarding the above:
“This summed up something I’ve been trying to say for years. Because, yes, the cruelty is the point for trump supporters but this is why. “
“This is why there is no bottom of the barrel and why so many of them will tell you he’s been such a successful president. They don’t care that he’s the reason they’re getting fucked in taxes or that his border wall is a failure, they don’t care that he hasn’t managed to really pass any landmark legislation or make good on the promises he made during his campaign. They don’t care because the ONLY measure they’re using to determine how successful he’s been and how much they support him is how much he pisses off or hurts liberals and the more he does it the better he looks to them, the more support they give him and the more bullshit he doubles down on. It’s a never-ending feedback loop and it’s ALL about "the performance" rather than his political promises & results. It’s why we’ve devolved into whatever mess of a country in 2020 with seemingly no rock bottom."
“These are people who don’t understand politics as an entity that actually affects them, they can’t be reasoned with because they know being like that pisses off liberals. It’s honestly the most juvenile, immature tactic that elementary school-aged bullies use, but just as long as they get a rise out of liberals, repeatedly, they'll do it. It’s why so many of them comment on social media “trump 2020″ on posts that aren’t even about politics: because they know just posting that on a tasty video or something will piss off a bunch of liberals. We need to just stop responding to them when they say this type of shit, we need to ignore them, we need to stop giving them the outrage they want. “
“But, of course, we CAN'T do that because ignoring fascism is the same as and just as dangerous as ENABLING it.”
“Most of them don’t even pay attention to what he’s actually does and says; ask them about it–half the time, they don’t even know what you’re taking about. But so long as he’s pissing off liberals (and I’m using the colloquial US definition of “opposite of conservative” here), he’s doing everything they want.
Conservativism in this country has devolved into a movement with no ideals, no principles, nothing at all beyond - hurt the enemy at all cost.”
The truly disturbing aspect of this is I don’t know that I’m even capable of feeling hate. Its a useless emotion that does nothing but cause the hater mental duress while the hated goes along their merry way not even giving a crap that they’re being hated.
Trump supporters are the gathering together of all the people who think they’ve gotten screwed by us, the Liberals. Personally, I’ve never screwed anyone out of anything. And I too have busted my ass and worked my way up in my career. But I work at a desk or in a conference room. I attended an Ivy League university. I live in a (fairly) Liberal state. And no matter how deep the friendships I had before Trump were, they have been destroyed by the the tonic of one man and the weak mindedness of men I thought I knew. It’s crazy to me that I’ve been my very same, very progressive, very Liberal self for 20 years yet not until Trump was that ever a breaking point in friendships.
One interesting note. Of my college educated white Republican women friends EVERY LAST ONE has come to our side. The people are referenced above are ALL men. Both college and non-college educated. The educated ones are ALL religious - Catholic or Evangelical. The non-college ones are not religious. It’s interesting to break down the demographics in ones own circle to see if the national polling is accurate. And it is. 😊
I never considered myself liberal. Registered as a Republican back in the Nixon days but dropped the party when it was taken over by the moral majority. Always voted a split ticket until the last couple of years. All of a sudden, I'm called a liberal because I put country over self & party.
Sad story is my law enforcement (commercial vehicle inspections) son & family are living with me & politics has become heated. This is not the person I raised. Daughter in law has said she follows Trump on Twitter. OMG!!!
I’ve always found it baffling that college educated white men are behind him. I think for some of those it might be anti-choice, others wealth, and there’s always racism, maybe for some on a subconscious level.
It’s ALL about the racism. They won’t admit that that is what it is, but they’re people who feel entitled to their whiteness and superiority.
The thing that just kills me is that Biden is a CRAZY CATHOLIC. He carried his rosary with him always. I’ve seen him cross himself during pressers. So, for THEM to be portraying him as some kind of baby killer (or pedophile or...) is insane. And the fact that people are lapping this up is also insane. Biden literally became pro-choice in this presidential cycle. Wtf?
It is racism and wealth---especially the kind of rapacious accumulation of wealth in the financial sector with the manipulation of everything..... (the curse laid on this country by neo-liberals in financial matters---they are the rotten root [democrats and republicans alike] of the destroyed industrial sector of the American economy) End of rant! (for now....)
I can't even visit some of my relatives now because of the toxic Trump multiplier of Fox News craziness. Before the 2016 election, we simply disagreed about politics and did not discuss it. The last time I saw them, in 2019, I mentionned only that we couldn't talk about politics. The reply was, "If you did, I'd have to throw you out of the house", said in a very hostile tone.
Have you seen *Coastal Elites*? There is a vignette in there you’d probably love! A New Yorker goes home to the Midwest to quarantine with her family. When she walks in, they’re all MAGA. And it goes on from there.
Not as much here in Texas. I see a lot of women still holding out to remain Republican. Baffling! I hope they are complacent while Democrats vote in mass!
totally get this. there is no reasoning, no rational conversation to be had. This is why things like Living Room Conversations are such a joke. What is the point in attempting to have a conversation with someone who's guiding principle is "fuck liberals?"
We had a friend in Louisiana. He is one of my partners fraternity brothers. They’d gone to high school together. He got sucked into Q. We didn’t understand what was going on at he time. He started texting us with crap like *why are you such a libtard* and *pedophile liberal*. Totally weirdo stuff. Now that the Q thing has been *outed*, I totally see what happened to him. He was such a nice guy.
The scariest question we need to ask is..
If Biden is elected, what exactly are we do to do with his base? They’re not going anywhere and, I fear, when Trump loses it will cause them to become even more radicalized. How are these people going to react? How can they be kept in control? Seriously. They’re a whole lot of angry white peoples with guns.
The last point is one that keeps bothering me. The Genie is "out of the bottle' so to speak with the guns. And the four guys with their guns at their unofficial roadblock in the Northwest are quite possibly a harbinger of the future. Would anyone want to be driving around in Oregon in an out of state car just now??????
Thank you for posting this. It's been obvious from early on that this is why his support never wavers, but to hear it articulated by trumplorables was cathartic. This also why liberals should never try to reason with them ever. They will just see it as more weakness and take advantage of it.
Scary. Because, for the most part, it’s true. Especially for those who might recklessly use violence. Hate for Liberals and cruelty are the the toxic fuel of Trumps base.
Today’s HCR’s posting is more confirmation of what I’ve been fearing ever since Charlottesville. Much of this righteous, hot blooded rage has been stirred up by the NRA. Dangerous and Scary.
I've been asserting this forever. The main m.a. is "stick it to the libtards". That's all. If it gets a rise out of "libruls" then it's okay. Eight years of Bill Clinton and eight years of Barack Obama have helped create these mantras for them, aided and abetted by conservative media. Our society and advancing technology have inadvertently created a wealth of "monsters". How to fight it?
O it was the eight years of Obama that set them into a tailspin. “You got yours. It’s our turn now” is a literal statement we heard from a friend when we were still living in Louisiana.
All I can say is that I’m soooo grateful I finally talked my partner into moving from his native land to mine, Connecticut.
Yes thank you. When I look at some clips from his rallies, you can see that they are just reacting and responding but not even hearing what he’s saying. It’s very disturbing. A bunch of unthinking drones.
Yes. I grew up where JFK's assassination was celebrated. I've returned to that area, and I've watched as Trump has unleashed and legitimated the same kind of hate. Few Americans grasp what we face and how close a call this is likely to be.
At the moment I'm visiting Portland, OR. We are in an upper class suburb not threatened by the fire. Still, we've had to run air filters 24/7 and tape the fireplace, windows and all but one door to protect ourselves from the smoke. We've left the house only for groceries and worn KN94 masks when we do. And we are among the most privileged.
We are living through a pandemic that in a few weeks will have killed more Americans than died in combat in WWII, the worst economy since the Great Depression, the greatest threat to our democracy since the Civil War, and the greatest climate disaster since the Dust Bowl. And yet the outcome of the election remains very much in doubt.
Which is where I am. I am looking out the window and still seeing fog. Also doing a rain dance which is supposed to happened in a day or two. I have gardened here for about 50 years and I can speak to climate change. My neighbor has a banana tree (doesn't produce though). In the good days we would get rain by state fair time, the last week of August. Things are bone dry, but there is no wind.
We have a friend who goes fishing a lot with some people of this kind and his description of them is exactly like yours. He has them sitting on bar stools in an alcoholic stupor knowing that they are not doing well, but wanting to blame someone for their failures to get that which, as white males, they feel entitled to. I have a few Trumper friends on FB and for one of them with a big cross hanging around her neck, I am sure that the motivating factor is abortion. She should really read what Woodward says about this in his book. Most of the rest are my poor and poorly educated relatives who have scut jobs, if they have one, and fall prey to QAnon nonsense. They live in southern Illinois and southern Indiana (Terre Haute) which are basically a part of the upper south.
Woodward says the mafia don is actually pro-choice. I haven't read the book either, so can't point you in a specific direction. Maddow asked Cohen if he knew of any abortions that mafia don paid for. He didn't.
Kate Benson, thank you for the most thorough and comprehensible explanation I have seen of the Trump "aura". He is not the spokesman but the mouthpiece for this movement. Putin, Barr, Netanyahu, the NRA and the evangelicals are the puppet masters and pull the strings. It is very scary indeed.
