How has it come to this?

My father and I had many political discussions.  His views, at least initially, had a profound impact on me.  Although Republican he did not hide his love for Franklin Roosevelt and his love of Roosevelt's proclivity for verbal eloquence.  When FDR spoke my father listened.  I was born well after Roosevelt's death but I felt like I knew him.  I visited his grave, Eleanor's grave and his dog Fala's grave at Hyde Park, New York.  I stood there and cried yearning for that moment in time when he lived to be repeated in my era.  I have never known what it would be like to love a president like my father loved Roosevelt. 

I wonder, too, what he would think of our current classless and brash 1000 lies narcissistic president who loves himself more than anyone else and because he does perpetrated the greatest con of the century upon an electorate who believed the lies he told.  He was going to give big tax breaks to everyone but did so permanently only for the top 2% wealthiest telling his friends at his Mar A Lago Estate that they were going to love him come tax time.  He told his supporters during the campaign that he was going to repeal Obamacare but that he was going to replace it with something better than before, moreover, he was not going to let insurance companies get away with not paying for preexisting conditions.  He did neither.  He told them he was going to solve illegal immigration but said nothing about a Holocaustesque separation of children from their parents made worse by failing to include a way to reunite them with the parents who brought them into this world in the first place leaving them alone and afraid stuck in cages or tents.  How did it come to this?

Trump told his fans he was extraordinarily wealthy, a fabulous businessman and smart.  They did not care he refused to show his taxes even though every other modern-day president has proclaiming ad infinitum they were under audit.  What was he hiding?   They did not care that he refused to show a copy of his grades and threatened a lawsuit if any of the institutions he attended revealed them.   When the Access Hollywood tape came out as he proudly declared because he was rich women let him do most anything to them.  Even that did not bother his so called moral Evangelical supporters.  He is the first American president to fall in love with authoritarian dictators and eschew the democracies of Europe even threatening NATO, America's premier defense of Europe.  I have read and it has been alleged that he keeps on his night table a copy of Mein Kampf, Hitler's autobiography written in Landsberg prison where he was held for an attempted overthrow of the German Weimer state.  Trump, by his own admission, has fallen in love with Kim Jong Un, the brutal executioner of the innocent of N. Korea.  Then there is always Putin, the man he loves the most; a man whom he believes did not subvert the 2016 election because Putin told him emphatically he did not and Trump believes him over the truth tellers of his own national security administration.  How did it come to this?

By far the most subversive element in which he is now engaged is threatening our nation's greatest 1789 foundational legacy -- The Constitutional separation of powers.  Our Founders formed this government so that each coequal branch of government would protect against totalitarian usurpation of power the Founders knew human flesh to be heir to.  They wanted a Republic we could keep.  Trump's hand has been caught in the cookie jar stealing all the benefits democracy has to offer, siding with dictators and denying all that our first branch of government, the legislative branch, is requesting from its second Executive branch.  Sure, Trump thinks, let it play out in the courts.  By that time he would have won a second term.  Donald J. Trump is a liar, he is a con man, he is a racist,  a self dealer, a criminal, a lousy deal maker we now know lost 1 billion bucks from from 1985 to 1994 paying zero taxes.  We now know he would be indicted, convicted and sent to jail for his myriad of crimes too numerous to mention here if only he were not president of a nation which does not indict a sitting president.  How has it come to this?

In one of my many discussions with my father I asked him about the 1933 southern Populist Governor of Louisiana, Huey Long.  My father said that he was a bad man who wanted to be a king.  Huey Long was ultimately assassinated on the steps of the Louisiana state capitol.   It reminds me of the Lord Acton quotes:

“Power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely."

“Despotic power is always accompanied by corruption of morality.”

“Authority that does not exist for Liberty is not authority but force.”

“Everybody likes to get as much power as circumstances allow, and nobody will vote for a self-denying ordinance.”

“Absolute power demoralizes.”  

Will our Republic stand against this would be dictator Trump or will it succumb to an authoritarian corrupt executive who in his heart wants to be a king?  We must ask ourselves how it has come to this and, if we survive it, how will we never let it happen again.

Terror on the Right

Trump Admin Disbanded Domestic Terror Unit Amid Rising Far-Right Violence

The far right is the most vicious and violent of all on the political spectrum. The far right has zero empathy and zero morality. They are exclusionary and not egalitarian or inclusive. Since their morality is zero, killing for their cause -- the white "race" is done with impunity. They do not care about those who cannot care for themselves. Their belief in a superior white race means that they want the weakest to die and government to pay nothing to help anyone. It's that simple. 

Read Mein Kampf for their road map and listen to Adolph Hitler's screaming diatribes for their inspiration.  Trump has his visions set on eradicating Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security with a rollback of corporate regulations initiated in other administrations to protect us and the planet we live on.   The only thing Trump wants to protect is his bank accounts no matter the fraudulent methods he used to accumulate his wealth.  It is time to RESIST this, and act for all of those who cannot act for themselves.

The Unsinkable Hatred of the Jew

The killing of one and the wounding of three at the Chabad Synagogue in Poway, CA, the killing of 11 Jews at the Tree of Life Synagogue in Pittsburgh and anti-Semitic strikes having risen 57%  in the United States forces the embers of my anger to reverberate once again in my soul, to rise up again in my consciousness and to yet again decade after torturous decade prod me to ask why. 

Shakespeare writes of Shylock the Jew in The Merchant Of Venice Act 3, scene 1, 58–68 circa 1596:

"I am a Jew. Hath not a Jew eyes? Hath not a Jew hands, organs, dimensions, senses, affections, passions; fed with the same food, hurt with the same weapons, subject to the same diseases, heal'd by the same means, warm'd and cool'd by the same winter and summer, as a Christian is? If you prick us, do we not bleed? If
you tickle us, do we not laugh? If you poison us, do we not die? And if you wrong us, do we not revenge? If we are like you in the rest, we will resemble you in that."
Shylock's questions are profound and yet the answers to his questions remain to this day illusive.  Why one Jew or why 6 million Jews killed beggars the imagination so we strive with dizzying thought to find rationality in the irrational.  How does a religion whose Son of God is a Jew, whose people were Jews, and whose religious practices were Jewish become the missile of world-wide vitriolic AntiSemitic hatred throws?

