HEY! WE CAN'T FIND THE FOREST BECAUSE ALL THESE TREES ARE IN THE WAY!

Ever since Luigi Mangione was arrested at a Pennsylvania McDonald's in connection with the murder of CEO Brian Thompson reporters in all media have been shocked - shocked terribly - by two aspects of this suspected murderer's case. First is the popular public perception that Mangione is both a hero and handsome. The second universal reaction of print and electronic media in amazed disbelief that this scion of wealth, privilege and exceptional education could be a cold-blooded murderer.

Let me address the first perception now. Mangione is no hero. UnitedHealth Care is, by all accounts,.the heartless, cold-blooded killer of many.people whose medical care might reduce UnitedHealth Care's profits by a few pennies. That is vile. That is wrong. That is capitalism. Unless we are ready to stringently enforce an humane moral code on medical insurers, the heartless capitalism of UnitedHealth Care will continue to be the norm. Killing is inherently wrong. Killing one CEO blindly intent on increased profits only makes room for another of his ilk with better personal security to take his place. Not only is the Thompson murder inherently wrong, it was entirely pointless.

As for Luigi Mangione's attractiveness, that's undeniable. The men and women attracted to him must answer for their own compromised morals and their lack of decency and clear thinking.

What concerns me most is the second matter, theaà media's comprehensive inability to understand how Mangione could become a murderer. The first mistake lies in that word "become". How, they ask, does a young man of wealth, privilege and superior education become a murderer? The media ask this as if wealth, privilege and education inoculated one against illegality, crime and sociopathy. The answer is in the question. We have examples of great sociopathy from the educated and rich all the time though we choose to reward the sociopaths with wealth, privilege and educate them to be more antisocial than they already are.

Take as current examples both Donald John Trump and his bosom buddy, Elon Musk. Neither man has the least scintilla of decency, sense of shame or feeling for humanity at large. Trump can vilify destitute people who come to our borders in the hope of earning an infinitesimal piece of what we call "The American Dream". For their temerity in begging for a crust from the great American feast, Trump.would separate them from their children, send them to vile, for profit camps and then deport them to countries that they fled in fear of their lives  Musk would minutely examine government with an object of slashing the largely mythical "waste, fraud and abuse" in all areas excepting the military where actual "waste, fraud and abuse" is truly rampant and also excepting the billions of taxpayer dollars that have massively enriched.him. Musk would ravage USAID (U. S. Agency for International Developmen) because some branches found that his SkyLink was involved in some shady practices while, in Trumpean fashion, calling the Agency investigating Musk's criminal organization a "criminal organization".

We have had examples aplenty of Luigi Mangiones/Elon Musks over more than a century, at least since Harry K. Thaw shot Sanford White in Madison Square's Roof Garden in 1906 and probably as far back as when, during our Civil War, wealthy people could hire a substitute when drafted for military service. Money and social standing always trump (a term from games of cards though apt in our political context too) duty and justice with money trumping all.

What is remarkable is that there aren't more handsome sociopaths committing crimes out on our streets. But then again, they have corporate boardrooms in which.their crimes are muffled by actuarial tables and defended by highly paid.attornies adept at making the law conform to the desires of the highest bidder. One might think that Lady Justice often peeks beneath her blindfold to be enchanted by a pretty face while collecting cash in some fulsome fold of her flowing skirts. We shall see what peeking and profiting will make of Luigi Mangione's case as this dreadful year drags on.

The ultimate point here is that plenty of people are brought up in famous and toney private schools, ivy League colleges and business schools to believe in their blackest of black hearts that they are a perversion of the Nietschean Superman. Their every whim and act are above reproach because they are handsome, well connected, monied and privileged regardless of any crime they commit, regardless of the number of ugly, friendless, poor or underprivileged who die or are afflicted with the hell of unremitting poverty. 

Are we truly so jaded, unfeeling and selfish that we will follow in the footsteps of Donald J. Trump, Elon Musk and Luigi Mangione? Can those amongst us charged with speaking truth to power truly not see the dense forest of criminals hiding behind the pretty face of a Luigi Mangione?

