In Answer to Ronald Reagan

Ronald Reagan used to tell us when we considering whom to vote for to ask if we were better off today than we were four years ago.

Minneapolis.

We have become the laughingstock of the world.  They would be laughing out loud and slapping their knees trying to get their breath if it was not for the fact that this buffoon has caused misery all over the world.  All the while, constantly blaming somebody else for his own ignorance, his own bigotry, his own cruelty.

Louisville.

On January 20, 2016, the unemployment rate in this country was 4.1%.  As of today, most economists agree that the true unemployment rate is greater than the officially announced rate of 14.7%.  Yet all he talks about is how great things were, if only for that damned virus, which he blames on a laboratory in China.

Atlanta

We have put children in cages, apparently because their parents came to this country looking for a better life for their families, but did not sound like the rest of us.  You know, just ike his grandparents at the end of the last century.

Denver

We have systematically withdrawn our authority as the leading voice of just about everything around the world.  We are no longer a part of the Paris Climate Change Accords, as the pace of climate change accelerates to the breaking point.  As the pandemic surges around us, he has withdrawn from the World Health Organization.  Never mind that this hamstrings the medical and public health world at perhaps the most critical time in its history.  He has also guaranteed that if a vaccine is found, but is found outside the United States, we will not be in line to receive it.

Charlottesville

In not condemning white terrorism for what it is, he has set free and given the imprimatur to all would be white nationalists, the KKK, Nazis and other second amendment terror types to prey upon the rest of us with impunity.

Philadelphia

Russians interfered with our election in 2016.  He stonewalled every investigation.  He has all but shut down the possibility of election security, threatening to veto any such provisions in any legislation given to him to sign.  Why would you want to veto legislation designed to ensure the integrity of our elections?

New York

At a time when the nation needs somebody to lead by example, he refuses to wear a mask in public and outright says Wall Street is more important than the lives of the people he serves.  So no masks for him.  Not even encouragement for others to wear them.  No social distancing.  No testing.  No tracing.  More than one hundred thousand dead and counting is a badge of honor.

Miami

Our cities are on fire.  We need soothing words, soaring words from our leaders to assure us that we will be okay.  That people of color are not going to shot when they go jogging in their neighborhood, shot by the police when they are asleep in their own homes, or snuffed out by an animal with a badge who grinds his knee into a handcuffed black man until he dies, while his partners stand around doing absolutely nothing even after the black man has stopped breathing.  Instead of words of healing, this imbecile offers images of the Jim Crow era, of lynchings, of dogs set upon people simply for protesting their rights.  He then tries to silence dissent when a single social network finally has enough of he lies and the dog whistles.  As staggering as it seems , all of this happened simply in the last week.

Chicago

So are we better off than we were four years ago?  On a personal note, I have not been able to work in the  profession I trained for and made a good living in for nearly forty years since March 16.  Although I had given up my private practice a year or so ago, it was nice having a stream of income coming in.  That ended when they closed the courthouses around here.  Since then, I have not been able to socialize in person with any friends.  No visits with families.  I cannot hug or kiss my ninety year old mother.  

Columbus

In the meantime bread lines form across the country.  People wait in their cars for hours for basic staples.

Minneapolis

Louisville

Atlanta

Denver 

Charlottesville

Philadelphia

New York

Miami

Chicago 

Columbus

Seattle

Los Angeles

Any Town, USA...

Although I am infinitely better off than many, if not most, yesterday, I received my first installment of unemployment insurance from the government.  Aside from this, I do not know what other income I personally will have for the foreseeable future.  Am I better off than I was four years ago?.

You tell me.

you can't talk to a maga -- exhibit a

A few nights ago, I was unfriended on facebook by a person I have known since high school.  This was a person I had accepted a friend request from almost as soon as I signed up on facebook back in the stone ages.  You know, like about twelve years ago.  I am not all that upset that I was unfriended.  Frankly, I barely knew this person in high school, and as I think about it now, if you showed me her picture from our yearbook without her name tagged to it, I don't think I could have picked her out.