The answers incomplete as they are lie, of course, in two thousand years of text, bounced around over history's net in the spoken word from one generation to the next so that even utterly mendacious and insipid untruths appear as fact and are used in some ritual or another as a reason to torture and murder Jews at any time, at any place and for any reason.  Old canards are by the murder at Poway used to mix with even older accusations of deicide taken from some New Testament texts to aid in his rationale for murder.  Anti-Semitism evolves.   “You are not forgotten Simon of Trent, the horror that you and countless children have endured at the hands of the Jews will never be forgiven,” the killer wrote using the Internet as his servant.  "His thoughts reached millions around the world. But the hatred at its core could have been plucked directly from the 15th century" or even the second century to contemporary antisemitism that boasts "Jews will not replace us" as if Jews everywhere were looking to do just that. 

The longest hatred has albeit evolved over time so that it is able to neatly mix with the prevailing cultural milieu endeavoring to strike fear in the hearts of white Christian men and women everywhere that prompts them toward violence in service of it. Accusations against the Jew by white Nationalists as the polluter of whatever the white Christian race is serves up a fundamental ingredient of anti Semitism and a rationale for the murdering of all Jews. But, no, that is not enough.  Anti Semitism must rest on its initial accusation some two thousand years ago of God killer.  Who could argue with killing a people whose ancestors were guilty of committing that?  I could and you should -- all of you -- lest this Republic Franklin admonished us to keep will not be kept and this oldest of hatreds will become unsinkable.

Danger: Angry Trump supporter showed up at Hillary Clinton's home to demand her arrest

Will the toxicity of right wingnuts in their land of idiocy never give it up? The irony of it all that they still carry the burning cross tar and feathers for Hillary from a campaign three years old instead of looking at their crime syndicate lover Donald Drumpf.

Trump's crimes are ENORMOUS and his unconstitutional behavior mind numbing. You idiot, Mr. Cross Hat, take a look at Matthew 7:5: "You hypocrite! First take the log out of your own eye, and then you will be able to see clearly to take the speck out of another."

Hillary's "crimes" if she even had any which she does not pale by comparison to Donald the Emolument's Clause violator, the obstruction of justice and abuse of power, money laundering, self dealing, mendacious criminal Trump!

 

 

https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2019/4/24/1852755/-Danger-Angry-Trump-supporter-showed-up-at-Hillary-Clinton-s-home-yesterday-to-demand-her-arrest?detail=facebook&fbclid=IwAR3Gdk8d6kxUOU-I1ZnVuyJ_idwwbhSe1JiU03eoB9S60dPYzV4OeJ4cmaY

Where I stand -- the Mueller Report -- lives of generations

Where do I stand?  The short answer is I am not sure.  The issues are not only complex but of the gravest nature that Democrats get it right.  The Report was as impeccable in substance as it was long in length (448 pages.)  I am of two minds one of which was formed by a political ally and compatriot. 

 

My first thoughts last evening:  If Democrats controlled the Senate there would absolutely positively be enough -- more than enough -- evidence to impeach this so called president.  He would not only be impeached but he would be the first president in US history to be convicted and removed from office. Three presidents in American history are of impeachment note -- Andrew Johnson was impeached in 1868, Richard Nixon in 1974 (resigned before certain impeachment and certain conviction in the Senate) and Bill Clinton.  No president has been convicted ... yet.  Today the Democrats do not control the Senate Republicans do.  Because of that conviction on impeachment would be nearly impossible and, as many say, would be a waste of time. 

Maybe it would not be a waste of time. Looking at the Clinton impeachment.  In 2000 the electorate gave Republicans the presidency.  It gave them the House and the Senate through 2007. Maybe we could have our cake and eat it too. Trump could definitely be impeached by a Democratic control of the House. Although there would be no conviction in the Senate that impeachment in the House would historically stand. It would be an eternal stain on Trump and his presidency even if he could not be convicted in the Senate. The election of 2020 because of the shameful stain of impeachment as well as a huge amount of evidence against him on obstruction could throw the 2020 election entirely in Democratic hands.  From what I have investigated after the Clinton embarrassment impeachment and during the contentious 2000 Bush presidential election the Republican Party kept control of both the House of Representatives and the U.S. Senate until 2007. This time Democrats could take it all.

Another view:

"In the case of this lunatic president, the House going after him would be throwing raw meat to his base. The last thing we want is to have him re-elected! To some extent we need to listen to Nancy and the House Committee Chairs. Remember that the chairs will investigate and may get lots more incriminating evidence on him, including the financial information. Once he is out of office, he could be a busy boy in court for some time" If found guilty no one would be there to pardon him.  He could end up in jail.

Presidential historian John Meacham believes in the Constitutional process which leaves it to Congress to remove a president from office.  While this would be the optimum way to proceed practicalities may need to dictate otherwise.  There are serious cases against Trump and others in the Southern District of New York and elsewhere.  Trump will, I believe, pay and pay dearly.  Perhaps, we should not court even the possibility of handing impeachment red meat to Republicans during the 2020 campaign. Perhaps we should let the exposé which Mueller has iterated en masse to perfection in his Report which we should read and let the massive obstruction of justice and other malevolent acts do its electoral job.

Note Bene: Listening to Congressman Tim Ryan 3rd District of Ohio on Morning Joe who attended a town meeting last night.  He said no one in two hours of discussion mentioned the Mueller Report.  He said no one cared about the Mueller Report but they cared about making ends meet, jobs and they cared about their children.  That says a lot and from my observation tragically so.  Nothing less than our democracy is at stake.  It envelopes all issues economic, political and most importantly international.  Life and death issues are mandated by a president.  It is one of the most important choices we can make.  We must think about who we are and who we want to be.  Nothing short of the lives of generations are at stake.

