Here’s something that young people today may not be able to understand.
And just look at the intensity of the face on that kid.
Now, when I’m having breakfast, I’m praying for at least some level of evidence that the U.S. has somehow stopped its fall into authoritarianism. Can we please have some indictments against the people who came within a gnat’s a** of overthrowing our government?
Re: the question raised in the meme here, as much as I hate Trump and desperately want to see him face justice for his myriad crimes, I actually don’t think I could convict him of that particular crime.
If I were a juror and heard evidence that Trump, on the morning of January 6th, urged his to supporters to “go down to the Capitol and fight like hell, or you won’t have a country anymore,” I’m not sure I could convict him of seditious conspiracy, even though considerable violence ensued.
But his attorneys will say, “Yes, he used the word ‘fight.’ But he didn’t mean to resort to violence. When MLK said that American negroes needed to ‘fight’ for their rights, he most certainly wasn’t urging black people to literally beat the pulp out of those who stood in their way.” Insofar as the standard of proof in criminal cases is guilt beyond a reasonable doubt, I would have to (begrudgingly) acquit him.
But what to make of us Trump’s watching the insurrection he had fomented–and its violence–on television for more than three hours before intervening. I’m not sure which criminal code that violates, but there must be one, if not dozens. In the military, it’s called, at a very minimum, “dereliction of duty.”
What it’s called in the civilian code I can’t say, but he clearly declined to insert himself so as to avoid what is arguably the single most disgraceful moment in U.S. history.
The world around us, to this day, stands with its mouths collectively agape with the knowledge that the great United States of America came within a hair’s breadth of losing its democracy that day. And we’re still nowhere close to having all the threats of autocracy put behind us.
Someone sent me this, and I thought it was funny; I hope readers will forgive the vulgarity.
I recall the moment I realized that Donald Trump had arrived on the political scene in 2015. I called my mom and asked, “Wasn’t there an unwritten rule that a viable candidate for U.S. president couldn’t be a terrible human being?”
We are surrounded by people whose intellects are perfectly suited to accept the idea that more guns will make us safer.
Worse, their votes count just as much as yours and mine.
From ultra-right-wing religious fanatic Mike Huckabee writes: Our kids are hearing that the Earth is doomed. Naturally, they’re scared—but they don’t need to be. It’s why (my) team created The Kids Guide to The Truth About Climate Change. It gives kids a close look at the facts behind climate change so they can feel safe.
“The Truth About Climate Change” claims to dispel the three myths from the screen cap here.
In fact:
1) Our kids are most certainly not “safe.” That said, there are plenty of reasons to believe that our civilization can limit the damage associated with climate change if it acts rapidly and decisively.
2) The situation is, in reality, getting worse. There are no climate scientists who aren’t in the pocket of Big Oil who refute this.
3) Ultimately, the cause is capitalism, insofar as it calls for a) infinite growth on a planet of finite size, an absurdity, and b) massive removal of laws that regulate environmentally destructive practices. Those who understand this, and who care about the fate of life on Earth, are proponents of what is called “conscious capitalism,” “democratic socialism,” etc.
For many different reasons, I favor being truthful with our children. It’s said that “honesty is the best policy.”
But beyond that, it enables them to get involved early. By the time kids are five, they’re old enough to understand that we all live on one planet, that this is our home, and that we need to take care of it. By the time they reach nine or ten, they can grasp the basic concept of anthropogenic global warming, i.e., that human activity is changing the composition of the Earth’s atmosphere, creating an imbalance in the amount of heat that the Earth absorbs and reradiates back into space.
Do you think for a moment that people like Huckabee and the others who do the bidding of Big Oil honestly believe that climate change is a hoax? That’s a sad joke. The Christian zealots, and Huckabee may be among them, actively welcome the end of the Earth and the ensuing events laid out in the last book of the bible, Revelation.
The rest are “people” whose life work is directed at enriching themselves, all the while knowing that their wealth is gained at the cost of inflicting unprecedented suffering on billions of people. They are the personification of evil. Relative to theirs, Huckabee’s crime is a parking violation.
I have to admit, if I lived in a place in which most people held these beliefs, I probably would move.
I’m reminded of a guy I met recently who is a retired university professor with a daughter who lives in Florida. Apparently, his kid suggested that he visit, and the dad replied, “I’d love to see you, but you’ll have to come out here (to California). I’m not stepping foot in Florida, for any reason whatsoever.”
Huge voter turnout is precisely what’s needed here, and, fortunately, it’s bound to happen.
Before 2016, being apolitical was an option for some people, not any longer.
It would make sense that a moderate Republican could become the next U.S. president, but here’s the problem: there are more unicorns in this country.
From this:
A Washington D.C. police lieutenant was arrested and charged Friday with obstruction of justice and making false statements over allegations that he leaked information to then-Proud Boys leader Enrique Tarrio, who was convicted of seditious conspiracy last month for his role in the Jan. 6 assault on the U.S. Capitol.
The Justice Department announced Friday that Shane Lamond, 47, was indicted by a grand jury in D.C. with one count of obstruction of justice and three counts of making false statements.
This raises the question: In the case of a civil war, in which armed Trump supporters participate in an insurrection several orders of magnitude larger than that of January 6th, can law enforcement be counted on to uphold the law and defend the nation against the rioters, or will they simply join the riot? The answer isn’t at all clear.
One thing’s clear. If the insurrection takes place in the next few years, we won’t have to worry about the allegiance of Shane Lamond, since his treasonous ass will be in prison.
One of the most sickening symptoms of the decline of the U.S. educational system is the quality of the people we elect to make the laws that govern our lives.
Here’s Tom Hanks on U.S. history and the editorial decisions we make as to what we teach our children.
Of course, we live in country in which any progress we’ve made recently in terms of fairness and objectivity, may soon be erased by the Ron DeSantises of the world.