This explains alot. I had a trump friend but when she started being cruel just to be cruel, I broke it off. And the weakness? Yup, that’s totally her thing. Very disturbing.
Thank you Ms. Benson. that was cathartic to read. I stopped trying to reason with them only recently. I believe the way to affect change is to live differently myself, but how? What do we do in the wake of a Biden victory? Continue to grind these people under the heel, as they feel has been done to them for some 15-30 odd years? What does the path to redemption look like?
Here is a great Twitter thread that highlights that there are cracks in *the base*. It’s 5 embeds. Read the first post after his too. Might restore a little hope and curb the fear a bit.
This post yunfortunately recalls the passage from the movie "Terminator 1", when John Connor's father explains to Sarah about the Terminator - a cyborg come back from the future to kill her:
"He is out there. He can't be bargained with. He can't be reasoned with. He doesn't feel pity, or remorse, or fear towards you and you absolutely can not stop him"
The future is here. (And B-movies may be more relevant than art films.)
And that whole situation a shit show. Did you read about the couple that was just there to film,? They were down from Portland. It was the woman’s home town even. They got followed around town by armed mobs. Someone posted on a FB group that they were antifa. They were even wearing PRESS jackets. And it was HER HOME TOWN. Jesus.
American history has managed to largely write out a significant part of antebellum southern history that has a major effect on the Civil War. There were in fact two Souths - the south of the coasts that spread inland with their slaves, and the South founded by the Scotch-Irish who came down through Appalachia from Pennsylvania, the people derisively called "hill billies" by the slaveowners. It's not widely known, but it took Mississippi, Alabama and Tennessee several tries before they suppressed the "hill billy" voters and their anti-slavery representatives so their rump legislatures could pass articles of secession. East Tennessee, northern Alabama, Mississippi and Georgia nearly seceded to create the "State of Nickjack" (based around the Nickajack river). A civil war was fought in the south to fight the Civil War, and in fact about 35-40% of the white southerners fought for the Union. They were suppressed after the war and their history wiped out until it was rediscovered in the late 70s. The South's "history" of the Civil War is nearly completely lies.
As to where we find ourselves today, it's a good idea to keep up with the news from Belarus, because that could be a preview of our Main Attraction.
Slave owners were quite busy trying to keep blacks and poor whites from making common cause against them. This occurred before the Civil War and of course, afterwards. I like the book Saving Savannah, for some enlightenment on how this worked as well as how the city did manage to save itself. There was one county in Alabama that never seceded and I can't tell you which one.
There were pockets of resistance to secession in the South here and there. If I remember right, the whole slavery/free state issue was what led to West Virginia's creation. Also, the area of North Carolina that my ancestors hail from (around Chapel Hill) wasn't really enamored with secession, though my great-grandfather enlisted in the CSA once things got underway (and lied about his age so he could sign up--they had to be 16 and he had just turned 15 in 1862). That said, there were some Southern sympathizers in northern states too...thinking especially of central and southern Indiana.
Thanks Thomas. Appreciate the insight about the two souths (I'm from Arkansas; fortunately on the "fringe") Yes---what is coming down the pike? Not good, I think. With the local "militias" the genie is out of the bottle, so to speak.
I would love to put all of you who comment here in one area and make sure I live there also. I want to be among those who are thoughtful and intelligent.
I don’t think so. I live in Connecticut. We just have property up there. We’d been planning to get started on it this year and then Covid happened, my partner lost his job and there went that. But anyway, no, sorry, I don’t know her. (I’m Kate Benson (/happygreta on FB and @katiegreenberg on twitter)
I’m becoming very serious about this. I have been considering creating an intentional community somewhere with other people. I think I’m going to fly with this. Anyone who is serious about this can contact me. I’m ready.
Yes, this daily/nightly gathering around Heather's virtual evening "interpretation" (there has to be a better word, but I can't reach it right now in the back of my mind) is a kind of 'beloved community' Heather has selflessly created a community that has powerful elements of sharing, concern, sympathy, and the rest. I am continually amazed a what rather personal details about lives people have been willing to share with what by all accounts should be called "total strangers". That does not happen often. Peace and Courage this night and all nights to come.---just read another comment below---Heatherton is a great idea!!!
I am a daily reader of the letter (thank you HCR); however, I do not typically read the comments. Today’s letter in reaction to the ever-increasing dark tenor of the right-wing rhetoric, had me go to substack and read all the comments.
This is my first post on this forum. I will apologize in advance if my comments have already been addressed on other days.
People are different...some think and feel differently than others. Some people are curious (this crowd) some, not so much. Throughout history, there is always a segment of the population that is authoritarian...they respond to power and use power, physical and mental, in their own lives. It is also a religious activity as Jeff Sharlott describes. Trolling is always an affirmation of their beliefs without any pushback that they have to emotionally digest. So yes the hashtag #Cult45 is applicable for today’s right-wing crowd. However, if Twitter existed when the Roman republic was transforming into Imperial Rome, #CultCeasar would be trending. I am sure there are historians that will point us to the graffiti saying the same. Therefore, there is always a segment of any population that is easily susceptible to manipulation. Who pulls and how hard is the pulling of their string is the next part of the equation. Cult members are VERY tribal...mine is good, yours is bad -- Black or white.
Divide and conquer is as old as history. The powerful will always use whatever tools available to them to manipulate the population to stay in power and gather more riches.
Starting in the ‘70s, after the turbulent ‘60s, the powerful developed and have enacted a plan to take control of the country. Politics is at its core about money and power.
It takes a concerted effort and a whole lot of money to buy control of the country.
The media has been concentrated into the hand of a very few right-wing owners, Out in the hinterlands, the majority of the media landscape is plutocratic funded propaganda. All of the outlets were not initially profitable, requiring continued fud and many still aren’t profitable.
Radio. Rush is on in every tractor and house on a concentrated right-wing radio network very weekday afternoon. Multiple Rush wannabe shows out there as well.
TV. Fox News is in every house. Sinclair TV stations masquerading as local news with the editorial content provided by a right-wing hack. Infotainment vs news is on all outlets on cable news.
Internet: Multiple right-wing internet sites and shows continue to get funding to exist. Social media is home for right-wing propaganda. The right brain craves confirmation.
Books. The right-wing book market is huge. Mix that in with the religious books as well.
Religion. Sundays are not a day of rest from propaganda. The preachers are now very much into politics. Some living in > $10M homes. The prosperity gospel rules. The right brain craves someone powerful to tell them what to do.
Washington There are multiple right-wing plutocratic funded think tanks: Heritage, Club for Growth etc.. The Supreme Court has been bought to assure corporate power and the wealthy are taken care of. Congress has been bought such that there are not any real anti-monopoly worries. Tax laws are promulgated to enrich the already uber-wealthy. Degreulate vs protection to allow the companies to socialize their externalities. The IRS has been kneecapped so that it does not have the resources to track the wealthy and their tax avoidance schemes. Can’t imagine the amount of money in off-shore tax shelters. There are multiple other examples of regulatory capture that benefit the wealthy. Privatize the profits, socialize the costs.
There has been an all-out assault on the American people for the past 50-60yrs and we see the result.
I am mad as hell and won’t take it anymore. However, I will focus my FDR hate on the pullers of the strings vs the people who are getting their strings pulled. It does not mean that we should not be VERY strong in how we respond to evil or wrongdoing. So many people have had their brains altered. It makes me sad to see extended family members emersed in cult behavior.
Since we are the hopeful types, I see do see hopeful signs out there. It is a good thing that many young folks do not take in a lot of main street media and are less tainted by propaganda. I see hope in the overall reaction to the BLM movement so the bulk of the population is moving in the right direction. We need to focus on the elimination of the corrosive force of the uber-wealthy in our politics.
Excellent comment. I read a lot of history from all times and many different places (read one recently on how the Republic became the Empire) I agree one hundred percent with your observation of how the powerful operate and they have done this from the time of the agricultural revolution. I am in Oregon and we have seen in the latest problem, the horrible fires, all sorts of assertions and rumors. We have seen armed militia out stopping people on public roads and confronting a local school superintendent who was out checking on his buildings among some other incidents. Fortunately, no one has been killed. I hope that it remains that way.
Like Joan said, when things get bad, the people WILL take to the streets. I think what we saw with the demonstrations around the Floyd killing might just be the beginning of the re-awakening of activism in this country. If Trump were to "win" again, especially if he refuses to respect the election outcome if it goes against him, I think the turnouts of protests might just be epic and make the demonstrations of this summer look like a garden party. "We who are hopeful" can become "we who are hopeful AND pissed off" in the blink of an eye. Belarus HAS to be making Putin sit up and take notice.
Lukashenko has been in power for 26 years. I don't believe people here can replicate that, hope I am wrong. May be it will take 8 years of Mike Pompeo at the very least and some Tom Cotton mixed in.
Thank you, once again, for the clarity and concise recap of the day's doings.
Amanpour & Co. had an interview on recently about how we are being manipulated by algorithms, from Facebook to Youtube, and are being offered our own personal realities. We've talked about this in this forum before, but according to the guests, who have done a documentary (The Social Dilemma) on it, we are in deeper danger than most of us have realized. You can catch the clip here:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fKHGrhZxE3Y&t=1s
We often chalk up the current polarization to Fox News, etc., but the ability of social media to micro-target each user is astounding. Because of the human proclivity to gravitate to people, situations, etc. that reinforce our beliefs and prejudices, the algorithms do, in fact, create not just broad bubbles of belief, but individual bubbles for us to swim in.
