"I was only following orders...." We've heard that line before. And we're in danger of the same thing that happened to the Germans. People refused to stand up and question authority out of peer pressure, and later out of fear. And as the Nuremberg trials showed, this was inexcusable and was a betrayal of a great nation.
We now have a corrupt leader in Washington, DC who is not being openly challenged by his own political party. They are only interested in being in power, and not the purpose of being in power - to govern. Gradually, we're seeing the state houses pass laws which are meant to restrict the right to peaceably assembly and protest wrongful actions by government.
The most egregious offenses may yet come from the Federal Government. We're seeing provisions meant to protect whistle blowers being repealed by executive order. We're seeing an attack on a health care plan, that in spite of its many flaws, has succeeded in bringing health care to millions who were not able to afford health care before. We're seeing an attack on Women's rights by extremists who want to limit a woman's access to birth control AND prohibit her from having the choice of having an abortion if that birth control method fails. We're seeing attacks on the LGBT community, by attempts to ignore the community's existence AND remove protections established by both the courts and executive orders. We're seeing a rollback of environmental safeguards, as well as ceasing to collect data which helps to prove that global warming is real.
Yet, what offends me most is not what one might expect from a "far right" shift in government. Instead, it is that "far right" government has been enabling a president to betray his country. Our president is tainted by his direct and indirect connections to the Russian oligarchy. The GOP fears betraying the man who would betray us all. They still act as if he is a leader who should be respected - even though he shows no loyalty to those below him.
Several times over the past couple of years, my friends and I have discussed the alarming signs that America is about to have a Fascist government. Most of these friends are on the left, and never would have voted for a Republican candidate. However, today I had a similar discussion with a friend who never likes anything coming from the left - and even she is seeing the signs of Fascism coming from the right. If this doesn't make a person think, I don't know what does....
Hopefully, I am wrong. And I hope that the midterm elections make it possible for the left to check and balance the current unchecked power of the right. Only time will tell....
The Women's March on Washington. It's hard to believe that this took place a month ago as I'm writing this entry. A lot of feelings were vented, but has it yet led to anything substantial? Probably not. The protesters were marching against Trump, and not FOR anything in particular. And this is where the problem lies. Trump's opponents are still divided. We think of women's rights, LGBTIQ rights, immigrant rights, but we're not focusing on what should be the core issue - Human Rights and how to achieve them for all. Each of these causes is important. But without a central focus, our opposition wins.
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In order for progressives to win both the cultural war and the ideological war being foisted upon us, we need to make sure that no one accepts any of the lies coming from 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue as anything other than what they are - tools being used to get the common person to stop paying attention to a critical press, and to only focus on what Trump claims to be truth. This is dangerous, as an honest free press is the most important check and balance against government overreach when the public feels empowered.
Right now, we're seeing attempts from the Trump administration to disempower groups that have traditionally been disenfranchised in the USA: Poor People, Blacks, Latinos, Gays & Lesbians, Transgenders, and Women. Ignore the rhetoric from both sides of the political aisle. We have an Attorney General who was once voted down by the Senate for being too racist to have a judicial seat. We have a Secretary of Education who has no clue how public education functions, and wants to replace the public school system with private schools. We have a Secretary of Housing and Urban Development who has never run an organization of any size. Virtually all of his civilian appointees are there to destroy the departments which they are supposed to run. We've already seen protections once held by the LGBT community overturned by the new Attorney General, as he won't defend protections established by the prior administration.
It's easy to give up hope. But the progressive movement needs a set of tactics that can be used to
- Maximize the impact of any protest.
- Prevent Trump's bullying of dissenters from being seen as "normal".
- Stagger large scale protests, so that people stay sensitive to the protest message.
- Disrupt the potentially authoritarian status-quo from being accepted as "normal".
- Develop a rotating focus on key issues, having an entire coalition protest one issue at a time, and preventing messages from becoming tired.
There is much more that can be done. But the people must stay alert to any lies that are being spewed as part of this administration's propaganda campaign. And then, they must expose those lies for what they are, using as much humor as possible in order to deny this regime the social legitimacy it craves.
