Tag Biden

The Trump Doctrine: Bullshit, and Fling Shit

Dusty Leave a comment

Okay. Let’s talk. Honestly. Let’s get down to brass tacks.

The truth.

I’m trying to get my Freshman English students to do that. To talk honestly. They don’t – ever – but I think it’s mostly because they don’t know how.

See, what we have done in education over the last ten or twenty years is reward lying. Reward cheating. To a certain extent that is not new: I lied constantly when I was a teenager, especially to my teachers and my parents, and I would guess that most teenagers had similar experiences. And for the same reason: schools reward lying and cheating. For as long as schools have been product-focused, rather than process-focused, we have given students an opportunity to achieve all the rewards of school (All the apparent ones, at least) without doing the difficult parts. My grade in my classes was based on the work I turned in: which means that if I can find a way to cheat on those assignments, then I get the exact same grade I would if I did the work myself, the hard way. And sure, we also try to stop students from choosing to cheat, through threats of dire consequences if they get caught; but that “if” in what I just wrote is a humming, glowing, throbbing beacon of glorious light. Because teenagers are dumb: we think that we can get away with anything, even while we are actively not getting away with it. The very first time I caught students cheating – and they were cheating on a small, simple, easy assignment, a set of study questions that came after a reading, which they did with the reading in hand, in class – I realized while I was reading their responses that three young women, all friends, had given identical, word-for-word answers. They had copied. And the giveaway was they had used the word “oasis” completely out of context – something like “and the oasis of the story was the courage the characters had.” One of them – the one who had done the work and given it to the other two, the source student – had written “basis,” in cursive, and the other two had misread it. So I gave them all zeroes for copying, two for doing it and one for letting them, and when I handed the work back, I told them they had gotten zeroes. But instead of confessing, they argued with me. Vociferously. Angrily. Denying that they had ever done such a thing. I hadn’t handed back their papers, choosing to keep them as evidence, and just informed them of their grades; when they demanded I show them the evidence, I realized I had left the papers in my other classroom (Like many first-year teachers, I got the crappiest job assignment, so I floated between three different classrooms and taught two different remedial classes), and they insisted on coming with me to see the evidence; they yelled at me the whole way across campus, about how dare I accuse them, and they would never do that, and it was not fair, and so on. We got to my other classroom, I showed them their papers, pointed at where they wrote “oasis” and said, “Explain that.”

And they actually tried. They tried to come up with some bullshit on the spot about how “oasis” was meant to represent the safe space that had been created in the story by the characters… the girl who was talking trailed off in the middle of the sentence. I just shook my head and said, “No.” And they left. Grumbling. Still denying that they had done what they couldn’t actually prove that they hadn’t done – because they had done it.

But what happened? The student who had done the work had her mother complain to the administration, and I had a meeting with one of the vice principals and this mother. Who told us that her daughter was under a lot of stress, and after all, she had done the work, and then had made the poor choice to let her friends copy because they all just wanted so badly to do well. That’s not really bad, is it?? So, as per the decision my administrator made, that girl got the grade. The other two had a chance to make up the work and get a grade. They got a warning.

A few days later, one of the boys in the class told me that he had actually let the first girl, the source girl – the one who got the grade – copy his work.

So. This is the structure we have built for students. Cheating is overlooked; copying is standard; getting “help” with the answers is encouraged. Because the product is what matters, not the process by which you create that product. (It’s the perfect conceptual framework for a life cut short by working yourself to death in order to get the company more profit. But surely that’s just a coincidence…) And onto that structure we have added the internet, with all of its access to perfect information and perfect writing; and now AI, the same perfect information and perfect writing, but now both customizable – and untraceable. And we still grade students on product, not process. We still assign homework, so they can complete the assignments in privacy, without supervision, with full access to resources like AI and Google. We use the same assignments year after year, so students can pass on work they did to the next year’s class. And we tell them that what really matters in school is getting good grades, so you can get into good college, so you can have a good job and make money. Oh, we tell them they need to learn, they need to master the skills; but that’s just talking. Every single reward in school is derived directly from product. (With the exceptions of PE, the arts [which sometimes reward product, but not always – my wife’s Life Drawing class is graded only on process, her AP Art class graded largely on process… though in that last case that’s because if she graded their art work as she would grade a college student’s work, they’d all fail. She has high standards. And we don’t work at an art school.] and a few classes like foreign language, where students are graded on their conversation and pronunciation and so on: performance metrics.) And almost every product can be completed with some kind of corrupting assistance, whether it is copying from a friend, getting help from a family member, or using the online resources they have available. Even just using the excuse of “Oh no, my paper didn’t upload!” to get extra time to complete it and turn it in, with permission, a second time. Because after all, I can’t blame a student if the WiFi went down, right?

Right.

So I’m trying to get my freshmen to think about lying, and whether it is good or bad. They all, without exception, think it is good in the right circumstances, which are always two: to spare someone’s feelings – the classic “Do I look good in this outfit?” conundrum – and to save yourself from getting in trouble. They do usually offer a third circumstance: when someone threatens to kill you if you don’t tell them something, like where you hid the money, then it is acceptable to lie to save your life. Thank you for including that hypothetical, children; surely an important one. But it’s that middle one, the lying-to-get-out-of-trouble, that I want them to think about. Actually, the first one, too, because I gave them the counterargument: if you tell someone they look great when they look terrible, then you’re telling that person to walk around proudly, while they look terrible, and don’t know it. They didn’t have an answer to that. They’re not ready to admit what I think is the answer, that honesty really is the best policy, and the key to getting along is knowing how to speak truth without being harsh and insulting – you don’t have to say “Damn, you look terrible!” when someone looks terrible in an outfit, but you should not lie and say they look perfect when they look terrible – and the key to not getting in trouble is… not doing things you shouldn’t do. I don’t think they’ll all come over to my side, but I want them to think about it, because they lie to me constantly, and I’m sick of it.

But then, last night, I watched our President stand up in front of Congress, his words broadcast to the whole world, and tell lie after lie after lie. After lie. After lie. For ninety minutes. And the whole time, without exception, the Republican majority clapped and cheered for his lies. The two grinning dolts behind him, Mike Johnson and J.D. Vance, grinned and laughed – because Donald Trump didn’t just lie, he was also needlessly, gleefully cruel, and appallingly stupid, again and again and again, and clearly that stupid cruelty was even more popular than his lies. Because the cruelty won’t even get the apathetic next day fact-checking that his bullshit has gotten today; the cruelty we just let go, maybe frowning a little at how our President doesn’t show the same decorum we enjoyed so much from President Obama (When he wasn’t bombing people in the Middle East or deporting families from the US), who was always polite and well-spoken and never overtly cruel and bullying like this guy, with his goddamn shit-eating grin when he tells some joke about innocent people he’s going to harm, because it will save money, or because it will win him points with his equally cruel, stupid, bullying base. But he won’t have to suffer any consequences for his lies or his stupidity or his cruelty; he did all the same things last time, and we elected him again. Because eggs were too expensive.

(Please understand – and know that I am in the middle of writing a piece about that, about grocery prices and inflation and Trump’s broken promises regarding the issue, but I had to address this absolute horror show of a “speech” – that I recognize the genuine damage and stress that inflation and high prices inflict on those of us who are on the edge of not having enough. I am a high school teacher: I can’t afford eggs. I am also a partial vegetarian: eggs are one of my primary sources of protein. So I get it. I only mock the idea of egg prices as a reason to vote for Trump because even if we do see that as a valid reason to elect a president – and I will argue all day that presidents just don’t have that much control over prices in our system – it ignores SO MANY other things about Donald Trump. I get the need for relief from the cost of living: but that’s not the only thing that matters. That’s why I say it. If you disagree with me about the right priorities to focus on for a vote, then so be it. We’ll discuss this more another time.)

For now, let’s start with talking about what Donald Trump lied about last night in his address. This is easy to find, of course – here’s a good source FactChecking Trump’s Address to Congress – FactCheck.org, that gives a clear list followed by more careful analysis – but while they do include some of the things that sometimes slip past fact checkers, like that Trump ignored the influence of the Covid-19 pandemic on creating the economic situation that the Biden administration dealt with, they focused on the specific lies Trump told in the speech: and that means they don’t talk about the lies he has used as the justifications for his actions thus far, which he then discussed in the speech. And that’s where I want to focus.

But let me also list out, if you are not interested in following the link – if you believe, as many people do, that fact checkers are unreliable, that only independent media sources are believable, which means you have not thought a whole heck of a lot about why “independent” is more important than “part of an organization whose business model relies on truthful reporting rather than garnering attention” – some of the more egregious falsehoods that Trump spouted.

First, the savings he and Elon Musk have found through the “work” of “DOGE.” They have not found hundreds of billions in waste: they have “saved” about $20 billion, claimed $105 billion, and proved that exactly none of it was savings from eliminating fraud. It’s all “savings” from firing employees. Which, sure, that saves money – but it also eliminates work and productivity. If you have three people working for you and you fire one, you save one-third of your payroll costs – AND YOU LOSE ONE-THIRD OF YOUR PRODUCTION. Seems like this would be already known by two guys who run such huge and successful companies, but maybe not. They do both seem to believe that they personally do the work which is actually done by their employees, so, maybe they’re unclear on the concept.

Or maybe the only fraud here is the one being perpetrated by Trump and Musk and DOGE.

Kabosu, Dog Behind Famous 'Doge' Meme, Dead at 18

Next: Social Security. Trump went on and on and on about the MILLIONS of people who Social Security “believes” are over a hundred years old, including some that he said were older than the United States. So let’s be clear on this: when we say that “Social Security” “believes” these people are impossibly old… who are we talking about? Is Social Security the name of the person in charge of the organization? Is it the hive mind of all the bureaucrats who work there? Is it the AI who runs the database? Is Social Security here in the room with us now?

No: social security is the much-beloved system whereby we ensure that senior citizens don’t have to starve to death in shantytowns after they stop working. And it is also the biggest “entitlement” in the Federal budget: and therefore it is the one the Republicans most want to cut. But since so many of their voters are senior citizens, they can’t cut it without facing the wrath of their voters: so they try to turn their voters against social security. By talking about it like it’s the Avatar of bureaucrats, and that it’s stupid enough to “believe” that there are impossibly ancient people still getting social security checks.

Here’s the truth: the social security database is enormous. Tens of millions of people receive checks every month; hundreds of millions of people make payments into the fund for those checks every month. When people pass away, there is a form that one’s survivors are supposed to fill out and file with SS to let them know that someone on the roll has passed and no longer need checks. But: people don’t consider that to be an important job, especially while grieving, so they don’t always do it. Also lots of people don’t have loved ones to file the form. I would guess millions of people, over the years. The ancient people in the database are not people that Social Security “believes” are alive, they are people who were on the rolls as alive, and who have never been confirmed to be dead. See the difference?

Trump doesn’t. Well: he does, he just lied about it, and pretended these two different things are the same. They’re not. If you want to see this as a moment when Trump is monumentally stupid instead of a liar, I’m fine with that. And yes, it’s monumentally stupid: if someone told me there were people on the SS database who were over 120 years old, I would assume there was a mistake in the data, not that Social Security “believed” there were Americans living over 120 years old. Especially not the millions whom Trump gobbled about.

And while thousands of those people – thousands out of the millions, which is fractions of a percentage point – may still get checks, and some of them get checks because living people are using the name of a dead person to collect social security (Frank Gallagher does this with his dead mother in Shameless.), which is fraud, the rest of the millions of unconfirmed-dead people on the roll are just – on the roll. In the database. They don’t get checks. Money is not wasted on them, and it would not be saved by cleaning up the database. Of course cleaning up the database would be a good idea, but how many man-hours would it take to confirm that millions of people are actually dead? And if you decide to remove everyone who is over, say, 100 years old, there will be at least 80,000 people who will want to have a word with you.

Centenarian, older adult population change by state | Northwell Health

Several of Trump’s other lies were of a less serious nature: claiming that 38,000 Americans were killed during the construction of the Panama Canal (5,600 workers died during construction, mostly from diseases like malaria and yellow fever. Not all of them were American. Special Wonders of the Canal – PMC), that Biden inherited a great economy and Trump inherited a terrible one twice, that Europe has given less than the US to the Ukraine and that the US has given $350 billion – these are just bad facts; they’re definitely lies, but they are small, because none of them change people’s minds, and none of them serve as the primary justification for Trump’s bad policies: he wants to take us to war over the Canal because China has an influence there, not because some number of Americans died during construction; he constantly lies about his accomplishments and, especially last night, about Biden’s failures, but that doesn’t change anyone’s opinion about either man; Trump is going to give as much of the Ukraine to Russia as he can, because he wants to be allies with Putin, not because of how much Ukraine costs to defend. And he doesn’t want to be allies with Putin to save money, it is to make himself into a strongman, in appearance if not in fact. (Though I have to note here that when I said last night that Trump wanted to be Putin, my wife’s immediate response was “Trump will never look that good with his shirt off.” Savage, she is. But: she ain’t lyin’.)

But the lies I really want to get to with Trump’s speech are the ones about people who are disenfranchised in this country. Such as people who are described, by that shit-flinging gibbon and his handlers, as representatives of DEI: like General C.Q. Brown, whom Trump fired from his position as head of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and whose fucking resume looks like this:

EDUCATION
1984 Bachelor of Science, Civil Engineering, Texas Tech University, Lubbock
1991 U.S. Air Force Fighter Weapons School, Nellis Air Force Base, Nev.
1992 Squadron Officer School, Maxwell AFB, Ala.
1994 Master of Aeronautical Science, Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University, Daytona Beach, Fla.
1997 Distinguished graduate, Air Command and Staff College, Maxwell AFB, Ala.
2000 Air War College, Maxwell AFB, Ala.
2004 National Defense Fellow, Institute for Defense Analyses, Alexandria, Va.
2008 Air Force Senior Leadership Course, Center for Creative Leadership, Greensboro, N.C.
2012 Joint Force Air Component Commander Course, Maxwell AFB, Ala.
2014 Joint Flag Officer Warfighting Course, Maxwell AFB, Ala.
2015 Pinnacle Course, National Defense University, Fort Lesley J. McNair, Washington, D.C.
2017 Leadership at the Peak, Center for Creative Leadership, Colorado Springs, Colo.

