Roy Moore (Caucasian) candidate for US Senate from Alabama in today’s special election to replace Jeff Sessions (Caucasian), appointed by President Don the Con as US Attorney General: “I think it (America) was great at the time when families were united, even though we had slavery, they cared for one another. People were strong in the family.”
Charles Blow (Negro) opinion columnist for the New York Times: “The pre-Trump Republican Party is dead; The zombie Trump party now lives in its stead, devoid of principle, feasting on fear and rage, foreign to moral framing.”
It seems that Alabamians (Caucasian Republicans) are so opposed to abortion on “moral” grounds that they will vote for a candidate who refuses to accept lawful precedents (Obergefell v Hodges, “establishment of religion”) from the Supreme Court of the United States and has been dismissed from the Alabama Supreme Court twice for this refusal (he was elected, and then re-elected after his dismissal, by those same Caucasian Republican Alabamians), and who has a history of (alleged) pursuit and sexual battery of underage (Caucasian) Alabamian teenagers– rather than a candidate who accepts lawful Supreme Court (Roe v Wade) precedents on abortion restrictions and is personally free of moral taint.
By the way, Alabamian voter laws restrict the privilege of voting to those who can present an Alabamian photo ID at the polls, available ‘for free’ to those who can reach a Department of Motor Vehicles office before the election… Such laws prevent in-person voter fraud by impersonation, although such fraud is virtually non-existent according to a five-year investigation by the presidential administration of Republican George W. Bush. Those laws also prevent poor and working-class blacks from voting (due to their lack of time and resources) at a hugely disproportionate rate, double that of whites. Voter ID laws are nothing more than a racist “poll tax” that will be declared unconstitutional when the issue is litigated at the Supreme Court level, which has not happened yet even though the law has been in effect since 2014. Section Five of the Voting Rights Act declared such laws null and void without prior review by the Justice Department, but this was declared unconstitutional by a 5-4 majority of the Supreme Court because the US Congress had not revised that section when it renewed the law in 2010– despite the Alabama Congress’ history of continuing to attempt to pass similar racially discriminatory laws.
Just for fun: Roy Moore’s 27 y/o son has been arrested nine times, mostly for “moral” crimes (like drug possession), and is said to insist on only dating (adult) black women to spite his father.
The New York Times published this quote from our US Ambassador to the UN, one of the highest-ranking women in the Trump administration:
Nikki R. Haley, the American ambassador to the United Nations, said on Sunday that women who have accused President Trump of sexual misconduct “should be heard,” a surprising break from the administration’s longstanding assertion that the allegations are false and that voters rightly dismissed them when they elected Mr. Trump.
In fact, 52 or 53 percent of white women voted for Don the Con, a seeming paradox in light of the allegations against him and his recorded conversation with Billy Bush in which he talked about grabbing women by the genitals and getting away with it because of his fame– released a month before the election. One can only assume that the audio recording of Don the Con’s sexual bragging did not get the wide circulation that it deserved or that somehow Don’s policy positions justified voting for him over a woman…
Whatever the cause, the United States is going to hell in a handbasket, and even Mueller’s proof of Don the Con’s illegal, secret deals with the Russian government won’t prompt impeachment unless a Democratic majority is elected to the House in November 2018– an eternity of administrative malfeasance and the risk of an economic crash at any moment. What is worse, impeachment of Don will lead to government by Mike Pence, who will continue the administrative destruction of the government undeterred by any scandal.
This appeared in an article in the New Yorker about the effect Michael Flynn’s guilty plea has had on Don the Con’s lawyers:
Comey, whose testimony before the Senate Intelligence Committee mapped out the President’s potential obstruction of justice, certainly seems to feel vindicated by Flynn’s guilty plea and by what it might mean for Trump. Shortly after the news broke, Comey, referring to the Biblical Book of Amos, tweeted, “But justice roll down like waters and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream.”
This quote came from an article in which Billy Bush emphasized the fact that Don the Con really said those things about sexually battering women and getting away with it, in the New York Times on December 3, 2017:
“The man who once told me — ironically, in another off-camera conversation — after I called him out for inflating his ratings: ‘People will just believe you. You just tell them and they believe you,’ was, I thought, not a good choice to lead our country.”
Don the Con has been, for many years, a consistent liar whenever it suits his fancy or his interests. It is shocking– shocking, I tell you– that 1/3 of the American public actually believes his lies. More important, Republicans are poised to fulfill their rich donors’ demands for tax advantages that would destroy what’s left of the middle class– so they don’t care what lies Don tells as long as he signs their tax bill.
Quote of the Day II: Chuck Grassley Thinks Estate Tax Punishes Good People Who Invest Wisely
Senator Chuck Grassley of Iowa defended the repeal of the estate tax in the new “tax reform” bills, saying that “many” farmers would have to sell their farms to pay the tax; actual figures show that less than 100 Iowan farmers a year could potentially owe an estate tax when they expire, and most would have additional assets on hand to avoid selling any land. Even Grassley himself, who has farming interests, would probably not have enough to qualify. But having an estate tax, to him, apparently helps people who waste their money instead of investing it– not people who never had any money to begin with.
“I think not having the estate tax recognizes the people that are investing,” Grassley said, “as opposed to those that are just spending every darn penny they have, whether it’s on booze or women or movies.”
Do you see a pattern here? It is known, in philosophy, as Calvinism, the belief that those who are wealthy deserve their money because they are better people, and those who are poor are morally and mentally undeserving. Somehow the reality of poor children and infants is contrary to Calvinism and makes it a poor philosophy.
These remarks by Senator Orrin Hatch were reported in the Guardian yesterday:
“I happen to think Chip has done a terrific job for people who really needed the help. I’ve taken the position here for my whole Senate service: I believe in helping those who cannot help themselves but would if they could.
