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STOP CALLING THEM “REPUBLICANS"

Words Matter

I try never to paint groups of people with the same brush but I will now.

In the modern history of the United States we've only had two great political parties: Democrats & Republicans. We have now been reduced to one. 

Millions belonged to the Republican Party. They had some good ideas & stood for some principles. Some identified as “Conservative”, “Middle-of-the-Road” or “Compassionate Conservative” but you can forget that nomenclature. They have vanished; co-opted. Now we have Democrats & Cultists. 

Cultists have only fealty to the dear leader & are guided by his lies and conspiracies. The truth escapes them. They live in an alternate universe and entertain such rich ideas as “alternative facts”. There. Is. No. Such. Thing; IT IS AN OXYMORON. 

Consider Jones, Koresch, Rajneesh, Jeffs, Raniere & perhaps, the best known: Adolf Hitler. They all lived by “alternative facts”. Most who followed them lost everything, have suffered or perished.

Malcolm X argued that the word “integration” was only an invention to make middle class whites feel comfortable. The more accurate word, he argued, was “mongrelization”. Only as people intermarry, have families and successful careers in society will there be true integration. 

Fast forward. Today, you rarely hear anyone use that word, “integration”, referring to race. People no longer march for integration. We are now beginning a discussion on “systemic racism”.  

Those who once proudly identified as Republican can no longer do so. Thousands have resigned from the Republican Party. Some are simply disgusted. Some have become virulent Anti-Trumpers. Those who remain have sipped the Kool-Aid. They have morphed into the Alt-Right, Qnoners, Racists, Conspiracy Mongers, Purveyors of Misinformation, Bullshitters, Cowardly Lions; certainly not constitutionalists.. 

Current members of congress who identify as "Republican" can no longer claim to be the loyal opposition. They have done nothing to earn the title but have managed extreme fealty to Donald Trump. He paralyzes them, He mutes them. He has them running scared. He tweets at them. Oh my. They are no longer guided by truth & principle. Constitution? What Constitution? Truth? What truth? Law? What law? They are no longer "Republicans". They cannot debate with credibility, make statements or offer up ideas that make sense. Words matter. Stop calling these people “Republicans”. They are certainly not. Call them something else. 

Journalists, opinionists, public figures & writers, please find another name. Remember words do matter. And stop calling the man in the White House “the most powerful man in the world”. He is not. 

From 2015-2019 journalists "fumphered" around trying to describe Donald Trump’s exaggerations, untruths & flights of fancy. Only in 2020 did the mainstream media finally begin to call it “lying”. "Oorah"! That’s accurate and has made a difference in our collective conscience.

Meanwhile former “Republicans” need to find a new home and a new name. Many have found temporary asylum in the Lincoln Project but sooner or later, the Lincoln Project will morph into a political party with an alternate name, like, let’s say, “The National Union Party (United States)”. Check it out.  

Abraham Lincoln was actually part of “The National Union Party” so were “Republicans” really the “Party of Lincoln”? When Lincoln ran for President under the “The National Union Party” banner, he won by a landslide. Of course, that was in 1864. 

What makes this country viable is debate, voting and the law. Without “Republicans”, there can be no debate. You end up talking to yourself. That's what is happening now.

Discussion between Democrats and Cultists consists of “I’m right & you’re wrong.” One cannot discuss an issue with cultists who dispense conspiratorial smoke & mirrors and expect to arrive at a reasoned conclusion. But Democrats debating “The National Union Party”? Now that could be a healthy debate between equals. 

We hear the “talking heads” use the phrase “words matter”.  Yes, they do.So let’s start using more of them.

THE NEW HIGH FOR THE 45TH POTUS

My new theory: the imPOTUS is not lying. He DOES feel better. It's a drug induced high. That's what steroids do for you. 

In fact, he feels SO GOOD that he has ORDERED his military doctor to continue the STEROID regimen to which his doctor replies: "Yes Sir". 