When I was a young adult, there was a fear about government learning too much about you, and the power that would give them over our lives. Now we give away this power - this personal, intimate information - to corporations without a second thought. And they monetize it to reap profits off our clicks!
The Michael Caputo story really brought this home to me. Not that I wasn't aware of the silos we're all living in, but somehow I guess I minimized the danger until now. No wonder we can't talk to Uncle Henry at Thanksgiving!
Hari Srinivarsen made the comment, shared by many I think, "Isn't this just a tool, and can used for good or ill?" Tristan, one of the guests, who had worked for Google at one point, pointed out that a hammer is just a tool. But the hammer is directed by you, the user; you decide what you're going to hit with it. With these algorithms, that choice is taken away from you (I would say YOU are the tool). Suddenly, the hammer/tool is in control, not you. That's a helluva difference, and one we don't usually think about.
Has no one else watch “The Matrix” or “Terminator?” They pretty much run down what happens when we make robots more intelligent than us. And, seeing all the ignorant ppl today makes me feel that won’t be too hard to do.
I will watch the clip after work today. But I also became aware of a tactic Qanon uses to suck in further those who take the bite, a video game, with what I believe could be described as subliminals.
Early on in the Internet age, I discovered by Googling my name that every little off-hand comment made on a forum board and even paper letters to editors (newspapers were putting their stuff online) would pop up. That is when my screen name Shale Sandstone, came into use for my more risqué, gay or nudist posts.
Here is an example. I have AT&T, which uses Yahoo web mailer. Yesterday I sent an e-mail out with the Subject: QAnon - A Dangerous Idiocy. Today in the Ads that Yahoo puts on top of my inbox was an e-mail "Trump MAGA Committee" with a Subject: "Share your thoughts with the president" & first line "As One of Our Top Supporters..."
Damned 'bots read at least your e-mail subject line and extrapolate that anyone mentioning QAnon would be an Idiot who wanted something from the Asswipe occupying the White House.
Martial law is something that in the 1970s, I read was happening in Third World countries far away.
Now looking at the spectre of martial law in November 2020, my first thought was how to prepare. I am not an alarmist, but I do prefer to err on the side of caution. The ultra right preppers are prepared. Stock up at home, have alternative electric power back up, gas in the car, network with friends and family...
And look up the definition on Wikipedia. But first in the search came this article titled "Martial Law in the United States: Its Meaning, Its History, and Why the President Can’t Declare It" with the introductory summary, "the president lacks the authority to declare it." Relief! Except...
The author answers the question, can the president unilaterally declare martial law, with a "no:"
"Because the Constitution does not give the president 'conclusive and preclusive' authority over the domestic use of the military — and, on the contrary, explicitly vests power in the legislative branch — the president cannot act against Congress’s wishes in this area. Accordingly, a unilateral declaration of martial law by the president today — on the southern border or elsewhere — would not survive a legal challenge under Youngstown."
The author has a more recent brief article titled "Martial Law Explained," in which he reiterates, " "under Youngstown, the president would not have the constitutional authority to override the restrictions Congress has put in place, and a unilateral declaration of martial law would not survive a legal challenge."
Reasonable people see that an action will not be upheld in a court and therefore don't do it. We have see that trump aggressively disregards the law and acts first with no regard. Trump's minions are currently setting it up. Don't we have to assume that trump will unilaterally declare martial law to create chaos and destruction until a court issues a finding--after the fact--that the president does not have such authority?
In any event, separate from deploying the Armed Forces, we have seen this year how trump will exploit executive branch authority over federal law enforcement to bypass the Posse Comitatus Act whereby it is unlawful for federal military forces to engage in civilian law enforcement activities. Federal agents in high tech commando gear snatched civilians off the street, and I, for one, never heard explanation of what happened to these people while detained. The events were closer to martial law than any of us wants to see.
I am hoping that HCR and fellow readers dive into this issue, hopefully with assurance of how it cannot happen, or at least with clarity as to how it would be possible so that we can best prepare.
Ugh. This is getting uglier by the day. It's going to be a long couple of weeks until election day. Who knows what after that...
The killing of Reinoehl certainly looked like retribution from a federal hit squad when it happened, but seemed to pass from the news cycle without much interest. This is the first detail of the incident I'm seeing, and it's frightening and shocking.
What's really sticking in my craw is Roger Stone. That man is truly a public menace. Not only should he be jailed, he ought to be exiled from this country as well. It's not at all surprising he was involved in the Brooks Brother riot of the 2000 election. That entire Florida vote was a sham and a farce, and grieves me to this day. Imagine if 20 years ago the presidency went to Al Gore, the likely winner of most votes, who wrote a book and made a movie about the danger of global warming, instead of handing it to a bumbling shill for the petroligarchy, who took us to war in the middle east to try to lock down the supply of crude oil for our insatiable thirst? This question haunts me. And the Brooks Brothers riot was the turning point, where those ideological bastards, pardon my French, physically interfered in the vote count to stop the fair election result from becoming known. By stopping the count at that crucial moment allowed for the introduction of legal arguments to discontinue the count that went right up to the Supreme Court, where Bush effectively won that election by one vote. And now the West Coast burns. Thanks Roger :/. I have nothing but bad feelings toward that despicable person.
Heather - this is the most frightening post that I've read of yours, and it completely tracks my understanding of what is going on. They've done the work to completely undermine the free press and to distrust all the fundamental institutions that we rely on for civil society, and they are now laying the ground work for violence in the streets and to ignore the results of the election. We are on the verge.
I read an article in The Guardian yesterday about the rise of QAnon and it really set me off. I read about the unhinges rant that Caputo went on. I took half an Ambien, just to try to sleep. Today’s Letter, as always, helps me put it all in context. Never give up. Thinking of all of you in the path of Hurricane Sally and the fires out West.
Our Challenge Is To Hold Onto Our Hope And Our Outrage Without Being Hijacked By Our Fears.
I take inspiration from John Lewis. He never gave up hope, even after being arrested 40+ times, and suffering numerous beatings. Stay Strong! We can do this!
This morning I watched Morning Joe. Guests were Masha Gessen, Jeffrey Goldberg and Anne Applebaum. All three have newly released books about authoritarianism and how tRump is moving toward that. And I cried OUT LOUD to the TV: enough already. My consciousness is raised almost to the point of panic. What I want now from all these people and the interviewers and the mainstream media is a damn plan. What are we going to do now? Not just vote. Last time the media covered every fart that tRump made and he got so much exposure that it helped get him elected. Now, knowing that our democracy is on the line all these folks have the responsibility to do something. Yes, we can vote, but with the voter suppression and other nasty tactics it may not be enough and with these maniacs advocating violence, we are entering a very dangerous time.
Sounds like we have a bunch of cornered rabid dogs here: boast, bluster, threat, rage, foaming at the mouth and ranting. Keep them surrounded in the corner and clinically pick them off one-by-one while protecting everyone from their murderous intentions.
There's is not a cureable disease once the infection gets to this advanced stage. They need to be permanently isolated from society....as we would with any member of a group betraying attacking and killing his fellows. Thereafterwards a program of vaccination can truly begin to ensure the disease is eradicated and no one ever sinks into such a pitifull state of intellectual inertia, material decadence, emotional chaos and spiritual decay again.
Heather, thank you again for the clear road map. I am finding it harder as the days progress to keep a positive outlook. Oddly, as long as trump opens his mouth, the more he shovels shit over facts. I know there is nothing that would change the mind of a trumper at this point, unless trump were to wake up one morning as a black man, so I've basically written then off. I feel the violence, or atleast the idle threat of which may get those Democrats off the couch and out to the polls to vote. The expression "vote as if your life depends on it", should be the battle cry for 2020. More than ever before.
The West Coast is facing multiple and raging forest fires which are threatening communities throughout the region and my heart goes out to those having to flee their homes, the animals trapped and panicking, surrounded by flame and incinerated, those that are further away and put themselves in danger with every breath they take. From this distance seeing photographs of "red sky" in San Fransisco, and not just at night but 24hrs a day, leave me with a similar feeling to the fire at Notre Dame in Paris.
However, on this issue we would be well to remember a couple of less convenient things that are perhaps thought a little inconvenient.
Firstly, any biologist will tell you that the destruction of trees by fire from California to Oregan and beyond is part of the natural process of regeneration. Some trees seed cones only break open under extreme heat! Human settlement is not a factor that nature takes into account. I'm afraid that it is up to us to adapt to nature on this and fit in with its rules.
Secondly, we are not the first peoples to inhabit the west coast and a good look should be taken at the methods used to control the destruction of forests developed by the Native Peoples who have been managing these forests for the last 12-40000 years, depending on which archeologist you follow. They systematically used fire to create small burns that cleared the brush, stopped overcrowding by new shoots aand saved the mature and maturing trees in a relatively open forest. At the time the had the manpower to do the job and maintain their boreal agribusiness. Its is difficult to do this by machine and chemicals create other problems. Man has to get out there to do his bit and allow coexistence in harmony between his activities and the omnipresent and overarching forces of nature. (Those want to read further on this might try Kat Anderson's "Tending the wild". She has been trying to get California to move in this direction for some time.)
