Category: Opinion

What Is America’s Problem

About 50% of the nation embraces chaos, stupidity, ignorance and hatred….the other half is in search of knowledge and clarity…..some think that abortion, guns and religious iconography will free the country….no concern for hunger, homelessness and national unity.

There is some sort of unity that would be the myth of the ‘free market’…..that would be that a market that is free from nay  with the regulations would cure the ills of society like hunger, jobs, homelessness, etc….this myth as solved none of the societal problems with the exception of the captains of the free market….they have sucked all the profits possible out of the myth and left the rest of the country struggling.

Since about 1980 we have been watching our beloved country circle the drain.

There has been a wealth of finger pointing as to why this is happening……it is a feckless ineffective president or a do-nothing Congress or those damn lobbyists or…..like I stated a wealth of assigning blame.

All these assumptions are wrong!

The real problem is the American people.

The American people through their voting habits have created the division and the hatred that is the cancer on the American political landscape.

The election of 2022 the damage could possibly unprecedented….

“Our democracy faces an existential threat—the very real possibility that the outcome of an election could be ignored and the will of the people overturned by hyperpartisan actors,” 58 groups including MoveOn.org, Protect Democracy, Public Citizen, SEIU, and the Sierra Club assert in an open letter.

“Since the 2020 election, we have seen unprecedented and coordinated efforts to cast doubt on the U.S. election system,” the letter states.

“These efforts have taken many forms,” the authors explain, including “widespread disinformation campaigns and baseless claims of election fraud,… intimidation of election officials and administrators just for doing their jobs, new state laws to make election administration more partisan and more susceptible to manipulation or sabotage, and outright violence.”

Noting that “exaggerated and unsubstantiated fears about voter fraud have been a vote suppression tool for some time,” the letter argues that “these efforts took on entirely new ferocity with the advent of former President [Donald] Trump’s ‘Big Lie’ regarding the 2020 presidential election.”

https://www.commondreams.org/news/2021/11/08/our-democracy-faces-existential-threat-progressives-warn-gop-attack-2022-elections

 

Closing Thought–04Aug21

Trump’s re-election was ‘preordained by God”…..

Seriously.

Like the author of this op-ed I seldom comment on religious beliefs for those are personal decision and those of the people that believe them….but from time to time there are stories that makes it impossible for me to ignore them.

“Preordained by God”?

St. Louis Post-Dispatch editorial board penned a scathing indictment of evangelical preachers who told their followers to view former President Donald Trump’s potential victory in the 2020 election through the lens of Biblical prophecy — and thus making them blind to the reality of Trump’s loss.

“Editorially, we try to avoid opining about religious faith,” wrote the board. “But invoking divine guidance to advance partisan causes smacks of the worst kind of manipulation, opening the door to abuse and financial exploitation. Pentecostal and charismatic Christian leaders have laudably begun insisting that the false prophets among them cease and desist.”

Previous reporting has detailed how Trumpism became a fertile ground to radicalize white evangelicals around the country, and how religious extremists encouraged the “Stop the Steal” lie and the subsequent attack on the U.S. Capitol on January 6. There have also been links between the evangelical movement and the QAnon conspiracy theory, which recycles centuries-old anti-Semitic paranoia about shadow elites cannibalizing and brutalizing young children.

And faith leaders in positions of trust have furthered along this conspiratorial thinking, wrote the board.

“‘Why were most of the prophets wrong when it came to predicting the outcome of the 2020 election?’ host Jan Markell, founder of Olive Tree Ministries, asked on her ‘Understanding the Times‘ Christian radio show on June 25. She followed that question with a lengthy series of pre-election recordings in which a variety of prominent evangelical preachers claimed that God had told them Trump would be reelected,” wrote the board. “‘Trump will win. … He will sit in that office for four more years, and God will have his way in this country,’ author and self-proclaimed prophet Kat Kerr stated in one of the clips Markell played. Several others followed, including one by evangelist Pat Robertson and another by Jeremiah Johnson (who has since publicly repented).”

