Today is Pearl Harbor Day. On this day in 1941, 2403 Americans died. On 9/11/2001, about 3,000 Americans died. In both cases, Americans pulled together to make sure this could not happen again. Huge effort and trillions of dollars were expended. How times have changed. Now, with a daily death toll rapidly reaching 3,000, we... Continue Reading →
Elections: Georgia on My Mind
Although I live in Oregon, on the other side of the continent from Georgia, I love Democracy, my country, and my state just as much as I’m sure Georgians love theirs. If I were a native of Georgia at this point, I would be outraged. I would be outraged whether I was a Democrat or... Continue Reading →
QAnon: An Ugly Silhouette of Fear and Hatred Against the Surge of the Pandemic
Bird of Ill Omens (aka Vinnie the Vulture, Pandemic Pal) On October 22, 2020, the US saw the largest reporting of new Covid-19 cases since the start of the pandemic. Over 77,000 new cases were reported. In the Presidential debate that same evening, Trump once again repeated the falsehood that American had “turned the corner”... Continue Reading →
GOP Hypocrisy: Real Life vs. the Right to Life
(A Comment on the A.C. Barret Nomination) It was a really staggering experience in the midst of a pandemic to listen to the arguments put forth by right wing GOP senators as they recklessly pushed forward the Supreme Court nomination of Amy Coney Barrett. Rarely have both hypocritical faces of the GOP been so fully... Continue Reading →
Viral Misinformation: Trump as Super-spreader
A recent research survey of the sources of misinformation about the Covid-19 Coronavirus determined that the number one culprit in spreading misinformation was US president Donald Trump. That being true, it is hardly surprising that it now appears that he might be a super-spreader of the virus itself. He has certainly sponsored super-spreading events. He... Continue Reading →
Proud Boys: Useful Idiots (The Other Problem with Racists)
Very recently a former high-ranking foreign service professional referred to Donald Trump as Vladimir Putin’s “useful idiot.” Every dictator needs useful idiots. Putin has Trump. Trump has the “Proud Boys” and other racists. Mussolini had “Black Shirts,” Hitler had “Brown Shirts,” Saddam Hussein and Slobodan Milosevic had their goons and thugs- all aspiring and practicing... Continue Reading →
If Only Trump…
It is supremely ironic to remember Trump’s repeated claim that “only he” could solve this country’s problems. Many Trump supporters join Trump in blaming Obama for everything that has gone wrong—after 4 years that lame excuse is growing thin… What if Trump had simply followed Obama’s quite reasonable advice? That would have eliminated some of... Continue Reading →
Anti-Trump Election Posters
My wife, Carol, and I have created these posters in the last nine months. I usually came up with the concept and text, but she did all of the hard work with the graphics. Enjoy! Free to share, copy, or distribute in any way you like. Please share widely!
A Realistic and Achievable Fix for the Electoral College
Almost every thoughtful citizen has realized by now that the current structure of the Electoral College is no longer really necessary or functional. Sadly, most of the proposals to correct the problem would require constitutional amendments or would be easy to defeat on constitutional grounds. They would either abolish the college or render it irrelevant—a... Continue Reading →
Thoughts on Progressive Democratic Messaging in the 2020 Election (…and into the Future)
This is the second of two posts which discuss the future of both the Republican and Democratic Parties. The first was titled “Withered Now: The GOP at a Dead-End.” This post deals with what I believe Democrats need to do as they go forward. In my view the Democrats are on the right side of... Continue Reading →