Suggested Viewing

	PM (2 minutes ago)
HBO Monday at 9:00 p.m.  ‘Only the Dead See the End of War’ by Michael Ware (link below) Americans should see what this nation's leaders have done in our name and should think twice before it calls itself exceptional. ISIS is this nation's creation as it landed on a sovereign country, bombed it, crushed it into submission and dismembered an entire Middle East region  based on LIES for oil.  Our nation became TRILLIONS more in debt from it, took showers in blood out of it and condemned our nation as well as foreign nations to eternal war because of it. There are GENERATIONS of Iraqis ... little children... who know nothing but war and hellacious violence. As Michael Ware said on Chris Hayes, Iraq has Belgiums at least twice a week while our candidates talk about whose hands are bigger and whose genitals have more prowess. It is DISGUSTING and we should know ALL that this documentary will tell us because you surely will NEVER know watching the Today show, Good Morning America or some other silly ass programming the networks feed us to keep us dumbed down and them in cash.  Elections matter and the Bushes were our poisonous asps spewing their venom into our veins and into the marrow of our bones. Imagine if Al Gore, the one who truly won the presidency, in 2000 had been president...Imagine. DO NOT MAKE THE SAME MISTAKE again if we want our nation to survive. A Republic said Benjamin Franklin of the new nation the Founders created -- IF you can keep it! I hope we can.  http://variety.com/2016/tv/reviews/only-the-dead-see-the-end-of-war-review-hbo-iraq-documentary-michael-ware-1201733077/

Conservatives are destroying our future

Crackpots and Cranks

How far can our nation devolve into an "Alice In Wonderland" world where up is down and down is up? Every day, for all the world to see, a different insult is levied by one Republican candidate against another not over policy but over issues more prevalent on the playgrounds of juveniles than should exist in a race for the most powerful and serious office in the land. Are we really discussing the size of Trump's hands and relating it to his genital prowess or the posed nudity of Trump's wife and the inference that there is something about Ted's wife, as an employee of the investment firm of Goldman Sachs, that Trump threatens to expose? Are these men running for the highest office in the land; one in which someone will be entrusted with the nation's nuclear codes in the most dangerous world since World War II? There are such serious issues at stake. Have these Republican candidates lost their minds and will this nation lose its by electing one of them to the presidency? Trump is a Republican curse and Cruz is not far behind him.

Yes, I am a strong Democrat, BUT I do see the necessity of the two Party system and think if I were Republican I would stomp my feet and say "STOP IT" just "STOP IT" before you inflict the death knell of the Republican Party.

The Republican Party needs an extreme makeover. I would want this Party if I were in it to stand for a difference in the views of the economic system and not the exclusion of the vote for one group or another. I see a rationale even for the representation of the 1% who are after all Americans. Yes, they deserve representation too.

The cancer in the Republican Party's bone marrow is its rejection of science even when the science is clear. Democrats and Republicans alike should be on the same page when the issue is one of scientific certainty like global climate change is. It is true, it is fact, 98% of scientists agree, with the exception of those few who work for big oil, our planet is melting and the extreme weather events we have seen all over our nation and around the globe is evidence of that fact. 70 degree days in Colorado one day and a blizzard white out leaving 20 inches of snow the next is further proof. One cannot deny it as one could not deny that viruses and bacteria cause disease. If I were Republican I would demand my Party NOT eschew science but welcome it.

I would, too, want my Party to do as the Founders wanted and separate church from state. This is imperative as they saw in their time and we see in ours what fanatical religious belief, unyielding and extreme, can do. It places one foot on the neck of another with hands ready to kill for a belief not of scientific veracity but of personal unprovable adherence.

I once read a book entitled "Idiot America: How Stupidity Became a Virtue in the Land of the Free" by Charles Pierce. I ask as he did how did stupidity become a virtue in our nation? Something must change in the Republican Party or its death knell will be a certainty. Our nation must NOT be run by crackpots and cranks with someone's hand on a nuclear bomb. The face of the Republican Party in our time is a frightening face and it needs to change or the body politic of that Party will succumb to the cancer invading it.

