Month: September 2020

To Make SCOTUS Better?

I have written my thoughts on how I believe SCOTUS could be improved after the death of Ginsburg and the fight that is about to erupt……https://lobotero.com/2020/09/23/dems-need-to-buck-up/ and my plan for the court…..https://lobotero.com/2020/09/25/i-have-lots-to-say-about-scotus/

The Dems are thinking ahead and have apparently been reading IST (JK) for they will offer a new plan for the highest court this week……

Under a bill House Democrats are preparing, Ruth Bader Ginsburg would have had to retire in 2011—and William O. Douglas, the longest-serving justice in Supreme Court history, would have stepped down in 1957 instead of 1975. The bill, which Democrats plan to introduce next week, limits the terms of Supreme Court justices to 18 years. It excludes those currently on the court, who were appointed to lifetime terms, Reuters reports. Democratic Rep. Ro Khanna says it “would save the country a lot of agony and help lower the temperature over fights for the court that go to the fault lines of cultural issues.” Recent polls have shown large majorities in favor of introducing term limits, which are already required on the Supreme Courts of every state except Rhode Island.

The bill would allow each president to nominate two justices per four-year term. After their terms expired, justice would became “senior” and would be allowed to return to service on lower courts, as numerous former SCOTUS justices have done, including David Souter. This would allow term limits to be introduced without changing the Constitution, writes Gabe Roth In a USA Today op-ed. Roth is executive director of the nonpartisan Fix the Court group. While Democrats probably won’t be able to stop President Trump nominating a replacement for Ginsburg, “they can join with their conservative colleagues who have long embraced the concept of term limits and ensure that never again will a superannuated bench determine the direction of our country,” he writes.

Rep. Khanna has a bill that could do the trick….

“No justice should feel the weight of an entire country on their shoulders,” Khanna added. “No president should be able to shift the ideology of our highest judicial body by mere chance. Most importantly, our country’s top constitutional questions shouldn’t be decided by a panel of jurists who are biding their time until a president of their choice is elected. It’s time to standardize and democratize the Supreme Court.”

https://www.commondreams.org/news/2020/09/25/time-standardize-and-democratize-supreme-court-ro-khanna-introduces-bill-justice

I like the idea that the Constitution does not needed amending…that process takes so long that my grandchildren will have grandchildren before it is decided…..look at the Equal Rights Amendment written in 1972 and still has not been ratified a half a century later.

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Tale Of The Taxes

This is for all those people that have been working tirelessly to get Trump’s tax returns to made public…..well sports fans your wait is over.

Praise be!

After 3+ years of bitching and whining we all get a chance to look into the taxes of our Dear Loving President…..the returns have been made public…..and now we can go to the tale of the taxes…

The most sought-after documents in America have finally surfaced: President Trump’s tax returns. And what they reveal is sobering. Trump, a self-described master of the deal, appears to be taking in hundreds of millions of dollars a year while suffering huge losses that he uses to pay little or nothing in taxes, the New York Times reports. His properties are struggling, he’s deeply in debt, and he’s facing a battle with the IRS could cost him over $100 million. The 20-plus years of documents “reveal the hollowness, but also the wizardry, behind the self-made-billionaire image,” says the Times. “Ultimately, Mr. Trump has been more successful playing a business mogul than being one in real life.” Among the details:

  • Trump paid no federal income taxes in 10 of the last 15 years, $750 the year he won the election, and $750 the year after that.
  • He’s facing $421 million in loans and other debts for which he’s personally responsible—most of which will come due over the next four years. If he wins in November, lenders will face the unenviable decision of whether to foreclose on a sitting president. But Trump can use that debt to declare future losses and avoid paying taxes.
  • Beginning in 2010, he successfully claimed an income tax refund of $72.9 million due to his vast losses. That refund is at the heart of an IRS audit fight that could force Trump to repay the refund with interest—possibly more than $100 million.
  • Most of Trump’s key ventures, like his golf courses and Washington hotel, are losing millions of dollars annually. The properties are also magnets for foreign officials and lobbyists, which could represent a conflict of interest for a president who refused to divest himself from his enterprises while in office.
  • Trump’s revenue from licensing deals and The Apprentice—over $420 million in all—is running out, and years ago he sold off stocks that might help him shore up his properties.
  • Alan Garten, a Trump Organization lawyer, tells the Times that “most, if not all, of the facts appear to be inaccurate” in its report. He says Trump “has paid tens of millions of dollars in personal taxes” over the past decade, but the Times suggests that Garten is confusing Trump’s income taxes with other federal taxes, like Medicare and Social Security. Garten said Trump paid some taxes with credits, which the Times calls “misleading.”
  • Trump called the Times report “fake news” on Sunday and said he has paid taxes, the AP reports. He didn’t give details but said it “will all be revealed.”

Our fascination even obsession over the Trump taxes has now been satisfied….may we please move on to more pressing issues?

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Sino-Iranian Agreement

While the US is playing silly games with Iran like our newest attempt….

the Trump administration announced new sanctions on Iran under the guise of enforcing stipulations of the 2015 nuclear deal, an agreement the US withdrew from in 2018. The US is taking these measures unilaterally, with virtually no international support. The move is not only rejected by the UN Security Council but also by key European allies like the UK, Germany, and France.

President Trump signed an executive order on Monday that is meant to replace a UN arms embargo on Iran that will expire in October. The executive order allows the US to impose sanctions on any individual or entity that sells weapons to Iran.

Announcing the new measures, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo insisted on calling the new sanctions “UN sanctions,” even though a US bid to extend the embargo failed miserably in the UN Security Council. “The President’s executive order announced today gives us a new and powerful tool to enforce the UN arms embargo and hold those who seek to evade UN sanctions accountable,” Pompeo said.

(antiwar.com)

Like I said silly games……

While the idiots in our foreign policy machine are thumping their chests like sex crazed primates the Chinese have entered into an agreement with the government of Iran…..

Rouhani government must show some achievements after more than seven years of office and the Sino-Iranian agreement might be a way for them to say to its people to just wait a little bit more because things will get better. And things in Iran may indeed be better, as the leaked information reveals that one of the terms of the agreement stipulates a Chinese investment of almost $ 400 billion in the oil, gas and petrochemical industries in Iran. Despite this, the deal is so controversial that even some of Iran’s politicians and government media have criticized it. For example, a headline in the newspaper Arman Melli claims that Iran is not Sri Lanka, while an article in the newspaper Hamdeli daily asked whether Iran will become a Chinese colony.

The agreement would vastly expand Chinese presence in banking, telecommunications, ports, railways and dozens of other projects in Iran. In exchange, China would receive a regular and heavily discounted supply of Iranian oil over the next 25 years. Furthermore, it will deepen the military cooperation, and even potentially giving China a foothold in a region that has been a strategic preoccupation of the US for the last decades, which holds a major naval basis there. It is not a new phenomenon and, for example, in December 2019 the two sides together with Russia conducted a four-day joint naval exercises in the Indian Ocean and the Gulf of Oman. And almost 10 years ago the Major General Zhang Zhaozhong commented that China will not hesitate to protect Iran even with a third world war.

Opinion – The Sino-Iran 25 Years Agreement: Why, and Why Now?

So while the US is strutting around like a dickless rooster ….China is expanding its economic base….something Trump has been promising since 2016 and as of yet we have NOT seen any success.

The US needs to learn the fine art of diplomacy again….in the last 3 years it has been replaced with mindless promises and lies.

Maybe the next generation can learn from our mistakes because we are not learning a goddamn thing.

Why do I say the “next generation”? 

This agreement is a 25 year plan…..maybe by then the idotsi will no longer be in control.

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History Of The Dog Collar

That spikey thing that punkers wear to look “cool”…..but that is a post for another day…..

This post is for my readers that have a canine companion and a little history behind the association of the two, man and canine.

MoMo uses a harness…but I guess we can put that in the category of a collar.