For reasons you will easily figure out, I will refer to this now ex-friend as "Maga-ette".  While Maga-ette was mostly quiet for a long time on facebook, only posting pictures of wineries she visited every now and then and of her grandchildren, once Cadet Bone Spurs got elected, it started.  Nothing he could do was wrong.  All the problems of the world were caused by "libtards".  I debated unfriending her myself, but never got around to it.  Then came the events of this week.

It started a few nights earlier, when Mitch McConnell announced that the reason the coronavirus was allowed to spread through the United States as it has is that the president was distracted from the looming disaster by the "impeachment hoax".  From there, the inevitable happened.  A few right wing pundits backed this statement, none of them showing a bit of proof for the claim that the president was distracted by proceedings in the house that ended in December and in the Senate that was over in the first days of February all the way through the middle of March.  Then Maga-ette posted McConnell's statement word for word in boldfaced font on her newsfeed for all to see.

I pointed out to Maga-ette that the impeachment proceedings had long since ended before the president even considered taking the coronavirus threat seriously at all, and in any event, if any politician suffers from such a severe case of attention deficit disorder, perhaps they should not be serving in public office at all.  Another friend on my side of the political spectrum added that Cadet Bone Spurs did not seem all that distracted during that time so as to prevent him from running around the country giving campaign speeches and playing golf at his clubs.  Maga-ette professed not to know what either of us were talking about.  I then explained that he did not seem distracted from making nominations to judicial and government posts.  He did not seem distracted from working on deregulation of any number of industries.  He did not seem distracted from making speeches or golfing. Why was he distracted from attending to perhaps the single most looming existential threat in history, but nothing else?

Maga-ette responded that in times like this, we should all be working together, which is true.  That would have been good enough if it ended there.  Instead, she added that it is clear that I do not want to work together for the greater good at this time.

I note that Maga-ette lives about three thousand miles away from me, and to the best of my knowledge has no clue of what I do now or what I did before I semi-retired.  So I decided to educate her, at least as to the last two weeks.

During the last two weeks, my wife and I have formed a facebook group called "Stitched Together Long Island".  The purpose of the group is to mobilize the home sewing community and get them to make masks for health care professionals on the front line fighting the coronavirus pandemic.  We are in just two weeks at just under one thousand, five hundred members.  In that time, together with a sister group in California, we have distributed just about fifteen thousand masks throughout our community.  Now that the CDC is calling for all to wear facemasks outside of the home, our people are shifting slightly and making masks for their friends and neighbors, while still cranking them out for the first responders and the medical community.  All the while, we do not ask about political affiliations.  In fact, there is a rule in the group that there is no political discussion allowed.  We provide for everyone, regardless of political belief.  I also pointed out to Maga-ette that we do all of this for free and do not accept monetary donations.

I concluded by saying that I thought I was doing my part, and asking what she was doing.  Her reaction?

Maga-ette instantly had two one sentence responses, which sort of told me she had not really read what I had written.  The first told me to stand up, pat myself on the back and give myself an "ada boy" (her spelling, not mine).  The second was to tell me I was an "arrogant dem".

Frankly, I am quite proud of what my wife and I have done in the past two weeks.  The response from Maga-ette was so asinine I went immediately to my friends page to unfriend her, only to find out she had beat me to it.

And that, in a nutshell shows you how difficult it is to talk to somebody who has made up their minds that they are not going to listen, no matter what you say.  In other words, she might as well be the president himself.

let's play softball -- questions...

It was a softball question.  As softball questions go, it doesn't get more softball than this.

NBC's Peter Alexander gave Cadet Bone Spurs the opening all political leaders crave.  He asked him, "What do you say to Americans watching you right now who are scared?".

This was his Fireside Chat moment, his "Nothing to Fear but Fear Itself" moment, his "Shining City on the Hill" moment.  It was his opportunity to bring all Americans together, to rally around the flag and we are all Americans moment.  It was the opportunity to shine and let all Americans rally around the effort to beat back the coronavirus.  It was the chance to be proud for a moment.

Instead...

What does he say to Americans watching right now who are scared?