AS THE REPUBLICAN PARTY IMPLODES HILLARY CLINTON IS LOOKING BETTER AND BETTER. THE DEMOCRATIC PARTY IS THE ADULT IN THE ROOM. A REPUBLICAN MUST NEVER BE ALLOWED INTO THE HALLS OF POWER. GET OUT THE DEMOCRATIC VOTE, TAKE THE PRESIDENCY AND OVERTURN THE CONGRESS. THERE IS SO MUCH AT STAKE!

Magnificence

I enclose the text of the Democratic front runner for president, Hillary Clinton's speech on terrorism at Stanford University today here or below. I thought Secretary Clinton's speech at Standford on the Brussels terrorist attack was nothing short of MAGNIFICENT. I was so proud of her and to be an ardent supporter of her candidacy. She will, if she is our Democratic nominee, and I think she most definitely will be, run rings around any of the Republican candidates who are so far from being qualified for the oval office it is stunning.

Secretary Clinton was brilliant, completely knowledgeable, serious and succinct about issues concerning the Middle East and terrorism. Why shouldn't she be? She has the experience in triplicate that is needed to assume this difficult job. No one in the Republican Party of know nothings can compete with her.

Thank you for the wonderful speech, Secretary Clinton, you gave at Stanford. I am going to try when the Secretary wins the Democratic nomination to work my heart out for her and sing the praises she so justly deserves.


http://www.nbcbayarea.com/news/local/We-Will-Defeat-ISIS-Hillary-Clinton-Gives-Counterterrorism-Speech-at-Stanford-in-Wake-of-Belgium-Terrorist-Attacks-373265291.html

Deadly Explosions Rock Brussels Airport And Subway--Fuel to Trump

Explosions in Belgium will give fuel to Trump who will advocate for increased uber violent policies that will embolden those who perpetrate these brutal revenge acts on the west and on other Muslims who do not agree with its ludicrous beliefs! The electorate must not be bamboozled again.

Lay the creation of ISIS and its violence at the feet of George W. Bush who conducted an entire trillions of bucks Iraq war based on lies, killing hundreds of thousands, destabilizing the entire Middle East, creating refugees by the millions and in the end creating ISIS and groups like it that perpetrate mayhem right back on us.

The more virulent talk by Trump and those who support him puts ALL of us at risk. It does one thing for sure: It EMBOLDENS those who want to destroy western culture and worse may have access to nuclear devices all over the world. THINK on that before you pull the lever to vote for Trump!

Trump off the Phone -- My email to MSNBC

FINALLY, Chuck Todd does something smart and will not interview Trump for "Meet the Press" on the phone probably for Todd's conservative "establishment" buddies. Why does MSNBC keep Todd? I don't see Fox keeping any liberals or progressives as commentators but MSNBC is so fair doncha know -- NOT!.

Chuck Todd is absolutely one of the most UNAPPEALING commentators on the air and slips by HE THINKS conservative clap trap erroneous analyses LIKE Nancy Reagan was the best first lady in this nation's history. I don't forget that and wonder if Todd ever took a history course and if so why did he omit Eleanor Roosevelt who really WAS the greatest first lady ever walking miles for her husband. She was her husband's legs better than "just say no" Nancy? YES!

Oh then there was Edith Wilson who ran the White House for her husband after his stroke and, oh yes, since Todd does NOT know history, there was Dolly Madison who was the toast of Washington and saved George Washington's famous portrait during the War of 1812, a copy of which hangs in the East Room of the White House where it presumably is today. Too much to ask Todd to know that.

Saying Nancy was the greatest first lady in our history frosted me. I BEG TO DIFFER, Chuck. Do you think he cares? No, he just walks away with his unearned god knows how much salary to hell with getting things right and being progressive like MSNBC is SUPPOSED to be!

And BY THE WAY, I HATE his beard that makes him look like the devil. 

The media is absolutely promoting Trump. They had Trump on for one hour doing a press conference after meeting with Republicans like he was the president. They want Trump on because he raises bucks for the corporate media of course. To hell with the American people who could vote for a man for the presidency who could kill us all!

Trump FREE Time

The networks must have devoted a HOUR to Trump after his meeting with a few Republicans. Where does he get off to command such an amount of time in front of the media? He is getting FREE air time. He is NOT the nominee ... yet. He is NOT the president, he is merely a candidate. You gave him the amount of time you would give the president at a news conference.

