Protesting the Crime of War

BEN FERENCZ graduated from Harvard law school with a degree in international law. During world War Two he was assigned to the staff of General Patton, for whom he cleaned latrines, among other duties. After the war, he was appointed the lead prosecutor at the Nuremburg war crimes trials. He painstakingly, thoroughly presented evidence which rather easily convicted twenty two German officers and doctors of war crimes, crimes involving the extermination of one million people in concentration camps, and the slaughter of civilians. At another trial at about the same time, German officers were convicted of battlefield war crimes. Most noteworthy of these was Joachim Peiper, Hitler's favorite tank unit commander who orchestrated the last ditch German assault known as the "Battle of the Bulge", and who gave the order to massacre eighty four American prisoners of war in Malmady, France. Peiper's death sentence was later commuted for political reasons, and he died, at age sixty one, in France in 1976. Mr. Ferencz, now ninety nine years old, lives in Florida, has written several books, and is quite willing to talk about the war, war in general, his experiences in it, and his philosophy of war. He unabashedly contends, as do many people, that all war is a crime, an international crime, which has been unjustifiably glorified for centuries, and which must somehow be outlawed and eliminated from human culture to ensure the survival of the human species. He further contends that all nations commit war crimes in all wars, the United States included. In fact, about two weeks after the Malmady massacre, American soldiers massacred eighty German prisoners who were trying to surrender, unarmed, waving white flags. This event was not acknowledged in post war American history classes or history books, and was in fact covered up for a long time, until quite recently. In General Patton's diary, now owned by the Library of Congress, Patton wrote something to the effect: "received word that fifty German prisoners have been unfortunately murdered. I hope this episode can be covered up." It was, and is still seldom mentioned in American history courses or books. Ferencz eschews the notion that the generation which fought and won World War Two for the United States, of which he was a member, should be called "the greatest generation." The greatest generation, he insists, are members of any generation who oppose all wars, the pacifists, those who tell the truth about the true causes of war, about national greed, imperialism, and aggression, those who are willing to be prosecuted for refusing to fight. He especially lauds the "Hell no, we won't go" Viet Nam War protesters, the "hippies" who staged protests in the streets of America and on college campuses in the late nineteen sixties and early nineteen seventies, so reviled at the time as traitors by the hawkish conservative establishment. This is of particular interest to me, because during the Viet Nam war I was in early adolescence, and by 1968, when I was thirteen, it was obvious to me that not only was the Viet Nam war unwinnable for the United States, but that it was unjust and corrupt. I agreed with the protesters I saw nightly on television, and with Walter Cronkite, who turned against the war after the Tet offensive in early 1968. I secretly admired the hippie protesters, wanted to join, but was too young, too timid, and didn't dare express these thoughts to anyone, especially my parents, for fear of being sincerely reprimanded, and perhaps placed in time out, the dog house, prison, or worse. To oppose the viet Nam war was to be a traitor to one's country, labeled a hippie, a radical, an outcast. I knew then, as I know now; the war protesters were right, and the Viet Nam war was wrong. Finally, I got my chance to protest an unjust American imperialistic war in 1991, when the United States attacked and conquered Iraq, driving Saddam Hussein from power, and initiating a thirty year nightmare, in which the United states is still mired today. Fondly I recall walking with five hundred other people down the main street in a major college town, wrapped in an American flag, carrying a sign which said: "no war for oil." The sidewalks were lined with pro war patriots hurling insults at us - protesting war is never popular among the patriotically righteous - and I lost control when some big dude called me a 'traitor". I walked towards him, ready to defend my honor and patriotism. He was twice my size, and would have killed me, post haste. I was a college instructor at the time, and by some good fortune, or divine intervention, one of my students, a black belt martial artist, intervened, and firmly suggested that I continue walking and protesting to my heart's content, and that I ignore the pro war folks. Good idea. I came to my senses, complied, and saved my skin and probably my life. I wish I still had my flag and my sign. If I had,they would now be proudly displayed on my living room wall, with a new sign reading"I told you so, you imperialistic bastards." I am proud of how I felt in 1968, what I did in 1991, and how I feel about the American presence in Iraq and Afghanistan today. It was wrong then, and its wrong now. The events of the past twenty eight years clearly prove that. Finally, motivated by President Trump's visit to their country, the Iraqis have the good sense to demand that American forces leave their country. Good for them. I hope I never get the chance to protest another war, but I suspect I will. After all, I am an American, and a patriotic one. I am sure that Ben Ferencz would agree, and that likelihood puts me in good company.

Dissing The Dissers

THE LATE SENATOR JOHN McCAIN, all good law abiding god fearing Americans ought to agree, with all due respect, was and shall forever remain a great American war hero, patriot, and public servant. We liberal Democrats ought to especially believe this, because of the Senator's nearly unique willingness to compromise with and respect liberal Democrats, aside from his nearly six years in captivity in a North Vietnamese prison. Those who fear God, which certainly seems like a strange and inappropriate entity to fear, for those who believe in a loving and just God, should respect and emulate the late Senator, because rather then fearing god, McCain seems to have loved and embraced the universe's designer and creator, fearlessly, thus providing a new and improved role model for those fearful of deities of any sort. Love and admiration might seem a better way to react to god than fear. But, I digress. Enter Donald Trump, resident white House chief prevaricator and purveyor of nonsensical policy and hollow platitudes. Recall that he said he did not consider military personnel who are captured to be heroes, because they were, well, captured. As if fighter pilots should first outrun veritable bevvies of incoming surface to air missiles, and then, failing that, should, upon hitting the ground, be able to outrun and elude, or engage and destroy, entire platoons of enemy combatants in unfamiliar territory, without assistance. When McCain died, every flag in freedom's land was lowered to half way up the flag pole -except the one at the White House. The responsible party was, quite naturally, the Prevaricator in Chief his lonesome. Trump does not tolerate criticism well, especially when it is accurate, and responds by blatantly disrespecting those who render it, especially when they are dead, and unable to defend their own honor. Trump like targets of opportunity, like all cowards and bullies. Trump kisses the cruel asses of cruel dictators, to avoid their wrath, and launches endless attacks America's best friends - again, easy targets. Enter James Imhoff, long time Senator from Oklahoma, who reveals his ignorance and stupidity almost daily, primarily by refusing to accept the reality of human made climate change, thus revealing himself to be a traitor, but for holding many other incredibly stupid policy positions as well. One is a traitor is one refuses to even acknowledge, let alone combat, an enemy which the United States Department of Defense long identifies as the nation's greatest national security threat, which is exactly what the D.O.D. classifies climate change caused by human industrial production, especially within the oil industry, Imhofff's greatest benefactor. Senator stupid (Imhoff) recently said in an interview that McCain was partly responsible for Trump's disrespectful treatment of him, by virtue of having criticized the president. Imhoff, the king of Senatorial clowns, is apparently unable to grasp the fact that when one criticizes the U.S. president fairly, accurately, and respectfully, which is exactly what McCain did, one is a patriot and good public servant. In all fairness, one can hardly expect morons, lunatics and traitors like Trump and Imhoff to grasp this essential aspect of life in a purported democracy which long ago legalized free speech.

Being Ivestigated, and Loving Every Minute Of It

MY STOCKBROKER, esteemed manager of my meager assets, recommend an investment to me, which, greatly unfortunately, had approximately the same outcome as if he had recommended none other than Bernie Madoff. To wit; Bernie Madoff the second, the one my stock broker recommended, made off with thousands of dollars of cash of mine, money hard earned toiling in college classrooms alla cross the fruited plain. This investment broker, a broker of freight hauling trucks, ostensibly, was in fact a swindler who's drug and pornography addictions impelled him to swindle dozens of dupes, marks like my broker and myself. My broker should have known better; maybe I should have, but didn't, didn't know better than to retain this particular broker, a presumed financial services professional whose recommendations I trusted. I aint making this crap up. The criminal has been arrested, indicted, and has appeared in court several times, represented only by a public defender, since the several hundred thousand dollars he stole had long since been invested in wild women, illicit pain killers, and good, hard porn.. He shall keep going to court, because the prosecuting attorney continues to receive an abundance of incoming accusations and indictments, can't keep up, thus necessitating repeated trial postponements. The rascal shall, at length, I am confident, relocate to the federal pen. This, because the FBI got involved, as did the federal prosecutor. My broker, meanwhile, in what appears to be an avoidance of responsibility, suggested that "we" should have done more, much more due diligence, and I replied: "we"? What's this "we" stuff? I relied on you, the financial services professional, which I am most certainly not. When I suggested that he was at least partly responsible for my misfortune, I made the mistake of dong so in the comfort of his own home, and his wife, a conservative Christian, threw me out on the street. Nonetheless, I managed to stop no less than tree SEC and FINRA investigations into his behavior, being as how said investigations were being conducted pertaining into his treatment of me, his professional behavior as a certified broker of stock. At length I got tired of this, and of his refusal to accept responsibility, and of being thrown out of his house on my ass, which happened but once, once being more than sufficient. My contention is that he should be investigated, that we should be be, should all live in glass houses, since we never do anything wrong, the price of glass is a bit down, and its fun watching people bathe. My broker's aversion to investigation reminds me of no less an orange haired toupe adorned person than Donald J. Trump, who, if I'm not mistaken, seems somewhat adverse to being investigated by Mr. Mueller. Why Shouldn't innocent people welcome the opportunity to prove their innocence? We all have the chance to prove our innocence, in the long run, in court, or out of it.

