Ending Racism In America, Like Good Christians

I'VE BEEN TO CHURCH maybe several dozen times in my life, tops. Not bad for a non Christian. A few weddings, a quiet moment or two in an iconic Catholic cathedral, some Sunday morning sermons. Far as I can recall, I have never seen nor heard a single minister say anything about racism, talk about it and how evil it is, unless it was a black church on television. Maybe its just the luck of the draw. Or maybe it isn't. Maybe ministers of the gospel simply tend not to broach the topic, for fear or consequences, for fear of angering racist church members. Maybe there is a failure on the part of America's faith based community to adequately address racism in America. By "adequately address", I mean eliminate, as in wipe it out by turning it into a grave sin against God, eradicate it, and nothing less. Since historically almost everyone in America has been a self described Christian, and since over seventy percent still are, the total and complete eradication of white on black racism in America is not an unreasonable goal. If the Christians insist on it, the other twenty seven percent of the population, the non Christian population, will have no choice but to do the same. Let the evil of racism be preached from every pulpit in America! repeatedly. Racism is evil enough to prioritize at the pulpit. Racism is very real in America, even as we speak, and is currently "enjoying" an upsurge in popularity, as Trump, although perhaps unintentionally, gives inspiration to and emboldens bigots. Most of the church services I've seen I've seen on television. Again, I cannot recall having ever heard a single solitary minister even mention, let alone condemn or discuss racism in America, in particular white against black variety. As we all know, the white subjugation of the black is the overwhelming source of racism, the source of all other kinds. I have heard many a cleric preach against Muslims, gays, liberals, and democrats, but never racists. Any guesses as to the reasons for this? Are church leaders possibly reluctant to broach the topic for fear of alienating their congregants? Keep those tithes coming in. Do not risk alienating the wealthiest, most conservative portion of the church membership? Is that it? In a country which often calls itself a "Christian" country, but is demonstrably a "racist" one, it might be time to examine causal connections and the relationship of the Christian faith to the original American sin. A good serving of soul searching might be overdue, long overdue.

Trump, Still Campaigning, Just In Case

PRESIDENT ELECT DONALD TRUMP, less than a month after winning the election, is back out on the campaign trail, believe it or not, making speeches and holding huge rallies for the purpose of either running for reelection in 2020, or getting a head start on the campaign against Hillary Clinton, just in case she wins the recount and forces it to two out of three or sudden death. I'm not sure what the rules are. Probably nobody is. We live in a free for all make your own rules wild wild west culture, despite or possibly because of our extremely legalistic society. It may be that if Clinton wins the recount she will win the electoral college and be elected, leaving Trump and his mob of gangsters (a gang can be a good thing) in free fall, limbo, infuriated, ready to turn the great American divide into full civil war. Can you imagine how ballistic Donald would wax in such an event? Off like a rocket. Nobody knows for sure exactly how long Trump will continue to stump, maybe the next four years. Perhaps we should hope he spends his entire term on the campaign trail, promising to do crazy things he will never do, just to keep the hungry hounds excited but at bay, while the country runs itself until the dark ages begin to abate. Some people just can't get enough politickin' and campaigning. The bright lights, the spotlight, the roaring crowd, the adrenaline, the ego. Trump exhorted his throng in Cincinnati to never forget how corrupt the media is, making himself out to be an unfortunate heroic victim, fighting valiantly against the forces of evil. What complete rot. You always sensed that despite his chaotic campaigning and speaking style, Trump is a well prepared guy, ready for anything. And, as always, Trump's hateful mob of ardent basket of deplorable supporters can't get enough chanting "lock her up!", no matter how irrelevant it becomes, or how innocent of crime Hillary Clinton is revealed to be. These people are still angry, alarmingly, but not surprisingly. If anybody should be locked up, it isn't Hillary Clinton.

