TGIF 4/7/23

It's been nearly a month since I last posted.  Much has changed in my life in that time, and I'm struggling to find a reason to write, much less trying to figure out what to write about. It occurred to me, though, that writing about anything is almost certainly better for me than not writing at all.  

And so, it starts again.

Usually, I stay home while My Sweet Baboo makes the run to our favorite Lenten fish fry, but today I went with him to pick up our orders. I waited near the table where a gentleman was selling tickets for a couple of fundraisers. 

A man approached the table to get tickets, and the two struck up a conversation. I could only hear the ticket seller's part of it and was surprised when I clearly heard, "We've got to get rid of the damn liberals..."

I sat up a bit straighter, I did - and then I remembered where I was, and I remembered I was just there to get some fish and support the organization, and not to get into a fight while I waited, so I behaved - I didn't even laugh.

I did, however, think of a few things as I sat there. For example:

Get rid of the damn liberals, you say? 

It is not the damn liberals demanding that all children who want to participate in athletics must expose their genitals to a stranger.

It is not the damn liberals stripping parents of their rights to raise their children and get them age-appropriate medical care.

It is not the damn liberals having bounty hunters chase your wife, daughter, or sister around to find out when she had her last menstrual period.

It is not the damn liberals policing doctors instead of protecting schoolchildren.

It is not the damn liberals allowing teenagers to carry concealed handguns without a background check or training. 

It is not the damn liberals stripping people of their right to representation in state legislators. 

It is not the damn liberals threatening to impeach a judge who just won an election. 

It's not the damn liberals calling to defund the Justice Department, the FBI, or the IRS.

It's not the damn liberals calling for death and destruction in America, calling the US a third-world country, or pretending they are above the law. 

It's not the damn liberals saying and doing all of the above and proclaiming themselves to be patriotic Americans at the same time.  

It's not the damn liberals doing all of these things - it's the damn MAGA Republicans.

TGIF, everyone.

Ranting and Raving (v8): We Don't Need No Stinking Unity!

You know, I'm SO sick of the Democrats already! How on earth am I supposed to make it through the next two years???  

No, I'm not stupid - I said two years on purpose, because we are going to take over the House and take back the Senate in the midterms - I promise you that! And then things will go back to normal!

First of all, the Dems cheated their way into office, with those supposed millions of ballots that picked Sleepy Joe Biden over our beloved savior of the GOP, Donald John Trump. As if!!!

Does anyone really believe that someone wouldn't want Donald Trump to continue being our president? I mean, how stupid would you have to be to not want him?? He saved our Country! He loves America! He hugs the flag!

They cheated, they CHEATED, in Pennsylvania and Georgia and Arizona and Nevada and Wisconsin and Michigan. And they had help, from China and Iran, and Venezuela, and a bunch of RINOs, those fake Republicans who said they supported our beloved President, but wouldn't help him when it mattered - when it mattered SO MUCH for our Country!!!

And then, after all of our efforts failed to keep the cheaters out, even when we tried to capture the no-good RINOs and liberals in Congress, and to hang that bastard Mike Pence for allowing the Electoral College vote to be certified, they're calling for UNITY? For Country over Party? Who the hell do they think they are??? We are all about Country over Party! We call our own people RINOs for Pete's sake! We - US, not the Dems - WE are the party that's all about country over party! Are they kidding???

They say they're fighting for the SOUL of the NATION?? What the hell is wrong with them?  Countries don't have souls - corporations and good people do! Not commies and socialists and liberals! Countries don't have souls - Republicans do! 

Our souls are fine - just fine, thank you very much for asking. We know where we're going when WE die - do they? Do they even believe in Heaven?  I bet they don't. Come on, man - how can anyone who believes in giving illegal ALIENS a pathway to citizenship believe in heaven?? That's a lie! And we're sick of the fake religious people, too!

And killing pipelines! Killing all of those jobs that don't even exist yet? Who does that, who erases tens of thousands of paper jobs? And what are all of those paper jobs going to do without a salary and benefits?? How are they supposed to survive? Where's THEIR stimulus, Biden?  

All because it's what Trump wanted, and what we wanted? When all of YOU were worried about the environment and animals or something silly like that? Not to mention, there goes my 401(k), and now I'm going to have to choose between putting food on the table or gas in my truck. Thanks a lot, Sleepy Joe!

And let's talk about UNITY... What does that even mean? How can you be pro-unity and allow our president, our country's savior Donald John Trump to be impeached a SECOND TIME?? Where's the unity in THAT??? What, do you want blood out of a stone or something?

