Bits & Pieces #55

Everyone remembers the big, far right, conference sponsored by Sheldon Adelson, Israel’s and the super right’s biggest sponsor. You know, the one where all the Republican candidates crawled on their knees across the desert to grovel at Shel’s feet.

Well, what you may not know is that tough guy Chris Christie, as is the Republican’s want, made a huge faux pas when he referred to the West Bank in Israel as occupied territory. Many Jews, in an audience that hugely backs the far right in Israel, were horrified.

So Christie had to crawl back across the desert to Vegas, and once again grovel at Adelson’s gnarled but golden-toed tootsies. The picture of that fat rump, high in the air, as it’s owner is busy

kissing those highly manicured toes is way past hysterical.

 

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Jeb Bush and Scott Walker are running around the country, using up valuable money making lots of speeches and having lots of meetings but, as yet not running for the presidency What kind of ingenuous bullshit is this

Up in New Hampshire Bush claims not to be running. If he’s not it’s the busiest vacation on record. Bush’s first official statement, ”I’m not running,” is only his first lie. How Bush of him. It looks a lot like the Bush family is running members in descending order but how he can possibly be more destructive to the country than his older, dumber brother is beyond conception.

I’m hearing an awful lot of dialog about the Republicans needing someone who is about the future because Hillary is about the past. This argument leads to the concept that they need a chronologically young candidate but take a look at who that encompasses: Ted Cruz, Marco Rubio, Walker, Chase, Santorum and maybe a couple o others all of whom have a world view set firmly in the 14th century.

That may be young, but in their cases, that also makes them immature, lacking experience, bigoted, stupid, exclusive and short sighted. It’s exactly what’s wrong with the GOP.

 

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Loretta Lynch, why hasn’t she been confirmed as the new Attorney General. She is eminently qualified, a bipartisan favorite and we need that job to be filled – desperately. After long months she still isn’t prosecuting bad guys. So what’s wrong? It’s obvious. The Republicans don’t want to confirm another Obama nominee. So once again they are bringing the governing process to a halt and that’s the big problem. The GOP has been so busy getting people who think like them elected, that they forgot to get anyone elected who is capable of governing, who even understands what that concept entails.

People keep asking me how could a guy who grew up a Republican have become so anti-Republican? Well, we hold sacred, the things and the people we grow up believing in. When these people or principals betray us we feel especially enraged. Maybe it’s because I have seen good sound principles of government trampled into the ground for gold and morally corrupt reasons that I am especially aware of the betrayal by the Republicans of the American people. Maybe it’s because that party, has grown into the party of me before everyone else. Maybe it’s because that party now houses more crazies, more haters, more greed and more betrayal of our country than is conceivably supportable under any circumstances. Maybe that is why I am no longer a believer. Maybe it’s just because I need to believe the things that people say, and there is nothing in the current Republican creed that is truthful, functional or even remotely believable. Maybe that’s why.

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Ted Cruz has announced his candidacy for the presidency. Two thoughts come to mind. The first is the most honest act by any potential candidate now running but saying they are not. The second is, what a disaster if he’s gets elected.

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The healthcare debate continues on. It’s difficult to see why people still oppose it. It’s goal was to lower the number of people without health coverage. The reality is that, that goal has been met and surpassed. For the first time in 40 years, we have lowered the number of the uninsured. 16 million people who didn’t have healthcare have it now. Anyone who does not recognize the benefit of the situation is seriously impaired.

There are a number of problems with the law but it doesn’t tale a genius to understand that the solution to those problems is to fix them and not to abandon the law. There have been many millions of words written about this subject and I, as yet,, don’t see any logical opposition; just people who react emotionally, to what is said by those who are losing money because of the law.

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The fall of Yemen has all the security people up I arms about how we are under attack and can’t do anything about it. The next step is guaranteed to be the great call for a, boots on the ground war, against everybody. It’s brain dead. Sure, there is a possibility for violence from those ISIS sympathizers living in this country but lets get real, let’s look at what we are talking about. Since 911 there have been 45 deaths due to terrorism in the country. That’s in fourteen years. In that same period we have lost 30,000 American’s to gun violence every single year, that’s 420,000 Americans killed by our own gunners and no one seems the least bit worried about that.

What’s wrong with this picture?

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Mike Pence, Governor of Indiana, the Christian nut state, is being mentioned as a presidential candidate lately, especially from “the base,” because of the anti-LGBT law that he pushed through the state senate . If it does nothing else, this bit of legislation will prove that “the base” is made up of serious bigots that haven’t got a clue about real Christian values. Will it help Pence reach his presidential goal? Not a chance. When you talk about how Pence arrived in the governor’s mansion you have to understand just what his constituency really is. This is a state heavily populated by religious sects like the Mennonites, Amish and Bahai, along with large concentrations of Mormons, Baptists and a wide variety of Protestant groups that are hard core conservatives, causing Indiana to be regarded as the most backward of the Mid-Western states. There are large concentrations of people in Indiana that for religious reasons, still don’t drive a car in what is principally a rural state. How can we expect any of them to have anything like progressive inclinations?

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overnor Mike, “The Bigot”, Pence’s new law is called the “Religious Freedom” bill. Of course, the title, Religious Freedom, is a misnomer. It doesn’t give those who profess to believe in a religion any more freedom than they have now. What it does do is give them the legal right to take freedom away from those who believe differently than they do; all this in direct contravention of the constitution. If you don’t believe me, just give it a read, it’s short.

What Mike and his fellow bigots didn’t foresee, mainly because people like this think only of what they want and not what’s good for the country, is the outflowing of anger that the bill would cause. Reactions have been, across the board negative, with companies threatening to pull out of the state and a huge outcry from the sports industries to move the NCAA and all tournaments out of Indiana.

Now Pence is rethinking his legislation as the business community, a pillar of Republican financing, attacks his dumb move. The first thing he ought to rethink is his bigoted motivations and those of his henchmen who pushed the bill through.

One interesting possibility was brought up this week when Rick Ungar senior editor at Forbes Magazine came up with the scenario of a white supremacist coming into a Jewish bakery and asking for a cake for a celebration, covered with swastikas.

It’s a tough call and as Ungar noted, you wouldn’t want to be the judge deciding on that case, but as stated above, the bottom line is all about motive and the motive for this legislation is crystal clear. Bigots are using their religion’s myths to back up their own prejudices against anyone who isn’t like them. Welcome to Berlin, 1937.