LET ME SEE IF I GOT THIS...

 

    So... according to the Republiscum/Trump/MAGA Cult...

    You're not a REAL Roman Catholic if you deliver a prayer at the Democratic National Convention.

    You're not a REAL Christian if you're a Democrat.

    You're not a REAL Christian if you believe that Christianity focuses on God being love and calling for acceptance of others.

According to Christian tradition, Satan is "the father of lies". The Orange Fuhrer lies about his wealth, on his taxes (for which he is a convicted felon), about the size of any and all crowds to which he speaks, about "winning" the 2020 presidential election, about "winning" his debate with Vice-president Harris, about encouraging organized groups of thugs like the Proud Boys, 3%ers, etc. to mount a coup, knowing that Nick Fuentes is a white supremacist and anti-Semite, his "right" to hoard classified government documents, encouraging the January 6, 2021 insurrection, wanting dictatorial powers, wanting to suspend the U. S. Constitution, his criminal activity, his convictions for his various crimes and, basically everything down to his golf scores and yet he is the anointed of God? Is it not obvious that anyone who claims to be your one and only salvation is out to scam you, especially if he has scammed others in he past?

You're not a REAL American if you're not a Christian.

    You're not a REAL American if you believe in the separation of church and state.

    You're not a REAL American if you live in a city.

    You're not a REAL American if you live in a state that touches the Pacific Ocean or the Atlantic north of Cape Hatteras.

You're not a REAL American unless you're white.

    You're not a REAL American unless you're as white (supremacist) as Tucker Carlson.

    You're not a REAL American if you believe that the U. S. Constitution is the law of the land instead of a talking point.

    You're not a REAL American unless you live in "Fly-Over Country" because there are definitely no airports west of Pittsburgh and east of Las Vegas.

You're not a REAL American unless you think that the murderer, Kyle Rittenhouse, is a hero.

    You're not a REAL American unless you fetishize our flag, using it for ridiculous, public displays of affection overkill without giving a damn about anything it actually stands for.

    You're not a REAL American unless you're willing to use the hallowed ground of a national cemetery for a political photo opportunity.

You're not a REAL American unless you believe any bat shit crazy conspiracy theory that validates your own bat shit craziness.

You're not a REAL American unless you believe that immigrants whose delicious, traditional cuisine centers on goat meat are suddenly inclined to eating household pets.

You're not a REAL American unless you want to "deport" millions of people you deem "illegal" after giving them an identifying number just like those magnificent role models, the Shutzstaffel, gave to their "deportees" at Auschwitz, Buchenwald, Dachau and Treblinka.

I am appalled that my fellow Americans hold "these  'truths' (above) to be self-evident" when they are not self-evident at all.

I am appalled and frightened that a majority of my fellow citizens swallowed the lies above with incomprehensible gusto on November 5, 2024. Henry Louis Mencken observed a century ago that, "No one ever went broke by underestimating the intelligence of the American public." And that's not lie!

MY WISH FOR THE FAILED ORANGE FüHRER

 

    So a young man whose motives, as of this writing now weeks past the shooting, are unknown tried shooting The Failed Orange Führer on Saturday, July 13, 2024. Immediately J. D. Vance of Ohio blamed Joe Biden/Democrats/The Left for inciting the violence visited upon his Dear Leader.

    Aw! Come ON!

    First, a Liberal (Liberal, not Radical Leftist) with a gun is almost as believable as kitten with a gun, possible if you really, really stretch your very strange imagination, but all but incomprehensible.

    Second, the shooter has been identified as a loner who is registered as a Republiscum voter. In other words, someone not very likely to be motivated by Joe Biden/Democrats/The Left. Which candidate is it again who calls for jailing and executing rivals? Now where have I heard lots of rhetoric about "bloodbaths", "uprising", "take back our country"? I don't think it was from my Lefty friends, even the radicals.

