Today, House minority leader Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) and Representative Elise Stefanik (R-NY), who took over as the chair of the House Republican Conference after the party rejected Representative Liz Cheney (R-WY) for her refusal to back the January 6 insurrection, released the House Republicans’ plan for the country.
A document only morons, er, I mean Republicans (no difference actually) could enjoy and believe.
Watch what they do, not what they say. As of tonight 168 Republicans have signed onto legislation in the house to ban abortion nationwide. Watch what they do, not what they say - today a state judge in Arizona said that the new law limiting abortion to the first 15 weeks wasn't as good as the 157 year old law written in 1866 when women couldn't vote and had no voice in government, that bans abortion in all instances without exception, was indeed the law in Arizona.
I'm pretty sure that dumbass just cost Kari Lake and Brett Masters and the QMAGAt running for Secretary of State their races, as well as a couple R congressmen.
“It feels rather as if the Republicans recognize that Biden’s policies are popular, and are hoping that voters haven’t noticed that he is actually putting them in place.”
The Repugs have written an Apologia for President Biden! How generous and kind of the weasels!
But here’s the thing, the MAGA base knows nothing about Biden’s successes in moving the country in the direction Democrats fought hard for (against the very Republicans who now see that this is what the public wants). They watch only propaganda. This “Commitment to America “ is new to them and they will attribute it to GOP efforts instead. There is no amount of doublespeak that they won’t accept. “My Party, My Life”
Well we need a list of these goals and under each one another list of the many times everyone of those lying bturds voted against that goal and publish it far and wide. Proves how they lie ALL the time!
Write all the GOTV postcards you can (Turnabout Project is one source) and take time to check out your local Indivisible chapter. Think of yourself as a front line Ukrainian. We are.
With relational campaigning! Talk to your friends. Ask them to talk to their friends.
I have a Republican friend that I think is going to now hold her nose and vote Democrat because the Republicans are doing such crazy stuff and taking away rights.
I also recommend knowing what messaging works. Attend the Messaging to Win - Mondays at 1pm PT/4pm ET:
Paid for ads??? The GOP pays to run their libelous propaganda ads 24/7 here in rural CD2 Maine. From what I have noted in my lifetime folks leave their tvs on constantly. Repeated over and over, even in the background. I’m quite confident it’s what delivered us 6 more years of Suzy Q
Ugh! What a nightmare she is...I call her “the dangling carrot”. That’s what she does when she’s considering a vote. Gets our hopes up and drops us like a lead balloon.
If only there was a way to get everyone to fact check all statements made by all politicians. I know that everything the democratic politicians say is not always spot on, and they do and say things that bug me, but I have this perception that the MAGA base accepts the MAGA kool aide as the HOLY gospel, never questioning some very disturbing statements of supposed “truth”. I hope I’m wrong….but?
The Dems should have a PR campaign of public mockery of the Republican "Commitment to America" making the points in Heather's post above. The MAGA zealots won't be convinced (or even reached) by it, but, as others have pointed out, the undecideds, or, as I like to say, the "reasonable middle", may be convinced. Hoping, of course, that the reasonable middle exists.
Over the years I have witnessed several instances of prominent right wingers angrily denying that they ever said precisely the words they were previously videoed saying, and the two recordings presented together. That sort of contradiction surely penetrates a MAGA skull or two here and there.
To be fair, modern Republicans tell so many, many lies, it must be pretty tough to keep them all straight.
💯💯 #45 has done this repeatedly. Lied on video and then later on video says exactly the opposite and NEVER gets called on it. Some genius could make a video of all these and call it liar, liar, pants on fire!
So true, the cretins have been sending fund-raising crap to me, with the most egregious lies. They sound like many of the Dem fundraisers, sad to say. The republicans have always accused Dems of what they do. And Frank Luntz taught them how to project as well as anything that Orwell could have imagined.
A peeve of mine…agree. It’s way past the time to reduce the reliance on fund raising for politicians. Outlawing all together would be a very helpful reform.
Absolutely correct. I was speaking to my MAGA neighbor about the “Commitment to America” website and was able to speak to each and every “commitment” listed, and point out how Biden was already doing it. The nabe absolutely shut me down and said I was making it up. I could have pulled out my iPhone and showed him actual facts, but we’ve been down this road before. His cognitive dissonance is crippling and he can’t even have a conversation about the differences without a meltdown. They will never believe Trump’s crimes really happened, but if they do somehow believe it, they’re insistent he is above the law.
They realize the policies and practices are popular (I.e. “small d” democratically supported) but, it is essential to note, they have voted against most of them while touting the benefits to their constituents.
An individual responded to me when trying to "inform" those posting on a legislator's page that my efforts dealing with Orcs wasn't going to go anywhere, now they are Orcs they're lost (those familiar with Lord of the Rings no Orcs used to be humans so a very appropriate analogy).
The Use of Language is the subject of this comment.
Today’s Letter addressed language, the language of the Republican Party’s “Commitment to America”.
What does it say versus what does it mean? HCR wrote the following:
‘Covering just a single page, it presents vague aspirations—many of which Biden has already put in place—but focuses on the radical extremes of the MAGA party while trying to make those extremes sound mild.’
‘…the first topic—making the economy strong—is a paraphrase of what the Biden administration has been doing.’ (Letter)
‘This is quite literally the platform of the Democrats, but while the Republicans offer no actual proposals to contribute to these goals, Biden has taken concrete steps to address inflation …’
(Letter)
“A Future That’s Built on Freedom” is a similar sleight of hand, meaning something far from the freedom of the recent past. Here it means giving parents control over their childrens’ education (more book banning and laws that prohibit teaching subjects that make students “uncomfortable”), “defend[ing] fairness by ensuring that only women can compete in women’s sports” (there’s the anti-trans statement), …’ (Letter)
The Letter takes the Republican Party’s ‘Commitment of America’ apart. What does the paper convey versus what it means.
‘In short, the document feels like the doublespeak from George Orwell’s dystopian novel 1984. To defend the indefensible, Orwell wrote in an essay titled “Politics and the English Language,” “political language has to consist largely of euphemism, question-begging and sheer cloudy vagueness…. The great enemy of clear language is insincerity. (Letter)
Language in divided America is a crucial subject for us to address. It was a crucial subject when Orwell wrote “Politics and the English Language.” First published in 1946.
How do we talk to one another in this divided time? It isn’t only about what they’re saying and writing; What about us? How can we communicate with one another?
How do we talk to one another? Good question. Carefully, politely, using verifiable (and short) statements of facts and by asking uncomplicated questions regarding what should be shared values ie “should the law apply equally to all”?”, “ would you stand in line for ten hours to vote”, “are national secrets important enough to be securely protected?, should the government favor one religion over another?
Do this calmly, no emotion. Do not react offensively to any dumb comment they make in rebuttal You won’t change their minds, but you’ve infected their brains with questions they’ll have wrestle with themselves
Make no enemies, but screw with their heads using facts and logic. Will it work? I don’t know. They’ll probably categorize you as dangerous or formidable
Dave Dalton, I don’t know where you live, but here in Texas, facts are not facts, and logic, well, I really don’t know how to explain it, but it’s not what you think. Some of us here in Texas really believe the stuff put out by Fox, OANN and newsmax. They really sincerely believe that stuff. It’s frightening.
Sigh. It’s true everywhere. This part of our population is quite literally not interested in truth/facts. They are in a cult, happy in the cocoon provided by said cult.
It is not easy, perhaps not even possible, to deal with irrationality that is the product of real, physiological fear, with reason. Facts, logic, and cognitive functions are shut down when chemicals are released into our brains telling us we are in danger. As long as folks are bombarded with fear of the dangers that “others,” be they liberals, socialists, Muslims, Jews, Christians, democrats, republicans, Chinese . . ., they literally cannot hear and act on reason. Calling folks foolish, idiotic, ignorant, or despicable cannot overcome the deep emotions driven by their fears.
I don’t have a magic elixir to soothe the fears that are driving so many of us, but I know that calming those deep, physiological fears has to be a first step to normalizing reason as a civic good and that the fear-based negativity of the Republican Party of today is a major source of our current politics.
I think the evolutionarily older functions of our brain that persist to defend raw survival; fear, hate and greed, and focus on ego, are security flaws in our ability to think rationally and compassionately, and are quite vulnerable to manipulation, as are security flaws in computer systems (very loosely speaking) that allow manipulation by predatory opportunist who seek to control others. We pay far too little attention to this dynamic on a day to day basis.
I think the problem lies in how we misuse those functions. That’s why I strongly advocate for brain health education starting at the earliest ages. Just for example: the brain needs healthy nutrients especially “good lipids” not food dyes. The brain needs a healthy balance of neurotransmitters, not a constant barrage of dopamine from video games The brain makes good neurotransmitter when we connect positively to other beings, so teach prosocial skills. If they’re not getting it at home, teach the skills needed so they can still get what they need to have a healthy brain. We get the brain our environment builds. Give kids a fighting chance to grow up with a healthy one.
I’m born ‘n raised Texan too, and you are absolutely correct. It is like a disease of the brain down here. I’d posit it’s the extreme heat and humidity but not all of us suffer from it!
Absolutely! The Fairness Doctrine must be reinstated to ensure the news is reportedly as truthfully and accurately as possible, not for propaganda, ratings and their bottom line.
I’d like to see Fox Propaganda shut down permanently, and the Murdoch’s imprisoned for the damage they’ve done to this country, thru their greed and power hungry ignorance.
It’s not bad enough Murdoch had to screw up his country, then he had to take his toxicity to the US and UK.
Yes, I understand. It ubiquitous “Facts are dismissed if Fox isn’t the source. Logic is of the Convoluted kind; you know, “ connect these unrelated dots” version. It is frightening. I have found that detailed argument is a waste of energy. No one changes positions or opinion
The best I can do is to use short simple sentences of documented facts, simple questions in a VERY passive aggressive manner to infect their brain with my virus. There is no antidote. They can’t “unhear” it
You've outlined the hard part for us, Dave. It is easy to call 'them' 'morons' and the 'enemy', and self-congratulatory to boot. We've built a high wall between us with our use language. DJT has been a major contributor. This is The WALL, however, on which his name is writ large.
The power of language works when people have a common language, and have a common understanding of events. When a gentle (trust me, I am not always abrasive) suggestion or comment is made and met with a flame of "libtard" or worse, it is hard to establish a conversation. I do not have a common basis for language with these folks; we can use the same words, even in a civil manner (occasionally, mostly with people who know me already) and they do not mean the same things to many of the MAGAts.
My response to accusations like “libtard” is to “not acknowledge” the invective. Just skip right passed it. Continue asking the basic questions of liberty, equality, fairness, rule of law as they grow red-faced ( like their hats)
The wall as been growing for decades and, I'm guessing, got much thicker in the last 7 to 8 years. There is research, which include suggestions about lessening it, some of it published in the last few years. Your experience, Ally, is common. There may be ways forward that we haven't employed. That's what some of us are looking for.
You are right Fern, Trump and the MAGAS have successfully built a metaphorical wall between us.
Between truth and propaganda, between those who believe in the body politic and those who are controlled by fear and hatred.
We need to go over, under and through that wall.
Probably the Dobbs decision gives us more power than we have had in 50 years.
I think the attempted transformation of 1/2 of our people to the legal standing of livestock should be our front line of persuasion. This wall is a powerful illusion but we must reveal it as just that, a lie.
An astute observation, Fern. Dumpster’s Wall of Lies and Bullshit can be seen from space. The final reality flip is that his MAGA faithful, trapped in there, think they’re the ones who understand freedom.
I think denial of climate change is behind some of the fear. As Republicans continue to refuse to say the words and to deny science they become more and more unreachable. After my neighbor told me in all seriousness “God will take care of climate change” (he is a financial advisor), I managed not to do a double take, but recognized that even an intelligent person can be a science denier, so many are even beyond th
But, the interesting context of HCR's points today for me is that,...given the almost identical content of the GOP's "new" platform to the existing one of the Dems that is openly underway,.... if this were really true for the GOP then would it not follow we would really BE the "United" States of America and there would be No Polarization? We would all be believing the same thing!
This should become the Dems new ad campaign going into the midterms and beyond,....So, if you really believe in the things we've been doing, then Join Us! Put up or shut up just as the Judge said to TFG.
BK, The beauty of asking real questions is the dialogue that they may produce; elicit the questions we ourselves have; spur our thinking, and promote sharing the knowledge that we have absorbed. Your insight, BK, is true and one for us to employ. You have taken today's letter one more crucial step forward. Thank you. I hope that you will share it again at the start of the forum, so that more subscribers have the opportunity to read it. Salud!
TY Fern. Being somewhat recent to the posting side of the forum I am not yet familiar with the methods of placement so, please with my nod to your instincts
Interesting in what Pascal has said about the use of persuasion in changing a person’s mind. Unfortunately, in my conversations with these individuals, I am talking to the wind. I am a very patient person who chooses her words carefully without losing my mind. I just lose it...after I have talked to these people!! Until Biden’s Inflation Reduction Act actually starts to produce progress, I simply think we are stuck with this stubborn mentality from the right.
Marlene, Language continues to degrade in US, which I think is very much connected to nature of the divide/politization of the country. Language is another lens through which to see ourselves. May another mirror shed more light? I'm very concerned about the future and about whether the ship of state could turn in a more positive direction in the next couple of years -- no predications here. Organization by the people, much more of it, by groups aimed at health, the environment, personal rights... our own lobbies may be a pro-democracy movement on our agenda.
Marlene, I am laughing for the first time today; there were a couple of narrow smiles, earlier. Wouldn't we be funny, the two of us with gigantic megaphones? I'm shrinking in size everyday!
Carol, in CA we can’t. We are paying premium prices for gas at $5.49 a gal for unleaded and $5.99 or in some places, $6.59! We get screwed by the oil industries that are here. Thus, the push for electric vehicles which none of us can find because they have been bought and won’t he on the sellers market for 2-3 years.
Fern, I travel locally in a wheelchair van which is a service I am grateful for. However, the drivers are not the best at parsing politics, and most seem to be watchers of Fox and Football. I often hear them spout the usual. So, recently someone said to challenge them without anger by asking who, when, where, what. It worked the first time I tried it.
So the driver informed me that all the cities with gun control have the highest crime rate.
I said, "How did you learn that?"
"I didn't," he replied. "I just know it." I do believe he trapped himself because he didn't offer more "advice."
I am so glad I am armed with a new tool and that I don't go bonkers over BS.
Love it! My similar experience party with plenty of alcohol, at least ten years ago. A climate denialist was feeling cornered by some science types, and she felt she had to point out she was a good person who donated large sums to charities. I just listened. It was kind of fascinating. When I could get a word in, I said what convinced me was the ice cores from Antarctica with trapped CO2 bubbles from the atmosphere of thousands of years ago. “What convinced me” was the end of the discussion, no more anger, just get something to eat.
Difficult to communicate when half the country would follow a glittering gold pied piper off the face of the earth. I agree communication is everything, but the liars have been winning at that for decades it now appears. Can facts win?
Right! The scary question is has #45 built the cult momentum to the point they’ll follow the glitterless over the edge? Hitler certainly had no glitter but it was a vastly different era. I’m betting on the appearance of glitter being a requirement. Many of them believe in a country where anyone of them can be #45 if only they can lie and steal their way there.
Thanks for the comment Fern. I've read your past comments and that which follows is likely "preaching to the choir." Maybe the following perspective on "how can we communicate with one another" will resonate with all LFAA subscribers...
Dr. HRC's interview with President Biden emphasized the importance of honor and decency in to accomplish the goals of a democracy. It's ALWAYS more honorable and decent to get beyond anger and frustration in communicating/discussing the best possible solutions to address any issue. That said, of course we will all be angry and frustrated at times-none of us are robots. Periodic "venting" in this venue is therefore to be expected. The thing is, there's not going to be much "communicating" with anyone who is stuck in a mindset of anger.
Imagine the possibilities for our democracy if the basic honor and decency in rising above anger in our communication/debate was more common.
Thank you, John. I think the question of 'how we can communicate with one another' opened a dialogue between us on the forum. We'll continue as we share our thoughts, knowledge, feelings and experiences in communicating 'language'. Language, visuals and movements are our means of communication. How can we not give communication the attention it deserves?
The mindset of anger is continually stoked by #45 and his mob of gangsters. Everything I have read of authoritarianism seems to say that is how they gain power, by stoking anger. Therapists spend their life’s work trying to help folks let go of anger. A person has to want to manage their anger. Most of the “mob” won’t even recognize that anger is their fuel.
Do you not see 'anger' and 'hatred' widespread among Americans, including here on the forum? It has become a form of validation. This does not mean tolerating inequality, white supremacy, racism, elitism... It means addressing how we use language with one another.