"I say you are a terrible reporter.  I think it's a very nasty question, and I think that's a very bad signal that you're putting out to the American people.  The American people are looking for answers and they're looking for hope.  And you're doing sensationalism, and the same with NBC and Comcast.  I don't call it Comcast, I call it Concast, for whom you work.  Let me just tell you something.  That's really bad reporting, and you ought to get back to reporting instead of sensationalism.  Let's see if it works  It might and it might not.  I happen to feel good about it, but who knows?  I've been right a lot.  Let's see what happens".

And then while a reporter was asking him the next question, he told Mr. Alexander "You ought to be ashamed of yourself", signalling, if nothing else, that he was not paying attention to the question being posed to him even though he had called on the reporter to ask it.

He was given the chance to shine and took it to make gratuitous insults and say a softball question is nasty.  We can only imagine how he would answer hard questions.  On the other hand, we have already seen how he does with those.

Don't believe me?  Watch the clip.  And watch the fact that nobody in the background bats an eye when he comes up with this drivel.

Leader of the free world, my ass.

https://www.aol.com/article/news/2020/03/20/trump-responds-to-question-about-coronavirus-fears-by-bashing-the-media/23956487/

something not political or coronavirus...

My wife tells me if I post something today, it should be entertaining and not so political, coronavirus, or just a downer in nature. 

Soooooooo....

This one was originally published in the Daily Pennsylvanian, my college newspaper, some time around 1978 or so.  I do not remember who wrote this.  He/she is an immortal in my opinion.  I may not get it exactly right, but so what?  I am now a senior citizen, eligible for social security, if the GOP does not ravage it (oops...).  When I finish with this, I am going to the kitchen.  My wife will tie a bib on me, and she will try to spoon feed oatmeal to me...

A cow is standing in a pasture, minding its own business, when a rabbit walks up to him and challenges him to a race to the fence on the other side of the pasture and back.  Knowing he cannot beat a rabbit in a footrace, the cow declines, but the rabbit persists (not unlike Elizabeth Warren, but then again, I digress...). 

"Mr. Cow, I am a good sport and I know you need something to make you feel better.  I will let you win the race".  With that, the cow and the rabbit take off.  Sure enough, they get to the fence on the other side of the pasture and the rabbit is letting the cow lead.  They turn around an head to the start/finish line.  Just before they get to it, the rabbit puts on a burst and finishes just ahead of the cow. 

Dismayed and utterly (I avoided saying udderly.  Oh wait, I just did...) heartbroken, the cow runs across the pasture where the old mare is munching on some hay.  Upon reaching the horse, the cow lets out his heart.

"Oh Ms. Horse.  The rabbit told me he would let me win a race from to the fence and back, but at the last moment, he ran past me!  He cheated!  He lied!  Just like the president (oops again...) I cannot believe he would do that to me!!!  What can I do?"

The mare looks up from her pile of hay, looks at the cow, and says...

"That's funny.  A talking cow"...

You're welcome.  I am ready for my oatmeal...

worst person addendum

Oops...  Worst Persons in the World Addendum...

Sometimes, you just have to admit you made a mistake.  I do so here.

I started the second annual Worst Persons in the World list a few months ago, and then finished up after having strayed for a while, publishing it earlier today.  Then moments later, I looked at the list...

How on earth I could have excluded William Barr is beyond me.

He undercut the Mueller investigation, gutting its findings before it was actually published.

He publicly embraced a president gone wild and promoted a unitary executive theory that states that the president can do just about anything he wants, and because he is the president, it is not illegal.  That would include the famous boast about shooting somebody in broad daylight on Fifth Avenue.

He announced that Christianity is a guiding force and that Christians have been persecuted for their beliefs throughout the history of this country, and notably, in the last several years.  As a result, "Christian" values that impose upon just about everybody else, are perfectly find by him, first amendment be damned.

As soon as the senate got through gutting the constitution, shredding the thought of fair and legal process, he announced that there would be no more investigations of presidents or presidential candidates henceforth without his approval.  Who do you think he is thinking of?  Andrew Yang?

I could go on.  I believe you get the point...

2nd annual top ten worst persons in the world -- well in the united states, but it sounded good

This one falls under the better late than never category, especially since I announced the list was just about to come out and solicited nominations about three months ago.  Oh well...