The dog collar, so often taken for granted, has a long and illustrious history. Anyone fortunate enough to share their life with a dog in the present day is participating in an ancient tradition every time they place a collar around their dog’s neck and take it out for a walk. The dog collar is a global link between people in the present, no matter their nationality, religion, or political affiliation, which also connects them firmly with the past and each other.

According to the AVMA (American Veterinary Medical Association), 43,346,000 households in the United States own dogs, and the Insurance Information Institute, in their 2017 CE survey, concluded Americans spent $69.4 billion on their dogs in that year alone. It is no surprise that dogs are among the most popular and best-loved pets in the present day, but the designation of “man’s best friend” is no recent development. Dogs and humans have been walking together since ancient times and the dog collar has been the common denominator in every era.

The basic design of the collar has not changed since the time of ancient Mesopotamia but variations on the collar, specifically ornamentation and style, reflect the values of the various world cultures that kept dogs. These subtle, and sometimes not so subtle, alterations to the central design can be quite telling in the role dogs played and how they were regarded in different time periods and cultures.

The oldest depiction of what seems to be dogs on leashes –

https://www.ancient.eu/article/1605/a-brief-history-of-the-dog-collar/

And since most people are familiar with Rome…..their thoughts on dogs as well…..

Dogs were highly valued in ancient Rome, as they were in other cultures, and the Roman dog served many of the same purposes as it did in, say, Egypt and Persia, but with a significant difference in focus. Like the Egyptians, the Romans created their own artistic dog collars – some of gold – and, although dogs did not feature in the Roman afterlife (as they did with the Persians), they were considered the best protection against ghosts or evil spirits. The central difference between the Roman view of dogs and that of other cultures is that the Romans viewed dogs far more pragmatically

https://www.ancient.eu/article/1603/dogs–their-collars-in-ancient-rome/

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Jefferson Davis, My Distant Cousin

Another Sunday and I have little of worth for this FYI session…..unless I can go on and on about the terrible pick for SCOTUS….but I prefer a different way today……so I fall back to a forte….HISTORY.

What do most people know about Jefferson Davis?

Jefferson Davis

Basically they know he was the first and only president of the Confederate States of America…..once they say that they are at a loss for words……and that is why I am here to help fill in the gaps in people’s education and knowledge.

As always I want to be up front….according to the family story my maternal grandmother was related to Jefferson Davis….he maiden name was Bessie Mae Davis…..I believe they were cousins twice removed or something like that…..

There is so much more about Davis than his stint as president of the CSA…..

Did you know he was put under house arrest for involvement of cadets at West Point in the Eggnog Riot?

Or that he was in the Army on the frontier dealing with the Comanche and Pawnee….or that he came up with the idea of the Camel Corps.

Or that his father and uncles fought in the Revolutionary War……or that Davis married the daughter of an American president Zachary Taylor…..

Like I stated so much more about the man…..let’s look at the man…..

Jefferson Davis (1808-1889) was a Mexican War hero, U.S. senator from Mississippi, U.S. secretary of war and president of the Confederate States of America for the duration of the American Civil War (1861-1865). Prior to the start of the war, Davis had argued against secession, but when Mississippi seceded he resigned from the U.S. Senate. In February 1861 he was elected president of the Confederacy. Davis faced difficulties throughout the war as he struggled to manage the Southern war effort, maintain control the Confederate economy and keep a new nation united. Davis’ often contentious personality led to conflicts with other politicians as well as his own military officers. In May 1865, several weeks after the Confederate surrender, Davis was captured, imprisoned and charged with treason, but never tried.

https://www.history.com/topics/american-civil-war/jefferson-davis

Like I stated there was more to the man than his presidency…..like he was NOT a secessionist leader…..

Davis was not a secessionist leader.
Less than two months before his inauguration as Confederate president, U.S. Senator Jefferson Davis opposed secession for his home state of Mississippi. While Mississippi Governor John J. Pettus and other state leaders advocated immediate secession in the weeks following the 1860 election of Abraham Lincoln, the slaveholding Davis urged caution. While he firmly believed states had the constitutional right to secede from the Union, he was among a committee of 13 U.S. senators who attempted to find a suitable compromise after South Carolina left the Union in December 1860. After Mississippi seceded in January 1861, Davis declared that his allegiance to his state required him to abide by its decision and leave the U.S. Senate.