Martyring the Evangelically Demented, Systematically (MEDS)

A TSUNAMI, which in less politically and terminologically correct times would have been termed a "tidal wave", swept into Indonesia, killing hundreds, but, thank heaven, sparing thousands more, unlike previous tsunamis and/or tidal waves. Out popped the zealous fundamentalist Christians, like hallucinogenic mushrooms after a summer shower, proclaiming that the Islamic Indonesians were spared by Jesus Christ, presumably providing proof of the urgency for their conversion. Its easy to imagine how ingenious the evangelicals consider themselves when posing such sacred and undeniable but, alas insane truths. Benjamin Franklin struck Jefferson's term "sacred and undeniable" from the Declaration of Independence and replaced it with "self evident" for the same reason that the right wing Christian version of Islam, Christianity, and truth should be deep dumpstered and replaced with reason; a preference among intelligent people for verifiable truth, and a contempt for zealous religious jargon and fantasy. We who boldly embrace reality stipulate that people who are spared death by tsunami save themselves by fleeing far enough, and by the limitations inherent in even the forces unleashed by nature, and nature's God. Recently this website published an essay praising Islamic culture for its humane treatment of and reverence for cats. Cat lovers agreed, but out came the Christian zealots. Amid a discussion of our beloved pet cats at the senior center, I offered similar comments in praise of culturally mandated respect for cats; out came the usual suspects (Christian lunatics). A slim pamphlet in terms of paper and reason, was placed on my table, called "The voice of Martyrs", a publications intent on glorifying some imaginary global martydom of true believers, in the face of some imaginary assault on their true faith, the only faith, the Christian faith. Millions of Muslims convert to the one and only true faith, the christian faith, it is claimed, at great peril, rendering them true martyrs, as well as new true believers. This, in the face of the fact that Islam is growing in numbers, and Christianity is shrinking, particularly in Europe and the United States. As Casey Stengal used to say: "you could look it up". Dear heavens, what one must endure for the love of cats. A favorite ploy of the zealously unbalanced is to invent an event, elevate it to the status of dogma, then proclaim its truth by virtue of its uniqueness. Hence the Christian faith becomes, by a long train of tortured thinking, the only religion on the planet with a living savior, thus proving it unique monopoly on reality, when in fact living Gods and saviors are more plentiful in human culture than the post shower mushrooms all closed minded zealots might be well advised to consume. They go well with wafers and wine, and at least hold the promise of illuminating the pathologically ill devout. Some hallucination engendered revelations are transcendent and sublime; those having to do with religious hatred and bigotry dwell in the realm of the pathologically irredeemable.

Booming Our Own Horns, Excessively

A PERHAPS OVERLY ZEALOUS BABY BOOMER with long thick pretty blonde hair bestreaked with dignified grey, proudly posted on Facebook that our generation helped stop the Viet Nam war, assisted in ending the Nixon administration, brought an end to sexual repression and initiated an era of sexual freedom and liberation merely by copulating like a pair of half crazed rabbits in extreme heat, and that therefore will kill anyone seeking to bring and end to medicare, Medicaid, or Social Security. This hubris infused person further pledged to bury the dead, (the ones we will have murdered for daring to oppose socialized medical insurance), and further bragged that we risked going to prison for thirty years by smoking marijuana, in apparent defiance of the law, and in an apparent desire to escape reality, perhaps the stark reality that, all in all, we may have far less to brag about than we might wish to believe. As if defiantly smoking marijuana were an act about which to be proud, or openly brag. Never underestimate the ability of us baby boomers to be self congratulatory. I responded by humbly pointing out that when the Viet Nam war ended, and when Nixon resigned, we were but green, wet behind the ears twenty somethings, fresh into, in, or out of college, that many of us actually served in the military in Viet Nam, and that we had less to do with the end of the war and the end of Nixon than the supposedly despicable mainstream media, what our current president calls "fake news" when it fails to glorify his dishonesty. alas, Nixon was brought down by corporate America, and the war was ended by the truncating of congressional funding. Though there is an element of truth in baby booming braggadocio, the element is somewhat, shall we say, limited, as are our achievements. I further stipulated that we went far by relying on our parent's financial resources, and that they, not we, were the "greatest generation." We humans are prone to overstate our importance, our talents, and our achievements. Einstein said: "I have no special talents, I am merely extremely curious." I fully agree. Humans are like red ants and bumble bees: they accomplish little individually, or even generationally. Human achievement is the work of millions of people over thousands of years, in concert with adequate natural resources, the plant and animal kingdoms, and good weather. As newton said of himself: we stand on the shoulders of giants. To the self congratulatory lady who touts the achievements of her own generation as justification for socialism, I would humbly respond that medicare and Social security should be preserved because the are good ideas which have proven that, over time, if managed properly, to work quite well, not because of the excessive narcissism of a sixty five year old bully who looks to be about thirty due only to make up, Botox injections, and plastic surgery. A little humility goes a long way, and pride, as the Catholics say, is a deadly sin. At least they got that part right.

Taking Life

MANY YEARS AGO a young woman was brutally stabbed to death in the parking lot of a suburban mall on the outskirts of a mid sized midwestern American city. The motive remains a mystery; presumably mental illness. For the benefit of those of less than a certain age, a "mall" was, and on rare occasions still is a large circuitous building within which are housed as many as several dozen retail businesses on both sides of the hallway , connected by a central concourse. Malls were, and some still are, anachronistically, corporeal rather than virtual. The term is "brick and mortar". The murderer was duly convicted, and if memory serves was sentenced to life imprisonment, due to a successful plea of insanity, and spared the death penalty. This was not long after the death penalty had been reinstated, after decades of absence, by the United States supreme Court. The sparing of the life of the murderer for such a senseless and bloody crime was extremely unpopular throughout the community, and caused a considerable public outcry. A socially conscious, politically charged young graduate student at the time, I jumped directly into the fray by writing a letter to the editor of the local newspaper, which was printed in real time on real paper, not online, being as how personal computers did not yet exist, and would not exist, for several more decades. In my letter I argued that the verdict and sentence constituted an appropriate rendering of justice, because in this instance, and in all instances, the death penalty was contrary to the laws of God and of the United States constitution. My letter was not well received in my politically and religiously conservative community, but was sufficiently well argued that it received no arguments against its reasoning, but only its conclusion, which i thought odd, inconsistent, and intellectually dishonest. As I recall, the essence of my argument was that putting criminals to death does nothing to provide restitution for the victim(s) of the crime, but in fact only compounds the original crime by trying to make a right from two wrongs. Also, I offered the rather unusual rationale that putting a murderer to death is actually not a punishment, but a relief from the punishment for the guilty party, sparing him or her a life of extremely unpleasant incarceration, which is surely the most severe form of punishment imaginable. I also offered the opinion that the death penalty should be considered cruel and unusual, thus unconstitutional, as it once was, because it is certainly applied only infrequently, and the cruelty derives from subjecting the convicted criminal to a period of awaiting execution, with the attendant terror of anticipating one's own death, as a time and date known beforehand. none of these arguments were original. Amid the uproar precipitated by my letter, a good friend of mine wrote own of his own, disputing everything I said, and basically arguing that death was the only just remedy for such a heinous, senseless crime. As I recall, the community responded far more favorably to his position, even though I felt that he offered little in the way of actual well conceived reasoning, but relied almost exclusively on an emotional appeal. Now, as then, the most ardent proponents for capital punishment are those in the conservative Christian community, which I find odd, and contradictory. The Mosaic commandment "thou shalt not kill" is quite clear, and includes neither exceptions nor qualification. One might conclude that all who truly embrace the Judeo-Christian moral philosophy would not only be against corporal punishment, but would be pacifists and vegetarians as well. But of course, in the Old testament, God repeatedly violates his own laws, so, why shouldn't they, unless they, like god, are somehow excepted from following them. Verily, among today's conservative christian community, one is hard pressed to fine opponents of the death penalty, or, for that matter, pacifists and vegetarians. but, by the smae token, among conservative Christians can be found far more personal profit seeking capitalists than socialists eager to render unto Caesar, sell whatsoever thous hast, and give unto the poor, for the poor, among these arguably hypocritical people, are solely responsible for their own plight, and therefore deserve neither sympathy nor assistance.

Changing Course

NOW IS THE TIME, since they are congregating at the southern border in any event, to reverse course, to abolish our current morally hollow and vicious nationalistic policy, and to truly manifest the United States as a Christian nation, which is to say, a nation whose citizens exemplify the teachings of the great and beautiful Joshua ben Joseph, known in the western world as "Jesus". Appropriate unto Trump the five billion or so dollars he seeks, reopen the government, and instead of spending the money erecting a useless thus senseless barrier, invest the money in shoes, clothing, blankets, water, food, and sundry other essentials for distribution among our good friends and fellow human beings, the central american asylum seeking refugees from misery. May the dear lord "unharden" the hearts of El Trumpo the Prevaricator, and the millions of extreme right wing politically conservative evangelical Christians among us, and let them realize, for the first time in a blue moon, that, no, they don't want no stinking wall, not really, not at all; what they want - is to actually begin emulating him whose ministry they profess to follow. Let us all symbolically accompany the president into the White House restroom, where before the mirror even now he stands, coloring his hair orange, take his hand, and lead him into the realm of goodness, kindheartedness, and assistance to those who come towards America, approaching us seeking love, friendship, and a chance to live a productive life. Dr. Mathews of the Princeton Department of Sociology, the word's leading expert in human migration, assures us that there are far fewer actual criminals, far fewer cutthroats, scaliwags, rascals, rapists, and pick pockets among the impoverished Central American forthcoming masses than there are throughout the general United States of American white upper middle class ostensibly Christian population. Consult Dr. Mathews by googling him, care of the Princeton Department of sociology. He has the facts, Trump does not. Trump and his followers are fabricators of fake facts, convenient to themselves only, used to support their agenda of rejection and exclusivity, and, yes, ethnocentrism. Robert Reich, former Secretary of Labor, now a professor at Cal Berkeley, can prove to you that people who migrate to the U.S. from Latin America are, as a whole, industrious, productive, and law abiding, and that they pump billions of dollars into the American economy through hard work, sales taxes, producing, and consuming. My fellow right wing extremists, it is in our economic best interests to let the poor folks in, post haste. And it is, also, dear extreme right wing conservative fundamentalist evangelical Christians, the Christian thing to do, assuming you actually know the meaning of the term "Christian" amid all your dogma mongering, public praying, tongue talking, and capitalistic money mongering lifestyles.