Keeping Secrets At the State Department

RETIRED GENERAL DAVID PETRAEUS is reportedly being considered by the Trump team for Secretary of State, and it might be a good idea. Petraeus has always seemed like the kind of intelligent, knowledgeable person who would do a complicated job well. He certainly understands the true nature of military action, its horrors and limitations, and in his various command positions at the head of international forces, Petraeus certainly has learned a thing or two about communicating diplomatically. Also, he undoubtedly has an excellent grasp of international geo-political circumstances, including political, military, and diplomatic realities. There is, however, a problem. Several years ago, while Petraeus was serving as director of the Central Intelligence Agency, he was having an affair with a lady who was writing his biography, and, in the course of their association, he shared confidential, classified, government documents with her. hr resigned from the CIA, was indicted on felony charges, and mad a plea bargain in which he plead guilty to a misdemeanor, placed on two years probation, and fined one hundred thousand dollars. he has been engaging in many activities recently, including so chairing an organization which advocates for what they call reasonable, common sense gun control laws. Presumably he is no longer on probation, otherwise he probably wouldn't be eligible to become Secretary of State. Is the irony of this whole situation apparent? Consider this. Condoleezza Rice and Retired General Colin Powell, both of whom served as Secretary of State under George Bush, used private email servers in their official job capacity. Nobody seems to worry about it, then or now. Along came Hillary Clinton, who did the same thing, and half the country wants to lock her up without even the slightest bit of evidence that she did anything wrong or illegal with her private email account. The mere thought that she could have done so is enough to inspire half the country to hate her, without so much as pointing a finger at Rice or Powell. Now, along come Petraeus, another possible republican Secretary of State, who really has sold out the country and been punished for it, but, apparently, neither Trump nor anybody else cares. the moral of the story s; is you intend to become Secretary of State and use questionable judgment with regard to handling classified materials, make sure you're a republican.

Refilling the Swamp With Trump

I NEVER HAD THE FAINTEST IDEA, and still don't, what the terms "populism" and "anti establishment" mean when applied to Donald J. Trump. Ever since Trump entered the presidential campaign all those weary months ago, he has been proclaimed as an outsider, an anti establishment neo politician and leader of something called a "populist uprising", a staunch advocate of the little guy, the forgotten American worker. Really? Merely because he had never before run for or held public office? That's all it takes to be considered a crusader for the common man against the entrenched political forces of the establishment? The only requirement is to have no political experience in public office? Sounds easy. Count me in! To me populism is a political movement which begins at the very broad based bottom of the social pyramid, organizes, and works to reduce or eliminate the political control of society by the very elite at the very pointed top of the social pyramid. Populism as a political movement was strongest during the first three decades of the twentieth century in the United States. There seems to be some of it around now, and lord willing and the creek don't rise it will grow and conquer the world, but does anyone now somehow believe that populist ideas are embodied in the ideas, of all people, Trump? For modern day populism, look to Bernie Sanders, not Donald Trump. The populist movement of 1920 is called the "Progressive era" because populism is progress, and progress is progressive, not conservative. Populism is usually not the religion of billionaires, for a reason. The term "anti-establishment" means working against the people, institutions, and social forces which control society, elevate the few, and oppress the many. How does Donald J. Trump have anything to do with that? Populism was so strong in the early twentieth century that this entire era in U.S. history is named for it. The great populist president, in the opinion of many, was Theodore Roosevelt, who worked to break up corporate monopolies and provide legal protection for workers. Wisconsin Senator Robert Lafollette is considered a champion and congressional leader of populism, and Eugene Debs ran for president as a socialist in 1920, while in jail, and got almost a million votes. But Trump? Anti establishment populist Trump? Trump has already appointed Wall Street billionaires to his cabinet, with more sure to follow. Everyone of his appointees is a hard core conservative traditionalist, not a protesting populist liberal crusading for change and progress. If he is draining the swamp, as he promised, he is refilling it fast. How exactly is this anti establishment populism? All his life Trump has surrounded himself with very wealthy very powerful very elite people, by design. He wants to be, and is, one of them. Now, he is filling the executive branch with them. Whatever Donald Trump is, he isn't an "anti establishment populist".

