As someone who’s lived in California for more than 40 years, I never cease to be amazed at how aggressively conservatives hate this state–a deep obsession that goes far past Donald Trump’s revulsion for the state.
Republicans tend to represent California as a dystopia that has come about from decades of socialist policies and general mismanagement. (more…)
Internet search engines are modern miracles for clearing up areas of confusion, big or small. For most of us, Google is our dictionary, thesaurus, encyclopedia, and real-time news channel, where YouTube is our online university and movie theater.
Maybe it’s just me, but there are certain things I just can’t get through my head, and I find myself looking up the same subject again and again, because it doesn’t seem to stick. (more…)
The Brits generally have never tried to conceal their deep disgust for the former president. They respect people of class, intelligence, humility, subtlety, good humor, honesty, and decency, and they recognized instantly that Trump possessed exactly zero of these traits.
The Scots in particular had to go though the nauseatingly painful experience surrounding Trump’s golf course, and his bad-faith negotiations to get a permit to ruin miles of pristine Scottish coastline.
In addition to the many obvious horrors associated with the Russian bombardment of Ukraine, there comes a hidden one: the glorification of war. We see countless images of old ladies and preteens with machine guns, farmers towing away armored tanks, and Miss Ukraine in battle fatigues, and we think collectively how cool and brave all this is.
True, this invasion, unlike many, is the epitome of good versus evil, but it’s terrifying to think what this is doing to the world population in terms of riveting into place the concept of war as the go-to means of resolving our differences.
Politically, one thinks of farmers as Republicans: God-fearing, no nonsense, rugged individualists. Yet, Trump’s economic decisions, while they were excellent for the ultra-rich, were catastrophic for others, especially those whose financial conditions rise or fall dramatically according to seemingly small pressures put on supply and demand.
In particular, the nation’s farmers took a terrible hit to their bottom lines due to Trump’s capricious trade war that cut them off from huge chunks of their customer bases.
For these folks, Biden’s policies have resulted in a healthy recovery.
Here’s an interesting piece of a unique solar-architected house, a concept that is under development in Morocco.
From the piece linked above: (more…)
In rendering Republican gerrymandering asunder, the Ohio Supreme Court demonstrated its understanding of the 14th and 15th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution that guarantees every American citizen an equal right.
Anyone could have seen this coming. The language in the 15th Amendment is completely unambiguous: “The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude.”
Now, one could say that the electoral college is a colossal breakdown of this principle. In choosing a U.S. president, the votes of the people in Wyoming (1 electoral vote per 193K popular votes) count almost four times what ours are worth here in California (1 electoral vote per 727K popular votes).
It is for this reason that the days of the electoral college are numbered, or at least, that is the hope of those who value democracy.
In this powerful but brief video, a Russian woman, who had been quite active politically, describes how she fled her homeland with her husband and son, immediately after the government announced a crackdown with harsh punishments for all dissidents.
The whole thing is both touching and horrifying, but what hit me the hardest was her asking herself, “What could we have done differently? I simply don’t know.”
I just hope we Americans don’t wind up asking ourselves that same question. What would have happened had Trump successfully overturned the 2020 presidential election and installed himself as “president for life,” or whatever role Putin plays in Russia or Xi in China?
It’s terrifying just to think about.
The Trump phenomenon is unique in many different ways, one of which is the sheer volume of evidence that the former president is a conman.
What should we infer from Trump’s telling us that he is a “stable genius?”
If he were, would he have to claim to be one?
As shown here, this is about as close to the “good versus evil” narrative as you’re going to find.