Survival of a Nation: Reconstruction--America After the Civil War

I watched Part II of this two part work of excellence on PBS, Reconstruction--America After the Civil War. Part 1 dealt with the beginnings of slavery to the end of it in 1865. The first slave ship arrived in Jamestown in 1619. Slavery ended as an economic practice in 1865. For nearly 250 years persons of color had to endure conditions beasts of burden did not even have to endure.

Worse still once the Lincoln assassination occurred persons of color slowly but surely began to endure a second humiliating institutional reality almost mirroring the slave system itself. Reconstitution Part II deals with the reality of Jim Crow in the late 1800's and the federal government relinquishing enforcement of the freedom that the union Civil War victory brought. How persons of color had to endure such indignities for so many years I will never know. Even Courts including the Supreme Court of that time would not protect them.

Sound familiar as the immoral right wing so called "conservative" justices of our time call our society a "post racial" one. It has given racist whites free rein to think of creative ways to deny persons of color the vote and has eradicated that part of the Voting Rights Act of 1965 that oversaw those states, especially in the south, which most egregiously flouted civil rights law.

Think about it. What have both state and federal white Representatives, Senators, and Presidents done by placing right wing extremist judges on both lower courts and the Supreme Court?  They have packed the courts with extremist right judges undermining the last vestige of hope to maintain racial equality.

How ironic that the very first bone of contention slavery may result 400 years later in a permanent civil schism in our nation in our time. Watch these episodes narrated by the historian Henry Louis Gates Jr. and then RESIST the cancer of Trump and his presidency that permanently threatens our body politic today. The price of Trump's corrupt presidency is not only felt today but may survive for decades to come IF our nation survives at all.  VOTE DEMOCRAT IN 2020 to make sure that it does.

Video: Pete Buttigieg Speaks French During French TV Interview on Notre Dame Fire

https://www.newsweek.com/pete-buttigieg-notre-dame-cathedral-speaking-french-notre-dame-fire-gerard-1397610

WHAT A GUY!!!

Richard Engel -- on Assignment -- a must see

Not only does Richard Engel do a segment on Steve Bannon's attempt at subverting Pope Francis and creating an uber conservative Catholic Church but he also does a segment on Russian systems in Moscow and maybe elsewhere that are dedicated to foment discord among adversarial groups especially in the western democracies.

It is why those of us dedicated to humanitarian causes and nonviolence should not get into shouting matches with extremist right wing fanatics religious or otherwise or use profane language in heated arguments. I will try to follow my own advice.

The best way to fight this onslaught is either by not reacting or by reacting with peaceful sentiment and humanitarian beliefs. Watch Richard Engel's On Assignment if you haven't to see how this is being done. [linked below].  The Russian attempt is brazen and getting worse as time goes by probably into the 2020 election!

Think for yourself and do not allow them to destroy what is good and humane in our nation.  Pass this on to anyone.

https://www.msnbc.com/onassignment

The Politics of Peace--My letter to Congresswoman Rashida Talib

Dear Congresswoman Talib: I want to address the right wing violence and ugly verbiage levied against you in particular and Muslims in general.  I am a Jewish woman and heretofore an ardent supporter of the State of Israel. Since, however, the election of the aggressive and in my view closed minded Netanyau with the help of the corrupt, inhumane, mendacious and cruel Trump I have changed. I want to tell you why I have changed which includes both the etiology of my historical position and the one to which I subscribe today. My political bent has formed since 1958 when I as a child viewed the first film on the Holocaust. The devastating Holocaust history of the Jewish people became the footing on which my politics stood. My politics is still left of center BUT the historical rationals in our era have changed. I joined J Street, a progressive Jewish organization, which seeks peace not against Palestinians but WITH Palestinians. I believe in fundamental fairness, justice, and I believe human beings can work together to find that commonality which can work against violence, against war, against hate but for understanding and peace. I seek not to move away from what you say but urge you to soften what you say so that it falls on more receptive ears. I ask you to try to use my experience as your own guide to speak to Palestinian hardship as well as the Jewish Holocaust experience to talk to people with an understanding of both sides and a standing against hate both Netanyahu and Trump perpetuate but do not ameliorate.

I was against placing the US embassy in Jerusalem, so cavalierly talking about expanding settlements and the appropriation of the West Bank. This cruel and inhuman treatment of Palestinians cannot stand and should not stand. Recognizing the Holocaust taught us to speak out against injustice and is its most profound instruction. Those of us who desire humanitarian and just politics must not let cruelty stand because I believe it will mean more violence and death for both Palestinians and Israelis if not to the world at large. Your points are listened to by me. References to old antiSemitic memes provoke anger in all Jews but understanding of both positions will speak for truth, justice and peace! That is what must be emphasized by you and should speak to the politics not of war and hate but of understanding and peace.

Assange innocent?

The US is surely not the only aggressive nation on planet earth. I would put, without a doubt, Russia into that illustrious group and Putin one of the worlds most belligerent and corrupt authoritarian dictators at the helm. Assange played footsie with Russia and Putin. I submit he was no choir boy. Moreover, from accounts of those who worked with Assange he was a beast and allegedly no joy for whom to work.