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Every year, there is a "mooning" of Amtrak trains as they pass through a California town. The "Mooners" (not to be confused with "Moonies", who are affiliated with a Korean Church) line up along a 2 mile stretch of track, and expose themselves when an Amtrak train rolls by. Might we want to consider mooning Trump's motorcade to show him the respect he deserves? It's one idea among many we should be thinking about - we need the attention of the press, and we need to find as many non violent, but media catching methods possible. Hopefully, we will find a few things that work well, and will use them as long as they work well....
Obamacare. The GOP promises that we'll have something bigger and better. With all the rhetoric that has been spewed to the party loyalists, I doubt that they can deliver anything that is half as good as what they pledge to destroy, if only because they never have worked to design something that can replace Obama's signature accomplishment. It saddens me that the only thing unifying the GOP has been a pledge to destroy healthcare for millions. Yet, it could be much worse. We don't know what the "new normal" will be in the near future.
Recently Meryl Streep came out and protested the president elect's style in a recent speech at the Golden Globe award show. She didn't even have to mention him by name. Was she justified? She decried the bullying that passes for strength nowadays, and attacked a subculture that wants power for its own sake, and not to do something good with it. What is wrong with that?
There is a rush to undo the gains made in society over the past 8 years. We have a president who is likely owned by the Russian government. He is already breaking some of his many promises, pledging to build a wall along our Southern border with our money, then convincing Mexico to pay for it. Does anyone really believe that they will do so? I doubt it very much. Strangely enough, some of his nominees have more class than Trump has, including Jeff Sessions. Sessions is willing to say that Waterboarding is torture, something that Trump can't bring himself to say. Why is that? Could it be that many Trump supporters only care about their rights, and not the rights of humanity? Could it be that they have no empathy for others, and like Trump, are on a narcissistic ego trip?
It is troubling how extreme how today's GOP seems for a centrist. Abortion should have been a question settled 40 years ago, and it is still in play because of cultural politics. White supremacists have cleaned up their message, and use phrases such as "Southern Heritage" when they fly the Confederate Battle Flag. (Heck, most of these people don't know that the "Stars and Bars" referred to a different flag, the flag the South wanted to use for its national standard.) Centrists fear a government led by people who would shut down polling places heavily used by poor people. Centrists fear a government who would take rights away from the GLBT community because it angers a small religious minority. Centrists fear a government run by people who can not compromise in any way. And now, we will get to see what a "Right Wing" government will do.
There is a big problem in America, and it is the Urban/Rural divide. Maybe it is about time that we think of dividing this nation into three separate nations: (1) States along the Pacific Coast, (2) States along the East Coast, and (3) The "Heartland" states. Each would inherit the US Constitution, but would make its own laws following the dissolution of the America we once knew. Only then would we be able to see which nation's laws makes the most sense. But until then, we have this social conflict that can not be resolved, and can result in a second civil war. Hopefully, we will not see that happen....
As I write this, I've just digested the news that Donald Trump has made a $25 million settlement for the Trump University swindle, without admitting any fault for the problem. On the same night, his VP was at "Hamilton" and a cast member stuck up a challenging conversation with Pence. To distract people from Trump's paying off on a settlement, Trump accused the cast member of harassing the VP elect. Again, we're seeing business as usual from Trump - when you have to pay for your sins, distract others from the confession, and certainly don't admit any fault or responsibility.
No one ever expects Trump to ever expose his tax returns to public scrutiny. If they were public, they would expose the many intricate layers of international deals with people who are less than honorable. Couple this with not divesting Trump's holdings into a blind trust and disconnecting the family from the family business, we have great potentials for conflicts of interest which I have no trust that Trump will handle honorably.