The Evolving Views of Mr. Trump

DURING THE ELECTION CAMPAIGN, a period of time which most of us might prefer to forget, Donald Trump, like all overly ardent politicians, made a large number of comments and statements of intent which even at the time seemed, shall we say, a bit poorly conceived, and now seem positively insane. Fortunately, the president elect apparently has no intention of fulfilling any of them. One by one, Trump has spent the post election period "walking them back", as we like to say, stating his intention of breaking all his promises, as we used to say. First, he quietly mentioned something to the effect that a gargantuan wall might not be necessary to keep the U.S. and Mexico separated; a simple fence might do quite well. It was good to hear that. That change of policy should save billions of dollars and a great deal of embarrassment right off the bat. Then, we were graced with a rare act of good Trump grace. After months of promising to, if elected, put Hillary Clinton in jail, Trump nobly and magnanimously, and wisely and pragmatically announced that, no, he does not want to "hurt the Clintons", they've been through enough already, the campaign was bruising, they need time to heal, and so forth, droning on and on, displaying true greatness of spirit.That, aside from the fact the incoming chief executive has absolutely no power or legal authority or standing or evidence of any kind to put anybody in jail, as any astute legal mind is well aware, which he is definitely not. Then too, it turns out that all members of the Islamic faith need not be kept from entering the country; they only need to be questioned a bit more closely, to find out what they're really up to in advance, just like we already do.Remember Donald's promise to bring back torture and to use it on captured terrorists? No, say the military experts, they can do better with a couple of beers and a pack of cigarettes. Besides, torture is illegal, a minor detail which usually fails to stop Trump from doing anything, but this time seems to be. Even more newsworthy is that to Trump man made climate change has become something other than a Chinese or liberal hoax; it is now something about which to be open minded, meaning that America's participation in the Paris climate change agreement might not, after all, be in dire jeopardy. Remember the promise to tear up and throw away the nuclear weapons agreement with Iran? Now, it turns out that might not happen either, and probably won't. A few amendments and adjustments to it might do the trick, plus, new strategies to force Iranian compliance. The fact that the United States hasn't the power to tear up the treaty unilaterally, because other countries are involved in it, has perhaps finally sunk in at Trump Tower. We must all live and learn. Seems a great deal of information is reaching all the way to the top of the tower, as Trump meets with, discusses issues with, and learns from people who know a great deal more than he, showing his pragmatic flexibility. For this process we should all be immensely grateful, and pray that it continues, and never stops.

Giving Sanctuary At Harvard

YOU CAN'T GET INTO HARVARD if you're not a good student. You gotta be smart, with good grades and a solid work ethic. That includes the athletes, which doesn't help Harvard win many football or basketball games nowadays. Approximately forty of Harvard's thousands of good students are undocumented aliens, children of parents who crossed into America many years ago looking for opportunity, and brought their brainy dreamer kids with them. Now that Obama is leaving office and is being replaced by someone who isn't exactly known for being immigrant friendly, now that Obama's executive order giving temporary amnesty for dreamer children has been challenged and put on hold by the court system, Harvard is concerned that the federal immigration authorities might suddenly show up on campus, track down the forty dreamer students, all of whom are doing well in school and are headed for a successful graduation, arrest them, carry them away in shackles, and either lock them up and throw away the key or deport them. The president of Harvard thinks that would be a shame, as do most civilized folks, and has declared his intention of running his university as a "sanctuary institution", meaning that on campus the feds will have no help from the university in tracking down the at risk students. All across America we have of course sanctuary cities, in which local police have been instructed not to use their valuable time helping the feds track down illegal aliens, but rather to focus on actual crime, of the locally committed variety. If the feds want to make the rules, which is their duty with regard to immigration policy, then let them enforce them. Cities and universities have enough work cut out for them just keeping their jurisdictions safe, without doing the federal government's job for them. That's the rationale behind the progressive minded sanctuary concept as it is practiced in municipalities and colleges across the country, and it does not seem to be going away anytime soon, despite the outraged expressions of conservative groups such as "Judicial Watch", the right wing organization whose purpose is to advocate for the placement of conservative justices on America's court benches, the destruction of Hillary Clinton, and the punishment of sanctuary cities by the American people and the American government. How noble. Trump is likely to threaten all kinds of mayhem for sanctuary institutions, including deprivation of federal funding. That probably won't have any impact on Harvard, which is rich by other means, mostly contributions from wealthy alumni.