It's is drug of choice and because he now feels bigger, stronger, even more confident, he is even more DANGEROUS.  

That's what steroids do to you. 

Be careful, very careful.

For those of you who have been prescribed a regimen of steroids, you know I'm telling the truth. For those of you who haven't had this experience, ask a doctor, a nurse,  a nurse practitioner or your local pharmacist.

There are legitimate reasons to be discussing the 25th amendment. Let's just not take too long....

HAVE A LAUGH.

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WAIT A MINUTE!

This is certainly worth your time & attention

GEORGE FLOYD'S PLACE IN HISTORY

George Floyd was murdered before our eyes. For over eight minutes he begged for his life but no matter. Mr. Floyd had the life squeezed out of him by a policeman who pressed his knee across Mr. Floyd's neck, choking the breath out of him. 

Colored peoples have historically been & continue to suffer from racism that is deeply ingrained in our history. But change must come to America for it to live up to its ideals. Maybe, just maybe, we will now make real strides towards those ideals. 

Once upon a time, fire fighters & EMS workers were routinely called "heroes". But with the pandemic upon us, the "hero" ranks have swelled to include doctors & nurses, cleaning staff, grocery store clerks, care givers, truck drivers, warehouse & food factory workers. And deservedly so. 

But is George Floyd a "hero"? Was he a good person? Is that important? Would it make a difference if he wasn't really?

Do you want to know him better? I do. But, short of a speech from attorney Crump, the family lawyer, an emotional eulogy delivered by the Reverend Al Sharpton & short statements by a few family members, we don't know much about him.  I don't even know the actual events surrounding Mr. Floyd's arrest.  But would that change the narrative?

Into this void, stepped black conservative commentator Candace Owens who vlogged a rant about Mr. Floyd's past. @Kevin Rose (NYT Tech  Columnist) tweeted that Ms. Owen's "video is at 58,000,000 views & is now the 'top-performing' Facebook post of the past week. It was also featured in a Daily Wire article [...] for another 300,000 views." (I can't verify these  numbers.)

I've watched Ms. Owen's vlog. I'm deeply troubled by her vlog. While everyone should enjoy Freedom of Speech, what troubles me is that her narrative has gained so much traction when, in reality, it doesn't make any difference who Mr. George was. It's a red herring.

The real issue -- the only principle that should guide us here -- is how Mr. Floyd died at the hands of a policeman, an instrument of the state & what that represented.

I don't want to see this moment in history diluted or corrupted or perverted or disfigured by politics or some 'ism'. 

Would it make a difference if George Floyd was a thief or high on meth? Would that make his murder less important? I don't think so but Ms. Owens' rant seems to be resonating with a large portion of our population if you can believe the count. And that's just unacceptable.

If you are not crystal clear-eyed about WHY what is happening in the streets & if the issue of racism is important to you, I strongly urge you watch Kerry Washington in the Netflix production of "American Son". It's all dialogue; something we desperately need in this country and it illustrates the depth of our problem.  

TOO IMPORTANT TO IGNORE. PLEASE TAKE A MOMENT TO READ.

Opinions
By 
George F. Will 
Columnist

June 1, 2020 at 3:18 p.m. EDT

This unraveling presidency began with the Crybaby-in-Chief banging his spoon on his highchair tray to protest a photograph — a photograph — showing that his inauguration crowd the day before had been smaller than the one four years previous. Since then, this weak person’s idea of a strong person, this chest-pounding advertisement of his own gnawing insecurities, this low-rent Lear raging on his Twitter-heath has proven that the phrase malignant buffoon is not an oxymoron.

Presidents, exploiting modern communications technologies and abetted today by journalists preening as the “resistance” — like members of the French Resistance 1940-1944, minus the bravery — can set the tone of American society, which is regrettably soft wax on which presidents leave their marks. The president’s provocations — his coarsening of public discourse that lowers the threshold for acting out by people as mentally crippled as he — do not excuse the violent few. They must be punished. He must be removed.