Everyone I speak to in my bubble of friends is horrified about what this presidency means. To me, I expect to see a lot of scandals, with a president trying to scuttle freedoms enumerated in the 1st amendment and upheld by over 200 years of legal precedent. His election has unleashed conservatives who want to shred the social safety net. The Speaker of the House is now floating proposals to scuttle Medicare, and replace it with a voucher program. We have never had a decent marketplace solution to healthcare issues in this country, and the Speaker only will make things worse. He wants to subsidize the wrong side of the Supply/Demand curves with his voucher based proposal, and this will only raise prices. If he were to subsidize supply, he'd reduce prices - but politicians never have a clue on how to make markets work to solve problems and not make them worse.
I see a major attack on Gay Rights coming, and the GLBT communities have much to fear. It's amazing how many people are killed around the world because they do not fit the molds of traditionalist sexual identities and/or practices. With a VP such as Pence, Trump has signaled that he doesn't give a damn about social rights or safety to marginalized groups. He is a bully, and only respects bullies - and despises anyone who could be a victim. Hopefully, more gay people will join groups such as the "Pink Pistols", and signal that they will not allow themselves to be pushed around.
But it is not just the Gays who are at risk. I go to a Muslim doctor for treatment. He has always treated me with respect, and we have always had the chance to talk a little about social affairs on my visits. He has been a valuable member of my community for generations. Why should he be called on to register with the government because of his religion - as posed by Trump before and after his election? How does one choose who is good and bad from any religion? Should Christians get a free pass? We see religious terrorism from some people from our religious right, and no one demands that Christians register with the government. And what about the Jews? They should always remember the yellow stars sewed on to their clothes. They must always remember the numbers tattooed on their arms during the Nazi years. They must start standing up to say NO - this should never happen to any group, not even our professed opponents, ever again!
What about the rhetoric of rebuilding our military? We're the only nation in the world that can fight a war in two theaters of operation at the same time. We spend as much on our military as the next 5 nations in the world combined. The biggest problem with our military is that it is too big! Much of our spending takes place because we have grown addicted to the jobs that building unneeded equipment brings to communities across the nation. It is an inefficient way of keeping people employed, as once bullets are shot and bombs are dropped, we have nothing to show for this spending. No new bridges are built. No roads are constructed. No houses are erected. No children are educated. No sick are healed. I could go on and on about the things we don't have because we have chosen to fight "forever wars" instead of preparing ourselves for a future of prosperity we could
have earned.
We do have problems. For example, we have alienated people in both rural and urban areas. They are not well educated, and live where good jobs are not available to them. In rural areas, the mills have closed down, and the people can't move to places where plentiful jobs are. In urban areas, the high paying jobs require educations that people can't afford to get. And when people fail to achieve to a reasonable potential, they often fall into despair and escape into drugs and alcohol. No amount of moral and legal punishment can help these people. Only opportunity can help them. Sadly, structural unemployment is becoming a greater problem every day, and the elites have at best neglected the worse off in our society. And at worst, they have warehoused these people in a prison industrial complex geared to keep them out of sight and out of mind.
There is a tendency for those who are alienated to follow authoritarian leaders when they don't feel like they are getting their fair share from the system. They look towards a messianic figure to deliver them from the injustices they perceive are being inflicted on them without delving deeper into their problems. For example, many people voted for Trump because he promised to eliminate environmental regulations which made the coal mines unprofitable. Sadly, he can't make people use coal who don't want to buy it. As such, the people are going to get screwed again, because the false messiah made promises which could not be kept. If these people saved their money when times were good, they could have left their one horse towns at the first sign of decline. The unions could have negotiated phased shutdowns of plants, with safety nets in place to help people transition to skills currently in demand - and provided relocation assistance so these retrained workers could go to where the new jobs were. Instead, the former workers blame the wrong "others" for their problems, and keep sowing the seeds for future disappointments.
The election of Trump was a signal by the masses that they wanted change. They did not care much about the nature of the change - they wanted to riot using ballot boxes as weapons. Trump can not and will not deliver the changes the people want. He has too many conflicts of interest for him to even govern honorably. All he can and will do is push this country towards an authoritarian government - if we don't resist it. Resistance can be peaceful - mobs of people can block movement of traffic in a city. Mobs of people can protest at key locations and get the press needed to show that the government lacks critical public support. But mostly, they can slow things to a halt until a new and more honest leader can come through the ranks, and truly push for healthy change. Until then, I pray that the decent people in the GOP will reach across the aisle to the Democrats and use the legislative branch of government to check and balance the power of this Sociopath who will be in charge of the executive branch of government.