Mixing Conservatism and Christianity in America

WHAT DO YOU THINK OF when you think about the KKK, if you ever allow yourself to? Racism? Hatred of African-Americans? Maybe throw in a few Catholics, Jews, and queers? What are the fundamental principles and beliefs of the Klan? What's their ideology? When I think of the Ku Klux Klan, I think of two things: first, pure old fashioned ultra right wing conservatism. Second, devout Christianity. Konservatism and Kristianity, and Krosses, like two peas in a pod, embodied most strongly together in the Klan. The KKK is not a bunch of bleeding heart do gooder liberals, fighting for gay rights, socialism, gender and racial equality, vegetarianism, welfare, and replacing fossil fuels. Quite the opposite. The Klan is all about tradition, not change. The Klan is about property, freedom, guns,Bibles, and crosses. Traditional American values. The freedom to compete for and own as much property as you want, unhindered by government. Guns to protect the property, crosses to justify it. welcome to the Ku Klux Klan, and the tightly interwoven world of Konservatism and Kristianity. This tight interwoven christian conservatism extends well beyond the Klan. Its strongest in the Klan, but very strong in many other places, like the United States of America, the land of the free and the home of the Klan. The home of Donald Trump, the republican party, alt right, the Tea party, and home of the vociferous and ultra conservative Christian community. Sometimes it seems as if half the American people belong to it. Give me the left wing liberal Christian type like Jesse Jackson any day. Here's a clue: the Christian conservative community hates Jesse Jackson, Barack Obama, and outspoken black advocates of civil rights, for a reason. The reason is, Christian conservative based racism. The Jesus, guns, and money christian conservative crowd hates liberalism and any trace of liberal progress so passionately that no matter what President Obama does or says, they hate it. In America, racism is traditional, a traditional value. They offered Ben Carson as a token candidate to hide their racism, because he is a right winger. Pretty clever. In America, racism, like Christianity, lives in traditional conservatism, and always has. This body politic, the one which elected Trump, has only its Bibles, guns, and outdated values and ideas, so, it won't be around much longer.

Why Doesn't Trump Want A Recount?

THE GREAT THREE STATE RECOUNT is beginning, and why would anybody be against it? If somebody is willing to pay for it out of personal funds, why not? It won't cost the taxpayers a dime, and it will give a lot of people extra work, and an extra paycheck, just in time for Christmas. Good economic stimulus, this recount. Almost certainly the results won't change, and that's fine; at least we'll know for sure. Nothing wrong with knowing for sure. The fact that several computer science professors recommended a recount because they thought something looks fishy justifies a recount. Maybe these scientists can find out whether there was any computer hacking and altering of the vote count. Its possible. In fact, according to the experts, hacking into the election in a precinct or county here and there in certain pre-selected locations is not only possible, it could be done by a knowledgeable hacker, of which there are thousands, and it wouldn't take a large number of people, a conspiracy, or a huge amount of money. It could be done without ever being noticed, unless somebody sat down, looked at the vote count in every county in all three of these states, and noticed something funny, something wrong. And that's exactly what happened. Computer professors who specialize in election study noticed that in every county which had certain voting methods, like computer balloting with no paper trail, Hillary did much worse than she should have, worse than she did in counties which use a paper trail. The pattern was consistent, and it happened everywhere. In paper free voting precincts, much lower vote totals for Hillary. Makes you wonder, right? The paper free part makes it much harder to trace, but it can be traced, electronically, by computer experts. And now, we can find out: one) whether there has been hacking, and 2) who did it, how it was done, and how much it changed the true vote count. All that should be fairly easy to find out, if it happened, now that we're looking for it. Notice how hard Trump is trying to distract us from the recount, trying to sabotage the recount; ridiculing it, accusing its initiators of being crooks, calling it ridiculous, claiming that he really won the popular vote but Hillary appears to have won it only because millions of illegals voted for her. If Trump believes that, wouldn't he want a recount too? No, he wouldn't, because it would make him look even more like a fool, and because he doesn't really believe he won the popular vote. But he may know something about hacking and stealing the election, it it really happened. We'll find out.