Social causation is difficult to demonstrate, particularly between one person’s words and other persons’ deeds. However: The person voters hired in 2016 to “take care that the laws be faithfully executed” stood on July 28, 2017, in front of uniformed police and urged them “please don’t be too nice” when handling suspected offenders. His hope was fulfilled for 8 minutes and 46 seconds on Minneapolis pavement.

What Daniel Patrick Moynihan termed “defining deviancy down” now defines American politics. In 2016, voters were presented an unprecedentedly unpalatable choice: Never had both major parties offered nominees with higher disapproval than approval numbers. Voters chose what they wagered would be the lesser blight. Now, however, they have watched him govern for 40 months and more than 40 percent — slightly less than the percentage that voted for him — approve of his sordid conduct.

Presidents seeking reelection bask in chants of “Four more years!” This year, however, most Americans — perhaps because they are, as the president predicted, weary from all the winning — might flinch: Four more years of this? The taste of ashes, metaphorical and now literal, dampens enthusiasm.

The nation’s downward spiral into acrimony and sporadic anarchy has had many causes much larger than the small man who is the great exacerbator of them. Most of the causes predate his presidency, and most will survive its January terminus. The measures necessary for restoration of national equilibrium are many and will be protracted far beyond his removal. One such measure must be the removal of those in Congress who, unlike the sycophantic mediocrities who cosset him in the White House, will not disappear “magically,” as Eric Trump said the coronavirus would. Voters must dispatch his congressional enablers, especially the senators who still gambol around his ankles with a canine hunger for petting.

In life’s unforgiving arithmetic, we are the sum of our choices. Congressional Republicans have made theirs for more than 1,200 days. We cannot know all the measures necessary to restore the nation’s domestic health and international standing, but we know the first step: Senate Republicans must be routed, as condign punishment for their Vichyite collaboration, leaving the Republican remnant to wonder: Was it sensible to sacrifice dignity, such as it ever was, and to shed principles, if convictions so easily jettisoned could be dignified as principles, for . . . what? Praying people should pray, and all others should hope: May I never crave anything as much as these people crave membership in the world’s most risible deliberative body.

A political party’s primary function is to bestow its imprimatur on candidates, thereby proclaiming: This is who we are. In 2016, the Republican Party gave its principal nomination to a vulgarian and then toiled to elect him. And to stock Congress with invertebrates whose unswerving abjectness has enabled his institutional vandalism, who have voiced no serious objections to his Niagara of lies, and whom T.S. Eliot anticipated:

We are the hollow men . . .

Our dried voices, when

We whisper together

Are quiet and meaningless

As wind in dry grass

or rats’ feet over broken glass . . .

Those who think our unhinged president’s recent mania about a murder two decades ago that never happened represents his moral nadir have missed the lesson of his life: There is no such thing as rock bottom. So, assume that the worst is yet to come. Which implicates national security: Abroad, anti-Americanism sleeps lightly when it sleeps at all, and it is wide-awake as decent people judge our nation’s health by the character of those to whom power is entrusted. Watching, too, are indecent people in Beijing and Moscow.

Read more from George F. Will’s archive or follow him on Facebook.

PANDEMIC

"The Los Angeles Times reported that two months before the virus spread through Wuhan, the Trump administration halted a $200 million early-warning program to train scientists in China and elsewhere to deal with a pandemic. The name of the program? “PREDICT.”" 

"DON'T LIE TO ME" by Barbra Streisand

Click Here for Barbra Streisand music video

THE U.S. IS CLOSED

AHOY! A BLOOMBERG IS ON THE HORIZON

Let's suppose Bloomberg ends up being the nominee. He will definitely need, and should definitely have, a lady running mate (especially in view of the mysterious dirty joke pamphlet). 

Forget the alt-right haters; his current weaknesses seem to lie with minority & mid-west voters. Although his minority (black) support is on the upswing -- because he is seen as the dRump killer -- I haven't seen any discussion about Bloomberg's chances in the mid-west.