“Such quackery also can be deadly dangerous, such as when many protesters, claiming divine inspiration, joined in storming the Capitol on Jan. 6. ‘Jericho March’ cofounder Rob Weaver was among the preachers who claimed divine guidance in directing followers toward Capitol Hill,” wrote the board, which concluded by promoting the propheticstandards.com petition website calling on preachers to reject “the spiritual manipulation of the prophetic gift for the personal benefit of the prophet or of his or her ministry.”

(rawstory.com)

What more to say?

Not a damn thing…religious quackery!

Turn The Page!

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

Do You Want To Stop The BS In Government?

WE all know of the antics going on in DC….all the back and forth about bi-partisanship…..the silly games played by some in the Congress….all in all our government is truly a political circus….it has been called that for decades and now they have sent in the clowns.

There is a simple way for all this partisanship and obstruction to end.

It would fall in the laps of corporate America.

If corporations were truly part of this country and the processes then they could step forward and turn off the money spigot to ALL politicians until they learn to play nice and get stuff done that is needed in this country.

That means all funds to politicians, lobbyists and think tanks until they show the progress of bi-partisanship….that means ALL groups that try and influence the political discourse.

After all the Supreme Court has rules that corporations are ‘people’ as well (think Citizens United).

Corporations have been doing well thanx to this corrupt system and now it is time for them to step forward and prove they are an American entity.

In the days of the Civil Rights Movement corporations flexed their muscle and pushed the LBJ admin tom pass and then sign the Act….why?  The protests were costing them lots of money and their profits needed protecting.

These entities could do it again….especially now when they possess all the political power.

If they do not assist in the establishing rationality in the process then they should be pressured by all means necessary….taxation, sanctions anything that will get their laser focused attention…..

If they want to preserve those obscene profits then they need to become a participant other than throwing money at politicians.

There has been an attempt to get corporate American to wake up and do the right thing for the country…..an open letter…..

This ‘memo’ is about the voter suppression laws being passed in states on a lie….but it could be extended to encompass all the partisan BS……

We call upon our colleagues in Corporate America to join us in taking a non- partisan stand for equality and democracy. Each of us stands ready to work with you on what can and must be done.

https://www.bowdoin.edu/president/writings-and-addresses/messages-to-the-community/2021/chenault-letter-mar-31.html

Just A Thought!

Turn The Page!

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

Stop Showing Those Videos

I am writing this in opposition to an op-ed…..

Allissa Richardson writing for Vox stating that we need to stop showing the videos of killings of black/brown people by the police……

Allissa Richardson once thought videos showing police brutality would bring justice. Proving to everyone what people of color encounter with police would bring change. Richardson has changed her mind, she writes in an essay on Vox, after repeatedly seeing George Floyd die on television. The practice invites a victim’s last moments to be broken down by the public and a jury, then preserved online for viewing anytime, often without the family’s consent. Now she wonders why it ever seemed necessary to document the killings. “Why were Black and brown people forced to pre-litigate their own murder trials in this way?” she writes. “Why was it necessary to form a counternarrative to the old stereotype of Black and brown folks’ criminality? Why did we ever need to produce a parallel storyline to an official police report?”

The practice only reinforces white supremacy, Richardson writes, reminding everyone of the protections police officers are afforded and the fate of people of color who object to this social order. She calls for suspending the airing of the videos online and on TV unless the family agrees they can be shown. That could prompt journalists to look into the systemic issues leading to the deaths instead of the exact second when a 13-year-old about to be killed dropped a gun. If we believe people of color, we can eliminate the “need to play this game of video empathy before justice,” says Richardson, who teaches journalism at USC. “We have enough proof,” she writes. “We have enough pain. What we don’t have is reform.” You can read the full piece here.

As I stated in the beginning…..I disagree with the premise…..

I do not think that the outcome would have been the same without the video.

I will agree that the MSM does have a tendency to beat the viewer about the head with them…..and until there is more accountability for the violence and death committed by the police the videos are needed.

