One Manchin Too Many

 

What can be done about Joe Manchin? He’s always been a Republican in Dem clothing. After being governor of West Virginia he won his senatorial seat by only 3%. How is that relevant?  Here’s how; he can be replaced.

He’s up for election until 2022, and the effort to replace him (and several others) starts now. Pull the same ploy whereby the GOP threaten their wayward members: threaten to primary them. Put the fear of losing his phony-baloney job into Joe.

Manchin claims that the January 6^th insurrection changed him (!). He goes on to state that because of the attack on the capital by the Trumpians, he’s convinced that seeking out bipartisanship cooperation is all the more important.

Say what? Lunatics attack the capital, kill a police officer, chant death slogans against elected officials, smear feces in the rotunda, parade Confederate flags and the banners of Trumpian sedition, loot, vandalize and violently disrupt the legislative assemblies and these acts of domestic terrorism were a ‘come to Jesus’ moment for Joe Manchin?

Really?

After the proponents of the insurrection have denied that the insurrection even occurred, after members of the Insurrection Caucus declared on the floor of the Congress that the insurrection didn’t happen, after the GOP failed and continue in their failure to confirm that Biden was duly and legitimately elected president, after all that, Manchin thinks the GOP will be swayed by rational dialog to see the righteousness of the Biden agenda?

Who is gas-lighting whom?

Manchin may seem to be wield some power here but that power is tenuous. It can be stripped from him. Democratic leadership must take ol’ Joe to the side and lay down the law; support the Biden agenda or be cast adrift.

 

Number 42

 

Nothing is more American than baseball. Baseball, apple pie, hot dogs, and the 4^th of July. Yes, nothing is more American than baseball.

On Thursday, April 15^th, all the players of MLB will sport the number 42 on their uniforms to honor Jackie Robinson; for it is Jackie Robinson Day, commemorating the first baseball player to break Major League Baseball's color barrier.

Here again is the melding of America and baseball; the forced integration of America’s past-time and all the furor caused by Branch Rickie’s decision to get a leg up his competition by raiding the roster of the Kansas City Monarchs of the Negro Baseball League.  This is emblematic of the dire crucible of racism in the USA, a crucible that continues to be heated by violence and rhetoric; a crucible which has, as yet, to produce a sustainable alloy of white and black people to form a ‘more perfect union’.

It took a world war and the defeat of fascist forces, with the heroic exploits of the Tuskegee Airmen and their like, before America could be dragged kicking and screaming into the racial integration of its past-time.

There is still much kicking, screaming, grousing and obstruction to that integration in America. (More is the pity that such a sentence still needs to be written.) The presence of Confederate flags in the Capitol Rotunda on January 6^th of this year attest to the still brittle nature of that melding of parts.

We can rejoice in the number 42 and feel a tinge of voyeuristic pride in the accomplishments of Jackie Robinson and that baby-step into racial integration. Hip-hip-hurrah! But we must also cast a tear-filled eye to Brooklyn Center, Minnesota and the tragic killing of Daunte Wright for a minor traffic violation. 

As American as baseball.

 

The Flood Gaetz Are Open

 

Schadenfreude. It’s one of those ten dollar words that sophisticated people like to pepper their conversations with.

Schadenfreude is that feeling of joy brought on by the problems of others. (Yes, it’s a real thing and wouldn’t you know that the Germans would have a term for it?)

Slap-stick comedy evokes schadenfreude. Watching Buster Keaton or Charlie Chaplin pratfall and wince in pain is hilarious, after all. That’s what I’ve been experiencing every day of late; schadenfreude. The mirth which has infused my spirit is the deep doo-doo that Gaetz and The Former Guy find themselves in recently.

It is to laugh! And I do. Reference Gaetz-gaete and gales of laughter cause my wife to be concerned for my sanity. Mention money-bomb, ‘Winred’ and MAGA-minions being fleeced by the Orange One and mad chortling ensues every time.

It must be pointed out that my schadenfreude is tempered with anger, frustration and incredulity. Where the anger comes from should be known to all who resisted the presidency of Ol’ 45. The frustration stems from the glacial pace of the judicial system. The incredulity is in response to the number of MAGA-goofs who persist in putting their confidence in a Confidence Man; who actually give money to a self-proclaimed ga-zillionaire.

(That triumvirate of reaction is triggered by the Derek Chauvin trial, too, but that is another story…)

Gaetz Gaete has been a joy to watch unfold. It’s a bit like watching an origami master in reverse but finding out that that the craft which made the paper unicorn was a spurious one involving scissors and a kind of salacious glue.  And Little Matty’s world is, indeed, coming unglued.

