4 VII 2020: Taxpayers’ dollars wasted on jet exhaust

The Dept. of Defense has announced that there will be multiple “flyovers” on Independence Day. It is said “Flyovers will travel from Boston to New York City, Philadelphia and Baltimore before they ‘join other Department of Defense and heritage aircraft in the Salute to America over our nation’s capital.'” I suppose this is to be an aerial parade to pump up Trump’s deflating ego and distract Americans from their growing remorse for the genocides and slavery upon which its wealth has been founded.

I’d like the answer, also, to some practical questions. How much are these flyovers going to cost? How many flights will have to be re-directed to accommodate this aerial razzle-dazzle? What will be the cost in wear and tear to planes worth multi-millions of dollars each? What is the cost to American morals to celebrate Independence is this way? This bit of aerial arrogance will be a re-run of May Day flyovers in Red Square, a display of brute force from a brutal regime.

1 VII 2020: Rant vs. reason, lies vs. truths

Sen Rand Paul of Tennessee sometimes chews on his feet in public. I watched a news reel of his harangue addressed at Dr. Fauci. Sen Paul is confused about COVID19 and he’s not going to take it anymore. He wants simple answers and he wants them right away. Dr. Fauci confronted Sen Paul’s passion with his usual genial rationality, explained the realities to him, and refused to try to predict the future.

I see that Trump’s younger brother was plucked out of the psychiatric ward to obtain a temporary restraining order to block publication of Mary Trump’s memoir. Of course, Robert Trump is a cat’s-paw for the President. I suppose Donald feels he has over-burdened his personal law firm, the former Justice Department, and decided to let the private sector handle this one. This case shows dramatically how our legal system is riddled with inconsistencies: the law allows Trump to block publication of the truth but cannot keep him from publishing an inexhaustible gush of lies.

29 VI 2020: Miscellanea

I just watched newsreel footage of a couple on Portland Place, one of St. Louis’ ritziest and closely guarded residential areas, waving firearms at demonstrators passing their house. Observations: It is a waste of a beautiful house in a beautiful neighborhood to have it inhabited by a couple of rednecks who would be more at home in a double-wide. She kept brandishing a pistol while he cradled an assault rifle, occasionally aiming it at the demonstrators passing by. Waving deadly firearms around in public has somehow become one of the inalienable rights of Americans, even if they are as obviously unhinged as these two. How pathetic! These people are emblematic of American gun culture.

Who knew?!!! So the Russians put a bounty on the lives of U.S. soldiers, and some Afghans have already collected it. Trump denies knowing anything about this crisis of national security. He is trying to shift blame by saying “Nobody ever tells me anything.” But if he really was not informed about this crisis, it would be more accurate to claim “Nobody ever tells me anything that I don’t want to hear.” Another excuse might be “If they told me, I don’t remember, because the deaths of G.I.s in a distant place are a lot less deserving of my attention than plans for campaign rallys.” Or, again, Trump might claim “Putin wouldn’t ever do anything like that. It must be the work of Obama people sent over there to make me look bad.” Trump is wholly egocentric and knows little and cares less about national security.

[ It occurs to me that in the Hitler Rants parodies on youtube Hitler could represent Trump and Obama could be Fegelein. ]

24 VI 2020: Nazification of immigration policy

I have been reading some reactions to the latest white-supremacist effort from the White House. Obersturmbannführer Stefan Miller is taking advantage of the Covid-19 crisis to further restrict immigration, even to the point of barring entry into the U.S. of medical professionals who bring us desperately needed help and of technologists who help to keep us abreast of the latest foreign developments. The pretended excuse for this radical change is the old “Them furreners are gonna come in and take away your jobs!” I don’t know whose jobs would be taken, given that America is woefully short of fine scientists and skilled medical personnel. 

Aged as I am, I need the care of many physicians to keep me going. Now my urologist is an American, as is my cardiologist, but my internist is from Armenia, my nephrologist from Croatia, my psychiatrist from India, and my dermatologist from Pakistan. Where would I be without these physicians?

As we are not turning out enough physicians and nurses, so too are we lacking in well-trained scientists and technologists. Our public education system has collapsed. American students emerge from school ignorant of math and science in comparison to students in other developed countries. We need these foreign scientists and technologists to close the science/technology gap between us and our commercial and military rivals.

