Progressives Coming Out

ITS CALLED THE "DEMOCRATIC PARTY", but conservatives, led by the nose by their guru Rush the Gush Limbaugh, have taken to calling it the "Democrat" party, as if doing so constitutes some greatly effective, immensely clever insult, the implication being that the party is not "democratic", presumably. Surely these master of insults could do better. These are exciting and interesting times for the more progressive wing of the American electorate, with a record number of candidates having already declared their intention of seeking the presidency, perhaps smelling the blood of a severely politically wounded incumbent demagogue with faltering approval ratings and a growing litany of corruption, dishonesty, self made enemies, and disastrous policies. I've been a Democrat all my increasingly long life, though I took what proved to be an ill advised detour in 1968, when Hubert H. Humphrey's incessant verbal assaults on Richard M. Nixon inspired my bleeding heart thirteen year old mentality to switch loyalties, and "vote" Nixon. I repeated the mistake in 1972, as high a school senior, but, looking back, Nixon was not altogether a bad president, and was in fact quite progressive as far as Republicans go. What's a little gangland style criminal corruption among friends? Humphrey, and several former presidents agreed at his funeral in 1978, would have made a great president, being exceptionally conversant with the mechanisms of the legislative process, as LBJ had been. It galls me to think that I passed on Humphrey only because of his acid tongue, and on George McGovern only due to blind, unreasoning loyalty to a crook in denial. Finally, a mere fifty years down the road, arrives my opportunity for atonement. Hillary Clinton was more moderate than liberal, a war hawk, and a corporate puppet, just like her husband, just like Obama, corporate property all. Bernie Sanders ignited the progressive instincts of the left wing, and quite likely would have won the nomination and the presidency had it not been for the nefarious machinations of Hillary Rodham and Donald J.Trumped Up. Trading on the Sanders legacy, it seems that every left winger in the party other than Bernie himself has already tossed a hat into the proverbial ring, or is expected to quite soon, in this era of never ending political campaigning. Oh my, how does one decide? The women, including African-Americans of the most impressive credentials, are out in force; registered to vote, running for office, ready for the fray, determined to excise the cancerous Trump movement from the political landscape. Kamala Harris has the early lead, by a large margin. So far no less than five United Stats Senators have declared, although historically the U.S. Senate is a poor platform from which to seek the presidency. it may be that the constant engagement by Senators in national and international issues tends to taint them with bad reputations and built in opposition before they ever get started. Governorships are better launch sites for presidential runs. More candidates are on the way. As many as thirty or forty democrats will end up in the early primaries a year from now, all having traversed back and forth across the country, stirring things up, getting their names into people's minds. and, most noticeable of all; most of them will be hard left liberals, with but a few moderates and no conservative in sight. Some might say this spells disaster for the Democrats; another theory is that the millennials are coming of political age, will soon be registering in record number, already outnumber eh dying baby boomers, and are, as a whole, very whole, and very conspicuously unaffiliated with hard right conservative evangelical Christianity, republican style.

Doing Whatever It Takes

IN THE LATE NINETEEN TWENTIES, after an economic boom fueled by post war prosperity, the fruits of prosperity had disproportionately accumulated in the hands of the wealthy elite, leaving millions of people without sufficient purchasing power to maintain a high enough level of economic demand to motivate suppliers to supply, resulting in over supply, a precipitous decline in productivity, with consequent contraction of business, waves of worker layoffs, mass unemployment, and depression. Conservative Republican president Herbert Hoover failed to grasp these underlying causes, and insisted the economy would correct itself, that the free market would regain balance and productivity naturally, and urged people to provide for the needs of the needy by contributing to charity. That was the best he could do in a situation which required much more. The nation responded by electing Roosevelt, whose New Deal program of massive government intervention in the economy saved capitalism from itself, and has remained ever wince. We now take government involvement in the economy for granted. When World War Two erupted, conservative Americans were isolationist, but Roosevelt understood that American involvement in the war was unavoidable, vital to a successful outcome for civilization. After tricking the Japanese into attacking pearl harbor, he led a massive wartime mobilization of the American economy and people, turning the wealthiest nation in the world into a military juggernaut whose participation in the war made the difference. This included the "Manhattan project", in which billions of dollars and thousands of people, mainly scientists, were organized into an efficient machine-like force for the purpose of successfully building an atomic bomb before America's enemies did so. The successful conclusion of the war once again brought economic prosperity to the United States, and technological progress made it apparent that any task could be accomplished, given the political will and organized resources necessary to achieve the goal. Diseases were conquered, medical advances came at a prodigious rate, and advances in transportation means and industrial techniques revolutionized and modernized the American lifestyle. President Kennedy challenged the nation to land men on the moon, and once again national resources were organized and focused on a seemingly prodigious task, and once again the task was accomplished. All along the way conservative mindsets were skeptical, and yet, every obstacle was conquered, just as all obstacles had been conquered before by progressive mindsets and determined, concerted cooperative effort. We have thus far failed to eliminate war, poverty, and disease, but only because of our lack of determination to do so. There is an even greater threat now, and a greater task awaits solution. The threat is, of course, climate change, which, we are reliably told, is far worse than we had thought, and will become severe beyond our ability to reverse within little more than a decade, unless drastic action is taken immediately. The scientists are quite correct, as they always are in the long run, despite missteps along the way. Science always, sooner or later, gets to the truth, and it has gotten to the truth regarding climate change. Once again we are faced with the necessity of mobilizing a vast cooperative effort to conquer a common danger, just like we did in solving the great depression, World War Two, and the space race to the moon, This time, the future existence of the human race, and all other forms of life, is at stake. Conservative thinking is once again putting up roadblocks. We the people of planet Earth have not yet decided whether our will to survive is sufficient to the task, but there are indications that the will to win is building the necessary momentum, and, because of this, there still may be hope.