Assange I suspect, but have no evidence of this, was paid by Russia and had a hand in the electoral 2016 cabal. I am politically left of center BUT that does not mean I am willing to look the other way when it comes to nation states whose behavior is egregiously immoral and people like Assange do not do that or Snowden for that matter takes cover in Russia. In my opinion, it is a world where the lesser of evils must be taken into account. Putin and his oligarchic friends kill their opposition with mind numbing cruelty and invade neighboring nations to rule with an iron fist. I would like someone like Glenn Greenwald or Noam Chomsky for once to be an equal opportunity employer and call out a nation like Russia or Saudi Arabia and many more whose behavior is worthy of scorn!  Going on RT (Russia TV) and proclaiming Assange's innocence is laughable and more laughable is Putin proclaiming Assange's capture was a violation of freedom of the press.  Hah! Putin is no civil libertarian. Go there, criticize Putin, and see which area of Siberia you end up or worse and most probably so you will end up dead killed in Saudia Arabian brutal form.

I say follow the money. Assange stole classified information and it has been alleged got paid mucho dolares to release it and worse played into Trump's hands. Oh how Trump loved Wikileaks he said 160 times. That alone puts Assange in the unethical dumpster!

Yes, it is a cruel world and a spy vs. spy world. The US must play that game too and be protective of itself to survive. I'll take the US any day over so many others most especially Russia but I want to take it WITHOUT the democracy destroying Trump!

White House proposed releasing immigrant detainees in sanctuary cities, targeting political foes+ my short comment

https://www.washingtonpost.com/immigration/white-house-proposed-releasing-immigrant-detainees-in-sanctuary-cities-targeting-political-foes/2019/04/11/72839bc8-5c68-11e9-9625-01d48d50ef75_story.html?utm_term=.d2e0aae9fdc8&wpisrc=nl_most&wpmm=1

My Comment Trump is a bastard! He is the worst president in US history bar none. Something has to be done as he is leaving this nation unsecured vacancies everywhere. He knows nothing about anything. He cares NOTHING of homeland security but wants to penalize those who are the neediest. Christ would be leading Sanctuary Cities.

Trump is the evil ANTI-Christ who needs to be taken down by the Republicans who staggeringly support him and the worst of the worst policies and department heads who know nothing about the department they lead. He lies ALL the time. He is a corrupt conman who has taken his base for the ride of the century.  He is a beast and Dems better get the gd word out and do it FAST or you will be seeing him for god forbid four more years ruling over the death of our Republic.

Perhaps Israel will be an option for me if the unthinkable happens. RESIST AND GET OUT THE GD VOTE!

In a heartbeat

Allow me the privilege of copying and pasting the essence of one of our best Democratic candidates who both served in Iraq and is also a Rhodes Scholar.  It is a bit lengthy but I ask you to read it because elections matter and it is important.  I will have a short comment about it below.  Please feel free to share.

Pete Buttigieg got this question from CNN's Jake Tapper: "If elected President, you would have the most military experience of a commander-in-chief since George H.W. Bush, who fought in WWII. Barack Obama didn't have any military experience. Does it matter? It's certainly an important part of your biography, and we honor it, but does it matter as a part of your resume for President that you serve?"
Pete: "I think so. I don't mean to say that you have to have served in the military to be eligible to run, but I do think that it brings a lot of perspective. First of all, again, you can never lose touch with why politics matters, with why it matters who's sitting at that desk. When you have had the experience of writing a letter and then putting it in an envelope marked 'just in case', and putting it where you know your family can find it, and packing your bags and leaving, you have a sense of the gravity and the weight of the decisions that are made in the White House. But there's something else about serving that I think the generation of George HW Bush and JFK experienced, which is that it brings you together with other Americans. When I got into the vehicle - a big part of my job was just driving and guarding vehicles on movements around Kabul, or occasionally between Kabul and Bagram. You know, when somebody got in my car, my vehicle, they didn't care whether I was a Republican or a Democrat, they didn't care if I was going home to a girlfriend or a boyfriend. They wanted to know if I was doing my job well and if I could keep them safe, and we learned to trust each other with our lives, even though our politics and our lives back home were so different. And I think we need to get back to that. It shouldn't require going to war to get that. But one reason I'm a big believer in expanding opportunities for national service is that we need more common experiences, in this world that's divvied up into Twittersphere bubbles and ideological echo chambers, we need more of those experiences that can bring us together even when we have nothing in common except the fact that we're American."

My Comment:  To have a chief executive who has not only the ability to fight but the ability to empathize with the heart of his/her nation that liberated Europe nearly 75 years ago; a nation and its military which was staggered by the carnage of what our men saw with incredulous eyes and then freed with the help of a commander in chief whose values convinced a nation that democracy was worth fighting for. Those values are the thread that weaves the common quilt of America. A president, yes, needs a hard fist, but also needs a soft heart. This man has it all. A Rhodes scholar brilliant but the understanding of the working and middle class too. He has the ability to rise out of his own being and relate to the experience of others especially those who understand what it is like by an accident of birth not to have been born into riches or if he has then the ability to relate to those who have not. I would vote for him in a heartbeat.

Sunday service unites parishioners after three historic black churches go up in flames

Not just a coincidence!  I hope I am wrong but I  suspect I am not!   RESIST,

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/sunday-service-unites-parishioners-after-three-historic-black-churches-go-n991876?fbclid=IwAR1HobB6uQtmCJUnbkILtbBkgxHViBz99PaK79BRyz9yVyRr0a6dkd26Fbc

In Dramatic Shift, Netanyahu Vows To Annex West Bank Settlements If Re-Elected

https://www.huffpost.com/entry/netanyahu-annex-west-bank-election_n_5ca95261e4b047edf95b4a0b

This is insanity and spells eternal war.  It is a political move on Drumpf's part to get the Jewish vote. This Jew says NO don't fall for it. Drumpf is as anti Semitic as he is anti Black. He is racist to the core and is shaking hands with Netanyahu the Belligerent because he thinks he will get the Jewish vote. Drumpf would NEVER get my vote and he WON'T get the majority of the Jewish vote. Here's hoping this vile handshake spells doom for Netanyahu the Corrupt. Birds of a feather!

Film recommendation--GREEN BOOK

I just LOVED this film. Send a copy to Trump, et al they need it. Black lives DO matter. They matter a lot! Never give up, never give in

RESIST AS YOU HAVE NEVER RESISTED BEFORE!