Tis the season.  With help from our loyal legion of followers, and simply because I can do it, the good folks here at White Fluffy Duckies, with herald trumpets blaring, hereby present the Second Annual Top (Bottom) Ten Worst Persons -- IN THE WORLD!!!... well, at least here in the good old USA...

As a reminder, last year's list was:

10.  Susan Collins
9.  Ryan Zincke
8.  Duncan Hunter
7.  Sarah Huckabee Sanders
6.  Ted Cruz
5.  Brian Kemp
4.  Lindsay Graham
3.  Sean Hannity
2.  Steve King
1.  Mitch McConnell

Before the big reveal, I once again note that the President is not on this list, as he remains in a class of worstness by himself, and by including him herein, I would be permanently rendering lists of this sort obsolete and even more irrelevant in the grand scheme of things than they already are.

I also note again that in whittling the list down to only ten, I know I am leaving out much deserved people, who tried their darndest to get on the list, practically soliciting inclusion from me personally.  You cannot, however, include all fifty-two republican united states senators and one hundred and ninety-seven members of the House of Representatives.  It just does not work in a top ten list, unless you happen to use math employed by the President, which I will not do, even if we share the same alma mater.  By the same logic, the entire staff of the President at the White House cannot be included; therefore, we tearfully leave Kelly Anne Conway out once again.  We note, however, in a world of alternate facts, she is at the top (bottom) of the list once again.  But wouldn't you want to be a fly on the bedroom wall when she and George get into it?

But I digress...

Sooooo.... with our second annual nod to Keith Olbermann, and without further ado:

10.  Betsy DeVos -- To be honest, I was not going to include Ms. DeVos here, although it does seem to me that in less than three years she has demonstrated clearly that her name and the word "education" should never be mentioned in he same sentence.  It does take a massive amount of talent, however, to have a member of the president's cabinet held in contempt of court, not once, not twice, but on sixteen thousand counts.  Aside from the punishment of being included on this list, Ms. DeVos is going to be asked to write "I will not be in contempt of court" on the blackboard sixteen thousand times, assuming she knows where the blackboard is located in the classroom, is not offended by holding a piece of chalk and knows how to spell "contempt".

9.  Jodi Ernst -- This is by popular demand.  How on earth a woman can approve of defunding planned parenthood, sponsor legislation that denies a woman the right to choose, cannot bring herself to pass any kine of legislation controlling the ridiculous explosion of weapons in the hands of those clearly unqualified physically or emotionally to own one, let alone an arsenal is beyond me.  She has solidified her stance, however, by being the first to call for the impeachment of Joe Biden, who has not even been nominated to run for president, let alone be elected to the position.

8.  Rush Limbaugh -- I almost gave this one a pass; however, in light of his health, this may be the last chance for him to make the list.  Call this a lifetime achievement award that balances off the Presidential Medal of Freedom.  Hint to the president -- if Mr. Limbaugh's lifetime of bigotry and vile comments about anyone he disagrees with makes him deserving of the Presidential Medal of Freedom, please do not consider me for the prize.

7.  Steve Mnuchin -- A bastion of consistency, he refused to release the president's tax returns, claiming there was no legitimate legislative purpose in doing so, but immediately upon being asked, never mind subpoenaed, he released Hunter Biden's info.  You know, the son of the guy who is running for president against his guy.  Well, he is consistent.  He consistently aides the guy in the oval office regardless of whether or not it is ethical or legal to do so.

6.  Jim Jordan -- This one was rather close between Rep. Jordan and Mark Meadows, who according to the transcript of the closed door hearing of Ambassador Marie Yovanovitch questioned the Ambassador over where she got the nickname "Masha" from, as if that established that she was a Ukranian mole for the democratic party.  But Mr. Jordan, who has made it a mission in life to make very loud, abrasive and completely baseless claims about just about anyone to the left of him, which means just about everybody, and then staring blankly into space when confronted with the proof that he was once again wrong, wins out herein with his performance in the public impeachment hearings.  He has a talent for making baseless allegations in the most abrasive manner and then, as noted above, staring blankly into space when confronted with the fact that his claims have already been debunked.  We won't even get into the fact that he was an assistant wrestling coach at Ohio State for years and claims he had no idea there was a sex abuse scandal playing out under his nose nearly the entire time.  Well, I guess I just did get into that.  Nothing to see here.