The new restrictions are designed to make it virtually impossible to obtain asylum and to obstruct all immigration with unendurable delays. This is simply a sneaky way of trying to end immigration altogether. Miller and his like are mono-maniacal extremists, like the Know Nothings and America Firsters of old. Their legally questionable obstructions and their SS tactics are continuing a shameful reversal of American immigration policy. I look forward to Trump’s resounding defeat and the return of these monsters into the jungles of the Far Right.

23 VI 2020: Individual freedom?

An analysis piece on CNN deals with the widespread refusal of Americans to wear protective masks as directed by competent authority. The article begins: “America was born in rebellion and it’s a spirit that still runs deep in its character.” A “spirit of rebellion.” I am not sure what this means. Does it mean resistance to injustice, to predatory capitalism, and to racism or an infantile stubbornness that refuses to do the right thing just because someone else told you to do it. The article continues: “If you live in a country where the balance between personal rights and collective well-being falls differently, you might consider the refusal to wear a mask to be pure selfishness. But while plenty of Americans are wearing masks, rebellion is part of the country’s political DNA.” This sounds like a conclusion that Americans are after all children who rebel against common sense and social responsibility. 

The article cites the case of a man in North Carolina who burned up a mask because “mandatory mask use infringes ‘our freedoms.'” What freedoms? Our freedom to do harm?  Does the same idiot refuse to wear a seatbelt and insist on dumping his sewage into the creek. Refusal to wear a mask is reprehensible, but sociopaths of this sort go beyond refusal and send death threats to health officials and caregivers.

And, alas, there are many more than a few of these nut-cases. Americans voted Donald Trump and the Republican Senate into office — talk about a rebellion against common sense and social responsibility. I don’t know about rebellian, but childishness is certainly part of our country’s political DNA.

18 VI 2020: Gaetz’s son. If they’d just stop testing for Covid-19 there would be far fewer cases. Will attendance at Trump’s pep-rally drop because of his warning to lowlifes?

News yesterday of Rep. Matt Gaetz’s bad behavior at a House committee meeting. Gaetz, alas, is still not house-broken. He was pitching the white-supremacist slogan, “All lives matter,” and extolling the love of parents for their children. Now Gaetz’s office, the records of Congress, documentation everywhere have always stated that Gaetz is unmarried and has no children. That should not, of course, prevent his having opinions about parenting. But then he appeared on the Tucker Carlson show and as if pulling a rabbit from a hat revealed his hitherto unknown, because never-disclosed, kind-of son, the Cubano Nestor. 

Nestor is the son of Nestor’s aunt with whom Gaetz once lived. Though he never adopted Nestor, Gaetz considers him his virtual son. Nestor lived with Gaetz for four years upon entering the U.S. at age twelve. Then Nestor left to live with his biological father in Miami until he reached the age of eighteen when he moved back in with Gaetz. Gaetz had earlier described Nestor as his “helper” and as “a local student.” But now Nestor has been promoted to “son.” Any adult male who supports and guides a younger male, i.e., serves as a mentor, is doing good work, and Gaetz is to be admired for doing so. But his sudden revelation of Nestor now transformed into his son borders on exploitation.

Two Trumpists, Governors Abbot of Texas and DeSantis of Florida, repeated the party line that the spike in their states in Covid-19 cases is due to increased testing and to outbreaks among people who, in their view, do not count, sc., in prisons, assisted living facilities, and migrant worker communities. It’s a good thing for the Trumpists that they have no sense of humor, for if they did, they would be unable to say such things without laughing themselves.

Well, I’m sure we are all looking forward to the opening battle of World War Trump on Saturday. Trump has been languishing for want of a pep-rally and large crowd where he can tell his lies without fear of contradiction. His craving for this kind of attention has grown so intense that he is willing to risk a dramatic upsurge in Covid-19 cases and violent racial unrest.

Attendees will be mixing together strains of the virus from all over the country, and taking them all home with them when they return. This will be another large contribution by Trump to the on-going pandemic.

Trump has warned “protesters, anarchists, agitators, looters or lowlifes” to stay away from the rally or else. I guess that by protesters, anarchists, and looters he means the participants in the many demonstrations currently taking place nationwide. As to “lowlifes,” he’d better not use this term lest he alienate his base, the most enthusiastic members of which are life-long lowlifes.