ASSIGNMENTS
1. May 1985 – April 1986, Student, undergraduate Pilot training, 82nd Student Squadron, Williams Air Force Base, Ariz.
2. May 1986 – July 1986, Student, lead-in fighter training, 434th Tactical Fighter Training Squadron, Holloman AFB, N.M.
3. August 1986 – March 1987, Student, F-16 training, 62nd Tactical Fighter Training Squadron, MacDill AFB, Fla.
4. April 1987 – October 1988, F-16 Pilot, 35th Tactical Fighter Squadron, Kunsan Air Base, South Korea
5. November 1988 – April 1991, F-16 Instructor Pilot, wing electronic combat officer, and wing standardization and evaluation flight examiner, 307th and 308th Tactical Fighter Squadrons, Homestead AFB, Fla.
6. April 1991 – August 1991, Student, U.S. Air Force Fighter Weapons Instructor Course, Nellis AFB, Nev.
7. August 1991 – August 1992, F-16 Squadron Weapons Officer and Flight Commander, 307th Fighter Squadron, Homestead AFB, Fla.
8. September 1992 – October 1994, Weapons School Instructor, and standardization and evaluation flight examiner, F-16 Division, U.S. Air Force Weapons School, Nellis AFB, Nev.
9. October 1994 – July 1996, Aide-de-Camp to the Chief of Staff, Headquarters U.S. Air Force, Arlington, Va.
10. August 1996 – June 1997, Student, Air Command and Staff College, Maxwell AFB, Ala.
11. June 1997 – September 1997, Student, Armed Forces Staff College, National Defense University, Norfolk, Va.
12. September 1997 – November 1999, Air Operations Officer, Current Operations Division, Operations Directorate, U.S. Central Command, MacDill AFB, Fla.
13. November 1999 – June 2003, F-16CJ Instructor Pilot and assistant operations officer, 79th Fighter Squadron; Weapons and Training Flight Commander, 20th Operations Support Squadron; Operations Officer, 55th Fighter Squadron; and Commander, 78th Fighter Squadron, Shaw AFB, S.C.
14. July 2003 – June 2004, National Defense Fellow, Institute for Defense Analyses, Alexandria, Va.
15. June 2004 – June 2005, Deputy Chief, Program Integration Division, Directorate of Programs, Headquarters U.S. Air Force, Arlington, Va.
16. July 2005 – May 2007, Commandant, U.S. Air Force Weapons School, 57th Wing, Nellis AFB, Nev.
17. May 2007 – May 2008, Commander, 8th Fighter Wing, Kunsan AB, South Korea
18. June 2008 – May 2009, Director, Secretary of the Air Force and Chief of Staff Executive Action Group, Headquarters U.S. Air Force, Arlington, Va.
19. June 2009 – April 2011, Commander, 31st Fighter Wing, Aviano AB, Italy
20. May 2011 – March 2013, Deputy Director, Operations Directorate, U.S. Central Command, MacDill AFB, Fla.
21. April 2013 – February 2014, Deputy Commander, U.S. Air Forces Central Command; Deputy, Combined Force Air Component Commander, U.S. Central Command, Southwest Asia
22. March 2014 – June 2015, Director, Operations, Strategic Deterrence, and Nuclear Integration, Headquarters U.S. Air Forces in Europe – Air Forces Africa, Ramstein AB, Germany
23. June 2015 – July 2016, Commander, U.S. Air Forces Central Command, Air Combat Command, Southwest Asia
24. July 2016 – July 2018, Deputy Commander, U.S. Central Command, MacDill AFB, Fla.
25. July 2018 – July 2020, Commander, Pacific Air Forces; Air Component Commander for U.S. Indo-Pacific Command; and Executive Director, Pacific Air Combat Operations Staff, Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickam, Hawaii
26. August 2020 – September 2023, Chief of Staff of the U.S. Air Force, the Pentagon, Arlington, Va.
27. October 2023 – present, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff

SUMMARY OF JOINT ASSIGNMENTS
1. September 1997 – November 1999, Air Operations Officer, Current Operations Division, Operations Directorate, U.S. Central Command, MacDill AFB, Fla., as a major
2. May 2011 – March 2013, Deputy Director, Operations Directorate, U.S. Central Command, MacDill AFB, Fla., as a brigadier general
3. July 2016 – July 2018, Deputy Commander, U.S. Central Command, MacDill AFB, Fla., as a lieutenant general
4. October 2023 – present, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff

FLIGHT INFORMATION
Rating: command pilot
Flight hours: more than 3,100 including 130 combat hours
Aircraft flown: F-16A/B/C/D and 20 additional fixed and rotary-wing aircraft

MAJOR AWARDS AND DECORATIONS
Defense Distinguished Service Medal with two oak leaf clusters
Distinguished Service Medal
Defense Superior Service Medal
Legion of Merit with three oak leaf clusters
Bronze Star Medal
Defense Meritorious Service Medal
Meritorious Service Medal with two oak leaf clusters
Aerial Achievement Medal
Joint Service Commendation Medal
Air and Space Commendation Medal with two oak leaf clusters
Combat Readiness Medal
National Defense Service Medal with bronze star
Armed Forces Expeditionary Medal
Global War on Terrorism Expeditionary Medal
Global War on Terrorism Service Medal
Korea Defense Service Medal
Nuclear Deterrence Operations Service Medal
NATO Medal
Republic of Korea Order of National Security Merit (Tongil Medal)
Republic of Singapore Pingat Jasa Gemilang (Tentera) Meritorious Service Medal
Republic of Korea Order of National Security Merit (Samil Medal)
Brazilian Order of Aeronautical Merit (Degree of Grand Officer)

PUBLICATIONS
“Developing Doctrine for the Future Joint Force: Creating Synergy and Minimizing Seams,” Air University Press, September 2005 “No Longer the Outlier: Updating the Air Component Structure” Air University Press, Spring 2016

Yeah. That guy was a DEI hire.

People who are endangered by the anti-vaccine movement that Trump supports and promoted last night – which is all of us, but is especially those who can’t work in close proximity to others, for any of a thousand reasons (permanent disability, mental illness, inability to travel, along with being immunocompromised, again for a thousand potential reasons), but who do work, and who who now have to return to work because Trump is a cruel idiot and a liar who claims that “not coming IN to work” is evidence of laziness or fraud. It is not clear to me whether the real goal here is just to fire valuable workers for a reason that Trump’s base can stand behind, so that Trump and Musk can channel the money “saved” from payroll into tax breaks for billionaires, or if it is to undermine the very idea that a person who cannot come into an office can nonetheless, in this day of complete interconnectedness online, still be a productive worker because that idea is, I dunno, woke or some shit. Either way, it is a stupid lie that is cruel to those who need the accommodation of remote work – and also cruel to those who just like it better, because what the hell is wrong with working from home if you can do the work?

Trump is going after people with neurodivergence, in addition to attacking those who need to live in a vaccinated world, by lying about the history of autism diagnoses, in conjunction with his comments about naming the anti-vaxxer Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to a post for which he is not only unqualified, but entirely unfit. It is not true that “not long ago” 1 in 10,000 children had autism; it is true that 50 YEARS AGO we did not understand autism nor how to diagnose the entire spectrum of conditions associated with the term. It is also emphatically not true that autism is a disability that would justify removing or changing the vaccine schedule, as Trump was implying. The entire argument that parents would rather risk their children dying of measles than “becoming” autistic because of the MMR vaccine is disgusting, along with being a thoroughly debunked and incredible lie. Even where autism does present as disabling, ask a parent of an autistic child whether they would rather have their child living or dead – and then duck, before they quite rightly punch you in the face. Though I’d be really happy if all of those theoretical punches landed on Elon Musk, and also on whoever suggested that Elon’s Nazi salute was a sign of Musk’s own autism. Remember: “Always Punch Nazis” includes punching those who argue that being autistic explains away Nazism.

But I will admit that, despite all of the terrible and cruel and stupid things that Trump said in that speech, the lies that actually bothered me personally the most were the transphobic ones. Maybe because they got the loudest cheers. Maybe because he seemed proudest of his anti-trans policies like the declaration that there are only two genders in the U.S. – which is both a lie, and a cruel and stupid statement. Or his executive order keeping men from playing women’s sports, which, HOLY GOD THAT I DON’T EVEN BELIEVE IN CAN WE STOP? Can we just stop? Can we just agree to never again allow anyone to repeat the absolute and utter nonsense and poppycock that there are “men” playing “women’s” sports? There are women playing women’s sports. Nothing more. And 99.99% of those women are those who were assigned female at birth. And also, this is fucking sports we are talking about. Not something important. Sports are entertainment. They are inconsequential. They don’t matter. They matter plenty to the people who play them, both professionally and passionately, and therefore they are worth consideration for the sake of those people; but the idea that a national policy, as a focus of what is essentially a state of the union address, would make such a deal of opposing the existence of trans people, particularly in relation to sport? What the hell are we doing here?

The answer is simple: we, and by “we” I mean that orange-tinted shit-flinging gibbon and his flying monkeys and most definitely not me, are attacking and belittling and trying to destroy and torment and kill anyone whose destruction would make the stupid, cruel base of the Republican party feel stronger and meaner, which is how they want to feel. Trans people are not the danger, regardless of what nonsense some goddamn volleyball player claims (Want to know how many volleyball players get hurt every year? About 35,000. Volleyball Related Injuries in Adolescents: A Decade of Data | Published in Orthopedic Reviews How many of those injuries were caused by trans athletes? Conversely, how many trans athletes suffer injury and abuse and death because of the way they are objectified and demonized and ostracized and assaulted in every way by the entire Republican establishment of this country? I bet it’s more than the one injury Trump claimed was caused by a trans athlete.)

I don’t know why this one upsets me more than the other loathsome false accusations and attacks that Trump launched at everyone who is morally and ethically and humanistically better than he is himself. But it does. I suppose it doesn’t matter why it bothers me, any more than it matters why the base and the Republicans and the shit-flinging gibbon himself chose trans people to try to destroy: it’s just that they found someone they can harm, and I have found someone – millions of someones – whom I want to help protect from that harm, in whatever way I can assist. I don’t really need to justify which fight I choose to take on: I just need to be aware of who my real target is.

It’s not just Trump. Just like Adolf Hitler, who was a uniquely effective figurehead for the Nazi party and the apparatus that rose during the Third Reich, but neither the brains behind that apparatus nor the one in control of it, Trump himself is not the cause of the problem, he is simply the most visible pimple on the very wide flabby ass of the MAGA movement. It is possible that, after Trump is gone (Hopefully before the end of his term, though personally I’m hoping for impeachment and jail rather than the death that many others think he deserves), JD Vance or one of the other flying monkeys will take over as the chief shit-flinger; and that might even be worse. It’s not even the billionaires who back Trump and who are taking advantage of the distraction he is because of the shit he flings – shit that is flung like no one has ever seen before – because the wealthy have always been there, trying to control things, trying to take advantage of every opportunity to have wealth and power, without being in the spotlight themselves. I know it’s not Elon Musk: there’s a reason why the real power brokers don’t ever do what he is doing, and put themselves out front. It’s because when people get mad enough to pick up the torches and pitchforks – and the more effective Musk is, the sooner that will happen, as it always does when inequality gets too extreme – they look for an obvious target for their anger. We all know who Elon Musk is. Who the hell is Rebekah Mercer?

(Is it wrong of me to point out that, were she to become known to those with torches and pitchforks — or, let’s say, were she to get targeted by the next Luigi Mangione — nobody would miss the ENORMOUS target that is her head?)

Natural History Museum Curators Revolt Against Trustee Rebekah Mercer for Funding Climate Change Deniers | Artnet News
Now we know what Megamind’s mom looked like

What I oppose is what Trump represents and distills. It is stupidity, chosen because it is easier than learning, and more comfortable than truth – because stupidity lies to us, even as we lie to the stupid. It is cruelty, because cruelty, also for the sake of ease and comfort, brings the displaced self-hatred of the stupid crashing down on the innocent; and not only do we then have that many more victims, some of whom will lash out at other disempowered people, but we also have those among the stupid who now cannot face enlightenment because then they would have to admit what they did to people who never deserved anything but the kindness and empathy due every one of our fellow human beings, and so those angry, cruel, stupid people will be even more incapable of changing what they are doing, no matter what truth is put before them and no matter what pleas for mercy they hear and ignore.

The worse we act, the less likely we are to stop acting badly. That’s why Donald Trump is the way he is: because he’s always been this way, he’s just been getting worse, for his entire life. And he’s an old, evil, man, now.

And everything he says is bullshit.

Either/Or, Neither/Nor

Dusty Leave a comment
Oof. That was a rough night.

I watched the Presidential debate on CNN last Thursday, and I wish I hadn’t. Or rather, I wish I hadn’t seen what I saw, because I wish it hadn’t happened the way that it did. I wish there hadn’t been a debate for me to watch, because it did not go well for my side. Or, even better, I wish the sides were different: I wish the debate had featured entirely different candidates, giving entirely different answers to the questions — which probably should have been moderated by entirely different journalists on an entirely different channel.

Overall, I’m going to give that debate a vigorous No. None of the Above, please. We saw that Biden is too old and depleted to make up for his shitty moderate stances, and we already knew, and had confirmed for us, that Trump is a lying sack of crap who uses rage and cynicism to make up for his catastrophic reactionary stances. The whole thing just made me feel desperate and hopeless.

And that’s exactly the way it is supposed to be. At least according to the preferences of the people and forces which shape the politics of this country. Which, in our current state of affairs, is not the will of the people nor the votes of the majority: because this country is, practically speaking, not a democracy. The simplest understanding of a democracy is that the majority will of the people rules, and no president has ever been elected by a majority of the citizens of this country, let alone the residents. Certainly not these two specimens.

But that’s fine because this is actually a constitutionally limited republic, not a democracy. So there.

Actually dog Meme Generator - Imgflip
ACtually…

No, I’m fucking around, because there are internet bros who always get snotty when people in political arguments say this country is a democracy. It’s not. By the strictest definition, at least — and it’s a distinction that doesn’t even matter at all, and the fact that shitty people use their nitpickery about it to shame and silence people pisses me off: so I’m mocking those people. Sorry if it is confusing. At least the dog in that Actually meme is cute.

But here’s the real actually: whatever the intended shape of the government for this country, we are in truth currently controlled by an oligarchy: a plutocracy (or maybe a kakistocracy and certainly a kleptocracy) made up of people with too much money, who are willing (unsurprising, but still disgusting) and able (appalling and even more disgusting) to influence the political machinery of the country in order to benefit themselves, at the expense of all the rest of us. They have captured both major parties, thanks in large part to the influential power of money in our elections, particularly as unleashed by the Citizens United decision, and sanctioned de facto by politicians’ continued inability to pass election financing reform, solely because they put their own interests before those of the nation or their constituents.

Unsurprising. But still disgusting.

Because the people who run the politicians who run the country are in the business of doing business — namely using their money to make even more money, which is their sole purpose and motivation, their raison d’etre — the corruptions they create in our politics are mostly those which benefit business. They just got their personal Supreme Court to knock down Chevron deference, for instance, which will make it much easier for them — rich people who can afford the attorneys and legal costs, that is — to challenge government regulations in court, because now judges, who are definitely not experts in such matters as workplace safety or environmental impact, but who, like most people — especially these fucking people

Or at least six of them

— like to think they are experts in every way that actually matters, can knock down regulations that they personally don’t think are valid or necessary. Even if the actual experts disagree with them. And do we think that our One-Percenter overlords will be taking advantage of this process?

You bet your sweet bippy we do.

But the point is, the people in charge are best served by the continued dominance of the two major parties. Because both parties rely on enormous infusions of cash in order to defeat — each other. Elections like this one, choices like this one — like the contest between these two terrible old men, the Mummy and the Blob — serve the preferences of the ruling class, because they make us desperate, not hopeful. If we had a good candidate, one who gave us hope — and the last one such was Barack Obama (who still was not a great president, because he, like Joe, was too moderate and didn’t do enough to change the life of the average citizen of this country; though in fairness to Obama, he was trying to make change pretty much on his own, and fighting against the entire political machine, and of course he lost. Donald Trump gave some segment of the populace hope, but he’s a lying sack of shit, so that hope doesn’t count, in my opinion.) — then it would inspire people to get involved, to take action; the rulers do better, have more control, when we despair, and give up, and lie down and take it. Take whatever they give us, and hate everything — and do nothing. Most of us don’t even vote. Which makes it that much easier for the plutocrats to control the votes of those who do turn out. And they like that it is only two parties, and in every specific electoral contest, for every seat and every office, it is winner take all — the person who gets one more vote beats the person who gets one fewer vote — because that also makes it easier to control the politicians. This system means the two opponents are best served by focusing only on each other, cooperatively blocking any third candidate (who already has a named role in most three-way races: “spoiler”) and fighting to the death against their one nemesis, fighting for every single vote: and that means the holders of the moneybags, the distributors of the thirty pieces of silver — the rich fuckers who try to control everything — have a death grip on the entire system, because they have a death grip on both of the two major parties: because they offer either party a way to destroy the other party if the other party dares to try to give up that sweet, sweet dark campaign money. Their money is the best way for both parties to get one more vote than the other party.

See? If the Democrats stop taking corporate One-Percenter cash, they will lose all elections to the Republicans, and vice versa. Shit, even members of the parties who don’t continue to meet with the approval of our corporate masters can’t win elections, because they can’t win primaries in the face of huge amounts of money. And third parties can’t possibly compete with the amount of money that continues to flow to the two major parties — and there’s no need for the One-Percenters to shift their money to the third parties, because the two major parties do everything their masters ask of them, whether it is Trump cutting taxes on corporations (with a bone thrown to the rest of us in the form of a middle class tax cut which had a sunset clause, the tax cuts ending in 2025 [After the end of a hypothetical second Trump term, and no it’s not a coincidence: there ain’t no cynic like a government cynic], while the corporate tax cut did not.) or Biden failing to rein in the corporate profiteering which helped drive the inflation that may cost him re-election.

But if Biden, like Trump, fails to win re-election, that doesn’t matter, of course, at least not to the people who matter; because if Biden loses, our corporate hegemony will be perfectly satisfied with Trump in the White House. The one they couldn’t abide would be Bernie: and that’s why Bernie lost two primaries to deeply unpopular candidates. Because money. And political machinery controlled by money.

Welcome to politics where votes don't count and only money matters - drew carey oiler meme - quickmeme

Wow. I’m sorry: I didn’t even mean to go that far down this road. Now I’m wrecked in the eternal darkness of the abyss at the end, mired in hopelessness.