• Never Forget: Shwerner, Chaney & Goodman. They did NOT die in vain!

                                                                                                                                                   

The Truth -- Barr's folly

The plot just thickened on William Barr and the Mueller report

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2019/04/04/plot-just-thickened-mueller-report/?utm_term=.1bf4fecff928&wpisrc=nl_most&wpmm=1

 I have been posting on FB and on various blogs my frustration with the Barr so called "summary" of Mueller's Report ruling the day.   Barr clearly is a Trump lackey, does not want to make the same mistake the previous Attorney General Sessions made and is doing his best to propagandize the Mueller report to suit Trump's wishes making Trump's victory laps possible. 

I have been saying because this is so and because Barr is ignoring Congress's request and threatened subpoena of the Mueller Report that Muller and/or his Team should make an end run around Barr's bar and release the Report in its entirety now, not tomorrow, not in weeks but now.  The American people want it and they paid millions for it.  Clearly the Mueller Team is springing leaks because they are consummately frustrated with Barr's coughing up the Party line to make Trump look good and able to take his courtly bows.  Victory laps are not in order and probably will never be.   Trump is probably guiltier then his victory laps suggest.

Mueller and his Team have copies of their unredacted report which I hope they will submit to Congress forthwith.  Clearly, it is not the whitewash of the Barr summary absolving the President of guilt at least with respect to Russian collusion and certainly not with respect to obstruction of justice.  Barr's action, to say the least, is unacceptable.  Barr is thwarting the will of Congress and the people.  He should be stopped immediately.  For Barr to think his own report "summary" of the Mueller Report will suffice is abject folly.   The American public demand, for once, the truth and Mueller can provide it!

Letter to the Fifth Circuit re: the ACA

Dear Justices.  I am writing you today because I do not know, truthfully, what to do nor how I as an American citizen and lover of my country can express an opinion that

could have some thoughtful influence on the case that is, I believe, due to come before you soon.

Perhaps, it is my political philosophy I have honed for decades trying to weigh what rightful powers government can and should possess in a free society.  I have dedicated many hours of thought into this question, perhaps, being slightly influenced by my own circumstances and by my father's love of this nation, its history and most especially, even though he was Republican, his love for Franklin Roosevelt.  Although I was born during the Truman administration my father's thoughts of FDR influenced the trajectory of my own political thought.  Yes, I am progressive on most policies but I am not progressive because I think government should simply hand out money to all but because I believe as FDR did that government's proper role is to help its people most especially in extreme social circumstances like the Great Depression or to avoid living in abject poverty when our bodies fail us and we grow old having no money to secure our lives. 

In my own life I was one of the last who contracted polio six months before the vaccine came out.  It has had in my senior years some dire impacts.  In my youth I remember when my father, a small business owner, could not get insurance for me because, yes, I had a preexisting condition.  Polio has been a life long preexisting condition.  The effects of the virus are not only horrifically impactful to one's body it is also very expensive to address it in one's entire life.  One long leg brace amounts now to about $5,000.  There were and are other accoutrements of this malady including surgeries, casts, crutches, braces, and much more.  In my later years I have fallen so many times including three femur fractures and one surgery for it that I thank God every day for the blessing of Medicare and the blessing of living in a country where I can get help.

My plight is shared now by millions who will face the loss of their healthcare entirely if the Affordable Care Act aka Obamacare is struck down.  I believe the Texas Court was in great error in its opinion and I hope and pray fervently that this Court will come to a different conclusion and save the ACA.  Why on God's earth someone so cruelly and without empathy would deny millions health care and ensure that many will die without it I do not know.

Therefore I ask you, no I beg you, to consider my simple argument when deciding this case.  Without healthcare people die -- many people die.  Without healthcare even those nearest and dearest to lawyers, judges or to just the average person will die without healthcare.  Healthcare today is unduly expensive and is costing more and more each day. People are signing up for the ACA and it has been saving lives.   As the great orator and my hero FDR said:

"The test of our progress is not whether we add more to the abundance of those who have much it is whether we provide enough for those who have little."

 

 I hope this email can be sent to the justices on the Fifth Circuit who may decide the fate of this important legislation.

Thank you for your consideration.

My Second Letter to Special Counsel Mueller

Dear Special Counsel Mueller:  I wrote to you yesterday before General Barr released his letter on your lengthy investigation of collusion with Russia by the president or anyone in his administration.  General Barr in his report also put forth his edict on obstruction of justice.  I wrote because I love my country and I value any person's ability to address power.

I had high hopes yesterday of finding out that which I had been longing to find out over the past two years.  In truth, I believe very little was answered and to the contrary the decision by General Barr to clear the president of obstruction of justice created more questions and wondered if you, the special counsel, so highly regarded by all, would have ever wanted more discord between factions of our nation to reach another fever pitch.  I cannot believe that is what you wanted nor can I believe that you would have left in Mr. Barr's hands the very question we all knew he addressed months ago in order to secure the job of AG.  Mr. Trump knew, I allege, that Mr. Barr would show allegiance to him and not to the greater American public good. I wondered, too, if you knew it would be handled as such and not be handled as it should have by Congress as it was in the Watergate era.  You cannot be pleased with this besmirchment of your professional actions. 

I implore you to clear this fog of discord and anger on both sides each accusing the other of destructive actions flying in the face of truth.  Only the release of your report and testimony by you can rectify our angst.  My fantasy would be for you to address us directly as others have done with other investigations.  Perhaps, I am dreaming but in our great democracy it is right and proper that one dream to save this great Republic.  Mr. Franklin said when a woman asked what kind of government the Founders had created he said:  "a Republic if you can keep it."  Keeping us in the dark with respect to this huge investigation serves only to continue keeping us apart.