If this comment is truly intended to be a response to my comment and not an error of some sort, then we have a “communication” problem. I fail to see any connection between my comment and this response and to be frank, I have learned from our history of communicating that I am not interested in trying.
With patience, open ears and kindness. Listen, listen, listen some more…maybe ask a question or two but stay off the soap box…unless, it’s you who is tasked with being on it.
Propaganda has been very effective, particularly with large numbers whose lives have changed as a result of loss of manufacturing and community, technology, inadequate governmental solutions (at best), Black Money, loss of journalistically based local news, social media, white supremacy/racism, and I add - isolation - to the mix. Propaganda requires a great deal of attention. It has been studied in depth and we need to find 'workable' solutions.
Fern, Orwellian is the “ Inflation Reduction Act” and BBB. Biden’s insane spending has directly contributed to staggering inflation and a lowering of our National standard of living by virtue of a collapse in real earnings. Biden’s energy, public safety, foreign policy and open borders immigration policies are not much better. Dystopian and delusional if you think this administration has advanced our security and our economic vitality. Sadly it has not. My guess is we will see this confirmed soon enough at the polls.
OM goodness, David. Everything you have noted surely belongs on the other side of the aisle.
I'd like to see a better energy policy, too, but compromises were made to have anything at all in the way of improved environmental standards.
Surely you are aware of post-pandemic causes of inflation: shipping and supply delays, corporate profiteering, especially in the fossil fuel segments, China's covid chaos, the war in Ukraine, et al.
Surely you are aware of a rapid return to pre-pandemic employment status. Quite an accomplishment. Especially gas prices have lowered quite a bit, due to Pres Biden's managing of fuel reserves.
I would also like to encourage you to reconsider "open borders." That simply is not true. the Biden administration is dealing as compassionately and LEGALLY as possible with immigration. There is no limit on applications for asylum. Thousands of migrants have been returned to their countries who did not fit the qualifications for refuge. The cruelty of the former administration in their immigration policy will define the Republican party for decades. As will the mad man who was President.
There are a multitude of reasons that immigrants and refugees are applying for entry to the US. Compare our nation to the world as a whole in which masses of people are fleeing warfare, destitution, drought and floods. It bears a universal solution far beyond us by ourselves.
I think you are hinting at a "trickle down" economy as ideal, or Reaganomics. That is what has failed. Therein lies the lowered standard of living, including rotting infrastructure and housing shortages, tainted water and poor health care for poor people.
Compassionate. Total BS. It leaves millions of people we have not vetted rampaging around forever as illegal immigrants. Funny how it’s not compassionate when illegal immigrants go willingly to Sanctuary states. Biden’s economic policies are a disaster. Say what you want about Reagan. I had to leave a private college during Carter as a result of financial distress. The Reagan years were pretty darn good having stated in the whole with nothing. The only reason gas prices are coming down is people can’t afford to drive. Joe’s crazed spending lit the flame. I imagine you see his finest hour surrendering in Afghanistan?
Troll. The inflation being had now is the direct result of over $2T being literally gifted to the GOP's investors who by definition expect results for their investment,... and they got it courtesy of TFG who continued to threaten the Fed to keep rates at zero so he could lay the entire mess at the doorstep of the next admin. Typ GOP playbook stuff as it has been for decades. Next.
I agree BK. David is definitely trolling and/or not making much sense. David, when you throw stuff, check before. Biden left Afghanistan because Trump set a date for withdrawing which the US was obligated to follow. Of course he set the date to occur in the next administration.
I hope you are helping the Afghani refugees settle here. Their lives depend on it.
Chris, I really like your thoughtful comment today. Your phrase “Treating people as abstractions” is a pivot point for much of wisdom we need to lead us out of this morass we are in, this Tower of Babel, if you will. Propaganda’s greatest feature is it’s ability to shorten the cognitive milliseconds we take to form a contextual judgement/status assessments of a person we are encountering in any given situation. Propaganda is perfected in each technological age to shorten this thinking-time, and replace it with pre-formed, manufactured opinions (which often include the time-honored-fear-based label “Enemy”). Stopping to “treat individuals as human beings and not abstractions” takes milliseconds more time, - and courage. And doing it requires risk and effort. Yet it remains the only way out of the mind-prison of propaganda.
Getting to know some background allows for shared empathy before moving to value examinations; which is really what we are all attempting to convey, “ what ARE your values, in your own words?”
Old Moscow mitch-bitch's scamplan to hijack the supreme court by jamming in a bunch of dumbass greedy maggots backfired SPLAT in his turtled contorted puss giving Democrats a gift that will keep on giving right up to this November 8th ! WHOOOO! HOOOOO!
It would seem that some poor souls out "There" were taught to squeeze their nose real tight and hold their mouth closed even tighter and then try to blow real hard until the wax shoots out of their ears...unfortunately there are way to many Blowhards out "There" that blew some of their brains out also!
Their plan for the country isn't a plan at all. It's a facade of lies. It will persuade no one. The abortion ban and threats to Social Security will not be forgotten.
My college pal Tom Cullen lives in LA, I thought you were he. He is both smart and irreverent like you seem to be. He has a Ph.D but whose counting. Your comment is spot-on !!!!!
As a one-time ‘blue water’ sailor, I appreciate having detailed nautical charts and electronic aides on a vexing voyage. President Biden, as captain of our ship of state, has clearly established an appropriate course which, as circumstances required, was adjusted midstream. His crew (the Democratic Congress), while encountering some back winds, has provided fulsome support to their skipper.
Trump has never relied on charts or electronic aides in office or afterwards. As president, He led our ship of state onto rocks on various occasions. As ex-president on policy he has been as vacuous as would-be-Senate-Majority-Leader-McConnell.
Two wannabe-leaders of the House, McCarthy and Stefanik (who replaced Liz Cheney in Republican House leadership) have now presented a one page Commitment to America ‘policy paper’ that reads like it was scribbled on a napkin after a boisterous night of drinking.
I would consider this ludicrous, were it not the only purported ship of state nautical charts provided by Republican ‘leadership.’ I find it frightening as indicative of a rudderless Republican ship of state.
“Trump has never relied on charts or electronic aides in office or afterwards.” I do recall one exception, Keith: remember that weather map that he Sharpied to prove his off-course assertion that hurricane Dorian was heading to Alabama? While a potentially life-threatening hurricane was headed to the Carolinas, he continued displaying his doctored map for several days, forcing National Weather Service personnel to rush multiple corrections to alert those residing on the storm’s factually chartered path. But I’m sure you are correct, Keith: he doesn’t rely on any source of universally accepted knowledge. (BTW, I ’d love to see him try to identify 10 of the states in an unlabeled U.S. map 😉)
I do not think he could. There are numerous things many of us can do and things we understand that he does not have the slightest clue about. I am not exaggerating. It is astonishing.
Since the ex president thinks bleach could cure COVID, it is highly unlikely that he could pass the citizenship test. Probably lots of his base couldn’t either.
Joan NO! The only thing Trump knows about checks and balances [the constitutional interrelationship between the Executive, Legislature, and Judiciary] is what Wissenburg (in court with a guilty plea) the financial wizard at The Trump Organization, tried to explain to him in Checkbook 101. [Trump flunked.]
Nonetheless, November gives Palin one more bite at the apple. Let's hope that she's widely enough disliked (as has been expressed elsewhere following the primary) that she'll lose once again.
All members of the House and Senate should be required to pass a citizenship test. Do they even understand the structure of our government? How can they swear to uphold the Constitution when they don't even know what it says?!
Rose Thanks for your Sharpie-eyed remembrance. I believe that Trump might be able to identify FL & NY. On a blank global map, I am certain that he couldn’t locate Ukraine. And, as he explained to Xi, it was fortunate that India didn’t have a common border with China. [Are their troops fighting in some video game?]
Keith, brilliantly written and honestly expressing the sad reality of the Republican party as well as describing the leadership of the captain of our ship of state. He knows how to navigate. He loves this country....he respects the ideal of democracy. His leadership is inspiring.....and I also have to include thank you to the many young men and women who are working hard beside him for the healthy growth and well-being of our nation and the world. They are being encouraged by a great mentor....actually President Joe Biden is providing proof that democracy works!
Frightening. So frightening. Especially after viewing 6 hours of Ken Burns documenting the rise of the Nazi party in Germany and the massive sympathy/ disinterest here. The refusal to see the news that was in papers daily. And then there was Lindberg and his adoring followers. We seem to be that same country today. Sleepwalking into right wing vision.
That feeling of “Oh Sh*t! We are doing the same thing today!” was my immediate reaction. Then it gave me a really weird calming feeling. All my marching, protesting, letter-writing, donating, and engaging have been what I should have been doing, because this thing is REAL, this fight, this creep of fascism, this fragility of democracy, is REAL. I don’t know how this will all turn out, but I want my grandchildren to say “She didn’t just sit around complaining!”
By calmness I meant my seeing the similarities to the 1930’s and the people who protested then, affirmed my belief that action needs to happen. We are not delusional, or histrionic, which is something I often hear. No. This is real.
What really struck me was not just the parallels, but the MAGA repetition of the isolationists’ “America First” and the tiki torches March in Charlottesville. I hadn’t realized how closely the MAGAs copied Hitler.
Always appreciate your input to the discussion, Keith. The American people are a practical group not tied to class restrictions. Depending on their internal compass, perhaps, mostly forged in their mother’s womb, they make most of their decisions. They know they need to be honest, even when they break rules and then, either choose to own up ...or choose to keep breaking them. Arguments are generally avoided...most every one just wants to peacefully get through their day and feel good about their behavior and interactions with others. Fighting happens when emotions become overly charged but rarely change how anyone behaves since they find change so difficult and often very repellent. Most Americans like to make their own changes. Many do it through education, contemplation, others through upbringing and life experience, inside a free society ...what works, and what doesn’t ...is the approach, almost everyone follows if they’re mentally capable of doing so.
Biden and his large team of government leaders are on a solid path; they’re making real progress and, even better, they’re animated and inspired by the biggest accomplishments of past administrations and their own solid internal compasses. They’re also pretty clear about not repeating the errors of their predecessors; they’ll make their own along the way. They’ve made a few, but they keep trying to correct course and they’ve succeeded many times in doing so. They’re very effective in a crisis; experience counts very much along with solid problem solving skills. It’s pretty plain to see. There’s a lot to still accomplish. Joe and his team are on course to doing a lot more. The midterms are a very good litmus test for how practical Americans really are. After all the din and roar and chicanery of the republicans... what have they accomplished for the American people? Let’s see how American citizens, who make the effort to vote, actually decide things.
But I, who loves to parse words and do research, taking a quick read of the Repub “platform,” have to say, it sounds good. Who could argue with the thoughts and goals? But unless you also read the words and know what the ideas really mean, and most of all compare them to past and current actions, you could think the repubs have come to their senses.
MLM Of course you couldn’t parse the words in the 2020 Republican presidential convention party platform since, for the first time in my memory, they chose not to have one. [Might there have been a footnote: ‘See Trump Tweats for Republican policy?’]
And therein lies the place we all need to really get to in all public discourse. Honest dialogue about past and current actions - and intent! The truth is that most human beings are closer in hopes and dreams than we are apart. Getting to that field where we can honestly have those discussions and debates -with civility and no guns - seems to be the absolute essential thing we are kept from naturally doing for our survival. Mother Earth will endure no matter what. Humans? …………..we keep being compelled to make a “Hell of Heaven”.
I thought it was interesting yesterday listening to McCarthy say that they were wanting to bring the economy back to the robust years before the pandemic. My mind immediately said “Thanks to Obama!” The former guy’s economy was in good, steady shape. It was his to F-up, which his choices did. Neither Obama, nor Biden inherited such a gifted, steady economy. Yet had to spend their first years heaving it out of deep abysses the previous administrations drove it into.
I enjoyed your navigation analogy being a blue water sailor myself. I hope our fellow citizens do not lose their point of sail and get themselves stuck in the doldrums of inaction.
Adjusting sails is continually needed. We just need to keep a steady course to the port of call - Winning in November.
Don't forget, tfg wanted to detonate a nuclear weapon inside of a hurricane, thought he could adjust the course of a storm with a Sharpie on a map, and claims he can declassify Top Secret National Intelligence documents by simply thinking about it.
And let us not forget that Rick Scott has presented an R platform that clearly lays out the details behind this one page "policy paper." Everyone in the R cult is trying hard to pretend it does not exist, but...too late. The genie is out of the bottle.
How can you say he didn’t rely on charts or electronic aides in office? He used his sharpie during the hurricane and Stephen Miller was a droid on the Death Star before hitching his wagon to the Dumpster Fire.
I'm going out on a limb here. Maybe I'm seeing a convergence of views between Heather here, today's Opinion Piece on the predecessor to the Big Lie being the Big Joke, and David Brooks on Washington Week last night. Or, it might just be me seeing the obvious that everyone else has knownall along. Brooks got me piecing some stuff on my Friday night walk.
David Brooks suggested this speech as the Republican twitching (my word) to becoming the party of the working man (albeit that there are working women). I think there might be something here. I reflect here on that twitch.
Democrats propose and tell you what they are doing (you need?) and the working man wants to know how their leader will manage or what they will manage. We think everyone wants or needs to know what we will do and why. All voices need to be heard and everyone gets to talk about the best way and the best measure and how to calculate and have the right sampling of our choice democratic demographics, etc.
Their new swing, probably apparent in much of the MAGA stuff, is in taping into voter imagining, not bogging down of the nuances or nitty gritty or which of what we said we would do to make the price of gas or groceries or how fast some thing from Amazon gets delivered or whether there will be enough Cabagge Patch Dolls available by December 15th (OK, I am showing my age). This twist is from what we will do (a detailed platform) to what we will (vaguely and perhaps contradictory to what we would makes connections to) promise. I think it a Platform of Euphemisms, but I'm an old progressive, number cruncher. Later, they know they can find the data points to match the broad promises or just drop them for another one or two to repeat and hammer at as success (e.g., how the economy took off after Trump got elected based upon the stock market or minority economic improvement basf upon a small improvement in employment rate as boomers left jobs and a slight rise in hourly wage rates).
I think this swing (or twitch) could be big. It may just work with the demographics we have targeted, nurtured, and counted on at the voting booth. It might explain why rural America went Red in the North and West. Or why Blacks and Hispanic voters are slipping away. We are the party of doing things, but not connecting what we did to the tapestry that working class folks just pay attention to. We over inform with the facts and fail in forming the message. We analyze and argue about methodology, data quality, and under-deliver in discussion, interpretation, and application (relevance, what's improved?). We count on numbers to deliver and fail to realize that the folks who vote do so based upon conclusions that are shared with them. What does it mean, not what did you find against some purist criteria? They don't live by the numbers or vote by the numbers for each promise, but rather on how your interpretation, the application, is convincing to them.
Call that dummying it all down, but the average voter (I'm tweaking us here) votes on how they feel what you tell them supports their belief or macro-understanding. And maybe, as reflected in a couple of numbers they can rely upon: e.g., stock market performance, favorability ratings of president, CPI. I think this could be the pivot to recreate the Republican party. Then again, this could just be me finally seeing the obvious to everyone else.
Fred: Call that dummying it all down, but the average voter (I'm tweaking us here) votes on how they feel what you tell them supports their belief or macro-understanding. And maybe, as reflected in a couple of numbers they can rely upon: e.g., stock market performance, favorability ratings of president, CPI. I think this could be the pivot to recreate the Republican party. Then again, this could just be me finally seeing the obvious to everyone else.” This is the proverbial nail being hit upon it’s tiny head! Thanks for the description.
Mary Pat Were your most brilliant brilliant napkin projects when you first came to the bar or after a number of swizzles?
The Laffler curve, done on a napkin in the 1970s, was the basis for the economic ‘trickle down’ theory that commenced with Reagan’s major tax cuts and later Trump’s 2017 massive tax giveaway to the very wealthy and to corporations.
I agree with Paul Kaufman’s rejection of ‘trickle down,’ in part because of the yellow drizzlies on the shoes of these trickle down doozies.
I love Dr Richardson’s letters and have shared them with all of my friends, many who too have become devoted readers! Thank you for making the time to write them.
A particularly powerful Letter today, Professor Richardson.
Slicing the film of obfuscation from the GOP's talking points, exposing them for the treachery they are, your contribution to our understanding of the perilous space our Democracy now inhabits is invaluable.