No. Fuck that. You know why? Because there is hope. Really. There is hope because, whatever those racist elitist pricks who founded this country meant to do, what they actually did was create a lasting democracy. A democracy — shut the FUCK up about a constitutionally limited republic, please, Internet Bros — because the power to change the entire government rests, in the end, in the hands of the people. No matter how cynical we are, I am, about who is in charge, and no matter how we keep feeling like there’s no way anything can change: there IS a way for things to change, and it is through Americans casting votes for their choice of candidate (and in some cases for their choice of laws). Because we can choose to remove and replace our elected officials, who — money or not — are chosen ONLY by votes, according to our laws, according to our system of government. There is no tiebreaker that counts how much money the candidate has. All that matters, for determining who runs this country, is the votes.

Yes: of course those votes are generally easy to influence through money; that’s how we got to where we are. But influence is not control. No matter how many times I call them overlords and masters and rulers, they are not: the rich influence everything, and so end up getting what they want most of the time. But not all the time. Because it is still votes that change the government. All of it: obviously we could vote in a new President, and new Senators and Representatives; but also, if we stack up enough votes for congresspeople who will actually do what we want them to do, then even the Supreme Court, the one unelected branch, can be controlled: they can be impeached and removed from office, they can be outnumbered by an expansion of the Court, their decisions can be overridden by laws passed by Congress, and even, if necessary, by Constitutional amendments: which are passed by popular vote.

Make no mistake: getting people to vote for anything is nearly impossible, unless you have, at this point, billions of dollars to pour into the campaign. But if something is nearly impossible, it is still possible.

YARN | Now, mostly dead is slightly alive. | The Princess Bride | Video gifs by quotes | cb1a7c60 | 紗
Just like my hopes. Not all dead. Not yet.

(And also, let me note in passing that we have as much money as the One-Percenters: we just spend it on food and stuff. But we could buy ourselves an election, even in the face of all the dark money in the world, if we really needed to. Just think about that.)

It’s possible for us to throw off the yoke and chains of our oppressors. It is. We’ve done it before, in opposition to slavery and the secession of the Confederacy; after the Great Depression; during the fight for civil rights. We can do it again. The way to compensate for a lack of ready money to throw around is: organization. And patience. If I may paraphrase the Doors: they got the bucks, but — we got the numbers.

But that is the long term goal. So. What do we do about this current debacle?

Clearly we don’t want either of these fucking guys — sorry, I’ve gone far afield, let me bring it back:

These fucking guys (Source)

We don’t want either of these fucking guys to be in control of our lives. Not even a little bit. I’ve been arguing for a while now, going back to 2020, that Biden is the better choice; but I still don’t want him to be President, and I never have. He was my third-to-last choice in the crowded Democratic field in 2020 (The two below him on my list were Marianne Williamson, because combining lunacy with complete inexperience is just about the worst thing you can do, and Michael Bloomberg, because actually putting one of the One-Percenters in charge is the worst thing you can do. [Note that, Trumpers. I don’t know how you got tricked into forgetting that, but that’s who Trump really is. Actually.]), and he was my second choice even in this election where my first choices (Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders — and Andrew Yang, and Jay Inslee, and Cory Booker and Julian Castro and John Hickenlooper and Tim Ryan and JESUS CHRIST FUCKING ANYBODY ELSE) didn’t run, because Dr. Cornel West would be a far better President than either the Geezer or the Groper. The Sleeper or the Shitbag. The Fumbler or the Fascist.

So do we vote for the third party candidates?

Do we boycott and refuse to vote?

We do not: because this election will put one of these two into the White House. The system cannot change between now and November; not unless we actually rise up and revolt. I don’t plan to grab a pitchfork and light a torch; if you do, we’re going to have to have some serious talks about what you plan to do and why, because violent revolution is something I can’t support as a pacifist; and as someone who both read AND understood George Orwell’s 1984 (That’s not a dig against you: that’s another one for the internet bros who say things like, “Facebook took down my anti-trans meme! It’s LITERALLY 1984!”), I recognize that revolutions generally don’t change the system, they only change the people who hold the whip: they don’t change who the whip falls on, nor remove the whip entirely. So we can discuss it, but I don’t think violent revolution is the right thing to do.

I think the right thing to do is to work on improving the system. We don’t even need to change it, to tear it down and build a new one, because as I said, this actually is a democracy in the most important sense: no, we do not vote directly on all political matters (which is actually what a “democracy” means, control by the people without representatives), but our votes have the greatest authority. We can vote to change literally anything in our system, even the system itself through Constitutional amendment.

I do think we’ll need to change a whole lot of things to make the system functional in the long term. But there are a couple of specific things that we can work to change in the fairly short term — meaning in the next, say, five to twenty years, but not before November — that will make an enormous difference, and make it much easier — even simply possible — to change everything else we need to change. Those things are the factors which give the plutocrats their ability to influence politics so powerfully: unlimited money in campaigns, unlimited advertising in campaigns, monied lobbying and the revolving-door interactions between the government and industry, the winner-take-all two-party system (and other minority-rule structures like the electoral college). I think there are politicians who would be willing to change those things for the better. Or maybe there are people who would be willing to become politicians in order to change those things for the better. Starting with money in politics: that is the simplest and most direct way we have to challenge the plutocrats, the One-Percenters. And people like John McCain existed. People like Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, who unseated a corporate Democrat using only small-dollar donations, exist and are currently in Washington. It is possible. It can be done. It may take years or even decades to get a majority of such people in Congress: but we can do it. And that’s what we need to do.

But what do we do about November?

About these two fucking guys?

@rmsthornton

#Trump #Biden #Debate #FYP #ForYou #Meme #Memes #Funny #Comedy #Humor

♬ original sound – R. M. S. Thornton

I know some of you aren’t going to like hearing this, and I don’t like saying it: but the answer is, we have to vote for Joe Biden. The arguments haven’t changed, not even with that incredible faceplant of a debate performance. Trump is still a wannabe fascist, who will do untold damage to the actual lives of real people during the four years he would be in office; not to mention the damage he would do to our democracy. Biden is a failure as a leader of our nation: both because he hasn’t done nearly as much as he should have done, and because he is a miserable excuse for a figurehead — not the most important role of a president, but not a negligible one. But he is not a threat to our nation’s continued existence. Trump really is.

Don’t stay home: the MAGAts won’t. Don’t vote for RFK Jr. (If you would otherwise vote for a Democrat, that is: if you’re a Trump voter, go right ahead and vote for ol’ Brain Worms): he’s a seriously terrible candidate in his own right (and currently only on the ballot in eight states, so literally cannot win 270 electoral votes and take the presidency) and votes cast for him would only result in the victory of Trump or Biden, with no positive effect at all; because he’s not running as representative of a legitimate third party. If you want to vote Green Party or Libertarian Party or another established third party, that has more merit, because a larger number of votes cast for a third party makes it easier for the third party to gain entry into future races, which is part of the way we break the duopoly of Democrats and Republicans; but be aware that, in this election, taking a vote away from a Democrat, even a shambling mound like Joe Biden, makes it more likely that Trump will take over, and that will be very bad for us all. Including Republicans, whatever they think about how much they’ll laugh in all those stupid lib faces once Trump is in charge. The truth is that Donald Trump is not our friend, and will not do anything to help anyone but himself, if he is returned to the White House. I promise you. For the same reason, I will not be voting for Cornel West, even though I like and admire him and would choose him over every other candidate. My vote for Dr. West will not make him win: and I cannot abide the thought of a second Trump term.

So I will do the right thing to protect and serve my country and my fellow Americans: I will not choose None of the Above, and I will not cast a protest vote. I will vote for Joe Biden.

This fucking guy.

And then I will work to make sure this kind of bullshit stops. Once and for all.

No more malarkey.

Justice Is Served

Dusty Leave a comment
Opinion | Trump guilty on all counts: Breaking down the media coverage of the historic trial | Editor and Publisher
My favorite bit is that “Trump appeared to look blankly forward as jurors exited.”

Donald Trump was found guilty on 34 felony counts. Class E felonies, sure — but that’s still 34 more felonies than I’ve ever been convicted of, 34 more than anyone in my family has been convicted of, 34 more than Joe Biden has been convicted of.

So that’s that, right? Surely no one would want to vote for a convicted felon.

Except of course they will.

Donald Trump poll: Half of Americans say Trump guilty verdict was correct, should end 2024 election bid, ABC News/Ipsos poll shows - ABC7 Chicago
Notice how it isn’t “100% Trump should end campaign.” Which 50% of the population do you think said that he should end it?
Guilty or not guilty, Trump verdict won ...
Notice this number is higher than 50%: which means a good number of people who would vote for him still will even though he has been found guilty.
WANTED OUTLAW PRESIDENT MUGSHOT T-Shirt
I really wish this said “Rootin Tootin” somewhere

This one is amazing. Though I wish I could make out those tattoos. Think there’s a swastika in there somewhere?

I just think he should have gone a little lighter on those eye-bags.

And speaking of going a little lighter… ain’t nobody got hair that yellow.

My Outlaw President #trump #biden #outlaw #badass #MAGA | TikTok

I just want to know: who looks at these images and thinks, “Yes. That is a perfect depiction of how I see this man. This captures my feelings exactly.” I don’t doubt a lot of the images are intended mainly to troll the left, but also, there is literally no sense of irony in MAGA world, and since many of these kinds of images get shared mainly or exclusively in MAGA world, there are actually people there who are encouraged by them. Who nod and think, “Hell yeah!” Seriously.

I can’t imagine feeling that on the other side, not really. I mean, this stuff is insane:

Dark Brandon On the Throne" Art Board Print for Sale by Based Creations | Redbubble

(I do appreciate the strong Dr. Manhattan vibes in that image. Even more than the AR-15 Iron Throne.)

Dark Brandon" Canvas Print for Sale by hypershirts | Redbubble
How does that even look like Biden??

I actually like this one, though.

Because they didn’t try to change his appearance. At all. It’s like an old man spontaneously combusting and really confused about it. Hilarious.

But it’s still not going to make me vote for Biden.

No, I’m voting for Joe Biden because I think he’s a decent man who’s done a decent job as president. I’ve talked about it in other posts, I will talk about it more (Now that school is out and my brain has had a chance to recover — this was a really bad year, y’all.), but that’s the reason. Full stop. Not because he’s a Socialist — he’s not, though I wish he were — and not because I fucking hate Trump that much — I do, but that’s not a good enough reason to vote for Biden — but because he’s a decent man who’s done a decent job. Do I wish Biden would step aside with dignity and let somebody else be the Democratic nominee? I do. Do I think that any decent Democratic candidate — who had reasonable credentials on reproductive rights — would kick Trump’s ass in the election? I do, especially now that Trump’s a convicted felon whom most independents already didn’t like. But Biden is worth voting for. That’s my position.

On the other hand, we have this position:

A friend of mine on Facebook shared this meme. (Actually several did; this one was popular.)

And a mutual acquaintance of ours commented thusly:

As much as I dislike both of them I think that whole court case was a crock of shit and shows how people with political power can weaponize the judicial system. That judge on this case was about as corrupt as they get smfh.

So notice how this comment starts by bringing in Joe Biden (Am I presuming too much in saying Joe Biden is the other in “both of them?” I am not. I knew his position, and he confirms it in later comments.), even though the meme had nothing to do with Biden, as the trial had nothing to do with Biden: this was a New York case, brought by the Manhattan DA, about events that happened in 2006 and 2015-2016, and were revealed to the public in 2018. Nothing here to do with Biden’s campaign against Trump. Notice how this makes some pretty extreme accusations — the whole case was a “crock of shit,” people with political power can weaponize the judicial system, the judge was “about as corrupt as they get” — but provides no evidence at all.

This is not unique, of course. This is how American political discourse usually goes. We are all inside our little tents, holding up the collapsing tent poles, ignoring the canvas (or nylon? I honestly don’t know anything about tents, I haven’t been camping since I was 14. Imma go with canvas because I think the metaphor should be circus tents. Don’t you? Uh… circus tents are canvas, right?) falling all around us, completely cutting us off from the outside world, while we yell at people in the other tents that their tent is bad and stupid and they should really be in OUR tent.

To be clear: the Democratic tent is bad, but the Republican party tent has currently been taken over by a proto-fascist cult of personality worshipping a convicted felon. (Love how that last part rolls off the tongue. No, I’m not fucking objective. There are not fine people on both sides. There are formerly fine people in the Republican party who decided to give up on being fine people in order to support the proto-fascist cult of personality worshipping a convicted felon. They don’t get to be fine so long as they are in that tent. If they come out they can be fine people again — even very fine people. There are fine people in the other tents — though not the Libertarians. Libertarians are assholes. But that’s just a joke. The Trump tent comment is not.) They are not the same party, they are not in the same situation. They are not equal, not in any way. I’m just recognizing that a lot of Democrats are blind to reality, too. Including Joe Biden, in some ways. He really should step aside. It would be better for the country.

My first response was fully inside my tent. I don’t remember exactly what I wrote, but it was irate. (I will also say I have a history with this fellow; while he is in some ways reasonable and open-minded, in other ways he is a lot of things I dislike. Even hate. Hence my knee-jerk reaction was not the right one.) It started with “What in the Fox News are you talking about?” (Okay, I admit I’m including that mostly because I’m proud of the phrase, and I want to remember it to use it some other time for real.) I said that there was no political weaponization of the judicial system, the judge was not corrupt, the case was not a crock of shit. I used more words, but that was all I said. And then I hit Post.

I did not provide evidence. I did not explain my arguments. I did not provide context. I just said “NO!” a lot.

It was not a useful contribution to an argument.

So I thought about it. Part of me did not really want to engage in this debate: because I know that there are people who are not worth engaging with because they will not listen and they will not take conversation seriously, they will only take the opportunity provided by disagreement to mock and yell and crow and scoff, which just makes me mad and spreads more distrust and disinformation. That’s what happened the last time I got into an argument with a Trumper (Note: this fellow is not a Trumper, as he hinted and as he said in more detail later), and I specifically didn’t engage with said Trumper because I knew he wouldn’t be an honest participant in a discussion. I said so. He got quite exercised in insulting me and lying about the state of this country — in that case, it was about immigration, because he was also a racist. Shocking, I know.

But part of me knows that this fellow, while he has said things and done things which I dislike and even hate, is also sometimes open-minded, and also sometimes rational, and also sometimes kind.

And more importantly, there is the person I am when I am irritated or angry, and there is the person I think I need to be in order to do what I can to help our society to heal.

So I deleted that comment (Not fast enough, because he was already replying to it, and noted that I had changed my comment; I apologized and invited him to bring up anything from my comment which he wanted to challenge me on. Because I want to be the person I think I need to be.) and replaced it with two questions:

What makes you say the judge was corrupt? And which people with political power weaponized the justice system?

Because I realized something in the last year or two. When I am teaching, I ask questions. All the time. It’s pretty much all I do when my students make comments or observations in discussion. Either I recognize them for their point, and thank them/compliment them/build off of what they said to continue the discussion — or I ask a question. “Why?” is my favorite, of course, though I mostly have to add more words to that — “Why do you think that?” or “Why do you think that character acts that way,” etc. — but I ask other questions, too, all kinds of them, one after another. I rarely make statements, I rarely agree or disagree with them: that isn’t my job. My job is to make them think. And the questions do that quite well. So I realized that I should ask more questions in my political discussions, rather than simply making statements or trying to disprove or deconstruct my opponents’ opinions or ideas. Usually because the positions I oppose do not have internal logic or consistency, and simply asking someone questions about their positions will frequently show the flaws in those positions, without me ever having to get into a fight about what is true and what is not.

And here’s the response I got in this instance, from this fellow. (Partly this was in response to my original combative tone, because he was replying to my first comment, not my questions; I’m not trying to cover up that I reacted badly, just trying to show that I know I did it the wrong way, and my two questions were what I think was the right way. [I will also note that while I am writing this, I am also arguing with a dude who thinks there should be a Heterosexual Pride Day because discrimination against LGBTQIA+ people is mostly gone, and in fact LGBTQIA+ people are now the real bullies, and they are picking on heterosexuals. And I am not simply asking him questions. I am being as polite as I can be, but I am also making declarative statements that he is simply wrong. So I guess I’m not perfect yet. But also — FUCKIN REALLY?!?!?!?!?!])

Theoden Humphrey a NYC DA who campaigned on the sole fact he was gonna find and convict Donald Trump of a crime. Whose campaign was also funded by none other than now ex-WEF leader George Soros.

The trial took place in an 87% Democrat county.

The judge who is a major Biden campaign donor. Also the judge’s daughter works with Leticia James who also has a hard on for convicting Trump.