My wife should anticipate more howls of laughter when the Man from Mar-A-Lago is swept away in a tidal wave of indictments. 

Schadenfruede.

Fade to:

Bill Barr.

If the thought; ’The most corrupt AG in recent memory…’ leaps to mind, you’re not alone.

Barr’s departure from legalistic norms is well-known and well-documented. Barr interfered with prosecutions, prioritized politics over justice, undermined the Russian interference in the 2016 election and hindered congressional oversight. Moreover, he declared that all investigations of politicians would go directly through him; that way he could protect the Former Guy’s sycophants and pillory political enemies.

In that context, consider this: Barr’s office began investigation in late 2020 into a certain Matt Gaetz. The most corrupt AG since John Mitchell could not or would not side-step an FBI inquiry into the affairs of Mr Gaetz.

That is how bad this is. Barr could dismiss Russian election interference, ignore more than a score of credible accusations of sexual assault against the Orange One, stand aside and allow all of the depredations of 45’s administration; graft, corruption, violations of the Hatch Act, and so on. What Barr could not do was shuffle the FBI investigation into Matt Gaetz to the bottom of the ‘to-do’ list at Justice.

Caveat: Charges against Mr Gaetz have, as yet, not been brought. (tick-tock...) He has denied any wrong-doing by pleading in true GOP-fashion that he’s a victim of ‘cancel culture’, blah-blah-blah.

That Gaetz petitioned the Former Guy for a blanket pardon does not bode well for him, either. It must be noted that even the ethically and legalistically unhinged advisors to the Orange Doofus would not consider broaching the idea of a pardon for the young Congressman to the Grifter-in-chief. Gaetz’s steadfast loyalty to the Man from Mar-A-Lago didn’t enter into it.

It must be assumed that Gaetz was too toxic for either Barr or 45. There is much more to come.

 Gaetz-Gaete Update:
Joel Greenberg - nobody's favorite tax-collector and Matt's good buddy in crime (allegedly...) has decided to flip on the Florida Congressman in hopes to get a deal from federal prosecutors. Hoo-boy, this should be good. Stay tuned.

Update of the Gaetz-Gaete update:
Republican maverick, Adam Kissinger, has called for Matty to resign.
Schadenfreude...

 

 

9:29; Chauvin, Floyd and Gaetz

 

Nine minutes and twenty-nine seconds.

Try holding ‘downward dog’ for nearly nine and a half minutes.

Try doing it with one hand jammed into your pocket.

(Seriously. Why did Chauvin have his hand in his pocket? Searching for change? Playing pocket-pool? What?)

I digress.

It’s all been captured on video; multiple times from several angles. One or another video version of the murder has been seen around the world by millions. Can anyone honestly watch that horrifying video and assert that former officer Derek Chauvin did NOT commit murder?

George Floyd’s blood toxicology doesn’t enter into it. Neither does his prior history of arrest. Neither does anything other than Derek Chauvin kneeling on his neck for 9 minutes and 29 seconds. George Floyd’s character and track-record are of no consequence. His life was ended on that day while in the custody of the police. His life ended as Derek Chauvin knelt on his neck for nine minutes and twenty-nine seconds.

Yesterday, Genevieve Hansen, the off-duty firefighter with EMT training testified that she offered her assistance in relieving Mr Floyd’s life-threatening distress. She was denied the chance to save Mr Floyd’s life. (Let that sink in.) Ms Hansen testified that she called 911 to report a murder at the hands of a uniformed officer. She was not the only witness of the ‘arrest’ who called 911 to report the police to the police.

 Chauvin’s defense thus far is that the hostility of the small group of witnesses distracted him from the care the suspect. Really. That’s as feeble and cynical as a defense can get. There were nearly as many armed police officers on the scene as there were civilian witnesses, but the cops felt threatened?

One might laugh if cold-blooded murder was not the outcome. 

Speaking of unspeakable jokes: Matt Gaetz.

Under investigation by the DOJ.

Pardon if I smirk. Chuckle. Chortle.

Matt Gaetz is under investigation for transporting a 17-year-old girl across state lines, putting her up in hotels (all on the tax-payer dime, BTW) for the purpose of… well, best leave that to the imagination

Gaetz denies having a relationship with a 17-year old. His defense - as he tried to lay it out on Tucker Carson’s show – is that he and his family were victims of an extortion attempt. Tucker, sporting his trademarked quizzical look, seemed to be having none of it and denied, on air, recollection of a dinner which had something to do with the purported extortion attempt? Maybe?

