Category: Politics

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Dear God. Donald Trump has sent out a picture to his many fans as him dressed as the new pope. Isn’t this really disrespectful to Catholics? I think so but then I am just not sure any more. That is how jaded I have become about Trump’s behavior. I really don’t know what is acceptable behavior any more. It seems wrong for the President of the United States to do this but I could see a comedian doing it and being perfectly fine with it. Where is the line?

And forget Hitler, I think we have moved into Caligula territory now. I am pretty sure we are pretty close to Trump announcing a horse to the cabinet.

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Heather MacDonald writes that Donald Trump took “the most important step it can to restore meritocracy. to American society” by eliminating disparate-impact. When exactly was there a meritocracy in the United States? Certainly no time before 1964 when discrimination against people of color and women was legal. Not directly after the passage of Civil Rights laws in 1964 when White resistance to the new laws was so fierce it required the implementation of Affirmative Action in order to ensure that Whites complied with the new law. Since MacDonald finds any tool that aids people of color a boost is an affront to meritocracy, it certainly isn’t the recent past So MacDonald needs to identify the golden age of meritocracy in USA because from the evidence I can see, there never has been a meritocracy.

MacDonald glosses over 200 years of American History. She assumes that the 1964 Civil Rights ended discrimination and nothing more needed to be done. For her racial prejudice is obvious, racists are obnoxious assholes in a Ku Klux Klan robe screaming the N word. It certainly couldn’t be nice middle class whites who hire employees or admit students to Ivy League colleges. They wouldn’t be caught dead in a Ku Klux Klan robe, so how could they be prejudiced.

The advantage of the public bigots is that they are easy to identify. The problem is the more prevalent form of racism that Blacks encounter is from polite and powerful White who, just the same, might be disinclined to hire someone different from them. They don’t say we are picking a White over a Black. They know the game. They say that the White guy is just more qualified for the job than the Black guy. For this reason, discrimination is difficult to prove. This is the barrier that Blacks face. MacDonald doesn’t appear to be bothered much by this more subtle form of racism or even acknowledge that it might exist.

Disparate-impact was one of the tools that the government used to show discrimination. If an employer has never hired Blacks, year after year, in a community where the population is 25% Black, then the government can see that there might be a problem with discrimination in hiring. Without disparate impact, how does MacDonald propose to identify non-compliant businesses and schools?

She doesn’t. She views discrimination as a phantom problem that doesn’t occur any more so there is no reason to investigate. People are only looking for the best – Black, White, Man, Woman. Race and Gender don’t matter only quality. Well, maybe, but how do we know this is happening unless we evaluate?

Finally, for the record, there will never be a meritocracy as long as rich families hand over their businesses to their children. It is never going to happen as long as some people have connections and others don’t. It never is going to happen as long as people with money can buy their children’s ways into universities. It never is going to happen when White middle class people can avoid “bad” school districts. It never is going to happen as long as poor Black children are given a second rate educations while White middle class children are given a first rate one.

How does MacDonald feel about those problems? Until she addresses them, I don’t believe that she gives a damn about meritocracy.

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Matt Margolis, a conservative columnist, was talking about the left wing threats to Donald Trump. Unfortunately, these are real and not particularly helpful. Many people believe that he won the 2024 election when he stood up after the assassination attempt in Pennsylvania.

I am no fan of Trump but I think assassinating him is a bad idea and wrong. First, he is a human being. It is vitally important for us to recognize that unlikeable people will always be a part of our lives. Yes, he is an asshole, but assholes deserve the same rights as we do — even if they are acting pretty dangerously.

This is why we respect the rights of murderers despite their unforgivable behavior. Murderers deserve to be heard. This is particularly important when the sentence is death. So this means I have to accept Donald Trump, as a fellow human being, shouldn’t be killed because some person, acting on his own judgement, decides Trump must die.

Let’s forget the Hitler comparisons too. Trump is disturbing. He has authoritarian instincts and needs to be checked at every possible opportunity but he fails miserably as a Hitler. Comparing Trump to Hitler is unfair to Hitler. Trump doesn’t even come close to Hitler’s evil machinations. Judges are still independent, the press is still free and the Democrats are still vocal, if a little ineffective, in opposition. He also has, after almost universal criticism, backed down on tariffs.