Evidence of a crime that exceeds the statute of limitation since 2019 but upgraded what is normally a misdemeanor to a class E felony due to other crimes not mentioned being committed.

Corrupt judge tells jury that they do not need to agree on verdict unanimously they just have to agree that Trump committed some kind of crime. Which is a first.

And 34 counts yes. However, they will only sentence him on 1 because all 34 are considered the same 1 “crime”

I just think that this is political persecution to suppress a political opponent. And I’m not really on the Trump train any more. I really enjoy what robert f Kennedy has to offer and think that he better represents the middle isle American who supports the constitution and has left and right leaning views. He’s pro choice and pro 2A I like both those things.

Let’s be real. Biden and Trump are both equally pieces of wealthy filth and we need a big change from what we are being spoon fed. We are stuck with two dog shit choices. Either far left or far fuckin right. All the two parties we have to chose from are doing is further driving a wedge of division in this country.

If Trump is truly guilty throw his ass in prison for 4 years for committing a class E felony. But they should also go after every single politician left and right wing who’s paid out hush money and done exactly what the pos orange man did. I’m just as sick of hearing trumps bullshit as you are too. I’m also sick of genocide joe not giving a single shit about you and I. Neither of them represent us fairly.

I just think that this whole court case crap is only going to fuel the fire of his supporters. Also think it’s coincidental that the sentencing hearing is 4 days before the RNC. Honestly they should have done this 4 years ago when he left office instead of confidently waiting until 6 months before the election. And again I’m not stroking trumps ego on this but I think it’s just in time that now the biden campaign can put ads out talking about how Trump is a convicted felon etc etc.

We are all tired of both biden and trumps shit. And we the people have absolutely no say in a third party member being elected. Here in November 2024 we get two shit ass choice like we have for the last 2 decades. You get to pick corrupt left wing or corrupt right wing. And really your vote don’t mean shit anyways. If you’re a Democrat living in a red state your state is not representing your beliefs same with if your republican living in a blue state.

It’s all a crock of shit Humphrey. Can we atleast agree on that ?

My response to this comment was this:

No, we can’t agree that it’s all a crock of shit. There’s a lot of shit in the mix, absolutely: but there are things here that matter. Things like democracy and the rule of law. Truth. Simple human decency. They matter so much that I believe it’s worth digging through all that shit and wiping it away.

You’ve done something here that we shouldn’t do. That’s not an accusation; I did it too — this was my second reply on your comment, I deleted the first one, because sure I did what you’ve done here: I made statements without evidence, without even fully explaining my point; arguing only by innuendo and implication. I deleted that bad argument, and now I’m going to challenge you on yours. I hope you’ll reach across and work with me on this: because this, too, is important: communication and understanding.

Start with your first point: Alvin Bragg. How do you know he campaigned on going after Trump? And if he did, what would that show about him or what happened in this case? Did he lie? Fake evidence? Bribe the judge? Suborn the jury? Intimidate the witnesses? Same questions about Soros: how do you know he funded Bragg’s campaign? What would it mean if he did? Does that mean Bragg obeys his commands? What is Soros’s goal?

Okay: and here, though it has taken me my customary WAY TOO LONG to get to the point of this, is why I wanted to write about this. I’m not trying to embarrass or criticize my — let’s call him my interlocutor, the fellow I was having the discussion with — and I’m not really trying to argue with him; if I were, I would have continued on Facebook with him. He did post another comment (which I may turn into another post) and when I challenged him on that one, he replied to that challenge and said that he had been writing a long response with the evidence I was asking for, but it had gotten deleted; he then, quite rationally, moved on with his damn life, and the FB debate ended there.

And now here I am, continuing it.

Here’s why. I think there is a ton of misinformation out there in our world. I think a lot of it is spread in exactly this way, in comments on social media posts, which are presented as fact without any support or explanation, as both I and my interlocutor did. I think most of us do not have reliable news sources which we consult regularly, or sources of real information that explain what’s actually going on in our political world. That, I think, is why most of us have opinions that do not change according to new facts or new events: first because, frequently, we are unaware of new facts and new events; and second, because our opinions never were based on facts. I’m not really sure that mine are, either, and so I struggle, every time I write about politics, with the position I should take: should I be neutral and objective? Should I only talk about things I have researched extensively, things I can be considered an authority on? If I just share my opinions, which are not based on facts, how am I different from everyone else?

When I call Trump a fascist, for instance: what is the basis for that statement? Have I studied the history of fascism? Do I know specific instances of actions and positions taken by Trump that align with historical fascism? I have certainly read some history of fascism, and some political analysis of Trump and his GOP supporters that shows him to be aligned with fascism, so I feel fairly comfortable making the accusation: but I surely know that there is room for me to be wrong there, and I surely recognize that I could do more research and more fact-finding to support the opinion.

But the real question is: should I present the opinion? Or should I only present information that is proven to be true, that is purely factual and objective?

Okay, let’s be real. I’m a damn English teacher. And a fantasy/horror writer who likes pirates a lot. My opinions are not the ones that should be taken as proven objective facts.

But what I can offer, what I hope to offer, is what I asked my interlocutor for on Facebook, which he started to provide but then didn’t have time for — and which I now have time for — evidence. Explanation. Enough to show what we are actually talking about, and why we should or should not take it seriously.

So that’s what I want to do here. I want to engage with these talking points, and try to figure out if there is anything behind them. Not disprove them, not show that the fellow who posted this was wrong or bad in any way; but I want to explore these statements a little, and try to see if they are worth considering. If this seems valuable, then I will probably do it again with his second long comment, which I am not including here because this post is already too wordy. But, that’s how we roll here on Just Dusty, so I’m not going to apologize for my verbosity. Just gonna do my thingy.

Here we go.

First: Alvin Bragg. Manhattan District Attorney, who, allegedly, “campaigned on the sole fact he was gonna find and convict Donald Trump of a crime. Whose campaign was also funded by none other than now ex-WEF leader George Soros.”

The first part of that is not true, though the fellow did adjust his statement to say that Bragg made speeches about prosecuting Trump, which is true. But Bragg did not campaign solely on convicting Donald Trump. (It is also meaningful to me that the investigation was opened by Bragg’s predecessor, Cyrus Vance.)

But here’s the thing: does this matter? Is it wrong if a man running for DA, in a district that is, as was pointed out in the next statement, 87% Democratic, says he will go after the (at the time) current Republican president, who is one of the most hated politicians, especially in Democratic circles, of the past, say, twenty years? Does that show prejudice? We can certainly argue that maybe district attorneys shouldn’t campaign on going after political figures, but the question that has to be addressed is: is that respect for the separation of politics and justice, or is it suppression of justice for the sake of the appearance of respect for the separation of politics and justice? That is: if Trump was actually guilty (or could reasonably be accused, since we’re talking about decisions regarding bringing a case, not the verdict) of crimes, should the man running for DA say that he will prosecute Trump? Or should he back off because Trump is a politician?

Obviously we know what Trump would want in this case. But just as obviously, Trump’s position on this — and the same positions parroted by all of his supporters — are not about the respect for the separation of powers and the political process, because that same former President (now convicted felon) and his supporters said that Hillary Clinton should be locked up, and they’ve never stopped going after Joe and Hunter Biden with claims regarding criminality and the justice system.

Honestly, I can see the point in terms of, say, a judge, or a jury member. They need to have both the appearance of objectivity, as well as approaching as close to actual objectivity as they can. But the DA is not supposed to be unbiased. In fact, to do his or her job well, it seem reasonable that a DA should be as biased as possible: it would motivate them to work hard to find all of the evidence to prove their case in court, to prepare and formulate all the arguments and all the strategy needed to convict their target, to “Get their man.” So long as they can remain rational and uncorrupted in their prosecution, so long as they don’t intimidate witnesses, or bribe the judge, or falsify evidence, or try to suppress information or corrupt the jury, or any of the other ways that a DA could corrupt a criminal trial.

Does evidence of bias against Trump provide evidence of corruption or wrongdoing on the part of the DA?

It does not.

The same with Bragg receiving funding in his campaign from George Soros. My immediate question is: what is the impact of that funding? Did Soros call the man up and say “Here’s what I want in exchange for my money: someday — and that day may never come — I may ask you to do a service for me.” Or does his money buy access? Is there an assumption of what Bragg might have to do to maintain that level of funding in the future? Any or all of those would be a concern. (Though none of them would necessarily show that Bragg did anything corrupt in prosecuting Trump.)

But, actually, now that I think about it, my first question is, Is that even true? What evidence do we have that Soros funded Alvin Bragg’s campaign?

The answer? It’s kinda true.

This is Mary Louise Kelly, from NPR, interviewing Emily Tamkin, a spokesperson from Soros’s organization.

KELLY: Let’s start with a basic fact check. What exactly is the connection between George Soros or his foundations and Manhattan DA Alvin Bragg?

TAMKIN: So in this case, Soros gave money to a group called Color of Change, which is a social justice civil rights group that in turn gave some money to the campaign of District Attorney Alvin Bragg.

Right, okay. So in fact George Soros did not give money directly to Alvin Bragg, which pretty much shows that none of the immediate thoughts on possible corruption would be true. They might happen at one remove — Soros pressures Color of Change, and Color of Change pressures Bragg — but that disconnect makes it harder to believe that Soros had any real influence on Bragg. It does raise a question which Tamkin brought up in the NPR interview, while responding to the important question from Kelly:

KELLY: Yeah. I mean, is there any evidence that Soros got something for this money in the case of Alvin Bragg, that his money bought influence in some way?

TAMKIN: No, there’s no evidence of that. And just more broadly, there are critiques to be made – right? – about a billionaire philanthropist who gives money to prosecutors’ campaigns, right? We could have a conversation about money in politics, the power of billionaires in American society. All of that is fair game, right? But that’s not really what this is. This is over-assigning the influence of Soros over Bragg and also dramatically overstating the agency that Soros has over this case.

We could definitely have a conversation about money in politics, the power of billionaires in American society. We could talk about the billionaires who bought the Supreme Court. We could talk about Trump offering policy to oil companies in exchange for a billion dollars. Hell, we could talk about all the billionaires who gave to both Trump and Biden — and Biden had both more donors, and more money from them, in this graph from Forbes. (And yes: Soros is on it.)

But how does the existence of George Soros giving money to a PAC which then gave money to Alvin Bragg show that Soros corrupted the case against Donald Trump as prosecuted by Alvin Bragg? And by the way, where is our understanding of what Soros wants which is corrupt in the first place?

It does not show that the case against Trump was corrupted. And the fact that no one that I have ever heard or seen bring up George Soros’s name can also offer a credible explanation of how he wants to corrupt American politics shows that this use of George Soros’s name to taint one’s political opponents by association is nothing but hot air. (I’m going to leave the description of how people usually go after Soros for another time, another place. Because it’s ugly. And completely off the point here.)

So what is the point here? The point is that the argument, the accusation, being made exists only because so much of it is left out, is unsaid. The argument leaves our imaginations to fill in the gaps. Alvin Bragg campaigned on getting Donald Trump: okay… and? This was why I asked for specific evidence of specific corrupt actions that my interlocutor was accusing Bragg of, and if he had made specific claims, I would have asked for evidence. As it stands, there’s not even really an accusation. He never said “George Soros commanded Bragg, in exchange for his political donation of X dollars, to frame Trump so that Biden could defeat Trump in the election because Biden is trying to create a Socialist state and that’s what Soros wants, so Bragg tampered with evidence and intimidated witnesses to get them to lie about Trump on the stand.” See how that specific kind of claim just screams for evidence? “How do you know all of that?” would be the only thought in my head if I were to read all of that. Which is why that claim wasn’t made: because of course there isn’t evidence for that claim, because it is not true. All this fellow said was “Bragg was funded by Soros.” Never even gave the specifics about how that funding was provided (I’m sure he didn’t know), and neither of us have provided how much funding there was; he didn’t say that only Soros funded Bragg’s campaign, which of course is also not true, but that’s implied in the wording.

This is what I’m talking about. This is argument by innuendo, by hints and implications, accusations left unsaid because we all know what’s really going on here. But what’s really going on here is bad argument, bad discussion: misinformation. We are all doing it, all the time.

We need to stop.

Okay. Moving on.

Next: the case took place in an 87% Democratic county. (Not even sure if that’s true: this website shows it, but — it’s BestPlaces, a real estate website, so not the most reliable source of political information; and the info on this page alone seems to contradict that 87% figure a couple of times, so — I dunno. I’ll stipulate it. [Which is what Trump should have done with his affair with Stephanie Clifford, who uses the stage name Stormy Daniels, who therefore wouldn’t have had to testify in open court about how she spanked his ass, how she rejected his pathetic attempt to Hugh Hefner her, how he didn’t use a condom — all the salacious details which embarrassed Trump, which his lawyers claimed prejudiced the jury and tainted the verdict, all could have been avoided if they had stipulated the affair had happened; but Trump wanted to pretend he never had sex with Ms. Clifford. So here we are, with Trump hoist on his own petard. But I digress.])

The main question is: does this fact, that 87% of Manhattan voted Democrat, show bias against Trump in the potential jury pool?

You bet your ass it does. Any poll — every poll — shows that Democrats pretty roundly and universally and virulently hate Donald Trump. I certainly do, for all kinds of rational and irrational reasons, which I would be happy to list except I already have so just read this if you want.

But.

Two questions: one cynical but important, and one much more to the point.

The cynical question is: yes, and? How is this jury pool different from any other? It’s Donald freaking Trump: what else would you expect? Of course Democrats hate this guy. Just as, of course, Republicans love him (and I’m going to resist the temptation here to point out that they SHOULD NOT, and just accept that they do); it seems clear that any Republican district would have just as much potential bias in the jury pool, it would just have the opposite polarity, so to speak. Of course Trump would like to move the trial to a Republican district; he likes that bias better. But is there anywhere the trial could be moved that would lead to an unbiased jury pool? Everyone is biased when it comes to the 45th President of the U.S. of A. Do we really think there are a dozen people in any locale in these United States who don’t already have a strong opinion of Donald Trump? And here’s the cynical part: there is, therefore, no possible way to find an unbiased jury, if — if — we think that political affiliation and voting record are prejudicial in terms of a juror’s ability to come to a fair verdict beyond a reasonable doubt. Which is where Trump wants to take this argument: to the conclusion that, if there is no way to find an unbiased jury — he should simply never be tried for his crimes. He should be allowed to act with impunity, because any jury would be biased, and therefore incapable of rendering a fair verdict.

I don’t think I need to say that I would not want that situation to happen. I do not want anyone to be above the law. Especially not Donald Trump.

And now we get to the question that really comes to the point. Do we believe that people who voted Democratic in 2016 or 2020, or at any time in the last fifty years, are incapable of setting aside those political views in order to serve as a juror in a criminal case regarding the President as a private citizen campaigning for political office?

Do we really believe that any opinion, one way or another, means that people cannot be fair? Really? Because then we’re going to have to set aside all judgment in all cases, forever and ever. I mean all cases: which parent could fairly judge their child? Don’t parents have opinions about their children? What teacher could grade an assignment? We all have opinions about our students.

Shall I point out here that my interlocutor is a former student?

Look: this is important, but we all know it’s important, so it is already a carefully considered factor. People knowing about something does not mean they are necessarily incapable of fairly judging an event or person associated with that thing. People having connections to a person, or a party, or an experience of any kind, does not necessarily mean that person is incapable of being objective and judging fairly. But because we recognize that it could, that a previous opinion could create an unfair bias, the entire justice system is designed to get around that fact.

I mean: ALL of it. Twelve jurors, selected randomly, then vetted by the judge and by both sides’ attorneys. Proof beyond a reasonable doubt. Unanimous verdict. The right to appeal. Every bit of it, and a hundred other things I didn’t mention — rules of evidence, and admissibility in court, and having statements removed from the record, and jury instructions, and alternative jurors, and jury sequestration, and on and on — is intended to address the problem of jurors’ possible prejudice.

To dismiss that simply because someone voted a particular party at some point in the past — no, not even that; because the people who lived in an area voted for a particular party in the past, which does not include all the people in the area because in addition to the 14% or so who didn’t vote Democrat, there are the 50% or so who didn’t vote, and the people who moved into the area since then — and every single person who voted for Democrats and also voted for one Donald J. Trump.

Like this fucking guy.