    Third, I despise The Failed Orange Führer. I do not hate him. I hate everything he stands for but not that despicable scum himself. I have been saying since 2016 at least that the last exhibit in the The Failed Orange Führer Presidential Library should be the jail cell in which he spends the last years of his miserable, criminal life. I do not want The Failed Orange Führer to achieve the martyrdom that he so undeservedly affects. No. This despicable shit stain on American history deserves to live out his life shorn of his golden penthouses, estates, self-labeled buildings and his sleasily accumulated wealth. I want him eating prison food and, in my darker moments, serving as the bitch of a muscled, 275 pound undocumented Mexican lifer - I'm thinking Danny Trejo with young Arnold Schwartzenegger's body - who hasn't had any sexual relief in the last decade except from his own, preferred hand. That is my darkest wish for The Failed Orange Führer. Long life like that to him!

    I am also absolutely certain that the vast majority of my Lefty fellows would giggle a little and then tell me how awful a person I am and disown me emphatically. 

    Now, I ask you to contrast my dark demise for this despicable person with the litany of violent rhetoric spewed by The Failed Orange Führer from "Lock her up!" to "Grab them by the pussy." to "Some, I assume, are good people." to "Stop the steal!" to "poisoning the blood of our country" to "I am your retribution." to "in four years, you don't have to vote again. We'll have it fixed so good, you're not gonna have to vote." Let's take that in the context of his proven false arguments that the 2020 election was "stolen" from him when The Failed Orange Führer insisted that his phony election fraud claims "allow for the termination of all rules, regulations and articles, even those found in the Constitution." King Donald the 1st anyone? Our successful Führer? His Highness, Fearless Leader, President-for-Life Bone Spurs?

    No, I don't wish him dead...right away. I just want him imprisoned and abused, forgotten and obscure, dying alone in his prison cell noticed by a dwindled cult that often forgets to send a card on his birthday. Were I a religious person, I would find a church in which I could light a candle as I pray for his long, lonely demise.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

WHAT'S IN A NAME?, BRAINWORM EDITION

 

    Robert Francis Kennedy, Junior has suspended his pointless presidential campaign and endorsed The Failed Orange Führer in that felon's run to become a successful Führer for what would quickly become our failed democracy.

    I think it is not unreasonable to say that Bobby's father, Robert Francis Kennedy, Senior would have hired Sirhan Sirhan before endorsing George Wallace or Richard Nixon.

    The bulk of the discussion following RFK, Jr's announcement has centered on what he brings to the current presidential campaign other than shame and embarrassment.  Let's consider that for a moment.

    Bobby, Jr. made his name as an environmental lawyer who has now endorsed the poster child for polluters.

    The scion of the family most associated with the Democratic Party has endorsed The Failed Orange Führer whom even many Republicans can't stomach.

    What could possibly inspire this bizarre turn of events? A brain worm, if you'll pardon the pun, comes to mind but that seems too facile an answer. I am going to speculate since I don't know RFK, Jr and have no evidence for my speculation, yet it seems that he has an animus toward the Democratic Party. Why might that be? Perhaps it could be that RFK, Jr harbored some thought that he should be the party's nominee for the presidency. Perhaps he feels that he has inherited a leadership mantle that he didn't deserve. Has he ever paid attention to the term "nepo-baby"? Up-starts like the Clintons and Barack Obama capture the notice of party members in preference to him and the boy-who-would-be-king is left with a speaking problem, anti-vaccination conspiracies, a brain worm and some weirdness with a dead bear. Perhaps it seems unfair to him. Perhaps it seems to us that we have dodged that lunatic bullet.

    In 1980, RFK, Jr's uncle, Edward Kennedy, drove a resounding nail into the coffin of the Kennedy family's political ambitions by being unable to make an extempore case for his candidacy. The untimely death of John F. Kennedy, Jr. drove in another nail and now RFK, Jr. has killed the political careers of every member of his family for at least another generation. Personally, I'm sorry to see that. Every large family is allowed one crazy member whom they usually keep locked in an attic. RFK Jr's failing is that he's been allowed to roam free. Yet it does allow a future generation of Kennedys to chart their own courses perhaps one of which may be leadership in the Democratic Party. I wish saner members of the Kennedy family well  but that nail he's driven so firmly home today seals RFK Jr's own coffinas well as the family's immediate fate.