Absolutely! She's a gift to us and a real catalyst. But here's the deal; two thirds of the Republican electorate still believes that the 2020 election was at least "suspect" and many are apparently gravitating toward giving credibility to the Q-Anon lunacy. While some independent voters may be swayed by the lack of substance in this new "platform", the only thing that will nudge these Fox News junkies, I mean mainstream Republican voters, into the slightest critical examination of the GOP's flim-flam will be when Hannity and Carlson suddenly develop a sense of shame and decide to use their big megaphone for the betterment of the nation. I have some small hope for this, but I'm not holding my breath. I guess the best we (this small group) can do is to make an effort to put the excellent offerings of sources like Dr Richardson in front of anyone in our orbit that may be a fence sitter, and critically, well before the midterms.
Yes. All of a sudden, I can't "like" your post, but yes this is not a tiny radical fringe alt-right group. We have found out a terrifying truth--it's a huge chunk of "mainstream" or "moderates" Republicans. It's almost half of the voting public in this country.
One always hopes for the miracle, but I'm not especially cheerful. I do whatever I can to help the great unexpected good news to happen, but--
When the heart button doesn’t turn red, refresh your page and it should then show it’s red. If not, just click on it again, and it should turn red. You may have to scroll to find it.
Has anyone noticed that both of the embedded ads are right wing? The first is "Today's Poll" asking if "illegal aliens" should receive Social Security. The ad even says "Right Wing" in the lower right corner. The other is about Critical Race Theory and links to an article by Christopher Rufo, the guy who brought forward the the non-existent claim that CRT is being used in elementary & secondary school classrooms. One (or two) more reason(s) I'm losing interest in anything from Politico.
Environmental defense fund (finding the ways that work).
EDF has drawn some criticism for its ties to large corporations including McDonald's, FedEx, Walmart, and the Texas energy company TXU, with which the organization has negotiated to reduce emissions and develop more environmentally friendly business practices.
So they seem to be guided by their slogan, "Finding The Ways That Work"
EDF seems much more liberal than right wing....
The second embedded ad is for the New York Times whose bias rating is close to neutral and is considered the greatest newspaper in the United States of America....
Hard to understand your claim of right wing for Politico...
I think the ads you saw are not the same as the ones I saw and describe in my post. The "Today's Poll" ad has nothing to indicate EDF which I support, nor does EDF have anything to do with immigration policy. The second quite clearly links to an article by Christopher Rufo and not to the NY Times. Admittedly, I didn't click on either but neither had anything to suggest they were other than right-wing.
I've just gone back to that link and I right-clicked on the poll asking about SS for illegal aliens to open it in a new window. Here's the result: https://www.rightwing.org/pollsf-16-1-1/
The same action on the second ad, which is entirely different than the one I originally saw, got this: https://brainable.com/quiz Maybe they rotate ads so what one sees is different at different times?
Based on my supposition about rotating ads, I just opened the original Politico link again and, lo and behold, the first ad now is the CRT ad I originally saw as the second ad on the page: https://lp.hillsdale.edu/imprimis-critical-race-theory/
Dean-this may help you being able to "like": Go to the top of the pagelook to the left of the search bar. You'll see an incomplete circle w/ an arrow @ the end of it. Click on that-the process refreshes the page and will go back to the comments. Scroll back to where you were-the Heart should be there. (It doesn't last too long so you may have to repeat the process after a few times of "hearting".
Barbara D. Reed - "You'll see an incomplete circle w/ an arrow @ the end of it. Click on that-the process refreshes the page and will go back to the comments."
Ctrl-R will do the same thing. The downside to both actions is that you are taken to the top of the page and getting back to your previous place is inconvenient... at best.
An alternative (I found) is to simply click on the "heart" icon and trust that it was accepted (it will). Caution, however, if you click it twice (to make sure) it will uncheck your choice... a third time will be accepted, fourth unchecked, and so on --all while appearing to do nothing.
I have encouraged readers to report the issue to support@substack.zendesk.com. They claim they cannot replicate the problem on their end. The more who report it, the more they will recognize it is an ongoing issue with many readers and the better the likelihood they will try to fix it.
As to the dumbass GOP voters, what really terrifies me is the numbers of them who say, "Yes, Trump is crazy; no, the GOP has nothing to offer, but at least they aren't DEMOCRATS". It's like the worst kind of reverse of the old "Yellow Dog Democrat" (I'd sooner vote for the yellow dog on the porch, than a Republican).
I watched a couple of interviews with Peter Baker and Susan Glasser, as they hit the book tour stages. (Check out the one at the Commonwealth Club, on Youtube). They provide a few more tidbits that season the stew that is/was the Trump saga. Unfortunately, none that will make it any easier to sleep soundly anytime soon.
Thank you so much for drawing out attention to this hour-long interview with Baker & Glasser. It's fascinating and stunning despite, also, confirming much that most of us already knew in outline.
Glad to do it, Judith. None of us can be aware of all the resources and info available, so we need to share when we find helpful info, IMO. I'm always grateful for reliable, useful information to help me sort through all the BS!! :0)
Copied from page: "Commonwealth Club of California, organizer
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Carlson and Hannity, being exposed every bit as much as #45, pose no mystery to us. There is zero chance of them doing a single good thing for democracy. Experts have been saying over and over, when people tell you who they are, believe them!
Well Christy, I surely didn't mean to imply that either of those two would get religion or feel a pang of guilt over the monumental damage they've done (I did mention shame but discounted its likelihood). But even Bill Barr has started to change his tune, and I believe that's because he sees the writing on the wall and is trying to protect what little credibility he imagines he has left. Michael Cohen started the stampede and many more will follow; rats fleeing a sinking ship. Nobody will want to be the last schmuck left flapping their lips in defense of Trump when the last wheel comes off his wagon. It's just a pipe dream, I know .... :-)
Whoa!!! “ said that the White House switchboard connected a call to a rioter’s phone while the Capitol was under siege on January 6, 2021.” I mean I’m not shocked but FFS.
I can’t seem to copy the link, but go to CNN and look for the article entitled “Trump’s Secret Court Fight To Stop Grand Jury From Getting Information From His Inner Circle.”
Time for this too privileged manbaby to come down to earth.
“The dispute is separate from privilege protections Trump has tried to claim in the separate investigation of handling of federal records and national security information after his presidency. That investigation prompted the FBI to seize classified documents from Trump's Mar-a-Lago resort, and a judge acting as a special master is now working through the more than 10,000 non-classified records to determine if Trump can block them from investigators.”
Of course the congressional Republicans are attempting to piggyback on Joe Biden's successes. Having become the 'Do Nothing Just Say N0' party over the last several decades they've stifulled their ability to create meaningful policies that proffer realistic solutions to the challenges facing the nation. The old adage applies: 'You can fool some of the people all of the time, and all of the people some of time, but you can't fool all of the people all of the time.' The current party that calls itself 'Republican' is dominated by small minds that have nothing to offer their fellow Americans put lies. Their time for fooling people is coming rapidly to an end.
We have seen this before.....the republicans were against Obama's health care plan.....then they were going to revise it ......nothing happened.
they have become an ineffective body ....I can not refer to them as a governing body....they have become self-serving .....the entire party is going to implode.
They continue on the long, slow slide to oblivion. In my town, the local Republicans met this week (the second meeting in their efforts to 'restart' i.e., resuscitate the Republican Town Committee) and the report was that several of those in attendance wanted to change the name of the group to something that would be more acceptable. The Town Clerk will have to approve it; I don't think he will look kindly on this attempt at subterfuge. They also asked for support for the local state representative candidate - who aligns with the gubernatorial candidate, an avowed election denier. A supporter I spoke to would not accept the results of the 2020 election. I live in a blue state, but these MAGAts are everywhere.
I'm going to focus on only one overriding thought that occurred to me--and is probably obvious--about halfway through Professor Richardson's letter. The difference, in every point, between what Biden is doing and the Republican platform (and between Republicans and the Biden administration in general) is the difference between carefully constructed catch phrases and the very particular work on one concrete and undramatic issue at a time. The difference between words and action.
I suppose the insight for me, also not a surprise, is that so many American voters respond to what someone says rather than what another someone does. Drama and show vs. one-step-at-a-time accomplishment of specific goals. Why do we buy this? And has TFG finally made it so dreadful that we might finally be changing?
I don't know. I think I said the same thing when Biden went on his train tour and was shouting and romping and stomping like a man on the campaign trail. Comment after comment praised him with great sighs of relief, "Biden has finally found his voicc! Now he's doing something." We are failing to understand that drama is drama. Joe Biden accomplished a staggering amount of nation-building change one small item at a time and he accomplished it sitting at his desk, talking on the phone, crafting bills and consulting with experts when necessary. He was too busy saving the soul of the country to come out into the corridor every hour and perform.
Are Americans just lazy? Are we so superficial that we require loud noise to convince us something is happening?
I think the tide might be turning but far too many voters lay hold of the words and just don't look beyond them.
I don't think this happened overnight with Trump's election, but he suddenly bombarded us with a lot of noise and bling for long enough to have managed to instill a fatigue we need to shake off.
"Are Americans just lazy? Are we so superficial that we require loud noise to convince us something is happening?"
No, Mr. Robertson, I don't believe that even begins to describe our problem, although laziness has definitely been a big factor. I'm an old dude, even older than a "boomer" if you can imagine that. I've been around long enough to observe the changes in our society and to have had time to contemplate the reasons for them. I believe the critical juncture came in the mid '50's, though it's been a gradual process. First, we've given up on insisting on a sound education for our kids, the learning of critical thinking skills most importantly. That's hard work, for both students AND parents. I guess that's where the lazy part first came in. Second, we've completely surrendered to the seduction of Television. I've seen intelligent friends, sitting slack jawed in front of the TV watching reality shows and asked myself "why"? They don't read. and if they're under fifty they frequently wouldn't have the skills to parse and understand what they just read. And finally, we've become cynical. We've been abused by our leaders, that is, politicians and CEO's for so many generations (cooperated, really) that many of us just say "screw it", sit in front of the HUGE high definition TV with a beer, watching football. You know? Bread and crcus as the Romans used to say? Shame on us! We'll either collapse due to this foundational rot or we'll get pissed off enough to start making some meaningful changes, but we are certainly at a cusp. Hang on, friend. As HNO said in his tweet just before January 6, "Will be wild!"
I’m rather thinking this boils down to our tussle with the character traits of racism, and xenophobia. For the first time in my 61 year lifetime, I feel these traits are being framed more clearly. And their historical impact on our nation’s actions, leading it to always fall short of our ideals. In the mid fifties, SCOTUS decided Brown v Board of Ed. White supremacy defines why suddenly funding for education was no longer supported if it included equal funding for black and brown children’s schools. The sixties voting rights legislation, etc. pushed white supremacists to further pull back civil society monies if it included money for black and brown people. We have a racist, xenophobic character problem. Justice dispensed ethically, and fairly would help lessen the pernicious hate of most people. But therein lies the problem.
Good point, Michelle. I grew up in a small town on Puget Sound near Seattle. I don't believe I ever saw a single non Northern European until I reached high school, where even then a person with different ethnicity was rare. Moving to a much larger town where I encountered only one first generation Chinese kid in my high school class of 673 students, I was still sheltered by accident of geography . Later in life I did a lot of international travel in connection with my work, much of it in Asia. I came to know the Chinese as a very caring, hard working but fun loving people - they play every bit as hard as they work. I've known few black folks, but have always had great experiences in those relationships. I have never been able to "groc" racism as it exists in this country in this "enlightened age", but Howard Zinn in "A People's History of the United States - 1492 to Present" presents a very convincing account of how it was intentionally introduced by the early colonial white elites to keep poor whites and black slaves (with whom they really had more in common) from uniting against them. But back to your point, we really do still have a white supremacist mindset woven deep into the fabric of our country and I fear it will take a very long time to erase it. Likely the most effective solution will be racial mixing. That's a force that simply can't be stopped.
Good assessment. It is my belief that we will not grow as a country unless and until we acknowledge the fact that our wealth and success as a nation was based upon the genocide of the previous occupants of this country (which continues, in modern ways, today) and the enslavement of another race, kidnapped and brought to this country. Factor in the collateral "ownership" of women and you've got the backdrop for our "character problem".
I couldn't agree more, especially with the fact that at least as far back as the '50's too many factors came together at the same time, gathered momentum and, unnoticed by those of us who would have been pitching fits had we been looking but if we caught a glimpse, it didn't seem urgent. And now, in what seems like a sudden storm of all kinds of human horrors driven by this lightning flash of technology out of control--hoe the heck did Amazon and Facebook even happen? I'm sure they were some guys selling books out of a garage or making a small space in their dorm room for teenagers to chat.
I think the whole business has gotten clean away from us. I think we don't know the half of it. I'm too much of a bulldozer to retire to television and beer, but I will admit to significant mental and spiritual fatigue.
On another Subject, it's MS Robertson. Perhaps I should choose a different photo?
So sorry Ms Robertson. I didn't check out the photo, I just made a hasty assumption. But your point is well taken about rampaging technology. I spent a lifetime serving that beast and was too busy working to see this coming. Our kids deserved better. But then, life is all about learning in my view, and the lessons abound. Thanks for the reply.
I do believe that many people are fundamentally lazy (raises hand). I also believe that many folks are, indeed, superficial and lacking in critical thinking skills (thinking is hard).
It’s devastating detail of what it was like to breathe in that administration.
Thank you, Professor for your LETTER - I read it and thought to myself, “We as a nation are going to be recovering from that knot head for generations.”
“Knot head” is my polite for very bad jerk.
I have to believe he is ill.
That is the only reasonable explanation for the trail of destruction he levies upon anything he touches.
For someone who doesn’t drink or do drugs, he sure acts under a craven influence.
Okay. I think I can peel myself off the ceiling and slip back into a semblance of calm.
We could really use a lifetime without this individual’s further meddling. Cripes….
The clincher is all those judges on federal benches, coast to coast, lifetime appointments, young, inexperienced, far right, beholden to Trump. And then there's the Supreme Court.
From Brett Meiselas on Twitter: “Let me get this straight: The GOP is running on banning abortion, banning contraception, banning books, eliminating Social Security and Medicare, defunding the FBI, targeting the people investigating Jan 6, raising drug prices, and protecting Trump? “
"It feels rather as if the Republicans recognize that Biden’s policies are popular, and are hoping that voters haven’t noticed that he is actually putting them in place."
Well, given that essentially all of rural America is covered by far right AM radio talk shows all day, and, morning and evening much of America is tuned in to the radical right wing fascist Fox News, and completely unaware of anything not reported on those two platofrms......
I would not be surprised one bit if most Americans have not noticed what Biden is doing.
Rather, if you listen to AM radio, (make sure to have a hanky to wipe the hate spittle off your face while listening) you will hear anti Biden and anti Democrat bile that will make you feel sick, angry and, in my case, which is honestly pretty rare, helpless.
All of you guys should stream WHAM 1180 in Rochester NY some weekday from 8 am to noon to hear what I am talking about. Listen to to this crank Bob Lonsberry for 4 hours just so you know what is being said. Or pick the nuts on AM radio down in rural Eastern PA. Serously, it is a completely different world.
The far right has done an absolutely fantastic job taking over the apparatus of communications to Americans and they are blowing smoke up American arse all....day....long....every single day.
I know what it feels like to listen to that stuff and feel like it is true. Note the word feel, not think.
Much or most of America uses their feelings, not their rational apparatus, to sort out the world. Maybe most humans do this, including all of us, but, for those who read, we have a mechanism to dampen that tendency. To add information to the feeling part of the brain.
I don't really know, but, I hear what I hear and I see lots of folks fully bought in to the far right, fascist, propaganda.
Worse, if I try to have even a brief conversation about what Biden is doing I get what I call the "red face" result. Because people are so deep into their feelings by having been brainwashed by far right media so long, they just get angry if I bring up a simple, provable fact. They get really angry. There is no talking with them.
And, until the invasion of Afghanistant and Iraq, so did I (buy in to right wing BS). It is hard for me to feel and see into myself prior to that, but, I clearly remember "feeling" great when I heard Rush Limbaugh bash Bill Clinton when the blue dress turned up.
Of course, having a Protestant background and raised by two loyal parents who loved and respected each other, and having a father who was enthralled with my mother, Bill Clinton represented everything that I never wanted to be plus a stupid smile and a complete lack of ethics. Plus, he just sounded stupid to me. I know, he went to this fancy college and that one too. No matter.
So, even now, I would probably agree with Rush Limbaugh about Bill Clinton keeping his pants down around his ankles every chance he could, even if he was sitting at the Oval Office desk for goodness sakes.
That is how the far right gained credibility. They know the issues that matter to (some) Americans and they bang on them all day long. AND......in Trump's case, who was way worse than Clinton, they just decided not report on what a low life he was. A really cynical decision to be sure.