Gaetz’s defense/alibi included his father wherein Gaetz Senior wore a wire in an FBI probe of the extortion attempt. This is the very same father who made a drunk driving charge for the younger Gaetz ‘go away’ some years ago, it should be remembered.

No charges have been made, as yet. The congressman is claiming victimhood, following the GOP play-book, and charging the Deep State (or something) with something. Maybe?

Amusement at Matt’s legal predicament may be premature. This whole magilla could be totally innocent and easily explained. Right? Matt, true to form, is making a big stink about this, which, to most observers, indicates that the stink is emanating from a much bigger cesspool. Katie Benner, Justice Department reporter for the New York Times, claims this latest stink pre-dates the purported extortion by months.

Whatever the outcome of this investigation, it’s gratifying to watch Gaetz squirm. As the Former Guy’s biggest, most vocal supporter in the House, one might see the Fickle Finger of Fate at play.  

It should be noted that Mr Gaetz was the sole vote against a human trafficking bill. Hmmm.

Matt Gaetz, in plain terms, is a massive, steaming pile of Putz. 

Gaetz, however, is not nearly as loathsome and detestable as Derek Chauvin.

This is a judgement call, most assuredly. It is. 

But, ending someone’s life is not equal to ruining someone’s life. By which I mean that murder is not the same as rape or statutory rape. Both are contemptible. Both are egregious. Both are illegal.

Yes, this may be controversial in the ‘#metoo’ generation and this is not an attempt to minimize the suffering, fear and harm caused by sexual predators. It is an attempt to bring two publicly discussed crimes into focus.

As reprehensible as Matt Gaetz is, a child of white privilege, who like his mentor, the Former Guy, was born with a silver palaver up his bum and several ‘Get Out of Jail Free’ cards tucked into his nappies, he has not been charged with murder.

(The day is still young…)

On the other vile hand is Derek Chauvin, who, as an officer of a law broke a law which is as old as human civilization itself and engraved on mythical stone by the finger of ‘god’; ‘Thou Shalt Not Kill’!

While it is certainly titillating to watch Gaetz burst into flames and scurry for any cover available, we must maintain moral focus and moral outrage.

Chauvin is a murderer.

Allow his trial to proceed. He must be afforded his day in court, yet we know he is guilty of taking the life of George Floyd in a most cowardly, callous and cold-blooded manner. How many times can one watch any of the video documentation of that fatal day without reaching the conclusion that what is being witnessed is murder?

Gaetz is a steaming pile of Putz but he’s no Derek Chauvin.

 

 

Righteous Kvetching About an Algorithm

 

Every once in a while, one must simply allow oneself to gripe. As a dedicated curmudgeon, ‘once-in-a-while’ happens frequently.

Case in point is a current gripe with FaceBook or rather the ’bots at FB. I’ve been given (given? Ha! ) another 30-day suspension.

Another one, mind you. 

The more recent one about which this writer is kvetching, resulted from a three-word post in response to a post about a current bill awaiting a vote in the Senate, namely, HR1, the ‘For the People Act’, to expand and further secure the voting rights of Americans. There are many more bits of Biden’s agenda headed to the Senate floor, including one on gun control which will face lock-step republican recalcitrance.

The responding post in question read ‘Kill the filibuster!’; quick, simple, to the point and on we go to the next one. After about 5 minutes (time is elastic and relative when streaming down the black hole of one’s FaceBook wall), the proviso from the ‘bot announced that my account was suspended for 7 days because of a violation of community standards. What followed moments later, was a more detailed pronouncement asking if I disputed the finding. The confirmation of the ‘bot’s ruling came quick on the heels of my ephemeral protest. (funny, that...)

‘Kill the filibuster’ promoted violence, it was ruled by the algorithm.

Huh? WTF!? Over...

Did the algorithm assume that ‘filibuster’ was a person?

‘Kill the lights'. 'Kill the music'. 'Kill the engine'. Those all promote violence?

Right...

And to add injury to insult, the ‘bot ruled that since I had been a bad boy before this, the suspension would be for 30 days not 7.

The previous offense had resulted from using the word ‘pussy’. A Trumpian simpleton had whinged about something or other and I had advised him not to be such a pussy. It was advice. Snarky, sure but...

In my defense, I had tried to edit the post, replacing ‘pussy’ with ‘snowflake’ but was interrupted by the ‘bot’s ruling that such language was considered ‘bullying’.

‘Bot says; ‘30-day suspension’!  
Talk about ‘snowflakes’. Scurry to your safe place...