It is of course evident that our global economic activities and its effect on climate are making the forest fire problem significantly worse. However, for once there is also a grain of truth that cannot be ignored in what Trump is saying this time about poor forest management and the need to clear the unwanted brush which is feeding the blaze.
At least 40% of the forests out West are under Federal control, and funding has not been sufficient. Maybe if the republicans hadn’t given those huge tax cuts, money could have been spent on caring for our forests.
Unless there is a financial or political advantage to forest fire control in the west the Trump regime including the Senate will not fund it beyond a pocket of PR money.
The BIG picture is Climate Justice and bringing the Fact of climate into mainstream media and the consciousness of the population. The Oil Oligarchy PR campaigns via Government have been effective in promoting denial.
It’s too late to prevent our extinction but there is perhaps time to lessen its speeding onslaught.
Stuart, I would like to suggest that you connect with the FB or IG posts of climate scientist, Katharine Hayhoe for a more inclusive understanding of the wildfires and the myths that are circulating.
She is an excellent source, I agree. She is like the "Heather Cox Richardson of climate science" - my highest compliment! Katharine Hayhoe's Twitter handle is @KHayhoe
She looks extremely interesting.....but it still comes down to managing within nature rather than against it as we do now once we've figured out how to stop mankind totally destroying the planet and extinguishing his race. It is evident that our agricultural practices, industrial production, energy systems and extractive industries are driving the natural systems to overload resulting in changed weather patterns, temperature increases and highly destructive storms etc. I have difficulty accepting that the capitalist system is going to be able to handle the change over to non-destructive and distinctly less global production without the putting in place of extensive regulations and controls but other systems seem much worse. Concommitant with this we are probably going to get a significant erosion of our personnal freedoms and an overbearing emphasis on our "obligations". You put these two elements together "in the ring" and you are likely to get "fireworks". I'm not sure that this is going to happen peaceably and in a harmoniuos fashion for all of the world's population. Significantly greater weight will doubtless be imposed on the developing nations, It is sure, but we are not sitting pretty either!
How it's going to turn out who knows but for the time being it looks like a good moment to head for the hills.
Inclusive of Native American strategies, of course, but demonstrating the complexity of the issue of the wildfires, even if Native American strategies are included.
Your post makes sense to me, but you left out the necessary context for Trump's comments. He is for once pointing to an actual problem, true, but he is also blaming state governments for the mismanagement of federal land. HIs suggestion of raking catches the need for labor intensive activity but not the need for that activity to be well-informed and include well controlled burns. The federal government has not been good at controlled burns in the past. I remember seeing charred mountainsides in one of the western national parks where an attempted burn had gone out of control.
And if you want to read a fascinating description of the methods, to illustrate my point about Native forest management, you should look at the Australian example of what the country looked like when the Europeans first arrived. Bill Gammage quotes the first travellors as describing it as a "Gentleman's Estate" in his book "The Biggest Estate on Earth".
This is the only forum I participate in, so please indulge me for a lengthy note.
As a former debating teacher and so-called expert, I want to put out my general rules of debate in the hope that one of you will be able to pass this on to JB's advisers within the next two weeks.
The first debate is crucial, for it sets the tone; remember Kennedy vs Nixon. Here is my advice:
1. To be on the Defensive means you are losing the debate. To be on the Offensive means you are winning. It's like football; you can only score points when you are on the offense. Don't waste time defending; respond and counter attack. Always try to dictate the topic and direction of discussion. Mohammed Ali won many of his fights by learning his opponent's vulnerabilities and going for them; make a checklist of the most important ones which will score points.
2. Get the audience on your side; remember Ronald Reagan and "There you go again". Your opponent will try to score points by attacking you, twisting facts, making spurious accusations, denying failures, claiming untrue successes, etc. Don't simply deny; that is a mug's game. Laugh and say "There you go again, there's lie number 2,760" or similar. Puncture his balloon.
3. The best precedent you can call upon is Joseph Welch, during the McCarthy hearings. His quote, "Have you no sense of decency, sir?" made nationwide headlines and brought McCarthyism to an abrupt end. When confronted by an outrageous lie or false accusation, simply reply "You know that is totally untrue and it is an insult. Have you no sense of decency, sir?" (I can guarantee it will be the headline of every newspaper the next morning.)
4. If he does not treat you with respect, respond accordingly. Do not call him "Mr President" if possible. If he calls you "Sleepy Joe", use a similar appellation in response; the terms "Conman", "Devious" and "Dopey" come to mind. Remember that he has a very thin skin and is easily riled. He cannot stand confrontation.
5. The final rule of debating is "He who loses his temper loses the argument."
Once again, apologies for this lengthy treatise, but I felt I must somehow make my thoughts public.
An excellent post. THANK you! There is some excellent advice here. However, reading it I kept asking myself several things...
While I agree about the thrust of all 5 points above, I wonder if maybe the times have changed to the point that such things as "There you go again...", or "Have you no decency, sir?", or coming up with some witty rejoinder to a Trump epithet would actually make the "outrage meter" budge at all. This is a different playing field now, certainly from the '50s McCarthy era or '60s Nixon/Kennedy era, and even from the 1980s of Carter/Reagan era. After nearly 4 years of a constant, daily barrage of outrageous, unethical, even unlawful behaviour from Trump & Co., we have become completely inured to anything anyone could say or do anymore. That was then, this is now. Reality has been altered, and not for the better. Actually, I don't see the debates REALLY making much of an impact as in past years. (I tend to think the VP debate could be much more interesting.) I just don't see anything either candidate might do or say anymore that will garner much publicity. Okay, it might generate a headline for a day or two, but then how soon would that be forgotten and added to the huge pile of old news events? Things are coming and going so quickly nowadays, the news cycle changes at such an alarming speed, I don't see "gotcha" moments in debates having that much of an impact now. I do agree that disarming Trump and making him appear even more insane and unstable SHOULD be an easy task, and might further affect him adversely with some swing voters, but overall I think most people already know who they're going to vote for. (I doubt I will watch as I dislike what these "debates" have turned into...but that's a topic for another discussion.) Neither Trump nor Biden impresses me as being successful debaters, and "winning" or "losing" will probably come down to who makes fewer mistakes. Again, thanks for your post!
Thanks for your thoughts. While I may be antedeluvian in my thinking about Reagan or Welch, the one important thing is to keep the debate focused on the topics YOU think will win points and not on those which benefit your opponent. And.....attack, don't defend.
Send to Biden!
I am not on any social net working app so I hope someone else will do so.
Great post - solid advice.
Actually I don't think this is so different. DT has a strong connection with the '50s McCarthy era in Roy Cohn who was sitting right next to Senator McCarthy during those hearings. Roy Cohn was DTs lawyer and the one who taught him to double down no matter what. He was also Rupert Murdoch's lawyer; worked with Roger Stone on the Reagan campaign, and was finally disbarred in 1986 and died of complications of AIDS shortly after.
This is good advice for those of us having to deal with trumpers. Thank you. Biden did very well when he debated Paul Ryan. He won 51% or 32% for Ryan. His acceptance speech was dynamic. Trumpers will think trump won, you can’t convince them nor could you convince me to vote for trump. We’ll see what independents think.
How do we get you into Biden’s Basement for training? This is great and well stated.
I agree!
Here's my little shorthand:
Traitor
Russian
Unfit
Malignant
Putin's Pup.
I change the U to Useful Idiot as in Putin's Useful Idiot
I call him death star donny and mafia don.
Wow. That is great advice! I hope Biden keeps his cool and responds to trump’s lies and quips with your suggestions
Trump literally has no sense of decency. He is invulnerable to shame. He doesn’t like to be mocked by people he respects. I don’t know if he respects Joe enough to let anything he says get under his skin.
I copied this and sent it to a friend who posted it in a way to draw the attention of the Biden campaign. Fingers crossed.
Seriously--can anyone get this to the Biden team?????!!!!
Steven, I was invited to give my opinion in a focus group for Joe Biden for the upcoming debates. I copied and pasted your advice with attribution to you having shared it on this forum. I sincerely hope you are ok with that because I meant no harm.
I, too, am in that loop and invited to give opinions to that focus group. So glad to see you already forwarded SH’s advice. 👍
I am hopeful it will get to him and be helpful. One must fight fire with fire and ensure that DT (delerium tremens?) doesn't get away with his dirty tricks. Remember he is a seasoned TV presenter and he will try to dominate the stage (as he did with Hillary)
I sent your original posting to a friend, who just emailed this to me: "I just pasted his comment in a FB item from the DNC asking what do you want Joe to talk about in the debate. Fingers crossed it gets to him or his handlers.
Thank the former teacher for me!!"
Thank you and the teacher. We will know next week.
Of course. I am honored.
That is terrific advice. Finding one or more "names" to hang on "The Don" is crucial. Why has no-one succeeded before now???? And you are right---this is nothing that approaches a "normal" debate; Trump doesn't understand debate---and HE needs to be hit back hard, figuratively speaking. Go Biden!!