The conservatives won this election. Now they have a duty to govern responsibly. Only time will tell if they handle their responsibilities honorably in spite of having a dishonorable man in charge of the executive branch of government....
When I wrote the following rambling missive to a friend, I didn't realize how well it could work as a blog post. Thinking about this letter (and my friend's unpublished response), I realize that I am a Jeffersonian at heart, while my friend is a Hamiltonian. In short, I believe in the will of the people, although I believe that it must occasionally be checked and balanced. My friend sees the elite as a needed safeguard against the rabble running amok.
For the most part, our views are two sides of the same coin - both of recognize the public's need to have a say in their own affairs, but we both recognize the need for a buffer to keep the common person from destroying the society in which he lives. And both of us have been lucky enough to avoid the encumbrances that would make us slaves to the society in which we live, instead of controlling our own destinies to a large degree.
Right now, I see the Trump and Sanders campaigns having their successes rooted in the general belief that the public is mad as hell and isn't going to take it any more. A Trump or Clinton win would result in a one term presidency - and would leave the body politic much more unstable than we can afford at this time in history. Yet, I like instability (to some degree) as I like to see the body politic refreshed by healthy blood - something we haven't seen in a while.
So I hope you enjoy today's missive, in the form of rambling thoughts I've written to a friend to provoke conversation....
If I were going to do a War Of The Worlds story today, I'd make the "aliens" look more like us, so that the alien invasion would not be that of a faceless enemy, but of an enemy that lives with us. (This reminds me of a movie that Roddy Piper made - "They Live.") The story would be more of the dilemmas a space faring civilization faces when encountering a "sort of" sentient species, and then the ultimate realization that this planet is too toxic for that species to inhabit - leaving the formerly colonized to think that they had the upper hand in their own right. Of course, one could throw a lot of social metaphors into the story to give the story more gravitas than it deserves, and to score higher ratings from the critics.
The problem with a lot of mass media these days is that it has been dumbed down for a lot of Americans to consume. For example, how many shows will they make about antique and pawn shops, along with the people who run and supply them? How many shows can they make about dwarfs and their families? How many shows can they make of "unusual" families? Of course, I'm biased. I feel that narrowcasting has allowed a significant portion of the American public to avoid exposure to ideas to which they feel uncomfortable.
I think the problem starts in the schools and in the homes. Both liberals and conservatives can make good arguments about the problems in educating our children. But I also think we're seeing signs of structural unemployment which can't be ignored. Low end jobs are being outsourced to low wage places, leaving America to increase the size of its social safety net, lest we have major social unrest. Couple that with middle to high end jobs now gradually being replaced by computer functions, and we may be looking at a situation (which could become worldwide) where there are more people than jobs. How can a society cope?
Before you think that my idea of people outnumbering available jobs is a problem that could result in a radical solution, think of this. Before the Black Plague, "serfs" (I could equate them to newly freed slaves becoming tenant farmers) had no social power, owed most of their production to the manors, and could afford to take no chances with what they grew. There was always another serf to take his place. The plague took away all that excess labor that the manoral economy depended on, took away many of the lords and ladies, and left the remaining labor with the upper hand. They started to grow a wider range of crops, ate better, and were part of an economy that started to develop labor saving inventions because there were more jobs than labor. What could happen in America with roughly one gun in circulation for each of its citizens, if our elites don't address the problems of an economy where there are more jobs than people? Any slight event could radically destabilize things, resulting in great population loss before a new stable state is achieved.