Enter Amy Klobuchar. She's a she, she's moderate, smart as a whip, tough, no nonsense & slightly more charming than Bloomberg. 

OTOH, Kamala Harris is all those things plus she appears to be even more approachable, has real charm, an infectious laugh, is a minority & all that counts for something anywhere, any time.

Having said that, a Bloomberg/Harris ticket would represent the two coasts, once again leaving the mid-west as flyover country & I'm not sure the Dem's should try that again (even though Uncle Joe will undoubtedly be waiting in the wings to help out). So maybe it will be Bloomberg/Klobuchar.

However, given that the overriding imperative in 2020 is to make dRump the unPOTUS, I believe all the losing Democratic candidates -- maybe not Bernie because he'll be pouting up in VT -- but a wonderful culturally diverse cross section of very smart surrogates like Castro (Latinos), Beto (idealists), Booker (love preacher), Bennett (Big Sky reformer), Mayor Pete (LBGTQ + Iowa) & Warren (the pragmatic revolutionary) will be out campaigning for the chosen one, addressing some of the electorate nooks & crannies across the nation.

If I'm right, the current POTUS can kiss his ass goodbye. Unfortunately, that will not rid us of the Trump/Kushner cabal. They will be feeding in the political trough, dogging the Democratic administration for years to come. But it will eventually recede like a bad dream.

FOLLOWING THE SHINY OBJECT, JOURNALISM IN THE AGE OF TRUMP

What I wouldn't do to sit down with Walter Cronkite, Bud Benjamin, Peter Jennings, Tom Brokaw, Fred Friendly, Roger Mudd, Chet Huntley, David Brinkley, Tim Russert, Mike Wallace, Bob Schieffer, and a few others to discuss how the TV news outlets are covering this political season.

I think it borders on irresponsibility especially as TV journos consider themselves an indispensable column in the democratic coliseum. But it may be time to realize that what was once fine TV news reporting is now slithering from the Fourth Estate into the Fifth Estate.

Journalists and news outlets of all kinds ARE indispensable to a healthy democracy. However, there is much public sentiment that views TV news as utterly dispensable. Considering how much news is consumed over the airwaves, this is dangerous but may be deserved.

Day after day, there is uneven, lazy TV reporting on our presidential candidates, arguably the most important story in the world for all that it suggests about our place amongst nations. I watch the coverage day after day. I find myself talking to my TV set. I'm both disgusted and sad.

It's like watching an extremely accomplished, greatly respected individual, who once had gravitas, now living as a drug addict, on the street, family-less, home-less, fund-less, scrounging around, wondering how to get their next (ratings) fix.

* * *

First published in my local newspaper during the 2016-17 campaign season. Three years later I am able to say that journalism (especially newspapers) are again carrying their weight, restoring their mantle & leading the way.

February 15, 2020

ACCESSORIES TO MURDER

Steyer, Bloomberg, Soros, Schultz & other such fortunates should spend their billions to target EVERY SINGLE REPUBLICAN SENATOR in Washington up for re-election in 2020.

From now until November, the billionaires should blanket newspapers, magazines, airwaves, Facebook, Instagram & Twitter with facts exposing these unprincipled representatives to the cleansing effects of sunlight, for turning their backs on our civilized society. They are criminals.

The law goes like this: If you are a witness to murder and you do nothing, you are an accessory to the crime.

The crime: murdering the rule of law, murdering the Constitution, murdering our values, our respect for each other, murdering our way of life, all to preserve their miserable fiefdoms & by so doing, unleashing the sociopath, who resides in the White House, onto the rest of us.

Making dRump the unPOTUS is the imperative but let's finish it in one sanitary flush.

Voters in every town, city & state that has a Republican Senator up for a re-election, should organize to wipe out these spineless individuals. Citizens should take to the streets again, again & again in order to show them the door in November.

These Senators are nothing less than a virulent form of political Ebola that spreads like wildfire. And that's already happened via social media & on the airwaves; both in broadcast & cable.