I would love your thoughts.

Turn The Page!

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

This Apathetic Nation

It is like deja vu all over again.

Recently I gave my thoughts on this since the election of Joe Biden……read my thoughts here……https://lobotero.com/2021/02/01/the-apathy-is-deafening/

People, at least those here, were so concerned about the direction under the Trump leadership(?)…..and since the election of Biden the sound of crickets is prevalent.

Look at the past week…..the Super Bowl was the most important topic for discussion….like however won the game would change the face of the nation…..it did not and all it accomplished was the possibility of a super spreader for the pandemic that we all are trying to avoid…..well apparently NOT all.

In 1995 I gave up writing for a decade because few could see the direction of the country was spiraling downward and few could care less….was like people thought that since they had shelter and food the whole country was in great shape…..social issues meant nothing to these people.

After a decade of silence on my part I could stand the deafening apathetic attitudes of the American people and in 2005 I started trying to educate about the problems that were building just under the skin of the republic.

For example the rise in GOP led policies that try and limit voting by people that might vote Dem…..

Since former President Donald Trump failed to reverse the outcome of the 2020 presidential election, Republicans in more than two dozen states have introduced over 100 bills to restrict voting access, an alarming development that voting rights advocates have pointed to as yet another reason for Democrats to abolish the filibuster, an anti-democratic tool currently allowing the GOP minority to block the enactment of a suite of popular pro-democracy reforms.

Mother Jones journalist Ari Berman on Thursday reported on the GOP’s ongoing nationwide push to make voting more difficult—particularly for communities of color and other Democratic-leaning constituencies—and in some cases to empower state legislatures to overturn election results. He called state-level Republicans’ efforts “a huge scandal that should be getting as much attention as Trump’s plot to overturn the election.”

…

Already this year, 106 bills have been introduced in 28 states—including 17 under complete GOP control, where passage is more likely—to undermine access to the franchise. According to the Brennan Center’s report, “These proposals primarily seek to: (1) limit mail voting access; (2) impose stricter voter ID requirements; (3) limit successful pro-voter registration policies; and (4) enable more aggressive voter roll purges.”

https://www.commondreams.org/news/2021/02/05/downright-scary-2021-alone-gop-introduces-100-voter-suppression-bills-28-states

And yet the minds are closed….and NO one gives a crap.

Another example…..about 12% of Americans live below poverty line and yet the nation is perfectly fine with CEOs getting multi-million dollar bonuses while wrecking the economy…..now that is pathetic if it weren’t disgusting.

This nation gets dumber and more apathetic by the year…shades of the movie Idiocracy.

I blame my generation, the Baby Boomers, for these problems….we brought about the Me Generation where my personal life was more important than the nation…..we have tunnel vision…..we think that if we give to the Red Cross (for example) then we have done our part….and we give only because it can be a tax write off not that it benefits the people of this country.

After 15 years of trying to wake people up I am having the same apprehension I had back in 1995…..NO one cares anymore.

My grandfather had the perfect saying that expertly describes these dark days…..”When you teach pigs to dance you accomplish two things…first you waste your time and secondly you PISS off the pig”.

Maybe I would be more pleased if I just learned to “give a shit” like the majority…but sadly I was taught better than that….so for now I will continue to lecturing and point out the manure we are creating for ourselves.

 

 

 

Should We Be Concerned?

By now we all have seen the fiasco around and in the Capitol building on 06 January and the reports from the different news sources….but is it possible that there is not much to be concerned with?

This is an op-ed that shows little concern for the actions of some…..

Let’s be clear about what took place at the Capitol Building last night. This was a mob assault on the institutions of democracy. The ragtag army of Capitol breachers may have looked ridiculous, decked out in Trump-wear and face paint and antlers. But what they did was not ridiculous, it was serious. They illegally entered the democratic citadel of the United States, a beacon of democracy to many people around the world, with the express intention of blocking the peaceful transition of power voted for by their fellow citizens. They committed a violent incursion against the practice and the ideal of democracy.

