August 7, 2022

“What’s the Matter with Kansas? How Conservatives Won the Heart of America” (2004) is a book by American journalist and historian Thomas Frank, which explores the rise of populist anti-elitist conservatism in the United States, centering on the experience of Kansas, Frank’s native state. In the late 19th century, Kansas was known as a hotbed of the left-wing populist movement, but, in recent decades, it has become overwhelmingly conservative. According to the book, the political discourse of recent decades has dramatically shifted from social and economic equality to the use of “explosive” cultural issues, such as abortion and gay marriage, which are used to redirect anger toward “liberal elites.”

Now that Kansan’s have overwhelming rejected eliminating the right to an abortion from the state constitution, we can now rightfully ask, “What’s Wrong With Arizona?” What is wrong with Arizona goes well beyond Kyrsyen Sinema’s fan girl obsession with the carried interest provision in the tax code that favors hedge fund billionaires. Arizona Republicans have just nominated four, mega MAGA election deniers for its highest offices. Mark Finchem, candidate for Secretary of State, is a member of the militia group, The Oath Keepers. Their candidate for Governor, Kari Lake, is a former TV news anchor. Blake Masters, candidate for the U.S. Senate, had advocated for impeaching President Biden and removing him from office. Masters encouraged people to read “Industrial Society and Its Future,” the manifesto of Unabomber Ted Kaczynski, for its analysis of the negative impact of technology on society; he pointed to Kaczynski as an example of a “subversive thinker” who should be more widely known.

Maybe if global warming continues with its attendant droughts, Arizona may become moot. At least we will know what happened. Thirst made it crazy.

August 6, 2022

Believe it or not, another football season is upon us. Players on both offense and defense are sweating through the dog days of summer. Preseason games are only a week away as teams prepare for the start of the season in September. Likewise, it’s also a good time for Democrats to review their offensive and defensive playbooks for the upcoming Fall elections.

The defense is loaded. There are the January 6th Committee hearings, which are the gift that keeps on giving. The Dobbs anti-abortion ruling by the Supreme Court energized the voters of Kansas to go to the polls and “just say no.” The wackadoodle Republican Party in Arizona has nominated a group of election deniers and conspiracy theorists for statewide offices, one of whom is a member of a white supremacist organization. Herschel Walker, J.D. Vance, and Dr. Oz give celebrity a bad name. Mitch McConnell, who will not win back the Senate, decided it was a good idea to hold up veterans payments. Alex Jones, an FOT (Friend of Trump), is now $50,000,000 poorer with more law suits on the way. Trumpian Matt Gaetz is probably afraid to open his mail.

The offense looks pretty good also. After much sausage-making, Biden, Schumer and Manchin got a deal done, which addresses climate change, healthcare, and inflation. This is on top of the original rescue package. Joe Biden forged an international coalition weakened by Trump to counter Russian aggression in Ukraine. He is bringing computer chip manufacturing back to Ohio. Inflation and the price of gas is coming down. COVID has receded from the headlines, and is no longer a burning issue for most Unemployment is at 3.5%, and the economy has regained all of the jobs it lost from COVID. Congress passed meaningful gun legislation.

We will see what impact the plays put in by the Biden administration will have on the midterm elections. As Bill Belichick might say, “It’s on to November.”

August 2, 2022

Republicans continue to outdo themselves. They fought President Obama on the Affordable Care Act, refusing to cast a single vote for the legislation. Then, they tried to repeal and not replace the legislation as many as seventy times. The ACA is wildly popular with a majority of the American people, but not among Republican lawmakers.

Then, the super majority of Conservatives on the Supreme Court, who were put there through the machinations of a Republican-controlled Senate, decided to deprive women of proper, prenatal healthcare. Women are literally bleeding to death because doctors don’t want to face law suits and the loss of their licenses.

Finally, Republicans won the healthcare trifecta by depriving veterans of the healthcare they need due to wounds they received from burn pits in Iraq and Afghanistan. Even now, veterans are camped out on the steps of the Capitol.

Why do they hate healthcare so much? The public health statistics in red, Republican-controlled states are well below those in blue states. The average life span is much less in red states than blues states, but nothing seems to matter to these people. As someone once said, “Don’t confuse them with the facts.”