“I have a rough time wanting to spend billions and billions and trillions of dollars to help people who won’t help themselves – won’t lift a finger – and expect the federal government to do everything.
“Unfortunately the liberal philosophy has created millions of people that way, who believe everything they ever are or hope to be depends upon the federal government rather than the opportunities that this great country grants them. And I’ve got to say, I think it’s pretty hard to argue against these comments.”
Kids who aren’t from rich families should drop out of school and take up shining shoes to help Orrin pay for their health costs… and food/clothing…
The following was published in the New York Times on November 30, 2017, after being sent in the form of a letter to the editor:
To the Editor:
I am the editor of “The Dangerous Case of Donald Trump: 27 Psychiatrists and Mental Health Experts Assess a President.” We represent a much larger number of concerned mental health professionals who have come forward to warn against the president’s psychological instability and the dangers it poses. We now number in the thousands.
We are currently witnessing more than his usual state of instability — in fact, a pattern of decompensation: increasing loss of touch with reality, marked signs of volatility and unpredictable behavior, and an attraction to violence as a means of coping. These characteristics place our country and the world at extreme risk of danger.
Ordinarily, we carry out a routine process for treating people who are dangerous: containment, removal from access to weapons and an urgent evaluation. We have been unable to do so because of Mr. Trump’s status as president. But the power of the presidency and the type of arsenal he has access to should raise greater alarm, not less.
We urge the public and the lawmakers of this country to push for an urgent evaluation of the president, for which we are in the process of developing a separate but independent expert panel, capable of meeting and carrying out all medical standards of care.
BANDY X. LEE, NEW HAVEN
<
p class=”story-body-text story-content”>The writer is a forensic psychiatrist at the Yale School of Medicine.
First Known Extrastellar Asteroid: Oumuamua
In October, a strangely shaped asteroid shot through our solar system and is now leaving at roughly 95,000 km/hr, soon to leave us far behind. Calculations say it is roughly thirty meters in diameter and 140-400 m long; it is rotating around its long axis, producing a 10-1 difference in apparent brightness over a 7.4 hr rotational period. It appears to be made of rock or iron and have the overall density of water, suggesting that it is nearly solid. Its color is a dark red, attesting to a prolonged bombardment by interstellar cosmic rays. It is guessed that the object has been underway from another solar system for the last 40 million years, giving it plenty of time to acquire its reddish sheen from surface alteration by cosmic rays.
The speed of this object is such that no human-built craft could catch up with it, even if it were launched in a timely fashion. Our Voyager spacecraft are currently leaving the solar system at roughly 35,000 km/hr, a third of this object’s speed.
This object (asteroid) is unusual in several ways. First, it entered the solar system from high above the plane of the planets, passed close to the sun and earth, and exited at a very different angle due to the sling-shot effect of passing by the sun. Second, it is quite elongated, shaped somewhat like a cigar. Third, it is quite dense and appears not to be outgassing at all– unlike a comet, which releases quantities of gas as it passes the sun and leaves a coma, or shroud and tail of gas behind. The object is classed as an asteroid, a solid that doesn’t have significant amounts of water or gas.
Speculation as to the origin and nature of this object is intense, but the most likely fact is that it arose in a solar system far away and was naturally created during the formation of that system. It was probably kicked out of its home system by gravitational interactions with planets and other objects that threw it out of a normal, elliptical orbit into an interstellar journey. The reason for its odd shape is completely open to discussion.
The object has been given the name Oumuamua, which is Hawaiian for “messenger from afar arriving first.”
Videos of the object can be found at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O6PpbO7vIjU and an article in New Scientist is at https://www.newscientist.com/article/2152851-tracking-the-first-interstellar-asteroid-back-to-its-home-star/
Comment of the Day: 86 and Tired of Trump
Syl
Thousand Oaks 1 day ago
At 86 years old, I’m now required to sit and watch this administration basically dismantle my country. The protections for which so many have given so much….the nattional conscience which I believed came as a Constitutional right….the pride which was instilled in me by my parents and a government of honor.. from my childhood through the Second World War. All being disolved before my very eyes. What a waste. I can’t look at or listen to any of them anymore…..they make me sick to my stomach. The Trump Tribe on down.
Comment of the Day: Poverty is a Sin
This comment was posted in response to a Paul Krugman piece that claims the Republicans are in a hurry to pass their tax cut bill because they know they will be trounced in November 2018:
Ron Cohen
is a trusted commenter Waltham, MA 1 day ago
The rich are tearing our society apart. We surely must ask ourselves, why do they care so much? After all the tax cuts are modest relative to their immense wealth. Is it really about the money? Or is it something deeper and more visceral, a need to dominate and impoverish everyone else?
The great English historian, R.H. Tawney, in his magisterial work, “Religion and the Rise of Capitalism” (1926), tells us that by the mid 1600’s, most English Puritans saw in poverty “not a misfortune to be pitied and relieved, but a moral failing to be condemned, and in riches, not an object of suspicion … but the blessing which rewards the triumph of energy and will.”
This ideal of individual morality, derived from Calvin, has been with us ever since. But it has surfaced with renewed zeal in the 21st Century, with men like the Koch bothers, Robert Mercer, Art Pope, Sheldon Adelson and others determined to spend whatever it takes to replace democracy as we know it—a leveling force—with a fascistic, plutocratic model of government.
For these billionaires, however, religion plays no role. Rather, it’s how they see themselves, their self image, that motivates their lust for power, their need to dominate. They are the “makers,” deserving as such, while the rest of us are undeserving “takers,” living off their efforts. Identity politics isn’t just for Democrats anymore.
For a penetrating interpretation, see George Monbiot’s short but defining piece in The Guardian: http://tinyurl.com/p5dg6b5
Conrad Theodore Seitz 