Today seems like the perfect day for this. Here is what Cult45 RRALLY thinks about us and about Trump. (Full of fucks, so if you’re easily offended by language you might want to sit this one out. Even though you really shouldn’t)
From a FB friend who escaped the Trump cult:
“You all don’t get it. I live in Trump country, in the Ozarks in southern Missouri, one of the last places where the KKK still has a relatively strong established presence. They don’t give a shit what Trump does. He’s just something to rally around and hate liberals, that’s it, period. He absolutely realizes that, and plays it up. They love it, he knows they love it, and the fact that people act like it’s anything other than that just proves to them that liberals are idiots, all the more reason for high fives all around.
“If you keep getting caught up in why do they not realize blah blah blah and how can they still back him after blah blah blah, you are not understanding what is the underlying motivating factor of his support. It’s fuck liberals, that’s pretty much it.
“Have you noticed he can do pretty much anything imaginable and they’ll explain some way that rationalizes it that makes zero logical sense? Because they’re not even keeping track of any logical narrative, it’s irrelevant, fuck liberals is the only relevant thing, trust me, I know first hand what I’m talking about. That’s why they just laugh at it all, because you all don’t even realize they really, truly, don’t give a fuck about whatever the conversation is about, it’s just a side mission story that doesn’t really matter anyways. That’s all just trivial details- the economy, health care, whatever. Fuck liberals.
“Look at the thing with not wearing the masks. I can tell you what that’s about. It’s about exposing fear. They’re playing chicken with nature and whoever flinches just moved down their internal pecking order, one step closer to being a liberal.
“You gotta understand the one core value that they hold above all others is hatred for weakness, because that’s what they believe strength is, hatred for weakness. And I mean passionate, sadistic hatred. And I’m not exaggerating. Believe me. Sadistic, passionate hatred, and that’s what proves they’re strong, their passionate hatred for weakness. Sometimes they lump in vulnerability, a compromised circumstance, or an overwhelming circumstance in there with weakness, too, because people tend to start humbling themselves when they’re in those circumstances and that’s an obvious sign of weakness.
“Kindness=weakness. Honesty=weakness. Compromise=weakness. They consider their very existence to be superior in every way to anyone who doesn’t hate weakness as much as they do. They consider liberals to be weak people who are inferior, almost a difference species, and the fact that liberals are so weak is why they have to unite in large numbers. Disgust is a true expression of their natural superiority.
“Go ahead and try to have a logical, rational conversation with them though. Just keep in mind what I said here, and think about it.”
The below is by another author regarding the above:
“This summed up something I’ve been trying to say for years. Because, yes, the cruelty is the point for trump supporters but this is why. “
“This is why there is no bottom of the barrel and why so many of them will tell you he’s been such a successful president. They don’t care that he’s the reason they’re getting fucked in taxes or that his border wall is a failure, they don’t care that he hasn’t managed to really pass any landmark legislation or make good on the promises he made during his campaign. They don’t care because the ONLY measure they’re using to determine how successful he’s been and how much they support him is how much he pisses off or hurts liberals and the more he does it the better he looks to them, the more support they give him and the more bullshit he doubles down on. It’s a never-ending feedback loop and it’s ALL about "the performance" rather than his political promises & results. It’s why we’ve devolved into whatever mess of a country in 2020 with seemingly no rock bottom."
“These are people who don’t understand politics as an entity that actually affects them, they can’t be reasoned with because they know being like that pisses off liberals. It’s honestly the most juvenile, immature tactic that elementary school-aged bullies use, but just as long as they get a rise out of liberals, repeatedly, they'll do it. It’s why so many of them comment on social media “trump 2020″ on posts that aren’t even about politics: because they know just posting that on a tasty video or something will piss off a bunch of liberals. We need to just stop responding to them when they say this type of shit, we need to ignore them, we need to stop giving them the outrage they want. “
“But, of course, we CAN'T do that because ignoring fascism is the same as and just as dangerous as ENABLING it.”
“Most of them don’t even pay attention to what he’s actually does and says; ask them about it–half the time, they don’t even know what you’re taking about. But so long as he’s pissing off liberals (and I’m using the colloquial US definition of “opposite of conservative” here), he’s doing everything they want.
Conservativism in this country has devolved into a movement with no ideals, no principles, nothing at all beyond - hurt the enemy at all cost.”
The truly disturbing aspect of this is I don’t know that I’m even capable of feeling hate. Its a useless emotion that does nothing but cause the hater mental duress while the hated goes along their merry way not even giving a crap that they’re being hated.
Trump supporters are the gathering together of all the people who think they’ve gotten screwed by us, the Liberals. Personally, I’ve never screwed anyone out of anything. And I too have busted my ass and worked my way up in my career. But I work at a desk or in a conference room. I attended an Ivy League university. I live in a (fairly) Liberal state. And no matter how deep the friendships I had before Trump were, they have been destroyed by the the tonic of one man and the weak mindedness of men I thought I knew. It’s crazy to me that I’ve been my very same, very progressive, very Liberal self for 20 years yet not until Trump was that ever a breaking point in friendships.
One interesting note. Of my college educated white Republican women friends EVERY LAST ONE has come to our side. The people are referenced above are ALL men. Both college and non-college educated. The educated ones are ALL religious - Catholic or Evangelical. The non-college ones are not religious. It’s interesting to break down the demographics in ones own circle to see if the national polling is accurate. And it is. 😊
I never considered myself liberal. Registered as a Republican back in the Nixon days but dropped the party when it was taken over by the moral majority. Always voted a split ticket until the last couple of years. All of a sudden, I'm called a liberal because I put country over self & party.
Sad story is my law enforcement (commercial vehicle inspections) son & family are living with me & politics has become heated. This is not the person I raised. Daughter in law has said she follows Trump on Twitter. OMG!!!
I’ve always found it baffling that college educated white men are behind him. I think for some of those it might be anti-choice, others wealth, and there’s always racism, maybe for some on a subconscious level.
It’s ALL about the racism. They won’t admit that that is what it is, but they’re people who feel entitled to their whiteness and superiority.
The thing that just kills me is that Biden is a CRAZY CATHOLIC. He carried his rosary with him always. I’ve seen him cross himself during pressers. So, for THEM to be portraying him as some kind of baby killer (or pedophile or...) is insane. And the fact that people are lapping this up is also insane. Biden literally became pro-choice in this presidential cycle. Wtf?
Not just racism. Misogyny. A female executive friend called it in 2016. She said the male executives looked at voting for him as punishing women.
It is racism and wealth---especially the kind of rapacious accumulation of wealth in the financial sector with the manipulation of everything..... (the curse laid on this country by neo-liberals in financial matters---they are the rotten root [democrats and republicans alike] of the destroyed industrial sector of the American economy) End of rant! (for now....)
I can't even visit some of my relatives now because of the toxic Trump multiplier of Fox News craziness. Before the 2016 election, we simply disagreed about politics and did not discuss it. The last time I saw them, in 2019, I mentionned only that we couldn't talk about politics. The reply was, "If you did, I'd have to throw you out of the house", said in a very hostile tone.
Have you seen *Coastal Elites*? There is a vignette in there you’d probably love! A New Yorker goes home to the Midwest to quarantine with her family. When she walks in, they’re all MAGA. And it goes on from there.
The whole thing is wicked funny.
Not as much here in Texas. I see a lot of women still holding out to remain Republican. Baffling! I hope they are complacent while Democrats vote in mass!
Wow. So this is emotional for them. What pitiable people. What a small life.
totally get this. there is no reasoning, no rational conversation to be had. This is why things like Living Room Conversations are such a joke. What is the point in attempting to have a conversation with someone who's guiding principle is "fuck liberals?"
We had a friend in Louisiana. He is one of my partners fraternity brothers. They’d gone to high school together. He got sucked into Q. We didn’t understand what was going on at he time. He started texting us with crap like *why are you such a libtard* and *pedophile liberal*. Totally weirdo stuff. Now that the Q thing has been *outed*, I totally see what happened to him. He was such a nice guy.
The scariest question we need to ask is..
If Biden is elected, what exactly are we do to do with his base? They’re not going anywhere and, I fear, when Trump loses it will cause them to become even more radicalized. How are these people going to react? How can they be kept in control? Seriously. They’re a whole lot of angry white peoples with guns.
The last point is one that keeps bothering me. The Genie is "out of the bottle' so to speak with the guns. And the four guys with their guns at their unofficial roadblock in the Northwest are quite possibly a harbinger of the future. Would anyone want to be driving around in Oregon in an out of state car just now??????
Thank you for posting this. It's been obvious from early on that this is why his support never wavers, but to hear it articulated by trumplorables was cathartic. This also why liberals should never try to reason with them ever. They will just see it as more weakness and take advantage of it.
Scary. Because, for the most part, it’s true. Especially for those who might recklessly use violence. Hate for Liberals and cruelty are the the toxic fuel of Trumps base.
Today’s HCR’s posting is more confirmation of what I’ve been fearing ever since Charlottesville. Much of this righteous, hot blooded rage has been stirred up by the NRA. Dangerous and Scary.
I hope you mean unrighteous rage, not righteous.
Perhaps I should have said self righteous rage.
I've been asserting this forever. The main m.a. is "stick it to the libtards". That's all. If it gets a rise out of "libruls" then it's okay. Eight years of Bill Clinton and eight years of Barack Obama have helped create these mantras for them, aided and abetted by conservative media. Our society and advancing technology have inadvertently created a wealth of "monsters". How to fight it?
O it was the eight years of Obama that set them into a tailspin. “You got yours. It’s our turn now” is a literal statement we heard from a friend when we were still living in Louisiana.