July 31, 2022

With apologies to Jeff Foxworthy, you might be an aggressive driver if…

you tailgate regardless of the speed.

you think that one drink sharpens your senses.

you think that speed limits posted in school zones are just suggestions.

you believe that ten miles over the speed limit is a minimum.

you believe that directional signals are for others.

you are a honker and not a honkee.

you find that running a yellow light is a challenge.

you find that running a red light is a test of manhood.

you give someone the finger at least once a day.

you seethe at the sight of bike riders sharing the road.

your truck has a battering ram for a grill.

your car has more dings and dents than the Green Monster.

you have a skull and crossbones hanging from your mirror.

you list to the right while driving.

the judge at traffic court knows you by your first name.

the sight of a crosswalk is like waving a red cape in front of a bull.

you carry a baseball bat (or worse) because you never know.

your windows are tinted.

your car is festooned with NASCAR and STP stickers.

your Datsun is a stick shift.

you like your chances against a semi-tractor trailer.

July 28, 2020

Don’t know much about history

Don’t know much biology

Don’t know much about the science book

Don’t know much about the French I took

But I do know that I love you

And I know that if you love me too

What a wonderful world this would be

Don’t know much geography

Don’t know much trigonometry

Don’t know much about algebra

Don’t know what a slide rule is for

But I do know that I love you

And I know that if you love me too

What a wonderful world this would be

July 26, 2022

Running Man was a dance craze in the late 80’s. It looks like Senator Josh Hawley has done his best to revive it. Hawley was caught on camera running from the MAGA insurrectionists after he gave them the white power, clenched fist salute. Only Herschel Walker could have run faster. At the same time that the main networks were looping Harley’s run for glory, another station was interviewing Tommy Smith and John Carlos at the World Track and Field Championships. Smith and Carlos ran in the 1968 Olympics, finishing first and third in the 200 meters. On the awards platform, they both raised a black-gloved fist in support of Black Power. They were real runners, who were willing to suffer the consequences of their actions. They were expelled from the Olympic Games.

Smith and Carlos believed in a cause. You can draw a straight line from Black Power to Black Lives Matter. The specific issues may be different, but they both have a search for social justice as a common denominator. Josh Hawley doesn’t believe in anything. He is a craven opportunist. In the movie, “Casablanca,” Captain Renault famously said, “I have no conviction, if that’s what you mean. I blow with wind, and the prevailing wind happens to be from Vichy.” Replace Vichy with Trump, and you have Josh Hawley. Josh Hawley probably plans on running again some day for something, and it will be just as disgusting as his run from the Capitol.

July 26, 2022

I have been trying to figure out why social media is so popular and addictive. It is not uncommon to see entire families at dinner with their heads down, doom scrolling through all their feeds and posts. I have sampled some social media websites out of curiosity, but remain free of all social media websites. I am not trying to be a curmudgeon. I just find them to be a colossal waste of time. But what makes them so enticing?

Social media is like popcorn. It keeps you busy, but it doesn’t get you anywhere. It can last a long time, but it really has very little nutritional value. You could starve to death on a diet of popcorn. In the same way, people are mentally starving to death on social media platforms.

Social media presents no challenge to the reader. We are all procrastinators, and we deal with the easy stuff first. Social media is an endless string of easy, non-threatening content. We can pretend we are enriching ourselves, but the reality is true enrichment takes focus. Social media is anything but focused.

Let’s face it. We all love gossip. There is nothing like dishing the dirt about others, and diverting attention from ourselves. We revel in the misfortunes of others. The internet is one, big yenta.

Andy Warhol made the phrase “fifteen minutes of fame” famous. We all want our moment in the sun. Social media can make us the topic of conversation for a New York nanosecond, which isn’t exactly the same as fifteen minutes. Posting something like this blog doesn’t make you famous. It just proves you can type, and are semi computer literate.

Lastly, we are all cheap. The two most powerful words in advertising are new and free. As long as you can abide the steady stream of pop-up ads, social media is free. Maybe at some time in the distant future, it will stop being new. If and when that happens (don’t hold your breath,) we will stop being its tool, and start using social media as our tool. In the meantime, in the words of the Talking Heads, “We’re on a road to nowhere.”