Blaming It On Religion (the "Wrong" Religion)

THE STUDENT AT Ohio State who used a car and a knife to brutalize people was evidently not associated with any terrorist organizations, but had evidently self radicalized. A student gets on the internet, surfs the web, and decides he hates the United States and becomes loyal to the Islamic State, and goes on a suicidal attempted murder spree. That would seem to indicate that the internet is either a very powerful force, or can become a very influential and powerful force under certain conditions. Either way, its alarming. What will the internet be used for next? The fact that he did all that damage without using a gun will only serve to inspire America's pro gun conservatives to say: "See? We told you so. If somebody wants to kill people badly enough, almost anything can become a weapon, not just guns. Guns don't kill people, people kill people. We must allow every good law abiding citizen to carry a gun, so that every good law abiding citizen will have the power at his or her disposal to stop mass killers or attempted mass killers in advance, whether or not the would be mass killer has a gun or some other weapon, like a car or a knife." Dubious as this argument sounds, and dubious as it is, it will be used, over and over again. Also we should be ready for the anti-Islamic bigots to return from the woodwork, since this young man had a middle eastern sounding name. No, he may not have been directly associated with any known terrorists organization, although we can never know for sure, but he was sure as hell acting on behalf of terrorist ideology, because he had a middle eastern name, proving that stringent measures to monitor and control Muslims entering and living in the United States are necessary. You know we're going to hear more of that. But the real problem is something else, something deeper in our minds. We are a culture of fear and hatred, on a planet in which most cultures are similarly afflicted, with fear, and hatred. For all we know our computers and cell phones are poisoning our minds.

Ditching The Press Pool

BEFORE DONALD TRUMP molests women, if, as he said he did, he does, one might imagine that he at least gives his immediate surroundings a cursory examination, to inspect for potentially uncontrollable witnesses. It might prove difficult to catch him in the act, or convict with incontrovertible testimony. Maybe some or all of the more than a dozen women who spoke up and accused Trump of sexual molestation after the release of his taped sexual predatory confession are lying, or engaged in a conspiracy, or both. Frankly, it doesn't look good for the president elect, with regard to sexual misconduct, financial conflicts of interest, his inability to temper his comments or refrainng from telling easy to disprove lies. His prospects for a good relationship with the news media seem dim, considering how easily Trump becomes angry and outraged at journalists, and lashes out unwisely.Trump seems destined to have a rocky and volatile relationship with the news media, the press, over the next four years. The media have decided to pursue the truth no matter what, and to not be bullied. Power corrupts. It has been speculated that had JFK lived, he would have been impeached in his second term, over sex and national security. Clinton cot caught, and the Donald self proclaimed his indiscretions, which differ from Kennedy and Clinton in that his pose a clear violation of the law. After Kennedy was killed the idea of a "press poo", or floating group of journalists who follow the president around like a group of mosquitoes scribbling and observing, witnessing, and holding the president accountable, as well as providing protection. Harry Truman, and maybe a few other presidents, would have ditched their press pools back in the day, but there weren't any around. Trump has already ditched his, and hasn't even started being president yet, and he probably'll keep doing it. The press pool is important; ever since its inception after JFK, it has been regarded as a very important feature of the presidency, something which should and must be near the president at all times, even though there is no law requiring it. Problem is, trump does not agree. During the campaign and on up to the present, Trump has been very dismissive of, rude to, resentful towards, and unhelpful to the press, particularly personal press pool. he's left them stranded at airports instead of letting them fly with him, even though he would have been reimbursed for the burdensome expense. This is troubling, and its likely to get more troubling, as Trump's term begins and his relationship with the media, which promises to get very exciting.

To Be, Or Not To Be Fair

IT IS NOT UNFAIR to remind people that Secretaries of State Rice and Powell both used private email servers during their tenure, but that no republican has ever so much as even hinted that they be investigated, described them as "crooked", or chanted "lock 'em up" in their faces. What about all those classified documents they possibly and undoubtedly transferred into the wrong hands? Isn't that automatically what happens when Secs of State use their own email addies? If they do that, they are suspect, and must be investigated, to find our exactly how the government server and the private server were both used, to make sure nothing inappropriate was done, right? If one didn't know better, which indeed one does not, one might suspect that what we have had for the past seeming millennia is what might be termed a "Hillary witch hunt". Get 'er, by any and all means necessary. Let Rice and Powell, who set the precedent for private email servers in government jobs, off the hook, ignore their potential criminal activity, but, by all means, get Hillary, she's a crook. Excuse me? That old right wing the ends justify the means thing. A classic case of double standard if ever there were one. Nor is it unfair to remind folks that Hillary aint never had so much as a parking ticket, let alone a felony rap for treason, here in the land of the innocent till proven guilty, is it? Nor is it unfair to say that between the two candidates, Hillary and Trump, the self described criminal is the latter. One should never accuse anyone of being a sexual predator, unless the person of the first part self proclaims as much. Or, at least, so common sense would seem to dictate. But let's face it, when society is confronted with an attack machine as lethal as the great right wing media and political conspiracy we now have, and when it is augmented and fully supported by the conservative community at large, common sense and fairness vanish beneath a heaping avalanche of lies, deception, and hatred. The conservative media, always on the attack, while we are led to believe, falsely, that the media is liberal, and therefore, somehow, unworthy. Welcome to the fun house that is America, where everything is grotesquely distorted, and nothing is as it seems.