There are plenty of better things to pass the pandemic time then doom scrolling the FB wall, of course. Re-arranging my sock drawer (again) come to mind. However, to be stymied by a ‘bot and stifled by an algorithm which red-flags words out of context is something to righteously kvetch about, thus wasting more time.

 Thus, endeth the gripe.

Now, how about that drink?

 

 

 

Kill the Filibuster

 

Kill the filibuster.

It’s not a law. It’s not in the Constitution. It’s only a Senate rule and can be changed by a simple majority. VP Harris can make the scale-tipping vote as president of the Senate. 

We must keep at the fore-front of our minds that any legislation which might lean towards ‘progressive’ action (i.e. climate change, voter rights, minimum wage, etc) will be stymied by Mitch ‘the Bitch’ McConnell and the obstructionist GOP. The Dems must remove the filibuster as it is Mitch ‘the Grim Reaper’ McConnell’s most powerful tool as the Senate minority leader. It is his and the GOP’s veto power.

Kill the filibuster.

Should the GOP obstruct Biden’s agenda and the agenda of the Progressive wing of the Democratic Party, the GOP could then run in 2022 on the seeming failure of Dems to enact the change that Biden promised in his election.

Diabolical and inevitable

According to a recent Politico/Morning Consult poll, 76% of Americans are in favor of the COVID relief bill passed in the House. 61% of Americans polled say they want to raise the minimum wage to $15 an hour. Raising the federal minimum wage to $15 would benefit more than 32 million Americans.

There are 253 bills in 43 states to restrict voting at this writing.

Robert Reich has stated that, “The filibuster was popularized in the Jim Crow era by Southerners who wanted to prevent the Northern majority from passing legislation in favor of civil rights for Black citizens.”

The ‘For the People Act’ (HR-1) would end gerrymandering, set up public financing of elections, expand early voting, enact automatic voter registration (AVR) and counter Citizens United. This must pass. 

Unless the filibuster is eliminated and HR-1 passed, the Democrats will continue to be legislated out of power by the GOP.

 

The Meghan Harry Kerfuffle

 

Here’s the thing. 

All the nugatory comments citing disinterest or exasperation, and taut expressions of aloof worldliness such as ‘The British royals are racist? Who knew? (insert eye-roll emoji) are beside the point.

What Meghan and Harry have revealed in their interview with Oprah is not just more social media celebrity news. It’s more than that.

(Full disclaimer: I don’t give a whit nor a shit nor a toss. After centuries of brutal colonialism expanding and retaining the British Empire, after the calamity of the UK leaving the European Union in ethnocentric fear of foreigners, to suddenly realize the Royals may be racist and chauvinistic is a bit disingenuous if not bone-headedly ignorant.)

The point that should be internalized is that, Harry, the son of Lady Di, sixth in the line of succession to the British throne, has expressed the painful truth in public, at long last: the Royal Family is a business, an extremely profitable business which has racism, ethnocentricity and class prejudice as the tenets of its business model.

Harry; Henry Charles Albert David. The Prince. The Duke of Sussex, has dissed the Royal Fam as hateful racists. (Nota bene; he gave a pass to the Royal Gram and Grandpa – just barely.)

This accusation of rank racism was not leveled by some left-wingnut anti-royal republican. (Ironic, that, eh, what?) This indictment came from within the House of Windsor, itself, or at least from the front portico. Sure, Harry and Meghan are building on the foundation set by his mother, Lady Di, but it has been a foundation largely ignored. 

Until now.

Is it any wonder that they waited until after they left ‘Old Blighty’ before dropping the bombshell?

 

 

Really? Potatohead? Earth calling GOP...

 

Potatohead?  Really?

This is the number one issue for Republicans during a pandemic, at the beginning stages of a new executive administration as crucial legislation regarding pandemic relief and voter suppression awaits House and Senate votes and following an armed, murderous insurrection?

Not the neo-fascist deification of Supremo Orange-o at the QPAC Conspiracy Seminar at the Orlando, Hyatt?

Nor the raging vaccination disaster master-minded by Governor Ron ‘Doofus’ DiSantis in the host state of Florida ?

Not the Golden Calf, Mexican-made effigy of the Former Guy at said White Nationalist convention?

Not the celebrity status of QAnon adepts, Marjorie Taylor-Greene and her pistol-packing side-kick, Lauren Opal Boebert? 

Not the gross and hideous display of poor taste and poor delivery exhibited by Cancun Ted? 

Not the vainglorious clamor of the attendees for the outright, specious and oft-repeated lies pronounced by the Chosen Orange One? Nor, indeed, the lies themselves which serve to undermine our Republic, the Constitution and the very concept of the Rule of Law?