(there is more)

https://www.history.com/news/10-things-you-may-not-know-about-jefferson-davis

After the war Davis lived on the Mississippi Gulf Coast where he worked on his memoir, “Rise and Fall of the Confederate Government”……his last home is called Beauvoir…..

The Beauvoir estate is notable as the historic post-war home (1876-1889) of the former President of the Confederate States of America, Jefferson Davis, (1807/08-1889). Its construction was begun in 1848 facing the Gulf Coastline (Gulf of Mexico) at Biloxi, Mississippi. It was purchased earlier in 1873 by the planter Samuel Dorsey and his wife Sarah Dorsey. After her husband’s death in 1875, the widow, Sarah Ellis Dorsey learned of former Confederate President Jefferson Davis’ difficulties. She invited him to visit at the plantation and offered him a cottage near the main house, where he could live and work at his memoirs (“Rise and Fall of the Confederate Government”). He ended up living there the rest of his life. The house and plantation have since been designated as a National Historic Landmark, recognized and listed by the U.S. Department of the Interior and its National Park Service

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beauvoir_(Biloxi,_Mississippi)

If you are in the region and fancy some history then I suggest a visit to Beauvoir it is well worth your time.

There is more to Jefferson Davis legacy than his time as president of the ill fated Confederacy…..

My thoughts on my ancestor…..

Do I think he was a traitor?

Yes I do…..the rest of that side of the family does not agree.

Should we preserve his memory?

Yes we should….it is history and history should not be censured.

Any statues of Davis should be removed and placed on the grounds of his home at Beauvoir….after all it is a museum as well……

Anything you would like to ask or add to this?

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Trump’s SCOTUS Lotto Is Done

I try to avoid the silliness of the nation on weekends….but sometimes there is news that truly needs to be reported…….

Looks like Donald the Orange has made his much awaited decision on who he would nominate to replace Ginsburg on SCOTUS…….and the winner is…..Amy Coney Barrett.

It appears that President Trump has his new Supreme Court nominee. The Washington Post, Politico, the New York Times, and Axios all report that sources are pointing to federal appeals court judge Amy Coney Barrett as Trump’s pick to replace Ruth Bader Ginsburg, a move that would significantly push the Supreme Court even further to the right, with a 6-3 conservative majority. The 48-year-old Barrett, who has served on the US Court of Appeals for the 7th Circuit since 2017, would be the third relatively young conservative justice appointed by Trump to the high court, joining Neil Gorsuch and Brett Kavanaugh, both in their 50s, on the bench.

Barrett, whom the Times calls a “polar opposite” to Ginsburg, was in the running to replace Justice Anthony M. Kennedy when he retired in 2018. Trump, however, was said to be “saving” the devout Catholic, known for her deeply conservative views on such topics as abortion and LGBT issues, for when Ginsburg’s slot opened up. A caveat from the Times, though, on Trump’s supposed nominee: “As they often do, aides cautioned that Mr. Trump sometimes upends his own plans.” On Friday night, in response to questions from reporters on his pick, Trump would only say he’s made his pick “in my own mind, yes,” and that “I haven’t said it was [Barrett], but she is outstanding,” per Politico.

There is so much more……this pick is polar opposite to Ginsburg…..but what can we expect when we allow ideologues make the picks for the president.

The 48-year-old Barrett was appointed by Trump to the appeals court in 2017, and was also reportedly a finalist for Justice Anthony Kennedy’s seat in 2018. She has been portrayed as a favorite of social conservatives seeking to push against the Supreme Court’s abortion jurisprudence. She is unusual, compared especially to famously (and perhaps strategically) tight-lipped recent nominees like Brett Kavanaugh and Elena Kagan, for her extensive paper trail on questions of constitutional law. As a legal academic, she’s written extensively on what obedience to the original meaning of the Constitution requires of judges and members of Congress; how to reconcile the importance of precedent with allegiance to the Constitution’s original meaning; and how precedent can be used to mediate deep disagreements about the law.