He's gone! He's out of office! He's banned from Twitter! You stole the election from him! How much punishment do you think he deserves, for doing NOTHING wrong? How much is one man supposed to take?  What did he say that was so wrong?  NOTHING, that's what he said that was so wrong. Do you think people actually listened to him? Do you think the people who were arrested blame him?  Hell, NO - they blame ANTIFA and the DemoRATS and the Libtards and the socialists, that's who they blame! 

And they're RIGHT! Trump had nothing to do with it, and you're trying to kick him when he's down, when he's already gone?!

You want unity? How about you stop pushing for stuff that you know we don't like? How about not getting rid of the Trump agenda?? How about not trying to shove your left-wing socialist crap down our throats by suggesting legislative and policy changes? Where do you get off doing that, Mr. Unity???!! 

If you want unity, you'll listen to US! 74 million people voted for US, and for our COUNTRY! You have NO RIGHT to come in and start pretending you're president on day one, just because you won the Electoral College in a stolen landslide, and just because you had 7 million more votes - they were all fake! FAKE! YOU HAVE NO RIGHT!! 

And who do you think you are, Mr. "Scranton" - some "every man" you are -- you wear a goddam ROLEX watch!  You own a PELOTON! Nice try, you leftist, elitist piece of crap! DONALD TRUMP was "every man" - he's the only one who understands what it's like to be in the trenches like us working people!!!  No one else EVER cared about us. And who cares if he has a gold toilet - he talked JUST LIKE US!  He was OUR president, and you're just a puppet for the coastal elites and Big Tech who want to CONTROL US!! And take away our guns! And turn us into Cuba! 

You want Unity?  Do what we say!  WE'RE right and YOU'RE wrong, totally wrong!  Trump had the election stolen from him, and we lost control of the Senate, but WE'RE STILL IN CHARGE because those Trump voters LOVE us - and if you want unity, dammit, you're going to have to go through us!! 

And as soon as we figure out what your precious 'unity' means, we'll let you know.

OrangeVerse XLV: Cities and Their State

The president chatted with his Number Two, Tucker Carlson, the other night - Sean Hannity must have been off working on policy papers with Jared, or something.

Carlson got things going,talking about cities they'd seen on the trip to the G-20, with no graffiti, no one going to the bathroom on the street, no junkies. And how that was "very different" from our cities. The president corrected him, saying "some of our cities." Carlson and Trump agreed it was "sad" about cities like New York, San Francisco,  and Los Angeles.

And it is - there's no question about that. We do have issues with homelessness, and drugs, in many cities large and small, in the suburbs, and perhaps even more critically, in rural areas where there are even fewer services available than in our cities.

Where it got poetic, though, was when the president ruminated on why it is that American cities have this kind of issue.

It's On Me

It's a phenomena 

that started two yeas ago.

It's disgraceful.

Seriously Maybe Important

I'm gonna maybe

and I'm looking at it

very seriously,

we're doing some

other things

as you've probably noticed

like some of the

Very Important Things

we're doing now.

Can't Have That

But we're looking at it

Very Seriously

because you can't do that. 

You can't have what's happening

where Police Officers are

getting sick by

just walking the beat.

I mean

they're actually

Getting. Very. Sick.

In Sickness and Mental Health

Where people are getting sick

where the people are

living in hell, too.

Although some of them

have mental problems

where they don't even know

they're living that way.

In fact, perhaps,

they like living that way.

Oh Wait - Maybe It's Not On Me?

They can't do that.

We cannot ruin our cities.

And you have people

that work in those cities.

They work in office buildings

and to get into the building

they have to walk through a scene

that nobody would have believed

possible three years ago.

And this is the liberal establishment.

Fight. Fight. Fight

This is what I'm fighting.

They - I don't know

if they're afraid of votes? 

I don't know 

if they really believe

this should be taking place.

But it's a terrible thing

that's taking place. 

The Situation Room

And we maybe

you know - I had a situation

when I first became president.

We had certain areas of

Washington DC where

that was starting to happen

and I ended it

Very Quickly. 

I said "you can't do that"

when we have leaders of the world

coming in to see the president

and they're riding down a highway

they can't be looking at that. 

I really believe

it hurts our country.

The West Coast Has The Sunshine

San Francisco, I own

property in San Francisco

so I don't care except

that it was

so beautiful.

And now areas

that you used to think of being,

so, you know, being really

Something Very Special,

you take a look

at what's going on

with San Francisco it's terrible. 

Checking Our Equipment

So we're looking at it

Very Seriously

We may intercede.

We may do something

to get that whole thing

cleared up. 

It's inappropriate.

We have to take the people

and do something.

We have to do something.

And you know

we're not really very equipped

as a government

to be doing that kind of work.

That's not really

the kind of work

the government should be doing.

We've never had this

in our lives before

in our country. 

Nope, Definitely Not On Me!

At the same time

most of our cities

are doing great.