    In her acceptance address, Kamala Harris noted, quite correctly, that The Failed Orange Führer is an "unserious man". Today, RFK, Jr has announced that he is even more of an "unserious man" than the fascist he's endorsed.

August 30, 2024 -

    More information came to light in the past week that moves me to pity RFK, Jr. a little, only a little. In endorsing The Failed Orange Führer, RFK, Jr. or his worm-damaged brain has allowed himself to be conned by The Failed Orange Führer. First, he's been offered a possible cabinet post. The offer itself is probably bullshit. We all know how quickly The Failed Orange Führer renegs on promises. Still he made Ben Carson HUD Secretary so it's possible that RFK, Jr. could find some hope in that.

    What has moved me to pity is that The Failed Orange Führer apparently promised to release all the government files on the assassinations of RFK, Jr's father and uncle. I see that as a baited lure just as it is also a wild goose chase, The murders of President John and Senator Robert Kennedy have been investigated and reinvestigated most importantly by the Congressional Committee led by Senator Frank Church in the 1970s. The likelihood of some dark secret lurking in those files is pretty slim but is an undeniable draw for a loyal, disturbed son and nephew who is inclined to conspiracy fantasies. That I find sad and pitiable while also finding RFK, Jr's endorsement all the more appalling because it's been bought by false hope, mental distress and vicious manipulation.

THIS IS NOT WHO WE ARE

 

Wrong! This is precisely who we are. Some of us always and all of us at our worst.

The attempted coup by Fascists and right wing groups allied to The Orange Führer on January 6, 2021 is precisely who they are. The scum who caused five deaths in threatening our elected legislators are precisely the Nazis that marched through Skokie, Illinois more than four decades ago and the Nazis that marched through Charlottesville, Virginia in 2017. The scum who attempted to end our democracy are precisely the people who hid and supported Eric Robert Rudolph, Olympic Park bomber and assassin. The scum who invaded our Capitol are precisely the people who bombed the Alfred Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City. The scum who sought a coup to make The Orange Führer  president for another term and possibly for life are precisely the traitors and tax evaders who incited the stand offs at Ruby Ridge, the Bundy Ranch and the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge. 

These scum are not patriots. Regardless of what flags they wave, they are not supporters of American democracy. It is a desecration of our flag to see these insurrectionists carrying American flags as if they supported what that flag stands for, a united nation.

I have noted several times in the past that Dr. Samuel Johnson, in his Dictionary of the English Language, defined Patriotism as "the last refuge of a scoundrel." A century later Ambrose Bierce noted Dr. Johnson's definition but insisted that, on the contrary, "it is the first." The traitors and insurrectionists on January 6th proved Bierce's gloss on Dr. Johnson. Although we must note that the grinning idiot Orange Führer hugging a flag is the paradigm for his imbecile minions waving a banner they too insult by their actions.

Many of my political stripe have thumped, foolishly, for elimination of the Electoral College. I understand their frustration because a 110 year old refusal to reapportion the House of Representatives based on a Census that showed that most Americans live in urban areas has biased the House and the Electoral College toward rural states. However, a Constitutional Amendment to eliminate the Electoral College is treating the symptom rather than the disease. The U. S. House needs to be reapportioned, as the Constitution intended, to account for the 340% increase in our population since the 1910 Census. The Electoral College is a part of our Constitution because its framers had a healthy mistrust of rabble rousers like The Orange Führer. To guard against such would-be dictators they created an alternate means of confirming election results to prevent the presidency from falling into the hands of demagogues of which there were plenty in their time and midst.

The United States of America is a great nation. Contrary to the message on The Orange Führer's red baseball caps, this 45th president has sullied the nation and its reputation worldwide. The Orange Führer and his Republiscum minions have made our nation more vile and venal, a nation to be pitied and derided, an example of how not to treat people both citizens and immigrants. That is not anything like patriotism. Wearing a flag lapel pin as one tears down our democracy is not patriotism. White supremacy is not patriotism. Supporting a would-be dictator and insurrectionist is not patriotism. Attacks on people of other religious faiths is not patriotism. Vilifying the duly elected representatives of the people  and exalting those who participate in insurrection is not patriotism. Fomenting dissention and discord on the public airwaves is not patriotism.