As a result, we know more about her jurisprudential beliefs than we’ll know about those of any SCOTUS nominee since, perhaps, Ginsburg. We know she identifies as an originalist who believes that the original public meaning of the Constitution is binding law. But we also know that she is skeptical of the radical libertarian originalist idea that economic regulation is presumptively unconstitutional, and that she believes some Supreme Court decisions that originalists may conclude are incorrectly decided nonetheless stand as “superprecedents” that the Court can abide by.

Her legal writing has also prompted heated reactions from detractors. One piece (with fellow law professor John Garvey) on when Catholic judges might be obligated to recuse themselves from death penalty cases, prompted criticism from Senate Democrats during her appeals court confirmation hearings, who suggested Barrett was unable to separate her faith from her jurisprudence (a charge she strongly rejected).

(Read More)

https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/21453067/amy-coney-barrett-potential-nominee-supreme-court

Read and weep……this is what our “impartial referee” of the Constitution has become a plaything of ideologues.

30+ days until the election and now the Dems have something else to bitch about…..which they need to focus on the vote and let this minor irritant go for the more they bitch and whine the more they turn people off.

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More Covid News

Cases–7 million   Deaths–204,000

But not to worry it is all a scam according to those mental midgets that support Donald the Orange.

First order of business…according to the idiot in the White House….

President Donald Trump told a crowd of his supporters in Swanton, Ohio Monday evening that the coronavirus—which has killed around 200,000 people and infected nearly seven million in the U.S. alone—”affects virtually nobody” except “elderly people,” a blatant falsehood that critics said underscores the president’s view of certain segments of the population as expendable.

https://www.commondreams.org/news/2020/09/22/it-affects-virtually-nobody-trump-falsely-states-virus-has-killed-200000-and

According to Trump if Blue States are not counted then the death totals would be less…..

President Trump on Wednesday blamed the country’s coronavirus death toll on states that lean Democrat, despite the fact that current data indicate 47% of all US deaths have taken place in red states. Trump was discussing the early projections on total number of deaths at a news briefing: “This was a prediction that if we do a really good job, we’ll be at about … 100,000 to 240,000 deaths, and we’re below that substantially, and we’ll see what comes out,” the president said, per the Washington Post. “And that’s despite the fact that the blue states had had tremendous death rates. If you take the blue states out, we’re at a level that I don’t think anybody in the world would be at. We’re really at a very low level. But some of the states, they were blue states and blue state-managed.”

The early surge in deaths was, indeed, in mostly blue states, but most of the deaths occurring now are in red states. USA Today calls the remarks Trump’s “most explicit politicization yet of the handling of COVID-19.” Another misleading statement? The current death toll stands at at least 193,000, but considering there have been 263,000 extra deaths this year than would typically be expected, some experts believe the official toll is an underestimate. And the University of Washington’s Institute on Health Metrics’ latest projection estimates nearly 413,000 deaths by year’s end, with almost exactly half of those in red states. One Democratic congressman, Virginia’s Rep. Don Beyer, called Trump’s words “quite simply one of the most appalling and inhuman statements ever uttered by an American President.”

The big news last week was that the vaccine according to Trump and his Toadies…….should be ready by October….maybe sooner…..

Let’s say it is ready when Trump wants it to be ready……what then for the population?

The federal government released plans Wednesday on the Covid-19 vaccine that calls for all Americans having access to the drug at no cost.

Vaccine developments are still underway. However, assuming a safe and effective option is created, the plans will be implemented as outlined.

Several vaccines are in later-stage trials, with some expectations one will get approval before the end of the year.

https://justthenews.com/politics-policy/coronavirus/covid-19-vaccine-will-be-free-americans-federal-government-reveals

Sounds good….but does ayone really think the Pharma will give up the opportunity to rape a captive audience?