Miscarriage of Justice

Attorney General Barr systematically made a decision on Obstruction of Justice he had previously stated last June when nothing had come out on it upping the chances of Trump picking him as his own personal AG which Trump erroneously thinks the AG is. It was NOT NOT NOT Barr's decision to make exonerating Trump of Obstruction. It is Congress who should make that determination.

Muller needs to come out to clarify how this report was handled by AG Barr and this report needs to be made public--Not in two weeks, not in two days but NOW!. This entire investigation where it stands now is an obstruction of justice. Does it surprise me? No. Much of US history is a miscarriage of justice whether it's Vietnam, Iraq, voter suppression of persons of color in our time or this investigation of the most corrupt president in US history. The people are NEVER going to be heard but they ARE going to be hurt -- a LOT! Elections have consequences.

If you are as furious as I am about this miscarriage of justice of Mueller and Barr then you WILL vote Democrat in 2020. It is the last hope of justice this nation has!

RESIST!

My email to Attorney General Barr

Dear Attorney General Barr:  The Mueller investigation as you know has been proceeding for 2 years.  Two years the American public has been awaiting this nation's most well kept secretes about Russian collusion in the 2016 election and the president and his minions alleged involvement in it. It has cost the taxpayer 26 million dollars.  It matters not whether one is a Republican or a Democrat these are our hard earned tax dollars at work.  I will not try to hide my affiliation.  I am a Democrat who came from a Republican household. I made the change because one word interests me -- justice.  I want justice to be done and that can only be done through clarity, openness and truth.  Wherever the chips may fall I am ready but I  want them all to fall with nothing hidden from view.  I could have thought of more just ways to do this and that is by not having a seeming ally of the president guarding the chicken coup.  How will we know you have given us the document in its entirety and not let your Republican allegiance lean toward the president?  I beg and implore you to do the right thing and not hold anything back if for nothing else but justice to be served.  Whether it clears the president or impugns him I simply want the unvarnished truth.  I am on the side of believing that you want the same as I do.  I hope and pray I am right.  My heart is with you for the most difficult task that lies ahead. 

ANOTHER VIEW--WHAT THE MUELLER INVESTIGATION ACCOMPLISHED

My Comment:  I still want to see the Trump syndicate locked up!  We'll see what the report discovers and if it will be open for the people to see what 2 years and millions of bucks later has uncovered!

MUCH HAS BEEN ACCOMPLISHED

By Matt Zapotosky and Rosalind S. Helderman WASHINGTON POST

WASHINGTON — He pulled back the curtain on a sophisticated Kremlin hacking operation — identifying by name the 12 Russian military officers who he said sought to sway a US election.

He exposed a Russian online influence campaign, bringing criminal charges against the 13 members of a Russian troll farm accused of trying to manipulate US voters and sow division through fake social media personae.

And he revealed how those closest to President Trump defrauded banks, cheated on their taxes, and, time and time again, lied to deflect inquiries into their ties with Russia.

After 22 months of meticulous investigation, charges against 34 people — including six former Trump aides or confidants — and countless hours of all-consuming news coverage, Special Counsel Robert Mueller Friday submitted the long-anticipated report on his findings to Attorney General William Barr.

Barr said in a letter to lawmakers that he may be able to inform Congress of Mueller’s ‘‘principal conclusions’’ as early as this weekend.

But through legal documents and court hearings, Mueller has already revealed rich details about the Russian attack on the US democracy in 2016 — and his investigation has triggered unpredictable ripple effects.

The special counsel indirectly helped expose hush money that Trump’s lawyer paid an adult-film actress, shed new light on secret foreign-backed lobbying efforts, and helped force a reckoning at major technology companies over how social media can be used to divide and inflame.

Mueller’s investigation also severed the bonds between Trump and some of his most loyal confidants, brought down a national security adviser, and spawned spinoff criminal probes that appear likely to live on, even after the special counsel’s office disbands.

“He’s almost like a venture capital incubator who has spun out multiple lines of business,’’ said David Kris, a former Justice Department national security division chief and founder of the consulting firm Culper Partners. ‘‘He’s shown us an awful lot, and yet I think there’s an awful lot more to come.’’

From the start of his investigation, Mueller and his team followed a consistent pattern. They would toil in silence for months, and then — often on a Friday — they would reveal indictments packed with more detail than needed to substantiate the charges.

Mueller struck first at the heart of Trump’s campaign, charging its former chairman, Paul Manafort, and deputy campaign chairman, Rick Gates, with crimes related to their work for a pro-Russian candidate in Ukraine.

The infractions Mueller alleged were not related to possible coordination with Russia, a fact that Trump and his allies were quick to seize on. But the October 2017 indictment sent a message: Mueller was alleging that the president’s campaign had been led by people who had engaged in serious criminal wrongdoing.

Mueller also revealed that another campaign adviser, George Papadopoulos, had secretly pleaded guilty earlier that month to lying to the FBI about his contacts with foreigners claiming to have high-level Russian connections.

He was one of at least 14 Trump associates who had contact with Russian nationals during the campaign and transition.

Papadopoulos’s plea agreement described his extensive efforts to try to arrange a meeting between Russians and the Trump campaign. And he said that in April 2016, a London-based professor claiming to have Russian connections confided that he had ‘‘dirt’’ on Hillary Clinton, including ‘‘thousands of e-mails.’’

That same month, Mueller would later allege, Russian hackers had accessed the networks of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee and the Democratic National Committee.

The plea deal previewed what Mueller would show over and over: Those surrounding the president sought to hide or downplay their dealings with Russia.

One of the persistent mysteries has been why.

In December 2017, former national security adviser Michael Flynn admitted that he lied to the FBI about his conversations with Sergey Kislyak, the Russian ambassador. Flynn had claimed the two did not discuss Obama-era sanctions directed at the Kremlin, when in fact they had.

Nearly a year later, Trump’s former personal lawyer Michael Cohen similarly pleaded guilty to lying to Congress about his efforts to pursue a possible Trump Tower project in Moscow.