"I would not be surprised one bit if most Americans have not noticed what Biden is doing"
You have it, I'm afraid. Most haven't noticed because he doesn't make enough noise to get the attention of most American voters. The maintenance of our democracy depends on the existence of "an informed electorate." Oh, dear. Too many of us limit our reading to what we can slide through between our cars and Starbucks. Being "informed" requires some actual work and critical thinking.
Yes, and if you read a bit around the beginning of our country, you will get the impression that Europeans who visited and wrote back were completely impressed with how the "masses" gathered to read the various papers.
Back then, the ONLY method of getting information was via reading the various printer press newspapers...one of which was owned by Benjamin Franklin.
If you read the book John Adams, by Catherine Drinker Bowen you will see a man who spent YEARS reading Coke, and who studied EVERY past form or government thoroughly and even wrote a summary of his study.
So, now? Even though I pushed my kids and even though they read well, they don't really sit down to "read". My own kids.
So, as Jefferson said often (something like): An ignorant electorate cannot hold a Democracy. Hence, his tireless push for public education. He might have run a nasty work camp for black people, but, he DID get public education going here.
I have the secret to raising a kid who is a reader. From the day I brought my son home from the hospital (half a century ago), when I was nursing him I sat in an old rocking chair of my grandmother's, rocked, nursed, and read aloud whatever I happened to be reading at the time. He got a lot of Jane Austen, if I'm remembering right. I really am convinced that I accidentally hit on the formula--milk, Mother smells, warmth, soothing movement, a familiar voice reading words, book in hand.
I wonder if the dads of this world could make that work with bottles.
Whether it was what did the trick or not, I can tell you they were magic moments. Except for the nursing, I've done the same with my grandson, now 7 and already a reader.
I don't think most people today have or take the time for stuff like that.
Am I being inappropriate to talk about breast-feeding at 6 in the morning?
I feel the same way about classical music, which I must have heard while in the womb and have loved ever since, though my repertoire expanded to include '50s rock 'n' roll (while in high school) and jazz (beginning at college). The exposure must begin very early. As for ideas and beliefs, "You've got to be taught..." (Rodgers & Hammerstein) That said, it makes me wonder at what point a preference for fact-free, willfully ignorant existence was sown in MAGAts.
Brought to mind when I was about 8 years old and my Chgo neighborhood was beginning to become integrated. My mom told me "you might have some little black kids in your class this year. Don't treat them any different."
It surprised me because I wondered WHY I would want to treat them different.
Later our neighborhood was decimated by white flight, as I grew I understood the cause was more the fears implanted by unscrupulous realtors than by the actual people moving in. This was a community of many first time home owning families, their entire wealth (such as it was) was sunk into their homes. The threat of property values plummeting terrified them.
It seems that the GOP motivates by fear and by money.
My Mom did this. Between classical music and folk music, with reading aloud whatever she was reading (alas, the poetry did not stick, but the Agatha Christie did) she planted lots seeds and nurtured their growth with modeling the behaviors for me.
Mim, I hear you. Often on Sundays, our small family visited my aunt and uncle's home - they had opera or classical music playing at their home all day, and that same aunt sent me classic albums for gifts (when I wanted rock 'n roll) - but today I love classical. Also Sunday dinner table conversation was elevated a few notches there as well, since auntie was a teacher. The habits of our youthful years truly can rub off.
I didn’t start reading to my children while nursing, but started with lap time when they could sit up. Both read well and can write with proper spelling and grammar.
At age 2, my son was attracted to the neon beer logo signs in our grocery store window. I read them to him and he started reciting them as we went by. People stared at us and I responded “He likes the lights, the lights spell words. It’s called reading.”He started recognizing them on delivery trucks and it was a great day when he recognized one that wasn’t a beer.
I started with my grandson at age 1, and Nana Daycare at my house was no tech, with lots of reading, outdoor walks and play. When he entered kindergarten, he had just finished fluently reading my reprint “”Dick and Jane” book, the primer I had learned to read from in first grade. He tested as reading at a 3rd grade level, by current standards.
And that is what I call joy. When my son was, I think, in 6th grade, I read out loud to him the entire four volumes of Tolkien's books. The pleasure was doubled by the fact that I had never read them and we had the experience of discovering them together. Good memories.
When my daughter was in 4th and 5th grade, I continued our bedtime reading each night with a chapter from the American Girl series books. Not great literature like Tolkien, but they did give her a bit of a grounding in American history.
Dean, good idea. I started reading to them very, very early. They always wanted to "read a book". Both of my kids are well spoken and write reasonably well.
They read for pleasure up through around the 8th grade, then, it dropped off because of high school loading and swim team. Then, college hit.
So, now, they are working. They don't have a Library card which is tragic really.
I did my best. My wife was never much into the reading thing, and, perhaps that did matter.
Well, as much as I like to think it was mother's milk that did the trick, I can't swear to it. My son has gone in an out of his reading for pleasure entirely dependent on his life. Right now, at 51, he is the father of his first and only child, age 7, and he and my daughter-in-law run their own successful business.
His house, however, always manages to have a place for his rather alarming book collection (I think he has been threatened with dire consequences if he buys more) and I have never known a time when he didn't carry with him his favorites from his school years--The Great Gatsby; Pride and Prejudice; Great Expectations; the four Tolkien books. Every few years, he'll haul one of them out and read it.
Mike, I look for your posts as I skim as you generally have excellent posts. Being in the greater Chicago area, my AM dial is turned to news radio which is apolitical, but I am sure you are accurate.
One thing I'd like to offer to you and any other readers: yeah, when you look at a map of blue vs red states, the county does looks very "red" but if you consider POPULATION, it is a different story. I had an online argument with an ancient relative (and I ain't young) who thought that urban blue areas had too much power vs rural red ones. I countered with some of those areas he was arguing for have less power because they have less people! So, should we give votes to the black bears of the Blue Ridge? The long horned cattle in the plains? The gators in the Everglades? That sounds ridiculous, doesn't it?
We're never going to change a lot of people's minds, we don't have to. I think the best way is to not bang on them as it sets up a wall. Logic, respect, focusing on mutual intents works for the less MAGA driven.(the true MAGAts, can't win every battle) Don't give up!
Our friend Beto is using very persuasive dialogue - along with a healthy dose of respect - at the town hall and community gatherings in Texas, with much success in catching the ear and capturing the hearts of Texas Republicans. Can we clone him? And send the clones to the Republican heartlands?
It rather comes down to feeling vulnerable. Progressives feel vulnerable because a few racist, xenophobic, misogynistic, homophobic, xtian folk want to take away our rights
(reproductive freedom, voting rights, etc), reduce our public spaces to gun-slaughtering, grievance-dramas, and super-charge the climate to further degrade the only planetary life-support-system we have. And Conservatives feel vulnerable because a gay couple asked them to bake a wedding cake, or a black man walked/jogged through their neighborhood, or someone in their employ wants to have contraception included in their healthcare plan. Conservative’s discomfort with vulnerability has never been equal to the vulnerability they expect all others to cope with. This needs to be pointed out more often. I remember laughing when I heard them call us “snowflakes”.
Mike, I know exactly what you're talking about. From time to time I'll tune in Tucker Carlson, just out of morbid curiosity. I used to do a 45 minute commute and occasionally I'd tune in Rush Limbaugh, just to see what nonsense he was pushing today. I was especially intrigued by his fallacious and often specious arguments. Made me wonder why he had such a large fan base. But eventually it hit me: He had a cadence to his delivery that was almost hypnotic. I was sometimes caught up in it myself, even while being repulsed by the content. A person may not speak or understand German, but even if you don't, you can get a sense of that speaking style in the old videos of Adolf Hitler addressing the assembled masses. These right wing pundits all seem to share that talent to some degree. That's more frightening than the manure they shovel, in my estimation.
Oh, my gosh. That's it exactly. It's the cadences, the rhythm of language. Many years ago I attended a rally for George Wallace, to try to gauge what we were up against in Montgomery, Alabama, and I will tell you that the very large crowd of white people would have taken to the streets and carried out any terrible violence Wallace suggested.
More embarrassing personally was my own trance several years ago after watching the two documentaries about Steve Bannon. It wasn't any kind of change of ideas or loyalties, nor even a moment's doubt as to what the man is, but for an hour or so I was, to use your accurate word, hypnotized. It got my attention and, frankly, scared the stuffing out of me.
"said that the White House switchboard connected a call to a rioter’s phone while the Capitol was under siege on January 6, 2021."
Honestly, this is no surprise to either MAGA people or me/us here.
What is a surprise is that, two years after a traitor called up an army to take over the National Government and kill Mike Pence, that traitor is still living in the lap of luxury at Mara Lago running around telling more lies.
That, I have to say, is profoundly disturbing.
George Washington would have rounded up Trump and his leaders and he would have hung them forthwith. John Adams would have attended to show support. Period.
Orwell's Politics and the English Language is a great essay. It is available in ebook form from the usual sources for under 2 dollars. A good investment
Correction: "teaching subjects that make white students uncomfortable." Nowhere have any parents objected to teaching a version of U.S. history that makes Black, brown, AAPI, or Indigenous American children "uncomfortable."
I think that we need to juxtapose this "plan" and the "12 point plan" and see how they line up. I suspect that may be the best way for us to demonstrate how much of the Democrat's progress is part of their "new and improved" "platform".
‘Make Orwell fiction again’, as a recent bumpersticker spotted in Maine recently read. Thanks as always for the clarity you bring to current political events. Imagine if the Republicans devoted just 10% of their resources and energy to governing rather than trying to game the system in a never-ending quest for power.
The Republicans are in a tough spot; How to keep the support TFG's Maga Mob (MM) while distancing themselves from TFG himself. The MM by itself won't get you elected, but lose them and you're toast. And they won't abandon TFG no matter what. It seems he was right when he said he could shoot someone in broad daylight on 5th Ave. and not lose a vote.
The White House/capitol assualt phone connection story, if true, is stunning. it will be more than interesting if 60 Minutes has the details of whose phone was at each end of that connection. If not, it should be relatively easy for the 1/6 Committee to find out. If the White House end was the Oval Office phone, we have a very smokey gun. Or, perhaps those phone logs were among the documents stolen and taken to Mar-A-Lago.
A document only morons, er, I mean Republicans (no difference actually) could enjoy and believe.
Watch what they do, not what they say. As of tonight 168 Republicans have signed onto legislation in the house to ban abortion nationwide. Watch what they do, not what they say - today a state judge in Arizona said that the new law limiting abortion to the first 15 weeks wasn't as good as the 157 year old law written in 1866 when women couldn't vote and had no voice in government, that bans abortion in all instances without exception, was indeed the law in Arizona.
I'm pretty sure that dumbass just cost Kari Lake and Brett Masters and the QMAGAt running for Secretary of State their races, as well as a couple R congressmen.
“It feels rather as if the Republicans recognize that Biden’s policies are popular, and are hoping that voters haven’t noticed that he is actually putting them in place.”
The Repugs have written an Apologia for President Biden! How generous and kind of the weasels!
But here’s the thing, the MAGA base knows nothing about Biden’s successes in moving the country in the direction Democrats fought hard for (against the very Republicans who now see that this is what the public wants). They watch only propaganda. This “Commitment to America “ is new to them and they will attribute it to GOP efforts instead. There is no amount of doublespeak that they won’t accept. “My Party, My Life”
Well we need a list of these goals and under each one another list of the many times everyone of those lying bturds voted against that goal and publish it far and wide. Proves how they lie ALL the time!
But how do we reach the MAGAts if all they watch and read are right-wing media?
I don’t think we can reach them; however, we can try to reach all other “ iffy” voters to get out there on 8 Nov! That’s where a list might help!
Right. It is difficult or impossible to deprogram the brainwashed, so we must reach the undecideds.
EXACTLY!!
Write all the GOTV postcards you can (Turnabout Project is one source) and take time to check out your local Indivisible chapter. Think of yourself as a front line Ukrainian. We are.
I believe that they are unreachable. I see that in my cadre of retired law enforcement friends. They just double down on the propaganda.
Ally, do you think any of them could be members of Oath Keepers and that’s why they’re “unreachable”?
Then we must target the undecideds and the kinda-left-leaning R's.
With relational campaigning! Talk to your friends. Ask them to talk to their friends.
I have a Republican friend that I think is going to now hold her nose and vote Democrat because the Republicans are doing such crazy stuff and taking away rights.
I also recommend knowing what messaging works. Attend the Messaging to Win - Mondays at 1pm PT/4pm ET:
https://us02web.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_Z7B2IJ1MQqSW-H0MAjn-Yg?utm_campaign=Movement%20Briefing
Thanks, Cathy. One of my dearest friends has finally said she just can't vote Republican this time. Dobbs put her over the edge.
That 61% of newly registered voters are WOMEN portends which way the wind is blowing.
I hope so!
We can't - so Fox and right-wing Nazi media must be stopped.
Paid for ads??? The GOP pays to run their libelous propaganda ads 24/7 here in rural CD2 Maine. From what I have noted in my lifetime folks leave their tvs on constantly. Repeated over and over, even in the background. I’m quite confident it’s what delivered us 6 more years of Suzy Q
Ugh! What a nightmare she is...I call her “the dangling carrot”. That’s what she does when she’s considering a vote. Gets our hopes up and drops us like a lead balloon.
Here is the recording of the Sept. 19th Messaging to Win webinar: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1lLXWMLhZK3WzfAKkvVpKJ31Z41iOBzcO/view
The next webinar is Oct 3rd.
A black and white list for facts vs. the reality might be a good idea! At least one could hope…
If only there was a way to get everyone to fact check all statements made by all politicians. I know that everything the democratic politicians say is not always spot on, and they do and say things that bug me, but I have this perception that the MAGA base accepts the MAGA kool aide as the HOLY gospel, never questioning some very disturbing statements of supposed “truth”. I hope I’m wrong….but?
The Dems should have a PR campaign of public mockery of the Republican "Commitment to America" making the points in Heather's post above. The MAGA zealots won't be convinced (or even reached) by it, but, as others have pointed out, the undecideds, or, as I like to say, the "reasonable middle", may be convinced. Hoping, of course, that the reasonable middle exists.
Over the years I have witnessed several instances of prominent right wingers angrily denying that they ever said precisely the words they were previously videoed saying, and the two recordings presented together. That sort of contradiction surely penetrates a MAGA skull or two here and there.
To be fair, modern Republicans tell so many, many lies, it must be pretty tough to keep them all straight.
💯💯 #45 has done this repeatedly. Lied on video and then later on video says exactly the opposite and NEVER gets called on it. Some genius could make a video of all these and call it liar, liar, pants on fire!
LOL Wikipedia, magazines, books all detail his lies. Maybe we need public education on the harm lying causes? Keep it simple?https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Veracity_of_statements_by_Donald_Trump
So true, the cretins have been sending fund-raising crap to me, with the most egregious lies. They sound like many of the Dem fundraisers, sad to say. The republicans have always accused Dems of what they do. And Frank Luntz taught them how to project as well as anything that Orwell could have imagined.
A peeve of mine…agree. It’s way past the time to reduce the reliance on fund raising for politicians. Outlawing all together would be a very helpful reform.
I saw Frank Luntz on MSNBC last week. He is a very worried man, and said so.
The fact that Frank Luntz was on MSNBC says it all about the depth of his guilt for helping Republicans do this to political speech.
Absolutely correct. I was speaking to my MAGA neighbor about the “Commitment to America” website and was able to speak to each and every “commitment” listed, and point out how Biden was already doing it. The nabe absolutely shut me down and said I was making it up. I could have pulled out my iPhone and showed him actual facts, but we’ve been down this road before. His cognitive dissonance is crippling and he can’t even have a conversation about the differences without a meltdown. They will never believe Trump’s crimes really happened, but if they do somehow believe it, they’re insistent he is above the law.
You tried, thank you. Dunce caps for all the MAGAts!
And as an aside, the neighbor has an eighth grade education (he’s 40). It really does speak to Trump’s comment “I love the uneducated”.
"There is no amount of doublespeak" sums it ALL up!!
"My Party, My Lie." (oops, my finger slipped).
They realize the policies and practices are popular (I.e. “small d” democratically supported) but, it is essential to note, they have voted against most of them while touting the benefits to their constituents.
Weasels is too kind a word, maggots and cockroaches are more like it.
You demean maggots and cockroaches since these creatures actually provide useful services.
An individual responded to me when trying to "inform" those posting on a legislator's page that my efforts dealing with Orcs wasn't going to go anywhere, now they are Orcs they're lost (those familiar with Lord of the Rings no Orcs used to be humans so a very appropriate analogy).
The Use of Language is the subject of this comment.
Today’s Letter addressed language, the language of the Republican Party’s “Commitment to America”.