Don’t exaggerate the threat of the Capitol rioters

I do not know if totally agree with this opinion.

What do you think?

Should we be concerned or not?

I say yes!

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

VOTE Today!

Closing Thought–03Nov20

Today in history….

1868–Ulysses Grant elected president

1896–William McKinley elected president

1964–Lyndon Johnson elected president

1992–Bill Clinton elected president

Onward……

I will be cruising the Coast to check on different polling stations to see if there is anything to report.

Today is the Big Day….time to make up your mind go to the polls and cast your worthless vote……worthless because all we will do is change who sits on the Golden Toilet in the White House.

“The people I distrust most are those who want to improve our lives but have only one course of action in mind.” ~ Frank Herbert

Policies will remain similar as those today…..the rich will get richer and the poor will go hungry….but at least were tried to rid the nation of the gutless wonders that control our very lives.

Regardless we need to vote our feelings and hopes…..

Then there are those creepy little piss ants that think they are tough by dressing like soldiers (something they are too cowardly to do in real life) and the DA of Philly has the right idea on the treatment of these small minded douche bags….

Philadelphia’s Democratic district attorney Larry Krasner is warning armed, so-called “poll watchers” to stay away from the city’s voting precincts unless they want to find themselves explaining to a jury why they “thought it was okay to come to Philly and steal our votes.”

“If you want to dress up like a G.I. Joe and claim you are protecting the polls when we all know what you’re really doing is intimidating voters,” Krasner told CNN on Friday, “you’re getting locked up.”

“Wannabe fascists stay home,” he added. “If your idea of how to have a democratic election is to steal it, then I’ve got something for you. I’ve got a jail cell, and I’ve got criminal charges.”

That should be law and enforced.

One final thought from Daniel Ellsberg (look him up)….

‘Tis the season for some progressives to argue that the best way to build a progressive political movement in America is to stick it to the centrist Democrats—who have rejected progressive nominees and platforms—by voting for a third party, even in swing states.

If that helps elect what many regard as a “greater evil” Republican, some third party supporters argue, it will radicalize significant parts of the electorate, help the third party grow, and gradually increase the prospect of victory for genuinely progressive politics.

As die-hard progressives, we strongly disagree. Few beliefs among progressives have been so thoroughly tested in empirical reality over the last twenty years—and few have been so thoroughly discredited—than the idea that running third party candidates in swing states during close elections is a good way to build a progressive voting bloc.

https://www.commondreams.org/views/2020/11/02/dear-fellow-progressives-please-vote-biden

“All governments suffer a recurring problem: Power attracts pathological personalities.” ~ Frank Herbert

“Governments can be useful to the governed only so long as inherent tendencies toward tyranny are restrained.” ~ Frank Herbert

“All governments suffer a recurring problem: Power attracts pathological personalities. It is not that power corrupts but that it is magnetic to the corruptible. Such people have a tendency to become drunk on violence, a condition to which they are quickly addicted.” ~ Frank Herbert

VOTE!

“lego ergo scribo”

Should US Troops Remain In The Middle East?

My first reaction to that question is…Hell NO!  Their families have suffered many years and it is time for them to be reunited with their soldiers.

Bring our troops home…..and the reasons are clear.

  1. The Middle East is a small, poor, weak region beset by an array of problems that mostly do not affect Americans—and that U.S. forces cannot fix. The best thing the United States can do is leave.
  2. The immense cost and evident fruitlessness of U.S. wars in the Middle East are widely lamented in American politics, but not enough to extricate U.S. troops. And even beyond the wars, U.S. policy in the region is an expensive and unnecessary disaster.
  3. The cost of maintaining forces to protect the Middle East from itself is extraordinary, even in peacetime. Conservatively, attempting to control the Middle East costs Americans on the order of $65–70 billion dollars each year, apart from the trillions spent on wars there. The number should be closer to zero.
  4. Nothing about the Middle East warrants the U.S. investment there over the past 30 years. The few important interests there—preventing major terrorist attacks, stopping the emergence of a market-making oil hegemon, curbing nuclear proliferation, and ensuring no regional actor destroys Israel—do not require American troops.
  5. The roughly 60,000 U.S. troops in the region should leave. American efforts to manage the Middle East make nothing about oil, Israel, or terrorism better. The United States would be better off withdrawing all forward-deployed troops from the region, while maintaining access agreements for naval ports with the consent of host countries.
  6. Withdrawing ground forces from the Middle East will make it harder for the United States to start or join any wars there. Shrinking the U.S. armed forces to reflect the lack of threat from the Middle East will free up resources for any number of higher priorities at home or abroad.