When longtime Trump adviser Roger Stone was indicted in January, accused of making false statements and obstruction, he became the sixth Trump aide ensnared by Mueller’s investigation.

Earlier this month, Manafort was sentenced to a total of 7½ years in prison for conspiracy and fraud. Cohen is set to start serving a three-year prison sentence in May.

‘‘These aren’t bit players; these are people who were part of the heart and soul of the Trump operation,’’ said Douglas Brinkley, a history professor at Rice University.

One of Mueller’s core assignments from the start was to dissect exactly how Russia sought to influence the 2016 presidential campaign.

Four months before Mueller was appointed, the US intelligence community laid out in a terse 14-page report how it said Russia — on the order of President Vladimir Putin — had waged an online campaign to help Trump win the election.

The special counsel added to that 66 richly detailed pages of his own, outlining in two indictments the specifics of the cyberoperations.

In the first, which accused 13 Russians of waging a social media influence effort that ran afoul of US law, Mueller revealed he had access to the group’s internal communications, including an e-mail from September 2017 in which one of those charged wrote to a family member: ‘‘The FBI busted our work (not a joke).’’

Mueller also described how the group worked offline, visiting states to gather intelligence on US politics and enlisting unwitting Americans to hold rallies in support of Trump, providing the clearest window yet into Russia’s covert efforts.

In the second, which charged a group of Russian military officers with hacking Democrats’ e-mails and laundering them through fake online personae so they could be posted online, Mueller identified by name those he asserted were responsible for the attack. The indictment expanded considerably on the intelligence community’s assessment.

Notably, the indictments did not accuse any Americans of conspiring with Russia, one of the main questions the special counsel was asked to examine.

Mueller’s impact has gone far beyond the work of his own prosecutors.

His revelations have fueled calls for greater government oversight of Facebook, Twitter, and Google, following years in which the tech industry grew into one of the nation’s wealthiest and most important economic sectors while facing little regulatory scrutiny.

Mueller has also referred additional investigations to at least three US attorney’s offices.

One of those cases, a handoff to prosecutors in Manhattan, led to a guilty plea from Cohen, Trump’s longtime personal attorney, for tax evasion, bank fraud, and campaign finance violations that he told a judge were directed by Trump.

That case ruptured a key personal relationship for the president, spilling into public view embarrassing details about Trump’s efforts to pay off the adult-film actress known as Stormy Daniels and allowing prosecutors to pry into Trump’s personal business.

The Cohen case appears to have been the spark for yet another investigation, this one related to Trump’s inaugural festivities. Prosecutors in Manhattan issued a wide-ranging subpoena in February to Trump’s presidential inaugural committee seeking records related to its fund-raising and spending.

Meanwhile, this summer in Virginia, prosecutors will try a former business partner of Flynn, the former national security adviser, on charges that he acted as an illegal agent of Turkey. The case underscores how the Mueller probe shined new light on a lucrative and largely unseen American lobbying industry financed by foreign interests.

Teachers Reportedly Shot ‘Execution Style’ With Pellets In Active Shooter Drill

They lined teachers up against the wall facing it. It was a "drill" with teachers unaware of either the drill or who the shooters were? Is 1/2 of our nation certifiably insane? I guess the school board sanctioning of this crackpot idea is to show how much teachers need to carry guns. Just how would that work in a room full of screaming frightened children facing live ammunition of terrorists?

New Zealand's response to 50 people slaughtered by a right wing Trump-influenced terrorist was to make assault weapons, AK 15s and the like, extended ammunition magazines illegal. Why does sanity exist in this small nation and insanity rules in a nation with over 350 million people and over 300,000,000 guns?

Law enforcement and the military should be the only ones to carry assault type weapons. If it were up to me I would love to repeal the Second Amendment. Fat chance. Think about it when our Founders wrote the second amendment into the Constitution they were thinking of 18th century muskets that only kings possessed. They were not thinking of modern-day military rapid fire assault weapons with extended magazines in a democratic nation.

https://www.huffpost.com/entry/teachers-shot-active-shooter-drill_n_5c93fc99e4b0a6329e142b5a

Trump’s Acting Defense Secretary Faces Ethics Investigation Over Boeing Ties

 

 

"Patrick Shanahan, the Pentagon’s acting chief, allegedly touted his former employer while disparaging competitors."

Conflict of interest?  Naturally, of course he is Drumpf's pick:  If he knew he should be tried and executed for murder if he left this flawed plane in action!!! Over 300 human beings were killed on two similar if not exact flaws in the gd tech system that keeps the plane straight up except it failed and the planes went down.  The pilots did not know how to bring it up because Boeing never told them about a problem of the known flaw.

They did not ground the planes after the first crash and did not make a statement of the investigation of this flaw. The US was the last nation to ground the planes after the second crash! Yet another Drumpf CORRUPT BEAST IN POSITIONS OF POWER THAT CAN KILL US! Shame on Shanahan and most of all shame on Drumf. What did they know and when did they know it in this corruption plus administration.

Condolences to the Muslim Community

Dear Brothers and Sisters:  I want to express my sincere condolences to all those who suffer and are in mourning because of murders in the two mosques in New Zealand by a right wing white supremacist racist.

I, a Jew, am struck by the senselessness of the demented perpetrator and the deep sadness he inflicted on Muslims and, indeed, on all the world.  It is clear both of our peoples should be allies to fight discrimination and hate wherever it exists because we both have suffered from it.  Count me as one of your allies with the hope that the better angels of our nation and the world will come together for our mutual security and love for the humanity of us all.

As-salamu alaykum

Shalom

Boeing Crashes

The Boeing crashes -- Trump and his administration are the most corrupt, unethical, unsympathetic, cruel, bestial administration in US history. The US was the last to ground the Boeing Max planes. Trump and his corrupt administration and cronies MUST be taken down lawfully and electorally and FAST before they literally kill us all.