Shame on you and most ALL the big media for making Donald Trump into the threat to our republic that he is!

Bill Moyers: The Republican establishment has been infecting the body politic for years.

By Bill Moyers:

From their “Dark Money” bagman Karl Rove to their philosophical guru David Brooks, the GOP elites are in a tizzy over saving the Republican Party from Donald Trump and the other intruders, extremists and crackpots who have fallen in behind Trump as if he were the Pied Piper of Hamelin. But who will save the party from the elites?

Look around at just some of the other sheer lunacy their party perpetrates when it’s not trying to shut government down, redistribute wealth upward, and prevent the president of the United States (who, the last time we looked, has the constitutional right and mandate) from filling a vacancy on the Supreme Court.

The Republicans in southern California just got a 7-6 majority on the region’s air quality board and have set out to reverse all of its safeguards, “reaffirming new smog rules backed by oil refineries and other major polluters,” according to the Los Angeles Times.

Mary Lou Bruner, a Republican crank in Texas who claimed that a young Barack Obama had worked as a black male prostitute, is on track to become a key vote on the state’s board of education, the group that, as Matt Levin at the Houston Chronicle writes, is, “already drawing intense criticism for textbooks that, among other issues, downplayed slavery and racial segregation.”

That’s important because the school board is such a major buyer of books its decisions affect editorial content in texts all over the country. So remember that Bruner is an eccentric whose Facebook declarations include “School shootings started after the schools started teaching evolution” and “The dinosaurs on the ark may have been babies and not able to reproduce. It might make sense to take the small dinosaurs onto the ark instead of the ones bigger than a bus.” Huh? Yet Republican elites seem quite satisfied to have a Mary Lou Bruner as the arbiter of what their children read in schools.

And while we’re talking about education, travel over to Texas neighbor Louisiana and look at the legacy that former Republican governor and presidential candidate Bobby Jindal has left behind for his Democratic successor, John Bel Edwards.

At The Washington Post, Chico Harlan reported:

“Louisiana stands at the brink of economic disaster. Without sharp and painful tax increases in the coming weeks, the government will cease to offer many of its vital services, including education opportunities... A few universities will shut down and declare bankruptcy. Graduations will be canceled. Students will lose scholarships... Since the 2007-08 school year, Louisiana has cut funding for higher education by 44 percent, the sharpest pullback in the nation.”
Part of this can be attributed to the precipitous drop in oil and gas prices and loss of fossil fuel industry revenue crucial to the state’s economy. But the real problem, according to the Associated Press, is that:

“Jindal, burnishing his fiscal conservative credentials for his failed presidential campaign, refused to hike taxes or approve any action that even resembled a tax hike, including trimming expensive business tax credits, even amid an economic downturn... Legislators are hearing that cuts described by the Jindal administration as ‘efficiencies’ actually went much deeper, striking at services. They’ve learned about borrowing practices that increased state debts and about threats to Louisiana’s cash flow because it spent down reserves.”
The result? A calamitous budget crisis in the second most impoverished state in the country, a $900 million shortfall that has to be fixed by June 30 and another amounting to around two billion that will need to be closed next year.

So that’s how you govern when you have the power. Thanks, Republicans!
“This is the party whose elites deceived America into war after cutting taxes on the wealthy so they wouldn’t have to pay for it.”

And while we’re at it, ponder, too, the once-great state of Kansas, where, under the right-wing ideology and bumbling leadership of Republican governor Sam Brownback, the clowns are running the circus. The state legislature there is moving toward passage of a bill that would allow the impeachment of Kansas Supreme Court justices for, among other newly-thought of high crimes and misdemeanors, “attempting to usurp the power” of said same legislature or the executive branch.

The reason? As per Edward Eveld of The Kansas City Star, “A recent state Supreme Court decision, citing the Legislature’s constitutional duty to properly finance public schools, has demanded that lawmakers fix a school funding formula by June 30 or risk the shutdown of public schools for the 2016-2017 school year.”

The court also has overturned death sentences and is considering a case that would void anti-abortion rules. The Republican legislature doesn’t like any of this one bit — not to mention that four of the seven judges were appointed by former Democratic Governor Kathleen Sebelius. So in a classic, don’t-raise-the-bridge-lower-the-river solution, the GOP legislators — who outnumber Democrats by three to one - have decided that the answer is to do away with the judges they don’t like and to hell with checks and balances.