Building A Futile Wall, Or not

I WAS BUT A WEE LAD of sixteen when the George C. Scott movie "Patton" came out in 1971. I loved it then, i'd love it now. Patton, street smart in his crude sort of way, was convincingly portrayed by Scott. His famous injunction against fixed fortifications being monuments to mankind's stupidity seems more apropos now than ever. Patton understand that the invention of the tank and the airplane rendered fortified structures obsolete in modern warfare, and he would understand today that there is no use in constructing the "Great Wall of Mexico". An eighteen foot wall required only a nineteen foot ladder to be overcome, more or less. Why is it that those who support the wall concept don't accept that stark fact? A wall is a mere inconvenience, a temporary impediment to further progress, a means of keeping those inside and outside who have no desire to cross ot the other side. A wall is like a locked door; it serves only to keep honest people honest. The criminals will come anyway. Border security, true border security, requires the presence of a massive military presence. lest we forget in our zeal to right all the wrongs of the world with global military deployments, the first and fundamental purpose of a military is self defense, the defense of a sovereign state's borders. A massive military presence need not be unfriendly to those who seek to enter a country, those who seek access to asylum. A strong military presence can serve as a welcoming as well as a protective force. It is questionable whether a strong military border defense on the Rio Grande would violate the 1877 Posse Comitatus law. since the military presence would be serving a national defense requirement and not enforcing civil laws in the form of a police force, it would seen not. All over the world are American military installations intended to enforce an american geo-political agenda. a valid question is whether an American agenda is in the best interests of anyone other than the American corporate state. It very well might not be. From hundreds of widely disperse military bases of questionable intend and necessity, surely the U.S. could find sufficient manpower to man and safeguard its own borders. What, other than that, is the legitimate purpose of any military?

Living, And Dying With Nuclear Guilt

DURING THE SUMMER OF 1945 President Harry Truman made it plain in his personal diary that he was well aware that the Japanese were attempting to initiate the process of their surrender, by communicating through the Soviet Union's military, since the United States refused all communication with Japanese representatives. We conveniently omit this fact from our American history textbooks, understandably, preferring instead to portray the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki as regrettable but unavoidable means of ending the war without suffering massive American loss of life. this justification was obviously a false fabrication, the real reason for the bombs being a desire to impress upon the world, and particularly upon the soviet Union, a knowledge of America's intention of dominating the post war world. Immediately after two bombs were dropped needlessly on Japan, and the ended in two final acts of criminal civilian slaughter, it became apparent to the American military and foreign policy establishments that the possession of a large stockpile of nuclear weapons would indeed enable the United States to play a dominant role in post war international affairs, to in effect rule the world, and to reshape it in accordance with its own interests, which basically mean, and still means, American corporate interests. to that end, the U.S. the systematic construction and testing of nuclear, and later hydrogen bombs. Between 1946 and 1958 sixty seven nuclear bomb tests were conducted in the Marshall islands in the Pacific, far from American shores, but essentially in the midst of the Marshallese people. In 1954, a bomb was dropped in the islands which contained one thousand times the explosive power of the Hiroshima bomb, and massive amounts of radioactive coral reef dust descended upon the islands, covering everything; food, land, water, and people. An epidemic of massive proportions thus engulfed the Marshallese people, producing an epidemic of various forms of cancer and other illnesses, including diabetes. Among Americans, guilt, responsibility, and restitution are often belated virtues. Finally, in 1983, Congress enacted a bill which provided for Marshallese people to relocate in the United States, albeit without the privileges and benefits of birthright citizenship. Large communities of Marshallese descendants live today in places like Enid, Oklahoma, and Springdale, Arkansas, and for the most part they choose to retain their cultural identity, and, like many immigrants to America, prefer not to assimilate, understandably. Now, having either forgotten to forgot or ignore the lessons of history, American president Donald Trump wants to significantly enlarge the American nuclear arsenal, and to develop new means of delivering atomic bombs to distant enemy targets. The sheer insanity of this runs counter to decades of international efforts to reduce and eventually eliminate nuclear weapons from the Earth, and recalls two famous quotes: "You cannot simultaneously prepare for war and plan for peace". (Einstein), and "Those who forget the lessons of history are domed to repeat it" (Santayana). It is crucial that the American people elect future leaders who are aware of these profound truths.

Blaming It All On the Fed

DONALD J. TRUMP, forty fifth president of the United States of America, has generously informed us of the single cause of all America's economic woes, assuming there are any. This, in the era of an administration which pledged to make America great once again, just like it once was but had not recently been, and which, by the president's own admission, has done exactly that, in some mysterious unseen manner unknown to anyone but the chief executive himself and his sycophantic subordinates and followers. There is nothing wrong with the American economy, nothing whatsoever, says the don, other than the chairperson of the Federal Reserve Bank. To some of us, that must comes as news, to most of us, as more pathological presidential drivel, to his supporters, gospel. Trump threatens to fire the Federal Reserve Chairman, which, he has allegedly been advised, surprisingly, by his inner circle, he cannot legally do. The Federal reserve Board, consisting of seven unlucky, browbeaten souls, has raised the prime interest rate three times this past year, for a whopping total of three quarters of one percent, and that, says the billionaire bubble bursting Mr. Trump, is the essence of all problems, of which he has repeatedly told us there are none, the root of all economic evil. Never mind that over a quarter of the nation's wealth is in the hands of one tenth of one percent of the population. Never mind that there are more than forty million Americans in poverty, that worker's wages have barely budged, adjusted for inflation, for forty years. The federal reserve bank is supposed to be independent of all political machinations. That's why it was established as an independent entity. And no, contrary to rumors popular among new age gurus and conspiracy theorists, the fed is most definitely not, repeat not secretly owned and operated by a cabal of European trillionaires and interventionist extraterrestrials. The federal bank, established in 1913 and consisting of twelve interlinked branches scattered across the fruited plain, stabilizes the economy, or supposedly serves that function, when left unmolested by miracle mongers and madmen. Two of the banks are in the great state of Missouri, in Kansas City and St; Louis, because then powerful Missouri Senator James Reed hedged his support for the scheme by insisting that "I don't know what these banks are supposed to do, but my state is going to have two of them." Had the Senator but known the uproar they would cause a century in his future, instigated by a multi billionaire president without much knowledge of the banking industry or monetary policy, he might have been content with one.

Avoiding, Rather Than Accepting the Truth

PEOPLE ON FACEBOOK, I am finding, are more prone to utter platitudes and superficial sentiments than truth. That is most likely for the best, since the truth is often unpalatable, and is but a reflection of normal personal human interaction. Most deep thinkers seem to agree that it is difficult to the point of being nearly impossible to think or speak the truth, and that on those rare occasions when we do, we, as the famous movie line goes, "can't handle the truth". Or, as Goethe put it: "we resist the truth only because we fear we would perish if we accepted it." In place of truth we invent fiction, we fabricate intricate systems of thought with which to give ourselves comfort and inspiration, and with which to hide from reality. Hence, the world is full of primitive, misleading religions, religions which enable us to avoid the apparent fact that we live in a universe indifferent to our very existence. The universe is sufficiently interested in our existence to create us, but not to nurture our well being. Thus, we suffer, nearly constantly. Optimism is the insanity, said Voltaire's famous character Candide, of believing that all is well with the world, when in fact we are miserable. And with regard to the Christian religion, specifically the Catholic church, Voltaire, without creating a character for saying so, said, "crush the infamous thing". Voltaire would rather have suffered the truth than invented fiction for the purpose of avoiding it. Arguably, had Voltaire's personal life been less pleasant than it was, he would have felt impelled, like most of the rest of us, to hide behind superstition and religion. When my cousin posted a picture of herself and her deceased brother, taken shortly before his death, I, in a fit of truth telling, pointed out that it was unfortunate that they had never gotten along, because of his affliction with a personality disorder, hyper emotional sensitivity syndrome. I pu tit this way: "He offered hugs and kisses, and when he received smiles and handshakes in return, he responded with resentment, somewhat regrettably." I thought this was a charming if not adequately delicate way of doing a bit of truth telling. She responded that nobody is perfect, a point with which I chose not to disagree. To a picture of uniformed military personnel taken in Afghanistan, I reacted as follows: "it could be argued that Afghanistan is an unlikely, ill advised, and indefensible place for American military personnel to congregate and linger." Even at Christmas time, I don't regret my remark, my breaking of a comforting bubble during a rain soaked parade, if for no other reason than it comforts me to agree, at long last, with someone to whom the truth seems not only unacceptable but virtually poisonous, Donald Trump.