Really?

Got nothing for any of that but the re-gendering of a plastic toy everyone had forgotten about until a feature-length cartoon series resurrected it gets your goat, does it?

It is good to know that the opposition party has its eye on the prize.

Who said irony is dead?

 

Stand Back & Stand By

 

According to testimony given by Maj. Gen. William J. Walker, the order for the National Guard ‘to stand back and stand by’ on January 6^th, was from the Secretary of the Army, himself, the highest echelons of the maladministration of Pumpkin Boy.

The likelihood that one of his ignoramus underlings would dare to do anything but serve the wishes of the Orange Blob is preposterous. The thought that then-Secretary of the Army Ryan McCarthy would unilaterally jump unless told to jump is fantasy.

We know who gave the order for the National guard to be on hold for three hours while, Lt. Gen. Charles Flynn, the brother of the disgraced Michael Flynn hemmed and hawed, citing ‘bad optics’ at the behest of a certain smug, spray-tanned arsehole.

If John LaCarre had ever been so desperate for plot line, (he was not.) to entertain such a tawdry, almost lewd story twist, he would have had to be main-lining Tide pods, drowning in alcohol and inhaling spray-paint in a writer’s block wasteland.

No one ever accused the Former Guy of being original.

Or crafty... But, he is predictable. He put the fix in and watched the swirl of chaos he’d unleashed – the nation be damned, the devil take the hind-most.

To the point, it would not take more than a bow-legged baby-step to get from (1.) the Secretary of the Army flubbing a call-up order for three hours to (2) the same or similar orders being ‘implied’ before the day and on the day with the Capitol Police and the DC Metro Cops.

Now, why weren’t the other federal law-enforcement agencies out in force?

Car 54, where are you?

 

On Windmills and Wind Turbines

 

Let’s get this straight; a wind turbine is NOT a windmill.

Never was.

Never will be. 

It’s like calling a donkey a zebra.

It’s like calling Chewbacca a human. 

It’s like calling ‘Ted’ Cruz... well, no one would ever call ‘Ted’ Cruz...

Never mind.

Let’s start with the basics. A windmill is a ‘mill’. A mill is a machine which grinds grain. Grinding grain is a process called ‘milling’. The machine which grinds grain (oats, wheat, rice, barley, etc) is a mill.

Many coffee drinkers use a mill on a daily basis to grind their coffee. These aficionados of freshly brewed java may call their machine a ‘coffee grinder’ but it is, in fact, a mill. It grinds the coffee beans to a smaller size that suits the needs of the coffee drinker the preferred method of brewing coffee to suit taste.

 Terms to consider is here are ‘granule’ and ‘granular’ which stem from the Latin word ‘granum’ from which the English word ‘grain’ is derived. How ‘bout that?

 Now back to our rant.

 A mill is a machine that grinds; a machine that makes granules. A mill granulates.

 A windmill is a large machine – usually pre-industrial – which harnesses the power of the wind to grind grain. Wind drives large blades or ‘vanes’ which cause the wheels and cogs of the machinery to turn. The purpose of the turning machinery is to grind grain.

The proprietors of such machines are called ‘millers’ as their enterprise is the milling of grain and the maintenance of the large machine which mills grain. 

To recap; a ‘windmill’ is a machine which utilizes the energy of wind to grind grain – i.e. to mill grain.

A wind turbine, to reiterate, is NOT a windmill. 

Admittedly, a wind turbine is also a machine which has large blades or vanes which are turned by the wind, however. This is undoubtedly the source of the unfortunate confusion. It is tantamount to confusing a cat for a dog or mistakenly identifying Mitch McConnell for a human. It’s understandable but dismaying. 

A wind turbine does NOT mill anything. Its purpose is to harness the power of the wind to turn a turbine which generates electricity. There is no ‘miller’. There is no grain. There is nothing granulated in a milling process.

A wind turbine is NOT a windmill. A windmill is NOT a wind turbine.

By now, dear reader, you’ve wondered why such a big meal is being made from this seemingly innocent misuse of a term. 

Malapropism, for one thing. Malapropism comes from the French phrase mal à propos, which means ‘ill-suited’. The word ‘malapropism’ was coined in Richard Brinsley Sheridan's ‘The Rival’s, 1775. A character in the play, Mrs.  Malaprop, continually misuses words. Sheridan’s intent was for a comic effect to ridicule the upper class as ignorant and unsophisticated.

The continuous misuse of the term ‘windmill’ when referencing a wind turbine is a show of ignorance.