I do not!

Again let’s say the vaccine is ready when Trump wills it to be ready……is there any problems on the horizon?

I am glad you ask!

“Do we have enough freezers?” That’s a question many may not be pondering now, but it’s an important one when it comes to a COVID-19 vaccine, per the Wall Street Journal. That’s because the inoculation samples that may soon emerge might need to be stored at incredibly cold temperatures, and freezers that get that chilly aren’t typically found in pharmacies, hospitals, and doctors’ offices, which would theoretically be distributing the vaccine. Pfizer and BioNTech, for example, have a vaccine in the works that needs to be kept at -70 degrees Celsius (-94 degrees Fahrenheit)—a temp about 30 degrees Celsius frostier than the North Pole at its coldest, Quartz notes. “There’s no precedent for vaccines to be stored at that low of a temperature,” a pharmacist and purchaser for health care facilities tells the outlet, which notes these types of freezers are typically found only in labs.

So why don’t states just find companies that make these freezers and stock up now? The CDC is advising against doing that, as there’s still no vaccine out, meaning that although this is being presented as a hypothetical issue, we don’t really know for sure what the best way to store an eventual vaccine will be. And the freezers themselves aren’t the only problem. The number of days a vaccine is viable could be cut into during transport (i.e., this could especially affect rural areas), and the containers Pfizer has created to hold its vaccine—capable of carrying up to 5,000 doses—could lead to waste if there aren’t enough people in a particular region to use them all. Pfizer, however, doesn’t seem too concerned just yet. “We are confident of our capability to deliver and store doses to the [destinations] governments designate,” the company said in a recent statement, per ABC News.

Now you know!

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More Space Stuff

My weekend begins with cooler temps and a weary mind from all the manure being spread in the media.

For something different I will will try to educate rather than obfuscate……

I may well be the only blogger that spends more time reading news than on social media body shaming some dickweed in LA……plus I do not see the need for blogs about fashion or make-up……such a self-absorbed society we have become.

Any way I have been watching the news about space and its exploration…..plus trying to get people to realize the plans that some are making are a violation of a treaty signed years ago….and may be illegal.

The newest news…….start with China…..they will be firing up an asteroid mining bot soon……

Beijing-based private space mining company Origin Space is launching its first ever “space mining robot” in November, IEEE Spectrum reports, on top of a Long March series rocket.

The concept of excavating resources in space is highly controversial. Many scientists have called for the solar system to be protected from such practices — but that hasn’t stopped global superpowers, particularly the US and China, from investigating ways to do so.

It may become a milestone moment in the country’s efforts to make use of space resources — but the robot, dubbed NEO-1, won’t be mining any asteroids itself.

https://futurism.com/the-byte/chinese-startup-space-mining-robot

While Japan is focusing on the moons of Mars and the possibility that human will soon land out there…..

Japan’s Martian Moons eXploration (MMX) mission aims to probe and observe Mars’ two moons, Phobos and Deimos, collect surface material, and return them to Earth.

MMX is scheduled to launch in 2024 and bring back rocks and other samples, possibly from Phobos, the larger of the two moons, five years later in 2029.

That puts Japan and its space agency JAXA in direct competition with the USA and Europe. The European Space Agency (ESA) and America’s NASA are working on a joint mission to bring back samples from the planet, but that may be two years later in 2031.

Those samples would be collected by NASA’s Perseverance rover, which is on its way there now. The rover will store samples in a process called “sample caching,” and wait until they can be retrieved later. Those would be the first samples returned from Mars.

https://www.dw.com/en/japans-mars-moons-mission-leads-to-human-spaceflight/a-54961901

A few visual aids for those that break out in a rash if they must read…..

There is a treaty already in place……

The rush to Mars reminds me of the 15th century rush to claim the New World and its treasures….but who actually owns what?

This situation will get uglier as the decades go by….and I do not think that it will end well for anyone.

But speaking of Mars.  How will the visitors build their shelters once they arrive?

Of course there is an answer….insect polymer.