What does it say versus what does it mean? HCR wrote the following:
‘Covering just a single page, it presents vague aspirations—many of which Biden has already put in place—but focuses on the radical extremes of the MAGA party while trying to make those extremes sound mild.’
‘…the first topic—making the economy strong—is a paraphrase of what the Biden administration has been doing.’ (Letter)
‘This is quite literally the platform of the Democrats, but while the Republicans offer no actual proposals to contribute to these goals, Biden has taken concrete steps to address inflation …’
(Letter)
“A Future That’s Built on Freedom” is a similar sleight of hand, meaning something far from the freedom of the recent past. Here it means giving parents control over their childrens’ education (more book banning and laws that prohibit teaching subjects that make students “uncomfortable”), “defend[ing] fairness by ensuring that only women can compete in women’s sports” (there’s the anti-trans statement), …’ (Letter)
The Letter takes the Republican Party’s ‘Commitment of America’ apart. What does the paper convey versus what it means.
‘In short, the document feels like the doublespeak from George Orwell’s dystopian novel 1984. To defend the indefensible, Orwell wrote in an essay titled “Politics and the English Language,” “political language has to consist largely of euphemism, question-begging and sheer cloudy vagueness…. The great enemy of clear language is insincerity. (Letter)
Language in divided America is a crucial subject for us to address. It was a crucial subject when Orwell wrote “Politics and the English Language.” First published in 1946.
How do we talk to one another in this divided time? It isn’t only about what they’re saying and writing; What about us? How can we communicate with one another?
How do we talk to one another? Good question. Carefully, politely, using verifiable (and short) statements of facts and by asking uncomplicated questions regarding what should be shared values ie “should the law apply equally to all”?”, “ would you stand in line for ten hours to vote”, “are national secrets important enough to be securely protected?, should the government favor one religion over another?
Do this calmly, no emotion. Do not react offensively to any dumb comment they make in rebuttal You won’t change their minds, but you’ve infected their brains with questions they’ll have wrestle with themselves
Make no enemies, but screw with their heads using facts and logic. Will it work? I don’t know. They’ll probably categorize you as dangerous or formidable
I can live with that
Dave Dalton, I don’t know where you live, but here in Texas, facts are not facts, and logic, well, I really don’t know how to explain it, but it’s not what you think. Some of us here in Texas really believe the stuff put out by Fox, OANN and newsmax. They really sincerely believe that stuff. It’s frightening.
Sigh. It’s true everywhere. This part of our population is quite literally not interested in truth/facts. They are in a cult, happy in the cocoon provided by said cult.
It is not easy, perhaps not even possible, to deal with irrationality that is the product of real, physiological fear, with reason. Facts, logic, and cognitive functions are shut down when chemicals are released into our brains telling us we are in danger. As long as folks are bombarded with fear of the dangers that “others,” be they liberals, socialists, Muslims, Jews, Christians, democrats, republicans, Chinese . . ., they literally cannot hear and act on reason. Calling folks foolish, idiotic, ignorant, or despicable cannot overcome the deep emotions driven by their fears.
I don’t have a magic elixir to soothe the fears that are driving so many of us, but I know that calming those deep, physiological fears has to be a first step to normalizing reason as a civic good and that the fear-based negativity of the Republican Party of today is a major source of our current politics.
Well said. Based on my experiences, that seems to be both the driving force, and the stumbling block to any kind of rational, thoughtful conversation.
I think the evolutionarily older functions of our brain that persist to defend raw survival; fear, hate and greed, and focus on ego, are security flaws in our ability to think rationally and compassionately, and are quite vulnerable to manipulation, as are security flaws in computer systems (very loosely speaking) that allow manipulation by predatory opportunist who seek to control others. We pay far too little attention to this dynamic on a day to day basis.
I think the problem lies in how we misuse those functions. That’s why I strongly advocate for brain health education starting at the earliest ages. Just for example: the brain needs healthy nutrients especially “good lipids” not food dyes. The brain needs a healthy balance of neurotransmitters, not a constant barrage of dopamine from video games The brain makes good neurotransmitter when we connect positively to other beings, so teach prosocial skills. If they’re not getting it at home, teach the skills needed so they can still get what they need to have a healthy brain. We get the brain our environment builds. Give kids a fighting chance to grow up with a healthy one.
💯💯 and from where I sit the view tells me that Dems are busting balls trying to do this
Agreed, and I think Biden is leading the way.
So well said! Thank you. Allows room for compassion, which I have very little of towards extremists.
I’m born ‘n raised Texan too, and you are absolutely correct. It is like a disease of the brain down here. I’d posit it’s the extreme heat and humidity but not all of us suffer from it!
Attempted like
The evil oozes in places hard to imagine
Propaganda Works! To save democracy we must shut down Fox news, QAnon and all their ill ilk.
Absolutely! The Fairness Doctrine must be reinstated to ensure the news is reportedly as truthfully and accurately as possible, not for propaganda, ratings and their bottom line.
I’d like to see Fox Propaganda shut down permanently, and the Murdoch’s imprisoned for the damage they’ve done to this country, thru their greed and power hungry ignorance.
It’s not bad enough Murdoch had to screw up his country, then he had to take his toxicity to the US and UK.
The Fairness Doctrine does not apply to cable tv. It only applies to public airwaves. Cable channel owners like Fox or HBO “own” their content.
Yes, I understand. It ubiquitous “Facts are dismissed if Fox isn’t the source. Logic is of the Convoluted kind; you know, “ connect these unrelated dots” version. It is frightening. I have found that detailed argument is a waste of energy. No one changes positions or opinion
The best I can do is to use short simple sentences of documented facts, simple questions in a VERY passive aggressive manner to infect their brain with my virus. There is no antidote. They can’t “unhear” it
I agree. Short and sharp. Like an inoculation.
Propaganda works. Goebbels proved that in the 1930s.
I keep wondering why Rupert Murdoch wants to destroy the US, after trying in Britain and Australia. I understood Roger Ailes; I don’t Rupert Murdoch.
They love Big Brother.
You've outlined the hard part for us, Dave. It is easy to call 'them' 'morons' and the 'enemy', and self-congratulatory to boot. We've built a high wall between us with our use language. DJT has been a major contributor. This is The WALL, however, on which his name is writ large.
The power of language works when people have a common language, and have a common understanding of events. When a gentle (trust me, I am not always abrasive) suggestion or comment is made and met with a flame of "libtard" or worse, it is hard to establish a conversation. I do not have a common basis for language with these folks; we can use the same words, even in a civil manner (occasionally, mostly with people who know me already) and they do not mean the same things to many of the MAGAts.
My response to accusations like “libtard” is to “not acknowledge” the invective. Just skip right passed it. Continue asking the basic questions of liberty, equality, fairness, rule of law as they grow red-faced ( like their hats)
A deep breath and slow exhale is empowering
The wall as been growing for decades and, I'm guessing, got much thicker in the last 7 to 8 years. There is research, which include suggestions about lessening it, some of it published in the last few years. Your experience, Ally, is common. There may be ways forward that we haven't employed. That's what some of us are looking for.
You are right Fern, Trump and the MAGAS have successfully built a metaphorical wall between us.
Between truth and propaganda, between those who believe in the body politic and those who are controlled by fear and hatred.
We need to go over, under and through that wall.
Probably the Dobbs decision gives us more power than we have had in 50 years.
I think the attempted transformation of 1/2 of our people to the legal standing of livestock should be our front line of persuasion. This wall is a powerful illusion but we must reveal it as just that, a lie.
An astute observation, Fern. Dumpster’s Wall of Lies and Bullshit can be seen from space. The final reality flip is that his MAGA faithful, trapped in there, think they’re the ones who understand freedom.
I think denial of climate change is behind some of the fear. As Republicans continue to refuse to say the words and to deny science they become more and more unreachable. After my neighbor told me in all seriousness “God will take care of climate change” (he is a financial advisor), I managed not to do a double take, but recognized that even an intelligent person can be a science denier, so many are even beyond th
the reach of the education system.
Click on the three little dots and you can edit your post.
Very similar to what works in a family. Set clear boundaries. Maintain them firmly, fairly and consistently without emotion.
17th century philosopher Pascal had a theory on this and it's rather simple. To tell someone they're wrong, first tell them they're right. See link:
https://getpocket.com/explore/item/a-philosopher-s-350-year-old-trick-to-get-people-to-change-their-minds-is-now-backed-up-by
But, the interesting context of HCR's points today for me is that,...given the almost identical content of the GOP's "new" platform to the existing one of the Dems that is openly underway,.... if this were really true for the GOP then would it not follow we would really BE the "United" States of America and there would be No Polarization? We would all be believing the same thing!
This should become the Dems new ad campaign going into the midterms and beyond,....So, if you really believe in the things we've been doing, then Join Us! Put up or shut up just as the Judge said to TFG.
BK, The beauty of asking real questions is the dialogue that they may produce; elicit the questions we ourselves have; spur our thinking, and promote sharing the knowledge that we have absorbed. Your insight, BK, is true and one for us to employ. You have taken today's letter one more crucial step forward. Thank you. I hope that you will share it again at the start of the forum, so that more subscribers have the opportunity to read it. Salud!
TY Fern. Being somewhat recent to the posting side of the forum I am not yet familiar with the methods of placement so, please with my nod to your instincts
feel free to do a cut-&-paste as you see fit.
Hello, BK. I think it is too late to repost your comment today, but there will be more opportunities in the future to share your insights. Cheers!
Interesting in what Pascal has said about the use of persuasion in changing a person’s mind. Unfortunately, in my conversations with these individuals, I am talking to the wind. I am a very patient person who chooses her words carefully without losing my mind. I just lose it...after I have talked to these people!! Until Biden’s Inflation Reduction Act actually starts to produce progress, I simply think we are stuck with this stubborn mentality from the right.
Marlene, Language continues to degrade in US, which I think is very much connected to nature of the divide/politization of the country. Language is another lens through which to see ourselves. May another mirror shed more light? I'm very concerned about the future and about whether the ship of state could turn in a more positive direction in the next couple of years -- no predications here. Organization by the people, much more of it, by groups aimed at health, the environment, personal rights... our own lobbies may be a pro-democracy movement on our agenda.
That is my hope and thinking, as well, Fern. We must acquire a big megaphone.
Marlene, I am laughing for the first time today; there were a couple of narrow smiles, earlier. Wouldn't we be funny, the two of us with gigantic megaphones? I'm shrinking in size everyday!
I wonder if the hardcore people can actually admit that gas prices have been falling.
Carol, in CA we can’t. We are paying premium prices for gas at $5.49 a gal for unleaded and $5.99 or in some places, $6.59! We get screwed by the oil industries that are here. Thus, the push for electric vehicles which none of us can find because they have been bought and won’t he on the sellers market for 2-3 years.
I live in CA too. Ours have come down only a little compared to the rest of the country. It was people in red states that I was thinking of.
Thanks, BK for the link to Pascal. The word “trick” in the title seemed like clickbait, but the article itself was quite useful.
Fern, I travel locally in a wheelchair van which is a service I am grateful for. However, the drivers are not the best at parsing politics, and most seem to be watchers of Fox and Football. I often hear them spout the usual. So, recently someone said to challenge them without anger by asking who, when, where, what. It worked the first time I tried it.
So the driver informed me that all the cities with gun control have the highest crime rate.
I said, "How did you learn that?"
"I didn't," he replied. "I just know it." I do believe he trapped himself because he didn't offer more "advice."
I am so glad I am armed with a new tool and that I don't go bonkers over BS.
Love it! My similar experience party with plenty of alcohol, at least ten years ago. A climate denialist was feeling cornered by some science types, and she felt she had to point out she was a good person who donated large sums to charities. I just listened. It was kind of fascinating. When I could get a word in, I said what convinced me was the ice cores from Antarctica with trapped CO2 bubbles from the atmosphere of thousands of years ago. “What convinced me” was the end of the discussion, no more anger, just get something to eat.
Attempted like
The likes are certainly sluggish today. (Enemy action? or just mechanical fatigue?)
Difficult to communicate when half the country would follow a glittering gold pied piper off the face of the earth. I agree communication is everything, but the liars have been winning at that for decades it now appears. Can facts win?
De Santis doesn't have much glitter...
Right! The scary question is has #45 built the cult momentum to the point they’ll follow the glitterless over the edge? Hitler certainly had no glitter but it was a vastly different era. I’m betting on the appearance of glitter being a requirement. Many of them believe in a country where anyone of them can be #45 if only they can lie and steal their way there.
Thanks for the comment Fern. I've read your past comments and that which follows is likely "preaching to the choir." Maybe the following perspective on "how can we communicate with one another" will resonate with all LFAA subscribers...
Dr. HRC's interview with President Biden emphasized the importance of honor and decency in to accomplish the goals of a democracy. It's ALWAYS more honorable and decent to get beyond anger and frustration in communicating/discussing the best possible solutions to address any issue. That said, of course we will all be angry and frustrated at times-none of us are robots. Periodic "venting" in this venue is therefore to be expected. The thing is, there's not going to be much "communicating" with anyone who is stuck in a mindset of anger.
Imagine the possibilities for our democracy if the basic honor and decency in rising above anger in our communication/debate was more common.
Thank you, John. I think the question of 'how we can communicate with one another' opened a dialogue between us on the forum. We'll continue as we share our thoughts, knowledge, feelings and experiences in communicating 'language'. Language, visuals and movements are our means of communication. How can we not give communication the attention it deserves?
A great start would be mental health 101 in preK. Actually the Nurse Family Partnership or Parents are Teachers too would be even in better
The mindset of anger is continually stoked by #45 and his mob of gangsters. Everything I have read of authoritarianism seems to say that is how they gain power, by stoking anger. Therapists spend their life’s work trying to help folks let go of anger. A person has to want to manage their anger. Most of the “mob” won’t even recognize that anger is their fuel.
Do you not see 'anger' and 'hatred' widespread among Americans, including here on the forum? It has become a form of validation. This does not mean tolerating inequality, white supremacy, racism, elitism... It means addressing how we use language with one another.
Attempted like
That heart is for you, Citzen60.
If this comment is truly intended to be a response to my comment and not an error of some sort, then we have a “communication” problem. I fail to see any connection between my comment and this response and to be frank, I have learned from our history of communicating that I am not interested in trying.
We can communicate with each other if some authority shuts down Big Brother's Fox news.
Nothing stifles debate like constant noise.
With patience, open ears and kindness. Listen, listen, listen some more…maybe ask a question or two but stay off the soap box…unless, it’s you who is tasked with being on it.
Propaganda rules
Propaganda has been very effective, particularly with large numbers whose lives have changed as a result of loss of manufacturing and community, technology, inadequate governmental solutions (at best), Black Money, loss of journalistically based local news, social media, white supremacy/racism, and I add - isolation - to the mix. Propaganda requires a great deal of attention. It has been studied in depth and we need to find 'workable' solutions.
On the origins and multiple applications of propaganda (very interesting): https://csmt.uchicago.edu/glossary2004/propaganda.htm
Fern, Orwellian is the “ Inflation Reduction Act” and BBB. Biden’s insane spending has directly contributed to staggering inflation and a lowering of our National standard of living by virtue of a collapse in real earnings. Biden’s energy, public safety, foreign policy and open borders immigration policies are not much better. Dystopian and delusional if you think this administration has advanced our security and our economic vitality. Sadly it has not. My guess is we will see this confirmed soon enough at the polls.
Are these the ravings of a troll?
Yes, Alan. DC is a resident troll. You can report his comment by clicking “…” under it.
OM goodness, David. Everything you have noted surely belongs on the other side of the aisle.
I'd like to see a better energy policy, too, but compromises were made to have anything at all in the way of improved environmental standards.
Surely you are aware of post-pandemic causes of inflation: shipping and supply delays, corporate profiteering, especially in the fossil fuel segments, China's covid chaos, the war in Ukraine, et al.
Surely you are aware of a rapid return to pre-pandemic employment status. Quite an accomplishment. Especially gas prices have lowered quite a bit, due to Pres Biden's managing of fuel reserves.
I would also like to encourage you to reconsider "open borders." That simply is not true. the Biden administration is dealing as compassionately and LEGALLY as possible with immigration. There is no limit on applications for asylum. Thousands of migrants have been returned to their countries who did not fit the qualifications for refuge. The cruelty of the former administration in their immigration policy will define the Republican party for decades. As will the mad man who was President.
There are a multitude of reasons that immigrants and refugees are applying for entry to the US. Compare our nation to the world as a whole in which masses of people are fleeing warfare, destitution, drought and floods. It bears a universal solution far beyond us by ourselves.