It is now up to us to mobilize our forces to quarantine it for reasons of our national health.

So organize! If we can get to the moon in less than a decade, we can run these criminals out of office in less than ten months.

Wake up! The clock is ticking, ticking, ticking...

TIME

Bedroom View (Winter 2020)

JAY SEKULOW : EVEN MORE DANGER! DANGER! DANGER!

SOURCE: ASSOCIATED PRESS 01/31/2020 The 

Associated Press reviewed 10 years of tax returns for the ACLJ and other charities tied to Sekulow, which are released to the public under federal law. 

The records from 2008 to 2017, the most recent year available, show that more than $65 million in charitable funds were paid to Sekulow, his wife, his sons, his brother, his sister-in-law, his nephew and corporations they own. 

Daniel Borochoff, president of the American Institute of Philanthropy, said Sekulow appears to be mixing his defense of Trump with his charitable endeavors. The group has issued a “Donor Alert” about ACLJ on its CharityWatch website.

CLICK HERE FOR THE ENTIRE STORY

DANGER! DANGER! DANGER!

[...] an  NPR/PBS NewsHour/Marist poll  found that about 41% of Americans surveyed do not think the country is prepared to protect the U.S. election system from another attack.

Voters also say their biggest concern is disinformation, followed by voter fraud and voter suppression. Forty-four percent think it's likely that many votes will not actually be counted in 2020.

American Distrust Of The Voting Process Is Widespread, NPR Poll Finds  Jan. 21, 2020

While most voters have confidence in their state and local governments to run a fair election, 43% do not think those officials have done enough to make sure that there's no foreign interference.

Many more blame President Trump. Fifty-six percent say he has done little or nothing to keep the elections safe. A slim majority think the president, who has repeatedly questioned Russian tampering in 2016, actually encourages foreign interference.

This lack of voter confidence has unnerved lower-level election officials as the nation heads into what's expected to be a highly contentious presidential race with high levels of turnout.

"My biggest concern in 2020 is that regardless of outcome, we will be faced with somewhere around the end of the first week in November, this concern by half of the country that they lost the election illegitimately, " says Colorado Election Director Judd Choate.

SOLIPSISM

"His presidency would be powered by solipsism. From the moment Trump swore an oath to defend the Constitution and commit to serve the nation, he governed largely to protect and promote himself."

Excerpted from "A Very Stable Genius"

THE ART OF THE DEAL

Excerpts from an NPR interview with Fred Kaplan, author of "The Bomb: Presidents, Generals, and the Secret History of Nuclear War"  

Please note the frequent ellipses. This is NOT a transcript. I have edited for brevity but have not changed the direction of the interview.

Read these excerpts with 2020 vision.

"In 1962, Kennedy faces a real crisis - The Soviets [were] building nuclear missiles in Cuba [...] So Kennedy and advisers had to figure out what to do and whether the wrong move would trigger a nuclear war. 

[...] Even now the real story is not that well-known. [...] On the third day of the [...] 13-day crisis, Kennedy is kind of mulling. He's saying, Khrushchev seems to have got himself in a trap. Maybe we need to give him a face-saving gesture. Maybe we should trade the missiles that we have in Turkey for his missiles in Cuba. Nobody pays any attention to this.

On the Saturday, on the last day of the crisis, Khrushchev issues a telegram proposing a deal - we'll get rid of our missiles in Cuba; you get rid of your missiles in Turkey. And Kennedy says, well, this seems like a fair trade. And everybody around the table is against this - not just the generals but all the civilians. Bobby Kennedy, Robert McNamara, McGeorge Bundy - all these reasonable people, they're all against it. [...]

Kennedy lets them talk. And he says, well, you know, [...] it seems to me that once [...] we start doing 500 sorties a day against the missile sites and then invade the island, [...] then the Russians would grab Berlin. [...] Well, the argument goes on. Kennedy secretly sends Bobby to make the deal with the Soviet ambassador. 