Practicing Safe Sects

FACEBOOK POSTS, as billions of people have doubtless discerned, range from the inspired, to the insipid, to the idiotic, to the insane. In which category to place particular offerings resides in the realm of individual discretion. "Avoid dangerous Cults: Practice safe Sects" scrolled down my screen, offered up by my seventh grade social studies teacher from fifty years ago, a young man then, perhaps the victim of dementia now. Presumably he intended this as an endorsement of Christianity. I have never cultivated sufficient discipline to refrain from commenting when I should refrain from commenting. To this I responded: "Among these are those which promise salvation to those who accede to the torturing to death of a human being as atonement for one's personal mistakes, with the guarantee of eternal torture for those who do not." I thought this was an apt if terse description of the Christian religion in general, and expected numerous negative responses, but got none. My suspicion is that those who read the exchange failed to comprehend what I was talking about, failed to grasp that in fact I was relegating Christianity to the "dangerous cult " category, which in fact i was, and do. Goethe said that the Christian religion began as an uprising against roman oppression, failed, and turned moralistic. To me that very well explains its melodramatic, tragic, sad, yet hopeful characteristics. Jefferson was so horrified by the details of crucifixion theology, and other supernatural aspect of the faith, that he described himself as "a sect unto myself", and at best a "primitive Christian", by which he meant that he, like many intellectuals, embraces the moral teachings of Jesus but rejected all claims to miracles thus insulating himself from the miraculous, which he summarily rejected. As Einstein said: either everything is a miracle, or nothing is. An interesting quote appeared: "An irreligious society cannot endure the truth about societal conditions. it prefers a lie, no matter how idiotic." To me, that's another comment about Christianity, and all religion. we invent our religions for inspiration and comfort. Again, I responded. Sometimes the lie takes on grotesque proportions, such as when human sacrifice is used as a means to appease an angry, meat eating deity, and people believe that through that sacrifice great miracles occur, including their own personal salvation from eternal m=suffering and torment, and the appeasement of the hostile, violent deity. if I am fortunate, this too will seem too abstruse and arcane to generate antipathy among Facebook's many devout worshipers. At least, if I am fortunate.

Vindicating Bumper Stickers

THE GREAT REPROBATE, the great prevaricator, the purveyor of pernicious perfidy, has ascended yet again from the depths of his self imposed swamp. After weeks of telling the nation that he would not blame a government shut down on democrats, but would instead take full responsibility for one, in the unlikely event of such an event, he today precipitously changed course, and announced in advance that, in the ever increasing imminence of said looming shut down, he would indeed consider democrats solely responsible. The Senate minority leader promptly pointed out to us that there exists an abundance of video and audio recordings in which the president's persistent perversity, his unmasterful misinformation, is well documented, irrefutably. This merely serves to accumulate further his litany of pathological prevarications, and fortifies the message on my bumper sticker: "unfit to serve". One can only endure so much - So much deceit, fabrication, name calling, and blame mongering. The president's behavior, always marginally coherent, has now moved from the realm of the marginally sane to the pathological. You are cordially invited to google the phrase "Donald Trump's lies", and behold the avalanche of misinformation spewed by this chief excrementive. What you will discover is that during the past seven hundred days, presumably the number of days Mr. Trump has been president, is that he has uttered no less than seven thousand five hundred and forty six false or misleading statements, according to sources whose compilations are in accordance with each other. The precise number of false statements, and the precise number of merely misleading statements is not verifiably discernible, due to the fact that many of them simultaneously fall into both categories, and also that many of his statements could arguably be placed in either. What is certain is that this situation is entirely unacceptable, an indisputable proof of this pathological liar's unfitness to serve in public or private office, or to function freely in a society in which veracity is even remotely prized, and integrity and honestly valued as fundamental if often neglected components of American society. Consider my bumper sticker vindicated, expressly.

Rethinking Trump, Part Two

BUT, THEN AGAIN, it may well be that my bumper sticker ought to stay put. "Unfit To Serve:Impeach Trump" seems more fitting every day, what with Trump-related scandals and investigations mounting well into the double digits. What, there are now seventeen ongoing, including the one in which the newly elected Attorney General of the great state of New York announced that the Trump foundation, so precipitous in its closing just a day or so ago, needed some looking into, on account of its tendency to neglect actual charitable giving, and to focus instead on distributing its funds for the purpose of defending its eponymous namesake in lawsuits alleging that the Don raises his flags a bit too high, and other matters, some minor, some significant. The trump foundation is evidently quite a racket, one in which wealthy donors make contributions for the express purpose of lowering their tax bills, and its managers do what they please with the acquired resources, as long as said resources benefit nobody other than he after whom the foundation is named. No less scandalous is the real life scenario in which the United States Department of Defense for years informs us that the greatest single threat to American national security is climate change, precipitated by no less an esteemed gang of thugs than humanity itself, and the President, in true gangster fashion, proceeds to proclaim his belief that the climate will "change back" some fine sunshine filled day, and to appoint people top positions within his administration, such as Director or the Environmental Protection Agency, whose ostensible purpose is to aid and abet the very process they should have been hired to oppose. Its almost as if there is some sort of insidious relationship between the now defunct Trump foundation and the anti-climate change community, consisting largely of conservative Christian republicans, in which money is "kicked back" into the foundation, having been allocated, in cash only disbursements, to fight the forces which fight climate change, by assisting the forces which assist its progress. From all this we learn at least two lessons, if not more. They are as follows: when one becomes president with the aid of foreign operatives and only because of the whimsical realities of the antiquated American electoral system (to wit: the "electoral college, a mechanism designed by our founders only to prevent we the american people from possessing any real political power or influence), and one subsequently engages in corrupt practices, precipitous action is always unwise, and when one engages in reckless policy, one risks receiving a letter of resignation from one's Secretary of Defense, as well as one's Environmental Protection Agency Director.

Rethinking Trump

ON MY CAR'S BUMPER is a sticker which reads "Unfit To Serve: Impeach Trump". It sits next to my favorite, one imploring all to "stand up for science". That, and I think I have another one stuck on proudly proclaiming my membership in the democratic party. Nothing incongruous. But now that Mr. Trump has announced his intention of withdrawing American forces from Syria, I am considering not only removing the Trump bumper sticker, but also replacing it with one saying something like: "making America isolationist again, like Washington advised". (avoid foreign entanglements, said the first president in his farewell address) The "make America great again" concept has serious flaws, among them that America is already great, and always has been. Also, an expression of a need to make it great again would seem to imply that she is not currently great, a great sin of patriotic lack. But in removing troops from Syria, trump is doing right by me, if not his own supporters and Republican members of Congress. I'm no isolationist, but much like the president and millions of my fellow Americans, I often wonder why in hell we have over eight hundred military bases on foreign soil and in foreign waters. The answer of course is that the United States of Aggression wishes to impose her sacred will upon the world, in the name of American corporate expansion and exploitation. Trump sees through all that, as do most of us, and would probably be happy to accede to my suggestion that the wall be scuttled in favor of merely amassing a massive military presence all along the Rio Grande, in defiance of the Posse Comitatus law of 1877, which ended reconstruction and outlawed the positioning of the military in southern states for the purpose of acting as law enforcement. Repeal the law, close the foreign bases, reposition the troops, screw the wall. it would require substantial monitoring anyway, as did the Great Wall of China. Walls keep nobody out; they merely render relocating an inconvenience.

Waking Up Ready to Write and Roll

I AWAKENED THIS MORNING, a miracle in it own right, loaded for bear, rip roarin' ready to write. Whether it was the bad loss last night in major college basketball, during which my team exposed its inability to penetrate off the dribble into the match up zone, or the absence of marijuana, (temporarily I might hope), or the dreams I had, to me is irrelevant. I remember seeing my mother, dead now nearly five years, and Amy, sweet Amy, with whom I used to work, and with whom I recall wanting to be left alone, much as I adore my long dead mom. Then too, that new John Grisham novel is off to a fast start; we know he's going to kill someone - he's admitted that much, in a mea culpa remindful of a deathbed confession articulated long before entering the bed - we just don't know precisely why, who, when, how, or to what effect. All I remember is leaving the arena, angry, a few seconds before we threw up one final desperate last second three point attempt, once again in futile vain banality, surrendering to the zone. Then the buzzer buzzed, just as I unlocked the car, left foot throbbing. The Yellowjackets presumably boarded the bus, (not, one hopes, a true ramblin' wreck), headed for the airport, then to Atlanta. I hope there were so many Delta seven forty sevens on the tarmac down there that the team is still sitting on board, bored, hungover, already tired of winning. Maybe the restrooms are even clogged and out of order. (it would serve the cause of justice.) That touchy little muscle on the right side of my left foot finally had had quite enough, and gave out, as I ran towards my car, venting, looking for that telltale "Impeach Trump" bumper sticker, the only one like it in town, spewing anger at an offense which never entered the paint, I, like some long haired high school loser on meth, or the jumpy thirty year old i once was, so very long ago. Then I got home too quickly and slept on it. Nothing changed. To root for the Razorbacks is to suffer. But, well, and then..don't we all, at least in the long run? Here's a hint; later today I fully intend to publish an essay praising president Donald J. Trump. That, dear reader, is production.

Owning Up To Bump Stocks

THOSE WHO BEAR ARMS, and those who are victimized by them, are more than likely quite familiar with "bump stocks", which are ingenious devices which, when attached to semi automatic weapons, use the recoil energy of a pulled trigger to hasten the trigger's next engagement, repeatedly, effectively converting the semi automatic into a fully automatic weapon, aka "machine gun". Machine guns per se were criminalized way back when, in the nineteen thirties, in response to the then ongoing war between purveyors of illegal alcoholic beverages and law enforcement during the era of prohibition, 1919-1933. Now, thanks to President Trump, a surprisingly flexible and relenting National Rifle Association, piles of cadavers, and public outrage, bump stocks shall, within ninety days, be either turned over to appropriate law enforcement officials, or destroyed in the privacy of one's own arm bearing home. Remarkable what can be accomplished, belatedly, by a shooting rampage directed from a high rise hotel downward upon a country and western concert. The number of these devices extant in the United States of Armaments is not known. What is known is that there are approximately four hundred million privately owned and operated firearms in America now, heavily concentrated in the hands of an elite few. What is known is that there are many bump stocks out and about. They can be manufactured with the aid of modern technology in what are known as 3D printers, and there is doubtless a goodly number of them, on that account alone. Plastic can be made hard as nails. Fondly I recall a conversation I had with an NRA member friend of mine in 1977, who confided with me that he would be more than willing to support any sort of gun control measure whatsoever, were it not for the fact that the proverbial cow, as it were, was out of the barn, meaning, that even if our government suddenly decided to round up all privately owned weapons, there would be far too many to round up, people would simply hide and hoard them, and that those hiders and hoarders would swear oaths to themselves to retain possession of their purely defensive weapons over their own hypothetically dead bodies. I had to admit, the man had a point. So why bother outlawing bump stocks now, at this late date? For theatrical appeasement of liberal do gooders, if nothing else. And really, there is nothing else. The cow is indeed out of the barn, and its too late to round it up. My conversation in 1977 occurred when there were a mere million NRA-sters, the year when the million members were taken captive by a right wing, pro gun junta advocating not merely gun safety but gun ownership and use. In captivity they remain today. Since the bump stock cow is indeed being hunted down and returned to the barn, why not apply this principle to, say, semi automatic weapons, to Saturday night specials, or, dare we say, to weapons at large, if, for no other reason, than eight children are killed each day in the U.S. of Ammorica by, you guessed it, the family firearm. And really, there is no other reason.