I think you are hinting at a "trickle down" economy as ideal, or Reaganomics. That is what has failed. Therein lies the lowered standard of living, including rotting infrastructure and housing shortages, tainted water and poor health care for poor people.
Hope, he’s a resident troll. One can report his comment by clicking “…” under it.
Thanks Ashley. I have to remind myself that trolling is pretty pathological. What a small universe trolls live in.
Compassionate. Total BS. It leaves millions of people we have not vetted rampaging around forever as illegal immigrants. Funny how it’s not compassionate when illegal immigrants go willingly to Sanctuary states. Biden’s economic policies are a disaster. Say what you want about Reagan. I had to leave a private college during Carter as a result of financial distress. The Reagan years were pretty darn good having stated in the whole with nothing. The only reason gas prices are coming down is people can’t afford to drive. Joe’s crazed spending lit the flame. I imagine you see his finest hour surrendering in Afghanistan?
Troll. The inflation being had now is the direct result of over $2T being literally gifted to the GOP's investors who by definition expect results for their investment,... and they got it courtesy of TFG who continued to threaten the Fed to keep rates at zero so he could lay the entire mess at the doorstep of the next admin. Typ GOP playbook stuff as it has been for decades. Next.
BK,
DC is a resident troll. One can report his comment by clicking “…” under it.
Heart.
I agree BK. David is definitely trolling and/or not making much sense. David, when you throw stuff, check before. Biden left Afghanistan because Trump set a date for withdrawing which the US was obligated to follow. Of course he set the date to occur in the next administration.
I hope you are helping the Afghani refugees settle here. Their lives depend on it.
FERN
Yeah!
Use SHORT statements
Of original conceptualizations instead of ALWAYS poaching others comments that we have already studied, Eh!?
Chris, I really like your thoughtful comment today. Your phrase “Treating people as abstractions” is a pivot point for much of wisdom we need to lead us out of this morass we are in, this Tower of Babel, if you will. Propaganda’s greatest feature is it’s ability to shorten the cognitive milliseconds we take to form a contextual judgement/status assessments of a person we are encountering in any given situation. Propaganda is perfected in each technological age to shorten this thinking-time, and replace it with pre-formed, manufactured opinions (which often include the time-honored-fear-based label “Enemy”). Stopping to “treat individuals as human beings and not abstractions” takes milliseconds more time, - and courage. And doing it requires risk and effort. Yet it remains the only way out of the mind-prison of propaganda.
Attempted like
Same here. But I have faith (that my attempt will succeed in a few minutes).
Yes, thank you for that
Getting to know some background allows for shared empathy before moving to value examinations; which is really what we are all attempting to convey, “ what ARE your values, in your own words?”
TCinLA
Moronic Minions, Eh!?
And
Old Moscow mitch-bitch's scamplan to hijack the supreme court by jamming in a bunch of dumbass greedy maggots backfired SPLAT in his turtled contorted puss giving Democrats a gift that will keep on giving right up to this November 8th ! WHOOOO! HOOOOO!
Your joy is contagious
Jeri Chilcutt
Thank you for answering my daily prayer!
🤣🤣you have quite the way with words! Love the early morning giggles! 🤣🤣
We hope, so must vote!
Virginia Witmer
Aha!
A snappy little ditty, EH!?
Let ‘er rip!
Let’s hope and pray that it is definitely the case that he helped them to lose!! 🥳
Agreed
Was hoping Masters et al would have lost anyway.
Oh, TC we hope that those regressive republicans will lose their races! Defeat to the far right fascists!
You would think this costs them their races, but there are apparently enough morons in this country who don't have a freaking clue.
Are there enough people with ears connected to a brain that has not been “MAGAfied?” Those around me seem stupefied. May the concrete crack…
Jeri Chilcutt
It would seem that some poor souls out "There" were taught to squeeze their nose real tight and hold their mouth closed even tighter and then try to blow real hard until the wax shoots out of their ears...unfortunately there are way to many Blowhards out "There" that blew some of their brains out also!
Your keyboard to G*d’s ear, TC!
SLWeston (PA)
That would be to the ear of our FATHER in Heaven, Eh!?
For Christians, yes. All kinds of names for God, Mr. Dobbs.
SLWeston (PA)
Gee...
Thanks for the heads up Mr. SL Weston.
Sure hope you're right, TC, about AZ elections.
Pam Peterson (West MA)
Hope is good...
Prayer is infallible with request for the Grace of discernment to hear HIS answer instead of your answer.....Eh!?
Their plan for the country isn't a plan at all. It's a facade of lies. It will persuade no one. The abortion ban and threats to Social Security will not be forgotten.
May we hope you are correct. After all, you have correctly noted that R's aren't all that bright.
🤞
You are assuming the RepubliCONs are literate....
My college pal Tom Cullen lives in LA, I thought you were he. He is both smart and irreverent like you seem to be. He has a Ph.D but whose counting. Your comment is spot-on !!!!!
Different TC, but in LA. :-)
Worth some thought and consideration:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Fo-ELYK2Pg&list=PLQDS8YKa2B0kkdfbs6x8dMPdm6u-XxWs6&index=2
Isn’t Justin King, a.k.a. Beau of the Fifth Column, the BEST?! So much wisdom, experience, common sense, wry wit. The best.
As a one-time ‘blue water’ sailor, I appreciate having detailed nautical charts and electronic aides on a vexing voyage. President Biden, as captain of our ship of state, has clearly established an appropriate course which, as circumstances required, was adjusted midstream. His crew (the Democratic Congress), while encountering some back winds, has provided fulsome support to their skipper.
Trump has never relied on charts or electronic aides in office or afterwards. As president, He led our ship of state onto rocks on various occasions. As ex-president on policy he has been as vacuous as would-be-Senate-Majority-Leader-McConnell.
Two wannabe-leaders of the House, McCarthy and Stefanik (who replaced Liz Cheney in Republican House leadership) have now presented a one page Commitment to America ‘policy paper’ that reads like it was scribbled on a napkin after a boisterous night of drinking.
I would consider this ludicrous, were it not the only purported ship of state nautical charts provided by Republican ‘leadership.’ I find it frightening as indicative of a rudderless Republican ship of state.
“Trump has never relied on charts or electronic aides in office or afterwards.” I do recall one exception, Keith: remember that weather map that he Sharpied to prove his off-course assertion that hurricane Dorian was heading to Alabama? While a potentially life-threatening hurricane was headed to the Carolinas, he continued displaying his doctored map for several days, forcing National Weather Service personnel to rush multiple corrections to alert those residing on the storm’s factually chartered path. But I’m sure you are correct, Keith: he doesn’t rely on any source of universally accepted knowledge. (BTW, I ’d love to see him try to identify 10 of the states in an unlabeled U.S. map 😉)
Do you think he could pass citizenship test for immigrants?
I do not think he could. There are numerous things many of us can do and things we understand that he does not have the slightest clue about. I am not exaggerating. It is astonishing.
Since the ex president thinks bleach could cure COVID, it is highly unlikely that he could pass the citizenship test. Probably lots of his base couldn’t either.
Joan NO! The only thing Trump knows about checks and balances [the constitutional interrelationship between the Executive, Legislature, and Judiciary] is what Wissenburg (in court with a guilty plea) the financial wizard at The Trump Organization, tried to explain to him in Checkbook 101. [Trump flunked.]
That test might be a test for many of us🥴
HAhahaha
Am not sure I could…
Senator Tommy Tuberville (R-AL) thought the three branches were president, senate and house. Seriously.
Glad Palin (who could see Russia from her house) was defeated in Alaska. (Maybe she was THINKING she could see it?)
Not sure I would use the verb think with Palin.
Nonetheless, November gives Palin one more bite at the apple. Let's hope that she's widely enough disliked (as has been expressed elsewhere following the primary) that she'll lose once again.
She isn’t finished yet...planning to re-run against the woman who defeated her!
All members of the House and Senate should be required to pass a citizenship test. Do they even understand the structure of our government? How can they swear to uphold the Constitution when they don't even know what it says?!
That the people of Alabama could replace Doug Jones with this ignoramus football coach says a lot about the people of Alabama! And it’s not good….
Not a surprise. I knew he would win as a former football coach. It's SEC country.
Voter suppression had a lot to do with it
He is an extra dose of stupid
Duh! He is a Republican elected by Republicans!
Ah, a former football coach who didn't need to know anything beyond football games. A travesty.
Spot on Rose; let's see if the Special Master, Judge Dearie, can locate the Sharpie effort among the NARA documents at MAL.
Rose Thanks for your Sharpie-eyed remembrance. I believe that Trump might be able to identify FL & NY. On a blank global map, I am certain that he couldn’t locate Ukraine. And, as he explained to Xi, it was fortunate that India didn’t have a common border with China. [Are their troops fighting in some video game?]
I think he could find Tsar-a-Loco and yes, New York. And maybe places where he has golf courses or hotels.
"Tsar-a-Loco"—Good one, Michele.
My fav for that ugly pile.
Hurricane Dorian’s tornadoes came right through my southeastern NC backyard, no place close to Alabama.
Also I have noted that Biden was right on it for Puerto Rico this week. And gosh, not there throwing out rolls of paper towels.
Me too. Remove FL, CA, AK, HI. Hell leave them in, it won’t matter.😜
Keith, brilliantly written and honestly expressing the sad reality of the Republican party as well as describing the leadership of the captain of our ship of state. He knows how to navigate. He loves this country....he respects the ideal of democracy. His leadership is inspiring.....and I also have to include thank you to the many young men and women who are working hard beside him for the healthy growth and well-being of our nation and the world. They are being encouraged by a great mentor....actually President Joe Biden is providing proof that democracy works!
Frightening. So frightening. Especially after viewing 6 hours of Ken Burns documenting the rise of the Nazi party in Germany and the massive sympathy/ disinterest here. The refusal to see the news that was in papers daily. And then there was Lindberg and his adoring followers. We seem to be that same country today. Sleepwalking into right wing vision.
That feeling of “Oh Sh*t! We are doing the same thing today!” was my immediate reaction. Then it gave me a really weird calming feeling. All my marching, protesting, letter-writing, donating, and engaging have been what I should have been doing, because this thing is REAL, this fight, this creep of fascism, this fragility of democracy, is REAL. I don’t know how this will all turn out, but I want my grandchildren to say “She didn’t just sit around complaining!”
Michelle. Calmness. I wish that was my reaction. I feel polar opposite
All these years of supporting Planned Parenthood and Guttmacher Institute and the Supreme court waves a wand …over. Just one example
they are going to go after soc security and obamacare and who knows what?
By calmness I meant my seeing the similarities to the 1930’s and the people who protested then, affirmed my belief that action needs to happen. We are not delusional, or histrionic, which is something I often hear. No. This is real.
Great point. Can’t help but see KB documentary through the lens of trump desantis and the maga movement.
Seeing it now is why Ken Burns insisted it be broadcast at this time, not whenever it had been scheduled to be shown.
I watched the first 2 hours last night, and it wasn't difficult to see some of the parallels between then and now. Scary.
What really struck me was not just the parallels, but the MAGA repetition of the isolationists’ “America First” and the tiki torches March in Charlottesville. I hadn’t realized how closely the MAGAs copied Hitler.
I agree 1000%. This has been apparent to me (and actually many others) since TFG was elected.
And we don’t have the Japanese to blast us out of our stupor.
Isolationism, but also the strength of the world’s oldest hate that always simmers in non-Asian societies.
Always appreciate your input to the discussion, Keith. The American people are a practical group not tied to class restrictions. Depending on their internal compass, perhaps, mostly forged in their mother’s womb, they make most of their decisions. They know they need to be honest, even when they break rules and then, either choose to own up ...or choose to keep breaking them. Arguments are generally avoided...most every one just wants to peacefully get through their day and feel good about their behavior and interactions with others. Fighting happens when emotions become overly charged but rarely change how anyone behaves since they find change so difficult and often very repellent. Most Americans like to make their own changes. Many do it through education, contemplation, others through upbringing and life experience, inside a free society ...what works, and what doesn’t ...is the approach, almost everyone follows if they’re mentally capable of doing so.
Biden and his large team of government leaders are on a solid path; they’re making real progress and, even better, they’re animated and inspired by the biggest accomplishments of past administrations and their own solid internal compasses. They’re also pretty clear about not repeating the errors of their predecessors; they’ll make their own along the way. They’ve made a few, but they keep trying to correct course and they’ve succeeded many times in doing so. They’re very effective in a crisis; experience counts very much along with solid problem solving skills. It’s pretty plain to see. There’s a lot to still accomplish. Joe and his team are on course to doing a lot more. The midterms are a very good litmus test for how practical Americans really are. After all the din and roar and chicanery of the republicans... what have they accomplished for the American people? Let’s see how American citizens, who make the effort to vote, actually decide things.
Attempted like
But I, who loves to parse words and do research, taking a quick read of the Repub “platform,” have to say, it sounds good. Who could argue with the thoughts and goals? But unless you also read the words and know what the ideas really mean, and most of all compare them to past and current actions, you could think the repubs have come to their senses.
MLM Of course you couldn’t parse the words in the 2020 Republican presidential convention party platform since, for the first time in my memory, they chose not to have one. [Might there have been a footnote: ‘See Trump Tweats for Republican policy?’]
And therein lies the place we all need to really get to in all public discourse. Honest dialogue about past and current actions - and intent! The truth is that most human beings are closer in hopes and dreams than we are apart. Getting to that field where we can honestly have those discussions and debates -with civility and no guns - seems to be the absolute essential thing we are kept from naturally doing for our survival. Mother Earth will endure no matter what. Humans? …………..we keep being compelled to make a “Hell of Heaven”.
Journalistic integrity should intervene somewhere
MLMinET
They lie, lie, lie...they always lie!
Follow the money, Eh!?
I thought it was interesting yesterday listening to McCarthy say that they were wanting to bring the economy back to the robust years before the pandemic. My mind immediately said “Thanks to Obama!” The former guy’s economy was in good, steady shape. It was his to F-up, which his choices did. Neither Obama, nor Biden inherited such a gifted, steady economy. Yet had to spend their first years heaving it out of deep abysses the previous administrations drove it into.
I enjoyed your navigation analogy being a blue water sailor myself. I hope our fellow citizens do not lose their point of sail and get themselves stuck in the doldrums of inaction.
Adjusting sails is continually needed. We just need to keep a steady course to the port of call - Winning in November.
Karen N
Watch out for that BOOM!
So well put!
Don't forget, tfg wanted to detonate a nuclear weapon inside of a hurricane, thought he could adjust the course of a storm with a Sharpie on a map, and claims he can declassify Top Secret National Intelligence documents by simply thinking about it.
But he has a dozen Sharpies
And let us not forget that Rick Scott has presented an R platform that clearly lays out the details behind this one page "policy paper." Everyone in the R cult is trying hard to pretend it does not exist, but...too late. The genie is out of the bottle.
How can you say he didn’t rely on charts or electronic aides in office? He used his sharpie during the hurricane and Stephen Miller was a droid on the Death Star before hitching his wagon to the Dumpster Fire.
Laurie (MA, VT)
The only electronic aide little donny relied up on was in the nightstand drawer on the other side of the bed!
I'm going out on a limb here. Maybe I'm seeing a convergence of views between Heather here, today's Opinion Piece on the predecessor to the Big Lie being the Big Joke, and David Brooks on Washington Week last night. Or, it might just be me seeing the obvious that everyone else has knownall along. Brooks got me piecing some stuff on my Friday night walk.
David Brooks suggested this speech as the Republican twitching (my word) to becoming the party of the working man (albeit that there are working women). I think there might be something here. I reflect here on that twitch.
Democrats propose and tell you what they are doing (you need?) and the working man wants to know how their leader will manage or what they will manage. We think everyone wants or needs to know what we will do and why. All voices need to be heard and everyone gets to talk about the best way and the best measure and how to calculate and have the right sampling of our choice democratic demographics, etc.
Their new swing, probably apparent in much of the MAGA stuff, is in taping into voter imagining, not bogging down of the nuances or nitty gritty or which of what we said we would do to make the price of gas or groceries or how fast some thing from Amazon gets delivered or whether there will be enough Cabagge Patch Dolls available by December 15th (OK, I am showing my age). This twist is from what we will do (a detailed platform) to what we will (vaguely and perhaps contradictory to what we would makes connections to) promise. I think it a Platform of Euphemisms, but I'm an old progressive, number cruncher. Later, they know they can find the data points to match the broad promises or just drop them for another one or two to repeat and hammer at as success (e.g., how the economy took off after Trump got elected based upon the stock market or minority economic improvement basf upon a small improvement in employment rate as boomers left jobs and a slight rise in hourly wage rates).