[...] Not known at the time - that the Russians had already installed nuclear warheads on some of those missiles. It also turned out that the Russians had secretly deployed 40,000 troops to the island of Cuba to stave off a potential American invasion.

So if Kennedy had succumbed to all of his advisers and said, yeah, you're right, we can't take this deal, and gone ahead with the airstrikes, gone ahead with the invasion, the Russians might very well have launched one of those missiles [...] and the small invasion force going into Cuba would have found themselves being repelled by 40,000 Soviet troops. In other words, we would have been in a war with the Soviet Union. 

So, you know, one lesson of this is that who you elect as president really does matter sometimes. [...] The fact that you have a lot of smart advisers doesn't necessarily seal the deal."

IS MICHAEL BLOOMBERG THE ONE?

It is my opinion that to win the presidency in 2020, Democrats will need a strong MODERATE candidate to run against Donald Trump. 

While Joe Biden is the only viable moderate candidate currently on the campaign trail, he has not generated much excitement in the electorate although he does seem to have support in the working classes & black communities. However until now, there has not been a viable REALPOLITIK alternative. I believe that situation changed when Michael Bloomberg entered the 2020 campaign for President of the United States.  

Michael Bloomberg is socially liberal & fiscally practical, which is different than being fiscally conservative. As a graduate of Johns Hopkins University & Harvard Business School he, himself, is well educated & believes in a strong public education system for everyone. To that end, he took controversial measures to improve public education for millions of children in New York City during his time as Mayor. 

As an extremely competitive, tough skinned New Yorker he will stand up to Donald Trump -- another New Yorker -- on the campaign trail & on the debate stage. 

He recognizes and has called Donald Trump a con man & will prove it. Bloomberg can play dirty as necessary but it will be based on facts, not tweets, memes & name calling. He will bring the latest M1 Abrams to the gunfight and will obliterate Donald Trump intellectually at any level, on any issue.

Unlike Donald Trump, Michael Bloomberg is a multi-billionaire who earned his money, does not need and will not take a penny from anyone in any form. He cannot & will not be bought by any lobby & has demonstrated that by improving the lives of millions of New Yorkers as mayor over a period of 12 years. Since then, he has spent millions fighting special interests that have warped social issues affecting our everyday lives.

For 20 years, he was the CEO of a successful & respected business built on facts. It is clear he is a data driven executive who leads on reality, not emotion or politics. In other words, he is not an ideologue. That’s Realpolitik.

As a businessman he believes in tax realignment and has created thousands of jobs beyond the 20,000 employed by his own company while mayor of New York.

He is action oriented, but has proven to be a collaborative, successful leader who does not shy away from argument, is a measured & practical problem solver, is not afraid to apologize & admit error, has taken successful action on the environment, gun violence, student debt & health care. Moreover, he is neither a sociopath nor a psychopath. In other words, he is not nuts.

Bloomberg has said that he would turn the Situation Room into an open space, everyday collaborative work area where he will roll up his sleeves to serve alongside his advisers, appointees &/or cabinet members, to listen to facts & to discuss current issues; all before making decisions. His only use of the Oval Office will be for ceremonial occasions. In my opinion, all this signals a constructive work ethic & a governing style that we desperately need.

You may not agree with my assessments but, in my opinion, Michael Bloomberg is a substantive contender & should be considered for the 46th Presidency of the United States of America beginning January 20th, 2021.

Here is some information on Bloomberg's  political positions.

WAG THE DOG

I have no doubt that Donald J Trump picked Suleimani from a list of possible targets for a very simple reason.

It's called getting the biggest bang for your buck.

It is counter programming. And as long as he can keep it going, one way or another, he will succeed in blunting the national conversation about impeachment while honing a jingoistic campaign for another four years.

Only a broad swath of activist groups -- along with fulsome news coverage -- may be able to change the conversation.

Unfortunately, that will most likely include a lot of national unrest. It would be 1968 again.