Enlightening the World With Islamic Cat Love

THE ISLAMIC RELIGION is much reviled in the West, particularly the United States. For two hundred years great Britain has meddled in the affairs of Arabic Islamic countries, seeking control over them, seeking to plunder their resources, especially oil. the United States has followed suit. the western powers have caused great destruction and misery in these countries, presuming to establish their borders, their economic systems, and their access to their own resources, all in the name of profit and imperialism, often using the Christian faith as justification, just as slave owners in the antebellum south used the Christian faith and Biblical scripture to justify their "ownership" and enslavement of humans. Islamic nations have resisted encroachment by western superpowers, and have thus evoked the wrath of the mostly christian west. How dare they have the temerity to resist American imperialism! There is one respect in which Islamic culture is indisputably superior to Christian; the veneration of cats. As we all know, cats and humans form perfect relationships, and Muslims are far more aware of,and responsive to this fact that are Christians in general. In Islamic culture, cats are considered to be of great value, because they are, as they say, "ritually clean". dogs are looked down upon for being dirty, a notion in which Islamic is mistaken, but the cleanliness of cats cannot be disputed. The legend is that the prophet Muhammad was saved from a snakebite by a cat, that he repaid it by stroking its head and back, and thus gave cats the ability to right themselves in midair, and their beautiful markings. One day the prophet was preparing to dress for prayer, and a cat was sleeping on the sleeve of his garment. rather than awaken the cat, Muhammad allegedly cut off the sleeve of his garment, thus sparing the cat from being awakened. Cats may enter the houses of Muslims, dogs may not. In turkey in particular, all cats are seen as a great treasure, and hundreds of stray cats roam the street of Istanbul, copiously fed and watered by everyone. anyone who is caught bringing harm to a cat in Islamic countries is in dire peril. Food and water which has been touched by cats is considered clean. Cats have essentially taken control of the world, as millions of people in the U.S. and other countries love them. but in no other culture are they held in such high regard as in Islamic countries, and for this, all cat lovers should have the highest respect for the Islamic faith.

Overreaching, Judicially, Conservatively

WE ARE TOLD, repeatedly, by the conservative community that the appointment of liberal judges to the bench is unacceptable, not because they might offer renderings which reflect a liberal point of view, but because they tend to "make law from the bench", they "overreach", they legislate, rather than interpret the law, which is properly the domain of elected legislators. Not surprisingly, conservatives tend to identify judicial overreach with findings which reflect a liberal point of view. Suddenly, unexpectedly, a federal judge, a very conservative federal judge in Texas has ruled that the Affordable Care Act, affectionately known as "Obamacare", is unconstitutional, perhaps because the word "Obamacare" does not appear in the constitution. Obamacare was, as everyone knows, enacted duly by an act of congress in 2010, and signed into law, duly, by the president, Barack Hussein Obama. (the middle name "Hussein" has been used by conservatives as evidence that Obama is Islamic, in typically fatuous conservative style). The supreme court has failed to find the law unconstitutional, even though it has had countless opportunities to do so. That supreme court, however, did not included justices Gorsuch or Kavanaugh; the current court might well agree with the federal judge in Texas. What will be the conservative reaction to this latest ruling? Will we hear accusations of "judicial overreach"? Will we hear charges from the right that the Texas judge is legislating from the bench? You can bet your house that no such hue and cry will be heard, because, in fact, conservatives are not concerned about justices legislating from the bench,, so long as their "legislative" decisions produce a result favorable to conservatives. You might expect American conservatives to recognize, and do ameliorate this hypocrisy, but, considering that the conservative community is largely composed of Christians, who support a president who on a daily basis displays cruelty, racism, hatred, and has a proclivity for adultery, don't hold your breath.

Criticizing the President

AN OLD HIGH SCHOOL CLASSMATE of mine decided that enough is enough, that he has become sick, tired, and resentful of the scathing criticism being directed at our nation's president, and that it would be a whole lot better, more patriotic, to support the president, rather than constantly criticize and oppose him. To this end he started a petition on Facebook, and all who signed it pledged to, if nothing else, agree with him. What else can one do, other than to personally refrain from presidential criticism, and make enemies by personally chastising those who fail to so refrain? A lot of people, at least several dozen, signed up. The project seemed to fade away; my classmate's posts turned to other matters, but I suspect that if he had persevered, the number of signatories could have become impressive. It may be that all for percent of Trump supporters would have signed on, and that many of these people are the very same folks who relentlessly attacked Obama, and Bill and Hillary Clinton with a constant barrage of verbal salvos. All moral conduct, after all, is relative, it seems. So I posted a question to my classmate: in theory, say, if the president is deemed by duly empowered investigators to have diverted campaign money to hush payments to women with whom he allegedly had affairs, would it be proper to criticize him for violations of campaign finance laws, for infidelity, or anything else? Would it be "unpatriotic" and unsupportive of the president to even mention the matter at all? What about a president who refuses to accept the obvious reality of human made climate change? is this behavior beyond the bounds of negative criticism? To what extent is the president, or the government, beyond the realm of criticism? I would suggest that no amount of criticism is to much, as long as it can be supported by facts. I responded to my classmate that the never ending avalanche of negative responses directed at the government is a glorious manifestation of our sacred American freedom and democracy, and i stand by it.

Sticking With Trump, No Matter What

WE HAVE ALWAYS KNOWN that Trump will not go down easy, without a fight. We can expect much the same from his supporters. Amazingly, at this point, the president still "enjoys" an approval rating of around 40 percent. In what other country would such mass delusion be possible? Only in America, as we like to say. Based merely on his comments on twitter, it is difficult to imagine anyone respecting someone who speaks with such hatred, anger, and dishonesty so much of the time. Those who still support Trump, nearly half the country, have forfeit ed any claim to moral integrity, and this is most noticeable among the religious right wing,the politically conservative evangelical crowd. one month before Trump was elected, he was revealed as a self proclaimed sexual predator, proud to be such. That did nothing to dissuade his supporters, and was a harbinger of their attitude today. Hush money payments to former lovers? that's old news, they say, we've heard all that before; as if having heard it all before somehow minimizes the disgusting criminality of transferring campaign money to that purpose. Trumper's response to the Mueller investigation is even more interesting, ina bizarre way. he obviously has no evidence of collusion with Russians operatives, so he needs to shut down the investigation. Actually, the opposite is true: the very fact that Mueller has been working this case for a year and a half quite obviously points to the fact that he has something substantive, something major, to investigate, and that the material is of such consequential nature that it is taking a great deal of time and effort to sort it all out, and present the facts in an organized, accurate manner. Trump supporters, so ardent for so long, have gone into a sort of denial, refusing to believe that their judgment could have been so wrong, their loyalties so misplaced, their own moral integrity so fragile and questionable. Imagine how these same people would be responding if a Clinton or an Obama were in Trump's situation. These right wing Christian reprobates would be ready for a lynching, or to "lock her up".

Evolving Our God

ALL THE WORLD'S major religions are ancient, primitive, and misleading, and should be respectfully encouraged to evolve fadingly away. religion, of course, serves a very real human need, an emotional need for relevance, understanding, inspiration, and comfort. Religiosity is an emergent quality, the effect of combining billions and billions of nerve cells into a bundle and placing a bone protector around the cell mass. The human mind seeks to understand the universe, and to come to terms with it. The main problem with religion is that it fails to correct itself, fails to incorporate new knowledge into its belief system, and therefore, over time, stagnates in it sown errors, which become increasingly obvious. Every major religion, being thousands of years old, is thousands of years behind in knowledge, and all contain beliefs which are unquestionably outdated, just plain wrong. We have become habituated to glossing over those inconvenient facts, in our urge to preserve our traditional religions, rather than update and improve them, like science does. Isn't there some way to express our worshipful, reverential regard for existence by embracing an enlightened, rather than a petty, all to human creative intelligence? Must we, in order to be religious, believe in a God who slaughters thousands of people whimsically, or sends bolts of lightening down to Earth to kill bad guys? how about a God of creation whose spirit is manifest in the laws of nature, in the perfect aligned force of gravity, or in the forces which bind the nucleus of every atom in the universe together, making their, and our existence possible, and even necessary? For me, the Old testament God is simply too violent, too malicious, too capricious to worship and obey, but would be better off in an insane asylum. For me the beautiful, true God is the "infinitely superior spirit" manifestly perceivable in nature. The human species will spend at least the next one hundred years, certainly the rest of the twenty first century, fighting for its very survival, mainly against climate change, but also under threat of global epidemic, food and water shortages, the effects of over population. Whether we, whether our descendants win the war to survive as a species will depend on science, hard, solid, factual science and applied sciences, technology - not religion. it will be in our best interests to focus on the most advanced science we can muster, not the most primitive religious traditions.