Explaining Trump's Support

SINCE BECOMING PRESIDENT, Donald Trump has lied thousands of times, all documented and verified, has shown a remarkably thin skinned inability to respond in a mature manner to valid criticism, has constantly verbally attacked good people with vicious slander, and has pursued numerous policies which a re demonstrably damaging to the United States, most especially his refusal to accept to reality of global warming and to pursue policies to ameliorate it. he has entangled himself in a vast array of unethical and probably illegal situations, including innumerable financial conflicts of interests surrounding his many business interests, and the likelihood that his relationship with Russian political operatives in gaining political power is treasonous and traitorous, depending o the results of the soon to be completed Mueller investigation. Even more shockingly, many of these highly problematic circumstances were known or became known during the presidential campaign in 2016, when Trump's habit of prevaricating and vicious name calling became apparent, as he casually invented such derogatory terms as "Lying Ted", "crooked Hillary", among many others, slandering good people with dishonesty, accusing others of criminal activity while hiding his income tax returns and deflecting attention from his various questionable practices forms of behavior politically, professionally, and personally. Those who elected Trump did so knowing full well his reprehensible character and history, but, incredibly, not seeming to care. Two years into his presidency, they still don't seem to care, and when Trump's reckoning comes, and his career flames out in massive ignominious scandal, those who stayed with him will most likely not bother to bat an eyelash, preferring to ascribe all Trump's troubles to vast, impossibly complicated impossible to prove or even defend conspiracies between progressives, the media, the criminal justice system, and who knows who else, perhaps even foreign countries. Every day it becomes more obvious that the Trump presidency will be remembered as the most corrupt in American history, a nd that Trump himself will be remembered as a criminal demagogue who got elected by fraud, deception, and a sense of desperation among millions of alienated American voters. Enough people voted for Trump to elect him, and the question is: why? the answer may lie in human nature itself; the tendency of people to resort to desperate solutions to desperate problems during desperate times, the tendency to seek salvation from a savior. All human behavior, individually and collectively, has psychological and sociology explanations, which is why those sciences exist. it may be that Trump became president for the exact same reason that the Christian faith was invented, that Julius Caesar replaced the ancient Roman republic with the Roman empire, the napoleon came to power, that Hitler came to power, and that strong man demagogues throughout world history have come to power, usually with ultimately disastrous consequences; the need for people to be saved from their own desperate situations and conditions. Trump may be the latest, and God willing the last (tragically, probably not the last0 strong man savior to rise to power in human history. We can only hope; Caesar, Napoleon, and Hitler, among others, did not work out well, despite exuberantly optimistic beginnings with fervent popular support. The only savior who has had any tangibly positive impact on humanity is Jesus Christ, and it must be noted that Jesus was different than all the others in one very important way; he made no attempt to gain or exert any political power on Earth, but was content to teach a message of wisdom and love in this life, while allowing others to chase temporal power, while he articulated the necessity for a virtuous, noble lifestyle during one's lifetime on earth, in preparation for entrance into his kingdom, in heaven.

Schooling Trump, and the Right, On Socialism, Again

I DIDN'T WATCH THE State of the Union address, content to get the summary on National Public Radio. On NPR, there is no need to adjust the color on the flat screen to account for orange hair, or the sound, to account for shrill screeching. Apparently, though, the president launched a verbal salvo against "socialism", whatever he might think socialism is. If I'm not mistaken, he said that the United States will never become a socialist country, that socialism does not work, and he may have even included all the tired old platitudes; that socialism has never worked anywhere in the world where it has been tried, that it destroys freedom, is satanic, does not glorify Christ of God, and is the very antithesis of goodness. I have spent many years asking myself, and others: what, precisely, do American conservative Christians think socialism is? It has become apparent that they truly think it is all the above. Socialism is, of course, cooperative economics, rather then competitive economics, which is capitalism. Cooperation is organized through government, often democratically, with everyone's participation in the political process allowed, even encouraged, like it is, for instance, in Europe, where all the countries are socialist countries. In socialism, freedom is shaped and limited by the constraints of democratic socialism, while in capitalism freedom is limited by the constraints of corporate capitalism. In either system, socialism or capitalism, there are limits to freedom, and there is freedom. Every business or corporation I have ever heard of is a dictatorial tyranny, not a democracy. The ownership has absolute power, and whatever power the works have they have only because of limits imposed upon corporate ownership by government. Workplace democracy has not arrived in America, but may well soon; the natives are restless, and AOC is loose upon the land. Government, contrary to what right wing free enterprisers will tell you, more often guarantees and protects freedom than destroying it. In many ways there smore individual freedoms in democratic socialism than in corporate capitalism. The United States is a socialist country, and also a capitalist country. the two work quite well together, as America proves. Socialism has already come to America, evidently without the Christian conservative community even knowing it, proving that socialism must not be taking away any of their freedoms, for if it were, surely even these largely oblivious people would realize it, although perhaps sluggishly and belatedly. Socialism works wonderfully well in the United States, and all across Europe. The list of successful socialism in America is long, but here are a few examples: local police and fire departments. Local streets, state and federal highways, and bridges. Public libraries. Public colleges and universities. Medicare, Medicaid, and social Security. The National Park system and service. Public school systems. And that is only the beginning, only a few examples of democratic socialism in a country (U.S.A.) which is partly democratic democratic socialism and part tyrannical corporate capitalism. Socialism means owned, maintained, operated, and financed publicly, with the government doing the work on behalf of the people. Minimum wage is socialistic. Work place regulation, the forty hour work week, environmental protection regulation, patent and copyright protection, bankruptcy law, anti trust laws, the process of incorporation itself, which are all government mandated and protected, are examples of socialism becoming involved in capitalism to prevent capitalism from destroying itself through the formation of monopolies. Donald Trump, and every other anti socialist conservative in America, not only lives in a country full of socialism, but has benefitted from and received protection through socialism. When these people say that "socialism doesn't work", that it "must be kept out of America", and that it is dictatorial and non Christian, they are revealing that they do not understand the teachings of Jesus, who was a hard core wealth redistributing socialist, who said "render unto Caesar" and "give unto the poor". America's Christian conservative community, by condemning socialism, is revealing its ignorance, stupidity, and unwitting opposition to the teachings of Jesus Christ. Also, they don't know a good thing when they see it, or refuse to see it.