Cutting off the head to end Trumpism is a rather naive and lazy. It allows you to think the problem is handled when it hasn’t been handled at all. Half the country voted for the man. They will all still be alive after Trump’s death. How will they respond to an attack on their man. Something tells me it could bring on more violence. Once there is a body count it is difficult to see how things will end well.

Here is the bottom line for me: You can be both appalled by the attack on Governor Shapiro and be OK with Luigi Mangione killing a CEO at the same time. The same applies for Trump. Once you accept political violence as OK for your side, you also are tacitly approving it for anyone who disagrees with you. You don’t abhor violence, you abhor violence being used against your side. This is why anyone who uses political violence has to be condemned.

Is it a gamble. Yes it is a better bet for me than the alternative.

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Since Trump’s election, I continue to be puzzled by the passivity of the Billionaires Boy’s Club. The system, though imperfect and could be a lot better, has worked reasonably well for a broad swath of the American people particularly the wealthy. The very same men who explicitly or tacitly support Trump’s rampage against the Federal Government are attacking the system that made them rich.

What more can these people at the very top of the heap want? Despite their frequent complaints to the contrary, the American people, and the rich in particular, are taxed very little. These billionaires act as if the government has actually hobbled their chances on obtaining wealth. Musk has in the neighborhood of 244 billion dollars. Bezos has 197 billion. You can see the whole list here. They are billionaires for Christ’s Sake. What has government deprived them of? A 15% Federal tax bill?

Also, notice how Musk and his DOGE buddies are only going after programs that help the poor and the Middle Class — Social Security, Medicaid, Medicare — while remaining silent about tax breaks for billionaires. Tax breaks, which almost exclusively benefit the wealthy with no expectation that the money they save from eliminated taxes are reinvested into industry, are good. While government programs that help the poor and the middle class are bad. Helping people only encourages dependence on the Federal Government.

So, the already wealthy are demanding even more sacrifices from the less wealthy in order that the already wealthy can make even more money so that they will, hopefully, reinvest this money into the economy. Why are the already wealthy so dependent on the Federal Government for investment money? Of course, few people phrase the question that way.

More troubling is that there is no credible plan on how to replace this functioning system other than the economy will be so good that there will be no need for the federal government. I find it a little difficult to believe that the homeless will be shocked so profoundly by these new limitations that they will suddenly become employable. I, for one, would like a little more detail. What happens to the poor? What happens when Social Security is gone? How does this support better public education? How will healthcare became more accessible? Nothing but silence.

These people, who have benefited most from the present system, are just hoping that their immense wealth will protect them from the fallout of this chainsawing frenzy. The rich no longer have the idea of noblesse oblige that, because they have benefited from the system, they also have an obligation to help other people. They will watch the carnage from a safe distance. At least this is what they hope.

Burn it all down. None of it is any good anymore. We will figure out how to rebuild later. The old Viet Nam war adage applies here — we had to burn the village in order to save it.

Thanks for nothing.

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A Kentucky state representative wants to put a 10 Commandments statue at the Kentucky state capitol. The idea being, I guess, that people reading the 10 commandments will have some magical effect and bring Kentucky to Jesus.

Do it. I could care less. Seriously, if the heathens of Kentucky wanted to come to Jesus there are thousands of churches in the state that will do the trick. If the churches can’t do it, I doubt seriously that a marble block at the state capital is going to have greater success.

In the meantime, let’s not waste our time on this trivial matter. This is a red flag meant to incite an utterly meaningless battle. Sadly, it will work. People on both sides will yell at each other until they are red in the face. There will be some to and froing until some decision is made that will make one side think they have won and the other side think they lost. The media will breathlessly follow because it has emotion and action which makes for great television but, alas, little else. All and all, it will be a big waste of time.

I am weary of these phony cultural battles. Ultimately, they distract from real problems. A block of marble with some words on it will have a limited effect on the people of Kentucky. Very few will bother to look at the statue and even fewer will bother to read it. On the other hand, insufficient health care will have a much greater impact on regular people. As will bad schools, bad fire departments, low wages and a long list of problems facing the people of Kentucky.

I would trade a 10 Commandments statue for universal health care any day of the week. Let’s fight battles that matter and not get sucked into losing battles about things that will cause minimal, if any, harm.

