Another magnificent piece -- "Love thy Nature" -- The Road Out

This link below made me cry sometimes and sometimes filled me with just plain awe.  I urge you to watch its beauty and listen to its truth.  Truth, often, is better than any fiction one could create.  While we have time to ponder the great creation that is life both large and small I highly recommend viewing the film below entitled "Love Thy Nature."

Is there something we can learn from the ravages of COVID-19?  Perhaps, it is this: As great as man's big brain is nature in all its creation is bigger than all of us.  It presents challenges that give man pause to reflect on his own diminutive being and ask why the smallest/simplest of microscopic things unseen by the naked eye yet worldwide are bringing man to his knees.  Why does this exist in nature only to pose an existential threat to man; a good topic for research.

I too was felled by a virus and asked many times over my life what on earth could a five year old have done that would exact its pound of flesh from a young body asking me to pay its extortion over a lifetime?  The answer, I think is, there is no answer but to say it teaches us humility that this microscopic piece of RNA will have the last word until man's big brain can figure out a way within nature's laws and working in tandem with nature to halt its destruction of our species.  Another answer, of course, is that man is not the center of the universe and that other things large and small can threaten and even destroy us.

Humans must heed the warnings of science to isolate, use masks, wash our hands for a minimum of 20 seconds and do what the best scientists implore us to do because science is the best way man has of telling environmental truth no matter how difficult that truth is to hear.  Until science with man's big brain as its engine, ultimately finds a way out of this mind altering darkness go and walk humbly with nature seeing the integral part it plays in our survival.  Man works hand in hand with nature and nature, in all its glory, will be the final arbiter of all things as it presents another ever present Everest for man to climb.  Man will climb it though and should do its bidding without destroying the nature that supports us all as it teaches us to find the road out.

https://uplift.tv/2019/love-thy-nature/?utm_source=UPLIFT+TV&utm_campaign=16c7d3caed-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_2020_04_21_11_39&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_932e12aea9-16c7d3caed-116678369&fbclid=IwAR3WTZeDP7EATLX1b38DPvxIPyoowwKS1mbvlmu5mWzPd7RViPusyND8-6w

British Writer Pens The Best Description Of Trump I’ve Read

Someone on Quora asked “Why do some British people not like Donald Trump?” Nate White, an articulate and witty writer from England wrote the following response:   

A few things spring to mind.   Trump lacks certain qualities which the British traditionally esteem. For instance, he has no class, no charm, no coolness, no credibility, no compassion, no wit, no warmth, no wisdom, no subtlety, no sensitivity, no self-awareness, no humility, no honour and no grace – all qualities, funnily enough, with which his predecessor Mr. Obama was generously blessed. So for us, the stark contrast does rather throw Trump’s limitations into embarrassingly sharp relief.  

Plus, we like a laugh. And while Trump may be laughable, he has never once said anything wry, witty or even faintly amusing – not once, ever. I don’t say that rhetorically, I mean it quite literally: not once, not ever. And that fact is particularly disturbing to the British sensibility – for us, to lack humor is almost inhuman.   

But with Trump, it’s a fact. He doesn’t even seem to understand what a joke is – his idea of a joke is a crass comment, an illiterate insult, a casual act of cruelty.   

Trump is a troll. And like all trolls, he is never funny and he never laughs; he only crows or jeers.   And scarily, he doesn’t just talk in crude, witless insults – he actually thinks in them. His mind is a simple bot-like algorithm of petty prejudices and knee-jerk nastiness.   

There is never any under-layer of irony, complexity, nuance or depth. It’s all surface.   Some Americans might see this as refreshingly upfront. Well, we don’t. We see it as having no inner world, no soul.   And in Britain we traditionally side with David, not Goliath. All our heroes are plucky underdogs: Robin Hood, Dick Whittington, Oliver Twist. Trump is neither plucky, nor an underdog. He is the exact opposite of that. He’s not even a spoiled rich-boy, or a greedy fat-cat.   He’s more a fat white slug. A Jabba the Hutt of privilege.  