Being Unfriended; Finding Freindship On Facebook

WHEN ONE JOINS FACEBOOK, one soon discerns that Facebook Is something of an adult version of public education, name the grade, minus the "adult". To wit, Facebook is at once a meat market, a pecking order, and a feeding frenzy of tangled friendships, grudges, or, as the great poet Theodore Roethke said in a poem: "a steady storm of correspondences". One can play god. One can "friend", or "unfriend", with god like powers of creation and destruction one hasn't used since high school. Friend and unfriend, though two discrete categories, are interchangeable, marginally distinguishable, subject to momentary reversal, just like they are in grades one through twelve. Facebook, one discerns, is a safe haven for those billions who long to return to childhood, or who never left it, or are still immersed in it, chronologically. As we move in and out of favor, we surely resist the temptation to assign rankings, a top ten friends list. In my beginning, I decided to share no information on my Facebook page. Facebook, it is well known, does not treat personal information with the proprietary respect it deserves. At least, not yet. The public is restless, legislation is pending. I have no wish to voluntarily become merchandise. They'll have to pry it out of me, post by elusive post. This avoidance of the exploitation of the self approach severely limits the number of invitations to friendship one receives, a price I am willing to pay. At the outset I went on a friendship finding binge, and sent out eager pleas for acceptance to high school friends from forty five years ago, long lost friends who moved away throughout adult life, and anyone else who moved. I was never rejected. On Facebook, finding friendship is easy. Too easy. I soon learned the perils of this: I soon found was reading posts from evangelicals and right wing Trumpers, and nearly buried myself in scripture and photos of stranger's grand children, and notices of extended family outings for which I could find no relevance. At that point I decided to construct my own little bubble, like, apparently, everyone else. Like Goethe said: when I realized that everyone invents his own religion, I decided to invent mine". Out to the unfriended bone pile I sent the Christian righteous, the right wing extremists, and the purveyors of baby pictures and family minutia, and ended up with a nice tight little community of eccentric progressive intellectuals and sports fans, my kind of people. At last, safely ensconced in my ideological bubble. Or so I thought. What goes around comes around, as we all like to say. I got unfriended three times, and I hope the slaughter is over. One, a high school hot blonde sweetheart, who committed the duel sin of posting religious platitudes and family pics, cut me off before I did the same to her. Another, my housemate in grad school, evidently was offended by my theft of his left wing thunder, and, he being an attorney, took decisive action. He was always weird anyway, always intent on proving himself the smartest dude in the room which he usually was. Perhaps he felt threatened by my incisive comments on shares; at this point, it seems I will never know. Then, the old girlfriend from the seventies, who married well, got rich, and became a hard line Christian conservative. She undoubtedly was repulsed by my liberalism and irreligiosity, and cut me off before I could get to her. She used to be a flaming racist in any event, and I can only hope and assume that she grew out of it, like most of the country did. Again, I will never know. I think my friend finding binge is at last quelled, and I am content to simply sit back, do a little sharing, commenting, messaging and posting, and see what happens next. The friendship offers still come in, as I suspect they always will, but only at a trickle, which is fine with me. I never turn anyone down.

Letting Go Of Bump Stocks, Or Not

ON MARCH 26, bump stocks, those magical little monstrosities which turn an ordinary semi automatic weapon into a fully automatic killing machine capable of spitting out hundreds of rounds of ammunition per minute, will become illegal in the United States. Shockingly, but maybe not so surprisingly, Americans, seemingly unwilling to say good bye, are snatching them off the shelves of gun dealers by the tens of thousands, like day old donuts, black Friday super bargains, or as if they were going out of style, which in effect they are, not by their own choice. Heaven and hell only knows that the National Rifle Association and its millions of dollar donating supporters, the community so doggedly devoted to not only defense of the Second Amendment but nowadays to the advocacy of gun ownership and carrying for all good militia members and patriots, has done everything in its impressive power to prevent the bump stock ban from taking effect. The fact that it is nonetheless soon to become law is a tribute and a testament to two things: the power of the anti gun lobby, and the power of bump stocks themselves, which over the past few years have helped to mow down, at the very least, several dozen good people who were unfortunate enough not to have been armed with automatic weapons at the time of their untimely demise. In America, the power of the pro gun lobby remains undiminished, as witnessed by the fact that little to no gun restricting legislation has been passed in the U.S. in recent years, despite that fact that there is an obvious problem with guns in America, a problem exemplified by the fact that there is at least one mass murder in America every day, in which at least three people are gunned down in a single incident by a single assailant. There are so many mass murders that few of them ever make it into the national media, so run of the mill are have they become. The elimination of bump stocks from the legitimate market place and transfer to the black market place may be the beginning of a real effort to legislate gun violence out of existence in America, if it can even be done in a nation founded upon and nurtured upon violence. Or, it may not be. After march 26,, everyone, and there will be tens of thousands at the very least, who owns a bump stock will do so illegally. This raises the question: why? Exactly what is the reason why people are so intent on obtaining a piece of machinery which they know will soon be illegal, which in fact they are acquiring precisely because they know it will soon become illegal? In what way, precisely will illicit bump stocks be used,, if they are used at all? Several hundred rounds per minute seems like a bit of an overkill in taking target practice, don't you think? Or maybe there are those who are convinced that the bump stock ban will ultimately be repealed, and who want to be ready, waiting, and well armed, when it is. That might be the best explanation one can hope for, if there actually is an explanation for this ostensibly strange, counter productive, blatantly defiant law breaking behavior. Maybe those people, the born again bump stock buyers, believe that when the repeal is enacted, the waiting list for bump stocks will be so long that it will take forever to get one, while their manufacture ramps back up into action. Although somehow that explanation fails to logically ring a bell, it may have a kernel of truth to it, because we must assume that the people stocking up even as we speak are good, law abiding, well intentioned gun owning citizens, who, for some reason, are about to become formerly good, formerly law abiding but born again law breaking citizens. Mustn't we? For now, its the best we can hope for, considering the horrible nightmarish alternatives.