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Well, it looks like somebody in the Trump Administration is reading my blog about how insulting it was to send the vice-president’s wife to woo the people of Greenland. That blog was up for less than 24 hours when Trump changed his plans. Vice-President Vance is now going to Greenland with his wife.

It is nice to think my words have such power but people in the know are saying Trump is looking for some positive publicity after the Signal Group Chat Fiasco and it has absolutely nothing to do with my blog.

Just for the record, and based on no real evidence, I still think it was my blog.

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For those still wondering why Trump got elected, look no further than the news that a lab leak was the likely cause of COVID19. Liberals and Democrats greeted this seemingly bombshell revelation with a sang froid that borders on indifference.

Now things would be different for me if the government scientists, at the time, were open to the possibility of lab leak being a possible explanation but they weren’t. They vehemently denied the possibility of a lab leak and accused any one who suggested it of being a racist. There is a big difference between an I don’t know and a they are wrong and shouldn’t be spreading such nonsense.

It is a big problem and the Left is ignoring it as if it never happened. Like if we don’t talk about it, it will somehow go away. Why would Trump and his buddies drop such a good example of government malfeasance? These people are not idiots. They also seem to have their pulse on a large segment of the American people. So I guess underestimating Trump and the wreckers will go on for the foreseeable future.

This is the only conclusion you can have when you consider:

  1. Trump was right about something very important. He claims that Dr. Fauci and the government scientists were lying about COVID and, it turns out, he was correct, at least about the lab leak theory. Yes there is still a low confidence that a lab leak is the culprit but it is now considered the most likely explanation of all the known possibilities. This isn’t what the government was saying in 2020. They were saying a Lab leak couldn’t be responsible and people who claim that a lab leak was responsible are racists. Trump has every right to gloat.
  2. It gives credence to every new crackpot theory that comes down the pike. All the crackpot has to say is well they lied about the lab leak theory. How do your respond to that? They are correct which is really bad news because too many people already listen to these crackpots. Now the voters have evidence that the crackpots are right. This is why the truth is important when dealing with people in a democracy. How does it help your cause to lie today when people will eventually discover you are in fact a liar?
  3. Belief in Government is already painfully low. This admission confirms every bad thing that the anti-government types claim our government does. If the Government wanted to momentarily placate the Chinese government while they got more information, I get it. This is a completely reasonable position. Withholding information, however, is different from a lie. The government could have said, and rightfully so, that they just don’t have enough information to determine the source of COVID and they are keeping an open mind. I can live with that. But no they aggressively denied any possibility of a lab leak. This turned into an overkill involving character assassination and dissembling. This was wrong especially since many of these scientists knew that a lab leak was the likely cause.
  4. Finally, it is an incredibly stupid lie to tell. If many scientists believed that a lab leak was responsible for COVID then this information was destined for revelation. Someone eventually was going to spill the beans. This should have been obvious as soon as scientists began sharing their suspicions with other scientists. So why lie in the first place? To keep the Chinese happy? Why? The Chinese stopped co-operating with UN officials fairly early in the crisis. Once this occurred what possible benefit could come from keeping the Chinese happy? But everybody in the know just kept their mouths shut. They may know a lot about biology but they are crap at public relations. They have damaged their reputation for being trustworthy. Why would the world believe these people when they announce the next pandemic?

This bothers me personally. I put my trust in these people because I saw no reason for them to lie and they knew more about viruses. Boy was I wrong. It is an unforced error that has done great harm to Liberalism, Science and Government — pillars of our democracy that are already under siege.

And, yes, I hold people on the Left to a higher standard which makes this so much more disappointing. I think democracy and liberalism are the best route to take for a better world. It hurts when my own side fucks up so royally. The good news is that you can’t say you don’t understand why some people voted for Trump. They believed they were being lied to and it turns out, in this case, they were right.

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Whenever I think of Donald Trump, I remember that Americans actually admire swindlers. How do you explain vacation time shares? Or must try diets? Or Alex Jones vitamins? Amway? Telephone Sales? Trump University? Swindlers, grifters and telesales people, whatever you want to call them prevade the American landscape.