But if you look at

some of these,

they are usually sanctuary cities

run by Very Liberal People

and the states are

run by Very Liberal People.

The Update Desk: Aggressive Progressives

A week or so ago, I wrote a Knock Knock post about the aggressive progressives that are making a whole lot of noise in the House and Senate.

The post was about this wing of the Democratic Party suggesting that the only way their agenda will move forward in the Senate is if they retake the majority and then get rid of the filibuster, the tool that requires 60 votes for most legislation to pass.

Here's an excerpt the crux of the issue, we're told by Ezra Levin,  co-founder of the Indivisible Project.

In order to actually pass a big, bold pro-democracy package, or a big, bold climate package, or a health care package, we're going to need to be able to do that with 51 votes. 

 And here's my opinion on this whole mess:

And unless there's some miracle that ends up with a blue tsunami or a red tide in the Senate, we're going to continue to see a small majority for one party or the other -- and all voters deserve to get what they want, including the people in the minority.

The fact that the minority might continue to be blue, or will inevitably turn blue, is reason enough not to make this silly move...

The filibuster is just one issue; the Green New Deal, and calls for socialism (Democratic or otherwise), and the extreme language they use, are others that seem to be getting a lot of attention for the particular representatives, but the attention has not all been positive for them, or for the party as a whole.

Recently, I stumbled on a NY Times article from last month that helps illustrate how the aggressive progressives (let's call them the APs) are having an influence on the party as a whole that is also not necessarily positive.

I'm Not Smarter Than a Michigan First Grader

I was going through some stacks of reading (a trend I've noticed, lately) and came upon a tiny blurb in the 'Only in America' section of The Week, a magazine that compiles US and international media reports. 

Here's what I saw that caught my eye:

Conservative lawmakers have stripped Michigan's social studies curriculum of any reference to civil rights, climate change, or "core democratic values." State Sen. Patrick Colbeck said these phrases are "not politically neutral."  Other referenced removed include Roe v. Wade, the NAACP, and gay rights. Students will be taught that "the expansion of rights for some groups can be viewed as an infringement of rights and freedoms of others."

Now, as the daughter of a social studies teacher (and a straight A student throughout my elementary and secondary educational career in that particular subject), you can probably imagine why this one was intriguing.

My dad was a creative social studies teacher back in the day, working to get kids thinking about his favorite subject not as a standalone thing, but as something connected to the world we live in. He also tried to have fun; I distinctly remember his trivia questions (pre-Internet, folks) and having to get the answers right myself so I could grade those while he read the essays he was famous for assigning. One question I was sure he had to have made up was the one about a river catching on fire (Cuyahoga River, 1969). I also remember shortened summer vacations, as he frequently was involved in negotiations and also curriculum development - stuff like they're doing around the country these days.

Anyway -- back to the Michiganders and their abolishment of the facts, or whatever it is they're trying to do. What they're trying to do is what many red states have tried to do: take back their curriculum from the liberals. This happens when there's a flip in the balance of power from D to R, from L to R, as it were.

Texas almost let students and dinosaurs walk to school together. Florida let any citizen challenge the curriculum, including statements that the United States is a democracy; it's a constitutional republic, in Florida and too, Michigan. You can read more about that in this article from the Washington Post back in 2015, which concludes after a detailed argument,

But there is no basis for saying that the United States is somehow "not a democracy but a republic." "Democracy" and "republic" aren't just words that a speaker can arbitrarily define to mean something (e.g., defining democracy as "a form of government in which all laws are made directly by the people"). They are terms that have been given meaning by English speakers more broadly. And both today and in the Framing era, "democracy" has been generally understood to include representative democracy as well as direct democracy.

I'm sure that settles nothing, right?

So - Michigan has slowed the process considerably on the modifications, which you can read for yourself  - all 142 pages of it. The documents outline the entire social studies education plan from K-12. I haven't yet read the whole thing but what I did read scares the crap out of me.

Why? Because, to be honest, I'm not going to be able to pass first grade.

Seriously.

 Assuming the edits get approved in their entirety, here's what I'm supposed to know at the age of 6. Under the goal of 'Understand the core values and principles of our unique form of democracy, called a constitutional republic' I should be able to:

Explain fair ways to make decisions and resolve conflicts in the school community. 

The example provided for that first one is majority rule. Which wouldn't have meant all that much to me at that age. I mean, if my brothers and I all wanted to stay up past our bedtime, that would have meant 100% of the children wanted to do the same thing; not only that, but the three of us outnumbered the two parents - so what's am I supposed to be learning here, again?

Next, I should be able to:

Identify and explain how important symbols of the United States of America represent core values.  

And here are the examples of important symbols: Statue of Liberty, Uncle Sam, White House, Bald Eagle. OK, those I can handle, I think. I could probably even color pictures of them, with the right crayons.