In the words of Esquire‘s inimitable Charlie Pierce, “They recognize no limits to their power, no curbs to their desire. There are few frontiers in democratic government that they will not work to violate, or to twist to their own purposes. And they absolutely will not stop. Ni shagu nazad, as Stalin said to his army. Not one step backwards.”

What happened to Kansas? A coup against common sense, sound principles and the “general welfare” hailed in the preamble to the US Constitution. And as it all has gone down, Republican elites seem to have developed a case of laryngitis.

We could go on. Let’s not forget what Governor Scott Walker has done to Wisconsin and Michigan Governor Richard Snyder to Flint. Check out how Illinois Governor Bruce Rauner is endeavoring to “fix” higher education there. Will Republican elites please tell us where they stand on their man’s ax-wielding mania?

And what Republican poobah has dared call out Grover Norquist, whose monomaniacal crusade against government has thrown public education into crisis, turned streets and highways into bottomless potholes, and produced stratospheric deficits? (Bobby Jindal, by the way, was just one of the many who signed Norquist’s no-tax pledge, a major reason why his state is barely holding on by its fingernails.)

Finally, this is the party whose elites deceived America into war after cutting taxes on the wealthy so they wouldn’t have to pay for it. And so it goes. All of which leads us to the conclusion that what’s wrong with the GOP ain’t just about Donald Trump, apoplectic, mendacious miscreant though he is. Over decades, the Republicans have built castles of corruption and citadels of crony capitalism across the country and now the angry villagers are climbing over the ramparts. Not one step backwards? Too late.

Trump Meets the Honeymooners

If you remember this program (who could not) with the great Jackie Gleason you will LOVE this. It is a brilliant, clever and short Youtube starring Ralph Kramden, Alice and Trump. Enjoy!!
here or
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3XriXDtfqCg

BEWARE THE IDES OF TRUMP

84 year old Woman who fled Nazi Austria and who denounced Trump is mailed KKK symbol


By Travis Andersen Globe Staff March 18, 2016


An Arlington woman who wrote a letter to the Boston Globe denouncing Donald J. Trump’s initial reluctance to disavow a former Ku Klux Klan leader said she received a copy of the KKK’s symbol in the mail.



Louise Mayerson, 84, who left her native Austria as a child when her family fled the Nazis, said she received an anonymous envelope in the mail shortly after her letter to the editor was published in the Globe in March



In her letter, Mayerson described herself as “an Austrian refugee from the time of Hitler” and said the Republican presidential frontrunner’s “failure to immediately repudiate [former Klan leader David] Duke chilled my blood.”

Days later, Mayerson said, she received an envelop containing a copy of the KKK symbol that featured a square white cross set against a red backdrop. The envelope was postmarked from Boston, she said.

“I believe somebody just read that letter, it touched a nerve, and that’s the way they reacted,” Mayerson said.

Mayerson contacted Arlington police, who are investigating the incident, Chief Frederick Ryan said. He declined to comment on the ongoing investigation.Arlington police have increased patrols on streets in Mayerson’s neighborhood. The department also reported the incident to the town’s Human Rights Commission, which assists hate-crime victims, Ryan said. Mayerson praised police for their response. She lamented the “poisonous atmosphere that has been created” in public discourse that “can lead to some pretty unpleasant things for all of us.”Robert O. Trestan, regional director of the Anti-Defamation League, echoed her sentiment.

“The more that hateful and denigrating speech becomes commonplace in the public realm from leaders, the greater the likelihood that people will start acting up, whether it’s harassment via the mail or violence,” he said.

Asked for comment, a Trump spokeswoman did not comment directly on the Arlington incident, but said the candidate has disavowed Duke.

“Mr. Trump has disavowed David Duke, the KKK and all other groups that espouse similar views. He will continue to do so,” spokeswoman Hope Hicks wrote in an e-mail to the Globe.

Mayerson wrote the letter in response to an interview Trump gave to CNN last month when he was asked about Duke, a former Louisiana legislator and vocal supporter of the businessman’s campaign.