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Donald Trump registered as a Republican in Manhattan in 1987; since that time, he has changed his party affiliation five times. In 1999, Trump changed his party affiliation to the Independence Party of New York. In August 2001, Trump changed his party affiliation to Democratic. In September 2009, Trump changed his party affiliation back to the Republican Party. In December 2011, Trump changed to “no party affiliation” (independent). In April 2012, Trump again returned to the Republican Party. (From Wikipedia, emphasis added)

To dismiss every precaution built into the system, every application of judgment about someone’s potential bias, every possibility that someone could look beyond their bias and be a fair juror — that’s not cynical. It’s downright absurd. It’s bullshit.

I have thought to myself, since the trial started, that I could be a juror. I would never pass the voir dire, because they looked at past social media posts, and I’ve been pretty clear that I have strong opinions about Trump; his lawyers would strike me in a hot minute. And they’d be right to do so, because no matter how much I flatter myself that I could be impartial, I would not have the appearance of impartiality (and, honestly, probably not the fact of it either), and my presence on the jury would undermine confidence in the verdict. So even though I think I could be impartial, I wouldn’t be on the jury. Not because I have voted for Democrats, but because I have railed against Trump more times than I could count. I said in this very post that I hate the fucking guy, and I do. So, biased.

(I still kinda think I could be impartial because I do not like all of my students, but I treat them all fairly and grade them all as impartially as I can. But also, a grade on an essay is not a criminal verdict, and none of my students are as hateable as the Nazi Cheeto.)

There’s a process, a system, for finding the most impartial jury possible, and getting those twelve people to overcome any biases they come in with. It’s an imperfect system. But it’s a good system. It deserves our trust. A whole lot more than Donald Trump does.

I’m going to put the next claim, that Judge Merchan was a “major Biden donor” into the same category here; either we trust that someone can put aside their political affiliations in order to serve as a judge in a criminal case — or else we should TAKE THE GODDAMN MAR-A-LAGO DOCUMENTS CASE AWAY FROM EILEEN CANNON.

But I digress.

(Oh also — the claim that Judge Merchan’s daughter worked for Letitia James, who also “has a hard on for convicting Trump” is not true. My interlocutor is mixing up his false claims here. Laura Loomer, an idiot who pushes pro-Trump messaging on the internet, claimed that Merchan’s wife worked for Letitia James, and since it was Loomer who said it, it’s probably not true at all, and if it is it doesn’t show that Mrs. Merchan is biased in favor of AG James; I have worked for a lot of people, and most of them, I DID NOT LIKE, not even if they were as badass as Letitia James — who, if I may say, is the Attorney General of the state of New York, and the first woman and the first African-American elected to hold that post, which means she is amazing on a scale well beyond what this discussion can capture — while Merchan’s daughter is the president and partner of a consulting firm that works for all kinds of big name political clients, including Vice President Kamala Harris. So I’m not sure that any of this claim holds water at all. But if it does? Absolutely none of this shows any particular unfair corrupting bias on the part of Judge Merchan, so we’re just going to leave this one alone. Now, if the judge’s wife had raised a “FUCK TRUMP” flag over the judge’s house during the trial…)

Okay. Phew. I can see why people prefer to argue without explanations and evidence: this is hard. And time-consuming.

But this is how it needs to be: we need to actually show what the hell we are talking about, using resources from other than our own memory or imagination, and we need to actually explain the claims we make. It’s not enough to just be like “THE JUDGE GAVE MONEY TO BIDEN!” You have to go the next step: tell me how this fact (which you also would need to provide evidence for) shows unfair bias on the judge’s part, which was shown in this specific statement or action.

And if that means we might talk less and raise fewer, better points in our arguments? Well, all I can say is I know how long this post is.

But long or not, let me provide some evidence, in the shape of one quick example: Judge Webster Thayer presided over the trial of Niccolo Sacco and Bartolomeo Vanzetti, the two Italian immigrants and anarchists who were convicted and executed for the murder of two guards during the robbery of a payroll in 1920. Here’s Thayer’s bias, which did indeed have an impact on the conviction and execution of these two (probably innocent) men:

Thayer’s behavior both on and off the bench during the trial drew criticism. A Boston Globe reporter, Frank Sibley, who had covered the trial, wrote a letter of protest to the Massachusetts attorney general condemning Thayer’s bias. Others noted the frequency with which Thayer denied defense motions and the way he addressed defense attorney Fred H. Moore. Thayer defended his rulings to reporters saying, “No long-haired anarchist from California can run this court!” According to onlookers who later swore affidavits, in private discussion Thayer called Sacco and Vanzetti “Bolsheviki!” and said he would “get them good and proper”. In 1924, referring to his denial of motions for a new trial, Thayer confronted a Massachusetts lawyer: “Did you see what I did with those anarchistic bastards the other day?” the judge said. “I guess that will hold them for a while! Let them go and see now what they can get out of the Supreme Court!” The outburst remained a secret until 1927 when its release fueled the arguments of Sacco and Vanzetti’s defenders. The New York World attacked Thayer as “an agitated little man looking for publicity and utterly impervious to the ethical standards one has the right to expect of a man presiding in a capital case.”[1] From Wikipedia

So. Get me audio of Judge Merchan saying, “Did you see what I did to that fascist orange motherfucker last month?” and I’ll say he was unfairly biased. Let him deny motions for an appeal or a new trial and then say “I guess that will hold those shitheads for a while! Let them see what they can get out of the Supreme Court!*” and then I’ll say Merchan’s actions were unfair based on his prejudices. Drop some innuendo based on the assumption that political affiliation is a universal source of unconquerable prejudice? I will simply point out that oftentimes an accusation is a confession.

*Also, what they could get from the Supreme Court is: probably any fucking thing they want, because the SCOTUS is, in my opinion, both corrupt and unethical, and also unfairly biased and prejudiced in their judgments connected to Donald Trump. But I digress.

Okay: now we get to the issues regarding the actual case, rather than the people involved. There are three presented.

Evidence of a crime that exceeds the statute of limitation since 2019 but upgraded what is normally a misdemeanor to a class E felony due to other crimes not mentioned being committed.

Corrupt judge tells jury that they do not need to agree on verdict unanimously they just have to agree that Trump committed some kind of crime. Which is a first.

And 34 counts yes. However, they will only sentence him on 1 because all 34 are considered the same 1 “crime”

First: past the statute of limitations? No. From an AP fact-checking article:

CLAIM: “They missed the statute of limitations by a lot because this was very old. They could have brought this seven years ago instead of bringing it right in the middle of the election.”

THE FACTS: Judge Merchan in February denied a request from Trump’s legal team to dismiss the indictment on the grounds that the statute of limitations had passed, according to court documents.

In his decision, Merchan cited pandemic-era executive orders issued in March 2020 and April 2021 by former New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo that extended the limit on filing criminal charges.

New York’s statute of limitations for most felonies is five years. The earliest charge in Trump’s felony indictment was described as occurring on Feb. 14, 2017, while the indictment was filed on March 30, 2023.

(And just in case someone disagrees with this: okay, show me the evidence that this statute of limitations claim is valid.)

The misdemeanor being raised to a felony is something that should be considered; but there is a reasonable argument for the felony: the crime was committed in pursuance of committing another crime, which makes the offense more serious. Reasonably: because someone who will commit one crime in order to commit a second crime is more likely to commit a third crime. Right? So that increases the severity of the initial crime being tried here, the falsification of business records. Alone, it’s a misdemeanor; in conjunction with another crime, it’s a class E felony — which is not far away from a misdemeanor, honestly. We can and should question the step the DA took to try this as an felony, but we can see that choice as reflecting the facts of the case, and thereby necessitating a trial — because if this was only a misdemeanor there’s no way we have this trial — or we can see it as a biased DA corrupting the law in order to go after Trump.

If you think it’s the second one? Prove it.

I think it’s the first one. Not least because the jury, whom I will trust because I trust the system, in the absence of specific evidence to the contrary, convicted Trump of the felonies, which at least implies, post facto, that there was validity in the argument. But let’s get into the details a little more.

Let me include the next claim, that Judge Merchan (who is, in the absence of any specific evidence, definitely not corrupt) instructed the jury that they did not need to be unanimous on the verdict, they just needed to agree that Trump committed some kind of crime.

False. Or at least unclearly stated to such an extent that it becomes false.

From a CBS News article about the trial

Why were the charges a felony?

Under New York law, falsification of business records is a crime when the records are altered with an intent to defraud. To be charged as a felony, prosecutors must also show that the offender intended to “commit another crime” or “aid or conceal” another crime when falsifying records.

In Trump’s case, prosecutors said that other crime was a violation of a New York election law that makes it illegal for “any two or more persons” to “conspire to promote or prevent the election of any person to a public office by unlawful means,” as Justice Juan Merchan explained in his instructions to the jury.

What exactly those “unlawful means” were in this case was up to the jury to decide. Prosecutors put forth three areas that they could consider: a violation of federal campaign finance laws, falsification of other business records or a violation of tax laws. 

Jurors did not need to agree on what the underlying “unlawful means” were. But they did have to unanimously conclude that Trump caused the business records to be falsified, and that he “did so with intent to defraud that included an intent to commit another crime or to aid or conceal the commission thereof.” 

So the crime, the falsification of business records, was well and fully proven by the prosecution; it was what they found him guilty of. 34 times. They also proved guilt in the secondary crime which the falsification was in pursuance of, conspiracy to promote the election of one Donald J. Trump ; that was why they used David Pecker of the National Enquirer as their first star witness.

What they did not need to prove beyond a reasonable doubt was which specific law was violated in the “unlawful means” used to promote the election of Trump. It could have been any of three crimes, all of which had evidence in support provided during the trial; they did not need to prove, and the jury did not need to agree, on which unlawful means were used — or rather, on why specifically those means were unlawful — because that was not the matter being tried here; the jury’s opinion of it was enough for the sake of proving beyond a reasonable doubt that Trump committed the crime of falsification in pursuance of another crime, fraud to promote the election of a specific person. So that’s the answer to the objection: this is part of how the system works. And I should point out that, contrary to the claim that this was unprecedented, this happens all the time: every plea deal involves changing charges up or down the scale of severity, even if the charge that results is not entirely apropos. And every case involving a difficult-to-try person involves crimes that can be proven, which stand in for crimes that can’t be proven but definitely happened; just ask Al Capone. So really, if we don’t like this, we don’t like the thousands of other times it happens in our justice system daily.

I will also say that, honestly, I don’t like that they did this. I have heard legal commentators on NPR saying they think this specific element may lead to a successful appeal of the verdict, and I don’t like that.

But the point here is that I don’t really understand the legal maneuver that the DA used in this case. Not that it was bad, or that it made the verdict bad; just that I don’t understand it, and therefore I don’t like it. Using the same gut-feeling level of decision making, I will say that I believe in my gut that Trump absolutely committed this crime; maybe he shouldn’t have been convicted of it, and maybe he shouldn’t have been convicted in this way — but if he got away with this, that would be a miscarriage of justice.

And we’ll leave this for the Court of Appeals to decide.

Also, not that I want to descend into whataboutism, but if we’re talking about miscarriages of justice? Trump should be on trial in three other court rooms, with stronger evidence of more serious crimes. The fact that he is not, and maybe never will be, shows a miscarriage of justice that FAR outweighs any issue about the misdemeanor felonies and the unlawful means.

Moving on again.

The last one, that Trump was convicted of 34 crimes that were all one crime and so will only be sentenced for one crime — I mean, sure, and that’s why Judge Merchan will probably not sentence him to 34 penalties. This is an area of the justice system that is quite rightly left up to judges to decide in sentencing: sometimes it matters that a crime was committed 34 times, even if it was the same crime. If someone murdered 34 people, that’s different than one murder. If someone raped the same victim 34 times, that is not one crime.

In this case, does the minor nature and the repetitiveness of all 34 counts mean we shouldn’t keep emphasizing that Trump was convicted of 34 felonies?

Sure, maybe. But also: it’s fun to say it. And I’m not going to apologize for, nor draw back, my shit-talking about Donald Trump. This is one case where I will gleefully say “Fuck your feelings.” Karma’s a bitch.

Okay: now we get to the general commentary at the end of the list of factual concerns regarding Trump’s trial and conviction.

First is this: “I just think that this is political persecution to suppress a political opponent.”

Not one thing in all of this so far connected Joe Biden to this trial. Not one thing. Okay: George Soros, and the fact that both Alvin Bragg and Joe Biden — and Judge Merchan, and most Manhattan voters — are Democrats. But man, if everything every Democrat does is in service of and part of a conspiracy involving Joe Biden, then I need to stop writing this blog: I am clearly committing political persecution of Donald J. Trump, at the behest of Joe Biden.

Now, is it convenient for Biden that Trump was tried and convicted? Sure — but let me grab another statement that was made a few sentences later.

I just think that this whole court case crap is only going to fuel the fire of his supporters.

And you’re right. I started out by saying that the verdict doesn’t change very many votes , either way. So why would Biden go after Trump in this way in hopes of changing the election? Doesn’t this show the opposite, that Biden probably didn’t try to do this in order to suppress a political opponent, because this clearly didn’t work, and polls have been showing for months that a conviction wouldn’t swing the election? And I think we all know that a felony conviction doesn’t disqualify anyone from running for president, or from serving if they win. Biden and his advisors knew that. So unless we assume that Biden and all of his political advisors are so completely out of touch or so thoroughly stupid that they didn’t know that Trump’s voters would not change their vote because of the verdict, it’s not reasonable to assume, in the absence of evidence, that Biden masterminded this whole thing. And that Biden and his team were too dumb to recognize the futility is a very poor assumption: after all, whatever else we may think of Joe Biden, the man won election to the highest office in the country. Clearly he knows what the fuck he is doing politically. Especially when it comes to beating Donald Trump, which he also did.

Going on:

Also think it’s coincidental that the sentencing hearing is 4 days before the RNC. Honestly they should have done this 4 years ago when he left office instead of confidently waiting until 6 months before the election. And again I’m not stroking trumps ego on this but I think it’s just in time that now the biden campaign can put ads out talking about how Trump is a convicted felon etc etc.

The sentencing was decided by Judge Merchan. And what exactly will it do when it happens four days before the Republican National Convention? Will they fail to nominate Trump? Will this ruin his run to the November election?

When's John going to appear publicly?” : r/JohnMulaney

No, seriously: why not point out that it is a week after the Fourth of July? Or on John Quincy Adams’s birthday — and also Giorgio Armani’s? This is another attempt at argument just by unclear innuendo. I don’t know what Trump’s sentencing is supposed to do to affect the RNC, but my best guess is that it will rile them all up and they’ll spend three days screaming about a witch hunt while falling in line behind DJT as the GOP nominee.

In terms of the case going to trial four years ago: Cyrus Vance had to sue Donald Trump to get his tax returns. Twice. And it went all the way to the Supreme Court. And then Trumps’ lawyers delayed this in every possible way — and it was delayed quite a bit by the fact that the COVID pandemic backlogged all of the courts for years. (PRETTY CONVENIENT THAT DONALD TRUMP DIDN’T DO ANYTHING TO STOP THE PANDEMIC AND IT DELAYED HIS TRIAL, HUH??? See? I can argue by innuendo too.) That’s why it took so long. I’m sure they would have loved to try it in 2019 — except for the fact that would have meant trying a sitting president, and honestly, maybe that would have been kinda bad.

Is Biden going to make hay out of Trump being a convicted felon? Absolutely. But you know who else is capitalizing on it?

This fucking guy.

He always makes money off his persecution complex.

And there’s another factor here, which connects to all of these points about the timing and how Biden will use this conviction, and so on. Sure: it may be convenient when your opponent’s crimes or scandals or whatever show up — but that doesn’t mean they didn’t happen. Your opponent’s mistakes or wrongdoings are certainly good for you, but that in no way shows that you made them up: it only shows that you took advantage of circumstances, or your opponent’s failures, as anyone would and should in a competition. Do we think the tortoise made the hare take a nap? No: it’s not your fault if your opponent fucks up. It doesn’t mean you made those scandals happen, or drummed up false charges for those crimes. It doesn’t mean the opponent was framed. Not even if you personally have the power to persecute someone, and falsely accuse them of crimes. To show that that happened, someone would need actual evidence that Trump was not guilty of doing what he was accused of.

And did you notice? The one claim that was missing from all of these arguments about this trial?

That Trump was innocent. That he didn’t do anything.

We all know he did it. We all know it was criminal. It’s just a question of whether he should pay, and how much he should pay.

The first answer is emphatically, categorically, YES.

The second question is more to be debated and determined. But it should be determined using facts, using reason, not innuendo and implication and misinformation and lies.

Then we can have something that is not a crock of shit.

We can have justice.

Served up 34 times.

Yummy.