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  And worse, he is that most unforgivable of all things to the British: a bully. That is, except when he is among bullies; then he suddenly transforms into a sniveling sidekick instead.   There are unspoken rules to this stuff – the Queensberry rules of basic decency – and he breaks them all. He punches downwards – which a gentleman should, would, could never do – and every blow he aims is below the belt. He particularly likes to kick the vulnerable or voiceless – and he kicks them when they are down.   

So the fact that a significant minority – perhaps a third – of Americans look at what he does, listen to what he says, and then think ‘Yeah, he seems like my kind of guy’ is a matter of some confusion and no little distress to British people, given that:

• Americans are supposed to be nicer than us, and mostly are. 

• You don’t need a particularly keen eye for detail to spot a few flaws in the man. 

 

This last point is what especially confuses and dismays British people, and many other people too; his faults seem pretty bloody hard to miss. After all, it’s impossible to read a single tweet, or hear him speak a sentence or two, without staring deep into the abyss. He turns being artless into an art form; he is a Picasso of pettiness; a Shakespeare of shit. His faults are fractal: even his flaws have flaws, and so on ad infinitum. God knows there have always been stupid people in the world, and plenty of nasty people too. But rarely has stupidity been so nasty, or nastiness so stupid.   He makes Nixon look trustworthy and George W look smart. In fact, if Frankenstein decided to make a monster assembled entirely from human flaws – he would make a Trump.   

And a remorseful Doctor Frankenstein would clutch out big clumpfuls of hair and scream in anguish: ‘My God… what… have… I… created? If being a twat was a TV show, Trump would be the boxed set. 

Trey Hollingsworth, Indiana congressman, says he's willing to let more Americans die to save economy -- The Wizard of Oz Trump

 https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/indiana-congressman-says-he-s-willing-let-more-americans-die-n1184036?fbclid=IwAR2bFDUNXXdAvdtMJNn3Jl_NRrwDh02az-kNfwAnyVDcWfBBe-YA1KZlUUc

 What if this immoral piece of sludge congressman gets the virus, suffers immeasurably and then dies leaving a family to fend for itself or his kids or wife gets too close to someone whom they do not know is COVID-19 positive and one or both of them contract it?  He does not care?  I am sure he cares about himself or his wife and children alright but rather it is the nursing home population, the elderly, the sick, the homeless and the poor whom he wants to be the sacrificial lambs since they are the ones most at risk.  However, in reality, no one is immune from this most deadly infectious virus spread by close human to human contact.  He is willing to let more Americans die as long as it is the at risk population so the economy can get going. He is an intrinsically ugly, immoral, and unethical human being -- the mirror of Trump.  He seems to be suggesting we do like the Nazis did and kill off those who are sick, the elderly in nursing homes, the homeless and the poor, that is all those who cannot work to boost the economy.  Is this the same guy that wants fetuses not to be aborted because he is so pro life.  He is a hypocrite.

The Corona virus required action when it first reared its ugly head and was botched by Trump back in January when he said only 15 have it and it will disappear miraculously.  He was being prodded then to do something but what did he do?  He threw out those many in the CDC who were Obama leftovers and were pandemic experts because Trump did not think they mattered, did not care or know anything about the issue, and after all, it was Obama's policy, of course.  He could have saved thousands if he acted sooner when he was first told by epidemiological experts this virus could be bad.  Thousands of people did not have to die while Trump played golf in Fantasy Land.

Now he will botch it again by advocating for people to go back to work too soon when we know physical distancing and other sanitary behaviors like wearing masks and washing hands frequently definitely bend the infection curve in the right direction.  Businesses can open up but only after careful scrutiny that the cases in intensive care units around the nation are lowering.  However, money trumps (pardon the pun) all in Trumpland human life be damned.  Trump, after all has an election to win.  As usual Trump thinks only of himself.  It has been said from the very beginning of the botched surge of the virus testing, testing, testing is the first important order of business. We cannot know how many have the virus and/or have antibodies to it until we test for it.

Trump lies and lies all the time.  We do NOT have the world's best testing, have NOT tested millions and everyone who wants a test canNOT get a test. If governors order a state's population free to go back to work too early many more will die, Trump will blame someone else and we will be brought back to ground zero.  I hope the governors of our 50 states make prescient choices because the allegedly all powerful wizard of Oz Trump cannot handle this pandemic, cannot lead and is in way over his head.   No matter what happens vote blue, tell everyone else you know to do so and save lives.