“Well, just so you understand, I don’t know anything about David Duke,” Trump told the network. “I don’t know anything about what you’re even talking about with white supremacy or white supremacists.”

Trump later said on Twitter, “I disavow.”

THERE IS ONLY ONE WAY A DEMOCRAT CAN WIN THE PRESIDENCY AND OVERTURN CONGRESS AND THAT IS TO GET OUT THE VOTE EN MASSE--GET OUT THE AFRICAN AMERICAN VOTE, GET OUT THE HISPANIC VOTE, GET OUT THE ASIAN VOTE AND GET OUT ALL PROGRESSIVES, MODERATES AND LIBERAL VOTE. TRUMP IN FACT COULD WIN. THAT IN AND OF ITSELF SHOULD PROD EVERYONE TO GET OUT THE DEMOCRATIC VOTE!!!

My Political Purchases

Sanders's strategy is to win the western states which he thinks are more progressive than the ones Hillary won last Super Tuesday. The big kahuna, California, of course, is in the mix. Moreover, he says that matching up Donald Trump and him in the general his stats are much better than Hillary's to defeat Trump. I must think about that. I am not sure he is right in that she swept all five contentious states Tuesday including the big one, Ohio.

In truth, I like Bernie Sanders but I cannot manage to whip up enthusiasm for him. My heart is with Hillary who has experience times ten that makes her the most qualified for the presidency. There is no movement in the Democratic Party that is viciously against one candidate or the other ... yet. The wonderful thing about those who are in the Democratic Party is that however it shakes out, and I do think it will happen for Hillary, we can be sure we will have no problem voting for either of the two candidates who may prevail. That is a pretty good place to be. 

Having said that I just purchased a Hillary 3/4 length sleeve T shirt and two bumper stickers. My political radar says those purchases will not be in vain.

Power to the Party

My opinion at this moment in time is that Trump cannot be defeated as the Republican Party's nominee even at the convention. If the convention is brokered denying him the nomination after he has gained so much support I close my eyes and shudder as the power in the Republican Party, weak and ineffective, folds like a paper tiger fearful of the violence that is behind Trump.

The rise (and hopefully ultimate fall) of Trump is reminiscent to me of the rise to power of the Nazi state. One by one responsible power brokers in Germany at that fateful time caved and through the Enabling Act in response to the Reichstag fire (lit surreptitiously by Nazis themselves but blamed on Communists and, of course, Jews,) gave the elected Chancellor Hitler all the power that he needed to assume totalitarian control. The Nazi rallies at Nuremberg foretold the portents of doom.

Trump's rallies show us in living color the violent nature of their supporters' essence and the encouraging remarks by Trump himself who easily admits if he is challenged "rioting will break out" show his tolerance of it.

It is up to ALL of us to stand with those in the Republican Party who have the power to challenge the delegate count which ultimately selects the nominee. In this case, unknowing by most, the Party has enormous power to choose the nominee. Whether they have the will use it is surely up for conjecture. I personally doubt that they will.

A Lesson for All Time

Renée Graham's excellent Globe editorial "Anti-Trump protesters are Patriots" see link here or below is one to which I wholeheartedly agree. Not only is it not treasonous to oppose the likes of the egomaniac racist Trump it is OBLIGATORY and patriotic to vociferously oppose him.

I am reminded of the great Spencer Tracy in his brilliant performance of an Allied tribunal judge, Dan Haywood, in "Judgment at Nuremberg" which centered on the trial of Nazi judges guilty of war crimes. Burt Lancaster plays Ernst Janning, a former German judge of some intellectual heft and moral compass before the rise of Nazism. He realizes his egregious crimes during the Nazi period sentencing the innocent to imprisonment and even death. He is seemingly the only former Nazi of conscience. He asks to see Spencer Tracy at the end of the film and says:

"The reason I asked you to come. Those people, those millions of people... I never knew it would come to that. YOU must believe it, YOU MUST believe it."

Judge Haywood says "It came to that the first time you sentenced a man to death you knew to be innocent."

The film speaks of conscience and of personal guilt. It speaks of one man's obligation to protest and refuse to commit inhumane acts of bigotry and monstrous acts of inhumanity. Nuremberg is not just applicable for that era but for all eras and man's duty not to commit unconscionable acts against the powerless in the name of the state.