All I can say is that I’m soooo grateful I finally talked my partner into moving from his native land to mine, Connecticut.
All hail the BLUE STATES! 😊
Yes thank you. When I look at some clips from his rallies, you can see that they are just reacting and responding but not even hearing what he’s saying. It’s very disturbing. A bunch of unthinking drones.
It’s one of the pillars of an autocratic ruler. Give them catchy slogans. Repeat often. They become mantras to the 🐑 🐑 sheep.
*lock her up*
*build the wall*
It has become a cult.
Yes. I grew up where JFK's assassination was celebrated. I've returned to that area, and I've watched as Trump has unleashed and legitimated the same kind of hate. Few Americans grasp what we face and how close a call this is likely to be.
At the moment I'm visiting Portland, OR. We are in an upper class suburb not threatened by the fire. Still, we've had to run air filters 24/7 and tape the fireplace, windows and all but one door to protect ourselves from the smoke. We've left the house only for groceries and worn KN94 masks when we do. And we are among the most privileged.
We are living through a pandemic that in a few weeks will have killed more Americans than died in combat in WWII, the worst economy since the Great Depression, the greatest threat to our democracy since the Civil War, and the greatest climate disaster since the Dust Bowl. And yet the outcome of the election remains very much in doubt.
Staggering, isn’t it? Good luck! My brother is in Salem OR.
Which is where I am. I am looking out the window and still seeing fog. Also doing a rain dance which is supposed to happened in a day or two. I have gardened here for about 50 years and I can speak to climate change. My neighbor has a banana tree (doesn't produce though). In the good days we would get rain by state fair time, the last week of August. Things are bone dry, but there is no wind.
We have a friend who goes fishing a lot with some people of this kind and his description of them is exactly like yours. He has them sitting on bar stools in an alcoholic stupor knowing that they are not doing well, but wanting to blame someone for their failures to get that which, as white males, they feel entitled to. I have a few Trumper friends on FB and for one of them with a big cross hanging around her neck, I am sure that the motivating factor is abortion. She should really read what Woodward says about this in his book. Most of the rest are my poor and poorly educated relatives who have scut jobs, if they have one, and fall prey to QAnon nonsense. They live in southern Illinois and southern Indiana (Terre Haute) which are basically a part of the upper south.
I have not read the book yet... what did he say about abortion? Would love to point it out to some single-issue voters.
Woodward says the mafia don is actually pro-choice. I haven't read the book either, so can't point you in a specific direction. Maddow asked Cohen if he knew of any abortions that mafia don paid for. He didn't.
Michael Cohen has also stated on the record that Trump is pro-choice. He knows because *we used to talk about it*.
Kate Benson, thank you for the most thorough and comprehensible explanation I have seen of the Trump "aura". He is not the spokesman but the mouthpiece for this movement. Putin, Barr, Netanyahu, the NRA and the evangelicals are the puppet masters and pull the strings. It is very scary indeed.
This explains alot. I had a trump friend but when she started being cruel just to be cruel, I broke it off. And the weakness? Yup, that’s totally her thing. Very disturbing.
Thank you Ms. Benson. that was cathartic to read. I stopped trying to reason with them only recently. I believe the way to affect change is to live differently myself, but how? What do we do in the wake of a Biden victory? Continue to grind these people under the heel, as they feel has been done to them for some 15-30 odd years? What does the path to redemption look like?
Here is a great Twitter thread that highlights that there are cracks in *the base*. It’s 5 embeds. Read the first post after his too. Might restore a little hope and curb the fear a bit.
😊
https://mobile.twitter.com/teapainusa/status/1306350341315846145?s=21
This post yunfortunately recalls the passage from the movie "Terminator 1", when John Connor's father explains to Sarah about the Terminator - a cyborg come back from the future to kill her:
"He is out there. He can't be bargained with. He can't be reasoned with. He doesn't feel pity, or remorse, or fear towards you and you absolutely can not stop him"
The future is here. (And B-movies may be more relevant than art films.)
Check out the tee shirt on one of these 'defenders'. It proves Kate's point
https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2020/9/14/1977463/-Armed-vigilantes-set-up-rural-checkpoints-in-Oregon-as-antifa-fires-hoax-inflames-social-media?detail=emaildkre
😞
And that whole situation a shit show. Did you read about the couple that was just there to film,? They were down from Portland. It was the woman’s home town even. They got followed around town by armed mobs. Someone posted on a FB group that they were antifa. They were even wearing PRESS jackets. And it was HER HOME TOWN. Jesus.
American history has managed to largely write out a significant part of antebellum southern history that has a major effect on the Civil War. There were in fact two Souths - the south of the coasts that spread inland with their slaves, and the South founded by the Scotch-Irish who came down through Appalachia from Pennsylvania, the people derisively called "hill billies" by the slaveowners. It's not widely known, but it took Mississippi, Alabama and Tennessee several tries before they suppressed the "hill billy" voters and their anti-slavery representatives so their rump legislatures could pass articles of secession. East Tennessee, northern Alabama, Mississippi and Georgia nearly seceded to create the "State of Nickjack" (based around the Nickajack river). A civil war was fought in the south to fight the Civil War, and in fact about 35-40% of the white southerners fought for the Union. They were suppressed after the war and their history wiped out until it was rediscovered in the late 70s. The South's "history" of the Civil War is nearly completely lies.
As to where we find ourselves today, it's a good idea to keep up with the news from Belarus, because that could be a preview of our Main Attraction.
Slave owners were quite busy trying to keep blacks and poor whites from making common cause against them. This occurred before the Civil War and of course, afterwards. I like the book Saving Savannah, for some enlightenment on how this worked as well as how the city did manage to save itself. There was one county in Alabama that never seceded and I can't tell you which one.
East TN was on the side of the Union in the Civil War. Ps “NickAjack”
There were pockets of resistance to secession in the South here and there. If I remember right, the whole slavery/free state issue was what led to West Virginia's creation. Also, the area of North Carolina that my ancestors hail from (around Chapel Hill) wasn't really enamored with secession, though my great-grandfather enlisted in the CSA once things got underway (and lied about his age so he could sign up--they had to be 16 and he had just turned 15 in 1862). That said, there were some Southern sympathizers in northern states too...thinking especially of central and southern Indiana.
Also southern Ohio was a center of Copperhead activity, as pro-southerners were called in the North.
News today seems to suggest Putin is offering a little money but not cuddles to the Belarus dictator. Russia is waiting to see which way this goes
Um. I think HRC knows this. See her latest book, How the South Won the Civil War.
Thanks Thomas. Appreciate the insight about the two souths (I'm from Arkansas; fortunately on the "fringe") Yes---what is coming down the pike? Not good, I think. With the local "militias" the genie is out of the bottle, so to speak.
That (the anti-slavery South) is very interesting. Are there any books about it?
I would love to put all of you who comment here in one area and make sure I live there also. I want to be among those who are thoughtful and intelligent.
Yes, we could form a commune and call it Heatherton.
We have land in western Massachusetts we’re trying to figure out what to do with. 🤔
The sanity sanctuary?
Well.....? I’m ready.
Hi Kate, I have a friend named Kathie who until about a year ago lived in W MA, might you be related?
I don’t think so. I live in Connecticut. We just have property up there. We’d been planning to get started on it this year and then Covid happened, my partner lost his job and there went that. But anyway, no, sorry, I don’t know her. (I’m Kate Benson (/happygreta on FB and @katiegreenberg on twitter)
I’m becoming very serious about this. I have been considering creating an intentional community somewhere with other people. I think I’m going to fly with this. Anyone who is serious about this can contact me. I’m ready.
I'm afraid I can be only a happy member of a virtual community, Elaine. But if you form a real one somewhere, I would be with you in spirit.
😁
Yes, this daily/nightly gathering around Heather's virtual evening "interpretation" (there has to be a better word, but I can't reach it right now in the back of my mind) is a kind of 'beloved community' Heather has selflessly created a community that has powerful elements of sharing, concern, sympathy, and the rest. I am continually amazed a what rather personal details about lives people have been willing to share with what by all accounts should be called "total strangers". That does not happen often. Peace and Courage this night and all nights to come.---just read another comment below---Heatherton is a great idea!!!
Count me in on this conversation.
My kids have said something similar. Like however this country divides and reconfigures, we need to be with our like minded tribe. 💙
I am a daily reader of the letter (thank you HCR); however, I do not typically read the comments. Today’s letter in reaction to the ever-increasing dark tenor of the right-wing rhetoric, had me go to substack and read all the comments.
This is my first post on this forum. I will apologize in advance if my comments have already been addressed on other days.
People are different...some think and feel differently than others. Some people are curious (this crowd) some, not so much. Throughout history, there is always a segment of the population that is authoritarian...they respond to power and use power, physical and mental, in their own lives. It is also a religious activity as Jeff Sharlott describes. Trolling is always an affirmation of their beliefs without any pushback that they have to emotionally digest. So yes the hashtag #Cult45 is applicable for today’s right-wing crowd. However, if Twitter existed when the Roman republic was transforming into Imperial Rome, #CultCeasar would be trending. I am sure there are historians that will point us to the graffiti saying the same. Therefore, there is always a segment of any population that is easily susceptible to manipulation. Who pulls and how hard is the pulling of their string is the next part of the equation. Cult members are VERY tribal...mine is good, yours is bad -- Black or white.