A team of researchers are suggesting we could use one of the most common organic polymers on Earth to construct shelters on Mars.

The material, called chitin, is produced and metabolized by most biological organisms and makes up the bulk of the cell walls in fungi, insect exoskeletons, and fish scales.

The team, led by Javier Fernandez from the Singapore University of Technology and Design, attempted to make the material by combining a fiber made from chitin with mineral material that mimic the Martian soil.

https://futurism.com/the-byte/scientists-new-technique-build-mars-shelters

Now you know stuff you care nothing about….peace out.

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Closing Thought–25Sep20

Every time Donald the Orange opens his mouth or picks up a pen (sorry….Sharpie) he proves what a racist pig he truly has become.

His newest Executive Order bans diversity training in corporations…..now he is telling business what to do….a dictator at heart….no a fascist dictator at heart……

Donald Trump announced that he signed an executive order prohibiting government contractors and grantees from providing racial sensitivity and diversity training to employees. In it, the President claims he is taking action to combat “harmful and offensive race and sex stereotyping and scapegoating.”

The Daily Beast reports that Trump announced the new executive order in a series of tweets, because of course he did.

“A few weeks ago, I BANNED efforts to indoctrinate government employees with divisive and harmful sex and race-based ideologies. Today, I’ve expanded that ban to people and companies that do business… with our Country, the United States Military, Government Contractors, and Grantees. Americans should be taught to take PRIDE in our Great Country, and if you don’t, there’s nothing in it for you!”

This executive order is similar to the one that Trump signed earlier in September which directed federal government agencies to cancel or divert funds away from any contracts for training sessions that mentioned “white privilege” or “critical race theory.” Tuesday’s executive order comes less than a week after Trump gave a speech on the importance of “patriotic education” and once again condemned critical race theory, arguing “the crusade against American history is toxic propaganda, ideological poison that, if not removed, will dissolve the civic bonds that tie us together.” Well, if the civic bonds are really that weak….

https://theslot.jezebel.com/trump-signs-executive-order-banning-federal-contractors-1845149417

There can be no doubt to anyone that is NOT a racist pig that this person, Trump, is a bigot with NO empathy for anyone but himself.

All that is missing these days is a special salute to the leader.

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Ethan Allen–Hero Of The Revolution

If you have studied American history at all then the name of Ethan Allen will be familiar to you.

After fighting in the French and Indian War (1754–63), Allen settled in what is now Vermont. At the outbreak of the American Revolution, he raised his force of Green Mountain Boys (organized in 1770) and Connecticut troops and helped capture the British fort at Ticonderoga, New York (May 10, 1775).

245 years ago today……

A tale that we are all familiar with but the rest of that story is that in that same year, 1775, Allen was captured by the British as he attempted to invade Canada.

After aborting a poorly planned and ill-timed attack on the British-controlled city of Montreal, Continental Army Colonel Ethan Allen is captured by the British on September 25, 1775. After being identified as an officer of the Continental Amy, Allen was taken prisoner and sent to England to be executed.

Although Allen ultimately escaped execution because the British government feared reprisals from the American colonies, he was imprisoned in England for more than two years until being returned to the United States on May 6, 1778, as part of a prisoner exchange. Allen then returned to Vermont and was given the rank of major general in the Vermont militia. In 1777, Vermonters had formally declared their independence from Britain and their fellow colonies when they created the Republic of Vermont. Forever loyal to the colony he founded, Allen spent the rest his life petitioning the Continental Congress to grant statehood to Vermont.

After the war concluded, the independent Vermont could not join the new republic as a state, because New York, Massachusetts and Connecticut all claimed the territory as their own. In response, frustrated Vermonters, including Allen, went so far as to negotiate with the Canadian governor, Frederick Haldimand, about possibly rejoining the British empire.

Ethan Allen died on his farm along the Winooski River in the still independent Republic of Vermont on February 12, 1789, at the age of 51. Two years after his death, Vermont was officially admitted into the Union and declared the 14th state of the United States.

(History.com)

Now you know the rest of them story.

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