Six excellent reasons for pulling US troops out of the Middle East…..[

Why are we still there?

Is it to protect Israel?  If so I say fuck them let them do their own security.

Is it to protect oil?  Again I say screw it…we do not need their oil any longer.

Is it to keep the M-IC in defense contracts and their profits rolling in?  I think I have hit on the the true reason we are still there.  The industry spends billions on Congress they want their money to be well spent….if not they move on to the next corrupt politician that will do their bidding.

Why are we still in the Middle East?

(Insert your thoughts here)

Learn Stuff!

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

NO! I Will Not Support Biden!

Bernie has come out in support of Joe Biden in 2020….and Biden has said he wants to gain the support of Bernie Bros…..

I will not support Joe Biden!

Why?

Do I want Trump to be beaten in November?

Of course I do….but then I ask….at what price?

Sorry to all those Biden supporters…..but to me he is just a reptile that will change his stands whenever it is most beneficial to him…..he has NO principles in my opinion.

For one I do not appreciate a candidate that would use the death of a child as a political prop…..or that uses a child as a prop at all.

Plus as a senior I remember Biden’s days of calling for a cut in Social Security to balance the budget….

And after a Republican wave swept Congress in 1994, Biden’s support for cutting Social Security, and his general advocacy for budget austerity, made him a leading combatant in the centrist-wing battle against the party’s retreating liberals in the 1980s and ’90s.

“When I argued that we should freeze federal spending, I meant Social Security as well,” he told the Senate in 1995. “I meant Medicare and Medicaid. I meant veterans’ benefits. I meant every single solitary thing in the government. And I not only tried it once, I tried it twice, I tried it a third time, and I tried it a fourth time.” (A freeze would have reduced the amount that would be paid out, cutting the program’s benefit.)

https://theintercept.com/2020/01/13/biden-cuts-social-security/

Of course in the name of votes he will back off this plan……

I read  a piece by Jennifer Matsui that I agree with completely and she says it so much more eloquently than I could……

It’s not just dementia behind his decision to make another failed bid for the presidency, but the still active reptile part of his part that has always been its guiding force. ‘Survival of the unfittest’ is the evolutionary principle of the political class and the law of the Swamp. Biden has always been a primordial, slime dweller with a keen cockroach-like ability to adapt to his surroundings. He can do the bidding of a pro-segregation Senator, taking the opposite stance of his party on the issue of bussing, while using Black Panther talking points to make the case for institutional racism. He can serve at the behest of the first black president as his official court jester without ever having taken an honest inventory of his past, except to fill in the blanks between writing and passing atrocious Republican bills with fabricated stories of civil rights heroism. Today, Biden sees his role as the DNC’s black vote magnet as a natural extension of his previous incarnation as a “tough love” foreman on Strom Thurmond’s cotton plantation. There, he sharpened the implements Master Thurmond used to keep the slaves in line.

As Vice-President, he put a drunk handyman spin on the murderous policies for the two parties he serves, making drone programs and regime change seem as harmless as pretend-pissing in a punchbowl. You might even say that pretend pissing in a punchbowl has been Biden’s stock in trade for his entire political career. Degenerative brain disease has eroded the buffoonery down to a husk, and made visible the incontinent serial killer behind Pogo the Senator. The brightly colored cords that the infamous clown killer used to publicly entertain children with sleight of hand magic tricks was the same ligature used in private to incapacitate his victims. On both occasions, his targets were willingly duped into entrusting their safety to a clown with handcuffs. Now the DNC is asking voters to do the same. Biden’s bland, the average guy next door appeal has always masked a homicidal predator, now reduced to a math-addled playground flasher.