The problem for Americans is the victims of the grifter. They are an annoying lot. Whining about being taken advantage of when they simply should have just been smarter. Or more suspicious. Or more assertive. Or something better than they were in order to stop themselves from being taken advantage of. Americans may pretend to take a dim view of the grifter but really they are more upset with the mark.

Think about a story where someone takes advantage of someone. Invariably you will hear: how could someone be so stupid as to fall for a story like that. The grifter is just doing what grifters do but the victim, now there is where the trouble is. They let their guard down. How could they do something so stupid?

There is an admiration for the grifter for coming up with such an ingenious grift. But the mark. There is no sympathy for the mark.

Think of the society we have created. We tolerate grifter behavior, even say it is the grifter’s right to grift. They can phone us, email us, text us and even, if they are old fashioned enough, knock on our doors. If you don’t want what they are selling, all you have to do is say no. Some of us are so good as to be actually polite to these assholes trying to sell us things we don’t need or want.

The poor grifter is just trying to earn a living. Yeah, right, off of the gullible. More troubling is that grifting is a rich person’s crime. Time shares. Crypto coins. Life Insurance and any number of suspicious business practices are initiated by the rich to take even more money from the poor and the gullible.

This is where our real estate developer president comes in. He is a known grifter. He was convicted of being a grifter in regards to Trump university. He provided his students with a college degree that was meaningless. He also has a history of stiffing trades people right at the point when a non-payment becomes a misdemeanor instead of a felony. Misdemeanors are handled in small claims courts and are rarely worth the money you have to spend to get the money owed. Ka-ching. This practice by the rich has become so pervasive that trade’s people are now marking their prices up in order to recoup what they are rightfully owed. The lesson here is you have to grift in order to deal with grifters.

Since Trump is know to be such a talented grifter, people might think that here is the man to deal with our corrupt system. Yes he is grifter but, then, so is everyone else. Who better to handle the other grifters than a fellow grifter. The problem, as with all marks, is that people have a tendency to think that they can spot the grift and will save themselves from the grifter. That, is, of course, what all marks think.

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Sometimes the choice you have is between two bad options. Neither option is particularly desirable but a choice has to be made nonethless. I am afraid this is the position Chuck Schumer was in when he decided to go forward with the Continuing Budget Resolution. One option is to shut down the government, which is what many Republicans want in the first place, or continuing funding a government which Trump and company are trying to dismantle.

Fighting the funding seems like a losing battle with possibly worse results than just continuing with the present chaos. What exactly Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez expected Schumer to do is unclear. Fighting for a better bill, particularly when large segments of the Republican party would love to shut down government permanently, seems like a losing battle with the stakes being even greater chaos than we are presently experiencing. Primary him if you must but Schumer is making much more sense to me than Ocasio-Cortez.

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Donald Trump is trying to position himself as the realist in the ongoing dispute between Putin and Zelenskyy. He wants Zelenskyy to come to terms with his inability to win the war. OK. Fair enough. But Putin is in exactly the same position. Putin can not win it either. So why is he only applying pressure on Zelenskyy? And why is only one side making concessions in this great deal that Trump is working on.

Furthermore, why is Zelenskyy getting the blame for trying to start World War III? Putin invaded the Ukraine. Doesn’t Putin deserve just a little bit of the blame then. If nothing else, for being impatient. What kind of shit sandwich is Trump expecting Zelenskyy to eat?Surrendering more land to Putin is all I am hearing, so and, wait I forgot, wait there is some promise from Putin that he will never never invade again.

What a deal. I am sure that it sounds pretty empty to Zelenskyy whose county has been invaded twice in the last 10 years. I keep thinking I am missing something. If not, it seems like an incredibly bad deal with Zelenskyy conceding land for nothing. And, I can’t believe this one, Trump wants Zelenskyy to thank him for his help.

My mind is blown. What a nakedly apparent betrayal and humiliation of Zelenskyy. And Trump is loving every minute of it. He is taking revenge on the world with no concern for tomorrow. He has absolutely nothing to lose now.

Since he is a lost cause it would be helpful for the wise men in the Republican Party to step up. There comes a point when getting reelected seems secondary to the world and to the future. But I guess not. Silence. Mostly just silence. And some of these guys have nothing to lose. Senator Grassley is 91 years old. What is the risk? What a bunch of cowards. Lots and lots of cowards.