Whoa There Buddy

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Confused by This Anti–Joe Biden Meme? The Creator Says You Just Don't Get the Joke. – Mother Jones
I mean, leaning into the insults is one thing, but… really?

After my last post about my buddy Joe Biden, I was challenged. I was challenged from both sides: by a liberal friend who focused on my point that Biden was the lesser of two evils, and couldn’t get beyond that to my points about how, really, the election of Joe Biden is about preventing actual evil which would result from the election of Donald J. Trump, and that by comparison, Joey B. is not evil at all; and by a conservative friend who pointed out that I was far more forgiving of certain of Biden’s traits than I would be if Trump, who shares many of those traits, were to win the next election. (It is possible that both of these friends would object to my characterization of their objections [and the one for my use of the descriptors “conservative” and “friend”]; if so, I apologize now for what I am about to say regarding both of these positions as I have characterized them. Please feel free to challenge me again, and I may add a third post about this issue — or if you wish, feel free to post a comment directly on this post which expresses your objections to everyone who reads this.)

Regarding the idea that Biden is the lesser of two evils: granted. He is. Does it make any difference if I point out that every single election ever can be characterized as being between the lesser of two evils? That Abraham Lincoln was the lesser of two evils? That George Washington running unopposed was the lesser of two evils, because the other option was the collapse of this particular democratic nation, which would have been a much worse outcome than electing Washington — an appalling elitist snob and a lifelong slave owner who wore dentures made from the teeth of human beings he bought and sold?

What if I point out that every politician is evil in one way or another? That every human is evil? We all have our bad qualities. We all have our wrong-headed opinions. We all make mistakes, and even worse, we all do the wrong thing and do it proudly, and determine to repeat the same wrong action if we are given another chance to do it. All of us.

I understand the desire to have a candidate for president that matches what we really want, that has the right opinions and the right history and the right qualities and the right intentions. I understand the frustration and exhaustion that comes from a lifetime of never getting that candidate. I think it’s the same frustration that comes from never finding the right person to love, especially if one has several failed attempts at finding that person, or if one has the terrible experience of being with entirely the wrong person, and suffering because of it. And as someone who has actually found the right person for me to love for the whole of my life — and who found her early on, when I was only 20 — I can’t blame someone for wanting the same thing that I have. I suspect a lot of people who feel this way about the President are those who feel like they maybe had that person in the past; for a lot of people of a certain generation, it was John Kennedy, and when he was assassinated, Lee Harvey Oswald stole that perfect President from them.

But here’s the thing: John Kennedy wasn’t the perfect president. Neither was Ronald Reagan, or Jimmy Carter, or Barack Obama. Franklin Roosevelt interned hundreds of thousands of Japanese-American citizens. Abraham Lincoln wanted to repatriate the freed slaves to Africa. Bernie Sanders would not be the perfect president: he has a tendency to yell at people, which would not go over well in diplomatic circles. My love is not the perfect love: she is not always easy to live with, as she would be the first to tell you. I am also difficult to live with, as I will be the first to tell you. Nobody is perfect. Every relationship — romantic, Platonic, professional, political — is a compromise. Which means every relationship, always, can be characterized as the lesser of two evils.

Or it can be characterized as the best of all possible options.

There’s a saying which I am particularly fond of: Don’t let perfect be the enemy of good. The intent of the saying is to prevent a bad choice that a number of my students — especially my Honors students, my Gifted and Talented students — tend to make: they work on an assignment, create something they are not very proud of, that they don’t love, and they know they could do better — so they never turn it in. And they get a 0, rather than the less-than-perfect grade they could have gotten if they just turned in the thing they completed but didn’t love, because they would rather have nothing than accept something that is less than perfect: and so they suffer an even worse consequence. They lost the good, because they were only willing to accept the perfect, which then got in the way of the good. We all do this kind of thing all the time: knowing we can’t do something perfectly, we never share what we can do, so we never sing karaoke or bake a dessert treat for the holidays or share that poem or short story. Or that blog about politics: which I frequently stop myself from writing or sharing, because I’m not nearly as smart as the writers I read, as the pundits I pay attention to — so who the hell am I to post my opinions? I’m certainly not perfect, so often, I tell myself I shouldn’t write or post anything at all.

And it’s a mistake. We should do those things, because we can do a good job of them, even if not a perfect job. But the goal of any attempt is not perfection: it is a positive result. You don’t have to hit every note to sound good and entertain the people at the karaoke bar; you don’t have to have perfectly shaped latticework crust on your apple pie for people to enjoy it; you don’t have to have every word just right to be able to communicate your thoughts in a creative way. As I can attest to, and I hope many of you will agree with.

You don’t need to find the perfect person to find love. Just someone who is good for you.

Or, of course, accept that you don’t need someone to love at all, and just love yourself.

For the President, you don’t need to love him, or even like him. You just have to pick one who will do you good. And while Joe Biden could be a lot better than he is, and Bernie Sanders would be better than Biden could ever be, still Biden has done and will do good for this country. I think that’s what this argument against Biden boils down to: we can easily imagine the perfect candidate (though I suspect that when we do so, we are ignoring some aspects of the perfect person which would actually make them less perfect, more human; more evil.), and JRB sure as hell ain’t it. So we don’t want him, because he’s not perfect — some of us would rather have nobody. And I do fully recognize that nobody expects a politician to be perfect; people arguing this position just think Biden isn’t good enough to deserve a vote, no matter how bad they may agree that Trump is. Not that he’s imperfect: it’s that they think Biden sucks. If it isn’t clear, I don’t think that’s true, but if you do think that, then please, feel free not to vote for him; you can always choose to not accept any of the choices you don’t like.

Let me say it as clearly as I can: I am not saying that every individual reading this — including my friend who is sick of choosing the lesser of two evils in every election — needs to vote for Biden. You do not. I think voting third party is an excellent choice. I do think that Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is a vile candidate — much closer to the greatest of three evils than the least — but if that’s the way your vote needs to go, then do it. We should break the two-party duopoly, and voting for a third party candidate is an important step along the way to accomplishing that.

However. If you do choose not to vote for Biden because he is not someone you can support, but you recognize Trump is a serious problem, then I would like to make two requests of you. The first is that you do actually vote. Staying home out of frustration with the system is an emotionally appealing choice, but it does simply lump you into the great ignorant masses who don’t vote for no good reason. The parties, aware that you’re not voting, will consider you “Uninformed” or “Unmotivated,” rather than “Protesting the neverending stream of bullshit we call U.S. politics.” That means they will use their favorite strategy to reach you in the future: advertising. Lots and lots and lots of paid targeted advertising. If you choose not to vote, you are lining yourself up for even more ads in the future, I guarantee it: and that means even more politicians stumping for money, and compromising with the wealthy donors rather than trying to work with voters. Whereas if you show up and vote, and vote for a third party candidate, especially the one closer to the “traditional” party you might otherwise vote for (so if you’re a Democrat, vote for Cornel West or Dr. Jill Stein; if you’re a Republican, vote for the Libertarian or Constitution Party candidate; and if you’re an anti-vax conspiracy theorist who wants to use your family name to shill for corporate lobbyists, vote for RFK. Or actually no: if you’re in that last group, go ahead and skip voting.), you will be one of the voters that trouble them: and their strategic response might be to move closer to that third party in the future, to change their candidates or their policies to ones that you can support. I want that to happen, so if you do vote third party, thank you. Also don’t listen to people (including me in 2016, before I was corrected) who blame you for the outcome of the election. If Biden and the Democrats lose, it will be because of Biden and the Democrats, not because of the people who voted their conscience and picked third party.

What I want to do here is get people who want to vote for Biden to be excited about that vote. Because it is a good vote. For all the reasons I posted two weeks ago, with the main one being that Joe Biden has far and away the best chance of preventing a second Trump presidency: and that is something we very much need to prevent.

Which brings me to the second thing I would like to ask third party voters to do. Try to do something, other than casting your own vote for Joe Biden, which will help to defeat Donald Trump. If you are willing to vote for Democrats down ticket, do that, and try to help them get elected — because honestly, if Trump won the White House but the Democrats picked up majorities in the House and Senate, I’d almost enjoy watching TFG get stymied at every turn (Almost. Except for the Supreme Court, which will obviously back DJT even to the extent of slow-walking his criminal trial until after the election because they need to hear some absolute bullshit immunity argument. And that’s why I intend to vote for Biden, and encourage you to do the same. Even if he did fail to increase the Supreme Court to 13 members, or to work to impose term limits and ethics requirements on those corrupt assholes.). But if you want to vote third party for President and then vote for Democrats after that (And again, vote your conscience in local and state elections; third parties need to start with the grass roots, and that means getting elected to local school boards and county commissions and so on), that would be great. If you want to volunteer for the Democratic party, to help get other people out to vote for Democrats downticket — especially if you can swallow your ire and let those people vote for Biden, if they want to — then that would be wonderful. And if you can do something to impede Trump: if, for instance, you could find someone like you, too disgusted with the two-party system to vote for either of these shitheads, but who would lean towards voting for Trump because they hate Biden that much, and you could then convince that person to join you in voting third party? Well, you have just taken a vote away from Trump, and you have helped to stop a possible dictator from doing everything he can to tear down this democracy we live in and the rule of law that keeps us all whole and alive. So thank you for that, and for voting your conscience. Those are my two requests, if you can’t vote for Biden but you know that Trump is a danger.

And if you can join me in voting for Biden in November, thank you.

Okay. Now let’s turn to Objector #2, who pointed out, and maintained in the face of my rebuttals, that I had soft-pedalled certain objections to Biden’s qualifications for the presidency, which, he said, were reasonable objections that had been leveled reasonably against Trump as well; and he opined that, if Trump were to win this upcoming election, I would feel much too hypocritical because I would be making the argument that these qualities of Biden’s which I am ignoring or apologizing for now are disqualifying attributes of Donald Trump’s.

Specifically, the arguments that Joe Biden and Donald Trump are old white men who speak badly and suffer from some level of mental deterioration from age.

Whatever - GIPHY Clips

If I sound dismissive of these arguments, I sort of am. I did not claim that Trump was too old or too white or too bad a speaker or too far down the path of mental decline to be President; I maintain that he is a dangerous narcissistic conman who wants to profit from the destruction of this country as a modern democracy that obeys the rule of law, and who sees racist, sexist, xenophobic fascism as the best means to accomplish that and profit thereby. So I don’t agree that I will feel hypocritical if Trump wins, because I still won’t argue that he is too old and too white and too bad at speaking and too mentally incompetent to be President. I will certainly admit that I might level some insults at that shitbag, because I hate him and everything about him, and in among those insults might be comments about what a dumbass he is or how much of a fumble-mouthed fool he is; but that will be me being shitty to Trump because I hate him, not leveling the same arguments against him which I drew back from in regards to Biden. My criticism of his presidency, if he wins again, will be that he is a dangerous narcissistic conman who wants to profit from the destruction of the rule of law in this country, and sees fascism as a convenient way to achieve that destruction. If there was a young Black woman with a high IQ and a silver tongue running as a dangerous narcisstic conman who wanted to profit from the destruction of the rule of law through the implementation of fascism, I would not support them either. Honest.

Candace Owens Exits Daily Wire Amid Fights With Ben Shapiro Over Israel
In other words, she doesn’t get my vote, either.

But okay, let me address these specific claims. Because I did state that these things are unimportant for Biden, and that may seem inconsistent for me as I have argued in the past that we should have better, younger, and less white leaders, even if I didn’t make those arguments about Trump specifically. In 2020 my first choice was Elizabeth Warren, who I would still vote for if she ran right now; and part of the reason is because she is younger (though not enough younger) than Biden, and smarter and a better speaker, and a woman — though still too white. So how, if I argue that Warren would be better because of her speaking and her mental acuity, can I turn around and say that Biden is a good choice despite his failings in those areas?

For a couple of reasons. First of all, I do not personally believe in the power of identity in politics. For my own self, and what I see as important in a politician, I would happily say “I don’t give a shit who the person is, what race or gender or sexuality or age or any other subgroup they belong to, as long as they do a good job.” The reason I don’t say that is because I understand that the subgroup that someone belongs to is important to millions of people, and I don’t get to tell them how to feel, and because I understand the power of a symbol. Barack Obama did not serve better because of his race: but the fact of his race was important to millions and millions of my fellow citizens, and therefore the fact that he was our only non-white President is important. The thing is, our national politicians need to represent everyone in the country, and so no matter who they are, they need to look beyond their own identity; that includes politicians who are not old white men, because even they need to represent old white men with whom they do not personally identify. Biden won’t do a worse job just because he is an old white man, and if he weren’t an old white man, he wouldn’t do a better job simply because he wasn’t an old white man. Symbolically, he would be LEAGUES better as a candidate if he weren’t an old white man. But anyone who gets the job and does the job well will never get my criticism just for being an old white man.

Donald Trump, on the other hand, wants to make life better for old white men and worse for everyone who is not an old white man. (And actually, inasmuch as he is willing to let his asshole party eliminate Social Security and Medicare, he’s only serving rich white men and not old white men. Biden is largely doing the same because he is indebted to Wall Street and corporate donors. But that also has nothing to do with race and gender on Biden’s part, any more than it has to do with Trump’s identity.) He wants to do that by implementing fascism in order to break down the rule of law in this country, so that he can profit thereby. That is a much bigger problem.

So that’s the first reason: I don’t think identity in and of itself is salient in national politics. I do think socio-economic status is salient, because money insulates people from real life and that does make them less able to empathize with other people, in a way that being old or white or male does not necessarily do; and since Trump has always been insulated by wealth, and Biden has not always been insulated by wealth, I think that’s a mark in Biden’s favor. But he is certainly not in the right place policy-wise when it comes to economics. A good place, but not the right place.

The second reason I will argue that Biden’s qualities are not marks against him as a President is because I have realized, since this whole Trump debacle began, and since I have started learning more about politics and looking back on the Presidents in my lifetime, that a strong single Executive is not in the best interests of the country. The people elected to the post are not reliable. And more to the point, they change at least every eight years, and this country is now so evenly divided that half of the time, that election is likely to reverse the results of the last one — and hand that strong executive power right back over the bad guy. It’s like if Thor defeated the enemy — and then picked them up, handed them Mjolnir, and said, “Here, your turn.”

This is why I argued in my last post that Biden’s general weakness would actually be a benefit, as it would force him to surround himself with good people who would help him do a better job than he can do on his own; I think we are largely seeing that, and seeing the benefit of it compared to Trump’s administration. Trump tended to fire everyone who pissed him off, and then he was left with not enough people to do the work of government; this worked just fine for him because he wants to break government, which will then prove his case that government doesn’t work — a fine and long-established conservative strategy. Biden, however, not looking to do everything himself, but rather trying to show that government can do important work to help people, has done plenty to strengthen the federal bureaucracy, and the result has been a more efficient government that has managed to get more shit done to help people: and that’s a good thing — and it is a result of Biden being willing to delegate authority and work with other people, which Trump is not.

A simple example of this is student loan forgiveness. Biden tried to do it all on his own through executive order, and he was stopped by the Supreme Court. That pissed me off because student loans should be forgiven, and I would love to just see it done with the stroke of a pen; but also, because I do believe more in the rule of law than in student loan forgiveness, I can see the point that Biden’s argument for how he wanted to do it was flawed. I will also argue that the Supreme Court never should have heard the case because the determination of standing on behalf of the plaintiffs was fucking nonsense — “You shouldn’t get your student loans forgiven because I can’t get mine forgiven” is a neener-neener argument, not a real one — but I recognize, again, that some Court cases don’t come from good standing, because the Justices want to put their foot down for one reason or another. I can accept that. So I can accept Biden’s initial plan being struck down as part of the rule of law, and therefore a successful action by government, to stop Biden from taking too much executive power, even if he was in fact doing the right thing and we’d be better off if he had been able to do it.

But Biden then went ahead and started finding small ways, legal ways, acceptable ways, that he could forgive student loans. And it’s slower, and it’s not enough, and that leaves a lot of people out in the cold — but it’s progress.

And because I don’t want a dictator, I am more willing to accept slow progress through compromise within the rule of law than I am fast action by a strongman.