I think this swing (or twitch) could be big. It may just work with the demographics we have targeted, nurtured, and counted on at the voting booth. It might explain why rural America went Red in the North and West. Or why Blacks and Hispanic voters are slipping away. We are the party of doing things, but not connecting what we did to the tapestry that working class folks just pay attention to. We over inform with the facts and fail in forming the message. We analyze and argue about methodology, data quality, and under-deliver in discussion, interpretation, and application (relevance, what's improved?). We count on numbers to deliver and fail to realize that the folks who vote do so based upon conclusions that are shared with them. What does it mean, not what did you find against some purist criteria? They don't live by the numbers or vote by the numbers for each promise, but rather on how your interpretation, the application, is convincing to them.
Call that dummying it all down, but the average voter (I'm tweaking us here) votes on how they feel what you tell them supports their belief or macro-understanding. And maybe, as reflected in a couple of numbers they can rely upon: e.g., stock market performance, favorability ratings of president, CPI. I think this could be the pivot to recreate the Republican party. Then again, this could just be me finally seeing the obvious to everyone else.
https://www.pbs.org/newshour/show/brooks-and-tumulty-on-putins-war-in-ukraine-and-the-state-of-republican-politics?utm_source=PBS+NewsHour&utm_campaign=6fb178beb5-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_2022_09_16_05_40_COPY_01&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_47f99db221-6fb178beb5-321115761
Fred: Call that dummying it all down, but the average voter (I'm tweaking us here) votes on how they feel what you tell them supports their belief or macro-understanding. And maybe, as reflected in a couple of numbers they can rely upon: e.g., stock market performance, favorability ratings of president, CPI. I think this could be the pivot to recreate the Republican party. Then again, this could just be me finally seeing the obvious to everyone else.” This is the proverbial nail being hit upon it’s tiny head! Thanks for the description.
Hey, don't disparage all cocktail napkin scrawls! My most brilliant projects were birthed in bars! With no Republicans at the table.
Mary Pat Were your most brilliant brilliant napkin projects when you first came to the bar or after a number of swizzles?
The Laffler curve, done on a napkin in the 1970s, was the basis for the economic ‘trickle down’ theory that commenced with Reagan’s major tax cuts and later Trump’s 2017 massive tax giveaway to the very wealthy and to corporations.
I agree with Paul Kaufman’s rejection of ‘trickle down,’ in part because of the yellow drizzlies on the shoes of these trickle down doozies.
Ha! I said "brilliant", not evil. Plus, I don't really drink alcohol. I like to consider it.
Keith the path of your life very much parallels my Dad’s.
I meant PATH
Keith Wheelock
Wait for it
The republican party symbolized
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pJW-wAyMREI
I remember this, lordy
I love Dr Richardson’s letters and have shared them with all of my friends, many who too have become devoted readers! Thank you for making the time to write them.
I wish I could afford to mail today's letter from HCR to every American.
AJT NYC
You can!
https://www.directmail.com/perfectmailinglistsolutions/
A particularly powerful Letter today, Professor Richardson.
Slicing the film of obfuscation from the GOP's talking points, exposing them for the treachery they are, your contribution to our understanding of the perilous space our Democracy now inhabits is invaluable.
Thank you!
Absolutely! She's a gift to us and a real catalyst. But here's the deal; two thirds of the Republican electorate still believes that the 2020 election was at least "suspect" and many are apparently gravitating toward giving credibility to the Q-Anon lunacy. While some independent voters may be swayed by the lack of substance in this new "platform", the only thing that will nudge these Fox News junkies, I mean mainstream Republican voters, into the slightest critical examination of the GOP's flim-flam will be when Hannity and Carlson suddenly develop a sense of shame and decide to use their big megaphone for the betterment of the nation. I have some small hope for this, but I'm not holding my breath. I guess the best we (this small group) can do is to make an effort to put the excellent offerings of sources like Dr Richardson in front of anyone in our orbit that may be a fence sitter, and critically, well before the midterms.
Yes. All of a sudden, I can't "like" your post, but yes this is not a tiny radical fringe alt-right group. We have found out a terrifying truth--it's a huge chunk of "mainstream" or "moderates" Republicans. It's almost half of the voting public in this country.
One always hopes for the miracle, but I'm not especially cheerful. I do whatever I can to help the great unexpected good news to happen, but--
When the heart button doesn’t turn red, refresh your page and it should then show it’s red. If not, just click on it again, and it should turn red. You may have to scroll to find it.
Dean Robertson
https://www.politico.com/2022-election/race-forecasts-ratings-and-predictions/
Now you know for now, Eh!
Has anyone noticed that both of the embedded ads are right wing? The first is "Today's Poll" asking if "illegal aliens" should receive Social Security. The ad even says "Right Wing" in the lower right corner. The other is about Critical Race Theory and links to an article by Christopher Rufo, the guy who brought forward the the non-existent claim that CRT is being used in elementary & secondary school classrooms. One (or two) more reason(s) I'm losing interest in anything from Politico.
Judith Swink (CA)
The first embedded ad is an advertisement for:
Environmental defense fund (finding the ways that work).
EDF has drawn some criticism for its ties to large corporations including McDonald's, FedEx, Walmart, and the Texas energy company TXU, with which the organization has negotiated to reduce emissions and develop more environmentally friendly business practices.
So they seem to be guided by their slogan, "Finding The Ways That Work"
EDF seems much more liberal than right wing....
The second embedded ad is for the New York Times whose bias rating is close to neutral and is considered the greatest newspaper in the United States of America....
Hard to understand your claim of right wing for Politico...
I think the ads you saw are not the same as the ones I saw and describe in my post. The "Today's Poll" ad has nothing to indicate EDF which I support, nor does EDF have anything to do with immigration policy. The second quite clearly links to an article by Christopher Rufo and not to the NY Times. Admittedly, I didn't click on either but neither had anything to suggest they were other than right-wing.
I've just gone back to that link and I right-clicked on the poll asking about SS for illegal aliens to open it in a new window. Here's the result: https://www.rightwing.org/pollsf-16-1-1/
The same action on the second ad, which is entirely different than the one I originally saw, got this: https://brainable.com/quiz Maybe they rotate ads so what one sees is different at different times?
Based on my supposition about rotating ads, I just opened the original Politico link again and, lo and behold, the first ad now is the CRT ad I originally saw as the second ad on the page: https://lp.hillsdale.edu/imprimis-critical-race-theory/
Dean-this may help you being able to "like": Go to the top of the pagelook to the left of the search bar. You'll see an incomplete circle w/ an arrow @ the end of it. Click on that-the process refreshes the page and will go back to the comments. Scroll back to where you were-the Heart should be there. (It doesn't last too long so you may have to repeat the process after a few times of "hearting".
Barbara D. Reed - "You'll see an incomplete circle w/ an arrow @ the end of it. Click on that-the process refreshes the page and will go back to the comments."
Ctrl-R will do the same thing. The downside to both actions is that you are taken to the top of the page and getting back to your previous place is inconvenient... at best.
An alternative (I found) is to simply click on the "heart" icon and trust that it was accepted (it will). Caution, however, if you click it twice (to make sure) it will uncheck your choice... a third time will be accepted, fourth unchecked, and so on --all while appearing to do nothing.
I have encouraged readers to report the issue to support@substack.zendesk.com. They claim they cannot replicate the problem on their end. The more who report it, the more they will recognize it is an ongoing issue with many readers and the better the likelihood they will try to fix it.
Carlson has been dining at Orban's table, though - hasn't he? recently? I mean that figuratively and literally.
Like
First, ditto on the kudos to HCR!
As to the dumbass GOP voters, what really terrifies me is the numbers of them who say, "Yes, Trump is crazy; no, the GOP has nothing to offer, but at least they aren't DEMOCRATS". It's like the worst kind of reverse of the old "Yellow Dog Democrat" (I'd sooner vote for the yellow dog on the porch, than a Republican).
I watched a couple of interviews with Peter Baker and Susan Glasser, as they hit the book tour stages. (Check out the one at the Commonwealth Club, on Youtube). They provide a few more tidbits that season the stew that is/was the Trump saga. Unfortunately, none that will make it any easier to sleep soundly anytime soon.
Thanks for this. I found the Commonwealth Club interview. Fascinating.
Betsy, I found them by accident - a happy accident! I'm glad you found it useful. They do good work.
Thank you so much for drawing out attention to this hour-long interview with Baker & Glasser. It's fascinating and stunning despite, also, confirming much that most of us already knew in outline.
Glad to do it, Judith. None of us can be aware of all the resources and info available, so we need to share when we find helpful info, IMO. I'm always grateful for reliable, useful information to help me sort through all the BS!! :0)
Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b200Duu1RvU
Copied from page: "Commonwealth Club of California, organizer
As a nonprofit public forum, The Commonwealth Club relies on generous contributions to support our many public programs and civic initiatives. Your support enables us to focus more of our energies and resources on meeting the challenges ahead while knowing that our day-to-day operations are funded."
Carlson and Hannity, being exposed every bit as much as #45, pose no mystery to us. There is zero chance of them doing a single good thing for democracy. Experts have been saying over and over, when people tell you who they are, believe them!
Well Christy, I surely didn't mean to imply that either of those two would get religion or feel a pang of guilt over the monumental damage they've done (I did mention shame but discounted its likelihood). But even Bill Barr has started to change his tune, and I believe that's because he sees the writing on the wall and is trying to protect what little credibility he imagines he has left. Michael Cohen started the stampede and many more will follow; rats fleeing a sinking ship. Nobody will want to be the last schmuck left flapping their lips in defense of Trump when the last wheel comes off his wagon. It's just a pipe dream, I know .... :-)
Whoa!!! “ said that the White House switchboard connected a call to a rioter’s phone while the Capitol was under siege on January 6, 2021.” I mean I’m not shocked but FFS.
THAT MAKE ONE WONDER WHO @ WH WAS CALLING AND WHO THE CALLER WAS-TFG OR CHIEF OF STAFF?
We may find out at the open hearing of the committee on Weds.
🤞🏼🤞🏼
I can’t seem to copy the link, but go to CNN and look for the article entitled “Trump’s Secret Court Fight To Stop Grand Jury From Getting Information From His Inner Circle.”
https://www.cnn.com/2022/09/23/politics/trump-grand-jury-court-fight/index.html
Time for this too privileged manbaby to come down to earth.
“The dispute is separate from privilege protections Trump has tried to claim in the separate investigation of handling of federal records and national security information after his presidency. That investigation prompted the FBI to seize classified documents from Trump's Mar-a-Lago resort, and a judge acting as a special master is now working through the more than 10,000 non-classified records to determine if Trump can block them from investigators.”
Of course the congressional Republicans are attempting to piggyback on Joe Biden's successes. Having become the 'Do Nothing Just Say N0' party over the last several decades they've stifulled their ability to create meaningful policies that proffer realistic solutions to the challenges facing the nation. The old adage applies: 'You can fool some of the people all of the time, and all of the people some of time, but you can't fool all of the people all of the time.' The current party that calls itself 'Republican' is dominated by small minds that have nothing to offer their fellow Americans put lies. Their time for fooling people is coming rapidly to an end.
We have seen this before.....the republicans were against Obama's health care plan.....then they were going to revise it ......nothing happened.
they have become an ineffective body ....I can not refer to them as a governing body....they have become self-serving .....the entire party is going to implode.
Not only do Republicans vote against Democratic bills, but when they become law, they claim responsibility for how much THEY help their constituents.
We may only hope...
They continue on the long, slow slide to oblivion. In my town, the local Republicans met this week (the second meeting in their efforts to 'restart' i.e., resuscitate the Republican Town Committee) and the report was that several of those in attendance wanted to change the name of the group to something that would be more acceptable. The Town Clerk will have to approve it; I don't think he will look kindly on this attempt at subterfuge. They also asked for support for the local state representative candidate - who aligns with the gubernatorial candidate, an avowed election denier. A supporter I spoke to would not accept the results of the 2020 election. I live in a blue state, but these MAGAts are everywhere.
I'm going to focus on only one overriding thought that occurred to me--and is probably obvious--about halfway through Professor Richardson's letter. The difference, in every point, between what Biden is doing and the Republican platform (and between Republicans and the Biden administration in general) is the difference between carefully constructed catch phrases and the very particular work on one concrete and undramatic issue at a time. The difference between words and action.
I suppose the insight for me, also not a surprise, is that so many American voters respond to what someone says rather than what another someone does. Drama and show vs. one-step-at-a-time accomplishment of specific goals. Why do we buy this? And has TFG finally made it so dreadful that we might finally be changing?
I don't know. I think I said the same thing when Biden went on his train tour and was shouting and romping and stomping like a man on the campaign trail. Comment after comment praised him with great sighs of relief, "Biden has finally found his voicc! Now he's doing something." We are failing to understand that drama is drama. Joe Biden accomplished a staggering amount of nation-building change one small item at a time and he accomplished it sitting at his desk, talking on the phone, crafting bills and consulting with experts when necessary. He was too busy saving the soul of the country to come out into the corridor every hour and perform.
Are Americans just lazy? Are we so superficial that we require loud noise to convince us something is happening?
I think the tide might be turning but far too many voters lay hold of the words and just don't look beyond them.
I don't think this happened overnight with Trump's election, but he suddenly bombarded us with a lot of noise and bling for long enough to have managed to instill a fatigue we need to shake off.
I believe we can.
"Are Americans just lazy? Are we so superficial that we require loud noise to convince us something is happening?"
No, Mr. Robertson, I don't believe that even begins to describe our problem, although laziness has definitely been a big factor. I'm an old dude, even older than a "boomer" if you can imagine that. I've been around long enough to observe the changes in our society and to have had time to contemplate the reasons for them. I believe the critical juncture came in the mid '50's, though it's been a gradual process. First, we've given up on insisting on a sound education for our kids, the learning of critical thinking skills most importantly. That's hard work, for both students AND parents. I guess that's where the lazy part first came in. Second, we've completely surrendered to the seduction of Television. I've seen intelligent friends, sitting slack jawed in front of the TV watching reality shows and asked myself "why"? They don't read. and if they're under fifty they frequently wouldn't have the skills to parse and understand what they just read. And finally, we've become cynical. We've been abused by our leaders, that is, politicians and CEO's for so many generations (cooperated, really) that many of us just say "screw it", sit in front of the HUGE high definition TV with a beer, watching football. You know? Bread and crcus as the Romans used to say? Shame on us! We'll either collapse due to this foundational rot or we'll get pissed off enough to start making some meaningful changes, but we are certainly at a cusp. Hang on, friend. As HNO said in his tweet just before January 6, "Will be wild!"
I’m rather thinking this boils down to our tussle with the character traits of racism, and xenophobia. For the first time in my 61 year lifetime, I feel these traits are being framed more clearly. And their historical impact on our nation’s actions, leading it to always fall short of our ideals. In the mid fifties, SCOTUS decided Brown v Board of Ed. White supremacy defines why suddenly funding for education was no longer supported if it included equal funding for black and brown children’s schools. The sixties voting rights legislation, etc. pushed white supremacists to further pull back civil society monies if it included money for black and brown people. We have a racist, xenophobic character problem. Justice dispensed ethically, and fairly would help lessen the pernicious hate of most people. But therein lies the problem.
Good point, Michelle. I grew up in a small town on Puget Sound near Seattle. I don't believe I ever saw a single non Northern European until I reached high school, where even then a person with different ethnicity was rare. Moving to a much larger town where I encountered only one first generation Chinese kid in my high school class of 673 students, I was still sheltered by accident of geography . Later in life I did a lot of international travel in connection with my work, much of it in Asia. I came to know the Chinese as a very caring, hard working but fun loving people - they play every bit as hard as they work. I've known few black folks, but have always had great experiences in those relationships. I have never been able to "groc" racism as it exists in this country in this "enlightened age", but Howard Zinn in "A People's History of the United States - 1492 to Present" presents a very convincing account of how it was intentionally introduced by the early colonial white elites to keep poor whites and black slaves (with whom they really had more in common) from uniting against them. But back to your point, we really do still have a white supremacist mindset woven deep into the fabric of our country and I fear it will take a very long time to erase it. Likely the most effective solution will be racial mixing. That's a force that simply can't be stopped.
Good assessment. It is my belief that we will not grow as a country unless and until we acknowledge the fact that our wealth and success as a nation was based upon the genocide of the previous occupants of this country (which continues, in modern ways, today) and the enslavement of another race, kidnapped and brought to this country. Factor in the collateral "ownership" of women and you've got the backdrop for our "character problem".
I couldn't agree more, especially with the fact that at least as far back as the '50's too many factors came together at the same time, gathered momentum and, unnoticed by those of us who would have been pitching fits had we been looking but if we caught a glimpse, it didn't seem urgent. And now, in what seems like a sudden storm of all kinds of human horrors driven by this lightning flash of technology out of control--hoe the heck did Amazon and Facebook even happen? I'm sure they were some guys selling books out of a garage or making a small space in their dorm room for teenagers to chat.