Another reason for making such a meal out of this is ‘solecism’. Solecism is the misuse of a word or mistake in grammar. In the modern derogatory parlance of social media, a ‘grammar nazi’.

 The departed New York Times writer, William Safire, decried solecism as a form of insanity. The constant and consistent misuse of terms (so his argument went) leads to ‘solipsism’- the idea that the world is created by an individual’s mind.

 In this matter, the solecistic individual claims that grammar and terminology are irrelevant or inconsequential. The solecist is declaring a mastery over reality which is not real. Such a declaration announces not only ignorance but a mild psychosis.

 To consistently write ‘you’re’ for ‘your’ or ‘their’ for ‘they’re’ may seem harmless enough, but it is akin to mistaking the moon for the sun.

Or a donkey for a zebra.

Or a wind turbine for a windmill.

The ‘former guy’ (ugh) persisted in mislabeling wind turbines as windmills.“You know, I know windmills very much,” he erroneously speechified in 2019 when deriding wind turbines. That sort of ignorance must be combated. It must not be accepted into common usage. Yet, news readers, politicians and social commentators persist in this lexical error.

That is why such a meal is being made here of this solecism.

Wind turbines are NOT windmills.

(nota bene; when searching for images, Google search offered both windmills and wind turbines when asked for windmills. ugh...) 

Snake Oil from the Anti-Vaxxers

 

24% of recently Americans polled say the they will NOT take a vaccine for COVID-19.

According to a Monmouth University poll, one in four Americans “say they will avoid getting the vaccine at all if they can help it.”

https://www.monmouth.edu/polling-institute/reports/monmouthpoll_us_020321/

WTF- over?

This preposterous posture of ignorance and disregard for their own health and the general health of the nation is the result of the enduring campaign by anti-vaxxers and anti-science proponents.

There are folks who have prospered with a cyber-based cottage industry of anti-science insanity. These people (Ty and Charlene Bollinger among them) are hawking flimflam. They are swindlers of the oldest sort; they are snake-oil salesmen and the huskers for snake-oil sales. They are kooks devoid of medical certificates, degrees, authority, warrant or authenticity.

Yet, they hold a substantial number of Americans in their sway.

One must ask; How is this possible? The answer to that innocent question will fill volumes in the years to come as historians and journalists attempt to decipher the madness of the Trump years. There is not space or time or inclination to explore this dispiriting phenomena here.

Make no mistake, though. This dismissal of science is madness. It is a stark departure from sanity and reality.

However, the Bollingers (mentioned earlier) should not be branded as insane or included in the number of the deluded. Not at all. They are clear-eyed cons working a grift. They are making money hand over fist by hawking their snake oil and proselytizing others to embrace their anti-vaxxer nonsense.

Perhaps that is the most disturbing aspect of this social-media induced madness; that it is a crass, crude grift which naïve, uninformed people are taking as sincere concern for matters of personal health.

 

Not A Political Piece

 

This is not a political piece, per se. It’s not specifically about a political personage or about political process. It is about science. As written before, here, at the Palmer Report, science and the Biden attention to scientists will, if not hamstrung by political crab-walking, supply the solution to the many crises facing humankind.

Far too many have been made ignorant of science by cult-like thinking and theocratic propaganda. The MAGA-cult, QAnon, intelligent design quacks, flat-earthers, anti-maskers, etc, each in their own peculiar way, have caused the dumbing-down of the United States. Pandemic Deniers fit squarely within that bizarre panoply of anti-science and ignorance.

(Our last president, a dysfunctional toad of a man, was an amalgam of the collective ignorance and prejudicial superstition represented, in part, by the aforementioned cults of anti-science.)

I digress…

If this article were a Venn diagram, the reader would see a considerable amount of over-lap displayed therein.

One area of duplication that would be evident in such a diagram is between the deniers of the pandemic (which would include ‘anti-maskers’) and those espousing the ‘intelligent design’ and deny the veracity of evolution. 

To much dismay, COVID-19 has morphed into at least two new variants. This morphing is also known as mutation. The process of mutation is also termed ‘evolution’. The virus is evolving; it continues to evolves just as our species and all species continue to evolve. (Homo sapiens sapiens evolves far more slowly than any strain of virus, of course. We’re far more complicated.) 

Thus, we have evidence of evolution before us. The new variants of C-19 are more readily transmissible, possibly more deadly to certain segments of the population which casts the efficacy of the current generation of vaccines in some doubt.

In-Quiring Minds

 

QAnon. 

 It really raises lots of Questions. (See what I did there?) 