July 20, 2022

Polls tell us that voters want schools to spend more time on core subjects, and less time on teaching critical race theory. They also tell us that voters do not want schools to teach sexuality to kindergartners. It doesn’t matter that neither of these things are happening. Republicans like Ron DiSantis have been very effective in creating these straw man issues. Assuming these really are core issues for many voters, what do Republicans want our schools to teach?

Science is clearly not a core subject. The scientific evidence that the world is warming is overwhelming, but children are taught by their parents that you can’t believe the data because it is generated by the elites and the deep state. The scientific evidence that we were in a pandemic was dismissed by Trump, Fox News and others. The POTUS advocated hydroxychloroquine, UV light, and equine medication while he vilified the science coming out of the CDC and NIH. Georgia Senate candidate, Herschel Walker, is a walking scientific Rorschach Test for the Republican Party.

English is a core subject as long as we teach what Conservatives want us to teach. They are banning and burning books. Nobel Prize winners in literature don’t pass the Right’s litmus tests. Math is a core subject as long as it doesn’t involve counting. In real world math, 81,000,000 is greater than 74,000,000, but not in the Republican classroom. 74,000,000 is greater because 81,000,000 is a fake number. The study of foreign languages is part of the core curriculum as long as the foreign language comes from a Caucasian country, and not from a Muslim or shit hole country. The study of History is much too important to be left to historians in the MAGA universe. White, armed militia show up at school board meetings to make sure we don’t study the atrocities committed by white, armed militia.

Education used to be seen as the elevator to upward mobility. In the wrong hands, it could become the escalator down.

July 18, 2022

Donald Trump infamously tried to ban all Muslims from the United States. He made sure that Republicans would be paranoid about Muslim extremists and the fear of Shariah Law being imported from abroad. So where do Muslims stand on abortion?

The Koran does not directly address intentional abortion, leaving greater discretion to the laws of individual countries. There are no explicit prohibitions on a woman’s ability to abort her child under Islamic law. There are different schools of thought in Islam about when life begins. However, abortion is recommended any time when the mother’s life is in danger. No Muslim-majority country bans abortion in the case of the mother’s life being at risk. The mother’s life is paramount. It is not an offense for which there are criminal or even civil sanctions. Other reasons that are permitted by Muslim-majority countries include preserving a woman’s physical or mental health, fetal impairment, cases of incest or rape, and social or economic reasons.

Republican-controlled states are criminalizing women who seek abortions. They want to restrict travel to states that offer maternal healthcare. They want to criminalize anyone who aids and abets a woman seeking an abortion, and are willing to offer bounties to vigilantes to this end. They want to put doctors in jail. They want to force ten year old rape victims to carry fetuses to full term. The health of the mother is of no concern to them. They want to federalize abortion restrictions.

Congratulations, Republicans. You have traded international terrorism for a more comfortable form of domestic terrorism. And you have created a form of religious law that would make Muslims wince.

July 9, 2022

There is an old saying down South. “Wherever you find four Baptists, you’ll find a fifth.” It is an apparent attempt to point out the hypocrisy that comes with being born again. Pretty soon, the Supreme Court will decide that it is not your right to not be born again. Donald Trump said he could shoot someone on Fifth Avenue, and get away with it. Apparently, he was right, and it is even easier now that you can open carry as you window shop. And we have an army general named Michael Flynn taking the fifth when asked if an armed insurrection of the Capitol can ever be justified. When answering the question, he looked like a Baptist after happy hour at the church. Not to pick on Baptists. Rudy Giuliani was credibly accused of over imbibing sacramental wine on election night as he was advising the President.

Beethoven’s Fifth takes the theme of heroic struggle. We all know the first four notes, dun dun dun dun. The Allies used it as a signal in WWII. I don’t see any heroes in the first paragraph. The Christian Coalition, the Supreme Court, Donald Trump, Michael Flynn and Rudy Giuliani are all co-conspirators in the overthrow of democracy and the diminution of personal rights. Donald Trump once said,”You see the mob takes the Fifth. If you’re innocent, why are you taking the Fifth Amendment?” Maybe the new saying should be, “Wherever you find four Republicans, one will be taking the fifth.”