Joe Biden: Survival of the Unfittest

Again I do not want you to convert the reader to my thinking….all I am doing here is explaining why Biden is out as a candidate for me….you must do what you think is best for the country.

I see some Bernie supporters have refused to support Biden even to the point of a Never Biden movement……

There’s no question it’s been a banner two weeks for Biden. But lurking in the background of his sudden ascension to all-but-presumptive nominee is evidence that at least some Bernie Sanders supporters might not migrate to him in November, weakening him in the general election.

https://www.politico.com/news/2020/03/13/democrats-confront-a-never-biden-contingent-127438

I was not a Bernie supporter but I can get down with the movement of Never Biden…..

(About here I will get those that will start blaming me for their candidates loss…just like all those Hillary supporters after she got her butt handed to her by Trump)  (It was all us voters that did not vote for her that handed her the loss….had nothing to do with her being a POS as a candidate)

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

The Lincoln Project After The Fall

Closing Thought–05Aug20

Many of us have been exposed the the ads of the Lincoln Project. It is true Repubs and conservs that are not down with the silliness of the RNC and its defense of the toad Trump.

Their anti-Trump ads have become the stuff of legends.

The Lincoln Project?

President Abraham Lincoln led the United States through its bloodiest, most divisive and most decisive period of our history. He fought not because he wanted to, but because he knew the dual goals of preserving the Union and the end of slavery would be achieved only through armed conflict. Lincoln always kept the enormous human cost of the struggle in the front of his mind. At Gettysburg, he implored us not to forget those that had given “their last full measure of devotion” to preserving the American experiment. As it became clear that the Union would be victorious, Lincoln’s thoughts turned to how the nation would “bind up its wounds” and move forward together.

Today, we find ourselves divided again – sectionalism in the country and factionalism in government has led to ever uglier examples of how our political system is failing. President Donald Trump and those who sign onto Trumpism are a clear and present danger to the Constitution and our Republic. Only defeating so polarizing a character as Trump will allow the country to heal its political and psychological wounds and allow for a new, better path forward for all Americans.

https://lincolnproject.us/

A couple of the political ads from the Lincoln Project…..

These are excellent ads with a strong message.

Everyone is talking about the effect that the Lincoln Project is having on the GOP.

They may well be the best thing to happen to Joe Biden and they could be the very thing he needs to get himself elected in 2020.

Amid all the noise of an election involving Donald Trump – all the inflammatory tweets and shadowy Facebook posts – one set of ads has somehow managed to break through.

There’s the one of the US president shuffling down a ramp that declares that the president “is not well”. There’s the whispering one about Trump’s “loyalty problem” inside his White House, campaign and family.

There’s the epic Mourning in America that remakes Reagan’s election-defining 1984 ad, turning the sun-bathed suburbs into a dark national portrait of pandemic and recession. On Twitter, YouTube and Facebook, those three ads alone have racked up more than 35m views.

The Lincoln Project, run by a group of renegade Republican political consultants, has crystallized one of the core narratives of the 2020 campaign in ways that few other political commercials have in past cycles.

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/aug/01/lincoln-project-donald-trump-republicans-campaign-ads

We can enjoy the fact that Trump may well be gone from the White House in January 2021…..and the Lincoln Project will be the real cause that Trump was defeated.

And the peasants danced!

Please do not rejoice to soon.

WHY?

After Trump loses these people will revert back to the GOP and the Dems will be their targets….the very effective ad process will have a new foe and that foe is the Democrats.

All those creative juices that help defeat Trump will now be there to help Repubs regain their former glory.

Be warned and start NOW looking for a counter to the Project’s effectiveness.

Learn Stuff!

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”