My letter to the Atlantic "This Is Trump’s Fault" by David Frum

This was a wonderful, precise and thorough analysis of Trump's failure to act in a timely fashion to rope and hog tie a killer virus saving thousands an untimely death.  I am sending this article to my political allies and hope they will read it (linked below) ferociously getting every nugget of truth Mr. Frum serves up.  I believe it is unnecessary to expound on the veracity of this article but I will do so anyway.  The opinion is true, 100% true every morsel of it and I thank Mr. Frum for writing it.

I hope this pandemic scourge will finally crush the Trump presidency as it has been a weighted albatross around the necks of those who loath Trump's lies but enjoy rational well thought out truth.  Trump's lies are legion and I believe are seen by the nation who will be more than happy to give him a kick with a steel tipped boot out of the oval office.  I only regret that his presidency has cost so many lives but has made Trump millions at the public trough.  Loosing an election would be too easy for Trump.  Jail, however, may be a more appropriate and just accommodation for the many illegalities he has committed. 

Trump said he could kill someone in the middle of Times Square and get away with it.  Perhaps that was so but inflicting great injury and death upon thousands of innocent souls from a pandemic by his failure to act may not provide him the same comfort. 

Excellent article, Mr. Frum and 100% correct!

https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2020/04/americans-are-paying-the-price-for-trumps-failures/609532/

I weep -- Passover prayers

The Facebook post below written by a friend is one of the best opinions I have seen yet of Trump's contribution to the Corona pandemic this nation is suffering today. I believe the blogger is 100% correct. I am going to cut and paste his post below for my friends and allies to read. I do not know if any have seen on HBO "The Plot Against America" a work of fiction based on the Phillip Roth novel and created by David Simon and Ed Burns. It is eerie in its similarity to what Trump is.  In the film the fictional winner of the 1941 election was Charles Nazi lover Lindbergh, a true extreme right winger so called "hero" of that period who thank God in reality wanted to be president but did not run. My anger at what this misfit Trump has done to our nation knows no bounds as I sit screaming at the TV when the bastard is bloviating at his so called "press conference" or what should be called his campaign and lies rallies. Often I turn him off as I simply cannot stand the harangue and mendacity.

I am sickened by what has gone down in this nation as this unfit-for office (to say the least) president is dismantling it piece by piece. The thing, though, I am most angry and horrified at are his Nuremberg-like supporters who are blinded by the darkness he has created so they cannot see the light and the man behind the curtain who is destroying a one time powerful vibrant democracy. The Carona death wielding virus is a metaphor for the war inside our country Trump has waged tearing us apart threatening to kill us. I am in mourning for the nation I know the United States of America once was and I weep every day for it.

I have prayers this Passover that the scourge of Trump passes over our nation like the Angel of Death did in the Biblical Exodus story sparing us further destruction.  I pray Trump loses resoundingly in November, then faces jail time for the abundance of the crimes he has committed and our country returns to the free humane democracy it once was.  Send this to anyone you choose and in November (if there is an election) vote blue up and down the ticket sparing this nation the rank incompetence and death wielding policies of Trump!

The Facebook post:  " trump [sic] knew of the potential pandemic in January. He disbanded our CDC Emergency Control Center two years ago leaving us completely unprepared for this pandemic. He has refused to require manufacturers to begin to make respirators when it was in his power to do so. This has cost hundreds, if not thousands of lives going forward. Manufacturers have volunteered their services but only a handful and delayed.
Trump has expressed no remorse for the deaths he had caused by his inaction during his daily political rallies disguised as press conferences.
He is promoting a malaria drug he is financially vested as a cure, when in fact it has been proven, in many cases, ineffective and fatal.
His ineptitude is epic."