5.  John Cornyn -- This is the guy who usually is standing in the background when Mitch McConnell is at the microphone telling us why Democrats to do nothing and then explaining why he is blocking a vote on (fill in the blank), just past by the House, that happens to have a democratic majority.  Senator Cornyn gets on the list this year, as well as a vote for humanitarian of the year by supporting the decision to have our troops get out of the way, thereby allowing Turkey's rampage and ethnic cleansing of the Kurds, hinting that this was perhaps a good thing.  Perhaps someone should have whispered in Senator Cornyn's ear the simple fact that the Kurds were supposedly our allies.

4.  Mitch McConnell -- You knew he had to be here somewhere.  I'm sure Mitch is devastated that he did not repeat his championship performance of last year.  I suppose he can take solace in the fact that he is part of the group that took this year's honors and led the way for the nonsense that is our elected representatives.

3.  Bone Spurs, Jr. -- He is this year's best selling author, as long as the Bone Spurs Re-election Committee, the Republican National Committee and the Fox Cheerleading Network continue to shop for stocking stuffers this coming holiday season.  BSJ makes the list this year, however, for repeatedly wondering in public how an underqualified, apparently uninterested and completely idiotic son of a politician can land a cushy job on an international corporate energy board simply by being the son of that politician.

2.  Rudolph Giuliani --  'nuff said...

1.  with a nod to all the congressmen and senators who are listed above --  EVERY REPUBLICAN MEMBER OF CONGRESS.  Yes, I said that I could not include every single one of them, but then again, with the exception of Mitt Romney, they all showed a complete lack of spine, morals or whatever it takes to be a decent human throughout the impeachment fiasco.  I would also note that this is my list, so if I want to ignore my own rules, it's still my list.  Go make your own.  That said, even Mitt did not vote for a conviction on teh obstruction of congress count.  Hey, he announced he would not comply with a single subpoena and then he did not.  I agree here that no witnesses or documents were needed on this count.  By definition, this is obstruction of congress.  Not a single GOP legislator or senator agreed.  We will now all reap what they have sown.

Can't wait til next year...

times change

If I were to write a blog enthusiastically describing my desire to shoot, maim and kill my enemies, including the President of the United States in my enemies list, or even stating a deep seated wish that the president simply drop dead, the secret service would be all over me.  It is likely that I would be arrested, and just as likely that I would be convicted of threatening him.  

Don't believe me?  Google "The Bullet and the Ballot -- Dominic Manno".  In 1981, Dominic Manno was a student at the University of Pennsylvania.  I had graduated two years earlier and knew Dominic slightly, as he was in a couple of my classes.  By 1981, he was a columnist for the Daily Pennsylvanian.  It was around this time that President Reagan was shot by John Hinckley.  In a column he wrote shortly after that, Dominic wrote something to the effect that his first reaction after hearing the news was hoping that that Reagan died.  At the time, he was a young, immature twenty-one year old college student.  He did not seem to have an actual death wish for President Reagan.  He clearly had no ability to carry out any death wish towards him.  The column resulted in the secret service descending upon the University and grilling Dominic over his alleged desire to see Reagan dead.  Whether or not he really wanted the President to die of his wounds does not seem to have mattered much.  Whether or not a columnist for a college newspaper had the wherewithal, the ability, the desire to kill the President, cause him actual harm or inspire others to try to harm him also does not seem to have mattered much.  Dominic had written an article published in a student newspaper of reasonable distribution in which he stated that his initial reaction to the President being shot was to hope for his death.

As a result of this article, it is my understanding that Dominic Manno was hounded out of a career he was hoping for, whatever that career may have been.  I do not know ultimately how things turned out for him; however, I had heard through the seventies and eighties student grapevine at Penn that things were not good, and it was primarily because of the backlash to his column.