Trump's Supporters, Dealing With The Albatross

THE NOOSE IS TIGHTENING about Mr. Trump's neck, metaphorically, legally, politically. The latest court filings by investigators indicate that Trump and his presidential campaign had far more contacts with far more Russians far earlier than anybody within Trump's circle had previously admitted, and that several of Trump's closet associates, such as his former attorney and "fixer" Robert Cohen, lied to investigators about these contacts, by vastly underestimating their number and inception. The dreaded collusion between R operatives and Trump becomes more likely, more obvious each day. Also, there is now proof that Trump violated campaign laws by channeling campaign money into hush payments for women he had affairs with, which is a felony, and which the federal court in new York is preparing to formerly accuse him of. Against Trump, indictments, probably multiple indictments, are coming. this presents a big problem for Trump's followers, especially the conservative Christian base, of which there are so many,so many devout Christians who are also devout supporters of Donald J. Trump. the problem is, how long to support him, and when to come clean about the criminal nature of their leader, and their enormous mistake in supporting him. The fat that Donald Trump is not a good christian, nor a good person, was clearly revealed by the Hollywood Access tape, (if not before) which was made public, Oct. 7, 2016, a full month before Trump was elected. All good Christians should have renounced Trump at that point. that they didn't they should be ashamed of, and their shame will only grow, as Trump's vast array of crimes and un christian behavior is made clear to all. It was the far right conservative Christian community which most strongly condemned Bill Clinton for lying to a grand jury about extramarital sex, the very same people who now not only refuse to condemn and drop Trump, but who actually continue to support him, demonstrating a shocking lack of moral integrity.

Worrying About the Future, Strangely

THE ONLY THING that matters is climate change. All other issues, no matter how seemingly monumental, pale in comparison, because climate change can cause the extinction of the human species, unless we do something now. Earth's nearest neighbor in space, Venus,, used to be much more like earth, climatically, but, due to a build up of carbon in her atmosphere, now has surface temperatures of eight hundred degrees, constantly. That's where Earth is headed, unless we do something, now. Either way, those of us who are alive now will be dead soon enough, soon enough to avoid the most devastating impact of global warming, namely, an inhospitable, to human life, planet. The unfortunate ones are those, numbering perhaps ten billion, who will be alive one hundred years from now, experiencing the worst of climate change; the wars, the endless mass migrations, the poverty, the starvation, as the human species, silly little primates, fades from existence after a once promising start. Can anyone imagine a scenario in which there are not at least ten million people on Earth in the year 2100, other than atomic war, a global epidemic, collision with an asteroid, the rapture, or whatever? And can anyone imagine them all being well fed, happy, healthy, wealthy, and wise? During my lifetime the Earth's population is more than doubled, from three million when I was a kid to close to eight billion now. Despite slowing birth rates in developed countries,much of the world is birthing right along, as we head towards nine billion by mid century. it may already be too late to save ourselves, particularly considering that a large part of humanity doesn't seem to care about the future. But, scientists say there is still a chance, and they go further, by telling us what we need to do, and how to do it. The only thing we the people need to start doing is listening to the scientists.

Believing

EVENTUALLY, AND IN FACT rather soon, everybody in the world is going to believe in climate change. It will be impossible not to. When the great grand children of the baby boomers are seeing hurricanes and one hundred degree days on a regular basis, they'll quite naturally ash whether its always "been like this". History moves from right to left, from traditions to change and innovation, towards progress, although, as Martin Luther King and others have often point out,; it sometimes takes a long time, the arc of progress seems to generally bend slowly. there will come a time when people will laugh at the very thought that there was ever a time when people refused to believe in climate change; they will be the flat Earthers of their day. An objective analysis indicates that all told, the human condition is far better now than it has ever been, especially in terms of life expectancy, nutrition, violence and war, and so forth. Considering how much war there is in the world today, it is particularly hard to believe that humanity has actually reduced warfare, but, alas, its true. Violent as we may seem now, we have been mic more so, in our dark and bloody past. even the most sacred traditions evolve over time; change is constant, and progress seems to be the normal process of human history, for we are creatures who learn from our mistakes. Science, for instance. Science is the closest thing I have to a religion, for good reason. Science produces results, results which are tangible, right in front of our faces. Cars, planes, computers, phones, modern medical miracles - all of it, a million blessings, come to us from science. Whatever religion give us could be given more easily and effectively through science, and someday soon the human species will come to believe that. The fight, the grand project to save the ecosystem from drastic climate change will clearly demonstrate the superiority of science. Let us replace mindless worship of some imaginary anthropomorphic deity with sublime reverence of nature, as we perceive it, as revealed through science, whatever little that may yet be.

Giving Lincoln A Chance

YOU HAVE TO GIVE a person a chance. I was raised to believe that, and I still do. That's why I gave Trump a chance. At my local small town in the south senior center, an eighty five year old rebel, fossil from the Jim Crow south, proclaimed one day that Franklin Roosevelt and Abraham Lincoln were the two sorriest presidents we ever had. I didn't, but should have responded that Abraham Lincoln could have been the best, was potentially the best friend the south ever had, had the south allowed it, had the south given Lincoln a chance. He was elected fair and square, but the very minute he was elected, the states in the Confederacy started to secede, before Lincoln was even sworn in as president, or even had a chance to do anything as president to show his attitude towards the south. In face, if Lincoln had had the chance, he would have entered the White House very conciliatory towards the south, defending their right to self determination, and that ending slavery was a matter for the states in which it existed, not the federal government. The southern states would have found out: Abraham Lincoln was a man you could talk to, who would listen, and try to see your point of view. But, they never gave him the chance. So, the Confederacy started the unnecessary Civil War, and when it was over, one of the southern people, defeated, devastated, and angry, killed Lincoln. Lincoln's plan was to be conciliatory, forgiving, ready to reunite the country in brotherly love, but because he was killed, the new president, Andrew Johnson hated the Confederacy, and the rest, the horrible history of reconstruction, is history, as they say. Again, for the second time, the south did not give Abraham Lincoln a chance, and paid dearly because of it. Of course, you have to know who to trust, and, really, you never can. So, shouldn't we modern Americans give each other a chance, if nothing else? I have grown particularly impatient with conservative Christian types who refuse to accept either evolution or climate change, both of which are fact. I must at least give them a chance to change.

Coming To Terms With Reality; Facing Doom

FINALLY, we're really starting to see the effects of climate change, and more American conservatives who heretofore have denied its existence, are beginning to accept reality. Recent surveys indicate that as many as seventy percent of the American people now believe in human made climate change. Reality isn't pretty. The weather is going to continue getting and being crazy, with extreme events and conditions world wide. The latest information is dire. If we don't start significantly reducing carbon emissions by 2030, we're done. This is just as surely as if a large asteroid were approaching Earth on collision course. Every time we look up, the asteroid is closer, and now collision seems imminent, unavoidable. And the crazy thing is, I might live long enough to see it happen, to see climate change totally disrupt the world's climate. I'm sixty three now, so, if I live another twenty years, to, say, 2038. I might see some really crazy climate changes where I live, like triple digit hear all summer long, every year, and the growing season extending year round. Presumably, at some time in the future we will eliminate fossil fuels, and reduce carbon emissions to zero. The question is: when? Its happening now, and needs to keep happening. Even without any help from the American government, solar and wind energy are increasing around the world, giving us hope. We are replacing fossil fuels. Not fast enough, though. We need to hurry. As it stands now, ocean level will rise enough to inundate much of the world's land, and agricultural production will decrease. We've already raised the planet's temperature one degree, and we are going to raise it at least one more, no matter what we do. That will be dangerous. Its too late to stop human suffering due to climate change, because its happening now, and will only increase. Scientists started talking about global warming in the nineteen sixties, but, very few people listened, or cared. Greenhouse gases and global warming have been known about for two hundred years, and we're still ignoring it.

Vetting , and Letting the Caravan In

THE DIFFERENT REASONS for keeping the caravan of migrants out of the United States are, in a sick sort of way, fascinating. They're bringing crime, they're bringing drugs. They're killers and rapists. So goes the Trump line, a blatant lie by virtue of grotesque distortion of facts. Statistically, actually, the migrants are a whole heckuva lot less criminal in their behavior than your average American. That's just a fact, whether my fellow arrogant Americans prefer to accept it or not. Then, we have the legal purists, and their paltry excuses...The "They must come legally" crowd. Well, there is absolutely nothing illegal about running for your life, escaping your own country to save your life, and seeking asylum in another country. Then, there are the economic arguments, equally bogus. These people take jobs away from good, law abiding, native Americans. They are a drain and a burden on American society, taking up social benefits, like welfare money, and giving nothing in return. Even funnier is the "America cannot afford these people" bullshit. The "we can't even take care of our own people" crowd. Too freaking funny. And the funny thing about this whole mess, the funniest thing of all, is that the people spewing these bullshit arguments are, overwhelmingly, the conservative Christian capitalist crowd. The mainstream G.O.P.. As far as I can tell, the Democrats, the liberals are, overwhelmingly saying "let them in. Give them a chance. Help them." Meanwhile, its those socialistic atheist Christ denying left wing types, urging compassion towards the caravaners. The great national divide continues, right versus left. Folks, there's no argument here. The Christian thing, the Jesus like thing to do would be to welcome the immigrants, all immigrants, with open arms, and give them everything they need, food, water, clothing, shoes, money, housing, jobs, all of it. The non christian thing to do, the devilish thing to do, is to tear gas them. Economically? Economically, the capitalistic thing to do, the free market capitalistic thing to do, is to let the immigrants in, get some money into their hands, with jobs, and watch as their ability to spend money, and their demand for goods and services, leads to production, sales, and profit for American business. ts that simple. Illegal immigrants in America already pay trillions of times more taxes than they take out in welfare money, trust me. Legalize them, put them to work, to paying taxes and spending money, and watch the American economy take off like a rocket, capitalistically. Increased demand is increased work, production, supply, and prosperity. the Christian argument and the capitalistic argument, for letting the caravan in and treating them well, are both the same argument. For Once, Christian and capitalistic values coincide, merge on the side of good. therefore, its extremely ironic, tragic, and not a little humorous, that the very people who reject these arguments concerning the immigrant caravan, claim to embrace them generally. do we see racism, just as traditional an American value as Christianity and capitalism, cleverly disguised here? Hey, just asking. In any event, when will America's Christians and capitalists, aka America's conservative community, finally wake up and understand basic religion and economics, and start embracing them?