Trump, Talking State of the Union Trash

LEGEND HAS IT that during the days leading up to the State of the Union address, president Trump, his advisors, assistants, associates, and sycophants carefully inspected every phrase of the rough draft, assiduously eliminating from the text any trace of fact or good reasoning. They succeeded in this endeavor admirably, as evidenced by the President's campaign style propaganda spiel. The president succeeded in freeing himself to exude an uncontaminated assortment of pure prevarications. His remark that undocumented foreigners are a clear and present danger to the safety and security of each and every American citizen evinces images of undocumented laborers toiling at menial tasks at various Trump properties, with phony papers, a now well documented fact, without any direct harm coming to Trump or his properties. But enough of that. Had Trump not been elected, we (the United States) would now be at war with North Korea, in the president's opinion. His use of the word "opinion" sufficiently qualifies the comment to preclude the label "lie", just barely. He might have a point there, actually. Hillary Clinton was, at least in public life, quite the war monger. No American public figure, past or present, was or is more sensitive to criticism, more adversely reactive to public scrutiny, or more desperately opposed to being investigated than Donald J. Trump, a mafia con, or both. As if any American presidency can be executed secretly. Trump's claim that it is not possible to simultaneously enact beneficial legislation and conduct investigations of the president cannot be found in any known political science text(book), and arouses fear that this president has an even greater aversion for being investigated than for enacting beneficial legislation. At first glance, it seems that Trump is articulating some well known axion of economics and political science. Upon deeper reflection, you realize that he is in fact insidiously blackmailing America; stop the investigations now, or I will veto everything that comes across my desk. Very dark, barely veiled threat. One can only wonder why, and suspect the worst; massive soon to be disclosed corruption. The American economy, bleats the don, is experiencing an economic miracle, neglecting to mention that under his administration it has performed no better than under Obama. The only things which can derail it are war, politics, and endless partisan investigations. Now we know a fundamental economic truth: To investigate Trump's increasingly apparent many faceted forms of corruption and illegal activities puts the entire American economy at risk. You couldn't make this Orwellian stuff up, and most surrealistic of all is that millions of right wing evangelicals sat transfixed before their flat screens, soaking in the insanity like gospel. Donald J. Trump, magnanimous and conciliatory president of these United States, encourages all Americans to unite in creating a state of national unity, a state of being he indisputably intends to nurture, having brought us unity with a gesture and a word. A sixty second pronouncement of noble intent, effectively nullifying over seven hundred days of chaos, confusion, hatred, bigotry, and divisiveness from the born again conciliator. Three hundred and sixty four days a year of Trump engendered national division, all erased by a momentary comment given on a single day. He would be delightfully humorous, a veritable caricature of sane leadership, were he not in such evident earnest. The State of the Union address may have been the most twisted display of thought processing in words ever forced upon a republic long suffering from a lack of oratory well supported by intellectual content. Such an occasion demands nothing less than a jewel of wisdom from the penultimate American political commentator, Mark Twain, who informed us of what we, all by ourselves, sense: that diapers and politicians should be changed frequently, and for the very same reason.

Figuring Out the Pic

IN A WEIRD SORT OF WAY, the actual photo is rather impressive, especially for a bunch of immature med school kids in the nineteen eighties. The one in black face is impressive in that the blackface appears to be thoroughly and evenly applied, as if done carefully, with artistic intent. The Klan costume by all appearances is' authentic', both gown and hood. Of course, one might expect future physicians to be assiduously devoted to detail. It brings to mind a story about when harry Truman was a Senator from Missouri, an early supporter of civil rights, and received a death threat from the Klan. While he and his Jewish friend were driving to the Klan Konvention to directly confront his antagonist, which he indeed did, Truman's friend remarked: "whoever sold the sheets to these idiots must have been a Jew, because they paid sixteen dollars apiece for one dollar bed sheets." Truman barged into the meeting, shamed the grand high dragon into ripping off his hood by accusing him of hiding behind it, and offered to fight every damned last one of them, one at a time. when one is a United States Senator, one is imbued with an aura which allows one to be very courageous, verbally, it must be noted. There is a haunting, lingering question which nobody seems to be asking, in our national rush to judgment and gubernatorial eviction: what, exactly, is the message? What, or who, exactly, is being denigrated? The black man, or the Knansman? Both? Or are we merely witnessing a portrayal of the original American sin, with the only intent being to highlight our national history of racial strife? That hardly seems likely. it was, by all accounts, a keg party. The most likely story is what everyone seems to be assuming: that the picture is pure racism, and that the man in blackface is being confronted by the proximity of the white robed racist, reminding him that he live in a white man's country, and that therefore his status and opportunities are strictly limited. But, again, with the two of them just standing there, doing nothing, the scene could be interpreted in a number of ways, including as a condemnation of the Klan figure for imposing hatred upon innocent people, or of society at large, for having permitted, and continuing to permit, this sordid state of affairs to remain extant. it is even possible, though only remotely, that one or more of the proffered excuses might have a grain of truth; but its too late to worry about that now; the cow has left the barn, so to speak. Considering the governor's convoluted, ever changing explanations, he might as well try throwing some of these ideas against the wall. As we like to say, sometimes the crap sticks to the wall, or whatever. We all agree that the governor should resign, and five'll get you ten that he will, before it reaches the point where everybody pretends he isn't in the room, and he becomes an invisible ghost, surrounded by the silent treatment. If nothing else, the sheer volume of the national outcry against him is more than sufficient to drive any sane, sensible public servant from office, having exhausted all moral capital. Even if the actual intent was the depiction of American history in factual, non judgmental terms, for the governor to so assert at this late politically correct date would carry no weight, and the only weight the soon to be ex gov will ever carry is the baggage bought at a discount, at a silly college keg party, long, long ago.