Wanting To Be Understood

AS I CHECKED OUT at the grocery store, one of a chain (which is employee owned, yea!), I noticed that the lady ahead of me had walked out without her plastic bag containing two head of lettuce. I mentioned it to the check out person, who hadn't noticed, and ran out of the building, and saw a car leaving the parking lot. Altruistically, determined to make a difference, I started jogging after it. It slowed down and pulled over for a moment- then zoomed away. Nice car, late middle aged lady, I was sure I had the right car. Just guessing, but pretty sure. She had taken one look at me, I reckon, and decided to play it safe. Who knows what that person might or could conceivably do. Better to not take a chance. I wanted to find someway to convey to her that my intentions were honorable, but had no opportunity. Maybe she got home, missed her lettuce, figured it all out, and went back to the store, and it all worked out. I can only hope. Seems possible, if not likely. What could I have done differently? What I tried to do really didn't matter; just let it happen, she got home, and missed her lettuce, and all was well. Trying to do to much. I further hope she thought about me, the guy chasing her car, and realized, belatedly, that I had been harmless. I consider a good sign about myself that I care whether some stranger understands my harmless intentions. I care! Yes! I have been thinking recently that I am so far removed from the human race that I like dogs and cats more than I like people, and I find that troublesome. Maybe other people's intentions are more harmless than I think. Maybe power is not the most important thing to Hillary, and getting attention is not the most important thing to Donald. But what is? During the campaign, Hillary was being interviewed by a guy who asked her how she felt about the fact that many people dislike her because they perceive her to be cold, distant, secretive, defensive, unknowable, distant, insensitive, calculating, dishonest, and so forth. She stood there a moment, and said: "well, it hurts my feelings". I believed her. I still do. Maybe that's a good sign. The genius of it was, in one brief sentence she disproved everything her interviewer said. So there you have it. Lady at the store, in her car, just doing her thing, but maybe losing some lettuce in the bargain. I, poor I, trying to do the "right thing", but failing miserably, misunderstood. And Hillary, she gots what it takes, but, surrounded by enemies, tough as nails, so strong that she don't feel a thing, she puts the wrong foot forward. The real hero is the guy who interviewed her, seeking truth, and getting some.

Deciding What Racism Is, And Who Qualifies

WHAT, EXACTLY, IS "RACISM"? Technically, it is nothing other than the arbitrary division of humanity into categories based on skin pigmentation, called "races". It would be as if the species were divided into categories based on eye color, hair color, height, or weight. Like all categories, racism is a suspect convention intended to simplify and render convenient and comprehensible the real world of infinite varieties of unique forms. It may be that every human who has ever lived has a slightly different and unique skin tone. An interesting experiment is to place your forearm next to those of as many other people as possible, and compare color. Most likely you will never find a perfect match, even within members of your own "race". Another definition of racism is that it exists when people who accept these broad categories, as everyone seems to, and then place importance on them. Or, when someone, after deciding to give race importance, arbitrarily decides that one race is superior to another. At least one of these three definitions could probably be applied to everyone, meaning that everyone is, in one way or another, a "racist". Nobody, or very few, admits to being a racist, but it could be argued to everyone is.1)Races exist, 2)races are important,3) races are of differing value. Three definitions of racism. The third definition is the one which we seem to agree on. It can never be proven that anyone is a racist, according to the third definition. We can't read minds, we have to take people's word for it, or we can decide for ourselves whether someone in particular is a racist by analyzing their words and actions. Consider, for example, this so called "alt right" movement. Unless I'm mistaken, this" organization" claims not to be racist. They claim to merely be interested in retaining their identity as white Americans of European descent, and preserving and protecting that identity. Clearly, they qualify as racists under the first two definitions. they clearly believe that races exist, and that categorical racial distinctions are important. What about the third definition? Part of their platform is that there should be a location where members of the white race can live separately from all other races, in order to associate with like people, and to further their aim of preserving and protecting their perceived racial identity. What about the third definition, that races are of differing value? Insistently they proclaim that they do not meet this definition, that their ideology has nothing to do with whether one race is superior to another, but only that different races, especially black and white, do not associate well with each other, and should be allowed and even encouraged to live apart. Are they being honest? Are they putting all this effort into building their all right movement even though they do not consider their own race to be in any way superior to any other race? That's for you to decide.