We cannot hide behind the easy disclaimer that "This not who we are!" It is exactly who some of us are. It is exactly who some 74 million of us are. If we refuse to confront the fact that many of us are these racist, vicious lunatics who would bring down our democracy in loyalty to on single con man then the next would be Führer may succeed in destroying everything that our nation has stood for for nearly 250 years. Should we allow that to happen by not rooting out the disease in our population, this will certainly be who we all are like it or not.

THE MOST BASIC OF RIGHTS

I write today about the right to vote and the need for every citizen to exercise that franchise. Please bear with me while I establish my bona fides and indulge, as I too often do, in a bit of history.

In an absolute monarchy as existed in Britain and its colonies in the 1770s no one could vote for the king. In fact, no one votes for king or queen in any country with one today. Back in the 1770s there was some unpleasantness that lasted for more that 6 years between Britain and her American colonies over the fact that the people of those American colonies could not vote and be represented in the British government. In consequence of that unpleasantness those British colonies became the United States of America, the nation in which I was born and have lived all my life.

Not only am I a native of the United States of America but I also feel a special bond to this nation that goes beyond my lifetime. My earliest ancestors on the North American continent were William and Suzanna White. Suzanna was pregnant when she left Europe. Before she could even land she gave birth aboard ship to a son and named him Peregrine after the falcon that travels great distances. Peregrine White was born on November 20, 1620 (Old Style) aboard the ship Mayflower as it lay at anchor off the tip of what we now know as Cape Cod. Other ancestor immigrants from Britain were among the first settlers of Watertown, Massachusetts and Chandler's River (now Jonesboro), Maine. Some of those ancestors stood to stop the progress of General Howe's troops at Lexington Green and also fought "by the rude bridge that arched the flood" in Concord, Massachusetts later that day.

As I say, I feel a special bond to my nation. Man and boy I have visited many of the shrines of our nation from Saratoga, Ticonderoga, the U. S. S. Constitution, the Bunker Hill Monument, Ulysses Grant's Tomb, Valley Forge, Independence Hall, the Gettysburg battlefield, the many monuments in Washington, D. C., and the battlefields of Virginia including Yorktown, Fredericksburg, Winchester and others. I've been to Mt. Rushmore, Yellowstone, the Grand Canyon, Muir Woods and walked through Abraham Lincoln's home in Springfield, Illinois as well as been awed by his monument in our capital, my capital.

I've been able to do all these things because my ancestors, including my Father and Uncle Ed who fought Fascism in Europe during World War II, could and did vote. The ability to vote for your representatives in government is the first and foremost right for which we fought our Revolutionary War. Some will say that the Revolutionary slogan was "No Taxation without Representation". That was one of the Revolutionary slogans but it is utterly wrong to place the sole emphasis on the word "Taxation" and forget "Representation" and the vote that elects representatives.

We have a flag that I cherish. We have all those monuments that I've named and many more. Yet the flag, the monuments, the ancestry and history is meaningless without the right of franchise, the right to vote.

During our Civil War, with the nation torn apart over the disgusting idea that one group of people had the right to enslave another group of people because of the color of their skin, our nation held Congressional elections in 1862 and a Presidential and Congressional election in 1864. That right to vote was so essential, so sacred that even a civil war could not gainsay it.

Today, however, we face a different kind of crisis which some try with all their might, money and influence to turn into a civil war. We are faced with an epidemic. Today it is not armed traitors in grey uniforms that we fight; it is a microbe that is passed from infected person to uninfected persons by our very breath. Today the traitors who would do us in are our very breath or that of someone near us. In our 19th Century Civil War, Maine, Michigan and Minnesota were far from the battlefields. Today every state, every town, every community is the battlefield against this virus and. once again, we face an election.

The only effective way we have at the moment of winning this war against this CoVid-19 virus is by limiting our contacts with others. I don't like it much. No one I know likes it much. However, using social distancing and wearing face masks means that I am, so far, not infected and am not potentially infecting people with whom I come in contact. With our national elections just over two months away, the safest way for us to conduct that election is by limiting our contact with others. We are fortunate in having a fine postal system through which we could readily conduct our election this year so why shouldn't we do so?