Spewing the Nationalist Line

FINDING INFORMATIVE FACEBOOK POSTS can be a bit like extracting diamonds from a dung heap, to borrow Jefferson's elegant quote. An old schoolmate of mine, an ardent online Christian, posted a video of a young, gorgeous (aren't they all) television reporter, microphone in hand, standing under a highway overpass, with a couple dozen sleeping homeless rolled up in tarps and tents in the background. With an aggressive, strident Sarah Huckabee Sanders voice, the intelligent looking young lady invited the audience to behold the scene behind her, reminding viewers that if American can't even take care of its own people, then it has no room for a caravan of impoverished, jobless immigrants. America simply doesn't "have room" for them. The report, or ad, or Trump propaganda byte, or whatever it was intended to be, might be effective at convincing the undiscerning conservative mind. If you can convince yourself that the United State is bursting at the seems with so many unproductive people that it cannot afford to feed itself, you might fall for this bit of right wing propaganda coming from a gorgeous young female face. If, however, you understand basic economics, you dismiss this ploy with an eye roll and a shrug. America needs prosperity, and it needs to distribute that prosperity throughout society by manufacturing wealth with productive jobs, good jobs for many people. We are raising minimum wage at the city and state level, a good start. Now, all we need are workers; young, healthy, hungry workers to fill the jobs, fuel the economy, and produce the prosperity while not earning huge, just fair salaries themselves. And there they are, heading straight for us, just south of the border. My fellow Americans, we don't have enough young working people; our birth rate is too low, ans has been, for some time. We need people, young, smart, hard working, people, to work and produce our way out of poverty, and here they are, a godsend, sent from God, to help us save America.

Remembering

I HAD FORGOTTEN THAT Mr. Bush had "celebrated" his 94th birthday. I must've missed it. Very impressive. My uncle, who died nine months ago, just barely failed to make his 94th, expressing a preference for going home, and quietly dying there. He got his wish, and had indicated that he wanted no memorial ceremony of any sort. Strange, since he was a retired cemetery manager, having worked in a mortuary for years before that. His family decided they wanted to have a memorial service anyway, so they did, and I did not attend, perhaps using my uncle's expressed wishes as an excuse. So at least we have, if we're lucky, a little control over how we go out. I remember when Nixon died, a friend of mine noticed that none of his eulogizers even remotely mentioned Watergate or Nixon's ignominious resignation fro the presidency. My friend wondered when they were going to "come clean". My attitude then was that his funeral was not the proper time to make such mentions. It is conceivable that George Bush the forty first president will be remembered, at least partly, as a war criminal, or, at the least, as an architect of war, a leader who used deception to lead his nation into war. In 1990, Saddam Hussein amassed the Iraqi army on the border of Kuwait, as if preparing to attack that much smaller country. President Bush, through his Ambassador to Iraq, April Glaspie, told Saddam that the United States really didn't care what Iraq did, had no interest in becoming involved in conflicts between Arab countries. Doubtless grateful for the blank check, Saddam went ahead and attacked, and conquered Kuwait. The rest, as they say, is history. In defense of Bush, it could be said that he hadn't the slightest inkling that Saddam would actually launch his army, and that had he known, would never have been so passive in dealing with the dictator. Historians will be arguing that point, presumably. Its tempting to wonder what would have happened if Bush had told Saddam: "if you attack Kuwait, we will destroy you". Would we have avoided nearly thirty years of war? Who knows? Historians will have more to say about that as well. For the moment, R.I.P. Mr. President.

Becoming Friends

THEY CAME TOGETHER because they were willing to take a chance, to take a chance on love and reconciliation. Knowing that they were natural adversaries, they came together hoping and believing that they could find something better, could create something better. One group came from Massachusetts, the other from Kentucky. One, liberal, the other conservative. The bleeding heart liberal do gooders fearing the end of the world, wanting to change everything, the other, content with the comfort of long held traditions. Amid all the turmoil and acrimony of our tortured country, they knew there surely must be a better way. Well, it was worth a try. The folks from the north can see climate change in their own neighborhoods, and wonder why not everyone else can. The Kentucky folk, proud in their fundamentalist, patriotic roots, married to their livelihood in the coal mines, turned out to be less unwilling than expected to accept that, yes, the climate is changing, and yes, human beings may be causing some of it. But they know that without their coal industry, they have no hope and no future. Without hope and a future, how can people worry about the climate? Complete strangers, few if any of them had any expectation of success, of coming harmoniously together in love, replacing fear and mistrust with community. And yet, within the human spirit lives something higher, something more precious than mere political differences, and somehow, without anyone knowing or understanding why or how, this higher self emerged. They became friends. They began to understand each other. First, In Kentucky, then, in Massachusetts, they visited, talked, got to know one another. Gradually, the miracle emerged. When they parted company, they resolved to never let their new friendship be severed by petty political concerns, and to always remain friends. The Kentucky people did not want to let their sweet guests from the north go home, but, reluctantly, they parted company. They sill see each other again, they will be together always, and always, they will give the rest of us hope, the hope that if they can do it, so can we. At least we can try.

Reading Adam Smith Right

ADAM SMITH was an interesting fellow. Multifaceted, he was an accomplished moral philosopher, political scientist, and economic analyst and historian, who is generally given credit for being the first person the describe in detail in way in which modern capitalism functions, in his book "The Wealth of Nations", widely regarded as one of the most important and influential books of all time. The "Bible of Capitalism" is often seen as explaining capitalism with such clarity that it not only explains the free market economic system, but provides an unassailable argument in favor of it. This, however, is not altogether true. Smith, in fact, never uses the word "capitalism" in the book, and never uses the term "laissez faire", "leave alone', the term often associated with a lack of government intervention in the free market. He does extol the virtues of the "invisible hand" of the law of supply and demand, but uses those principles in ways not widely known today. Smith does not give his approval to people using their abilities to seek great personal wealth, and in fact expressed his view that economic inequality was harmful to general national prosperity. He believed that when the free market is allowed to operate unhindered by government regulation, it would naturally produce widespread economic equality, and that this was a desirable end. He not only believed in equality of opportunity, but also equality of outcome, a fact not well known today. He said that all government action on behalf of the poor is desirable, but that government action on behalf of the wealthy was never desirable. Today's exponents of capitalism use Smith as an example of logical justification of a wealthy class and persistent economic inequality, but smith in fact believed that a nation, any nation, was far poorer the greater the gap between the rich and the poor. In today's terms, Smith can be seen almost as much as a socialist as a capitalist, a theorist who believed that government intervention was undesirable, until it became necessary to remedy great social ills, such as impoverishment of the working class, or glaring inequality. And, today's socialists do not prefer government run economics for its own sake, but rather, like Adam Smith, for the purpose of making society more equal, compassionate, and stable.

Explaining Capitalism To Trump

IT WOULD APPEAR that Donald J. Trump could use a basic lesson in free market capitalism, (as well as grammar, articulate speech, common courtesy, and a few other areas). Hardly surprising, considering that Trump has been bailed out of bankruptcy by the taxpayers no less then four times, clearly demonstrating a lack of business acumen, if not outright incompetence. The purpose of a business is to make money, what is commonly called "the profit motive". To achieve this, businesses which are successful respond to the demands of the market place, producing, distributing, and selling such goods and services as are in demand. This is called "the law of supply and demand" in fundamental economics, and was clearly articulated for the first time in modern history by Adam Smith in his seminal 1776 monograph: "The Wealth of nations". Obviously Trump, a graduate, shockingly, of the Wharton School of Economics at the U. of Pennsylvania, has never read Adam Smith, or if he has, failed to understand the material. General Motors is down sizing its business, laying off employees, closing plants, as a response to the law of supply and demand, according to which in current American market conditions, the consumer products made at these plants are no longer in sufficient demand to justify their continued production. When some aspect, any aspect of a business fails to be profitable, a well run business eliminates the source of the problem, and redirects production resources elsewhere. Trump, petulant that General Motors is damaging his promise to bring back jobs, create jobs, and all that rhetoric we heard so much of a couple of years ago, reminded the company that he is not happy with their decision, that America has done much for it, such as bail it out of bankruptcy about ten years ago, a move Trump opposed at the time, and has given the company, and all other businesses, a huge tax cut. The president seems to be forgetting that nowhere in any basic economics class are students taught that corporations should feel a sense of gratitude and obligation for favorable government policies, and should continue to invest in unprofitable production to repay the government for its kindness. But, how could one expect a man whose only business success has come through high stakes gambling, rather than true business building, to understand basic economics?