Finding Out What Poltical Correctness Is

ON A BEAUTIFUL, BRIGHT, globally warmed seventy five degree day, I drove to the grocery store, and was glad I did, being much rewarded with more than M and Ms and ice cream. On a twenty five year old car the bumper sticker blared: "political correctness is demonic lies dangerous". No punctuation, nor grammatical correctness (why should there have been?), no subject verb agreement. There was also something about Jesus having monarchial status, but my attention was already caught. Very old car, doors and windows taped shut, the folks who own it probably, what, white? Conservative? Christian? Just guessing. I should have waited for them to come out of the store, but I had all the info I needed, and, anyway, I didn't want my ice cream to melt. What, exactly, do these folksy folks think political correctness is, anyway? A code name for the Russian nuclear arsenal? The anti-Christ? Both? Political correctness, I have long come to believe, is nothing more than courtesy and respect. When being politically correct, you refer to a woman not as a "gal", or a "broad", but as a "lady". When referring to a black person, you do not use the term "nigger" or 'coon", but rather, the term "African-American". Political correctness is the concept of using the language is such a way as to carefully avoid giving insult to anyone, correct? It should probably be called "social correctness" or "verbal correctness", but the term "political correctness" was borrowed from Chaimrn Mao's little red book, back in the sixits, when liberal s borrowed the phrase to poke fun at each other. Political correctness seems to be a liberal thing, not a conservative thing. In fact, it seems to be conservatives who deride it, rather than accept it, cooperate with it, and go about their business, unfazed by it. But why? Because they are angry that they can no longer use language to insult people with impunity? Or maybe they (conservatives) also believe that its better to stay away from words like "nigger" and "broad", but want to retain the freedom of using those odious words whenever they damned well please, and are sick and tired of control freak do gooder libtards ("libtard" is a politically incorrect right wing term for "progressive", a combination of the words "liberal" an "retarded", intended to imply that liberals are stupid, which is ironic, since studies have revealed that, on average, liberals have higher intelligence than conservatives, which is in itself a politically incorrect finding) chastising them whenever they simply want to exercise freedom of speech and freedom of rudeness. The hatred of political correctness among the right wing is an expression of resentment at loss of freedom, we'll stipulate. Actually, though, they still have the freedom to be rude, if they have the backbone to put up with a little libtard righteousness, which they evidently do not. But...demonic? Really? Must these poor white trash trailer park politically incorrect types be so sensitive, as they accuse the politically correct of being? And must they presume that everything they dislike has something to do with Christ, hell, damnation, and salvation? Have they never read a book other than the Bible, and have they even read the Bible, assuming they can read? Why not just accept the idea of political correctness as a liberal reaction against sexism and racism and all other isms in society, and an often overly enthusiastic overly freedom denying means of enforcing cultural acceptance of minorities and the previously verbally disparaged? Why in the hell bring Jesus into it, as if Jesus absolutely has to be involved in everything, even minor semantical cultural matters? People want the freedom to be rude with impunity. Anyone can understand that ancient primal urge. It must be admitted, however, the political correctness haters have a good point: sometimes its just downright fun and satisfying being politically incorrect. Like when discussing the idiocy of stupid, poorly educated poor white right wing religious fanatic trailer trash.