Divide and conquer is as old as history. The powerful will always use whatever tools available to them to manipulate the population to stay in power and gather more riches.
Starting in the ‘70s, after the turbulent ‘60s, the powerful developed and have enacted a plan to take control of the country. Politics is at its core about money and power.
It takes a concerted effort and a whole lot of money to buy control of the country.
The media has been concentrated into the hand of a very few right-wing owners, Out in the hinterlands, the majority of the media landscape is plutocratic funded propaganda. All of the outlets were not initially profitable, requiring continued fud and many still aren’t profitable.
Radio. Rush is on in every tractor and house on a concentrated right-wing radio network very weekday afternoon. Multiple Rush wannabe shows out there as well.
TV. Fox News is in every house. Sinclair TV stations masquerading as local news with the editorial content provided by a right-wing hack. Infotainment vs news is on all outlets on cable news.
Internet: Multiple right-wing internet sites and shows continue to get funding to exist. Social media is home for right-wing propaganda. The right brain craves confirmation.
Books. The right-wing book market is huge. Mix that in with the religious books as well.
Religion. Sundays are not a day of rest from propaganda. The preachers are now very much into politics. Some living in > $10M homes. The prosperity gospel rules. The right brain craves someone powerful to tell them what to do.
Washington There are multiple right-wing plutocratic funded think tanks: Heritage, Club for Growth etc.. The Supreme Court has been bought to assure corporate power and the wealthy are taken care of. Congress has been bought such that there are not any real anti-monopoly worries. Tax laws are promulgated to enrich the already uber-wealthy. Degreulate vs protection to allow the companies to socialize their externalities. The IRS has been kneecapped so that it does not have the resources to track the wealthy and their tax avoidance schemes. Can’t imagine the amount of money in off-shore tax shelters. There are multiple other examples of regulatory capture that benefit the wealthy. Privatize the profits, socialize the costs.
There has been an all-out assault on the American people for the past 50-60yrs and we see the result.
I am mad as hell and won’t take it anymore. However, I will focus my FDR hate on the pullers of the strings vs the people who are getting their strings pulled. It does not mean that we should not be VERY strong in how we respond to evil or wrongdoing. So many people have had their brains altered. It makes me sad to see extended family members emersed in cult behavior.
Since we are the hopeful types, I see do see hopeful signs out there. It is a good thing that many young folks do not take in a lot of main street media and are less tainted by propaganda. I see hope in the overall reaction to the BLM movement so the bulk of the population is moving in the right direction. We need to focus on the elimination of the corrosive force of the uber-wealthy in our politics.
Excellent comment. I read a lot of history from all times and many different places (read one recently on how the Republic became the Empire) I agree one hundred percent with your observation of how the powerful operate and they have done this from the time of the agricultural revolution. I am in Oregon and we have seen in the latest problem, the horrible fires, all sorts of assertions and rumors. We have seen armed militia out stopping people on public roads and confronting a local school superintendent who was out checking on his buildings among some other incidents. Fortunately, no one has been killed. I hope that it remains that way.
It was very frightening to see police offering water to armed militia and thanking them for help.
Minor versions of this have happened here in Salem.....right wingers being treated with kid gloves.
I have an honest question. What would the people who are hopeful do if trump wins again? Is there a point when hope has no home?
Like Joan said, when things get bad, the people WILL take to the streets. I think what we saw with the demonstrations around the Floyd killing might just be the beginning of the re-awakening of activism in this country. If Trump were to "win" again, especially if he refuses to respect the election outcome if it goes against him, I think the turnouts of protests might just be epic and make the demonstrations of this summer look like a garden party. "We who are hopeful" can become "we who are hopeful AND pissed off" in the blink of an eye. Belarus HAS to be making Putin sit up and take notice.
I hope you’re right. We CANNOT allow this to continue. The total corruption of our government is beyond unacceptable people.
Lukashenko has been in power for 26 years. I don't believe people here can replicate that, hope I am wrong. May be it will take 8 years of Mike Pompeo at the very least and some Tom Cotton mixed in.
See the news about Belarus.
When the perception of democracy is gone it will be hard.
I wonder that too.
Thank you, once again, for the clarity and concise recap of the day's doings.
Amanpour & Co. had an interview on recently about how we are being manipulated by algorithms, from Facebook to Youtube, and are being offered our own personal realities. We've talked about this in this forum before, but according to the guests, who have done a documentary (The Social Dilemma) on it, we are in deeper danger than most of us have realized. You can catch the clip here:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fKHGrhZxE3Y&t=1s
We often chalk up the current polarization to Fox News, etc., but the ability of social media to micro-target each user is astounding. Because of the human proclivity to gravitate to people, situations, etc. that reinforce our beliefs and prejudices, the algorithms do, in fact, create not just broad bubbles of belief, but individual bubbles for us to swim in.
When I was a young adult, there was a fear about government learning too much about you, and the power that would give them over our lives. Now we give away this power - this personal, intimate information - to corporations without a second thought. And they monetize it to reap profits off our clicks!
The Michael Caputo story really brought this home to me. Not that I wasn't aware of the silos we're all living in, but somehow I guess I minimized the danger until now. No wonder we can't talk to Uncle Henry at Thanksgiving!
Ain't technology grand??? It'll be the death of us.
Hari Srinivarsen made the comment, shared by many I think, "Isn't this just a tool, and can used for good or ill?" Tristan, one of the guests, who had worked for Google at one point, pointed out that a hammer is just a tool. But the hammer is directed by you, the user; you decide what you're going to hit with it. With these algorithms, that choice is taken away from you (I would say YOU are the tool). Suddenly, the hammer/tool is in control, not you. That's a helluva difference, and one we don't usually think about.
Has no one else watch “The Matrix” or “Terminator?” They pretty much run down what happens when we make robots more intelligent than us. And, seeing all the ignorant ppl today makes me feel that won’t be too hard to do.
I will watch the clip after work today. But I also became aware of a tactic Qanon uses to suck in further those who take the bite, a video game, with what I believe could be described as subliminals.
Who has privacy now. Anyone can put in my name and get info and thanks to Google find a nice picture of my house.
Early on in the Internet age, I discovered by Googling my name that every little off-hand comment made on a forum board and even paper letters to editors (newspapers were putting their stuff online) would pop up. That is when my screen name Shale Sandstone, came into use for my more risqué, gay or nudist posts.
Here is an example. I have AT&T, which uses Yahoo web mailer. Yesterday I sent an e-mail out with the Subject: QAnon - A Dangerous Idiocy. Today in the Ads that Yahoo puts on top of my inbox was an e-mail "Trump MAGA Committee" with a Subject: "Share your thoughts with the president" & first line "As One of Our Top Supporters..."
Damned 'bots read at least your e-mail subject line and extrapolate that anyone mentioning QAnon would be an Idiot who wanted something from the Asswipe occupying the White House.
What is martial law?
Martial law is something that in the 1970s, I read was happening in Third World countries far away.
Now looking at the spectre of martial law in November 2020, my first thought was how to prepare. I am not an alarmist, but I do prefer to err on the side of caution. The ultra right preppers are prepared. Stock up at home, have alternative electric power back up, gas in the car, network with friends and family...
And look up the definition on Wikipedia. But first in the search came this article titled "Martial Law in the United States: Its Meaning, Its History, and Why the President Can’t Declare It" with the introductory summary, "the president lacks the authority to declare it." Relief! Except...
The author answers the question, can the president unilaterally declare martial law, with a "no:"
"Because the Constitution does not give the president 'conclusive and preclusive' authority over the domestic use of the military — and, on the contrary, explicitly vests power in the legislative branch — the president cannot act against Congress’s wishes in this area. Accordingly, a unilateral declaration of martial law by the president today — on the southern border or elsewhere — would not survive a legal challenge under Youngstown."
The author has a more recent brief article titled "Martial Law Explained," in which he reiterates, " "under Youngstown, the president would not have the constitutional authority to override the restrictions Congress has put in place, and a unilateral declaration of martial law would not survive a legal challenge."
Reasonable people see that an action will not be upheld in a court and therefore don't do it. We have see that trump aggressively disregards the law and acts first with no regard. Trump's minions are currently setting it up. Don't we have to assume that trump will unilaterally declare martial law to create chaos and destruction until a court issues a finding--after the fact--that the president does not have such authority?
In any event, separate from deploying the Armed Forces, we have seen this year how trump will exploit executive branch authority over federal law enforcement to bypass the Posse Comitatus Act whereby it is unlawful for federal military forces to engage in civilian law enforcement activities. Federal agents in high tech commando gear snatched civilians off the street, and I, for one, never heard explanation of what happened to these people while detained. The events were closer to martial law than any of us wants to see.
I am hoping that HCR and fellow readers dive into this issue, hopefully with assurance of how it cannot happen, or at least with clarity as to how it would be possible so that we can best prepare.
https://www.brennancenter.org/our-work/research-reports/martial-law-united-states-its-meaning-its-history-and-why-president-cant
https://www.brennancenter.org/our-work/research-reports/martial-law-explained
Ugh. This is getting uglier by the day. It's going to be a long couple of weeks until election day. Who knows what after that...