The protesters at Trump rallies are doing just that and my heart is with them as they do a moral good and make judgment at Nuremberg and its lessons a lesson for all time for all men.

http://www.bostonglobe.com/opinion/2016/03/16/anti-trump-protesters-are-patriots/AYf5RW9hzpJB0UnqJTDMgI/story.html#comments

Youtube: Chomsky on What if Trump Wins?

What if Trump wins? --


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gVqO3r3ugVo

OH HAPPY DAY

HOLY GOD I JUST FOUND OUT AS I TURNED ON THE TV NEWS THAT HILLARY DID SWEEP!! SHE GOT MISSOURI. I WAS RIGHT IN THE FIRST PLACE. OH HAPPY HAPPY DAY.

Spread the Word

I am forwarding the links below. Hillary did better it the Super Tuesday Democratic primary than I ever could have hoped. I understand all may not feel as I do about taking the presidency by a Democrat who can win but in case you do I send what I was sent below from Secretary Hillary Clinton's campaign. If you want to contribute to a Democrat who can win go to HillaryClinton.com to do so or you have the option of going to the links below.

Donald Trump must NEVER come even NEAR the oval office. The consequences of a Trump presidency would be national suicide. A nation is not a business. It is composed of all of us who must work together with those nations around the globe without Trumpian bluster and shoot-from-the-hip rude madness. Nation states who are our allies will be alienated and those who are our adversaries will not submit to his authoritarian dictates. Our nuclear world demands prudence and careful analysis for which Trump has NO ability nor the temperament.

I urge you to be smart and to be pragmatic for you, your children, your children's children, and for all of us. The stakes are enormous. I share what the Clinton campaign sent to me. Scroll below.

Thanks for sharing why you’re a Democrat. It’s important that we spread the word about how Democrats are moving our country forward, and sharing your story is a huge part of that.

Another way to help get the word out is through social media. When you share official Democratic Party news, you’re helping our candidates reach the widest audience possible.

Follow the Democratic Party on Facebook
Follow @TheDemocrats on Twitter
Follow The Democrats on Pinterest

Thanks for helping spread the word.

The Better Angels of Our Nature

In 1968 I thought a candidate like the segregationist George Wallace was frightening but I knew he would never be president and he wasn't. He was, though actually paralyzed by an attempted assassin's bullet that relegated him to a wheelchair all of his life.  The violence of the sentiment George Wallace engendered was epic.  The fact he did not win reflected that as much as race played a part in American politics it was not the only part and as Anne Frank said of her time I said in mine:  -- in my heart I believed Americans were basically good.

 

It is sometimes said that those who do not remember history are condemned to repeat it.  When a nation belches forth a candidate, like Trump who, despite his denying the essential violence of his campaign, serves to divide and not to unite then the dark history of another era shows its possibility again.  Trump pits race against race, men against women, religion against religion, and nativist nationalism against the policies of inclusion.  He is playing with dynamite and the explosive fuse is ready to be lit as minorities will not sit quietly by while they are attacked.  Trump pits African Americans, Hispanics and other peoples of color, and religion as well as sexual orientated minorities against its majorities of white Christian men.  Soon the Republican Party will become the Party of Christian whites no others need apply.  The danger is obvious.

 

The forces of the right share a proclivity for violence because their message is one of hate and hate knows no promotional restraint. The right wing extremist can do anything he wants, including violence to secure often poorly thought out crackpot policies with a plethora of lies supporting their advocacy.  The extremist right will gladly commit violent acts even murder to get what it wants. Timothy McVeigh, the Oklahoma City bomber, was an example extraordinaire of that and there are many more.  McVeigh brought down the federal building of that city while it housed a nursery school and killed 168 innocent human beings including children. The extremists of the right even the populist right like those who support Trump are incredibly violent and will stop at nothing to advance the cause of an anti-federal government and a white power nativitist agenda.  It is why Trump could not vociferously and immediately deny the support of David Duke and the Ku Klux Klan. He gets their votes.