Evaluating Trump, Open Mindedly

MIND FORERUNS ALL CONDITIONS, instructs the Dhammapada. Mind is chief. Of mind are we made. Indeed, our lives are made by our minds, and nothing is more important than an open, receptive mind, receptive to the universe, to new information, able to discard clutter and remake itself anew. In a democracy, or alleged democracy, open minded is vitally important in assessing the performance of elected political leaders. To disparage everything, for example, that Donald J. Trump says and does merely because of personal antipathy towards Trump is not an acceptable attitude. Everyone deserves a chance, and maybe millions of chances. For example, Trump's stated aversion to foreign military entanglements is not only in keeping with similar admonitions made by George Washington, in his farewell address, it makes fundamental sense. it implies humility, and an awareness that American values are not necessarily the values of other nations, and that solutions imposed on other countries by the United States are not necessarily in the best interests the nation being influenced by American policy, but of other nations, most especially the United States itself. foreign intervention of any sort, military, diplomatic, or economic, comes with a high price, and the Untied States has repeatedly paid high prices, in death, financial cost, and morel burden, for its traditional interventionist policies. it seems unlikely that Mr. trump is concerned with any of these costs other than the financial; give him credit, he is a man who watches closely the bottom line. But the philosophy he espouses is arguably wise, and a majority of Americans probably agree with it. Unfortunately, most of Trump's behavior, in terms of public policy and verbiage, remains difficult to understand or justify. How can anyone deny the reality of climate change, and, as president, refuse to take actin to ameliorate it, considering that the United States Department of Defense has for years identified human made climate change as the greatest threat to American national security? The D.O.D. would seem, to an objective minded individual, to be as reliable an authority as nay on the planet. If Donald J. Trump has committed an impeachable offense, surely his refusal to defend and protect the country against is greatest threat, the greatest to its very existence qualifies. Trump's supporters are no less enigmatic. Computers and fact checkers have monitored and marked every comment the president has mad, and catalogued the factual misstatements. the lies number more than eight thousand, eight thousand verified, documented, provable, recorded outright lies, many if not most of them so blatantly, egregiously false as to evoke amazement that anyone would have the audacity to say such thing, anywhere, under any circumstances, let alone in front of millions of people, including hundreds of immediate witnesses. To behave like that, it is necessary for a liar to believe his own lies, which is even more alarming that anyone could issue such an endless cascade of blatant lies, believing them. and yet, from all indications, people who support Trump simply do not seem to care. They never even bother to make mention of Trump's incessant lying, as if it wasn't actually happening, of, in their parlance, were "fake news" Events which are recorded on audio and video and available for anyone's perusal are most assuredly not "fake news"; they are proven reality. Trump supporters have not only revealed their moral bankruptcy and lack of integrity, they have painted themselves into a corner by virtue of not having abandoned their support, or not having at least raised an outcry demanding that Trump clean up his act. They are now stuck with him, and have nowhere to go. Tragically, they fail to realize that submitting oneself to the humbling process of confession and redemption is among the most liberating process known to civilized humanity.

Mixing Memory and Desire

A REMARKDABLE RADIO PROGRAM, "Hidden Brain", on NPR (National Public Radio), presented a discussion on personal memory, dividing it into two categories: Nostalgia, and regret. Nostalgia was defined as a longing for the things of the past, a longing to embrace memory as reality, to return, in a sense, to a cherished past state of affairs. Regret, of course, can be defined as a negative response to memory, a mindset in which we wish the past had been different, that we had acted differently, or had experienced different results in certain past situations. It could be argued that both mindsets are unnecessary, both detrimental to our present well being, both, needlessly stressful and irrelevant to the present. Goethe said that we should never wish to have back anything from the past, that the only purpose served by the past is that it opened up all the possibilities for our present, and, if we are wise, provides us lessons from which we can construct a more productive future. Then too, nostalgia, fondly remembering our past, can be fun, if we accept our longings less than seriously, with a smile and a shoulder shrug. Regret can be instructive, if not allowed to dominate our thinking. We can learn from the past, and our memory gives our lives meaning, context, and a sense of continuity and purpose. The radio program told the story of a lady who had long been estranged from her father, by his choice. One day she was driving with her husband, and saw her father walking down the street with his new wife, arm in arm. She stopped the car to speak to her father, thinking of perhaps a beginning of reconciliation. but then, she lost her courage, and drove on. Later she regretted her choice, and the regret stayed with her. Goethe also said "poor fellow who is all head'. Indeed, we must not stifle or ignore our emotions. But in many cases, a little bit of head doesn't hurt, when dealing with unpleasant emotions. The lady need have no regrets, but only happiness, which, after all, should be the end result of all life, including our memories, correct? The lady mistakenly allowed herself to assume that the chance sighting of her father walking down the street was her one and only golden opportunity, and that she failed to take advantage. That is absolutely false. In fact, every moment of every day of her life was, is, and will remain an opportunity to contact and attempt to reconcile with her estranged father. The fact that she hasn't done it is most likely for the best; she obviously, deep down, does not sufficiently desire the meeting to make it happen. After all, estrangement was his choice, not hers, and every day of his life is an opportunity for reconciliation with her, which he has obviously not taken. So, perhaps the lack of reconciliation is best, in her case. Besides, the opportunity remains, should she ever choose to take it. There are more things worthwhile in life than happy endings for all situations. WE have the present, and its potential for limitless productivity and improvement of all circumstances, we have the future with is unlimited potential for constructive action and reconciliation, and then, we have the past, a past we all have and should cherish, notwithstanding its numerous imperfections and undesirable results. If the past were perfect, we would be overwhelmed with nostalgia. If it were nothing but pain, we would have nothing but regret. The sublime, subtle combination of nostalgia and regret is what makes memory and history, personal and societal, so interesting, and amenable to our learning and so very worthy of being cherished, however tinged with nostalgia and regret our past might be and unavoidably is. To the extent that we all experience nostalgia and regret, let us embrace and cherish them both, for the exceedingly exquisite seasoning of life they both can be, and are.