Did I always feel this way? Of course not. When I was a kid, I read Piers Anthony’s series Bio of a Space Tyrant, about a charismatic man who becomes the dictator of a planetary nation-state, and who imposes his will — all for the good of the people. He’s a benevolent dictator, and when I was young, I thought he was both cool and brilliant, and I thought his system was the right one. But see, then I grew up and stuff? And realized that democracy, while it is impossibly frustrating and also slow, and requires compromise with awful people, which then causes harm to good people — is also the best system of government possible, because it disseminates and dilutes power. And power corrupts. (I kinda want to go back and re-read the series now, because I wonder if Anthony’s intent was to show that power corrupts, and that his character was actually an anti-hero like Paul Atreides from Dune — or if Anthony was just playing out his personal fantasies of godlike power and authority, all for the good of the nation, of course. Since he named his character Hope Hubris, I think it was probably the former. But also, Hope gets laid a lot, like a lot a lot; so it might be the latter. Anyway.)

Also let me just say, out loud, that anarchy would be better than any government at all. But as long as we believe we need government, we do need it; and we should have a democratic government. You want to talk about actually eliminating government, I’m interested in chatting about it.

So okay. I realized that Barack Obama, for all of his charisma and intelligence, was an ineffective president — unless you happen to be a Wall Street banker/trader/mogul, in which case he did wonders for you. (It said a lot to me when I found out that Obama had trouble with Mitch McConnell because Obama wanted to argue and debate issues on the merits, and McConnell just wanted to cut a political deal. I hate that McConnell’s stance is more realistic, because I relate to Obama’s desire to convince the other side of his rightness with every ounce of my soul; but I get that McConnell’s stance is more realistic. This is also when I realized for sure that I would be an awful politician.) I realized that Biden, for all of his stupid-ass gaffes and his inability to give a good speech, has done more for the 99% in four years than Obama ever did in eight — and more than that charming amoral shitbag Clinton did in eight, too. I realized, as I’ve said, that a stronger executive, while it does potentially achieve more of my goals because it means someone can actually implement progressive ideas over the objections of Congress and the courts, is bad for democracy, even if those ideas are good — because I’ve watched Trump do shit that he shouldn’t have gotten away with, but he was able to because past Presidents created an atmosphere where he could do it. Like using executive orders to incarcerate migrants, for instance.

Which Barack Obama did as well.

And Joe Biden, too.

So: the fact that Biden is a weak leader? Not a terrible thing. It would be great if he was a better, stronger, smarter man — IF he also had the right ideas. And he doesn’t have enough of them, and that’s a problem; but since he doesn’t have all the right ideas, it makes it better that he’s not strong enough to implement all of his bad ideas over the objections of everyone else in the government.

The real problem in his weakness is how he deals with strongmen, which is — not well. He has been incapable of suppressing Putin or Xi Jinping, he has not been able to handle Iran, and he has given bombs to Bibi Netanyahu. I don’t know how many of those things could have been different if he had been stronger, but I do see his personal weakness as an issue with all of that.

But also? Trump would be actively worse in every single way, and we all know it.

Okay, my friend who raised this objection doesn’t seem to know it, as he said that he doesn’t see much difference between Biden’s foreign policy and Trump’s; but that’s whataboutism, and it’s nonsense –same as when he also tried to equate Biden lying about his past (Specifically this: “He lied about his attendance in a black church as an adolescent in Delaware, his work for desegregation, and his role in the civil rights movement? He has simultaneously claimed to have, and to not have marched.”) with Trump’s lies. Trump lied about winning the 2020 election, which he lost; and his continued attempts to maintain his lie about that election have severely damaged this nation in a way that Biden making himself look better than he actually is never, ever will. The two are not the same. Trump would, so far as we can tell, actively support Putin, and Netanyahu, and also obviously Viktor Orban, and Kim Jong Un, and probably several other authoritarians; because that’s who he wants to be. Because Trump is a narcisstic conman who wants to profit from the destruction of the rule of law through the implementation of fascism.

I don’t give a shit that he’s an old white man. If that means a younger, past version of me would be upset by my failure to maintain the party line regarding race and gender and age, sure, that’s fine. I’ll own that. And I would still like to see someone younger, less male, and less white running the country, because I believe in the power of symbols; I would even more like to see anyone at all in power actually doing everything that should be done to help people who are not white, not male, not old — and not wealthy, most of all.

Biden is doing more of that than Trump ever would.

So Joe Biden has my vote. And, I hope, yours too.

Why We Are Voting for Joe Biden And Kamala Harris | Features | Roger Ebert

Abidin’ Biden

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Joe Biden: The President | The White House

There’s my guy. My buddy Joe. Pretty regular fella — other than the fact that his 81-year-old face has fewer wrinkles than my 49-year-old one, which, sure, fine, lots of people use Botox and plastic surgery and all — but Joe is unquestionably at the stage where his face has been so thoroughly Zambonied that it looks more “plastic” than “young.” But other than a flat plastic face, overly-squinchy eyes, and those too-white-pearly-whites? Very normal man. Reminds me of my dad. Especially when he talks, since most of the time he sounds like he’s kind of running out of breath, unless he is particularly excited.

I have to admit, though, that for a normal man — a regular dude — he’s sure fond of supporting some pretty fucked up things. Like Israel’s genocide in Gaza. Hopefully we can all agree that the ones really responsible for the atrocities and the genocide are Hamas, and Benjamin Netanyahu’s war-loving government, both of whom benefit from increased conflict and greater frequency and intensity of atrocity, as it increases their support by radicalizing more of the population; and also creates enough confusion among the smoke and rubble for them to siphon off wealth. I do not for a second believe that my old buddy Joe could put his arm around Bibi’s shoulders, lean in real close, and whisper, “Hey, man, cut the shit, okay?” and get any kind of real result. Netanyahu is never going to stop the war, because when the war stops, so does his political career, as he is epically unpopular now — but when he leaves office, he’ll no longer be able to avoid prosecution for his corruption, which is pervasive and pretty concretely proven everywhere but in that court of law he is avoiding. (Sounds like a certain would-be Fascist dictator in this country, doesn’t it? No wonder they get along.) But on the other hand, even though Ol’ Joe can’t stop the genocide in Gaza, I would very much appreciate not having my country supply the weapons to Israel for their genocide.

And then there’s Joe’s past support for crime bills targeting African-Americans, and a lack of support for abortion access for women, and for clearing Clarence fucking Thomas for the Supreme Court, and his willingness to destroy people’s lives at the southern US border, which he backs partly because he wants to be able to blame the Grand Ol’ (Fascist) Party, the GO(F)P, for their failure to secure the border, undercutting their own main talking point; but also because he’s clearly pretty comfortable with adopting said Fascist party’s framing of the issue as a crisis at the southern border, and the problem being one of too many people trying to live out the American dream and the ideals we claim to stand for, and with the argument that punishing those people as brutally as we can is definitely the best way to handle it.

All of that is garbage. And all of it is Joe Biden.

Plus there’s the simple fact of the man’s titanic goddamn ego, which makes him look in the mirror every morning and say, in all sincerity, “The only man who can be President is you. The only man who can stop Trump is you. You have to run again, Joe. You gotta save the world! All by yourself! LET’S DO THIS!” That’s Joe Biden, too.

But you know what else is Joe Biden?

He’s the most progressive president we’ve had in 75 years — even though he failed to provide Medicare for All or a livable minimum wage or a permanent child tax credit or a Voting Rights Act or a balanced and reasonable Supreme Court.

But the focus on climate change spending, particularly in the Inflation Reduction Act, is brilliant. The Infrastructure bill was good though not enough — but it was good, no question. The change in tone and the reintegration of the US into the world’s leadership, particularly NATO, was necessary. And his administration has done a good job of making sure the US did not fall into the economic malaise that the rest of the world has fallen into. I don’t like everything about the way they did it, because like always, inflation was brought under control mainly by punishing working and middle class families by raising interest rates to levels high enough to make us stop buying houses, even though the rent is too god-fucking-damn high; and like always, the majority of the GDP gains went to the top 1% so the corporations and Wall Street mavens could keep making campaign contributions to Joe and the Democratic party; but still, unemployment is ridiculously low — and there have been some actual gains to wages set against inflation and the cost of living.

So. Considering all of that, I have a request for all of you.

Vote for him. Vote for my man Joe in November.

I mean, to be clear, the only other realistic option for someone who could actually win is the fucking Fascist. And you — yes you, person who is reading this right now, who has felt enough connection to me that you came here to read this piece that I wrote — you better not vote for the fucking Fascist.

But that’s not the issue here. Right? Millions of cultish fans, and millions of people freaking out over the scourge of Socialism, are going to vote for Trump; but he lost the popular vote in both of his elections, so I expect he will lose again. The issue is whether or not enough of the voters on the margins, the ones who maybe don’t want to vote, who don’t care enough to vote, or who are wavering between the two choices, will swing the battleground states to the right side to win the Electoral College. That’s what the issue is, and what I want to talk about: will the undecided voters decide to go the right way?

It should honestly be pretty simple for every Democrat and progressive: Joe Biden is no progressive — but the progressive movement has made major gains with this administration, and importantly, Smilin’ Joe’s worries about his legacy, and also his genuine and historic support for unions and the working class, mean that he would likely continue to move slightly to the left of center, and might be able to enact and solidify some of the gains made in this first term. Any other president, from the left or the right, would be likely to ignore Biden’s accomplishments and try to create their own: but Biden will try to make sure that Biden’s wins stay in place. And Barack Obama doing exactly that is why we still have the Affordable Care Act despite all the best attempts by the fascists and corporate interests to root it out and remove people’s health insurance. Compared to Medicare for All, the ACA is hot garbage; but it was and is progress. It was and is a good thing. The same goes for Biden’s wins. Even though we’d like to have more of them, it would be useful to make sure what we’ve got, we won’t lose; like any other leftist/progressive idea, once it is in place, people realize it’s probably a good thing — and then they don’t want to get rid of it. Just ask Trump and his Republican congress about the ACA.

So re-electing Biden would make sure that we don’t move backwards. And let me point out how important that is: both Trump and Biden did a whole lot of stuff through executive order; and because those come from one man’s pen, they can be (and were) undone by another man’s (or a woman’s) pen. That fact, and the stark contrast between Trump’s foreign policy (Which is basically this) and every sane President’s desire to remain involved with the world on some kind of good terms, are why so much of the rest of the world is now wary of relying on the US for anything. And while I definitely think it would be better for the US and the world not to have the US in any kind of leadership role, since we have fucked up almost every other country on the planet at one time or another for our own desires or aggrandizement or simple profit, I do think that inconsistency from our policies or our economy has severe negative long-term knock-on effects on the rest of the world. So keeping ourselves in check is the best possible thing for everyone: and for that, a second Biden term, with his focus on maintaining American value around the world and renewing and continuing old policies about connection and cooperation, are the best possible choice.

I understand and agree that just maintaining what we have is not enough. We need to have an actual progressive administration, and more importantly, a progressive congress to go with a progressive executive, so they can name progressive judges, and then we can do some of the things we really need to do. And the more often we are given this kind of bullshit either-or, Lesser-of-Two-Evils choice, the longer we have to delay an actual progressive movement and the accomplishment of simple but necessary things that will save lives, like a livable minimum wage and Medicare for All. But to accomplish that, we need to start at the grass roots: and that’s where progressives suck. Don’t we? Because we won’t fear monger the same way the establishment and especially the Fascists will, we can’t drive the same kind of brand loyalty that only comes with paralyzing fear of the other side. We have to educate. And the political education of the populace relies on one thing: actual policy wins. Actual things being done, by government, to help people. And you know what we need in order to achieve that? More progressives in office, which basically starts with more progressives in the world.

And you know what drives more progressives in office? Anger and frustration with Fascists and with the establishment Democrats who appease them. In the large historical sense, the longer we have to deal with these people in charge, the better our side will do in recruitment and inspiration and drive. You cannot stop the pendulum from swinging: the GO(F)P has done a fantastic job of slowing down the swings for a long time now; but there have been lots and lots of little swings — LGBTQ rights, for instance, even though we’re seeing the violent Fascist reaction to that swing — and the big swing? It’s coming. And it’s going to swing a long way.

And then it will swing back again.

Let me also point out that the reason the GO(F)P has done so well for the last twenty-five years is because they started at the grass roots FIFTY years ago, and built up slowly; and the best news I can say for the future of the progressive movement is that Trump and MAGA have completely torn down the Republican infrastructure that helped put Trump into office. So if we can stay focused, and pay attention and do the work, we can take the country back. For real. I’ll write more about that another time.

And if none of that convinces you? Let me just remind you: the guy on the other team is a fucking Fascist. And no, I won’t tone down that language or that accusation: it is appropriate, and accurate. I will express that in greater detail another time, but I hope everyone reading this is already close to accepting that, if you’re not already there.

So let me sum up.

Biden has done a genuinely good job. He should have done more, but he has done more good than harm — and that’s an important metric for any politician. The first line of the Hippocratic Oath is “Primum non nocere” — first, do no harm. Politicians should all swear the same thing. Actually, we all should. And Biden has done good, for the economy, for the country’s manufacturing and infrastructure, for climate change adaptation, and for the international rules-based world order.

The best criticisms against him are: he has failed to end support for the genocide in Gaza, which is an entirely fair criticism, and the reason why I voted against Biden in my state’s primary, as I want him to recognize that this is an issue; he has tried to meet the GO(F)P in the middle of the aisle, particularly on the border, which shows far too much acceptance of Fascism and, essentially, racism and sexism, which were already issues for Biden as they are for so very many white male Americans; and he has accepted the current framing of issues like the economy, where he has failed to support the real change that would actually achieve his “from the bottom up and the middle out” economic growth.

Oh right — and he’s old.

And he sounds kinda dumb when he talks sometimes.

Those criticisms are bullshit.

He’s old. Granted. So why does he need to be young? Because only young people understand the needs of young people? Are we really that wedded to identity politics, that we believe that nobody can understand the needs of a group to which he doesn’t belong? That nobody can be sympathetic to those needs, and supportive of them? How different are those needs, really? Do we actually think there’s that much of a gap between the basic human needs of someone who is 8 and someone who is 80, when both people are human beings? Both love their family, both want to be safe and healthy, both love cheese and naps; must we have an 8-year-old president in order for 8-year-olds to live good lives? And if not: why do we need a 40-year-old President? Or a 50, 60, 70-year-old President?

He doesn’t speak well. And? Why does he need to speak well when he can get other people to deliver complicated policy platform announcements, or to handle press conferences with the piranhas of the press corps? Do we really need Joe Biden to inspire us with his soaring rhetoric? Or could we maybe read a book, listen to a poem, watch a Rage Against the Machine concert video, and get our inspiration from those? If we have a President who needs the help of other people to run his administration, then maybe we get something more like, I dunno, a representative Republic serving democratically. Instead of a strongman who handles everything himself, and who can and might want to build a cult of personality.

Whatever else you say about Old Joe, he is not going to build a cult of personality. None of us can stand his personality. No: he will build a team of smart and capable and driven people, who will help to fill in the gaps where he doesn’t have the best strengths. One of the best things about Biden is that he realizes who he is and what he can do (Other than his enormous ego, but clearly that is a prerequisite for an American politician), and he looks to others for help. He stood behind Barack Obama completely. That says a lot. I am also, despite my criticisms of his past shitty positions, genuinely impressed with his ability to recognize when he might be wrong, and to listen to others with better ideas. The fact that he is not the same man with the same ideas he had fifty years ago? That’s a good thing.

Look. Seriously. The President doesn’t need to be young. The President doesn’t need to be strong. The President doesn’t need to be a good speaker. We like all those things in our politicians, as we like them in all of our celebrities: but the reality is that the President is a politician and a leader. And that doesn’t require strength in a physical, youthful sense. It requires determination and drive: and Biden has those. Even if he needs to take a nap every day (And don’t pretend we wouldn’t all support a President who mandated a daily nap), he gets up and still has the same absolute convictions about the right things: the goodness of America, the desire to help people, the opposition to cruelty and violence. Right? You can’t miss those things when you talk about Biden. That same ego I was mocking earlier actually shows his strength in this area: he believes he is right, and a lot of the time, in a lot of ways, he is.

Let me also note: if our President is strong-willed, so strong that nobody could stop him or oppose him or stand in his way — how do we not end up with a dictator? Hell, we almost got a dictator with the last guy, and he only thinks he is strong and commanding. Someone who actually is? There’s a real risk there. And there’s only a benefit in that if we think that this country is actually carried by one guy.

It is not. The strength of this country is not in the leadership. It is not in the White House. It is not in our politicians, at all: they are all — or almost all — weak people. Weak morals, weak wills, and a lot of weak minds, especially in the GO(F)P.

We are the strength of this country. We are smarter, stronger, braver, wiser, kinder, and better in every way than our political leaders. As we should be: because we are the ones who run this country. We are.