The killing of Reinoehl certainly looked like retribution from a federal hit squad when it happened, but seemed to pass from the news cycle without much interest. This is the first detail of the incident I'm seeing, and it's frightening and shocking.
What's really sticking in my craw is Roger Stone. That man is truly a public menace. Not only should he be jailed, he ought to be exiled from this country as well. It's not at all surprising he was involved in the Brooks Brother riot of the 2000 election. That entire Florida vote was a sham and a farce, and grieves me to this day. Imagine if 20 years ago the presidency went to Al Gore, the likely winner of most votes, who wrote a book and made a movie about the danger of global warming, instead of handing it to a bumbling shill for the petroligarchy, who took us to war in the middle east to try to lock down the supply of crude oil for our insatiable thirst? This question haunts me. And the Brooks Brothers riot was the turning point, where those ideological bastards, pardon my French, physically interfered in the vote count to stop the fair election result from becoming known. By stopping the count at that crucial moment allowed for the introduction of legal arguments to discontinue the count that went right up to the Supreme Court, where Bush effectively won that election by one vote. And now the West Coast burns. Thanks Roger :/. I have nothing but bad feelings toward that despicable person.
Send them all to Jeffrey Epstein's island.
Too luxurious for them. But they might experience a nice climate change fueled hurricane.
Heather - this is the most frightening post that I've read of yours, and it completely tracks my understanding of what is going on. They've done the work to completely undermine the free press and to distrust all the fundamental institutions that we rely on for civil society, and they are now laying the ground work for violence in the streets and to ignore the results of the election. We are on the verge.
I read an article in The Guardian yesterday about the rise of QAnon and it really set me off. I read about the unhinges rant that Caputo went on. I took half an Ambien, just to try to sleep. Today’s Letter, as always, helps me put it all in context. Never give up. Thinking of all of you in the path of Hurricane Sally and the fires out West.
Our Challenge Is To Hold Onto Our Hope And Our Outrage Without Being Hijacked By Our Fears.
I take inspiration from John Lewis. He never gave up hope, even after being arrested 40+ times, and suffering numerous beatings. Stay Strong! We can do this!
The Biggest story today is Trumps denial that the science of climate is not accurate!
Trump has proclaimed that he will decide if science is accurate and as such he will not lead America and the world toward a slower extinction.
Climate justice must be named,enabled and fought for all of our days that we have left.
This morning I watched Morning Joe. Guests were Masha Gessen, Jeffrey Goldberg and Anne Applebaum. All three have newly released books about authoritarianism and how tRump is moving toward that. And I cried OUT LOUD to the TV: enough already. My consciousness is raised almost to the point of panic. What I want now from all these people and the interviewers and the mainstream media is a damn plan. What are we going to do now? Not just vote. Last time the media covered every fart that tRump made and he got so much exposure that it helped get him elected. Now, knowing that our democracy is on the line all these folks have the responsibility to do something. Yes, we can vote, but with the voter suppression and other nasty tactics it may not be enough and with these maniacs advocating violence, we are entering a very dangerous time.
Sounds like we have a bunch of cornered rabid dogs here: boast, bluster, threat, rage, foaming at the mouth and ranting. Keep them surrounded in the corner and clinically pick them off one-by-one while protecting everyone from their murderous intentions.
There's is not a cureable disease once the infection gets to this advanced stage. They need to be permanently isolated from society....as we would with any member of a group betraying attacking and killing his fellows. Thereafterwards a program of vaccination can truly begin to ensure the disease is eradicated and no one ever sinks into such a pitifull state of intellectual inertia, material decadence, emotional chaos and spiritual decay again.
Heather, thank you again for the clear road map. I am finding it harder as the days progress to keep a positive outlook. Oddly, as long as trump opens his mouth, the more he shovels shit over facts. I know there is nothing that would change the mind of a trumper at this point, unless trump were to wake up one morning as a black man, so I've basically written then off. I feel the violence, or atleast the idle threat of which may get those Democrats off the couch and out to the polls to vote. The expression "vote as if your life depends on it", should be the battle cry for 2020. More than ever before.
The West Coast is facing multiple and raging forest fires which are threatening communities throughout the region and my heart goes out to those having to flee their homes, the animals trapped and panicking, surrounded by flame and incinerated, those that are further away and put themselves in danger with every breath they take. From this distance seeing photographs of "red sky" in San Fransisco, and not just at night but 24hrs a day, leave me with a similar feeling to the fire at Notre Dame in Paris.
However, on this issue we would be well to remember a couple of less convenient things that are perhaps thought a little inconvenient.
Firstly, any biologist will tell you that the destruction of trees by fire from California to Oregan and beyond is part of the natural process of regeneration. Some trees seed cones only break open under extreme heat! Human settlement is not a factor that nature takes into account. I'm afraid that it is up to us to adapt to nature on this and fit in with its rules.
Secondly, we are not the first peoples to inhabit the west coast and a good look should be taken at the methods used to control the destruction of forests developed by the Native Peoples who have been managing these forests for the last 12-40000 years, depending on which archeologist you follow. They systematically used fire to create small burns that cleared the brush, stopped overcrowding by new shoots aand saved the mature and maturing trees in a relatively open forest. At the time the had the manpower to do the job and maintain their boreal agribusiness. Its is difficult to do this by machine and chemicals create other problems. Man has to get out there to do his bit and allow coexistence in harmony between his activities and the omnipresent and overarching forces of nature. (Those want to read further on this might try Kat Anderson's "Tending the wild". She has been trying to get California to move in this direction for some time.)
It is of course evident that our global economic activities and its effect on climate are making the forest fire problem significantly worse. However, for once there is also a grain of truth that cannot be ignored in what Trump is saying this time about poor forest management and the need to clear the unwanted brush which is feeding the blaze.
At least 40% of the forests out West are under Federal control, and funding has not been sufficient. Maybe if the republicans hadn’t given those huge tax cuts, money could have been spent on caring for our forests.
Unless there is a financial or political advantage to forest fire control in the west the Trump regime including the Senate will not fund it beyond a pocket of PR money.
The BIG picture is Climate Justice and bringing the Fact of climate into mainstream media and the consciousness of the population. The Oil Oligarchy PR campaigns via Government have been effective in promoting denial.
It’s too late to prevent our extinction but there is perhaps time to lessen its speeding onslaught.
That's a feature, not a bug, from their point of view. Cutting taxes on the wealthy is intended to have the effect of starving domestic expenses.
Stuart, I would like to suggest that you connect with the FB or IG posts of climate scientist, Katharine Hayhoe for a more inclusive understanding of the wildfires and the myths that are circulating.
She is an excellent source, I agree. She is like the "Heather Cox Richardson of climate science" - my highest compliment! Katharine Hayhoe's Twitter handle is @KHayhoe
Here is a link to her twitter thread on the wildfires: https://twitter.com/KHayhoe/status/1305566962815295489?s=20&fbclid=IwAR17mV0lqR5v8JYTcOVvwrRVGYTl6tVwSt_Fpy_9JKnyoUkYixqYmCmhhAg
She looks extremely interesting.....but it still comes down to managing within nature rather than against it as we do now once we've figured out how to stop mankind totally destroying the planet and extinguishing his race. It is evident that our agricultural practices, industrial production, energy systems and extractive industries are driving the natural systems to overload resulting in changed weather patterns, temperature increases and highly destructive storms etc. I have difficulty accepting that the capitalist system is going to be able to handle the change over to non-destructive and distinctly less global production without the putting in place of extensive regulations and controls but other systems seem much worse. Concommitant with this we are probably going to get a significant erosion of our personnal freedoms and an overbearing emphasis on our "obligations". You put these two elements together "in the ring" and you are likely to get "fireworks". I'm not sure that this is going to happen peaceably and in a harmoniuos fashion for all of the world's population. Significantly greater weight will doubtless be imposed on the developing nations, It is sure, but we are not sitting pretty either!
How it's going to turn out who knows but for the time being it looks like a good moment to head for the hills.
Inclusive of whom? Native Americans? Or are we saying that their previous good experience is nothing compared to the mess we have made?
Inclusive of Native American strategies, of course, but demonstrating the complexity of the issue of the wildfires, even if Native American strategies are included.
Sorry, I meant Twitter account, not IG.
No problem! I'll check her out.
Was it you who recommended Tim Snyder? I’m 3 books in and they’re great. Terrifying, but great.
I did recommend it ...but i think i first heard it here from someone else. Part of the what we bring to each other around HCR.
He is one of our favorite authors and we recommend his books constantly and mention his observations when we can. And yes, they are terrifying.
Your post makes sense to me, but you left out the necessary context for Trump's comments. He is for once pointing to an actual problem, true, but he is also blaming state governments for the mismanagement of federal land. HIs suggestion of raking catches the need for labor intensive activity but not the need for that activity to be well-informed and include well controlled burns. The federal government has not been good at controlled burns in the past. I remember seeing charred mountainsides in one of the western national parks where an attempted burn had gone out of control.
And if you want to read a fascinating description of the methods, to illustrate my point about Native forest management, you should look at the Australian example of what the country looked like when the Europeans first arrived. Bill Gammage quotes the first travellors as describing it as a "Gentleman's Estate" in his book "The Biggest Estate on Earth".
I have a note posted on my refrigerator, “The answer is usually somewhere in the middle”.
Thanks for your thorough and well researched thoughts on this tragedy.