I think the whole business has gotten clean away from us. I think we don't know the half of it. I'm too much of a bulldozer to retire to television and beer, but I will admit to significant mental and spiritual fatigue.
On another Subject, it's MS Robertson. Perhaps I should choose a different photo?
Thanks for getting me thinking!
So sorry Ms Robertson. I didn't check out the photo, I just made a hasty assumption. But your point is well taken about rampaging technology. I spent a lifetime serving that beast and was too busy working to see this coming. Our kids deserved better. But then, life is all about learning in my view, and the lessons abound. Thanks for the reply.
I believe that "Dean" is a title and not a name. Dean Robertson is female.
Thanks Ally. I too frequently shoot from the hip....
Same...
"so many American voters respond to what someone says rather than what another someone does."
Yes, entirely due to BS propaganda that blankets America with right wing BS.
But they're so very good at it
👍🏼
I do believe that many people are fundamentally lazy (raises hand). I also believe that many folks are, indeed, superficial and lacking in critical thinking skills (thinking is hard).
Is anyone reading DIVIDER Baker/Glasser?
It’s devastating detail of what it was like to breathe in that administration.
Thank you, Professor for your LETTER - I read it and thought to myself, “We as a nation are going to be recovering from that knot head for generations.”
“Knot head” is my polite for very bad jerk.
I have to believe he is ill.
That is the only reasonable explanation for the trail of destruction he levies upon anything he touches.
For someone who doesn’t drink or do drugs, he sure acts under a craven influence.
Okay. I think I can peel myself off the ceiling and slip back into a semblance of calm.
We could really use a lifetime without this individual’s further meddling. Cripes….
And the entire cult of liars, crooks and dumbkopfs.
Exactly!
The clincher is all those judges on federal benches, coast to coast, lifetime appointments, young, inexperienced, far right, beholden to Trump. And then there's the Supreme Court.
Generations and generations.
However we just saw three judges rule on the Trump Treason case with integrity and constitutional knowledge. 💥
Probably because they saw the deserved, horrified reaction and pushback to the other trump-judge ruling.
Give them a break!
I'm reading it. Trump is just a greedy, narcissistic, spoiled brat anarchist.
Does he NOT do drugs? I remember early on photos of Adderall in his desk drawers.
According to his self-tattle.
And there’s quite a bit of silence about it if he does.
With him? ALL factoids are just toids in his vernacular.
From Brett Meiselas on Twitter: “Let me get this straight: The GOP is running on banning abortion, banning contraception, banning books, eliminating Social Security and Medicare, defunding the FBI, targeting the people investigating Jan 6, raising drug prices, and protecting Trump? “
Put THAT on a bumper sticker!
"It feels rather as if the Republicans recognize that Biden’s policies are popular, and are hoping that voters haven’t noticed that he is actually putting them in place."
Well, given that essentially all of rural America is covered by far right AM radio talk shows all day, and, morning and evening much of America is tuned in to the radical right wing fascist Fox News, and completely unaware of anything not reported on those two platofrms......
I would not be surprised one bit if most Americans have not noticed what Biden is doing.
Rather, if you listen to AM radio, (make sure to have a hanky to wipe the hate spittle off your face while listening) you will hear anti Biden and anti Democrat bile that will make you feel sick, angry and, in my case, which is honestly pretty rare, helpless.
All of you guys should stream WHAM 1180 in Rochester NY some weekday from 8 am to noon to hear what I am talking about. Listen to to this crank Bob Lonsberry for 4 hours just so you know what is being said. Or pick the nuts on AM radio down in rural Eastern PA. Serously, it is a completely different world.
The far right has done an absolutely fantastic job taking over the apparatus of communications to Americans and they are blowing smoke up American arse all....day....long....every single day.
I know what it feels like to listen to that stuff and feel like it is true. Note the word feel, not think.
Much or most of America uses their feelings, not their rational apparatus, to sort out the world. Maybe most humans do this, including all of us, but, for those who read, we have a mechanism to dampen that tendency. To add information to the feeling part of the brain.
I don't really know, but, I hear what I hear and I see lots of folks fully bought in to the far right, fascist, propaganda.
Worse, if I try to have even a brief conversation about what Biden is doing I get what I call the "red face" result. Because people are so deep into their feelings by having been brainwashed by far right media so long, they just get angry if I bring up a simple, provable fact. They get really angry. There is no talking with them.
And, until the invasion of Afghanistant and Iraq, so did I (buy in to right wing BS). It is hard for me to feel and see into myself prior to that, but, I clearly remember "feeling" great when I heard Rush Limbaugh bash Bill Clinton when the blue dress turned up.
Of course, having a Protestant background and raised by two loyal parents who loved and respected each other, and having a father who was enthralled with my mother, Bill Clinton represented everything that I never wanted to be plus a stupid smile and a complete lack of ethics. Plus, he just sounded stupid to me. I know, he went to this fancy college and that one too. No matter.
So, even now, I would probably agree with Rush Limbaugh about Bill Clinton keeping his pants down around his ankles every chance he could, even if he was sitting at the Oval Office desk for goodness sakes.
That is how the far right gained credibility. They know the issues that matter to (some) Americans and they bang on them all day long. AND......in Trump's case, who was way worse than Clinton, they just decided not report on what a low life he was. A really cynical decision to be sure.
"I would not be surprised one bit if most Americans have not noticed what Biden is doing"
You have it, I'm afraid. Most haven't noticed because he doesn't make enough noise to get the attention of most American voters. The maintenance of our democracy depends on the existence of "an informed electorate." Oh, dear. Too many of us limit our reading to what we can slide through between our cars and Starbucks. Being "informed" requires some actual work and critical thinking.
Dean,
Yes, and if you read a bit around the beginning of our country, you will get the impression that Europeans who visited and wrote back were completely impressed with how the "masses" gathered to read the various papers.
Back then, the ONLY method of getting information was via reading the various printer press newspapers...one of which was owned by Benjamin Franklin.
If you read the book John Adams, by Catherine Drinker Bowen you will see a man who spent YEARS reading Coke, and who studied EVERY past form or government thoroughly and even wrote a summary of his study.
So, now? Even though I pushed my kids and even though they read well, they don't really sit down to "read". My own kids.
So, as Jefferson said often (something like): An ignorant electorate cannot hold a Democracy. Hence, his tireless push for public education. He might have run a nasty work camp for black people, but, he DID get public education going here.
I have the secret to raising a kid who is a reader. From the day I brought my son home from the hospital (half a century ago), when I was nursing him I sat in an old rocking chair of my grandmother's, rocked, nursed, and read aloud whatever I happened to be reading at the time. He got a lot of Jane Austen, if I'm remembering right. I really am convinced that I accidentally hit on the formula--milk, Mother smells, warmth, soothing movement, a familiar voice reading words, book in hand.
I wonder if the dads of this world could make that work with bottles.
Whether it was what did the trick or not, I can tell you they were magic moments. Except for the nursing, I've done the same with my grandson, now 7 and already a reader.
I don't think most people today have or take the time for stuff like that.
Am I being inappropriate to talk about breast-feeding at 6 in the morning?
Oh, well. Inappropriate is part of my charm.
Thanks for the conversation, Mike.
I feel the same way about classical music, which I must have heard while in the womb and have loved ever since, though my repertoire expanded to include '50s rock 'n' roll (while in high school) and jazz (beginning at college). The exposure must begin very early. As for ideas and beliefs, "You've got to be taught..." (Rodgers & Hammerstein) That said, it makes me wonder at what point a preference for fact-free, willfully ignorant existence was sown in MAGAts.
Yup, you must be taught.
Brought to mind when I was about 8 years old and my Chgo neighborhood was beginning to become integrated. My mom told me "you might have some little black kids in your class this year. Don't treat them any different."
It surprised me because I wondered WHY I would want to treat them different.
Later our neighborhood was decimated by white flight, as I grew I understood the cause was more the fears implanted by unscrupulous realtors than by the actual people moving in. This was a community of many first time home owning families, their entire wealth (such as it was) was sunk into their homes. The threat of property values plummeting terrified them.
It seems that the GOP motivates by fear and by money.
My Mom did this. Between classical music and folk music, with reading aloud whatever she was reading (alas, the poetry did not stick, but the Agatha Christie did) she planted lots seeds and nurtured their growth with modeling the behaviors for me.
Yes, Ally, the modeling of my parents' exemplary behavior was critical, too.
Mim, I hear you. Often on Sundays, our small family visited my aunt and uncle's home - they had opera or classical music playing at their home all day, and that same aunt sent me classic albums for gifts (when I wanted rock 'n roll) - but today I love classical. Also Sunday dinner table conversation was elevated a few notches there as well, since auntie was a teacher. The habits of our youthful years truly can rub off.
I didn’t start reading to my children while nursing, but started with lap time when they could sit up. Both read well and can write with proper spelling and grammar.
At age 2, my son was attracted to the neon beer logo signs in our grocery store window. I read them to him and he started reciting them as we went by. People stared at us and I responded “He likes the lights, the lights spell words. It’s called reading.”He started recognizing them on delivery trucks and it was a great day when he recognized one that wasn’t a beer.
I started with my grandson at age 1, and Nana Daycare at my house was no tech, with lots of reading, outdoor walks and play. When he entered kindergarten, he had just finished fluently reading my reprint “”Dick and Jane” book, the primer I had learned to read from in first grade. He tested as reading at a 3rd grade level, by current standards.
And that is what I call joy. When my son was, I think, in 6th grade, I read out loud to him the entire four volumes of Tolkien's books. The pleasure was doubled by the fact that I had never read them and we had the experience of discovering them together. Good memories.
When my daughter was in 4th and 5th grade, I continued our bedtime reading each night with a chapter from the American Girl series books. Not great literature like Tolkien, but they did give her a bit of a grounding in American history.
Dean, good idea. I started reading to them very, very early. They always wanted to "read a book". Both of my kids are well spoken and write reasonably well.
They read for pleasure up through around the 8th grade, then, it dropped off because of high school loading and swim team. Then, college hit.
So, now, they are working. They don't have a Library card which is tragic really.
I did my best. My wife was never much into the reading thing, and, perhaps that did matter.
Well, as much as I like to think it was mother's milk that did the trick, I can't swear to it. My son has gone in an out of his reading for pleasure entirely dependent on his life. Right now, at 51, he is the father of his first and only child, age 7, and he and my daughter-in-law run their own successful business.
His house, however, always manages to have a place for his rather alarming book collection (I think he has been threatened with dire consequences if he buys more) and I have never known a time when he didn't carry with him his favorites from his school years--The Great Gatsby; Pride and Prejudice; Great Expectations; the four Tolkien books. Every few years, he'll haul one of them out and read it.
Such a pleasure to be remembering all this.
I could have expressed the same views and experiences.....and unfortunately the far right uses the church pulpit every Sunday ....
How similar my story is to yours
Talk Radio propaganda is powerful until you begin to see the cracks in the veneer for yourself
It remains powerful to the mass of the GOP base
The question becomes, “how to crack the veneer?”
Mike, I look for your posts as I skim as you generally have excellent posts. Being in the greater Chicago area, my AM dial is turned to news radio which is apolitical, but I am sure you are accurate.
One thing I'd like to offer to you and any other readers: yeah, when you look at a map of blue vs red states, the county does looks very "red" but if you consider POPULATION, it is a different story. I had an online argument with an ancient relative (and I ain't young) who thought that urban blue areas had too much power vs rural red ones. I countered with some of those areas he was arguing for have less power because they have less people! So, should we give votes to the black bears of the Blue Ridge? The long horned cattle in the plains? The gators in the Everglades? That sounds ridiculous, doesn't it?
We're never going to change a lot of people's minds, we don't have to. I think the best way is to not bang on them as it sets up a wall. Logic, respect, focusing on mutual intents works for the less MAGA driven.(the true MAGAts, can't win every battle) Don't give up!
Our friend Beto is using very persuasive dialogue - along with a healthy dose of respect - at the town hall and community gatherings in Texas, with much success in catching the ear and capturing the hearts of Texas Republicans. Can we clone him? And send the clones to the Republican heartlands?
It rather comes down to feeling vulnerable. Progressives feel vulnerable because a few racist, xenophobic, misogynistic, homophobic, xtian folk want to take away our rights
(reproductive freedom, voting rights, etc), reduce our public spaces to gun-slaughtering, grievance-dramas, and super-charge the climate to further degrade the only planetary life-support-system we have. And Conservatives feel vulnerable because a gay couple asked them to bake a wedding cake, or a black man walked/jogged through their neighborhood, or someone in their employ wants to have contraception included in their healthcare plan. Conservative’s discomfort with vulnerability has never been equal to the vulnerability they expect all others to cope with. This needs to be pointed out more often. I remember laughing when I heard them call us “snowflakes”.
Mike, I know exactly what you're talking about. From time to time I'll tune in Tucker Carlson, just out of morbid curiosity. I used to do a 45 minute commute and occasionally I'd tune in Rush Limbaugh, just to see what nonsense he was pushing today. I was especially intrigued by his fallacious and often specious arguments. Made me wonder why he had such a large fan base. But eventually it hit me: He had a cadence to his delivery that was almost hypnotic. I was sometimes caught up in it myself, even while being repulsed by the content. A person may not speak or understand German, but even if you don't, you can get a sense of that speaking style in the old videos of Adolf Hitler addressing the assembled masses. These right wing pundits all seem to share that talent to some degree. That's more frightening than the manure they shovel, in my estimation.
Oh, my gosh. That's it exactly. It's the cadences, the rhythm of language. Many years ago I attended a rally for George Wallace, to try to gauge what we were up against in Montgomery, Alabama, and I will tell you that the very large crowd of white people would have taken to the streets and carried out any terrible violence Wallace suggested.
More embarrassing personally was my own trance several years ago after watching the two documentaries about Steve Bannon. It wasn't any kind of change of ideas or loyalties, nor even a moment's doubt as to what the man is, but for an hour or so I was, to use your accurate word, hypnotized. It got my attention and, frankly, scared the stuffing out of me.
Lord, I hate admitting that.
Amen, Dean. Me too :-)
Don't forget, Kissinger said, "power is the greatest aphrodisiac"
Hugh,
Well, Kissinger obviously never met my wife. Poor guy. Power is definitely NOT the best of aphrodisiacs. Not even close.
:-)
Good point, well made. We need legislation with a cabinet-level department who's job is to ensure fair and balanced media across the spectrum.
"said that the White House switchboard connected a call to a rioter’s phone while the Capitol was under siege on January 6, 2021."
Honestly, this is no surprise to either MAGA people or me/us here.
What is a surprise is that, two years after a traitor called up an army to take over the National Government and kill Mike Pence, that traitor is still living in the lap of luxury at Mara Lago running around telling more lies.
That, I have to say, is profoundly disturbing.
George Washington would have rounded up Trump and his leaders and he would have hung them forthwith. John Adams would have attended to show support. Period.
What is more egregious is that we are only finding out about this NOW? Why did the person not come forward before?
Orwell's Politics and the English Language is a great essay. It is available in ebook form from the usual sources for under 2 dollars. A good investment
Correction: "teaching subjects that make white students uncomfortable." Nowhere have any parents objected to teaching a version of U.S. history that makes Black, brown, AAPI, or Indigenous American children "uncomfortable."
Every time Republicans bring up this plan they need to be pressed on their voting record this past session and how these two things jibe?
I think that we need to juxtapose this "plan" and the "12 point plan" and see how they line up. I suspect that may be the best way for us to demonstrate how much of the Democrat's progress is part of their "new and improved" "platform".
I love this idea!!!!!
‘Make Orwell fiction again’, as a recent bumpersticker spotted in Maine recently read. Thanks as always for the clarity you bring to current political events. Imagine if the Republicans devoted just 10% of their resources and energy to governing rather than trying to game the system in a never-ending quest for power.
The Republicans are in a tough spot; How to keep the support TFG's Maga Mob (MM) while distancing themselves from TFG himself. The MM by itself won't get you elected, but lose them and you're toast. And they won't abandon TFG no matter what. It seems he was right when he said he could shoot someone in broad daylight on 5th Ave. and not lose a vote.
The White House/capitol assualt phone connection story, if true, is stunning. it will be more than interesting if 60 Minutes has the details of whose phone was at each end of that connection. If not, it should be relatively easy for the 1/6 Committee to find out. If the White House end was the Oval Office phone, we have a very smokey gun. Or, perhaps those phone logs were among the documents stolen and taken to Mar-A-Lago.
Stay tuned!