When we abdicate those roles and those responsibilities, when we elect politicians intending for them to carry the load for us, to do our thinking for us, to do everything for us so that we need to do nothing for ourselves — we get exactly what we want. We get controlled. We get exploited. We get screwed: because we put people in power over us, people who want to screw us, and we hand them the tools to do it.

Joe Biden, whatever else he is — old, weak, stumbling, mumbling, moderate, somewhat racist, somewhat sexist — he is not looking to screw us. He just wants to help.

So let him.

Vote for him.

My man.

Joe Biden 'not sure' he would seek re-election if Trump were not running

Vote No

Dusty 1 Comment

Okay. Let’s talk about it.

I understand if you don’t want to discuss the election that will take place later this year. I sympathize, I absolutely do.

But I’m going to talk about it. And I’m going to ask you to listen, even if you don’t want to — or really, to read, even if you don’t want to. I’m going to ask that you take a deep breath, let it out, say out loud — as loudly as you can — “I don’t want to think about this” (and if you are so inclined, add “shit” at the end of that sentence).

And then read what I have to say. Because it’s important. Not because I’m saying it: I’m just a regular guy, smarter than some and not as smart as others; good with words but far from the best; aware and knowledgeable in some ways and deeply ignorant in others. Just a regular guy. But the topic is important, which is why I’m writing about it — even though I don’t really want to. I want to take a break from writing: I just finished editing my book. I want to take a break from politics: I’ve been much too closely involved in the subject for way too long now.

But this election, this November? It’s a big one. That’s not to say it is the only important election; all elections are important, to some people, for some reason. But this one is important to all of us. And I mean ALL of us: this one has literal global implications, pretty serious ones. It’s our responsibility as people to be decent to each other, to try not to harm each other, to try to help each other; and in this case, that means we need to talk about the election in November, and we need to think about it, and then we need to do the right thing. Or else we are not living up to our responsibilities as human beings. I don’t want to be that person, and I presume you don’t, either — or else you’ve already clicked away from this, and you’re not reading these words right now.

(By the way: if you clicked away, it doesn’t mean you’re not a decent person; but if you’re not a decent person, you’ve definitely clicked away. Because I’m gonna get all woke and try to shame you, and you don’t put up with that kind of shit. But getting all bunched up about being woke-shamed? That means you’re an asshole. Not to say that woke-shaming is good; I have people who try to woke-shame me, and it’s obnoxious; but I put up with it because I’m not an asshole. If you’re still here, you’re at least tolerant, and therefore not an asshole.)

I’m not actually going to woke-shame you, by the way. Because I don’t need to. You don’t need to be a woke liberal snowflake to recognize the right thing to do in this election. That’s the point of this post: I’m not even talking about my opinions about what is best for this country, or the best choice to make in November; I may talk about that some — I plan to get into the best choice in the next post. But for this one, it is simple, it is stark, it is clear: it is black and white.

Vote No on Donald J. Trump for President of the United States.

Now, I get it: I’m tired, too. I’m tired of the political game the two parties play, where you have to vote for OUR candidate because THEIR candidate is SO MUCH WORSE. We have to vote for the lesser of two evils, and it’s exhausting and depressing to never vote for anyone with some actual hope in our hearts. Honestly, that’s why the last two presidents — not the current one — got elected: because people felt hopeful about their candidacies. Obama was inspiring; Trump was energizing — for different sections of the society, of course. People who were inspired by Obama did not find Trump energizing. But in both cases, Obama and Trump offered something different from the usual kind of political candidate, and that newness had a lot to do with how they won. And I hate, I loathe, that the Democratic party, rather than taking an opportunity to back a candidate who had some new ideas, who had some integrity and consistency, and who inspired some of the same energy in their electorate — Bernie Sanders — went sprinting straight back to a 50-year Washington insider, an old white male politician who has literally never inspired anyone to do anything.

But we’ll talk about ol’ Sleepy Joe next time. This time we have to talk about the other old white male politician running for this election. The dangerous one.

This guy.

Trump will only be a dictator on Day One

No, no, I know he was kidding. Of course he was; he says that he has two intentions on day one, for which he claims he would use power dictatorially: to close the border, and to drill, drill, drill (for oil). “After that,” he says, “I’m not a dictator.” Totally harmless. I shouldn’t take things so seriously, especially not when Trump says them, right? He’s just kidding around. Just a lil funnin’.

But let’s be clear. First of all, in terms of the joke, Sean Hannity set that up as a serious question, saying “Under no circumstances, you are promising America tonight, you would never abuse power as retribution against anybody.” When Trump drops his joke, there is a clear moment of horror, because he didn’t say “Absolutely.” He didn’t say “Of course I would never do that.” He didn’t say “In America we believe in the rule of law and in democracy, so I would never act like a dictator in any way.” He said “Except on day one.” In a moment when he was asked for sincerity, for honesty, for a promise to the American people: he made a joke. A joke about being a dictator.

And considering it realistically, it seems perfectly reasonable to assume that he is sincere in his two intentions to use power dictatorially: to close the border, which would mean violating dozens of laws and international treaties and disrupting the lives of millions (because I assume by “close the border” he means stop allowing people to cross the border, including innocent legal travelers; or else he means send overwhelming military force to stop all illegal crossings at the southern border, while also defying due process in order to build some ridiculous wall covered in electrified barbed wire and anti-personnel mines filled with Sarin gas and anthrax: either way he would be breaking the law and disrupting the lives of millions.), and defying all science in order to destroy the environment while feeding money into the bottomless maw of the fossil fuel industry: also in violation of who knows how many laws and policies of our own government. Of course he is serious about that: those are two of the “policies” (To be clear, he has no policy positions or plans at all; he’s running purely on hate and lies) he is running on, which are both very popular: fuck everyone who isn’t already American (by which we all know he means “white”), and fuck the environment and everyone who cares about it.

I refuse to then believe, subsequent to misusing presidential power for these two issues, that he would not immediately misuse presidential power to do what he does not tell Sean Hannity, what he does not promise the American people, that he would never do: seek retribution against his perceived enemies. Because of course he would do that: it’s all he ever does. He did it while he was in office, he has tried to do it since; he ran on the promise that he would lock up Hillary Clinton, and he is running now on the promise that he will weaponize the DOJ and FBI and go after all of his enemies, while filling the government with people loyal to him.

You know all this, right? I mean, I know we’re all tired of listening to him speak, and we’re exhausted by the constant news cycle of the whatever is the most recent travesty he said aloud — a news cycle that has gone on uninterrupted for the last nine years, since Trump declared himself a candidate for the Presidency — but still, the information is everywhere, the facts are unavoidable.

So why is he leading in the polls?

I’ve been avoiding writing this post because I can’t think of anything new to say. Every time I think, “I need to write that post about why people should vote against Trump, why people should fight Trump’s reelection,” I then think, “But what will I say?”

What can I tell you that you don’t already know?

What insight can I offer into the threat that Trump poses that you’re not already aware of?

What point can I make that hasn’t already been made? Here, this piece from The New Republic literally says everything I want to say about why Trump is dangerous and why we need to stop him from getting reelected: read this, if by some chance you don’t already know everything it is going to say.

But if you know everything that I know about Trump, why the fuck is he leading in the polls???

Seriously, I cannot fathom this. It has been driving me nuts. I keep telling people my opinion: Trump hasn’t done anything to make himself more popular, so he can’t possibly be more successful in this election than he was in the last — which he lost, as I hope everyone reading this is painfully, exhaustively aware. But every time I say that, smart people around me say, “I dunno, man. He’s leading in the polls.” Every time I open a newsletter or listen to an episode of my favorite political podcast, Unfucking the Republic, the host is saying he expects Trump to win this next election. Trump. To win. Not cheat his way into the White House like he already did in 2016, not lead an insurrection to take control of the country like he tried to do in 2021, but win. The election. With votes. From Americans.

I know you have to sign in to watch this, but do it. For me. And for America.
This is about something else, but the lyrics are apropos. Plus it slaps.

I honestly don’t know how to deal with this. I know I’m not alone: listen to Jonathan Capeheart coming a hair’s breadth away from just losing his shit in this interview with Presidential historian Michael Beschloss, about 2:45:

(The Black, gay, liberal MSNBC host clearly has reason to lose his shit, as he expresses later in the clip.)

Okay, I understand some of the issue here. I get that if 44,000 votes, out of 150,000,000, had gone the other way, then Trump would have won reelection. And actually, I get that if he had, a number of people think things would have gone better, or at least not much worse, over the last three years; they’re wrong, but I can’t disprove a hypothetical any more than they can prove it, so I can accept that people believe it. It pisses me off that people mock the opposition to Trump by saying the only reason we don’t like him is because he was too mean on Twitter, like there aren’t a thousand reasons to despise Donald Trump and what happened during his administration (Top ten: insurrection; impeachment; second impeachment; The Big Lie; 6-3 Conservative SCOTUS; COVID non-response; tax cut for the rich and $8 TRILLION added to the deficit; “Very fine people on both sides” and also the trans ban for the military; pulling out of the JCPOA and Paris Treaty and shit-talking NATO and all other treaties; and it wasn’t part of his presidency, but I’m not going to ignore all of his sexual assaults) — but I understand that people believe lies about all of those things, or those things at least align with things they do believe. And I mock the other side for their stupidity, so I can accept that they mock me for what they perceive as mine.

I know that, in conjunction with what I’ve just been saying, the country is so divided along partisan lines that people would generally vote for a disease-carrying mosquito rather than cross party lines; and that means any GOP nominee can count on 200 or so electoral votes, just as any Democratic nominee can count on 200 or so different electoral votes, and while Trump has only gotten worse over the last four years, so has inflation, which people blame Biden for. They shouldn’t, but again, I don’t know how to prove that, either. If you don’t know that corporate profits and supply chain issues were responsible for the inflation of the last three years, then you’re not paying attention — or you’re paying attention to the wrong things. (Best line from the article at that last link: “It is unlikely that either the extent of corporate greed or even the power of corporations generally has increased during the past two years. Instead, the already-excessive power of corporations has been channeled into raising prices rather than the more traditional form it has taken in recent decades: suppressing wages.”) I know that our country is awash in lies about socialism and government takeovers. I know, also, that there are people who vehemently believe in Great Replacement theory, the conspiracy theory which claims Democrats (Or even better, the “global elite” led by Jewish people) are bringing dark-skinned people into this country to replace white people, because one of them yelled at me on Facebook not too long ago.

I know that people are not excited about voting for Biden. I hoped he wouldn’t run, too — but come on. Let’s not pretend that anyone who decides to be President doesn’t already have an ego that needs its own West Wing. You can’t be an ordinary person and believe that you would be the right individual, the only right individual, to lead this entire country. You have to think you are the greatest ever. That’s why we have term limits in the first place: because after FDR, who clearly believed himself to be the only person who could ever run this country, believed it strongly enough to run FOUR TIMES, we recognized that it was genuinely unlikely that a modern President would give up power. And look at how they all run for that second term. All of them. (Quick tip of the hat to LBJ for backing out of a second run because he thought the country was too divided over his war in Vietnam) So we all knew he would try for the nomination again — and if the DNC backed him over Bernie in 2020, why would they stop backing him now?

I want to talk more about voting for Biden, because he’s actually done an outstanding job as president; but that’s not the topic for today.

The topic for today is voting No on the question of whether Donald J. Trump should once again be President of the United States.

This is our duty. It is our responsibility, both for the sake of our country and our democracy, but also for the sake of the world. Everybody, literally, is counting on us to stop this asshole from fucking up everything in this country that he hasn’t already fucked up.

I know we don’t like voting for the lesser of two evils, so let me put it this way: I’m not asking you to vote for the lesser of two evils. I’m asking you to vote against evil.

I don’t actually care how you do that. I think the safest course is to vote for Biden, because in our winner-take-all electoral college system, voting third party is potentially dangerous; but if you want to vote for Jill Stein or Cornell West, please do so. I’d love to see the Green Party gain more national attention, and I think Dr. West is far and away the best candidate running right now. (Oh — don’t vote for Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. Libertarians are dangerous, particularly when they are also anti-vax. And he is the worst kind of anti-vax. Don’t give him a platform, please.) But what matters is taking away votes from Donald Trump, so if you were going to vote for the Democrat and you don’t want to vote for Biden, be aware that taking your vote away from Biden is not voting No on Trump. It is voting No on Biden. You are welcome to do that, as I said, especially if you live in a safely blue state like New York or California; but you first need to vote No on Trump.

Vote No on Trump by giving a political donation to the Democratic party. Vote No on Trump by volunteering to help the Democrats get voters out and registered and to the polls — which is still what I plan to do, now that MY BOOK IS FINISHED and now I have time to do that. Vote No on Trump by convincing a would-be Trump voter to change and vote for someone else (They can even vote for RFK, because if he pulls votes from the GOP he’ll never get conservative backing again, and that would be swell.). Vote No on Trumpism, as well, by supporting those who oppose him: vote Democratic or Green or Progressive or left-leaning Independent on all of the downticket races; pay for and consume media that does not support the Trumpiverse view of things.

Or vote No on Trump by voting for Biden, even if you don’t like or agree with him, because in our system, Joe Biden has far and away the best chance to stop Trump from becoming President again.

This isn’t a matter of picking between two identical puppets run by the same political machine. It’s certainly true that the moderates of both parties are frequently indistinguishable in their actual governance, even if their rhetoric has contrasts; but the Republican party has had to fall in line behind Trump — and they have done it. They are obedient acolytes, they are foot soldiers, drones, servants of their Beloved Leader. Trump knows it, and he pushes them around at will; he will, of course, continue doing it as President — because while he may be a lame duck president, he will continue to apply pressure to the members of his party; he will anoint the chosen and castigate the insufficiently loyal: and all of them, it seems, will dance to his tune. Biden may be a puppet of the powers-that-be, and that is dangerous; but he’s not the puppet master, and Trump is. (Even though Trump himself may be controlled by others, either autocrats like Putin and Netanyahu and Kim, whom he somehow needs to impress, or anyone with power enough to gain access, and brains enough to manipulate that goddamn idiot.) If we retain Biden and those who have influence over him, it won’t lead to the collapse of this country’s democracy. Trump’s election might. I won’t say he definitely will turn himself into a dictator and end American democracy entirely — but I also won’t definitely say he won’t do that. He is a danger to this country, and because we are the richest, most powerful, and also the most toxic country in the world, Trump is therefore a danger to everyone — look no further than Avdiivka for that.

We all know that all that is necessary for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing. Donald Trump is evil. Whatever else you think of him or about him, his intentions, his corruption, and his ability to do harm through the office of the Presidency are far too great for any of us to ignore. So please: do something. \

Vote No on Donald J. Trump for President of the United States.

Step by Step

Dusty Leave a comment

Tomorrow’s a big day. And if you have work to do today and tomorrow, then thank you, and know that I support you. Go get ‘em.

Remember, though, that change doesn’t happen overnight. The events and influences that got us here didn’t arrive yesterday, and they won’t disappear tomorrow.

Things change incrementally. And there are two things we all have to keep in mind because of that.

First thing: don’t expect everything to be different all at once. No matter how momentous tomorrow may seem, remember that tomorrow is not change: tomorrow is an opportunity to move one step closer to change, or to move one step further away — which probably just means standing where you are, unmoving. Tomorrow may turn out that way: standing in place. No change. But whether that happens or not, it won’t make a big difference; not tomorrow. Tomorrow plus the next day plus the next day plus the next hundred days, the next thousand — those will make a big difference. That’s when we’ll see change. If we look back a thousand days ago, things appear very different from now: but only because we’ve made a thousand choices, taken a thousand steps. No one step is going to move us very far. Not even tomorrow.

So stay patient. Don’t give up hope, and don’t fool yourself into expecting more than a single step.

And the second thing is, if you want to make change, great change, momentous change — or if you want to ensure that there is no change in the things you want to conserve, if you want to fight off all those who want to push you off of the ground where you stand — then you must be persistent. Patient, as real change takes time; and persistent, because though it takes time, still you need to take that step, tomorrow, and the day after that, and the day after that. If you want to take a thousand steps, then you need to fight every single day for a thousand days. You need to fight against the people who don’t want to take any steps, and the people who want to stop after a hundred steps, and the people who want to take a thousand or a hundred steps in a different direction.

You need to fight all of them. Every day. For every step. And the more often you win, the harder they will fight.

Persistence is the key. Never give up until you get where you want. And if you can’t keep fighting, find allies, and help them take one more step than you, and then another step after that. No step is all-important. But every step is important.

Let’s take the next step in the right direction. Please.