Comparing Trump’s Coronavirus Response To Herbert Hoover’s Great Depression Failure

This article linked below is a very good comparison between two failed presidents, how they are similar and how they are different.Herbert Hoover neither knew nor does Donald Trump know what to do nor how to marshal federal power. I thank god for my hero Franklin Roosevelt every day, cried at his grave site in Hyde Park and wish fervently then and now for a return of that wonderful kind of humane inspiring leadership that ushered in a new way of thinking about the federal government's power to help its people and save a nation from hard times. It is about not treating government like the enemy but treating it as the only thing of power that can save a huge nation from a humanitarian and economic disaster. Call it socialism or call it the road to communism it was neither of those dog whistles. Call it chicken soup I do not care what one calls it it was a way of saving a nation and thinking humanely about the people living in it who are suffering and in trouble. It was a way of innovating thought about a nation that is a collection of beings who need help. A nation is not a rock. It is an assembly of humanity that sometimes needs prescient leadership to come to its rescue. The Roosevelt New Deal restored our nation to economic viability and brought back a nation from Great Depression disaster. We are in those times now but are burdened with a leader who does not think of us at all, who does not care about us and who cares mostly about his polls and winning the next election damn the fact that this nation is on the edge of a pandemic abyss where death is our constant companion.

This president simply will not act as science tells him to act for the entire nation in a way to stem the greatest pandemic ever to hit the global scene in one hundred years. If he does not act it will send this nation into economic free fall. The Carona virus is a national problem. It needs a national collective solution with strong executive leadership and not a states' rights individualistic one depending on this governor or that for individual answers one state bargaining against another for PPE (personal protective equipment.)

No matter how much he bloviates and looks like a powerful Mussolini fascistic populist Trump is not a strong man but a weak one who does not know the first thing about governing a nation through the strongest storm. Neither he nor his son-in-law of zero experience, Jared Kusner, know what to do. Trump is a man who could not save from bankruptcy even his own casinos much less save a nation of 325 million people from a pandemic economic collapse. It is our bad luck to have elected a puerile know nothing narcissist driving the ship of state into ruin. Rescue it and save our nation by voting blue up and down the ticket in November.

 https://www.huffpost.com/entry/donald-trump-herbert-hoover_n_5e879fb4c5b6cbaf2828e7c0

Coordinate all Disaster Relief--If you want to know how to handle a pandemic listen. Magnificent instruction all should hear

I believe the link below is yesterday's show that was magnificent as only Rachel can do it. Listen and marvel at her professional analysis of how our so called "president" should be dealing with Covid-19. She compares it with Bush's handling or non handling of Katrina and how a military man General Honore managed the Katrina disaster when Bush did one right thing and appointed him. That is who should be handling this Corona pandemic--our excellent military who have disaster experience! A general who knows what he is doing should take charge!!!  It is amazing that the most inept human on earth is in the oval office.  What is more amazing than that are those who voted for him!  

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yjP2k3dyq48&list=PLDIVi-vBsOEyETRGoRP9y8zhyu6bHl6iK&index=2&t=0s&fbclid=IwAR0DYYAFlNxz-ddLFZ_NmX6vjoUvcQBERfRSEJgWsr_2sPbOvkcCSdaQDRk

The lesson of the coronavirus pandemic? Competence matters by Michael Cohen--My Comment LEARN WELL WHY ELECTIONS MATTER

My Comment: No, Democrats are not perfect but as one observes history, modern Republican administrations have proven murderous. See the link below. From Reagan and Gingrich's negative view of government desirous of reducing it to the "size of a postage stamp" to Bush's 9/11 horrific mistake-saturated Iraq War and the massive hurricane Katrina "heck of a job Brownie's" dastardly incompetent response the failures of Republican leadership are legion. Thousands die at the direction of inefficacious even unintelligent Republican government hating leaders.

The massive incompetence, illegalities and crimes against humanity of Trump are too voluminous to state here. Please read the link below and observe the carnage.

The difference between Republican and Democrat is the former hates government and wants to reduce it and the latter wants government to work for the governed. In times

of national catastrophe I believe government is the only answer that can work for all the people.

The summary I am left with is elections matter. I urge you to remove the criminal in the oval office and vote blue up and down the ticket if there is an election in November to be had.  Rescue our lives and that of our nation!  Pass this on to anyone you choose.

https://www.bostonglobe.com/2020/03/28/opinion/lesson-coronavirus-pandemic-competence-matters/