 It’s not so much intriguing as it is perplexing to those of us on the outside. 

Although the MMS and the lib-tard talking heads like to call the QAnon followers stupid and ignorant, they must be, on the contrary, quite bright and studious. I mean my head fairly reels trying to keep track of all the conspiracies. 

For example; a pedophile ring headquartered in the basement of a pizza parlor that has no basement. Really astounding! (Is there a star-gate or something to a Satanic universe involved?) 

Or the idea that a guy, JFK, Jr, was murdered in a plane crash by the Clintons but is still alive and working for Q? Is there a handbook or something which settles some of these basics? A sort of ‘Q for Dummies’, or something? 

To be honest, watching YouTube videos and trolling 4-channel isn’t really my thing. Perhaps it is a case of my being of an earlier generation which read books. My brain is woefully addicted to facts, sad to say. I get off on reading foot-notes and perusing indexes, glossaries, lists of dramatis personae, so a hand-book would be right up my alley. It could be in a proprietary cypher, of course, like the writings of Nostradamus. 

 Just an idea – I’m spit-balling. 

Another question niggling at my lib-tard brain is one that is a bit more... pedestrian. I hesitate to ask as it is rather crass, but here goes:
 

I was delighted to see that Q-Anon (Am I saying that correctly? I’d hate to make a faux pas like Qevin McCarthy did the other day on camera…) 

Anyway, Q-followers have meetings. How delightful! The camaraderie and sense of community was clearly in evidence. I particularly liked the guitar sing-along towards the end of the meeting. 

‘Where we Go One, We Go All! 

WWG1WGA. 

Brilliant! Very stirring! 

That leads me (at last) to my crass question:
When you all go out for lunch, how do you split the check? Is it all ‘even-steven’ or strictly ‘dutch’? Or is the bill picked up by Q? Maybe special Q credit cards? 

 I ask because when BLM or Antifa or #metoo meet, George Soros picks up the tab, as you know. That takes a bit of the bother out of planning Marxist anarchy, you see, although I do envy your sing-alongs. 

 In-Quiring minds want to know!

It's Gone But Not Forgotten

 

Consider this: Trump never expected that he wouldn’t be able to corrupt more people in the government. 

He expected to work, as he had all his life, with crooks and people he could corrupt. It didn’t quite go as he’d liked. He got the boot from more than 80,000,000. 

There were those who were corruptible, of course. He found plenty of willing minions. Bill Barr is but one in a very long list of despicable agents of and accomplices to Trump’s criminality. Thankfully, however, there were those he encountered who did not succumb to the his corrupting influence. In addition, Barr chose to reject Trump’s fantasy about the election and resigned limp-wrested protest, so even the corruptible Bill Barr had limits. 

In Georgia, neither the Governor, nor the Secretary of State nor the Election officials would  be lured into illegal waters in order to ‘find more votes’ to flip the presidential election. They had suppressed the vote and had striven to disenfranchise millions within the state of Georgia, in this and previous elections (ask Stacy Abrams, ahem...) but they would not cross that line of legality for 'the Donald'. Their lapses in democratic zeal to serve their white, male privilege was one thing; a failure of ethics. Breaking the law to serve the psychotic ego of the President was something completely other. Indeed, they went so far as to record an incriminating phone call from Trump to protect themselves from his corrupting influence. 

Moreover, of the judges which Mitch had railroaded onto the benches - Gorsuch, Kavanaugh and Comy-Barrett are but three of the two hundred and forty-five judicial appointments by the Orange Turdling - none, NONE!, would bend to Trump’s will and rule in favor of any of his law suits regarding the 2020 election.

He whinged and pouted openly about how ‘his’ Supreme Court refused to rule in his favor. 
Boo-hoo. 

His MAGA-crew and the more ammosexual Vanilla ISIS variants such as the ‘Proud Boys’(snigger) and the ‘Oath Keepers’ (gack) were willing to toss morality and legality to the wind by assaulting the Capitol, threatening Congress members and even the Veep, himself during the insurrection; Trump’s imbecilic end game but they achieved only their own arrest and temporary toilet in which to deposit their more erudite offerings.

Imagine the calamity if some of the less corruptible (e.g. Kelly, McMasters, Priebus, Rex, etc) had been more corruptible.

Drumpf's Plandemic?

 

Has it occurred to anyone else that the GOP plan to address poverty is to eliminate the poor by attrition? The pandemic has provided them the opportunity to accelerate the pace. 