The answer to that is that there is no real reason other than the fear that our Orange Führer and the Republiscum Party have that they will lose catastrophically if everyone votes. The propaganda that voting by mail opens the process to fraud is nonsense. The state in which I live has voted entirely by mail for a decade without any hint of fraud. In fact the only instances of verified and actual fraud in elections have been carried out by the Republiscum Party in North Carolina and Georgia. Further, there is no evidence whatever that shows an advantage for one party over another in voting by mail.

But it isn't the method of voting that is really under attack here. The Orange Führer and the Republiscums are attacking the universal franchise itself. They know that they lost the fair and honest popular vote in 2016. They also know that their crony capitalism, treason with Putin's Russian dictatorship and influence peddling both in and outside the United States isn't likely to claim even the Electoral College in 2020. Their best hope is to keep as many American Citizens from exercising their most basic right, the right to vote. We have already seen their nefarious attacks on voting. In 2018 voters in predominantly white wards in Georgia waited an average of 3 minutes to vote while citizen voters in predominantly Afro-American wards had to wait 51 minutes to vote thanks to closing of polling places, intimidation and intentional delays. Similar things happened in Republiscum dominated Wisconsin. 

Attacking the right to vote is anti-democratic and a clear violation of our Constitution. Attacking the right of every citizen to vote is absolutely and incontrovertibly UnAmerican. Coupled with the use of Gestapo-like tactics in Portland, Oregon and the Orange Führer's encouragement of neo-Fascist vigilantism our nation, my nation is descending into the same sort of Fascism that my Father and uncle fought against 80 years ago. We MUST stop it here, now and in this presidential election if we are not to forsake our history, our democracy and all that my ancestors fought to save so that "this government of the people, by the people and for the people shall not perish from the earth." If we cannot stop the Orange Führer and the Republiscum now we will not have a democracy in 2024 and won't deserve to have one.

MISCELLANY, JUNE, 2020

Let's get this out of the way quickly: Donald Trump is an intellectual micro-midget who is incapable of governing himself, let alone the United States. He is an embarrassment to the nation and a danger to it as well. Trump is a congenital Fascist. Eighty years ago we combined with Britain, the Free French and forces from many other nations to defeat Fascism in Europe and the Far East. It is crime for us to allow Trump, Mitch McConnell and the Republiscum Party to bring Fascism to America and it is also an insult to the men and women, living and dead, who fought Fascism in the 1920 through 1945 period. If we want to honor "The Greatest Generation" we must remove these Fascists from government no later than the November elections if American Democracy is to survive.

I have been homeless for just over a year. I currently live in a dorm in a shelter run by a Calvinist fundamentalist religious group. We are in Washington State. The manager of our shelter expressed his distress at the "tyrannical orders" of Governor Jay Inslee in March when sensible regulations for controlling the Corona Virus came down. I am in one of three dorms with ten other men who are either pigs or babies when they are not being bigots. The fellow, a young man with very serious physical and mental problems, in the bed next to mine spent months saying that he'd decided he was Jewish because Jews are all rich and control the world. He also uses the word "Negro" as if it were the even nastier variant on that term. The fellow next to him is very sympathetic to him and is also a big Trump supporter. Two others of my dorm mates are very distressed that NASCAR has banned the Confederate battle flag.
You, dear reader, if there are any dear readers out there, need to know this background because this morning (June 11, 2020) I awoke at 7:30 A. M. to find myself utterly alone in the dorm. That situation is so completely unusual that my first reaction was, "Well, finally The Rapture has happened and I get my choice of cars!"
Sadly, about ten minutes later one of the Confederate flag supporters came back and my plans for a road trip evaporated.

When I tweak the folks who run the shelter in which I now live, please don't misunderstand. They are good people and are expressing their faith in the way truest to the teachings of Jesus of Nazareth as set forth in the Book of Matthew 25th Chapter. Their failings all centre around getting bogged down in the Old Testament prophets, the Revelation of St. John and the letters that purport to be from Paul of Tarsus. They believe that the Bible is the inerrant word of god but have no compunctions about editing it to comport with their belief that demons are abroad in the land. I choose to know them by their acts rather than their failings though I still like pointing out the absurdities of those failings.