Banning The Bible

HOMOSEXUALITY is a fact of life, a law of nature, God's will, if you will. It exists in many species of animal other than human. We are not alone. It is estimated that something on the order of five percent of human beings are homosexual. A gene for homosexuality has been isolated, proving conclusively that homosexuality is written into the very fabric of life, a deliberate natural mechanism, possibly for population control, but very definitely in accordance with the grand life plan of the creator of the universe. None of this matters to conservative Christians, whose tendency is to deny the existence of whatever they deem inconvenient to their primitive system of belief, and to invent whatever they believe enhances their own status as believers in primitive theology. There was a time when Christians denied that the Earth orbits the sun. Now, they deny the fact of evolution, and they deny that homosexuality is a biological, not a moral issue; unless troublemakers attempt to make it one. The Christian community has given us, among many other evils, Sexual Orientation Conversion Effort ,or SOCE. In this process, a gay person is forced to undergo extensive brainwashing to convince the victim of this barbaric cruelty that he or she is in fact heterosexual, and that he or she has merely strayed morally, or is somehow confused, misguided. Often people subjected to this torture convince themselves for a time ht they are indeed "cured" of homosexuality, but in almost all cases, the biological imperative returns, and the person has experienced misery and mistreatment for no beneficial reason. In California it is illegal to use Sexual Orientation Conversion Effort on anyone under the age of eighteen; a bill is now under consideration to outlaw the practice for everyone. The bill has been passed by the lower house, and is not being considered by the state Senate. The christian community is up in arms, claiming across the internet that California is attempting to "ban the Bible', and that California's fires are God's retribution for the Bible banning effort. This lunacy presumably derives from the twisted logic that since the Bible considers homosexuality a sin, to ban any attempt to eradicate it is to ban the Bible. Between homosexuality and the Bible, the Bible does far more harm, by promulgating falsehood; homosexuality does no harm, and in fact does a great service of enticing religious fanatics to expose themselves and their hateful, destructive doctrines to public scrutiny.

Loving Cats

FOR MANY YEARS I taught Western Civilization, and early in the semester I delivered lectures about ancient Egypt. lectures don't do justice to ancient Egypt; you need visual aids, maybe a trip to a world class museum of ancient history. I always smiled when it came time to make my favorite comment: the ancient Egyptians worshiped cats. My own love of dogs and cats underlay my joy in considering an entire advanced civilization with reference for my beloved felines, but when I said it, I was never quite sure what I meant. I'm not still not. Not long ago I heard an interview with a renowned scholar of ancient Egypt, and she siad that the ancients did not so much worship cats, as they paid very close attention to them. That, I can relate to. In fact there are in the Egyptian pre Christian panoply of deities, among their many incarnations of the divine, several goddesses who could and often did transform themselves into cats. The beautiful engravings on monuments attest to reference for cats. Speculation is that cats were extremely beneficial in removing rodents from granaries, allowing the people to keep their staple crops to themselves. That would inspire gratitude and reverence in anyone, one would think. Of the roughly three thousand years of ancient Egyptian history, cats only started becoming house pets during the second millennia; and their status remained quite high, although the process of "de-deification" had probably begun. The ancient Romans, always borrowing from other cultures, caught on to cats; to this very day stray cats are a welcome part of modern Rome, for the same reason; they drastically reduce the rodent population. I live in a small town in the middle of the United States, we seem to have a fairly large and healthy stray cat population, and I feed them, and "take them in", ten in all so far, but I think I have finally reached my maximum carrying capacity. (how many times have I said that before?). When you consider the absolutely primitive, cruel, and irrational nature of our modern religions, involving such nightmares as human sacrifice and eternal damnation in hell, the worship of cats, a symbol for the admiration of nature and life, doesn't seem at all hard to understand.

Stabbing America In the Back

WHEN PRESIDENT TRUMP took office, he ordered that the term "climate change' be removed from all federal government websites. Trump, a true climate change denier conservative, really doesn't care one way or another about climate change as an issue. he would be just a happy to be the world's leading crusader for fighting the problem. Trump only wants what most children want: attention. Tragically, he cast his lot with the dark side, the dark side of climate change denial, an attitude which threatens our very existence. Every four years the government issues a comprehensive report on climate change, its progress, its probable future course, based on the latest, most comprehensive research. This program was instigated by president Bush in 2001. The latest report came out this past week, and is alarmingly dire. Trump, evidently, arranged for the report to be released over the Thanksgiving weekend, hoping it would be buried beneath the holiday festivities, and would attract less attention, thus providing less demonstrable repudiation of his insane climate change policy of denial. When it became obvious that his clever little tactic had backfired - the public seems to be paying attention - the president simply shrugged off the comprehensive study as unfounded, unproven, unreliable. This is hardly surprising, however, coming from a person who cannot distinguish the difference between "weather" and "climate", an ignorance which, tragically, is apparently shared by most climate change deniers. And how often have we heard climate change deniers brilliantly pose the question, n the midst of a period of cold weather: "so where's this climate change now"? the fools would be humorous were thy not in such deadly earnest, as H. L. Mencken said. It is unspeakably tragic that Trump got elected for many obvious reasons, but the greatest of them is that by refusing to take action against the looming disaster to human existence, a disaster which is already being seen and experienced by millions, Trump is in fact stabbing his own country in the back. We are left to fantasize about some high school chemistry teacher, any of the tens of thousands in this country will do, explaining basic chemistry to the president. It'll never happen, and even if it did, Trump would ignore the explanation. it is not unreasonable, inaccurate, or unfair to characterize Trump's behavior, and for that matter the behavior of all climate change deniers, as unpatriotic, traitorous, treasonous. Any other description of this behavior would be dishonest.

Taking Notice, Finally

CLIMATE CHANGE has by now had a noticeable impact on every inch of the Earth, and it is difficult to imagine many people being unaware of it. Most of the human race believes in man made climate change, because most people have experienced it. In my particular neck of the woods, the growing season is much, much longer than it was fifty years ago, when I was a child. Spring now begins in February, and October is rapidly becoming a summer month. It used to snow where I live, middle America, rather frequently, but now, only rarely. Also, the weather has become more violent and dramatically changeable; the rain , when it comes, seems to come in drenching downpours, with relatively few pleasant, mild showers. Large portions of every calendar year in our area is either in a mild drought, or a serious one. The number of truly hot days, with temperatures in the high nineties, is increasing, and winter's are generally milder. Man made climate change has been occurring, to one degree or another, since the dawn of the industrial age, the middle of the eighteenth century when smokestacks began belching greenhouse house gases into the skies of first London, then all other European cities. Soon, surely, billions of people will be so impacted by climate change that our entire species will join hands to fight and reverse it, by taking strong action. Its already too late, later than it should have been. If Al Gore had been elected in 200, for example, the United States might not now be mired in our stupid, needles bickering over and ignoring of climate change. Soon, surely, the last dregs of the conservative community in America will come around, acknowledge reality, and start to help the rest of us, instead of getting in our way. The most recent, up to date report on climate change is frightening, and all new, improved research indicates the the problem is worse than we thought it was. Our grandchildren are going so suffer, long after we're dead. its just a matter ow how much, and how much we do to make their suffering less severe.

Giving Thanks

A SMALL CARAVAN OF poor, homeless, hungry, desperate immigrants, among them some criminals and other undesirables, with only their dreams and the clothes on their backs, approaches the land, and enters, without permission from the inhabitants. The rightful owners of the land, the natives, see this happening and disagree among themselves what to do about it. Some of them want to kill the intruders, while others want to drive merely them out of the land. Others want to continue to observe them, and keep deciding what to do. A small group wants to welcome the intruders, offer to help them, and try to get to know them. After much arguing, the native inhabitants did a little of all of these things, but, for the most part, they allowed the newcomers to enter the country, welcomed them, and helped them. it is surprising how often that scenario has played out in human history, and amazing how often the response has been welcoming, rather than turning away or killing the refugees. Maybe there is hope for humanity after all. Human history is the history of migrants and refugees. We humans spent millions of years living in paleolithic culture, mobile, always moving, in small groups. Now, in our permanent settlements, we can't stop moving. American history is the history of caravans of poor, helpless, desperate people coming to America, giving thanks when they got there, and working hard to survive. Whether its 1607, 1620, or 2018, its basically the same thing, even though they are all different. For instance, the 1607 Jamestown gang came for one reason only; to get rich by stealing. So, technically, they were all criminals. There are about a million reasons why it is wonderful to be an American, and today is a great day to list them. At the top it should say "my (ancestor's) successful immigration".

Supporting The President

ONE OF MY HIGH SCHOOL CLASSMATES posted on Facebook a scathing condemnation of the American people for criticizing Trump too harshly and too often, complained that no previous American president has been treated this badly, and suggested that we all work together and support the president. He was asking people to sign his letter if they agree, and quite a few did. I scratched my head when he said he has lived under five presidents before the current one, because he's my age, and I have lived under twelve presidents. My response was and is: "Every American president has been closely scrutinized and constantly criticized, an ongoing glorious display of American freedom and democracy. May we the people always speak our minds, and may we always be good citizens by voting, participating in public discourse, and always trying to make ourselves, our communities, our country, and our world better, through honest analysis."... Frankly, I think that (my response) pretty much says it all. When the infamous Access Hollywood Trump recording was given to the public, what was the appropriate response? sharp criticism, or support and approval? The answer, to any reasonable person, is obvious. I personally have not actually kept track of the number of blatant lies Trump has told while in office, but other people have, and the number is alarming: several thousand, and growing. That behavior on the part of Trump is shocking, frightening, and must be criticized often and loudly. Truly Trump often just makes it up as he goes, assuming that whatever he says is true because he said it. The arrogance and narcissism are alarming. The Mueller investigation needs to continue and complete, and then revealed to us, the American people. Apparently, a number of other disturbing situations within the Trump administration merit investigation, and to fail to reveal the facts in all of them would be detrimental to the country. We the American people pay attention to our presidents, and for thank we can thank the dear lord, the constitution, and ourselves.