The moral of the story is that it is not a good thing to threaten or have bad thoughts about anyone, let alone the President of the United States and then to reduce those thoughts to writing to be published...

Unless, of course, your name happens to be Donald Trump (I know, I broke the rule of mentioning his name here in this blog), and you happen to be the one publishing rants wishing for the death of those you deem to be your enemies.

On the offhand chance you spent the Columbus Day weekend happily vacationing on Jupiter, at a pro-you know who rally held at his you-know-who Doral Resort in Florida attended by his son of the same name and Sarah Huckabee Sanders, a video was shown.  It depicted a Cadet Bone Spurs entering a church, the scene taken and doctored from a 2014 movie, and going on a shooting rampage, gruesomely killing characters who were depicted as CNN and other members of the media he does not like.  Included in the video was a montage in which he apparently pistol whips John McCain, who for those remaining on Jupiter is likely still dead anyway, shoots Hilary Clinton, a former presidential candidate and standard bearer of her party, and also shoots Barack Obama.  Putting aside the utter tastelessness of this video and the question of why anyone on the entire planet may have thought showing this anywhere, let alone making the video in the first place may have been a good idea, let us consider this much:

1.  The video condones killing members of the media, and would seem to suggest that according to this president, encouraging psychopaths in training to kill members of the media is a good idea.  Last I heard, this was illegal.

2.  The video somehow seems to think it may be funny to show a man who used the excuse of bone spurs which may or may not have actually existed, blugeoning a war hero, who spent years in captivity in Vietnam and then sent on to serve his country as a public servant honorably, even if you did not agree with his politics, which I did not.  We will not even get into the fact that somebody thought it was a great idea to show an image of this mighty midget allegedly pistol whipping the image of a man who is already dead.

3.  The video encourages shooting Hilary Clinton.  The former first lady, senator from New York and Secretary of State.  We have first hand knowledge in these parts of just how seriously the secret service takes any perceived threat to Hilary Clinton.  Last I heard, making legitimate threats to the safety of Hilary Clinton was illegal.

4.  The video depicts and encourages some lunatic to try to kill Barack Obama, the former president and man this buffoon in the White House obviously knows he will never match up with at any level at all.  THIS IS ILLEGAL.  Thus far, as far as I know there has been no move to interview whoever made this video, whoever showed it at Bone Spurs Doral National, or whoever thought it was a good idea in the first place.

Thus far, he has not condemned the video.  His spokesperson has... well, sort of... but he has not.  Stephanie Grisham stepping forward with a tweet that the president does not condone violent political videos tells me nothing.  Let me hear it from him.

And not in a god damn tweet.

To our Commander in Chief:

If you believe in more of the Constitution than the Second Amendment; specifically, if you believe in the First Amendment.

If you believe it is wrong to show any video that depicts you committing violence.

If you believe it is wrong to encourage violence against the press.

If you believe it is wrong to encourage violence against people you believe are your political enemies, even if they are people who simply disagree with you.

If you believe it is and should be illegal to try to kill or encourage the killing of a former Secretary of State and a former President of the United States.

If you believe all or part of the above, then... 

CONTACT ALL OF THE NEWS NETWORKS, EVEN FOX.  TELL THEM YOU NEED ABOUT TWO MINUTES OF AIR TIME ON A MATTER OF SOCIETAL IMPORTANCE.  GET YOUR ASS IN FRONT OF A TELEVISION CAMERA.

AND TELL US THAT THIS VIDEO IS ABHORRENT AND THAT YOU REJECT EVERYTHING IT STANDS FOR.

Because until we see it directly from you, we will not believe a word of it.  What we will believe is that you want somebody to kill members of the media and public servants, including a former secretary of state and standard bearer for the office you now hold, and an ex-president you simply do not match up to, and would be more than happy to see any of them killed.

Dominic Manno was wrong to put his thoughts on the subject out there, even if he did not mean to actually harm anyone.  He was twenty-one.  

YOU ARE THE FUCKING PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES.  YOU ARE SEVENTY-TWO YEARS OLD.  YOU ARE SUPPOSED TO ACT LIKE YOU KNOW BETTER.

How about you finally show us you do...