17 VI 2020: Non-disclosure agreement, yet again!

Trump’s law firm, the Justice Department, is suing to prevent publication of John Bolton’s new book. The report reads: “… the Trump administration went to court to try to claw back Bolton’s earnings for the book and to potentially stop the book’s publication, arguing in a lawsuit that Bolton had breached non-disclosure agreements and was risking national security by exposing classified information.”

So John Bolton will have to join Stormy Daniels and all the others whom Trump has menaced with non-disclosure agreements. Trump has used non-disclosure agreements all his life to suppress evidence of his filthy behavior. I hope Bolton will tell Trump, and Barr, and their minions to go to hell.

As to the risk to national security … no, it’s the risk toTrump’ s security that this is all about. In the Trump system, almost any truth is a threat to security, so we can expect little or no truth from Trump and Barr. I think that Bolton is far more reliable. Bolton knows and can find out what might be a risk to national security. Thus he and we needn’t let ourselves be taken in by what Trump & Co. choose to call national security. In fact, Trump knows very little about national security, but to pretend that he does he will motor-mouth away, telling lies and running the risk of revealing what secrets he happens to remember.

15 VI 2020: Trump collecting waivers

I was not surprised to read that the Trump Machine is requiring anyone who wishes to attend the coming Circus in Tulsa to sign a waiver. The document begins with a warning (required, I’m sure, by Trumpist lawyers) that “inherent risk of exposure to COVID-19 exists in any public place where people are present.” Given this risk, we might expect the document to say “If you are in a high-risk category for COVID-19, you should not attend” and to offer advice about how to minimize the risk of infection in a crowd, e.g., everybody wear a face mask. No, the document continues “By attending the Rally, you and any guests voluntarily assume all risks related to exposure to COVID-19 and agree not to hold Donald J. Trump for President, Inc.: BOC Center; ASM Global; or any of their affiliates, directors, officers, employees, agents, contractors, or volunteers, liable for any illness or injury.” That’s Trump’s empathy and sense of responsibility at work. His zombies are going to have to attend the Circus at their own risk.

This is another instance of Trump refusing to take any responsibility

If you are to have any dealings with Trump, you do so at your own risk.

10 VI 2020: Misc.

1) Sometime during the 2016 campaign Trump asserted that the coming election would be rigged. Of course, he was complaining that it would be rigged against him. If he thought it would be rigged in his favor he would have said nothing about that. The recent election in Georgia shows in a microcosm what Trump, his Republican bitches, and wealthy racists are trying to do: Prevent black people from voting. The stumble-bum elections, the purges of the voter rolls, the resistance to mail-in ballots all come down to the attempt by these anti-democracy sneaks to rig elections in their favor.

2) Barr’s unidentified police. If enforcement personnel are not wearing identification badges, do they not cease to be recognizable as enforcement personnel? Shouldn’t their aggression be resisted like the aggression of any ordinary citizen?

3) The Trumpists want CNN to apologize and recant poll findings that show Biden ahead of Trump. The Trumpists have neither taste nor shame and will try anything. This case points out the chronic inability of Trump and Trumpists to deal with reality that they don’t like.

4) The photograph of the so-called “All lives matter” protesters re-enacting the murder of George Floyd has all the symbols of the base of Trump’s base: misuse of the flag, Trump, and the Republican redneck equivalent of frat boys displaying their devotion to evil. They are hyenas trying to feed on the corpse of democracy. 

9 VI 2020: If Republicans can’t win, they cheat

I have read an article that describes the utter screw-up in voting in the State of Georgia (another Confederate State!). Maybe I’ve grown overly suspicious, but I have to think that the screw-up was planned. The article reported “In April, the state’s Republican House leader, David Ralston, publicly denounced the Republican secretary of state for sending absentee ballots to registered voters ahead of Tuesday’s primary, which was postponed from its original May 19 date due to the pandemic. Ralston claimed mail-in voting is “devastating to Republicans.” I can only read this as saying: If all registered voters are able to vote, the Republicans will lose. 

So Georgia Republicans are trying to sneak their way ahead. They’ve been conducting huge purges of the voting rolls in Georgia to get rid of voters who are likely to vote against them. How different is this from paying voters to vote for you or stuffing the ballot box? As I’ve long maintained, today’s Republicans do not believe in democracy, but are supporters of plutocracy.