 

COVID-19 has a higher morbidity rate amongst people of color. This indicated that the poor are at higher risk generally because of several factors: living in closer quarters with more people, less access to health care, working low-paying jobs in the service industry resulting in contact with more people and a higher chance of infection. Moreover, low-paying jobs are also less secure, less stable, provide no paid days off, no sick leave health insurance, no unemployment insurance and no PPE. 

The GOP has stood in obstruction of any sensible economic program presented by the Democrats. The GOP reluctantly passed feeble, short-term aid. Mitch has fulfilled his self-pronounced role as Grim Reaper, letting all legislation die on his desk. Those moribund bills include the House proposal, the Heroes Act - passed in May! - for a second economic aid package which would and provide some solutions to the current economic and health crises.

Yet, Mitch and the GOP chose to railroad through an unwanted, unqualified nomination to the Supreme Court rather than deal with the Democrats faithfully. Drumpf stood on the side-lines, incapable of leadership or unwilling to lead and did nothing as the executive officer but whinge about his ratings.

Taken together, I conclude that the neither the GOP nor the president wish to solve the problems facing Americans. It’s the old ‘sink-or-swim’ mentality embraced by the GOP. 

 

Poverty is a personal failure in their decrepit credo. In their world, one is poor because one does not strive. One is poor because of a character flaw. The poor are poor because they lack the desire to succeed, as Drump’s son-in-law, Jared the mannequin, has proclaimed. Utter nonsense - as anyone who has ever been poor will attest.

These are dark thoughts, true, but ones that fits the facts and fits the history of the GOP and the Orange Ogre-in-chief. In their fascist, racist minds, the Poor are a blight and the pandemic provides a means to eliminate the problem of poverty by eliminating the poor.

Herd Immunity and Eugenics

 

The non-response to the pandemic by the Drumpf administration is a combination of two elements; both are sociopathic tacts.

The first is a combination of the GOP’s prime tenets: ‘no government is the best government’ and ‘if it’s not happening to you, then it’s of no concern’. 
(e.g. Poverty? I don’t know anyone who’s poor.
Health care? I have insurance.
Climate change? My vacation home seems to be okay.
Gun control? I’ve never been shot.
COVID-19? I don’t know anyone who’s sick or dead from it.)

The second is purely Drumpfian. Drumpf’s ‘race-horse’ concept of DNA, genetics and bloodline; his law-of-the-jungle, only-the-strong-survive mentality.

The GOP of Drumpf has combined the two in a senseless, lumpy stew and have come up with their laissez-faire, pseudo-policy of herd immunity’ whereby they do nothing and watch the population sicken and day.

It’s flat-earth theory applied to epidemiology.

Of course, only the ‘strong’ survive this policy. Those like the ‘chosen one’; Donald the Magnificent, Donald the Virus Slayer, Donald the Immune.

If you’re of the ‘chosen people’, - those of the proper bloodline - then you’ll survive and thrive in a the post-pandemic world. The Nation will be thusly made stronger!

Praise unto Donald the Magnificent!
The coronavirus has met its match in Drumpf and has been bested.

“I feel so strong!”, he crows from the stage to his adoring followers.
“I guess I’m immune!” He admits with gratuitous piety.

'It’s all good!' runs the Party line.
Fun and games.
Pass out MAGA masks.
High-Fives all around!
Do nothing ’til you hear from me.

Or the ICU nurse. 

This do-nothing approach might remind one of that hateful, racist, murderous pseudo-science; eugenics. It should properly be so considered; for ‘herd immunity’ and eugenics are hand-maidens of the same evil. It speaks of a superiority of one class of people over another; those who would survive COVID-19 and those who won’t (or haven’t).

 “It is what it is.”

(See my previous post of Wednesday, July 22, 2020 ‘Ineptitude as Racism’
https://lexisnexussolarplexus.blogspot.com/2020/07/ive-been-working-on-thistheory-for.html)

Herd immunity has become the de facto policy of the Drumpf administration regarding the pandemic. Sacrifice the old, the sick and the weak so that the ‘strong’ will attain further strength.

They’ve done a cost/benefit analysis, the GOP and Donald the Immune. They conclude that subtracting the poor, the black, the brown, the elderly from the population, those of stronger nature, of stronger fiscal condition will come out ahead in the end.

Make way for the Uber-Mensch. He takes large steps.

In Florida, a MAGA-gramma renounced her right to life by stating that she didn’t care if ‘the COVID’ took her. She beamed as she said it. She would be a vestal grandmother striding proudly to the sacrificial altar in the IC unit.

“It’s the will of ‘god’”, you could almost hear her say.

Or is it the perfidy of Donald the Magnificent?