 

The left, especially decades ago, has shown its violence too BUT the philosophic underpinning of the left is one of racial inclusion and not exclusion. The two sides are mortal adversaries.  I stand with those who are for inclusion and not exclusion of the “other” because I know what it is like for one to feel excluded and not a part of the society in which one lives.  I stand for justice and fairness for the minority and the oppressed. It is why I could never be a member of a Party that wants to reject human beings and not accept them, often because of the color of their skin, their religion or the person whom they choose to love and with whom they want to share a life. The right wing is simplistic and authoritarian in its understanding of issues that require not simplicity but the complexity of questioning and thoughtful analysis.

 

I say walk in another oppressed man's shoes and maybe history, with the repulsive Donald Trump heading for bone chilling victories, will not repeat itself and doom us all to eternal domestic conflict, war and international violence.  The only one who can stop him is you.  I believe we are a better nation than those who support Trump and one which shows, as Lincoln said, “the better angels of our nature.”  I believe in my heart Americans are still basically good.  Truly, the fate of nothing less than western civilization depends that we are.

After all these years--an email to the principal of Catholic Memorial

Mr. Folan: At a basketball game these know nothings from Catholic Memorial again chant a centuries old accusation against Jews? This is UNACCEPTABLE behavior which in other times culminated in the Holocaust and the killing of the six million. It deserves more than a mere apology. Those who stated "The Jews Killed Jesus" should be found out and made to extend a PUBLIC apology themselves and not through just you. Moreover, some who instigated it should be threatened with suspension.

Further, a lecture should be given as to the religious and historical etiology of those hurtful words and in emphasis they should be told of the Vatican's removal of that malevolent thought from Catholic teaching. High school students need to be taught!

SHAME ON those who uttered those dastardly words and shame on the hierarchy of Catholic Memorial for its tepid response. Antisemitism is alive and well after all these years and should be vociferously and adamantly criticized with penalties paid when it is!

http://www.boston.com/news/local/massachusetts/2016/03/12/catholic-memorial-students-chant-anti-semitic-taunts-game/k2MjTP1NydoIntdhAZ6noO/story.html

Pulling away from hate

After the violence I see at Trump rallies and Trump lying about all he sees and all he says to encourage it, I am taking time off from this political sewer of insanity. I simply cannot watch the nation being surreptitiously taken down a path to hell.

Our nation, once the beacon for the poor, the homeless and the huddled masses yearning to breathe free has become the mirror image of the "Gangs of New York" Scorsese film about vicious and murderous nativisim in the 19th century of our nation and beyond. Trump has roots. The violence then created Tammany Hall of NYC political patronage corruption. The nativism and racist hate spewing from a Republican Party in our time has gone wild and its leader denies it all and will not tell his minions to stop.

The Republican beast is of their own Republican making. Republican power usually controlled the extreme but is powerless in the face of it now. It is bone chilling awful to watch its violence. I must pull back from it all, at least for a time, or it will be to my detriment because I am not a denier of truth but I am one who faces it and this truth pierces my soul.

John 13:34-35 says: "A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.” How wonderful it would be if the fundamentalist extreme of our nation chose that edict from their New Testament diatribes instead of hate!

Anderson Cooper's interview of Trump about Muslim hate

Trump thinks that Muslims hate us and goes on saying pretty much the same thing throughout the interview by Anderson Cooper. Anderson comes back at Trump with not much.

I believe the media fails at its investigative task of speaking truth to power and I wish, at times, I were in the interviewer's seat to have targeted questions posed in response to, in this case, Trump's simpleton beliefs.

How about Anderson suggesting, perhaps, the Muslim world, most especially the oil producing nations, are, in fact, angry with the west and maybe they are angry at western political policy post World War I carving out and forming their nation states, extending into the removal by the CIA of Mosadeq -- a democratically selected and beloved Iranian leader -- and placing the murderous Shah as head of state in Iran.

Finally, Anderson could have asked him if he would not be upset if a powerful nation state with the excuse of "preemptive war" dropped carloads of bombs on his house killing his family, friends and children too just because that nation could while having NO justification for an Iraq war that placed boots on Muslim ground killing thousands, creating millions of refugees and dismembering the Middle East tinderbox all based on a lie. And for what?

Anderson could have suggested it was for oil -- maybe?

http://edition.cnn.com/2016/03/09/politics/donald-trump-islam-hates-us/index.html