Taking Responsibility For The Bomb; Building Nukes, Once Again

AS THE STORY GOES, Robert J. Oppenheimer, a principle architect of the atomic bomb, shortly after the twin bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki Japan, was horrified by the destruction, and walked into President Harry Truman's oval office, seeking absolution. Mr. President, he is alleged to have said, I have blood on my hands. Truman, an astute judge of human character and motivations of human behavior, was having none of it. Nor was Mr.Truman known to be tactful in his approach to anyone, particularly weaklings, sycophants, and deceitful, money mongering, power hungry politicians. He promptly threw Oppenheimer out of the his office, strongly advising him to never darken his door again. Reportedly, his verbiage went something to wit: "You son of a bitch, how dare you come in here expecting me to give you some kind of comfort, or forgiveness. We both did what we had to do. We had to win this war, by any means possible. Civilization depended on it. it was I, sir, and not you, who made the decision, who pulled the trigger, who dropped both bombs. And it is I, sir, and not you, who takes full responsibility for the decision. Just like the sigh on my desk here says: "the buck stops here". And you know what" I haven't lost a minute of sleep over it, since it happened, and I do know good and god damned well, that for the rest of my life, however long that is, that I will not ever lose a single night, let alone moment, of sleep, because you know what? It was the only decision anyone in my position could possibly have made. I chose to be here, I was here, and I did what I had to do. so, if you'll excuse me, Mr. Oppenheimer, I have far better things to do than sit here, wasting my time and yours, trying to make you feel better. Good day, sir." Reportedly, at about that very moment, Dr. Robert J. Oppenheimer, esteemed renowned nuclear physicist and prime inventor of the atom bomb, quietly left the oval office, somewhat subdued. Wouldn't you have done the same, in his situation? Truman was the kinda guy you kinda have to admire. He, like Donald Trump later, spoke his mind. The main difference is that Harry Truman was not a pathological liar. Generally, he looked you in the eye, and told the damned truth. But not so about the bomb. Truman always claimed, to his dying day, that he had no choice in dropping the bombs on Japan, because the japs, as he said, refused to surrender, and any other course of action, like continuing the war by conventional methods, would have cost the United States as many as a million lives. This was, until rather recently, the standard version, the version my generation was taught in school. But it was a lie. The Japanese did in fact try to surrender, and Truman knew about it, but chose to ignore the surrender offers, which were sent through the Russian military, and transmitted to the American military, because he truly wanted to drop the bomb, to intimidate the Russians. The two atomic bombs used against Japan were entirely unnecessary, and therefore, easily quality as war crimes. Like millions of others of my generation, I spent my childhood occasionally ducking under my little wooden desk at school, practicing a bomb drill in case the Russians decided to go off on us. As if my little wooden desk would have protected me. Well, you have to do something, don't you? When bombs fall, you'll do damned near anything, I reckon, to try to survive. After decades of nuclear bomb stockpiling, Reagan and Gorbachev signed an historic treaty, eliminating many of them, and the treaty held up until now. Putin is no Gorbachev, Putin is a snake, and Russia is indeed cheating. Obama and Trump both agree on that. Tragic that it is that Trump is in power, it is more tragic still that Putin is, because now, we look to return to the days of ducking under our desks, in mock futility. Reagan and Gorbachev were men of honor, compared to these two clowns. Well, at least when today's kids start ducking under their molded plastic desks, they'll have their smart phones to keep them from being bored, and can tweet and text to their little heart's contentment.

Becoming A Christian Country, Again

GREAT AS MY INHERENT PROCLIVITY to surround myself and insulate myself within one of those ideological bubbles we hear so much about, it behooves me to remain available to Christian conservative input, for the usual reason that exposure to diverse viewpoints broadens the mind, and for other reason, including fairness, and the opportunity to know my ideological enemies, and to respond accordingly. Ideological bubbles may not be the problem they are often portrayed as being, may in fact be merely normal human behavior; are not humans by nature inclined to associated themselves with like minded individuals and groups? Does not the very fact that to live in any country, society, social context or culture in itself imbue everyone with the attitudes prominently extant throughout the culture? We are fortunate that in our world of modern communication methods we all have access to cultural diversity, even when only vicariously. What is undeniable is that social media, Facebook in particular, lures an herds us into our bubbles, with our willing cooperation. Guilty as charged, Facebook, and Facebook users. Thus, it has become increasingly rare for conservative or Christian posts to appear in my soon fed feed. that I retain the option of reversing that trend is to my benefit, notwithstanding my unavoidable vulnerability to shepherding. A two frame post appeared, the first announcing this: "some say this is no longer a Christian country", and the second, showing a picture of President Trump holding up a Bible, with the caption: "wrong". See what I mean? If my bubble ere perfectly sealed off, I'd have never been privy to this priceless post. Sir, I say to myself, unseal thy bubble! Just to run through it quickly, the United States is, and always ahs been, a country in which a large majority of its citizens are Christian. But never has the United States been, nor is it now, a "Christian" country. There is a big difference. The United States is a nation of religious freedom, required tolerance, and, to what some may find a surprising extent, diversity. Only about seventy percent of Americans are today Christians, and the percentage is shrinking, as the millennials come of age, half of whom identify with no religion. The new agers and atheists are proliferating James Madison, the primary author of the constitution, repeatedly wrote to This mentor Thomas Jefferson about the necessity of building and maintaining an impenetrable wall between church and state, and he built the wall, without any help from Donald J. Trump, into the constitution's first amendment. In 1797, the year that Washington left office and Adams replace hi, congress unanimously passed a law, declaring: "the United States of America is no more a Christian country than an Islamic country" The law is called the Treaty of Tripoli, and, according to the constitution, treaty is law. The irony of Donald J. Trump carrying the torch for the Christian community is deliciously laughable, well beyond ludicrous. what about Donald Trump is in any way "Christian"? His lifelong urgent quest for ever increasing accumulation of personal wealth? the scores of illicit sexual liaisons? The endless cascade of lies, all well documented on video recordings? And for that matter, precisely what is it about the United States of America which qualifies it in any way for description as a "Christian" country? The theft of land and genocide of native populations? The 246 years of enslavement of millions of people? The constant manufacturing of foreign wars of aggression, conquest, and theft of resources. The imposition of its will upon dozens of less powerful countries? its hedonistic, lascivious popular culture? If ever the United States becomes a "Cristian" country, in any meaningful way, shape, form , or manner, which it certainly will not, or at least is highly unlikely to, it will not be again, it will be a first time original.