I have some hope that the Corona Virus in the United States is natures way of weeding out the Republiscum. I encourage "Red" states to abandon sensible virus control measures especially in towns and counties with big Republiscum majorities.

Isn't it great that Stephen Miller looks like the villain he is?

Remember how we were sold William Barr as a solid defender of law and an adult in the room? Remember how we were sold first Dubya and later Trump as a "business man" who would bring a responsible business perspective to government? Now, I ask you, do you really think that we aren't going to order some other dose of Republiscum snake oil in the future?

Yes, I know I was getting the Trump matter out of the way at the start but there's just too much of it to to fold into one paragraph.

I am so relieved that Donald Trump is taking hydroxychloroquine. It is supposed to be dangerous for the elderly, you know.

I'm glad that Donald Trump refuses to wear a mask in public. It wouldn't improve him any and might allow inattentive people to mistake him for a decent human being.

Let's give a cheer for the unsung hero Warren G. Harding. When his administration was rife with corruption and beset by scandal he had the decency to die in office.

I have been going to demonstrations and singing We Shall Overcome for 60 years. Now, thanks to cell phone videos, we just might.

Mark Zuckerberg stole the idea for Facebook from the Winklevoss twins so why do we expect him to act nobly now?

How come we don't see anti-vaccers out demonstrating against creating a Corona Virus vaccine?

The Republiscum are constantly talking that our sovereignty is threatened by international treaties and organizations while they threaten our Constitution. Could there be a connection there? A distraction?

Can we agree that Twitter is for Twits?

I have fallen in love with Phoebe Waller-Bridge and Rachel Brosnahan (Fleabag and The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel respectively). What more can a man want than a lovely, smart woman who is sexy, sensual, funny and talks dirty?

Republiscum believe that patriotism means wearing a flag pin or hugging a flag while trampling and then pissing on the Constitution. Over a century ago Ambrose Bierce wrote that Dr. Samuel Johnson defined patriotism as the last refuge of a scoundrel. He then corrected Dr. Johnson by definitely stating that it is the first refuge of a scoundrel. The Republiscum prove Bierce correct every minute of every day.

Once we include African-Americans and Latino Americans, the black and brown peoples who are our neighbors, brothers and sisiters, in "All Lives Matter" we can use that slogan. Until then Black and Brown Lives Matter is something to push for.

Wouldn't it be nice if the CHRISTIAN Fundamentalists actually followed Jesus of Nazareth?

If this world is the creation of the Judeo-Christian god, then isn't it a bit presumptuous to be so all fired up and eager for the "End Times" and the destruction of their god's handiwork? Wouldn't it be more respectful to step back and let their god get on with his or her work and take things as they come?

The United States has had over 100,000 deaths from CoVid-19 with the death count rising daily. Is anyone surprised that that total could have been much smaller if we weren't led by a congregation of fools who despise science and think that mental illness is caused by demonic possession?

And, by the way, bad Christian Rock is redundant. It falsely implies that there is good Christian Rock which, like Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny, does not exist. I know this from a year's worth of experience.

If you've been stuck at home since mid-March and need something to do, read a good book -NOT THE Good Book. Read a novel that you've never read before by an author you've never read before. If you have children at home, read to them. Read them Harry Potter or the Oz books of L. Frank Baum or the Gormengast books or Lord of the Rings or something else that's age appropriate like Pippi Longstocking, Mary Poppins or The Saggy, Baggy Elephant or A Child's Garden of Verses. Reading is what got us to the heights we've reached so far. Not reading is what got us Republiscum and Donald Trump.

While I'm on the subject of reading, a couple of years ago I waded through Herschel Parker's 2 volume, 1937 page biography of Herman Melville. The other day I came across another quotation from Ambrose Bierce that fits that work exactly. The quotation is , "The covers of this book are too far apart."

Well, that's all for now. I'm sure that there will be more to recommend or skewer in July.