A Realistic Plan For Saving The Planet

THE EXTRA CARBON in the atmosphere is, to a certain extent, being absorbed by the photosynthesis process inherent in botanical lifeforms. Problem is, it isn't enough. Plant sequestration of carbon mitigates climate change a wee bit, but, again, not near enough. We need more action, of the human made variety, to reverse climate change so we can enjoy our great great grand children. Two hundred years ago, the atmospheric carbon content was two hundred parts per million. A hundred years ago it was over three hundred, and now is surging past four hundred, and rising fast. We know this because its easy to measure it. Everyone agrees on the numbers, and everyone with a basic knowledge of chemistry understands who put it there; we. But we can remove it, and we can stop adding to it. At the dawn of neolithic civilization, there were, it is estimated, seven trillion trees, give or take a few dozen, on Earth. Now, that number has been deforested in half. A worldwide tree planting project could make up the difference in a short period of time. Say, a one trillion global tree planting initiative, for starters. Every military organization, every civic organization, and every community on the planet could participate, every last one of us. Make every day Arbor Day! Already in cities like New York the number of trees has been more than doubled, and that's just in one small city. Phase two could consist of massive solar energy infrastructure construction, to augment an already burgeoning industry. Huge solar arrays could be built to provide energy for desalination plants around the world, and sea water could be cleansed, pumped and piped into deserts and areas stricken by drought. The new trees would greatly slow the carbon buildup, the desalination would not only assist in creating new green land, but would also slow sea level rise, more than you might think, with enough pumping and piping. Pipelines for brand new fresh water, rather than fossil fuel transport. So let's get started! You handle the solar energy and desalination facilities, I'll start planting trees, one by one. Either that, or we can vigorously encourage the incoming president, whoever that might be, to invest federal funds in all the above. It happens all the time, this business of government investing in private enterprise, the government picking winners. Its called "mercantilism", an often productive variation/distortion of free market capitalism, and it often works like a charm. Maybe we'll hook up on the death valley or Saharan solar energy farm and and stroll casually together through the surrounding verdant forest.

Trump, Over the Edge, and Out To Lunch, Upstairs

TO BORROW A QUOTE from John McEnroe: "you cannot be serious!" Unless I'm dreaming, I and maybe we all are living in some bizarre alternative parallel science fiction universe in which a nut job with the emotional age of a third grader and various mental disabilities, among them extreme narcissism and hyper sensitivity emotional personality disorder, has been elected president of the United States, just as he begins a descent into depravity, perhaps caused by dementia. In the latest of a seemingly never ending series of inane statements, Donald J. Trump, most likely soon to be president of that wonderful fun house called America, actually said that he, and not Hillary Clinton, won the popular vote. In point of fact, as the rest of us, we the members of the sane universe are well aware, Clinton won it by well over two million votes, and counting. The reason, Trump alleges, that he actually won , or should have won, is that there occurred massive voter fraud, consisting of millions of illegal aliens casting votes. He declined to specify whether the "illegal aliens" to which he vaguely referred are Mexicans, or extraterrestrials. Knowing Trump, it could be either. Does it matter? First, he said that he could have won the popular vote if he had tried harder, now, this. The frightening part is that he appears to be perfectly serious. The even more frightening part is that, unless the recount in Wisconsin, Michigan, and Pennsylvania changes the electoral outcome, Trump suddenly gains sufficient lucidity to have himself checked into a mental institution, or the good lord intervenes, this wack job is actually going to become president of these United States. Is this a bad dream, or merely a humorous one, from which we shall all soon awaken? Are we ready to acknowledge buyer's remorse? Has anyone over at Bellevue suggested curtailing twitter tweet privileges for the mentally and emotionally disabled?