Bringing Back Butterflies

ON EARTH ARE "BELLWETHER SPECIES", plants and animals the state of whose health is an indicator of the state of health of the overall environment. Among these are butterflies, frogs, bees, and many various plant species. Alarmingly, over the past few decades, the populations of nearly all bellwether species have shrunk dramatically, and the much maligned but always correct scientific community knows exactly the cause, if anyone in our anti-scientific culture cares to receive elucidation. The culprits are chemical pollution, climate change, and in general human destruction of natural habitat, the selfsame bugaboos which are combing in a perfect storm of destruction to shepherd us all towards doom, towards species extinction, human included. And yet, there is hope, for we have determined that we shall not go quietly into the night, but shall stand and fight, fight for our very lives amid our own self destructive behavior. All over the world masses of heretofore moribund are awakening to reality, a sleeping giant of potential human momentum for health, change, and survival bringing itself to life. We have hope. The annual migrations of the monarch butterfly, for example. It must be a glorious sight as a huge cloud miles long a wide, goes sweeping across the sky, back and forth, between the northern United States, or somewhere, and southern Mexico, or somewhere, following the seasons, dancing the sacred life cycle dance of creation and recreation through mating, life, and death. A thick dens fog, of black and yellow monarch butterflies, billions of them, thick as a dense fog, never seen by most, but presumably momentarily glimpsed by a few thousand or so fortunate souls, whose reports we seldom if ever hear. Has anyone ever heard tell of the witnessing of the cloud of monarchs passing by? In actuality, the gorgeous tiny creatures live all over North America, and tend to migrate in many dense clouds towards Mexico and even southern California where it is warm enough for them to spend the winter, then, in the warming spring, form many clouds for long collective flight and scatter back towards the north, again, to append the growing season all over North America, including your back yard. The great butterfly clouds, like all other great natural phenomena, has diminished in recent years. but now, oh holly now, the cloud is once again growing, ad the Mexican government takes charge, and takes time away from fighting drug cartels and American attempts to seal off it asylum seekers - to try to save the monarchs, and hence, the planet. he Mexican government is restoring monarch habitat, and that simple process is rapidly restoring the flock to its original, natural billons members condition. but there is a caveat, as always. Capitalism will not be quenched. New construction is springing up everywhere, as the profit motive behind human habitat and infrastructure expansion devours more and more wildlife habitat, all along the thousands of miles long butterfly route, all points in between, and including at both terminuses. (termini?) We the human species is, as always, at war with ourselves. We simultaneously want to save the ecosystem, the planet, and ourselves with it, and multiply, prosper, and grow materially, with new houses, highways and cities emerging from the soils explosively. We are at war with ourselves, and which side of our inside selves will win in the end? Count the monarch butterflies as they fly by your satellite dish some fine, balmy summer evening, and by counting them, ye shall know the truth, and the truth, as always, shall set you free, free, at least, of the fear inherent in doubt.

Franklin Graham, Not Caring One Bit

THE RIGHT 'REVEREND' FRANKLIN GRAHAM, the politically conservative evangelical heir to the pulpit of the more reasonable really reverend Billy Graham, said, on a television interview, that he really isn't concerned about the fact that President Donald J. (Jesus?) Trump has told over eight thousand verifiable, well documented, video taped lies since becoming president. Doesn't bother him at all. Doesn't even keep track of it. (it would be mighty hard for anyone, especially a mathematically challenged minister, to keep track of so many lies) "Franklin" is presumably at least indirectly named after the great American founding father Benjamin franklin, who would have cared about our current president's immoral depravity, because Benjamin Franklin was, unlike his after named, a man of character, and a man who most definitely gave a fig about the character, honesty, integrity, and decency of people in general, unlike his namesake, the right unreverend one, Mr. Graham. Graham, instead of talking no further, which might have been best, went right on ahead, and said that he does not expect the president of the United States to be a perfect human being, anymore than he expects anyone else to be perfect, and that the only perfect person was Jesus Christ. Apparently the unreverend Graham not only does not expect presidential perfection, hell, he doesn't even expect decency, nor a chief executive who keeps his hands off women's private parts, but In the likely event that he puts them there, doesn't brag about it. What the unreverend Graham likes is a president how speaks his mind, which Mr. Trump most assuredly, to the extent that he has a mind, does, and a president who defends the unborn, and who unleashes the power of freedom through the defense of capitalism and the elimination of that darned old communistic, atheistic, unchristian, money sharing, unto Caesar rendering, unto the poor giving, socialism. Spoken like a true, conservative, tax hating, money sharing hating, Trump the prevaricator loving Christian. Meanwhile, Sarah Huckabee Sanders, Trumpian spokesperson of evangelical Christian pretensions, the oft born again, stated her dubiously articulate belief that Trump was "ordained by God" to be president. Trump, God's president, Christ's political Earthly representative, the billionaire woman grabbing constantly lying God's choice champion of Christ, with bright hair to boot. What a hoot. And you can bet your bottom bank account that this pathological expression of tortured, twisted, sordid epitome of anti-reason perfectly reflects the mentally ill mind set of America's entire evangelical politically conservative multi million member community. These alleged human beings, en mass, are doing the civilized world a great service, simply by exposing their mass pathology to the rest of us, thus giving us warning of their dire danger to civilized society, and exposing themselves as the pathologically criminally insane tortured souls that they indisputably are. Let us pray that they all, every last one of them, eventually if not sooner gets the psychological assistance and subsequent spiritual renewal they so very desperately, urgently require, before they go forth and multiply, and verily inundate us all in their putrid, holy than thou excremental morass of swampy holy only to themselves holiness.