Statement from the former Commissioner of Consumer Protection 2-13-18

"After the 2nd crash I could not believe that the Max planes were not grounded. And even though there was an Israeli, Israel will continue to support Trump.
Even though there is now a temporary grounding in place, can we trust President Trump, knowing Boeing’s president was one of the parade of supplicants who visited him at Mar-a-Lago, knowing that he has installed a former Boeing executive as the acting secretary of defense, and knowing Boeing gave $1 million to his inaugural committee? 

That is where we are in this country right now. The Republicans who have controlled the federal government these past two years have been so maniacally focused on “deregulation’’ that they refuse to see how critically important federal safety regulations are to each of us individually and to our economy as a whole. And in their zeal to deregulate, they have allowed the very industries most in need of uniform safety regulations to take over the federal agencies formed for the purpose of protecting consumers. 

The result is stark: 

We no longer trust the words or actions of our federal safety agencies to protect us in the ways we have come to expect over the past many decades. The chaos in the White House and Congress over the past two years has provided a distraction from the administration’s steady and frighteningly effective destruction of consumer protections in most of our federal agencies, whose very purpose for decades has been to protect American consumers. The foxes are definitely in charge of the hen houses; the regulated control the regulators...

...Marietta S. Robinson was commissioner of the Consumer Product Safety Commission from 2013 to 2018...."

A

White Nationalism’s Deep American Roots--By Adam Serwer in The Atlantic--A must read + My Comment

 

 

 A long-overdue excavation of the book that Hitler called his “bible,” and the man who wrote it

https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2019/04/adam-serwer-madison-grant-white-nationalism/583258/

My Comment:  After you read this historical analysis of race in America, if you read it, stop and think on why our nation today is having convulsions over race and why our nation has become, especially on the right, so imbued with hate, cruelty and violence with laser focus on immigration. There are historical American roots of reasons for this. Think on the early authors mentioned by this historian and what they said about Eugenics and the movement of it that followed. Think then on films like Scorsese's "Gangs of New York" or D.W. Griffith's "Birth of a Nation" starring Lilian Gish.

Think on who composes this nation. The citizenry of this nation comes from every continent on earth; from western Europe, Eastern Europe, the Baltic, Russia, the Mediterranean, the Middle East, South America, North America, Asia, Africa, and Latin America. It is an amalgamation of gold leading to greatness.

See our history in this piece as a rationale for what is happening now. Then resist and refuse to repeat it.

New Zealand shooter called Donald Trump 'a symbol of white identity' as he murdered 49 people

Right Wing Hitlerian extremists are the most violent of all terrorist groups in the US. They include such notables as Timothy McVeigh, the Oklahoma City bomber, Dylan Roof killer of 9 African Americans as they sat in prayer at the Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in South Carolina, and Robert Bowers killer of 11 Jews at the Tree of Life synagogue in Pittsburgh to name a few.

These Nationalist right wing killers exist all around the world and sadly have been inspired by the Nationalist swill of which Donald Trump is an advocate. They are cruel, fanatical and brutal. There is zero humane policy behind their beliefs and they will ultimately kill anyone who opposes their white supremacist philosophy. The fact that our so called president plays footsie with them to protect the only supporters of him -- his base -- is sickening.

Trump and his administration are a threat to all people of humanitarian, democratic and egalitarian ideals. They must be stopped -- no crushed -- electorally by the Democratic Party and those moderates in the former Republican Party who have left it after the Trump authoritarian takeover of it.

RESIST AMERICAN FASCISM AND RIGHT WING EXTREMISM OF ALL STRIPES ALL AROUND THE WORLD. Ask yourself what kind of a nation do you want to leave the generations to follow. Certainly right wing fanatical Trumpian politics of the far right would not be your choice!

Mass Shooting At 2 New Zealand Mosques 49 People Dead--The face of White Nationalism

Violent,right wing EXTREMIST, white Nationalism lives to strike another day this time in New Zealand. It is ugly and it is probably Trump inspired. It is mean, cruel and murderous. This is the face of Nationalism. It was the face of Mussolini and Hitler's white Nationalism in the 1930's and it is the face of 2019 Trump Nationalism and what has been unleashed all over the world.

Will Trump condemn it from the oval office? We shall see.

 https://www.huffpost.com/entry/christchurch-mosque-shooting-new-zealand_n_5c8b08e5e4b03e83bdbeebc3

Maybe there is a God

Beto O’Rourke Is Running For President

"The 46-year-old former congressman brought the state of Texas into play for Democrats for the first time in a generation."

OMG I'm speechless. Maybe our national nightmare is heading to an end. With all the evidence mounting against Drumpf, with investigations up the ying yang of corruption everywhere including his rotten family, with the Southern District of New York and even other states going after those bastards that Drumpf cannot pardon, with Mueller the Great first responders coming to the rescue there is hope, I think, for the first time in two long very long years I am dizzy with enthusiasm.

The west and the south are being devastated by a weather cyclonic blizzard snow bomb yet another proof of climate change (as if we needed anymore proof) that science is our best approximation of truth. The House has been taken by Democrats who care about leadership, intellect and veracity and our nation may rise again from the depths of insanity! There are protestors in front of gd Fox No News News -- the real Fake News!

Okay, I know I've been enthusiastic before and it's come to naught but I think, I hope and yes I pray this is different. Maybe just maybe there is a God and so many infinite prayers have been heard by some force in the universe. For once I wake up with guarded optimism.

RESIST fascism and the hate of Trump and help Democrats anyway you can. I don't care if it's Beto for president and some smart Dem VP or if it's Biden/Beto whoever is the Democratic choice HELP them, contribute, work, phone, smoke signal do anything you can to beat the Beast!

https://www.huffpost.com/entry/beto-orourke-is-running-for-president_n_5c4117e1e4b0bfa693c17f35