So we go back to the schools and the homes. Religious fundamentalism has shown itself to be a plague on mankind. We have home schooled students who can't prove they know enough to enter trade schools. In fact, many of them can't do the math required for these schools, because their parents decreed that the bible contains everything the child needs to learn. We're already seeing what happens to some states when these clowns get to power - education gets shafted, in one case, the cutbacks meant that there was no local school available for the children of one town. (I wish I remembered the full details of this situation - I think it was in Kansas, but I'm not sure.) I shouldn't pin the blame on religious fundamentalism alone. We've seen the same neglect for our school systems and families in non religious areas of the country. We're seeing an America divided on Rural vs. Urban lines, and the Rural populations are winning for now. They are making the mistake that the solutions that worked 50-75 years ago, when the US was at its greatest level of prosperity vs. the world, are still valid today. Simply praying to god a bit more, and resisting social change (acceptance of the GLBT population as having equal rights), will not solve their problems. Something more is needed from both Rural and Urban populations....
We now have ready made scapegoats for people like Trump to exploit. Before you say I'm about to go into a diatribe against "the Donald", reflect on this - he did bring issues into the political conversation that the political elite would rather not address - albeit in an inelegant, crude way. I'd rather see him as president than Cruz. A vote for Trump is the hard core Republican's way of giving a vote of "No Confidence" to the GOP and its candidates. Sanders is the equivalent from the hard core Democrat's side of things, especially when it's a vote against Hillary Clinton. Although Sanders has not fleshed out his ideas that well, he might be the least dangerous person to elect because a GOP dominated legislature will block his every action.
Both political parties have their own reasons for keeping the insurgents from taking power. But it's harder to see the benefits of the insurgents gaining power. If Trump were to be elected, he'd be a wild card, a joker waiting to do something that would trigger impeachment and conviction - removal from office. It would also mean that the GOP would be able to get rid of its extremist elements and could produce a party ready to govern again. If Sanders were to be elected, it would give the Democrats a reason to stop a continued slide to the political right, and renew its position as a moderate leftist party again. And with both Trump and Sanders, I expect that they would have their reasons to deal with Wall Street and the corrupting influence of its money and power. Trump, to remove power from his enemies. Sanders, to clean up a system which caused the mess we are in....
As I noted, this was the start of a conversation that has lasted several sets of email exchanges so far. The ideas are not well formed yet, but they touch on problems that have been long ignored by our elites. I only wonder whether our leaders will bother to do their job, or continue to push America towards the decline of its empire....
Trump Steaks. One of the many failed products sold with "the Donald's" name, for which he got paid for the use of his name. Were they good? I have no clue. Given a choice, I'd rather spend the same money and go to either Gallagher's Steakhouse in Manhattan, or Peter Luger's in Brooklyn. At least, in these two restaurants, I know I'd get a better steak than anything Trump could sell to me.
It is Trump's attitude of selling the sizzle and not the steak that worries me. His followers know he's lying to them, and they don't care. He has brought issues into public debate which the GOP elite would rather not address. And the elites are now trying to figure out a way to prevent him from winning the nomination, so that they have a chance of retaining some political power. As for me, I want to see him trash the GOP's structure and collapse the party. Trump has no real plan. Trump has no governing philosophy. And Trump has no ethics. He's dangerously close to winning the GOP nomination, and that poses a great risk to our republic.
With all this being said, the GOP gets what it sows. They have given lunatic religious fundamentalists power, and these Christianists have used their bully pulpits to attack the GLBTIQ communities across the United States. Strangely enough, Trump is a moderate compared to the rest of his party. People know that he has supported Planned Parenthood, Obamacare, and other positions which are in conflict with the GOP platform. And they don't care. They want the sizzle, because they know they won't get the steak. And Trump is just the candidate who will give them that sizzle.
The GOP elite first wanted Jeb Bush, and then shifted to Marco Rubio. The public rejected those clowns. However, it is a race between Trump and Ted Cruz to see whether one or the other will get the nomination. Sadly, the elite will tolerate Cruz, even when he will do much more damage to their ticket than Trump will. Can you see people voting for a theocracy, as Cruz would have (but would never openly say it)? At least, Trump has a chance of winning against Hillary....
Sadly, Trump's lies are more palatable than Ted Cruz's lies. It looks like the GOP may just self-destruct instead of figuring out a way to control Trump. And I fear what is likely to happen if the GOP loses the election, as I expect they will....