The core values? This where it gets fun:

• equality 
• rule of law 
• unalienable rights 
• limited government 
• social compact theory, and 
• the right of the people to alter or abolish an oppressive government

Limited government? Social compact theory? Altering or abolishing an oppressive government?  Come on! I'm SIX!

I get told when to get up, what to eat, what to wear (or perhaps, what not to wear would be more accurate), and when to go to bed. I have no unalienable rights, my 'government' is my mom and dad, and my rights to alter or abolish them is nonexistent.

I'm not going to get out of first grade, I swear.

Poll Watch: Post Midterm Edition

Here's a smattering of what's happening out there, according to what we tell pollsters.

Most of it is political, given that we've just come from 'that election' last week, which 'shellacking' falls short of adequately describing.  Dems lost the Senate, several gubernatorial races which they thought they might have had a chance of grabbing, and a couple others, including Massachusetts.

On the other hand, it was not all a lost cause; progressive initiatives such as raising the minimum wage scored a few wins, and legalized marijuana scattered a few more seeds of change.

Now, before anyone gets too overwrought or overjoyed with the results, here's some food for thought from Rasmussen Reports:

• President Obama's overall approval rating has actually improved three points since the election, up to 48% from 45%.  The media and political consultants tried to make this election about the President and his negative rating, but here's the thing they don't tell you:  for 56 of his 70 months in office, his total approval rating has been between 45% and 49% --  including all of 2010, 2011, and so far in 2014, two-thirds (eight months) of 2013 and three quarters (nine months) of 2012. 
• Yes, Americans voted in a Republican majority in the Senate, and expanded the majority in the House but a majority of us (59%) think that the new Congress will be a disappointment.
• Not sure whether there's a correlation, but 35% of us have a drink at least once a week. Of the imbibers, 25% of them drink several times a week or every day.  The questions didn't include "have you had a drink today?" but one can only figure that, if political candidates were surveyed last Tuesday, the number raising a glass to that question would have been very high. 

Remember Ebola? You know, that "issue" facing America that surfaced in ads from the right-wing interest groups right before the elections?  That "issue" that right-wing anti-czaristas like John McCain felt needed an czar? Yeah, turns out not so much.  According to a Fox News poll from the end of October, most Americans were not on board with that. 

• When asked whether they thought appointing an Ebola czar was a PR stunt or a serious attempt to address the problem, only 23% thought it was a serious attempt.  That would be Republicans elected officials, apparently.  Two thirds of us know better.

The Pew Research Journalism Project took a look at media habits of folks, and have some interesting findings on which media sources are trusted, and by whom.  

• Not surprisingly, 47% of people who identify as consistent conservatives get their news from Fox. Consistent liberals are all over the map, with CNN (15%) NPR (13%), MSNBC (12%) and the New York Times (10%) sitting on top of the heap. 
• When it comes to trusting media sources,  the consistent conservatives trust more than distrust only these: The Wall Street Journal; The Blaze (Glenn Beck's outlet) and Glen Beck himself; Fox News; Sarah Palin-favorite Breitbart News Network; the Drudge Report; Sean Hannity; and Rush Limbaugh. Consistent liberals, on the other hand, trust most than distrust 28 of the 36 media sources, including both The Daily Show and the Colbert Report. Which at least reaffirms they have a sense of humor. 
• Everyone apparently trusts more than distrusts The Wall Street Journal. Of the news sources mentioned, it's the only one that received a 'trust' from all groups, which in addition to consistently liberal and consistently conservative also included mostly liberal, mostly conservative, and mixed. On the flip side, Buzzfeed is the only one distrusted by folks of all stripes. 
• Of the major networks, only ABC captured trust ratings from all but the consistent conservatives. (Note to NBC: perhaps paying hiring inexperienced children of former presidents is not helping your credibility as a news organization?)
• I wonder what the trust score would have been for Inforwars, home of the false flag?

Speaking of  mostly distrusted Buzzfeed, they're sharing access (with the afore-mentioned highly trusted ABC News) to Facebook's 'sentiment analysis' data, which aims to analyze user preferences based on what gets posted. Looking ahead to 2016, here's a sampling of who's hot:

• Pianist/golfer/former Bush Administration hawk Condi Rice (72%), Medicare-slashing budgetarian and former Veep candidate Paul Ryan (65%), union-busting governor Scott Walker (57%) and Rand Paul (56%) on the Republican side
• Literally Joe Biden (67%), Hillary "what difference at this point does it make" Clinton (57%), Elizabeth "a better Hillary than Hillary" Warren (56%) and our own Sonofa Governor, Andrew Cuomo (56%).  

As I said, liberals sure do have a good sense of humor. They're going to need one for a while.